Alfred Hitchcock‘s filmography reads like an all-time best of list: Psycho, Rear Window, Vertigo, North by Northwest, Notorious, The Birds, it goes on and on. But out of all of Hitchcock’s movies, only one received the Academy Award for Best Picture: 1940′s Rebecca. Hitchcock’s first American project, Rebecca featured Laurence Olivier as a widower whose new wife (Joan Fontaine) is overwhelmed by the spirit of his late wife, the title character. It was based on a 1938 book of the same name by Daphne du Maurier.
Now, DreamWorks and Working Title are planning to go back to the source material and remake the story with Steven Knight, who wrote Eastern Promises for David Cronenberg, hired to write the screenplay. Read more after the jump. Read More »
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John Hawkes as a young Robert De Niro and Mos Def as a young Samuel L. Jackson? Sounds fantastic and it’s actually happening. Hawkes and yasiin bey (Mos Def’s new name) will star in Switch, based on an Elmore Leonard novel, written and directed by Dan Schechter. They’ll play Louis Gara and Ordell Robbie respectively, characters made famous by De Niro and Jackson in Quentin Tarantino’s Jackie Brown. Switch takes places 15 years before Tarantino’s film (itself an adaptation of Leonard’s novel Rum Punch) and features Louis and Ordell as they attempt to kidnap a corrupt real estate broker. There’s much more after the break. Read More »
The star power that came out in defense of the West Memphis Three was remarkable and now there’s added juice behind an eventual dramatic film version. Oscar-winner Colin Firth has just joined previously cast Oscar-winner Reese Witherspoon in Devil’s Knot, the first narrative feature (after several documentaries) concerning the complicated yet fascinating subject of the West Memphis Three. It’ll be directed by Atom Egoyan and is based on the non-fiction book by Mara Leveritt.
Firth will play Ron Lax, a private investigator who was instrumental in finding key evidence that raised considerable doubt as to the guilt of Damien Echols, Jason Baldwin and Jessie Misskelley. Witherspoon will play Pam Hobbs, the mother of victim Steven Branch and the wife of the man believed to have committed the crimes. There’s more after the jump. Read More »
Yesterday it was announced that Joe Carnahan would write and direct a remake of the 1974 revenge classic Death Wish. Today, Carnahan has confirmed the report, and clarified his vision on the new film.
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Posted on Thursday, January 26th, 2012 by Angie Han
Whether the world really needs another Romeo and Juliet adaptation is up for debate, but Carlos Carlei‘s upcoming film boasts some intriguing talent, at least. The script comes from Gosford Park and Downton Abbey writer Julian Fellowes, while young up-and-comers like Hailee Steinfeld, Douglas Booth, Ed Westwick, and Kodi Smit-McPhee are lined up to star.
The latest addition to the project is the always welcome Paul Giamatti, who’s set to play Friar Laurence. A confidant to both Romeo and Juliet, the character plays a key role in the star-crossed lovers’ fates. Shooting on the film, which is rather discouragingly being described as “Romeo and Juliet for the Twilight generation,” is slated to begin this month in Italy. [Variety]
After the jump, Dr. John Watson and the Earl of Grantham book big-screen gigs.
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Posted on Tuesday, January 17th, 2012 by Angie Han
Is it Halloween already? Today’s TV Bits is dark and spooky, as it deals with vampires, zombies, murderers, and other scary creatures. (Insert your own joke about some of Star Wars‘ CGI characters being their own brand of horrifying here.) After the jump:
- Rick McCallum talks about the Star Wars TV show (again)
- ABC releases a trailer for Oren Peli’s The River
- NBC picks up Dracula from Black List writer Cole Haddon
- Golden Globe winner Jessica Lange ponders a return to FX’s American Horror Story
- AMC announces the Season 2 premiere of The Killing and orders an extra dose of The Walking Dead
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(This review originally ran last week when Sony lifted the review embargo, but we’re running it again today to coincide with the film’s wide opening.)
Something at the center of Stieg Larsson’s Millennium novels has captured the attention of millions. Actually, make that ‘someone.’ The first novel, Män som hatar kvinnor (Men Who Hate Women, softened to The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo in many countries) spins around an unlikely nucleus: counterculture heroine Lisbeth Salander, a determined outsider possessed of keen investigative skills, a vengeful spirit and a strong sense of fairness. In the 2009 Swedish film adaptation, Noomi Rapace played Salander as a character just different enough to be a forceful vision, and familiar enough to become nearly iconic. But the film in which she lives is a routine potboiler of a thriller.
The directly translated Swedish title is promising in a way, as ‘men who hate women’ hints at a thriller that will use the conventions of a serial killer story to explore the ways in which abuse and violence shape people and their relationships to one another. The first film didn’t skimp on the intersection of sex, power and violence, as a dethroned magazine publisher is hired to discover the truth about the murder of an industrial magnate’s niece, but it was never any good at getting under the skin of the story.
Enter David Fincher and screenwriter Steven Zaillian with their own take on The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo. Fincher also doesn’t skimp on sex and violence, and in the middle of his dark, frosty film is a strange but tightly controlled performance from Rooney Mara as Salander. This film trims minor players and subplots to focus, in a slightly more effective manner, on these characters who have been molded by violence. And yet it remains merely a routine thriller. The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo is a technically proficient piece of work, but it is almost as bloodless as an old murder victim. Read More »
The last time we wrote about a possible film version of Erik Larson‘s book The Devil in the White City: Murder, Magic and Madness at the Fair That Changed America, Leonardo DiCaprio‘s company had just optioned the book and attached the actor to star. He hadn’t yet shot J. Edgar, which has already come and gone, and he wasn’t yet set for The Great Gatsby, which has wrapped principal photography.
Perhaps most crucially, he also hadn’t been signed to play the bad guy in Quentin Tarantino’s Django Unchained. DiCaprio hasn’t played a villain yet, so seeing him attached to The Devil in the White City was a big deal, because he was, and still is, set to play a serial killer that haunts the creation of the 1893 World’s Fair in Chicago. We haven’t heard much about the film version of the story in the past year, but Warner Bros. is still working to make it a reality, and has just hired Graham Moore to script. Read More »
