When it was first announced that JJ Abrams and Tom Cruise were reteaming to co-produce a fourth Mission Impossible film, a lot of factors were unknown. Would it be a reboot, a spinoff? Would Tom Cruise return as Ethan Hunt? Would JJ Abrams also direct? Well now we finally have our answer — Paramount Pictures has signed a deal with Tom Cruise to reprise his role as Ethan Hunt in M:I-IV. The bad news is that JJ Abrams is sitting this one out.
Read More »
I’m sure quite a few people have called for something like this in discussions about what Warner Bros. should do to make Superman work on the big screen: the studio is reportedly turning to Christopher Nolan to act as a “godfather” to help shepherd development of a new Superman film. Before we go further, at this point Nolan is not writing, and is not directing. Rather, Nolan would play more of a mentor’s role to help the film get moving. In other words, WB wants him to communicate some of the methods he used to reinvent Batman on film to help Superman get off the ground in time for Warners to exploit the character before the rights go back to the Siegel and Shuster families. Read More »
Could Saw VII be the final installment of the popular horror movie franchise? Screenwriter Patrick Melton, who co-wrote the last three Saw films and the upcoming seventh movie, claims the the series will probably end with the seventh installment, and they have even planned to wrap up the lingering questions.
Read More »
Within the next few years, you can safely expect to see just about every film genre reworked for teens — the last few that haven’t already been fed into the Teen Machine will be lined up right quick. Not that there’s anything wrong with that, necessarily. Skewing a film young doesn’t mean it will be crap as an absolute, by any means. But when is a teen movie not a teen movie? When the studio responsible buys a young lit property and then skews the character ages up into their 20s. When every other project lately is about skewing ages down, that’s a bit confusing.
The reason for all that preamble is that Warner Bros. has picked up the rights to Heist Society, a young-lit novel that will be published next week. Described as The Thomas Crown Affair for teens, the book could spawn a heist film for audiences for those who think the Oceans movies were too slow-paced. Read More »
I’m not sure that you can really call this a ‘reboot’, but there’s word that Fox and Regency Enterprises are working on a new Mr. and Mrs. Smith film that would, in effect, be just a new film story entirely. The new movie, called Mr. and Mrs. Jones, would essentially be a way to keep the core idea going forward from the original film, but with two new characters and a pair of cheaper actors. Who’s cheaper than Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie? Almost everyone, of course.
Vulture has the details, saying that the idea is to create an “origin story” in which a couple much like the Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie characters in the 2005 film is assigned to live as a fake married couple after graduating from their special agent training. So: different setup, different story, different characters. Not sure how this qualifies as a reboot, or how it could even do much to draft off the name brand of the ‘first’ movie. It’s a curious scenario, but not the lamest studio idea we’ve heard today.
You’re going to be seeing this one everywhere today, so let’s get it out of the way quick. In a report about David Goyer leaving FlashForward, Nikki Finke pegs script duties on the third Batman movie as one of the primary reasons he walked away. The direct quote from Goyer was pretty vague (”As my feature projects have started ramping up again, I felt I was being pulled in too many directions”) and Finke spins that directly into a statement about Goyer and Jonathan Nolan writing Batman 3. (”Goyer’s feature career is really heating up, since he co-wrote Batman Begins, and penned the story for The Dark Knight, and is now writing the third Batman installment with Chris Nolan’s brother Jonah.”)
Without any further confirmation, don’t get too excited about that yet. Goyer has a lot of feature projects in the fire, and while Finke has had a lot of good info lately, this one sounds like she’s spinning a broad statement into something too specific. There may be work of some sort going on, but read this one as unsubstantiated for now.
File this story in the “I wish I were joking” pile: Gary Marshall’s ensemble romantic comedy Valentine’s Day doesn’t even open until Friday but Hollywood is already planning a sequel. According to Finke, the film’s producers have hired screenwriter Katherine Fugate write another holiday-themed film as a follow-up titled New Years Eve. The sequel/spin-off will feature some of the Los Angeles-based cast/characters from Valentine’s Day, in a new setting - New York City, over the course of 24 hours surrounding the new year.
Read More »
Back in November, we told you that Chevy Chase and Beverly D’Angelo would be reprising their roles as Clark and Ellen Griswold from the National Lampoon’s Vacation movies, but not for another big screen sequel (not yet, at least…). The Griswolds reunited instead for an advertising campaign for HomeAway launched during the 2010 Super Bowl. The television spot advertised a new Vacation “mini-movie” titled Hotel Hell Vacation, featuring Chase, D’Angelo, and an exact replica of the film’s iconic Wagon Queen Family Truckster. Here is the official plot synopsis:
Ride along as The Griswolds hit the road again. This time theyre on their way to see Rusty at his vacation rental. They stop at a hotel and typical Griswold madness ensues.
The 14 minute short film is now online, and embedded after the jump.
Read More »
Universal Pictures’ prequel to John Carpenter’s cult classic thriller The Thing is gearing up to begin shooing in Toronto in mid-March, and the studio has begun to announce the cast line-up. Heat Vision has learned that Mary Elizabeth Winstead (Grindhouse, Scott Pilgrim) and Joel Edgerton (The Secret Life of Us, Kinky Boots) have been cast as the leads. We have a lot of information on both of their characters after the jump.
Read More »
In an article in the Sunday Mail, Bill Murray has confirmed that he will be appearing in Ghostbusters 3. He also revealed some spoiler-ish details of what he will be doing in the third installment of the sci-fi comedy franchise. You can read those details, after the jump. You have been warned.
Read More »
