“Zero Dark Thirty” is a military slang term for super-early in the morning — that zone between midnight and 4am where a soldier might find himself stuck with some particularly crappy duty. Or the time where a raid might be launched on a wary target, the better to catch them off-guard.
Zero Dark Thirty is also the working title of Kathryn Bigelow‘s film about the SEAL Team 6 effort to kill Osama Bin Laden. The movie features Jason Clarke, Joel Edgerton, Chris Pratt, Kyle Chandler, Harold Perrineau, Jessica Chastain, Mark Strong, Jennifer Ehle, Nash Edgerton, and Edgar Ramirez, and some early shooting is taking place now after months of prep, revisions and delays. Read More »
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In the wake of this weekend’s successful opening of the ‘real Navy SEALs’ movie Act of Valor, expect to see other similar movies go into action. While we wait to hear that Kathryn Bigelow is actually rolling on her movie about the SEAL Team 6 hunt for Osama Bin Laden, we’ve got word of another Naval special-ops adventure.
Over the past couple years Universal has developed Lone Survivor, based on the memoir of the same name by Marcus Luttrell. The author was one member of a SEAL team ambushed in Afghanistan, and the book tells of the team’s struggle to survive.
Peter Berg has been part of the project since the beginning, and now it looks like Berg will direct the film this fall as his follow-up to Battleship. He’s got Mark Wahlberg in talks to play Marcus Luttrell, and Ben Foster in talks to join Taylor Kitsch as other men on Luttrell’s team. Read More »
Act of Valor is two movies. The first is your basic, exciting, yet simple war movie. It features some minor character development and emotion wrapped around a lot of shoot ‘em up action, explosions and death. High-octane kind of stuff. Acting not required.
Then there’s the second movie. And that movie is created by the fact that Act of Valor mostly stars real life, active Navy SEALS. That means everything you see was hypothetically put through a no bullshit filter. The missions are based on true events, the on-screen techniques drip with realism, and if the acting or dialogue isn’t quite up to par, it’s okay because these guys are true American heroes. Including these men gives the film a gravitas that all but negates any issues the movie itself has.
Act of Valor is a deeply flawed, but interesting and entertaining film. Instead of reading the rest of my thoughts, you can watch a video of me talking about it on the Totally Rad Show. Read More »
When Peter Berg talked recently about the challenges of turning the Friday Night Lights TV show into a movie, one of the chief hurdles seemed to be scheduling. “Kyle [Chandler] is busy,” he said, and now we know one of the things that is keeping the actor away from the field.
Kyle Chandler has signed on to be a part of the ensemble cast in Kathryn Bigelow‘s movie about the Navy SEAL hunt for Osama Bin Laden. The movie was already in development from the Hurt Locker team of Bigelow and Mark Boal, in slightly different form, when it was announced that the Navy SEAL Team 6 had killed the terror figure. After that point it went back to the drawing board, and has slowly been gearing up to shoot. Read More »
Briefly: The cast is shaping up for Noam Murro‘s prequel to the unexpected blockbuster hit 300. The film, 300: The Battle of Artemisia, is scripted by Zack Snyder and Kurt Johnstad based on Frank Miller‘s graphic novel Xerxes, and we’ve had a couple major cast announcements in the past few weeks: Sullivan Stapleton is playing Greek warlord Themosticles; Rodrigo Santoro is returning to play the Persian leader Xerxes; and Eva Green will be the title character Artemisia.
Now Jamie Blackley, recently seen (by some) in William Monahan’s London Boulevard and soon to be on screens in Snow White and the Huntsman, has been cast in a role that is described as one of the co-leads of the film. He’ll be Calisto, “a teen whose desire to become the heroic man/soldier his father was leads the 16-year-old to become a leader of a small band of soldiers.” [Deadline]
Briefly: There’s not much info at this point, but both Variety and Deadline are reporting that Legendary Pictures has scrapped the Alex Proyas film Paradise Lost. Read More »
Warner Bros. and Legendary Pictures finally have an important piece to the 300 prequel puzzle. The producers of 300: The Battle of Artemisia have chosen Sullivan Stapleton (Animal Kingdom) to play one of the two key male roles in the film, though there has been confusion as to whether he’ll be Xerxes or Themistocles. The current word points towards Themistocles. Noam Murro‘s film will be based on Frank Miller‘s 300 follow-up graphic novel Xerxes, and was scripted by Zack Snyder and Kurt Johnstad. Read More »
Steven Spielberg and Warner Bros. have been doing a slow dance towards one another over the last couple months.
The film potentially bringing the two parties together has been the Moses biopic Gods and Kings, which may turn out ot be a lot more like Saving Private Ryan than we would have previously expected. And while there isn’t a signed deal in place at this point, things are continuing to move forward. Right now, it looks like the next week could see the completion of a deal that will put Spielberg in the director’s chair for the film by April or May 2013, after he’s done with Robopocalypse. Read More »
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