In this week's Pop Culture Imports, we cover Park Chan-wook's Vengeance Trilogy, two French dramas from Jacques Audiard, and an Indian millennial webseries.
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With Ghost in the Shell opening to disappointing numbers, we have one question: are Hollywood adaptations of Asian movies actually profitable?
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100% Soft, a California based artist, has an amazing Mass Hysteria Art Show Coming to Gallery 1988 East February 6. See some art here.
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Look around the internet and you'll see loads of hilarious bootleg DVD covers. They might mis-identify the stars or filmmakers, provide a terrible plot synopsis, use nonsensical review pull quotes, or feature visual elements which are completely unrelated to the film. Still, this bootleg copy of Spike Lee's Oldboy may now be the king of…
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Dave and Devindra discuss some messed up Korean thrillers, praise the sci-fi trappings of Almost Human, debate how well Spike Lee treats his poster artists, and mourn the loss of Paul Walker. Writer/director Vincenzo Natali joins us. Be sure to check out Vincenzo's latest work at The Darknet Files. You can always e-mail us at slashfilmcast(AT)gmail(DOT)com, or call and leave…
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Spike Lee's Oldboy is a curiosity to be sure, a remake of a bizarre, twisted, gruesome Korean thriller. Most people thought Lee's film was pretty terrible, and while I don't have too many positive things to say about it, I did find it fascinating to compare the decisions that Lee made with those that Park Chan-wook made…
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Sometimes we'll post concept art for posters, and sometimes that art gets pulled, or doesn't get used in favor of more bland compositions. People always wonder why, and while the answer is often complicated we're rarely flush with all the details. Here's a case where we now know a lot, thanks to the artist in…
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With almost every film Spike Lee makes, he's trying something different. From college comedy through racial drama, coming-of-age stories, the historical biopic, murder mystery, Hollywood blockbuster, sequel, war film, and sports movie, he rarely attempts the same genre twice. It's part of the reason he's remained influential and relevant for so many years. His latest…
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Though film fans are well-versed in Chan-wook Park's 2003 film Oldboy, most audiences have no idea what the film is. To 90% of people who go to the movies, it's nothing more than an ultra-violent, ten-year-old foreign language film with subtitles, if they even know that much about it. At least, that's what Filmdistrict is…
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To fans, there are certain aspects of Spike Lee's Oldboy that have to be consistent with Chan-wook Park's original. One of those is the hallway scene. In the original, Oh Dae-su wreaks havoc on a bunch of thugs in a hallway with nothing but a hammer. And it's breathtaking sequence. Having seen trailers for the…
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I got a press release earlier today that describes the new Spike Lee film, Oldboy, as "a unique reinterpretation of the 2003 Korean film," with that '03 movie being the Park Chan-wook effort that turned the director into a globally-popular filmmaker. That's a slightly new way to position a remake. We’ve seen so many clips, violent…
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Spike Lee's remake of Oldboy is quickly approaching, and with it come answers to innumerable questions. Paramount among those questions is "Will American audiences want to see such a brutal, visceral story after eating their Thanksgiving dinners?" Based on this violent clip, it seems like a hard sell. Josh Brolin stars as Joe Doucett, an unlikeable…
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At the risk of limiting the audience for this article, I'd say that the featurette below is really best for those who have seen Park Chan-wook's original Oldboy. Fortunately, that's probably most of our readers. This piece is about the stuff Josh Brolin went through to play the role -- rapid weight gain and weight…
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As fascinating as Josh Brolin's fierce Joe Doucett is, a story as dark and twisted as Oldboy needs a good villain to really tie everything together. So far, FilmDistrict has been playing coy with Joe's demented tormenter, but that changes today with our first peek at Sharlto Copley as Adrian Pryce. In addition, the marketing…
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We know a good bit about Oldboy, from Spike Lee. It's a remake, after all, so the story is pretty well set in the minds of many potential audience members. The film stars Josh Brolin, Elizabeth Olsen, Sharlo Copley, and Samuel L. Jackson, and presents a story of deep-seated offenses and elaborate revenge. We've seen…
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Fans of the original have long been skeptical about the English-language remake of Chan-wook Park's classic Korean thriller Oldboy, and we don't blame them. Heck, we are them. But whatever comes of Spike Lee's take on the tale, at least the marketing team is doing a solid job. The material released so far has been appropriately…
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Josh Brolin says he spent three days in solitary confinement to prep for Oldboy. That's pretty serious stuff. He doesn't make the mistake of thinking that it really gave him the mindset of Joe Doucette, the character he plays who is imprisoned for 20 years for reasons unknown. But it does represent a level of…
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Spike Lee's new version of Oldboy was recently delayed to November, but that might only have been so that a certain "hotel" could prepare for new guests. That's the trust of an intense and intimidating new teaser trailer that shows a great many close-ups of the inner workings of an unusual prison. That prison, as…
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The same game is played out over and over again when it comes time to promote a remake of a well-liked film. It's always a balancing act where audiences are convinced that all the things they liked from the original film will be in place, or not done poorly, but that there will be new…
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Briefly: FilmDistrict has pushed back the release of Spike Lee's Oldboy from October 25 to November 27. The film, a remake of Park Chan-wook's modern masterpiece, is about a man (Josh Brolin) mysteriously kidnapped and imprisoned for 20 years. When he's just as mysteriously released, he vows revenge on his captors. It co-stars Sharlto Copley, Samuel L. Jackson…
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Dave, Devindra, and Peter Sciretta discuss the culture of line-waiting at Comic-Con, Spike Lee's new Kickstarter project, the achievements of Netflix, and whether 2015 will lead to the end of cinema as we know it. Be sure to read up on why there will be not be a Dredd sequel, The Daily Beast's profile on Laverne Cox,…
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It seems like we've been talking about the potential for a remake of Park Chan-wook's film Oldboy for years. Spike Lee finally came on to direct, with Josh Brolin in the title role, playing a man who is kidnapped and held in a strange prison for 20 years. Released just as unceremoniously as he was…
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Over the past several years, Park Chan-wook's Oldboy has been established as a modern classic. The intense, surprising and violent revenge story of one man mysteriously imprisoned for years, then released out of the blue, has struck a chord with audiences worldwide. In America, however, a foreign film can unfortunately only gain so much popular…
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Briefly: It took a long time for the English-language remake of Chan-wook Park's Oldboy to come together. Now FilmDistrict is asking audiences to stay patient just a tiny while longer. The Spike Lee-directed thriller has been pushed back two weeks, from October 11 to October 25. It's not a massive difference, but it pits the film…
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Is your pop culture art collection cluttered with too many huge movie posters? Do you have a full stack of 27 x 40 inch paper laying around and not enough wall space to display? Are you looking for something smaller, more tasteful but still as awesome and exciting? Mike Mitchell is here to help. Mitchell…
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Spike Lee's new version of Oldboy, drawn from both the Park Chan-wook film and the manga that inspired it, is getting closer to release, with a date planned for this fall, but it remains more or less a mystery. Sure, we know the basics: that Josh Brolin plays a guy kidnapped off the street one…
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Remakes live, die and get defended in this edition of Remake Bits. After the jump, read about the following: David Lindsay-Abaire gives an update of the Poltergiest remake. Sharlto Copley eases fan misconceptions about Spike Lee's remake of Oldboy. Chris Tucker is in talks for the remake of the French smash The Intouchables. Larry Clarke said a remake of Mona…
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