The other day we learned that Gravity, the film from Alfonso Cuarón that was set to co-star the big name of Robert Downey Jr. but showcase the talents of a leading Hollywood actress, was struggling and might not get made at all. Why so? Was the studio in difficulty? Downey or Cuarón pulling out? No, it's because Angelina Jolie had said no to the lead for a second time.
We've seen this kind of thing happen a few times before, but what's surprising here is that after they tested many big name actresses they went back to Jolie, and now she's said no again, the word is that the film is in danger of being scrapped.
That surprises me and raises two points, first is that the film is so reliant on a big name star, and one in particular, that it won't get made otherwise, and the other that Jolie was the only female actress who could take charge of the film.
Continue reading "Are films too reliant on big name stars?" »
Ridley Scott has been talking about his Alien prequels and revealed some interesting facts about the film, and especially about the relationship between the huge alien we see in the first film sitting in that chair and all those Alien eggs in the ship.
Well if we forget the silly nonsense of the Hollywood version of the wonderful 1973 The Wicker Man then we can go straight to the latest news from The Wicker Tree, written and directed by Robin Hardy, the director of the original film.
Thrillers are my favourite kind of film, they are the ones that most readily pull you in and affect you emotionally, they're the ones that get your heart pumping with the characters, have you backed into a corner and uncertain about what's going to happen next, and when they're done right you're caught up in the mystery of it all.
Well there didn't seem to be any trains or planes in the trailer, but Due Date, judging from the trailer that has just arrived, does make me think of Planes, Trains and Automobiles with a vengeance. Although the content does look harder, faster and tougher. Or is that just more and bigger, the two most loved words by studio executives listening to sequel/remake/re-imagining pitches?
I don't know why I watched this trailer to begin with, but I did, and it surprised me and the brief moments we get with the character drew me in. There's not nearly enough to have me racing to the cinema but there's enough to have me intrigued, especially with some positive comments coming from those who have seen it.
Angelina Jolie 
We're all losing count with the number of films about John DeLorean and his work that are on the go at the moment, and news comes through that there's another one to add to the pile.
Isopod was previously a bit of an unknown project from Barry Levinson, but now some more details have leaked out and it seems that it's going to incorporate all manner of real life video and audio channels and is now known as The Bay.
The first trailer for the remake of 13 Tzameti from writer and director Géla Babluani has arrived. It's called simply 13 and has been remade by the original director for Hollywood featuring a big name cast and a Hollywood style, certainly to the trailer.
There's a little spat of words broken out across the media between James Cameron and Mark Canton, James Cameron the first person to show that 3D can be used non-obtrusively within a film to deepen the environment and draw the viewer into the film, and Mark Canton who has produced many a film including Piranha 2 and Piranha 3D, the latter being the standard 3D implementation of things flying at the camera.
John Sayles has a new film coming out called Amigo, and it looks like it's going to draw some controversy for the parallels it makes with the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, and yet it's based in the 1900's when the U.S. occupied the Philippines.
Did you ever see Stephen Chow's excellent Kung Fu comedy called 
When 
It’s funny that the games industry seems to be holding out against the desire of making every game into a film and they’re the ones really concerned about quality whereas the studios really just want to snap up the property and sell to an already made audience.
In 2007 
