Film News – Mockingjay and Seventh Son

It’s been a long time since I did some Film News but recently there has been some exciting developments in the film world regarding one of the most popular film series of the moment, a film that has had a greenlit sequel despite not being released in the UK yet and one film which has become one of the most annoying pieces of film news this year.

At long last, well yesterday a trailer for The Hunger Games: Mockingjay – Part 1 was finally released after months of waiting. Mockingjay Part 1 is of course the first part in the final part of The Hunger Games trilogy (Quadrilogy now) and is the movie adaptation of the final book in the series Mockingjay. It has been a long time for the trailer to be released as up till now there has only been a few teasers, but even then they were only a few months ago and it is surprising really that Lionsgate have waited this long to release the trailer when Catching Fire last year was released around about March/April time, not two months before the film is due for release. Having finally gotten round to reading the book earlier this year (it was 2012 when I read the first one) due to me being preoccupied with the incredible GONE series, I have been wondering how they were going to show the underground world of District 13 as well as how it was going to look and also wonder where the film would split in half. From watching the trailer I can see that the world has once again been beautifully crafted and from shots alone can see that once again the filmmakers have been true to the books. One thing though that I think works spectacularly is that of the appearance of Donald Sutherland in the trailer. One of the things I have enjoyed most about the series is the casting and acting of both Jennifer Lawrence as Katniss and Donald Sutherland as President Snow and with him in particular having another up front role in the trailer is an added bonus. The trailer though feels very minimalist with most acting pieces going to Snow and Katniss with bits from Peeta and Haymitch, but I suspect that more will be revealed as the release date approaches on November 20^th 2014, with the UK getting to see it before the United States; I suppose it makes up for Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles.

You may remember for some time now I have constant mentions to the film Seventh Son, an upcoming adaptation of the book; The Spook’s Apprentice (which I have also made constant mentions of and even reviewed) by Joseph Delaney. Initially put down for like a late 2013 release and then an early 2014 release with a trailer originally released around about August 2013, the film’s release was pushed back by an entire year due to Universal buying the release rights from Warner Bros. when Universal Studios stepped in as the co-produce and co-finance partner to Legendary Pictures and then deciding to push back the release date to roughly the same time, (give or take a month) one year later. Well, another trailer has been released……….with the date attached (February 6^th 2015), so hopefully, we may finally get to see this film. The trailer discloses a lot more than the previous trailer did with still some sections of Comedy from Jeff Bridges (the film also stars Ben Barnes, Julianne Moore and Alicia Vikander), however, much like the first trailer I still get the overall opinion of “I don’t remember that happening in the book” (much like the trailers for the recent film version of Noah as I have heard the real story of Noah). Despite that though some of the trailer looks true to the book and it is still 5 or 6 months until it gets released and so we’ll just have to wait and see. Expect Monsters, witches (not sure about Ninjas or Turtles) and Fantasy galore as Seventh Son (“HOPEFULLY”) gets released next year.

Which finally brings us on too, you guessed it……………………….Hellboy 3. No not really, the constant references to Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles means that yes I am going to talk about a film that has already had a sequel confirmed for release in 2016 while annoyingly has not been released in the UK yet, and I don’t know why? This is the new live action adaptation of the popular series starring those loveable ninja turtles and their master rat. The film has been in development for a long time and all until roughly last year I was hoping it would be an animated sequel to the 2007 film TMNT. The film however is a live action film, and upon discovering this I have been sort of worried as to what it would look like, but thankfully Michael Bay was producing it. The film looks like it is in fact adopting the look and techniques that were used in producing the Awesome Transformers series and from what I can so far gather, looks really good. Trailers for the film have been hard to come by and have so far been only available on YouTube; there are however been some clips of the film too. From the looks of the film the film will be exploring the first time the turtles met reporter April O’Neil played by Megan Fox as they once again do battle with the villainous Shredder. The films cast include William Fichtner and Tohoru Masamune as the Shredder with Alan Ritchson, Noel Fisher, Pete Ploszek, Jeremy Howard and Johnny Knoxville playing the role of the 4 turtles (confusing I know) and not forgetting Danny Woodburn and Tony Shalhoub as Splinter (again, confusing). The film does look pretty impressive and I am very excited about finally getting to see this film when it gets released October 17th 2014 (10 days before Godzilla gets released on DVD and Blu-ray in the UK), particularly to see how they are going to approach my Favourite turtle, Raphael. So let us finish there with this awesome clip from the new film, and also the best lift music you could possibly want to actually listen too.

And here’s the trailer.

GENEPOOL

Film News – The Outsider

Some of you may probably not know about The Outsider. It was this interesting looking film which when announced sounded quite promising. The film’s plot revolves around the idea of a former POW (Prisoner Of War) in post World War 2 Japan who rises up through the ranks in the Yakuza. Based on an idea by John Linson (Sons of Anarchy) the plot makes it sound really interesting in its own right and after what happened with 47 Ronin, sounded very promising. But the most exciting thing about the film came from news about who was to star in it and who was to direct it. The film was to star Tom Hardy (Inception, The Dark Knight Rises) and to be directed by Japanese Movie Master as well as one of the most prolific directors in cinema today, Takashi Miike (13 Assassins, Ichi the Killer).

So with one of the finest actors in cinema today teaming up with one of the world’s most renowned directors in the world today teaming up on a film that in its own right, sounded amazing, I was really looking forward to The Outsider. Sadly however there has been some unfortunate news. It turns out that Tom Hardy has left the project while production was underway, as a result the film needed to find a new star, and as this caused scheduling difficulties, it means that Takashi Miike is no longer available to direct. So the film has no lead and no director.

As far as I know, the film is still to be produced, so I thought I would give my own take on how this whole situation can be turned around. If the studio wants to get the proper direction, then a local director would be best, so this leaves two options. Either wait until Takashi Miike is available again or find another prolific director in the area. One name that comes to my mind is  Ryuhei Kitamura (Versus). While he has not made as many films as Miike, (Kitamura = 16, Miike = 85+), I think Kitamura is the man for the job as he is one of the country’s top directors at the moment, and if it is the case that Kitamura is not interested, well, while he may not be Japanese, The Outsider’s producers could look into asking Bong Joon-ho (The Host). As for a replacement for Hardy, well, why not Mark Strong (Sherlock Homes, Welcome To The Punch). I think it would work quite well.

I really do hope though that The Outsider gets produced, it sounds really good and has a lot of potential, providing it comes together alright.

GENEPOOL

Movie Preview: Pacific Rim

It is now just a little more than a month until the Biggest Movie Release of the year. Forget Superman (no seriously, just forget about it), forget Star Trek (that too), forget Iron Man 3, and while there are several more films to be released this year, they don’t match in comparison to the years real big show. From Director Guillermo del Toro (Pan’s Labyrinth, Blade II and Hellboy) in collaboration with Legendary Pictures; The Monster Movie returns with the release of Pacific Rim.

I first heard about this film when I was looking up the Actor Idris Elba wondering when Luther or Thor 2 was going to be released. Well after some further reading I heard about this film. I looked it up but could not find much. It was only just before The End Of The World, when my Mam showed me a trailer she had seen that I got hooked with the film. Further reading I did into my early knowledge of the film also told me that Guillermo del Toro was directing and the film would also be starring Charlie Hunnam (Sons of Anarchy) and Rinko Kikuchi (Babel, “The first Japanese actress to be nominated for an Academy Award in 50 years” – Wikipedia). The film will also star Burn Gorman (Torchwood), Ron Perlman (Hellboy) and Ellen McLain who will be providing the same voice as GLaDOS from the Video Game Portal.

The idea of the film is about Giant Robots known as Jaegers defending Humanity from Giant Monsters called Kaiju (a reference to Japanese Monster Movies). It has only been through the trailers for the film and some pictures found Online that I have been able to get an idea of what this film is going to be like. The more recent trailers show a really artistic approach to the film, while the previous trailers have also done this to some perspective, well it wouldn’t be a Guillermo del Toro film without some artistic look about it. The film’s effects look Fantastic, The Jaegers have a great sense of scale about them, the trailers show how big they are through a select group of scenes, like towards the end of the main trailer where one is dragging an oil tanker. The design for the Jaegers themselves differ from what country they belong too and it is nice to see the various designs for them. As for the Kaiju, they look absolutely superb, absolutely magnificent. Some of the best CGI Monsters produced to date (and I have yet to see the film).

The film’s ideas are another point of mention. The idea that the monsters came from the sea instead of from space as it usually is for most American Monster Movies. Also, giving the monsters a collective name gives the creatures personality (something learned from Japanese Monster Movies) which gives them a more interesting back story than constantly referring to them as an it or a the. Another idea is that ordinary weapons are useless which is one that is used in all Japanese Monster Movies and so a specific weapon is needed to combat the monsters. The control of the weapons is another interesting point as the robots are not remote-controlled like drones and are instead controlled from within and to do this as best as possible requires a huge amount of teamwork and so this brings in the idea that the film does not follow the life of one super hero type character and instead requires the majority over the few to save the day.

I absolutely love the idea of this film. I love Giant Monster Movies and the film arrives at an interesting point, as in that in Less than a year from this film’s release is the release of another Legendary Pictures Monster Movie – GODZILLA. It is now only over a month away until the wait is finally over, I am so excited.

GENEPOOL