Author: Robert Greenberger

Brian Selznick’s award-winning hybrid novel/graphic novel The Invention of Hugo Cabret is being released this November 23 as Hugo, a big budget film directed by Martin Scorcese. Yes, that Martin Scorcese. Coming from Paramount Pictures, the movie adapts the novel and will be available in (ugh) 3-D and 2-D and the studio kjust released both a new trailer and one-sheet which we present here.

The film, set in early 20th Century France, tells the story of not only a boy who lives in the train station but involves a mystery leading to secrets about pioneer filmmaker Georges Méliès. It’s pretty fun stuff and worth a look.

First, check out this cast:

Asa Butterfield as Hugo Cabret

Chloë Grace Moretz as Isabelle, a friend of Hugo

Ben Kingsley as Georges Méliès

Sacha Baron Cohen as the station inspector

Jude Law as Hugo’s father

Christopher Lee as Monsieur Labisse, the bookshop owner

Helen McCrory as Mama Jeanne, Méliès’ wife

Michael Stuhlbarg as René Tabard, a film historian

Marco Aponte as Julien Carette

Emily Mortimer as Lisette

Ray Winstone as Uncle Claude, Hugo’s deceased uncle

Frances de la Tour as Madame Emile, the owner of the café

Richard Griffiths as Monsieur Frick, the newspaper seller

Johnny Depp as M. Roulea

I wrote a while back, lamenting over not writing much for or about Star Trek these days and it appeared that my involvement in the franchise was going to become a fading memory.

Perhaps I wrote too quickly.

Back in August, I was contacted by an editor at Voyageur Press on the recommendation of fellow Trek writer, and Voyageur employee, Scott Pearson. Grace LaBatt kindly asked if I was perhaps interested in tackling an Unauthorized History of Star Trek, tracing not only the TV series but the movies, the spinoffs, the merchandise and most importantly, the fan following that kept the dream alive.

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TinTin doesn’t open here until December but it begins to play around the world within the next few weeks. The early reviews have gone live and the general opinion is that Peter Jackson and Steven Spielberg have created an energetic film based on the graphic novels from Herge, Beligum’s premiere creator.

The movie blends live-action and CGI motion-capture work with kudos going once more to Andy Serkis, who this time portrays Captain Haddock. Of the actors working today, none have done more work with motion capture than Serkis, known best as Gollum and more recently as Ceasar in the latest Planet of the Apes movie.

Paramount has released a new trailer for American audiences.

And the production team has offered up a brand new featurette entitled Fanboys.

Alex Rocco, best known for his role as gangster Moe Greene in The Godfather, returns to his mobster roots as Carmine Falcone in Batman: Year One, the next entry in the popular, ongoing series of DC Universe Animated Original Movies.

The appearance in a Dark Knight-related project brings Rocco’s 44-year career full circle. The Massachusetts-born actor, who was once an adjunct member of Boston’s Winter Hill Gang, got his first on-screen role in the 1960s Batman television series.

Rocco appeared as the thug Block in the back-to-back episodes “A Piece of the Action” and “Batman’s Satisfaction,” which premiered on March 1 and 2, 1967.  The episodes also featured the first true crossover appearance of Green Hornet and Kato on the Batman series (aside from a cameo popping out a window in the first season).

Since then, Rocco has been seen on primetime in everything from Get Smart, The F.B.I. and Kojak to The Mary Tyler Moore Show, The Rockford Files and Baretta. He has had recurring roles on The Facts of Life, The Famous Teddy Z, Sibs, The George Carlin Show and The Division. His voice is easily recognized as Roger Myers Jr., the head of Itchy & Scratchy Studios on The Simpsons.

In feature films, Rocco’s most notable roles include Moe Greene (and his gruesome demise) in The Godfather, the comically curious police chief in The Stunt Man, and as over-the-top Sol Siler, the head of Playtone Records in That Thing You Do!

Produced by Warner Premiere, DC Entertainment and Warner Bros. Animation, the all-new, PG-13 rated Batman: Year One arrived this week from Warner Home Video as a Blu-ray™ Combo Pack and DVD, On Demand and for Download. Batman: Year One is also available in a special download-for-purchase early window (starting October 11) through iTunes, Xbox Live, Zune, VUDU HD Movies and Video Unlimited on the PlayStation Network & Sony Entertainment Network.

Rocco, an agreeable and funny man in person, spent a few extra minutes after his initial recording session to chat about mob bosses, Burt Ward’s whining, Julie Newmar’s sex appeal, and how to get ahead in Hollywood when your bartending partner takes a bathroom break. Take note … Moe Greene, er, Alex Rocco is speaking. (more…)

Ben McKenzie plays a wealthy young man on a personal quest for justice in TNT’s hit series Southland. Now the actor heads to the streets of Gotham City as the voice of another rich young adult with a need for righteousness in [[[Batman: Year One]]], the next entry in the popular, ongoing series of DC Universe Animated Original Movies.

McKenzie makes his maiden voyage into animation voiceovers as Bruce Wayne/Batman, the title character of comics legend Frank Miller’s classic retelling of the Dark Knight’s gritty, formative days.

Produced by Warner Premiere, DC Entertainment and Warner Bros. Animation, the all-new, PG-13 rated Batman: Year One arrives today, 2011 from Warner Home Video as a Blu-ray™ Combo Pack and DVD, On Demand and for Download. Batman: Year One is also be available in a special download-for-purchase through iTunes, Xbox Live, Zune, VUDU HD Movies and Video Unlimited on the PlayStation Network & Sony Entertainment Network. (more…)

There have been few original characters created for the screen in the last decade that have been memorable enough to be welcomed back for at least an encore. The exception could well be Captain Jack Sparrow, with Johnny Depp taking the stereotypical pirate imagery and turning it on its head with a madcap performance that is brilliant. I still delight in the first film which had yet to be crusted with barnacles of backstory, mythology, and larger-than-life special effects. Its unexpected success required those to be affixed to the Black Pearl for the sequel and then it became a trilogy. Screenwriters Terry Rossio and Ted Elliott were required to go back and fill in the gaps they unwittingly created, resulting in a somewhat convoluted mess.

The third film in the [[[Pirates of the Caribbean]]] series, At World’s End, nicely tied off several threads and gave Elizabeth Swann and Will Turner a bittersweet ending to their story. Freed from complications created in the bloated trilogy, Rossio and Elliott could have told us a nice new pirate story in On Stranger Tides, showing us new sides to Sparrow or the world of pirates in which he is but one of many such plunderers. After all, it was largely taken from a far stronger novel by Tim Powers. Instead, we get more magic and mythology robbing the fourth installment of any sense of fresh beginnings. And while I adore Geoffrey Rush’s Captain Barbossa, he was not required for the film.

Instead, the story could easily have been King George II dispatching Sparrow in search of the Fountain of Youth while encountering the feared Blackbeard and see what happens when legends confront one another. That core notion is lost within layers of other events (the missionary and the mermaid for example) and the screenwriters are mostly at fault, although producer Jerry Bruckheimer never knows when to leave well enough alone. Director Rob Marshall, joining the franchise for this film, brought none of the dazzle he used in adapting Chicago to the screen. (more…)