Tagged: film

‘Tales of the Black Freighter’ Sails onto DVD

One of the big looming questions with the Zack Snyder adaptation of Alan Moore and Dave Gibbon’s Watchmen was how they would handle the Black Freighter side story.

Now we have an answer: It’s going straight to DVD, says The New York Times (via Cinematical). For those unfamiliar, the story of the Black Freighter is contained within a comic book that’s being read by a character in Watchmen. It features a man who had been captured by undead pirates and escapes, only to meet an even worse fate.

Instead of filming the Black Freighter story and splicing it into the Watchmen film (as Moore does in the graphic novel), Snyder decided to break it out into a separate film. The Times, which doesn’t usually cover such Hollywood business, uses the news as an example of efforts to drive up DVD sales, which have been stagnant:

The second film, tentatively called “Tales of the Black Freighter,” follows a side “Watchmen” storyline about a shipwreck and will arrive in stores five days after the main movie rolls out in theaters. The DVD will also include a documentary-style film called “Under the Hood” that will delve into the characters’ backstories.

Warner, the No. 1 distributor of DVDs, bills the effort as a way to renew retail excitement for little silver discs now that the once-booming market has matured.

After years of blistering growth, domestic DVD sales fell 3.2 percent last year to $15.9 billion, according to Adams Media Research, the first annual drop in the medium’s history. While it is still a blockbuster business, any decline is cause for concern because DVD sales can account for as much as 70 percent of revenue for a new film. Results for the first quarter this year were mixed, with overall sales flat but notable softness for some new releases like Warner’s box office hit “I Am Legend.”

Happy Silver Anniversary, Return of the Jedi!

Twenty-five years ago today (and six years after the original Star Wars opened) the summer movie season of 1983 blew wide open with the finale to the Star Wars saga — if you don’t count the re-releases, the three movie prequels, the multiple animated series, the books, the comics, oh, you get the idea.

And what do we remember from the film? Do we remember the escape from the Sarlaac? Do we remember the light saber duel between (spoiler) father and son? Do we remember Leia’s slave girl outfit?

Well, of course we remember the outfit. But we also remember the true heroes of the film, as memorialized here:

 


 

I think I speak for everyone here at ComicMix when I say, "yub yub".

Brian K. Vaughan to Write ‘Runaways’ Movie

Big name superheroes like The Incredible Hulk, Thor, Captain America and The Avengers aren’t the only Marvel properties hitting the big screen.

The lesser known characters are getting their crack at film stardom, including the ragtag group of young heroes known as the Runaways.

Created in 2002 by Brian K. Vaughan as part of Marvel’s Tsunami line, Runaways follows a group of kids who discover their parents are evil supervillains. Vaughn, who left the series at the conclusion of the second volume, will return to the property he co-created and write the script for the upcoming movie.

No director is currently attached to the film, but maybe they’ll hire Richard Donner and the movie will be like a super-powered version of The Goonies.

(via Hollywood Reporter)

ComicMix Six: The Best Movies Adapted From Comic Books

In a previous edition of ComicMix Six, I set forth my picks for The Worst Movies Adapted from Comic Books. Now, because a "worst" list is nothing without a "best" list, I’ve assembled another one for you. This time around, I’m casting the spotlight on the opposite of bad movies and highlighting The Best Movies Adapted from Comic Books.

In contrast to the worst films, these stellar examples of cinematic goodness are not only great comic book adaptations, they’re great movies, too. From brilliant direction, exciting visuals that enhance rather than obscure the story, to compelling peformances, these six films deliver in a big way.

They alse showcase adherence to, and reverence for, their source material and represent what happens when talented people who appreciate comics get together to make a movie. Plus, they’re just plain fun to watch.

So now, without further ado and in no particular order, here is my ComicMix Six list of The Best Movies Adapted from Comic Books.

 

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Inside Scoop on ‘Watchmen’ Film: Spoilers Ahoy!

Comic Related has one of the most in depth reports on the upcoming Watchmen movie yet, including some massive spoilers in its latest report.

There’s plenty that I won’t post, but here’s a taste:

To start off, I’ve learned that the supplemental material at the end of the individual issues of the comic series will be included in the film in the form of newsreel-style reports. Whether these will be part of the opening credits – as has been reported elsewhere – or interspersed throughout the film, we will have to wait and see. Perhaps the Mothman scene I reported on months ago will be part of this footage.

The story comes via io9, which also offers a bevy of behind-the-scenes photos from the set. Fair warning: That link repeats lots of the spoilers. So if you’re trying to avoid such things, steer clear.

[UPDATE: ComicRelated.com’s Chuck Moore recently let ComicMix know that, due to popular demand, he’s compiled all of the site’s great behind-the-scenes Watchmen coverage on a single page, providing a great one-stop shopping spot for anyone in search of information about the film. Thanks, Chuck! -RM]

 

Heath Ledger’s Oscar-Winning Performance?

Whenever the subject of The Dark Knight comes up, everyone seems to be asking the same question (when they’re not talking about the film’s viral marketing, that is): Do you think Heath Ledger will receive an Oscar post-humously?

Over at Cinematical, they’ve started a discussion thread on exactly that subject, and the resulting comments have been interesting, to say the least. Reader response is all over the spectrum, but I thought commenter "techstar25" summed up the debate pretty darn well:

Last year the Academy recognized the work of two brilliant actors playing two of the most heinous villains ever put to film (Javier Bardem and Daniel Day-Lewis). There is now clearly a baseline with which Ledger’s Joker will be compared. How does "Joker" stack up against "Anton Chigurh" and "Daniel Plainview"? We’ll see, but at least now we know that the barriers have been broken and the voters will take a second look at "the bad guy".

This subject has certainly been the topic of conversation at many a ComicMix meeting, but I’d like to throw it out there for discussion among our readers. Is Ledger a lock to take home an Academy Award, or is the entire discussion premature with the film’s July 18 release still months away?

Child Brides of the Ozarks and Beyond, by Michael H. Price

child-bride-poster-5914420Sixty-five years after a double-edged sword of a movie called Child Bride of the Ozarks professed to indict the custom of underage marriage – while courting a leering, voyeuristic audience, naturally – the issue remains urgent. Last month’s raids upon a polygamist sect in Texas demonstrate that such persistence, involving girls scarcely into their teens, belongs as much to the presumably Civilized World as to the more thoroughly well-hidden corners of the planet: The Yearning for Zion Ranch had hidden in plain sight, a Third World concentration camp, bunkered in alongside Mainstream Amerika.

Meanwhile in the Dominant Culture, a Florida-based plastic surgeon named Michael Salzhauer has published a cartoon-storybook testament to female objectification called My Beautiful Mommy (Big Tent Books) that purports to “[guide] children through Mommy’s [cosmetic] surgery and healing process in a friendly, nonthreatening way” – nonthreatening, that is, until one grasps the deeper message: Looks are everything, and you get what you can pay for. The greater objective would appear the preconditioning of a next generation of face-lift addicts: Better start saving up now, girlie, and maybe develop an eating disorder as a prelude.

So which sector, or sect, is the less civilized? The backwater zealots who propose to wait out the Apocalypse in round-robin conjugal confinement with “brides” young enough to be their granddaughters? Or the proponents of glamour-at-a-price?

Dr. Salzhauer’s idealized Beautiful Mommy, as pictured on the cover of that scrofulous little book, calls to mind nothing so much as an over-glamorized Britney Spears or Miley Cyrus, perhaps a Bratz-meets-Barbie: Never too young to aspire to such artificiality, never too old to lay claim to it, given a loaded checkbook. Photographs from the Yearning for Zion round-up suggest nothing so much as some 19th-century agrarian-society re-enactment, but the forcibly modest attire of the young women involved conveys an aspect more ominous than bucolic.

About that movie…

My lingering impression of Harry Revier’s Child Bride of the Ozarks has hinged more upon featured player Angelo Rossitto (1908–1991) than with any social-agenda implications. Rossitto, a pioneering dwarf player of Old Hollywood, had reminisced fondly about Child Bride during a series of late-in-life interviews for the Forgotten Horrors film-history books. George Turner’s and my chapter on Child Bride in Forgotten Horrors 2, in turn, deals as much with Rossitto as with the picture itself.


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Review: ‘Speed Racer’ – Emile Hirsch Gets Behind the Wheel

So here we are, a mere two weeks into the Blockbuster Season and the veil of bedazzlement has already been lifted. If you are a fan of the original [[[Speed Racer]]] franchise, animated films, or even decent films in general, you will more than likely be disappointed with the film that should’ve been more accurately named [[[Speed Raver]]]. From start to finish, this film is very much like what an 8-year-old would do if he were given a crate of Pixie Stix and free run of a CGI studio, with no knowledge whatsoever about pesky details like story structure, character development or any shred of realism.

For those not in the loop, the story of Speed Racer surrounds not just the titular character (played by possibly one of the better actors of his generation, Emile Hirsch), but his über-supportive family. Pops and Mom Racer, played by John Goodman and Susan Sarandon, respectively. Balancing out the cast was Speed’s girlfriend Trixie (Christina Ricci), his obnoxious and extraneous little brother and pet chimp, and by far the MVP of the film, in Matthew Fox as Racer X.

The plot, or at least what one can gather about it after two hours in the theater, takes place in a world where car racing is king and the car-building Racer family takes aim at the allegedly fixed world of professional racing with their prodigal son, Speed. The plot is almost beaten into our heads for the first hour, with cartoonish performances and poorly rendered backdrops aiding along the way.

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Gotham’s Most Wanted: Dark Knight Joker Action Figure

It isn’t often that mainstream media picks up on toy collector news, but various news sources couldn’t help notice a mania for Dark Knight action figures based on Heath Ledger’s Joker.

The New York Post reported that people lined up the day they went on sale. Within minutes, the stock was sold out. The craze for the figure isn’t isolated to this side of the pond, either, with similar reports coming in from the U.K.

Collectors are believed to be buying up stock, convinced the figure is a collector’s item, since Ledger passed away before the film was released. The $9.99 toy is ranging from $15-50 on eBay now. As hype builds up for the movie and the buzz builds, it’s anybody’s guess as to how the value of the figure will be affected.

New ‘Watchmen’ Set Video – Costumes

Zack Snyder and the Watchmen movie crew recently delivered another video from the set of the film, providing a bigger peek at the "look" of the upcoming adaptation of Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons’ groundbreaking graphic novel.

This time around, costume designer Michael Wilkinson takes you on a tour of the clothing that makes the men — and women — of Watchmen.

UPDATE: Looks like the code JoBlo provided to embed the video wasn’t playing nice with our system here, but I think I’ve wrangled it into shape now. Apologies for the delay. – RM

 

 

 

 

(via Cinematical and JoBlo)

 

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