Oh why not. Entertainment things...

[lithera]

Alan Moore has instructed DC not to credit him with anything having to do with the Constantine movie coming out this summer. It is currently up in the air as to why exactly he's done this, however it has said he wants nothing to do with one of his concepts brought to film ever again. (It is hard to tell from what I've read if this is because of the product or because of the way things are being handled or someone just really pissed him off.) No matter what it looks more and more like Batman maybe DC's last chance to get something right in movie form.

From Avi Arad - For 2005 - Fantastic Four will be released in July. He says they've got a great script and are now picking the right director. Elektra starts production this May, Iron Man starts production in the middle of the year for a November, 2005 release. Ghost Rider and Luke Cage are also targeted for 2005 by Sony Pictures. Also in the works are X-Men 3 (2006), The Hulk 2 (2006), Namor (2006), The Punisher 2 (2006), Iron Fist, Black Widow and Deathlok.

(Deathlok? Namor? Why don't we make a West Coast Avengers movie? Or maybe a Defenders movie. I'm sure those'd be great too. Yeesh.)

For Iron Man, Tom Cruise is still rumored to be very, very interested in the role. They shopped the movie to Spielberg who said he had other things he was doing but reportedly they're trying to keep it on that level of director.

John Singleton is in talks to develop and direct Luke Cage for Columbia Pictures. Luke Cage. Man. ... That could just be a fiasco in the waiting.

Access Hollywood will premiere the new trailer for Brad Pitt's Troy this Thursday, March 4.

The Get Shorty sequel Be Cool is filiming, moving along just fine.

Warren Zide's Anthem Pictures has acquired the film rights to Soul Calibur, the popular fighting video game from Namco.

Here is a look at a Phantom of the Opera picture. I haven't heard much about this positive or negative. They've finished principle photography. I've just seen Phantom so many times, it would have to be a truly astounding performance on screen to make much difference to me. It looks cool, though.

I want to go see Wilbur Wants to Kill Himself when it comes out. As Cody and I have started saying, "Independant film breeds independant film." (This also applies to smaller non-independant pictures.) You go to see one and suddenly, there are fifty of them you want to see in the next few months.

Comments

[crispengray.livejournal.com]

Namor's a good character. He's just handled... poorly in most cases.

As for Deathlok, well... he's about as major a character as Blade.

If they're going a Cage AND an Iron Fist movie, it'd be nice to see them cross-reference each other. As long as Cage doesn't ever say "Sweet mama Christmas!" ever again.

[crispengray.livejournal.com]

Oh, and I'm not seeing the picture of the Phantom on that link.

[lithera.livejournal.com]

Really? Hrm.

[lithera.livejournal.com]

I can see it, but you might want to look here instead - http://www.comingsoon.net/news.php?id=3729

[pullthestars.livejournal.com]

you forgot to mention that "Serenity" has been greenlit for production. but I'd love to find out if the actors for Book and Wash have indeed signed on, because the article I read didn't mention the two actors.

[lithera.livejournal.com]

I mentioned that the other day, actually. Though the production dates have gotten moved around a bit from the first time I mentioned it. It was May for a start and it is June now.

[warpdragon.livejournal.com]

The independent films are always out there. You just don't notice them unless you go to one and see the previews for others, or pick up the fliers at theaters. But it's there, and it's not hard to find. You just have to be willing to look beyond what's easiest to find.

[lithera.livejournal.com]

I didn't mean for it to sound like they weren't there or they were hard to find. It is just something I noticed in that once you go to see one, suddenly you are shown previews or otherwise notice all of the others that you want to go see.

[warpdragon.livejournal.com]

Exactly. That's how I was drawn in. The Adventures of Baron Munchausen was playing at a theater owned by Hope College, my friends said we should go see it, we did and picked up a schedule, and suddenly for the next two years I was borrowing my mom's car once a week for the next two years to drive to see these movies.

[lithera.livejournal.com]

Yep. That's how it seems to be for me at the moment. Went to see Bubba Ho-Tep which led me to The Lost Skeleton of Cadavra which... Yeah.

[mizkit.livejournal.com]

(Deathlok? Namor? Why don't we make a West Coast Avengers movie? Or maybe a Defenders movie. I'm sure those'd be great too. Yeesh.)

Exactly. :)

[lithera.livejournal.com]

There are so many Marvel characters I would want to see before that. Just SO MANY before Deathlok. I mean, c'mon.

[cleverusername2.livejournal.com]

Like a five hour Rogue epic?

[lithera.livejournal.com]

Nah. She's getting her fair time in the X-men movies. I'd like to see plenty more of those, though.

Hey!

[archeon.livejournal.com]

a Defenders movie would be cool! I love the Defenders...

[leiden.livejournal.com]

I feel bad for Alan Moore. His works are fantastic but just on this side of artistic for hollywood's taste, so more explosions get added.

Why does everybody have to follow the "more cowbell" philosophy?

[samy.livejournal.com]

Defenders and WCA are team books. Team books have a much bigger threshold. You can hook a solo book onto a single actor, you can't do that with a team book.

It's much much MUCH easier for Hollywood to do a movie based on a solo book than on a team book. Hence, you will continue to see small solo books grabbing movies for themselves.

Besides, Deathlok has a concept (man trapped in robot/cyborg body). WCA, in many ways, does not. Defenders, arguably, does not -- although the whole 'non-team' could be played up, but I suspect it wouldn't be enough of a concept for Hollywood.

[lithera.livejournal.com]

I'm joking. I'm just thinking that Deathlok is not the greatest concept for a movie. Well, it could be agood concept for a movie but the comic book ... welll.... I don't remember it being all that great. I'd much rather see A Captain America movie first. Hell, I'd rather see a Thor movie first.

[samy.livejournal.com]

I think you're fairly unlikely to see a Thor movie ever, really. The Marvel-owned parts of the copyright are pretty damn scarce. I mean, you can do a THOR movie without ever referencing any of the Marvel stuff, and get away with it totally. Hell, even if Marvel itself did a THOR movie, odds are it would skip the Marvel parts almost entirely, and just focus on 'Norse god of thunder comes to modern New York'. Why would Hollywood waste money on license, when they can do 'Norse god of thunder comes to modern New York' just based on the public domain aspects of the Thor myth? No, I think the biggest shot we'll ever have of seeing the Marvel Thor on big screen is if there ever is an AVENGERS movie.

As for a Captain America movie -- there has been one. In fact, more than one. There were a pair of telemovies in '79, in the same vein as the live-action stuff of Spider-Man and Hulk back in those days. They were pretty bad, IIRC he had some kind of a Judge Dredd helmet (ironic considering USAgent's current look) and a transparent plastic shield or something. Then there was the '91 movie with Matt Salinger or someone equally forgettable. It was a little better than the telemovies, but still pretty bad. IMDB seems to list some oldie movies for Cap too but haven't seen those myself.

I'm sure there'll be more Cap soon, after he's had a little time to chill out first. He's only been out of the movie world 13 years so far, that's practically nothing in Hollywood

As for Deathlok, he's precisely an ideal property for a movie. The core concept for the character is solid and simple to understand; it's also even somewhat topical and current. Where do prostheses end? Can you have your entire body replaced with prosthetics, leaving just the brain? Even beyond that, there's the fact that he's very scarcely tied o the rest of the Marvel Universe which is always a bonus in Hollywood, being that Hollywood shuns having to reference other comics. They want their movies to stand in a vacuum, and books like Deathlok, or, I dunno, SLEEPWALKER are perfect for standing in a vacuum. Hence, they become very possible properties for movies. You're unlikely to, for example, ever see a SHE-HULK movie because the character is too intricately tied to the Hulk, and for the same reason the upcoming CATWOMAN is being raped, to separate it from the Batman property.

There are exceptions, of course (like the possible, rumored NIGHTSTALKERS spin-off from Blade) but those are more or less exceptions, rather than the rule. By and large, the more separate the character/property is from the shared universe, the better its movie prospects.

[lithera.livejournal.com]

All of the Captain America movies have sucked. In fac,t I doubt anyone other than comic book people remember them And all of us cringe.

[samy.livejournal.com]

Which is true, but doesn't contradict the fact that there have been several.