Damon Houx
When New Line tried to bring 'Dungeons and Dragons' to the big screen in 2000, it was coming a year after 'Star Wars: The Phantom Menace' and a year before 'The Lord of the Rings,' and was done on a budget. Basically, it came at the right time and place to be totally forgotten and dismissed. But now, according to Warner Brothers, the time couldn't be more right for a reboot.
With shooting right around the corner, Michael Bay's 'Transformers 4' is rounding out its primary cast. We know it will star Mark Wahlberg, Kelsey Grammer, and a number of vehicles that will transform into robots, but now Sophia Myles has joined the cast.
Though Tom Cruise may have gone through a rough patch in his career, that's now completely over as he's being brought back to star in 'Mission: Impossible 5' for Paramount. This has been rumored for a while, but it was confirmed today.
In one of the strangest exits in recent memory, Al Pacino has left the production of 'Despicable Me 2,' which is set to hit theaters July 3. But it was just announced that Benjamin Bratt is replacing him. They'll have to work pretty quick if they want to hit theaters exactly two months from today.
When Brett Ratner took over the 'X-Men' franchise from Bryan Singer, he was tasked with adding new mutants to the steady roster of actors who were in the previous two films. One was Ellen Page, who Singer has brought back for 'X-Men: Days of Future Past' to reprise her role as Kitty Pride. Page recently turned up on set, and Bryan Singer took a picture.
Before they decided to get in the film business for themselves, Marvel used to license out their characters to different studios. And those studios can continue making movies about those characters as long as they have a film (or sequel or reboot) in production in the allotted amount of time. If they don't, the rights revert back to Marvel. With no sequels or reboots in active development, the rights to Blade and Ghost Rider have reverted back to Marvel.
From the opening frames of the trailer for 'The Butler,' it's as if you can hear everyone involved saying one word. That word? Oscar. Academy award-nominated director Lee Daniels leads Oscar winning actor Forest Whitaker in this tour of race relations in America as told through the perspective of a White House butler.
It was well known that -- partly to appeal to an ever-growing global audience -- Marvel thought ahead and included Chinese actors for an extended cut of 'Iron Man 3' that was made specifically for the Chinese market. Now that the film has been released in China, the content of those additional scenes have been revealed, and it turns out that the rest of the world isn't missing much.
It's nearly the summer season (at least for movies), so it's surprising how quiet 'The Great Gatsby' has been in selling itself. Sure, it's going to be opening the Cannes film festival, but it's not being sold as a tentpole summer event picture. Regardless, the film has released seven new clips to get us excited.
Ever the busy producer, J.J. Abrams not only has 'Star Trek,' 'Star Wars' and 'Revolution' on his plate, his company Bad Robot is looking to get the rights to Stephen King's '11/22/63' and bring it to the small screen.
'Thor: The Dark World' looks to be bigger and better than the original movie!
'Dodgeball: A True Underdog Story' was a pretty funny movie that was a surprise hit in 2004. It pitted Vince Vaughn and his gang of outsiders against Ben Stiller and his corporate stooges in a winner-takes-all game of dodgeball. When a film does as well as 'Dodgeball' did (it made over $100 million at the box office), a sequel is practically guaranteed, and though it took a decade, it looks like they're finally getting around to it.