Author Archives: T-Rack
New “Garbage Pail Kids” Movie Coming
Another 80′s fad is making a comeback on the silver screen. This time around it’s the Garbage Pail Kids.
According to Deadline, Michael Eisner’s The Tornante Company will finance and produce a new Garbage Pail Kids movie. The movie will be based on the trading cards produced by Topps in the 80′s.
Hatched in 1985, theGarbage Pail Kidslaunched as an irreverent parody of theCabbage Patch Kids(Topps eventually settled a lawsuit brought by Cabbage Patch-maker Coleco). Hatched by Pulitzer Prize-winning cartoonist Art Spiegelman, the cards became wildly popular enough that they were banned by many schools. There was also a feature done in 1987.
The film will be produced by Toby Ascher, directed by PES (that’s actually the director’s name) and with a script written by Michael Vukadinovich.
Hawking To Guest on “Bang”
Add another high profile guest star with a Trek connection to the Big Bang Theory.
Scientist Stephen Hawking will make a guest appearance on the popular CBS comedy. He filmed his cameo last week, according to reports.
Fans may recall that Hawkin had a cameo in the fifth season of Star Trek: The Next Generation.
Hawking will play himself on the April 5 episode.
Lawrence Feeling “Games” Excitement
With anticipation building for The Hunger Games, actress Jennifer Lawrence says she’ s beginning to feel the passion and fervor the fans have for the books and the big-screen adaptation.
“For so long, I didn’t see The Hunger Gamesexcitement,” Lawrence says. “I knew it was there. But I hadn’t heard the screaming girls. I hadn’t really felt it.”
Lawrence says that changed Sunday night for the Hollywood premiere of the film.
“Seeing it all just makes it so real,” she said. “This is just really humbling. It’s amazing.”
“It’s really just a relief to know that I have seen the movie and that it’s good. Thank God,” she added. “It would not be good to let these people down. “
The fans are feeling it as well. A new survey shows that anticipation for the film is higher than last year’s Breaking Dawn, Part One and many in Hollywood are predicting a huge weekend for the film when it opens.
Meanwhile, fans in the UK will have to watch a slightly edited version of the film. The UK ratings board insisted on seven seconds of cuts to the film to get it down to the more family friendly 12-rating.
Warners Revives King’s “Dark Tower”?
Warner Bros. Pictures is very close to a deal that could see the resurrection of Ron Howard’s adaptation of Stephen King’s “The Dark Tower” which previously imploded at Universal reports Deadline.
Previously the plan was to do three films and two limited-run TV series based on the mammoth seven book post-apocalyptic western series. Now Warners has picked up Akiva Goldsman’s script for the first feature and are paying him to do a polish.
Howard remains attached to direct, likely in very early 2013, while Javier Bardem looks to still be starring as gunslinger Roland Deschain depending upon his availability. Goldsman, King and Brian Grazer will produce.
If the TV component moves forward, Warners-owned HBO now seems certain to be the home of the series.
All Sorts Of “Avengers” News Tidbits
Been a busy few days on “The Avengers” front with a lot of news morsels dropping all over. Joss Whedon has recently done early interviews ahead of the release of “Cabin in the Woods” in mid-April and used the opportunity to speak quite extensively about the superhero mashup.
He tells Collider that his earliest rough cut of the film clocked in at three hours but he’s trimmed that down to a 2hr 15min version he’s said to be happy with. “In a TV show, you can bring your baggage and sort of lay it out because you have a season to do it, but in a movie you actually have to remove yourself from the equation a bit and when I was finally able to do that, I saw a much clearer road to how to get the best experience for the audience” he says.
Don’t expect a Director’s Cut with any of those scenes, though we’ll hopefully see some of those cut scenes on the disc release – “I believe very strongly in putting the director’s cut into the theaters. I believe that the director’s cut is the best movie for the studio and the best version of the movie for the audience… I think people get to see a lot of extraordinary extras because I did shoot a bunch of stuff that I love, but the movie is the movie I want it to be.”
As for Loki’s alien army in the film, Whedon once again denied they are either the Kree or the Skrulls – “It is not the Kree or the Skrulls… Those two aliens are Marvel mainstays and have enormous backstories. They have a big life of their own that just could not be contained in a film where I already had seven movie stars.”
Next up, AMC Theaters has announced a movie marathon event set to take place May 3rd in select cinemas in North America. Starting from 11:30am, ‘The Ultimate Marvel Marathon’ will consist of back-to-back screenings of “Iron Man,” ‘The Incredible Hulk,” “Iron Man 2,” “Thor,” and “Captain America: The First Avenger” all leading up to and including a midnight opening screening of “The Avengers”. Details of cinemas involved will be released on Friday.
Thirdly, several new character posters from the film have gone online and can be seen at CBM.
Last, but not least, Latino Review has posted a scoop claiming to have found a link as to how events in “The Avengers” will impact the upcoming third “Iron Man” film.
POSSIBLE SPOILERS * *
According to their scooper, Captain America is responsible for placing an idea in the head of Tony Stark – nanobots. The third ‘Iron’ would therefore adapt elements from Warren Ellis’ acclaimed “Extremis” mini-series in which the title refers to a programmable military nanotechnology serum, an attempt to recreate the Super-Soldier Serum, and one which grants Stark extraordinary powers.
The comic itself was something of a reboot of the title, introducing a new origin story for the character which also heavily influenced the one seen in the first “Iron Man” film.
Muppets Parody “The Hunger Games”
As they did with Green Lantern and the Hangover, Part II, the Muppets are parodying the trailer for The Hunger Games.
The trailer is to promote the March 20th release of The Muppets on DVD and Blu-Ray. You can check it out below.
Man Sues AMC Over Snack Prices
We’ve all lamented the high price of going to the movies–not just the tickets but the concessions.
Now one movie fan is trying to do something about it. The Detroit Free Press reports that Joshua Thompson has filed a class action law suit in Wayne County Circuit Court against his local AMC theater in hopes of forcing theaters statewide to dial down snack prices.
“He got tired of being taken advantage of,” said Thompson’s lawyer, Kerry Morgan of Wyandotte. “It’s hard to justify prices that are three- and four-times higher than anywhere else.”
American Multi Cinema, which operate the AMCs in the area, wouldn’t comment on the lawsuit.
“It’s a loser,” said Gary Victor, an Eastern Michigan University business law professor. He said state Supreme Court decisions in 1999 and 2007 exempted most regulated businesses from the Michigan Consumer Protection Act.
Grace Creates His Own “Star Wars” Prequels
Lots of Star Wars fans have ideas on how to fix the Star Wars prequels. (Eliminate Jar Jar)
After the Phantom Menace was released, there was the bootleg cut that circulated on-line.
Now actor Topher Grace has taken it one step further. According to Collider, Grace hosting a screening featuring his own edit of the prequels. According to Steve “Frosty” Weintraub, Grace edited the three installments down to a 90-minute presentation and showed it to a group of 50 gathered friends and fans.
Apparently, Grace started by omitting “about 99% of the first movie,” picking things up at the epic lightsaber duel between Darth Maul, Qui-Gon Jinn and Obi-Wan Kenobi. That eliminates most of the child Anakin story (assuming he kept any of the later pieces) and nearly all (except one shot) of Jar Jar.
“After the quick start, Grace’s version of the prequels focuses on a few things: the Anakin/Padme relationship, Obi-Wan trying to figure out who is trying to kill the politicians, and a ton of the action,” Weintraub wrote, though he does note that Grace cut some big action scenes—including lightsaber duels—when they didn’t suit his purpose.
Among the deleted scenes that Grace slipped back in to the flick is a sequence in which Padme takes Anakin to Naboo to meet her family, which Weintraub said “definitely adds to the story.” But the most interesting part of this re-cut seems to be the new ending.
“Instead of having Anakin scream ‘No!’ as he learned that Padme died, Grace’s version shows Anakin getting the Vader costume put on and the film ends with Vader in the center of the screen looking evil,” Weintraub said. “It’s a perfect way to connect the prequel to the original trilogy and it works perfectly.”
Grace says the showing is a one time thing and that his version won’t be seen again.
Geektopia 