Monday 11 October 2010

Monday film news: Dystopia, Aliens, Assasins....and Zoolander

Hello there, I'm back again for the weekly roundup of news from the world of movies. There's been a lot of announcements and goings-on this week, so I'll try to keep it down to the stuff that interests me the most.
  • Richard Stanley, director of the lesser-known horror flick Dust Devil, has begun plans to adapt J.G.Ballards novel High Rise for the big screen. The novel is a typically dystopian classic from the author, written in 1975 it follows the residents of a block of ultra-modern flats and deep into the pathology brewed within. Ballard is my favorite modern writer, so it will be interesting to see how this adaptation goes.

  • My Week With Marilyn has commenced filming, based on the book by Colin Clark which recounts her 1956 visit to Britain, and the adventures that happened there. Its shaping up to be a gloriously retro production, helmed by the Weinstein Company and featuring a massively talented cast including Dame Judi Dench, Zoe Wannamaker, Toby Jones and Emma Watson among others.

  • Ridley Scott and 20th Century Fox have been discussing the casting options for a planned Alien Prequel. Not a lot is known yet besides rumours on casting – Noomi Rapace, Carey Mulligan and Abbie Cornish have all been hotly tipped recently. Personally I'm hoping for Rapace, who has been brilliant in the Swedish Millenium trilogy (Girl With The Dragon Tattoo, etc). If not, you will still get to see her in December 2011's Sherlock 2, as what is rumoured to be a villainous gypsy.

  • I've recently read about an interesting film coming out Spring next year, entitled Hanna. Directed by Joe Wright (Atonement, Pride and Prejudice), the film follows the titular anti-heroine, bred as an assassin in a CIA prison camp. The role is played by Saoirse Ronan, who also appeared in Wrights Atonement, and more recently The Lovely Bones. To me this plot is pretty familiar, for example in the Bourne films and this years Salt, but with a director who is more used to period pieces it has the potential to be a refreshing take on the genre.

So, that's all the nice meaty bits of news out of the way - just a few more things! A low-fi romantic-drama Blue Valentine has courted some controversy with the emotionally charged scenes released online, but the trailer is now up and looks promising as a mature take on the romance genre (although if Blue Valentine by Tom Waits does not appear on the soundtrack I will be most saddened).

Rhys Ifans has been potentially attached to Spiderman 4 alongside Andrew Garfield; Johnny Depp is interested in the new Kathryn Bigelow war flick Sleeping Dogs; Martin Freeman is interested in the role of Bilbo in the still-unconfirmed The Hobbit, and there are some rather rubbish sounding films in the pipeline such as a reworking of Pepe Le Pew, Yogi Bear and Zoolander: The Sequel.

Just to finish off, this weeks cinema charts:

  1. The Other Guys

  2. The Town

  3. Buried

  4. Eat Pray Love

  5. The Hole 3D

  6. Made in Dagenham

  7. Back to the Future

  8. Toy Story 3

  9. Devil

  10. Grown Ups

That's everything for now, and I will be back in a few days hopefully with a review of Buried.

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