Category Archives: Movie News & Opinions

Sony Letting Go of Spider-Man? *UPDATE*

In a nerd conversation of epic proportions the other day with Dr. Kronner, I disclosed that it was my dream to see the three studios controlling the biggest Marvel superhero franchises to come to an agreement and make a trilogy of awesome movies on par with the Avengers, but involving everyone. This would mean Spiderman, the Avengers, the X-men and the Fantastic Four all sharing the same universe and then Marvel Studios, Fox, and Sony all split the revenue from the trilogy. Clearly this is a fevered dream that will never happen, but there has been news that Sony may be looking to offload the film rights to Spiderman in the future according to a report at Geek Rest:

A new report has surfaced that suggests Sony may be exploring their options as to how they can raise capital for their fledgling hardware divisions by selling off several of their numerous music and film properties. According to CEO Kazua Hirai, Sony is currently considering a proposal from investor Daniel Loeb and his hedge fund company Third Point that would see Sony selling off several of their movie properties including Resident Evil and – wait for it – Spider-Man.

“Third Point’s proposal involves the way we manage a core business of the Sony group and the direction of our management. So the Sony board will give it thorough consideration before replying to Mr Loeb,” explained Hirai.

So although it’s not as grand as my plan that the studios would never buy into, at least that’s one of the big heroes that could possibly be joining the fray of Marvel Studio’s/Disney’s shared movie universe.

I know it’s not a guarantee that Sony would sell to Marvel Studios/Disney, but really who else could make the highest bid for the rights? This is a company that not only has Marvel in it’s pocket, but it’s now showing off the recently bought Star Wars franchise by announcing a new trilogy and a crap load of new standalone movies to boot. In the coming decade, Disney will have made more movie money than all of the other studios combined, unless DC can get some steam behind their own sought after shared movie universe in which the Man of Steel may or may not kick start. Only time will tell.

Spider-Man

In the meantime, what does everyone think of this news? After all of the recent reacquiring of characters such as Daredevil, Elektra, Punisher, Ghost Rider and Blade, would it be a big game changer if Marvel Studios had Spider-Man in its holster? Sound off below!

Spider-Man

UPDATE via Comic Book Therapy:

[box_light]After the initial post from The Register hit, more details regarding what is in the proposal have hit. Unfortunately it doesn’t look good for those wanting Spidey in the MCU either. The proposal that Loeb has brought to Sony wouldn’t be to sell of the franchises, but rather spin their entertainment branch into a separate entity that people can buy into. So the long and short of it is, don’t expect Peter Parker to be helping Tony Stark or any of The Avengers anytime soon.[/box_light]

Man of Steel: Newest Trailer! Now With Extra Action!

Apparently the formula for trailers nowadays is to keep releasing them until you find the perfect one. As if Man of Steel didn’t look fabulous enough in the last epic trailer that showed glimpses of Krypton and the other Kryptonians such as Jor-El and General Zod, the latest trailer shows a whole lot more of Kal-El-Clark-Superman in action! It was a little bit of a combo trailer with a quick TV spot that was shown at the MTV movie awards involving Zod calling out Kal-El to give himself up or Earth will pay the price and outing Superman as an alien. Pretty crappy of you Zod. Anyways, check out the trailer below:

Tons of goodness to come out of this one! Heat vision, Kryptonians pummeling one another, destruction in Metropolis and a weird looking robot that I can only hope is an early incarnation of Brainiac. My favorite part of the trailer was Faora’s line to Kal-El threatening to kill millions if he continues to fight. Very chilling. I’m hoping this movie shows the true extent and danger that more than one Kryptonian can present to the human populace. I know they sort of already did that with Superman II but let’s face it, it was a little bit on the lame side. The lameness is definitively evidenced here in another trailer below:

Man of Steel

The Wolverine: Newest Trailer Is Here…

As The Wolverine gets closer and closer we are treated to teasers, trailers and international trailers. Now we get another, possibly the last one before the movie releases? But this is arguably the best one, even though I still don’t know how I feel about the movie, I am rather intrigued by the movie taking place after X-men: The Last Stand. Apparently they’re trying to make up not only for that piece of crap, but the nigh unforgivable X-men Origins: Wolverine as well. I’d say based on this trailer alone it would appear they have succeeded, but I’ll reserve my final judgment until I see the finished project.

Check out the trailer for yourself:

As you can see there is a very interesting cameo appearance by Famke Janssen as Jean Grey. Apparently the last kill Logan made in The Last Stand continues to haunt him. Now his latest adventure takes him to the heart of Japan (Madripoor?) and against lots and lots of guys with swords, including the Silver Samurai. I’ve not heard whether or not he is a robot of some sort or an actual mutant like in the comics. From the looks of things he appears to be one big sum’bitch. Either way I’ll be making the trek to see the latest outing for Weapon X. It can’t be worse than Origins…

Check out our MOST ANTICIPATED SUMMER MOVIES list for more!

‘The Rambler’ Trailer Will Make You Question Your Sanity

The trailer for the release of The Rambler has just come online and it is an interesting one to say the least. It is directed by Calvin Lee Reeder, one of 2007’s ’25 New Faces of Independent Film’ (according to Film Maker magazine) and whom you may have seen in V/H/S as Gary from the Tape 56 segment of that movie. But I first became aware of his work when I met him at a UK Comic convention promoting his latest film, a low budget movie called Jerkbeast which was a great little punk trash classic about the world’s worst punk rock band, one of the members just happens to be a monster (or a guy in a suit I was never sure on that detail!).

the rambler trailer jerk beast

What I am sure about though is that film was a lot of fun. This film seems to be a lot darker. Here is the plot outline from YouTube channel FilmFestivalVideos.

[box_light]Upon release from prison, a solitary man known only as “the Rambler” embarks on a mysterious journey en route to reconnecting with his long-lost brother. Traversing treacherous back roads, lost highways, and isolated small towns, he unearths a multitude of bizarre and wickedly depraved slices of Americana.[/box_light]

But the film seems so much more than this. Here is the trailer.

The basic framework does appear to be just a guy from prison going on a journey of self discovery but the whole thing has a disturbing David Lynch style quality to it with quirky editing and musical choices to heighten this feeling of tension and unease. The scenes on show in the trailer enforce this notion even more with a large, hook handed boxer, the rambler with burn marks all over his face and a sinister collection of old people all greeting us as they greet the rambler. The lack of dialogue is also a key factor, meaning much more attention is given to the said images on show and the further into the trailer this goes, the weirder and more disturbing these images become.

the rambler trailer boxing

The film does have some interesting set pieces to. Exploding houses, boxing matches, trippy encounters with women such as The Girl and the coven of old people all mixed in with a very western feeling backdrop are just a few things on show for the viewer to ponder over. The lack of big Hollywood names also helps to add to this films bizarre charm. The only people I could make out were the role of The Girl played by Lindsay Pulsipher who most people will know from her role in True Blood as Crystal Norris, and The Rambler himself played by Dermot Mulroney, a character actor who has popped up in numerous films and TV since the 80’s, but most recently worked on The Grey with Liam Neeson.

This, if nothing else this looks like quite an engaging movie and with the emphasis on unnerving audiences rather than bombarding them with explosions, it could be a good movie for anyone sick of the more main stream movie affairs. It does have explosions to if you fans of main stream movies want to give it a try!

the rambler trailer explosion

Karl Urban Talks Possible ‘Dredd’ Sequel

Despite losing about $10 million at the box office, Dredd was one hell of a movie, and one of our favorites from last year. As awesome a flick as it was, because of the business side it’s been assumed that we would not get to see it bloom into a franchise, which is a shame. However star of the movie, Karl Urban seems to think that’s not written in stone:

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10 Bizarre Foreign Posters for American Movies…

Film posters are amazing. Not only do they help advertise to people quickly and easily the content of any film, they also are truly stunning pieces of art in themselves looking great displayed on our walls. However, this is not always the case. Some posters confuse us, so a bad film is made out to be good, while some don’t really tell us anything about the movie and others lose the plot entirely showing us random images or awful art and leave us thinking about what mental state the artist could have been when they devised this monster of a poster. For some reason some of the best examples of these types of poster come from abroad in non-English speaking countries and this is what I want to focus on here, those posters that with out the internet’s help would be lost in a trash can for all time. This week we focus on the Horror genre.

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