Posts Tagged ‘Dream Works’
Posted by bob in Films, News on June 26th, 2008
We’re still a year away from DreamWorks’ 3-D Monsters vs. Aliens but they’ve signed the small outfit ToyQuest to be the master licensee. Start looking for monster toys and games early next year.
With Wanted now out and receiving positive reviews, there’s little doubt that Universal Studios are already thinking sequel. Writer Mark Millar, on his message boards, said “Wanted 2 already being planned and they’ve asked me how I can develop some of the other stuff from the book into the sequel. We’ll see what box office is like at the weekend, but everyone knows this is going to make a LOT of dough.”
Posted by bob in Comics, Films, News on June 16th, 2008
It appears Robert Downey Jr. is not done with the genre. Word in the trades this morning has him negotiating to star in the DreamWorks adaptation of Cowboys & Aliens. The movie, based on the high concept comic book from Platinum Studios, is intended as Universal’s big summer 2010 tent pole project.
The interesting fall out from this may be a delay in Marvel/Paramount’s plans for Iron Man 2, which they want shooting next March for a May 2010 release. IM director, Jon Favreau, though, remains unsigned and feels Marvel is being cheap with him and by the way, there’s no way he can do a good sequel with such a short window.
Downey would play the lead, a former Union soldier turned gunslinger who must contend with the beginning of an alien invasion. In fact, he finds himself rallying Native Americans and white settlers to band together to face a common threat.
If Downey shoots this film, to be produced by Brian Grazer and Ron Howard, this may interfere with his prep for the IM sequel. The movie is based on the comic book, released last year, by writers Fred Van Lente and Andrew Foley and has gone through numerous big name screenwriters. Interestingly, the most recent draft is by Iron Man scribes Hawk Ostby and Mark Fergus
Posted by bob in Films, News on June 5th, 2008
Freestyle Releasing has announced they have the distribution rights to The Haunting of Molly Hartley with a Halloween release planned. The film stars Chace Crawford (Gossip Girl), Haley Bennett (Music and Lyrics), AnnaLynne McCord (Day of the Dead), Jake Weber (Dawn of the Dead), Jessica Lowndes (Autopsy) and Josh Stewart (Midnight Man). The film is the first from Mickey Liddell and the film is about a family that has moved to a new town after the mother recovered from a psychological meltdown. Molly (Bennett) struggles to gain friends while being haunted by visions or repressed memories and must figure out the truth.
Brian K. Vaughan, who successfully leapt from comics (Y the Last Man) to television (Lost), is now making the next step into feature films. He wrote a supernatural comedy on spec and found himself in a bidding war. DreamWorks paid $650,000 to win the rights to Roundtable. Vaughn stands to make a cool million should the film actually make it into production. The story, according to Variety, features Merlin putting together a new modern day Camelot to fight a resurrected evil. Unlike the noble and brave knights of yore, Merlin winds up with former athletes, a cowardly scientist or two, and Oscar-winning actors.
Posted by bob in Films, News on May 22nd, 2008
A young girl, gone for sixty years, returns to her Japanese home completely, unchanged. The mystery of her disappearance and return propelled the novel (Resurrection), written by Shinji Kajio to the top of Japan’s bestseller lists. A 2002 film version topped the box office charts.
DreamWorks, no stranger to remaking Japanese product into English, has nabbed the rights according to The Hollywood Reporter. William Nicholson (Elizabeth the Golden Age) has already been hired to write a screenplay with production intended for later this year.
This is the studios’ fourth Asia to America production following The Ring, The Ring 2 and A Tale of Two Sisters.
Posted by bob in Films, News on May 8th, 2008
MasterMind, DreamWorks’ animated satire of the super-hero genre, has been licensed to THQ Inc. for video games. The film is scheduled for November 5, 2010 release so expect the games in time for the holiday season. The deal includes all console and handheld systems, wireless devices and Windows PCs.
The story tells of a super-villain who doesn’t know what to do with himself after he achieves his goal – the death of Uberman.
Posted by bob in Films, News on April 23rd, 2008
The wonderful chameleon of an actor Jeffrey Combs (Re-Animator) will star in The Darkest Evil, based on H.P. Lovecraft’s “The Dunwich Horror”. Shooting in Lafayette, Louisiana the film is from director Leigh Scott’s (Beast of Bray Road) Bullet Films. Griff Furst (Ghost Image) and Sarah Lieving (The Apocalypse) also star.
With the growth of the DTV (direct to video) market, it’s little surprise the studios are ravaging their vaults to see who and what might make for a good (and cheap). Sony apparently is exploring a revival of the Universal Soldier. Once a 1992 vehicle for action star Jean-Claude Van Damme, there were two theatrical films plus 1998’s Universal Soldier III: Unfinished Business which was a telefilm using leftover pieces. A full-fledged third installment will likely bring Van Damme back from the brink of obscurity. He’ll once more become the super-soldier who violates his programming and goes on the run from his masters.
The Uninvited, DreamWorks’ remake of A Tale of Two Sisters, has been announced as coming January 30, 2009. The film stars Arielle Kebbel (The Grudge 2) and Emily Browning (Darkness Falls) as sisters who come home after their released from a mental institution. A wicked stepmother and a ghost make their time at home less than relaxing.
Happy Birthday to Me is joining the remake parade. Originally released in 1981, it starred Melissa Sue Anderson (Little House on the Prairie) and was directed b J. Lee Thomson (Messenger of Death). No details on the new version but we have to ask, when will the madness stop?
Posted by bob in Comics, Films, News on April 16th, 2008
Atlantis Rising, the Platinum Studios comic book from Scott O. Brown and Tim Irwin, has been optioned by DreamWorks for a live-action feature. Genre vets Alex Kurtzman and Roberto Orci have been tapped to produce with Platinum’s Scott Mitchell Rosenberg also involved.
The five-issue miniseries, concluding this month, tells of an underground civilization that begins to cause concern among the surface world’s governments. A war between surface and sea is inevitable, it seems.
“The comic brings a fresh, techno-thriller approach to a story that holds all the tenets of a classic us-vs.-them alien invasion movie,” Kurtzman told The Hollywood Reporter. Orci added, “No sea horses or tridents here.”
Rosenberg founded Platinum as an idea factory beginning with comics and graphic novels, available either in print or digitally, to be further exploited as film, video games, novels, or other media. They made a splash with their print debut late last year, Cowboys vs. Aliens, which was already optioned by DreamWorks for Orci and Kurtzman to develop.
The duo have become the kingpins of genre films gaining notice first with The Legend of Zorro and have gone on to write Transformers and the current Star Trek feature. For television they partnered again with Trek director J.J. Abrams to develop Fringe for Fox.
Their next film is an original, Eagle Eye with Shia LaBeouf.
Posted by bob in Films, News on April 15th, 2008
The incredibly popular Japanese Manga series Ghost in the Shell has been optioned by DreamWorks with an eye towards turning the sumptuous visuals in a 3-D live-action feature. Jamie Moss (Street Kings) has been hired to write the screenplay which will be overseen by producers Avi Arad (Spider-Man), Ari Arad and Steven Paul. 
The comic series was created by Masamune Shirow in 1989 and has gone on to spawn a cottage industry with print, anime, and video game adaptations and sequels. The high-tech world depicted involves a covert operations team working for the Japanese National Public Safety Commission.
Story follows the exploits of a member of a covert ops unit of the Japanese National Public Safety Commission that specializes in fighting technology-related crime.
“Ghost in the Shell is one of my favorite stories,” Steven Spielberg told the press. “It’s a genre that has arrived, and we enthusiastically welcome it to DreamWorks.” The studio previously released Ghosts in the Shell 2: Innocence in 2004.
Posted by bob in Comics, News on April 14th, 2008
The Damned, a graphic novel by Cullen Bunn and Brian Hurtt, has been picked up by DreamWorks. They’ve hired David DiGilio (The Traveler) to write the adaptation which is about a Los Angeles private eye who finds out that a supernatural gang has come to town.
This marks the second Oni Press project to be collected by DreamWorks in recent weeks. Previously, they grabbed The Return of King Doug, prior to publication, as a vehicle for Ben Stiller (Night at the Museum).
Posted by admin in News on April 4th, 2008
Monsters Vs. Aliens from DreamWorks Animation SKG boasts a new form of 3-D that they’e billing as Ultimate 3-D. The project is being directed by animation veterans Rob Letterman (Shark Tale) and Conrad Vernon (Shrek 2) with a projected March 27, 2009 release. The voice cast was announced this week, topped by Reese Witherspoon (Legally Blonde) as Susan Murphy, a.k.a. Ginormica; Hugh Laurie (House) as Dr. Cockroach, Ph.D.; Will Arnett (Horton Hears a Who as The Missing Link; Seth Rogen (Knocked Up) as B.O.B.; Rainn Wilson (The Office) as Gallaxhar; Stephen Colbert as The President of the United States; Kiefer Sutherland (24) as General W.R. Monger; and Paul Rudd (Reno 911)as Susan’s boyfriend, Derek.
Monster Zoo Headed for Raimi Zone
Sam Raimi is blending comics with horror by attaching his production company to Doug TenNapel’s Monster Zoo graphic novel. Word has it Paramount Pictures, where Raimi is already at work, will release the adaptation.
Terror Tidbits
Superman Returns was pretty horrific so we’re cautiously concerned that Bryan Singer is talking up his involvement in the follow-up Superman: The Man of Steel. At Shoe West in Las Vegas, Singer has been telling people he will be back but the writing team of Michael Dougherty and Dan Harris will not return. Speculation already has the hot genre screenwriting duo of Roberto Orci and Alex Kurtzman replacing them.
Uprising will be Wolfgang Peterson’s (Air Force One) next film for Columbia Picutres. A thriller, it will involve Earth already occupied by a nasty alien race, and has been written by Charles Leavitt (Blood Diamond). Douglas Wick and Lucy Fisher (Gladiator) will produce.
Cloverfield may have only been the beginning with other direct-to-DVD monster flicks in the works. Taking a page from Sci-Fi channel’s Saturday night monster-of-the-week formula, Birth of a Legend: Story of the Wawa will feature irradiated worms in Alabama. The enlarged worms are hungry and begin eating the fisherman. Yum. Then there’s Minnesota-based Serpent Lake which is based on local lore about a dinosaur-like creature.
Charlie Sheen returns to his low-budget roots with a film once known as Tortured. The Twisted Pictures production is said to be about a couple coping with their loss of their five year old. He was killed by a pedophile, who was freed by the courts so they decided to take justice into their own hands. Rob Lieberman (Fire in the Sky) will direct from a script by Marek Posival (Hold Up).
We’re still a year away from DreamWorks’ 3-D Monsters vs. Aliens but they’ve signed the small outfit ToyQuest to be the master licensee. Start looking for monster toys and games early next year.
