Henry Jones, Jr. imparts a life lesson in a new TV spot for Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull. A lot of the overlap with the teaser here, but worth a look for the opening exchange.
Category: Cinema
The face in the misty light.
Dubya gets his damsel: Elizabeth Banks will play Laura Bush in Oliver Stone’s forthcoming W, with Josh Brolin in the title role. W starts shooting next month in Shreveport. As a admirer of Stone’s Nixon, I for one am looking forward to the finished product.
Update: Here comes 41. Stone casts James Cromwell and Ellen Burstyn as George H.W. and Barbara Bush respectively.
Death of a Gunfighter.
“I know I’ve made kind of a half-assed career out of violence, but I abhor violence. I am an ardent supporter of gun control. It seems incredible to me that we are the only civilized nation that does not put some effective control on guns.” Richard Widmark, 1914-2008.
McKellen the White. | Dent-Worthington Heats Up.
“Encouragingly, Peter and Fran Walsh have told me they couldn’t imagine The Hobbit without their original Gandalf. Their confidence hasn’t yet been confirmed by the director Guillermo del Toro but I am keeping my diary free for 2009!” Grey Havens be damned, Ian McKellen reports he’s likely returning as Gandalf for The Hobbit (well, if he and producer Peter Jackson have anything to say about it, and they probably will.) Update: More good news: Composer Howard Shore is back as well.
Also in movie news, the viral marketing campaign for The Dark Knight is picking up again. As you may remember, a slew of new Gotham-related sites appeared last December. Now, more have arrived, of a distinctly Harvey Dent bent: A new edition of The Gotham Times, Dana Worthington for DA (a.k.a. Harvey Dent’s opposition), Maiden Avenue Report (Gotham’s Drudge, it seems), Citizens for Batman, St. Swithuns Church, and Gotham Cable News are all now online, along with the Dent campaign site linked to the other day. Also, apparently the original marketing plan was always to shift from the Joker to Harvey Dent, so this rollout hasn’t necessarily been affected by the loss of Ledger. (That being said, viral text messages seem to indicate the Clown Prince of Crime will pop up yet again before April Fool’s Day.)
The Great Debate: Minotaur v. Centaur.
By way of my bro, Underground Online queries numerous celebrities and luminaries on the most pressing issue of our time: Who would win in a fight between a minotaur with a trident and a centaur with a crossbow? Those weighing in on the debate include David McCullough, Ridley Scott, Helen Mirren, Ed Harris, Marc Singer, and the Battlestar and Wire crews. I was asked before being shown the site, and you can count me in the centaur camp. Screw the dice: If this is happening outdoors and not in close quarters, ranged cavalry > heavy infantry (although admittedly there’s something to be said for the existential Nolte thesis.)
Thomas meets the Thompson Twins.
“An executive who worked with Sangster in Los Angeles recently told me: ‘Thomas seems to be the one. He was just great, but I’m not certain if anything has been finalised yet.‘” Spielberg and PJ look to have found their Tintin, and it’s Thomas Sangster, formerly of Love, Actually (but I’ll try not to hold it against him.) He joins Andy Serkis as Captain Haddock and…hey, it’s mocap…can we get Berk as Snowy/Milou?
A Man for All Seasons.
“Sir John Gielgud admired Mr. Scofield’s stillness and sense of mystery, describing him as ‘a sphinx with a secret.’ Peter Hall, who directed Mr. Scofield’s acclaimed Salieri in Peter Shaffer’s ‘Amadeus’ in London in 1979, said that as a young man Mr. Scofield brought ‘a sulfurous passion, an entirely new note’ to the stage, and that there was always a tremendous tension beneath the surface, ‘like a volcano erupting.‘” Paul Scofield, 1922-2008.
Benicio del Lobo Revealed.
Can you resist the evil of the thriller? Entertainment Tonight has the first look at Benicio del Toro as Joe Johnston’s The Wolfman, courtesy of makeup guru Rick Baker. Thankfully, it seems no CGI pixels were harmed during the making of this shot.
Let the devil wear black, for I’ll have a suit of sables.
In the trailer bin, the full-length preview for Tropic Thunder, with Ben Stiller, Jack Black, Steve Coogan, Nick Nolte, and, uh, Robert Downey Jr. in blackface. (Downey’s got a pretty high degree of difficulty here to not crash and burn, obviously, but my guess is he’ll probably be less off-putting than Fred Armisen’s cringeworthy Obama.) And, while it’s probably straight-to-video, I like the admittedly gimmicky premise: the trailer for Rosencrantz & Guildenstern are Undead, i.e. Hamlet with vampires.
The Talented Mr. Minghella.
“He was a really beautiful man, a lot of fun to be with. He was a storyteller in a classic British David Lean tradition.” Anthony Minghella, 1954-2008. I can’t say I was a huge fan of his work, although I’ll stand by the first half of The Talented Mr. Ripley. Still, he aimed high, and had a keen eye for the haunting shot. Condolences to his friends and family.