Previews and Reviews that are Z's Views
Recently io9 posted information and art about the Rick Baker tribute called The Monster Maker which featured art from…
…Star Wars to An American Werewolf in London, Men in Black to Ed Wood,Gremlins, Thriller, Hellboy…
Hollywood.com presents 20 Surprising Facts About Dwayne The Rock Johnson. Here are three of my favorites…
He wasn’t always known as “The Rock” in the ring.
Successful wrestling gimmicks rarely happen right out of the gate. Even The Rock wasn’t exempt from that rule of thumb. He started his pro wrestling career as “Flex Kavana,” followed by “Rocky Maivia” (a blend of his father and grandfather’s ring names) before landing on the name that would help make him a superstar. I think we can all agree that it’s hard to imagine his persona as anything other than “The Rock” in the ring.His Scorpion King paycheck was a record-breaker
Back in 2002, The Rock made his leading-role debut in The Scorpion King, and he was paid $5.5 million to do it. For a first-time above-the-title name, that sum was the most ever paid – a testament to The Rock’s fame before he started starring in filmsHe Doesn’t Want to be Called The Rock
In a 2006 interview with Entertainment Magazine, Dwayne Johnson says “I no longer am a wrestler, I am now pursuing a future as an actor and someday as a director. I am not the Rock. I am Dwayne Johnson.” It sounds like people are a little slow to come around to that fact, but it seems to be happening, slowly but surely.
Bill Nye “the Science Guy” and Neil DeGrasse Tyson sing about how science can change the world for the better in this autotuned video created in collaboration with The Planetary Society.
The art above and below was created by the extremely talented Noriyoshi Ohrai. Although I’ve shared two black and white pieces, Ohari’s color work is equally amazing.
Mr. Ohari passed away on October 27th at the age of 79. Our thoughts and prayers go out to Mr. Ohari’s family, friends and fans.
Source: /Film.
Roger Cormier and Mental_Floss present 15 Fast-Talking Facts About Get Shorty. Here are three of my favorites…
1. “SHORTY” WAS DUSTIN HOFFMAN.
Danny DeVito’s Martin Weir character was modeled after Dustin Hoffman, who Elmore Leonard dealt with when the actor expressed interest in an adaptation of the author’s LaBrava.Weir’s very specific food order at a restaurant was based on Hoffman ordering off-menu at a lunch meeting with Leonard. Hoffman suspected he was Shorty after the book came out.3. QUENTIN TARANTINO CONVINCED TRAVOLTA TO PLAY PALMER.
Travolta said no to Sonnenfeld. Twice. His Pulp Fiction director convinced him to change his mind.15. ELMORE LEONARD LOVED IT.
“Definitely, it’s the best adaptation I’ve had,” Leonard said at the time of its release. At that point, 12 of his books had been adapted into movies. He also said he never realized how funnyGet Shorty was until he saw the film.
Hollywood.com posted their choices for The 12 Deadliest Hit Men [and Women] in Film and TV.
There are some good choices in the list…
Samuel L. Jackson as Jules Winnfield in Pulp Fiction
Jean Reno as Leon in The Professional
Javier Bardem as Anton Chigurh in No Country for Old Men
Uma Thurman as The Bride in Kill Bill: Volume 1 & 2
Chow Yun Fat as Ah Jong in The Killer
…for example.
But how do you create a list of the best hit men and leave off…
Keanu Reeves as John Wick in John Wick
Charles Bronson as Arthur Bishop in The Mechanic
Clint Eastwood aka William Munny in Unforgiven
Sly Stallone as Jimmy Bonomo in Bullet to the Head
If you’re a fan of the original Rocky movie you’ll want to check out Cinephilia & Beyond‘s Rocky: A Heartwarming Sports Drama Reflecting Its Very Process of Creation.
When you click over you’ll find a treasure trove of materials…
Vintage photos
Quotes from industry luminaries
A PDF of the Rocky script
A Conversation with Sylvester Stallone
Rocky: Behind the Scenes on 8mm
Video of Sly telling The Rocky Story
Rare Footage of Sly and Carl Weathers Choreographing the Fight
Garrett Brown Video on Rocky
Rocky Photographer Elliott Marks‘ Contact Sheets
Today we have the Standoff trailer starring Laurence Fishburne and Thomas Jane.
You just knew I’d have to post this Creed character poster of Rocky here. You can check out a heavyweight championship size at IMPAwards.
Eric D. Snider and Mental_Floss present 13 Epic Facts About Once Upon a Time in America. Here are three of my favorites…
1. SERGIO LEONE TURNED DOWN THE GODFATHER TO MAKE IT.
By his own account, Once Upon a Time in America was Leone’s pet project, the one he devoted most of his adult life to making. He became interested in the story while he was making 1968’s Once Upon a Time in the West , and was so fixated on it that when Paramount approached him a few years later to make The Godfather, he politely declined. If he’d known it would take another 12 years to get Once Upon a Time in America produced anyway, maybe he would have accepted. But then where would Francis Ford Coppola be?8. NOBODY HAS EVER SEEN LEONE’S COMPLETE VERSION.
After the nine-month shoot, Leone had eight to 10 hours’ worth of material. He trimmed it down to six hours, hoping to release it in two three-hour parts, but the producers were having none of that. So he reduced it to 269 minutes—four and a half hours—but it still wasn’t enough. He chopped out another 40 minutes, and this 229-minute version is what premiered at the 1984 Cannes Film Festival and subsequently played in European theaters.American distributors butchered the film even more, cutting out another 90 minutes and rearranging the scenes into chronological order (no more flashbacks), which rendered the movie incomprehensible. The American version flopped, of course, and Leone was devastated. A Martin Scorsese-led effort to restore Leone’s original version resulted in a 251-minute cut playing at Cannes in 2012, but some 18 minutes were still missing due to legal issues over who owned the missing scenes. The 251-minute version is now available on Blu-ray and DVD. Someday, perhaps the complete version will be restored.
12. LEONE WAS A PERFECTIONIST.
Leone and De Niro had their different approaches, but one thing they had in common was perfectionism. According to one of the screenwriters, Leone did 35 takes of a large (and expensive) crowd scene, only to insist on one more because he noticed a kid in the crowd looking directly at the camera.
Today we have a trick and some treats thanks to Andrew LaShane and Mental_Floss who present 9 Celebrities Reading Edgar Allan Poe’s The Raven.
The celebrities are Christopher Walken, James Earl Jones, Sir Christopher Lee, Vincent Price, Stan Lee, John Astin, Basil Rathbone, William Shatner and Tay Zonday.
What, what’s the trick you ask? Well, the art above shows Sylvester Stallone as Poe, but Sly isn’t one of the celebs reading The Raven. [No wisecracks about that’s a treat, please.]
The treat then? Vincent Price’s reading embedded below!
Roger Cormier and Mental_Floss present 16 Fun Facts About Look Who’s Talking. Here are three of my favorites…
3. THREE STUDIOS PASSED ON THE FILM.
Warner Bros., Disney, and Orion Pictures all passed on the idea before Tri-Star took a shot.11. AUDIENCES IN DIFFERENT COUNTRIES HEAR DIFFERENT BABY VOICES.
Foreign countries had their own celebrities voicing baby Mikey. It was Travolta’s idea.15. IT INSPIRED THE TV SHOW BABY TALK AND THE E*TRADE BABY.
ABC’s Baby Talk, featuring Tony Danza as the voice of the little one, wasn’t as successful as the movie; star Scott Baio called it a “nightmare.” The E*Trade baby endorsed the financial company from 2008 to 2014.
Eric D. Snider and Mental_Floss present 10 Deliberate Facts About 12 Angry Men. Here are three of my favorites…
2. IT’S THE ONLY FILM HENRY FONDA EVER PRODUCED.
The actor saw the TV production and felt strongly that it would make a great movie. Unable to find any producers willing to take a risk on it (a serious, single-room drama in a time when colorful widescreen epics were in fashion), Fonda teamed up with the writer, Reginald Rose,to produce it themselves. Fonda wound up hating the experience—not the acting side, which he loved (and he was always very proud of the film), but the business side. He hated having to worry about financial and logistical details, and couldn’t stand watching himself in the daily rushes (which producers, but not necessarily actors, are expected to do).5. IT USES CAMERA TRICKS TO INCREASE THE TENSION.
The problem with making a film set entirely in one room is that it’s bound to get boring, visually speaking (unless it’s a very interesting room, which a jury room is not). Lumet also realized he couldn’t have his characters moving around very much, meaning most of the “action” would involve sitting around a table. So he had the camera move a lot instead. He and his cinematographer, Boris Kaufman (who won an Oscar in 1955 for On the Waterfront), also devised some photographic methods of amplifying the movie’s tone. Lumet wrote: “I shot the first third of the movie above eye level, shot the second third at eye level, and the last third from below eye level. In that way, toward the end, the ceiling began to appear. Not only were the walls closing in, the ceiling was as well. The sense of increasing claustrophobia did a lot to raise the tension of the last part of the movie.”8. LUMET WAS ONLY THE THIRD PERSON TO GET A BEST DIRECTOR NOMINATION FOR HIS DEBUT FILM.
Orson Welles had been nominated for Citizen Kane, and Delbert Mann had actually won forMarty. About 20 directors have since been Oscar-nominated for their debuts. (Six have won.)
Bruce Lee: The Dragon Rises is a new comic book series set to drop in 2016. The series will be co-written by Shannon Lee [Bruce Lee’s daughter] and Jeff Kline, with Brandon McKinney providing the art. Bernard Chang will provide the covers.
Bruce Lee: The Dragon Rises is a co-production of Darby Pop Publishing and Bruce Lee Entertainment.
