The “Criminal Activities” Poster and Trailer are Here!
Criminal Activities looks like it could be fun…
John McTiernan’s “Killing the Butcher” Poster
This Killing the Butcher poster has the right ingredients. Lone guy going behind enemy lines to kill a Nazi butcher, yeah, that could work.
Who knows, John McTiernan could be back, baby!
Source: Critical Movie News.
13 Foreboding Facts About “The Omen”
Stacy Conradt and Mental_Floss present 13 Foreboding Facts About The Omen. Here are three of my favorites…
9. GREGORY PECK AND RICHARD DONNER HAD ONE ARGUMENT DURING FILMING.
Peck wanted to angrily smash a bunch of stuff during the scene where Robert finds out his wife has died. Donner disagreed; he wanted to cut in on Thorn well after the discovery, not in the moment. According to Donner, he and Peck argued about the scene for an entire day before Peck told him, “You’re wrong. I’m right. But you’re the director, and therefore I have to do it your way.” After the scene was shot, Peck reviewed the dailies and conceded that Donner had been right about how to film Thorn’s reaction.11. THE MOVIE CAME WITH A TERRIFYING AD CAMPAIGN.
To promote the movie, gloom-and-doom posters and promotional materials went up all over the U.S. They contained uplifting messages such as:
- “Good morning. You are one day closer to the end of the world.”
- “Remember … you have been warned.”
- “It is a warning foretold for thousands of years. It is our final warning. It is The Omen.
12. THE PRODUCTION MAY HAVE BEEN CURSED.
Like many other horror movies, some spooky things happened to the cast and crew that made them wonder if they had angered some higher power. Here are just a few of the incidents:
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Peck, writer David Seltzer, and executive producer Mace Neufeld were on planes that were struck by lightning or had a near-miss.
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The crew had planned to charter a plane to get some aerial shots, but had to switch at the last minute due to a scheduling conflict. The original plane ended up crashing, killing everyone on it.
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Director Richard Donner’s hotel was bombed by the IRA the day after they shot the safari park scene.
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A zookeeper at the safari park was killed in the lion area, which also happened the day after filming.
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The stuntman standing in for Peck was attacked by Rottweilers during the graveyard scene; they managed to bite through the protective gear he was wearing.
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After the film wrapped, special effects director John Richardson and his assistant, Liz Moore, moved on to the film A Bridge Too Far. While filming in the Netherlands, the duo was in a serious car accident. Richardson survived, but Moore was decapitated. This was especially eerie since Richardson was responsible for the infamous decapitation scene in The Omen.
The Harlem Globetrotters and STOMP Make Beautiful Music
What do you get when you combine the Harlem Globetrotters with STOMP?
Check out the video below and you’ll know!
Neon Joe: Werewolf Hunter (and Dan Panosian)
“Y’all know me. Bet you know how I earn a livin’.”
“No, we don’t.”
“I was under the assumption you’d been briefed about who I am. My name n’ Neon Joe – Werewolf Hunter.”
The Dan Panosian cover caused me to click over. The trailer piqued my interest so I thought I’d share it with you.
10 Things You May Not Know About Teddy Roosevelt
Christopher Klein and History.com present 10 Things You May Not Know About Teddy Roosevelt. Here are three of my favorites…
His mother and his first wife died on the same day.
On Valentine’s Day in 1884, Roosevelt’s mother passed away from typhoid fever. One floor above in the same house, his first wife, Alice, died less than 12 hours later from Bright’s disease and complications from giving birth to the couple’s first child just two days before. “The light has gone out of my life,” Roosevelt wrote in his diary that night.
He won the Nobel Peace Prize.
The man famed for his exploits at San Juan Hill during the Spanish-American War and “Big Stick” diplomacy captured the 1906 Nobel Peace Prize for his role in mediating the Treaty of Portsmouth, which ended the Russo-Japanese War. Roosevelt was the first American to capture the award, and he used the prize money to fund a trust to promote industrial peace.
A boxing accident left him virtually blind in one eye.
Roosevelt boxed for Harvard University’s intramural lightweight championship and continued to spar recreationally during his political career. During his days in the White House, he regularly put up his dukes against former professional boxers and other sparring partners until a punch from a young artillery officer smashed a blood vessel and left him nearly blind in his left eye.
15 Rapid Facts About “Speed”
Roger Cormier and Mental_Floss present 15 Rapid Facts About Speed. Here are three of my favorites…
4. STEPHEN BALDWIN TURNED DOWN PLAYING JACK.
In addition to that Baldwin brother, Tom Cruise, Tom Hanks, Wesley Snipes, and Woody Harrelson were all approached to play the lead. Director Jan de Bont thought Keanu Reeves was a great fit after seeing him in Point Break.5. HALLE BERRY TURNED DOWN PLAYING ANNIE.
Berry wasn’t interested, nor were Meryl Streep or Kim Basinger. Yost wanted Ellen DeGeneres for the role (DeGeneres recently claimed she was never officially asked.) Demolition Man star Sandra Bullock won the role, and was paid $200,000.13. IT TESTED THROUGH THE ROOF.
At a test screening, some audience members walked up the aisles backward so that they would miss as little of the movie as possible before going to the bathroom. It helped convince 20th Century Fox to move up the release date from August to June.
The “400 Days” Trailer is Here!
The 400 Days trailer is here!
400 DAYS is a psychological sci-fi film centering on four astronauts who are sent on a simulated mission to a distant planet to test the psychological effects of deep space travel. Locked away for 400 days, the crew’s mental state begins to deteriorate when they lose all communication with the outside world. Forced to exit the ship, they discover that this mission may not have been a simulation after all.
16 Repeatable Facts About “Groundhog Day”
Roger Cormier and Mental_Floss present 16 Repeatable Facts About Groundhog Day. Here are three of my favorites…
1. TOM HANKS AND MICHAEL KEATON TURNED DOWN PLAYING PHIL.
Hanks was busy, and figured if he starred in the film audiences would just expect him to become nice because he’s always nice anyway. Keaton didn’t understand the script. He admitted to regretting the decision.13. NOBODY REALLY KNOWS HOW LONG MURRAY WAS STUCK IN THE SAME DAY.
Ramis refuted an earlier estimate of 10 years, guessing in 2009 it was more like “30 to 40 years.” In Rubin’s original script, Murray was looping for 10,000 years, and he marked the time by reading one page in one of the B&B’s library books every day.16. MURRAY AND RAMIS’ FRIENDSHIP FELL APART ONCE FILMING ENDED.
Ramis admitted that his old friend and fellow Stripes and Ghostbusters star was “really irrationally mean and unavailable” at times, and often late to set, though he attributed the behavior to a divorce Murray was going through at the time. Outside of a few words at one wake and one bar mitzvah, Murray stopped speaking entirely to Ramis for 20 years, only to finally bury the hatchet on Ramis’ death bed before he passed away from complications due to autoimmune inflammatory vasculitis in 2014.
The Un-Aired Intro to “The Munsters”
Have you ever seen the un-aired intro to The Munsters with the original cast members… and some of the originals did not make it to the series.
“Triple 9” – The Trailer and Poster are Here!
Here’s the poster and trailer to Triple 9.
The “Shades of Blue” Trailer is Here!
The trailer to Shades of Blue looks like we’re in for a good series. I’m in.
J. O’Barr’s Walking Dead Variant Cover
I like this Walking Dead variant cover by James O’Barr. It was created as a giveaway for people who went to Wizard World Louisville, that ran from November 6th to 8th.
Source: Bleeding Cool.
“Somebody I Used to Know” by the Key of Awesome
The Key of Awesome present present their take on Somebody I Used to Know.
9 Mournful Facts About Edgar Allan Poe’s “The Raven”
Joy Lanzendorfer and Mental_Floss present 9 Mournful Facts About Edgar Allan Poe’s The Raven. Here are three of my favorites…
1. AS POE WAS WRITING THE POEM, HIS WIFE WAS DEATHLY ILL.
When Poe was writing “The Raven,” his wife, Virginia, was suffering from tuberculosis. It was a weird marriage—Virginia was Poe’s first cousin and only 13 years old when they married—but there’s no doubt that Poe loved her deeply. Having lost his mother, brother, and foster mother to tuberculosis, he knew the toll the disease would take. “The Raven” is a poem written by a man who’d lost many loved ones, and was soon expecting to lose one more.6. “THE RAVEN” WAS AN IMMEDIATE HIT.
After Graham’s Magazine rejected the poem, Poe published it in The American Review under the pseudonym “Quarles.” In January 1845, it came out in The New York Mirror under Poe’s real name. Around the country, it was reprinted, reviewed, and otherwise immortalized. It soon became so ubiquitous, it was used in advertising.And then there were the parodies. Within a month after “The Raven” came out, there was a parody poem, “The Owl,” written by “Sarles.” Others soon followed, including “The Whippoorwill,” “The Turkey,” “The Gazelle,” and “The Parrot.” You can read many of themhere. Abraham Lincoln found one parody, “The Polecat,” so hilarious that he decided to look up “The Raven.” He ended up memorizing the poem.
7. “THE RAVEN” MADE POE INTO A CELEBRITY …
Poe was soon so recognizable that children followed him in the street, flapping their arms and cawing. Then he’d turn around and say, “nevermore!” and they would run away, shrieking. Trying to capitalize off this fame, he gave lectures that included dramatic readings of the poem. They were apparently something to see. His lecture was “a rhapsody of the most intense brilliancy … He kept us entranced for two hours and a half,” said one attendee. Yet another said that Poe would turn down the lamps and recite “those wonderful lines in the most melodious of voice.” Another said, “To hear him repeat ‘The Raven,’ which he does very quietly, is an event in one’s life.”
