Matthew Monagle
Watch the First Teaser for James Gunn’s Office Horror ‘The Belko Experiment’
I’ve always wondered why more horror films aren’t set in corporate environments. While the office remains a popular setting for comedies and the ubiquitous faux-documentary television programs, anything darker — such as the 2006 horror film Severance which centers on a group of coworkers in the midst of an office wilderness retreat — remains the exception rather than the rule. For how much hidden animosity and frustration your typical office building contains, you’d think this would be an area ripe for exploration by the right twisted storyteller.
Get Your Lin-Manuel Miranda Fix With This Outtake Track From ‘Moana’
It seems to me that Moana brought in two very different audiences this holiday weekend. For some, Moana was the newest entry in a long line of Disney princess movies and a step in the right direction for the studio in terms of inclusiveness and empowering young women. For others, it was a chance to cure their Lin-Manuel Miranda withdrawals after the turnover of the Hamilton cast and the end of the regular Ham4Ham sidewalk performances. That probably explains the odd mix of millennials and children at the recent matinee you attended.
Gal Gadot Describes Her First ‘Wonder Woman’ Costume Experience
One of my favorite parts of Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice was Gal Gadot’s costume as Wonder Woman. Not only was it a much-needed splash of color in an otherwise monochrome film, it was also a nice departure from the overly bulky superhero costumes that have become the norm. Ben Affleck might be a great Batman, but there were times when he looked a little bit like Ralphie’s brother in A Christmas Story, too padded up to put his arms down, let alone fight his way through a warehouse of bad guys. Wonder Woman, on the other hand, looked every bit the agile warrior we were hoping for.
Go Behind the Scenes with Joker and Harley Quinn in This ‘Suicide Squad’ Featurette
Listen, impressionable young men and women of the world, because this is important: you should not watch Suicide Squad and think that the Joker and Harley Quinn represent any kind of reasonable #RelationshipGoal. This is an abusive and possessive relationship, start to finish, and while there may be a more consensual love story scattered among the footage on the cutting room floor, we won’t know until we see it. This is a pretty important disclaimer to throw out there before we talk about this footage
Ewan McGregor Explains Why He Nearly Turned Down ‘Star Wars’
Over the past few years, there has been a small but noticeable attempt to rehabilitate the image of the Star Wars prequels in popular culture. Last November, for example, the A.V. Club published an article on why the Star Wars prequels don’t deserve our hatred. Similar pieces have been published in The Mary Sue, USA Today, and many other websites and online publications. It just goes to show that there is a lid for every pot, no matter how misshapen that pot may be.
Want to See ‘Rogue One’ Early? Fly to the United Kingdom
How far would you go to see one of the most anticipated movies of the year a few days early? Would you drive to the theater on the other side of town? Drive to a neighboring city? Cross state boundaries? Or — gee, I don’t know — fly all the way from your hometown to the United Kingdom for a chance to see a movie like Rogue One: A Star Wars Story 24 hours before everyone else?
Jennifer Lawrence and Chris Pratt Are Very Serious in Space in the First ‘Passengers’ Poster
Now that summer is officially drawing to a close, people are preparing themselves for the inevitable shift from the blockbuster season to the award season. Sometimes the award season movies have months of build up, with endless festival buzz and Oscar speculation; sometimes, though, a film is just sort of there, expected to do well because of its cast and crew but with no real hype to speak of. One such movie is Passengers, the high-concept science fiction film from Sony starring Jennifer Lawrence and Chris Pratt. Much like Christopher Nolan’s Interstellar, Passengers seems expected that special holiday mark between blend of big budget entertainment and arthouse sensibility.
Japanese Blockbuster ‘Shin Godzilla’ Sets its American Release Date
It’s been twelve years since Japanese film studio Toho released its last Godzilla movie, the longest gap between films dating back the first Godzilla movie in 1954. And while Japanese audiences have always loved their kaijū (“strange monsters”) movies, the fact that international audiences are starting to develop a taste for giant monsters has set the stage for Toho to bring back their most famous creation in the 2016 blockbuster Shin Godzilla.
James Gunn Has a Special ‘Groot Version’ of the ‘Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2’ Script
“I am Groot.” With the exception of one small variation, this is the only thing we hear from Vin Diesel’s Groot throughout Guardians of the Galaxy. What makes this such a funny running joke isn’t the fact that he only says the one phrase, though; it’s the fact that Rocket Raccoon understands him perfectly, unearthing complicated sentiments and emotions from three simple words. Translating Groot’s dialogue would be like un-bleeping the profanity in an episode of South Park: you pretty much already know what Groot is saying, and the jokes just work better this way.
Morgan Freeman Joins the Cast of Disney’s Live-Action ‘The Nutcracker’
Earlier this week, we learned that Disney had officially cast Interstellar actress Mackenzie Foy as Clara in their upcoming live-action adaptation of The Nutcracker. You can now add another name to that cast: according to The Hollywood Reporter, Morgan Freeman is in talks to join the movie as the mysterious and whimsical Drosselmeyer. Fingers crossed that this means we will get a Morgan Freeman dance number in the new movie.
Matt Damon is Open to More Jason Bourne Movies
Flashback to four or five years ago and it seemed like the idea of another Matt Damon-led Jason Bourne movie was a bit of a pipe dream. How things change. Not only did Jason Bourne open in theaters this weekend, but according to Entertainment Weekly (via Heroic Hollywood), Damon would be open to coming back for even more Jason Bourne sequels.
Watch Matt Damon Recap the Original ‘Bourne’ Trilogy in 90 Seconds
If you’re like me, even after all these years, you can still remember everything that happened in The Bourne Identity pretty clearly. It’s when you get to The Bourne Supremacy that things start to get a little fuzzy. I remember an early scene in the second film where Matt Damon’s Bourne and Franka Potente’s Marie are ambushed by Karl Urban’s Treadstone assassin, and then some sort of car chase in an Eastern European city, but that’s about the last major plot point I can keep straight in my head. Was Brian Cox in the second film? Didn’t the third film have some sort of investigative journalist? Did Bourne actually ever get his memory back in the three films? Does The Bourne Legacy even matter at all?