It’s Official—Andy Serkis is Alfred in The Batman
The cast of Matt Reeves The Batman is really, really good. Now that it’s official that the multitalented actor/director and motion-capture specialist Andy Serkis will be Bruce Wayne’s beloved butler Alfred, we can start to get a bit of a feel for what kind of film Reeves is attempting to make based on the quality of this ensemble.
Reeves shared the news via tweet:
And here comes #Alfred !
The Report’s Production Designer On Recreating a World of Conspiracy
Find the mental capacity for another deep dive into the darkest corners of U.S. government and policy, but put away the newspaper. We’re winding back the clock to the beginning of the Aughts, when the CIA first implemented its “enhanced interrogation techniques,” or what most regular folks would call torture, at black sites around the world. The average American citizen didn’t learn about what the CIA was up to until after the program was shut down,
How Ford v Ferrari Stunt Coordinator Kept Christian Bale Safe at 140 Miles an Hour
“Christian Bale is hands down the best actor I’ve ever trained,” says stunt coordinator Dan Nagle, and for a guy who’s worked on Baby Driver, The Fate of the Furious and John Wick: Chapter 2, that’s saying a lot. A former racer himself, Nagle prepped Bale to portray Ken Miles, the hot-tempered driver who in 1966 competed in the 24 Hours Le Mans against the previously indomitable Italian racing team masterminded by Enzo Ferrari.
Composer Joseph Trapanese on Scoring a Live-Action Lady and the Tramp for Disney +
Video snippets from Disney’s history, showing the studio’s early animators gathered around a live deer, drawing its actions for Bambi, make for both great contemporary Instagram bait and charming Disney lore. They also demonstrate the extent to which Walt Disney encouraged his animators to learn and experiment. That level of commitment to creative exploration is something that can be heard today in the score to the live-action remake of Lady and the Tramp,
How Ford v Ferrari’s Production Designer Rebuilt the World’s Greatest Race Track Piece-by-Piece
James Mangold‘s Ford v Ferrari revisits one of the greatest car races in history. It began back in 1959 when Carroll Shelby (Matt Damon) wins the most difficult race in the world, the 24 Hours of Le Mans, in France. The problem for Shelby is his crowning achievement is also his last race—doctors tell him a heart condition makes it impossible for him to race again. The ever-resource Shelby decides to become a car designer (he can’t bear to leave the sport he loves) and sets up shop in Venice Beach,
Here’s Every Marvel Film on Disney + Right Now
At long last, Disney + officially launched yesterday. One of the biggest draws was The Mandalorian, the first-ever live-action Star Wars series. Considering Star Wars is one of Disney’s most galactically popular franchises, it makes all the sense in the world that The Mandalorian (which folks really like so far) would draw so much attention. A series that looks and feels as epic in scope as a Star Wars film?
New The Mandalorian Clip + Premiere Reviews Hype Disney +’s Marquee Series
The Mandalorian is here. The first-ever live-action Star Wars series began streaming yesterday on Disney +. This means the reactions are in, and if you’ve been waiting to decide whether to fork over cash for another streaming service, you might be doing just that—especially if you’re a Star Wars fan. The Mandalorian is one of the big, marquee series that Disney has been working on,
Going Big Down Under: The 13th Annual Asia Pacific Screen Awards
Entering its 13th year, the Asia Pacific Screen Awards (APSA) is becoming one of the best places to capture some of the most unique voices in filmmaking today. The filmmakers whose work is selected and honored by APSA each year reflect the diversity of the vast region (spanning 70 countries) and the astonishing breadth of stories being told. Take last year’s winner for best director, Lebanese filmmaker Nadine Labaki (and read our interview with Labaki here),
Behold the Insane Fantasy Island Trailer
For a certain generation, when you hear Fantasy Island you immediately conjure up images of ABC’s hit show from the late 70s through 1984, and specifically, of Hervé Villechaize’s Tattoo and Ricardo Montalbán’s Mr. Roarke offering visitors to their remote Pacific idyll whatever fantasy they could possibly imagine. The catch was that those fantasies rarely turned out the way visitors expected them too. That Fantasy Island might be a part of the pop-culture pantheon,
Producer Daniela Taplin Lundberg on Pushing Boundaries With Harriet and Honey Boy
She has produced more than 25 feature films that have moved audiences and in many cases also earned industry accolades. Indeed, Daniela Taplin Lundberg has demonstrated a knack for bringing to the screen soulful stories that deftly explore the human condition — all while keeping budgets in check and quality high.
Armed with filmmaking insights gleaned early on from her parents, producer Jonathan Taplin (Mean Streets) and actress Rosanna DeSoto (Stand and Deliver),
How Last Christmas Production Designer Gary Freeman Got the Rom-Com Look Right
It’s fitting that the season’s first big holiday rom-com, a love letter to a George Michael Christmas song, is as much a testament to London’s enduring charms as it is to holiday-inspired selflessness, love, and cheer. Written by Emma Thompson and directed by Paul Feig, Last Christmas follows shambolic party girl Kate (Emilia Clarke) as she besmirches various charming London corners in permanently smudged eye makeup, dragging around her suitcase (having prevailed too much on exhausted friends,
A Special Look at The Mandalorian Gives us Fantastic Barroom Brawl
The Mandalorian is here, folks. One of the most marquee new series for Disney + officially debuts today, and to get you into the bounty hunting mood, we’ve got our longest look at a single scene yet in this new video. It gives us Pedro Pascal’s titular hero (called Mando by a goon who will regret getting in his face) walking into a bar. It’s like the set up to a Star Wars joke,
First Soul Trailer Reveals Next Pixar Film That’ll Likely Break Your Heart
In Pixar’s vast stable of excellent writers and directors, few so reliably break your heart as Pete Docter. The man behind Monsters, Inc., Up and Inside Out is now back with a new feature, Soul, and it looks like it has Docter’s winning formula of humor, heart, and intelligence.
Soul is centered on middle school band teacher and jazz lover Joe Gardner (Jamie Foxx) whose dream has long been to become a real jazz musician.
Here Are All the Marvel Films and Disney + Series Coming Your Way
Marvel Studios president and chief creative officer Kevin Feige recently told Bloomberg that the upcoming Disney + series Loki absolutely does connect to Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness. “I’m not sure we’ve actually acknowledged that before. But it does [connect],” he said.
This isn’t surprising considering Feige has already gone on record to say that the Marvel series that will be exclusively on Disney’s new streaming service Disney + will all connect to the Marvel Cinematic Universe.
Elisabeth Moss vs See-Through Sociopath in Creepy The Invisible Man Trailer
Writer/director Leigh Whannell’s got a modern update on the H.W. Wells classic The Invisible Man, and it comes from powerhouse horror studios Blumhouse and Universal Studios. Universal has dropped the first trailer, which gives us the set-up and a few effective vignettes that make The Invisible Man one to watch. Who knew being hunted by an invisible sociopath could be so terrifying? Okay, that’s an obviously scary set-up, but this first glimpse at The Invisible Man is still surprisingly creepy.
Watch Mark Hamill React to his Original Star Wars Audition Tape
Watching the always game Mark Hamill watching himself is a uniquely delightful experience. The talented veteran of screens big and small knows full well that he’ll always be best known as Luke Skywalker, and here we get to watch Hamill watching himself—in what feels like a long time ago in a galaxy far, far away—in his original audition tape for Star Wars: IV – A New Hope.
The year was 1976.
These Rescue Dogs Will Steal Your Heart in new Lady and the Tramp Featurette
While Disney’s upcoming live-action remake of Lady and the Tramp for their brand new streaming service Disney + features the voice work of a lot of famous actors—Tessa Thompson, Janelle Monáe, Sam Elliot, and Justin Theroux to name a few—yet the real stars of this new featurette are the rescue dogs that were a big part of the cast. It turns out that finding the right dogs to play your two leads,
Avengers: Endgame Executive Producer Trinh Tran on Capping Off a Decade’s Worth of Work
Last spring, Avengers: Endgame wrapped up Marvel’s Infinity War saga. The three-hour epic spanning space to Wakanda and back again impressed the critics, exceeded audience expectations, and raked in $2.78 billion in gross global earnings. The movie’s length was only one unusual development within the world of superhero fare, with Endgame representing the culmination of 11 years’ worth of work, bringing about the deaths of Natasha Romanoff (Scarlett Johansson) and Tony Stark (Robert Downey Jr.),
Colin Farrell Could be Your New Penguin in The Batman
No one said the Penguin had to look, well, like an actual penguin. For most of us (of a certain age), when we think of someone portraying the Penguin in a Batman movie, we see Danny DeVito in Tim Burton’s Batman Returns way back in 1992. Under Penguin-like prosthetics including a beakish nose, and making the most of his short stature, DeVito’s excellent take on one of Batman’s most iconic villains owed quite a bit to his flightless polar bird namesake.
It’s an Epic Bear Attack in new His Dark Materials Trailer
Now that HBO’s new epic fantasy series His Dark Materials has bowed (spectacularly, we might add), we’ve got a fresh trailer on our hands that looks at the weeks ahead. And while we’re thrilled to follow Lyra Belacqua (Dafne Keen) as her adventure becomes wilder and more dangerous, there’s one particular moment everyone’s waiting for—the armored bear attack.
The premiere episode “Lyra’s Jordan” delivered in a big way,
