Might Laurie Strode (Jamie Lee Curtis) finally find a way to kill the seemingly unkillable Michael Myers? That’s the underlying question in Halloween Kills, the final film in director David Gordon Green’s critically acclaimed trilogy. Myers has been haunting, stalking, and tormenting Strode for years, and she, in turn, has thrown everything at him—at last, we have a confrontation that promises some finality.
The first trailer eschews dialogue (save for one memorable line from Strode when she beckons Michael with some colorful language). The mythic struggle between the impossibly resourceful Laurie Strode and the impossible unkillable Michael has been one of the consistently great aspects of Green’s three Halloween films. Laurie is still afraid but long past the point of playing defense. She’s out to kill Michael, and with Halloween Ends, the titanic struggle between the maniac and the ultimate Final Girl is set.
Joining Curtis and James Jude Courtney as Michael are Andi Matichak, Will Patton, Kyle Richards, Nick Castle, and Omar Dorsey. Halloween Ends is set four years after the events in Halloween Kills, with Laurie now living with her granddaughter Allyson (Matichak) and writing her memoir when The Shape emerges, yet again, to make her life a living hell.
Green promised The Hollywood Reporter that Halloween Ends will feel quite differently from Halloween (2018) and Halloween Kills (2021). “[Halloween Ends is] very different in tone from Halloween and Halloween Kills, and I think that’s part of my self-indulgence. I very often jump around in genres and explore different themes and characters through movies. I just came up with a new twist ending on the ending that existed a couple weeks ago, and that’s something that only I hold the piece of paper that has those words on it.”
Check out the trailer below. Halloween Ends arrives on October 14.
For more on Halloween Kills, check out these stories:
This is one reaction we’re seeing a lot of from critics who have seen Jordan Peele’s Nope, his eagerly-anticipated third feature set on a horse ranch outside of Los Angeles, and involving some unexpected visitors in the sky. Nope has been hyped as Peele’s most ambitious project yet, which says something considering the big swings he took with his Oscar-winning debut Get Out and his sensational follow-up Us.
#NopeMovie is a resounding YES. See it on the biggest screen you can find. A thrilling and strange spectacle unlike anything else out there. I’ll never look at the sky the same way again.
With Nope, Peele re-teams with his Get Out star Daniel Kaluuya and surrounds him with an interstellar cast (excuse the pun). Kaluuya plays OJ Haywood, and Nope is centered on his relationship with his sister Emerald (Keke Palmer, coming in for massive praise) as they try to figure out how to handle visits from some uninvited interstellar guests to the skies above the Haywood Ranch. While terror is an understandable first blush reaction, soon OJ and Emerald hit on a new plan—they’re going to film an alien craft and not only prove we’re not alone in the universe but possibly become rich and famous in the process.
Now that critics have seen the film, their reactions are flooding onto Twitter. While full reviews are still embargoed, you can get a feel for the Nope vibe through these spoiler-free takes:
So #NopeMovie is absolutely phenomenal in so many ways. Perfectly blends together a sci-fi spectacle w/a story that is also something of a Hollywood reckoning & it blew my expectations away. Gorgeously shot, the sound mix is thunderous & the cast all shines. Love love loved it. pic.twitter.com/qdcZIvsX5T
— Heather Wixson (@MMEFXBook is available now!) (@thehorrorchick) July 19, 2022
#NOPEMovie isn’t what you expect and the trailer doesn’t give it justice.
Jordan Peele does the unimaginable — again.
RUN, DON’T WALK TO SEE IT THIS WEEKEND.
E-X-C-E-L-L-E-N-T-!
GIVE KEKE PALMER ALL THE AWARDS CONSIDERATION THIS YEAR.
The most important thing you need to know about NOPE is it’s crazy different from Get Out & Us. This is Jordan Peele spreading his wings and making big budget Spielberg/esque sci-fi, but with the subtext you’d expect. Enter with an open mind and you’ll be rewarded. #NopeMovie
NOPE is out of this world. A monster mash with great performances (esp. Kaluuya) and a 50s sci-fi invasion motif. A spectacle about the horrors of spectacles.
Jordan Peele has been compared to Hitchcock, but NOPE shows he’s a next-gen Carpenter. Enjoy the show and don’t look up. pic.twitter.com/dGKwbXg0WF
#NopeMovie is otherworldly yet indescribable. From instances of sheer terror to heartfelt moments btwn the characters, #Nope is an experience that won’t be easy to shake off as you find yourself picking your jaw up from the floor. Jordan Peele has done it again! @nopemoviepic.twitter.com/bUr1ad5TAx
— Shannon McGrew 🎃🍭 @ Screaming Into the Void (@shannon_mcgrew) July 19, 2022
Not going to spoil any aspect of @JordanPeele‘s #NopeMovie except to say *big* thumbs up.
And cinematographer Hoyte Van Hoytema shot the movie using @IMAX cameras so if you’re going to see #Nope see it in IMAX. Hoytema previously shot ‘Tenet,’ ‘Dunkirk,’ and ‘Interstellar.’ pic.twitter.com/92z9udtRMT
Jordan Peele’s #Nope is one of the best films I’ve watched this year! It’s frightening & ferocious, but also very funny & unlike any UFO movie you’ve ever seen. It is a wholly unique & VERY entertaining horror epic full of wild surprises & an unforgettable Keke Palmer performance pic.twitter.com/iua9HPt0RG
Jordan Peele’s Nope is his most confident, unfettered, and potentially most divisive vision yet. Swapping the exclamation marks of horror for the question marks of sci-fi, this is less about scares. With hints of Close Encounters, Jaws, and more, #NopeMovie is a real puzzlebox. pic.twitter.com/Ny3EVaLTqW
“I feel incredibly loyal and responsible for the original show,” says showrunner/executive producer/director Miguel Sapochnik at the top of a new House of the Dragon video. “It was a game changer,” Sapochnik says about a little show he worked on previously called Game of Thrones.
“George and his writing was a huge influence on me,” adds House of the Dragon showrunner Ryan Condal. “It’s an incredible feeling to achieve my dream job. You get that great call, which is the thing that every writer is hoping for, telling you that we’re going to go make this thing. You’re happy for a few seconds, and then you realize the responsibility that’s on your shoulders.”
The responsibility of following HBO’s world-conquering Game of Thrones is no joke. House of the Dragon has the bones to pull it off, however, thanks to the talented cast and crew and the fact that George R. R. Martin is on board as a producer. Based on Martin’s “Fire & Blood” series, House of the Dragon is set 200 years before the likes of Daenerys Targaryen, Jon Snow, Cersei Lannister, and the rest fought and died over the Throne in Game of Thrones. The series will explore the rise of Daenerys’ ancestors in the House Targaryen and track how these volatile, often vicious dragonlords ruled Westeros and the civil war that followed, known as the ‘Dance of Dragons.’
“It’s great to have Ryan [Condal], a great writer and someone who really knew my work,” says George R. R. Martin, a producer on the series. “He’s going to his best to remain faithful to it.” As for Miguel Sapochnik, Martin knew he’d do a great job, adding that he directed some of Game of Thrones best episodes. Yet even for Martin, there are nerves involved. “There’s always a little suspense on how good is it going to be,” Martin continues. “But I think I’m in good hands with Ryan and Miguel.”
Condal promises viewers that House of the Dragon isn’t just a Game of Thrones prequel for a prequel’s sake but that there’s a good reason to tell this story. And, of course, the series will be hugely ambitious.
“The biggest sets I’ve ever been on, the biggest locations I’ve ever been on, the biggest crew I’ve ever seen, it’s staggering,” Condal says.
Check out the new video below. House of the Dragon premieres on HBO and HBO Max on August 21.
For more on House of the Dragon, check out these stories:
Stranger Things season 4 was the biggest, gnarliest, and most satisfying season of the Duffer Brothers’ ambitious series. Our heroes are a little older, the stakes are higher, and the Upside Down’s mysteries are becoming clear as we near the finish line (the show will end after season 5). There has been no mystery bigger than this season’s reveal of Vecna, the tortured torturer who has been pulling the strings—er, tentacles—behind the horrors haunting Hawkins since the beginning. Now, Netflix has released a new behind-the-scenes look at how Jamie Campbell Bower became the show’s Big Bad. Bower was revealed to be the first patient in Dr. Martin Brenner’s (Matthew Modine) sadistic experiments , and whose evolution into the grotesque villain Vecna was inadvertently aided by a young Eleven (Millie Bobbie Brown).
Bower shares a very interesting tidbit about his audition process—when he read for the role, he was given two sets of sides (the term for the pages of a script an actor will read); one was from the Edward Norton psychological thriller Primal Fear, where Norton plays an altar boy accused of murdering a priest, and the other was from the classic horror film Hellraiser. When Bower eventually met with the Duffer Brothers, they gave him a peek at what Vecna would look like—a former human (with extraordinary abilities) turned into a living skeleton, only with terrible powers and one awfully lethal claw-like left hand. Oh, and also telepathic control of those tentacles!
Bower’s transformation was led by makeup effects department heads Barrie Gower and Duncan Jarman. It began with them taking a life cast of Bower’s entire body, because instead of designing Vecna as a large rubber monster suit that Bower would wear, Gower says it was designed like a jigsaw puzzle, which allowed Bower much more fluid movements and a skin-tight look that resembled horribly burnt but nonetheless real skin.
“The first thing I started to think about was the physicality of this person,” Bower says, which meant special attention to his giant claw of a left hand, which was built practically and controlled mechanically by Bower himself.
Unlike the previous inhuman monsters on Stranger Things like the Demigorgon, what makes Vecna so disturbing is that he is still human (sort of), and the way he targets his victims is by getting inside their heads and exploiting their darkest thoughts. The end result of the collaboration between Bower, Gower, Duncan, and the rest of the Stranger Things team is a monster worthy of Stranger Things’ ambitions.
Check out the video here:
For more on Stranger Things 4, check out these stories:
Deadline reports that Adam Scott has joined Dakota Johnson in the upcoming Spider-Man spinoff for Sony, with director S.J. Clarkson helming the feature. Scott, fresh off earning an Emmy nomination for his starring role in Dan Erickson’s excellent sci-fi series Severancefor AppleTV+, joins a cast that also includes Emma Roberts, Celese O’Connor, Isabela Merced, Tahar Rahim, and Sydney Sweeney.
Madame Web will star Johnson as the titular superhero, a clairvoyant mutant whose ability to predict the future has shaped the lives of Spider-based superheroes including multiple versions of Spider-Woman and Peter Parker’s alter ego. Madame Web will add to Sony’s growing Spider-verse, which includes the Tom Holland-led Spider-Man trilogy, the two Tom Hardy Venom films, and Jared Leto’s Morbius.
One of the interesting things about the Madame Web character and Johnson’s casting is that in the comics, she’s usually an old woman, both blind and paralyzed, who functions using a web-like machine to stay alive and is more a facilitator of other people’s heroics than a superhero herself. It seems likely that Johnson’s version of the character will differ significantly, but plot specifics from Matt Sazama and Burk Sharpless’s script are being kept stitched up for now. Deadline reports that because of Madame Web’s sensory powers, “she is essentially Sony’s version of Doctor Strange.”
Madame Web isn’t Sony’s only superhero film in production—Kraven the Hunter, starring Aaron Taylor-Johnson, is in the works. Considering the colossal success of Spider-Man: No Way Home, which became the highest-grossing film in Sony history with a $1.9 billion haul, you can be sure they’re going to be building out their superhero world well into the future.
For more on films from Sony Pictures, check out these stories:
Featured image: L-r: AUSTIN, TEXAS – MARCH 18: Dakota Johnson attends the premiere of “Cha Cha Real Smooth” during the 2022 SXSW Conference and Festivals at The Paramount Theatre on March 18, 2022 in Austin, Texas. (Photo by Rich Fury/Getty Images for SXSW). Adam Scott in “Severance,” now streaming on Apple TV+.
Eight weeks into its release and Top Gun: Maverick continues to go Mach 10.
The Tom Cruise-led mega-blockbuster soared yet again this weekend, adding another $19.2 million from 65 overseas markets, bumping it up to $619 million internationally. Add another $617 million domestically, and you’ve got $1.23 billion (and counting). It’s official—Top Gun: Maverick is now the highest-grossing film in Paramount Pictures history.
Maverick continues Paramount’s hot streak, with the studio notching hits this year with Scream, Jackass Forever, The Lost City, and Sonic the Hedgehog 2. With Top Gun: Maverick, they now have a film that is racing to catch some of the most successful movies and franchises in history. Maverick is hot on the heels of The Fate of the Furious, which sits at the 20th spot on the all-time list at $1.238 billion. Tom Cruise can also say he took out Iron Man, as Maverick has edged past Robert Downey Jr’s Iron Man 3, which garnered $1.21 billion.
Cruise, director Joseph Kosinski, and a deeply committed cast and crew took what could have been a vanity project—it had been 36 years since the original Top Gun, after all, and there was no guarantee enough new fans would join those of us who recall the original fondly in theaters—and made it into a gotta-see-it-on-the-big-screen experience. To ensure that the film was worth the ticket price, Cruise, Kosinski, and the rest of the team delivered real stunts, with real Navy pilots and real Navy planes, and a storyline that connected to the original and then surpassed it. That commitment to creating an old-school movie spectacle with big stunts, big emotions, and big payoffs has obviously paid off big time.
If you’ve seen Top Gun: Maverick already, the question might be whether it’s time to see it again. It’s still playing in theaters, in case you hadn’t heard.
Tom Cruise plays Capt. Pete “Maverick” Mitchell in Top Gun: Maverick from Paramount Pictures, Skydance and Jerry Bruckheimer Films.
For more on Top Gun: Maverick, check out these stories:
You may be coming out of the weekend, but The Weeknd is still here to help get you through your Monday.
Behold the first teaser for The Idol, the upcoming HBO series created by Abel “The Weeknd” Tesfaye and Euphoria creator Sam Levinson, which promises to be “the sleaziest love story in Hollywood.” The Weeknd stars alongside Lily-Rose Depp, and the teaser revels in the seedy, glam-god version of Los Angeles where massive mansions, piles of cocaine, luxury cars, and vampiric relationships abound. While the plot details are slight, the vibe of The Idol is readily apparent, and considering Levinson’s track record with the excellent, challenging Euphoria, you can be sure The Idol won’t shy away from the harsh light of Hollywood, either.
“Do you trust me?” The Weeknd’s character asks Depp at the end of the trailer.
“Not really,” she replies. We’re guessing she has very good reason to feel this way.
The Idol will chart its course through a world Tesfaye knows well—the music industry—as it follows a self-help guru and cult leader whose burgeoning relationship with a rising pop star fuels the drama. The cast includes Suzanna Son, Steve Zissis, Melanie Liburd, Tunde Adebimpe, Elizabeth Berkley Lauren, Anne Heche, and Nico Hiraga.
We don’t yet have a release date for The Idol, but the teaser is heavy on Hollywood atmospherics as young, beautiful people live dangerously. HBO promises The Idol is coming soon.
Check out the teaser below:
For more on Warner Bros., HBO, and HBO Max, check out these stories:
Isabelle Huppert, one of the world’s undisputed queens of stage and screen, has won nearly every award an actor could possibly receive. In France, she is an Officer of the National Order of the Legion of Honor, an Officer of the National Order of Merit, and a Commander of the Order of Arts and Letters, the highest honors given to citizens of the country. She is now co-starring in the ensemble cast of Mrs. Harris Goes to Paris, which is releasing in theaters on July 15th. The film is directed by Anthony Fabian, who co-wrote the screenplay based on Paul Gallico’s 1958 novel.
Lesley Manville stars as English housekeeper Ada Harris, a widow living in post-World War II London. Mrs. Harris’s desire to make her dream of owning a couture Dior gown a reality sends her on an adventure in Paris. She heads for the storied House of Dior with her hard-earned money, determined to buy a dress. There, she is met with a series of setbacks, not least in the form of Madame Colbert (Huppert), the intimidating manager of the fashion house. Undeterred, Mrs. Harris faces every obstacle with aplomb and determination, changing all those around her in the process.
Huppert brings her usual nuance and complexity to the role of Madame Colbert, who has secrets and many layers to shed on her way to greater joy. In fact, all the characters transform through Mrs. Harris’s presence. The Credits chatted with Isabelle Huppert about her inspiration for the character and the experience of working on her latest film.
It feels like everyone can make some kind of connection to the characters in Mrs. Harris Goes to Paris. My own connection is to your character because my French grandmother was the head of publicity for Christian Dior in the 50s. Who did you have in your life who was an inspiration for Madame Colbert?
I didn’t have someone in particular, but my family was, in a way, connected to the world of fashion. My great-great-grandmothers were famous fashion designers and had one of the leading fashion houses at the turn of the 20th century. They were called the Callot Sisters (Callot Soeurs). Some of the dresses are still exhibited at the Metropolitan Museum. They were very famous, but the company no longer exists. It’s funny because as I’m talking to you, I’m just making the connection. Since I started doing interviews, I didn’t even think about saying it. Because you talked about your grandmother, all of a sudden I realized I have my own connection, in a way, to the fashion world, even if I don’t have any of their dresses, because they’re all gone or in museums. Sometimes I have a dress in a film I’m in, and it’s a Callot dress, which is wonderful.
You’ve said acting happens when it’s the right person in front of you, and it’s clear in the scenes with Leslie Manville that you’re creating sparks together. Were there rehearsals?
No, we didn’t have rehearsals. Actually, we didn’t even have any readings of the script. It was very, very well written and the dialogue really was good. The director Tony Fabian relied on our skills. We just wanted to do it, and we had such pleasure in the experience, that was enough for us to do it well, I guess. The whole situation was very clear, and Tony created such a great script that it was easy for us to deliver our performances.
Cinematographer Felix Wiedemann collaborated with the director to create a feeling of a musical without music. How did you experience that concept of creating a sort of choreographed film with so many performers in scenes like the fashion shows?
Well, I think that the art of mise-en-scene is, by definition always a kind of choreography. Even if you have two people in a room, it’s always a way of having people moving in space in a given frame, which is the frame of cinema, so it’s always a choreography. Sometimes in this film, it’s more complicated, because in certain scenes we have more people involved, like at the end of the film and in all the fashion show scenes. But it’s the art of mise-en-scene to give the ensemble a vision of the movie and preserve and highlight every single movement for each character. That’s one of Anthony Fabian’s great talents.
The film really evokes the Technicolor movies from the 50s, many of which had fashion shows, but it’s quite deep, too. There’s grief and hope.
What I really like about the film is it takes you back to the imagery and the magic of a certain time, but it also has so much depth. It is not just something light and superficial that talks about clothes and fashion, It’s much more than that. It says a lot about people’s lives and dreams, and the importance of trying to achieve your dreams and strive to have a better life. In a way, Mrs. Harris is a revolutionary character. She changes people’s lives.
Some of the depth of this film is expressed by the complicated representation of a post-war French woman.
I didn’t just see her necessarily in the specificity of a French woman, but more as any woman of the Western world, not necessarily only French, but all women of the post-war period. My character, for example, is a working woman. Of course, in the end, you find out something behind the surface, but she is a hard-working woman. She’s not just staying at home. She has a certain social position in her life. She needs Mrs. Harris to reveal something about herself, and that’s what’s beautiful in this film, that Mrs. Harris is really a bridge for her, and not only for her but for many people in the house. She urges them to change their views on life and helps them find the confidence to change their lives. She is the catalyst. She makes that possible.
As to Madame Colbert, what would you say is her hierarchy of concerns? What drives her choices?
I think at the beginning of the film, she does not even know or isn’t recognizing her concerns, or rather, what’s important to her. Her hierarchy is a bit superficial, because she only sees life in terms of being the servant of the boss, and wants only to please Monsieur Dior. Her vision is, in a way, completely blurred by this, so she doesn’t see Mrs. Harris coming. She can’t imagine for one second that a woman like this should be allowed into that world. For her, it’s inconceivable, until Mrs. Harris becomes the catalyst she is, shifts Madame Colbert’s consciousness, and allows many more choices for her.
Mrs. Harris Goes to Paris, which is a feel-good film, was in production during the pandemic. It’s interesting that it centers on the importance of compassion and on dreaming of more for ourselves, and those around us. How did that resonate with you and the rest of the cast and crew?
We didn’t really have discussions, but there was certainly the same kind of inspiration for all of us who decided to do the film. When we read the script, we had a clear view and understanding of what the film meant. But interestingly enough, we shot the film during the second part of the pandemic, so we felt very privileged being able to go on working. We shot the film in Budapest. It seems so long ago. It’s been a year and a half ago, already. I think the confinements blurred all sense of time. We felt very grateful for being able to go on working when the situation was still so difficult for so many people, but at that time, productions had started filming again. I think we felt even more enthusiastic about doing it, and the message of being open and compassionate, and the beauty of Mrs. Harris meant so much more after such a difficult time for everyone.
For more on Universal Pictures and Focus Features projects, check out these stories:
After delighting in the alluring visual tapestry throughout director Olivia Newman’s adaptation of the beloved novel Where the Crawdads Sing (in theaters now), you might find it hard to believe production faced a crippling onslaught of rain. So much so, that it flooded the practical set of protagonist Kya’s (Daisy Edgar-Jones) home.
Production designer Sue Chan, whose work includes Shang-Chi, Gone Girl, and Punch Drunk Love (the latter two as supervising art director), mentions they struggled to “keep the landscape from turning into a muddy bog.” But before the crew stepped onto the marshy Louisianan terrain, where much of the film was shot, Newman, Chan, and cinematographer Polly Morgan (Lucy in the Sky) started to pin the painterly aesthetics early in prep.
Young Kya (Jojo Regina) in front of the shack in Columbia Pictures’ WHERE THE CRAWDADS SING. Photo by Michele K. Short.
Both Chan and Morgan connected deeply with the novel by Delia Owens (screenplay by Lucy Alibar). For the cinematographer, she says she was “instantly united” with the director in terms of approach. “I put together a pitch deck and a lot of my references were the same as the ones she put together to get the job,” says Morgan. “We shared the same vision on how the story would be told.”
In exploring the journey – which is a coming-of-age tale where a young girl fends for her survival in the Louisiana swamp circa the 1960s – the trio keyed in on the idea of transformation. Not only did they seek to illustrate the changes Kya experiences but extend it to her environment, especially her family home.
Kya (Daisy Edgar-Jones) in Columbia Pictures’ WHERE THE CRAWDADS SING. Photo by Michele K. Short.
“Kya goes through a big arc in what happens to her and her family. She is sort of frozen in this natural state once her family leaves and the whole natural world becomes her family. We wanted the feeling of everything being absorbed into her home,” notes Chan. “Then when she starts to become a member of society, rather than blossoming, she sort of retreats the way an animal would. We sort of wanted to illustrate that in how you see her house evolving with the story.”
Kya’s shack-like home was constructed in the Fairview-Riverside State Park in Madisonville, Louisiana on a lagoon next to the Tchefuncte River. The setting offered a lush canopy of cypress trees and live oaks with surrounding marsh and swamplands. Chan further filled the space with greenery to create the hamlet. The practical set was built with the time period in mind using a blend of natural colors to complement the surroundings.
Kya (Daisy Edgar-Jones) in Columbia Pictures’ WHERE THE CRAWDADS SING. Kya (Daisy Edgar-Jones) in Columbia Pictures’ WHERE THE CRAWDADS SING. Photo by Michele K. Short.
“We really wanted it to feel like it had been there for a very long time,” continues Chan. “Although these people are not people with a lot of resources, they really care about keeping it up. With the interior, there’s this feeling of layers and layers lovingly added onto it the way lots of people had to in that time period. On the exterior, it needed to feel weathered which our scene painters did a great job transforming.”
The story is told with a moving timeline. We see Kya at a young age become a woman where her quiet life is turned upside when she’s charged with the murder of an ex-boyfriend who, at one point in the story, sexually assaults her. The ongoing trial is juxtaposed with her growing career as an author where she illustrates different animals, insects, and plants living in the marsh. It’s here where we see the house transform into Kya’s home.
Daisy Edgar Jones in “Where the Crawdads Sing.” Courtesy of Sony Pictures.
When Kya is young, Chan says, “The family home is this warm place she is in love with and then it becomes frozen. We wanted nature to come into the home. The birds, animals, the trees just became her family. When she gets her book agent and defines who she is, she starts to integrate, in a more overt way, her art and her choices that are informed by the animals and color all around her.” The production designer added touches of warmth when the family was around and made it cooler in tone when they left.
In photographing Kya’s arc, Morgan illuminated the scope of her environment by paring a large format camera sensor with a set of prototype lenses designed specifically for the movie by Panavision. “I really wanted the frame to be very expansive and pull the viewer in a subjective way,” says Morgan. “We did shoot the movie on wide lenses most of the time with the 14mm and 28mm being my favorites. We wanted to keep the camera close and be with Kya in order to draw people into her world.”
Daisy Edgar Jones and Taylor John Smith in “Where the Crawdads Sing.” Photo by Michele K. Short.
The production design of the house allowed Newman and Morgan to do just that. “The fact that Kya spends so much time on her porch you never really get away from her strong relationship with the natural world,” notes Morgan. “We shot scenes in her home like it wasn’t a set. We didn’t fly any walls. We wanted it to make it feel very real. We were able to frame Kya through doorways at certain times then move with her through the space and have this free-flowing feeling to the camera.”
Morgan leaned into camera movements that felt lyrical. Color palettes were subdued with a mix of low contrast and soft lighting while embracing ambient light. “We wanted to keep it quite naturalistic,” says the cinematographer. “Kya’s journey is relatable to so many people, we wanted to be authentic to how that would have felt in that time period and really try to do whatever we could to turn people onto her experience.”
Kya (Daisy Edgar-Jones) in Columbia Pictures’ WHERE THE CRAWDADS SING. Photo by Photo by Michele K Short.
For the period when Kya was young, Morgan referenced Spielberg to compose the frame. “There is something Steven is so good at when he photographs children. He’s always looking down or up at them and just seeing the world through her eyes. It’s this young girl who is isolated and lost. We really tried to show that through the framing and then change the framing as Kya grows older and becomes more confident and at peace.”
While production scheduled scenes to make use of the natural light, the weather wasn’t always accommodating. Buckets of rain and lightning created their own challenges but the cinematographer (and the rest of the production team) got the most out of it. “When you’re on stage or doing night work, you have ultimate control of the light. When you’re doing exterior work in remote locations, it can be very hard to soften the light and make it pretty. That was my biggest challenge I think on this project and somehow we got away with a good-looking image.”
In helping to flourish in the circumstances, Morgan recalls a piece of advice from cinematographer Wally Pfister. “’If you can’t control the light, you have to make sure you have control of the frame.’ I think as cinematographers we can’t always do what we want and we have to embrace what nature gives and make the image feel the way we want with the camera or the framing.” For Where the Crawdads Sing, the visuals poetically embrace such a notion with splendid detail.
For more on Where The Crawdads Sing, check out these interview with director Olivia Newman:
Based on Delia Owens’ best-selling novel of the same name, Where the Crawdads Sing (playing in theaters now) tells the stirring story of Kya, a young girl abandoned by her family and forced to raise herself in the marshes of North Carolina. Shunned by her town as the “marsh girl,” she becomes the prime suspect in the murder of an ex-boyfriend.
Daisy Edgar-Jones delivers a captivating, stand-out performance as Kya, alongside David Strathairn, Harris Dickinson, and Taylor John Smith. Helming the lush production was director Olivia Newman (First Match, Chicago Fire), making her studio film directorial debut. Having spent many weekends and summers during her childhood at an electricity-less, isolated cabin her father purchased in the woods of upstate New York, Newman says the book’s setting strongly resonated with her. She also was quite taken with the lead character.
Newman received support and resources for the project from fellow Crawdads fan Reese Witherspoon, whose Hello Sunshine media company helped make the film possible. “In our first meeting together, she said that at Hello Sunshine one of their missions is to open doors for people that may not have otherwise been opened … how can we support you in making that transition?” remembers Newman, now working on another Hello Sunshine adaptation, The Last Thing He Told Me, for Apple TV+.
The Credits spoke with Newman about filming in the marsh, finding the perfect Kya, and staying true to the beloved book. Edited interview excerpts follow.
I read that you were sent the book and script by Lucy Alibar (Beasts of the Southern Wild), read them, and knew you had to be involved.
Absolutely, yes, when I first heard about the book, I knew it would make an incredible movie. And when I read it, I could not put it down. I was in awe of the character of Kya, of her strength and her resilience. I read it during the pandemic when I was separated from my family for the longest stretch of time ever, and I connected of course to her desire for that human connection, which I think we all could relate to at that time. But I also thought she was so heroic in her ability to get knocked down and get right back up again, in her ability to not only survive in these incredibly challenging circumstances but find a way to actually thrive, to find something that was uniquely hers, that she was good at. So I just thought that character was fascinating. And then the setting of it for a filmmaker, you just want to grab a camera and start shooting out in the marsh. It’s just gorgeous.
Daisy Edgar Jones and Taylor John Smith in “Where the Crawdads Sing.” Photo by Michele K. Short.
Where was the film shot?
It was shot in Louisiana, mostly on the north shore of New Orleans. When we were trying to figure out where to shoot it, we wanted to make sure we could find a place that not only had those beautiful, wide grassy marshlands, but also had cypress swamp and big live oaks, and also a place where we could find Kya’s beach, and we found all of that in Louisiana.
Kya (Daisy Edgar-Jones) in Columbia Pictures’ WHERE THE CRAWDADS SING. Michele K. Short.
The marsh is another character in this movie, so location was critical.
Critical. The marsh is an extension of Kya. I really feel to understand Kya, you have to understand her connection to the marsh. It’s a place that is her safe place, but it’s also a place that can be very scary. It’s a place that’s isolated, but also a place where sometimes she’s exposed. It’s full of contradictions in the way that nature is.
Daisy Edgar Jones in “Where the Crawdads Sing.” Photo by Michele K. Short.
How involved was the novel’s author, Delia Owens? And did the film version stray from the novel?
Delia was a great resource to us. We all were on the same page that we wanted the adaptation to be faithful to the book. We knew that it had a huge fan base, and we wanted to give viewers the same emotional experience they had when they read the book. That was sort of our guiding principle. Delia read drafts of the script and gave us her feedback, she watched audition tapes, and she was there to answer questions. She was always really happy to be involved, but she also knew that the movie was gonna be its own thing and was very respectful of our process in trying to figure out how to take this incredible book and distill it into a film. Of course, like every adaptation, you can’t keep everything that’s in a book. There are some structural changes, and my biggest priority was that we try to stay inside of Kya’s point of view as much as possible, so then we would really be able to follow her trajectory and understand her character arc best.
Was that behind the voiceover, to help us know her mind?
Kya spent so much time alone in the book, but has thoughts and reflections and is observing nature, and so we wanted to be able to include some of that in the movie and feel Delia’s voice and her writing. A lot of the voiceover takes quotes directly from the book.
Many women were involved in the film, particularly on your crew, for which I read you wanted to make sure all thedepartments were women-led. Why was this important to you? Was it the story or was it just elevating the industry for women or both?
So, a slight correction. That was not a mandate. Our mandate was to make sure that the lists that we were looking at when we were considering people were as diverse as possible. And that’s true for everything I do. I think for this project, the best people for the job happened to be women because they connected so deeply to the book. They were all huge fans of Delia’s novel and brought the same passion for wanting to make sure that the movie adaptation did justice to it. I’m sure it’s not a coincidence that all of my department heads were women because I think we probably connect to Kya’s plight and her story perhaps in a way that might be different for men.
Director Olivia Newman, Producer Lauren Neustadter, Costume Designer Mirren Gordon-Crozier, Daisy Edgar-Jones, Production Designer Sue Chan, Executive Producer Betsy Danbury, Executive Producer Rhonda Fehr, and Cinematographer Polly Morgan on the set of Columbia Pictures’ WHERE THE CRAWDADS SING. Photo by Michele K. Short.
Tell me about working with your cinematographer, Polly Morgan, in creating the look of the film.
From my very first meeting with Polly, we just were completely in sync in terms of our visual references. We really wanted the film to have this very lyrical quality to it. We wanted it to be grounded in a specific time and place, but also embrace the idea that this story also can function in a way as a bit of folklore. For me, the story of the “marsh girl” feels like that timeless tale that you could imagine being told in different cultures and different time periods, and our telling of it just happens to be set in the south of the United States during the 50s and 60s. We looked at filmmakers who are so lyrical in their capturing of landscape and in the emotionality of their camera work; Jane Campion and Terrence Malick were big touchstones for us. Polly has such a magnificent eye. Because we were shooting on location, it was very important to schedule the film so that we were able to capture the landscape in just the right lighting, just the right mood, and give just the right emotional feeling that we were trying to get across.
Kya (Daisy Edgar-Jones) in Columbia Pictures’ WHERE THE CRAWDADS SING. Photo by Michele K. Short.
And Daisy Edgar-Jones, how did she come to be cast? Did her performance in Normal People prove integral?
When I got Crawdads and we were going through ideas for who could play Kya — and there were a lot of young actresses who were vying for the role — Daisy was top of mind because I had recently seen her in Normal People and was a huge fan. There was so much complexity to that performance. Kya is a very difficult character, she’s sometimes difficult to like, and yet Daisy manages to make you really feel for her and get inside of her shoes. And Kya’s equally complex: a young woman in the wild, totally comfortable and strong and in some ways uninhibited, but who has this real shyness and sensitivity to her. She’s awkward and she’s very nervous around people because she doesn’t spend that much time around them. So I needed an actress who could capture all of those different sides of Kya, and in Daisy’s first audition, we saw all of that come through. And from my conversation with her before the audition, the kinds of questions that she asked, and the way she thought about character — she thinks about psychology and human behavior — I knew she would be a fantastic collaborator.
Daisy Edgar Jones in “Where the Crawdads Sing.” Photo by Michele K. Short.
This film so beautifully intertwines many genres: romance, thriller, courtroom drama, coming-of-age, and family ties. What were the challenges in balancing them all?
It was just that: How do we make sure that we’re still engaged in the mystery, even when we were in the romance, for example. It really started at the script level of how do we weave all of these elements together into one cohesive film? Part of the adaptation process was a bit of restructuring that would be propulsive in a movie, so we moved the courtroom trial up to the beginning of the movie so that you’re following the mystery of the trial at the same time that you’re learning about who this girl was and what she’s been through. You’re waiting to find out how is she connected to this murder and did she or didn’t do it as you’re falling in love with her and rooting for her to survive and get through all of the challenges that she faces as a girl surviving alone in the marsh.
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We’re getting closer to our return trip to Middle-earth.
Amazon Studios has revealed the second teaser trailer for The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power, their hugely ambitious upcoming series that will tell the story of the Second Age of Middle-earth. Fans of both J.R.R. Tolkien’s iconic novels “The Hobbit” and “The Lord of the Rings,” as well as Peter Jackson’s trilogies, are no doubt thrilled about the sprawling, epic series. Yet even casual fantasy fans, as well as folks who loved Game of Thrones, have lots to be intrigued about here. The Rings of Power is, without a doubt, the biggest fantasy series since Thrones. What’s more, it’s also the biggest swing Amazon Studios has taken yet, and that’s saying something considering they’ve produced Barry Jenkins’ gorgeous adaptation of Colson Whitehead’s The Underground Railroad, to name but one major undertaking.
The new trailer gives us a better glimpse at some of the characters who will be populating the series, including Isildur (Maxim Baldry), Elendil (Lloyd Owen), Pharazôn (Trystan Gravelle), and Queen Regent Míriel (Cynthia Addai-Robinson). The eight episodes will roam across the landscape of Tolkien’s richly envisioned world, with stops in the Elven realms of Lindon and Eregion, the Dwarven realm Khazad-dûm, the Southlands, the Northernmost Wastes, the Sundering Seas, and the island kingdom of Númenór.
The characters on hand include Galadriel (Morfydd Clark), Elrond (Robert Aramayo), High King Gil-galad (Benjamin Walker), the Harfoots Marigold Brandyfoot (Sara Zwangobani), Elanor ‘Nori’ Brandyfoot (Markella Kavenagh), Poppy Proudfellow (Megan Richards) and Sadoc Burrows (Sir Lenny Henry), The Stranger (Daniel Weyman), the Dwarves King Durin III (Peter Mullan) and Prince Durin IV (Owain Arthur), Halbrand (Charlie Vickers), and Arondir (Ismael Cruz Córdova).
Check out the new trailer below. The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power premieres on Amazon Prime Video on September 2.
Here’s the official synopsis for The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power:
The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power brings to screens for the very first time the heroic legends of the fabled Second Age of Middle-earth’s history. This epic drama is set thousands of years before the events of J.R.R. Tolkien’s “The Hobbit” and “The Lord of the Rings” books, and will take viewers back to an era in which great powers were forged, kingdoms rose to glory and fell to ruin, unlikely heroes were tested, hope hung by the finest of threads, and one of the greatest villains that ever flowed from Tolkien’s pen threatened to cover all the world in darkness. Beginning in a time of relative peace, the series follows an ensemble cast of characters, both familiar and new, as they confront the long-feared reemergence of evil to Middle-earth. From the darkest depths of the Misty Mountains, to the majestic forests of the elf capital of Lindon, to the breathtaking island kingdom of Númenor, to the farthest reaches of the map, these kingdoms and characters will carve out legacies that live on long after they are gone.
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Thor: Love and Thunder has scored the biggest Thor opening yet, proving MCU fans are loving writer/director Taika Waititi’s romantic comedy space adventure. The film reunites Thor (Chris Hemsworth) and his ex-girlfriend Jane Foster (Natalie Portman), who has become the Mighty Thor. They fight to stop Gorr the God Butcher (Christian Bale) from killing all the gods and goddesses of the universe.
Essential to capturing the essence of Waititi’s aesthetic is the bright explosion of color represented in every aspect of the project, and that extends to the costumes created by designer Mayes C. Rubeo. An Emmy winner for her costume designs on WandaVision and well-versed in the world of Thor from her work on Ragnarok, Rubeo is no stranger to the Marvel Universe. She is also a frequent collaborator with Waititi, garnering an Oscar nom for her inspired costumes in his Jojo Rabbit. For Thor: Love and Thunder, Rubeo found inspiration from Waititi’s endless energy and joyful approach to filmmaking, finding ways of creating looks lesser artists would find impossible. We spoke to Rubeo about some of the more challenging costumes audiences see in Love and Thunder, and how she sees herself as a facilitator in collaborating with the actors to help them build their characters.
Chris Hemsworth has 25 costumes in Love and Thunder. The 80s biker look is especially wonderful and full of color.
That 80s costume was based on Big Trouble in Little China, which is a movie that we all loved. There’s no better person on the planet to rock that kind of look than Chris. He worked so much on his physique to really be the strongest, the biggest Thor ever. That demanded an incredible amount of discipline, but he’s a wonderful artist and takes all aspects of his job seriously. Taika is a person of color, and he loves his life to be full of color.
All those costumes have to be inspiring in terms of getting into character.
Yes, but a costume designer is only an accessory to help actors find their character. We are just like a lantern on the way for them to help find their complete character. It’s complex and it is an integral collaboration.
Speaking of collaboration, the Mighty Thor costume looks so powerful, it seems like it would give Jane strength. How did you work with Natalie Portman, and what were some of the considerations for that costume?
If you notice, every time that Jane is the Mighty Thor, even her muscles are bigger, and she stands taller and has a different posture and is stronger. That is Natalie’s work as an actor, and also that wonderful costume. In Marvel visual development there is a group of fantastic artists that is led by visual development supervisor Andy Park, a wonderful illustrator. There were very smart lines that I had to follow in order to build this costume. That was great, because in reality Natalie is very slight and is not a tall woman, and she has a stuntwoman also working in the action scenes. To do her superhero costume we needed 10 sets because we had all the principal costumes and then those for the stuntwoman, who was much bigger than her, for the long shots. It had to not only look good but also be good for the action, including wire work or being catapulted or fighting, that’s all the technical issues that have to be considered.
That was very important, but not a problem. There are so many articles that you can find in vegan material. She is vegan and good for her, but there are also so many other people in the world that are, so there are more and more textiles and brands available. There is leather that comes from cactus. Imagine that! It’s from agave, and it’s amazing because it looks just like leather. It was also good and challenging for me to exercise that, to get to know so many sources for vegan clothing and textiles.
The draping on Christian Bale’s costume as Gorr the God Butcher is modeled after statues and is actually quite complicated as a design. It’s white, which is a color used in mourning in ancient times. It also looks like a funeral shroud, which is powerful symbol around his lack of joy and his bleak hopelessness.
There were many conversations about Gorr, especially with me and Taika. We did so many sketches, but also Taika decided he wanted him in white. He wanted to portray Gorr in an archaic and ancient way, and how ancient people mourned. He had lost his daughter, so all the color had gone out of his life. This is a metamorphosis that happens to many people who are in great pain in their lives, a sort of in-between place where none of the colors of life exists. Christian embraced it all.
The costumes in Omnipotence City are so extravagant and opulent and just an orgy of color. They must have been a huge challenge.
I love to talk about Omnipotence City! I gave Taika some ideas about what gods could be there. My pitch was ‘why don’t we represent every god by how it is represented in every religion?’ You may have an alabaster or terra cotta god, or an Aztec warrior made of turquoise inlay. We had a Mayan god, and got the smallest man in Australia and created a costume that was made all of clay like it was a Mayan idol, but then Taika extrapolated that and made him a giant. I also made sure everything was balanced in this world, with an equal number of male and female gods. Anytime I can, I’ll do that, put things in balance. We had a Lady of Elche, which is an anthropological find in the Iberian Peninsula, and we made an orange costume with wheels at the ears. So many very original costumes and even some that didn’t make the cut, and we made them all.
What is one challenging costume you’re very proud of that viewers can seek out in the film?
For the Omnipotence City scene, I did a god costume that had to be all in turquoise, in broken pieces like a mosaic. We actually made a digital print of the inlaid turquoise, with all the nuances in colors, and made a body suit for this actor, and then the makeup artists matched it for his face. His headpiece was a 3D piece with elements to look like solid gold, and then I personally put all the feathers in that. It is seen onscreen for about 2 seconds, but I was very proud of it. It was challenging, but I just loved it. Everything about this project was fun.
Thor: Love and Thunder is in theaters now.
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Ryan Gosling is currently making the publicity rounds to discuss starring alongside Chris Evans in the Russo Brothers spy thriller The Gray Manfor Netflix. Yet the good-natured Gosling is willing to take a question or two about another big role he’s got on his slate, playing Ken to Margot Robbie’s Barbie in writer/director Greta Gerwig’s Barbie.
Speaking with Variety, Gosling responded to a question about the role this way: “Finally, it’s happening. This has been coming my whole life.”
This live-action take on Barbie was written by Gerwig and her partner Noah Baumbach and was a hot commodity the second it was announced considering the talent involved. Joining Robbie and Gosling as Barbie and Ken are Alexandra Shipp, Kate McKinnon, America Ferrera, Simu Liu, Will Ferrell, and Hari Nef. The first image of Gosling as Ken caused quite the stir when it was released, which reveals him with a solid spray tan, bleached blonde hair, a matching denim vest and jeans and, the coup de grace, exposed “Ken” underwear.
“I felt like I was seeing myself. I felt seen,” Gosling joked to Variety. “I think a lot of Kens will feel seen when they see this. Gotta do it for the Kens. Nobody plays with the Kens.”
Barbie was filmed in London, with the first image of both Gosling and Robbie in their respective roles causing a stir when they were released back in April.
Caption: MARGOT ROBBIE as Barbie in Warner Bros. Pictures’ “BARBIE,” a Warner Bros. Pictures release. Photo Credit: Jaap Buitendijk
Back in 2021, Robbie told British Vogue that taking on the iconic doll “comes with a lot of baggage … and a lot of nostalgic connections. But with that comes a lot of exciting ways to attack it. People generally hear ‘Barbie’ and think, ‘I know what that movie is going to be,’ and then they hear that Greta Gerwig is writing and directing it, and they’re like, ‘Oh, well, maybe I don’t.’”
We definitely don’t, but we can’t wait to find out what Gerwig, Robbie, Gosling, and the rest of the cast and crew have done with the famous Mattel doll. Sorry, dolls—sometimes you do forget about Ken.
From a Galaxy far, far away to the Marvel Cinematic Universe goes Alden Ehrenreich. The Solo: A Star Wars Story star is heading to the MCU for a meaty role in Marvel’s upcoming Ironheart series on Disney+, Deadlinereports.
Ironheart stars Dominque Thorne as Riri Williams, a young genius who creates the most technologically advanced suit since a guy by the name of Tony Stark created the ever-evolving Iron Man armor. Ehrenreich joins Thorne and In The Heights star Anthony Ramos in the series, which is being led by head writer Chinaka Hodge.
Ironheart first appeared in Marvel comics in 2016 in “Invincible Iron Man Vol. 2 #7.” Throne’s role as Riri Williams is expected to become a big part of the MCU’s Phase Four, especially considering Tony Stark’s demise at the end of Avengers: Endgame has left the team without a tech genius (Mark Ruffalo’s Bruce Banner is a genius, of course, but he’s never been the tech wiz Tony was or Riri will likely be.)
So who’s Ehrenreich playing? That bit of business remains unknown, but Deadline reports it’s expected to be a big role. Ehrenreich is coming off a role in one of the most star-studded upcoming films, Christopher Nolan’s Oppenheimer, which includes Iron Man himself, Robert Downey Jr. Ehrenreich will next appear in Elizabeth Banks’s Cocaine Bear for Universal Pictures.
Filming for Ironheart began this June in Atlanta and is expected to carry through October. There’s no release date as of yet for the series.
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Your 74th Emmy Awards nominations have been announced, and despite the TV Academy deciding against sharing individual tallies by platform (the TV landscape is expanding so rapidly that this is probably becoming difficult to do), the math has been done and it looks like HBO has edged out Netflix for the biggest overall haul.
Yet we’re less concerned with which platform or network had the most nominations and more delighted by the many talented people who spoke to who got nominated. Some of those nominees worked on Netflix’s Stranger Things (which wrapped its tentacles around 13 in total), like music editor Lena Glikson, who helped thread Kate Bush’s song “Running Up That Hill” throughout the season. Glikson’s work was not only crucial to the success of Stranger Things’ darkly compelling, phenomenally successful fourth season, but it also helped reignite the love for Bush’s 1985 classic, which as of July 11 topped both Billboard global charts. Speaking of those tentacles (if you’ve seen the show, you know what we mean), we also spoke with sound team members Craig Henighanand Angelo Palazzoabout how they created the slithering soundscape of the Upside Down and more.
The most nominated show of all is HBO’s Succession, with a whopping 25, and two of those nominations belong to director Mark Mylod and composer Nicholas Britell. We got a chance to speak to both of them about crafting the performances and the sound of season 3’s all-out war within the Roy family, TV’s most beloved nest of vipers.
Staying with HBO for a moment, how about the twisted journey of Barry (14 nominations total) season 3? We spoke to cinematographer Carl Herse, nominated for his work lensing five of this season’s eight episodes. Herse gave us the scoop on Barry‘s cinematic touchstones, the liberating way the series is filmed, and lighting Barry’s dark path.
Over on Disney+, we were delighted to find out how Emmy-nominated cinematographer Gregory Middletonmade the leap in the Marvel Cinematic Universe with Moon Knight (8 nominations total), with Middleton telling us how you film a scene with your main character (Oscar Isaac), your second main character (also Oscar Isaac), and a giant talking hippotamus (voiced brilliantly by Antonia Salib).
Hulu’s Pam & Tommy (10 nominations) was going to work—or not—thanks in no small part to the efforts of Emmy nominee Jason Collins, whose job as makeup effects designer required him to turn Lily James and Sebastian Stan into the two of the most iconic people of ’90s. His nomination speaks for how well he did.
There’s more—a lot more—in our TV coverage on The Credits.
One of the most influential and eerily prescient sci-fi series returns at last and is doing so with a stellar cast.
Varietyhas the scoop that series creator Charlie Brooker has found at least some of his cast for Black Mirror season 6, and it’s a doozy. The beloved anthology series returns to Netflix with the likes of Zazie Beetz, Aaron Paul, Paapa Essiedu, Kate Mara, Josh Hartnett, Clara Rugaard, Danny Ramirez, Auden Thornton, and Anjana Vasan starring. The wild thing is that this bonkers list apparently only represents three episodes in the new season, so expect to hear about more stars joining.
Black Mirror has not only managed to produce an astonishingly high rate of exquisitely compelling episodes (for this viewer, there really isn’t a bad episode) but it’s been ahead-of-the-curve with casting from the jump. While many of season 6’s stars are already well established, Black Mirror has a knack for picking the perfect person for the perfect role, shining a light on character actors, or, providing a new angle on performers whose range you think you know but who, in fact, have been waiting for something as daring as Black Mirror to come along. Brilliant performers like Andrea Riseborough, Daniel Kaluuya, Rosemarie DeWitt, Georgina Cambell, Andrew Scott, Gugu Mbatha-Raw, Letitia Wright, Cristin Milioti, and Michaela Coel have all appeared on the show.
As is to be expected, there’s zero by way of plot specifics for Black Mirror season 6, but Variety reported back in May that it will be longer than season 5’s truncated 3-episode arc. Yet in just those three episodes, Black Mirror reminded viewers why it’s considered the pinnacle of modern sci-fi, with three gut-punch episodes that delivered not only the creeps and the terror we’ve come to expect but also, in at least the first episode, a portion of love. Anthony Mackie and Yahya Abdul-Mateen II starred in season 5’s premiere episode, “Striking Vipers,” which turned out to be a beautiful (if twitchy and nerve-wracking) look at same-sex attraction and love. Season 5’s 3rd episode, “Rachel, Jack, and Ashley Too” starred Miley Cyrus (she was excellent) in a clever, creepy spin on fandom, fame, and loneliness.
Many of season 6’s stars know a thing or three about working on hit shows. Zazie Beetz stars in Donald Glover’s consistently inventive and brilliant Atlanta. Aaron Paul starred in one of the most lauded shows of the past 20 years, Breaking Bad, and currently stars on HBO’s prestige sci-fi drama Westworld. Paapa Essiedu stars in Sky’s Gangs of London and The Lazarus Project, while Auden Thornton plays Lucy in NBC’s mega-successful This is Us.
Meanwhile, Josh Hartnett will next be seen in Christoper Nolan’s Oppenheimer, Danny Ramirez recently played Lt. Mickey “Fanboy” Garcia in Top Gun: Maverick, Anjana Vasan rocked out in Peacock’s punk rock show We Are Lady Parts, and Clara Rugaard broke out in the Sky series The Rising.
Needless to say, all of these stars will now be joining a long list of talented actors who loved, lost, and screamed bloody murder on one of the best shows around.
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Featured image: AUSTIN, TEXAS – MARCH 19: Zazie Beetz attends the premiere of “Atlanta” during the 2022 SXSW Conference and Festivals at The Paramount Theatre on March 19, 2022 in Austin, Texas. (Photo by Rich Fury/Getty Images for SXSW)
Director Halina Reijn’s Bodies Bodies Bodies was one of this year’s SXSW Festival’s big hits, and now the first official trailer gives you a glimpse of why it’s sitting at a 96% fresh rating on Rotten Tomatoes. Reijn’s film delights in gathering a group of rich kids for a “hurricane party” in the sprawling suburban mansion owned by the parents of David (Pete Davidson). The hurricane gives them ample excuse to hole up in the manse, party, and generally treat each other with the casual malice that infects so much of our online discourse. The trailer reveals the cast, led by Amandla Stenberg as Sophie, Borat 2 breakout star Maria Bakalova as Bee, and Davidson’s David as their hurricane party becomes a slasher nightmare.
Sophie and Bee (the latter a newcomer to the group) are a new couple, and they arrive at the mansion to find their contemporaries poolside, before the hurricane has hit, just revving up their engines for the big night ahead. Eventually, they’ll gather indoors to play “Bodies Bodies Bodies,” in which one person is the “murderer” and kills their victims by touching them on the back. When you find a victim, you call out “body body body!” to signify the game has commenced, and the object is to identify the killer before he or she takes everyone out.
Bodies Bodies Bodies satirizes the social media-saturated, blisteringly judgmental, and grossly performative umwelt of being young and alive today, with the friends gathered at David’s house so casually nasty to each other that having actual enemies seems beside the point. That’s when Bodies Bodies Bodies goes from social satire into a full-blown slasher flick, with the party guests dropping off, brutally, one by one.
Bodies Bodies Bodies scored big with critics when it debuted at SXSW, especially because of a twist ending, always so tricky to pull off, that lands. The trailer offers enough of a sneak peek to whet your appetite. By the dog days of summer in August, when lounging poolside sounds like the only thing you’d want to do, Bodies Bodies Bodies offers a zesty whodunit about what can go wrong when you’ve got everything you could want in the world but true friendship.
Check out the trailer below. Bodies Bodies Bodies hits select theaters on August 5.
Here’s the official synopsis for Bodies Bodies Bodies:
When a group of rich 20-somethings plan a hurricane party at a remote family mansion, a party game goes awry in this fresh and funny look at backstabbing, fake friends, and one party gone very, very wrong.
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Stranger Things season 4 is on track to maybe, just maybe, catch Squid Game and become the most-watched season of TV in Netflix history. Even if it doesn’t quite catch the South Korean juggernaut series, it goes without saying that Stranger Things 4 has been a massive phenomenon. From the resurrection of Kate Bush’s iconic song “Running Up That Hill” into the song of the summer thanks to its season-long importance to the series to the wild, satisfying reveal of who the Stranger Things Big Bad really is (at least, we think he’s the Big Bad), season 4 has hit all its marks.
One of the marks you might have missed, however, if you don’t watch the show with the subtitles on, is the brilliant work of the two people behind them. Take the unimprovable subtitle “tentacles squelching wetly,” which was used to describe this season’s villain Vecna as he hung in his grotesque tentacled web. Or what about “Nancy bandaging wetly” to describe Nancy Wheeler (Natalia Dyer) taking care of a wound? That wound was wet, thank you very much. The subtitles are sublimely descriptive and spot-on, and also a little gross. Now, Netflix’s online magazine Tudumhas published an interview with this season’s subtitle artists, English SDH (subtitles for the Deaf and hard of hearing) author Jeff T. and English SDH Qcer (quality checker) Karli Webster.
“While Jeff T. is responsible for bringing ‘[eldritch thrumming]’ into the world, Webster provides a second perspective to make sure the descriptors are clear, accurate, and relatable for audiences,” Tudum‘s Tara Bitran writes. “Jeff T. previously served in Webster’s role for Stranger Things Season 3 (we have him to thank for all the ‘chittering’), while Webster first descended upon Hawkins for Season 4.”
Subtitling is an art form, and a crucial one at that—millions of people rely on them to enjoy films and television series—so to be able to accurately capture things that are very hard to describe, like a tentacled monster dream-murdering teenagers while suspended six feet off the ground by his own grossness, is impressive. (Translating is also an art form, as we learned from Taco Chronicles producer Hallie Davison.) In the Tudum interview, which we recommend you read in full, writer Tara Bitran calls out some of season 4’s bravura subtitles, many of them unsurprisingly dealing with the monster Vecna. “Tentacles undulating moistly” is particularly wonderful, utilizing the dreaded “moist,” often described as the most hated word in the English language. Jeff T. was well aware of that fact:
“The auditory component is so crucial to the effect of this season. [Series co-creators] the Duffers know exactly what they’re playing with,” he told Tudum. “They know the genre they’re in, they know their historical antecedents, they know the history of horror movies and creature features. And in all those movies, sound design is so crucial. We wanted to try to accurately reflect that in our subtitles for the Deaf and hard of hearing because this is their primary avenue for access to those sensory inputs. There’s just something ‘classic monster movie horror’ about something slimy and wet. They gave us a lot of fun things to play with here. I’m extremely online, and I saw people were like, ‘Why is everything wetly?’ And then, I saw a comment that was like, ‘God, if they put moistly in…’ And I was like, ‘Well, bad news for you.’
Karli Webster concurred and is clearly enjoying herself in her role as well: “It’s hilarious the response that those types of words have received. You see people who have this weird, uncomfortable feeling towards the word moistly, but that’s the feeling that we want people to feel in that moment. It is an uncomfortable sound.”
It’s a very uncomfortable sound, but then again, Vecna is supposed to make you uncomfortable, so, bravo to Jeff T. and Karli Webster for making sure nobody misses just how gnarly of a monster he is. And lest you think that Jeff T. and Karli are choosing the most disgusting possible way to describe what’s going on in a given scene, you should know that before Jeff settled on “tentacles squelching wetly” he’d considered “pustulant oozing.” “I discarded that,” he told Tudum, “because I said, ‘No, I don’t want an angry mob outside my house.’”
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Disney has landed one of the biggest groups in the world.
The Walt Disney Company and the K-pop supergroup BTS have revealed a new global partnership, with BTS’s studio home Hybe agreeing to collaborate with Disney to produce five titles for Disney+. Three of those will be exclusive projects featuring BTS or BTS members. This is a huge win for Disney as they continue to grow their streaming service’s international reach—BTS is arguably the biggest band on the planet.
In a press release, Disney revealed three of the upcoming titles:
“BTS: PERMISSION TO DANCE ON STAGE – LA”: This exclusive cinematic 4K concert film features BTS’ live performance in Los Angeles’ Sofi Stadium in November 2021. Performing Billboard hit songs “Butter” and “Permission to Dance,” this was the first time in two years since the pandemic that the band met fans in person.
“IN THE SOOP: Friendcation”: An original travel reality show with a star-studded cast including V of BTS, Itaewon Class’ Seo-jun Park, Parasite star Woo-shik Choi, Hyung-sik Park, and Peakboy. The program features the five friends venturing on a surprise trip and enjoying a variety of leisure and fun activities.
“BTS MONUMENTS: BEYOND THE STAR”: This original docu-series follows the incredible journey of 21st-century pop icons BTS. With unprecedented access to a vast library of music and footage over the past nine years, the series will feature the daily lives, thoughts, and plans of BTS members, as they prepare for their second chapter. The docu-series will be available exclusively on Disney’s streaming services next year.
Hear from BTS themselves about their new collaboration:
Disney has been expanding their Korean drama since Disney+ launched in South Korea in November 2021. Every major streamer saw the juggernaut success of Netflix’s Squid Game, which is their most-watched show ever (Stranger Things 4 is playing some impressive catch-up, however). Disney+ premiered their own Korean original, Snowdrop, which featured Jisoo, a member of the K-pop girl group Blackpink, and it has become the streamer’s most popular original. Disney+ has promised more than 20 Korean titles in 2022, 12 of them brand new.
Meanwhile, BTS themselves are prime for reinvention. The members revealed that they’re looking to tackle solo projects (Hybe made it clear that despite this interest, they will still remain together as a supergroup), and Disney+ would be a great medium for the individual members of the world’s most popular group to show a new side of themselves.
“We are thrilled to be collaborating with Hybe to showcase their original content created with powerful artist IP on our global streaming services including Disney+,” said Jessica Kam-Engle, Disney’s APAC head of content, in the press release. “This collaboration represents our creative ambition – to work with iconic content creators and top stars in Asia Pacific so their talent can be enjoyed by mainstream audiences in multiple ways. We believe these new titles will captivate consumers worldwide and look forward to introducing more music content on our service.”
“This will be the start of a long-term collaboration, where we present worldwide audiences a wide range of Hybe content for fans who love our music and artists,” said Park Ji-won, CEO of Hybe. “The Walt Disney Company has a long history of franchise-building and promoting musical artists, with its unparalleled brands and platforms.”
For more on all things Disney+, check out these stories:
Featured image: LAS VEGAS, NEVADA – APRIL 03: BTS perform onstage during the 64th Annual GRAMMY Awards at MGM Grand Garden Arena on April 03, 2022 in Las Vegas, Nevada. (Photo by Matt Winkelmeyer/Getty Images)
Writer/director Jordan Peele is nothing if not ambitious. His directorial debut, Get Out, was an astonishing, game-changing horror film that established him as one of the most unique filmmakers of his generation. Peele nabbed an Oscar for Best Original Screenplay, while Get Out‘s star, Daniel Kaluuya, saw his career takeoff—he won a Best Actor Oscar for his stunning performance in Judas and the Black Messiah a few years later. Peele’s follow-up film, Us, was no less audacious and terrific as Get Out, and was, by our lights, egregiously overlooked by the Academy. This brings us to his third feature, Nope, which is his most ambitious film to date.
“Nope stands apart from my other films in that it’s a bigger adventure than I’ve ever tried to tell,” Peele says at the outset of the new look. “From a filmmaking perspective, it’s by far my most ambitious.”
Nope is centered on the Haywood siblings, OJ (Kaluuya) and Emerald (Keke Palmer), whose family has owned a horse ranch in a dusty gulch in Southern California for generations. OJ stayed behind to run the ranch while Emerald moved on, but in Nope, Emerald is back on the ranch when things start to get very, very weird. Some uninvited guests show up and start causing trouble, which would be bad enough if these trouble-makers were merely human, but the main problem for the Haywoods is that these guests appear to be from another planet. Yet this extraterrestrial trouble could turn into a goldmine for the Haywoods, if only they could capture footage of their new guest—a freakin’ alien ship—and make history.
“I purposely wrote something without any regard to how possible it was,” Peele continues. “Thankfully, the great Hoyte Van Hoytema, one of the best cinematographers and mastermind behind some of my favorite films and favorite imagery responded to the script and the challenges.”
“It’s a very exhilarating ride,” Hoytema says. “We shot on IMAX cameras, and we were not shy of doing very extreme or crazy things with those cameras.”
“When you’re shooting on IMAX you just know you’re doing something cinematically special,” Peele says. “The image is so overwhelming it feels like you’re there. I wanted immersion, the awe and the fear and the wonder we all had when we were kids.”
We all want to be immersed when we go to the movie theater, and few directors are as good at creating that environment as Jordan Peele. With Nope, we’ll get his most immersive, ambitious film yet.
Check out the new IMAX video below. Nope hits theaters on July 22.
Here’s the synopsis for Nope:
“What’s a bad miracle?”
Oscar® winner Jordan Peele disrupted and redefined modern horror with Get Out and then Us. Now, he reimagines the summer movie with a new pop nightmare: the expansive horror epic, Nope.
The film reunites Peele with Oscar® winner Daniel Kaluuya (Get Out, Judas and the Black Messiah), who is joined by Keke Palmer (Hustlers, Alice) and Oscar® nominee Steven Yeun (Minari, Okja) as residents in a lonely gulch of inland California who bear witness to an uncanny and chilling discovery.
Nope, which co-stars Michael Wincott (Hitchcock, Westworld) and Brandon Perea (The OA, American Insurrection), is written and directed by Jordan Peele and is produced by Ian Cooper (Us, Candyman) and Jordan Peele for Monkeypaw Productions. The film will be released by Universal Pictures worldwide.
