Nicholas Hoult might pull off the rare feat of going from nearly playing Superman to playing his arch-nemesis, Lex Luthor. The talented Hoult had gotten far along in the casting process for the role of Superman, but ultimately, Gunn tapped David Corenswet to play Clark Kent, while Rachel Brosnahan snagged Lois Lane. Yet several outlets, including The Hollywood Reporterand Variety, report that Hoult began talks to play Lex Luthor before the actor’s strike began.
Superman: Legacy will be the first feature to come out of Gunn and Peter Safran’s new-look DC Studios, centering on a Clark Kent/Superman in a film that’s not being billed as an origin story but rather a look at how the young Kryptonian balances his alien heritage and his human family ties while defending the Earth as the world’s most powerful superhero.
Luthor’s legacy as a heavy is a storied one, dating back to his arrival on the scene when Jerry Spiegel and Joe Shuster created him for 1940’s “Action Comics No. 23.” On the big screen, Gene Hackman delivered a memorable performance playing opposite Christopher Reeves in Richard Donner’s 1978 classic Superman. Kevin Spacey took on the role of Luthor, pitting off against Brandon Routh’s Superman, in 2006’s Superman Returns, while Jesse Eisenberg played a younger version of Luthor in Zack Snyder’s 2016 film Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice.
Hoult is no stranger to the comic book movie world, having played the lovable Beast in several X-Men films between 2011 and 2019 for Marvel. He’s had a slew of memorable roles in Warner Bros. films, probably none quite as dynamic as playing Nux in George Miller’s flawless 2015 epic Mad Max: Fury Road.
Gunn recently cast María Gabriela de Faría to play the villain The Engineer in Superman: Legacy, joining the aforementioned cast and Nathan Fillion as Guy Gardner/Green Lantern, Isabela Merced as Hawkgirl, Edi Gathegi as Mister Terrific, and Anthony Carrigan as Rex Mason/Metamorpho.
Superman: Legacy is slated for a July 11, 2025 release.
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The final trailer for Ridley Scott’s Napoleon is here, giving us a last glimpse of his sweeping historical epic starring Joaquin Phoenix as the infamous French Emperor. Scott’s hugely ambitious take on a figure that filmmakers have been drawn to for decades has already earned its fair share of stellar reviews. “Scott has created an outrageously enjoyable cavalry charge of a movie, a full-tilt biopic of two and a half hours in which Scott doesn’t allow his troops to get bogged down mid-gallop in the muddy terrain of either fact or metaphysical significance,” writes the Guardian‘s Peter Bradshaw. Meanwhile, the two leads, Phoenix and Vanessa Kirby as Josephine, the love of Napoleon’s life, have astonished critics. “Phoenix, sometimes laugh-out-loud funny and chilling in the same scene, is as compelling as he always is,” writes the London Evening Standard‘s Hamish Macbain, “…But it’s Vanessa Kirby who, much like Ryan Gosling in Barbie, upstages her title character.”
Napoleon transports viewers back to France in 1793 in the midst of a period of cataclysmic turmoil as the Jacobins seized control of the National Convention and instituted a series of radical measures. A relatively unknown Napoleon Bonaparte stepped onto the national stage to defend the nation and was quickly recognized as a brilliant tactician and courageous, almost mythic leader of men. Napoleon tracks the French general’s rise as he deploys his strategic gifts to build what seems to be an unbeatable army, propelling him from military mastermind to the throne and altering the history of France and the rest of the world in the process.
Joining Phoenix and Kirby in the cast are Tahar Rahim as Paul Barras, Ben Miles as Caulaincourt, Ludivine Sagnier as Theresa Cabarrus, Matthew Needham as Lucien Bonaparte, Youssef Kerkour as Marshal Davout, Phil Cornwell as Sanson ‘The Bourreau,’ Edouard Philipponnat as Tsar Alexander, Paul Rhys as Talleyrand, John Hollingworth as Marshall Ney, Gavin Spokes as Moulins and Mark Bonnar as Jean-Andoche Junot.
“I’m the first to admit when I made a mistake,” Napoleon said at the end of the first trailer, “I simply never do.” As historians and even casual readers of history know, Napoleon would go on to make some massive mistakes, and Scott, directing from a script by David Scarpa, gives us a man who seemed larger than life but who was, in the end, just a man—brutal, brilliant, and, in the end, tragically flawed.
Check out the trailer below. Napoleon hits theaters on November 22.
In director George C Wolfe’s follow-up to his critically acclaimed powerhouse Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom, he shines a light on the long-overlooked civil rights luminary Bayard Rustin. Rustin was one of the lead architects of the March on Washington but was also a gay Black man who was out and proud in the 1960s. Although he was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom posthumously by President Barack Obama in 2013, too few people know his importance to American history. That seems likely to change now.
In theaters briefly before streaming on Netflix on November 17th, the film is the first narrative feature produced through President and Michelle Obama’s company, Higher Ground. Co-written by Dustin Lance Black and Julian Breece, it takes place during several months leading up to the March on Washington and features a truly exceptional performance by Colman Domingo in the title role.
The Credits spoke with producers Tonia Davis, head of film and TV at Higher Ground, and Bruce Cohen, who is best known for his Oscar-nominated films Milk and Silver Linings Playbook and American Beauty, for which he won the Academy Award for Best Picture. Davis and Cohen discuss why Bayard Rustin is not just a hero of the civil rights movement but a man who deserves his place in history and why this film is even more important today than when they began bringing it to the screen five years ago.
Tonia, first, can you talk about the directives for features Higher Ground has and how Rustin, about a man director George C. Wolfe calls “the ultimate American,” is perfect as the project for it?
Davis: Higher Ground was started around five years ago now by President and Mrs. Obama, with the directive of telling stories that embody their values, which so many of us Americans have always known about. They wanted to do that in a whole range of ways by talking about our shared humanity, whether we’re making a biopic, a comedy, or a science fiction film. When we first started the company, we were looking for projects like any producing entity would, and we got a call from Bruce, whose work we knew about from Milk and Silver Linings Playbook, and he said, “I have the perfect project for the Obamas, a film about Rustin.” That hit so many different things that we were trying to do. First, it was an unseen story about a man who absolutely should be known. Second, it was with exceptional collaborators, Bruce and also George C. Wolfe, whose work we all loved and admired. It felt like a perfect way for the Obamas to launch the company. That was five years ago. We would have loved to put the film out sooner, but because of Covid, it just took this long to get it out the door.
Bruce, what did you know about Bayard Rustin before this production, and why do you think it’s so important for him to be celebrated and remembered?
Cohen: I had seen Brother Outsider, the documentary about him that came out in the 90s. It made the rounds in gay and lesbian film festivals. There was a moment at that point where a lot of queer people did know who Bayard Rustin was and had embraced him as this incredible, iconic hero of ours. He was responsible for the March on Washington, one of the great historical events of the 20th century. When Lance Black sent me the script, which he and Julian Breece had co-written, I was thrilled because I felt he was very underserved, undeservedly unrecognized, and needed to be. What really shocked me was is It felt like it hadn’t even been passed down in the queer community. Today, even fewer people know about him. I think it’s hard to overstate how important it is for Bayard not to be lost in history and for this story to make it down through the ages, which we’re really hoping the film will help accomplish, in part because it is so much more relevant now than it was five years ago when we started making it. There are many things that have happened in this country that just make his message, what he stood for, and what he accomplished even more important for everyone to know.
RUSTIN (2023) Colman Domingo as Bayard Rustin and Johnny Ramey as Elias. Cr: David Lee/NETFLIX
Tonia, how did Colman Domingo come to the project, and what did he bring to the character?
Davis: Colman was aware of the project really, really early on, and everybody involved in the project was aware of Colman from day one. As George began the process of prepping the film, starting to make notes on the script, starting to really get involved with Netflix and the financing entity, he started hearing Colman’s voice in his head as he was reading through the screenplay and making those director notes. There was almost never a question about who was going to play Bayard. Colman embodied him so perfectly. He was the right age. He was an out gay man who was personally aware of and inspired by the history. Colman, to his credit, had begun research on Bayard himself many years prior out of curiosity and in hopes that he would end up playing him. By the time George officially cast Colman, and they started their official collaboration on the project, he was already incredibly knowledgeable about Bayard. Of course, he and George had worked together before on Ma Rainey, so he was part of George’s world. We were so excited when he said yes.
What was it like to watch him transform into the role?
Cohen: It was the best of both worlds because, on the one hand, we were around in pre-production, so we started to get a sense through the wardrobe fittings, speaking with Colman, and hearing the research. One of the things that George always talks about is the incredible job Colman did in transforming his voice. He’s a baritone, and Bayard was a tenor, so Colman changed his voice to be Bayard. That’s appropriate because we feel the film is so musical. George directs it like a musical composition, and along with his great collaboration with the composer Branford Marsalis on the film score, the whole film has a musicality. We were not in the rehearsals because that’s a very sacred private space with just George and the actors, and George has always been very adamant about doing two weeks of rehearsal. We didn’t get to see the full embodiment of Bayard Rustin back with us in the flesh until the first day of shooting. That was an electrifying moment once we understood what Colman had conjured and would be bringing to the table for the film.
What are you hoping audiences are going to come away with?
Cohen: My strongest hope is that people will not just know who Bayard Rustin is; they will love him. They will understand his charisma, his joy, and how entertaining he was. Both George and Colman, at different times during the filming, felt that Bayard’s presence was definitely with them, and we started to get the strong sense that if this movie was not as entertaining and joyous and charismatic as Bayard had been, he would roll over in his grave and never want to speak to any of us again. It was super important that we pulled that off because we also think that’s part of how and why people will hopefully love the film, and his name will get its rightful place in history, which he one thousand percent deserves.
Davis: It’s also our hope that whoever you are, and whatever your background or sexual orientation, race, gender, or creed might be, you will understand through seeing this movie that you are in history and you could have been a leader in that history. We always talk about how important it is for people to see themselves reflected, and I think for this story to be told in this big way on this big screen with this beautiful cast and iconic director lets you know a little bit about how much you might have mattered in a different generation, and that wherever that generation is, you were present and you were accounted for. That’s really important.
There’s a great message that you can actually do something about things you feel strongly about in a nonviolent and peaceful way, as Bayard Rustin did.
Davis: Bury your differences. Grab a hold of your neighbor, and you can march for change.
Cohen: Bayard put together this incredibly powerful, never before seen coalition of young, old, Black, white, rich, working class, poor, and when you add to that now LGBTQ, that’s a coalition that needs to come together right now, again, if we’re going to save this country. We’re at a moment where we are either going to pull it together or we’re not, but Bayard has much to teach us and much inspiration to give us to understand that that’s what we need to do.
Rustin is in select theaters and streaming on Netflix.
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Good news for all you Dune-heads—Denis Villeneuve’s Dune: Part Two is moving up two weeks and will now hit theaters on March 1, 2024. This gives audiences a nice little light at the end of the winter tunnel, bumping the film up from its previous release date of March 15, 2024. An additional piece of good news is that the film will also play on IMAX 70mm screens, giving Villeneuve’s sci-fi epic the premium format it so richly deserves. This decision comes after the phenomenal success of Christopher Nolan’s Oppenheimer, which played on IMAX 70mm screens and broke records doing so. As of now, Dune: Part Two will play on the premium formats for a two-to-three-week run, but that run could be extended depending on the films that are released in that span.
The date change reflects another movie moving its release schedule—Universal’s Ryan Gosling/Emily Blunt-led action comedy The Fall Guy moved from March 1 to May 3, thus giving Warner Bros. ample reason to move Dune: Part Two up and helping theater owners fill the sudden gap.
Granted, Dune: Part Two had originally been slated for a 2023 release date but was delayed due to the actor’s strike. Now that the strikes are over, stars Timothée Chalamet, Zendaya, and more will be able to promote the film. Villeneuve’s first Dune opened during the pandemic, so the new March 1, 2024 release date finally gives the film a chance to open under normal circumstances.
Joining returning stars Chalamet, Zendaya, Josh Brolin, Rebecca Ferguson, Dave Bautista, and Javier Bardem are newcomers Austin Butler, Florence Pugh, Christopher Walken, and Léa Seydoux. Villeneuve has promised that Part Two is an epic war movie that will move at a brisker, deadlier pace than the more contemplative first film.
Caption: (L-r) TIMOTHÉE CHALAMET as Paul Atreides and ZENDAYA as Chani in Warner Bros. Pictures and Legendary Pictures’ action adventure “DUNE: PART TWO,” a Warner Bros. Pictures release. Photo Credit: Niko TaverniseCaption: AUSTIN BUTLER as Feyd-Rautha Harkonnen in Warner Bros. Pictures and Legendary Pictures’ action adventure “DUNE: PART TWO,” a Warner Bros. Pictures release. Photo Credit: Courtesy Warner Bros. PicturesCaption: FLORENCE PUGH as Princess Irulan in Warner Bros. Pictures and Legendary Pictures’ action adventure “DUNE: PART TWO,” a Warner Bros. Pictures release. Photo Credit: Niko Tavernise
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Oprah Winfrey, one of the power producers behind The Color Purple, joined stars Fantasia Barrino, Colman Domingo, Taraji P. Henson, Danielle Brooks, and more as they presented the film in its first public screening at the Samuel Goldwyn Theater in Beverly Hills on Thursday night.
Winfrey and The Color Purple cast were emotional as they spoke about the power of director Blitz Bazawule’s musical adaptation of the film and how much the movie has impacted their lives.
“For every one of us up here, it is a story of, ‘look at what God has done,’” said Winfrey during a panel after the screening, moderated by Variety’s Angelique Jackson. Winfrey was herself an Oscar nominee for her portrayal of Sophia in Steven Spielberg’s 1985 film adaptation of Alice Walker’s iconic novel. Winfrey said it was Walker’s book that helped her unlock an incredibly painful time in her own life.
“Until that time, I didn’t know there was language for what had happened to me,” she said. “I had been raped and had a child who later died, and I did not have any language to explain what that was. And that book was the first time there was a story about me.”
Starring in Spielberg’s adaptation “changed everything for me,” Winfrey said. Coming back to the material all these years later as a producer was a “full circle moment.”
The role of Sophia in the new film belongs to Danielle Brooks, who wept as she described what it felt like to take on the role and the space that Winfrey gave her to create her own Sophia. “She held my hand and let me fly,” Brooks said of Winfrey.
(L-r) DANIELLE BROOKS as Sophia and COREY HAWKINS as Harpo in Warner Bros. Pictures’ bold new take on a classic, “THE COLOR PURPLE,” a Warner Bros. Pictures release. Courtesy Warner Bros. Pictures.
Both Fantasia Barrino, who came to her role as Celie in The Color Purple with plenty of experience—she won a Tony for playing her in the Broadway musical adaptation—and Taraji P. Henson, who plays Shug Avery, revealed that they needed some convincing to take part in the film. Barrino said that Bazawule helped change her mind and allowed her to see “what women go through and how we sometimes need to imagine ourselves in a different place before we get there.” For Henson, she said it felt like destiny. “The funny thing about life is when something is destined for you, you cannot run away from it. I tried,” Henson said. “This is iconic. This is something that is going to live on forever.”
The Color Purple arrives in theaters on Christmas Day.
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Featured image: Caption: (L-r) TARAJI P. HENSON as Shug Avery, FANTASIA BARRINO as Celie and DANIELLE BROOKS as Sophia in Warner Bros. Pictures’ bold new take on a classic, “THE COLOR PURPLE,” a Warner Bros. Pictures release. Photo Credit: Courtesy Warner Bros. Pictures
David Fincher’s lean, mean The Killer is a film stripped down to its bare essentials, much like the work of its titular assassin. Based on a French graphic novel and adapted by Andrew Kevin Walker(Se7en), Fincher’s adaptation tells the story of an unnamed killer (Michael Fassbender) and the strict, self-imposed protocols of his trade. It’s the rules of the process that concern the titular character, not moral dilemmas, yet they become unbearably intertwined after he botches an assignment, and the fallout affects someone he loves.
On the surface, The Killer is a revenge story. Once the job goes terribly wrong and his partner, Magdala (Sophie Charlotte), suffers violent consequences, Fassbender’s nameless assassin breaks his own rules to track down those responsible. The Killer is a world of shadows, sociopaths, and the people they prey on. For Fassbender’s antihero, feeling like the prey is a novel concept, and he’s determined to do anything to realign the world so he fits back in as a proper predator.
Once again, the director collaborates with cinematographer Erik Messerschmidt, who has been Fincher’s DP on Mindhunter and Mank. With The Killer, Messerschmidt helps Fincher place the viewer into the cramped, icy perspective of the titular character with a grace that belies the chaos he creates. We spoke to Messerschmidt about his working relationship with Fincher and what it was like to bring The Killer to life.
The Killer is surprisingly detailed about the protocols of its titular antihero. What was it like bringing his world to life?
Well, so much of the film is about redundancy and monotony. I think it took an enormous amount of commitment on David’s part to just lean into it and photograph it. I wouldn’t say I was uncomfortable, but I was nervous that the audience wouldn’t feel completely engaged in that decision a little bit. We talked about it. I said, “God, so much of this is just him sitting in cars watching people. Are we going to stay with it?” And David said, “Well, we’re going to try.” We’ve worked together so much that we have a very, very clear shorthand, and we’re able to express things quite directly to each other, which isn’t always the case.
It’s funny how much this movie is about process and presentation, almost like filmmaking.
It is. I mean, I think that’s more coincidental than anything else, to be honest. I mean, are there similarities between an assassin and a film director? I mean, I guess there’s a process.
The movie is also about the stories we tell ourselves and how we tell them, right?
For sure. I think we all lie to ourselves to some degree throughout our lives. We lie to ourselves about our own confidence. I think the movie is about the tragedy of self-confidence, to some degree, and the fragility of it. I think that the killer really wants to believe that he’s completely in control of everything. Of course, he comes to the end, he realizes he’s not, and he finds a little bit of nirvana through that process. It’s almost like the sublime kind of reality of not having absolute control. You can certainly criticize it or explore it philosophically if you want to.
Or you can just enjoy the simplicity of the genre elements, like the brutal fight scene between the killer and a man in Florida. It’s so dark and vivid. How’d you pull that off?
Well, I had never been more conscious of the use of sound in a film than I was on this movie. And look, filmmaking is an incredibly selfish business. And if you’re a cinematographer, you’re generally very focused on the image, on the photography. And when we made that sequence, there were a couple of things we talked about, like the importance of geography and the audience understanding where they were in the house. We wanted the audience to start to build a virtual 3D model of the environment in their head as they’re going through the house. We were very dogmatic with screen direction and very concerned about cutting. We’re not just shooting on a long lens and seeing stuff tumbling in the frame. Hopefully, you get some more context than that out of the scene. But the other thing was that we were having very active discussions about what can be inferred and what can be understood through sound, and what needs to be seen.
How was prep for that sequence?
I think we prepped that to death, quite literally. Dave Macomber, the stunt coordinator, choreographed the fight. They built the house out of cardboard boxes. He shot a stunt team. We made coverage notes with screen directions. He went back, and they did it again. It was over the course of several weeks of refining and refining and refining. And then we were able to look at it, like, “Okay, we want light here. We don’t want light here. What are the realities of making sure everything is consistent?” I lit the whole house, and then we just methodically went through it.
Like you said, you never thought about sound as much as you did on this movie, so how much did the use of The Smiths influence your choices?
Yeah, that was a late edition. He was playing The Smiths, and he knew he wanted to use the song “How Soon is Now?” They had talked about the kind of cutting between where the sound becomes subjective as well. You hear the headphones, and then you hear the tiny kind of bleed from the headphones when the camera’s outside of his head. We had had those discussions, but the soundtrack and The Smith’s portion of it, I don’t think David had decided on until well into the cutting process.
With a David Fincher movie, you always feel like you’re in good hands as a viewer. Right from the beginning, how’d you both want to set a tone and invite the audience into The Killer’s point-of-view?
Well, I think we’re saying, look at this, this is important, and then we’re going to cut to this. This is important. It’s a bit of a spoon feed intentionally. We want to take you along a ride and give you an experience. It’s everything that’s included in the frame. Every decision we’re making, every cut, is something that was discussed and considered. More than anything before, certainly more than Mindhunter. David was very surgical about how we include things in the frame and how Michael exists within that composition more than any movie I’ve ever done.
In creating these experiences, what about the Red camera speaks to you both?
Well, we’ve shot Red for a number of years. David’s been shooting with Red longer than I have, actually. He started using the red camera on The Social Network. I don’t fundamentally view the camera as having any real impact on the image, and I think it’s a crime to cinema to suggest that. To suggest that the camera, somehow, the camera choice somehow influences the aesthetic is just wrong. I mean, it’s insulting the cinematography. The cameras have certain qualities and certain features that affect the type of photography you can do, but hopefully, I could shoot Alexa and I can get the image to look like that to some degree.
It’s a tool, right?
It’s a tool. It’s like Eric Clapton plays a Stratocaster because Eric Clapton likes it, but he could pick up a Les Paul, and he could play it, but he chooses to play a Stratocaster. I don’t think Clapton would ever argue that it’s a superior guitar. It’s just the tool he’s most comfortable with. I feel the same way about cameras.
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While Marvel Studios looks like they’ve found their next big superhero, James Gunn and Peter Safran’s new DC Studios has just landed their first big villain. Deadlinereports that Gunn has cast María Gabriela de Faría to play Angela Spica, aka The Engineer, in his upcoming Superman: Legacy. The Venezuelan actress has had roles in the comedies Animal Control and The Moodys for Fox, and she starred in Lionsgate’s The Exorcism of God. Playing a villain in Gunn’s hotly-anticipated Superman reboot is a major step for the rising star.
Her character, Angela Spica, was created by Warren Ellis and Bryan Hitch for “The Authority vol. 1” in 1999. Her abilities are based on nanotechnology that she’s got built into her body, which gives her tremendous powers due to having what is essentially a liquid metal form. She’ll be facing off against David Corenswet’s Superman, yet plot details are, of course, being kept under wraps.
Gunn’s Superman: Legacy will be the first official film in his and Safran’s new DC Studios, kicking off a unified universe of feature films and television series. The film isn’t being billed as a Superman origin story, however, but rather will focus on Clark Kent’s struggles to reconcile his Kryptonian heritage and his human connections as he faces down evil in the world that adopted him.
With the casting of María Gabriela de Faría as The Engineer, Gunn is setting up The Authority movie that he and Safran previously announced, which will bring in more characters from the WildStorm comic book universe that DC Comics bought in 1999. Gunn has previously teased The Authority as a film focused on a team of superheroes who deploy extreme methods to protect the planet. “One of the things of the DCU is that it’s not just a story of heroes and villains,” Gunn said. “Not every film and TV show is going to be about good guy vs. bad guy, giant things from the sky comes and good guy wins. There are white hats, black hats, and grey hats.”
Joining Corenswet as Clark Kent/Superman and María Gabriela de Faría as Angela Spica/The Engineer are Rachel Brosnahan as Lois Lane, Nathan Fillion as Guy Gardner/Green Lantern, Isabela Merced as Hawkgirl, Edi Gathegi as Mister Terrific, and Anthony Carrigan as Rex Mason/Metamorpho.
Superman: Legacy is slated for a July 11, 2025 release date.
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Featured image: LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA – JANUARY 14: María Gabriela de Faría attends the premiere week screening of SYFY’s “Deadly Class”, hosted by Kevin Smith, at The Wilshire Ebell Theatre on January 14, 2019 in Los Angeles, California. (Photo by Paul Butterfield/Getty Images)
The question of who will nab the four lead roles in Marvel Studios’ Fantastic Four has generated a year plus of speculation, but at last, it looks like Marvel has their man for the role of Mr. Fantastic. Pedro Pascal, arguably the breakout star of 2023 after his dynamite performance in HBO’s The Last of Us, is in talks to play Reed Richards. Richards is a genius scientist who ends up inheriting one of the oddest superpowers in all of Marvel when, after absorbing gamma rays during a trip to outer space, finds that he can stretch and bend his body as if it were made of rubber.
Pascal has long been a fan favorite and a scene-stealer. He was pitch-perfect as the cocky, soulful swordsman Prince Oberyn Martell in HBO’s fourth season of Game of Thrones, followed that up with a great performance as the DEA agent Javier Peña in Netflix’s Narcos, and of course, became buddies with Baby Yoda as The Mandalorian. Once The Last of Us became 2023’s first critical sensation, Pascal had cemented himself as a bonafide star. He was nominated for an Emmy for his performance in the series.
Fantastic Four will be helmed by WandaVision director Matt Shakman, who took over for Spider-Man director Jon Watts. Marvel Studios finally got the rights to Fantastic Four in 2019 when Disney acquired 21st Century Fox. The Fantastic Four are Marvel Comics royalty, as they were the very first superheroes created for Marvel by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby. Fox produced three films based on Marvel’s first family—Fantastic Four (2005), Fantastic Four: The Rise of the Silver Surfer (2007), and a reboot, Fantastic Four (2015). In that 2005 film, a future MCU star, Chris Evans, played Johnny Storm. In the 2015 reboot, another MCU star, Michael B. Jordan, played the same role.
There was a nod to the Fantastic Four in a recent MCU film, however, and it doubled as a knowing wink to Marvel fans. In 2022’s Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness, John Krasinski appears as an alternate-universe version of Reed Richards. Krasinski was the man fans were hoping would be cast in the role, alongside his wife, Emily Blunt, as Susan Storm (aka the Invisible Woman). In Doctor Strange, however, this version of poor Reed is annihilated by the Scarlet Witch (Elizabeth Olsen), whose powers of destruction are a touch greater than his bendy abilities.
There is still no word on who Marvel is eyeing for the roles of Susan Storm, Johnny Storm, aka the Human Torch, and Ben Grimm, aka the Thing.
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Sony Pictures has revealed the first look at Madame Web, their upcoming Spider-Man spinoff starring Dakota Johnson as Cassandra Webb, aka Madame Web, a paramedic in Manhattan with some unusual abilities. Like Cassandra in Greek myth, Cassandra Webb finds out she’s clairvoyant, yet those abilities and her complicated past are about to thrust her into a dangerous game.
Madame Web is directed by veteran S.J. Clarkson (The Defenders, Jessica Jones), who is working off her own script. The film will give us Madame Web’s origin story, which finds her abilities directly connected to all the Spider-based superheroes operating in the world. Johnson is joined by Sydney Sweeney, Celeste O’Connor, Isabela Merced, Tahar Rahim, Mike Epps, Emma Roberts and Adam Scott.
The trailer opens by hinting at Cassandra’s formidable skills. She goes into a diner where she’s attacked by a Spider-Man-like figure in a dark super-suit and Spidey abilities. The confrontation goes poorly for Cassandra, but we learn that she was seeing that ahead of time, giving her the foreknowledge of how to approach the situation in reality. Cassandra’s abilities were born after an accident while working as a paramedic (she tumbled off a bridge, in a car, into the river), and from this unhappy accident, she became something more. Later in the trailer, we learn the identity of the masked man who attacked her, Ezekiel Sims (Rahim), a man connected to her past. Cassandra and three new friends (Sweeney’s Julia Carpenter, O’Connor’s Mattie Franklin, and Merced’s Anya Corazon) are connected to each other and Ezekiel Sims in ways they are only beginning to understand.
Check out the trailer below. Madame Web is coming to theaters on February 14, 2024:
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HBO’s brilliant The Last of Us is, inarguably, the most successful video game adaptation in TV history. The series is based on the critically acclaimed video game of the same name, which was created by Neil Druckmann and Naughty Dog, and when it bowed at the beginning of this year (adapted by Druckmann and Chernobyl creator Craig Mazin), it was an immediate sensation. Here was a slow-burn, character-focused zombie show that felt utterly different from any in the genre. It did that, in part, by yoking the deathless idea of the voracious undead to a far-fetched but still theoretically plausible scenario—a world in which the Cordyceps fungi (a relative of the mushrooms in your salad) have infected our brains and turned us into thoughtless monsters.
In order for a show like The Last of Us to excel, hundreds of artists need to bring their expertise to bear in order to pull off a show of this scale and level of detail. From Druckmann and Mazin to the brilliant cast (led by Pedro Pascal as the no-nonsense Joel and Bella Ramsey as his resilient young charge, Ellie) to the vast crew building out this world, it’s a massive feat of collaboration. That includes concept artists like Pouya Moayedi, who were tasked with taking what was on the page and illustrating it so that Mazin, Druckmann, and crew members like cinematographers Eben Bolter and Ksenia Sereda, production designer John Paino, hairstylist Chris Harrison-Glimsdale, and everyone else involved could start to build out this world of ruin.
We spoke to Moayedi about what it took to turn a video game in which the fungi kingdom has gone rogue into one of the year’s most compelling and satisfying new series.
Walk us through your typical day as a concept artist for The Last Of Us.
So, my job is to visualize sets, characters, creatures, and key moments in the script. I work closely with the production designer, art directors, and set designers to create these moments and these worlds. Basically, I help bring the script to life so the construction people who build sets have a reference, and the producers who need to see certain beats in the story can see those visualized. Now we know how we’re going to approach it.
What’s your process—do you sketch by hand to start, or is it all digital?
I start with sketching, and I do a lot of 3D and Photoshop painting. When ideas come, I sketch them down to refer to. I think there were six concept artists, and I think collectively, we did maybe five hundred concept designs. We were basically illustrating every major scene in the story and establishing shots of significant moments.
A concept for a FEDRA dorm room by Pouya Moayedi. Courtesy Pouya Moayedi.
Did you actually play the game before working on the series?
I didn’t play the game. But we were always watching the gameplay, and two of the people at the office had PlayStations, and there’s a feature on it where we could take screenshots of the game, so we referenced that a lot. We were constantly watching the gameplay, but we wanted to do something that was not gamey.
Bella Ramsey. Photograph by Liane Hentscher/HBO
Did you watch any zombie films or series before you started working on the series?
Well, nothing like this had ever been done before. I remember watching I Am Legend with Will Smith, and the visual effects are pretty good. In some of the scenes in that film, the city streets are covered with grass, so I remembered that. That was the closest film aesthetically to what we were doing in The Last of Us. I also looked at a lot of natural disaster photos and photos of the aftermath of war. That was heartbreaking.
A concept for an abandoned skyscraper by Pouya Moayedi. Courtesy Pouya Moayedi.
The Last of Us is set in the United States, yet it was filmed throughout Canada. Where were the sets they built based on your illustrations?
Lots of them were in downtown Calgary. Some were in Edmonton. Some were in High River, Alberta. The first episode, where they’re going through Texas, was in Alberta. Most of episode five, set in Kansas City, was actually shot in Calgary.
Were there any sequences that you’re most proud of?
I did a lot of storyboards in the episode with David [Scott Shepherd, episode 8, “When We Are In Need”] with those cannibal people. They live in this snowy wasteland led by David and all those abandoned houses. I did a lot of concept art for those houses.
Pedro Pascal and Bella Ramsey. Photograph by Liane Hentscher/HBO
That episode was brutal. The Last of Us feels so grounded, which makes the extra harrowing turns, like from that David episode, that much more impactful.
Our showrunner [Craig Mazin] is the Chernobyl guy, so everything is real. We were referencing a lot of real-life stuff. I’m not the person who calls the shots, but I’m the person who can influence the person who calls the shots. Sometimes, I can wow people with my concepts, and sometimes, I have to go back to the drawing board and do six more iterations of it. One thing I’m really proud of is the designs I did for the rebel’s vehicles. I helped design the truck that runs through the cars in episode five [“Endure and Survive”], as well as all the Humvees. And then in the finale, when Ellie and Joel are going through the military hospital, you see all those medical tents in the background—I designed those. That’s the style of the show; it’s not asking you to pay attention to the world we built. Rather, it’s very character-driven. It’s subtle. It makes you feel like you’re there in the moment in the real world.
A concept for a modified truck by Pouya Moayedi. Courtesy Pouya Moayedi.A concept for a field hospital by Pouya Moayedi. Courtesy Pouya Moayedi.
Featured image: A concept for an abadoned skyscraper by Pouya Moayedi. Courtesy Pouya Moayedi.
The upcoming feature Supergirl: Woman of Tomorrow, part of the first batch of movies coming out of James Gunn and Peter Safran’s new-look DC Studios, has nabbed its writer.
Playwright and actress Ana Nogueria will be scripting the upcoming film, which will be a standalone feature focused on Superman’s cousin, a fellow Kryptonian with immense powers all her own.
Nogueria has actually been circling a Supergirl project for a while now—she was previously tapped to write a Supergirl film back in 2022 when it was being developed as a spinoff from Andy Muschietti’s The Flash, which featured Sasha Calle in the role. That was under the previous DC Studios leadership, and the hope was that Supergirl would begin a new franchise.
When Gunn and Safran came on board at DC Studios, they brought with them a completely new vision for the studio, which included new superheroes and revamped and recast icons, including Superman and Batman. It was thought that Supergirl was done, but then they revealed that a different film focused on the young superhero was a part of their upcoming slate. Supergirl: Woman of Tomorrow is based on a comic book mini-series by Tom King, published in 2021 and 2022, which gave Supergirl her own unique persona, rather than viewing her as a female Superman.
“Superman is a guy sent to Earth and raised by loving parents, where Supergirl in this story, she is a character raised on a chunk of Krypton,” Gunn explained on Twitter. “She watched everybody around her perish in some terrible way, so she’s a much more jaded character.”
In King’s comic, Kara Zor-El (Supergirl) and her trusty mutt Krypto (yes, he’s a superdog) find themselves involved in the revenge quest of a young alien girl. It’s unclear how much from King’s narrative Nogueira will be taking for her feature. Yet Gunn and Safran enjoyed her work on the previous Supergirl film, so she was brought back on to write the new film.
Nogueira’s play Which Way to the Stage debuted off-Broadway in 2022. She’s also working on an adaptation of author Alice Sola Kim’s short story Mothers, Lock Up Your Daughters.
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Featured image: NEW YORK, NEW YORK – FEBRUARY 27: Ana Nogueira attends the 66th Obie Awards Honoring Excellence In Off- And Off Off- Broadway at Terminal 5 on February 27, 2023 in New York City. (Photo by Jenny Anderson/Getty Images for American Theatre Wing)
The review embargo has been lifted for Ridley Scott’s Napoleon, the legendary director’s full-scale take on the life of one of history’s most infamous men. An epic of old-school filmmaking that boasts some of Napoleon’s most famous battles (including the Battle of Toulon and the Battle of Austerlitz), Scott’s film, from a script by David Scarpa, also pays close attention to the most crucial relationship in the French Emperor’s life—his lifelong love of Josephine—which was both a source of inspiration and comfort as well as torment.
Taking on the mantle of Napoleon is Joaquin Phoenix, and according to critics, he’s astonishing, at turns hilarious, haunting, scheming, and ice cold. His co-star, Vanessa Kirby, is coming in for equally lavish praise for her performance as Josephine. Their two performances are reason enough to see Scott’s latest.
“Phoenix, sometimes laugh-out-loud funny and chilling in the same scene, is as compelling as he always is,” writes the London Evening Standard‘s Hamish Macbain, “…But it’s Vanessa Kirby who, much like Ryan Gosling in Barbie, upstages her title character.”
Meanwhile, the full impact of Scott’s film is that of watching a hugely ambitious director set his sights on a historical figure that seems larger than life and fashioning a movie big enough to capture him.
“Scott has created an outrageously enjoyable cavalry charge of a movie, a full-tilt biopic of two and a half hours in which Scott doesn’t allow his troops to get bogged down mid-gallop in the muddy terrain of either fact or metaphysical significance,” writes the Guardian‘s Peter Bradshaw.
Napoleon is in theaters on November 22.
Let’s take a peek at what the critics are saying.
“Distinctively deadpan: a funny, idiosyncratic close-up of the man.”
Joaquin Phoenix stars as the legendary French emperor in Ridley Scott’s #Napoleon, in cinemas Friday.
Ridley Scott prints the legend in #Napoleon/ #NapoleonMovie & it absolutely rips. A compelling love story between a man & his country, military career, wife & ego. Battle sequences are visceral, gory & gorgeously expansive in scale & scope. Phoenix is great, but Kirby transcends. pic.twitter.com/wUad22ylNF
#Napoleon is an absolute joy, a scathing and frequently hilarious character study of a lil freak with a literal and figurative Napoleon complex. Some of the gnarliest battle scenes I’ve seen in a minute, incredible sound design, and that distinct, unique bitter taste of Sir Rid. pic.twitter.com/6nk3MxGpYg
Ridley Scott’s #Napoleon is a win. Phoenix’s portrayal of the French leader is a revelation. Together with Kirby’s pitch perfect Josephine they put the toxic in intoxicating. The ferocity of the brutal battle sequences come with sound design you few in your bones. #NapoleonMoviepic.twitter.com/L1Jwk4DqgI
#Napoleon is less a war epic and more a comedy about the absurdity of power and the delusional patheticness of a “great” man. An unexpected but welcome combo of tones that Ridley Scott shoots with appropriate grandness. I liked it! pic.twitter.com/bzw4Y3rGG4
Never doubt Ridley Scott. He delivers with #Napoleon. Incredible battle scenes, top to bottom brilliance in cratfs; cinematography, production design, sound and costume. Joaquin PHoenix’s and Vanessa Kirby’s love story is just beautifully executed. Loved it. pic.twitter.com/3HbLXd5Fni
NAPOLEON is FANTASTIC!! Director RIDLEY SCOTT is still at the top his game (at 85!) with a sweeping epic & JOAQUIN PHOENIX is magnificent! Incredible battle scenes that will blow you mind! Bound for OSCAR NOMS across the board, including BEST PICTURE! pic.twitter.com/vLcOr2dcsa
#NAPOLEON is an incredible feat of MASSIVE filmmaking and the type of historical epic that just isn’t made anymore. Joaquin Phoenix & Vanessa Kirby are pure alchemy together, but I wish it went deeper into the mind of the tyrannical leader.@TheMoviePodcast review out now. pic.twitter.com/1G9to2Blko
‘Napoleon’ Review: An impressive Joaquin Phoenix reteams with director Ridley Scott for this lavish biopic of the French military commander. @TimGrierson#Napoleonhttps://t.co/VZ4Ph7gZe3
Vanessa Kirby and Joaquin Phoenix in “Napoleon,” premiering in theaters around the world on November 22, 2023.“Napoleon” premiering in theaters around the world on November 22, 2023.
Featured image: Napoleon (JOAQUIN PHOENIX, center) looks onto the battlefield in Apple Original Films and Columbia Pictures theatrical release of NAPOLEON. Photo by: Aidan Monaghan
Mike White’s brilliant The White Lotusis gearing up to bring a fresh group of cosseted tourists to a new resort location for season 3. After a gangbusters murder mystery in season two—set in the unimprovable location of Sicily—White is bringing the third season of his critically acclaimed series to Thailand, with production potentially beginning next February, Deadline reports. Meanwhile, casting has begun—there are few jobs more coveted in the TV world than landing a spot on The White Lotus roster—now that the SAG-AFTRA strike is over.
White’s anthology series has depicted both the staff and the guests of the titular White Lotus resort in Hawaii and Sicily, utilizing those locations not only for their abundant beauty but also for unleashing the often rich, occasionally obnoxious guests on the staff and locals they interact with. From season one to two, only two characters, Jennifer Coolerdige‘s Tanya and Jon Gries’ Greg Hunt, carried over. For season three, word is that Natasha Rothwell’s Belinda, an employee at the Hawaii location’s spa in season one, will be reappearing. The rest of the cast will presumably be new, and considering you don’t only get to star in one of the buzziest series in all of television but you also get to spend months in a beautiful location, the competition will be fierce. Deadline reports that thirteen roles are currently being cast, nine of them for series regulars, ranging in age from 18 to 80.
The White Lotus season two was nominated for 23 Emmys and was moved officially, and it particularly dominated the supporting actress in a drama series category, nabbing five of the eight slots—Jennifer Coolidge, Meghann Fahy, Sabrina Impacciatore, Aubrey Plaza, and Simona Tabasco.
“It’s going to be a supersized White Lotus,” White told Entertainment Weekly about season 3. “It’s going to be longer, bigger, crazier. I don’t know what people will think, but I am super excited, so at least for my own barometer, that’s a good thing.”
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Featured image: Francesco Zecca as Matteo, Leo Woodall as Jack, Tom Hollander as Quentin, Jennifer Coolidge as Tanya McQuoid-Hunt, Haley Lu Richardson as Portia. Photo courtesy HBO.
The Holdovers (in theaters now) has the potential to become a holiday classic. It’s a movie that delves into themes of depression, loneliness, loss, and regret. Yet this bittersweet concoction has a tremendous if subtle, undercurrent of tenderness. Friendship and love are given their due, adding a touch of sweetness to Alexander Payne’s new film.
Screenwriter David Hemingson tells the story of the embittered professor Paul Hunham (Paul Giamatti), who possesses the quick wit and quiet depression of a stand-up comedian. Set in the 1970s over the holidays, Hunham — along with a grieving mother and school employee, Mary Lamb (a wonderful Da’Vine Joy Randolph) — is tasked with looking after students left behind during the break. One of the students is Angus (Dominic Sessa), who matches the unloved professor in prickliness. Together, the three holdovers embrace one another over a bitterly cold Christmas season.
Hemingson has crafted a story that would have made the likes of Hal Ashby blush. It’s a true and thorough 1970s movie, with the patience and unspoken observations that define the greatest character-driven films of that period. It’s a remarkable story from Hemingson, who imbues the deeply personal tale with a clear-eyed warmth.
Not only that, the screenwriter got to pay tribute to his mother and uncle, two figures that continue to inspire him. Consider The Holdovers a love letter to family, both blood or chosen. In the case of The Holdovers, it’s the chosen family that saves the day.
As someone who’s written a lot on television, was it a relief to write at such a patient pace for The Holdovers?
Oh my God, man, I got to tell you, it’s hard. I love television, and I will continue to write television, but there’s a beauty in being able to write a movie where the four corners of the world and the universe are going to be contained in those two hours. But the key thing is to pace it in such a way that the reveals feel organic and unrushed. The imperative is different because you’ve got to create a world and sustain a world, so the idea of trying to accomplish all that and make it seem unhurried—that is the hardest thing.
There’s such a beautiful simplicity to the movie. Mostly, these three characters are in one location. How delicate was that simplicity?
There are two things that leap out of me. I knew I had wanted to get most of the kids [out of the school] pretty early. I wasn’t interested in writing a movie about five boys at school with this curmudgeonly professor. I saw Dead Poets Society. I don’t need to do that. Who wants to go up against Peter Weir? Once I got rid of the kids on the helicopter, I was like, okay, now I got my three characters, which is what I wanted to do. Alexander was like, “I love your impulse. I love that you did that.” But then I was like, “What am I going to do? I got these three people; what do I do for myself?”
So where’d you go from there?
I didn’t know until I initially broke Angus’s arm [in the gym accident] because I needed some way to drive them all together. How do I start to tell you, the audience, this movie’s a love story? It’s just a love story. So, how do I uncouple them from their respective preconceptions about themselves and each other and get them close? Well, it is always good if somebody gets hurt, but not too badly. Getting hurt in comedy is good as long as it’s not too serious, hence the dislocation.
So the other thing was Mary and the box. That was really hard but really necessary. I struggled to figure it out because I based her around my mother, who was just an extraordinary woman and such a loving, caring, ferociously strong woman. What would happen if my mother had lost me? She would’ve been devastated.
How’d you want to communicate loss with the box?
This is the tragedy, this is the reason behind the tragedy, but what is she trying to let go specifically? What is the particularity of her journey? Her son is gone. I realized that that’s not something you accept. That’s something you hold onto the ghost of that person for as long as you can. The grieving process is not a straight line. She’ll never lose Curtis. Curtis will always be with her. I think about finding the box; that idea honestly came from J.J. Abrams talking about mystery boxes he’d received from DC or Marvel or whatever it was, and his uncle once said to him, “You always open the box, and you’re always disappointed. What if you never opened the box?”
You crafted such a tender movie about depression, loneliness, and loss without sugarcoating those emotions. How’d you pull off that tone?
Just writing what I know, man. You just hope, and honestly, you rely on a genius filmmaker and brilliant actors. I tried to wire it up in the script as hard as I could. I tried to wire that up hard, and I didn’t know until I saw it. You can have a burst of genuine laughter, thank God, and then a burst of genuine emotion and have them especially accelerate from about the midpoint to the end of the film. Those bursts accelerate as story complications pile up, as well. I wrote it almost like an action movie. Honestly, I just want to keep the incident going. How many organic incidents can I put in here that don’t feel manufactured but feel organic to the world, that don’t seem convenient but push the characters?
Where’d you specifically want to push them?
Push the characters to confront their depression, confront their loneliness, examine it, because as anybody who’s been depressed or lonely knows, it doesn’t look like it looks like in the vast majority of television shows or movies, whatever. It’s a different thing. And I think it’s a testament to the genius of Alexander Payne that he was able to depict that with such utter clarity on screen. And I think it’s absolutely a testament to the genius of Divine and Paul and Dom that they were able to portray that.
Your mother inspired Mary, so who inspired Paul Hunham?
He’s my uncle. He is the guy who raised me, who was born in 1920; had to leave school to fight in Saipan and World War II, so he was the same age. Paul’s character would’ve been born in 1920. That kind of baroque profanity, that sort of incredible knowledge, but also this sort of dyspeptic, curmudgeonly toughness and the way of expressing love, that’s my uncle. “For most people, sex is 99% friction, 1% goodwill.” That’s my uncle. He would just say these things like this weird Dickensian character that stepped out of a time machine. He was just great. I mean, he polluted and destroyed my imagination in a fantastic way. I carry him around with me all day long every day, and I just let him out, and then I put him in Paul.
The Holdovers is in theaters now.
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The coldest assassin is the kind you don’t see coming. In a lineup of globe-trotting sharpshooters from the movies, The Killer (Michael Fassbender) may be the most difficult to identify. On a crowded city street, he could be anyone—and that is by design. Costume designer Cate Adams developed the style for director David Fincher’s vision of a dangerous character you would hardly ever notice.
“Basically, he wears clothes that he can just find anywhere. Find in an airport, find in a convenience store. He doesn’t want to have to think about it,” she noted. “[Fincher] wanted a bucket hat instead of an umbrella to be water resistant for any kind of weather he was going to be in. He wanted a ‘lazy people notion.’ So, zippers or velcros or something pullover. Dad chinos. Anything he could have bought from an airport.”
That mindset even extends to modern conveniences. Sometimes, the easiest way to shop today is with online delivery, and The Killer could plausibly wear pieces he purchased with the click of a button.
“One of the shirts he wears is a printed, short-sleeved Aloha shirt that was actually from Amazon. So, there are some pieces from Amazon,” Adams revealed. “It’s just very basic. Whatever he could find easily. He doesn’t take a lot of time to think about his clothes, which I really liked. He’s not in suits like James Bond. He just kind of looks weird, and you’re not really sure what he’s doing there. He just kind of looks normal and blends in.”
To focus on his mission, The Killer needed to remain incognito and keep people at a distance. Rather than present himself as intimidating or unapproachable to avoid interactions, he emitted a more effective aura – irritating.
“You want him to blend in, then we went for him just being kind of awkward and weird,” Adams explained. “There’s a reference in the script for that – just about German tourists. Like you don’t really want to hang around them, they’re ‘annoying.’ So, we did a whole ode to a German tourist, but also with layers. So, we had a rain jacket over top. He’s got another parka kind of jacket on, then he’s got the Aloha shirt underneath, and he’s got a sweater on, and he’s got the bucket hat, which is kind of a fisherman-style bucket hat.”
Great efforts were made to find the perfect shoe that would keep The Killer on the go and match his casual, everyday aesthetic. Adams and her team searched through a myriad of styles but settled on a silhouette that emphasizes comfort over style.
“We knew David had always wanted to do some kind of orthopedic, funky shoe, which then progressed into a Skecher. We tried about every Skecher known to mankind,” Adams laughed.
With a signature wardrobe in place, The Killer was ready to travel the world in pursuit of his target. From Paris to the Dominican Republic to the United States, he stays sporty for agility and casual to fly under the radar.
“He’s very track athletic, Lululemon-esque. Just light layers all the time so he can take things on and off. He can ditch things. He’s got a go-bag with him, so he’s got an extra set of clothes with him,” Adams explained. “It was just like taking layers off of what he was wearing flying there. He’s always very ready to go. He’s got sneakers on. He’s got track-y joggers on. He’s got an athletic zippy on from Lululemon. Kind of sleek athletic wear.”
A neutral palette was a natural choice for the movie in keeping with Fincher’s style. Adams calls his films “tonally muted,” with an emphasis on the dialogue and script rather than the clothing. Within that limitation, she then researched a palette that would complement the locations and allow The Killer to blend in.
“I had my team go out and take a bunch of pictures of what everyone was wearing in Paris,” Adams said. “Everybody is mostly in black and navy and jewel tones. I had thought maybe he’s in brown to fit in. That’s when I sent all the photos to David, and he said, ‘Actually, put him in something like cream, ecru, not khaki.’ He’s very particular about khaki turning pink or green on the color wheel spectrum. So, it had to be the perfect shade of ecru, eggshell, cement.”
Back at home in the Dominican Republic, earth tones prevail. “When he’s in the Dominican Republic and he’s out during the day, he sort of blends in with the background. Everybody there is very bright. We muted it a little bit. There were so many neon colors, but we kept them faded colors, island-y. No black. Browns, greens, khakis, blues, and teals—that was the color palette for the Dominican.”
The Killer spares no grisly details. Adams had to come extra prepared for rips and splatters that the costumes would endure. Fincher is notorious for doing multiple takes of a scene, Adams noted. That meant that when clothing was being destroyed, she had to be there with plenty of backups.
“We had a good amount of practical blood in different locations. We had stunt doubles, and we had lots of multiples,” Adams explained. “Most everything that got blood on it was a purchase, so it wasn’t so much a custom make, which was helpful. We were able to buy more and just have everything altered. We had lots of blood.”
Adams is particularly familiar with Fincher’s work, having served as assistant costume designer under costume designer Jennifer Starzyk on Fincher’s hit serial killer series Mindhunter.
“It was really hard, and everything was super specific, and we did a lot of fittings, and every fitting you had to be tailored exactly and 70s and tight,” she described of working on the show. “I learned so much, and I learned so much about David’s style working on that. That was such a blessing.”
A scene from “Mindhunter.” Courtesy Netflix.
Adams said she had very little direct interaction with Fincher on that project, but she did have a memorable experience on camera. “Actually, they used my legs for something,” she recalled. “They had me wear these pantyhose and pretend like I was a victim. I think that’s the most interaction I had with him.”
To prepare for The Killer, Adams watched much of Fincher’s catalog for inspiration, paying particular attention to The Game. However, she humorously admitted that she didn’t always have a discerning taste for his work. She was surprised to come across a hilarious remnant of a teenage critique.
“I found an old journal that I had. It was like me, a guy, and some other friends went to see Panic Room in high school, but I wrote like, ‘Ugh, it sucked,’” Adams admitted. “David has a very dry, funny sense of humor. I was thinking about ripping that and sending it to him. Now, I am where I am. I’ll spare him, but that was pretty funny. I’m such a fan of all of his work.”
Now, she holds not only esteem for Fincher’s work but also for the on-set environment he creates.
“He’s amazing. It’s like you’re going to film school when you work with him. He’s so smart. He knows everyone’s job,” Adams revealed. “You have to be prepared. Prep is so, so important. He just makes everybody work that much harder because he’s so good at his job. He knows what everyone is supposed to be doing, too. It’s very professional, which I love.”
The Killer is now available to stream on Netflix.
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So imagine you’re a damsel, only you’re not really about the whole distress bit. You marry a handsome prince, but it turns out you’ve been duped. The royal family has agreed to the marriage to repay an ancient debt, and you, the damsel, are how they plan to pay it. You’re marooned inside an icy cave with one other resident—a dragon—and your only chance for survival isn’t the prince or some white knight but your own wits.
This is the conceit of Damsel, a new film from Juan Carlos Fresnadillo, which stars Millie Bobby Brown as the damsel, Princess Elodie, who’s rudely used as dragon food. Brown is surrounded by a fantastic cast, which includes Robin Wright, Angela Bassett, Ray Winstone, Nick Robinson, Shohreh Aghdashloo, Brooke Carter, Manon Stieglitz, and more.
The first trailer reveals the look and feel of Fresnadillo’s film (he directs from a script by Dan Mazeau), which only teases the dragon as we find Princess Elodie’s icy imprisonment in the cave, and her considerable pluck as she sets about trying to free herself. Set to Timber Timbre’s “Run From Me,” the trailer centers Princess Elodie’s potentially fatal predicament, as well as the rationale provided by Robin Wright’s queen. “For generations, it has been our task to protect our people,” she says. “So tonight, you join a long line of women who have helped to build this kingdom. The price is dear, but so, too, the reward.”
The price is especially dear for Princess Elodie, but we’re betting she’s got what it takes to turn the queen’s statement on its head—who ends up paying the price and who enjoys the reward will be the question Damsel will eventually answer.
Check out the trailer below. Damsel arrives on Netflix in 2024:
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Filmmaker Godfrey Reggio, whose groundbreaking Koyaanisqatsi (1982) remains influential and much admired, didn’t travel to Boston for the November 3 screening at the Coolidge Corner Theatre of his new film and his first in a decade, Once Within a Time. But executive producer Steven Soderbergh and co-director and editor Jon Kane happily channeled the 83-year-old Reggio’s animated, eccentric spirit in a lively post-film conversation (which this writer moderated) before an enthusiastic crowd that cheered Reggio’s avant-garde fairy tale released in theaters this week from Oscilloscope Laboratories.
Soderbergh, who executive produced Reggio’s Naqoyqatsi (2002) and Visitors (2013), drew laughs with his deadpan response about working with such a passionate visionary. “Godfrey is a fun guy, absolutely, but I tap out fast … I leave inspired, excited, and confused. It’s like, I’ll never see the UFO, but I believe he saw it, and you go with that. You go with the resume, which is unique among American filmmakers,” said Soderbergh, the 2001 Oscar winner for Traffic. “What’s really inspiring is that with each film, he creates a new grammar to tell the story that he wants to tell. I was excited by [Once Within a Time] because it’s completely different than anything he had ever attempted, and I just wanted to see it.”
Apple man in “Once Within a Time.” Courtesy Oscilloscope Laboratories.
Once Within a Time reunites Reggio with his longtime collaborator, composer Philip Glass, to create a unique visual and aural experience. A wordless, futuristic fairy tale that looks like it was made in the silent era, with each shot hand-painted digitally, the film mixes circus and apocalyptic imagery and features a cast of children. It’s a cautionary tale about omnipresent technology that also offers hope for the future.
Reggio originally wanted to make a “3D IMAX comedy for children,” said Kane, who edited Reggio’s last two films and served as editor and co-director for Once Within a Time. Kane described the long journey to bring Reggio’s fantastical ideas to life. The trial and error process involved miniatures on a sound stage, rear projection, “a lot of rotoscoping,” and hand painting each frame of film so it looked like a silent from the 1890s.
“It took a year to figure out how to do it so it didn’t look like an Instagram filter,” said Kane. “We did it by hand but digitally. To make it convincing, we had to treat every layer separately. It’s futuristic imagery done in silent style, frame by frame.” Silent films were handprinted using brushes, he said, but Kane’s team had to employ the technique with computers.
An image from “Once Within a Time.” Courtesy Apple man in “Once Within a Time.” Courtesy Oscilloscope Laboratories.
“Godfrey wanted to make a futuristic movie that looked like it was made in the past so it was somehow out of time and therefore timeless. The idea was great, but it was expensive,” said Kane, noting that the budget was originally estimated at 16 million dollars. “So we thought, [let’s] do in a studio, do it in 18 months, and make it a short film with Godfrey’s ideas still the same.” The short eventually expanded to its 52-minute running time, and although under $16 million, the budget was still a hefty price tag.
An image from “Once Within a Time.” Courtesy Apple man in “Once Within a Time.” Courtesy Oscilloscope Laboratories.
Enter Soderbergh, who over the past two decades had helped Reggio, a former monk and social activist, get two of his poetic, experimental films made: Naqoyqatsi, the final film in his “Qatsi” trilogy, and Visitors. Soderbergh wasn’t concerned with the lack of commercial prospects for such eclectic work; he wanted to help bring Reggio’s bold, singular vision to audiences that crave it.
An image from “Once Within a Time.” Courtesy Apple man in “Once Within a Time.” Courtesy Oscilloscope Laboratories.
With his latest effort, said Soderbergh, Reggio “wanted to make something young people could look at and be activated by. It is intense what we’re all going through right now. To send a message that whatever is going to happen, the option of doing nothing isn’t viable. Get involved; do anything. I signed on for that. Godfrey often says that making his films requires finding an angel. An angel is someone who is willingly going to make a bad deal. At the end of the day, my name is the only thing I have that’s all mine. So I try to be careful how it’s deployed. And this, to me, is a no-brainer.”
An image from “Once Within a Time.” Courtesy Apple man in “Once Within a Time.” Courtesy Oscilloscope Laboratories.
One of the most surprising moments in the film features boxing legend Mike Tyson as “The Mentor,” who regales a group of kids with a kind of jazz monologue. “Godfrey is very well connected in Hollywood. He can just call up Spike Lee or Francis Ford Coppola; he’s like the crazy hippie uncle,” said Kane. “He wanted Mike Tyson, and I thought, ‘that will never happen,’ but it did.” Tyson worked for a day on the soundstage and “was amazing,” said Kane. “He was happy to be there; he was witty; he was game for everything. A lot of the guys who work around the building in Red Hook in Brooklyn grew up with him, which we didn’t even know. So it was a homecoming.”
Soderbergh still draws inspiration from the uncompromising Reggio. “Godfrey is a child; it’s like being around a child, and I say that in the best possible way. There isn’t a mean or cynical bone in this man’s body,” said Soderbergh. “There’s something pure about how he sees and imagines things.”
The first official trailer for part one of Zack Snyder’s upcoming two-part sci-epic has arrived. Rebel Moon – Part One: A Child of Fire will arrive on Netflix in late December, and the trailer opens with a look at a once peaceful galaxy finding itself in the crosshairs of the armies of a tyrannical lunatic. Their only hope is a surprising figure—a mysterious woman who lives quietly among them and who possesses skills that they had no idea she had.
A Child of Fire sets up this epic tale and introduces us to Sofia Boutella’s Kora, a woman whose aforementioned surprising skill set comes in handy when her otherwise quiet planet is visited by soldiers who have no interest in her peaceful people’s farming techniques. Kora’s mysterious origins are tied to the invaders, and after she dispatches them (to the astonishment of the assorted villagers), she warns them they’ll have to fight to survive. “What do they want?” the villagers ask about the soldiers. “Everything,” Kora replies.
This leads to Kora heading out on a mission to protect her home—she must find enough able-bodied fighters, preferably men and women with a chip on their shoulders, to help her defend her people and her planet. We meet some of these figures briefly in the new trailer, including Charlie Hunnam’s Kai and Djimon Hounsou’s General Titus, two men who will be very useful in the upcoming war. Another character we meet is the droid Jimmy (although, considering this isn’t a Star Wars universe, they can’t be technically called droids, so we’ll say robot). The upshot with Jimmy? He’s voiced by none other than Anthony Hopkins.
Snyder has rounded up a great cast to support the above-mentioned players, including Ed Skrein as the villainous Admiral Noble, the late, great Ray Fisher as Darien Bloodaxe, Bae Doona as the arachnid-like Nemesis, Jena Malone as Harmada, Staz Nair as Tarak, Cleopatra Coleman as Devra Bloodaxe, E. Duffy as Milius, Charlotte Maggi as Sam, and Michiel Huisman as Gunnar.
Snyder’s been dreaming about Rebel Moon for years—it actually began as a potential Star Wars spinoff more than a decade ago—and the film is based on a script he wrote with his Army of the Dead co-writer Shay Hatten and his 300 co-writer Kurt Johnstad.
Check out the trailer below. Rebel Moon Part 1: A Child of Fire arrives on Netflix on December 22, while Part 2: The Scargiver lands on April 19, 2024
With director Susanna White’s The Buccaneers, an adaptation of Edith Wharton’s unfinished final novel set in the 1870s, Apple TV+ adds a period drama with a modern spin to its lineup. If any 19th-century chronicler of the era’s mannerisms can withstand a contemporary update, it’s Wharton, whose insight into upper-class idiosyncrasies on both sides of the pond ring true, even set to a modern soundtrack and present-day dialogue as is the case here.
The Buccaneers turns on the fallout of intercontinental marriages of convenience between five wealthy American heiresses and Englishmen long on family trees but short on cash, beginning at the nuptials of Conchita (Alisha Boe) and Richard (Josh Dylan), a love match overshadowed by an intractable culture clash. Despite the pair’s difficulties, Conchita’s four best friends take inspiration from her good-on-paper marriage and follow her from New York to England, where they vie to pair off with aristocratic, eligible young men.
The heart of the story isn’t in the girls’ subsequent marriages but in their determination to retain their American joie d’esprit, rendering them glaringly incompatible with their grim British hosts. For cinematographer Oliver Curtis (Stay Close, Vanity Fair, for which he was nominated for a BAFTA), who worked on the first two episodes, the contrast was a natural setup. “The theme of the clash of cultures from these vivacious, energized, young American women coming over to musty old England to meet their potential suitors has got a natural kind of transformative quality. You’ve got the color, light, and energy of their New York life, and then the dour, desaturated world of old England,” he said of the humor and heartbreak of the meeting of these two worlds, which informed the series’ lighting, camera movements, and framing. “It’s all about forward movement in people’s lives. It’s a playful show, full of light and color. The cinematography had to reflect that.”
John Arnold and Alisha Boe in “The Buccaneers,” now streaming on Apple TV+.
Conchita and Richard get set up at a lavish country estate and have a baby, but their family life is anything but blissful. Jinny St. George (Imogen Waterhouse) pairs off more quickly than her sister and their friends, but to Richard’s even less fun older brother. Nan St. George (Kristine Froseth), the show’s heroine, has the most appealing marriage prospects, but she’s too preoccupied with a shameful personal secret to fully enjoy them. As the Brits and Americans get tangled up in each other’s lives, Curtis’s camera work shifts. “Once we’re here in the UK, the worlds enmesh and disrupt and then infiltrate each other, so there are moments of stillness and quiet,” he said, best exemplified over a terrifically awkward, stilted English welcome dinner of soup. “But once the girls are running riot at the country house, you really get a sense of their energy and lack of respect for the mores of the time and the innate conservatism of the characters they’re living with.”
Imogen Waterhouse and Aubri Ibrag in “The Buccaneers,” now streaming on Apple TV+.
Curtis’s cinematography balances the grandeur of the girls’ lifestyle with a more personal sense of what’s really happening in their lives. “There’s always an expectation that in a period drama, certainly for television, that you’ve got to present the opulence of interiors — these big wide ballrooms, corridors, candlelit rooms, and so on. But what I think is important in this show is character, its close-up, its portraiture,” the cinematographer explained. Using a large-format camera, the Alexa LF, and Arri’s vintage DNA lenses, Curtis was able “to meld those two things — the sense of intimacy and expression within a big close-up, without losing the sense of the environment in which the characters found themselves.”
Alisha Boe, Josie Totah, Kristine Frøseth, Aubri Ibrag and Imogen Waterhouse in “The Buccaneers,” now streaming on Apple TV+.Kristine Frøseth in “The Buccaneers,” now streaming on Apple TV+.
Par for the course for Wharton’s realistically complicated relationships, nothing that works out for this wild American crew could be chalked up as a straightforward love story. Instead, The Buccaneers is marked by a constant sense that something is always befalling somebody. For Curtis, it was important to keep a sense of energy in the camera, and he and his team typically ran two to ensure they captured the performative nuances inherent to an ensemble cast drama and to foster a sense of fluidity around the actors’ performances. Ultimately, he said, “it’s all about forward movement in people’s lives. They’re emotionally changing all the time. I hope that comes across in the show.”
For more stories on Apple TV+ series and films, check these out:
Featured image: Episode 1. Kristine Frøseth, Alisha Boe, Josie Totah, Aubri Ibrag and Imogen Waterhouse in “The Buccaneers,” premiering 8 November 2023 on Apple TV+.
There are countless unsung heroes of the civil rights movement who will never get the recognition they deserve, yet it’s hard to imagine an overlooked figure more central to the cause and more courageous and capacious in spirit than Bayard Rustin. While historians are well aware of the impact Rustin had on the civil rights movement writ large and specifically the March on Washington, most Americans are not.
George C. Wolfe‘s Rustin (in theaters now) offers a course correction. Wolfe directs from a script co-written by JulianBreece, who has put ten years into shaping the story of a larger-than-life figure whose life went so largely unapplauded. Breece first heard about the project a decade ago and petitioned Oscar-winning screenwriter (and his co-writer on Rustin) Dustin Lance Black to give him a shot. Once onboard, Breece faced the challenge that every storyteller attempting to craft a biopic about a legend must surmount—how do you capture the essence of a figure so crucial and so complex into a single movie?
Breece’s approach was to focus on Rustin’s ingenious, tireless efforts to orchestrate the 1963 March on Washington. Rustin was not just a crucial architect of this defining moment in American history, but he was also a mentor to Martin Luther King Jr., and these dual roles gave Breece the backbone of his story, vividly showing how Rustin helped take the March on Washington from an impossible dream to King’s iconic “I Have a Dream” speech on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial.
“I grew up thinking whatever I did, I was going to have to be behind the scenes or in the shadows because I was queer, and I’m sure Bayard felt some of that as well,” says Breece. He was talking specifically about how Rustin, who was openly gay well before the March, was sidelined during portions of the civil rights movement on account of a whisper campaign about his sexuality. Eventually, King would stand shoulder-to-shoulder with his mentor, but it was the journey of getting to that moment on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial that Breece set his sights on.
We spoke with Breece about his decade-long pursuit of a script worthy of Bayard Rustin, Colman Domingo’s absorbing performance, and what he hopes audiences will take from Rustin’s life.
Tell me about this ten-year journey you went in researching and writing Rustin.
The year I found out about the project, in 2013, I was temping. I’d won some screenwriting awards coming out of grad school for a screenplay I’d written about the ball scene in New York, but none of that had translated into work, so I was still doing my spec scripts and working on a studio lot. My manager told me that Dustin Lance Black [Oscar-winner for his Milk screenplay] was producing a movie about Bayard Rustin, and he’s looking for a writer. At the time, it was still difficult to get into any rooms for features, particularly for Black writers. There weren’t a lot of us in the system in 2013.
Julian Breece
So, how did you get to Dustin Lance Black?
I wrote this super long letter to Lance explaining to him why I was so passionate about Bayard, who had been a hero of mine since I learned about him on my own—he wasn’t taught in any classes. I finally got a meeting with him after he saw a short I did at Out Fest, and he liked it. He read my work, and we hit it off. From there, I was off to research.
And what did your research entail?
I read everything I could get my hands on and actually moved to New York for three months because that’s where Bayard was based and where the people closest to him still live. And the Rustin Papers are in D.C. [at the Library of Congress]. But it was the one-on-one interviews that I did where I discovered the heart of the movie. I did about 19 hours of interviews with people who worked with Bayard and had close relationships with him. That was probably the most rewarding part of the research process.
How did you start to shape the story from this wealth of research material and all the hours of interview tape?
There was so much about Bayard’s life; it really could be a limited series. But I learned about Bayard in connection with the March on Washington and his relationship with Martin Luther King. You can’t do a movie about Bayard without centering the March on Washington, especially since it’s a culmination of the different parts of his career.
Did you look to any other biopics as a reference for what you were hoping to achieve?
As a student of film, there’s a place for cradle-to-grave biographical films, but I’m more attracted to films focused on the moment that made the person great. One of my favorite biographical films is Capote. I’d read the script over and over and over again. It’s so beautifully written. It really takes that moment when Truman Capote as we know him, all his flash and flair as a writer and public person, became great. It shows how his growth as an artist was also, in some ways, tragic. So, if I had to say there was a model for the way I looked at Rustin, it was definitely Capote.
There are so many moments that depict the way Bayard had of being in the world, his warmth and humor, his passion and hard-headedness. Who specifically did you interview that helped you flesh out his character?
I spoke to Rachelle Horowitz [played by Lilly Kay], who was one of Bayard’s assistants, for hours and hours. Then there was Walter Naegle, his partner, who was so generous and who has really been the person who’s carried the torch of Bayard’s legacy all of these years when it seemed like people didn’t want to know. He let me know the private Bayard, the Bayard behind the public face, behind the strength, behind the strong leader and organizer who everyone looked up to and wanted to follow, behind the Bayard who was charismatic and wonderfully flamboyant and captivating. Walter helped me know who he was in those vulnerable moments and how really felt about certain things, things that he may not have said publicly that hurt him.
RUSTIN (2023) Lilli Kay as Rachelle Horowitz. CR: Courtesy NETFLIX
You highlight so many crucial relationships Bayard had, and none more so than his relationship with Martin Luther King Jr. How did you approach their fondness for each other, as well as their falling out for a time?
What moved me the most when I learned about Bayard and King was that you have the most iconic, famous religious figure in modern history, aside from the Pope, who was mentored by a gay man. Mind-blowing. I think Bayard’s mentorship of King was the reason he was pushed out— the whisper campaign. Even though Bayard had helped mold King as a leader, it was like, ‘Well, now we can’t have you be associated with him at all.’ The lessons that Bayard taught King about bravery and leadership, we see that in the arc of King’s growth to becoming great, right at the moment before he stepped out onto that podium and made the greatest speech of all time.
Rustin also makes a very moving point that it’s the relationships between people, rather than simply the greatness of any one individual, that get things done. I’m thinking of Bayard’s conversations with Ella Baker [played by Audra Macdonald], who spurs him on to get back into the game after the whisper campaign.
Ella Baker and Bayard provided that kind of support for each other. Him being queer, and her being a woman in the movement and being underestimated because of that. You understand why Bayard’s relationship with the women in the movement was so important and why he saw them in a way that male leadership didn’t. And Ella was able to see him in ways that the male leadership couldn’t afford to, too. The March on Washington was all about coalition building and relationships. That’s the only way that it happened, and I’m hoping that we can look at that now as a country and a world and just see the importance of intersectionality and being able to support each other’s causes, as opposed to everyone fighting for themselves. Things don’t change that way. Bayard Rustin knew that revolutionary change happens through relationships and coalition building.
Another thing you take away from Rustin is the tremendous courage Bayard had. To live openly as a gay Black man at that time and be a force of nature in the civil rights movement…it boggles the mind.
People loved Bayard Rustin. Like anyone else, he has his edges, his thorns, but he was a deeply generous, deeply gentle person. The reason why he was out in the thirties, forties, and fifties is because his belief in equality and truth ran that deep. He’s like, if I’m not living it, I can’t fight for it. I can’t live a lie and tell other people to tell the truth. He drew people to him because of that courage.
RUSTIN (2023) Colman Domingo as Bayard Rustin and Johnny Ramey as Elias. Cr: David Lee/NETFLIX
His charm comes through from the very first scene, when he’s being mocked by a young member of the civil rights movement, and by the end of the film, that same young man adores him.
That was one of my favorite scenes to write. Showing Bayard coming back into the movement through the young people. You have to learn what’s going on. Even the old guard didn’t really know what was happening on the lower frequencies, but the young people who were on the ground knew. So Bayard’s relationship with that particular character, Blyden [Grantham Coleman], was a real relationship. Blyden’s a radical straight dude who, by the end, felt like Bayard was a badass. Who is more badass than Bayard Rustin? Who’s able to slay all of these dragons, say, ‘This is who I am, deal with it, come with it, I am going to fight on no matter what.’ I hope other people coming out of it feel that same way about Bayard.
Rustin is in theaters now and streams on Netflix on November 17.
