Francis Lawrence , who is directing the second installment of The Hunger Games franchise, Catching Fire will come on board for the final two in the series, Mockingjay – Part 1 and Mockingjay – Part 2 . Lawrence is currently filming Catching Fire , which is due out in 2013. Collider broke the news of Lawrence’s commitment to the final two Hunger Games . Gary Ross, who directed the first Hunger Games , starring Jennifer Lawrence, Wes Bentley, Stanley Tucci and Josh Hutcherson declined to direct the follow-ups saying he didn’t believe he could reasonably take on the tight schedule. Lawrence noted last May after the announcement he’d direct Catching Fire : “It is truly an honor and a privilege to bring Catching Fire, the second chapter of Suzanne’s beloved trilogy, to the big screen. I fell in love with the characters, the themes and the world she created and this chapter opens all of these elements up in such a thrilling, emotional and surprising way. I can’t wait to dive right into it and bring this chapter to life along with the truly superb cast and filmmakers involved.” Catching Fire will open November 22, 2013. Mockingjay – Part 1 is due out on November 21, 2014 and Mockingjay – Part 2 is set for November 20, 2015. [ Source: Collider ]
Star Wars fans worldwide learned Tuesday the celestial shattering news that George Lucas had sold Lucasfilm , and its most famous offspring to Disney for $4.05 billion. That news even surprised none other than Luke Skywalker himself. Actor Mark Hamill said he was surprised by the news, though he and fellow Star Wars veteran Carrie Fisher had met with Lucas who told them he wanted to do additional episodes in the decades-long franchise. “Yeah, last August, he asked Carrie and I to have lunch with him and we did. I thought he was going to talk about either his retirement or the Star Wars TV series that I’ve heard about…,” Hamill told EW . “So when he said, ‘We decided we’re going to do Episodes VII, VIII , and IX ,’ I was just gobsmacked. ‘What? Are you nuts?!’ [laughs] I can see both sides of it. Because in a way, there was a beginning, a middle, and an end and we all lived happily ever after and that’s the way it should be – and it’s great that people have fond memories, if they do have fond memories.” Hamill said in the interview that he feels “anxious” about what’s going on and admitted to mixed feelings about the sale, but said there has been a historical silver lining when Disney has picked up other marquee properties. “They haven’t done badly by Marvel and the Muppets and Pixar. It’s one of those big decisions that at first seems unusual but then the more you look at it, the more it makes sense.” Hamill noted that Lucas himself is in a “good place” today, which wasn’t exactly the case back when they were filming the earlier Star Wars . He recalled that his co-stars tried to lift his spirits on the set, which would come with mixed results. “He was not a jolly guy on set. [laughs] I always felt badly for him because he agonizes over details, and I’m sure after imagining it in his head for so many years, to see it realized — he’d look up and just hang his head and groan. Harrison [Ford], Carrie [Fisher], and I were always trying to cheer him up and joke him out of his doom and gloom.” [ Source: EW ]
The upcoming Star Wars Episode 7 will to a lot more good than satisfy legions of fans: Most of the $4 billion George Lucas will get from selling Lucasfilm to Disney will go to charity. Lucas “has expressed his intention, in the event the deal closes, to donate the majority of the proceeds to his philanthropic endeavors,” a rep for the filmmaker said. The 68-year-old heads the George Lucas Educational Foundation, which primarily focuses on educational issues. He once donated $175 million to his alma mater, USC. Major respect for the huge charitable giving from the film icon. As for Star Wars Episode 7 … are you excited for what?! OMG, YES! No way, the last three sucked! Eh, a little View Poll »
” I consider myself the Bo Jackson of entertainment .” Martial arts cinema and actual mixed martial arts collide in the form of pro fighter/actor Cung Le, who continues his rising Hollywood action career with a furious turn as Bronze Lion in RZA ‘s The Man With The Iron Fists . But his wild-maned, lethal work as the Lion clan henchman (who finds his toughest opponent in Lucy Liu’s Madam Blossom) is just Le’s “part time” job, of course; on November 10, a week after Iron Fists debuts in theaters, Le will face off against UFC fighter Rich Franklin in one of the biggest fights of his career. The kickboxing and sanshou champion, now fighting in the UFC, built up his Hollywood resume in recent years with supporting appearances in Fighting , Pandorum , Bodyguards and Assassins , Tekken , and True Legend . He’s also increasingly in-demand as an actor who can ably, and believably, fight; while filming RZA’s Iron Fists on location in China, Le was simultaneously filming Wong Kar-Wai’s Yip Man biopic under the tutelage of legendary choreographer Yuen Woo-Ping and shooting Dragon Eyes with Jean-Claude Van Damme, which he also choreographed. Le stopped by the Movieline/ENTV studio for a new recurring Movieline video series to discuss RZA’s martial arts epic, his childhood Bruce Lee obsession (and the unfortunate homemade nunchucks mishap that set him on the course to non-weapons based fighting), and his burgeoning second career as a martial arts action star and fight choreographer. As for his Franklin fight, broadcast by Fuel TV 6 on Nov. 10 from Macau, Le hints that his Iron Fists persona may make it into the octagon, and vice versa: “You will see a Bronze Lion with a Cung Le flair in action. Watch the Movieline interview on YouTube! You had multiple choreographies in your head at the same time while shooting Iron Fists , Dragon Eyes , and Grandmasters pretty much at the same time – how hard was that to keep straight? And does your fight training help somehow? Because I’m a professional fighter and I train all year round, I was probably the most in-shape on set, endurance-wise. The only thing that was tough was the weather, it was so cold. But I was excited to come to set and I was ready to put in extra hours – I did whatever it took. But martial arts, fight-wise, going from one movie to another didn’t really bother me. I felt like the transition was so natural and it came so easy to me, so everything was smooth, from one character to another, from one style to another – no problem. I think it’s so easy because my real job is stepping inside the octagon, looking up at my opponent pacing back and forth, who’s looking to take me out. That’s probably more nerve-wracking and more dangerous than what I’m doing in the movies part time. When I’m on a movie set it’s like, let’s do this ! When I’m inside the octagon, oh, man – he’s got the look and he wants to kill me . Doing both actual fighting and movie fighting, does it ever get confusing? Do your fight instincts ever take over during a fake fight, or do blows accidentally land here and there as you’re performing rather than fighting? Of course my natural instinct is to connect with my punch or my kick or my knee, but I’ve been doing martial arts so long that it’s natural for me. I can pull the punch at the last minute, I can make it look big or small, I can shorten my punch – it’s just years of training. So that part, I don’t need to think about it. On The Man With The Iron Fists , when Corey Yuen broke down a fight scene I could almost see what was going to come next. With Dragon Eyes I choreographed all the fight scenes, and I knew working with Van Damme was going to be a bit limiting because he wants to do so many of his own kicks and punches. So I let him do all his stuff, but of course he didn’t want to take any punches or kicks – but in the movie we came real close, and sometimes we did connect, just to make it more realistic. We wrapped Jean-Claude and brought in my trainer and Jean-Claude’s stunt double and I unleashed on him, so it looks like a great fight inside the jail cell, but before then it was all him trying to throw hook kicks and he was really trying to knock me out. For some reason I see the whole fight scene, then I write it on paper. Most people will write it on paper then try to piece it together, but I see not just fight scenes but action, how it plays out, before I can write it. Bronze Lion, like all the characters in Iron Fists , has a distinct martial arts style – what sort of discussions did you and RZA have about his form and how much additional research did you have to do? Bronze Lion’s is not as popular as the Tiger Style, so we were open to using things like the claw from Tiger to Lion, but there were also the weapons. They didn’t just want Bronze Lion to use Lion technique because my specialties are my kicks and scissor kicks. Corey Yuen wanted to incorporate all my strengths into the movie so he let me do a lot of kicks – I did the jumping side kick back kick without landing, the spin-around wheel kick, the running up the wall and grabbing someone by the head, scissor kicking the other guy’s neck and flipping him… so I got to do not just the Lion technique, I also got to put the Cung Le flair in there. So Bronze Lion got a chance to use Cung Le’s technique! Working with Corey Yuen and acting as Bronze Lion, did you pick up anything you think will help you in your actual fighting career? Working with high level martial artists, you see how they work and put things together, how things are planned out and how things come naturally. It gives me my own flavor and variety and the more variety I have, the more I can pull from. When I’m in a fight and I need to use a different technique, the transition is much quicker. But I can’t say that it does or it doesn’t, I can just say that with the years of being a student and a teacher and a fan I feel I can adapt to any situation with the training that I’ve had. Who’s your favorite martial artist of all time, the one you grew up watching? I grew up watching Bruce Lee. Enter the Dragon , Game of Death , Chinese Connection . I think hands down now, since I got a chance to work with Donnie Yen he’s one of my favorites now because he’s so open to doing different things. Not just the same kung fu, but he’s open to doing MMA in his movies and a lot of other things. I kind of look at what he does to mold my own style. Were you one of those kids growing up doing Bruce Lee moves in the mirror? When I was growing up I was really into nun chucks, and since my mom didn’t buy me any, this old broom that broke, I cut it in half and cut that half piece in half and drilled a hole through it with one of those hand drills. I tied it with some rope and I was working and doing pretty good, but I must have not tied it good enough so when I flipped it, it came around and hit me in the head. I had this big knot – and after that I just figured I’d do things with my hands and legs. [Laughs] Continued on next page…
May the farce be with you! In the wake of news that Disney will be producing more Star Wars movies as a result of its acquisition of George Lucas’ LucasFilm on Tuesday, the geniuses at Conan O’Brien’s Team Coco have posted some very funny parody posters of what the interstellar franchise will look like under the influence of the House of Mouse. I’m partial to the Boba Fett-meets-Buzz-Lightyear hybrid, but the image of the Jawas taking over for the Seven Dwarfs and spiriting off a comatose Snow White is a keeper, too. The full Boba poster and a third featuring the characters from Peter Pan silhouetted against the Death Star can be found at the Team Coco website . There’s such great material for satire here that I have a feeling that this is just the beginning. Walt Disney as Darth Sidious, anyone? Follow Frank DiGiacomo on Twitter. Follow Movieline on Twitter.
Lucas says talks are already underway with writers for the upcoming 2015 seventh film, with two more planned after that. By Gil Kaufman George Lucas Photo: WireImage
Well, say goodbye to the Internet. It’s about to explode. The Walt Disney Company has purchased Lucasfilm Ltd. for $4 billion, according to reports, and included in the press release announcing that mega sale is this passage: Star Wars Episode 7 is targeted for release in 2015, with more feature films expected to continue the Star Wars saga and grow the franchise well into the future . Says direcctor George Lucas: “For the past 35 years, one of my greatest pleasures has been to see Star Wars passed from one generation to the next. “It’s now time for me to pass Star Wars on to a new generation of filmmakers. I’ve always believed that Star Wars could live beyond me, and I thought it was important to set up the transition during my lifetime. I’m confident that with Lucasfilm under the leadership of Kathleen Kennedy, and having a new home within the Disney organization, Star Wars will certainly live on and flourish for many generations to come.” It’s really happening, movie fans. What do you think? Are you excited for Star Wars Episode VII? OMG, YES! No way, the last three sucked! Eh, a little View Poll »
This is not your mother’s Noah. A first look at actor Russell Crowe as the grizzled title character in Darren Aronofsky’s Noah has surfaced, and it’s not what you’d expect. As Movies.com reports , Crowe: “looks like a Mad Max out of the depths of time” and lives in a hostile world where “pity has no place.” Aronofsky’s film — which has an expected 2014 release date — does seem to jibe with the Biblical tale of Noah and his famous ark on one key point. According to Movies.com: Noah “is subject to visions which announce the imminent end of the earth,” which will be devastated by “the waves of an endless deluge.” Fan boys take note: Judging from the graphic novel series, Noah, For The Cruelty of Men , that Aronofsky created with executive producer Ari Handel and artist Niko Henrichon to help sell the film, Crowe’s character will be doing battle with some monstrous creatures. Hitfix writer Drew McWeeny reports that Noah’s opponents will include “Watchers,” 11-foot fallen angels have no wings but six arms. McWeeny also revealed that Anthony Hopkins has been cast as Noah’s 900-year-old father Methuselah and that Jennifer Connelly, Emma Watson, Ray Winstone and Logan Leman will co-star. George Lucas’ Industrial Light and Magic will provide the CGI movie magic. “This isn’t a historical period piece,” Movies.com writes. “Noah’s is a story that exists outside of what we know to be, which sounds almost like a Stephen King/ The Dark Tower , ‘the world has moved on’ type post-apocalyptic scenario. It may not even be Earthly, it’s all just a vehicle for the Noah metaphor”. Follow Frank DiGiacomo on Twitter. Follow Movieline on Twitter.
George Lucas Makes An Impact With Red Tails George Lucas is all the way down with the brown… George Lucas believes his big-budget movie “Red Tails” about the famed Tuskegee Airmen moved the ball forward for films starring or created by African-Americans in Hollywood, but didn’t change the game. “It had an affect on a lot of kids and adults. Now it’s the one thing that everyone comes up to me and says ‘thank you’ for. I’m proud of that,” he told us at the Fostering a Legacy benefit Saturday evening in East Hampton for singer Ne-Yo’s Compound Foundation, which supports kids in foster care. Lucas, who has three adopted children, was honored at the benefit for his positive impact on young adults. The movie, which took Lucas more than 20 years to bring to theaters and was produced with $58 million of his own money, raked in $50 million at theaters, surpassing Hollywood’s expectations. “We didn’t get to a point when they said, ‘Oh let’s just do black movies.’ But every time you poke ’em, it makes an effect.” said Lucas, who attended the benefit with girlfriend Mellody Hobson. The director announced his retirement earlier this year to focus on making smaller “hobby films,” but told us it will also leave more time for Hobson. Awww, how sweet. Are y’all feelin them as a couple? Source
Tyler Perry debuts a new Madea comedy this week, but as he tells Movieline in a forthcoming interview, he’s been itching to put the the fat suit and lady dress in his rear-view. Will his turn in the mainstream action film Alex Cross — as a husband and special agent in a cat-and-mouse game with a serial killer — be a successful attempt by Perry to branch out beyond his niche audience? Watch as Perry goes mano-a-mano with LOST ‘s Matthew Fox , who’s undergone some changes of his own, in the first trailer for the James Patterson adaptation. In the film (directed by XXX helmer Rob Cohen) Perry plays Alex Cross, a detective-slash-psychologist investigating a series of killings by Michael “The Butcher” Sullivan (Fox). The film’s newly debuted poster boasts the unfortunate tagline “Don’t Ever Cross Alex Cross,” and the trailer hammers home that solid fact: There will be crossing. Crossing paths, crossing lines, crossing gunfire, crossing Alex Cross. It’s enough of a curiosity to see how well Perry crosses over (groan) to the mainstream with his burly, straight-faced turn as the vengeance-seeking detective; his stature and that gravelly-velvety baritone work well for him, though his earnest delivery may not. Even more fascinating is what Fox is doing as The Butcher, whittled down to skin and muscle and acting equally serious as a sociopathic torture-killer. Will either image transformation work? Oh, and John C. McGinley, Ed Burns, Rachel Nichols, Giancarlo Esposito, Cicely Tyson, AND Jean Reno are also in this movie. Not that it’ll likely matter, being that this is The Tyler Perry-Matthew Fox Show. Verdict: Looks fairly rote as action pics go. Nevertheless, the curiosity of the season! Alex Cross will hit theaters on October 19.
