Charles Bramesco
Go Loco for the First Look at Pixar’s Mexico-Set Musical Adventure ‘Coco’
Disney’s currently riding a wave of buzz for their latest release Moana, a delightful Polynesian adventure that ticks all the most essential boxes for the Mouse House: precocious princess, lovable animal sidekick, well-placed showtunes, the whole nine yards. With Disney fever at a relative high, there’s no better time for the happiest PR department on Earth to start drumming up enthusiasm for their next original project, a Pixar Animation production that sounds like it’ll be catnip for anyone charmed by the return to form of Moana. And what’s more, this feature will continue its predecessor’s mission to introduce even more diversity to the Disney/Pixar racial palette.
American Heroes at TCM Bringing ‘The Godfather,’ ‘Casablanca,’ ‘E.T.’ to Theaters in 2017
One of the greatest advantages of living in or around a major metropolitan area, at least for cinephiles, is the abundance of repertory screening options. Independently run theaters will run older, foreign or rare movies to impassioned audiences who may not have had access to the material otherwise, balancing their filmic diet with a healthy balance of new releases and classics. Sure, pert near everything can be found online if you’re willing to investigate some shadier torrenting sites. But the experience of seeing a movie in a dark theater on the big screen, especially a nicely lived-in celluloid print and all its endearing pops and scratches — that makes a difference.
Power Down That ‘Stargate’ Remake, It’s Not Happening Any Time Soon
It must be tough being Roland Emmerich. Your passion project about the Stonewall riots gets savaged by critics and then left to die on the vine when it finally hits theaters. Next year, your big comeback — a long-awaited sequel to Independence Day, the film that remains your greatest success — goes down like the Hindenburg, mustering a faint fraction of the original’s box-office might and getting outclassed by a cartoon about a lost fish. You need a win, and luckily, you’ve got a sure thing coming down the pike: A remake of your first major blockbuster, 1994’s sci-fi adventure Stargate.
Lady Gaga and Bradley Cooper’s ‘A Star Is Born’ Remake Gets a Release Date
In a brash assumption from The Hollywood Reporter that the planet Earth, the United States of America, and its film industry as we know it will still be intact two years from now, Warner Bros. has announced a release date of September 28, 2018 for their remake of musical romance A Star Is Born. Operating under the premise that motion pictures will still be made, distributed, and exhibited in some form by the time President Donald Trump — a three-word phrase we all now must get used to — has served half of his term, the Lady Gaga-fronted directorial debut from Bradley Cooper will see an awards-friendly early fall run.
Super-Secret ‘Mission: Impossible 6′ Release Date Declassified
Your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to hold tight for a couple years and then faithfully head back out to see another Mission: Impossible movie. Variety notes that Paramount Pictures has officially announced a release date for the sixth installment in the perennially popular espionage franchise, and that audiences can expect Ethan Hunt to suspension-rope down into theaters once again on July 27, 2018. A fun fact about 2018 is that in that year, eternal ass-kicker and franchise star Tom Cruise (who agreed to headline the sixth film last year while promoting Mission: Impossible — Rogue Nation) will be 56 years of age.
Bruce Springsteen Wrote a Song for the ‘Harry Potter’ Films, Which They Passed on Somehow
Back around Christmastime, the well-regarded genre-defiers Radiohead revealed that they had recorded their own theme for the latest James Bond picture, Spectre. It was baffling, not just because their composition was swooningly beautiful, but because the Spectre team ultimately ended up going with Sam Smith, instantly agreed upon as one of the lesser Bond theme singers. But that’s all peanuts compared to the latest gross injustice from the world of film soundtracking, with greater effrontery dealt to an even more esteemed statesman of rock.
Smithsonian Mounts $300,000 Campaign to Preserve Dorothy’s Ruby Slippers
A step above the sought-after Maltese Falcon and the fabled Ark of the Covenant, Dorothy Gale’s ruby slippers from The Wizard of Oz have to be the single most vital prop in cinematic history. The red-sequined shoes, so lusted after by the Wicked Witch of the West in the immortal 1939 fantasy film, have spent the last 30 years as one of the Smithsonian's most popular attractions. But not even magical footwear is immune to the ravages of time, and Judy Garland’s old kicks have lost a bit of their luster. As The Hollywood Reporter notes, the iconic slippers have faded from their original Technicolor ruby to something closer to “a dull auburn.”
The Tank Gang Makes a Daring Escape in Deleted ‘Finding Dory’ Scene
This past summer's Finding Dory made a big splash at cineplexes (pardon me while I self-immolate), enchanting kid- and adult-aged viewers alike while running up the year's highest domestic gross. On the unfortunate side, however, the de rigueur short runtime of children's programming meant that some bits of the film had to be left on the cutting room floor like so many discarded fish eyeballs. Today, one lost sequence from Pixar's latest smash has been recovered and brought to the viewing public's attention.
‘Kingsman 2’ Official Title, Concept Art and Details Revealed
Kingsman: The Secret Service was the big sleeper hit of 2015, its nihilistic sense of black humor and highly stylized action resonating with a surprisingly large audience. Naturally, a sequel couldn’t have been far off, and while director Matthew Vaughn has already confirmed that he’ll write and direct a follow-up for release on June 16, 2017, basic details have yet to come to light...
Man Arrested For Failing to Return VHS Copy of ‘Freddy Got Fingered’ 14 Years Ago
In precisely the sort of absurdist mix-up that sounds like something Tom Green would come up with, a North Carolina man has been arrested for failing to return a VHS copy of the Tom Green comedy Freddy Got Fingered 14 years ago. The Wrap relays the odd tale of James Meyers, the unfortunate soul that checked out a tape of the widely reviled but cult-beloved surrealist comedy at a video store in Kan