The Week in Spandex - Green Lantern, The Dark Knight Rises, X-Men: First Class and more...

Our weekly round-up of all the talking points from the world of movie superheroes...



With Green Lantern arriving this coming week Warner Bros. have really ramped up the publicity with eight new clips from the film, in addition to a host of video interviews featuring director Martin Campbell, screenwriter Greg Berlanti, producers Geoff Johns and Donald DeLine and stars Ryan Reynolds (Hal Jordan), Blake Lively (Carol Ferris), Angela Bassett (Dr. Amanda Waller), Geoffrey Rush (Tomar-Re), Mark Strong (Sinestro), Michael Clarke Duncan (Kilowog), Peter Sarsgaard (Hector Hammond), Temuera Morrison (Abin Sur) and Tim Robbins (Hammond). If that's not enough to satisfy your Green Lantern thirst, then you might want to check out this series of press junket videos along with fifteen minutes of B-roll footage from the upcoming film.



Moving on to Warner Bros. big superhero offering of 2012 and a few new set photos have emerged from the shoot of The Dark Knight Rises. Now, there's been a lot of talk these past few weeks about Alfred (Michael Caine) ending up in the hospital, where it's rumoured that Bane (Tom Hardy) will attack Bruce Wayne (Christian Bale) and possibly throw the billionaire out of a window. Quite how Bruce would manage to survive such a fall is anyone's guess (I mean, it's pretty high - take a look for yourself), but the bigger question is, just who is that masked man? Bane? Black Mask? Some random League of Shadows goon? Or maybe it's the stuntman that Anne Hathaway clocked...



Elsewhere, ComicBookMovie got an unconfirmed ‘scoop’ (presumably from someone who’d just finished reading Knightfall) about a major plot point in The Dark Knight Rises, while in other Batman news we got a look at some concept art for James Gordon and Catwoman, albeit from the upcoming DC Original Animated Movies adaptation of Frank Miller's Year One, which you can check out here.



X-Men: First Class opened last weekend and while it seems to have been well received by the fan community the 60s-set prequel hasn’t exactly set the box office alight. First Class topped the US chart with a debut weekend of $55.1m, the second-lowest of the X-Men franchise after Bryan Singer’s original, while here in the UK it was saved from the wooden spoon by two days of preview screenings, giving it an opening haul of £5.4m. First Class currently sits on a world-wide gross of $148m, and at this rate it’s going to struggle to overtake Thor in the race for 2011’s biggest superhero movie, especially given the competition it will face this month from the likes of Super 8, Green Lantern, Cars 2 and Transformers: Dark of the Moon.



Shifting over to the Marvel Cinematic Universe and a new TV spot for Captain America: The First Avenger has given us the first words from the Red Skull himself, Hugo Weaving, in advance of the new trailer premiering tomorrow at the Hero Complex Film Festival. Chris Evans (Captain America), Robert Downey Jr. (Iron Man) and Mark Ruffalo (The Incredible Hulk) have also dropped a few brief updates about Joss Whedon's The Avengers, while a Twitter user by the name of Lionheart3rd seemed to be providing updates directly from the shoot until his account was disabled. ComicBookMovie managed to collate the tweets, which don’t contain all that much to be honest but – if true – do serve as extra confirmation that aliens will be present in the film, which I think everyone pretty much suspects to be the case by now anyway. If they are, it’s probably a good time to make it official.



Rounding up the best of the rest...



...Last week director David Slade teased some info on his upcoming Daredevil reboot and now Fox have announced that Fringe writer Brad Caleb Kane has been hired to pen the screenplay, which will be based on Frank Miller and David Mazzucchelli's acclaimed 'Born Again' run. Still now word yet on potential candidates to replace Ben Affleck as the Man Wihout Fear...



...Ryan Reynolds had a few words for MTV about Deadpool, praising director Tim Miller and explaining that the X-Men Origins: Wolverine spin-off is likely to be "pretty nasty, and pretty hard", while he's likely to start the film after his next project R.I.P.D...



...Sticking with the various X-Men spin-offs, a couple of weeks back it was revealed that eight directors were under consideration to take over from Darren Aronofsky on The Wolverine. Well, now we can scratch Mark Romanek off that list as the Never Let Me Go director confirmed to DigitalSpy that he is officially out of the running, while Doug Liman and Antoine Fuqua have also moved on to other projects...



...It's been rumoured that we'll get our first look the trailer for next year's The Amazing Spider-Man when Transformers: Dark of the Moon hits cinemas later this month....



...And finally, be sure to enter our fabulous Superman giveaway for your chance to win The Superman Motion Picture Anthology on Blu-ray, along with seasons 1-9 of Smallville on DVD!

Gary Collinson

Jesse Eisenberg agrees to lead magician heist Now You See Me

Jesse Eisenberg (The Social Network, Zombieland) has agreed in principle to star in Summit Entertainment’s new thriller Now You See Me and is in early negotiations for the leading role. The film follows a team of brilliant illusionists who carry out daring bank heists during their performances and reward their audience with a share of the money. A special FBI squad is assigned to track them down and a cat-and-mouse game between the two groups ensues.

Jake Gyllenhaal (Source Code) is also reportedly interested in a role and has been offered the other lead in the movie. Summit snapped up the script by Boaz Yakin (Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time) and Edward Ricourt last June and director Louis Leterrier (Clash of the Titans, The Transporter) was brought on board in February. Roberto Orci and Alex Kurtzman (Star Trek, Cowboys & Aliens) will be producing the film.

Next up for Jake Gyllenhaal is David O. Russell’s Nailed with Jessica Biel and James Marsden, while Jesse Eisenberg will be in Ruben Fleischer’s 30 Minutes or Less and is rumoured for Noah Baumbach’s While We’re Young with Ben Stiller and Naomi Watts.

Emma Hutchings

X-Men: First Class tops the UK box office

UK box office top ten and analysis for the weekend of Friday 4th - Sunday 6th June 2011...



The latest installment in Fox's X-Men franchise debuts in first place at the UK box office, but a weekend haul of £5.4m has to be considered less than 'First Class' considering that the figure - which includes over £2m from two days of preview screenings - is just over half the £10.4m opening enjoyed by The Hangover Part II. Discounting previews it's the weakest opening for the franchise but nevertheless, it's good enough to put X-Men: First Class in pole position as Todd Phillips' comedy sequel slips down to second place with another £3.8m, while Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides also falls one spot to third and remains the highest earner in the top ten with a cumulative gross of £26.7m.



Along with X-Men: First Class, there are another three newcomers in the chart this week, the highest of which is the 3D concert movie JLS: Eyes Wide Open, which debuts in fifth (one place behind family comedy Diary of a Wimpy Kid 2: Rodrick Rules), with acclaimed racing documentary Senna and Bollywood comedy Ready opening in seventh and eighth respectively. Meanwhile, heading towards the foot of the chart is animated comedy Rio (down to places to eighth) and Fast & Furious 5: Rio Heist (down four two ninth), but the biggest drop of the week is reserved for Thor, which plummets to the bottom of the chart after finishing up in fourth last time out.



Number one this time last year: Sex and the City 2

Pos.	Film	Weekend Gross	Week	Total UK Gross
1	X-Men: First Class	£5,438,386	1	£5,438,386
2	The Hangover Part II	£3,826,158	2	£21,055,272
3	Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides	£2,144,179	3	£26,693,930
4	Diary of a Wimpy Kid 2: Rodrick Rules	£645,196	2	£3,622,991
5	JLS: Eyes Wide Open	£463,914	1	£463,914
6	Senna	£375,173	1	£375,173
7	Ready	£236,868	1	£236,868
8	Rio	£94,127	8	£12,890,750
9	Fast & Furious 5: Rio Heist	£77,874	7	£18,368,657
10	Thor	£59,994	6	£13,849,095

Incoming...



DreamWorks Animation sequel Kung Fu Panda 2 (cert. PG) will likely flying kick its way to the top of the box office this coming Friday and features an all-star voice cast including Jack Black, Seth Rogan, Angelina Jolie, Gary Oldman, Jackie Chan, Dustin Hoffman, Lucy Liu, Michelle Yeoh and Jean-Claude Van Damme. Meanwhile other films looking to make an impact include dance flick Honey 2 (cert. PG), thriller Point Blank (cert. 15) and horror Mother's Day (cert. 18).

U.K. Box Office Archive

BBFC refuse to classify The Human Centipede II

The British Board of Film Classification has decided to refuse a certificate to horror sequel The Human Centipede II (Full Sequence) from director Tom Six, effectively banning the film from release here in the UK. According to the BBFC, the film - a follow-up to last year's controversial shocker The Human Centipede (First Sequence) - may fall foul of the Obscene Publications Act and "poses a real, as opposed to a fanciful, risk that harm is likely to be caused to potential viewers".

In a statement released by the BBFC, the film was focussed on the "sexual arousal of the central character at both the idea and the spectacle of the total degradation, humiliation, mutilation, torture and murder of his naked victims" and that "there is little attempt to portray any of the victims in the film as anything other than objects to be brutalised, degraded and mutilated for the amusement and arousal of the central character, as well as for the pleasure of the audience".

It's nice to see that the BBFC know what's best for us viewers and we can only thank them for taking this step to protect us from potential harm. Joking aside, unless the 'victims' were actually brutalised, degraded and mutilated for the purposes of making the film, I can't see what the problem is and I'd quite like to know what qualifies the BBFC to decide what is suitable and unsuitable for me to watch - as a responsible adult, I'm sure I can make that decision for myself.

Read the BBFC's patter here.

The Week in Spandex - X-Men: First Class, Captain America, The Dark Knight Rises and more...

Our weekly round-up of all the big talking points from the world of movie superheroes...



The big news is of course the release of Matthew Vaughn's Cold War-era mutant prequel X-Men: First Class, which I have to say I found to be a little over-rated. Don't get me wrong, it's enjoyable, but in my opinion it really doesn't justify all the hype that's been coming its way this past week (you can check out my full review here). Nevertheless, Vaughn's done a good job setting things up for the next two installments in the 'First Class Trilogy', which I'm sure will be announced once the opening weekend figures come in for this first outing, while James McAvoy has been discussing a potential sequel over at Hero Complex.



Anyway, a whole raft of clips and TV spots have made their way online this past week to further promote the release of First Class (I'm sure by now someone could do a pretty good job of editing the whole film together from these), along with a couple of interesting bits and pieces including a three-part roundtable interview with Matthew Vaughn at ObsessedWithFilm, a video interview with screenwriter Jane Goldman at IGN and an insight into the VFX process courtesy of Rhythm & Hues which you can read over at Comicus (scroll down for the English version). Finally, Vaughn and January Jones have also been answering fan questions over on the Facebook X-Perts Q&A (and no, they didn't answer that one).



Also stepping up the publicity this week ahead of a July release is Marvel Studios' Captain America: The First Avenger, which debuted three new promo images - featuring Chris Evans as Cap, Hayley Atwell as Peggy Carter and Hugo Weaving as the Red Skull - along with a few TV spots, one of which featured snippets of new footage. Meanwhile TFA storyboard artist Martin Asbury updated his website with some of his work from the film, which could possibly contain a few spoilers but really is worth checking out. Oh, and while we're on the subject of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, expect The Avengers to have quite a presence at the Licensing International Expo (which runs from June 14th-16th in Las Vegas), with ComingSoon.net delivering a sneak preview of a promo poster for the upcoming superhero ensemble.



Along with The Avengers, another big movie expecting to make a splash at the Licensing Expo is Christopher Nolan's final Batman feature The Dark Knight Rises, with Batman-News.com speculating that it could play host to the reveal of the latest Bat-vehicle in much the same way that the Batpod debuted back in 2007 (oh, and a couple of purported viral videos have sprung up on Youtube, most likely fakes but you can take a look here if you haven’t seen them already).



Wrapping up the best of the rest...



...After confirmation earlier this week that Sony will be taking The Amazing Spider-Man to Comic-Con, there's been talk from directors Mark Neveldine and Brian Taylor that Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance will be the next superhero flick to follow suit...



...New Daredevil director David Slade has been busy on Twitter recently, teasing an announcement on the upcoming reboot while confirming that he was never attached to the proposed Justice League of America movie, nor a potential reboot of The Shadow...



...Green Lantern's arrival in cinemas is now less than two weeks away and Warner Bros. have recently debuted a new website entitled Green Lantern Creator, which features some new shots of the alien characters and gives fans the opportunity to create their own member of the Green Lantern Corps...



...CosmicBookNews have posted an article that gathers together all of the Man of Steel rumours that have been doing the rounds lately, while original Superman director Richard Donner took part in a interesting interview with Hero Complex to promote the release of Superman: The Motion Picture Anthology Blu-ray box set that arrives on June 13th...



...Another DC superhero who looks set to be coming to the big screen is Hawkman, with BleedingCool reporting that the proposed film is "part Indiana Jones / The Da Vinci Code, part Ghost". Head over to the site to read the full logline that's doing the rounds...



...For anyone out there still remotely interested in NBC's Wonder Woman pilot, iFanboy posted an in-depth review which also features some previously unseen images, including what looks to be a shot of Wonder Woman's plane...



......And finally, while it doesn't really have anything to do with movies, DC Comics have announced plans to relaunch all of their titles with new #1s, which one can only assume to be the major announcement that was scheduled for this month's Hero Complex Film Festival.

Gary Collinson

The Hangover Part III? – A trilogy already in the offing after success of comedy sequel

With the dust barely settling after a barnstorming opening weekend for The Hangover Part II, talk of a third instalment of drunken hilarity from “the wolf pack” is morphing into concrete action. The writer behind the script for Part II, Craig Mazin, has been approached by Warner Brothers to craft a story for a possible end to the trilogy.

Director Todd Phillips had already let slip, just before the release of the latest film, that he had an idea for Part III. Presumably, on the evidence of Part II, his brainwave is to copy as closely as possible the events of the opening films, but possibly in a different city.

Critics may have loathed the rehash of 2009’s surprise hit but a loyal and wide fan base clearly can’t get enough. It’s no wonder that Warner Brothers are already getting things moving for a third film with opening weekend figures of £10,409,017 in the UK. Such gigantic starts are usually reserved for British icons like Harry Potter or James Bond, or American superheroes. Successful comedies never reach such stratospheric heights. Bridget Jones: Edge of Reason is the only comic creation ever to better the takings of the latest Hangover (and only fractionally), with past hits like Hot Fuzz and Borat all opening satisfactorily at around £5-6 million.

One huge stumbling block could derail the winning formula for a trilogy however: keeping the wolf pack together. Brad Cooper and Zach Galifianakis in particular, are forging Hollywood careers beyond the franchise. According to Total Film, Galifianakis was “negative” throughout the filming of Part II, no doubt fearing becoming typecast. And as the review here at Flickering Myth points out, the comedic charms of Alan are crucial to the appeal of these crazy capers.

If Part III lost any of the film’s big stars, especially Galifianakis, it would surely not reach the heights of Part II. It might not even get made. But, with piles of money to throw at his actors, Todd Phillips might just get yet another amnesiac night on the town.

Liam Trim (follow me on Twitter)

David Fincher options Panic Attack

David Fincher's (The Social Network, Zodiac, Fight Club) newly formed production company Panic Pictures has optioned its first property, an adaptation of the macabre crime novel Panic Attack. Jason Starr’s 2009 story is a dark thriller about a New York psychiatrist who shoots and kills a home intruder and then has to face a media frenzy and the victim’s accomplice who is seeking revenge.

Screenwriter Ted Griffin (Ocean’s Eleven, Tower Heist) will write the script for the movie adaptation. Novelist Starr’s tenth book The Pack is released next week and four of his previous novels are already in development in Hollywood.

No word yet on whether David Fincher will be directing Panic Attack himself or passing it on to another director. He is currently finishing The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (released in cinemas in the UK on December 26th) and may make the next in the trilogy. He is also due to make Cleopatra with Angelina Jolie and has other projects in pre-production.

Emma Hutchings

The Hangover Part II has a weekend to remember at the UK box office

UK box office top ten and analysis for the weekend of Friday 27th - Sunday 29th May 2011...



Todd Phillips' comedy sequel The Hangover Part II enjoyed a record-breaking opening at the global box office this past weekend and it also jumps in straight at the top of the UK chart, toppling previous champion Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides with an impressive opening of £10.4m. As a result, Pirates 4 slips one place to second with £4.7m, while another comedy sequel, Diary of a Wimpy Kid 2: Rodrick Rules, opens in third place with £1.4m and is the only other film in UK cinemas to break the seven-figure mark.



Moving on and Marvel Studios' latest superhero effort Thor finds itself down one place to fourth while Fast & Furious 5: Rio Heist drops out of the top two for the first time, slipping three places to round out the top five. Animated comedy Rio continues to perform well and actually climbs one spot to sixth, leapfrogging horror flick Insidious as it falls to seventh. Also on the decline are Hanna and Water for Elephants, both of which slip two apiece to eighth and tenth respectively, while Attack the Block suffers the steepest drop of the week as it plunges four places to ninth.



Number one this time last year: Sex and the City 2

Pos.	Film	Weekend Gross	Week
1	The Hangover Part II	£10,409,017	1
2	Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides	£4,757,411	2
3	Diary of a Wimpy Kid 2: Rodrick Rules	£1,476,720	1
4	Thor	£335,103	5
5	Fast & Furious 5: Rio Heist	£322,506	6
6	Rio	£300,865	7
7	Insidious	£208,313	5
8	Hanna	£148,339	3
9	Attack the Block	£142,919	4
10	Water for Elephants	£129,143	4

Incoming...



The big release this week is of course X-Men: First Class (cert. 12A), which opened here in the UK today, while alternatives arriving this coming Friday include the Disney teen flick Prom (cert. U), racing documentary Senna (cert. 12A) and the British concert film JLS 3D: Eyes Wide Open (cert. TBC).

U.K. Box Office Archive

The Week in Spandex - X-Men: First Class, The Dark Knight Rises, The Amazing Spider-Man and more

Our weekly round-up of all the big talking points from the world of movie superheroes...



As you’d expect with just days to go until the UK release of X-Men: First Class, the mutant marketing machine has gone into overdrive this past week and, judging by the critical reception so far, it seems as if Matthew Vaughn has overseen a return to form for the X-Men series, if not a franchise best. Vaughn took part in an in depth roundtable earlier this week (the transcript of which can be seen over at HeyUGuys) and he’s also been talking potential sequels with HitFlix and MovieWeb (along with the on / off status of Kick-Ass 2), while ScreenRant posted highlights of a press conference with the First Class cast.



There is of course a special guest cameo in X-Men: First Class, which we won’t ruin here (despite the fact it’s really not all that surprising anyway) but if you’re desperate to get your hands on anything X-Men then over twenty minutes of b-roll footage has made its way online that you can check out at ComicBookMovie. There’s also been a million or so more TV spots, posters, banners and what have you, but frankly it’s just too damn exhausting to keep track of them all. One thing that did prove pretty interesting though was Patrick Stewart’s comments about himself and Ian McKellen being up for another X-Men film, and with Bryan Singer linked to X4 and X5 it looks as if Fox is really going to get its money worth out of the franchise over the coming years.



And, on that very subject, the studio are also keen to push on with their latest Wolverine spin-off, with Variety reporting that eight directors are under consideration to replace Darren Aronofsky on the Hugh Jackman mutant actioner. Those said to be in the frame to helm The Wolverine are Jose Padilha (Bus 174, Elite Squad), Doug Liman (The Bourne Identity, Mr. & Mrs. Smith), Antoine Fuqua (Training Day, Brooklyn's Finest), Mark Romanek (One Hour Photo, Never Let Me Go), Justin Lin (Fast & Furious, Fast Five), Gavin O'Connor (Pride and Glory, Warrior), James Mangold (Walk the Line, Knight and Day) and notable commercials director Gary Shore. What, no Gavin Hood?



Along with the first reveal of Tom Hardy as Bane, last week brought word of three new arrivals to the cast of The Dark Knight Rises and now you can add another two to the ever-growing list. The latest additions to Christopher Nolan’s Batman swansong are Brett Cullen (Ghost Rider, Lost) and Chris Ellis (Catch Me If You Can, Transformers), with Cullen portraying a judge and Ellis featuring as a priest in what you’d imagine to be minor roles.



Meanwhile it’s also been revealed that Matthew Modine’s character is called Nixon and is described by Showbiz411 as “a politician and a key villain”. Batman’s certainly going to have his hands full in The Dark Knight Rises and it really seems like Nolan’s throwing everything he has into this final outing, which is rumoured to be getting a teaser trailer in time for the release of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2.



Rounding up the best of the rest...



…Another film that could be increasing its roster of villains is Marvel’s The Avengers, with LatinoReview reporting that the cosmic tyrant Thanos could be in line for an appearance in Joss Whedon’s superhero ensemble, while Industrial Light & Magic have updated their site to announce that they’ll be handling VFX duties…



...Having finished up principal photography on The Amazing Spider-Man, Sony have released a rather bland teaser poster and logo for the upcoming reboot, while Marvel legend Stan Lee has spilled the beans on his cameo appearance and revealed a little info about a showdown between Andrew Garfield's webslinger and Rhys Ifans' Lizard...



...According to Hero Complex, DC executives Geoff Johns and Jim Lee are planning a major announcement for the Hero Complex Film Festival on June 11th, which is said to concern "the future of Superman and the entire DC Universe". ComicBookMovie are speculating that this could be official confirmation of a Justice League movie, but I'd be surprised if that didn't come direct from WB. Could it have something to do with the messy dispute over the Superman rights? We’ll find out soon enough…



...Green Lantern is set to arrive in cinemas next month and this past week a new clip emerged featuring Michael Clarke Duncan’s Kilowog and Ryan Reynolds’ Hal Jordon, while io9 posted an article about the make-up used to turn Mark Strong into Sinestro. And there’s me thinking they’d just used cheap-looking CGI for all the aliens…



...And finally, for those of you out there distraught over missing out on the opportunity for a glimpse of Wonder Woman's Adrianne Palicki in a pair of skimpy, star-spangled knickers, you may be able to satisfy some of those cravings here.



X-Men: First Class Press Conference Report...

Gary Collinson

Four images from indie slasher Down the Road

You may remember back at the start of February that we posted a teaser trailer for Down the Road, an independent horror from writer-director Jason Christopher and producer Deven Lobascio, and now we've got our hands on four images from the upcoming film that you can check out right here.

Down the Road is a throwback slasher that sees a group of college students fighting for their lives against a revenge-seeking mad man. The film stars David J. Bonner (The Next Three Days), Shaun Paul Costello (You'll Know My Name), Chelsey Garner (Killer Shorts 2), Nikki Bell (Ugly Betty), Brian Gallagher (Calendar Girl), Matthew Nadu (The Last Airbender) and newcomer Jen Dance, along with veteran charactor actor Clint Howard (the Austin Powers trilogy, House of the Dead, Halloween).





The film, which features script mentoring from Friday the 13th scribe Victor Miller, is set for release later this year, and a full length trailer is expected soon.

Robot Chicken Star Wars Episode III trailer and UK release info

The trilogy will be complete this July with the DVD release of Robot Chicken Star Wars - Episode III, the latest spoof from Adult Swim's stop-motion animated comedy series from Seth Green and Matthew Senreich.

Voice talent returning for this third Star Wars-themed special include Billy Dee Williams, Ahmed Best, Breckin Meyer, Seth MacFarlane, Dan Milano, Abe Benrubi, Donald Faison, Rachael Leigh Cook, Adrianne Palicki, Eden Espinosa, Hugh Davidson, Bob Bergen, Keith Ferguson, Tom Kane and Zeb Wells, along with newcomers Zac Efron, Anthony Daniels, Mike Henry and Donald Glover.

Along with the 45-minute special, Robot Chicken Star Wars - Episode III also comes with over 3 hours of extra features including trailers, featurettes, commentaries and more.

Take a look at the trailer...


Star Wars Robot Chicken - Episode III is released on DVD on July 4th. Pre-order it here.

Doug Liman joins list of directors linked to The Wolverine

Following the departure of Darren Aronofsky from the director’s chair due to personal reasons, the scramble continues to find someone to helm work-in-progress The Wolverine. Rumours swirl online about a possible shortlist of people the producers would be happy to work with. Names such as James Mangold, Mark Romanek and Justin Lin, who is also attached to the likes of Terminator 5 and Fast and Furious 6, are all in the mix. The latest candidate to emerge is Jumper’s Doug Liman.

Whilst Jumper, starring the consistently awful Hayden Christensen, was pretty much universally panned by critics, Liman has proved himself capable of good action in the past with The Bourne Identity, the hard hitting opener to the Bourne franchise. Recently Liman’s suspenseful political thriller Fair Game, starring Naomi Watts and Sean Penn, divided some critics but scored a healthy 80% on Rotten Tomatoes.

Whoever takes charge of the project will be aiming to surpass the disappointing X-Men Origins: Wolverine in terms of quality. Opportunities were wasted to properly explore Wolverine’s background in this film, despite an abundance of source material to work with, leaving fans and critics alike feeling letdown. Nevertheless it was a reasonable box office hit, laying the foundations for a sequel and potentially lucrative spin-off franchise.

The plot for The Wolverine is known to be based on a substantial story from the comics set in Japan, during which our wild hero falls in love. The script is believed to have the potential to better the first film but it’s generally accepted that the new directors in the frame are inferior to Aronofsky, and what he would have brought to a mainstream picture. Liman’s mention in particular has sparked a far from positive reaction from fans.

Liam Trim (follow me on Twitter)

Several Frankenstein films in development

Hollywood has become overrun with vampires and zombies and lately Snow White and The Wizard of Oz have also been the subjects of multiple projects. Now there’s another familiar character who is the focus of a number of films currently being developed: Frankenstein.

It has been reported that David Auburn (Proof) has signed on to write the film adaptation of Peter Ackroyd’s novel The Casebook of Victor Frankenstein, to be produced by Sam Raimi’s Ghost House Pictures. This story follows Frankenstein’s youth, as he begins experimenting with corpses, influenced by the outspoken English poet Percy Bysshe Shelley. Frankenstein author Mary Shelley will also make an appearance in the film.

Meanwhile, Matt Reeves (Cloverfield, Let Me In) is going to direct an adaptation of Kenneth Oppel’s upcoming novel This Dark Endeavor: The Apprenticeship of Victor Frankenstein, with a script written by Jacob Estes (Mean Creek). This story’s plot features Frankenstein’s twin brother Konrad, who falls gravely ill, forcing Victor to seek a mysterious old alchemist in order to help him produce the Elixir of Life, which bestows perpetual health. Victor sets out on an adventure to find the three ingredients it requires, accompanied by his best friend Elizabeth.

If that’s not enough, there are others in development, including Guillermo del Toro's (Hellboy, Pan’s Labyrinth) remake of the classic 1931 Universal film, a contemporary re-telling of the famous tale recently acquired by Columbia Pictures, and an adaptation based on the graphic novel Wake the Dead, which Guns ‘n’ Roses guitarist Slash’s company Slasher Films is producing.

Emma Hutchings

Pirates of the Caribbean enjoys the biggest UK box office opening of 2011

UK box office top ten and analysis for the weekend of Friday 20th - Sunday 22nd May 2011...



With a phenomenal global opening weekend of $346.5m, the latest instalment in Disney's Pirates of the Caribbean series jumps straight in at number one on these shores with a mighty five-day haul of £11.6m, more than doubling the sci-fi comedy Paul's £5.5m debut to claim the biggest UK opening of the year so far. Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides also broke records at the international box-office with $256.3m in receipts, overtaking the previous champ Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince.



With On Stranger Tides sucking the life out of the competition, no other film managed to cross the seven-figure mark, with nearest rival Fast & Furious 5: Rio Heist pulling in just £587k to retain second. Marvel's Thor slips two places to third, a fate shared by Attack the Block in fifth and Water for Elephants down in eighth. Meanwhile Hanna falls one place to sixth as both Insidious and Rio hold firm in fourth and seventh respectively and finally, at the bottom of the chart we have a couple of new entries - Jason Statham cop thriller Blitz (in ninth with £266k) and Thomas McCarthy comedy Win Win (propping up the top ten with an opening of £155k).



Number one this time last year: StreetDance 3D

Pos.	Film	Weekend Gross	Week	Total UK Gross
1	Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides	£11,634,860	1	£11,634,860
2	Fast & Furious 5: Rio Heist	£587,617	5	£17,399,224
3	Thor	£528,701	4	£12,869,718
4	Insidious	£451,139	4	£6,386,799
5	Attack the Block	£355,232	3	£1,925,419
6	Hanna	£286,997	2	£3,182,700
7	Rio	£284,085	6	£12,064,570
8	Water for Elephants	£266,345	3	£3,202,936
9	Blitz	£266,148	1	£266,148
10	Win Win	£155,463	1	£155,463

Incoming...



A pair of comedy sequels arrive this coming Friday with Todd Phillips' The Hangover Part II (cert. 15) likely to put up a strong challenge for top spot, while Diary of a Wimpy Kid 2: Roderick Rules (cert. U) will look to cater to the family market. Also hitting screens on Friday is a re-release of Francis Ford Coppola's classic Apocalypse Now (cert. 15), while X-Men: First Class (cert. TBC) will enjoy a number of preview screenings on Bank Holiday Monday.

U.K. Box Office Archive

The Tree of Life takes the Palme D'Or at Cannes

The 64th annual Cannes Film Festival drew to a close yesterday as the jury announced their prizes for 2011, with Terrence Malick's divisive drama The Tree of Life taking the top award, the Palme D'Or. The film, which stars Brad Pitt and Sean Penn, was met with a mixed reaction of cheers and boos when it premiered earlier in the festival but the jury, which was headed up by legendary actor Robert De Niro, deemed it worthy of their most prestigious honour.

Take a look at the full list of honours below...

Palme D'Or - The Tree of Life (dir. Terrence Malick)

Grand Prix - Once Upon a Time in Anatolia (dir. Nuri Bilge Ceylan) and The Kid with a Bike (dir. Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne)

Prix de la mise en scène - Nicolas Winding Refn (Drive)

Prix du scénario - Footnote (dir. Joseph Cedar)

Jury Prize - Polisse (dir. Maïwenn Le Besco)

Prix d'interprétation féminine - Kirsten Dunst (Melancholia)

Prix d'interprétation masculine - Jean Dujardin (The Artist)

Camera d'Or - Las Acacias (dir. Pablo Giorgelli)

Be sure to check back later this week when we will be posting an in-depth article on the making of The Tree of Life.

The Week in Spandex – The Dark Knight Rises’ Bane, Green Lantern 3D trailer, X-Men: First Class and more

Our weekly round-up of all the talking points from the world of movie superheroes...

Well, just when it was shaping up to be a quiet week in the land of cinematic superherodom what goes and happens? Warner Bros. deliver the first image of Tom Hardy as Bane in The Dark Knight Rises, that’s what! Things all kicked off with the launch of the official website accompanied by some creeping chanting, which then went through audio software to reveal #thefirerises, a Twitter account that promised to reveal a fraction of the image with every new follower. Fortunately some clever cyber-sleuth managed to get their hands on the full picture, which presents a tantalising glimpse of Batman’s latest foe.

Principal photography on Christopher Nolan’s sequel was officially announced earlier this week, but of course filming has already taken place in India and the UK and it’s probably a wise decision to release the image given all the set photos that have been emerging from the London shoot. Much like the reveal of Heath Ledger’s Joker, it’s done a mighty fine job in getting fans talking; not only does it confirm that Bane will be sporting a mask (borrowed from Mortal Kombat’s Scorpion, by the looks of things), but it’s also probably a safe assumption that he’s sporting some kind of burns, what with the whole ‘the fire rises’ thing going on. Meanwhile Variety also broke the news that Nolan has added a further three actors to the ever-growing cast – Matthew Modine (Full Metal Jacket) will play a character called Nixon, while Tom Conti (Derailed) and 11-year-old Joey King (Ramona and Beezus) will feature in as-yet-unrevealed roles.

Sticking with Warner Bros. for the moment and yesterday also brought the debut of the third trailer for Green Lantern, Martin Campbell's big-budget, VFX-heavy DC adaptation. Aimed at the 3D market, the trailer (which you can see at the bottom of this article) is pretty epic in scope and should do a good job of further selling the film to fans, although I'm personally not so sure how this one will go down with the general movie-going public. In other Lantern-related bits and pieces, both Ryan Reynolds and Mark Strong have been taking part in interviews to discuss the film, while Total Film announced that director Martin Campbell has no plans to return for any potential sequel.

While we're on the subject of Ryan Reynolds, the actor also had a few words to say about the the upcoming X-Men spin-off Deadpool during an interview with Comic Book Resources about Green Lantern. Describing it as "a deconstruction of superhero movies," Reynolds stated that he had no problem starring as two superheroes but effectively ruled himself out of contention for The Flash: "I always thought if I did a Deadpool film, I wouldn't do a Flash movie". Meanwhile Robert Rodriguez, who was long rumoured to be in the running for Deadpool, has told MTV that his involvement only ever went as far as reading the script but he has high hopes for the final product: "It's going to be a cool movie. I don't want people to think it's going to stink! Not at all. It's a great script and action-packed and it's a great character. But it's like, 'He turned it down! He dropped out!' Well, I was never in the project!"

Mutant prequel X-Men: First Class is set to arrive here in the UK a week on Monday and ComicBookMovie have collected a whole host of stills that includes pretty much the entire roster, along with a few more TV spots that you can see here and here. Elsewhere James McAvoy and Michael Fassbender were the latest cast members to undergo the X-Perts Q&A on the official X-Men Facebook page, while Nicholas Hoult spoke to IGN about portraying Beast and Zoe Kravitz (Angel Salvadore) also had a few words about her role in the film. One person who won't be popping up in First Class however is Stan Lee (maybe that's something to do with his insistence that Bryan Singer is directing?), although the Marvel legend has confirmed that he will appear for his customary cameo in The Avengers, which leads us quite nicely into this week's round-up of the latest happenings from the Marvel Cinematic Universe...

Firstly, Joe Cornish (Attack the Block) took part in a fan Q&A with Empire and revealed that he has no idea whether Ant-Man will make an appearance in the upcoming ensemble, while Thor star Stellan Skarsgård revealed that Joss Whedon was responsible for directing the post-credits sequence in Marvel's most recent offering. Newsrama also put out a report earlier this week suggesting that Thor is underperforming compared to other Marvel efforts (I guess they must have forgot to take into account the film's world-wide haul, which at $376m and counting is already more than $100m ahead of The Incredible Hulk), but that hasn't had any impact on Marvel's plans for a sequel, with CinemaBlend reporting that The Enchantress and The Executioner are under consideration for Thor's next adversaries.

Wrapping up the best of the rest...

...If you cast your mind back to last year when Sony announced their then-untitled Spider-Man reboot, you may remember a few eyebrows being raised over suggestions that the film's budget would be a mere $80m. Well, it seems that figure was a gross underestimate, as actor and stuntman Richard Norton let slip that the actual budget for The Amazing Spider-Man stands at a whopping $220m...

...NBC chairman Robert Greenblatt has gone on record to explain the reasoning behind the network's decision to ditch Wonder Woman. Greenblatt told EW that "we did what was best for the schedule" but felt that "they made a really fine pilot and Adrianne Palicki did a fantastic job". Hmm... doesn't quite add up, that one. Nevertheless there may still be hope for Wonder Woman fans, with Greenblatt suggesting that the pilot could be shopped around to alternative networks...

...And finally, yesterday brought the sad news that wrestling legend Randy 'Macho Man' Savage has died in a car accident in Florida, aged 58. In addition to his hugely successful ring career, Macho Man enjoyed a number of film and TV roles, including his appearance in Sam Raimi's Spider-Man as Bonesaw McGraw.


Gary Collinson

Ian McKellen and Judi Dench to fight zombies

It has been announced that Ian McKellen (X-Men, Lord of the Rings), Judi Dench (Casino Royale), Mark Williams (Harry Potter) and Gillian Anderson (The X Files) are all attached to star in a zombie comedy set in the 18th century. The Curse of the Buxom Strumpet is about the inhabitants of a small seaside town who are struck down with a deadly illness.

Directed by Matthew Butler, who has also co-written the script with Tori Hart, this feature is based on their short film E’gad Zombies, which also starred Ian McKellen. The pair will also be producing the film for their UK production company Fizz and Ginger Films.

Butler is currently in talks with sales agents in Cannes and shooting on the £2-million movie is expected to begin in Scotland later this year. Zombie films are all the rage nowadays, so it’ll need to be special to stand out, but Sir Ian and Dame Judi fighting the undead horde sounds like a great concept.

Emma Hutchings

First trailer for The Adventures of Tintin: The Secret of the Unicorn

With his most recent directorial effort, Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, leaving some viewers disappointed, Steven Spielberg will be looking to make amends this later year with his latest one-two combo, the World War I drama War Horse and the big budget motion-capture adaptation The Adventures of Tintin: The Secret of the Unicorn, which has just received its first teaser trailer.



Written by Brits Steven Moffat (Doctor Who), Edgar Wright (Scott Pilgrim vs. the World) and Joe Cornish (Attack the Block) and produced by Peter Jackson, the film is the first movie adaptation of Herge's classic comic book series based on the adventures of roving reporter Tintin and his dog Snowy.



Spielberg's film will draw inspiration from three Tintin albums - The Crab with the Golden Claws, The Secret of the Unicorn and Red Rackham's Treasure - and is envisioned as the first of a trilogy, with Jackson set to helm the sequel before partnering up with Spielberg to co-direct the third.



Should it manage to avoid the 'Zemeckis Curse', that is.



The Secret of the Unicorn stars Jamie Bell as Tintin, Andy Serkis as Captain Haddock, Simon Pegg and Nick Frost as Thompson and Thompson, Daniel Craig as Red Rackham and Toby Jones as Aristides Silk. Take a look at the trailer...

Tintin hits the UK and Europe on October 26th, while our North American friends will have to wait until December 23rd.