That’s just one of several interesting bits in this profile of Gary Oldman, who used to be typecast as “the bad guy” in films like Léon: The Professional (1994) and Air Force One (1997), but has lately become more of a heroic father-figure type, thanks to his supporting roles as Sirius Black in the Harry Potter movies and as Lt. Jim Gordon in the current Batman movies. I especially like the broader quote from which that line comes: With his... Read more

Playbill reports that an open casting call has gone out for the Spider-Man stage musical that Julie Taymor plans to direct from a score written by Bono and The Edge, of the band U2. I can never think of Bono and The Edge working on franchises like this without thinking of the theme song that they wrote for the James Bond film GoldenEye (1995), so here is the music video for that song, performed as it was by Tina Turner:... Read more

Here are the figures for the past weekend, arranged from those that owe the highest percentage of their take to the Canadian box office to those that owe the lowest. Cruising Bar 2 — CDN $1,560,000 — N.AM $1,560,000 — 100%Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull — CDN $26,910,000 — N.AM $310,487,614 — 8.7%Wanted — CDN $9,460,000 — N.AM $112,455,060 — 8.4%Get Smart — CDN $9,230,000 — N.AM $111,564,176 — 8.3%Kung Fu Panda — CDN $15,550,000 —... Read more

Last month, Empire quoted Christopher Lee to the effect that he would be willing to play Saruman again — probably not in The Hobbit, per se, since Saruman never appears in that book, but perhaps in that rumoured second film that would bridge the gap between The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings (2001-2003): “I’ve read the books time and again,” said the 86-year-old. “Originally Saruman The White and the rest of the wizards, or the Istari as they... Read more

Christian Bale has been making the rounds lately, promoting The Dark Knight, but along the way, he has talked a bit about his role in the upcoming Terminator movies as well. ComingSoon.net recently posted this interview snippet: CS: What attracted you to another big franchise like “Terminator?”Christian Bale: Well, initially, actually, that was NOT an attraction. I felt that I wasn’t sure where it could go to. Before I gave an answer, I went back and reviewed the other movies.... Read more

Outlander stars Jim Caviezel as an alien who crash-lands on Earth in Norway in the year 709. And he brings a monster with him, too. So Caviezel the alien teams up with some Vikings, played by the likes of Hellboy co-stars John Hurt and Ron Perlman, to go hunt the monster down. Awesome. Watch the trailer here. Read more

I haven’t got time to say much about Hellboy II: The Golden Army right now, but suffice it to say that it might be my favorite comic-book movie of the year so far. I mention it now simply so that I can link to this interesting interview that Twitch did with Doug Jones, who plays Abe Sapien and a couple of other characters in the film: Guillén: When Guillermo and I sat down to talk, we spoke a bit about... Read more

Marvel Comics has been having lots and lots of success lately, first with its standalone franchises such as X-Men (2000-2006) and Spider-Man (2002-2007), and now with Iron Man and, to a lesser extent, The Incredible Hulk, the two of which Marvel plans to bring together in a few years with a couple more superheroes for a major, major cross-over called The Avengers. Meanwhile, what is DC Comics doing? They’ve got a successfully rebooted Batman franchise, of course, but beyond that?... Read more

One of the weirder trends these days is the one that has studios releasing DVDs of older films with CDs of music that came out during the same decade but otherwise have nothing to do with the movies in question. As luck would have it, my first exposure to this trend came a few weeks ago when I saw the “Decades Collection” editions of The Graduate (1967), Fiddler on the Roof (1971; my comments) and When Harry Met Sally… (1989)... Read more

My review of Journey to the Center of the Earth is now up at CT Movies. Read more