Stephen King's 'It' Will Grant Us Horrifying Clown Franchise
Pennywise is returning to haunt our adult lives as he did our childhood, but now with more CGI shit.
'Bond 23' May or May Not Have This Title, and More...
- Have you guys been seeing these Drive one-sheets hanging around places? Pretty good.
- There is some evidence that Sam Mendes's upcoming Bond film may be titled Carte Blanche. Hopefully that won't cause any international confusion with foreign releases of the 1994 Disney comedy Blank Check.
- Moviepass, that unlimited-theatrical-movies-per-month pass system that immediately failed after AMC and Landmark said they weren't going to do it, is going to give it another try with a new system through which the rate will vary depending on your local ticket prices--meaning it will probably be way pricier than the original $50-per-month offer if you live in a major market. Buying new releases off the blanket of an old Chinese woman in a subway station sounds like a better plan every day.
- That Thin Man remake Johnny Depp has demanded Rob Marshall put him in is now being written by the prolific David Koepp. In the original films and the books, the central character was perpetually intoxicated, so: yay, more non-lucid Depp! (As I've said, our best Depp.)
- Steven Spielberg and Stephen King are teaming up for a Showtime drama based on King's Under the Dome, which centers on a group of Maine residents whose town gets surrounded by a force field, stranding them from the rest of the outside world and leaving the townsfolk battling. Place your bets now if the Shore or Baldwin faction will persevere.
- And in today's model-in-a-real-movie news: Gemma Ward will be in Baz Luhrmann's The Great Gatsby.
Jonathan Demme Adapting Stephen King Book About Time Traveling To Save JFK
While projects based around classic Stephen King properties like The Stand, The Dark Tower, and Carrie have been making gradual moves forward, King's latest catalog entries have stood aside like wallflowers, unable to even catch the attention of a desperate network television miniseries. Until today, that is, when a passing Jonathan Demme noticed King's upcoming 11/22/63 sitting there all alone and decided, what the hell, let's make a movie out this goddammer. Odd that he would pick this 1000-page novel, though, because boy does this thing ever sound like the most bizarre series PBS would ever conceive of to teach kids about history.
If you couldn't tell from the title, 11/22/63 deals with the Kennedy assassination, but only in the most obtuse way imaginable. The story follows an English teacher who discovers a time portal and, figuring killing Hitler is too obvious, sets about stopping President Kennedy's untimely death. And while he's back there, the teacher also decides he might as well meet Elvis and some other celebrities, and meet a nice librarian he can marry while he's at it. Demme, whose last narrative feature was 2008's Rachel Getting Married, will write, direct, and produce. The book itself, meanwhile, will in November reveal the butterfly effect consequences we can expect when one saves JFK. The gaping hole that will leave in Kevin Costner's career, for example. Probably other things, too.
Never Mind About That 'Dark Tower' Trilogy + TV Series
I hope no one was really looking forward to Ron Howard and Akiva Goldsman's adaptation of Stephen King's The Dark Tower, because, sorry, we aren't doing that anymore. The ginger director and his lamentable screenwriter had been hoping to stretch King's seven-plus books across a trilogy of films and multiple NBC Miniseries Television Events, and even had Javier Bardem ready to star as the series' gunslinging lead. Now, though, after delaying the film back in May, Universal has canned the whole thing, having suddenly come to the realization that it will cost a lot of money to make so many Dark Towers. Howard, Goldsman, and producing partners Brian Grazer and Steve King are now free to take the project to another studio, but seeing that Howard--seemingly aware that no one was going to want to make all these Dark Towers--already set up a Spy Vs. Spy film and a movie about vrooms vrooms for himself to direct, I wouldn't count on that happening. Those hoping for an epic, multi-film Stephen King story on screens are just going to have to wait until CBS gets their act together and does that The Stand adaptation they've been talking about. Or, hey, maybe this is a sign it's time someone gets to work on some Stand By Me sequels. "We found another dead body, guys! Ut oh, Kiefer Sutherland is older!" Think about it.
We're Remaking 'Carrie', and Stephen King Figures Why Not Put Lindsay Lohan in It?
MGM's post-bankruptcy philosophy of betting it all entirely on sequels and remakes (because their Vin Diesel-the-Robot movie might as well be a remake) continues today with the revelation that the studio has hired Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa to slap a new coat of pig blood on Carrie and write a reboot of the Stephen King classic.
Far from undefiled, Carrie has already been adapted into a now-classic 1976 Brian De Palma film and a TV movie--meant to be the pilot to a new series wherein we'd follow Carrie around on her telekinetic adventures--and spawned a 1999 sequel (The Rage: Carrie 2) that was both a critical and commercial failure. Aguirre-Sacasa--hired partially because he's already adapted the author, having written a graphic novel of The Stand, and partially because he just got some press for re-writing Spider-Man: Turn Off The Dark--is said to be writing a version closer to the original novel, with a purer vision of a girl's first telekinetic period.
As for casting? It's early, but Stephen King already has an idea: how about Lindsay Lohan? And, hey, while we're at it, why not with David Lynch/Cronenberg behind the lens? The author joked(?) to Entertainment Weekly:
I've heard rumblings about a Carrie remake, as I have about The Stand and It. Who knows if it will happen? The real question is why, when the original was so good? I mean, not Casablanca, or anything, but a really good horror-suspense film, much better than the book. Piper Laurie really got her teeth into the bad-mom thing. Although Lindsay Lohan as Carrie White... hmmm. It would certainly be fun to cast. I guess I could get behind it if they turned the project over to one of the Davids: Lynch or Cronenberg.
Sorry, Stephen King, but I'm smelling Kristen Stewart and 3-D, PG-13 pig blood from whoever is doing Final Destination 5. David Lynch should sure do something with unexpected menstruation, though. Any ideas, David Lynch?
The Next Best Thing to an 'Arrested Development' Movie, and More
- When the Arrested Development movie doesn't pan out, at least we'll have these Arrested Development paper dolls to play with. Go to illustrator Kyle Hilton's blog and see the rest he's done. There's another full page of ridiculous Tobias outfits! Please keep making these, Kyle.
- The Daily Mail claims Ralph Fiennes is up for "a darkly complex" role in the next Bond movie. They're often full of shit with their casting scoops, but then again, you don't toss around a headline like "A Fiennes choice for a Bond star" unless you're serious.
- LucasArts' SNES cult classic Zombies Ate My Neighbors is likely headed to the big screen. A Maniac Mansion movie would be better. Just saying.
- Bond girl Eva Green has been cast as the female lead opposite Johnny Depp in Tim Burton's adaptation of '60s horror soap Dark Shadows. Nope, not Helena Bonham Carter.
- Stephen King apparently learned about plans for a remake of The Stand the same way we did: on internet. He also wouldn't mind Jake Gyllenhaal being in it.
- Ben Affleck is in early talks to direct Argo, a film about the the Tehran hostage crisis "which is said to also contain elements of wry humor." Time we finally had some laughs at that whole hostage thing, guys.
Pennywise is Coming Back for Me in My Adulthood
A friend recently said that what's scary about clowns is that "beneath that make-up lies the most dangerous monster of all: man." An accurate statement, but what's also scary is when, as a kid, your parents allowed you to watch Tim Curry spawn fangs while in a Bozo costume, and you grow up worrying all clowns may possess this dark power.
Now an entirely new generation of our youth will have the chance to know this irrational fear:
Warner Bros. is doing "It," tapping Dave Kajganich to adapt Stephen King's novel, with Dan Lin and Vertigo's Roy Lee and Doug Davison producing."It" centers on seven children in a small Maine town who confront the source of a series of murders in 1958 and again in 1985, when the cycle begins again.
The novel was previously adapted into a 1990 ABC miniseries.
Kajganich is also writing "Escape From New York" for Neal Moritz and New Line and "True Story" for Plan B to produce at Paramount Vantage, with Kevin McDonald attached to direct.
It's fashionable, and usually justified, to get down on remakes, but surely a new Hollywood adaptation has at least as much potential as a 1990 ABC miniseries starring Harry Anderson and The Waltons guy with the birthmark. Let's give the kids one more villainous clown, yeah?
'The Mist' Internet-Only Trailer - Even Mistier!
This internet-only trailer for The Mist really takes the mist quotient beyond anywhere you thought it could reach. So much so that it simply cannot be shown in theaters--too much mist. And this isn't some regular, refreshing mist. This is a rotten, awful mist full of just what you'd expect Stephen King to think of.
If you think you and your computer can handle it, be my guest and watch it under the cut, but you've been warned up front. Don't come back here crying when you have your mind blown with mist.
Thanks for the tip, Joe.
AM Poster Post: The Mist
With apologies for drifting slightly into the PM comes the poster for Frank Darabont's The Mist. This also serves as the introductory promotion for Universal Studio's newest attraction, "Parking Lot: The Ride," if you change the slogan to, "When the car stops, the ride begins..."
The Mist Trailer
Thanks to Joe for sending along the trailer to The Mist, the film about mysterious creatures hidden within a looming vapor that isn't The Fog. With Frank Darabont, director of The Shawshank Redemption and The Green Mile, trying his hand at yet another Stephen King property, this one definitely can't be mist. Feel free to use that line in your personal blogs or conversations.
