Jim Versus Jay

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The bad guy in the next Jason Statham movie is going to be played by James Franco. James Franco! Not only that, Franco's character is a "meth kingpin named Gator." Good lord. The Playlist makes a good point though - who can even remember any of the bad guys in Jason Statham's movies? I've seen nearly all of them and I'll be damned if I can. They're usually just a bunch of interchangeable goons. Even with the Crank movies, which I adore, I couldn't tell you who the bad guys were today. In this case however I think memorable villain might not be a problem. I think James will find a way to make "a meth kingpin named Gator" memorable. Of course this thing was written by Sylvester Stallone so who knows what might happen. Personally I'm hoping that Sly watched a lot of Road House while writing the script. "I thought you'd be bigger."

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An Inglourious Reunion

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If I hadn't rewatched Inglourious Basterds last week I don't know that I would've even remembered that Michael Fassbender and Brad Pitt briefly shared the screen in it (just the one scene where Fassy's Lt. Archie Hicox discusses heading into that fateful basement), but they do, and here they are again on the set of Ridley Scott's The Counselor. See some more pics over here. Looks like Brad's got another colorful character ahead.

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Pic of the Day

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That's the first picture (via) from the set of Michael Douglas and Matt Damon playing Liberace and his "male companion" in Steven Soderbergh's HBO bio-pic of the man the myth the hairdo called, wait for it, I will never ever get tired of typing out this movie's title, Behind the Candelabra. Greatest thing ever. Ever!

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Five Frames From ?

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What movie is this?

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Everything You Ever Need To Know About Life...

... you can learn from:

Hatchet For the Honeymoon (1970)

John Harrington: Poor little fly. Why are you so daring? You're so fragile? Yet you're born, you reproduce yourself, and you die like man. The difference is you don't think. And, you don't need to remember. You don't fear death because you ignore it. You're insignificant life is a mere accident. But death exists I assure you, and that's what makes life a ridiculous and brutal drama. But the fact remains that I have killed five young women. Three of whom are buried in the hothouse. Carol, Mary and Margaret. They were the friendliest, the most attractive ones. There is one problem. I must go on wielding the cleaver. It's most annoying. But when I begin to hear the footsteps. Those stealthy footsteps, I know I just kill. And shall have to keep on killing, until I find out the truth. That's it, the whole truth. 

The grand high poobah of giallo Mario Bava 

 was born 98 years ago today. What's your fave?

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Tom Daley Four Times

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I made sure all of these were from this year's Olympics so we're not breaking any pervert laws or anything. This makes me no less of a dirty old man, but whatever. He likes the attention. ETA What the hell, here are a few more after the jump...

5 Off My Head - Danny Boy I Love You So

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That there's the new full-length trailer for Sam Mendes' James Bond movie called Skyfall starring everybody's favorite snug suit-filler Daniel Craig. It's good! I want to see this movie. Visually everything looks pretty grand, which isn't surprising, this being a Sam Mendes movie and all. The action seems big and Judy Dench looks appropriately stern and yadda yadda here are the five shots from the trailer that most matter.

Okay obvious things first, the promised swim-trunk scene. We'd seen a still already so we knew it's coming. I doubt it could ever match the epic impact of that moment when Danny walked up out of the water in Casino Royale...

... and split the world in two (could the current hot trend of cinematic male exploitation be traced back to it? Did Bond make it okay for Michael Fassbender to whip it out? Discuss.) but I will not find fault with them dipping into that well again.

Next stop, shower scene! I just hope somebody takes the time to wipe that fog off mid-coitus, otherwise yawn. It's a pretty picture, but not as pretty as what's hidden back there. Also I know that's probably the lovely and talented Naomi Harris in there with him, but I'd rather think...

... that's Q (Ben Whishaw) testing out some kind of new spy gadget with him. Perhaps a urethra-cam, or some such. Anyway golly they make a cute couple.

This one's not as obvious, but what do you notice different between those two shots? That's right, his shirt's been unbuttoned some on the right. This is Bond being interrogated by the big baddie played by a Carol Channing'd out Javier Bardem, and if there's anything we know about Bond being interrogated we know these days it tends to go entirely homosexual. So keep the hope alive! And finally...

Seeing Daniel Craig do action sequences in suits so tight we know his religion is what we go to these things for in the end, right? In the end, get it? Ha ha, sigh. Damn.

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Good Morning, World

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Terminator and Aliens star (not to mention The Fan!) Michael Biehn, who is turning 56 today, deserves a proper gratuitous post filled to the gills, and I totally planned on doing it this morning for his birthday... but I got so distracted by a series of pictures trying to figure out what they're from that it ate up my time and attention and so proper gratuity will have to wait. It's these shots below (I think the ones above of him in the shower are from something else) and I could not for the life of me figure out what movie they belong to. Anybody know? I must know.

Somebody must know. I feel as if once you've seen such things in motion there can be no forgetting.

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Luke Evans Two Times

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 Luke Evans loves bikinis, it's true! (via)

Mirror Mirror in 150 Words or Less

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Suffers from the same inexplicable flatness that Immortals did. How these things, so visually resplendent, can be so boring I can't figure. At least Immortals had Henry Cavill and Kellan Lutz and Stephen Dorff and Luke Evans in their skimpy gilded nothings; Mirror Mirror perks up when Armie Hammer gets (repeatedly) tossed onto the screen in just his silky breeches but otherwise it's two hours of Lily Collins' Frida-brows and Julia Roberts' accent ricocheting off every corner of the globe. Aimless and airless and edited in a blender (my eyes honestly began to hurt from the over-cutting). There wasn't even enough love paid to Eiko Ishioka's costumes, her last ever, which never got the chance to pop iconically like every single thing she designed for Bram Stoker's Dracula et cetera did. They just scuttled across the screen in search of the next flailing bug gag.
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Which is Hotter?

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Phoebe Buffay from Friends
or Valerie Cherish from The Comeback?

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poll by twiigs.com

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Happy 49, Lisa Kudrow!

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Beach Boy Oh Boys

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(via) Hey remember when Kellan was at the beach a few weeks ago and his white shorts had stupid pockets that ruined all the see-through fun? Yeah these new shorts are not having that problem. Click up there to embiggen if you don't believe me, and then go write in your calendar that today is the day you learned definitively that Kellan Lutz is circumcised.

(via) Also spending some time on the water this weekend was Goran Višnjić , the one-time ER star and one-time gratuity recipient. Since we don't see enough of Goran (although he was great in Beginners last year) we've got to post these. Check off "sexy scar" and "tuft of snowy white chest hair" on your gratuitous check-list for the day, y'all. Hit the jump for more from both fellas.

Happy 44, Terry Crews

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I read earlier today that the second Expendables movie was rated R for "strong violence, language and brief sexuality" - I daren't dream the latter's got anything to do with Crews and Jason Statham, yet here we are, and I am dreaming anyway.

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Five Frames From ?

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What movie is this?

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The Future Is Written

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I just got an email from the Film Forum here in New York letting me know that it's now possible to buy tickets to see two of my most anticipated movies - Andrea Arnold's Wuthering Heights and Michael Haneke's Amour! I was so excited! 

Then I read the fine print and it seems Wuthering Heights isn't out until October 5th and Amour isn't our until December 19th. December 19th! I like to think that my life is not so maudlin and pre-scheduled that I don't really know what I'll be doing at 3:45 in the afternoon five full months from now, but thanks, Film Forum. 

It just makes me anxious though - should I know what I'm doing at 3:45 in the afternoon in the middle of December? Does everyone else have their December planned and they'll be buying up all the tickets while I waste away my time with nonsense, and then December will come and I'll be all, "Ooh I wanna see the new Michael Haneke movie!" but the machines will just laugh and laugh at me like those cruel Beverly Hills salesgirls in Pretty Woman? I can't let that happen!

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Today's Fanboy Delusion

Today I'd rather be...

... taking French lessons from Gaspard Ulliel.

That gif's from the 2004 movie The Last Day; you can watch the whole scene here. The actor he is kissing is Thibault Vinçon (and yes that's a young Melanie Laurent bouncing around in the full clip, too); I could watch these two make out for days, couldn't you?

In related news I tried to watch Hannibal Rising this weekend (I've never seen it) but only made it about halfway through before the boredom overwhelmed me. I will finish it at some point, but I'm not really in a hurry. It's way too dreary.

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Quote of the Day

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Actually this quote from Peter Jackson is more than a quote of "the day," it's more like a quote of "the next several years," since he's all prepped to swallow us all up for that long with it.

"We know how much of the story of Bilbo Baggins, the Wizard Gandalf, the Dwarves of Erebor, the rise of the Necromancer, and the Battle of Dol Guldur will remain untold if we do not take this chance. The richness of the story of The Hobbit, as well as some of the related material in the appendices of The Lord of the Rings, allows us to tell the full story of the adventures of Bilbo Baggins and the part he played in the sometimes dangerous, but at all times exciting, history of Middle-earth.

So, without further ado and on behalf of New Line Cinema, Warner Bros. Pictures, Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, Wingnut Films, and the entire cast and crew of “The Hobbit” films, I’d like to announce that two films will become three."

The Hobbit: Third Time's An Alarm will be out in 2014, apparently. I have no idea what any of the stuff he's going about is - perhaps I should re-read some Tolkien? It's been ten years at least since the last time. I couldn't tell an oliphaunt from a hole in the ground!

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I Am Link

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--- Joe's Cup - Joe Manganiello might shake his sweet ass right into a Terrence Malick movie. That one called Knight of Cups. Perhaps Joe will play the cup. Seems like an immeasurably odd pairing anyway.I'm yet to be convinced he can act. Not that I've been forced to give a damn about that yet. He's been plenty giving with the assets he's got more than enough of to compensate.

 

--- Dark Future - I've never read any, I repeat any, books by William Gibson. I've been doing a lot of sci-fi that I've missed lately but I'm working my way up to him. I'm not entirely sure he'll be my cuppa, anyway. Anyway his book Neuromancer is being made into a movie by Cube and Splice director Vincento Natali, and BD reports that recent nudist Liam Neeson and Mark Wahlberg are circling it to star.

--- Z Man - Human giant Drew Goddard, writer of Buffy and director of The Cabin in the Woods, was recently hired to do some fixer-uppering on the script for the movie adaptation of the book World War Z, which stars Brad Pitt and details a zombie-pocalypse. The movie's supposedly been a mini-disaster unto itself, they haven't been able to come up with an ending. Collider got to interview him, mainly about Cabin which is out on DVD in September and ho my god I want to watch it again, and got him to clarify the World War Z stuff some. 

--- Little Big Man - Nice to see Danny Devito get some love in Craig's "Take Three" series at The Film Experience; he's been seriously underrated over the years. I mean, I suppose he's terribly wealthy for being so underrated so we shouldn't feel too bad for him, but still. I love all the performances expounded upon therein.

--- Overlooked Again - We already knew that Stephen King is in the process if writing a sequel to The Shining called Doctor Sleep that focuses on a grown up Danny; last I'd heard that will be out next year. Well meanwhile apparently Warner Brothers, the studio behind Kubrick's film of that original story, is quietly working on their own prequel?

--- Bucket of Blood - STYD shares a quote from the brilliant actress Judy Greer about the, uh, actress Chloe Moretz, that she's co-starring with in the Carrie remake, and sigh, you killing me Judy. They're shooting the prom next week. Let's storm the set with tampons!

--- Ring Around The - I imagine Rosie Perez is tired of being called a firecracker but she's just such a firecracker, you know? A duck's a duck, even if it's got racist undertones. So anyway I'm pleased as punch that this spicy latina pepper (less racist?) got a role in Ridley Scott's next movie The Counselor with Michael Fassbender. (It's the one with him playing the drug-dealing lawyer.) We don't get to see her nearly as much as we want to. And maybe she'll get to hop on Fassy! Lucky goil.

--- PM Gal - Speaking of underrated (not to mention Stephen King again), Rachel Nichols is always so good, I can't understand why she doesn't get better work - she's just joined the cast of The Ten O'Clock People, that adaptation of a recent Stephen King short story we told you about awhile back, starring Justin Long.

--- And finally, celebration! Paul Thomas Anderson's The Master is coming out an entire month earlier! It'll be out on September 14th now; that's only six weeks or so away. Swoon.
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Everything You Ever Need To Know About Life...

... you can learn from:

Deliverance (1972)

Bobby: I had my first wet dream in a sleepin' bag.
Ed: How was it?
Bobby: Great.
There's no repeatin' it.

Happy 40, Deliverance!
You got a real purdy mouth...

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Good Morning, World

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A happy 43rd birthday to Aussie actor Simon Baker this morning. These are from the 2004 movie Book of Love; what's weird is his scene partner here, who I'm not giving you a good look at but she's there just off-screen from this good stuff...

 ... is the actress Frances O'Connor, and she's totally haunted me this weekend. I watched The Hunter, the "Willem Dafoe hunts a Tasmanian tiger" movie from last year and there she was, and seeing her made me immediately want to watch A.I. (she plays the woman who "adopts" David the Robot-Boy and then abandons him), and so I did. And then this morning I saw it was Simon Baker's birthday, looked this scene up for this post, and was surprised to see her again staring at me. What does it mean? What does Frances O'Connor want from me??? Ahem. Hit the jump for some more Simon, anyway.