This week, big rumors about “Django Unchained,” big news about “The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo” and big debate over “The Hangover Part II.” OH DRAMA.
-We’re spotlighting each of Terrence Malick‘s films leading up to the wide release of “Tree Of Life.” This week, Kevin Jagernauth gave us a closer look at the evolution of what would become Malick’s first and most romantic film, “Badlands.”
-Apparently we had no idea, but our readership is made up of HUGE “Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy” fans. With the debut of a few new stills from the film came the announcement that a release date of November 18th was selected for the film, placing it in a strong awards-consideration position.
-Apes everywhere! A new trailer for “Rise Of The Planet Of The Apes” surfaced, showcasing more apes-on-the-run action. Yeeeah, I think we know what type of film this is going to be already.
-We got some heat over gushing about the consistent teaming of Joaquin Phoenix and filmmaker James Gray, but it can’t make us less excited for “Low Life,” which will find Gray directing Phoenix, Marion Cotillard and Jeremy Renner. Catch the contagious enthusiasm here.
-Amy Adams is the latest to sign up for P.T. Anderson‘s untitled religious leader picture, joining the previously-announced Jesse Plemons and David Warshofsky.
-While we all weren’t on the same page, we weren’t alone in appreciating Drew Taylor’s look at “X-Men: First Class.” Catch his B+ take on the material here.
-Good old politically incorrect Shia LaBeouf set the record straight on Megan Fox‘s dismissal from the “Transformers” franchise, claiming her attitude was too “Spice Girls.” It does seem like LaBeouf missed a few Women’s Studies classes, no?
-Is Idris Elba the pick by Quentin Tarantino to star in “Django Unchained“? We all hope so, because the world simply needs fewer Will Smith movies. Whatever the case, Elba’s Tweet about meeting with a “controversial” director caught people’s attention. Hopefully it doesn’t interfere with Elba also showing up in Guillermo Del Toro‘s “Pacific Rim.” And while it’s only rumor, could Leonardo DiCaprio sign on to play a villain role?
-Our Oliver Lyttleton penned a love letter to Ewan McGregor with a piece on the Scottish thesp’s most essential performances. As always, with an actor of McGregor’s caliber, there’s plenty of room for debate. Unless you said “Attack Of The Clones.” Also, don’t miss Oliver’s wonderful peek at five music video directors who could make the leap into feature filmmaking.
-“The Hangover Part II” broke box office records last weekend. We thought about going “Yay!” until we realized it was a shitty movie. So we went “Boo” instead. Our readership had decidedly complex emotions about this, which you can experience here.
-‘Dragon Tattoo’ fever is about to hit Playlist readers. Oh goodie. Late last week, a “bootleg” of the international redband trailer for this winter’s “The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo” surfaced, and with it much celebration over Trent Reznor‘s techno-fied cover of “Immigrant Song,” with vocals from Karen O. Later in the week, we got our peek of both international and domestic posters for the film (and the green band trailer for the kiddies!), all of which lets the audience know that this is definitely going to be a movie for adults. Much is being made of the promotional materials sexing up the character of Lisbeth Salander, and not, surprisingly, of how David Fincher and company is working with some pretty silly pulp material.
