In more Image Entertainment news, they've recently announced that they've acquired the US and Canadian rights to the upcoming action thriller "Tokarev". The film is set to star Nicolas Cage. The film begins physical production in Alabama in June with a early 2014 release date.
Press Release:
Image Entertainment, an RLJ Entertainment (NASDAQ: RLJE) brand, has acquired all US and Canadian rights to Hannibal Classics’ new action-thriller Tokarev, starring Nicolas Cage. Tokarev (working title) is scheduled for release in the first quarter of 2014. The deal was announced today by Image Entertainment’s Chief Acquisitions Officer, Bill Bromiley.
“We are excited to add this action-thriller to our slate next year,” said Bromiley. “Nicolas Cage elevates the film to new heights, reaching a wider audience not only domestically but internationally as well.”
Tokarev begins physical production in Alabama in June. Hannibal Classics’ sales division will handle worldwide sales and will be selling the film in Cannes.
“Our experience with Image Entertainment has always been positive,” says Hannibal Classics’ CEO and Tokarev Producer, Richard Rionda Del Castro. “The commitment of their key executives to aggressively distribute Hannibal Classics and Hannibal Pictures’ films makes us all winners. We are thrilled they have teamed with us once again and with equal dedication to Tokarev.”
Tokarev marks Spanish Director Paco Cabezas’ American debut. Final casting is underway. Joining Rionda Del Castro as Producer is Michael Mendelsohn. Executive Producers are Nicolas Cage, Patricia Eberle, Mike Nilon, Hayley Magouirk, Jim Agnew, Sean Keller, Cam Cannon, Martin J. Barab and Frederico Lapenda.
Tokarev tells the story of Paul Maguire (Cage), a former criminal in search of his daughter’s kidnappers.
Anchor Bay Films recently acquired "Seeking Justice", which the latest film from Roger Donaldson (The Bank Job, Dante’s Peak). The film stars Nicolas Cage, January Jones and Guy Pearce and is co-produced by Tobey Maguire. "Seeking Justice" will be hitting theaters on March 16th.
Press Release:
Anchor Bay Films has picked up the U.S. rights to the Nicolas Cage thriller, Seeking Justice. Slated for a March 16th theatrical release, the film co-stars January Jones (X-Men: First Class, Anger Management) and Guy Pearce (The Hurt Locker, The King’s Speech) . Directed by Roger Donaldson (The Bank Job, Dante’s Peak), Seeking Justice was produced by Endgame Entertainment’s James D. Stern, along with Ram Bergman and Material Entertainment’s Tobey Maguire and Jenno Topping. Bill Clark, President of Anchor Bay Entertainment, made today’s announcement.
“Seeking Justice is a fast-paced, edge-of-your-seat action thriller and Cage is outstanding in it,” commented Kevin Kasha, Executive Vice President, Acquisitions and Co-Productions. “This crowd pleaser is a great addition to the Anchor Bay Films line-up.”
“We are thrilled that Seeking Justice has found a home with Anchor Bay,” stated Endgame CEO James D. Stern. “We look forward to working with them on delivering Roger Donaldson’s stellar work and outstanding performances from Nicolas Cage and January Jones.”
In Seeking Justice, Cage stars as Will Gerard, a happily married and dedicated inner-city high school teacher. His wife, Laura (Jones) is an accomplished musician and they enjoy a comfortable life until one fateful evening shatters everything. Laura is brutally assaulted and while awaiting an update on her condition, Will is approached by a well-dressed man (Pearce) who quietly offers to dispense immediate justice. Required to make a spontaneous decision in a distraught frame of mind, he accepts the proposal and is pulled into an underground vigilante organization that leads to increasingly frightening and dangerous consequences. The film was previously entitled The Hungry Rabbit Jumps
Lionsgate recently send us over the second official trailer for "Kick-Ass" which nit theaters next month.
Lionsgate recently send us over the trailer and offical poster for Matthew Vaughn's ("Layer Cake", "Stardust") new film "Kick-Ass".
Kick-Ass tells the story of average teenager Dave Lizewski (Aaron Johnson), a comic-book fanboy who decides to take his obsession as inspiration to become a real-life superhero. His life is forever changed as he inspires a subculture of copy cats, is hunted by assorted violent and unpleasant characters, and meets up with a pair of crazed vigilantes, including an 11-year-old sword-wielding dynamo, Hit Girl (Chloë Grace Moretz) and her father, Big Daddy (Nicolas Cage), and forges a friendship with another fledgling superhero, Red Mist (Christopher Mintz-Plasse). But thanks to the scheming of a local mob boss Frank DAmico (Mark Strong), that new alliance will be put to the test.
"Kick-Ass" hits theaters on April 16th.
"Kick-Ass": Official Trailer
Film Arcade.net recently recieved the official poster of the new Nicolas Cage film, "Season of the Witch" from Lionsgate.
In the supernatural thriller Season of the Witch, Nicolas Cage stars as a 14th century Crusader who returns with his comrade (Ron Perlman) to a homeland devastated by the Black Plague. A beleaguered church, deeming sorcery the culprit of the plague, commands the two knights to transport an accused witch (Claire Foy) to a remote abbey, where monks will perform a ritual in hopes of ending the pestilence.
A priest (Stephen Campbell Moore), a grieving knight (Ulrich Thomsen), an itinerant swindler (Stephen Graham) and a headstrong youth who can only dream of becoming a knight (Robert Sheehan) join a mission troubled by mythically hostile wilderness and fierce contention over the fate of the girl.
When the embattled party arrives at the abbey, a horrific discovery jeopardizes the knight's pledge to ensure the girl fair treatment, and pits them against an inexplicably powerful and destructive force.
The film hits theaters on March 19, 2010!
For more infomation of the this film, you can goto the film's official website at: http://www.seasonofthewitchfilm.com/
"Season of the Witch": Teaser Trailer
Alright, let’s get this out of the way like hundreds of reviews before this one and hundreds after it; Werner Herzog’s “Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans” is not a remake of Abel Ferrara’s 1992 film “Bad Lieutenant” which as a friend of mine pointed out “made ‘Taxi Driver’ look like ‘Alice In Wonderland’.” The only thing that these films have in common with each other is they have a main character who is a police lieutenant with serious gambling and drug addictions that sink them down into a world of immorality. Other than that, these are completely different cinematic works which somehow ended up with the same darn title. Comparing the two, while in some respects inevitable, does neither film any favors. If you do find me comparing them to each other, it is truly an accident (I understand if you don’t buy that). My guess is that the “Bad Lieutenant” title was chosen for commercial purposes, and that’s regardless of the fact that Ferrara’s film found a bigger audience on video and DVD than any NC-17 movie could ever hope to find in theaters (assuming if any near you dared play it).
Before I continue, I have to confess that this film is the very first feature length movie from Werner Herzog that I have ever seen. Yes, I did see his “Grizzly Man” and “Encounters at the End of the World,” but they were both documentaries (brilliant ones might I add). Being the big movie buff that I am, you will probably find this to be unbelievable and shameful on my part (it probably is). But on the upside, you won’t have to worry about me comparing this film to all his others he has made in a long and acclaimed career. Odds are that it might suffer compared to his other works, so be thankful I’m not stuck doing that here. From what I have heard, Herzog’s films deal with human psyches in a most extreme and uncontrollable state, so his “Bad Lieutenant” must be right up his alley in terms of themes he has dealt with throughout his career. It also allows Nicholas Cage a role where he can (and does he ever) go full out crazy in the only way an actor like him can. This is the kind of performance Cage is famous for, and the likes of which we have been denied for far too long.
Cage stars as Terence McDonagh who, when we first see him, is a sergeant with the
Terence starts off being prescribed Vicodin by his less than hopeful doctor, something I had when I got my wisdom teeth taken out, and which my mother became terrified I would get addicted to. It’s all downhill from there as the lieutenant quickly moves from Vicodin to cocaine, and then to crack or whatever else he can smuggle out of the evidence room. Just when you think McDonagh could not sink any deeper, he does. Then he hits rock bottom when he gets involved with local drug dealer Big Fate played by rapper Xzibit, looking far more lively here than he did in “The X-Files: I Want To Believe.” By collaborating with Big Fate, Terence hopes to pay off his mounting debts he brought upon himself by betting on the wrong damn teams. Throughout this twisted voyage of his, he is also met by a pair of iguanas who keep following him. Of course, no one can see these scaly animals except him.
As dark and immoral as the plot and the characters of this movie are, I actually found it to be shockingly funny. Seriously, “Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans” has moments that were so laugh out loud funny, I almost couldn’t believe how much I was enjoying myself while watching this. It’s like Werner Herzog took the original “Bad Lieutenant” and subtracted all the Catholic guilt and angst and replaced it with a heap of bizarre black comedy that seemed never ending. What’s on display here gives “Observe and Report,” a movie that has grown on me a lot since I saw it, a big run for its money in the perversely funny department. The audience I saw it with at Landmark Theatres in
But the big delight I got out of “Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans” is seeing Nicholas Cage acting in a totally unhinged state like he was doing a sequel to “Wild at Heart.” Maybe I’ve been too hard on Nic Cage lately, but this feels like such a welcome return to form for him. Actually, he was really good in a movie that came out earlier this year (“Knowing”), but this collaboration with Werner Herzog brings Nic back to the kind of role he does best. From “Leaving Las Vegas” to “Face/Off,” Cage proved to be a master of over the top performances infused with endless creativity. This was long before he did movies where he was just over the top, or went after one “National Treasure” too many. But here, Werner sets him loose to play a character whose mind is in a constant state of implosion that exposes a soul most corrupted.
One key scene which does look like it was taken from Abel’s film is when Terence pulls over a young couple who are about to drive home from a club. Nicholas plays the scene straight as he gets from these two what he wants and knows they have on them. Cage suddenly switches gears when the lady gives him a hit from what she is smoking (either marijuana or something much stronger), and he ends up making out with her while her stunned schmuck of a boyfriend watches. The scene is almost as horrifying as it is hilarious, assuming this debauchery is your kind of entertainment. You’re not really laughing at what he is doing as much as you do at the fact that he is debasing himself without a care in the world. Only an actor as risk taking and reckless as Cage could possibly sell us on such a scene.
So what’s Herzog’s “Bad Lieutenant” really all about? I’m not entirely sure. It could be that the director is looking at a man whose soul is as toxic as the water that submerged much of
Nicholas Cage is also surrounded by a good cast of actors who do memorable work here as well. It was nice to see Brad Dourif here, having seen and liked him not too long ago in Rob Zombie’s “Halloween II,” as Terence’s bookie whom he is heavily in debt to. Val Kilmer is very good as Terence’s corrupt partner, and that’s even if he has to stand in the shadow of Cage throughout (I hope Val was alright with that). I have to say I was very surprised to Jennifer Coolidge cast as Terence’s stepmother. Having seen Jennifer in so many comic roles that she was funny as hell in, it was interesting to see her to take on something different and more dramatic. Vondie Curtis-Hall appears as well playing Terence’s chief, and Tom Bower rounds out the cast by portraying his alcoholic father.
Eva Mendes is also on board here as the bad lieutenant’s prostitute girlfriend, Frankie. She previously co-starred with Nicholas Cage in “Ghost Rider,” a movie I’m not really sure I want to see. As Frankie, Eva plays the same kind of role she played in “We Own The Night”; a party girl whose boyfriend (played by Joaquin Phoenix before he went nuts) supplies her with all the fun and drugs she ever needs. I haven’t seen her in many movies she has appeared in, so I’m not sure if her range is limited to roles based on her gorgeous body, or if she has not been given the opportunity to stretch beyond that. On the basis of her performance here, I think she should get stronger opportunites because she plays off of the other actors very well, and she makes the transition from being selfish to being saved from herself effectively believable.
Herzog gives this film a rough and dirty look which all but suits the characters and the sleaze they involve themselves in. This whole shebang could have been ruined if he shot the whole thing in high definition, for it would have made things look too tidy. I could see all these hardcore movie buffs go after Werner Herzog and accuse him of selling out if he did that, but I believe he is one of the very few directors incapable of doing so. This is not a movie you want to look all smoothed over and polished at the surface. It requires an atmosphere thick with humidity and with slime dripping off of everything as it eats away what is left. For all I know right now, Herzog is not a director who is even remotely interested in sweetening up story and characters in order to make his movies more available to a mainstream audience.
“Bad Lieutenant:
***½ out of ****
Lionsgate recently send Filmarcade.net, the trailer for Nicolas Cage's new film "Season of the Witch", which is directed by Dominic Sena ("Swordfish", Gone in 60 Seconds" remake)
In the supernatural thriller SEASON OF THE WITCH, Cage stars as a 14th century Crusader who returns with his comrade (Ron Perlman) to a homeland devastated by the Black Plague. A beleaguered church, deeming sorcery the culprit of the plague, commands the two knights to transport an accused witch (Claire Foy) to a remote abbey, where monks will perform a ritual in hopes of ending the pestilence.
A priest (Stephen Campbell Moore), a grieving knight (Ulrich Thomsen), an itinerant swindler (Stephen Graham) and a headstrong youth who can only dream of becoming a knight (Robert Sheehan) join a mission troubled by mythically hostile wilderness and fierce contention over the fate of the girl.
When the embattled party arrives at the abbey, a horrific discovery jeopardizes the knight's pledge to ensure the girl fair treatment, and pits them against an inexplicably powerful and destructive force.
The film flies into theaters March 19, 2010!
Season of the Witch: Official Teaser
“Birdy” was the second part of a double feature I saw last Thursday at the New Beverly Cinema on a double bill with “Angel Heart.” Both were directed by Alan Parker who as a director seems particularly interested in characters that are lost in their obsessions and need others to bring them out of it and back into reality. It stars Nicholas Cage and Matthew Modine in some of their earliest roles on film. They play friends from Philadelphia who are in many ways complete opposites, but they become the best of friends through Birdy’s connection with birds and his desire to become one.
“Birdy” is a great movie, a great character study about two young men who grow up together, and who are forever changed by the war they are drafted into. The movie is based on a book by William Wharton which chronicles two characters who are thrown into World War II. For the film, it was changed to Vietnam which would soon become a major location for films like “Platoon” and “Full Metal Jacket among others. The movie starts with the two main characters who are now out of the Vietnam War, but who are forever scared by it permanently. In the end, all they have is each other.
The movie goes back and forth in time as we start off with Nicholas Cage’s character coming out of the hospital after his face has been seriously disfigured in combat. Bandaged like a Frankenstein creation, he is no longer the ladies man we see getting to first base like before. Al ends up going to an army hospital where Birdy (we never learn his real name) is holed up in a cell not saying a word. After the damage the war has done to him, Birdy has seemingly accomplished what he has set out to do – to become a bird in his own mind.
We then see these kids during their high school years in Philadelphia where they seem like complete opposites, but who both want the same thing in life. They want to fly away from their problems, but Birdy is a little more literal about it. With Al, he has an abusive father to deal with who thinks nothing of smacking his son around when he screws up, and being on the high school wrestling team helps him deal with his frustration of not being able to stand up to him. With Birdy, he has a tough as nails father who is nowhere as sympathetic and understanding as his janitor father, and who is always taking away the baseballs that the kids unintentionally keep batting into her yard. Both Al and Birdy get together in money making schemes like carrier pigeons they feel they can make a profit from. They later turn their attentions to a car in a wrecking yard that they manage to get running again.
Al really represents Birdy’s strongest link to the outside world as Birdy falls deeper and deeper into his obsession with birds and in wanting to fly away from all the troubles in the world. Birdy never shows any interest in anything else that you expect teenagers to indulge themselves in like girlfriends, making out, or being normal. One of the funniest expressions Birdy has is when he talks about how bad he feels for women that they have to have breasts that they just have to carry around and how they flop all over the place. I can’t think of anyone else who would make that argument (man or woman).
The scenes that Birdy spends with a beautiful yellow canary he ends up getting and naming Burda are some of the most interesting scenes here. It’s not just some National Geographic special you are watching as we see Birdy studying these birds ever so closely, almost making love to them. There is one amazing sequence where he is dreaming that he is flying like a bird and Parker shoots the scene from a bird’s eye view as we go around people and fly over cars and then way up into the sky above. All this done to the instrumental tune to Peter Gabriel’s “Not One Of Us.” Even without that song
While all this may make the movie sound like a nostalgic journey to the past, it is actually a very hard hitting movie which has its funny moments, but also has its awkward and painful moments. Seeing Matthew Modine going to a prom, only because his mom threatens to get rid of his birds if he doesn’t, is painful in terms of how much we know that he doesn’t want to be there. Hell, I would have killed to date the girl he goes out with! And seeing at the start of the movie where these two characters are at a moment where they are forever changed, we know that these two are on a descent which may permanently rob them of their humanity. We know things are not going to end well for these two, so there is a strong air of unease as we get towards the point where they are drafted into a war that they are lucky to come out of alive.
Seeing these two young actors early in their careers (this movie came out in 1984!) reminds you of just how talented they have always been. Nicholas Cage’s role of Al is one of my favorites of his as we see him as a fun loving guy, and then as a frightened war veteran who is terribly uncertain of what lies ahead for him. Having to spend so much of the movie in bandages could seem so limiting to some actors, but not to Mr. Cage. I heard that before he started making this film, he had his wisdom teeth taken out, and he insisted on having it done without Novocain. Just hearing about that makes my mouth hurt! Talk about suffering for your art! And the suffering Cage goes through as this character is pretty raw and genuine. I like to see him play more roles like this in the future instead of him doing another movie like “Ghost Rider.”
Matthew Modine is an actor we haven’t seen much of recently. The last thing I remember him being in was probably “Transporter 2” with Jason Statham. His role is especially hard to play because it could easily look so broad and ridiculous, but Modine makes Birdy’s love for birds seem so real that it almost doesn’t matter that he has cut himself off from the world around him. When we see him at the hospital, he is almost completely speechless and has to convey how he feels through expressions, and that is something you need to learn to be a great film actor so that you don’t emote all over the place. This is one his best performances as well, and it lead him to a career where he has played many different roles.
This is one of Alan Parker’s best movies, and it stands alongside his best work like “Midnight Express” and “Mississippi Burning” among others. Alan has not just made some simple antiwar movie about how unnecessary the war in Vietnam was, but of the bond of friendship and how it can never be completely broken, especially when you are in need. In essence, the scars (both physically and mentally) that are inflicted on them in combat bring them together because it seems like no one else can fully understand them. The heart of this movie is in the way these two guys lean on each other, and how they recognize each other’s strengths. Parker gets that and makes it the main thrust of this excellent motion picture. In the end, most of his movies deal with people in a place that seems so alien and unwelcome to them.
And of course, I can never get sick of Peter Gabriel’s score to the film. Some say that is dated, but I say bullshit to that. While it may seem weird to compose music to a movie that takes place in the 60’s with an electronic score, it fits perfectly into the themes that Director Parker portrays in this movie. Like the characters, it is in its own world and dwells in both the beauty and the pain of life. The music is cribbed from a lot of Peter’s other albums (he freely admits this in the album notes), and it would have been interesting if he did include some of the lyrics to songs used here like “Wallflower” as it deals with the mental state these characters are stuck in and need to fight out of.
“Birdy” is one of those great movies that stays with you long after the movie has ended, or long after your VHS tape of it is all faded and worn out. It also has one of the best endings of any movie I have ever seen. I refuse to ruin it for you. You just have to see it for yourself!
**** out of ****
