The Cannes Film Festival has a storied history of infamous moments. We think of Brigitte Bardot in her bikini, Spike Lee threatening Wim Wenders with a baseball bat after losing the Palme d’Or, pretty much everything Lars Von Trier has said or done…But one that really caught the media’s attention was when Jean-Claude Van Damme and Dolph Lundgren went at it on the red carpet, with people under the impression that the Universal Soldier co-stars and European macho men were really at each other’s throats. Turns out, it was all just a gag for the press.

It’s one thing that Universal Soldier was even being represented at the Cannes Film Festival but another entirely that it wasn’t even screened. As it was, despite a minor presence on the Palais des Festivals, Roland Emmerich’s sci-fi action flick wasn’t part of any screenings because it wasn’t complete. As such, it needed some extra promotion. So leave it to the Muscles from Brussels to concoct a plan that would give Universal Soldier a little boost in publicity ahead of its summer 1992 premiere.

As JCVD told Arsenio Hall of the staged Universal Soldier spat at Cannes, “The movie was complete but not cut yet…So I was in Cannes in Dolph. So I call his room, I say, ‘Dolph, we have a problem: we’re here, we have no movie to show…So let’s do something special. Remember when Sly and Arnold were dancing in Cannes [in 1990]? What about you and I…having a friction on the steps of the red carpet…So he said, ‘Yeah, that’s a good idea.’ So we push around each other and we made all the news in Cannes.” When Hall pressed JCVD really made up the entire red carpet tussle, he confirmed, “It was free publicity. I’m a businessman.”

Rumors were abound that JCVD and Dolph Lundgren didn’t get along while making Universal Soldier so when they pretended to go at it while the likes of David Lynch, Sidney Lumet and Robert Altman were waiting to see if they would take home the Palme d’Or, it was easy to buy. And the stunt paid off, with Universal Soldier opening at #2 and going on to be a fan favorite in the catalogs of both stars.

The post JCVD & Dolph Lundgren staged a fight at Cannes to promote Universal Soldier appeared first on JoBlo.

For some fans, Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban is their favourite movie in the franchise, largely thanks to Alfonso Cuarón’s stylistic direction. However, the Y tu mamá también director may not have taken the Harry Potter gig had it not been for some choice words from his friend Guillermo del Toro.

Alfonso Cuarón told Total Film that he was unfamiliar with the Harry Potter franchise when he was offered the chance to direct The Prisoner of Azkaban, but thankfully, Guillermo del Toro was. “I speak often with Guillermo [del Toro], and a couple of days after, I said, ‘You know, they offered me this Harry Potter film, but it’s really weird they offer me this,’” Cuarón explained. “He said, ‘Wait, wait, wait, you said you haven’t read Harry Potter?’ I said, ‘I don’t think it’s for me.’ In very florid lexicon, in Spanish, he said, ‘You are an arrogant asshole.’“

Harry Potter producer David Heyman explained why he thought Cuarón would be the perfect choice for the movie. “I’d seen Y tu mamá también, which I loved, and I oddly thought he’d be the perfect director for the third Potter,” Heyman said. “That’s not what some might think. Can you imagine what some thought Harry, Ron and Hermione would get up to, having seen Y tu mamá también?… Y tu mamá was about the last moments of being a teenager, and Azkaban was about the first moments of being a teenager.“

While subsequent Harry Potter movies were obviously very successful, I do wish they had continued with more unconventional director choices. Cuarón brought a dark yet still magical aesthetic to the franchise that felt lacking in the other movies. As a side note, The Prisoner of Azkaban celebrates its twentieth anniversary this year, just in case you don’t feel old enough today.

While it’s unclear if the Fantastic Beasts franchise will continue, the Harry Potter series will return, but this time to the small screen. Warner Bros. is developing a Harry Potter TV series, which will see one novel adapted per season. The project is aiming for a 2026 release on Max.

The post Guillermo del Toro told Alfonso Cuarón he was an “arrogant asshole” for questioning whether he should direct Harry Potter appeared first on JoBlo.

Universal Pictures has been assembling quite the cast of dino hors d’oeuvres for their latest Jurassic World movie, and THR reports that Rupert Friend (Asteroid City) has signed on.

Rupert Friend will star alongside Scarlett Johansson (Black Widow) and Jonathan Bailey (Bridgerton) in the Jurassic World movie, with Manuel Garcia-Rulfo (The Lincoln Lawyer) also set to appear. There have also been rumours that Colman Domingo (Euphoria) and Dev Patel (Monkey Man) are being eyed to appear, but nothing official has been announced. Plot details are being kept under wraps, but you really can’t go wrong with rampaging dinosaurs. Just no locusts this time.

Gareth Edwards (Rogue One) is set to direct the new Jurassic World movie after talks with David Leitch (Bullet Train) fell through, and with the movie already slated for a July 2, 2025 release, Edwards will have to get to work pretty quick. The movie will relaunch the franchise with a fresh take, which means that neither Chris Pratt nor Bryce Dallas Howard are expected to return. The original trilogy group consisting of Jeff Goldblum, Sam Neill, and Laura Dern won’t be back either. However, there will be a blast from the past behind the scenes as original Jurassic Park screenwriter David Koepp has signed on to pen the script.

Although Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom and Jurassic World: Dominion didn’t receive the best reviews upon release, they did quite well at the box office, earning $1.3 billion and $1 billion, respectively. Universal clearly believes that there’s plenty of juice left in the franchise.

Even before the release of Jurassic World: Dominion, franchise producer Frank Marshall was already keen on continuing the series. “[Dominion] is going to wrap up this [Jurassic World] trilogy, but we’re not resting on our laurels,” Marshall said. “We’re going to sit down, and we’re going to see what the future is. We have that wonderful series, Camp Cretaceous, on Netflix. We obviously want to make quality, good movies with great storytelling, great writers and directors, but we’re definitely looking to do more in the Jurassic world.“

The post Rupert Friend joins Scarlett Johansson in new Jurassic World movie appeared first on JoBlo.

It’s been a few years since Sons of Anarchy creator Kurt Sutter first announced The Abandons, but the Western series has finally started shooting. Netflix announced the start of production of the first season of The Abandons in Calgary, with an official cast photo seen above.

The official logline for The Abandons reads: “As a group of diverse, outlier families pursue their Manifest Destiny in 1850s Oregon, a corrupt force of wealth and power, coveting their land, tries to force them out.  These abandoned souls, the kind of lost souls living on the fringe of society, unite their tribes to form a family and fight back. In this bloody process, ‘justice’ is stretched beyond the boundaries of the law. The Abandons will explore that fine line between survival and law, the consequences of violence, and the corrosive power of secrets, as this family fights to keep their land.“

“I am fascinated by the metamorphosis of good into evil,” Sutter said. “What must transpire to drive the morally sound to become the dangerously corrupt. The Abandons explores those complex compromises through the most powerful human instinct — the love and protection of mothers.” The ensemble cast includes Lena Headey, Gillian Anderson, Nick Robinson, Diana Silvers,  Lamar Johnson, Natalia del Riego, Lucas Till, Aisling Franciosi, Toby Hemingway, Michael Greyeyes, Ryan Hurst, Katelyn Wells, Clayton Cardenas, Elle-Maija Tailfeathers, Brían F. O’Byrne, Marc Menchaca, Patton Oswalt, Michael Ornstein, Jonathan Koensgen, Jack Doolan, Michiel Huisman, Haig Sutherland and Sarah White. 

I’m always a sucker for a good Western series, so I’m excited that The Abandons is finally happening for Netflix. Sutter has always wanted to do a Western series, but he put those plans on hold when HBO’s Deadwood came out. “I’ve always wanted to do a western, even before Sons, and then Deadwood came out,” Sutter said in 2021. “There’s that great lore of Ian Anderson wanting to be a great rock guitarist, and he saw Clapton play, and he said, ‘F*ck, I’m going to become the best rock flautist that ever lived.’ And he did just that for Jethro Tull. This is how I felt when I saw Deadwood. I said, ‘Let me stick to the crime genre” and then used just about every actor that was on that show. But I do love the genre, and over the pandemic, I tried to get a western IP.“

The post The Abandons: Kurt Sutter’s epic Western series for Netflix starts production appeared first on JoBlo.

It’s been a few years since Sons of Anarchy creator Kurt Sutter first announced The Abandons, but the Western series has finally started shooting. Netflix announced the start of production of the first season of The Abandons in Calgary, with an official cast photo seen above.

The official logline for The Abandons reads: “As a group of diverse, outlier families pursue their Manifest Destiny in 1850s Oregon, a corrupt force of wealth and power, coveting their land, tries to force them out.  These abandoned souls, the kind of lost souls living on the fringe of society, unite their tribes to form a family and fight back. In this bloody process, ‘justice’ is stretched beyond the boundaries of the law. The Abandons will explore that fine line between survival and law, the consequences of violence, and the corrosive power of secrets, as this family fights to keep their land.“

“I am fascinated by the metamorphosis of good into evil,” Sutter said. “What must transpire to drive the morally sound to become the dangerously corrupt. The Abandons explores those complex compromises through the most powerful human instinct — the love and protection of mothers.” The ensemble cast includes Lena Headey, Gillian Anderson, Nick Robinson, Diana Silvers,  Lamar Johnson, Natalia del Riego, Lucas Till, Aisling Franciosi, Toby Hemingway, Michael Greyeyes, Ryan Hurst, Katelyn Wells, Clayton Cardenas, Elle-Maija Tailfeathers, Brían F. O’Byrne, Marc Menchaca, Patton Oswalt, Michael Ornstein, Jonathan Koensgen, Jack Doolan, Michiel Huisman, Haig Sutherland and Sarah White. 

I’m always a sucker for a good Western series, so I’m excited that The Abandons is finally happening for Netflix. Sutter has always wanted to do a Western series, but he put those plans on hold when HBO’s Deadwood came out. “I’ve always wanted to do a western, even before Sons, and then Deadwood came out,” Sutter said in 2021. “There’s that great lore of Ian Anderson wanting to be a great rock guitarist, and he saw Clapton play, and he said, ‘F*ck, I’m going to become the best rock flautist that ever lived.’ And he did just that for Jethro Tull. This is how I felt when I saw Deadwood. I said, ‘Let me stick to the crime genre” and then used just about every actor that was on that show. But I do love the genre, and over the pandemic, I tried to get a western IP.“

The post The Abandons: Kurt Sutter’s epic Western series for Netflix starts production appeared first on JoBlo.

Call of Juarez: Gunslinger may not look as fancy and realistic as Red Dead Redemption II, but its tight Old West gunplay, creative design, and stylish visuals make it one of the best cowboy games around. And now you can buy it on Steam for under $2. That’s a steal, partner!

Read more…

Call of Juarez: Gunslinger may not look as fancy and realistic as Red Dead Redemption II, but its tight Old West gunplay, creative design, and stylish visuals make it one of the best cowboy games around. And now you can buy it on Steam for under $2. That’s a steal, partner!

Read more…

We’re still two months out from the premiere of Deadpool & Wolverine, but the film is already shaping up to be a huge success. Tickets for the film went on sale earlier this week, and AMC Theatres CEO Adam Aron took to X/Twitter to declare that Deadpool & Wolverine has sold more first-day tickets than any other R-rated movie in their history.

“Many big movies will open in May, June & July. Including Deadpool & Wolverine starring Ryan Reynolds and Hugh Jackman,” Aron said. “Opens July 25. Some 200,000 movie fans have bought their AMC tickets already. This is more Day 1 ticket sales at AMC than for any other R-rated movie ever.“

THR crunched the numbers, which reportedly works out to somewhere around $8 million to $9 million in first-day sales. Keep in mind that’s just for AMC. Fandango also reported that Deadpool & Wolverine broke their first-day ticket sales record for the year and also surpassed the first-day ticket sales for the previous Deadpool movies. Deadline added that the ticket sales have bested the 24-hour advance sales for The Batman ($6.5M), Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 ($6M), and John Wick: Chapter 4 ($1.4M).

Fans were already going to flock to theaters for the third Deadpool movie, but when you add Hugh Jackman’s return as Wolverine and the film being the only Marvel movie in theaters this year, you’ve got the makings of one of the year’s biggest movies.

Deadpool & Wolverine stars Ryan Reynolds as Deadpool, Hugh Jackman as Wolverine, Morena Baccarin as Vanessa, Leslie Uggams as Blind Al, Karan Soni as Dopinder, Brianna Hildebrand as Negasonic Teenage Warhead, Shioli Kutsuna as Yukio, Stefan Kapičić as the voice of Colossus, and Rob Delaney as Peter. Deadpool 3 will also star Emma Corrin as the villain and Matthew Macfadyen as a TVA agent. The film is also expected to feature cameos from characters throughout the history of 20th Century Fox’s Marvel movies, with a few already being revealed in the trailer, including Aaron Stanford as Pyro. Deadpool & Wolverine will hit theaters on July 26th.

The post Deadpool & Wolverine: First-day ticket sales sets AMC record for an R-rated movie appeared first on JoBlo.

When 2024 started, Helldivers 2 was barely a blip on most people’s game release radars. It quickly became the biggest hit of the year so far, turning into both a sales juggernaut and a cultural phenomenon. And in an era of hyper consolidation, it made Arrowhead Studios an obvious target for acquisition by the game’s…

Read more…

When 2024 started, Helldivers 2 was barely a blip on most people’s game release radars. It quickly became the biggest hit of the year so far, turning into both a sales juggernaut and a cultural phenomenon. And in an era of hyper consolidation, it made Arrowhead Studios an obvious target for acquisition by the game’s…

Read more…