Business partners are continuing to ditch Guy “Dr Disrespect” Beahm after multiple reports corroborated allegations that he “sexted” a minor through Twitch, and the streamer himself admitted to conversations that “sometimes leaned too much in the direction of being inappropriate” with someone who was underage. The…
The Lord of the Rings franchise has grossed nearly $6 billion over the course of six movies, so it didn’t come as a big surprise when it was announced that more movies were in development. The first of these movies will be Lord of the Rings: The Hunt for Gollum. In addition to reprising his role as Gollum, Andy Serkis will direct the film, which he recently hinted could include appearances from characters we know and love.
Serkis dropped a few teases about the project while speaking at ACE Superhero Comic Con 2024 (via Popverse). “It is so early; it would be unfair to commit to anything at this point,” Serkis said. “But I will say that it will be a deep dive where we investigate Gollum’s character. There may be characters that we recognize that might be coming back. I’m not going to say who.“
As the story will likely take place during the timeline of The Fellowship of the Ring, a few potential candidates include Gandalf and Aragorn, and Ian McKellen and Viggo Mortensen have both expressed a tentative willingness to return. Serkis also said that The Hunt for Gollum is a “work-in-progress title,” so the final movie may not end up being called that, but it will “very much be the world of Middle-earth according to Gollum’s experience of it.” Fran Walsh and Philippa Boyens are writing the script for The Hunt for Gollum, which will be produced by Peter Jackson.
While we did see much of Gollum’s story play out in the previous six movies, Peter Jackson has previously said that there’s still a lot of story left to be told. “The Gollum/Sméagol character has always fascinated me because Gollum reflects the worst of human nature, whilst his Sméagol side is, arguably, quite sympathetic,” Jackson said. “I think he connects with readers and film audiences alike, because there’s a little bit of both of them in all of us. We really want to explore his backstory and delve into those parts of his journey we didn’t have time to cover in the earlier films. It’s too soon to know who will cross his path, but suffice to say we will take our lead from Professor Tolkien.“
Which Lord of the Rings characters would you like to see appear in The Hunt for Gollum?
The post Andy Serkis hints Gollum movie may include return of “characters we recognize” appeared first on JoBlo.
PLOT: A surprising romance kicks off comic consequences for a young woman, her mother and her movie star boss as they face the complications of love, sex, and identity.
REVIEW: When the trailer for A Family Affair debuted, I immediately felt bad for the careers of everyone involved. Nicole Kidman slumming it in a romcom, Zac Efron following up the excellent The Iron Claw with superficial dreck, and Joey King marring her career upswing. Not to mention the Oscar credibility of Kathy Bates. But something happened when I watched the film. While it is far from great, A Family Affair is better than I expected. Because it develops characters and does not rely on tropes and cliches but instead uses the formula of the genre, A Family Affair is an example of what romantic comedies could be if given a little room to breathe. Plus, it helps to have actors capable of carrying the film on their shoulders, whereas a weaker cast would have wasted the opportunity to poke fun at Hollywood and age-gap couples.
Reuniting on-screen twelve years since they co-starred in Lee Daniels’ The Paperboy, Nicole Kidman and Zac Efron play movie star Chris Cole and writer Brooke Haywood. Chris is the lead in a series of Marvel-esque action movies and is a bit of a diva, which stresses his personal assistant, Zara (Joey King). When Zara quits, Chris goes to her house to convince her to return to work, and he meets Brooke, Zara’s mother. Sparks fly instantly, and Zara runs in on the couple having sex, which lands her in the emergency room and Brooke and Chris questioning their relationship. As the film progresses, Brooke and Chris realize they have legitimate feelings for one another, but Zara doubts that Chris will do anything other than hurt her mom. Rather than focusing on Zara trying to undermine the relationship, A Family Affair shows the three sides to this relationship and how perception is not always the same as reality.
A Family Affair plays on themes similar to the recent Anne Hathaway film The Idea of You, but here, the celebrity crush is portrayed more as a spoof of famous actors. At one point, Zac Efron’s Chris says, “Hey, I am not a celebrity. I am a movie star,” and sincerely means it. Joey King’s Zara, an aspiring producer who lurks in the shadow of her Pulitzer Prize-winning mother, initially comes across as the suffering victim of Chris Cole’s ridiculous rich person neediness. Still, as the film progresses, she becomes a villain who is so self-absorbed that she fails to see the damage she is doing to the two key people in her life. Worried that Chris is going to wine and dine Brooke and then dump her, A Family Affair tries very hard to transform our initial perception of Chris from good looks and not so intelligent into a layered person who is not as dumb as he initially seems. The trailers make Zac Efron seem like a dolt, but the character is more than that once you get past the first act of the film.
While Kidman, Efron, and King are the actors we see the most on screen, there are nice supporting roles for Liza Koshy as Zara’s best friend and Kathy Bates as Zara’s grandmother and Brooke’s mother-in-law. Bates has played many solid roles that rely on extravagant personality traits, such as in Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret, but seeing her more subdued and subtly good is refreshing. Bates has solid scenes with all three leads, but she and Koshy are relegated to glorified cameos. Efron and Kidman have believable chemistry, and their age gap is only mentioned once, with the story not focused on the media’s perception of Chris Cole’s new girlfriend. Most of the movie is spent in small settings without large crowds, allowing the character-centric focus to build more than you would see in a typical rom-com.
Scripted by newcomer Carrie Solomon and directed by Richard LaGravenese, A Family Affair avoids many of the pitfalls of romantic comedies by not turning the story into a sexual love triangle. Instead, the relationship dynamic between boss and employee, friend and coworker, and lover and lover blend into a realistic situation that breeds realistic comedy. The more pratfall humor the film focuses on, the less funny it becomes. The Hollywood insider humor of making movies and celebrity personal assistants may be less appealing to mass audiences, but I found the jokes to be the funniest in the film. The movie struggles to present the characters in one light at the start of the film and expects us to see them totally differently before they have earned their transformation. The story is too clean and neatly put together for any drama to truly resonate, which undermines some of the emotional investment this genre needs to succeed.
A Family Affair is much better than the trailers make it out to be due to the solid lead actors. Nicole Kidman, who has very few romantic comedies to her credit (the last being 2005’s Bewitched), never plays her character down as anything but a woman afraid to love again. Zac Efron does a nice job of spoofing himself without making it seem disingenuous, while Joey King almost makes Zara likable after a film of being a pain in the butt for everyone in the movie. A Family Affair, clocking in at close to two hours, is too long and uneven to be good, but it is way better than it has any right to be. Better than the typical Netflix original but only by a tiny margin, A Family Affair is a light streaming option this weekend if you want to enjoy a few laughs and some warm and fuzzies.
The post A Family Affair Review appeared first on JoBlo.
One of the greatest characters from Frasier is set to make her triumphant return. Variety reports that Harriet Sansom Harris will reprise her role of Bebe Glazer in Frasier season 2, but she won’t be alone. Rachel Bloom (Crazy Ex-Girlfriend) will be joining her as Phoebe, Bebe’s daughter. Doesn’t that just make your blood run cold?
Harris appeared in 11 episodes of the original Frasier series and frequently stole the show. “Known for her dramatic flair and outrageous Machiavellian maneuvers. Bebe will stop at nothing to get what she wants,” reads the official description. As for her daughter, Phoebe has “inherited her mother’s indomitable charm,” and “boasts a magnetic personality as well as a taste for the finer things.“
Bebe Glazer isn’t the only original series character returning for Frasier season 2, as Peri Gilpin, Dan Butler, and Edward Hibbert are all set to reprise their roles. Gilpin played Roz Doyle, Frasier’s producer at KACL. She also appeared in the season 1 finale of the new series. Butler played Bulldog, the sports host at KACL, and Hibbert played Gil Chesterton, the station’s pompous food critic.
In addition to Kelsey Grammer, Frasier stars Jack Cutmore-Scott as Frasier’s son, Freddy; Nicholas Lyndhurst as Frasier’s old college buddy turned university professor, Alan; Toks Olagundoye as Alan’s colleague and head of the university psychology department, Olivia; Jess Salguerio as Freddy’s roommate, Eve; and Anders Keith as Frasier’s nephew, David, son of Niles and Daphne. You can check out a review of Frasier from our own Alex Maidy right here.
The second season of the Paramount+ series is currently in the middle of production, with a handful of new characters set to appear. Amy Sedaris will play Dr. “Doc” Stathos, “a municipal therapist with a down-home, scattered veneer. She works with the firefighters at Freddy’s firehouse and is also a big fan of Frasier Crane from his old TV talk show.” Yvette Nicole Brown will play Monica, Olivia’s sister, who is described as “part haughty professor, part Nancy Drew, the brilliant, biting, and delightfully deadpan. Monica is Olivia’s perfect older sister. She has everything Olivia has and everything Olivia wants – and never misses a chance to remind her.” Kelsey Grammer’s real-life daughter Greer will play Alice, Roz’s now grown-up daughter, who “has inherited more than some of her mother Roz’s free-spirited ways. Having just moved to Providence to study architecture, Alice is eager to catch up with Frasier’s son Freddy—and complicate whatever romantic plans he may have.” Patricia Heaton is also on board to play Holly, a potential love interest for Frasier.
The post Frasier season 2 will feature the return of the delightfully devilish Bebe Glazer appeared first on JoBlo.
“I make movies for men,” Kevin Costner said on the Happy Sad Confused podcast alongside members of the Horizon: An America Saga cast. “That’s what I do. But I won’t make a movie unless I have strong women characters. That’s how I’ve conducted my career. I think that’s why I have a good following. I thank you women for dragging your men here. It was a Western after all. I just can’t conceive of a movie without having [strong women].“
Horizon: An American Saga boasts quite the ensemble cast, including strong female characters played by Sienna Miller, Isabelle Fuhrman, Jena Malone, Abbey Lee, and others. Costner added that he “couldn’t conceive of a scene that didn’t involve a woman” while he was co-writing the script alongside Jon Baird. While speaking on The Kelly Clarkson Show earlier this month, Costner explained why women were so important to the story of Horizon.
“This has a tremendous amount of women in it,” Costner said. “They play such a big part of the West and what happened. They were often taken out there against their will and with their children on the idea that there was something great out there. There was nothing out there except a group of people who lived there for thousands of years. Women were drug into the most terrible of circumstances and made it work. And somehow they don’t find themselves in Westerns and in ‘Horizon’ they dominate.“
“In the great tradition of Warner Bros. Pictures’ iconic Westerns, Horizon: An American Saga explores the lure of the Old West and how it was won—and lost—through the blood, sweat, and tears of many,” reads the official synopsis. “Spanning the four years of the Civil War, from 1861 to 1865, Kevin Costner’s ambitious cinematic adventure will take audiences on an emotional journey across a country at war with itself, experienced through the lens of families, friends, and foes all attempting to discover what it truly means to be the United States of America.”
Horizon: An America Saga will be released in theaters on June 28th, followed by the second part on August 16th. Two more chapters are expected to follow to complete the saga. Opinions on the first chapter were divided upon its debut at Cannes earlier this year, but many praised it as sprawling and absorbing.
The post Kevin Costner says, “I make movies for men,” but he can’t conceive of a movie without strong women appeared first on JoBlo.
When The Dark Knight Rises revealed that Joseph Gordon-Levitt’s character, John Blake, was actually named Robin, it sparked debate as to whether or not he was actually Robin or if it was just an homage to the sidekick. Adding to this, if he was indeed going to develop into the Robin we all know – or at least the Christopher Nolan version – could Gordon-Levitt get his own spin-off? Now, a dozen years after The Dark Knight Rises was released, the actor is confirming whether or not there were ever plans to expand the universe.
Speaking with Inverse, Joseph Gordon-Levitt put those Robin rumors to rest, saying, “Nolan was making a trilogy. He never wanted to make any more movies. This was an ending to his trilogy.” He also noted that there is an entirely different mentality within the superhero movie world now than there was in 2012. “It’s funny, we look back on it now with the context of the Marvel Cinematic Universe — everything is a sequel to a sequel to a sequel. But back in those olden days, doing a trilogy was a lot, and that was how it was thought of.” As for if he would ever turn up again in a DC movie, Gordon-Levitt maintains that he doesn’t really keep up with all of that.
Gordon-Levitt has a point there on the mindset of modern superhero flicks. Then again, Robin has never really worked on the big screen (sorry, Chris O’Donnell!), so despite the hope of Gordon-Levitt continuing on as the character (or Nightwing?) – or if he was going to take over as Batman so Christian Bale’s Bruce Wayne could chill in Italy with Selina Kyle – it likely wouldn’t have worked out as well as we would imagine.
Outside of Robin, Joseph Gordon-Levitt had been rumored for various characters in the MCU, including Peter Quill in Guardians of the Galaxy and Scott Lang in Ant-Man, but he denies them to this day. “Yeah, people like to talk. I understand why it’s fun to talk about these kinds of things. I don’t really have anything to add to this. I’m sorry.”
Do you think a Robin spin-off with Joseph Gordon-Levitt could have worked? Give us your take below!
The post Joseph Gordon-Levitt addresses Robin spin-off plans appeared first on JoBlo.
The Blessed Blue Dew Talisman is found only in Elden Ring’s Shadow of the Erdtree expansion. This accessory will grant you Focus Point (FP) regeneration and can be found early in the game. It’s a must-find if you want to use plenty of spells or abilities without worrying too much over refilling their resources…
The Blessed Blue Dew Talisman is found only in Elden Ring’s Shadow of the Erdtree expansion. This accessory will grant you Focus Point (FP) regeneration and can be found early in the game. It’s a must-find if you want to use plenty of spells or abilities without worrying too much over refilling their resources…
We last saw Letitia Wright as Shuri in Black Panther: Wakanda Forever, but with several big Avengers movies on the horizon, it stands to reason that we’ll be seeing the character again.
While appearing on The View to promote Sound of Hope: The Story of Possum Trot, Wright was asked by co-host Sunny Hostin if Shuri would be making another appearance in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. “If it’s, uh, let’s just say, let’s just say… I would like to continue with Shuri,” Wright said, clearly aware those Marvel snipers are keeping an eye out. “She’s one of my favorite characters, such a blessing, honestly, I kid you not. I’m so grateful for her.“
When asked if a third installment of Black Panther was in the works, Wright merely said, “There’s a lot to, a lot to — a lot coming up.” The actress also spoke of the accident she suffered on the set of the sequel and how the words of the late Chadwick Boseman got her through it. “At the time it was an unfortunate accident that happened to me, and I kind of just had a moment to just reflect on everything, and I just thought a lot about him,” Wright said. “I thought a lot about his perseverance and his relentlessness just to keep going no matter what life was throwing at him, and I just thought, like, ‘If my brother could make it, you know, I can get back on set and finish the job.’ So, I just carried that panther spirit with me.“
Although Black Panther 3 hasn’t been officially announced, Wakanda Forever did set up a sequel by introducing the son of King T’Challa (Boseman). It also ended with a card which stated: “Black Panther will return.”
The upcoming Ironheart series for Disney+ will serve as something of a sequel to Wakanda Forever, continuing the story of Riri Williams (Dominique Thorne). The series is expected to debut in 2025. There’s also an animated Black Panther spin-off in the works titled Eyes of Wakanda. The series will tell the story of Wakandan warriors who, throughout history, have travelled the world to retrieve dangerous vibranium artifacts.
The post Black Panther star Letitia Wright teases the return of Shuri: “There’s a lot coming up” appeared first on JoBlo.
Dragon Age: The Veilguard’s character creator is the most robust BioWare’s ever put in one of its RPGs. We saw a glimpse of it at Summer Game Fest and can confirm Mass Effect and Dragon Ages of old have nothing on what’s coming. But the options for how you customize your character aren’t nearly as exciting as one big…