The Yellowstone era of Kevin Costner’s career has come to an end, and viewers now know the fate of his character. The box office disappointment of his film Horizon: An American Saga – Chapter 1 has left some wondering how he’s going to be able to complete his four-part Western epic (Chapter 2 has already been filmed, but Chapters 3 and 4 are left to go), which brought up the scheduling conflicts that caused him to exit Yellowstone in the first place… but Costner isn’t just sitting around, waiting to get back to the world of Horizon. Last month, it was announced that Costner is set to star in a horror thriller called Headhunters – and now, The Hollywood Reporter has broken the news that he’s being joined in the cast by Chloe East, who can currently be seen on the big screen in the horror movie Heretic, and Evan Mock (Gossip Girl).
Cinematographer Steven Holleran will be making his feature directorial debut with this film, which is based on an idea he originated. Holleran took the idea to Costner, and they’ve crafted the script together. Costner will be playing a character called Lazer, a washed-up American ex-pat with a mysterious past who finds himself living in Bali, Indonesia. Lazer recruits a group of surfers led by Bima, a local photographer, on a journey to an uncharted island to pioneer a perfect wave. To their surprise, the island is home to an ancient tribe of headhunters guarding the land at all costs. What ensues is an adventure turned survival story of epic and bloody proportions on a tropical island which once seemed to be paradise… but is actually closer to hell. Sounds to me like this has the potential to be an awesome movie. Kevin Costner vs. headhunters!
Also in the cast is Daniel Zovatto, whose credits include It Follows, Don’t Breathe, Beneath,The Pope’s Exorcist, Fear the Walking Dead, and Penny Dreadful: City of Angels. Zovatto has been on board since the project was first announced.
Headhunters is expected to start filming in Hawaii this month. Studios and streaming services are competing to secure the distribution rights. Costner and his producing partner Howard Kaplan are producing for Territory Pictures, while Scott Steindorff does the same for Stone Village Films, alongside the company’s Dylan Russell, Lindsay Davis, and Stacey Woods. Eric Hays is on board as physical producer. teindorff provided the following statement: “For decades, my friend Kevin and I have been searching for the right project to collaborate on. This is one of the best scripts I have seen in my career. Kevin is a legendary actor who brings so much depth and charisma to his roles, and has written an iconic horror script with Steve.“
Holleran, whose cinematography credits include Sympathy for the Devil, Missing, and Chick Fight, had this to say: “My filmmaking journey got its start in the ocean shooting surf videos in California as a teenager. Twenty years later, Headhunters brings things full circle and connects three life-long passions of mine — surfing, filmmaking, and adventure.“
Are you interested in Headhunters? What do you think of Chloe East and Evan Mock joining the cast? Let us know by leaving a comment below.
Robert Rodriguez’s El Mariachi Trilogy or Mexico Trilogy is now available in a new Blu-ray collection, which includes a 4K transfer of Desperado, courtesy of Arrow Video. The first movie was never truly intended to be a franchise starter. It was actually Rodriguez practicing how to make a movie. El Mariachi would put him on the map for film studios, but it was the sequel, Desperado, that brought him into the mainstream. It would also make Antonio Banderas an action star and introduced audiences to Salma Hayek. And it’s this manic film that we take a look at in this episode of Reel Action.
If you’re into movies, chances are you’ve heard the inspirational story behind Robert Rodriguez’s debut feature film. But if you aren’t up to speed, 1995’s Desperado is actually a sequel to a small film from 1992 called El Mariachi. And when I say small, there’s no hyperbole here because the film gained fame and reputation for being an action movie that was made with only a $7,000 budget. This includes the fact that Rodriguez made the whole thing by himself with no crew.
It was this accomplishment of immense efficiency and creative problem solving that had Columbia Pictures excited to give him a studio film to helm since it could be made for cheap. While El Mariachi was only made for $7,000, Desperado would naturally be a bigger budgeted movie. But it was still incredibly cheap for most action movie standards, at $7 million.
When he was given the go ahead to make this sequel, he also took it as an opportunity to essentially remake the first one. The first film was simplistic enough that there wasn’t too much lore to be a slave to and, since most people hadn’t seen the first anyways, this one could stand pretty much on its own without having watched El Mariachi. The film starts by establishing the guitarist as an urban legend when Steve Buscemi’s character tells a story of when he saw the man with no name unleash his guitar case full of guns on an unlucky bar. This guitar player is simply credited as El Mariachi and, eventually, it’s shortened to “El” in the third movie. El is on a mission to find a man named Bucho — a dangerous drug kingpin in Mexico.
There is a quick backstory established for El Mariachi as they remake the ending of the first film with Antonio Banderas now stepping in the role. For audiences who hadn’t known about the original movie, this flashback comes off as a thin, but effective motivation. They killed his love and he wants revenge. A good old fashioned tale. While the villain who actually pulled the trigger was killed at the end of the first movie, El is now going to find the head of the snake.
Banderas takes over the role of El Mariachi from the first film’s star, Carlos Gallardo. Gallardo’s portrayal of the character in the original is more of a naive musician. He’s an everyman who gets thrust into a life or death situation, then has to fight his way out. Banderas’ take has El going full-on action hero as he packs an arsenal in his guitar case and wields dual pistols in a very John Woo-esque manner. He’s almost a completely different character. His look and mannerisms don’t resemble Gallardo’s. And it’s almost like there is very little innocence left in this man after the events of the first movie. He’s now jaded and focused entirely on vengeance.
The only two characters that El connects with in this movie is Niño, a random street kid who aspires to be a guitarist himself, and Carolina, a bookshop owner, played by Salma Hayek. El’s big brother instincts come out when Niño’s around. He gives him advice on his music and looks after his safety, which includes foiling a drug deal that involves Niño’s dad. Somehow, it became a tradition for Rodriguez to put a kid in a yellow shirt in each of the Mariachi movies. Here, Niño came away as the one with the most character development in the series.
Then, right after a big action scene early on in the movie, El runs into Carolina when he’s being hunted down by one of Bucho’s men. He’s left mortally wounded and she takes it upon herself to fix him up, thanks to the medical books in her own inventory. While Rodriguez writes a lot of humor throughout the movie, it’s in their first scene together that you can see Banderas and Hayek have a fun chemistry. It’s not exactly the smoothest, easiest start to a love interest plot, and their bickering gives the movie some great levity in between the action. Their chemistry would blossom into a close friendship in real life as they’ve continued bickering in almost a sibling-like fashion.
In the movie, their tension would later turn into white hot passion as Rodriguez puts the 90s action stamp on Desperado with a fiery Latin love scene that would give Van Damme and Stallone’s gratuitous sex scenes a run for their money. Carolina ends up being with El, but unfortunately, she’s also tied to Bucho since he bought the bookstore for her.
Bucho, here, is played by Joaquim de Almeida. Audiences may recognize him from a more recent stint as the villain from Fast Five, who also briefly reprised his role in Fast X. Rodriguez originally wanted Raul Julia in the role, but tragically, he was too ill at the time to accept and would pass away after filming his final movie, Street Fighter. De Almeida makes the role his own though. He plays Bucho with some good subversive humor as he continuously gets annoyed with this unknown stranger who waltzes into town and keeps killing his many henchmen.
This movie is also filled with Rodriguez’s staple of actors in some fun small roles. Steve Buscemi plays El’s only ally before getting to town. Cheech Marin shows up to provide some of his signature comedy as a bartender at one of Bucho’s establishments. Rodriguez’s close friend Quentin Tarantino makes an appearance as a drug customer in a scene where it seems likely that he wrote most of his dialogue. And Danny Trejo would make a splash in this film with his silent role as the knife-throwing assassin.
While Gallardo didn’t get to reprise his role cause the studio wanted a bigger name for the lead, he was still able to get in on the action as Campa, one of El’s bandmates, who also happens to be gunfighter. And he wields his own guitar case weapons that double as machine guns. And the third bandmate, Quino, also joins the fray with his guitar case that doubles as a missile launcher.
Desperado marks up the action from the first movie by nearly 100%. The gunplay of El Mariachi is more subdued, but here, the bullets and bodies fly in an extremely comic book-like fashion. The urban legend aspect bleeds into the rest of the movie as much of the action shamelessly indulges in an exaggerated, hyper-reality. Additionally, Rodriguez, being a fan of John Woo, wanted to mix in the kind of balletic chaos that defines his action sequences. So, if you’re looking for tactical, logic-based gun fights, you ain’t gonna find em here. And thankfully, Desperado leans way into it.
Now that Rodriguez had a lot more fancier toys to play with behind the scenes, there was a significant jump in quality from the do-it-yourself rougher edges of the first film. However, he wouldn’t stray too far from his corner-cutting methods. For starters, it’s extremely beneficial that not only does he direct, but he is his own editor as well as his own camera man. So, he pretty much can visualize how he wants the scene to be shot and edits the movie in his head while he films it.
In one of his signature Ten Minute Film Schools, Rodriguez shows how they pre-planned the standout bar shootout scene by taping a pre-visualization with a camcorder. He called this process video storyboards. The kinds of unorthodox methods he picked up making El Mariachi had Desperado’s filming schedule take place just over a month. The film became very profitable as it grossed a total of $58 million globally with its $7 million budget. It established Rodriguez as the new pulp action director, while Banderas and Hayek’s careers took off like a rocket.
During his time on the film, Quentin Tarantino told Rodriguez that he should make the third movie in this series an epic like Sergio Leone’s The Good, The Bad and The Ugly in the Dollars trilogy. He also said he should title it Once Upon a Time in Mexico as a tribute to Leone’s Once Upon a Time in the West.
And that’s exactly what Rodriguez did with 2003’s Once Upon a Time in Mexico. The third movie was more epic with a coup plot that exploded into all out war in the finale. This film would also focus less on Banderas’ character with more of an ensemble cast that includes a scene-stealing new wildcard – Agent Sands – played by Johnny Depp, who’s having the time of his life.
Once Upon a Time in Mexico closed out the trilogy and Rodriguez would only revisit the franchise one more time in an attempt to adapt the first film into a TV series, but that would only last for one season. Desperado is fun, unpretentious entertainment that doesn’t take itself seriously. It doesn’t have much in terms of a plot. It’s almost like a series of vignettes in between the action scenes, but the performances are entertaining and the pace of the film never lets you get bored. It almost had the title El Pistolero, which means “the gunman.” And that’s exactly what you’re in for, a good old fashion video game-like shoot em up.
Robert Rodriguez’s El Mariachi Trilogy or Mexico Trilogy is now available in a new Blu-ray collection, which includes a 4K transfer of Desperado, courtesy of Arrow Video. The first movie was never truly intended to be a franchise starter. It was actually Rodriguez practicing how to make a movie. El Mariachi would put him on the map for film studios, but it was the sequel, Desperado, that brought him into the mainstream. It would also make Antonio Banderas an action star and introduced audiences to Salma Hayek. And it’s this manic film that we take a look at in this episode of Reel Action.
If you’re into movies, chances are you’ve heard the inspirational story behind Robert Rodriguez’s debut feature film. But if you aren’t up to speed, 1995’s Desperado is actually a sequel to a small film from 1992 called El Mariachi. And when I say small, there’s no hyperbole here because the film gained fame and reputation for being an action movie that was made with only a $7,000 budget. This includes the fact that Rodriguez made the whole thing by himself with no crew.
It was this accomplishment of immense efficiency and creative problem solving that had Columbia Pictures excited to give him a studio film to helm since it could be made for cheap. While El Mariachi was only made for $7,000, Desperado would naturally be a bigger budgeted movie. But it was still incredibly cheap for most action movie standards, at $7 million.
When he was given the go ahead to make this sequel, he also took it as an opportunity to essentially remake the first one. The first film was simplistic enough that there wasn’t too much lore to be a slave to and, since most people hadn’t seen the first anyways, this one could stand pretty much on its own without having watched El Mariachi. The film starts by establishing the guitarist as an urban legend when Steve Buscemi’s character tells a story of when he saw the man with no name unleash his guitar case full of guns on an unlucky bar. This guitar player is simply credited as El Mariachi and, eventually, it’s shortened to “El” in the third movie. El is on a mission to find a man named Bucho — a dangerous drug kingpin in Mexico.
There is a quick backstory established for El Mariachi as they remake the ending of the first film with Antonio Banderas now stepping in the role. For audiences who hadn’t known about the original movie, this flashback comes off as a thin, but effective motivation. They killed his love and he wants revenge. A good old fashioned tale. While the villain who actually pulled the trigger was killed at the end of the first movie, El is now going to find the head of the snake.
Banderas takes over the role of El Mariachi from the first film’s star, Carlos Gallardo. Gallardo’s portrayal of the character in the original is more of a naive musician. He’s an everyman who gets thrust into a life or death situation, then has to fight his way out. Banderas’ take has El going full-on action hero as he packs an arsenal in his guitar case and wields dual pistols in a very John Woo-esque manner. He’s almost a completely different character. His look and mannerisms don’t resemble Gallardo’s. And it’s almost like there is very little innocence left in this man after the events of the first movie. He’s now jaded and focused entirely on vengeance.
The only two characters that El connects with in this movie is Niño, a random street kid who aspires to be a guitarist himself, and Carolina, a bookshop owner, played by Salma Hayek. El’s big brother instincts come out when Niño’s around. He gives him advice on his music and looks after his safety, which includes foiling a drug deal that involves Niño’s dad. Somehow, it became a tradition for Rodriguez to put a kid in a yellow shirt in each of the Mariachi movies. Here, Niño came away as the one with the most character development in the series.
Then, right after a big action scene early on in the movie, El runs into Carolina when he’s being hunted down by one of Bucho’s men. He’s left mortally wounded and she takes it upon herself to fix him up, thanks to the medical books in her own inventory. While Rodriguez writes a lot of humor throughout the movie, it’s in their first scene together that you can see Banderas and Hayek have a fun chemistry. It’s not exactly the smoothest, easiest start to a love interest plot, and their bickering gives the movie some great levity in between the action. Their chemistry would blossom into a close friendship in real life as they’ve continued bickering in almost a sibling-like fashion.
In the movie, their tension would later turn into white hot passion as Rodriguez puts the 90s action stamp on Desperado with a fiery Latin love scene that would give Van Damme and Stallone’s gratuitous sex scenes a run for their money. Carolina ends up being with El, but unfortunately, she’s also tied to Bucho since he bought the bookstore for her.
Bucho, here, is played by Joaquim de Almeida. Audiences may recognize him from a more recent stint as the villain from Fast Five, who also briefly reprised his role in Fast X. Rodriguez originally wanted Raul Julia in the role, but tragically, he was too ill at the time to accept and would pass away after filming his final movie, Street Fighter. De Almeida makes the role his own though. He plays Bucho with some good subversive humor as he continuously gets annoyed with this unknown stranger who waltzes into town and keeps killing his many henchmen.
This movie is also filled with Rodriguez’s staple of actors in some fun small roles. Steve Buscemi plays El’s only ally before getting to town. Cheech Marin shows up to provide some of his signature comedy as a bartender at one of Bucho’s establishments. Rodriguez’s close friend Quentin Tarantino makes an appearance as a drug customer in a scene where it seems likely that he wrote most of his dialogue. And Danny Trejo would make a splash in this film with his silent role as the knife-throwing assassin.
While Gallardo didn’t get to reprise his role cause the studio wanted a bigger name for the lead, he was still able to get in on the action as Campa, one of El’s bandmates, who also happens to be gunfighter. And he wields his own guitar case weapons that double as machine guns. And the third bandmate, Quino, also joins the fray with his guitar case that doubles as a missile launcher.
Desperado marks up the action from the first movie by nearly 100%. The gunplay of El Mariachi is more subdued, but here, the bullets and bodies fly in an extremely comic book-like fashion. The urban legend aspect bleeds into the rest of the movie as much of the action shamelessly indulges in an exaggerated, hyper-reality. Additionally, Rodriguez, being a fan of John Woo, wanted to mix in the kind of balletic chaos that defines his action sequences. So, if you’re looking for tactical, logic-based gun fights, you ain’t gonna find em here. And thankfully, Desperado leans way into it.
Now that Rodriguez had a lot more fancier toys to play with behind the scenes, there was a significant jump in quality from the do-it-yourself rougher edges of the first film. However, he wouldn’t stray too far from his corner-cutting methods. For starters, it’s extremely beneficial that not only does he direct, but he is his own editor as well as his own camera man. So, he pretty much can visualize how he wants the scene to be shot and edits the movie in his head while he films it.
In one of his signature Ten Minute Film Schools, Rodriguez shows how they pre-planned the standout bar shootout scene by taping a pre-visualization with a camcorder. He called this process video storyboards. The kinds of unorthodox methods he picked up making El Mariachi had Desperado’s filming schedule take place just over a month. The film became very profitable as it grossed a total of $58 million globally with its $7 million budget. It established Rodriguez as the new pulp action director, while Banderas and Hayek’s careers took off like a rocket.
During his time on the film, Quentin Tarantino told Rodriguez that he should make the third movie in this series an epic like Sergio Leone’s The Good, The Bad and The Ugly in the Dollars trilogy. He also said he should title it Once Upon a Time in Mexico as a tribute to Leone’s Once Upon a Time in the West.
And that’s exactly what Rodriguez did with 2003’s Once Upon a Time in Mexico. The third movie was more epic with a coup plot that exploded into all out war in the finale. This film would also focus less on Banderas’ character with more of an ensemble cast that includes a scene-stealing new wildcard – Agent Sands – played by Johnny Depp, who’s having the time of his life.
Once Upon a Time in Mexico closed out the trilogy and Rodriguez would only revisit the franchise one more time in an attempt to adapt the first film into a TV series, but that would only last for one season. Desperado is fun, unpretentious entertainment that doesn’t take itself seriously. It doesn’t have much in terms of a plot. It’s almost like a series of vignettes in between the action scenes, but the performances are entertaining and the pace of the film never lets you get bored. It almost had the title El Pistolero, which means “the gunman.” And that’s exactly what you’re in for, a good old fashion video game-like shoot em up.
No! Stop! It turns out your shouldn’t let your dog piss all over your Switch. This is the radical new advice coming from Nintendo Japan’s customer service, where a statement posted on X explains that pet urine will, in fact, cause your electronic devices some manner of harm.
No! Stop! It turns out your shouldn’t let your dog piss all over your Switch. This is the radical new advice coming from Nintendo Japan’s customer service, where a statement posted on X explains that pet urine will, in fact, cause your electronic devices some manner of harm.
What if I told you that the late directing legend George Romero wrote and directed an ahead-of-its-time “one bad day” revenge slasher classic back in 2000 that mixed Michael Douglas in Falling Down with Michael Myers from Halloween and featured a live performance by The Misfits… yet no one noticed? It would take Robert Stack and a special episode of Unsolved Mysteries to uncover how a film that was arguably one of George Romero’s best films in the second half of his career went completely unnoticed, and stayed that way even as we speak today… This is just what happened to Bruiser.
Look for yourself and you’ll find a very thin file on the existence of Bruiser (watch it HERE). To craft even the video you’re watching right now we had to reach into the time vault of eBay and find a DVD copy featuring a commentary from Romero and his frequent collaborator producer Peter Grunwald to learn about the movie.
In the film, Romero writes the story of a mild-mannered and empathetic man named Henry Creedlow. Henry works at a fashion magazine called Bruiser with an overbearing narcissistic boss and then comes home at the end of the day to a money-hungry, dehumanizing wife and their half-finished home he can’t afford. He’d talk to his best friend and financial advisor about it, but he’s too busy stealing Henry’s money on the side and flaunting it in his face. “I thought there’d be more… I always think there will be more” Henry says as his supposed friend gives him the bad news about his finances. After hearing a caller on a radio program kill himself live on air one morning, Henry starts to feel a change deep within himself.
With every personal slight, he begins to have visions of himself doing copious amounts of harm to others in return. A lady who cuts him off on the train gets punched in the face and thrown on the tracks where the train runs over her head. Later, moments after he sees his wife giving his asshole boss his very own “job” poolside, he imagines driving an axe into her head. He’s not doing great and the world around him just keeps pushing him like those cops did Rambo in First Blood. One day, his only true friend hands him a blank, white mask and asks him to decorate it with his personality. He stares at it, unable to complete the task because he is empty inside. Then, he wakes up and finds that the mask has molded to his face and he is unable to remove it. His fantasies then begin to blur with the real world and he murders a woman he catches stealing from his home. Then he murders his wife when he catches her banging his boss. Finally, with the cops on his heels, he tracks his larger-than-life dick of a boss down to a huge Halloween party where The Misfits happen to be playing for his big finale.
The film would be the very first time in George Romero’s illustrious career that he wouldn’t be filming in Pittsburgh as Bruiser was instead filmed in Toronto, Canada. As a matter of fact, there are a lot of differences in the making of Bruiser that would contrast with Romero’s typical work. Something you have to imagine he welcomed after a string of films that didn’t go the way he’d have liked for various reasons. Bruiser would come fifteen years after his last (at the time) zombie film in Day of the Dead and would follow the TV short Iron City Asskickers, his adaption of Stephen King’s The Dark Half, a segment of Two Evil Eyes, Monkey Shines, and of course The Misfits music video he directed for their song Scream! This is actually where Romero recruited the famous punk band for the film. The Misfits’ own Jerry Caiafa, would explain, “For this new video, we have a song called ‘Scream!’ that was written for Wes Craven and his movies… and we were looking for a video to get done for it so we called George and asked him if he was interested and he said he would do it and he needed us to be in his movie. So we actually exchanged working atmospheres. He’s gonna direct our video, and we’re going to be in his movie. Just doing each other favors so, we’re very excited about it”
The band isn’t just playing in the background, either. There are many shots of them in the final set piece of the film that includes them beating up on unruly audience members and playing multiple songs on stage. It’s awesome and in this guy’s opinion, totally underrated in the zeitgeist of horror and punk. Not to mention how punk rock George Romero is for directing a Misfits video, then asking that his only payment be their appearance in his film. What a legend.
Speaking of legendary directors, this isn’t the only time in the making of Bruiser that Wes Craven’s name was mentioned. In fact, Romero, in an interview during the filming of his Misfits video, gave credit to Craven’s Scream for bringing horror to the forefront again, saying: “I’m sure Scream is what really brought the genre back. Brought the horror genre back. So it’s thanks to Wes and Kevin Williamson and those guys that made a couple movies that went out and made hundreds of millions of dollars. It’s always been a copycat business. And so that’s the resurgence. Then what happens is exactly what you see there’s some other independents like Blair Witch and then you have Sixth Sense and Hollywood sort of movies that come after. Then when the big movies don’t make as much as the little movies, they decide that horror is not the business to be in and horror will go down again until somebody makes a little movie that makes a hundred million bucks.”
While true, this resurgence in horror turned out to be a Catch-22 for Romero, who saw Bruiser not as a horror film, but more the dramatic story of a man going through a difficult time in his life. During a later DVD commentary for Dawn of the Dead, Romero remarked that the marketing of Bruiser as a pure horror film is a part of the reason it ended up going directly to video, rather than movie theaters where it belonged.
While fans of Bruiser and of course, Romero himself probably wish it had a chance to be more successful, this doesn’t mean he is not proud of his work on the film, nor that he had a bad time creating it. In fact, during the commentary he and Grunwald marvel non-stop at the crew they worked with. Most specifically, the work of the camera crew and cinematographer Adam Swica (who would also work on films such as Wrong Turn, and A Haunting in Connecticut) who the pair would say took a few million bucks and made it look like ten.
There were many aspects of filming Bruiser, that were foreign to Romero’s style at the time. The film required much more pre-planning than he was used to because the plot was constantly moving and they had a very short window in which to film. According to Romero, the crew was constantly professional, not only being accommodating but adding their visual creativity to each shot. And I have to tell you, watching the film with that in mind gives a new respect for how difficult some of those shots were to pull off, including multiple one-track moments.
Romero mentions that Bruiser was one of his favorite productions he’d worked on in all of his career. Despite the difficult shots, limited time to shoot, and modest budget… he mentioned that the financiers of the film stayed completely out of their way throughout the shoot. Something he was not used to in his later years in Hollywood. There were no excuses for the lack of success for Bruiser either, he stated proudly that because of the crew’s dedication to the script, this was in the top three films of his career that captured what he set out to accomplish. Right up there with Knightriders and Martin according to the director. Romero would proudly exclaim, Bruiser “The only movie I’ve ever made where you don’t have any problems, where nobody was in the way or had their own axe to grind. I could relive every moment of this again.” He even exclaimed that the “weapons guy” was the best weapons guy he’d worked with in his career, adding, “Where was he when I made Dawn of the Dead?” while laughing. Some things just worked out for George and Company on the set of Bruiser.
Most of the sets were found almost as is and needed only a little dressing up by the set decorator rather than having to be built from scratch. These included Harry’s lavish half-finished house which was found and offered up by the location director. A home in which the family who owned it lived in the basement even as they shot Bruiser. They were allegedly not familiar with Romero’s work and would “run the other direction” whenever they spotted blood on the set of the house, which the producer found hilarious. The table-saw from the home wasn’t originally in the script but Romero found it cool and wrote it into the story. Because you’re not going to NOT use a badass table-saw in a horror movie.
The mask that makes Bruiser so memorable, however, was not an easy road for the crew. The mask inspired by the 1960 Georges Franju film Eyes Without a Face had originally been written in the script as a flesh-colored mask whose physical attributes more resembled the mold in the building stages of a mask. They even shot several scenes of the film and had to go back and refilm them after they realized the stark white nature of the new mask, resembling how empty he was inside, was perfect for the story. And it truly is haunting. It’s a shock to see the mask from the cover of the film be so malleable on the actor’s face, moving enough for him to speak and emote. A truly underrated horror mask. That’s not to say it wasn’t rather tight, however, as they even had to build little cups inside of the eyelids to allow the actor to blink. An actor who had to be willing to sit for hours in makeup each day to bring the character of Henry to life… which would of course be none other than Bobby Beers from Rock Star,Jason Flemyng.
Flemyng was fantastic for the role, able to exude both a nice guy persona and more importantly be believable when he turned heel. Of Flemyng’s work ethic Romero stated “he was in basically every shot of the movie but always in good spirits. Always cracking everybody up”. George would also go on to say that it is Flemying’s vulnerability that sells the entire movie and I would have to agree. Then there’s his counterpart, played by the man who played Satan across from Keanu Reeves in Constantine, the great Peter Stormare.
Stormare takes to the character of Miles Styles like Robert Downey Jr. to Iron Man. It’s damn near impossible to see anyone else playing the role that brings to mind some of Gary Oldman’s amazingly over-the-top performances in movies like True Romance, Leon The Professional, and The Fifth Element. He’s not just an asshole character you love to hate, he’s a flaming bag of assholes holding sparklers during someone else’s moment of silence. And it’s hilarious. He was so perfect for the role in fact, that Romero originally had the character as a brash, New York type of guy in the script but changed him to match Stormare’s bravado entirely. Stormare was so into the role that he would ad-lib many, many parts of his performance, including one moment in a board room where he storms around the room discussing the need for “balls” and repeatedly, unexpectedly revealing his man-parts to the entire room. Peter Grunwald said during the commentary that the “thud” sound you heard during the flashing was one of the people behind the camera falling over in shock. Sounds like Stormare would have been a walking lawsuit in 2024 as he also ad-libbed shoving a person he was in mid-conversation with into a pool. Everyone seemed to be a good sport however, and Romero and Grunwald seemed to love it, saying, “You never knew what he was gonna do. He would go off in between takes, get an idea, and come out and run with it. Made it now and then a little difficult to edit, but it was really well worth it just for the constant creative energy.” They said when Stormare would walk on set they would have to tie everything down, or else it would blow away.
Nina Garbiras was cast as Henry’s unnecessarily mean two-timing wife Janine, bringing some depth to a character that could have easily felt one note otherwise. And of course, the great Tom Atkins was cast as the detective investigating the case and even complained jokingly to the producers “When are you going to give me a role that’s not a cop?” Though he was playing Detective McCleary, a cop in the background chasing the plot around, he wasn’t without his patented Tom Atkins moments or quotes. McCleary’s investigation led him to the aforementioned warehouse Halloween party that had originally been written as a boat chase scene taking place on an island. This was changed due to budgetary restraints and probably for the best. A John Woo Face/Off style ending would have just felt wrong here… someone like being shot in the d*ck with a laser while The Misfits played was far more apropos. To pull off the warehouse scene they shot in an abandoned liquor distillery, told the extras to just show up looking as bizarre as they could, and had three units shooting nonstop all day long for five days. Romero praised The Misfits for being ridiculously helpful on the film, not only writing two songs for it but also bringing their entire stage setup with them for the set.
Once Henry had achieved his revenge on Miles Styles by shooting him in the crotch and head with a laser built for the party, his face suddenly appeared again… which led to the question for the audience of whether or not this was all in his head. Romero confirmed as much saying, “In my mind, it’s in his head. Again like Martin. Martin isn’t really a vampire. He just happens to drink blood. The way that I… if you look at all the moments where people see him there’s always a little amazement. I was thinking (it was) because he was bloody… but never a clear moment where somebody said ‘God, your face has turned white’.”
While Bruiser ended up with an unceremonious release to DVD after a premiere in Canada in February of 2000, it was at the very least appreciated by some critics with a “Fresh” score on Rotten Tomatoes. But if you needed any other indication the film feels unfairly forgotten, that score is based on a mere nine reviews. But hey, it’s never too late for a film to become a cult classic. But for now, I guess this underrated George Romero film will just have to be for me and you. And that my friends, is what happened to Bruiser. Thanks for watching!
A couple of the previous episodes of What Happened to This Horror Movie? can be seen below. To see more, head over to our JoBlo Horror Originals YouTube channel – and subscribe while you’re there!
A new kind of video game adaptation is coming. It’s not live-action and it’s not just one game, but many games are being turned into episodes of an anthology series from Prime Video. And while the whole series is animated, the look and tone of the many titles are retained through the style of their source material. Amazon has just released the trailer for Secret Level and it looks like an experience never seen before.
The official synopsis for Secret Level reads: “Each episode of Secret Level serves as a gateway to a new adventure, unlocking exciting worlds from beloved gaming classics and highly anticipated new titles. Prepare for an unforgettable journey, where Amazon MGM Studios and gaming’s finest unite in a first-of-its-kind event that brings together more game IP in a single series than has ever been done before.”
The ensemble cast features an amazing list of names, including Arnold Schwarzenegger (The Terminator Franchise), Kevin Hart (Jumanji), Keanu Reeves (John Wick), Temuera Morrison (The Book of Boba Fett, Chief of War), Ariana Greenblatt (Barbie), Heaven Hart, Emily Swallow (The Mandalorian), Gabriel Luna (The Last of Us, Terminator: Dark Fate), Ricky Whittle (American Gods, Land of Bad), Patrick Schwarzenegger (The White Lotus), Merle Dandridge (The Last of Us), Claudia Doumit (The Boys), Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje (Lost, The Union), Clive Standen (Vikings, The Morning Show), Laura Bailey (The Legend of Vox Machina), and Michael Beach (The Perfect Couple, Tulsa King).
Secret Level consists of 15 animated shorts inspired by the following game franchises:
Armored Core
Concord
Crossfire
Dungeons & Dragons
Exodus, Honor of Kings
Mega Man
New World: Aeternum
PAC-MAN
PlayStation (featuring various PlayStation brand properties)
Sifu
Speluncky
The Outer Worlds
Unreal Tournament
Warhammer 40,000
Tim Miller and Dave Wilson will serve as executive producers of the series, and Wilson will also step up as the supervising director. “Secret Level weaves a tapestry of iconic games across multiple mediums, to tell a series of unique and captivating stories,” said Vernon Sanders, head of television for Amazon MGM Studios. “Created and led by Tim Miller, Blur Studio, and Supervising Director Dave Wilson, each episode will take our global Prime Video customers on a brand new journey with breathtaking animation and imaginative storytelling.”
Rumors have been flying all year that Xbox is working on a PC gaming handheld. On Wednesday, Microsoft Gaming CEO Phil Spencer confirmed that plans are underway, though it sounds like an actual portable device is still a few years out.
Rumors have been flying all year that Xbox is working on a PC gaming handheld. On Wednesday, Microsoft Gaming CEO Phil Spencer confirmed that plans are underway, though it sounds like an actual portable device is still a few years out.
Back in July, it was announced that Charlize Theron (Mad Max: Fury Road) was signing on to star in a survival thriller called Apex for the Netflix streaming service, with Baltasar Kormákur (Contraband) on board to direct the film from a screenplay by Jeremy Robbins, who earned writing credits on many episodes of the TV series The Purge (set in the world of the Blumhouse film franchise). Now, The Hollywood Reporter has broken the news that Theron is being joined in the cast by Taron Egerton, whose credits include Kingsman: The Secret Service, Kingsman: The Golden Circle, and Rocketman.
A genre movie that has been described as “Free Solo meets Silence of the Lambs,” Apex will see Theron taking on the role of a rock climber and adrenaline junkie who finds out that nature isn’t the only dangerous element out to get her when she sets out on an expedition in the wild. Egerton’s character is said to be a psychopath stalking his human prey… with Theron’s character being his prey. The title is a play on an apex being the top or highest part of something (like a cliff) and a particularly dangerous predator in the wild.
Theron is producing the film with Dawn Olmstead, Beth Kono, and AJ Dix under their recently-launched Secret Menu banner. Kormákur is producing for RVK Productions. Other producers include Ian Bryce and Chernin Entertainment’s Peter Chernin, Jenno Topping, and David Ready.
Theron has previously worked with Netflix on the graphic novel-inspired films The Old Guard and The Old Guard 2… and even though The Old Guard 2 made it through production a while ago, we’re still waiting to hear a release date for that one. Theron recently told Variety why the movie got stuck on a shelf: “Netflix went through quite a changeover. We got kind of stuck in that and our post-production shut down, I think, five weeks into it. They were going through a lot of changes, and I totally understand it. We finally picked it back up and I’m really excited about it. It’s really good. It’s a really important film to us. I only wanted to do it if we could make it amazing. I really love this movie.” She said the movie will be released “soon,” and clearly she has no hard feelings about the delay, since she’s collaborating with Netflix again on Apex.
Does Apex sound interesting to you? Share your thoughts on this Charlize Theron / Taron Egerton survival thriller by leaving a comment below.
