MGM Pictures will be releasing the suspense film, VALKYRIE (vfx by Lidar Services, Sony Pictures Imageworks and The Third Floor), from director Bryan Singer, on Friday, December 26, 2008.
"We saw and tested the movie," said Clark Woods, President of MGM Distribution. "And we believe a strong movie deserves a strong playdate."
Winning the weekend for a fourth time, THE DARK KNIGHT continues to dominate against anything thrown against it, beating openers PINEAPPLE EXPRESS and THE SISTERHOOD OF THE TRAVELING PANTS 2 with $26.12 million (weekend ending August 10; actuals). The Warner Bros. film (vfx by Double Negative, BUF, Gentle Giant Studios and New Deal Studios) has a cume of $441.63M.
VARIETY reports that $31M of that total comes from IMAX screens alone.
Sony's PINEAPPLE EXPRESS came in second with $23.24M over the weekend and $41.32M in the entire Wednesday-Sunday opening.
Furious FX slashed their way through 60 visual effects for director Ryuhei Kitamura's stateside debut MIDNIGHT MEAT TRAIN. Based on Clive Barker's BOOKS OF BLOOD short story, the film follows an up-and-coming photographer searching for edgy urban subjects, who unexpectedly captures images far more dark and disturbing while the city sleeps.
Lionsgate's CG film ALPHA AND OMEGA will be released in stereoscopic 3-D in spring 2010, according to THE HOLLYWOOD REPORTER.
Lionsgate and Crest Animation are co-financing and co-producing the film, scheduled for release on April 16, 2010. In it, two young wolves are thrown together by circumstance. Voices include Justin Long, Hayden Panettiere, Christina Ricci, Danny Glover, Larry Miller and Dennis Hopper.
Lionsgate's first 3-D project will be the upcoming MY BLOODY VALENTINE 3-D, in post-production now, and scheduled to open January 16.
Sony has hired writers Matt Sazama and Burk Sharpless to write the screenplay for FLASH GORDON, just months after winning the rights to the title, per THE HOLLYWOOD REPORTER.
The outer space tale follows Flash Gordon, a young polo player who is kidnapped and taken to the distant planet of Mongo, where he and companions Dale Arden and Hans Zarkov get into adventures while fighting ruler Ming the Merciless.
Columbia Pictures has purchased the screen rights to MAXIMUM RIDE, and has hired Don Payne to write the script, per VARIETY.
RIDE is a young adult novel series from James Patterson, featuring six children who have been genetically altered to be 98 percent human, 2 percent bird. The kids, bred to fly, escape their lab-rat existence and are pursued by their scientist creators, who send a pack of part-human, part-wolf creatures called Erasers to track them down.
The fifth installment of the book series will be published in 2009.
NewTek's LightWave 3D was used by artist Stuart Penn at Framestore for key scenes of one of 2008's biggest box office successes, THE DARK KNIGHT. A highlight of the LightWave-generated work appears during the movie's notable Hong Kong sequence.
Actor Max Thieriot has been cast in the title role in the sci-fi actioner PRODIGY, per THE HOLLYWOOD REPORTER. Chuck Russell will direct the Intrepid Pictures and Kincine film.
Thieriot will play rebellious William Cooley, a student at an elite boarding school that produces world leaders with the help of drugs. Three days before graduation, several alumni are murdered, and William is implicated. The school's valedictorian investigates William, but the two become reluctant allies when both are targeted in the conspiracy.
Brad Pitt is confirmed to star in Quentin Tarantino's WWII drama remake INGLORIOUS BASTARDS for Weinstein Co. and Universal, per VARIETY.
Production starts October 13 in Germany. Tarantino also wrote the script, and intends for the film to be ready for next year's Cannes Film Festival. Producers are Lawrence Bender and Erica Steinberg; exec producers are Harvey and Bob Weinstein.
The deal puts Pitt back into Universal's stables, patching things up apparently from his last-minute exit from STATE OF PLAY last year.
James Cameron calls AVATAR "the most challenging film I've ever made," in an in-depth look from THE HOLLYWOOD REPORTER.
Cameron is now at work on the CG production with the principal photography completed. AVATAR is set for release December 18, 2009.
Read the article in its entirety on THE REPORTER's Website.
BRIDESHEAD REVISITED, Miramax Films' recently released feature adaptation of Evelyn Waugh's cherished novel, is filled with seamless invisible visual effects created by CIS London.
Working closely with the film's director, Julian Jarrold, VFX Supervisor Adam Gascoyne oversaw the challenging subtleties that were essential in bringing Jarrold's version of the classic story to life.
Disney has acquired the rights to graphic novel MONSTER ATTACK NETWORK, per THE HOLLYWOOD REPORTER.
The 2007 novel, published by AiT/Planet Lar, was written by Marc Bernardin and Adam Freeman with illustrations by Nima Sorat. Jason Netter is producing via his Kickstart Ent. banner.
MONSTER is an adventure tale set on the picturesque Pacific island of Lapuatu, where giant monsters live. A team of adventurers deal with monster rampages, crises and the clean-up, but faces its biggest challenge when a shady industrialist comes to the island.
Gore Verbinski, at work on a big screen adaptation of videogame BIOSHOCK, has signed a three-year first-look deal at Universal Pictures, per VARIETY.
Verbinski directed all three PIRATES OF THE CARIBBEAN pictures for Disney and producer Jerry Bruckheimer, and will work on the Take-Two videogame project before moving onto other films.
John Logan (THE AVIATOR, GLADIATOR) wrote the script, whose story surrounds the mysterious events that transpire in an underwater utopia known as Rapture.
Universal's remake ISLAND OF LOST SOULS has a director: Nikolaj Arcel, per VARIETY.
Arcel directed and co-wrote the 2007 Danish original, DE FORTABTE SJAELES O. Jennifer O'Kieffe will write the remake.
In ISLAND, a suburban teen finds herself the central player in a centuries-old battle between good and evil when her younger brother gets possessed by the benevolent spirit of an 18th century magician.
Paramount Pictures and Brad Pitt's Plan B have purchased the rights to manga series MIKI FALLS, per VARIETY.
TV writer Sera Gamble will adapt the four-volume series from Mark Crilley. MIKI FALLS is about Miki Yoshida's senior year in high school. When she tries to befriend handsome new student Hiro Sakurai she is met with resistance, but she stubbornly refuses to take no for an answer, leading to a surprising revelation about the secretive teenage boy.
Warner Bros.' THE DARK KNIGHT won the box office for the third week running, earning $42.66 million (actuals) for the week ending August 3 and $393.75M in total gross. The record-breaking Batman flick's vfx were by Double Negative, BUF, Gentle Giant Studios and New Deal Studios.
Brendan Fraser's third foray into haunted mummies, THE MUMMY: TOMB OF THE DRAGON EMPEROR (Universal, vfx by Digital Domain, Gentle Giant Studios, Giant Studios, CIS Hollywood, CIS London, Rhythm and Hues and Special Effects Atlantic) opened in close second with $40.46M.
Entertainment and design company Imaginary Forces (IF) recently created the opening title sequence and end titles for Universal Pictures' THE MUMMY: TOMB OF THE DRAGON EMPEROR, in theaters now.
Karin Fong and Steve Fuller of IF set out to immortalize the film's tale in a stylized, mythological way. Director Rob Cohen sets the third installment of the MUMMY films in China, where trouble-seeking father-and-son duo Rick and Alex O'Connell (played by Brendan Fraser and Luke Ford, respectively) unearth the Dragon Emperor.
Off the success of THE INCREDIBLE HULK, character designer Aaron Sims will have another appearance in pictures as THE MUMMY: TOMB OF THE DRAGON EMPEROR hits theaters today.
Citing Sims as critical to bringing this all to life, director Rob Cohen said, "Working with Aaron Sims on MUMMY 3 was an incredible experience. His ability to adapt and realize fantastic ideas into very physical creatures is extraordinary...I couldn't have done it without him."
Indie animated feature YEAR OF THE FISH will have a limited U.S. release in August and October, including screenings in New York, San Francisco, Berkeley, Portland and San Antonio.
Writer and director David Kaplan shot this Cinderella story entirely in New York City's Chinatown, premiering the film at the 2007 Sundance Film Festival.
A modern-day adaptation of Cinderella based on an old Chinese version of the story, it was shot on inexpensive live-action video that was used as a guide for digital painting in post-production.
Framestore was one of only a handful of digital effects studios chosen to work on THE DARK KNIGHT by director Christopher Nolan, who notoriously prefers to work in-camera and practically as much as possible, turning to digital effects only when they offer him otherwise unachievable and un-improvable results. Framestore's shots for the film encompassed matte paintings, digital doubles (including a CG Batman), vehicles, crowds, and the highly sensitive Harvey Dent/Two-Face CG work.
Sony is reportedly going forward with VENOM, a SPIDER-MAN spinoff based on a villain from the comics who appeared in last year's SPIDER-MAN 3, per THE HOLLYWOOD REPORTER.
Venom, played by Topher Grace in SPIDER-MAN 3, could be played by a new actor, because Venom is essentially a substance that attaches itself to a host that gives that host special powers. Sony is hoping to reenergize the aging franchise the way Fox has used Wolverine to add legs to the X-MEN oeuvre.
Disney has delayed PRINCE OF PERSIA: THE SANDS OF TIME almost a year, to May 28, 2010. That moves it out of the way of the second TRANSFORMERS but directly between DreamWorks' SHREK GOES FOURTH and Marvel's THOR, per COMINGSOON.net.
Its original June 19, 2009 release date was a week before TRANSFORMERS: REVENGE OF THE FALLEN. Memorial Day that year is May 31, now giving PRINCE OF PERSIA at least a four-day opening.
Disney has picked up THE TRANSPLANTS, an action-adventure pitch from writers Adam Jay Epstein and Andrew Jacobson for Sam Raimi to produce via his Stars Road Entertainment banner with partner Josh Donen, per THE HOLLYWOOD REPORTER.
No word on the specific content of the project, but it is described as a four-quadrant ensemble superhero story with a comedic bent.
Multi-Grammy Award-winning and platinum selling recording artists Jack White of the rock band The White Stripes, and R&B artist Alicia Keys, have recorded the theme song for the upcoming James Bond film QUANTUM OF SOLACE, which will be released worldwide this November.
Their song, written and produced by White, and titled ANOTHER WAY TO DIE, will be the first duet in Bond soundtrack history. In addition to writing the song, White is also featured as the drummer on this track. The soundtrack to QUANTUM OF SOLACE will be released by J Records on October 28, 2008.
Santa Monica, California- and Vancouver, British Columbia-based Entity FX completed visual effects for THE X-FILES: I WANT TO BELIEVE. Entity FX's Mat Beck supervised all visual effects for the movie, continuing a 15-year collaboration with co-writer and co-producer Frank Spotnitz and X-FILES creator Chris Carter, who co-wrote and directed the film.
