Is Star Trek Over?
third year of shrinking audiences for UPN's Star Trek: Enterprise means potential cancellation, which would make the 2004-'05 season the first in 17 years without a first-run Star Trek series, USA Today reported.
Coupled with the poor box-office return for 2002's feature film Star Trek: Nemesis, fans of the Paramount franchise face the prospect of no new Star Trek on the near horizon for the first time in a quarter-century, the newspaper reported.
Longtime Trek executive producer Rick Berman remains sanguine about an Enterprise renewal. "Right now, I'm optimistic the show is going to be picked up for a fourth season," Berman told the newspaper. But, he added, "as to whether [the franchise] could use a rest for a while, that's a valid question. I think, eventually, Star Trek will be taking a breather."
UPN likely won't reveal Enterprise's fate until it announces its fall slate next week. Viewership is off 43 percent from its first season, and the series suffered its lowest-rated regularly scheduled original episode in April (2.9 million), the newspaper reported.
Berman and two other producers also are in "very early discussions" about another Star Trek feature film. It would be a prequel, but not related to Enterprise, he said.
Berman Talks Enterprise Future
tar Trek: Enterprise executive producer Rick Berman told the official Star Trek Communicator magazine that he's confident UPN will pick up the ratings-challenged series for a fourth season, according to a report on the TrekToday Web site.
"I am confident ... that we are going to get a season four from UPN," Berman told the magazine after the filming of this season's final episode, "Zero Hour." The magazine asked whether Enterprise would be shopped around to other networks if UPN declined to pick it up. "I would think that, just for the general sense of stability, our primary goal is to keep the show going on UPN," Berman said. "If it is not picked up on UPN, and it could be picked up elsewhere, that would be a terrific thing as well."
Berman said that rumors of the show's potential demise have made things "difficult at times." "TV is a business that relies on yearly pickups, and we have been very blessed that we have had lots and lots of those," he added, referring to the regular renewals of previous Trek series. "To have to deal with the anxiety of not knowing whether a show is being picked up or not is par for the course in TV production."
Berman added that he appreciated fan efforts to keep the show alive, including the Hollywood Reporter ads placed by the Enterprise Project. "I never know whether it helps, but it certainly is appreciated by everybody on the crew and the cast of the show," he said. "I have seen that the fans of Angel have been doing the same kind of thing on a regular basis now. I know that it was fan protest that brought the original series back for its third season, so I have no idea. We appreciate it, though, and every little bit helps."
Despite Enterprise's being "on the bubble," Berman and his writing staff have already begun planning for season four. He said the the final episode, "Zero Hour," will set up a mini-arc for the beginning of the new season. But, he added, "If I tell you more right now, I will give away the ending of the season. ... My feeling is that Enterprise will probably not go back to the first and second season job of simple exploration of space. I think there will be missions, but not missions that are anywhere as lengthy as what we have done with this 25-episode Xindi arc. I think that we will probably be dealing more with smaller arcs, maybe arcs of three, four or five shows. We see season four [as] being as different from season three as season three was from season two." Enterprise airs Wednesdays at 8 p.m. ET/PT.
Getting Shrek's Puss Right
ntonio Banderas, who created the voice for Puss in Boots in the upcoming computer-animated sequel Shrek 2, told SCI FI Wire that recording dialogue for the movie required lots of repetition.
"The process that they explained to me at the beginning was exactly what we did," Banderas said in an interview. "They said to me, 'We are going to take material from you. We are going to put it together and animate it. And then we're going to come back. That's going to happen seven, eight times, 10. We don't know the sessions.'"
Banderas said that his directors—Andrew Adamson, Kelly Asbury and Conrad Vernon—were extremely specific when describing the process by which they would be capturing the Spanish actor's voice and how it would be inserted into the finished movie. "I remember when I was taken to the studio for the first time, they had a room like this with still pictures or drawings of what the movie was going to be," Banderas said. "Practically the whole entire movie was there and in that room. There were at least 10 people, drawers, people who were going to be in different departments, and they all were explaining the movie to me."
Banderas added that it helped him shape his recordings as the sessions progressed and the character reached completion. "They want you to be integrated in the story as soon as possible and to be part of it," Banderas said. "After we did it the first time, apparently they were very happy with the results, and they made the character grow in different directions, add some things here and there. So the character started getting more sessions, but I didn't have the thing of one year later, 'Tell me what we have to do with this thing?'" Shrek 2 opens May 19.
Banderas Put Self In Shrek 2
ntonio Banderas, who performs the voice of Puss in Boots in the upcoming computer-animated sequel Shrek 2, told SCI FI Wire that he was surprised to see so much of his own behavior on screen in the animated character.
"Sometimes they put cameras in the recording [studio], or they were recording the way you were performing the lines, just to copy that," Banderas said. "Sometimes I recognized some moves; a way of looking, things like that. I'd say, 'Oh my God, that's mine!'"
Banderas said that Shrek 2, his first experience voicing an animated character, was far more enjoyable than other actors led him to believe. "I suppose it is also the director you have, but I didn't know that we were going to have so much input, that the movie is so related to the actors," Banderas said. "I thought it was going to be more a process like 'Just repeat this line' until the line got totally perfect. I don't know why I thought that; I probably did because it's so technologically based that I thought it was going to be almost like being in a tube, without any kind of creativity. But it was not like that."
Banderas said that his work on the movie started as he had been warned by other performers who'd done voice-overs for films. But the process soon changed and allowed him an enormous amount of flexibility and creativity, he added. "They give you two sessions that worked very much in the way that I thought it was going to be," he said. "But when they came back, they already did some animation with the material. They started proposing ways to me, [asking,] 'What do you think about this?' Changing lines, sometimes improvising a little bit. They might ask me to recite a line in Spanish. It was more creative from the acting point of view than I thought it was going to be." Shrek 2 opens May 19.
Hellboy II Moves Forward
s expected, Hellboy writer-director Guillermo del Toro will develop a sequel with Mike Mignola, who was co-executive producer on the first film and who created the comic series on which the movie is based, Variety reported.
Revolution Studios is moving forward with plans for the sequel, based on the further adventures of the demon who grows up to fight evil, the trade paper reported.
Hellboy, which starred Ron Perlman and Selma Blair, has generated $59 million since debuting April 2, the trade paper reported. The movie has yet to roll out in Europe.
Producers Lawrence Gordon, Lloyd Levin and Dark Horse Entertainment's Mike Richardson are returning to produce Hellboy II, the trade paper reported. Revolution has yet to target a release date for Hellboy II.
Del Toro is likely to helm the independent film Pan's Labyrinth as his next project. He is also attached to direct the horror film At the Mountains of Madness at DreamWorks, the trade paper reported.
Fehr Up For Mummy 3
ded Fehr, who starred in both of Stephen Sommers' Mummy movies, told SCI FI Wire that he would love to be involved in a third installment, though he added that he hasn't been approached.
"I'd love to do a third one," Fehr said in an interview. "The Mummy is what gave me a career. I love the character of Ardeth Bay, and I really enjoyed doing it."
Fehr said that the main obstacle to developing a third film in the series would be exceeding the ambition and scale of the previous two films. "I'm not sure what they're going to do, because going back to [The Mummy Returns], I don't know how you top that," Fehr said. "I think you have to kind of change it around and do something new."
Fehr also observed that, with the release of Van Helsing, director Sommers seems to have his hands full already. But Fehr added that he expected that he would no doubt be involved in subsequent installments of the series. "I think Steve just this weekend released Van Helsing," Fehr said. "I think he's probably taking a little breather off of that, [but] I'm sure that Universal will probably want him involved in [Mummy sequels]. But if there would be a third one, and I would be involved, I'd love to do it."
Universal is owned by NBC Universal, which also owns SCIFI.COM.
Evil Sequel Gets Real
ded Fehr, who stars in the upcoming zombie sequel film Resident Evil: Apocalypse, told SCI FI Wire that filmmakers aimed for a sense of reality in the movie, in part by using more on-set physical effects in lieu of computer animation.
Speaking at a preview of the film's trailer, Fehr said, "I know that you've seen a little bit of CGI in [the preview], but a lot of it is real, in the sense that it's makeup or action that's being filmed there, explosions that are being done. There is definitely CGI work, to cover wires and things like that, but a lot of it is real."
With spoilers for the film's final scenes, Fehr revealed a few of the movie's secrets at the preview, explaining how the creatures and conflicts were created on set rather than in a computer. "In the final scene, there's a huge, huge battle scene, and it's mainly Alice's character coming up against the Nemesis," he said. "There's a lot of elements involved, and I'm very excited about seeing how that will come together, [but] as far as CGI for that scene, there's not that much. There are no added creatures as far as I remember in that scene or things like that. That's what I think is going to be special about this movie."
Fehr added that creating a sense of reality was the key to telling an effective story and making an effective film. "I don't necessarily like scary movies," Fehr said. "When I watched Resident Evil, the first one, what I really enjoyed was that it didn't try to be something too big. It's ridiculous to say this, but it was very realistic in the situations that the characters were put in. It was very gritty [and had] kind of [a] real feel to the action, to everything, to the urgency of getting out of the structure they were in, and this is the same way. I think it's a very exciting movie, a lot of action and so on, but I think you'll find it's very realistic. It's difficult to explain, because how do you do a movie about dead people realistically? But it is." Resident Evil: Apocalypse opens Sept. 10.
Fehr Game For Evil Sequel
ded Fehr, who stars in the upcoming SF sequel Resident Evil: Apocalypse, told SCI FI Wire that his work in the film refers directly to a character in the popular video-game series on which the films are based.
"Carlos Olivera is in Resident Evil 3, the [Nemesis] game," Fehr (The Mummy) said in an interview.
Fehr said that the film takes a slightly different approach to the subject matter from the original Resident Evil movie, which took place entirely in an underground government complex. "Basically, [my character] works for the Umbrella Corp., who are responsible for what happens," Fehr said. "He works for them as a hired gun. There's an outbreak in the city, and he is sent in to actually take out the Umbrella personnel, evacuate them. He decides to save a woman that he sees that is about to be killed by the undead, and therefore he was left to die by the Umbrella Corp. He joins with Alice [Milla Jovovich] and Jill [Sienna Guillory] to fight the Umbrella Corp. and try to save their lives and bring the truth out."
Fehr admitted that he borrowed significantly from the video-game source material. But he added that he worked hard to add dimension to that universe for the film. "We tried to bring the game alive," Fehr said. "The story of the movie and the story of the game, they have similarities, but they're not parallel. I mean, it's not the same exact storyline, especially with the characters. We tried to give a feeling of the games and bring that alive a little bit more with little things. Sienna was great. For instance, like, you'll see in the movie, she stands there, and she's tapping her gun exactly like her character does in the game, things like that. I think what's great about this movie is that for people who enjoy the game, the whole situation of being in a city where you have all the undead and all the rest, it really brings it to life. The game is never 100 percent real, [but] the movie does make it feel very real. It really puts you through that experience." Resident Evil: Apocalypse opens Sept. 10.
Dead Stars Look Ahead
llen Muth and Callum Blue, who play Grim Reapers in the Showtime supernatural series Dead Like Me, told SCI FI Wire that a romantic relationship between their characters, George and Mason, is apparently not in the cards during the upcoming second season.
"I think they're steering away from any kind of involvement," Blue said in an interview. "And that's nice, because I look like a 40-year-old compared to her 12-year-old."
Blue added, "There's always a bit of a flirtation between Mason and George. They pretend not to like each other, but they've got a deep affection for each other. He was her first friend, so she won't forget that. I think he's going to be like a big brother to her most of the time."
Muth, in a separate conversation, concurred. "Last year, there were some questions as to whether or not I was going to have some sort of a romance with Mason," she said. "And this year it's very clear that we won't be."
Muth went on to explain that she thinks the upcoming second season of Dead Like Me will eclipse year one, particularly as far as George is concerned. "The reason I love this season so much more than last is that George has gained so much more confidence," Muth said. "She's really become a Reaper. She still has trouble with authority, but I'm not bothered by the deaths anymore, unless it happens to be someone that I know. But my character is very confident this year." Showtime will launch the 15-episode second season of Dead Like Me in July.
Ash Taking On Freddy And Jason?
ruce Campbell, who played Ash in the Evil Dead horror films, told SCI FI Wire that there is "some validity" to the rampant rumors about the possibility of a movie that would pit his character against Freddy of A Nightmare on Elm Street and Jason from the Friday the 13th franchise.
But Campbell added that nothing is imminent. "As I've been explaining to people, this wouldn't be a movie where you could just make a phone call and go, 'Let's do it,' and then it all happens," Campbell said in an interview. "You've got three franchises."
Campbell added, "[That] means you have 17 lawyers, each going, 'Yeah, look at my franchise. Yeah, look at my franchise.' So you have to get past that. Then you have to get past the question of 'how will the characters be treated?' What would you do with Ash? There's no way I'd be in it if I lost. No way. The good guy has to win, especially in that movie. You couldn't kill two whole franchises, but we could sure maim them."
Campbell Gets Lost In The Woods
an-favorite genre actor Bruce Campbell told SCI FI Wire that he plays a sizable role in the upcoming supernatural horror film The Woods, directed by Lucky (May) McKee.
"This is his first studio film, for MGM," Campbell said in an interview. "This is a guy who has very bizarre sensibilities doing a mainstream movie, so it should be interesting."
Agnes Bruckner stars in the film as Heather, whose father (Campbell) and mother (Emma Campbell, no relation) drop off their troubled teen daughter at an all-girls school in the middle of the woods. "I'm now out at that golden age where I get to play all the young heroines' fathers," Campbell joked. "The story is a schoolgirl's worst nightmare come true. She's being sent off to boarding school, which is horrible enough. And there are all these clichéd fears of what'll happen. You'll get raped or attacked or the woods will get you, and it all happens. So it's this girl's worst nightmare come true."
Campbell added, "I get in on the action a little bit. I come and go. But I actually live, which is amazing. I was fully expecting to die. Agnes has got a very interesting sensibility to her. Patricia Clarkson is the evil headmistress at the school. The film really should be called The Evil Women at the Evil School." The Woods opens Oct. 1.
Riddick Game Fills In Past
ete Wanat, producer of the upcoming Chronicles of Riddick: Escape From Butcher Bay video game, told SCI FI Wire that the title serves as a prequel to the 2000 film Pitch Black and offers insights into the film's upcoming follow-up, The Chronicles of Riddick.
"We wanted to really fill in [Riddick's] backstory," Wanat said in an interview at the Electronic Entertainment Expo in Los Angeles. "How did Riddick [Vin Diesel] get there? How did he get on the ship that crash-lands on the planet [in Pitch Black]? What was that prison that he escaped from that he eventually got caught? What was that like? Who caught him? How did they bring him in?"
The storyline will deal with such questions as how Riddick acquired his trademark "eyeshine," which allows him to see in the dark. "You've seen it done a hundred times in movies about an escape from prison, but it's never really been done in a game," Wanat added.
Diesel, who reprises Riddick in the upcoming movie, lends his voice and likeness to the game, and "he has total involvement," Wanat said. "Not only [with regard to] his likeness and [voice-over], but in addition to that, he sat down, looked at the game, gave his comments and advised on gameplay."
Wanat added, "We are a first-person shooter, but we also have heavy stealth-based elements. We tried to be very subtle. It doesn't take six hours to learn how to play. It's four basic combat moves that you can string together to make combos, do reversals, and then, in addition to hand-to-hand, we let you hit with prison-based weapons, [including] shanks, shivs and pipes. We have all those things interacting in the game."
The Chronicles of Riddick: Escape From Butcher Bay is due in stores June 3 for the Xbox. The movie The Chronicles of Riddick opens June 11. The video game is being published by Vivendi Universal Games, a unit of NBC Universal, which also owns SCIFI.COM.
Bruce Sequel Mulled
ony Pictures Entertainment, Universal Pictures and Spyglass are in talks to mount a Bruce Almighty sequel based on the Bobby Florsheim/Josh Stolberg script The Passion of the Ark, Variety reported.
Talks are just getting under way, but the plan is to court Jim Carrey to reprise his lead role and to have Tom Shadyac return as director, the trade paper reported.
Though Carrey almost always turns down sequels (except for Ace Ventura: When Nature Calls), he left the door open for another installment after the first proved to be the biggest-grossing hit of his career, the trade paper reported.
Steve Oedekerk will be enlisted to redraft Ark into a sequel, sources told the trade paper. The Ark script could work with another actor, who'd play a widowed writer who's chosen by God to prepare for the second great flood. Early plans call for Universal to run production and likely distribute domestically. Universal is owned by NBC Universal, which also owns SCIFI.COM.
MGM Backs Out Of Grimm
GM has pulled out of distribution of Terry Gilliam's upcoming dark fairy-tale movie The Brothers Grimm, leaving partner Dimension Films to handle worldwide distribution on its own, according to The Hollywood Reporter.
Grimm went into production last summer with Dimension and MGM splitting costs and territories. But MGM backed out, retaining only a small equity investment in the film, the trade paper reported.
Grimm—starring Matt Damon, Heath Ledger, Jonathan Pryce and Monica Bellucci—originally was developed at MGM, with Mosaic Media's Charles Roven producing with Daniel Bobker. Dimension came on board to co-finance and produce and to handle domestic distribution in March 2003, the trade paper reported.
MGM is understood to have reached the decision on Grimm in part due to its heavy international release slate next year, in which the studio will unveil The Amityville Horror and the next James Bond movie, among other films, the trade paper reported. The Brothers Grimm is eyeing a November release date.
Batman Novels Coming
el Rey Books announced a partnership with DC Comics to develop original fiction tied to DC's Batman franchise.
The program includes the novelizations for the upcoming Warner Brothers movies Catwoman and Batman Begins. The Catwoman novelization, written by Elizabeth Hand, will be available in stores on June 1, the company said. Catwoman, starring Halle Berry, opens July 23.
Three other original Batman novels, based on the comic series, are scheduled for spring 2005, fall 2005 and spring 2006. Novelist Michael Reaves will write the books with Steven-Eliot Altman, a writer for the Batman: The Animated Series TV show. Del Rey and DC Comics will work closely with the authors to develop the storylines, and DC editors of the Batman comic-book series will offer input and editorial resources, the publisher said.
Horror Writers Rally For Grant
he Horror Writers Association is holding a benefit auction for author and editor Charles L. Grant, who has been hospitalized with severe cardiopulmonary disease and emphysema, the association announced.
Grant, whose body of work spans five decades, faces a tremendous burden on his health and substantial health-related expenses, the association said.
The HWA is calling for contributions to a benefit auction. (The HWA is not a charitable
organization and contributions cannot be considered charitable donations.) Authors Stephen King, Dean Koontz, Neil Gaiman, Peter Straub, Clive Barker and nearly 50 others have contributed to the auction, as have publishers Leisure Books, Earthling Publications and Night Shade Books, the association said.
A two-part fund-raiser will take place in conjunction with the HWA's annual Bram Stoker Awards Banquet weekend. A high-profile auction will occur on eBay, from May 23 to June 5. Bidders can find all auction items by searching the eBay user ID "bookwyrm55." In addition, a silent auction will happen June 4-6 at the HWA annual meeting in New York, where the Bram Stoker Awards will be presented.
Campanella Clicks
uan Jose Campanella is supervising a rewrite of the Adam Sandler fantasy comedy Click, with an eye to possibly directing the film for Columbia Pictures and Revolution Studios, Variety reported.
Campanella will work with the film's original writers, Steve Koren and Mark O'Keefe (Bruce Almighty), on the script, which concerns a workaholic architect who finds a universal remote that allows him to fast-forward and rewind to different parts of his life, the trade paper reported.
Sandler's Happy Madison company and Neal Moritz's Original Film will produce the movie. Sandler, his Happy Madison partner Jack Giarraputo and Moritz are also producing.
Favreau Toys With Zathura
irector Jon Favreau (Elf) told SCI FI Wire that he is in preproduction on a film adaptation of the children's book Zathura, the follow-up to 1995's Jumanji, and will shoot it soon.
"We're prepping and casting that, and we should be shooting that over the summer," Favreau said in an interview.
Favreau said the movie is based on the popular children's SF book by author Chris Van Allsburg, who also wrote the book on which Jumanji was based. "It's a science fiction film about two kids whose house gets launched into outer space by a magical toy that they find under the stairs," Favreau said. "They encounter aliens and meteor showers. They have issues with gravity. Different things go crazy, and it's sort of an adventure that takes place in outer space in their flying house."
Favreau, who previously directed the independent films Swingers and Made, said that he has more flexibility as a director as his budgets increase. "If you do sort of a left-of-the-dial indie, it might cost less money, but they see a less potential upside to it, so they tend to be very controlling and want to protect their investment, more so than in a movie like Elf or Zathura, where they know that there's practically a market for it," Favreau said. "If you give them what they want so that the film is going to perform commercially, they will pretty much leave you alone as far as how you execute that vision. But, also, having the success of Elf under my belt, there are more people who want to be in business with me, and, as a result, they go farther out of their way to accommodate me creatively. They give me a much wider berth."
Elf DVD Has Bag Of Goodies
on Favreau, who directed the hit fantasy film Elf, told SCI FI Wire that the upcoming DVD will boast a great deal of footage not seen in theaters.
"We did a lot of work while we were shooting," Favreau said in an interview. "We shot a lot."
Favreau said that, in addition to the usual DVD accoutrements, such as commentary tracks and bonus scenes, the release would also contain a glut of kid-friendly features. "We did a whole film school for kids while we were shooting it, with a lot of behind-the-scenes access to show how we did a lot of the forced perspective and special effects and CGI towards the end," Favreau said. "It should be a pretty rich DVD."
Favreau added that his interest in developing the disc's bonus materials was based on his own positive experiences with the medium. "I'm a big DVD fan, and I learn a lot from extras on other films," Favreau said. "I wanted to really put a lot in it. So the people who will wait a year until next Christmas to buy it, I think it will be well worth it."
Doom 3 Eyes Summer Release
ideo-game publisher Activision and developer id Software announced that the highly anticipated sequel video game Doom 3 will be released this summer, the Reuters news service reported.
Doom 3, which was previewed during the Electronic Entertainment Expo industry trade show two years ago, will be released for the PC. An Xbox version of the game is also expected this year, the wire service reported. The two companies made the announcement during the current E3 show in Los Angeles.
Fans have awaited the release of the game for years, given the long and successful history of titles like Doom and Quake from id, whose top games designer John Carmack is considered a legend in his field. Carmack also designed Doom 3, Reuters reported.
Warcraft Previewed
lizzard Entertainment showcased its upcoming World of Warcraft, a massively multiplayer online role-playing game, at the Electronic Entertainment Expo in Los Angeles on May 12.
Visitors to the show had the opportunity to play the critically acclaimed closed-beta version of the game, which is set in the Warcraft universe, the company said.
In World of Warcraft, players assume the roles of legendary heroes and interact with thousands of other players online as they explore, adventure and quest across a vast world. World of Warcraft is scheduled for simultaneous release in both the United States and Korea at the end of 2004. The game is currently undergoing closed beta testing in both regions.
Speedman Spies XXX Sequel
cott Speedman (Underworld) is in final talks to join the cast of Revolution Studios' spy sequel XXX: State of the Union, which Lee Tamahori begins shooting this summer, Variety reported.
Speedman will play National Security Agency agent and adrenaline junkie Kyle Steele, who works alongside the XXX program's newest recruit (Ice Cube) to thwart a political power struggle in the nation's capital, the trade paper reported.
Samuel L. Jackson reprises his role from XXX for the second installment. Willem Dafoe also stars, the trade paper reported.
Halo 2 Tops Gamer Wish List
icrosoft's Halo 2 for the Xbox is the most anticipated game planned for release in the third and fourth quarter of the year, according to GamerMetrics, a new "customer intelligence tool" from IGN/GameSpy, the company announced.
GamerMetrics tracks awareness, purchase intent and critical competitive product relationships based on information gathered in real time from more than 13 million gamers who visit IGN.com each month, the company said.
GamerMetrics also reported that the following titles are top on gamers' minds, in descending order: 2) Resident Evil 4 for the GameCube; 3) Gran Turismo 4 for the PlayStation 2; 4) Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater for the PS2; 5) Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas for the PS2; 6) Fable for the Xbox; 7) World of Warcraft for the PC; 8) Half-Life 2 for the PC; 9) Metroid Prime 2: Echoes for the GameCube; and 10) Dead or Alive Ultimate for the Xbox.
IGN/GameSpy reported the findings at the Electronic Entertainment Expo in Los Angeles.
Snicket Mixes Old And New
rad Silberling, who is directing the upcoming fantasy movie Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events, told SCI FI Wire that the movie takes place in a world that feels contemporary and antique at the same time.
The film is based on a series of children's books by Daniel Handler, about the Baudelaire orphans and their scheming relative, Count Olaf (Jim Carrey), who conspires to steal their inheritance.
"What's great about the world that Daniel Handler created in the book series as it stands now is it takes very contemporary concepts, a very contemporary tone, and places them in an illustrated storybook environment," Silberling said in an interview on the film's set in Downey, Calif. "So you have wonderful anachronisms. I always say it's the world of cobblestones and computers."
SCI FI Wire toured some of the sets, including a rail crossing that recalls a Depression-era cornfield, a fishing village that seems right out of 19th-century New England by way of Popeye, and a large grotto-like cave. The "alternate reality" of the books "is really this great melding so that for kids reading or adults, it feels familiar with the attitudes," Silberling said. "It feels familiar with the sense of humor and intelligence, but somehow you do have a world that feels a little bit Edwardian. But then there are these other touches that seem contemporary. And what's great is, unlike some of the other popular book series that are out there, it's not overly specified in the book. There's not a tremendous amount of detail."
Key to capturing the stories' tone was Silberling's decision to shoot the entire film on soundstages, with no actual exterior locations. "The funny thing is, I always say this movie is somewhere between Mary Poppins and Night of the Hunter," Silberling said. He added that Handler's books are "very subversive. They're really smart. They're dark. And yet they're incredibly hopeful and surprisingly emotional, too." Lemony Snicket, now in production, is slated for release Dec. 17.
Potter Designer Talks Challenges
tuart Craig, production designer of the Harry Potter films, told SCI FI Wire that creating sets for the fantasy series provided a challenge unlike any he'd dealt with before in his long career.
"The reality was that for Sorcerer's Stone, we had no standing sets," he said in an interview. "What we built for Sorcerer's Stone became the standing sets for Chamber of Secrets, Prisoner of Azkaban and now Goblet of Fire."
Craig added, "When we did Sorcerer's Stone, nothing was there ready to be reused or reinvented as something else. Everything needed to be created from scratch, so it was an enormous building list. Inevitably, some things got done well, and I'm proud of them, and I think everyone is. And other things, we did what was expedient at the time."
When it came time to shoot Chamber of Secrets and the upcoming Prisoner of Azkaban, Craig said that he, along with his team, the producers and directors, assessed what they had and what they'd established. "Once or twice we wished it could have been different," Craig said. "Indeed, especially with [Azkaban director] Alfonso Cuaron, we felt free, liberated by him to make changes. And, where necessary, we did. Hogwarts, after all, is a magical place, and it's not too big a cop-out to say, 'Well, things shift around a little. The next time you look at it, guess what? It'll appear slightly different.' For example, I think that Hagrid's [Robbie Coltrane] hut has been improved spectacularly in Prisoner of Azkaban." Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban opens on June 4; The Goblet of Fire is currently in production in England, with an eye toward a November 2005 release.
Producers Discover Atlantis
targate SG-1 executive producer Paul Mullie told SCI FI Wire that the SCI FI Channel's upcoming spinoff series, Stargate Atlantis, will introduce viewers to a new galaxy.
"The franchise is Stargate, right? So it's still people who go through a gate to other worlds," Mullie said in an interview. "The difference with Atlantis is that it's in another galaxy, with a new set of villains, a new set of heroes, a new set of adventures. The hero crop is still the same."
Mullie's fellow SG-1 excecutive producer Joseph Malozzi said in a separate interview that he and Mullie will also be involved in the new series, which will be executive produced by SG-1 creators Brad Wright and Robert C. Cooper. "We are consulting producers and writers on the new spinoff," Malozzi said. "Actually, at this point we've written a couple of episodes." Mullie added that he and Malozzi were helping get Atlantis to a point where it can compare with SG-1. "We're in the writing room, and we're helping develop stories, that sort of thing," Mullie said.
Malozzi said that the increased popularity of SG-1 over the years doesn't put pressure on the new series. "I don't think it puts any pressure at all, actually," he said. "The truth is the show kind of labored in obscurity for a while there for the first few years, and it was on Showtime and didn't draw a lot of people. I remember when we first went on the show, I would tell people I worked on Stargate, and they'd be like, 'That's that show with that guy from that other show.' Now I tell people I work on Stargate, and they go, 'I love that show.' And it's great. I really appreciate it. The switch to SCI FI Channel has helped us a lot to get to a wider audience, and I just think it's great." Stargate Atlantis premieres July 16.
Stargate SG-1 Changes Coming
oseph Malozzi, executive producer of the SCI FI Channel original series Stargate SG-1, told SCI FI Wire that there will be a lot of new developments as the series begins its eighth season.
"We're looking at the return of an old villain and sort of a Freddy vs. Jason-type throwdown, a big villain-vs.-villain conflict on a cosmic scale," Malozzi said in an interview. He added: "There will be a big change for a main character, O'Neill [Richard Dean Anderson]."
Malozzi, who was recently in Los Angeles to collect SG-1's Saturn Award for best syndicated/cable television series, said that the end of the seventh season saw a few character upheavals as well. "One of our established characters [left] the show at the end of season seven," he said. Malozzi declined to indicate who would be leaving, but, he added, "there will be lots of changes for all of our characters."
Malozzi also said that the series was in no danger of running out of ideas. "It all hearkens back to the fourth season on the show, when we were looking ahead at season five and saying, 'We're all out of ideas. I don't know how we're going to come up with ideas for season five,'" Malozzi said. "Amazingly, the longer the series goes on, the easier it is to come up with ideas, because you've got the backstories. You've got past episodes you can draw off of for future episodes. The longer we go, the more stories we have. I'm looking ahead to seasons 12 and 13." Stargate SG-1 airs Fridays at 9 p.m. ET/PT. Season eight commences July 9. The SCI FI Channel spinoff series Stargate Atlantis premieres July 16.
Zwick Mulls The Talisman
d Zwick (The Last Samurai) is in talks to direct the upcoming supernatural movie The Talisman at DreamWorks, based on the novel by Stephen King and Peter Straub, Variety reported.
Zwick would replace Vadim Perelman (The House of Sand and Fog), who fell off the project last week, the trade paper reported.
The movie centers on a 12-year-old boy who goes on a supernatural journey in order to find the talisman that can save his dying mother, the trade paper reported. Steven Spielberg is executive producing; Kathleen Kennedy, Frank Marshall and Colin Wilson are producing.
Spawn Lives Again
odd McFarlane plans to produce a new TV version of Spawn, his late-'90s HBO animated series, Variety reported.
Producer/director McFarlane has struck a deal with IDT Entertainment to revive Spawn: The Animated Series, as well as develop at least two more animated projects, the trade paper reported. McFarlane originally produced 18 episodes of the supernatural Spawn over three years at HBO.
Spawn centers on a soldier who's executed and then reborn as a creature from hell. The show won two Emmy awards. The series was based on the comic-book series that was also the basis of a 1997 New Line movie, the trade paper reported.
McFarlane hopes to approach HBO with a new version of the show, then work his way down to other outlets if they decline, or even produce the show as a series of direct-to-video episodes, the trade paper reported.
Cowboys Meet Aliens
scape Artists and Platinum Studios are teaming up to produce Cowboys and Aliens, based on the comic series, according to The Hollywood Reporter.
Joshua Oppenheimer and Thomas Donnelly have come on board to adapt the project, which is set within Platinum's comic-book "macroverse" of more than 1,000 characters, the trade paper reported.
Escape Artists' Jason Blumenthal, Todd Black, Steve Tisch and David Alper will produce, in association with Platinum's Scott Rosenberg, Ervin Rustemagic and Gregor Noveck, the trade paper reported.
Created by Platinum Studios founder and chairman Rosenberg, Cowboys and Aliens is set in the Old West, where cowboys and Indians must put aside their differences to battle an alien invasion, the trade paper reported.
New Star Wars Games Unveiled
ucasArts announced that it will showcase five new computer and video-game titles at the Electronic Entertainment Expo (E3) this week in Los Angeles.
They include Star Wars titles that are tied to film events in 2004.
LucasArts will launch Star Wars Battlefront at the same time Lucasfilm releases the original Star Wars Trilogy DVD collection on Sept. 21. LucasArts will also ship Star Wars Republic Commando, a squad-based first-person shooter set during the Clone War, in conjunction with the release of Star Wars: Episode III movie trailers this fall.
The company will release Star Wars Galaxies: Jump to Lightspeed, an expansion pack for the massively multiplayer online persistent Star Wars universe that is set between Episodes IV and V, the company said.
LucasArts will debut Star Wars Knights of the Old Republic II: The Sith Lords, the sequel to last year's role-playing game set in the unique timeframe of the Old Republic, 4,000 years before the movies, the company added. Finally, LucasArts will unveil Mercenaries, a virtual playground of destruction that delivers the next level of freeform gameplay in massive interactive environments.
Death, Jr. Rises
roduction company Circle of Confusion and video-game development company Backbone Entertainment are developing film and comic-book versions of Death, Jr., a Backbone property being developed as a video game for Sony's forthcoming PSP, a portable version of the PlayStation 2, Variety reported.
The film will be a directing vehicle for Larry Guterman, who will also produce it through his Orange Grove Entertainment production company, the trade paper reported.
Death, Jr. is about a teenage kid who just wants to be normal, but finds this hard because he's the offspring of the Grim Reaper, the trade paper reported. Death Jr.'s middle-school buddies include Pandora, who is afflicted by the constant need to open boxes, and Stigmartha, whose hands bleed when she gets nervous, the trade paper reported.
Both the comic book and film will be based on the video game that is due out early next year, when Sony's PSP hits the market. The comic will be illustrated by Ted Naifeh (Courtney Crumrin and Gloomcookie), the trade paper reported.
Kelly Opens The Box
irector Richard Kelly (Donnie Darko) told SCI FI Wire that his next project will be The Box, a film adaptation of a Richard Matheson short story, which he will make with filmmaker Eli Roth (Cabin Fever).
"We're co-writing a project together called The Box that Eli is going to direct," Kelly said in an interview. "It's based on a Richard Matheson short story that I optioned probably a year and a half ago. We are adapting the short story into a screenplay right now, and probably we'll start shooting in November of this year."
Kelly described the project during an interview at the Saturn Awards last week, where he presented his future partner Roth with the Young Filmmakers Showcase Award. (Kelly won the same award two years earlier, for his debut film Donnie Darko.) The Box "is about a mysterious box that arrives on a young couple's doorstep," Kelly said. "There's a button on the box that presents them with an offer that says they will receive a great financial reward if they push the button, but someone they know will die. Madness ensues, and that's what the rest of the story's about."
Kelly also said that bringing the story to the big screen was a dream of his for many years. "It's kind of a cult story that Richard Matheson wrote long ago that was later formed into a Twilight Zone episode that I'd fallen in love with as a kid," Kelly said. "Once I arrived in the business and had the opportunity to option the material, I thought it would be a great film, and Eli and I found a lead into the material. It should be a good movie. We'll see."
Darkwatch Comes To Film
ongtime genre partners Glen Morgan and James Wong (Final Destination) are attached to adapt Sammy Corp.'s upcoming supernatural western game Darkwatch: Curse of the West into a film, Variety reported.
Darkwatch revolves around a secret organization dedicated to fighting the forces of evil. The game will take place in the Wild West, focusing on a cowboy train robber named Jericho Cross, who is recruited by the organization to battle a horde of vampires and other supernatural creatures, the trade paper reported.
The game, which will be a first-person shooter, is being readied for release sometime around the first quarter of 2005 for the PlayStation 2 and Xbox, the trade paper reported.
Caine Gets Enchantment
ichael Caine is set to star with Danny DeVito and Kristin Scott Thomas in The Nature of Enchantment, a fantasy-tinged drama for producer Penny Marshall and Mike Newell's 50 Cannons production company, Variety reported.
The $18.5 million film will shoot in September in Montreal and will be the feature debut of music-video director Nick Brandt, from an original script by Stephen Volk, the trade paper reported.
Enchantment is the story of a feral child found abandoned in New York. Caine plays Dr. Easterman, the aging psychiatrist who discovers that the boy sees the city as a fairy-tale land: The skyscrapers are a forest; the commuters are gnomes, ogres and witches; and his doctor is a benign troll, the trade paper reported. As Easterman's daughter (Scott Thomas) and colleagues start to fear for his health and sanity, the doctor gets drawn into the boy's fantasy world, and they embark together on an odyssey through the streets of New York to find the source of the child's trauma, the ogre's castle, the trade paper reported.
Sega Enters The Matrix
he U.S. arm of Japanese video-game publisher Sega Corp. said that it has struck a deal with Warner Brothers Interactive Entertainment to co-publish The Matrix Online, a massively multiplayer online game based on the Matrix movies, the Reuters news service reported.
Sega of America said it would manage distribution of the game, while WBIE will oversee its development and operations, and the two will jointly handle marketing. The game is expected to be released this November, the wire service reported.
When The Matrix Online was first announced, it was to be published by France's Ubi Soft Entertainment, but Ubi Soft dropped out of the project earlier this year. The Matrix Online is being developed with input from the Wachowski brothers, who wrote and directed the movies and oversaw a previous game, Enter the Matrix, the wire service reported.
A console video game based on the Matrix films, Atari's Enter the Matrix drew poor reviews from the gaming press, but still sold millions of units, Reuters reported.
Rings Game Trailer Is Live
he GameSpot Web site has posted a trailer for Electronic Arts' upcoming real-time strategy game The Lord of the Rings: The Battle for Middle-earth.
The trailer runs two minutes and 22 seconds and shows how battles from the Tolkien-trilogy-inspired films will play out in the game.
The game features the battle of Pelennor Fields, as realized in Peter Jackson's Oscar-winning movie, The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King. The Lord of the Rings: The Battle for Middle-earth is due out for PCs sometime later this year, the site reported.
Kelly: New Darko Is Different
ichard Kelly, director of the cult SF movie Donnie Darko, told SCI FI Wire that his recently finished extended cut of the movie, which is due in theaters later this year, dramatically alters the movie.
"[Newmarket Films] is re-releasing it, and they're letting me have a director's cut, which will come out this summer in theaters, that I just finished today," Kelly said in an interview at the Saturn Awards on May 5. "No one's seen it yet, but it will definitely be a completely new experience as a film. It will probably surprise and shock even the most hardcore fans."
Kelly said that completing this new version was an opportunity to fully develop all of his original ideas for the film and create what he considered a complete rendering of Donnie Darko. "Ultimately, for me, I'm just psyched I finally got to finish the film," he said. "While I'm proud of the theatrical cut, I feel like there were some elements that were never fully realized that I'm excited to be able to realize now. It's been a dream come true, and I'm really lucky to have gotten to do it."
Donnie Darko stars Jake Gyllenhaal as a disaffected teen who narrowly escapes death, then finds himself taking instructions for increasingly destructive behavior from a 6-foot rabbit. Kelly said that the director's cut will premiere at the end of May, and the film's subsequent distribution will be based upon initial reactions from filmgoers at the upcoming Seattle Film Festival. "They're going to test it in Seattle May 29th, and they're going to determine, like, a week later what the audience is, if they can really sell it to the multiplexes and to the suburban crowd," Kelly said. "The anticipation would be that maybe it could cross over and become more than just a cult film. It might become more of a mainstream success."
Day F/X No Problem
oland Emmerich, director of the upcoming SF disaster movie The Day After Tomorrow, told SCI FI Wire that the Mother-Nature-runs-amok movie featured elaborate special effects, but that they didn't distract his actors, including Dennis Quaid, Jake Gyllenhaal and Sela Ward.
"The mix of this movie is 95 percent computer-generated effects and 5 percent models," Emmerich (Independence Day) said in an interview. "We had a very, very small percentage of models. I don't think it affects the actors at all."
Emmerich added, "[The actors] still have to say their lines, and they usually have each other to act with. It is a little bit scary these days, because you can shoot whole sequences against a green screen."
In the Day After Tomorrow, Quaid plays a paleoclimatologist who realizes that a series of cataclysmic disasters foreshadows a dramatic shift in the world's climate. Gyllenhaal plays his son, and Ward plays his wife. The scale of the effects sometimes made him nervous. "For example, the opening sequence is in Antarctica," Emmerich said. "The actors stood on a little platform that was probably 40 by 50 feet and had snow and tents and everything. Around them was blue screen. For them, it didn't matter. It was like acting on a stage. For the filmmaker, it's scary, because every shot, in a way, is a visual effect. You have to always imagine, 'OK, this will be Antarctica.' It really doesn't look like that." The Day After Tomorrow opens May 28.
Quaid Jumped Into Tomorrow
ennis Quaid, who stars in the upcoming SF movie The Day After Tomorrow, said that it was easy to transition from the historical epic The Alamo to the movie, about humanity's possible future.
"I didn't think about [the transition] that way, because when I was doing them, I thought it was the present," Quaid said in an interview. "Doing The Alamo was like a kid's dream; I grew up in Texas, and I used to play the Alamo when I was a kid. But I've been a fan of disaster movies like Earthquake and The Towering Inferno since back in the '70s."
Quaid said that the idea of jumping into a big summer movie like this one was a fun challenge to tackle, especially with director Roland Emmerich (Independence Day) at the helm. "I knew that if there was anybody who could do something like this, it would be him," Quaid said. When asked if he felt concerns about starring in an "event movie," Quaid said, "Oh, not at all. Like I said before, this is Roland Emmerich doing this, and if anybody could do it, he's the man to do it. I just put myself in his hands, and I'm really happy with the results."
Quaid added that he feels the story and characters, rather than the special effects, sustain the movie, in which humanity is subjected to cataclysmic natural disasters. "That's what really carries the film," he said. "Besides all of the disasters that go on, it's got a compelling story so that the audience can link into the film through the story of this father and son who are trying to find each other, this family trying to find each other in the midst of this disaster." At the same time, Quaid admitted that the toughest part of filming was enduring the intense environmental conditions of the shoot in Canada. "We were shooting in Montreal, and it was 40 below outside," he said. "But we're shooting inside, where it's 80 degrees, and we're wearing arctic gear. We've got this wind machine blowing shredded newspaper and soap in our faces. It was tough." The Day After Tomorrow opens May 28.
Fox Picks Up Gideon
ox has picked up Andrew Klavan's supernatural horror spec script Gideon, according to The Hollywood Reporter.
Mike Macari and Neal Edelstein of Macari/Edelstein (The Ring) will produce the movie, which centers on a young artist who imagines evil figures so deeply that they cross over into her real world, the trade paper reported.
Macari/Edelstein, which is producing The Ring 2 and The Invisible for Spyglass, have worked with Klavan during the past several months to develop Gideon, the trade paper reported. It's the second time the two parties have collaborated, following the sale of an untitled Klavan script to Gold Circle last month. Macari/Edelstein will produce that feature, which revolves around a widow and her daughter, whose father comes back to haunt her. Gold Circle's Paul Brooks also will produce, the trade paper reported.
Isaacs Video On Pan DVD
ome movies shot by Jason Isaacs on the set of last year's Peter Pan film will show up on the DVD of the fantasy movie, the Associated Press reported.
Isaacs, who played Mr. Darling/Captain Hook, shot the behind-the-scenes home video footage during production.
"I always video everything," Isaacs told the AP. "What they put together on the DVD is a few minutes of fun. But I have the Hearts of Darkness version," he said, referring to the documentary about the nightmarish production of Apocalypse Now. "I've got everything, and I always have enough to burn some bridges if I don't want to work again."
Isaacs has shot such video on his other productions as well, including Armageddon and The Patriot, the wire service reported. "I guess I like hiding behind the lens," he said. He added, "Lots of people behave incredibly badly on the set, and I just go 'Ahemm' and point at my camera."
Briefly Noted
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Brian Van Holt has been cast as the villain in Dark Castle Entertainment's upcoming House of Wax remake for Warner Brothers/Village Roadshow, according to The Hollywood Reporter. Joel Silver, Robert Zemeckis and Susan Levin are producing.
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Swedish directors Simon Sandquist and Joel Bergvall have signed on to direct Warner Brothers' big-screen adaptation of DC Comics' Books of Magic, about a bespectacled teenager learning magic in contemporary London, which is seen as a precursor to Harry Potter, according to The Hollywood Reporter. Neil Gaiman, the author of the original story and the novel, will serve as executive producer.
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Charles Stone (Drumline) will direct Tekken, a movie based on the Namco fighting video game, Variety reported. Tekken, which translates as "iron fist," will be a fantasy action film with heavy computer effects.
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Maria Bello (The Cooler) and Sean Bean (The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring) will play bereaved parents in the independent thriller The Dark, about a seemingly harmless young girl who shows up bearing remarkable similarities to their dead daughter, according to The Hollywood Reporter. The movie starts shooting in June in London and on the Isle of Man.
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Former Angel and Buffy the Vampire Slayer star Charisma Carpenter (Cordelia) is the cover girl and subject of a pictorial in the June issue of Playboy magazine.
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Director Andrew Adamson has tapped Tilda Swinton to play the evil White Witch in the upcoming film version of C.S. Lewis' The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, Variety reported. Production is scheduled to start this summer with an eye to a Christmas 2005 release.
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Van Helsing star Kate Beckinsale wed her Underworld director, Len Wiseman, on May 9 at the Bel-Air Hotel in Bel Air, Calif., the Zap2it Web site reported. The family wedding featured Beckinsale's 5-year-old daughter, Lily, from her nine-year relationship with her Underworld co-star, actor Michael Sheen.
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Fox and Mel Gibson's Icon Productions announced an Aug. 31 release date for the DVD version of The Passion of the Christ, Variety reported.
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Terry Gilliam (Brothers Grimm) will direct the fantasy film Tideland starting Sept. 7 in Saskatchewan, Canada, Variety reported. Co-scripted by Gilliam and Tony Grisoni, Tideland is adapted from Mitch Cullin's novel, about a girl in rural Texas who escapes from the grim reality of her life into a world of fantasy.
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Wicked, a Broadway musical that provides a backstory of The Wizard of Oz from the witches' point of view, received 10 Tony Award nominations on May 10 to lead the chase for Broadway theater's highest honors, the Reuters news service reported.
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Holly Marie Combs, star of The WB's Charmed, gave birth to a baby boy April 26 in Los Angeles, TV Guide Online reported. Finley Arthur Donoho is the first child for the actress and her husband, David Donoho.
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A new full trailer has gone live for the upcoming SF movie The Chronicles of Riddick, the follow-up to Pitch Black, which opens June 11.
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Blackfilm.com has posted a teaser trailer for the upcoming Catwoman movie, starring Halle Berry, which opens July 23.
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