In Development

 

Ghost Recon: The latest Tom Clancy adaptation will complete its casting Tenoch Huerta (Scarface, Black Panther: Wakanda Forever) as rifleman Joe Ramirez, Daniel Dae Kim (Open Hearts, Gears of War) as North Korean Major-General Paik, Wesley Snipes (Victims, The Fall Guy: Trouble in Tahiti) as Commander Jacobs, and Caleb McLaughlin (The Revolution, Sister/Sister) as a new young recruit on the Ghost team. Ben Affleck is directing the video game adaptation from a script by Dawson Edwards. 

Rubicon Lies: The latest team-up of director Martin Scorsese and star Leonardo DiCaprio, the JFK assassination conspiracy-themed Rubicon Lies, has added more cast members. James Norton (Queen Margot, Resident Evil 5) will play Robert F. Kennedy, David Corenswet (Hair, Superman) will play President John F. Kennedy, while Brendan Gleeson (Pirate Latitudes, Someone Else) is set to portray CIA director J. Edgar Hoover. Jimmy Ellis penned the story.

Behind Closed Doors: Famed filmmaker Mike Leigh's LRF debut (at the age of 83 years old), Behind Closed Doors, will round out its supporting cast with the additions of Hannah John-Kamen (Fading Nights, We Were Never Here), Kaylen Luke (The Woman Upstairs, 7 Keys), Remmie Milner ("Silo", Book of Love), and Jack Bannon ("Pennyworth", "Pulse"). Holden Abbott penned the film.

Man-Thing: The Marvel Universe is back with a film based on the horror-themed character Man-Thing! Allison Williams (Regretting You, M3GAN), Max Minghella (The Guest List, "The Handmaid's Tale"), Lil Rel Howery (Code 3, Vacation Friends), and Nick Kroll (I Don't Understand You, Don't Worry Darling) are set to star. Williams will play Dr. Ellen Brandt, sent to an AIM lab in the Everglades to recover the research of a missing scientist. Minghella will play Dr. Ted Sallis, the scientist who becomes the monstrous Man-Thing. Howery and Kroll, meanwhile, will play shady AIM executives. Jordan Peele (Bright Neon Lights, Nope) is set to direct the film from a script by Jimmy Ellis (Convalescence, The Essence) and Mark Newton (Ghost Rider: Damnation, Gears of War 2).

The Molander Case: Daniel Bruhl (Pirate Latitudes, Sherwood) and Sandra Huller (Anatomy of a Fall, The Zone of Interest) are set to headline the WWII-era drama about filmmaker G.W. Pabst, who returns to Nazi Germany just before the war breaks out and is unable to leave. The film is based on the novel "Litchtspiel" by Daniel Kehlmann. Bruhl will play Pabst while Huller will play his wife Trude. Christoph Waltz (The Past Before, At the Mountains of Madness) will appear in a supporting role as famed German entertainer Heinz Conrads in addition to acting as a producer on the project. Christian Petzold (Undine, Miroirs No. 3) is set to direct the film from an adaptation by Wyatt Allen (Offside, Boys from the Forest).

The House of Black: The studio already has universes of DC Comics and Marvel Comics, but now the studio can add the Wizarding World to the list. The first film in the universe will be The House of Black - a 1970s set story about the Black family, namely young Regulus and Sirius. Benjamin Evan Ainsworth ("The Haunting of Bly Manor", "Son of a Critch") has been cast as Regulus Arcturus Black, Louis Partridge (Pompeii, The Writer and the Film Star) has been cast as Sirius Black, Emma Mackey (Broadway Joe, Sgt. Rock) has been cast as Bellatrix Lestrange, and Nell Hudson (Haunting of the Queen Mary, Salvable) has been cast as Narcissa Malfoy. Writer Sammy-Jo Ellis (All the Fives, Wonder Bean) is behind this first Wizarding World production, which is being helmed by Chan-wook Park (Blackbird, Hex).

Reel Talk (Season 35 Part 1)

 

Hello everyone, Grant Holloway here, back with Reel Talk, a segment in which I try to play devil’s advocate and critic well-received movies and praise badly-received ones.

ThunderCats – Since When Is Hope a Weakness
Yes, the plot is classical, but you know what that describes ? Every muth that’s survived more than five minutes, but apparently archetypes are now a flaw. ThuderCats seemed to operate on myth logic and not on franchise logic, which made it refreshing for me, but critics didn’t agree.
Tara’s Wrath – The trilogy that fell in love with its own darkness
Does Tara’s Wrath actually say anything new or does it just execute the same thesis with better lighting ? The film has been praised as ferocious, hypnotic and classical yet contemporary, but strip away the atmosphere and what remains ? Sexual manipulation, power reversal, mutual destruction and fatal inevitability and we’ve been here before, twice. It played it too safe for me.

The Writer and the Film Star – A marriage of ideas, not comfort
Critics say it’s emotionally hollow, but what if that’s the point ? Thomas Vinterberg doesn’t make swooning romances, he makes autopsies. The film isn’t trying to convince you that Max and January are meant to be, it’s dissecting why they aren’t and why they can’t stop orbiting each other anyway. The most common complaint was that we never believed they loved each other. Maybe we’re not supposed to believe in a grand, cinematic love story, but just see two ambitious artists who were drawn to what the other symbolized, not who they actually were.

Thus Dreamed Zarathustra – Three hours of fog yelling “God is Dead”
The artists behind this movie were all in, but commitment isn’t clarity. It felt to me like a three-hour thesis screaming its brilliance into the void, utterly convinced of its own importance. In the end, the film doesn’t wrestle with Nietzsche’s contradictions. It canonizes him and turns philosophy into spectacle and madness into aesthetic poetry.

Zorro – Zorro without the swagger
Although not a bad film in its own right, I felt like this Zorro adaptation tried to reinvent the legendary outlaw into a symbol of resistance rather than a crowd-pleasing swashbuckler he’s known for, in large part thanks to Luna’s melancholy gravitas and that didn’t really click for me. Not every film needs to be profound, sometimes you just want to lay back and enjoy a light-hearted movie, you know?

The Punisher : Purgatory – It’s time to let Mel Gibson go
Personal feelings and past actions aside, I still have a hard time believing Mel Gibson in this role. Sure, he does the job well, but the man is pushing 70 ! The Punisher : Purgatory leaves no oxygen in the room. Every scene feels soaked in despair and cruelty. Perhaps sometimes too much isn’t enough ?

The Tick – A joke stretched to feature length
The Tick will have some die hard fans out there and while it’s certainly not a bad movie, once the novelty wears off, The Tick starts to feel less like a comedy adventure and more like a single joke being told for ninety minutes straight. Rob Riggle commits completely, but while funny at first, the joke begins circling the drain. Props to the team for doing a superhero movie that doesn’t take itself too seriously though!

Man of God – The weight of fate without the fire
Man of God clearly wants to be a serious film, lingering in silence with the characters starring into the distance. It trusts the audience to wrestle with big questions about faith, morality and identity. The problem is it trusts those silences a little too much. The protagonist felt to me like a symbol walking through the story rather than a person living inside it.

Dust Saint – The false prophet of A24 Westerns

This film felt more impressive to me in theory than in practice. The atmosphere is undeniable and the film maintains a steady sense of spiritual unease, but once the dust settles, you start noticing that very little actually happens. It’s built entirely on mood, it’s stalling rather than building and that’s the main thing I got out of that movie.

Spelljammer – Wildspace, mild execution
Spelljammer is too much too fast and too sparkly, but it still felt really long to me. The plot is like a bag of dice rolled, a lot of things happens, but none of them sticks. It spends so much time explaining spectacle that it forgets to explain stakes. Although it’s nice to see D&D get some big screen love and try to make it mainstream!

The Letter Never Sent – Ghosted by nostalgia
I actually quite enjoyed this movie, but the twist at the end ? It’s the cinematic equivalent of being ghosted by your own nostalgia. By revealing the entire love story was imagined, it turned two hours of longing into a bittersweet rug pull. Beautiful to look at, frustrating to live through.

Discovery – It’s Tom Holland, sorry

The cerebral thrill sounded like it was my cup of tea, but although the relentless moral debates and expository dialogue suffocated the story’s emotional core, I quite enjoyed the movie. However, I’m tired of people pretending Tom Holland is a good actor. He gets completely overshadowed by everyone else in the cast and it undermined the movie in my opinion

Blood and Glory – A Renaissance painting set on fire with a chainsaw
It’s full-on operatic bloodbath, undeniably spectacular, but the excessive nudity, drawn-out feasts and palace politics slow the momentum, leaving the character arcs and strategy undeveloped. It’s a historical epic that overwhelms the senses but underwhelms the mind, proving that style can’t always carry substance.

Running from the Spotlight - It’s better if you expect the trainwreck
If you go see this movie and expect an A24 drama, you’re going to be disappointed, but if you accept that this is a chaotic, messy teen drama, it gets better ! Maria is a magnificent trainwreck. It’s over the top, addictive and completely watchable, better than the 39/100 it received.

Unreasonable Doubt – A really chaotic Tinder date
It tries to wedge a rom-com into a murder trial and it ends up confused, uneven and occasionally cringe-worthy. The tonal whiplash between the different genres it tries to tackle is too much, but still I find myself weirdly enthralled by this movie.

LAST RESORT FILMS: THE STORY SO FAR (SEASONS 16-20)

 

Welcome to Last Resort Films: The Story So Far! Chad Taylor checking in here with a new series that will take a look back at LRF’s illustrious past, five seasons at a time. In this fourth edition, we will cover seasons 16-20.

Season 16
One of the defining features of LRF’s 16th season was a large influx of quality adaptions. Some of the top films of the season were remakes The Birds (1963), Excalibur (1981), Coma (1978), and Oklahoma! (1955). And then of course there were the big superhero films like The Fantastic Four, who teamed with Gambit and Rogue (so to speak) to make for a Marvel one-two at the top of the box office. After DC dominated for much of LRF’s first half, the tides seemed to start turning a bit this season.

The surprise of the season came in the shape of Excalibur, the aforementioned remake of the 1981 John Boorman fantasy adventure based on Arthurian legend. It landed a whopping ten nominations at the GRAs, winning four. A sign that the film may make a big splash is in its director Nicholas Winding Refn, who had already had a Best Director win under his belt. This was the first in a trilogy of collaborations between Refn and Roy Horne, as the duo would go on to make two additional films in the ensuing five seasons.

Best Picture: Excalibur
Best Director: Nicolas Winding Refn - Excalibur
Best Actor: Chris Pine - McCain
Best Actress: Elizabeth Olsen - Coma
Best Adaptation: Excalibur - Roy Horne
Best Original Story: McCain - Dwight Gallo

Season 17
I’m sure the studio looks back on this season fondly, as it goes down as one of the most financially successful in LRF history. Four films exceeded $300million in profits: Justice League Dark, Namor the Sub-Mariner, Super Mario, and Green Lantern Corps, the breakaway success of the season. In all, it was the third most profitable season of all time behind only the first and third seasons. It really feels like one of those things where we didn’t know how good we had it, as the box office has never hit these heights since.

Speaking of “Heights”, this era marked a real high point in Tom Cruise’s legendary LRF run. While he had already had the Splinter Cell series and a Golden Reel of Achievement under his belt, he added a new franchise to his belt with Green Lantern Corps. and eventually the Justice League. Importantly, Heights from the season before also marked a more dramatic turn for the action star as he would go on to star in numerous well-acclaimed pictures over the next six seasons. But Season 17 is likely his true peak, being top at the box office and winning Best Actor for his role in The King of Hearts.

The GRAs this season are fascinating to look back on because of the real split that happens at the top. The King of Hearts won Best Actor, Best Supporting Actor, and Best Picture, while The Glass Menagerie won Best Actress, Best Supporting Actress, and Best Director. I don’t know if we’ve ever seen something like that since.

Best Picture: The King of Hearts
Best Director: Sam Mendes - The Glass Menagerie
Best Actor: Tom Cruise - The King of Hearts
Best Actress: Rooney Mara - The Glass Menagerie
Best Adaptation: Namor the Sub-Mariner - John Malone
Best Original Story: The King of Hearts - Chad Taylor

Season 18
The shadow of one Julius Caesar looms large over the eighteenth season. When I originally pitched this idea of “Christopher Nolan does Caesar” to John, I don’t think I quite imagined how grand it would all become over the course of three films. It won Leonardo DiCaprio his third Best Actor trophy, but also open the door for him to win two more in the next two Caesar films. Three wins for the same role in that category seems like one of those rare records that we may never see broken.

Elsewhere, this season marked a strong one for Dwight Gallo. His stylish crime drama Cocaine Cowboys, directed by Michael Bay, was a hit with both critics and audiences alike. Even amidst Caesar’s dominance, Cocaine Cowboys won four GRAs come awards night. And this season also brought the introduction of Mel Gibson’s Punisher, which just had its most recent entry this season.

Another emerging thread from this season was the continued rise of Sadie Sink as one of the studio’s major young stars. After appearing in Best Picture winner Born in Brooklyn and Red Sonja a few seasons earlier, Sink’s performance in Tumor really turned heads - even if it came up short of a GRA trophy. This would start a run for her of starring in highly-acclaimed dramas and starting a superhero franchise of her own.

Best Picture: Caesar
Best Director: Christopher Nolan - Caesar
Best Actor: Leonardo DiCaprio - Caesar
Best Actress: Dakota Johnson - Lock Every Door
Best Adaptation: Cocaine Cowboys - Dwight Gallo
Best Original Story: Caesar - John Malone & Chad Taylor

Season 19
And if the emergence of Sadie Sink was a plotline of season 18, then her double-S counterpart in Sydney Sweeney grabbed all the headlines of season 19. Sweeney’s memorable role in Poison Ivy immediately established her as one of the studio’s hottest stars, a trend that would continue over the following five seasons. It also firmly established Roy Horne as LRF’s preeminent writer of thrillers, a genre I personally love.

At the GRAs, we saw a battle between two directors vying for their second Best Director trophy in the last four seasons. Sam Mendes, who won with The Glass Menagerie, was hired on to direct Klondike. The film was a received as an instant classic and further established Jimmy Ellis & John Malone as one of the studio’s most fruitful partnerships. On the other end, you had Nicholas Winding Refn, re-teaming once again with Roy Horne for the haunting Cecil. The directors ended up splitting the honors, with Refn winning Best Director and Mendes bringing home Best Picture.

This season also saw the introduction of Spider-Man to Last Resort Films, one of the last untouched big-time properties for the studio. While that was well-received and a big hit, it was bested at the box office by the second appearance of Aidan Turner’s Superman.

Best Picture: Klondike
Best Director: Nicholas Winding Refn - Cecil
Best Actor: Chris Pine - Klondike
Best Actress: Sydney Sweeney - Poison Ivy
Best Adaptation: Poison Ivy - Roy Horne
Best Original Story: Klondike - Jimmy Ellis & John Malone

Season 20
And this brings us to LRF’s twentieth season, another impressive milestone. In all, it was great season for the studio. Box office was riding a high with new Justice League and X-Men movies, plus the addition of our first James Bond.

Speaking of, Risico had to be one of LRF’s most hyped films in history. John Malone had long said that James Bond was a character he would love to write, an enthusiasm that was matched by director Chris Nolan (who was reportedly turned down from directing a Bond film in the past).Risico overperformed all expectations at the box office, while also becoming a dominant force at the Golden Reel Awards. This would start a steady of pace of Bond films from Malone, starting in season 20 and then returning in 25 and 30. I’ve not personally heard any news of a new Bond entry this season, but am looking forward to his return whenever that it is. And I wonder if Dan Stevens will continue in the role or pass on the reins to someone new!

A little lost among some of bigger names attached to Risico and Sinatra was Roy Horne’s Wish You Were Here, which earned eleven nominations at the GRAs. It continued Horne’s hot streak and was an LRF career-best for director Joe Wright, who would eventually direct his own Bond film ten seasons later.

Best Picture: Risico
Best Director: Christopher Nolan - Risico
Best Actor: Idris Elba - Wish You Were Here
Best Actress: Margaret Qualley - Observance
Best Adaptation: Risico - John Malone
Best Original Story: Sinatra - Lon Charles

_________________________________________________________________________________

Box Office Top 20 (Seasons 16-20):
20. Mr. Earthling - $451 million
19. Plastic Man 2: Electric Boogaloo - $475 million
18. The Champions of Angor - $498 million
17. Caesar - $577 million
16. Skyrim III: Dovahkin - $585 million
15. Task Force X - $601 million
14. Gears of War - $605 million
13. Teen Titans - $609 million
12. The Hulk - $618 million
11. The Fantastic Four - $698 million
10. Green Arrow: SuperMax - $717 million
9. X-Men: The Cure - $757 million
8. Justice League Dark - $806 million
7. Namor the Sub-Mariner - $816 million
6. Super Mario - $878 million
5. Spider-Man - $932 billion
4. Risico - $1.02 billion
3. Superman: The Last Son of Krypton - $1.31 billion
2. Green Lantern Corps. - $1.38 billion
1. Justice League Unlimited - $1.44 billion

The Trades with Reuben Schwartz (Season 35)

 

Here we are at the halfway point of LRF’s 35th season and so it’s time to check in on the news and rumors at the studio this season. Welcome to The Trades with Reuben Schwartz!

The biggest headline running throughout the season has been the relatively low domestic box office. The studio has had just one movie cross the $100million mark in America, The Punisher: Purgatory. While films like ThunderCats and Zorro have held international appeal, neither has the profit margins of a runaway blockbuster. Rumor has it that Phil Dolan has been working vigorously with the studio’s research & development team to find scripts that will bring people back to the theaters.

When looking at films that made a splash in the first half of the season, I wanted to circle the Dust Saint. While the film’s isolating style was not everyone’s cup of tea, directors and actors alike have taken notice of writer Holden Abbott’s hot start at the studio. After earning Brad Pitt a Best Actor nomination for Exodus last season, Abbott has positioned Paul Dano in a prime spot to show up in that category this season. The one question that remains is how well Abbott’s style can extend beyond the religious subtext present in the first two films, leading to excitement to see what comes next.

In general, it appears religious-themed thrillers is a big trend at the studio currently as Man of God is another film that made a critical impact this season. Even Discovery, Damien Chazelle’s sci-fi drama about a mind-reading device, deals with the push-and-pull between science and faith. Given the ensemble nature of that film and the way it spreads out its performances, I will be intrigued to see who is put forward on the FYC ballot for that one as the film appears to be an early GRA contender at this point.

The talk of the town is currently the return of Martin Scorsese and Leonardo DiCaprio, due for their first LRF collaboration since Sinatra. Everyone pays attention any time the two link up and Rubicon Lies sounds like a thrilling subject matter. The octogenarian director’s last film for the studio was Season 24’s Monaco, which earned him the Best Director award at the GRAs. And of course we all know Leo’s history at the studio: 9 performances, 5 Best Actor wins (and a sixth nomination to boot).

Of course, returning to the box office point, the studio knows that Batman is waiting in the wings and that will almost assuredly do major business as that character always has. But the hope would be that some new franchise, whether new or original, will help carry on the studio for another 35 seasons and beyond. The Friend Zone sounds like it could a big swing towards that, though Michel Gondry’s direction likely makes it a bit offbeat than typical mainstream fare. Returning to the Tom Clancy playbook could be a smart call given the immense popularity of Splinter Cell in the opening seasons, though Jon Hamm is certainly no Tom Cruise. Speaking of Cruise and those R&D meetings from earlier, there have been murmurs among the lot about when the mega-star will next return in a non-Green Lantern role.

As always, I look forward to see how the rest of the season turns out and checking back in with you all before the GRAs!

GOSSIP RAG (SEASON 35)

 

In this segment, we will delve into the inside dirt on some of the latest and upcoming LRF releases and the studio's stars....

JACOB ELORDI

After steaming up screens in the original Tara’s Web, Jacob Elordi famously sat out the disastrous sequel Tara’s World - a move that, in hindsight, may have been career genius. But he made a high-profile return for Tara’s Wrath, and it paid off: the erotic thriller threequel delivered the franchise’s best box office and critical response to date. Insiders say Elordi was initially reluctant to rejoin the series, but a healthy pay bump and a script that offered a deeper, darker psychological edge finally sealed the deal. Paired with Victoria Pedretti, the film gave Elordi what he reportedly wanted most - substance with the seduction. “It wasn’t just about looking good in silk sheets anymore,” one crew member quipped. “He finally got to show some teeth - and audiences ate it up.”

MELISSA BARRERA

Melissa Barrera made a quiet return to the spotlight this season with a major role in LRF’s Zorro revival - but not without a few conditions. After being dropped from Scream 7 and left out of LRF’s Ghost Rider sequel following her controversial comments about the Gaza war - remarks many deemed antisemitic - studio execs were reportedly blunt about the expectations if she wanted to stay in the good graces of the marketing machine. Sources say Barrera was instructed to keep a very low profile during the Zorro press tour, with strict guidance to avoid any political discourse or potentially divisive topics. To her credit, the actress played ball, sticking to light soundbites, red carpet smiles, and breezy interview banter. “It was a vibe check, not a muzzle,” one insider said. “And she passed - at least this time.”

WILL SMITH

After famously passing on The Matrix, Inception, and Django Unchained because he didn’t “get them,” Will Smith was determined not to let another genre-bending blockbuster slip through his fingers. That’s what led him to accept the lead role in Zack Snyder’s Spelljammer, the now-infamous D&D-inspired sci-fi epic that fused space opera with high fantasy - and left many audiences as confused as he initially was. Insiders say Smith admitted from day one that he didn’t fully understand the concept - even repeatedly asking Snyder to explain what a Spelljammer is - but was drawn in by the spectacle and Snyder’s passion. While the film divided critics and bombarded viewers with dense lore, Smith’s charismatic performance was one of the few things nearly everyone agreed on. As one cast member put it: “He still doesn’t know what a Spelljammer is, but he tried.”

ANA DE ARMAS

Ana de Armas may have dodged a bullet - literally and emotionally. The actress was reportedly the top choice for the lead female role in Ghost Recon, the big-screen adaptation of the Tom Clancy video game franchise, but abruptly passed on the project after learning her ex, Ben Affleck, had signed on to direct. Making matters even stickier? Ben’s brother, Casey Affleck, was also attached in a supporting role. “She didn’t even read the final script,” one insider claimed. “As soon as she heard ‘Ben’s directing,’ she was out.” While no public drama has played out between the former couple, sources say things between them have remained “frosty” since their split - and working together, even from opposite sides of the camera, was simply not on the table.

FRANCIS FORD COPPOLA

Francis Ford Coppola will make a surprising return to theaters this season with New Christianity, a moody, blood-soaked high school horror drama about a murderous cult operating under the guise of teen faith. But sources say the legendary director wasn’t exactly in his element during the production. Coming off the high-profile flop of his long-gestating passion project Megalopolis, Coppola reportedly took New Christianity as a gun-for-hire gig - though working with a cast of Gen Z stars like Noah Jupe, Finn Wolfhard, and Olivia Rodrigo proved more jarring than expected. “He kept calling Rodrigo ‘Olive,’” one crew member said. “And there was a full day of confusion over what a Finsta was.”

SEASON 35 GOLDEN REEL OF ACHIEVEMENT VOTING

 

PREMIERE MAGAZINE #345