‘Venom’ Trailer Looks Intriguing — Except for Venom Itself

I hate Venom, the Marvel Comics villain-turned-anti-hero spun off from The Amazing Spider-Man, so I am definitely not the target audience for Venom, the movie. That would be 13-year-old boys who think the stylized hyper-violence of the comic is cool, and love the idea of a character whose costume is not only alive, but fights its wearer, Eddie Brock, for control over Brock’s body.

The new trailer for Venom was just leaked to the interwebs, compelling the studio to officially release it earlier than planned. Apparently far earlier than planned, because the worst thing about the clip is the appearance of Venom itself.

The title character is supposed to be a mix of actor and CGI, but it clearly needs to spend more time in rendering. Green Lantern also tried to pull this off back in 2011, and we all know what an unmitigated disaster that turned out to be!

This Sony film is centered on a Marvel character, but it is not part of the Marvel Cinematic Universe (like the Avengers and Spider-Man), which is unfortunate because Venom’s comic book origin is intimately tied to Spidey and his supporting cast; with Peter Parker and pals off-limits, the movie has to manufacture a new origin for Venom, and it’s… weak.

It’s also part of this trailer. See what you think:

‘Fury Road’ Looks Dangerous Even Without CGI

I just found this four-minute clip that shows snippets of the insane chase scenes from Mad Max: Fury Road without CGI enhancement of any kind — and the sequences don’t lose any of their heart-stopping thrills at all!

While it’s true that the final onscreen product was “sweetened” with some visual effects, it’s important to note that so much of the action was done with live-action, practical vehicles and stunt players. The climatic crash of the War Rig, seen in this clip, was obtained in just one take!

In my opinion, MM:FR should have won the Best Picture Oscar for 2015. While Spotlight certainly was the most important and most prestigious film of last year, it was also fairly forgettable. Come next February, just try to find someone who can tell you which movie won the previous year’s top award.

No one will have trouble recalling this R-rated, Charlize Theron/Tom Hardy instant classic. Fury Road drove away with six Oscars in tow, but I believe it was robbed of Best Picture and George Miller deserved Best Director.

But everyone who saw it will remember Fury Road as shiny and chrome for many years to come. It left flaming skid marks across my movie mind, and I was really (really) pulling for Max and Furiosa to pull an upset in L.A. I suppose this near-perfect film will have to be content in the company of so many other indelible movies that didn’t win the big prize.

To paraphrase the narrator of The Road Warrior, It lives now… only in my memory.

Witness an Honest Trailer for ‘Mad Max: Fury Road’

Since Mad Max: Fury Road was so shiny and chrome, this Honest Trailer doesn’t have a whole heck of a lot to work with, so this is one of the milder entries in the series.

 

“Tom Hardly in the movie” LOL

Tom Hardy Portrays Cray-Cray Kray Twins in ‘Legend’

Tom Hardy (Mad Max: Fury Road) portrays the Kray Brothers, real-life identical twins Ronald and Reggie, who ruled the underground of London during the Swinging ’60s with a gang that dabbled in everything from protection rackets and armed robbery to murder.

Apparently Hardy is trying to make up for being the sidekick in Fury Road by playing both leads in this movie, which co-stars Emily Browning, Christopher Eccleston (the Ninth Doctor), Chazz Palminteri and David Thewlis (Remus in the Harry Potter films).

 

The story of the Krays was portrayed onscreen once before, in 1990’s The Krays, starring brothers Gary and Martin Kemp of Spandau Ballet.

Legend opens Oct. 2 in the USA.

 

Pedal-to-the-Metal ‘Mad Max: Fury Road’ Trailer

Director George Miller unveiled a new, long trailer for 2015’s Mad Max: Fury Road at Comic-Con International: San Diego, and it pretty much buries the needle on driving mayhem:

The clip seems to feature more CGI than I’d like, but it still looks pretty terrific. I do wonder why producers are being so coy about showing Max’s face; are they hoping people will assume Mel Gibson is still starring? To me, new star Tom Hardy has such a generic face that I’d worry about viewers losing Max in the crowd and so I’d want to showcase his mug as much as possible.

Insane Images from ‘Mad Max: Fury Road’

It feels like George Miller‘s latest Mad Max sequel, Mad Max: Fury Road was shot so long ago that it’s about time for its sequel to be rolled out, but the truth is it’s been a long and winding road back to Miller’s post-apocalyptic wasteland — and there’s still almost a year to go before the movie unspools on theater screens on May 15, 2015.

Entertainment Weekly came up with a passel of photos that preview what a sun-blasted, sepia-toned world Miller has in store for Tom Hardy when takes over the title role of Max Rockatansky from the aging Mel Gibson. He will be joined by Charlize Theron as Imperator Furiosa.

The Mad (Max) and the Furious

Look, it’s an official photograph of The Dark Knight Rises’ erstwhile Bane, Tom Hardy, in character as Max Rockatansky in Mad Max: Fury Road!

I guess it gets pretty cold in the post-apocalyptic desert. Or maybe Max pulls that scarf up over his mouth before he speaks so that no one will understand his mumbling?

George Miller’s long-awaited next installment/reboot of the Mad Max franchise — co-starring Charlize Theron — has no release date yet. But, then again, it’s not even done shooting. Yes, still. Word is, an additional three weeks of production kicks off in Sydney on Nov. 22.

(If the photo looks a little familiar, it is; a version of this image was circulated as a copy of a copy of an autographed photo obtained by a fan a number of months back.)

The New Mad Max Looks Like…

Leave it to Twitter to source the “first look” image of Tom Hardy as the title character from Mad Max: Fury Road, in which he replaces Mel Gibson as former cop Max Rockatansky for the fourth film in the Mad Max franchise. Looks to be an autographed photo for a fan.

Director George Miller has been placating fans with images of the incredible vehicles to be featured in the movie, and while some industrious spies have been able to peep shots of Charlize Theron’s crew-cut hairstyle her character sports, until now, Hardy’s “new look” Max has been kept completely under wraps.

After seeing it, I have to wonder why they bothered. Hardy just looks like a dusty Gibson, with the scarf and the big knife in the holster being the obvious costume differences. Max sill looks to be wearing leathers to me. It’s kinda disappointing, actually. Of course that could be because, honest to Cthulhu, I don’t know what Tom Hardy looks like in real life! This could be his stunt double, for all I know. I do want to know if Hardy will he recite his lines in a muffled, Bane-like mumble?

Here’s the studio synopsis of the flick:

“Mad Max is caught up with a group of people fleeing across the Wasteland in a War Rig driven by the Imperator Furiosa. This movie is an account of the Road War which follows. It is based on the Word Burgers of the History Men and eyewitness accounts of those who survived.”

Mad Max: Fury Road opens in 2013, but an exact date has not been revealed.

Are You in a Frenzy for Mad Max: Fury Road?

If you thought details were sparse for The Wolverine, they are at a downright premium for a much larger, more star-packed production, namely Mad Max: Fury Road.

The long-gestating follow-up to 1985’s Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome (and before that, The Road Warrior/Mad Max 2 and Mad Max) is being directed by franchise honcho George Miller, but main character Max Rockatansky — the role that made Mel Gibson an international star — has been taken over by Tom Hardy, lately seen as Bane, the mush-mouthed villain of The Dark Knight Rises and in the current moonshine flick Lawless.

Here is what passes for a story synopsis of Fury Road:

“Mad Max is caught up with a group of people fleeing across the Wasteland in a War Rig driven by the Imperator Furiosa. This movie is an account of the Road War which follows. It is based on the Word Burgers of the History Men and eyewitness accounts of those who survived.”

The Dark Knight Rises: Hearing is believing!

Forget about the artsy and dramatic camera swings and zooms, Selina Kyle’s clunky dialogue (“There’s a storm coming” — really? Cliché much?) and Anne Hathaway’s shaky delivery… the real highlight of the third trailer for Christopher Nolan’s The Dark Knight Rises is the revelation that Bane’s unintelligible dialogue has been rerecorded!

Thank goodness that Nolan and Bane actor Tom Hardy backed off the foolhardy the idea of leaving Bane muffled for the entire movie. They were apparently hoping for some kind of artsy effect by making the villain so ridiculously impossible to understand, but apparently they realized that audiences would not flock to the film for multiple viewings if they couldn’t understand one of the main characters. It would have been cinematic suicide. But I’m sure the damning reviews would have been hilarious.

Now, if only Nolan could digitally replace Bane with a better foe from Batman’s rogues gallery…