Before I recount the gory details of Battleship‘s disastrous opening weekend, it behooves me to let you know yet again that The Avengers won the weekend. I adore The Avengers, but it has made so much money so fast that we are just about out of things to say about it in the Box Office report.

It settled a measly 46.6% for another $55+ million at the domestic box office. The Avengers scored a few more speed records, such as fastest film to $450 Million domestic, in 10 less days than the next best film. Next weekend will be interesting though, its first (potentially) non-first place hold will give a decent indication of how big of a final total we can expect.

The good news for Battleship is that it isn’t a complete and utter disaster worldwide. With its international release weeks in the film has already made over $200 Million. Of course it made a paltry $25 Million here in the states and will be viewed as a the new John Carter (and THAT film’s reign as biggest cinematic black eye might end up short-lived).

Continue Reading →

It’s a board-game movie, so I don’t think anyone has their expectations especially high, though the only other board-game movie I can think of off the top of my head is Clue, and it was fantastic. And Connect Four, but I think that’s a porno. Seriously, we all kind of knew this wasn’t going to be that good.

Anywho, the plot can be deduced from the trailer: Aliens come down and get nasty with the Navy, leading to an all-out aquatic assault. Wedged in between there is a love story involving a plucky, up-and-coming Lieutenant Alex (Taylor Kitsch) and the daughter (Brooklyn Decker) of the fleet Admiral (Liam Neeson).

There’s more: Alex’s brother Stone (Alexander Skarsgard) is a Commander aboard the destroyer USS Sampson, while Alex is aboard the USS John Paul Jones. Alex wants to marry his girlfriend but is worried about asking her father. The girlfriend is a physical therapist helping out an amputee.

Continue Reading →

Even with Battleship already out in theaters in other countries, there’s still time for the big PR push to keep on going in the US of A. Case in point is this new clip from the movie which debuted last night on MTV.

In it we see some of our men and women of the Navy get their action on and try to attack and alien space ship. We also get more of our favorite cast in action as well.

One thing this clip does prove is that machine guns don’t really have much effect on giant alien ships and those aliens are not to be trifled with. We could have told you that.

UPDATE: As a bonus, we’ve also got another clip for you which just arrived in our mailboxes. Enjoy.

Check out the new clips after the break. Look for Battleship, directed by Peter Berg and starring Taylor Kitsch, Liam Neeson, Alexander Skarsgard and Rihanna, hits the US on May 18.

Continue Reading →

When I first heard there was going to be a movie based on the Battleship tabletop franchise, I was expecting some modern naval epic. Instead, like Michael Bay going to the Ninja Turtles, we got aliens. And now, seeing the game based off the movie off the game takes on a FPS perspective, we can’t help but watch with morbid curiosity at the potential insanity that could be brought to us.

It’s obvious that developer Double Helix Games, known for Silent Hill Homecoming, G.I.Joe: The Rise of Cobra and Green Lantern: Rise of the Manhunters, were forced to tie in to the theme’s of the movie as opposed to the board game like the 1993 NES and SEGA Game Gear classic. But there is something unmistakably interesting about the premise behind the game, by association to the movie, that we can’t take our eyes off of it.

It could be the thought of combining Call of Duty and Halo style gameplay together on a modern locale like Hawaii. Or it could be the premise of a piece of our childhood being completely shattered like it was during the summer of G.I. Joe, Wolverine Origins, Transformers: Rise of the Fallen and Terminator: Salvation.

But, luckily, the Battleship tabletop game didn’t have characters that we could hold close to heart only to be torn from us. Instead, many people just remember the frustration of trying to program the damned Electronic Battleship that almost never worked as well in real life as it did in the commercial. So now, little white and red plastic pegs are replaced with high grade military grade weaponry in a FPS along with a tactical sea-based warfare game alongside it.

Continue Reading →

Often when searching the vastness of the Internets for interesting things to bring you, our very important readers, we come across people doing cool things with video. This time around it’s Doug King and his show Trailer Shots.

In this particular show, King combines two of the things we love the most: movie trailers and booze. The premise is simplicity itself, he highlights a few trailers for upcoming movies and then details a themed cocktail recipe that fits in perfectly with the trailers presented.

The most recent episode features trailers for upcoming movies Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter, Battleship and Ridley Scott’s highly anticipated Prometheus. Then, King introduces viewers to a new libation known as the Alien Secretion. We haven’t tried it yet but it sounds pretty good.

We’ve also got an earlier episode of the show after the break to share with you. In this one, look for trailers from upcoming movies Dark Shadows, Rock of Ages, and The Bourne Legacy. And, of course, a cocktail recipe called Barnabas Collins, which works well if you’ve seen the trailer for Dark Shadows.

Continue Reading →

I can hear the pitch meeting now. It probably went a little something like this: Peter Berg: “Transformers made a crapload of money, right? Well, this is Transformers on the ocean. See, robots attack ships and try to sink the them.” Studio Exec: “You’re a genius. Here’s a bag of money.”

I don’t know if Battlship will be good or not (probably not) or if Peter Berg is really a genius (I’m guessing no) but I can guarantee the movie will be busy and extremely loud. To prove that fact, please take a look at the new trailer just released today. We have it for you after the break.

In it you see lots of robots and whatnot trying to attack a group of ships at sea. All they wanted to do was have some simple war games and now these damn underseas robots have made this shit get real — or something like that. Does the story really matter? Not much as long as stuff explodes convincingly. Hint: it mostly does.

Peter Berg “directs” a cast of pretty people like Taylor Kitsch, Brooklyn Decker, Alexander Skarsgård, Rihanna and the always cool Liam Neeson (obviously doing this one for the money).

As the trailer says “The battle for Earth begins at sea” on May 18, 2012. Check it out after the break.

Continue Reading →

If toys make an effective inspiration for movie franchises, why not games? After all, regardless of its relative creative merits, the Transformers franchise has managed to make a metric crapload of money.

So, why not try to do the same with a movie based on a classic game? It could work. That’s just what director Peter Berg and his team have done with the upcoming Battleship. To prove it, we’ve got the first trailer for the film for you right now.

In it we get a lot of the film’s story of a young, upstart naval officer (Taylor Kitsch) in love with his Admiral’s daughter (Brooklyn Decker) who needs to put aside his personal feelings and learn to be a man when an alien invasion threatens his fleet of ships. The movie is, of course, based on the classic board game Battleship and from the trailer, it actually looks like director Berg gets that he’s making a movie based on a game, is in on the joke and doing his best to make it a fun and exciting film.

When I first heard they were making a movie based on Battleship, I was, to say the least, skeptical. After watching the trailer I’m now intrigued, especially as to how Berg and company are going to pull it off. Who knows, maybe they can?

Check out the trailer after the jump. Battleship, which stars Taylor Kitsch, Liam Neeson, Alexander Skarsgard, Brooklyn Decker and Rihanna, arrives in theaters on May 18th, 2012.

Continue Reading →

Just when you thought Battleship was a dumb idea to bring to the big screen, think again.

Atari–yes, the company that created the gaming console that’s been outdated for nearly 3 decades–has decided that their third biggest selling title, Missile Command, is worthy of a big-budget reboot, as they’re bringing the idea to 20th Century Fox. Here’s the breakdown from Variety.

Game is the third top title that Atari has set up as a film property, after Universal Pictures acquired “Asteroids” and Sony Pictures Animation picked up “Rollercoaster Tycoon.” It also becomes the latest brand from the ’80s to get the bigscreen treatment, with U readying a number of toy-based properties from Hasbro, including “Battleship,” and Mattel having set up others, including “He-Man and the Masters of the Universe” at Sony and “View-Master” at DreamWorks.

With “Missile Command,” the scribes have little to adapt beyond a title to build a plot around and a Cold War-heavy scenario of players having to defend their cities from being destroyed by a rain of missiles. Game celebrated its 30th anniversary last year.

Continue Reading →

Liam Neeson has joined the cast of Battleship today. Neeson was added to the cast of the Universal Pictures science fiction action adventure just as filming began today.

Battleship is based on the popular board game by the same name. The writers are obviously taking some liberties with the game in order to create the film. In the movie, a naval fleet at sea must protect the earth from alien invaders.

Neeson will be playing Admiral Shane, a Naval officer whose daughter is engaged to the film’s main protagonist, Alex Hopper, who is played by Taylor Kitsch (X-men Origins:Wolverine).

Neeson’s daughter will be played by relative unknown Brooklyn Decker, who had guest appearances on television shows including  Chuck and Ugly Betty. Alexander Skarsgaard (True Blood) plays Kitsch’s older brother, and R&B songstress Rihanna is making her acting debut as she plays Kitsch’s crew mate and a weapons specialist. Tom Arnold will also be part of the cast, but no news on what his role will entail.

Set for release on May 18th of 2012, Battleship comes from producers Scott Stuber, Peter Berg, Duncan Henderson and Sarah Aubrey, as well as Hasbro’s Brian Goldner and Bennett Schneir. The flick will shoot on location in Hawaii and Baton Rouge.

This week On the Radar a bunch of gaming news about Halo and Gears of War, Red Sonja switches up celebrity hotties, Mark Strong talks Sinestro in Green Lantern and Tom Arnold takes to the sea to fight aliens!

Court dismisses Marvel, Stan Lee law suit.  Excelsior!

While Stan Lee has been working overtime on film cameos and convention appearances he’s also been dealing with legal fights.  This one was between Stan Lee Media Inc. and it’s former board members.  At it’s most basic level the case was over ownership of mainstream characters like Spider-Man, the Hulk, and Fantastic Four.

The judge dismissed the case based on two primary factors.  First, the shareholders did not acquire their shares until a year after the issue of ownership occurred and second, said shareholders should not have waited nearly a decade to file their case.  No word yet on whether the decision will be appealed so until next time true believers…

Halo movie will be happening at some point

What should be an easy sell as far as a video game adaption, Halo has struggled to gain traction with studios.  However, Frank O’Connor of Microsoft Game Studios has said the film will happen eventually:

“We’re going to make a movie when the time is right,” he said. “We own the IP. If we want to make a movie, the scale of all the other stuff that we do changes dramatically. We make tens and tens of millions of dollars on ancillary stuff, toys, apparel, music and publishing. If we do a movie all of that will grow exponentially. We have some numbers if we do a movie, but it changes everything. It also changes our target and age demographic.”

Continue Reading →

It’s ironic how we were just having the discussion on this week’s podcast that Sam Worthington feels like a forced “action star” in Hollywood today, as news is now hitting that Taylor Kitsch has been cast to star in Peter Berg’s film adaptation of the timeless board game Battleship. From Heat Vision:

Pete Berg is directing the action adventure movie, whose story has drawn heat from some quarters for adding an “alien invasion” element to what has been traditionally seen as a grounded Naval game. The script, by Jon and Erich Hoeber, sees an international fleet come together to battle a water-bound armada of otherworldly origin.

In “Battleship,” Kitsch is playing a Naval commander named Alex Hopper, described as “wildly spirited” and “a great seaman but a lousy politician.”

Kitsch was a relative unknown a few years ago, but since being cast as Gambit in last year’s X-Men Origins: Wolverine, he’s already been cast as the titular lead in Pixar’s upcoming John Carter of Mars as well as being the lead in the TV adapatation of Friday Night Lights. Much like how Worthington was put over the top by getting roles in Avatar, Terminator: Salvation, and Clash of the Titans.

With this new role, it could seem that Kitsch is going to be the next “Worthington”, but what could that mean for the first “Worthington”? Is there room in Hollywood, amidst the stack of reboots and remakes as far as the eye can see, for two actors that Hollywood is forcing down our throats?

Because it’s just not good enough to make films about the E*Trade Baby or Battleship, Columbia Pictures is now taking it back to the 1980s with a remake of the Val Kilmer sci-fi comedy Real Genius.

That’s right. Not many people remember it, but before he was Batman, Jim Morrison, Dieter Von Cunth, Iceman, and the voice of K.I.T.T., Kilmer got his start in a little teen sci-fi comedy from 1985. In it, Kilmer plays Chris Knight, an incredibly bright university student that has to use his intellect to get back at a nefarious professor who steals his newest project for military purposes.

The super producer team of Brian Grazer and Ron Howard, who were the driving force behind such projects as The Davinci Code, 24, Angels & Demons, Arrested Development and many more, will be taking the lead on this one, so expect to see a few big names to drop by.

No word on a production schedule just yet, but since Columbia and the two producers are already on board, expect to see movement on this remake in the next few months.

The only thing now is to propose a remake of other great science fiction comedies of the 1980s such as Zapped! and Mac and Me.