No, this movie isn’t a sequel or prequel to Hobo with a Shotgun, although I can see how you may make that mistake. Instead, we’ve got Gerard Butler wielding the weapons and taking care of business in this Marc Forster-directed action/drama film with a heart.

Coming soon from Relativity Media, the film is based on the true story of Sam Childers, a tough guy who’s seen and done too much. After some particularly brutal misadventures his life takes a big turn when he finds purpose in establishing a haven for Sudanese children.

We’ve got the trailer for the film for you today and in it we can see what we need to see to know this movie could go one of two ways. Those two ways depend pretty much on if we believe Butler can pull off another tough but inevatible self-sacrificing role.

We’re betting he can, but you be the judge. Watch the trailer after the jump.

In addition to Butler, Machine Gun Preacher also stars Michelle Monaghan and Michael Shannon. It’s set to be released on September 23.

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Here at The Flickcast we get sent all kinds of videos made by fans. Many of them are, sad to say, not very inspired. Some, however, like the ones from Freddie Wong, are indeed awesome.

This most recent one has been around for a bit but we just got a chance to take a look. In it, creator msignore takes the familiar tale of 300 and moves it to the only other place we can see that story ever taking place: a bowling alley. Yes, you read that right, a bowling alley.

It’s a pretty interesting tale full of danger, suspense and, of course, shirtless bowling in slo-mo. We look forward to seeing what else this guy comes up with.

Check it out after the jump.

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As usual, the Hollywood brain trust has decided that instead of looking forward and creating some original work, they will instead look to the past for inspiration and take yet another great film and add it to the remake/reboot pile. The film in question this time, John Carpenter’s Escape from New York.

Granted, Escape isn’t exactly a classic in the strictest sense of the word, but it is considered by many, myself included, to be one of the best action/sci-fi movies of the last thirty years. So, much like Predators and so many others of late, I’m not exactly thrilled it will be receiving the reboot treatment.

That said, there is one potential bright spot here now that we know Breck Eisner will be handling the directing duties on the film. His recent work on The Crazies showed he’s got a lot of skills and my hope is that he’ll be able to do something really interesting and innovative with the Escape story.

In case you’re not familiar with the original 1981 film (which if you’re not, get familiar) it was set in a futuristic 1997 where a walled-off Manhattan island had been turned into a maximum-security prison. Air Force One, with the President on board, crashes on the island and newly captured super criminal and ex-war hero Snake Plissken (Kurt Russell) is coerced into a rescue mission. The new film will reportedly try to mix in an origin story for Snake with the story of the original film.

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Well, there wasn’t much of a box office battle this weekend as Clash of the Titans easily slayed the competition with a total weekend haul of $61.4 Million. Some weekend totals are reflecting Thursday night earnings as well, which brings the total closer to $64 Million.

Despite the fact that most critics were horrified by the look of the post-production 3D of the movie, and practically begged audiences to see the 2D instead, it seems that roughly half of the weekend revenue was from 3D screenings (LA Times.) The 3D money train marches on, at least for another weekend.

It is of interest to note that the movie did drop almost 20% from Friday to Saturday, which can be a direct result of bad word of mouth.

Tyler Perry pulled out yet another surprise as Why Did I Get Married Tooearned $30 Million. Perry has an an unconventional marketing strategy-he never pre-screens his movies for critics. His movies always enjoy an opening day unfettered by any reviews, positive or negative.

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This week on The Flickcast Chris and Matt celebrate a one year anniversary milestone with guest host Elisabeth Rappe. Some of the topics under discussion this week include proposed sequels to Independence Day, a reboot of the Godzilla franchise, the Caprica mid-season finale and the oddity of “Chat Roulette.”

The trio also made some great picks as they always do including Elisabeth’s pick of the Gerard Butler film Beowulf & Grendel, Matt’s pick of AMC’s series Breaking Bad and Chris’ pick of the original Clash of the Titans featuring Laurence Olivier and Harry Hamlin.

As always, if you have comments, questions, critiques, offers of sponsorship or whatever, feel free to hit us up in the comments, on Twitter, at Facebook and MySpace or via email.

Several prognosticators predicted that the one-two punch of Jennifer Aniston and Gerard Butler co-starring in a romantic comedy would equal box office gold. Well, until the reviews started trickling in. When the dust settled, The Bounty Hunter had amassed a truly rotten score of 9% favorable reviews on Rotten Tomatoes. Ouch.

Despite that, the film made $2 1Million, good enough to place it in third place for the weekend. With a production budget of around $40 Million, it is way to early to call this a flop. $21 Million is a respectable opening weekend take.

The Red Queen and company from Alice in Wonderland continue to surprise everyone.Now in its third weekend in release, Alice is still bringing in some pretty big numbers. It dropped 45% over last weekend, for $34.5 Million, bringing its three week cumulative total to a fantastic $265 Million.

So what box-office star beat out Aniston for the number two spot? Would you believe nobody?  A cast of relative unknowns starred in Diary of  Wimpy Kid, which you probably have never heard of unless you happen to have elementary school-aged children.

It is a hot book franchise for those who run in the pre-tween circles, and apparently that was enough to buoy its box-office take.  Diary narrowly edged out The Bounty Hunter with $21.8 Million, but with a much more modest budget of $14 Million, it is already profitable.  There are plenty of books (4 already out, with plans for a fifth this year) to pillage for a franchise, too.

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There are many things to like about Law Abiding Citizen including both Jamie Foxx and Gerard Butler’s performances, direction by F. Gary Gray, cinematography by Jonathan Sela and a rather taught and suspenseful screenplay by Kurt Wimmer.

The movie follows Clyde Shelton (Gerard Butler), a family man whose wife and daughter are brutally murdered in front of him while he lies helpless during a home invasion. When the killers are caught, Nick Rice (Jamie Foxx), an ambitions Philadelphia prosecutor, is assigned to the case.

Nick offers one of the suspects a light sentence in exchange for testifying against his accomplice. Sadly, it’s not the guy who did the actual killings but his accomplice that goes to jail. The real killer goes free.

Cut to 10 years later, the man who got away with murder is found dead and Shelton, without remorse, admits his guilt. Then he issues a warning to Rice: Either fix the flawed justice system that failed his family, or more people will die in the name of real justice.

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2010 is in full swing and some really great movies are hitting store shelves this week for the first time and for the first time on Blu-ray. This week’s releases include Gamer, Magnolia, Boogie Nights, Che, Damages, the complete run of ABC’s canceled too soon Defying Gravity and the Blu-ray release of Whiteout with Kate Beckinsale (pictured above).

Check out this week’s releases:

Movies

According to Greta ~ Hilary Duff, Ellen Burstyn (DVD)

Boogie Nights ~ Mark Wahlberg, Heather Graham, Burt Reynolds, Julianne Moore (Blu-ray)

Bourne Supremacy (Single-Disc Blu-ray/DVD Combo) ~ Matt Damon, Brian Cox, Karl Urban (Blu-ray)

Bourne Ultimatum (Single-Disc Blu-ray/DVD Combo) ~ Matt Damon, David Strathairn, Scott Glenn (Blu-ray)

Che (Criterion Collection) ~ Benicio del Toro (Blu-ray)

Gamer ~ Gerard Butler, Amber Valetta, Michael C. Hall, Kyra Sedgwick (DVD and Blu-ray)

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300, one of the biggest hits of 2007, directed by Zack Snyder and based off the comic book mini-series by Frank Miller (The Spirit, Sin City the movie and comic series), is now supposedly getting a prequel. For the prequel, the story is set in time to see the battle of Marathon – which took place ten years before the events of 300.

During the battle, Xerxes’ father, Darius I, battled the Athenians. I believe this is passingly mentioned in a mocking tone in 300, when Leonidas denies acquiescing to Xerxes’ messengers, before kicking them down a giant hole in the middle of town.

Miller, who will again be writing and drawing the comic series before it’s taken to the big screen, has said to the LA Times, “It’s the Battle of Marathon through my lens” and that he’s just about ready to begin. Of course, the interesting thing about 300, and some might say the frightening thing about this new story; is the level of fact and stylization Miller had put into his original story.

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Well, I’m  humbled and a little embarrassed to admit how much I enjoyed this movie. You see, before I actually started reviewing movies, this is exactly the type of film that would cause me to turn up my nose. I’ve made an earnest attempt to go outside my comfort zone, and damned if I am not pleasantly surprised every once and a while. All I knew about this film was that it starred Jamie Foxx and Gerard Butler. I’m not exactly a big fan of either.

Law Abiding Citizen is a bloody, sick, and twisted tale of revenge. What if you crossed a gruesome revenge movie like I Spit on Your Grave with a implausible, tech-savy caper like Mission Impossible? Why, you would get something like this film.  Suspend your logic and enjoy the ride. Wholly original, Law Abiding Citizen had me on pins and needles, and there are enough twists and turns to make even the most jaded movie-goer giddy.

Let’s get my disclaimer out of the way so we can get down to the business of reviewing the movie:

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As a big fan of Warren Ellis and his writing, I’m particularly happy to report that one of my favorite comics of his, Gravel, has now been optioned by Legendary Pictures for development as a feature film. This latest acquisition by Legendary makes a lot of sense considering they have several genre projects already going including Inception, Sucker Punch, Jonah Hex and Clash of the Titans.

In case you’re not as familiar with Gravel as you should be, it was created by Ellis in 1999 and is published by Avatar Press in its most current form. It centers on William Gravel, a soldier in the British S.A.S. who uses his skills in dark magic to moonlight and battle supernatural beings for clients in order to make extra cash. Along the way he encounters all manner of nastiness but still manages to not only survive, but to flourish.

According to the trade, Ellis will do the first draft of the screenplay and will also serve as an Executive Producer on the project, with Rick Alexander Producing. Given my fondness for Ellis’ work, I hope this continues the trend of his projects being adapted for the big screen.

No word on a director on any casting for Gravel, but for my money I would like to see Zack Snyder make this his next project after Sucker Punch. And, while we’re at it, how about Gerard Butler as Gravel? I think that combo, when combined with Ellis’ story, would make one hell of a movie.

After a week off your favorite team is back in action with an all new episode of The Flickcast. This week, Chris, Matt and Christina make up for lost time and get right back into it with discussions on topics like the formation of DC Entertainment, the new Titan Maximum show from the creators of Robot Chicken, new iPod Nanos, the box office success of Tyler Perry, the box office failure of Whiteout and new, or returning, TV shows the team is excited about like Dollhouse, Flash Forward, Trauma and more.

The team also made some great picks again this week including Matt’s pick of the new film Gamer featuring Gerard Butler, Christina’s choice of TV’s Project Runway and Chris’ pick of Mark Millar and John Romita, Jr.’s comic Kick-Ass.

As always, if you have comments, questions, critiques or offers of sponsorship, feel free to hit us up in the comments, on Twitter and at Facebook, MySpace or via email.

Thanks for listening.