The Flickcast – Page 521 of 1030 – Stuff Nerds Love

Exclusive: Director John Wells Talks ‘The Company Men’

A couple of weeks ago, I named The Company Men on my top 10 films of 2010 list. The movie tracks a handful of employees at a large company, and follows their stories through the economic downturn.

It’s an amazing film (full review will run tomorrow) that captures all the anguish, anger, and fear I have witnessed through my own friends and family experience. This movie absolutely nails it, and it can be difficult to watch at times, because it hits so close to home.

When I was given the opportunity to interview director John Wells, I jumped on it.  This film means a lot to me, and I couldn’t wait to talk to the man who wrote, directed, and produced it. Wells has an impressive filmography as a producer on a myriad of projects.

He served as executive producer during the entire run of television’s ER and The West Wing. He has also been President of the Writer’s Guild of America.  Although he has directed several television episodes, this is his first feature film.

Right before we started the interview, I told him how much the movie meant to me, and shared a few personal stories about friends and family members who have suffered since the recession.

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Javier Bardem Offered the Lead in Ron Howard’s ‘Dark Tower’ Adaptation

We all know that sci-fi and fantasy book adaptations are huge right now. Harry Potter just about broke the box office, Twilight is continuing the trend, and Hunger Games is in the process of bringing that even further with another huge screen adaptation. Well, that’s not all, as Ron Howard and super producer Bryian Grazer are getting some movement on their adaptation of Stephen King’s Dark Tower series.

It’s now being announced that No Country For Old Men star Javier Bardem is now being courted for the lead in the film, and potentially “films”. From Deadline.

I’m told that Bardem has officially been offered the lead role by director Ron Howard and Universal Pictures. While formal negotiations haven’t yet begun, there’s a high level of enthusiasm internally that they’ve got their cowboy. Akiva Goldsman has scripted the first movie, and will write the TV component as well. Imagine Entertainment’s Brian Grazer is producing with Goldsman and the author.

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San Diego Comic-Con 2011 Announces Registration Date

After several missteps with their online registration process, San Diego Comic-Con organizers have finally announced an official registration date for 2011 attendees. For fans of the country’s largest comic convention, you may be familiar with some of the event’s online registration melt-downs that have plagued the con’s organizers over the last few months. Attendees trying to score passes to the July 2011 event were met with server errors, frozen screens and an overall frustrating time with the online registration system.

Con organizers faulted an online registration system run by a third-party company called  EPIC, which managed to fail twice in spectacular fashion: first on November 1st, the original on-sale date for Comic-Con 2011, and yet again on November 22nd. Potential attendees took to Facebook and Twitter in droves to complain about the technical glitches.

It remains to be seen whether convention organizers have switched registration providers, or whether they’ve perhaps worked out their problems for good this time around. Either way, we hope the third time is the charm.

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The Flickcast – Episode 85: Oscar Snubs and Flubs

This week on The Flickcast brings more insight, innovation and innuendo from your favorite co-hosts. That’s right, Chris and Matt are back and discussing all sorts of new and returning topics.

Some of those topics include the Oscars, Spartacus: Gods of the Arena, Call of Duty: Black Ops Map Packs, the Verizon iPhone, Fantastic Four developments, Smallville’s final season and potential spin-offs, the Dead Space 2 ads and much more.

Chris and Matt also made new picks this week including Matt’s pick of the Sam Raimi film Darkman the and Chris’ pick of the new Starz series Spartacus: Gods of the Arena.

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.

$300 Superhero Short ‘Lazy Teenage Superheroes’ Takes Over The Web

We all know unconventional superhero stories are all the rage right now, between Kick-Ass, Green Hornet, and the popular BBC series Misfits. Now one indie filmmaker is taking that trend to the web with a super low-budget short about your not-so-average super powered crime fighters in Lazy Teenage Superheroes.

Filmmaker Michael Ashton, who shot, wrote, cut, and did VFX for the short, brings humor, pop culture references, and the voice of this generation all together in a classic comic team-up setting. Here’s the synopsis.

Tyler is your average awkward teenager just trying to get by like the rest of us. Until one day, he moves in with three unusual roommates – Mitchell, Calvin, and Richard all have extraordinary, super human abilities. Although Tyler still has one thing they don’t have: ambition. Lazy Teenage Superheroes follows Ty as he tries to get his new “super” friends to put down the video games, get off the couch, and use their powers to help save the world, instead of themselves.

There are some low budget elements that you have to look past in order to get some some amazing visual effects and storytelling. With any luck, this will turn the heads of a few Hollywood bigwigs and allow them to realize that productions like these are what fans of the genre are looking for, not things like The Cape or a sequel to Ghost Rider.

You can check out the short after the jump, which is rapidly approaching the 500,000 views mark on YouTube in just over a week. You can also hit up Ashton’s official site for more details on the production.

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First Trailer For Sean Bean’s ‘Black Death’ Hits The Web

Sean Bean loves him some Medieval storytelling. Of most recent history, he is attached to HBO’s Game of Thrones and now getting the lead in the gritty tale of the Bubonic Plague, Black Death, from Magnolia Pictures.

Outside of Monty Python’s Holy Grail, not many cinematic representations of the Black Plague come to mind very easily, and that’s where this film is planning on stepping in (with less British humor and more gore). Here’s the official synopsis.

The year is 1348. Europe has fallen under the shadow of the Black Death. As the plague decimates all in its path, fear and superstition are rife. In this apocalyptic environment, the church is losing its grip on the people. There are rumors of a village, hidden in marshland that the plague cannot reach. There is even talk of a necromancer who leads the village and is able to bring the dead back to life. Ulric (Sean Bean), a fearsome knight, is charged by the church to investigate these rumors.

He enlists the guidance of a novice monk, Osmund (Eddie Redmayne) to lead him and his band of mercenary soldiers to the marshland, but Osmund has other motives for leaving his monastery. Their journey to the village and events that unfold take them into the heart of darkness and to horrors that will put Osmunds faith in himself and his love for God to the ultimate test.

From what we got in the trailer, you can expect this to be a very gritty representation of the times, with plenty of guts and blood. Fun! Check out the trailer after the jump, and catch the flick in theaters on March 11th

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Apple Reveals Data Plan, Calling Plan, More Details for Verizon iPhone

As we get closer to the release of the Verizon iPhone 4, details of the voice and data plans available for it are starting to emerge. Yesterday, we told you about Verizon’s intention to offer an unlimited data plan with the iPhone. Now, other details have been revealed at Apple’s website which pretty much complete the picture.

On Wednesday, the company posted details on its website showing voice, data and messaging plans that will be offered with the upcoming device. The company also posted a utility to check subscriber eligibility for the discounted prices. If you’re eligible for upgrade pricing you will get to pay $199 for 16 GB and $299 for 32 GB. If not, plan on spending $599 for 16 GB and $699 for 32 GB.

Also, as we thought, the Verizon iPhone will have two data plans at launch: unlimited data for $29.99 per month and unlimited data with 2GB of Personal Hotspot and tethering services for $49.99 per month.

Here are the full details:

Voice

• 450 minutes/month: $39.99
• 900 minutes/month: $59.99
• Unlimited minutes/month: $69.99

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Hunger Games Adaptation Gets A Release Date

Not since the first talks of the Twilight adaptation has there been this much chatter about the casting and production of a film. Now, with Suzanne Collins’ Hunger Games, fans everywhere are all salivating (no pun intended) to get more details about this big film adaptation.

Not long ago, director Gary Ross (Pleasantville) was announced to take on the big screen adaptation for Lionsgate, with Billy Ray (Shattered Glass) taking on the screenplay. Now that we have the crux of the pre-production lined up, we’re now getting a release date. From THR:

Lionsgate has chosen a release date for high-profile event picture The Hunger Games: March 23, 2012.

By going out in theaters in late March, Lionsgate is looking to prosper from spring break and the Easter holiday (Easter Sunday falls on April 8 in 2012). So far, Hunger Games has the March 23-25 weekend to itself.

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