Like any good Tarantino script, a very large number of quality actors wanted to be apart of it. This leads to lots of people expressing public interest in taking roles only to have to bow out when schedules do not align. As was the case early on in production when Jonah Hill reportedly was cast in the film.
Well things have finally come full circle as Deadline reports that Hill has indeed joined the cast after all:
The Weinstein Company has set Jonah Hill to play a role in Django Unchained, which is in production. I’m trying to find out who he’ll be playing, but am told it won’t be Scotty Harmony, the kid who loses Django’s slave wife Broomhilda to Calvin Candie… Hill was eyed for the role early on, but had to turn it down because his schedule was so busy. He’s back in another role.
Good for Hill and good for the movie to add another seasoned actor in what might be a bot part. Often times you hear people knock a film for ‘wasting’ a skilled actor in a smaller role. I actually take the opposing stance, the better the actor you can get for any role only enhances the movie.
Last week we had a chance to see the first teaser for Quentin Tarantino’s new film Django Unchained. The movie looked like the sexy love child between the classic blaxploitation and western genres, and an oddly natural next step for Tarantino after the Kill Bills and Inglorious Basterds.
Thankfully international audiences tend to need to be sold films differently than their North American counterparts, which allows for the release of this more strait-forward trailer that gives us a more traditional sense of the plot of the movie. For those new to the Unchained train, here is the official synopsis:
Set in the South two years before the Civil War, “Django Unchained” stars Academy Award®-winner Jamie Foxx as Django, a slave whose brutal history with his former owners lands him face-to-face with German-born bounty hunter Dr. King Schultz. Schultz is on the trail of the murderous Brittle brothers, and only Django can lead him to his bounty. The unorthodox Schultz acquires Django with a promise to free him upon the capture of the Brittles – dead or alive.
Django Unchained comes out on Christmas Day, so it is basically the Tarantino’s Christmas present to cinema fans everywhere. Check out the new international trailer after the jump.
Of the 42 massively anticipated films coming out over the next year, only one of them is a new Tarantino film. Django Unchained is one of the most exciting concepts to come down the pike in a long time, and the addition of such an amazing cast only cements the expectations.
Entertainment Weekly has unchained the first official shots from the film showcasing three of its high class stars. The first shot looks incredibly western-y with Christophe Waltz and Jamie Foxx looking fantastic in some period gear.
The second image is far more exciting. Leonardo DiCaprio as evil plantation owner Calvin Candie, who makes his strongest slaves fight each other to the death. This cruel basterd has Foxx’s wife, and the plot of the movie will generally revolve around his attempts to save her.
With a Christmas release date, hopefully we should be seeing some actual footage soon. Inglorius Basterds and Kill Bill were high water marks for Tarantino’s visual style, so there is great excitement to see what he does with a western sandbox. The possibilities are staggering when a filmmaker is on a career high, his concept is solid gold and has the cast to pull it off.
Back in ’07, Robert Rodriguez and Quinten Tarantino joined forces for an ambitious theatrical experiment. Grindhouse was a double feature of exploitation films that ran together on a single ticket. Holding these two films together was a series of fake trailers that completed the retro marathon’s vintage experience.
The hype for this dirty celluloid love fest rose to some pretty serious highest, prompting a contest that capitalized on the fake trailer angle. Contestants were asked to create a fake grindhouse-esque trailer in a similar style to those that were going to appear in the movie. The eventual winner of this contest was director Jason Eisener and his entry Hobo With A Shotgun.
Winning in equal parts because of the absurd simplicity of it’s premise and the skill with which the Canadian director was able to recreate the esthetic of low budget ’70s era exploitation films, Hobo With a Shotgun became an instant fan favorite and talks began to surface about expanding the trailer into a full feature. Now 4 years (and one Rutger Hauer) later Hobo With a Shotgun is a full length feature that lives up to all of the promise the original trailer hinted at.
With Quinten Tarantino’s newest journey into the world of “instant cult classics” making it’s way to Cannes and getting some mixed reviews, the promotions machine for Basterds is kicking it into high gear. Their brand new website (with a very catchy background theme) went live earlier this week, and now three clips of the film have hit the net.
The first is a dialog between Colonel Hans Landa and Frederick Zoller (Christopher Waltz and Dan Brhl, respectively) in which Landa discusses his feeling on members of the Jewish faith.
Like any good Tarantino script, a very large number of quality actors wanted to be apart of it. This leads to lots of people expressing public interest in taking roles only to have to bow out when schedules do not align. As was the case early on in production when Jonah Hill reportedly was cast in the film.
