Movies

Thomas Jane as Rick Grimes? It might have happened if “The Walking Dead” creator Frank Darabont had had his way. At a special Q&A following a Hero Complex Film Festival screening of “The Mist,” Darabont, addressing a question from an audience member, spoke briefly about the thematic similarities between two pairs of projects on his resume — the Stephen King adaptations “The Shawshank Redemption” and “The Green Mile,” and his 2007 horror film, which follows a group of people trapped in a shopping market after a mist envelopes their town and charts their personal devolution as they face terrible, heartbreaking choices, and the hit AMC zombie series  he launched in 2010. He also pointed out that he initially had wanted the star of “The Mist,” actor Thomas Jane, to play lawman Rick Grimes, the part that eventually went to actor Andrew […]

Guillermo del Toro served as a guest of honor at the fourth annual Hero Complex Film Festival last weekend in Hollywood, appearing on stage for a Q&A between screenings of  two Spanish-language movies — “The Devil’s Backbone,” the 2001 gothic horror movie set during the Spanish Civil War; and “Pan’s Labyrinth,” his Academy Award-winning dark fantasy set during Francoist Spain. While taking questions from the audience, Del Toro elaborated on his planned adaptation of DC Comics’ “Justice League Dark,” saying that he wanted to focus on characters including Constantine, Deadman, Etrigan, Swamp Thing and Floronic Man. “I was never a superhero guy,” Del Toro said. “I thought I could do some of the edgier, darker stuff. “One of my most cherished memories when I was a kid was running to the drug store, the newsstand, on my bike to get […]

With 2009′s “Star Trek,” filmmaker J.J. Abrams breathed new life into one of science fiction’s most venerable franchises. His sleek cinematic reboot re-introduced moviegoers to brash but loyal Capt. James T. Kirk and his level-headed foil Spock, played with a winning hint of modern bromance by Chris Pine and Zachary Quinto. Now, Abrams has returned to the USS Enterprise with “Star Trek Into Darkness,” which beams into theaters on a course toward what’s expected to be a roughly $100-million opening. The Times’ Betsy Sharkey raved in her review that the film, “bursting at the seams with enemies, wears its politics, its mettle, its moxie and its heart on its ginormous 3-D sleeve.” She went on to describe the movie as the best release of the summer movie season so far. Late last month, before Abrams embarked on a whirlwind publicity […]

Guillermo del Toro served as a guest of honor at the fourth annual Hero Complex Film Festival this past weekend in Hollywood, appearing on stage for a Q&A between screenings of two of his most personal films, the Spanish-language movies “The Devil’s Backbone,” a 2001 gothic horror movie set during the Spanish Civil War, and “Pan’s Labyrinth,” his Academy Award-winning dark fantasy set during Francoist Spain. The writer-director talked about the ways his children have influenced his work — “If I had not had my two daughters, I couldn’t have written, much less do, ‘Pan’s Labyrinth’ because the girl Ofelia is very much based in how much admiration I have for their character,” Del Toro said. He talked about “Pan’s” as a film very much about “choice and disobedience.” “It was very important for me to make a movie in […]

Two classic Studio Ghibli films are getting the Blu-ray treatment. Disney is releasing Hayao Miyazaki’s “My Neighbor Totoro” and “Howl’s Moving Castle” on May 21. This year marks the 25th anniversary for “My Neighbor Totoro,” which follows sisters Satsuki and Mei (voiced by Dakota and Elle Fanning, respectively, in the Blu-ray’s 2005 Disney dubbing) as they move to the countryside and discover their new neighbor, a furry forest spirit named Totoro. Only children can see the strange animal ghost — “a seven-foot forest spirit who looks like an outsized cross between a bunny rabbit and a fuzzy throw pillow,” critic and historian Charles Solomon wrote in his 1993 Times review of the film. “Guided by their supernatural friend, the sisters share a series of adventures, soaring over the landscape while Totoro’s roars make the winds blow,” Solomon wrote. “But the story […]

Guillermo del Toro served as a guest of honor at the fourth annual Hero Complex Film Festival this past weekend in Hollywood, appearing on stage for a Q&A between screenings of two of his most personal films, the Spanish-language movies “The Devil’s Backbone,” a 2001 gothic horror movie set during the Spanish Civil War, and “Pan’s Labyrinth,” his Academy Award-winning dark fantasy set during Francoist Spain. But the appearance also provided the writer-director with a chance to tout his latest, “Pacific Rim,” a $180-million love letter to the kaiju movies he loved growing up. Showing the latest trailer for the film, which debuted online Thursday, spurred him to discuss his love for Japanese pop culture. He talked about reading manga series like “Astro Boy,” watching films by Toho, the Japanese production company behind Godzilla, and fancifully sketching giant robots. (To […]

Spectacle, you say? The new trailer for Guillermo del Toro’s “Pacific Rim” delivers it on a massive scale, with out-of-this world creatures and towering robots duking it out on land and in the ocean, all while bathed in stunningly beautiful blue and gold light. Due in theaters July 12, the film, which Del Toro co-wrote with Travis Beacham, takes place in a near future, after a race of giant alien monsters has invaded our world via an inter-dimensional portal, prompting mankind to build equally enormous robots called Jaegers to defeat them. The hulking mechanized weapons are manned by an elite team of pilots, including Charlie Hunnam’s Raleigh Becket and Rinko Kikuchi’s Mako Mori, who represent humanity’s best line of defense against the beastly threat. The new clip explains “Pacific Rim’s” monster premise in a little more detail, but it’s the […]

The highly anticipated sequel to J.J. Abrams’ 2009 reboot “Star Trek” opens in theaters tonight, but Chris Pine, Zoe Saldana, Leonard Nimoy and more “Star Trek Into Darkness” stars walked the silver carpet Tuesday evening for the film’s Hollywood premiere. The film follows Capt. James T. Kirk (Pine) and his Enterprise crew as they embark on a revenge-fueled manhunt to capture the man behind a terrorist attack on Starfleet. The search takes them to a war-zone world, putting the ship and the lives within it in danger and causing Kirk to question his abilities as captain. “I think a lot of maturing happens in this film for Kirk, for a man who thinks he knows everything and leads with his gut and leads with his heart, and is all kind of passion and heart,” Pine said during the film’s presentation […]

Earth’s victory over alien invaders in “Independence Day” may have been but the first battle in a war. The film’s co-writers — director Roland Emmerich and producer Dean Devlin – told the Hero Complex Film Festival audience at a matinee screening of the 1996 blockbuster Sunday that they have ideas for a sequel (and maybe more) but, as Devlin put it, “things have to align … the planets have to get together.” And planets getting together is a thrilling prospect for fans of these spectacle specialists. Emmerich said he and Devlin have discussed why the aliens came in the first place, what the bigger story is. The director called the aliens a “swarm intelligence, and we are individual intelligence – and even if we kill each other … we have something very special, we have this indomitable human spirit.” So, […]

Any public appearance by Guillermo del Toro is a buffet of goodies for fans of monsters, robots and things that go bump in the night. The director’s visit Saturday night to the Hero Complex Film Festival was no exception, with Del Toro sharing a new trailer for his upcoming sci-fi monster movie “Pacific Rim” and dropping details on future projects “Justice League Dark” and “Monster” in between screenings of two of his most personal films, “The Devil’s Backbone” and “Pan’s Labyrinth.” Del Toro said “Pacific Rim,” which opens July 12 and pits massive robots against invading monsters in a near-future world, was inspired by his childhood love of Japanese pop culture. He talked about reading manga series like “Astro Boy,” watching films by Toho, the Japanese production company behind Godzilla, and fancifully sketching giant robots — an obsession he has […]