Damon Houx
We're looking forward to Judd Apatow's 'This is 40' for a number of reasons, and one is Jason Segel. In the film he plays Jason, a personal trainer that Leslie Mann's character Debbie is going to partly for the exercise and partly because he constantly hits on her. In this new featurette, we see more of Segel's time in the film.
Though we're still months away from 'Iron Man 3's release, that doesn't mean we aren't going to get a trickle of steady publicity from now until May 3, 2013. The film has just released four new stills, including our first look at Rebecca Hall.
'Star Wars' rumoring isn't going to stop with just 'Episode 7' even if that picture hasn't signed a director or cast yet. On top of those rumors, we're now going to be hearing gossip about the entire next trilogy, and possibly all the spin-off movies after that. If the internet implodes on itself, it's going to be because of 'Star Wars.' Today's latest news: That they've approached Lawrence Kasdan and Simon Kindberg to write and produce Episodes 8 and 9.
We've seen competing asteroid pictures, competing "Friends with Benefits" films, competing destructive volcano pictures, but in 2012 we're getting competing "Bonding with your parents" movies, both within a week of each other. First comes 'The Guilt Trip' on December 19, and then 'Parental Guidance' on December 25. Now there's a new trailer for the latter.
For the build up to the December 25 release of 'Django Unchained,' Quentin Tarantino has started to do interviews, and in one of his latest he listed the actors who might have been his Django were it not for Jamie Foxx. That list? Idris Elba, Chris Tucker, Terrence Howard, Michael K. Williams, Tyrese Gibson and Will Smith.
Though 'The Amazing Spider-Man' tried to sidestep the Osborn family, the sequel 'The Amazing Spider-Man 2' is going to introduce us to Harry Osborn, and the role has already been narrowed to three candidates: Brady Corbet, Dane DeHaan and Alden Ehrenreich.
We're over six months away from the release of 'Iron Man 3,' but Marvel - coming off a pretty good year, what with 'The Avengers' and all - doesn't want to let the buzz slip away from them. And so now we get a new look at their villain in 'Iron Man 3,' The Mandarain.
It's been quiet on the 'Muppet 2' front for a while. We knew that James Bobin would return to write and direct, with writing assistance from Nicholas Stoller, and we knew that the sequel would be Jason Segel-free. But it looks like now they've started the casting process for the next film, and the first name is a bit of a surprise: Christoph Waltz.
It's easy to poke fun at George Lucas. He directed the prequel trilogy after all, and refuses to acknowledge the original cuts of the first three 'Star Wars' movies. But when Lucas does good, that's no joke. And today word broke that Lucas will be giving the majority of the money he got for selling Lucasfilm to educational philanthropy.
As if video game nostalgia weren't enough to get audiences into the theater, 'Wreck-it Ralph,' which opens November 2, has been laying out more and more content to get people excited. The latest are two featurettes that highlight the making of the film, and the voice cast, which includes John C. Reilly, Sarah Silverman and Jane Lynch.
Though he doesn't have the drawing power of the 'Twilight' franchise, Nicholas Sparks and films based on his work have become a cinematic sub-genre of modest success. Films like 'The Notebook,' 'Dear John' and 'The Lucky One' have been box office hits on a small scale. The latest Sparks film adaptation is 'Safe Haven.' And now it has a trailer.
The 'Iron Man 3' trailer. It's finally here, after a number of trailer teasers. And you get a good look and listen to Ben Kingsley's Mandarin, a taste of Guy Pearce's role in the film, and the sense that this is a film of scale, and that nothing is going to come easy for Robert Downey Jr.'s Tony Stark.