News

"This isn't your territory. It's their territory." Another international remake of a Hollywood classic! China has already remade the 1997 action-horror film about giant snakes called Anaconda, which was a huge hit when it debuted in the 90s. This new version is similar but follows a group of circus performers stranded in a rainforest. They must figure out how to survive when they discover they're marked as bait for the snakes. This Chinese remake stars Terence Yin, Nita Xia, Paul Che, Jiu Kong, Ken Lok, Wang Xing Chen, Wang Gang, Wang Zi Run, Xu Shao Hang, and Wu Hao. The original movie ended up with a few bad direct-to-video sequels (including Lake Placid vs. Anaconda in 2015) and Hollywood has also been trying to reboot it with screenwriter Evan Daugherty hired to write a new script. Until then, this Chinese version might be just as ridiculously entertaining as the original, which infamously...

Robert De Niro, Samuel L. Jackson in Jackie Brown Screenshot: Lionsgate/Miramax Every actor has worked on bad movies at some point in their career. For a long time, though, Robert De Niro’s bad films always felt like exceptions to the rule. The actor earned his place as one...

Alexander Nevsky stars in the action western.

Premiere Entertainment Group (Peg) has bulked up its Cannes sales slate with worldwide rights to Joe Cornet’s action western Gunfight At Rio Bravo starring Alexander Nevsky.

Craig Hamann has written the screenplay in which Nevsky plays a mysterious Russian gunslinger who aids a marshal and a sheriff as they stand up to a bloodthirsty outlaw gang known as The Hellhounds who have invaded their small East Texas town.

Cornet, Matthias Hues, Olivier Gruner, and Anna Oris round out the key cast. The film was produced by Nevsky for Hollywood Storm. Eta Films...

Joe Cornet directed from Craig Hamann screenplay.

Premiere Entertainment Group has bulked up its Cannes sales slate with worldwide rights to action western Gunfight At Rio Bravo starring Alexander Nevsky

Joe Cornet directed the film from Craig Hamann’s screenplay in which Nevsky plays a mysterious Russian gunslinger who aids a marshal and a sheriff as they stand up to a bloodthirsty outlaw gang known as The Hellhounds who have invaded their small East Texas town.

Cornet, Matthias Hues, Olivier Gruner, and Anna Oris round out the key cast. The film was produced by Nevsky for Hollywood Storm. Eta Films...

Exclusive: Twilight and FBI: Most Wanted actor Kellan Lutz has been set to star in thriller Palido, which LA-based sales firm Premiere Entertainment Group will be selling at the Cannes market.

Lutz will play an attorney with a military past who hunts down the gang that killed his wife and brother and took his daughter. Javier Reyna (Regionrat) is directing from his original screenplay.

The crime thriller is due to start principal photography on July 11 in the state of Washington. Additional casting is underway.

Elias Axume is producing for Premiere Entertainment, which handles worldwide sales, with Moctesuma Esparza (Selena), and Al Bravo for Al Bravo Films. Premiere’s Carlos Rincon serves as executive producer.

“We are excited to have Kellan on board the film,” said Premiere CEO Elias Axume. “He’s a dynamic actor with wide range that elevates any film to the next level.”

Lutz is also known for movies The Legend Of Hercules,...

Villanelle's not having a good week, forcing her to turn to the only therapist she knows: Martin.

Killing Eve Season 4 Episode 3 saw significant advancements in Eve and Carolyn's separate investigations.

Our favorite duo had a few scenes with each other throughout the hour, but none of them were entirely fun.

Villanelle broke into Eve's hotel room by posing as housekeeping and cleaned herself up after her previous murders.

Killing Season 4 Episode 2 saw the tragic killings of May and her father, the Vicar.

This event reverted Villanelle to what she had avoided doing for so long: killing (intentionally).

Now, Villanelle turned to the only person she could for help: Eve.

However, Eve still wanted nothing to do with Villanelle and told her to leave the hotel room when she got back.

This hurt Villanelle, so she turned to a different kind of help!

She contacted Martin (with Eve's tablet), the therapist,...

Deals follow successful business on Mickey Rourke thriller Commando.

Premiere Entertainment Group (Peg) has struck a raft of major territory deals on EFM sales title Blowback starring former UFC champion Randy Couture from the Expendables franchise and Twilight franchise regular Cam Gigandet.

The action thriller sees Nick (Gigandet) revenge out for after he is betrayed and left for dead by Jack (Couture) and his crew during a Las Vegas heist. Louis Mandylor, Michele Plaia, Rafael Cabrera, and William McNamara round out the key cast.

Los Angeles-based sales, production and financing outfit Peg has closed deals with Rialto in Australia, Dolphin Medien in Germany,...

Anthony Rhulen, the founder and CEO of FilmEngine Entertainment, died January 15 at age 51.

He died in Pasadena after losing a battle with addiction, according to the Times Herald-Record, the newspaper in upstate New York where Rhulen grew up in Monticello, NY, and where his family still resides.

Rhulen launched FilmEngine, an indie financing/producing company, which made 13 films that included the big genre hit The Butterfly Effect and its sequel, Lucky Number Slevin, Rum Diary, O, The Cleaner, Sleepwalking, Evidence, Killing Season and Hunter’s Prayer.

Rhulen is survived by his mother, Judy Rhulen; siblings, Erik Rhulen, Harry Rhulen and his wife, Jennifer, and Suzy Loughlin and her husband, Joseph; as well as nieces and nephew, Juliette Loughlin, and her husband, Rob Crawford, Zoe Rhulen and Max Rhulen.

After graduating from Syracuse University, Rhulen came to Hollywood by way of the insurance agency Film Bond Inc., and soon he acquired...

Anthony Rhulen, a producer known for The Butterfly Effect, died on Jan.15 according to a report in The Times Herald-Record. He was 51.

The newspaper noted that he passed away in Pasadena from reasons relating to addiction.

Rhulen was born in 1969 in Monticello, New York, and began his working life in insurance before starting a producing career in 2001 with the romantic thriller O starring Josh Hartnett and Julia Stiles.

He went on to found the company Film Engine, which financed and produced thirteen films including The Butterfly Effect (and its sequel), The Rum Diary, The Cleaner and Killing Season.

In 2010, Rhulen received the Dream ...

Anthony Rhulen, a producer known for The Butterfly Effect, died on Jan.15 according to a report in The Times Herald-Record. He was 51.

The newspaper noted that he passed away in Pasadena from reasons relating to addiction.

Rhulen was born in 1969 in Monticello, New York, and began his working life in insurance before starting a producing career in 2001 with the romantic thriller O starring Josh Hartnett and Julia Stiles.

He went on to found the company Film Engine, which financed and produced thirteen films including The Butterfly Effect (and its sequel), The Rum Diary, The Cleaner and Killing Season.

In 2010, Rhulen received the Dream ...

Exclusive: Seberg screenwriters and husband-and-wife writing partners Anna Waterhouse and Joe Shrapnel have been set by 20th Century Studios to adapt the Agatha Christie classic And Then There Were None. Disney will keep the film in its pre-World War II period in which Christie wrote the novel, but with a fresh take. Shawn Levy’s 21 Laps is producing alongside the Christie Estate.

Christie’s novel tells the story of 10 seemingly disparate individuals invited to an isolated island, with the house guests murdered one by one during the course of their stay. The book has sold more than 100 million copies in eight languages.

I’m told this will be a freestanding project and not a third installment of Christie’s Hercule Poirot mysteries at 20th Century that began with Murder on the Orient Express and continues with Death on the Nile, with Kenneth Branagh again directing and starring.

Shrapnel and Waterhouse...

One of the most memorable and star-studded creature features of the ’90s, Anaconda is being reimagined at Columbia Pictures.

According to The Hollywood Reporter, Evan Daugherty (writer of Killing Season and co-writer of 2014's Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and 2012's Snow White and the Huntsman) has been hired to write a screenplay for an "an all-new and all-modern take" on Anaconda.

While plot details have yet to be unveiled, THR reveals that the studio is "hoping to take a Meg-style approach" to the reimagining. According to Box Office Mojo, the 2018 colossal shark movie brought in more than $530 million worldwide on an estimated $130 million production budget. A producer and director have not been announced for the new Anaconda film at this time.

Released in 1997, Anaconda followed a film crew and a guide with a hidden agenda deep into the Amazon jungle, where they found themselves prey to a massive snake of prehistoric proportions.

Continuing his trend of offbeat genre features, Daniel Radcliffe’s latest role finds him locked in a live-streaming, real-life death match. Directed by Jason Lei Howden, Guns Akimbo premiered back at Tiff last year and also stars Samara Weaving, Natasha Liu Bordizzo, Ned Dennehy, Rhys Darby. Ahead of a late February release on VOD and in theaters, the first trailer has now arrived.

Jared Mobarak said in his Tiff review, “Just because you can troll the trolls on the internet from the comfort of your couch while wearing nothing but underwear and a bathrobe doesn’t mean you should. It’s not because it’s a waste of time, but that you probably didn’t activate your Vpn and the death match website you’re commenting on now knows your address. And they don’t take kindly to anonymous nerds projecting on them the aggression they’re too afraid to unleash on their bosses.

"That's when it all started to go sideways." Momentum Pictures has debuted an official trailer for a crime comedy titled Finding Steve McQueen, a new film directed by Mark Steven Johnson. Not to be confused with the biopic film about actor Steve McQueen, titled Chasing Bullitt, this film is about some thieves from Ohio and it doesn't really involve the iconic actor. Set in 1972, a gang of close-knit thieves based in Youngstown, Ohio attempt to steal $30 million in illegal contributions and blackmail money from President Richard Nixon's secret fund. All based on a true story, of course. Travis Fimmel (from Warcraft) stars, along with Rachael Taylor, William Fichtner, Forest Whitaker, Lily Rabe, Jake Weary, Rhys Coiro, and Louis Lombardi. This really looks quite boring. Here's the official trailer (+ poster) for Mark Steven Johnson's Finding Steve McQueen, from YouTube: When an unlikely gang of thieves from Youngstown, Ohio attempt to...

Cornerstone Films and German production company X Filme are teaming up with producer Joel Michaels on a remake of Michaels’ 1980 supernatural horror “The Changeling,” Cornerstone announced Wednesday in Cannes.

The film marks the first joint film production under the partnership between German’s Beta Cinema and Cornerstone, which was announced in February when Beta bought a minority stake in the London and L.A. based international sales company. The two company’s are partnering to produce, finance, distribute and sell distinctive, commercially driven English-language features for contemporary audiences. Beta acquired a strategic stake in X Filme in February last year. Cornerstone was set up in April 2015 by Alison Thompson and Mark Gooder (pictured).

Mark Steven Johnson will write and direct the update of “The Changeling,” which follows a musician who returns to his childhood home following the death of his young daughter where, after a series of terrifying events, he...

Corsan boss accused of swindling, forgery, tax breaches and money laundering.

Belgian film financier Paul Breuls, founder of Corsan, has been arrested as investigations continue into allegations of fraud against his company.

The 66-year-old Monaco-based producer is currently being detained by authorities in Antwerp, Belgium, facing criminal prosecution as well as civil action.

Belgain tax shelter specialists Corsan co-financed such films as Lee Tamahori’s The Devil’s Double, Killing Season starring John Travolta and Robert De Niro, and Paul Haggis’s Third Person, which starred Liam Neeson.

The company is also behind Tamahori’s yet to be released adventure epic Emperor, starring Adrien Brody.

A spokesperson for the Public Prosecutor’s Office in Antwerp confirmed to Screen that Breuls has been held in detention in Antwerp since June 21 because he is considered a flight risk.

He stands accused of swindling, forgery, tax breaches and money laundering, whether through Corsan or affiliated companies.

“In general...

Sylvester Stallone is the master at making the most out of simplicity. So good is this action legend at taking a basic idea and making it exist forever, that eventually he tries to give said idea a certain degree of gravitas. How does he do this you say?

Take Rocky Balboa. In the first film, this lovable schlub just wants to have a girlfriend and go the distance in a dream title fight. By the fourth film in this wondrous saga, Rocky is defending America on Russian soil and beating a fighter who (realistically) would have Ko'd the Italian Stallion in 1 round. In fact, Rocky was almost Ko'd in one round, however, the referee let it go on. How's that for Sylvester Stallone making the most of something simple?

He did the same thing with Rambo. In the first film, John Rambo was a simple man who just wanted to...

Emperor backer recently lost protection from its creditors.

Monaco-based Paul Breuls, founder and CEO of sales and finance outfit Corsan, has denied that the troubled Belgian company is teetering on the brink of bankruptcy.

This week, the Emperor, Killing Season and Third Person backer, lost protection from its creditors having previously been safeguarded through local law. On Monday, the commercial court in Antwerp concluded that the arrangement should be terminated immediately, citing the company’s restructuring plans as “neither clear nor credible”.

Speaking to Screen, Breuls has revealed that his lawyers are appealing the court decision and claims that Corsan can avoid bankruptcy. During the appeal process, he expects Corsan to be able to trade as normal and the protection from the company’s creditors to be re-instated.

Corsan asked for protection from its creditors in June. The company’s troubles reportedly stem from investors not having received the promised tax certificates for the money they have...

Belgian financier of films including Third Person and Killing Season filed for protection from its creditors last month.

Antwerp-based financier, tax shelter specialist and production outfit Corsan has issued a press release expressing optimism about its ability to continue in business, after recently being granted legal protection from its creditors until October 31.

Silence and Third Person backer Corsan asked for protection from its creditors (who include Haacht Brewery) last month and the company is attemping to work out a restructuring plan with them.

The company’s troubles reportedly stem from investors not having received the promised tax certificates for the money they have invested in at least one of Corsan’s films.

Corsan claims in the recently issued press release, quoted in Flanders News, that the delay is due to the tax authorities not issuing the correct certificate in time.

Corsan boss Paul Breuls points out that the company has three international projects in the pipeline and that...

Get ready for one helluva murder mystery. Freeform's new series Guilt debuts tonight, and introduces viewers to a riveting murder case about an American student in London who finds herself being dubbed suspect No. 1 after her Irish roommate is murdered. Is she innocent or did she really do it? It's hard to tell as more scandalous secrets are uncovered and more untrustworthy characters (Detectives, lawyers and royal family members, oh my!) are introduced. E! News sat down with creator Kathryn Price, executive producer Todd Slavkin and star Billy Zane at the 2016 Atx TV Festival in Austin, where they promised that there will be resolution by season's end. So don't worry, no The Killing season one...

facebook

twitter

google+

We check out the John Travolta films that have been bypassing cinemas over the past few years...

In the days leading up to writing this article, which will cover a recent period in which he’s made a bunch of films that have quickly drifted to DVD or VOD, I had to stop and ask myself a genuine question: how do I actually feel about John Travolta?

The answer that rose from the depths of my coal-black, hell-bound soul was weirdly surprising. Brushing aside his personal life – which is not worth getting into here – I found I had nothing but good feelings surrounding his work as an actor.

I grew up with Carrie, Grease, Look Who’s Talking and perhaps his best film, Brian De Palma’s Blow Out. I also grew up with some of his clunkers, like the Look Who’s Talking sequels and 80s concept comedy The Experts. He’s been acting since before I was born, so he’s always been in the background of my pop culture landscape – working solidly for more than 40 years.

Over those decades, his catalogue has defied explanation. He seems to unapologetically pick whatever he feels moved to be a part of regardless of criticism and, goddamn it, there’s something inherently admirable about that. Unlike, say, Bruce Willis, he doesn’t seem happy with doing just a couple of days work on a shoot in a smaller part; more often he will choose to be the star, or at least have equal-ish screen time – even if the project isn’t boasting a huge budget or a big name director. When Pulp Fiction thrust him back into the mainstream, he was still picking up stuff like Phenomenon and Michael in the following years.

I can confidently say that I’ve never seen the man actively 'phone in' a performance and even when he’s overcooked it, there’s usually a decent reason. I mean, if you find yourself on the set of Face/Off going up against The Cage, you’re gonna need to fight fire with fire. Even in Battlefield Earth, he was at least trying.

But in the last half decade we’ve found ourselves in a deeper Travolta trough than we’ve ever been in before. His films aren’t quite cutting the mustard in the industry like they used to and, after a run of flops that have seen him drift back into television with an impressive turn as Robert Shapiro in The People V. O.J. Simpson, I find myself wondering 'will Travolta ever be big business again?'

So, I took a look at four of the films that Travolta’s worked on in the last few years - each of which has effectively gone straight to DVD (save for a few days in a cinema) - to see if anything’s slipped under our radar that needs a boost…

The Forger (2014)

Rotten Tomatoes Score – 7% IMDb Rating – 5.7/10

In The Forger, John Travolta is a man serving a prison sentence who makes a call to get out of it early so he can spend more time with his dying son. In exchange for help with bribing the judge to release him early, John’s expected to help forge a Monet for his erstwhile crime boss, played by Hell On Wheels’ Anson Mount.

As the film casually flits between the forge/heist story and the bonding relationship between John and his son, it’s a testament to director Philip Martin - who comes from a TV background where he’s learnt his trade by helping to bring Prime Suspect and Wallander crime stories to life – that it isn’t a complete disaster. In someone else’s hands, it very well could have been.

Instead, The Forger has a delicate touch and a lot of the shots are interesting and unexpected without being jarring. It flows very smoothly and there’s an undercurrent of genuine love stemming from Travolta’s performance. After losing his own son, making a film about losing a son might have been cathartic and definitely quite close to the bone. I don’t want to read too much into Travolta’s choices, because that way madness lies, but it does really come across as though he cared about this one.

The Forger’s family scenes - with Travolta’s son Tye Sheridan and father Christopher Plummer - play really well, and while the tone of these scenes doesn’t gel with the heist elements of the plot, there’s good stuff here.

Overall, there’s not quite enough substance to sail the whole thing smoothly down the river, but it’s not bad by any stretch and the reviews have been a little harsh on what is actually a perfectly average film. No, you won’t watch it again, but neither will you probably regret watching it in the first place.

Criminal Activities (2015)

Rotten Tomatoes Score – 47% IMDb Rating – 5.8/10

Hoo boy, that title. That’s the worst title. I can’t imagine anyone involved could have wanted it. It’s maybe the most generic title I’ve ever seen. It’s so bad that even when I picked up the DVD, looked at the cover and saw that Michael Pitt (Hannibal, Boardwalk Empire) and Dan Stevens (The Guest, The Guest, The Guest) were Travolta’s co-stars in this, I still felt like I was drowning in the beigeness of it.

The film itself - Jackie Earle Haley's directorial debut - is an unfortunate mess. The plot, such as it is, involves Michael, Dan and the rest of the lads from their childhood gang borrowing money from a mob boss (Travolta) to invest in some sure-fire stocks that immediately collapse, leaving them out of pocket and in John’s. To pay off the debt, he wants them to kidnap a guy, because that guy’s friend kidnapped someone else. It’s convoluted and makes little sense, due to the fact that there’s a big twist coming at the end which will clarify most, if not all of it.

The actors are doing wayyy too much in the film - directed by an actor who clearly wants the actors to have room to act - and therein lies the fundamental problem. Apart from a great turn by Edi Gathegi (Gone Baby Gone, X-Men: First Class, Crank) it’s impossible to point a finger at anyone else in the cast and say 'yep, you, good job' because there’s just too much going on.

The twist is actually decent, but everything leading up to it is a headache. Working on a low budget, most of the scenes are dialogue-heavy, arduous and reliant on excessive coverage – so what you end up with is a film where a load of dudes sit in a room together and shout and swear at each other a lot. I wanted to take that final twist aside, buy it a drink, hug it, and reassure it that it deserved better.

I’m afraid to say there’s not much here to recommend, which is ironic given that it’s had the most positive reviews of the bunch.

I Am Wrath (2016)

Rotten Tomatoes Score – 13% IMDb Rating – 5.2/10

I Am Wrath is the worst film of these four by a long chalk.

Here, John stars as a man who decides payback is needed when his wife (Rebecca de Mornay) is killed before his eyes. That’s really all there is, plot-wise. See, it turns out he’s a man with a very particular set of skills and yada yada yada off he goes.

The script - written by Paul 'nope, nothing you’ve heard of' Sloan - is so very, very bad. I am going to tell you how bad it is, so you don’t think I’m just whistlin’ Dixie here:

During his wife’s funeral, John tells the priest that he’s an atheist after the priest gives him a bible in his time of need. Later, Travolta flings this bible across the room angrily. He then stops, pulls a full Joey Tribbiani 'smell-the-fart', slowly approaches the discarded bible, picks it up and reads a line about wrath with the dumbest revelatory expression on his face as the music builds. He sees this as a sign that he should become wrath, despite his earlier insistence that he thinks religion is total garbage.

Later, when asked who he is, Travolta looks determinedly into a mirror and says “I am wrath” – he said the name of the movie you guys! Holy shit. Honestly, I could not believe how hackneyed the whole thing was, not to mention bizarre - the film regularly abandons its serious 'violence begets violence' tone whenever John’s Bff Christopher Meloni turns up, suddenly becoming a jokey buddy comedy.

This was hard to get through. Please avoid it at all costs, for there is nothing here to keep you warm at night.

Killing Season (2013)

Rotten Tomatoes Score – 11% IMDb Rating – 5.4/10

De Niro and Travolta – together at last?

Well, the opening sequence gives us a bit of background on the reason we’re all here. Something bad happened during the Bosnian War that will bring our two main dudes together for some serious vengeance. The sequence is sepia, because past, and ohhhhh god, here comes the present…

It’s at this point that we discover that John is going to attempt an Eastern European accent. It is Not Good. It is not John Malkovich in Rounders, but it is Not Good and we are stuck with it for the duration.

His facial hair during this first scene is also completely ridiculous. I can’t adequately describe how bonkers it is, but try to imagine a werewolf that can only grow stubble carefully shaving a circle into its face. It’s a relief to find that they decided to tone this down for the rest of the film - he looks more like he’s wearing a black chinstrap from then on.

Despite the accent and the questionable chin beard, it’s a lot easier to buy Travolta as a man on a mission of vengeance during Killing Season than it was during I Am Wrath. He’s obviously jazzed to be working with De Niro and he’s knuckled down to bounce off him, keeping it low-key and making an effort not to overdo it.

As a result of this equilibrium, we also get a glimpse of a pre-Meet The Parents De Niro - which is very much welcomed, sweet lord - and the two men head into the second act ready to take each other on, hunt each other down and resolve those Bosnian sins of the past in the most violent way possible.

The script - by proposed Tomb Raider reboot scribe Evan Daugherty - occasionally stumbles, but is solid enough. The direction is fine. It’s fine. It’s probably Mark Steven Johnson’s best film (but when his other major films are Daredevil and Ghost Rider, that’s not exactly a gush) and as the two leads hunt and trap each other, a lot of Predator love oozes out of the frame. Unfortunately, this is not Predator, but you could do worse on an evening than to sit through this instead (if you don’t own Predator).

…Oh my god you guys. We should totally watch Predator right now.

Until next time, and until the next rebirth of Mr Travolta, I bid you adieu.

Next time: the straight to DVD movies of John Cusack

Follow our Twitter feed for faster news and bad jokes right here. And be our Facebook chum here.

See related Bruce Willis: examining his recent straight-to-dvd movies DVD & Bluray Feature Movies Kirsten Howard John Travolta 14 Jun 2016 - 05:16 The Forger I Am Wrath Criminal Activities Killing Season...

Essie Davis as.Miss Fisher.

ABC TV has received a record thirty-three nominations — the most of any network — for this year.s Logie Awards, to be held May 8.

Essie Davis, star of Miss Fisher's Murder Mysteries, is in the running for big prize, the Gold Logie.

Davis is also nominated for the Best Actress and Most Outstanding Actress awards.

The Doctor Blake Mysteries star Craig McLachlan is up against Please Like Me's Josh Thomas for the Best Actor award.

Other ABC acting nominees include Patrick Brammall (Glitch), Sarah Snook (The Beautiful Lie), Deborah Mailman (Redfern Now: Promise Me), Tim Minchin (The Secret River), Emily Barclay (Glitch) and Rarriwuy Hick (Redfern Now: Promise Me).

In the entertainment and comedy categories, The Weekly with Charlie Pickering, Utopia, Shaun Micallef's Mad as Hell, Please Like Me and Gruen all picked up nominations..

Sarah Ferguson's Hitting Home and The Killing Season will...

After a string of successful live-action fairy tale adaptations such as Maleficent and last year's Cinderella, Disney is exploring yet another iconic character, with a revisionist twist. The Hollywood Reporter reveals the studio has picked up a project entitled Rose Red, which follows the story of Snow White's sister. While fairy tale fans may recognize the Rose Red name, the project will present an entirely new story.

Rose Red is a character who did appear in the original Grimm Brothers' fairy tale, but she was featured in a different adventure separate from the story which the iconic Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs was inspired by. This new project started as an original script by Justin Merz (The Boxcar Children), which was envisioned as a stand alone movie. Screenwriter Evan Daugherty (Snow White and the Huntsman) came up with a different take described as a "companion piece" that sticks...

ABC iview has maintained its pole position as the most used free-to-air internet TV site in 2015..

ABC iview hit a new record in November with more than 40 million program plays (which is more than double the program plays from the same time last year) and had over 2 million visitors to its site and apps each month.

Total ABC prime-time share was stable year-on-year at 14.3 per cent, and ABC TV remained the leading daytime network, according to a company statement.

The ABC Kids iview app, launched in March, had over half a million downloads.

ABC Television director, Richard Finlayson, said the national broadcaster went into the year acknowledging that audience viewing habits were shifting..

"We had to reflect this in our programming, delivery platforms and the way in which we reported on audiences, and I.m delighted with the results on all fronts,. he said.

.Our success is testament to the...

After merging his company with Wtfn and producing Oddball with Steve Kearney, Richard Keddie has returned to his roots as an independent producer.

Via his banner The Film Company, Keddie is developing a slate of film and TV projects including Stalking Julia, a feature film on Julia Gillard which will star Rachel Griffiths, who will also co-produce.

It was an amicable split from Wtfn after a partnership of two and a half years. .I decided I am happier running my own company,. he tells If.

He.s co-developing some projects with Us-based Sheila Hanahan Taylor, who was one of the producers on Oddball.

He describes his Gillard biopic, which is based partly on Kerry-Anne Walsh's book The Stalking of Julia Gillard, as completely different from the ABC.s The Killing Season.

Sarah Ferguson's three-part documentary, which examined the forces that shaped Labor during the Kevin Rudd / Julia Gillard leadership years,...

The veteran actor recently walked out of a Radio Times interview – if only he took the same approach to his recent run of dud films like The Intern

Be honest: how eagerly are you looking forward to The Intern? Imagine the possibilities: the plot of The Devil Wears Prada, but this time with Anne Hathaway in the Meryl Streep role, and – genius casting alert! – Robert De Niro in the junior position lately vacated by the over-promoted… Anne Hathaway! Or is The Intern just a lazy retread of The Internship, as its title alone certainly suggests? The “old guys” in The Internship, Vince Vaughn and Owen Wilson, were just fortysomething flotsam left adrift by the tsunami-damage of the internet upon the world economy. They were still shy of midlife crisis time, still able to muster up a boner and not needing help to get off the toilet. De Niro’s character,...

We're entering the dog days of summer -- the perfect time to binge-watch some new TV shows and movies on Amazon. You can do it outside, if you want, to not feel so guilty. But why feel guilty about streaming all eight seasons of HBO's "Curb Your Enthusiasm"? It's pretty, pretty good. You can also buy movies like the amazing "Mad Max: Fury Road," which hits Amazon Instant Video on August 11.

Amazon just issued its list of new titles available for streaming on Prime and available for purchase through Amazon Instant Video. (If you missed the July titles, here they are.) So check out all the August additions below.

New in August - Available for Streaming on Prime

TV

Olympus Season 1 -- 8/1/2015

Curb Your Enthusiasm- Complete Series -- tbd

Wishenpoof - Original -- tbd

Movies

The Patriot -- 8/1/2015

The Longest Day -- 8/1/2015

Unforgiven -- 8/1/2015

The Legend of Longwood --...

Lionsgate

As the name suggests, the so-called “geri-action” movie involves actors of the elder variety generally behaving in a way not befitting of their advanced years. Liam Neeson kick-started the trend by rebranding himself as an action hero with the Taken films and now everybody seems to be at it.

60-year-old Denzel did it with 2 Guns and The Equalizer, 71-year-old Robert De Niro did it with Killing Season and Grudge Match, and virtually everyone’s at it in The Expendables and Red franchises. Hell, even King of the Cockneys Michael Caine was blasting geezers away in Harry Brown aged 77.

The arthritic-fun doesn’t stop there. Some aging former A-listers who’ve fallen a tad out of favour are now trying to break back into Hollywood’s good books via action movies of their own. 61-year-old Pierce Brosnan had a go last year with The November Man, both Sean Penn (54) and...

The Forger

If you couldn’t get enough of John Travolta at the Oscars (he’ll never live the Adele Dazeem/Idina Menzel moment down), and have missed him in modern cinema (his last movie being 2013’s Killing Season), then get excited about his newest movie, The Forger.

Set to come out in April, the film follows the story of world class art forger Raymond Cutter, as played by Travolta, who makes a deal with some scrupulous characters in order to duck out of his prison time. Unfortunately for him, he’s now stuck stealing an original Monet out of a museum, making a perfect copy of it, and replacing the original painting with his copy in the hopes no one will be able to spot the differences. With a heist of this size, Cutter must rely on his talent, his street smarts, and both his son and father as...

Crystal Dynamics

Producer Graham King has been planning a new movie version of Tomb Raider for a few years, and I was watching pretty closely. As development went on, very few details were leaked but I did manage to pick up some scraps. For example, they were looking for a much younger Lara Croft than Angelina Jolie’s version, with the story set to be something of a “first mission” affair. It seemed to have some similarities Rhianna Pratchett’s story for the 2013 game but was certainly not a direct adaptation.

But just as the pieces were starting to come together and that movie’s outline take shape before my eyes, the reset button has been hit. As reported by Deadline, Warner Bros. have now come on board to back and distribute the film, and Evan Daugherty has been brought on to write a new screenplay.

So all bets are off,...

Nearly two years after MGM and Gk Films announced their Tomb Raider reboot, Warner Bros. has boarded the project along with screenwriter Evan Daugherty. The scribe takes over writing duties from Hawk Ostby and Mark Fergus, whom Gk Films hired back in May 2011. No story details were confirmed at this time, although the reboot is expected to feature a much younger actress playing Lara Croft, as she goes on her first adventure.

Angelina Jolie first starred as Tomb Raider heroine Lara Croft in the 2001 video game adaptation Lara Croft: Tomb Raider, which spawned the 2003 sequel Lara Croft Tomb Raider: The Cradle Of Life. Both movies earned over $443 million at the box office worldwide during their theatrical runs. The reboot does not have a director attached at this time.

Warner Bros. will co-distribute Tomb Raider with MGM, with Gk Films' Graham King producing. No production schedule was given, but the...

Nearly two years after MGM and Gk Films announced their Tomb Raider reboot, Warner Bros. has boarded the project along with screenwriter Evan Daugherty. The scribe takes over writing duties from Hawk Ostby and Mark Fergus, whom Gk Films hired back in May 2011. No story details were confirmed at this time, although the reboot is expected to feature a much younger actress playing Lara Croft, as she goes on her first adventure.

Angelina Jolie first starred as Tomb Raider heroine Lara Croft in the 2001 video game adaptation Lara Croft: Tomb Raider, which spawned the 2003 sequel Lara Croft Tomb Raider: The Cradle Of Life. Both movies earned over $443 million at the box office worldwide during their theatrical runs. The reboot does not have a director attached at this time.

Warner Bros. will co-distribute Tomb Raider with MGM, with Gk Films' Graham King producing. No production schedule was given, but the...

John Travolta is in talks to star in the action-thriller I Am Wrath for Patriot Pictures and director Chuck Russell (Eraser). While no deal has been finalized yet, the producers are already seeking supporting actors to join John Travolta. Back in September 2012, Nicolas Cage and director William Friedkin were attached to the project, although it never moved forward.

The story centers on a man (John Travolta) who becomes frustrated with the local police when they fail to find his wife's killer. He uncovers massive corruption within the department, and becomes a vigilante who swears to take down these crooked cops. Paul Sloan wrote the screenplay based on an original story by Yvan Gauthier.

Production is scheduled to begin next month in Columbus, Ohio. John Travolta is also attached to play O.J. Simpson's defense attorney Robert Shapiro in the FX series American Crime Story, but that will shoot after he wraps on I Am Wrath.

With two main characters already cast in Cuba Gooding Jr. and Sara Paulson, American Crime Story: The People Vs. O.J. Simpson just landed their biggest name yet. Deadline reports that John Travolta has joined the cast of the American Horror Story spin-off as Simpson attorney Robert Shapiro. Travolta has seen a decline in his big screen gigs in recent years. Having been relegated to supporting roles in films like Savages or direct to Redbox fare like Killing Season, the Oscar-nominated actor...

If you’ve read my Top 10 Movies of 2014 list, you’ll know I proclaimed the vast amount of really good movies released this year but for all the good movies, there has to be some bad… And the bad were Really bad this year. From unfunny comedies to weird vanity projects that were seemingly made just for friends and family of the film makers attached, to some truly awful horror movies it seems that 2014 will be marked by some truly terrible films – some of which made it to the big screen!

The criteria is the same as my “best of” list: it has to be a movie I’ve seen this year, one that was released this year, i.e. making its UK debut, or a new movie that I’ve seen at a film festival that might not necessarily have been distributed as of yet. Also, the cut off...

As nominated by our writers, here are the books of 2014 we can’t recommend highly enough…

Closing the final page on the very best books leaves you with a single urge: to share it. We’re talking about the kind of books that make you want to follow strangers down the road, tugging at their elbow and saying “seriously, you’ve got to read this”.

Here then, is our equivalent of doing that. These are the books published in 2014 that our writers felt compelled to share. If there’s one that you feel similarly enthused about, feel free to recommend away in the comments section...

Half A King – Joe Abercrombie

Unless you’ve been living in hermit-like seclusion recently, you can’t help but notice that Young Adult fiction is having its moment. Not even a genre a few years ago, it burst into the public consciousness with a flurry...

Stars: John Travolta, Robert De Niro, Milo Ventimiglia, Elizabeth Olin, Diana Lyubenova, Kalin Sarmenov, Stefan Shterev | Written by Evan Daugherty | Directed by Mark Steven Johnson

Emil Kovac (Travolta) is a former Scorpions soldier based in Serbia on the assignment of his career: find and capture Colonel Benjamin Ford (De Niro). Wanted for being a former Nato operative, Ford has now retired from war and lives a reclusive lifestyle in the Appalachian mountains. Determined to finish what his people started, Kovac poses as a friendly European tourist and tracks Ford to his secret hideaway. As Kovac gets all the evidence he needs, he pursues Ford in a brutal game of cat and mouse, intent on bringing him to justice.

A film starring Robert De Niro and John Travolta going straight to DVD and Blu-ray? That can’t be right surely? Well if it’s The Killing Season it can.

First Blood,...

The management team of Millennium Entertainment, led by CEO Bill Lee, and private investment firm Virgo Investment Group have partnered to acquire the Millennium Entertainment library and distribution platform.

The group is acquiring the assets from a consortium of investors including majority shareholder Nu Image led by Avi Lerner and Trevor Short, White Horse Pictures principals Nigel Sinclair and Guy East and Prentice Capital, who are understood to have owned 20% apiece.

The company will operate under a new name. Going forward the Millennium brand will be held solely by Nu Image subsidiary Millennium Films, the production arm that is not a part of the transaction.

Lee will continue as CEO and all existing management are expected to remain in place. The company and Virgo plan to grow the platform through investments in film content, distribution growth and corporate acquisitions. Millennium Entertainment had courted buyers since it was put up for sale in April 2013.

“I’m proud of our...

The management team of Millennium Entertainment, led by CEO Bill Lee, and private investment firm Virgo Investment Group have partnered to acquire the Millennium Entertainment library and distribution platform.

The group is acquiring the assets from a consortium of investors including majority shareholder Nu Image led by Avi Lerner and Trevor Short, White Horse Pictures principals Nigel Sinclair and Guy East and Prentice Capital, who are understood to have owned 20% apiece.

The company will operate under a new name. Going forward the Millennium brand will be held solely by Nu Image subsidiary Millennium Films, the production arm that is not a part of the transaction.

Lee will continue as CEO and all existing management are expected to remain in place. The company and Virgo plan to grow the platform through investments in film content, distribution growth and corporate acquisitions. Millennium Entertainment had courted buyers since it was put up for sale in April 2013.

“I’m proud of our...

John Travolta is as fascinating and complex a member of the Hollywood fraternity as you could wish for. Iconic performer, experienced pilot, vocal Scientologist and mangler of pronunciation of Idina Menzel.

He has managed to appear in not just some of the best known, but also some of the best-full-stop films of the past forty years – Saturday Night Fever, Carrie, Grease, Pulp Fiction, Get Shorty, Face/Off, The Thin Red Line, Hairspray and the upcoming Gummy Bear The Movie – whatever one might think of the consistency of his output (and there have been some horrendous misfires), it is hard to imagine too many actors playing Danny Zuko, Vincent Vega, Castor Troy, Sean Archer, Chili Palmer and Edna Turnblad with equal conviction.

After the temporary resuscitation of Look Who’s Talking turned out to be a false dawn, Tarantino did Travolta a favour of inestimable proportions by casting him in Pulp Fiction,...

To mark the release of Killing Season on 18th August, we’ve been given 5 copies to give away on Blu-ray.

Two veterans of the Bosnian War – American Benjamin Ford (De Niro) and former Serbian soldier, Emil Kovac (Travolta) – meet once more to settle old battle scores, but end up engaged in a psychological cat and mouse game that becomes a deadly, personal war. Set against the backdrop of a forbidding and remote mountain landscape and full of tense stand-offs Killing Season is thrilling action packed new movie.

Also starring Milo Ventimiglia (Rocky Balboa, TV’s Heroes), written by Evan Daugherty (Divergent, Snow White & The Huntsman) and directed by Mark Steven Johnson (Daredevil, Ghost Rider) Killing Season will pack a punch this summer.

Please note: This competition is open to UK residents only

a Rafflecopter giveaway

The Small Print

Open to UK residents only The competition will close 25th August at...

Deborah Ann Woll has lined up her first major post-True Blood gig — and it’s a Marvelous one.

Related True Blood‘s Anna Camp on Sarah’s ‘Unexpected’ Reunion With [Spoiler]

The actress has been cast as Karen Page in Marvel’s upcoming Daredevil series that will premiere in 2015 on Netflix, according to EW.com. Her character originated in the episode 1 of the Stan Lee comic book on which the TV series will be based — serving as a secretary and love interest for both Matt Murdock (the titular hero’s alter-ego) and his partner Foggy Nelson.

Woll joined True Blood...

The six-episode fourth season of The Killing will be available on Netflix on August 1st 2014, and the company has released the first real trailer — promising cover-ups of an old mess, new mysteries, driving to a climactic conclusion of the story. Watch The Killing Season 4 trailer now after the jump. The Killing Season […]

The post The Killing Season 4 Trailer: New Cases and a Climactic Conclusion appeared first on /Film.

NBC’s The Night Shift celebrated its Season 2 pick-up on Tuesday night with an audience of 7.2 million total viewers paired with a 1.5 rating — rising 20 and 25 percent week-to-week and up 10 percent and a tenth from its last airing out of an original America’s Got Talent.

Agt opened NBC’s night with 11 mil and a 2.6 rating, matching its previous original and topping Tuesday on both counts.

Related Save the Dates! 50+ July Premieres and Finales

Over on ABC, Extreme Weight Loss (3.2 mil/0.9) shed 11 percent and a tenth, while Celebrity Wife Swap: Penn Jillette Edition (3 mil/0.9) plunged 21 and 30 percent…. The CW’s Famous in 12 (520K/0.2) was flat.

We've got the rare pair of writer/director assignments on horror films to share with you today: Screenwriter Evan Daugherty (Snow White and the Huntsman) will rewrite the Black List script for Ink and Bone, and will make his feature directorial debut on the Dimension Films picture. Relativity has set screenwriter Ronnie Christensen (Passengers) to script the psychological horror film Latitude, with Marcel Langenegger (Deception) directing. Hit the jump for more on both pictures. Deadline reports that Daugherty, who's had quite the run at scripting big-budget pictures, will step behind the camera for Ink and Bone. The spec script by Zak Olkewicz, picked up by The Weinstein Company's genre wing just last year, centers on a female book editor who visits the home of a horror writer so she can convince him to complete his novel, and soon discovers that all of his creations are holding him hostage. Lee Clay...

Films like "Blue Is the Warmest Color," "Her" "12 Years a Slave" and "Inside Llewyn Davis" are receiving loads of critical acclaim this year. Yeah, but what about all the exploding stuff? And that's what we'd like to celebrate. HitFix poured over flicks including Thor 2, Star Trek Into Darkness, Iron Man 3, The Hunger Games: Catching Fire, Pacific Rim, Kick-Ass 2, Grandmaster, Lone Survivor, Ender's Game, 2 Guns, Riddick, World War Z, Escape Plan, Machete Kills, The Hobbit: Desolation of Smaug, White House Down, Lone Ranger, Oblivion, Olympus Has Fallen, Pain & gain, Hansel & Gretel, Killing Season, GI Joe,...

Country Bumpkin: Bond’s Debut a Grating Escapade of Disingenuous Cliché

Swedish born Fredrik Bond, who’d made a notable name for himself as a successful director of commercials, makes his feature film debut with Charlie Countryman, unfortunately a clipped version of its initial moniker, originally titled the The Necessary Death of Charlie Countryman upon its premiere at the 2013 Sundance Film Festival. This indeed is a misfortune, because Bond’s catchy title was the only original aspect about the film, now with as denuded a calling card as its content is absent anything of consequence. Inane, banal, and thoroughly unrealistic, the film plays like the interrupted fantasy of some melancholic teenager who falls asleep listening to ultra-hip tracks on his iPod.

We meet Charlie (Shia Labeouf) in a hospital, dazed as he waits with his father (Vincent D’Onofrio) to say goodbye to their wife and mother (Melissa Leo) as...

Here's today's latest casting news: Robert De Niro (Killing Season) and Reese Witherspoon (Mud) are circling roles in Nancy Meyers' The Intern. Kate Bosworth (Big Sur) and Thomas Jane (Pawn Shop Chronicles) are set to star in writer-director Mike Flanagan's Somnia. Alex Kingston (Doctor Who), Peter Firth (Mi-5), and Tom Cullen (World Without End) have joined writer-director Joan Carr-Wiggin's If You See Her. Hit the jump for more on each project. First up from Deadline is news that De Niro and Witherspoon are circling The Intern. De Niro would play the title character in a story that "follows the owner of a successful fashion website who bonds with the elderly intern her company hires." Meyers was attached to direct when the project was set up at Paramount before it was put into turnaround, and is back again with plans to move forward with another studio. Cs reports...

"The Counselor" is written by Cormac McCarthy with the sort of grim, existentially weary atmosphere one might expect, but it's directed by Ridley Scott like a wild grindhouse picture. Until this mixed bag of entertainment value came along, I was ready to crown "Killing Season," wherein a neckbearded John Travolta sports a terrible Serbian accent while hunting aged militant Robert De Niro, as this year's top guilty pleasure. But "The Counselor," which also features an impressive set of stars wrestling with inherently silly material, offers a far more satisfactory combination of ridiculous characterizations and bleak showdowns. It's a familiar world of secular finality littered with absurd and eccentric extremes: "No Country For Old Men" on a bender. McCarthy's first screenplay involves the downward spiral in the life of a high-rolling lawyer (Michael Fassbender, in a nameless role) who inhabits a cozy, affluent existence with his fiancee (Penelope Cruz) until a sudden miscommunication.

Legend of Korra has a mystery problem. With the audience five steps ahead of the political terrorism whodunnit and characters blind to every red herring, Book 2 is entering its Killing Season One phase. Still entertaining, sporadically fulfilling. After being consumed in the middle of the ocean by an aquatic dark spirit, Korra is all but written out of “The Sting” — a bold and welcome mood. Writer Joshua Hamilton shifts the spotlight to Mako, the show's entry point to the seedy underworld of Republic City, for a contemporary crime story that riffs on everything from film noir to the oeuvre of Martin Scorsese to Starsky & Hutch. The pro-bender-turned-cop is still chasing his lead from “Peacekeepers;” While no one will listen, all the evidence that suggests water benders from the Northern Water Tribe are being framed for the bombing of a Southern Water Tribe cultural center. This was painfully...