THE FUSED FILM BLOG

John Cusack has signed on to topline Roland Emmerich’s apocalyptic thriller “2012” for Columbia Pictures.

“Redbelt” star Chiwetel Ejiofor also is in talks to join the big-budget epic, whose title refers to the end days of human civilization as foretold by the ancient Mayan calendar.

Story kicks off with a global cataclysm, which brings an end to the world as we know it, and chronicles the heroic struggle of the survivors.

Emmerich and Harald Kloser penned the screenplay, which Sony bought in February.

Shooting will begin in July in Los Angeles, barring a Screen Actors Guild strike.

Mark Gordon, Kloser and Larry Franco are producing. Emmerich is exec producing.

Cusack, who most recently starred in the horror film “1408,” will next be seen in satire “War, Inc.,” which he also wrote and produced. He is currently shooting “Shanghai” for the Weinstein Co.

Source: Variety.com

The Major’s Thoughts - Well if you haven’t heard about 12.21.2012 you will it is the date in which the Mayans predict the end of the world. This plot point has been used from the X-files to Indiana Jones. I am glad Roland has jumped on the band wagon as well. I am going to make a couple of predictions. Get ready for nuts and crazies to be running around saying the end is near (that is nothing new except this will be “news”). 2012 will bring back memories of how bad Indy 4 was with crystal skulls and bad cgi. Indy 5 will be in preproduction because they couldn’t end the Indy movies on that bad of a note. Which might make the end of the world really happen if you mix in two Hobbit movies. Maybe the Mayans did know something about the future. Of course this could just be one of two tablets kind of like the end of a calendar then another one starts. If in a 500 years someone finds a computer and turns it on and uses the calendar function, the calendar only goes to 2099. I wonder if people will think, that we thought that was the end of the world, and will they be making bad sci-fi about it.

Peace out MajorXero

That classic Wrath of Khan quote is kind of appropriate when you think about Shatner being in the next Star Trek movie. I mean it seems a majority of people want to happen so if  I was JJ Abrams I would bow to needs, wants and hearts of the many rather than the few or the one.

So this is post that has been done many a time in many different ways. Let me say again that Denny Crain in all is tubby, Priceline Negotiator glory will appear in the next Star Trek movie in some way. Let’s be realistic, first, it would give fans something to smile about as well as comfort them about J.J. Abrams quips about how he isn’t making this movie for fans. This would be the perfect opportunity for him to and I quote some of our readers comments,

“he is a GENIOUS when it comes to the plot thickening or going in the complete opposite direction.” - Fused Film Reader - Lt. CMDR TYLER

In public relations and communication strategy practitioners often use a form of misleading called “doublespeak” this where people deliberately say one thing to throw the audience off in a completely other direction. JJ Abrams has mastered this tactic time and time again. I can almost guarantee you that if you really analyze his comments surrounding the film you draw upon this notion that we will be surprised to see Shatner’s Kirk in the upcoming film. Also notice you haven’t heard the iconic pervert ( I mean that in a good way) say anything recently about not being in the film, notice you haven’t really heard much from the production of the movie that started filming last December, notice the actors are very good in front of the media almost mirroring the same comments and language saying the same thing. This is classic tight libbed staying on message tactics.

You can expect everyone associated with this film to be tight libbed due to the fact that legalities for leaking things are harsher, directors and producers are almost like political officios at the White House where the interns, peons and lowest of the low only know what they need to know and are so far out the loop they do not know the overall picture. (Trust me I used to be congressional intern - I only knew what they told me). Actors and Actresses in high profile films only get sections of there scripts now and they sometimes have a guy that watches them when they have it and make them lock it up and all kinds of things like that.

Continue reading ‘Kirk is Back! - “The Needs of the Many Outweigh the Needs of the Few, or the One”’

The Weinstein Co. will turn the Jim Henson series “Fraggle Rock” into a live-action musical feature.

Cory Edwards, who directed the animated “Hoodwinked!” for TWC, will helm the picture and write the screenplay. The Jim Henson Co. will produce and TWC will distribute.

Just like the series, the film will be populated by a mix of human characters and Fraggle Rock puppets. TWC co-chair Harvey Weinstein, who has been steering his company more aggressively into the family film arena, made the marriage with Lisa Henson, who runs JHC with her co-CEO brother, Brian Henson.

Ahmet Zappa will be exec producer with Brian Inerfeld.

Pic will take the core characters Gobo, Wembley, Mokey, Boober and Red outside of their home in Fraggle Rock, where they interact with humans, which they think are aliens. The show premiered on HBO in 1983, ran five seasons and was broadcast in more than 80 countries. It posted strong sales recently when the first three seasons were released on DVD.

The deal furthers the relationship between TWC and the “Hoodwinked!” creative team. Edwards is reteaming with “Hoodwinked!” co-writer Tony Leech on the animated alien adventure “Escape From Planet Earth,” on which Leech is making his directing debut.

Edwards is separately developing a live-action feature adaptation of Cedar Fair’s Halloween Haunt franchise, designed to be shot in 3-D by Kerner Optical and produced by Davis Entertainment, Dave Phillips and Tracey Edmonds. That pic is looking for a backer.

“One of our main priorities when we first launched the Weinstein Company was to feature a broad range of family-friendly franchises like ‘Fraggle Rock,’ ” Weinstein said.

source variety.com