Hobbit, Hellboy 3 and Frankenstein news from the mouth of Guillermo del Toro

Lots and lots of Hobbit goodness and it looks like Ron Perlman won't be Hellboy anymore. BBC radio's Simon Mayo had Guillermo del Toro on the show.

They were chatting about del Toro’s vampire novel The Strain, but they also discussed many of the films he's working on. /Film picked up on this first.

The Hobbit - We know it is going to be split into two films and del Toro mentioned that they will be expanding on some of the things mentioned in passing.

There is a whole other chapter, so to speak, which is the comings and going of Gandalf which are dealt with, people that know the lore know that Gandalf was delayed with a crisis… with a character that is very shady called the Necromancer that proves to be Sauron.

He was then asked if Andy Serkis would be returning which led to some cool news.

Yes [and] Ian McKellen is back, [and] Hugo Weaving in the roles they originated in the trilogy.

That's Gollum, Gandalf and Elrond. No news on who'll be playing Bilbo. He also mentioned that they have got the basics down for Smaug but it will take a good few months before they get it finished. Will Perlman or Doug Jones have a role in the film?

Hellboy 3 - Ron Perlman has said he no longer wants to wear the prosthetics, so Guillermo “guesses” it will never happen. I hope this gets changed though as I would love to see another Hellboy film.

Frankenstein - Doug Jones (Silver Surfer, Abe Sapien) has been cast as the monster. Guillermo will be directing it and they are starting make-up tests very soon. I can't wait to see what the Monster looks like.

The show is on BBC’s iPlayer for the next two days and the interview starts at the 1 hour 47 minute mark.

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Sex & Drugs & Rock & Roll - Andy Serkis' Ian Dury gets his Blockheads

Back in January I posted part of an interview with Andy Serkis where he mentioned he would be playing punk legend Ian Dury in a biopic due to start filming this month.

Now the film has a title, Sex & Drugs & Rock & Roll, and will be directed by Mat Whitecross reports Variety.

It has also gained an excellent cast. Naomi Harris ("Pirates of the Caribbean"), Ray Winstone ("The Departed"), Olivia Williams ("The Sixth Sense"), Noel Clarke (TV's "Doctor Who"), Toby Jones ("Infamous"), MacKenzie Crook ("Pirates of the Caribbean") and Bill Milner ("Son of Rambow") .

Arthur Darvill, James Jagger, Tom Hughes, Shakraj Soornack, Clifford Samuel and Joe Kennedy are also set to play Dury's band members the Blockheads.

Paul Viragh penned the script, Damian Jones is producing and shooting kicks off May 3rd in London.

No word yet on whether Andy Serkis will be portraying Ian Dury through the wonders of motion capture :)

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Tintin news - Daniel Craig is the big bad and Jamie Bell is Tintin

Collider have some news on the Tintin movie.

It's going to be called The Adventures of Tintin: Secret of the Unicorn.

Jamie Bell (Billy Elliot, King Kong) will be playing Tintin after Thomas Sangster dropped out.

Daniel Craig will be playing the nefarious "Red Rackham". Craig previously worked with producer and director of the first Tintin film Steven Spielberg on Munich.

The film will co-star Andy Serkis, Simon Pegg, Nick Frost, Gad Elmaleh, Toby Jones and Mackenzie Crook. All will be doing the motion capture dance.

Finally the script is being writtern by Edgar Wright (Spaced, Shaun of the Dead, Hot Fuzz), Steven Moffat (Dr Who, Press Gang) and Joe Cornish (Adam & Joe).

All in all good news for the Tintin film.

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Gollum is a Blockhead?

Cinemablend have a great interview with Andy Serkis (LOTR, King Kong, The Cottage). He chats about his work on The Hobbit and Tintin. However, he then mentions a little bit about what he will be doing next.

“I'm actually doing a film in April about the life of Ian Dury, who's a proto-punk rocker in the 1970s. He's an amazing character, a real poet. He sort of came up out of the British pub rock scene. He sort of pre-empted the Sex Pistols and the whole punk movement. And he was a polio sufferer, so he basically didn't have much use of his left leg or his left arm. The chance of being any kind of rock star is like zero [back then]. He was one of the first disabled punk rockers ever. I'm really looking forward to that."

Interesting stuff and as you can see from the photos (the one of Dury is from Tom Sheehan's gallery) the physical similarity is there.

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Pegg and Frost to play Thompson Twins in Spielberg's Tintin - Old news isn't it?

Bit of a strange one thisAin't It Cool News has reported that Simon Pegg and Nick Frost (Shaun of the Dead and Hot Fuzz) will portray Thomson and Thompson in director Steven Spielberg's Tintin.

The strange thing is that I posted the news on this way back in September of last year when Simon Pegg told The Times that Spielberg had asked them to play the twins. Oh well, may as well repost it again along with the following info.

Produced by Peter Jackson, the movie will be animated with motion-capture technology and star Andy Serkis as Tintin's friend Captain Haddock. Thomas Sangster was previously set to play Tintin but had to drop out because of scheduling conflicts. A new Tintin has not been announced.

DreamWorks' first Tintin feature, targeted for a 2010 release, will be based on two of the books, "The Secret of the Unicorn" and "Red Rackham's Treasure," written by Tintin creator Herge between 1942 and 1944.

The second film Tintin 2 will be directed by Jackson.

Above image from the excellent Tubby Paws.

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The Hobbit pushed back to 2012

Just saw this on Yahoo news. Anyone have any idea what could have caused the delay? IMDB is saying 2011.

Lord Of The Rings fans will have to wait another four years to get their next big screen fix of the franchise - its prequel The Hobbit has been postponed until 2012.

Earlier this year it was announced Guillermo del Toro would direct the new film, based on JRR Tolkien's novel.

Lord of the Rings Oscar-winner Peter Jackson is producing the project, and he and del Toro will pen the screenplay.

Sir Ian McKellen has already signed on to reprise his role of Gandalf, and Andy Serkis is expected to play Gollum once again.

Shooting was scheduled to start in New Zealand this winter (08/09), but it has now been postponed until 2010 - with the release day pushed back to 2012.

The reason for the delay is unknown.

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The Cottage, 2008 - Review

Director: Paul Andrew Williams
Starring: Andy Serkis, Reece Shearsmith, Jennifer Ellison
Running time: 92 minutes

Score: 4/10

This one from PCE.

I started to watch this movie last night with the expectation that it was going to be dire and I wasn't disappointed.Basically the film is about two brothers , David and Peter, (Andy Serkis and Reece Shearsmith ) who kidnap a gangsters step-daughter , Tracey (Jennifer Ellison). The brothers argue over past slights while Tracey is bound and gagged upstairs. The trials and tribulations of this trio are neither funny nor scary. The attempts at humour feel forced and fail everytime. The character played by Jennifer Ellison is annoying from the outset. Her limited vocab, consisting of mainly f*ck and c*nt seems to take over the first hour of this painstaking watch.

The people involved (apart from Ellison) have got experience in this kind of thing. Reece Shearsmith is a League of Gentlemen founder but his acting was strained and uncomfortable to watch. Andy Serkis was great in Deathwatch but I think he should stick to the CGI people he does so well. However, they probably made the most out of a dreadful script that wasn't anywhere near as funny as the writer thought. What humour there was was diluted with too much shouting, swearing and painful pauses. A bout two thirds of the way in there is a sub-par From Dusk Til Dawn style change of direction and the film begins to become a little more bearable. I never thought the sight of a mad farmer would lift a movie. Although the mantrap did make me chuckle.

The disfigured maniac looked impressive at first until the thing groaned and the rubber mask revealed itself. The attempt to make this part of the movie scary was to utilise gore upon gore! Apart from a slight feeling of angst for myself for having sat through 90 minutes of sheer hell, I didn't feel the characters plight in anyway.

However, it was in the final 15 minutes of the film that Serkis and Shearsmith seem to suddenly decide to pull it together and start acting so we don't think of them as actors on a set (one of the main problems throughout the early part of the film is that you are fully aware you are watching some actors going through the motions and that there are people behind the camera. You can almost hear the director telling the actors to look up, pause and appear menacing). You finally start thinking that they are two brothers caught up in the worst night of their lives and begin to buy into the whole sorry thing....and then it just stops.

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