"White House Down" Theatrical Poster

THE MOVIE: German-born director Roland Emmerich has made a career out of systematically destroying the United States in movies like Independence Day and The Day After Tomorrow. His newest film, titled White House Down, continues the trend but with less of a ‘disaster movie’ approach and more of an action/thriller one.

Hollywood ‘It’ boy Channing Tatum stars as a Secret Service agent tasked with protecting the President (Jamie Foxx) when a paramilitary group attacks the White House.

So far it seems like we can expect some buddy chemistry between Tatum and Fox, as well as plenty of stunts and explosions. Website First Showing has an advanced peek at the film, with photos and quotes from Tatum.

With a script from buzzoworthy screenwriter James Vanderbilt (The Amazing Spider-Man, Zodiac), this movie might be more than just your average summer blockbuster. White House Down is slated for release this June 28th, 2013, so a trailer should arrive in the coming months. | Watch the trailer of the trailer, which will premiere tomorrow. Check out the teaser posters: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | Watch the first trailer.

Updates: “Get your hands off my Jordans!” There’s a new full-length trailer for the film. Also, check out the latest poster.

BREAKING NEWS: Watch the new extended trailer at apple.com.

"Police Story 3" Japanese Theatrical Poster

This past Monday – June 3rd – the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences hosted a salute to Jackie Chan. The event began with a conversation between Jackie and Entertainment Weekly’s Geoff Bucher and concluded with a screening of the Academy’s print of Police Story III: Supercop.

Boucher provided little introduction, other than to say that watching Chan’s films is like watching Fred Astaire beat the crap out of people. Chan then emerged from behind the stage’s heavy red curtain – the stage itself is flanked by enormous gold replicas of Oscar statues – to a standing ovation that lasted until Jackie insisted the crowd calm down.

The conversation proved not so much a discussion, but rather a series of prompts provided by Boucher, in response to which Chan spoke with boundless enthusiasm for as long as fifteen minutes at a stretch. The martial arts legend, stood up, sat down, assumed fight stances, comically fell out of his chair, and did a spot-on, absolutely hilarious impression of Bruce Lee.

Topics covered in the chat ran the gamut from Jackie’s start as a stunt man to his visit to the set of Avatar; from the first time he saw his name on a movie poster to the first time he met Chris Tucker. In one particularly hilarious anecdote, he described meeting James Cameron and not understanding a word Cameron said. Chan, however, pretended he understood to avoid the awkwardness of admitting he didn’t.

He did admit, however, that he always, always gets nervous before a big stunt, no matter the number of crazy, outlandish things he’s done in his life. He confessed that he sometimes wishes he’d be born American, so he could avoid the ludicrous things he does in the service of his films.

During the conversation, Jackie dropped a number of priceless pieces of information for martial arts and Chan fans, and cinephiles in general. Here are some highlights:

• Chan began his career training for the Beijing Opera. An economic downturn led to a dearth of opportunities in the opera, however, leading Chan to focus on martial arts films.

• Drunken Master was made with a budget of $150,000. Police Story III: Supercop cost a mere $900,000.

• For his early starring roles, Chan was paid $9000 per film, over half of which he paid to the employees of his own production company. He pocked about $4000 per picture.

• The Hong Kong film industry tried fashioning Chan into another Bruce Lee. Chan, feeling his personality was very different than Lee’s, worked hard with his choreographer to develop a different style, one that would stand out in a landscape of Bruce Lee imitators. So, for instance, rather than looking tough after punching someone, as Lee did, Chan came up with the idea of looking weak and hurt after a fight. This was the birth of his comedic style.

• Chan was annoyed by Chris Tucker’s lack of professionalism on set during the first Rush Hour, and often had difficulty understanding his co-star – hence the line, “Do you understand the words that are coming out of my mouth?” However, Tucker is now the only American actor Chan has worked with with whom he remains in touch.

• Chan isn’t interesting in doing Expendables 3 – rather, he wants to do a buddy cop film with Stallone.

• When Jackie first experienced financial success, he put some money into digital effects. However, no one at his company could figure out how to use them properly, so he abandoned the idea and decided to continue focusing on things that could be done in front of the camera. Even today, he claims to have very limited knowledge of digital equipment and film making.

• Jackie experienced so many problems with theater owners, distributors, and others editing his films in ways that didn’t make sense that he began making multiple cuts of his films, so he could provide a movie of just the right length for the interested party.

• His most recent action extravaganza, CZ12, took seven years from the first draft of the script until its release.

• Chan described the process of jumping from the building to the helicopter ladder during Police Story III: Supercop as like a public execution. The press in Malaysia somehow got wind of the stunt, and dozens of photographers lined the street below the building, waiting for the jump. Terrified of messing up, Chan forgot to calculate the down draft of the helicopter into the jump and came very close to missing the ladder completely and falling from the roof of the building.

The conversation concluded with more thunderous, standing applause and a few hopeful autograph seekers storming the stage unsuccessfully, as security escorted Chan back behind the enormous red curtain (to see video excerpts, click here).

A few moments later, the curtain opened, and the audience was treated to a screening of Police Story III: Supercop. The Academy 35mm print of the film contained the Cantonese language track, with Mandarin and English subtitles, and ran ten minutes longer than the version released theatrically and on home video in the United States.

This longer cut of the film balanced the movie perfectly, adding action and drama to play against the film’s sillier moments. Unlike the theatrically released version, the Academy cut didn’t err too much to the side of silly comedy, but rather struck the perfect balance between the film’s two personalities.

Finally, the event coincided the the Academy’s ongoing exhibition Kick Ass! Kung Fu Posters from the Stephen Chin Collection. The exhibition, up in the Academy theater library until August 25th, features hundreds of vintage movie posters from the 70’s.

All in all, it was, (and apologies in advance for this), a Chantastic event.

"Book of Eli" Japanese Theatrical Poster

Denzel Washington is in talks to star in Shovel Ready, an adaptation of Adam Sternbergh’s debut novel. Considering they’re making the movie prior to the novel’s January 14, 2014 release date (pre-order at amazon), producer Erwin Stoff (All You Need is Kill) definitely sees something special in the project.

According to Deadline, Shovel Ready takes place in a bombed-out, near future New York City where most of the population escapes reality by tapping into a digital fantasy world, a contract killer is hired to kill the daughter of a powerful, maniacal evangelist. Ultimately, the killer becomes the girl’s protector.

In the meantime, be sure to watch Washington pair up with Mark Wahlberg in 2 Guns, which opens on August 16, 2013. And look for him again in Antoine Fuqua’s The Equalizer in the future.

"V/H/S/2" Theatrical Poster

In a move that is sure to please our webmaster Mighty Peking Man, the producers behind the indie-horror sensation V/H/S have announced a sequel. The first installment featured a series of ‘found footage’-style horror tales from various indie directors and V/H/S 2 will continue in this vein. In fact, the only filmmaker returning so far is Adam Wingard of A Horrible Way to Die fame.

But fear not, an impressive line-up of talent has already been assembled for the sequel. None other than Gareth Evans (Merantau, The Raid) will co-direct a segment with Indonesian horror filmmaker Timo Tjahjanto. In fact, according to an interview with Tjahjanto, their film has already been completed.

Says Tjahjanto: “It’s called project Safe Haven, an idea of mine that I have been keeping as a feature film, but never could find the right person to work with, cause the story is so absurd and over the top.”

Also look for Eduardo Sanchez (co-director on The Blair Witch Project) and Jason Eisener (Hobo With a Shotgun) to have a part in V/H/S 2. In the meantime, the original movie is still available via Video On Demand, while Magnet Releasing offers the Blu-ray and DVD come December 4th, 2012.

Update: Twitch Film has the first look at S-VHS, the sequel to V/H/S. Be warned that this still from The Raid director Gareth Evans’ contribution is quite bloody and probably NSFW! Check out the first teaser trailer for the film, which looks to have a bigger budget than its predecessor. | Check out the new poster. | Watch the latest Red Band trailer!

BREAKING NEWS: Indiewire has an explicit clip from V/H/S/2, featuring directors Gareth Evans (The Raid) and Timo Tjahjanto (Macabre). In addition, here’s a teaser poster for the short – which involves Indonesian cult members and exploding bodies – courtesy of MTV.

"Blind Detective" Theatrical Poster

Shooting starts this October on Johnnie To’s Blind Detective. The film will circle around a blind man who is aided by a female detective in order to solve a bank robbery. Blind Detective reunites box office darlings Andy Lau (Dragon Family) and Sammi Cheng (Infernal Affairs), who previously starred together in films like Needing You… and Yesterday Once More.

The film has a budget of around $11 million and is slated to be released sometime in 2013. Media Asia Group is currently looking to sell international rights to the film.

Updates:

Andy Lau recently spoke about the difficulty of playing a blind character. “This is one of the most challenging roles of my career because the character is blind but the director isn’t allowing me to wear shades,” explained Lau. “The director says ‘cut’ when he thinks my eyes are moving. So we’ve only managed to complete one third of the movie after 3 months of shooting.”

Website Chinese Films has new pictures of Andy Lau and Sammi Cheng taken during filming – in their pajamas! | The teaser trailer is here and it’s everything you’d want to see from a Milkyway Image production – dark, violent, and incredibly stylish. Thanks to Twitch for the story. | A second teaser trailer is now available.

BREAKING NEWS: Reportedly, Blind Detective has met with much criticism at Cannes. Judge what you can for yourself with this new Hong Kong trailer.

"The Family" Theatrical Poster

THE MOVIE: Léon: The Professional’s Luc Besson will be directing Robert De Niro, Michelle Pfeiffer, Tommy Lee Jones and Dianna Agron in The Family (aka Malavita). Due for release around 2013, Malavita is about a retired American gangster who relocates his family to Normandy and lives under the witness protection program.

Malavita is based on a 2005 novel called Badfellas by Tonino Benacquista. It’s co-written for the screen by Luc Besson and Michael Caleo (The Last Time).

Updates: The Film Experience has a pack of behind-the-scenes photos. | The Wrap reports that Martin Scorsese (Goodfellas) has been named an executive producer on the mob comedy Malavita, which opens October 18, 2013.

BREAKING NEWS: Introducing the first trailer for Luc Besson’s The Family.