Del Toro’s Crimson Peak releases trailer, SNL 40 lineup, Cotillard joins Assassin’s Creed and castings and images fro Deadpool

Until fairly recently, the gaming adaptation Assassin’s Creed was still set for a ridiculous August 2015 release date, before production and most of the casting, but there was then a eighteen month delay. Michael Fassbender (X-Men: First Class, Prometheus, 300, Shame, 12 Years a Slave) will star as a modern day man who’s forced to relive the memories of his ancestors, who are members of an ancient order while Justin Kurzel (Snowtown) directs.

A new addition is Marion Cotillard, the French-born Oscar winning star of Inception, The Dark Knight Rises, Big Fish, Two Days One Night, Rust and Bone, Contagion, La Vie en Rose, Midnight in Paris and Public Enemies. She teams with her future Macbeth co-star Fassbender in a undisclosed role.

Safe House star Ryan Reynolds and director Tim Miller have been lobbying for a greenlight for so long on mutant spinoff Deadpool and it’s finally on its way. On on set image reveals Wade Wilson’s iconic mask, pleasingly not tampered with from the comic book depiction, while some strides are being made in the casting department. Gina Carano (Fast and Furious 6, Haywire) has joined while three time X-Men star Daniel Cudmore will reprise his rule as Colossus.

It came close to topping our most anticipated list for 2015 and we can now reveal the very first look at Crimson Peak. Pan’s Labyrinth’s Guillermo Del Toro brings us this bold new horror entry which sees a young author lured into a reclusive house by her secretive new husband. It stars Mia Wasikowska (Stoker, Maps to the Stars), Tom Hiddleston (Thor, War Horse), Jessica Chastain (Interstellar, Zero Dark Thirty), Charlie Hunnam (Pacific Rim, Sons of Anarchy) and Doug Jones (Hellboy).

Many Americans will know that this weekend heralds the fortieth anniversary of the sketch show Saturday Night Live and we’ll give a special mention to the phenomenal ensemble of their new special including:

Adam Sandler (actor – Happy Gilmore)
Alec Baldwin (actor – 30 Rock, The Departed, Beetlejuice, The Hunt for Red October)
Amy Poehler (actress – Parks and Recreation)
Andy Samberg (actor – Brooklyn Nine Nine)
Bill Hader (actor – The Skeleton Twins)
Bill Murray (actor – Ghost Busters, Lost in Translation, Groundhog Day)
Billy Crystal (actor – Monsters Inc, When Harry Met Sally)
Bradley Cooper (actor – Guardians of the Galaxy, American Sniper, The Hangover)
Catherine Zeta Jones (actress – The Terminal, Chicago)
Charlie Day (actor – Horrible Bosses, The Lego Movie)
Chris Rock (actor – Madagascar, Top Five)
Christopher Walken (actor – Catch Me if You Can, Pulp Fiction)
Dan Aykroyd (actor – Ghostbusters, The Blues Brothers)
Eddie Murphy (actor – Shrek, Beverly Hills Cop)
Edward Norton (actor – Fight Club, The Bourne Legacy, Birdman)
Emma Stone (actress – Easy A, The Amazing Spider-Man)
George Lucas (director – Star Wars, American Graffiti)
Glenn Close (actress – Guardians of the Galaxy, Mars Attacks)
JK Simmons (actor – Whiplash, Spider-Man)
Jack Nicholson (actor – The Shining, The Departed, One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, Batman)
James Franco (actor – 127 Hours, Spider-Man, The Interview)
Jim Carrey (actor – The Truman Show, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, Dumb and Dumber)
John Goodman (actor – The Artist, Argo, Monsters Inc, The Big Lebowski)
Kristen Wiig (actress – Bridesmaids, The Secret Life of Walter Mitty)
Martin Short (actor – Innerspace, !Three Amigos!)
Maya Rudolph (actress – Bridesmaids, Away We Go)
Melissa McCarthy (actress – Bridesmaids, The Heat, St Vincent)
Michael Douglas (actor – The Game, Wall Street, Ant-Man)
Mike Myers (actor – Wayne’s World, Shrek, Austin Powers)
Paul Rudd (actor – Anchorman, Knocked Up)
Robert De Niro (actor – The Godfather Part II, Goodfellas, Heat, Casino)
Sarah Silverman (actress – School of Rock, Wreck It Ralph)
Sigourney Weaver (actress – Avatar, Aliens)
Steve Martin (actor – Cheaper by the Dozen)
Steven Spielberg (director – ET, Jurassic Park, Schindler’s List, Saving Private Ryan, Jaws, Raiders)
Tina Fey (actress/writer – 30 Rock, Mean Girls)
Tom Hanks (actor – Toy Story, Cast Away, Forrest Gump, Captain Phillips, Saving Private Ryan, Big)
Will Ferrell (actor – Anchorman, The Lego Movie, Elf, Step Brothers)
Zach Galifianakis (actor – The Hangover, The Campaign, Into the Wild, Birdman)

Crimson Peak – October

Deadpool – February 2016

Assassin’s Creed – December 2016

Birdman tops Indie Spirit nominations and Andy Serkis discusses Age of Ultron

Andy Serkis is one of Britain’s great innovative actors of the century, providing the iconic roles of The Lord of the Rings/The Hobbit’s Gollum, Rise/Dawn of the Planet of the Apes’ Caesar and King Kong. While also starring in the flesh in Christopher Nolan’s The Prestige, he’s still by far best known for his legendary motion capture work but its unclear which format he shall take for his upcoming works, an unspecified role in Star Wars: Episode VII – The Force Awakens, directing and starring as Baloo in Jungle Book: Origins and a mystery shrouded appearance in Marvel’s blockbuster sequel.

In The Avengers: Age of Ultron trailer Serkis’ part was teased in a single shot in which, bearded, he turns toward the camera. He bares a great resemblance to the Marvel villain Ulysses Klaw, which’d make him the lead antagonist in 2017’s Black Panther alongside hero Chadwick Boseman. As well as this he’s assisting with the film’s mo-cap work with the characters Hulk and Ultron. He’s shed some light on that process.

“We did some work on Ultron,” Serkis reveals to Empire on their visit to his Imaginarium Studio. “On the development of Ultron before James Spader came on board. In terms of movement styles: was he gonna be human-like? Was he going to be robot-like? So we worked with a bunch of different people, from body-popping experts to dancers, to this guy called Neil who’s nearly eight feet tall.”

“We gave Mark weights, we had voice projections so he could do his Hulk roar. On screen we could have a virtual representation of the low-resolution avatar of The Hulk, so he could come out and feel that sense of scale.”

Written and directed by Joss Whedon (Serenity, Buffy and the Vampire Slayer, Toy Story), the sequel stars Robert Downey Jr (The Judge, Sherlock Holmes) as Tony Stark, James Spader (Stargate, Lincoln) as Ultron, Chris Hemsworth (Rush, The Cabin in the Woods) as Thor, Jeremy Renner (The Hurt Locker, The Town) as Clint Barton, Chris Evans (Snowpiercer, The Iceman) as Steve Rogers, Scarlett Johansson (Lost in Translation, Lucy) as Natasha Romanoff, Mark Ruffalo (Shutter Island, Foxcather) as Bruce Banner, Elizabeth Olsen (Godzilla, Liberal Arts) as Wanda Maximoff, Aaron Taylor Johnson (Kick-Ass, Anne Karenina) Pietro Maximoff, Paul Bettany (A Beautiful Mind, Margin Call) The Vision, Cobie Smulders (How I Met Your Mother) as Maria Hill, Don Cheadle (Crash, Flight) as James Rhodes, Thomas Kretschmann (The Pianist, King Kong) as Wolfgang von Strucker, Stellan Skarsgard (Good Will Hunting, Melancholia) as Erik Selvig and Samuel L Jackson (Pulp Fiction, Jurassic Park, The Incredibles, Django Unchained) as Nick Fury.

Followed by Martin Luther King biopic Selma and drumming drama Whiplash, Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu’s Birdman, a dark comedy centred on a former but now fledging and arrogant superhero star played by Beetlejuice’s Michael Keaton, is leading the pack in The Independent Spirit Awards with six nominations. The lack of a mention for acclaimed British wartime drama The Imitation Game has caused some controversy (a calculated conspiracy to snub the Brits?). Take a look at the full list.

Best Feature:

Birdman
Boyhood
Love is Strange
Selma
Whiplash

Best Director:

Damien Chazelle – Whiplash
Ava DuVemay – Selma
Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu – Birdman
Richard Linklater – Boyhood
David Zellner Kumiko – The Treasure Hunter

Best Screenplay:

Big Eyes
A Most Violent Year
Nightcrawler
Only Lovers Left Alive
Love is Strange

Best Female Lead:

Marion Cotillad – The Immigrant
Rinko Kikuchi – The Treasure Hunter
Julianne Moore – Still Alice
Jenny Slate – Obvious Child
Tilda Swinton – Only Lovers Left Alive

Best Male Lead:

Andre Benjamin – Jimi: All is By My Side
Jake Gyllenhaal – Nightcrawler
Michael Keaton – Birdman
John Lithgow – Love is Strange
David Oyelowo – Selma

Best Supporting Female:

Patricia Arquette – Boyhood
Jessica Chastain – A Most Violent Year
Carmen Ejogo – Selma
Andrea Suarez Paz – Stand Clear of Closing Doors
Emma Stone – Birdman

Best Supporting Male:

Riz Ahmed – Nightcrawler
Ethan Hawke – Boyhood
Alfred Molina – Love is Strange
Edward Norton – Birdman
JK Simmons – Whiplash

Best Cinematography:

The Immigrant
Birdman
It Felt Like Love
A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night
Selma

Best Editing:

Boyhood
Whiplash
Nightcrawler
A Most Violent Year
The Guest

Best International Film:

Force Majeure
Ida
Leviathan
Mommy
Norte, The End of History
Under the Skin

Robert Altman Award:

Inherent Vice; Director: Paul Thomas Anderson; Starring: Joaquin Phoenix, Josh Brolin, Jena Malone, Benicio Del Toro, Owen Wilson, Reese Witherspoon

Special Distinction Award:

Foxcatcher; Director: Bennett Miller; Starring: Steve Carell, Channing Tatum, Mark Ruffalo, Sienna Miller, Vanessa Redgrave

The Avengers: Age of Ultron – May 1st 2015

Peter Dinklage and more cast as Angry Birds voice cast is revealed, Whedon regular teases SHIELD role

Its UK debut is yet to have been aired but the second series of Marvel’s action thriller show Agents of SHIELD has already kicked off in America. The original cast (Clark Gregg, Ming-Na Wen, Chloe Bennett, Iain De Caestecker, Brett Dalton and Elizabeth Henstridge) expanded drastically in the second half of the show, introducing regular spots for Bill Paxton, BJ Britt, Saffron Burrows, Ruth Negga, J August Richards and Patton Oswalt with cameos from Amy Acker, Cobie Smulders, Adrian Pasdar, Ron Glass and Samuel L Jackson. Reed Diamond, Lucy Lawless, Nick Blood, Adrianne Palicki and Kyle Machlachan have already boarded season 2 as newcomers but they don’t seemed to have stopped there.

Fran Kranz has posted a fairly cryptic tweet featuring the words “Robbie Baldwin, SHIELD, soon!” Baldwin would be referring to the Marvel hero Speedball. Kranz is a Joss Whedon regular following a lead role on Dollhouse, the Whedon-written horror Cabin in the Woods and played Claudio in Whedon’s Shakespeare adaptation Much Ado About Nothing. He’s the fourth Much Ado star to join the show after Clark Gregg, Amy Acker and Reed Diamond, who played Leonato, Beatrice and Don Pedro respectively. Should this theme continue, we may see Nathan Fillion make his MCU debut on the small screen. Alexis Denisof may be after more of the action after his abrupt exit in Guardians of the Galaxy.

In a plethora of Appstore installations, ornithology anthology Angry Birds is likely the most iconic. Across numerous sequels, the game has tied into the Fast and Furious, Rio and Star Wars franchises but is now ready for a film of its own. The film’s incredible, and largely comedic, voice cast has now been unveiled: Jason Sudeikis (We’re the Millers, Horrible Bosses), Maya Rudolph (Bridesmaids, Away We Go), Bill Hader (Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs, Paul), Josh Gad (21, Frozen), Danny McBride (This is the End, Tropic Thunder) and Peter Dinklage (Game of Thrones, X-Men: Days of Future Past).

Angry Birds – July 15th 2016

Agents of SHIELD – continues this year on ABC and Channel 4

New Hobbit 2 posters and trailer, Disney plans Cruella De Vil film and the must-sees of October 2013

October 2013 through to January 2014 is bringing us some big releases. This feature will be guiding you along and giving you the opportunity t start filling in your film diary.

October:

The Fifth Estate – Bill Condon (Gods and Monsters, the last two Twilight films) directs the true recent story of Wikileaks founder Julian Assange. The British actor of the moment Benedict Cumberbatch (The Hobbit, Sherlock, Star Trek: Into Darkness) takes the lead role while Spanish star Daniel Bruhl (Rush, The Bourne Ultimatum) plays tech-obsessed activist Daniel Domscheit-Berg as they set out extracting secrets from whistleblowers across the world and publishing them online. Carice van Houten (Repo Men, Valkyrie) and Peter Capaldi (World War Z and the new Doctor Who) also star. OCT 11th

Emperor – Tommy Lee Jones (Men In Black, Lincoln, No Country for Old Men) and Matthew Fox star in Peter Webber’s (Girl With A Pearl Earring) WW2 drama about the two leads character’s deciding the fate of surrendered Japanese Emperor’s daughter Hirohito (Eriko Hatsune). OCT 4th

Cloudy With A Chance of Meatballs 2 – Cody Cameron and Kris Pearn are the directors of the animated sequel to the 2009 oddball family comedy. James Caan, Bill Hader, Anna Faris and Adam Sandberg are the stars of a plot that sees all the animals in the safe-haven of Swallow Falls turn into bizarre food-animal hybrids. OCT 25th

Captain Phillips – Tom Hanks (Forrest Gump, Apollo 13, Saving Private Ryan) is the title character in the true story of Captain Richard Phillips and his ordeal at the hands of Somali pirates. Paul Greengrass (The Bourne Supremacy, The Bourne Ultimatum, Green Zone) is the director of the hostage thriller that could see him and Hanks in  contention for Oscars. OCT 18th

Machete Kills – Robert Rodriguez (Sin City) directs this action sequel. Danny Trejo (Breaking Bad) returns in a plot that sees his character, Machete, thrown back into action when the US Government appoints him with the task of charging into Mexico and taking down on of the US’s most wanted drug lords. Pop-star Lady Gaga stars in a revamped cast featuring Amber Heard (Drive Angry, Zombieland), Michelle Rodriguez (Avatar, Fast and Furious) and Carlos Estevez (AKA Charlie Sheen) as the US President. OCT 11th

Ender’s Game – Scott Orson Card’s sci-fi novel is finally adapted into a big-budget action film. Ender Wiggin (Asa Butterfield – Hugo) is a seemingly ordinary teen whose chosen to go to outer space and begin training as one of the first of a new breed of war commanders who must fight back against the impending alien threat. Harrison Ford (Star Wars, Indiana Jones), Sir Ben Kingsley (Iron Man 3, Gandhi, Hugo), Viola Davis (The Help), Hailee Steinfeld (True Grit) and Abigail Breslin (Little Miss Sunshine) also star in Gavin Hood’s (Tsotsi, X-Men Origins: Wolverine) space set thriller.

Romeo and Juliet – The aforementioned Steinfeld also has a lead role in this Shakespeare adaptation. If you don’t know the plot 1) HOW??? 2) Romeo Montague (Douglas Booth) falls for Juliet Capulet (Steinfeld) but their protective head of one of the rivalling famlies Lord Capulet (Damian Lewis) prevents them from meeting so Romeo’s friend Friar Laurence (Paul Giamatti) concocts a dangerous plan to get the romantic pair together. Ed Westwick and Kodi Smit-McPhee also star in the period drama that has a Julian Fellowes (Downton Abbey, The Young Victoria) script to it’s name. OCT 11th

You’ll have heard plenty about Marvel’s Thor: The Dark World in recent months. Chris Hemsworth, Tom Hiddleston, Jaimie Alexander, Natalie Portman, Christopher Eccleston, Anthony Hopkins, Kat Dennings, Idris Elba and Stellan Skarsgard all play roles in a plot that sees Norse god brothers heroic Thor and sinister Loki forced to team-up to end the potential destruction caused by revived evil race the Dark Elves and their diabolical leader Malekith (30th). October also brings the release of horror sequel V/H/S/2 (14th). There’s also Dexter Fletcher’s Proclaimers based, Scottish, comedy musical Sunshine on Leith (4th). Ken Jeong, Ryan Reynolds, Paul Giamatti, Maya Rudolph, Michelle Rodriguez, Bill Hader, Michael Pena, Samuel L Jackson, Luis Guzman and Snoop Dogg are all voicing characters in the story of a snail who dreams of becoming the fastest thing in the world titled Turbo (18th). James Corden and Julie Walters star in the true story of Paul Potts as he aspires to become a world renowned opera singer. His dreams are crushed over and over again until he auditions for the little known, in 2007 that is, talent show Britain’s Got Talent in One Chance (25th). Finally, we’ve got stupid, crass daredevil sequel Jackass Presents: Bad Grandpa (23rd). Our coverage of each month’s must-sees continues at the beginning of November with the November must-sees featuring Gravity, The Hunger Games: Catching Fire, The Counsellor, Grace of Monaco, Last Vegas, The Family, Kill Your Darlings, Escape Plan, Philomena, Dom Hemingway and many more.

Cruella De Vil was the iconic villain of 101 Dalmations. She’s now set to have her own spin-off film. This seems to be part of Disney’s apparent plan to turn a lot of their animated classics into more grown-up live-action films. Tim Burton’s Alice in Wonderland was the first and it’s been followed by Rupert Sander’s Snow White and the Huntsman and the upcoming Maleficent (a retelling of Sleeping Beauty directed by Robert Stromberg and starring  Angelina Jolie and Elle Fanning) and Cinderella (Kenneth Branagh directing with Lily James, Richard Madden, Helena Bonham Carter and Cate Blanchett building up the cast). Aline Brosh McKenna (writer of The Devil Wears Prada and We Bought a Zoo) has been hired to script the film as well as Branagh’s Cinderella.

Moving on, we’ve got fresh new The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug posters for you to admire.

Director Peter Jackson’s imagery is as stunning as ever in these character teasing banners. At the bottom, we’ve got returning company members Kili (Aidan Turner), Fili (Dean O’Gorman), Dwalin (Graham McTavish), Thorin Oakenshield (Richard Armitage) and Bilbo Baggins (Martin Freeman). Above them is the ever menacing presence of the Elven King Trandruil (Lee Pace). At the top we find a more cryptic poster. We know that it’s the legendary Bard the Bowman (Luke Evans) with the bow in the foreground. Behind him we find the Master of Laketown (Stephen Fry) accompanied by a more sinister, knife wielding figure. Much internet searching in my behalf as to who this actor or his character is has been fruitless so I challenge YOU to wildly guess his true identity in the comments.

Following the posters was an epic new trailer for the film which you can find over at The Verge. Anyone trying to avoid any plot details of the film (seeing as it does now differ from original book by JRR Tolkien) may want to skip to the next paragraph. Sauron is in it! The return of Lord of the Rings’ big bad was teased by The Necromancer in the previous film, An Unexpected Journey, but his eye does flash up on the screen. His distinctive orc army also looks like it’ll make an appearance in the dark land of Mordor. We’re also teased more of likely the most terrifying dragon in recent film history in the form of the titular villain Smaug (Benedict Cumberbatch). The Desolation of Smaug looks like it could be a more open with roaming special effects rather than An Unexpected Journey which was, at time, a little cramped into tight sets and the adventure really got going as soon as we got out of the enclosed areas.

“His name is Bilbo!”

Cruella De Vil – 2016?

Cinderella – March 13th 2015

Maleficent – May 30th 2014

The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug – December 13th

The November Preview Special – Early November here on Tuorhoth Movies