Hooray For The Humans ! 'Jurassic Park 4' Director Choice Means It Won't Be About Just Dinosaurs

The news that Steven Spielberg and Universal Pictures are taking a chance on Safety Not Guaranteed director Colin Trevorrow for Jurassic Park 4 is good news indeed for moviegoers who need more than a bunch of computer-generated dinosaurs to hold their attention.
Deadline's Mike Fleming Jr. reported on Thursday that Trevorrow, whose directorial debut probably cost less than it does to animate a Tyrannosaurus toenail, got the coveted gig because the studio and the film's producers "felt he was a good match for the material, having grown up a huge fan of the trilogy and part of a new generation of directors steeped in all things dinosaur. They felt he would preserve and protect the characters in the story they created."
I suspect that last sentence is key. Sure, the dinosaurs will look magnificent, but they'll have a whole lot less impact if moviegoers don't care about the human characters sharing screen time with them. Check out how vivid and interesting the characters are in the trailer for Safety Not Guaranteed. If Trevorrow can work this level of humor and humanity into Jurassic Park 4, the dinos can be as clunky as Bruce the Shark was in Jaws and you won't hear too much bitching.

Torrance Coombs To Co-Star In CW Pilot ‘Reign’, Thomas McDonell Joins ‘The 100′, Lane Garrison Cast In ‘Bonnie & Clyde’ Mini

Torrance Coombs (The Tudors) has landing a lead role in the CW’s drama pilot Reign, from CBS TV Studios. It chronicles the rise to power of Mary Queen of Scots (Adelaide Kane) when she arrives in France as a 15-year-old, betrothed to Prince Francis (Toby Regbo), and with her best friends as ladies-in-waiting. Coombs, repped by D2 Management and King Talent on Vancouver, will play Sebastian, Francis’ resourceful illegitimate half brother, a favorite son of King Henry II and his most favored mistress, Diane de Poitiers. He offers Mary some sage advice.
Thomas McDonell has been cast in the CW/Warner Bros. TV pilot The 100, based on Alloy’s books. Set 97 years after a nuclear war destroyed civilization, it revolves around 100 juvenile delinquents sent back to Earth to investigate the possibility of re-colonizing the planet. McDonell plays Finn, a cool and charismatic free spirit whos something of a folk hero to the kids on The Ark because of his ability to bend the rules and escape unharmed.

Lane Garrison has been cast in Bonnie & Clyde, Lifetime/History’s four-hour miniseries directed by Oscar-nominated helmer Bruce Beresford and produced by Sony TV and Craig Zadan and Meron’s Storyline Entertainment. Written by John Rice and Joe Batteer, the mini tells the true story of Clyde Barrow (Emile Hirsch), a charismatic convicted armed robber who sweeps Bonnie Parker (Holliday Grainger), an impressionable small-town waitress, off her feet, and the two embark on one one of most infamous bank-robbing sprees in history. Garrison, repped by Domain and manager Dannielle Thomas, plays Clyde’s older brother. He just wrapped the feature One Heart and can soon be seen in Waymon Boone’s The Devil’s In The Details.

‘The Hobbit’ Passes $1 Billion Worldwide
To date, the blockbuster has earned $301.4 million domestically. Now, with its recent release in China where it has grossed $37.3M in 10 days, The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey  has earned an estimated $700 million internationally. That’s a global total of $1 billion to date. Peter Jackson’s pic becomes only the 15th film in history to exceed one billion dollars worldwide. The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey is the first in a trilogy based on JRR Tolkien’s epic and is a production of New Line Cinema and MGM Pictures. Warner Bros Pictures is handling worldwide theatrical distribution, with select international territories as well as all international television distribution being handled by MGM.

Will Sasso To Star In ‘Middle Age Rage’, ‘The Hundred’ Adds Actress
Will Sasso is set as the co-lead opposite Annie Mumolo in ABC‘s comedy pilot Middle Age Rage, which chronicles what happens when Carol (Mumolo), a middle-aged wife and mother, is fed up with feeling invisible and begins to speak up and demand the respect she feels she’s earned. Sasso, repped by Paradigm, D2Management and attorney is Jon Moonves will play Carol’s husband.
Marie Avgeropoulos (Cult) will co-star opposite Eliza Taylor in in the CW drama pilot The Hundred, set 97 years after a nuclear war has destroyed civilization. It revolves around 100 juvenile delinquents sent back to Earth to investigate the possibility of re-colonizing the planet. Avgeropoulos will play Octavia, an illegally second-born child who grew up hidden in captivity. She is an independent spirit who follows her own path.

Hathaway In Tune With Song One

Anne Hathaway, Les MiserablesSinging on film has been good to Anne Hathaway: she’s up for an Oscar (and by the time you read this, she may have won it) thanks to her performance in Les Miserables. So she definitely seems keen to keep combining the two by officially signing on to star in Song One.She’s been loosely attached to the film since last May, after she was offered the lead role of a young archaeologist who returns to America from a dig in Morocco when her brother is injured.Helping him recover, she somehow meets his favourite musician –played in the film by Johnny Flynn – and falls in love with the rocker.Kate Barker-Froyland wrote the script and is directing the movie, with a shoot planned for autumn in the States. According to the Mail’s Baz Bamigboye, Flynn (a singer-turned actor) will handle much of the music, but there’s a specific song already picked out for Hathaway to warble.Though Hathaway hasn’t locked in any other solid jobs just yet, she will appear on screen for a cameo in Joseph Gordon-Levitt’s Don Jon’s Addiction. And there’s more related Hathaword in news that she’s officially on to voice Jewel in the Rio sequel.Carlos Saldanha is back to direct again and the story this time finds Jewel and partner Blue (Jesse Eisenberg) raising their three kids (including Looper find Pierce Gagnon) in Rio. But when she decides the children should learn to be birds, they venture into the Amazon, leading Blue to worry he could lose his family to the call of the wild.Jermaine Clement, will.i.am, Tracy Morgan, George Lopez, Leslie Mann, Rodrigo Santoro and Jamie Foxx are all returning along with new recruits Gagnon, Andy Garcia, Bruno Mars, Kristin Chenoweth, Rita Moreno, Amandla Stenberg, Rachel Crow and Natalie Morales. The Rio sequel is set to hit screens on April 4 next year.

Kyle Chandler Joins The Vatican

With the surprise resignation of Pope Benedict last week, the Vatican is naturally busy sorting out who the next bloke to wear the big pointy hat will be. Which seems almost too coincidental a time for US cable channel Showtime to announce that Kyle Chandler, Matthew Goode and Sebastian Koch are all joining Ridley Scott’s new series set behind the scenes of the Catholic Church’s seat of power.The Vatican will focus on enigmatic, progressive Cardinal Thomas Duffy (Chandler), who is usually to be found as Archbishop of New York.Goode, about to be back on cinema screens in Stoker, is on as Papal Secretary Bernard Koch and Koch, who is part of the A Good Day To Die Hard cast, is taking on a darker role, that of Cardinal Marco Malerba. He’s the Vatican’s Secretary Of State, but also known as the “dark prince of the Curia.”Scott, who usually tends to just produce TV shows these days, it stepping up to direct the pilot for the thriller show, created by Donnie Brasco writer Paul Attansio, who also spent years working on the small screen behind the scenes of House.

watch Breaking Dawn Part 2

Similar to Harry Potter, adopted from a fantasy novel that is not exactly the pride of the literary world, the Twilight series does offer an interesting fantasy world. But ultimately, for the movies at least, the main attraction would have to be the action. It is therefore not hard to understand why both split the final book into two parts. The first part is the setup which incidentally (not intentionally, I'm sure) milks the cash cow to the last degree. Breaking Dawn Part 2 movie will hopefully redeem the movie makers from the curses of the segment of the audience less endowed with the virtue of patience (the majority, I venture to guess) with the action set piece of grand finale for which they have waited so long. In that department, Breaking Dawn Part 2 online did well.

Perhaps a little recap would help, particularly to forgetful souls such as myself, on small details like to kill a vampire, you must tear out its head and toss it into a roaring fire.

"Twilight" and "New Moon" are essentially very, very long establishing scenes focusing respectively on the two heroes, vampire and werewolf who, because they are not French, cannot resign themselves to a peacefully coexisting triangle with their shared love object Bella Swan like Jules and Jim. After these preliminaries, "Eclipse" becomes the most packed and entertaining, not only with the heightening of the tension in the love triangle, but also with intriguing side stories (flashbacks) providing more dimensions of some of the characters including the wolves (how there animosity with the vampires developed) and members of the Cullen vampire family Jasper and Rosaline. Throughout these three movies, we also see the growing menace of the dominating, powerful vampire empire of the Volturi family in Italy.

Developments - finally, in "Breaking dawn part 1", leading the audience through two key events, marriage and childbirth. The movie ended with Bella after giving birth and struggling on her sick bed at the brink of death, suddenly opened her eyes, with the iris turned red.

Not much needs to be said about the rest of the story, told in this "Part 2". A very thin, unconvincing plot surround the strangely fast-growing child Renesmee (something like 10 times faster than normal) led to a final confrontation between the Volturi on one side and the Cullen family (now with Bella as the strongest vampire of them all) assisted by a generous assortment of friendly vampires gathered globally plus, of course, the wolf pack. Soccer fans may think of this as a sort of World Cup that comes once every four years, with strong teams such as Russia, Ireland, Italy and Brazil.

To reiterate my summary line, I promise I will watch Breaking Dawn Part 2 if action is what you are looking for, you should be satisfied. The twist of sorts in the ending is also meets with general approval, it would seem, from audience and critics.

ADG honors 'Anna Karenina,' 'Life of Pi,' 'Skyfall'

"Anna Karenina," "Life of Pi," and "Skyfall" earned top honors from the Art Directors Guild at the 17th annual Excellence in Production Design Ceremony held Saturday at the Beverly Hilton."Anna Karenina" and "Life of Pi" are also up for an Oscar for Best Production Design at the Academy Awards on Feb. 24.Sarah Greenwood earned the trophy for best period film for "Anna Karenina," David Gropman was recognized for fantasy film for "Life of Pi" and Dennis Gassner earned contemporary film honors for "Skyfall."In television, half-hour single-camera production designer Judy Becker won for "Girls," and hourlong honors went to Gemma Jackson for "Game of Thrones.""American Horror Story's" Mark Worthington earned TV movie/miniseries kudos.Paula Poundstone, in black -- no white top-hat this year -- hosted the evening for the fourth time. John Myhre won for the "81st Annual Academy Awards" in the awards, music or game shows category, and "Saturday Night Live" production designer Keith Raywood took home an award for best episode of a multicamera, variety or scripted series.Honors for commercial, PSA and music video went to Christopher Glass for an X-box spot.Production designer Hermann Zimmerman -- best known for his spaceship other-worlds designs on the "Star Trek" franchise -- received the guild's lifetime achievement award. Colleagues accepted on his behalf.ADG also inducted three production designers into its hall of fame: Preston Ames, Richard MacDonald and Edward S. Stephenson.Coinciding with the 50th anniversary of the James Bond franchise, ADG honored the four main production designers behind the Bond films -- Ken Adam, Allan Cameron, Dennis Gassner and Peter Lamont -- for outstanding contribution to cinematic imagery. Jane Seymour introed the presentation.

Disney Halts 3D Star Wars Re-Releases

Anakin Skywalker can go on scowling, pouting and whining just as much as he likes; it won’t get him anywhere. And certainly not back on cinema screens, as Disney and Lucasfilm have decided to postpone releasing the rest of the prequel trilogy – i.e. Attack Of The Clones and Revenge Of The Sith on 3D for now.If you’re thinking this might have something to do with the companies being a little busy preparing to make Episode VII (you might have heard something recently about JJ Abrams scoring the job of directing it), then you win a wookie cookie. So yes, while The Phantom Menace escaped back into the world last year,  Clones and Sith are now sitting in re-release limbo."Given the recent development that we are moving forward with a new Star Wars trilogy, we will now focus 100 per cent of our efforts on Star Wars: Episode VII in order to ensure the best possible experience for our fans," the company says in a press release on the franchise's official site. "We will post further information about our 3D release plans at a later date."So don’t get too downhearted if you were looking forward to seeing the two other prequel films on the big screen again – we’re sure they will show up at some point, either leading into the new baby or once the hoopla around it is at a level enough to pounce and offer up more tales from that galaxy far, far away.

47 Ronin Promo Posters Online

Once touted as Keanu Reeves’ big return to martial arts action, Samurai tale 47 Ronin has instead been busy fighting negative buzz about runaway production schedules, squabbles between director Carl Rinsch and the executives, rising costs and shifting release dates. So it’s almost a surprise to see the first promo posters for the film escape into the world, whether officially or not. Take a look in the gallery below. {47 Ronin posters}Ronin, which features Keanu alongside a mostly Asian cast (including Rinko Kikuchi, Hiroyuki Sanada and Cary-Hiroyuki-Tagawa), finds a band of Samurai warriors in 18th century Japan seeking to avenge their master’s death.It’s all based on a real account of a group of Ronin (masterless Samurai) who really did undertake such a mission, and which has been embellished and altered through the years in Japan.The film version adds in various elements, including some more fantastical trappings (witches, giants etc.) and Keanu’s character, who is apparently half-Japanese and half-British.This is, of course, just the first glimpse. We’ll have to wait and see a trailer to get a real sense of the movie. And it's set to arrive across the pond on December 25. But here’s a question to be going on with – are you hopeful for this one?