At the beginning of last year, when we talked about our most anticipated movies of 2007 on the Film Junk Podcast, I’m pretty sure Zak Penn’s The Grand was somewhere near the top of my list. This is another improvised mockumentary in the vein of Incident at Loch Ness, only this time it’s about a professional poker tournament. With a cast that includes Woody Harrelson, David Cross, Cheryl Hines, Chris Parnell, and Werner Herzog, how can you go wrong? (That’s David Cross in the big ass sunglasses there.)

The only problem is, 2007 came and went and the movie never got a theatrical release. It did premiere at the Tribeca Film Festival, though, where Anchor Bay picked it up for distribution. Now it appears that The Grand will finally get a limited release on March 21st. A new website and poster have turned up online, and although there’s no trailer yet, there is a short video of Woody Harrelson’s character in the Gallery section. Follow the link below and explore the website while we await the trailer premiere.

You may know Adam Carolla as the former co-host of Loveline, and also the co-creator of The Man Show, but now he’s trying to get his acting career off the ground, starting with an independently-produced comedy called The Hammer. Carolla stars as Jerry Ferro, a 39 year old construction worker who just lost his job. Somehow he winds up sparring in the local boxing ring with an up and coming pro fighter, and although he gets his ass handed to him, he sees a faint glimmer of hope that leads him to believe that maybe he could relive his glory days.

Watching the trailer for The Hammer, it definitely feels like an indie film. There are no major names in the flick, and the comedy seems a bit flat at times (never a good sign for a trailer). That said, I think Carolla is a funny guy and there is also something about the movie that feels somewhat unique, despite the admittedly Adam Sandler-esque premise. What do you think, does Adam Carolla have what it takes to become a Hollywood star? Check out the trailer for The Hammer below. It hits theatres on March 21st.

Earlier this week it was reported that director Mark Romanek had dropped out of The Wolf Man, due to creative differences. The movie was slated to start production on February 18th, with Benicio Del Toro attached to star as the werewolf. Could the creative differences have been related to the recent casting of Emily Blunt and Anthony Hopkins to play the film’s other primary leads? No one seems too sure at the moment. What is clear, however, is that losing Mark Romanek is a big blow to the film. I am a big fan of his film One Hour Photo and his music video work, and I was really looking forward to seeing what he would do for his next project on the big screen.

So now the hunt for a replacement is on, and word on the street is that Universal has narrowed the choices down to three possibilities. One is Breck Eisner (Sahara) who is also supposed to be directing an upcoming remake of Creature from the Black Lagoon. The second is Matt Reeves (Cloverfield), although with the other projects he has in the works, I don’t see why he would bother picking up the pieces of this project. The third choice is the one that most people are freaking out about. It’s also the one I’m the least surprised about. That’s right, apparently Brett “The Rat” Ratner is in the running to replace Romanek as well.

There’s nothing like a little Brett Ratner action to get all the internet fanboys worked up. It seems like he just sits around Hollywood waiting for someone to call for a last minute replacement on a project and then swoops right in. Hey, it makes for great publicity, right? At any rate, he did direct Red Dragon, so I suppose he has some experience directing horror/suspense stuff. Personally I don’t think any of these choices are great compared to Romanek, so this movie just fell a few notches on my list of upcoming projects I’m excited about.

Atonement
Directed by: Joe Wright
Written by: Ian McEwan (novel), Christopher Hampton (screenplay)
Starring: Keira Knightly, James McAvoy, Saoirse Ronan

Earlier this week Dayna and Elaine from work decided to go see Atonement and in a joking manner said, “Hey Greg, do you want to come see Atonement with us?” First of all, you never, ever invite me anywhere in a joking manner cause I’ll fucking show up. Yeah…I’m THAT guy. Second, you can’t invite a guy who is involved in a film-based website out to a movie and not expect him to go. So, after their fatal mistake and I agreed to go they still didn’t think I would show up. Idiots.

Before the film started I had dinner with Elaine and had a wonderful barbecue burger from Kelsey’s. Little did I know it would be a catalyst to the evening’s events. We get to the theatre and grab my free passes from Heather at Empire Studio 8 at the Pen Centre. (This is known as a cheap plug…although now that I think about it…I should get something from Kelsey’s) Two paragraphs into the review and I haven’t mentioned the film. You can’t find quality like this in your local newspaper.

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This week on Weird Web Wednesday, Quentin Tarantino returns to the spotlight after a scuffle with a paparazzi cameraman in Park City, Utah during the Sundance Film Festival. Personally I’d say the cameraman got what was coming to him, and the fact that he only tried to goad Tarantino on afterwards pretty much confirms it. Also this week check out a clever mash-up of Friends and Superfriends (this would make a killer Adult Swim show), a pretty braindead report by Fox News on the sex scene in Mass Effect, and the most insightful review of Rambo ever committed to video. Of course, the review may or may not be fake — it turns out last week’s Angry Nintendo Nerd was (big surprise). Full confession here.

Tarantino Attacks Cameraman at Sundance
The Hawaii Chair
Friends/Superfriends Mash-Up
Fox News Condemns Mass Effect as Pornography
Fox News/Mass Effect Parody
Pros vs G.I. Joes
Ronald McDonald Plays DDR
Best Rambo Review Ever
Fart Man
Sean Young Heckles Julian Schnabel at Director’s Guild Awards
Spiderman Not As Agile As He Used To Be
Jason Lee in Yacht Rock 11: The Making of Footloose
Jonah Hill Sings The Fuck You Song

I’ve been pretty excited to see Son of Rambow ever since I heard all the rave reviews it was getting at various festivals last year. This is a coming of age comedy by Garth Jennings (The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy) about a young boy who wants to film his own amateur sequel to Rambo: First Blood. It certainly seems like more than a coincidence that this trailer has been released just a few days after the fourth Rambo movie hit theatres, but all in all, it’s probably a good marketing move.

People watching this trailer are likely to be reminded of Michel Gondry’s Be Kind Rewind, with its low budget “movie within a movie” premise, and if this movie is successful I wouldn’t be surprised if we start seeing more directors jumping on the bandwagon. (For example, Daniel Clowes is supposed to be working on a script about the true story of the kids who made a shot for shot remake of Raiders of the Lost Ark.) At this point though, it still seems like a novel premise to me, and it’s obviously about more than just making a Rambo home movie. Being a fan of Jennings’ work as a music video director as well, I am totally pumped to see this. Son of Rambow hits select theatres on May 2nd, 2008, check out the trailer below. (P.S. Be on the lookout for more hand drawn lettering, reminding us that this is a quirky comedy!)

Although most of the initial questions that came up after Heath Ledger’s death seemed to revolve around how it might affect the upcoming release of The Dark Knight, once people realized that the movie had already entered into post-production, they turned their attention to the movie he had actually been in the middle of shooting: Terry Gilliam’s The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus. Gilliam has had more bad luck making movies than probably any other director working today (just check out Lost in La Mancha if you don’t believe me) and now he has the difficult task of figuring out how to a continue a movie that is half-finished without one of its lead actors.

Initial reports stated that Johnny Depp may be brought on board to replace Ledger. Since the movie involved a character falling through a mirror into an alternate world, it was thought that maybe they could keep Ledger’s performance in the real world, but substitute a different actor for his character in the alternate world. However, according to Christopher Plummer, who plays Doctor Parnassus, Terry Gilliam is currently seeking out a way to use CGI to keep all of Ledger’s scenes in the picture. I can certainly understand wanting to retain as much of the stuff he had already shot with Ledger; after all, this being his final film, you’d want to honour his work and pay tribute to him. The question is, can CG actually be used to create a reasonable likeness of Ledger? A similar technique was used for The Crow, where Brandon Lee’s face was digitally appended to the body of his stunt double. However, with half a movie still left to shoot, maybe that would be asking too much. Do you think CGI is the best way for Gilliam to salvage the movie? Or is scrapping the movie entirely the only respectful thing to do in this situation?

The final issue of Brian K. Vaughan’s comic series Y: The Last Man hits stores tomorrow, and for a lot of people, it’s somewhat bittersweet to see it come to an end. The story of a post-apocalyptic world without men was pretty unique, particularly within the world of comics. Still, I’m glad they stuck to their guns and ended it after 60 issues, just like they said they would in the first place.

Fans of Y: The Last Man, still have the big screen adaptation to look forward to, but a lot of people have been wondering how they could possibly tell the whole story in a single movie. Well it looks like director D.J. Caruso (Disturbia) has been wondering this as well, and in an interview with USA Today this week, he revealed that the film will actually cover only the first 14 issues. The plan, it seems, is to set it up to be a trilogy. While I am getting a little sick of the fact that everything has to be a trilogy nowadays, I have to admit that this makes good sense for Y: The Last Man. Ideally, I still think it would be better suited for television (as would most serialized comic stories) but this could be a good way to approach it.

Caruso also confirmed what we had all been thinking all along, he has had “preliminary discussions” with Shia LaBeouf to star as the main character Yorick. But hey, you know what? I’m okay with that. I just hope this movie doesn’t take another 5 years to get made… I need my next Y fix soon!

Yesterday our friends over at The Movie Blog posted a promotional image from Pixar’s next project, a movie called simply Up. There isn’t much known about the movie at this point, other than the fact that it will be directed by Pete Docter (Monsters, Inc.) and that it stars a 70-year-old man who joins forces with a wilderness ranger to travel the globe and fight monsters. At the very least, the fact that the hero is not a young kid is certainly something different.

Now, the curious thing about the promotional image for the movie is that it would seem to indicate that the movie is going to be a traditional 2D film. Could Pixar really be trying their hand at a non-CG flick? It’s entirely possible that this is just a piece of concept artwork with no bearing on what the final product will look like, however, I haven’t been able to find any official mention of the movie being computer animated either. Anyone who bought the Ratatouille DVD knows that Pixar produced a 2D short for it called Your Friend The Rat, and there were rumours way back in 2003 that Pixar was starting up a 2D Animation Division. Maybe I’m grasping at straws here, but it does seem like it’s at least a possibility, no matter how remote. Personally I’d love to see what Pixar could do with a feature length 2D movie. CGI is fine, but a little variety out there in theatres would be great… don’t you agree?