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Originally posted on www.thefancarpet.com

James Franco For Child of God

News is circulating that James Franco will be adapting the novel Child of God.

The star will be making the adaptation of Cormac McCarthy’s novel after his attempts to adapt McCarthy’s other novel Blood Meridian have seemingly hit a wall.

Child of God is a novel/film about a backwoodsman called Ballard who decides to live outside of society in a cave situated in the East Tennessee hills after being released from prison. He also decides to experiment with a little bit of necrophilia whilst he’s there. Nothing too strange then.

It isn’t clear at the moment what happened with Blood Meridian, as the film already had a producer in the form of Scott Rudin and twenty minutes of footage with Scott Glenn and Luke Perry. All that is known is that Franco has said it’s ‘on hold for now’ so it may never come to fruition in other words.

There are no further details regarding Child of God at the moment, so you will have to stay tuned for that one. But I’m guessing it may go the same way as Blood Meridian.

Lion King 3D  Tops Box Office

The house of mouse has shown its huge power once again, as The Lion King 3D soars to the top of the American box office.

The film took an incredible $29.3 million at the box office over the weekend, showing that there are still a lot of people out there with a soft spot for samba and his animated friends.

The film pushed last week’s number one Contagion down to the number two position, as it took a still impressive $14.4 million over the weekend. Coming in third was Ryan Gosling’s latest effort Drive, which took $11 million this weekend. A slightly disappointing return considering it was given quite a lot of praise from the critics, but cinemagoers had other ideas this weekend.

Coming in fourth, and slowly slipping away from the top of the box office after several weeks there was The Help, which took in $6.4 million. And coming in fifth was the reboot of Straw Dogs, which only managed to pull in $5 million.

Possibly one of the biggest disappointments was Sarah Jessica Parker’s latest effort I Don’t Know How She Does It, which only managed $4.5 million. SJP seriously needs a new Sex and the City film if she wants to up her box office cred again.

Silk To Be Remade

Taiwanese Film Silk is to be made remade for western audiences.

With remakes being big at the moment, and with Hollywood apparently having no originality about them it looks as though they have turned to foreign cinema once again to help them get a big hit.

Gold Circle Films have hired hired Marco King, Mary King and Jonathan Watters to remake the chilling tale of a dead child and seemingly barmy scientist.

The original movie, that was made in 2006 and was directed by Chao-Bin Su, and found a crippled scientist using his latest invention to capture the essence of a ghost child, who may also be a little bit vengeful. After discovering that the child was killed by his mother and buried at a nuclear power plant things start to go seriously wrong for everyone involved.

So far no details have been released as everyone is staying tight lipped about this movie, but to be honest it does sound quite exciting. Lets just hope they do it justice in the remake.

They don't make films like they used to!

So recently I’ve been thinking about films, and I’ve come to the conclusion that films today just aren’t as good as they used to be.

Sure films today are amazing, we have the ability to produce loads of special effects and we can even watch films in 3D now, allowing the films to almost come to life right in front of us, but they are just lacking that certain something.

Sure films made 50 years ago don’t have the amazing technical special effects that we have and the majority of them are made in black and white but they just had that something special, they had a certain magic about them if you will.

Maybe films today just don’t seem as magical because Hollywood and all the other picture houses around the world churn out about a million films a week these days (a slight exaggeration but you get what I mean), or maybe its because of the high rate of illegal downloading that stops people from going and experiencing the magic of the cinema, as you can now watch any film at anytime from the comfort of your own front room.

But does it really compare to the excitement of seeing something on the big screen? The answer to that I believe is no. It doesn’t because; you have other distractions at home to prevent you from getting totally engrossed in the amazement of the film.

I also think the magic of film has been lost due to us expecting more from films. Just think about it 70 years ago when the Wizard of Oz went from black and white to colour, that would have been absolutely amazing but now we expect bigger productions, more special effects and high action chase scenes. Our thirst for technology and advancement has taken away the brilliance of cinema.

The celebrity culture we now have has also taken away the cinematic magic that once was. Before you had these huge Hollywood stars like Marlon Brando, Bette Davis, James Dean and Marilyn Monroe who you could only access through the cinema system and they remained what they were because of this, elusive and unattainable film stars.

Now we have the likes Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt who my have hugely successful film careers, but are now more famous for being famous, we seem to care more about their relationship and how many children they have adopted rather than their film roles. I mean I have never actually seen Colin Farrell in a film, yet I seem to know everything about his personal life through magazines and TV shows.

The point I’m getting to is, I think the public have so much access to the media and those who are at the centre of it that we seem to view their lives as the movie narrative and not the film anymore. We have also become more dependent on big explosions and animated monsters that the movies actual message and plot.

It looks as though that Hollywood magic that once was has been replaced by a media saturated public that don’t really care much for the film anymore but more about the hustle and bustle surrounding the production of it.

No wonder they called it the Golden Age of Hollywood.

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Originally posted on www.thefancarpet.com

Snow White and the Huntsman to become a Trilogy

Producer of Snow White and the Huntsman Joe Roth has revealed that the revamp of the Brother Grimm tale is set to become a trilogy.

Roth said, “It’s meant to be the first in a series of films.” The producer added “This story will end, but there will be questions remaining for these three characters.”

The film, which hasn’t begun shooting yet, features an all-star cast including Twilight star Kristen Stewart, Academy Award winner Charlize Theron and Chris Hemsworth ofThor fame.

It looks as though Roth and his team are looking to win the race in the Snow White battle, considering there’s competition from the likes of Tarsem Singh’s Snow White, by planning for the future of a possible franchise.

Roth said of the film, ““We retain the basic story, a young girl meant to be the queen who is cast out.” He later added, “The Huntsman is a mercenary, in the sense that he’s a guy who is very able in the woods, more able than most anyone. His job is to capture runaway girls, who are all fleeing the kingdom because of the queen. He’s a nondescript bounty hunter, as we first meet him.”

Of the title character Snow white (played by Stewart) the producer said, ““She starts out not a damsel in distress, but innocent, and after 11 years of imprisonment by the Evil Queen, she escapes and learns the ways of a warrior in the woods.”

It looks as though in the battle of the Snow White films that appears to be emerging, The Huntsman with its planned sequels may come out on top.

But until those box office tallies are in it looks like we will have to sit and await the fate of Roth’s Snow White.

Texas Chainsaw Massacre gets 3D treatment in 2012

Texas Chainsaw Massacre 3D and its chainsaw wielding killer Leatherface will return to the big screen on October 5^th 2012.

The Chainsaw movie that only saw a remake a few years ago will be re-envisioned and directed by Takers’ John Lussenhop, who will be turning the 1973 horror hit into a 3D fright fest.

Producer Carl Mazzocone said, “I’m excited to reconceive this iconic classic in a contemporary setting for a new generation of horror fans.”

“Both John Lussenhop and I intend to deliver a new chapter derived from Tobe Hooper’s 1973 masterpiece with the goal of making it as horrifying as the original, in 3D.”

The end of 2012 looks like it's shaping up to be the season of 70s horror revivals, as another instalment of the Halloween franchise, Halloween 3D will be hitting the big screens three weeks after Chainsaw.

Considering the worldwide-induced nightmares experienced by people who have seen the original I think it can be safely said that in 3D this film will have cinemagoers shaking in their seats.