Movie News Mash 20

FAHRENHEIT 451
Screenwriter Frank Darabont has been trying to get his "Fahrenheit 451" movie made for years now. Its suffered numerous setbacks, including Tom Hanks dropping out last year, but he's determined to still get his vision of Ray Bradbury's novel to the big screen sooner than later. "I'm out to somebody at the moment, fingers crossed, because, boy, do I want to make that movie. I'm not giving up. I'll die in the traces before I don't make that movie," Darabont told SciFi Wire.

Darabont added that the actor "is of a clout that could get a medium-budget sci-fi film made," but if he doesn't get him, it could be the end of this project. "It's not one of those movies that are vastly expensive by any contemporary standard, but money is still money, and it's of a price that requires somebody that will justify that investment," Darabont said, adding that this will most likely have a bigger budget than "The Mist" (which cost roughly $18 million to make). As a reminder again, Bradbury's Fahrenheit 451 follows a fireman in the future who's job it is to burn books, but he begins to question his duties after meeting a young girl.
(First Showing)

G.I. JOE: THE RISE OF COBRA
Joseph Gordon-Levitt is playing the Cobra Commander in this summer's "G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra," but he hasn't been shown in any of the trailers or TV spots for the film yet.

As hardcore G.I. Joe fans know, Cobra Commander wears an ominous hood because his face is disfigured. Fans have been waiting and wondering if we'll ever even get to see this "face" at all, but Gordon-Levitt promises we will.

Here's an excerpt from an interview Gordon-Levitt did with NY Mag talking about Cobra Commander:

"Yeah. My face is in it. There's this crazy kind of getup that I wear. It's got makeup and it's got all this other stuff, and it's a mask, basically. You can hardly tell it's me. And that, to me, is the best. That's why I love Daniel Day-Lewis or Gary Oldman. Actors like that, where they're so different as each character, the actor disappears. Doing 'G.I. Joe' made it real easy to disappear because of all the elaborate stuff on my face. And it demands a totally different kind of acting style. You sort of check your realism at the door."

"I was thinking of Slava's Snowshow the whole time [Gordon-Levitt is a producer for the avant-garde Russian clown show]. In Snowshow, they put on makeup; it's old-fashioned makeup, totally different, of course, than what we did in 'G.I. Joe,' but they put stuff on their face to create a character. Now, the guy who put stuff on my face, Kazuhiro Tsuji is his name, the protégé of Rick Baker — he's an artist, man! He's such an admirable artist, and to watch him do this work and have it be all on my face, it's just so fun. And then I get to play with that and create a performance out of that, instead of my own face. It's so much fun for someone like me who gets off on different acting styles, playing with the craft. That's what 'G.I. Joe' is about for me."
(First Showing)

UNCHARTED: DRAKE'S FORTUNE
Adding to the already extensive list of video game adaptations is "Uncharted: Drake’s Fortune," an action-adventure game from back in 2007. Columbia Pictures are developing the game for the big-screen, with Kyle Ward hired to write the script. The film will be produced by Avi Arad, Charles Roven, Ari Arad and Alex Gartner.

The story follows a descendant of explorer Sir Francis Drake, a treasure hunter named Nate Drake who believes he has learned the whereabouts of El Dorado, the fabled South American golden city, from a cursed golden statue. The search becomes competitive when a rival hunter joins the fray, then is knocked up several notches when creatures -- actually mutated descendants of Spaniards and Nazis -- begin attacking those hoping to learn the treasure's true secrets.

The Sony Computer Entertainment game sold one million copies in its first ten weeks of release alone.

What’s interesting to note is Ward, the guy who’s been hired to write the script for "Uncharted," also wrote the upcoming video game adaptation "Kane & Lynch" (set to star Bruce Willis), and was just recently announced as the writer of "Hitman 2." So either Ward is a great writer who will finally give us some truly quality video game adaptations, or he’s just being hired repeatedly because he now has experience with video game movies. Hopefully the former.
(Screen Rant)

More news to come! Catch ya' later!