Emma Stefansky
Debbie Reynolds, Star of Stage and Screen and Mother of Carrie Fisher, Dies at 84
Unbeatable entertainer Debbie Reynolds, star of Singin’ in the Rain and mother to Carrie Fisher, has died at the age of 84 after suffering a stroke earlier on Wednesday.
You Can Watch Carrie Fisher’s ‘Star Wars’ Audition Tape Right Here
It’s undeniable that Carrie Fisher was a rare talent — and she’d have to be, to charm the notoriously picky George Lucas with her Star Wars audition. In a recently resurfaced video, originally posted on YouTube in 2006, Fisher sits down to read a scene opposite Harrison Ford (whom Lucas initially didn’t want to cast, but he was so good in the screen tests that Ford became his Han Solo).
Get Your First Look at the Human Versions of the Castle Staff from ‘Beauty and the Beast’
Everyone knows how Beauty and the Beast starts off — a haughty prince refuses to give shelter to an old lady who turns out to be a fairy, who then curses him and his whole castle, turning him into a monster and his staff into inanimate objects. Well, the inanimate objects are still pretty animate, able to talk and dance and sing at poor Belle, who should be checking her food for hallucinogens rather than singing along, but who cares, this is a Disney movie. For those of you dying to see the rest of the castle’s inhabitants in their more flesh-and-blood forms, they’re human again in a new poster standee for the movie.
The ‘Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2’ Trailer Is Here, and Baby Groot Steals the Show, Obviously
We’ve done our waiting, and now it’s finally here — feast your eyes on the first official Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 trailer! All of our favorites are back, plus a few new faces and one very big tentacle monster. This trailer keeps the rock music vibe of the first movie alive with their choice of Sweet’s “Fox on the Run,” and it looks just as fun, if not even more fun, than its predecessor.
Jennifer Lawrence Swims in a Gravity-Less Pool in First ‘Passengers’ Clip
When you’re alone on a giant spaceship sailing through the outer limits, how do you pass the time? Is it by swimming in the ship’s luxurious pool, only to have the power go out and the gravity turn off and get caught in a weightless maelstrom while you drown, stuck in a giant water balloon bubble with no one to call for help? On ...
’Jurassic World 2’ Currently Casting More Kids for Dinosaurs to Scare
We’ve gotten tons of information about the vague feel of J.A. Bayona’s Jurassic World 2 — it’ll deal, metaphorically, with the modern-day treatment of animals — but we haven’t heard much about the actual plot. Today, though, it sounds like Universal is finally getting the ball rolling with news of an open casting call for a child actor. Jurassic World attempted to update the franchise for modern audiences, but at least one tradition has stayed the same: it’s not a Jurassic Park movie without kids running form dinosaurs.
Hold on to Your Windmills, Disney Is Planning a ‘Don Quixote’ Movie
Because things that are adaptations of other things tend to sell pretty well (see: the current reboot storm we’re in the middle of, or any TV show based on a movie, or any movie based on a musical or book or comic) studios are once again looking at classic literature to adapt to film. Today’s latest news comes from Disney, which is planning a Don Quixote movie, based on that giant classic work of literature you probably read an abridged version of in your Spanish class.
How 9/11 Changed the Ending of ‘Lilo and Stitch’
The events of September 11, 2001 changed a lot of things. Airline security got tighter, the War on Terror became a regular national news item, and, overall, the outside seemed a little less safe than it had the day before. The repercussions of 9/11 were also felt as far as Hollywood, with the industry’s output of films based on or around themes of violence, terrorism, and war taking on a more serious, sinister bent. “Post-9/11 horror” and “post-9/11 action” became units students study in film class. A lot of films already in production went through slight alterations: the World Trade Center towers were digitally erased from New York City skyline scenes in movies released after the attacks, and entire scenes featuring the towers were cut. Hawaii is about the furthest you can get from New York and still be in the U.S., but even so, there’s a whole scene in Disney’s Lilo & Stitch that was altered so that audiences watching the film so soon after 9/11 wouldn’t be disturbed.
Reese Witherspoon and Mindy Kaling in Talks to Join ‘A Wrinkle in Time’
A Wrinkle in Time, Madeleine L’Engle’s beautiful and strange book about a young girl named Meg Murry who journeys through space and time to fins her scientist father, is being adapted into a film by Ava DuVernay. Not much is known about the cast at this point, but today two familiar faces have joined the project.
The Trailer for ‘A Dog’s Purpose’ Is the Most Depressing Dog Reincarnation Movie You’ll See
Happy National Dog Day. Here’s a movie about a dog doomed to die and be reborn again and again so that he can… learn something about life? So that humans can be happy? Is there a shortage of dog souls to go around, so that by the time you pick up your new puppy from the shelter, mentally it’s probably already a grizzled old man looking down the barrel at the next twelve years of its life with exhaustion and regret?