Winston Honored, Spider-Man 4 Announced, & The Curse Of CGI...
Stars, Relatives Honor Special-Effects Wiz Winston
LOS ANGELES (AP) — Friends, relatives and show-business colleagues gathered Sunday to remember Oscar-winning special-effects maestro Stan Winston, the man responsible for bringing the dinosaurs of "Jurassic Park" and other iconic movie creatures to life.
Winston died at his home in Malibu surrounded by family June 15 after a seven-year struggle with multiple myeloma. He was 62.
Winston's son Matt recounted his father's last day as being filled with laughter, hugs, kisses, tears and music from the Beatles. At the end of the private memorial service at the Hillside Memorial Park and Mortuary, Matt played the last song Winston heard before he died: the Beatles' "All My Loving."
Colleagues including "Iron Man" director Jon Favreau, Sigourney Weaver, Tom Arnold, Ernie Hudson and Robert Patrick joined Winston's family and friends to reminisce and listen to personal stories from Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, Rabbi Judith Halevy, brother Ronny Winston, uncle Mitchell Karlan, son-in-law Erich Litoff, and directors James Cameron and Steven Spielberg.
"What Stan did is that he took our dreams — he took all of our dreams — and he blended them with his own dreams," Spielberg told mourners in attendance. "He then workshopped those dreams with pencil, clay and later years on the computer. He would basically give life to all of our ideas. He would make them come to life."
In a career spanning four decades, Winston created some of the most memorable visual effects in cinematic history. He helped bring the dinosaurs from "Jurassic Park," the extraterrestrials from "Aliens," the robots from "Terminator" and even "Edward Scissorhands" to the big screen. He was a pioneer in merging real-world effects with computer-generated imagery.
Winston won visual effects Oscars for 1986's "Aliens," 1991's "Terminator 2: Judgment Day" and 1993's "Jurassic Park." He also won a makeup Oscar for "Terminator 2." He was nominated for his work on "Heartbeeps," "Predator," "Edward Scissorhands," "Batman Returns," "The Lost World: Jurassic Park" and "A.I."
Frequent collaborator Cameron told those gathered he spoke with Winston the day before he died. Cameron said Winston expressed something that he never had before: Winston told his colleague and friend that he loved him. Cameron also let "the fans speak for Stan" by reading several messages posted after Winston's death by users of the movie news and gossip Web site Ain't It Cool News.
"He inspired a generation of fans," Cameron said. "I think that just maybe the words of a bunch of people who didn't even know him personally may be his best tribute."
Winston's survivors include his wife, Karen; and his son, daughter, brother and four grandchildren.
Spider-Man 4 Targeted for May 2011
(comingsoon.net) The Los Angeles Times reports that "Spider-Man" franchise producer Laura Ziskin said the fourth installment is tentatively scheduled to hit theaters in May 2011.
Already scheduled for the month of May that year are Marvel's own The First Avenger: Captain America on the 6th and Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part II.
Ziskin added that the screenplay is not finished yet, but that she and Sony Pictures were hopeful Spider-Man 4 could be ready in three years' time.
Neither star Tobey Maguire nor director Sam Raimi is yet committed to work on the next installment, but Sony has paid Marvel to renew its rights.
Can Game Developers Expand Out of the Game Business?
(news.cnet.com) An interesting article from Kotaku today,
discusses Ubisoft's intention to get into the film business and try to
expand its offerings beyond video games.
"Our goal is to create a studio that will be very high quality, our
goal is to try to get to the level of quality of Peter Jackson's Weta
studio," Ubisoft's CEO Yves Guillemot said in an interview. "We have
been working to train people, to recruit highly talented people and we
are in test mode at the moment. We are going to make sure that we get
to the level of Weta. We have a long way to go but in getting to that
level will help us to actually be one of the studios where everybody
has to go."
Peter Jackson, best known for The Lord of the Rings trilogy and as
director of King Kong, is currently working in collaboration with
Bungie to create a new game set in the Halo universe. The game is
currently titled Halo: Chronicles, but no release date has been given.
Guillemot sounds ambitious and I applaud him for trying to do more
with his business, I can't help but wonder if video game developers
have any place in other forms of entertainment. Can they really create
a stellar sitcom or a blockbuster hit at the theaters? Are they
capable of publishing sci-fi novels?
With the way things are going in all of those industries, I don't
think it's too far-fetched at all.
Video game developers producing movies and television shows? Sounds a
little ridiculous at first glance, doesn't it? But if you consider the
implications and the fact that a video game developer is practically
the same as any film studio in Hollywood, it makes much more sense.
I don't see any reason why a company like Ubisoft can't create a
business that expands into other areas of entertainment. From a purely
practical sense, the company has more than enough cash to start out
and with some smart investments, it shouldn't have too much trouble
creating a television show and publishing some interesting novels. And
with a nice idea and some technical prowess to back it up, there's no
reason to suggest that it can't make a blockbuster hit at the box
office.
After all, what's really stopping it? The video game industry is
waxing the floor with the movie industry lately and although it hasn't
yet caught up, it looks like it could quite soon. With the success of
games like GTA IV and even Halo, more people are willing to spend
their hard-earned cash on video games than yet another crappy film.
And who can blame them? Movies are becoming more derivative each year
and there are few examples of films that actually break the mold in
any way.
Due to that fact, now seems like the perfect time for Ubisoft to jump
into the mix. If it can come up with something that offers a unique
storyline and a compelling group of characters, it shouldn't have too
much trouble performing about as well as any other movie in theaters
today. In fact, if the company plays its card correctly, it might be
able to make the series into a major powerhouse across each industry
-- film, TV, video games, and maybe even books.
But I digress. Ubisoft's decision to expand into other forms of
entertainment strikes me as something that should have happened years
ago. With the growing popularity of video games, it's the perfect time
to bring popular titles to other forms of entertainment. And although
most video game-to-movie franchises haven't performed as well as some
have hoped, that's mainly due to the fact that the movie industry
locked the developers out in many cases and created an adaptation that
they believed would be better for moviegoers. They were wrong.
And with upcoming movies like Halo, Assassin's Creed, BioShock, and
many more, it's only a matter of time before we truly figure out that
the movie industry knows nothing about video games.
If Ubisoft wants to be a success in other industries, it needs to
maintain creative control over the entire process and ensure that its
most cherished franchises are not being ruined by execs from other
companies that have no idea what the average person is really looking
for.
As long as Ubisoft can stay true to what it has created and assure its
current customers that the future of the company will not sell out to
industry insiders, it should do just fine.
Years ago, major movie studios cornered the market with titles that
made people actually want to head down to the theaters. Today, major
studios are out of touch with reality and continue wasting our time
with titles that provide no real value or simply don't offer a modicum
of what we're looking for in a film: good acting and compelling
storylines.
And that's precisely why Ubisoft can capitalize. As GTA IV has shown,
it's possible to create games that can mimic the film industry and
maybe even do it much better. If the company can bring that kind of
experience to the theaters, it shouldn't have too much trouble
breaking in and making a name for itself. But as I mentioned above,
its success is contingent upon its willingness to stay true to the
video game formula and not stray too far from it.
With the right vision, cash in the bank, and the desire to stay true
to its roots, I think Ubisoft can become a powerhouse in any
entertianment industry and companies like EA and Take-Two may have
something to worry about.
I applaud Ubisoft for jumping into new industries and look forward to
the day when video game developers show movie studios how
entertainment is really created.
Honey, I Re-Shrunk the Kids!
(The Hollywood Reporter)
According to The Hollywood Reporter, the story centers on a family that is turned into a popular set of dolls which must then work together to survive the dangers they encounter in their newfound state and find a way to reverse a wish gone awry.
Doody and Valenziano are writer-producers for televised award shows. They also wrote SCI FI Channel's horror film Bugs and the video game "Silent Hill: Homecoming" for Konami.
Hobbit Production To Rebuild Elaborate Village Sets
(stuff.co.nz) Kiwi film-maker Peter Jackson wants to
use the same New Zealand locations from The Lord of the Rings, as well
as the same actors, for The Hobbit and a sequel that will be shot in
2010.
It will include rebuilding the elaborate Hobbiton village on a farm in
Matamata, which is now a tourist attraction.
"We hope, with the permission of the land owner, that we will rebuild
Hobbiton bigger and even better than what it was for Lord of the Rings
in exactly the same location," said Jackson, the films' executive
producer.
"It is unlikely we will need any locations outside of New Zealand
which has always been the perfect Middle-earth."
Hobbiton Movie Set and Farm Tours managing director Russell Alexander
referred any questions to Jackson's film company.
The set has been returned to its natural state, but 17 of the 37
hobbit holes and some structures have been left. Thousands of tourists
each year still visit it.
Jackson said preproduction on the two films would take place next
year, and back-to-back shooting throughout 2010. The Hobbit would be
released in December 2011 - the 10th anniversary of the release of the
first Lord of the Rings film. The second film, still to be titled,
would be released in 2012.
Sending VFX Overseas - High Tech Global Infrastructure Grows
(seekingalpha.com) The gap between Bollywood and
Hollywood is becoming increasingly narrow.
The technology driving filmmaking is where Bollywood and Hollywood are
already working close together -- investing in each other, and
creating a new high tech global infrastructure. If you saw Warner
Bros.'s Oscar-winning Golden Compass last year, you saw the handiwork
of India's high tech capabilities. All of its special effects were
produced in Mumbai, studios taking advantage of the lower costs
overseas.
It goes both ways: India's largest visual effects house -- Prime Focus
Group, which is traded on the Bombay exchange -- recently bought Post
Logic, a Hollywood-based post-production house and special effects
company Pioneer Films.
And then there are the American companies promoting from the growth on
both sides. Autodesk (ADSK), the US graphics software company, has
been selling internationally for years. Now, the growth of Indian
entertainment businesses -- both internally and the jobs outsourced
from the U.S. -- benefit Autodesk's revenues.
Hollywood may be sexy, but it's not a fast-growing business--
according to PWC revenue from the U.S. movie business is up just three
percent a year over the past three years. In contrast, India's film
revenue is up 17 percent every year for the past three. Of course the
total size of India's film business is just $2.5 billion, less than a
tenth from Hollywood's films, but when it comes to growth Bollywood's
winning the Oscar.
'Turok' Live-Action Dinosaur Movie Unveiled
(digitalspy.co.uk) A live-action Turok movie based on the
original dinosaur hunter comic book series and video game franchise is
in the works, claims Adam Beach.
The Flags Of Our Fathers actor, who also provided the voiceovers for
the animated film Turok: Son Of Stone, said meetings have been set up
to develop a script.
"We just finished the animated movie and now we're going into the
feature film movie hopefully in a couple years. We're about to set up
meetings to develop a script and put it out there," Beach said.
"I'll have to beef up, and be a good guy, and save the world!"
Beach, who also provided the voiceover for the Turok game released
earlier this year, is expected to play the lead role in the film.
The Acclaim-published Turok comic book and video game portrayed the
dinosaur hunter as a young native American boy.
The first-person shooter series saw players use a diverse range of
weapons as they hunted down a plethora of dinosaurs, from the T-Rex to
the Mini Raptor.
G.I. Joe Picks Longer Name
(Film1.nl) The Cinema EXPO in Amsterdam, The Netherlands kicked-off today and a new poster for Paramount Pictures' "G.I. Joe" movie has already been spotted. The poster, featuring Channing Tatum as Duke, reveals that the full title for the movie is G.I. Joe: Rise of Cobra. What we're not sure about is if this is only for international territories, but the fact that Hasbro has the domain name GIJoeRiseofCobra.com registered is a pretty good indication that it will be the title here as well.
'08 VFX Tentpoles; Who's Guilty of CGI Abuse?
(chud.com) Spending most of his time as a student of
film and media studies at Emerson College in Boston, Scott Nye can be
found in Portland, OR a few months out of every year. He has a history
with comic books and a� background in high school theatre, but try not
to hold either against him.
I know this is an odd time to publish this, given the recent passing
of Stan Winston, one of the great practical effects artists, but...I
love computer-generated imagery. And I'm tired of it getting a bad
rap.
Part of this does stem from growing up in the CGI era. I was born in
1986, and while I was raised on Star Wars like any good American, I
found the Special Editions, at the time anyway, to be vast
improvements (I still hold Lucas made changes for the better of
Empire). I have no nostalgic ties to the good old days when everything
was strung together and made by hand, though I marvel at the
accomplishments made in pre-Abyss/T2 special effects films, and
continue to marvel and the work done on sets in modern filmmaking.
But much as I support CGI, I do acknowledge it's also an overused,
lazy way to create what could have been an amazing sequence if done
practically. So to illustrate diametric views, I'll use three recent
examples - Speed Racer, Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal
Skull, and Zodiac.
NOTE: This article contains minor spoilers for Speed Racer and major
spoilers for Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull.
More: http://chud.com/articles/blogs/728/CGI-Being-for-the-Benefit-of-Moviemaking.html
Sony Teases The Green Hornet
(comingsoon.net) We're almost exactly two years away from the release of Columbia Pictures' The Green Hornet on June 25, 2010, but the Sony-owned studio has already released the logo for the comic book adaptation that will star Seth Rogen in the title role. The action adventure, co-written by Rogen and Evan Goldberg, will bring to life the story of the masked fictional crime fighter and his similarly masked Asian manservant Kato.
See the logo: http://www.comingsoon.net/news/movienews.php?id=46227
Hulk Anim Crew's Secret Weapon: 'Mova'
(venturebeat.com) Steve Perlman's motion-capture start-up
Mova helped make possible the realistic animated faces in the new "The
Incredible Hulk" film that debuted a week ago.
San Francisco-based Mova is owned by Perlman's Rearden, a holding
company that incubates a variety of Perlman-sponsored technology
start-ups. Mova makes a tool that does a better job of capturing real
faces and converting them into computer images than typical "motion
capture" technologies. Perlman described Mova in a wide-ranging
interview we did with him in April at the Web 2.0 conference.
With Mova's "Contour Reality Capture" tool, technicians smear make-up
on the faces of actors such as the Hulk star Edward Norton. The tool
can capture each dot of the make-up as a data point that can be
directly translated into a computer-generated image. Such images give
artists a big head start in trying to create realistic animated faces
based on real humans.
Perlman said that the Hulk film is the first movie credit that Mova
has been allowed to reveal since the company announced its existence
about 22 months ago. He said more films will be coming out soon.
Indiana Jones Up to $683 Million Worldwide
(Variety, The Hollywood Reporter) Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull lead the international box office this weekend, edging The Incredible Hulk and Sex and the City.
Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull lead the international box office this weekend, edging The Incredible Hulk and Sex and the City.
"Crystal Skull" added $25 million from 5,877 theaters in 62 markets, with over half of that coming via a $13.1 million Japanese launch. "Skull" has hit $392 million overseas -- more than $100 million ahead of its domestic total. Worldwide, the movie has reached $683 million.
New Hulk Out Paces Old
(darkhorizons.com) Box-Office Mojo has an interesting
column which gives a day-by-day breakdown of the performance of both
film versions of "Hulk" and the surprise is the new one has fallen
behind the old - even during the week.
In its first six days 2003's "Hulk" took in $77.6 million to 2008's
"Incredible Hulk" with $70.7 million. Yesterday was the first time the
new Hulk outpaced with the old with $4.5m vs. $4.35m.
At its current rate, the new "Hulk" looks like it'll gross a total
around the $130 million mark - the same as Ang Lee's so-called 'flop'.
Reviews aren't a huge margin of difference either. Rotten Tomatoes has
2003's "Hulk" scoring a 61% positive & 6.2/10 score vs. 2008's
"Incredible Hulk" score with 66% positive & the same 6.2/10 average
score. Over at Metacritic its more divided with old "Hulk" getting a
54/100 & 5.2/10 score whereas new "Hulk" got 61/100 & 8.1/10.
Transformers Sequel Drops the "2"
(ComingSoon.net) While it was previously "announced" as
"Transformers 2: Revenge of the Fallen," Superhero Hype! has learned
that DreamWorks/Paramount has opted to make it Transformers: Revenge
of the Fallen instead.
In related news, Jalopnik has posted spy photos of the new Bumblebee
(the 2010 Chevy Camaro Z28) as well as an unknown Corvette concept.
Filming is currently taking place at the Eastern State Penitentiary in
Philadelphia for a June 26, 2009 release.
The Curse Of CGI: Anything Can Happen, So Nothing Matters
(theglobeandmail.com) I realize that CGI is a thrilling
toy, a technology that seems to advance by the minute, that gets more
fun the more you play with it. And I realize that in Hollywood, it's
become a tautology: Blockbusters have CGI, so if you want your film to
be a bigger blockbuster, it must have ever-more-massive chunks of CGI.
But I'm not sure that filmmakers realize what a yawn it is to sit
through.
Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull has grossed
$275-million, so the folks behind it have no reason to listen to me.
But (spoiler alert) I could not wait for that climax to be over. All
the human activity in the film simply stops; the actors are reduced to
standing stock-still and gaping. And at what - silvery cartoons,
swirling fake rocks, big hunks of nothing. The music swells and
swells, indicating that my fear or excitement should be mounting. But
instead I was feeling less and less and less - the moment I was
supposed to be the most thrilled was actually the moment when I could
not have cared less.
So unentranced was I that to keep myself awake I had to look around
the theatre, and I was not alone in my boredom. The six teenage girls
behind me were all texting, the middle-school kids below me were
searching the bottoms of their popcorn and M&M bags. People weren't
even smiling; their expressions were utterly flat. During an audience
Q&A session after a Toronto screening of The Rocker, Rainn Wilson
dissed Crystal Skull mercilessly. "It's a piece of dog poo," he said,
"the kind of movie where a whole army shoots submachine guns and never
hits anyone." In other words, the kind of movie where anything can
happen, so nothing matters.
I loved Raiders of the Lost Ark. I think it's one of the greatest
movie-movies of all time. It had some CGI, but the proportions were
more human. Indy ran from snakes, from spiders, from scimitar-wielding
thugs, and from that terrific, thundering rock. The hazards were
scaled to our size, and they felt real enough to ruffle our hair.
I loved Close Encounters of the Third Kind for similar reasons. The
manifestations of the aliens were so humble and palpable - the shaking
car, the mashed potato tower. Sure, the spaceship, when it showed, was
enormous - but it played that dinky little five-note tune. And we'd
spent so much time getting inside Richard Dreyfuss's head that when he
felt awe, we felt it, too. He'd earned it.
But now CGI can do so much, it renders everything moot. I felt nothing
all over again during the climactic battle in The Incredible Hulk,
when CGI-Edward Norton and CGI-Tim Roth duked it out on 125th/Yonge
Street. (Can anyone explain to me why, though characters are
diabolical and have access to wildly sophisticated weaponry, every
superhero movie comes down to two guys punching one another in the
head like cavemen?) The more relevant question is, why cast acclaimed,
charismatic actors, and then at the most crucial moment of your film,
replace them with blobs that, no matter how many flesh tones you give
them, every kid in the cinema knows aren't real? I don't mean "not
real" as in, it's a movie. I mean, not real as in, not a living being,
so I don't need to care.
We want to care. How else to explain the poll results from
MovieTickets.com that asked viewers which Hulk they prefer, the
current movie creature, Ang Lee's CGI lug from a few years ago, or the
human one played by Lou Ferrigno on the TV series. Ferrigno won, hands
down. (At the screening of the current film that I attended, his cameo
elicited a bigger response than any CGI trick.) He was just a guy
painted green. But he was a real guy, and we can feel the difference.
I spent some time with Patricia Rozema on the set of Kit Kittredge,
and she said something that stuck with me: "The most cinematic thing
in the world is the human face." It evokes emotions in a way that no
CGI, no matter how advanced, can do. All those brilliant inventions,
all those hours in post, still pale beside one real, salty tear.
Cirque du Freak Wraps Production in Louisiana
(wxvt.com) NEW ORLEANS (AP) - Filming wrapped up
earlier this month in New Orleans for Universal Pictures' dark fantasy
movie "Cirque du Freak."
Now there's plenty of talk about the potential for sequels. Executive
producer Andrew Miano tells the Times Picayune that New Orleans might
be considered as a site for those.
"Cirque du Freak" is based on the first three books in the 12-volume
"Saga of Darren Shan" series for young adults.
The movie is headed to the West Coast for post-production.
Shan's books are about a young man drawn into the world of vampires.
They aren't set in any specific city, but New Orleans' gothic flavor
is a natural fit for a movie version.
AFI's Top 10 Sci-Fi List – Are they kidding me?
(tanveernaseer.wordpress.com) To bring everyone up to speed,
here's the AFI's picks for the top 10 sci-fi films of all time (in
order of how they were presented during their special) -
10 – Back to the Future
9 – Invasion of the Body Snatchers
8 – Terminator 2: Judgement Day
7 – Alien
6 – Blade Runner
5 – The Day the Earth Stood Still
4 – A Clockwork Orange
3 – E.T. - The Extra Terrestrial
2 – Star Wars – A New Hope
1 – 2001: A Space Odyssey
Okay, while I get the reason behind "2001" being at the top of the
list, there are some choices, and omissions, that boggle the mind. For
example, could someone explain to me how "Star Wars – A New Hope"
beats out such classics as "The Day The Earth Stood Still", "Blade
Runner" and "Alien"? Oh, sure, when it came out in '77, "Star Wars - A
New Hope" was revolutionary and it certainly has impacted the world of
visual effects and sound. But outside of the technical wonders of that
film, what else is there that justifies it being listed at number 2? I
would at least give it to them if they put "The Empire Strikes Back"
instead since it builds on the technical advancements of "Star Wars –
A New Hope" and has a compelling storyline to boot. The emphasis
during the show on "Star Wars" revolutionizing visual effects also
draws a spotlight on one omission - "The Matrix", a film which not
only revolutionized visual effects wizardy as well, but also created
an interesting fusion of the science fiction and martial arts genres.
Of course, science fiction isn't just about fancy explosions or 'cool'
special effects sequences, one reason why I think films like the
original version of "Invasion of the Body Snatchers" and "The Day The
Earth Stood Still" should have placed far higher. Both these films
relied instead on their story and a fascinating examination of
contemporary social issues like our tendency toward self-destructive
measures or paranoia brought on out of a fear of those who are
different from us – themes that even today are quite significant and
relevant.
Another inclusion that bears much head-scratching is "E.T – The
Extra-Terrestrial". Now while I'll admit that I enjoyed this film
immensely when it first came out, the thing is I was a kid at that
time and this was really a movie directed at kids. Was it cute?
Absolutely. Was it heart-warming and nice to see an alien that wasn't
hell-bent on dominating our world? Sure. But those aren't qualifiers
that I would use to argue it being placed as one of the 10 best
science fiction films of all time. And if we're going to assume that
they felt the need to include a Spielberg film in the list, there is a
more obvious choice - "Close Encounters of The Third Kind". Not only
did Dreyfus give a fantastic performance in this film, but the visual
effects in this film, much like "Jaws", gave you just enough of the
UFOs to believe people were seeing them while keeping them mysterious
and unknown. How the AFI could have "E.T." on here and not "Close
Encounters of the Third Kind" is beyond me.
I'm sure everyone can agree on this final "what were they thinking"
inclusion - "Back To The Future". Really? Are they kidding? What, did
they run out of ideas here? Oh sure, "Back to the Future" is a fun
film and I admit I saw this and the 2 sequels in the cinema when they
came out. But let's be clear here – I never saw this as being anything
other than a summer comedy and certainly not a film that one would
utter in the same breath with "Alien", "2001" or "Invasion of The Body
Snatchers". It's amazing no one thought of such alternates as "Planet
of The Apes", "TRON", and "The War of the Worlds" (Bryon Haskin's 1953
version, not that Spielberg mess) just to name a few. I know I've read
others raise their eyebrows over the omission of "Star Trek" from the
Top 10 list and I'd agree that "Star Trek II: The Wrath Of Khan"
deserves consideration, but I'd also throw in "Galaxy Quest" as well
since the more times I watch it, the more I find things to like in it.
In any case, I stopped paying attention to these AFI specials some
time ago when they made a list that was fraught with such absurd
choices and omissions as this list here. Guess they still haven't
learned how to be consistent in their selection of noteworthy
cinematic efforts.
