Hey folks, Harry here... Well if this doesn't get that saliva gland kicking and cause that wetspot to drench... then you are no geek. Envy isn't quite the word for what Quint got to see today, so weep and be sad, for all of us that were not there... we lose, Quint wins!
Ahoy, squirts. Everybody's favorite crusty ol' seaman, Quint, here with a report in of all the cool big movie footage shown at the San Diego Comic Con. Below you will find descriptions and my thoughts on the footage shown from such big upcoming flicks as X-MEN 2, DAREDEVIL, TERMINATOR 3: THE RISE OF THE MACHINES, SOLARIS and DREAMCATCHER.
Let's start with the two biggest: T3 and X2. Jonathan Mostow was there to introduce the footage and who else but Schwarzenegger himself walks out to join him. I had heard about Schwarzenegger's appearance the day before and even had a one on one interview set up in advance. The interview ended up falling through, unfortunately. I was offered a seat in a roundtable interview with both Mostow and Schwarzenegger, but I turned it down as Garth from Dark Horizons, Nick from CHUD and a ton of other internet press seemed to have the interviews covered. I don't like the impersonal nature of roundtable interviews as it is, but it was pointless for me to report back to you folks with the exact stuff that Nick and Garth will do a fine job with anyway.
Anyway, the footage left me a little perplexed. It was cool, but it left me terrified of the project. The Comic Con footage started off with a John Conner (Nick Stahl) narration over blackness and then over a dark road at night. I couldn't hear the first line or two over the crowd cheering, but I did pick up the bulk of what was said. "My name's John Conner. I live off the grid. No one, nothing, can find me. If we changed the future, why am I still running? If it's safe now, why am I hiding?" Over this we see a troubled and grizzly John Conner wandering around deserted areas. There're cutaways to a clean science lab. There's another editing jumble of fucked up shit/demolished areas, then we see Arnold climb out of a truck that's crashed into a crumbling cement pillar of some sort and is on fire. That publicity photo that was released from T3, the one with Arnold clad in leather, holding his gun, standing in front of a fiery truck... It came from that scene.
I only saw the footage once, so I don't remember the exact order in which all these other flashes came in, but we see more of the clean science labs, but with huge, shiny robotic warriors looking things. They aren't endoskeletons. They actually kinda reminded me of the new and improved Robinson family robot in the terrible LOST IN SPACE film. I haven't seen them in action, so I won't pass judgment until I see some footage of them actually doing shit, but the first image of them didn't kick my ass. You also see a full sized endoskeleton in one of these lab shots, with scientists playing around with it a bit. There's more damaged, dark areas. Then, a rubble heap from which a hand suddenly springs out of (I think it was the Lady Terminator, but I'm not sure).
There was also footage of Schwarzenegger walking between tombstones, huge casket over one shoulder, gun in his opposite hand. He gets fired upon, bullet hits all over his body and the casket. He nonchalantly turns around and fires his gun, an automatic weapon, back at whoever is shooting him. We also see Schwarzenegger sitting in a car, bazooka on his shoulder aimed out his window at an approaching car. He fires and the approaching vehicle goes up in flames. We see Arnold a bit injured, limping about, his face a bit bloody, showing a bit of his endoskeleton. Then we have the final line. Arnold, face bloody, some damage to the flesh and silver showing through... It's at least a medium close-up of him as we see he's dealing with some inner conflict, which I assume is that good terminator/bad terminator glitch that we've heard about already... the thing that's supposed to make him switch from good to bad to good and back again during the film. He says, "Desire is... irrelevant. I AM a machine!"
It seemed well shot and I like Mostow as a director very much. U-571 and Breakdown were very solid, tense flicks. I just don't know. Because it isn't Cameron and isn't trying to be a copy of Cameron, which is a good thing, by the way, it's just different. Of course, we see none of the effects in the footage as the movie is still shooting, but it's the first time any of us have been in this universe without James Cameron guiding us. It's a little scary to be left with a stranger, no more than a friend of a friend, to hold our hands through this beloved area. It was an interesting look at the movie, but I'm still at the same place I was before I saw it. I want it to be good. I hope I'm just being rational about the footage, not making excuses for it. I hope the movie will be great. I'm scared it won't be, but will hold out any judgment until I see the film.
The X-MEN 2 footage, on the other hand, fucking blew me away. Bryan Singer is only 3 weeks into shooting X2 and the footage he showed was cut together better than 98% of the trailers that have come out this year. Of the 3 weeks of shooting, only the first 2 weeks footage was available due to the turnaround time for the rendering process. It was in-fucking-credible. I really, really dig X-MEN and the footage I saw today (and from what I know from grilling Moriarty about the script) is better than anything in the first film.
Enough with that. Here's the description: It opens with the very end of the first film. Xavier and Magneto are playing chess in Magneto's plastic prison. Magneto says, "Does it keep you awake at night? The feeling that someday they will pass that foolish law and come for you... and your children." Professor X retorts, "It does indeed..." then the footage kicks in. We see Navy Seal types running around the halls of the School For the Gifted. It's night time, they're wearing goggles, weapons raised. We see two flashes of the small children, one (who might have been Bobby Drake) hiding, his head whipping around from side to side, scared, the other someone I don't know, a child who is much younger (maybe 6 or 7) standing alone in a shadowed room as one of the soldiers carefully approaches. Then it cuts back to the end of the first film, on Professor X. "I feel a great swell of pity for the poor soul who comes to that school looking for trouble."
The music builds and flash on X2 footage of Wolverine, in tank top, screaming in rage and running down the darkened hall at the school at someone off camera, claws out and ready to kick some ass. We see many quick cuts from here on out. More Army guys infiltrating the school, one menacing looking bastard smiling creepily as army guys flood around him and into the different corridors in the X compound. We see a glimpse of Wolverine flying through the air, arms outstretched and SNIKT as his claws pop out. We see Pyro (I assume) holding out his hand and making a car explode in flames. Quick cut to Ian McKellen, in his white prison outfit, faced scrunched up and screaming, "You should have killed me when you had the chance!!!" Another quick cut of what appeared to be someone in Magneto's plastic prison hitting him over the head. I'm not sure on that, but I think that's what the quarter of a second of footage showed me.
We then see Professor X, just outside of the plastic prison, smashed up against the plastic wall as the accordion-like walkway is retreating. He's either pressing himself against the plastic in defeat, fear or is being pulled by an unknown force toward the glass. Again, I'm not sure, but that's what it looked like. We see flashes of Cyclops spinning around and Rogue in what looked like a sewer. We then see a silhouette of what I think was Wolverine at one of the Canadian Compounds as he's in search of his past. We hear someone, maybe Rogue, maybe not, say, "Have you been here?" Wolverine pauses and says, "I can't remember."
More flashes and we see Magneto, looking to be out of his plastic prison, and he says menacingly, "The war has begun." Then it cuts to the X2 title and some more coming soon type stuff. Then it cuts back to Xavier, looking worried. He says, "Eric... What have you done?" And then it cuts to Wolverine in a different shot, but from the same scene in the school at night as the army guys are invading, but this time he's even more pissed, he's closer to the camera, his claws out and he swipes 2 or 3 times right at us, screaming with rage, then BLACK.
Fucking awesome. I'm dying to see the movie and it doesn't come out 'til next year!!! Argggg!!! It looks like Singer is gonna hit this one out of the park. No one would be happier than me if Singer makes this one something special.
Next up is Solaris. This one wasn't announced officially, neither was the fact that James Cameron was there to introduce the clip, not to mention the few questions he took from the audience. He said that he had just seen the rough cut a few days ago and told Soderbergh to print the negative with the cut he has now. It was perfect. Soderberg is apparently going to tweak it a bit further, though. Cameron announced that he has a short list of what he's going to direct next, but high on the list is a live action remake of the Manga Battle Angel Alita. He said he was going to direct it sometime in the next 2 years. FINALLY!
OK. SOLARIS... The footage... Shows George Clooney as he first arrives at the space station. He's wearing a space suit that isn't very bulky, but not form-fitting either. It's thin material that is colored with silver and dirty gold. The space station seems deserted. It's quiet, creepy... very disturbing. The walls are all cold steel blue that are lit and shot beautifully. Imagine a mixture of Cameron and Kubrick and you have an inkling as to what the look of the interior of the space station was. Clooney looks around, obviously puzzled that no one is there. He finds a bloody patch on the grid floor. It's a shocking contrast to the light steel blue and metallic silver of the rest of clean station.
Clooney then sees that the bloody spot is really the beginning of a long, thin blood trail. He follows it along the grid floor until we reach another doorway. We pan up from the floor to see a bloody hand print at the doorway. Clooney continues to slowly follow the blood trail through a hallway, until he comes into a room and finds what looked like a bloody white glove on the floor. He kneels down, picks it up, turns it over, thinks... Then looks up to see the blood trail continuing into the next room, which has 2 body bags with stiffs in them. He cautiously approaches the body bags, opens one up to reveal a dead man in it. He goes to the other one and opens it up. We don't see who's inside of the bag, but there's obviously a bloody body in there. Clooney looks at the dead body for a minute, then leaves. We stay in the room and pan up to the ceiling where we see a blood spot.
Very creepy stuff. Not one word of dialogue in that whole scene (although Cameron was quick to assure us all that there was plenty of dialogue in the movie). It was beautiful and told so much without saying anything. From my understanding of the script and from what I've seen of the movie so far, this is going to be a brilliant film. I'm dying to see the whole thing.
Alright. Dreamcatcher. I read the book and while I really dug the book, it seemed to be all over the map. Not my favorite Stephen King book. But I do have to say that DREAMCATCHER the movie has me intrigued. The cast is incredible, the director, Larry Kasdan, has given us a great and beautiful trailer and has done some great movies in the past. Now, after seeing the footage I'm doubly intrigued. If you've seen the trailer, you know the film is set in the wilderness during the winter. We see Jason Lee and Timothy Olephant paling around, we see our first glimpse of Morgan Freeman as the crazy Army dude (I forgot what they renamed his character for the film). He's working with this crazy, white head of hair and scarily bushy white eyebrows.
We see a scene where Freeman is grilling one of his underlings, telling him to swear on something. Scout's honor. He asks this while loading a handgun. The young recruit hesitantly swears, scout's honor. He holds up the scout's honor three fingers of his right hand and POW!!! Freeman blows off his ring finger. We meet the annoying, farting guy whose ass explodes in blood... if you've read the book you know what I'm talking about. We see the scene where Jason Lee and Timothy Olephant find the stranger's bed smeared with blood, follow the blood trail (there are a whole lotta blood trails today, aren't there?) to the bathroom, find the dude sitting on the toilet, looking dead. Then we hear a PLOP! Jason Lee asks, "What's wrong with this guy?" Olephant says, "He's dead." Lee, "He can't be dead if he's doing that!" PLOP!
They end up pushing the guy over, revealing some pretty nasty shit (not literally) in the toilet. The guy's ass is blown out and blood is everywhere, not to mention other... matter... in the toilet. We see glimpses of tentacles, snow, helicopters, army dudes, freaky snow, scary silhouettes, etc. I'm very interested in seeing what this turns out to be. William Goldman script based on a Stephen King story directed by Lawrence Kasdan. I'm there.
Now for DAREDEVIL. Mark Steven Johnson (director), Avi Arad (producer), Ben Affleck and a few other producers were there to show the footage and give a little talk. Johnson seemed really enthused about the project, his love of the comic pouring out of him. Affleck was a little less enthusiastic, but his love and respect for the books was very evident. I know, I know. I hear you. "Shut up and get to the footage description!" Fine. Some of this might be a little out of order, but I'll try to keep it as I saw it. Give me a break! I'm working on a tired memory here!!!
We start off seeing the accident that blinds young Matt Murdock. It's interestingly done, but the first image that got me was the silhouette of the young DD in his hospital bed, gauze over his damaged eyes, a Nun leaning over him, kissing his forehead, cross dangling down being held lightly by the young boy. She sits back up, her cross pulled free from his feeble grasp as his hand reaches out weakly, fingers blindly searching for the icon. The next thing we see is an overhead shot of young Murdock with a cane, tapping along. We see his father in the boxing ring, knocking out his opponent. We see the victorious father hold his beloved, blind son up on his shoulder as the crowd is cheering for him. The young Murdock is wearing his father's robe, red with horns on the top.
Then we see his father get beaten badly. We see the young boy kneeling by his dead father as the camera pulls back, shifts focus, revealing the crumpled red boxing robe on the filthy alley floor. Next thing we get is Daredevil doing a flip, landing on a roof. He takes his mask off. He's a bit beat up, got some scrapes and scratches, but strongly walks toward a little wall on the roof. With the flash of his hand, we see 3 vertical black circles, one on top of the other. We hear a whirling sound, but we're not sure what it is. In a flash, Daredevil shoots out his hand hitting all three black circles. The whirling stops and we see that the black circles were 3 combination locks spinning so fast that all the numbers were a blur. There's a click and the door to the roof entrance to his place opens up.
He walks in, vacant stare on his face, but he walks confidently, avoiding all obstacles and even affectionately patting his father's boxing gloves that hang on the wall as he walks by. He nonchalantly hangs his billy club on a peg on the wall, the fourth or fifth peg in a line, the previous 4 already holding billy clubs, and drops his mask on the middle head of three dummy heads lined up in a row, the other two with masks on them already.
We see a close up of prescription medication. Pain pills. There are 4 or 5 bottles crammed together. He quickly reads the brail on one of them before popping the top and chewing the pills. The next thing is a close up of a mound of salt and a scooper. A hand comes into frame, picks up the scooper, fills it with salt and dumps it into a bath. Affleck climbs into the hot bathwater gingerly, kinda sighs and this weird metal plate slides over him as he lays down in the bath.
Then we see Kevin Smith in his cameo. He looks like a scientist. He says something along the lines of, "Want to see something cool?" Que the heavy rock music and the quick cutting action scenes. We see a bar room fight. Daredevil taking out some assholes, doing some amazing flips and action moves (you've seen the scene in the trailer where he does a flip, then jumps to the wall, kicking off it in mid jump and taking out another bad guy with a powerful kick. We see Daredevil on the ceiling, hiding out above the ceiling fan, letting the blades of the fan deflect the bullets headed his way. There's this great shot of Daredevil fighting the crowd... he runs and does a front flip, but the camera follows him in the flip. So we see Daredevil running across the screen and when he flips, the camera flips with him, keeping him upright, but sending everything around him spinning. Pretty neat.
We also see Collin Farrell as Bullseye, looking really badass in his black leather coat. He's on a motorcycle in the middle of a street making a nasty face at Daredevil before he peels out and pops a wheelie, headed straight at him. Daredevil calmly runs toward the approaching motorcycle until they are just about to meet. Then it cuts away. I think at this point we saw a limo crash with Elektra and her father being thrown about inside. We see a bit of Michael Clark Duncan as The Kingpin... Just a close-up of him smiling. Shortly after that, we see Elektra doing some pretty cool Sai swirling, swiping at Daredevil and looking hot in her black leather number. Sure, it lacks the striking electricity of the red outfit in the comic, but it looked cool nonetheless.
We also see Elektra sparring with Bullseye. She makes a few swipes at him with the Sais. He easily avoids the strikes, knocks her down, but not before he nabs one of her sais. He admires it briefly. We then see him grab Elektra by the throat, hold the sai up, then we cut to about 30 feet away. Daredevil is on the ground, seeing Elektra being held off the ground by the neck, her sai in the hands of Bullseye. Daredevil reaches out, pained look on his face (at least on the part not covered by the mask).
I believe that is all. Pretty cool stuff? The footage was full of shadow and darkness and some pretty badass action. If the rest of the movie is as cool and as detailed as the footage described above, then we are in for a treat come next February. Didn't get to see any of Jon Favreau's stuff, though. His Foggy Nelson is supposed to damn near steal the movie. Can't wait.
Alright, squirts. You got a lot of out of me today. I'm gonna go hit the sack so I can hit the final day of the ComiCon with a vengeance. I'll be back tomorrow with interviews with the lovely Asia Argento and Jonathan Mostow and maybe some other goodies. 'Til then, squirts, this is Quint bidding you all a fond farewell and adieu.
-Quint
