Ahoy, squirts! Quint here with the biggie Comic-Con report. Lots of good stuff below, so let's not waste any time.
KILL BILL and ALIEN-THE DIRECTOR'S CUT
Today (Sunday) had only one panel that I was interested in, KILL BILL volume II with the man, the myth, the fucking legend himself Quentin Tarantino, Daryl Hannah and Lawrence Bender. Although I don't know why Ms. Hannah and Mr. Bender was even scheduled to appear with Quentin 'cause anybody who has seen Quentin speak can tell you he likes to hog the mic... I'm glad they were there, though.
Anyhow, Quentin appeared after a few trailers from other movies played, like PETER PAN (which looks fucking amazing, as I'm sure you can tell from the apple.com version), TIMELINE (which looks... like it could be good... hopefully), ALIEN-the Director's Cut (which 20th Century Fox is re-releasing theatrically this Halloween, then onto DVD)... it was really cool to see this trailer play because it ended with that great moment in the film when Ripley thinks she's all alone at the end and the Alien arm shoots out of the wall... when that happened gasps came from the audience surrounding me and the girl in front of me jumped a mile. Gotta love a classic horror flick like ALIEN or JAWS or THE EXORCIST that still makes 'em jump. Hopefully this'll lead to a theatrical release of James Cameron's director's cut of ALIENS... one can only hope.
Anyway, out comes the man who introduces Lawrence Bender then Daryl Hannah as Elle Driver, the California Mountain Snake. They open up for questions and I stand up and get first in line in front of the mic on the left side of the huge Room 20. The first person on the right side of the room gets the first question. He asked about THE VEGA BROS. At that very moment someone cuts in front of me to take a question. Normally I would have fought for my geek position with an open hand bitch-fight, but when you see that Mr. Blonde is the one that cut... well, you let it slide. He is not one to piss off.
Quentin's response to the fan was, "I won't direct it... I might write it, but I won't direct... besides I think both Michael and John (Travolta) are too old now to do a prequel to PULP and RES DOGS." I'm holding back a huge laugh... Madsen is hiding his face so Quentin won't see him before he takes the mic. "What's this about VEGA BROS?" he growls over the mic and the flash bulbs go off and Quentin goes nuts and brings him up on stage to join the silent panel.
Someone asks Quentin about the light in the briefcase in PULP FICTION is... Quentin gives the standard, "Whatever you think it is, you're absolutely right," answer. It's my turn. "Since you're splitting the movie into two parts, do you have room for YUKI'S REVENGE?" Quentin comes back with, "There will be no Yuki's Revenge. God no! That'd mean I'd have to go shoot more. 155 shooting days is my limit!"
I also asked when he's going to come back to Austin for the next QT Fest. He then revealed a cool little tidbit that he thought was going to piss off Miramax. Apparently in October, when KILL BILL vol. 1 is released, Quentin is going around the country to a few select cities for a traveling mini-Tarantino Fest with his own prints of obscure spaghetti westerns, Italian crime and giallo and kung-fu films. He will go to Austin, home of the Tarantino film festival, and he also mentioned Chicago. If you get the chance to go, I can't recommend it enough. It's very cool to see Quentin introduce these films, give you the history of that particular film... It's like going to school, being taught the history of film by Quentin Tarantino. It's an amazing experience and you'll find films you'll remember for the rest of your life. Gravy Train, anybody? hehe
Quentin unveiled a great surprise after a few more questions. Apparently Quentin loves the trailer that has been out for the last few months, but his original idea was to cut a trailer that plays up the revenge/spaghetti western aspect of the film. Miramax loved it, but said that it played only to the people that love Tarantino films, not to everyone else that isn't automatically coming to this film. Miramax is cutting the second trailer right now... But for those of you lucky enough to have that great indie theatre or revival house in your area you'll get something special.
Theatres like the Alamo Drafthouse Cinema (150 or so theatres in the US) will be getting this specialty trailer that Quentin and Co premiered earlier today. It is cut like a classic western trailer. The voice-over begins "In El Paso, Texas..." We see the wedding chapel... we get a glimpse of Buford Pusser as the preacher... We see Madsen, Hannah, Vivica Fox and Lucy Lui as they walk to the church. FLASH on a very quick black and white picture of Uma Thurman's face beaten to a pulp. Very disturbing, very violent looking even in the quick flash that we saw.
Michael Parks (FROM DUSK TILL DAWN) pops up as another Texas Ranger... same one from DUSK? And observes the wedding crime scene. There's an exchange in Japanese between Uma and Sonny Chiba. The subtitles read, "I need Japanese steel." "Why do you need Japanese steel?" "I need to kill some vermin."
A total Ennio Morricone-ish Spaghetti Western score underscores the whole trailer, including the Aeon Flux-like animated sequences in the trailer. There's an extension to the scene with Vivica Fox we saw in the first trailer. She's chopping veggies and says, "I guess it's too late to say sorry, isn't it?" Then we see an extended version of the knife fight in the kitchen.
Michael Madsen's Bud appears in profile. He says, "That woman deserves her revenge..." More flashes of some really violent animation and some new pieces of the House of Blue Leaves sequence including a really nifty sword move from Uma where she does this low jump, flipping in mid-air, avoiding one of the Katos and sending a vicious slice to the mid-section. The shot of Madsen returns and he finishes his line. "...we deserve to die." The whole trailer feels like a '70s and earlier trailer, down to the over large quotation marks around the title at the end... it was only missing the quick post-footage "Rated GP."
The trailer kicks so much ass, but I can totally understand why they're not releasing it in 3000 plus theatres. Most people would look at this trailer and have no idea what's going on. It's light on the action, high on the revenge. I personally think it's a great idea to have the ass-kicking, mass audience trailers out to the mainstream market and have a completely different trailer cut for the art house or revival audience.
GOTHIKA
Halle Berry came out to talk to the Comic-Con crowd and show a behind the scenes clip from GOTHIKA. Between Berry and Angelina Jolie the Comic-Con organizers and studio heads made a fantastic double punch. The fanboys were wrapped around the building, some getting there as early as 2:30am to shout, "I love you!" and "Do you like Asian dudes?" "I want you to have my baby!" and such other intelligent quips. I'm very surprised no one asked about CATWOMAN in the whole half hour she was doing the Q&A.
The 4500 seat room was standing room only... to the point where the fire marshal was shouting at people to keep the isles clear!!!
GOTHIKA looked pretty cool. There was some footage of Charles Dutton crumpled up on the floor, arms and legs crumpled up painfully beneath him. Halle Berry stands over him with an ax... it's pretty gory. Penelope Cruz is an insane asylum patient. Halle Berry is a doctor at the asylum. Robert Downey Jr. plays in somehow. Don't have a clue what the movie's about, but it looks very atmospheric, creepy and bloody. That makes me smile.
TOMB RAIDER
Angelina Jolie came in and gave more than half the room an instant hard-on. Her whole Q&A didn't really contain anything we haven't heard in some form before. It was more about getting people excited that a super-celebrity was in the room and talking with them. She did show footage from TOMB RAIDER: CRADLE OF LIFE. Lots of her spinning around on a jet ski in a black bikini. There was also a scene where she jumps off the top of a sky scraper... No parachute... but she is wearing a jumpsuit with flaps under the arms and much like a flying squirrel she floats down to safety.
UNDERWORLD
A new trailer was presented by Kate Beckinsale. Where the first trailer played up the action and effects, this trailer plays up the Romeo and Juliet-esque love story between Kate (Vampire) and a Lycan (Werewolf). I'm still not a big fan of the look of the werewolves... hair-less... rubbery... The action looks cool (if not totally derivative). Beckinsale was very pretty, but seemed very, very bored throughout the Q&A. I really do hope UNDERWORLD kicks ass, but I'm not 100% sold yet.
LORD OF THE RINGS: THE TWO TOWERS DVD and RETURN OF THE KING
Richard Taylor and his WETA entourage brought out an orc in full Helm's Deep armor and then brought out a hobbit and a very familiar Elf (known around these parts as Mrs. Kraken) that were put in their costumes live on stage as Taylor narrated.
To appraise the job on the hobbit, an expert was called in... Dominic Monaghan came out to much applause. Andy Serkis and the WETA digital guys ran through some of the extras on THE TWO TOWERS disc, including a great comparison of Andy's performance and how they overlaid the Gollum effects without taking away from his performance.
Sean Astin, in a chillin' white panama hat, comes out with Elijah Wood (again, to thunderous applause and much female seat wetting) to show some extras from the first DVD. Some behind the scenes of Astin's extremely sweet short film called THE LONG AND SHORT OF IT featuring Elijah as a first AD, Andy as a runner and Peter Jackson as the bus driver.
The big deal of the panel was the preview of the preview of RETURN OF THE KING. On the upcoming release of the theatrical edition of THE TWO TOWERS there will be a 13 minute preview of ROTK... we got to see 3 minutes. It was introduced by Peter Jackson, Billy Boyd and Ian McKellen on the streets of Minis Tirith set. I was actually onset the day they filmed that scene. Matter of fact, it was on that set that I cornered Alan Lee and got him to draw me a sketch in my sketchbook.
I was a little disappointed that there wasn't more footage in the preview. It was a lot more behind the scenes stuff. Still very cool. Alan Lee is interviewed... There's a shot of the monitor as it displays Frodo in Shelob's Lair. It's a quick scene that doesn't quite bring out the creepiness of the set. With all the dead, shriveled animals and orcsies hanging from the ceiling and stuck to the walls... lots of bones... I can't wait to see it!
There's some stuff from Pelennor Fields... It's going to be major. Helm's Deep had an enemy army of 10,000. Pelennor Fields will have an enemy army of 200,000. It's going to be fucking amazing, trust me on this.
And just as quickly as it begun, it was over.
FREDDY VS. JASON and V
Jason producer Sean S. Cunningham handled most of the moderator duties for this panel that featured Robert Englund (Freddy), Jason (Ken Kirzinger) and director Ronny Yu.
Englund was asked pretty quickly about the possibility of a new V series or TV movie. Englund announced that due to the success of Spielberg's TAKEN, V will be resurrected as a new 3 to 4 hour mini-series to premiere in 2004.
A sneak look at FREDDY VS. JASON was shown. It's a scene that lasts about 2 minutes. Two teens, a fat one and a skinny one, are at a party... they've slipped away into a cornfield to smoke the dope and drink the Everclear, both unaware that Jason is standing right behind them. They look around, see him standing there... stand motionless and Jason quickly grabs the skinny one's head and snaps it around, twisting it backwards on his body. The fat one screams and throws the Everclear on Jason and lights him on fire. Calmly, Jason takes out his machete which catches fire as it's drawn.
The fat teen runs and Jason follows, lighting the corn on fire. There's a high shot looking down at the running teen and pursuing Jason... the trail of fire marking his route. The fat teen seems to be outrunning Jason. He bursts out of the corn, back to the party. Suddenly a flaming machete comes flying out of the corn, impaling the fat teen. It was flung so fast that the blade is still aflame, sticking out of the boy's chest.
The party goers scatter as Jason comes out of the corn, retrieves his weapon and begins hacking away. Blood sprays everywhere. It's a glorious scene. If the rest of the movie is as gory and fun as the clip they showed, then as a guy who spent 4 consecutive Halloweens dressed as Freddy, I can't wait to see the whole film!
TROY
A quick compilation of scenes and behind the scenes clips was shown. This movie is going to make so much bank. It looks amazing. Huge cast, epic scope, beautiful cinematography. If they cut the trailer in around the same way as they cut these clips the masses are going to get very excited. Brad Pitt looks totally in place. The big build up leads to the revelation of the Trojan Horse being pulled into the city of Troy and the greeks dropping out. Mark my words, this film is going to make a shitload of money... thank God with the budget they have...
HELLBOY
Cool cat Mike Mignola came out and spoke about the film based on his comic book. He also brought with him some clips. It was this footage that all those HELLBOY clips that appeared on the site a month ago came from. If you've seen those pics, then you've seen most of what was shown at Comic-Con. We see the Nazis summoning Hellboy and his rescue... we see a bit of him chatting it up with Liz, bonding... sweet-talking, that ol' devil. Mignola is very confident this film will be amazing and so am I.
I, ROBOT
I, ROBOT had a taped greeting by Will Smith. He assured us that I, ROBOT will be fantastic and is being faithfully adapted by director Alex Proyas. A little behind the scenes stuff was shown... Looks impressive... lots of wire work, people getting shot backwards and one little glimpse of a robot hand, which looked very much like the fingers on the Asimov covers. Coming from Proyas, I'm very excited about this project.
HARRY POTTER AND THE PRISONER OF AZKABAN
No footage at all was shown, but Daniel Radcliff taped a greeting with director Alfonso Cuaron. They just waved and smiled and stated that they have filmed the Knight Bus stuff, the Hippograph stuff, the Dementors and the "blowing up" of Aunt Marge. That's about it.
MATRIX: REVOLUTIONS
The big MATRIX show was a preview of the international trailer which was a combination of the preview from the end of RELOADED and the preview from ENTER THE MATRIX. The only thing I don't remember seeing in any of the previous trailers was a quick cut of Morpheus getting kicked in the face by Seraph.
LOONEY TUNES: BACK IN ACTION & MUSEUM SCREAM
Warner Bros is reviving the time-honored showing of cartoons before films with a new line of Looney Tunes cartoons. They presented the first one, a Sylvester and Tweety cartoon called MUSEUM SCREAM, at Comic-Con and said it will premiere with LOONEY TUNES: BACK IN ACTION. It was pretty funny, but most definitely lacks the wit and charm of the classic Looney Tunes.
They then screened scenes from LOONEY TUNES: BACK IN ACTION. Some were still in the pencil stage, some were half done, some were totally done. It was pretty much expanded scenes from the trailer. Brendan Frasier running through Yosemite Sam's Casino called The Wooden Nickel, avoiding the baddies. Then there's the car chase down the old Vegas strip. I'm not sure about this one. I'm frightened of this film. I have not yet disliked a Joe Dante movie, but I have a bad feeling about this one. Not because of any of the footage I've seen... the scenes shown weren't bad... It's just this feeling I have deep down in my gut. I hope I'm wrong.
VAN HELSING
This is the last one... Hugh Jackman (Van Helsing) came out with Kate Beckinsale, Richard Roxburgh (Dracula), Stephen Sommers (Director), 2 brides of Dracula (model lookin' hotties), Will Kemp (Wolf Man), Shuler Hensley (Frankenstein's Monster) and Kevin Jay O'Connor (Igor) joined him up on stage.
Of course, being Comic-Con, the X-Men fans dominated. He was asked about doing an X3 and he said he loved the character of Wolverine, but wouldn't commit to the public that he'd be in X3 as he's not currently contracted to do it. Guess 20th Century Fox is going to have to fork out the moola to resign Wolvie... if they hold out, they're astoundingly stupid. Hugh Jackman IS Wolverine and a big part of the success of the first two X-MEN films.
Anyhow, Sommers, who comes off as a really cool guy, introduced some footage. What was screened looked very impressive. I was kind of expecting the campy color scheme of the Mummy films, but I was totally wrong. The cinematography is sharp and dark, without a hint of a golden filter. The atmosphere is thick, the action is intense...
The only monster we see is Frankenstein's Monster. He's chalk white and has a lumpy rounder head. Pretty great make-up, at least in the few quick glimpses we got. Not too much action was shown... A lot of period stuff... dancing, horse work, etc. Everyone looks great. Van Helsing himself looks just like the teaser artwork we've seen already. I myself can't wait to see how similar The Wolf Man is to the teaser artwork, which is incredibly badass.
During the Q&A, the only thing that was really of super relevance was when Sommers was asked about THE MUMMY 3. He said he's still focused on this film, but would love to do another MUMMY movie. He also said Brendan Frasier won't leave him alone about it, that he's dying to get the next MUMMY movie going. We'll see...
That wraps up my Comic-Con coverage, folks. This last one was a big bitch of a report, but full of lots of good stuff. I hope you enjoyed it! I've got some cool stuff coming up... Keep your eye on the site! This is Quint bidding you all a fond farewell and adieu.
-Quint
email: Does Wolf Man have nards? I know the answer! Email me here!!!
