Cinematical has just received a batch of exclusive images from The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor (see gallery below for more). The first poster for this sequel hit the other day, and I imagine a trailer will be knocking on all our doors real soon. In this third Mummy installment (technically fourth if you include The Scorpion King), father-and-son duo Rick (Brendan Fraser) and Alex O'Connell (Luke Ford) find themselves in the Far East where they unearth the mummy of the first Emperor of Qin. Needless to say, said Emperor (as played by Jet Li) is your basic, run-of-the-mill shape-shifting entity, cursed by a wizard centuries ago, and out to wreak some havoc. The beautiful Maria Bello and Michelle Yeoh round out the cast.
Rob Cohen directed this one, and if you like what you see in the gallery below, make sure to head on over to Rob's official Mummy production blog. Dude's been keeping that loaded with all sorts of tasty goodies ever since production first began, so definitely check that out, as well as the film's official website (which just went live). The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor arrives in theaters on August 1.
This weekend's release of The Forbidden Kingdom, starring Jackie Chan and Jet Li, features the first teaming of the two Asian action heroes. (My review is here.) Jackie is older and got established first as a comic martial arts master before making a string of modern-day thrillers and adventures. Jet came along later and became known as an ultra-serious, ultra-deadly lethal weapon. Their relative merits have been debated endlessly, and The Forbidden Kingdom finally gives fans a chance to see them go man to man -- first against each other, and then against the bad guys.
Now it's your turn to weigh in. Who's your favorite Asian action hero? (For the purposes of this poll, we'll stick to the living, so that's why Bruce Lee is not included.) Do you prefer Jackie's humor and larger than life thrill-seeking stunts? Or do you favor Jet's solemn precision and frequently death-dealing fighting?
Or ... have you always been a secret backer of Donnie Yen? (He had his own square-off against Jackie Chan in Shanghai Knights.) Sammo Hung? (The former Martial Law TV star is still active in Hong Kong.) Michelle Yeoh? (Tomorrow Never Dies, Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon) Or the younger generation represented by Tony Jaa (Ong Bak, The Protector), Collin Chou (Jade Warlord in The Forgotten Kingdom), and Wu Jing (Invislble Target, Kill Zone)? Sound off in the comments to tell us your faves and let us know about anyone else we haven't mentioned.
Welcome back to another fun-filled edition of Insert Caption -- the game Totally Wicked Awesome Magazine called, "Delightful, Delicious and a Damn Good Time!" Last week we asked you to give us your bestest captions for a photo from this week's new release, The Forbidden Kingdom -- starring Jackie Chan, Jet Li and some white kid, who, judging from the picture, is quite obviously stuck in the middle with you ... and I'm wondering what it is I should do. Clowns to the left of me, Jokers to the right ... okay, that's enough. Congrats to our three winners below ...
1. "The MPAA's ongoing battle with illegal movie downloads in China as an interpretive dance routine." -- Todd G.
2. "This is my dance space, this is your dance space. Spaghetti arms!" -- Kathi F.
3. "Oh I know this! Wax on! Wax ggghhhhttt!" -- Paul R.
And speaking of things stuck in the middle, this week we're catching up with our old SNL pals Tina Fey and Amy Poehler as they prepare to launch their new comedy, Baby Mama. The three winning captions this week will carry away one Baby Mama poster, one Baby Mama t-shirt, one Baby Mama baseball hat and one Baby Mama baby blanket. (One Baby Mama baby unfortunately not included since you have to make that yourself.) Now push ... harder ... and sound off below!
The good news? Two of Asia's biggest action superstars have teamed up for the first time. The bad news? It's 15 years too late. And what's with the white kid?
The Forbidden Kingdom is yet another picture in which we are meant to experience an exotic locale peopled entirely by "others" through the eyes of a Caucasian character. In this case, it's a fantasy world cobbled together from classic Chinese literature and period martial arts movies. As the latest entry in the category of "low expectation, Asian-themed, English-language movies written and directed by respectful American creative talent," the film is slightly above average entertainment. But I grow tired of having to lower my expectations in exchange for the pleasure of seeing talented Asian performers make an appearance on the big screen in America.
Writer John Fusco and director Rob Minkoff make fun of some of the stereotypes inherent in period martial arts pictures, while also sprinkling shout-outs into the material to demonstrate their love and knowledge of the various source materials that inspired them. Jackie Chan and Jet Li are cheerfully engaging as a drunken beggar and monk on a mission, respectively, providing most of the film's comic and action highlights in supporting roles. That's right -- Chan and Li have both achieved Hollywood stardom, are top-billed, are no doubt top-paid, but play second fiddle to "the white kid," Michael Angarano. We waited years for this?
Welcome to another edition of Insert Caption -- the game where we provide the photo and you provide the funny! Last week, we asked you to throw on your lamest Hawaiian t-shirt and give us your best captions for a photo from Forgetting Sarah Marshall. Congrats to our three winners below for sharing their warmth, their passion, their creativity ... and their ability to conjure up a mental image of Jonah Hill on a spit. Our apologies to you Mr. Hill -- we still love ya man!
1. "I was speaking figuratively when I said I had a lot of baggage." -- Mike R.
2. "Crap... I thought I ditched the Verizon guy at the pig roast!" -- Russell K.
3. "They just put Jonah Hill on a spit and fired up the tiki torches. I'm outta here!" -- Andrew W.
This week, we're taking a trip back to ancient China for a visit with legendary martial arts stars Jet Li and Jackie Chan. Their new movie, The Forbidden Kingdom, arrives in theaters on April 18 -- and ... I just feel so bad for that poor, innocent white kid right now. It'd be hard enough running into one of those guys in a dark alley -- imagine getting stuck between both AND you have to go to the bathroom real bad? Ouch. The three lucky winners from this week will run (as fast as they can) away with one Forbidden Kingdom poster, one pack of Forbidden Kingdom trading cards, one box of green tea and one container of incense. Hmm, I smell a lot of captions this week ... and for some reason they smell like burnt roses with a splash of lemon vanilla? Sound off below ...
OK, so we all jumped the gun a little when the first image of what was being touted as the poster for The Mummy: Tomb of The Dragon Emperor hit the net. But, now Coming Soon has snapped a photo (that's only a little blurry) of the honest to goodness one-sheet for Rob Cohen's addition to the successful franchise.
By the looks of things, it was possibly an unfinished version that was released. So while it might look somewhat similar, there has been a big change. Now the poster has the entire cast on it. Rick O'Connell (Brendan Fraser) is front and center, along with Maria Bello as Evey, John Hannah as the bumbling brother Jonathan and son Alex (Luke Ford). Surprisingly, bad-guy Jet Li's photo is pretty far down on the poster, but I guess Universal wants to remind us about all the stuff we like about The Mummy in the first place right up front.
Stay tuned to Cinematical for the official poster release and hopefully we'll be getting a trailer sometime in the near future. Let's just hope we get the real thing this time. The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor opens in theaters on August 1st.
Before anyone accuses me of being too hard on the latest installment of The Mummy, you should know that it is coming from someone who really liked the first movie. So you would think that I would be happy with the news of a fourth film -- but here we are. MTV news reports that according to the brand new Evey (Maria Bello), "[There will] absolutely be The Mummy 4." She also went on to tell MTV that she has signed for not one, but three more sequels.
We all know by now that The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor is a bit of a departure for the franchise. Not only do we get a new bad guy and exotic locale, but we also have Bello taking over where Rachel Weisz left off. Sure, Brendan Fraser and John Hannah have returned, but this is not The Mummy that most of us know and love.
On the upside, at least Evey is going to get the chance to kick a little butt of her own. Bello told MTV, "In the beginning of the movie I do a sword fight with an invisible mummy, I had to be on wires and do sword work. It took days to do, and it was so much fun. I would do flips on the wire and I'd land down and be like a little kid." It's about time Evey got to handle a little more of the rough stuff.
Bello wasn't quite sure when movie number four will happen. Although she did hint that the next film might take place in South America -- or maybe she's just angling for a vacation. Universal might want to see what the box-office returns are for Emperor first. The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor arrives in theaters on August 1st.
You know, I am really trying not to be too hard on the latest installment of The Mummy franchise. I want to give the film a fair shot and all that, but it's getting pretty hard to keep the snark at bay when Universal insists on doing stuff like this. Over at Horror Movies.ca, they have posted what is said to be the first poster for The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor (courtesy of Filmz.ru). You can see a small version to the right.
Over the last few months, there have plenty of production updates and a stray photo here and there. But other than the glowing praises of director Rob Cohen on the official production blog, most of the details of the film have been kept under wraps. What we do know is that this time Jet Li stars as an immortal emperor, and that Maria Bello is taking over the role of spunky Evelyn. Both Brendan Fraser and John Hannah have both returned in their original roles, and for the most part, it looks like the same old thing -- a movie chock full of cursed relics, plenty of 'adventuring,' and some kicking special effects.
But if we were to just look at this leaked poster, it would appear that this time the action is centered on a cursed take-out menu. Seriously, couldn't they have come up with something a little better than a Mortal Kombatrip-off? For the sake of everyone involved, I just hope this poster turns out to be a fake. If it isn't, I'm afraid this is just a sign of crappiness to come.
Well to be honest, my expectations for the latest installment of The Mummy aren't too high, so if I look on the bright side then maybe I will get a pleasant surprise after all. Director Rob Cohen has announced on his production blog that The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor has wrapped shooting in China. Starring Brendan Fraser as Rick O'Connell, this time, the O'Connells (Maria Bello, Fraser, and Luke Ford as their son, Alex) are bound for China to battle an immortal emperor (Jet Li). Rounding out the cast are John Hannah, who returns to play Evy's brother Jonathan, and Michelle Yeoh as a "double-crossing sorceress".
Cohen has made this particular announcement on his blog a veritable love fest for his cast. Cohen gushes over his new stars, Maria Bello as the 'new and improved' Evy, saying, "Her beauty and intelligence, wit and courage were something I appreciated each and every day". Jet Li wasn't left out either, and Cohen says that he was everything that "epitomizes graciousness, spiritual depth, and physical grace". Just because shooting has finished, there is still a lot of work ahead on the film, including somewhere around "800 visual effects shots" to be completed.
Considering no one was all that anxious for a third film in the series, the blog has maybe managed to improve things just a little. I know my opinion on the film has fluctuated wildly based on the few pictures that have been released so far. Just for the record: those opinions varied from everything from "Well, maybe this won't be so bad after all" to something with a lot more expletives in it that I probably shouldn't get into here. The Mummy 3 is set for release on August 1st, 2008.
When you hear about big, multi-million dollar actor paychecks, ones which take up a good portion of a film's budget, it's usually a North American production. Not in this case. Reuters has reported that Jet Li, the it-man behind films from Romeo Must Die to Fearless, is getting one sweet paycheck for one of his most recent films. He is making 100 million yuan ($13 million) for Warlords--close to half of the budget for the film. This record-breaking pay continues to keep him as the highest-paid actor in a Chinese-language film, a spot he had already held for earning 70 million yuan for his role in Hero.
Director Peter Chan (Perhaps Love) is quoted as saying: "Without Jet Li, we would not dare to invest $40 million in a Chinese-language film." He went on to say that Li was a "guarantee" for global sales. I would hope so, because that's a big chunk of change that they are investing on that belief. They say about half of the budget went to the cast, and since Li has $13 million, that still leaves about $7 million for the rest of the cast -- House of Flying Daggers stars Andy Lau and Takeshi Kaneshiro, as well as actress/director Xu Jinglei (A Letter from an Unknown Woman). Set amidst the Taiping Rebellion during the Qing Dynasty, Warlords focuses on an unresolved crime, and three brothers who turn on each other because of a beautiful woman. Chan says that it is influenced by the 1973 film, The Blood Brothers, but isn't a remake. We'll find out if the film holds up to expectations soon enough -- it's getting released in Hong Kong next month.
Looking at this new promo still for The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor, I now realize what the first two Mummymovies were missing: martial arts! Never mind the fact that Jet Li looks awesome in this shot. I'm just excited because there's no possible way that Brendan Fraser (aka "Rick O'Connell") is going to get out of this fight alive. Imagine how great this sequel would be if Fraser got his ass kicked. Yeah, unfortunately, Fraser probably does win the battle somehow. Or if he does get served in this scene, he will win out in the end. In that case: poor Jet Li. How could he ever live with himself if he's seen on the big screen defeated by the guy who played George of the Jungle and Dudley Do-Right?
The photo comes courtesy of Rob Cohen, the sequel's director, who has been blogging the production ever since shooting began over a month ago. Since, we have seen a photo of "the Terracotta Army" and a photo of Maria Bello, who took over the part of "Evy" after Rachel Weisz dropped out. There have also been some videos on the blog, including footage of Fraser shooting at a river, falling out of a tree and throwing himself in some mud. And if you are really excited about the martial arts, you will want to check out the video about the stunt team, which doesn't feature any actual fighting but is still interesting enough. Say what you will about Cohen's directorial skills, he may in fact be better than Stephen Sommers at least, and The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor is sure to be the coolest installment of the series. Unless, that is, they decide to follow tradition and give us some really terrible CGI at the end. Pray that Jet Li doesn't end up rendered out of sand in the end.
Now is it just me or does Maria Bello look an awful lot like Geena Davis in this picture? Rob Cohen's production blog for The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor has posted the first picture of Bello as Evy (the role famously dumped by Rachel Weisz after two films). Just last month, Chris had reported on one of the first images to emerge from the production and for lack of a better word, it was pretty. Not much to see, but there was definitely some style there. Plus, let's be honest, it's not like expectations for this flick are all that high anyway, so I'll take what I can get thank you very much. As you probably know, The Mummy 3 will be heading in a different direction this time around, placing the action in China with martial arts master Jet Li filling in as the bad guy.
When Bello had spoken with Sci Fi Wire in September, she was quoted as saying her Evy, "...has the same name, but she's a very different character than Rachel played. She's a bad-ass action chick. I had to train a lot. I had to do wushu, a martial-art form, some kickboxing, swordfighting, rifle training for a couple of months before we even started shooting" A far cry from Weisz's plucky librarian, but as much as I like the idea of "bad-ass action chicks", I still think recasting the same role with a different actress was a bit of a mistake. According to Cohen, Li has just arrived on location in Montreal to film some of the more climatic battle scenes with returning hero Brendan Fraser (as Rick O'Connell -- who's also pictured in the above link) before moving on to shoot in China. The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor is scheduled for release on August 1st, 2008.
Aging martial artist Jackie Chan apparently keeps a blog, and has written the following on it, according to the AP: he's fully aware that Rush Hour, Rush Hour 2 and Rush Hour 3 all sucked. He knew they were crap when he made them, and he knows it now. (I think Richard Corliss of Time Magazine is now the last remaining person on Earth who doesn't know it -- he gave Rush Hour 3 a glowing review.) Of the first Rush Hour, Chan says "When we finished filming, I felt very disappointed because it was a movie I didn't appreciate and I did not like the action scenes involved. I felt the style of action was too Americanized and I didn't understand the American humor." Okay ... thanks for sharing. So why did he return for more of the same, after such a negative experience? Because, he says, he was offered an "irresistible" sum of money. He doesn't even bother giving a reason for the third one, apparently.
The interesting thing about all of this is that Chan seems to equate the bad humor of the Rush Hour movies with American taste, in general, as if we're a nation of people who think Rush Hour is the bar by which good taste is measured. He uses the word 'American' over and over again, when pinpointing the flaws of his various projects. Of his upcoming movie, The Forbidden Kingdom, with Jet Li, he tells us -- at least it's in advance, this time -- that the movie is no good. Why? It's "a movie made for Americans." I can't wait for the press junket for that one ...
It was probably the squeal 'heard round the world' for martial arts fans when Scott first reported on the historic pairing of Jet Li and Jackie Chan. That was over a year ago, and now Variety is reporting the film has just wrapped shooting and is ready for that special 'F/X touch'. Titled The Forbidden Kingdom, the story "is a loose adaptation of classic Chinese tale "The Monkey King" which sees an American teenager transported back to ancient China, where he learns about honor, loyalty and friendship, and the true meaning of Kung fu". It has been rumored that both Li and Chan will play the Kung fu masters who help the boy in his quest. Stuart Little director, Rob Minkoff, was at the helm, but Hong Kong cinematographer Peter Pau (Shoot 'em Up) was on hand to oversee the whole production. Pau is one of the most respected cinematographers in Hong Kong cinema, and won an Oscar for his work on Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon. Unfortunately, he also was in charge of Dracula 2000. Oh well, they can't all be masterpieces.
The Forbidden Kingdom was shot on location in the Zhejiang Province over the summer. Now, the film is headed for South Korea for some final touches. According to Kingdom's producers, it will be the most expensive non-Korean film to use the state of the art facilities. The film has a current budget of $70 million, but we all know how these things can get away from you sometimes. There is no word on what kind of FX are being added, but when your leads are Jet Li and Jackie Chan, you know it's probably not going to be any physical stunts. The Forbidden Kingdom is set for release on April 18th, 2008.
[Thanks to Rotten Tomatoes' Kathryn Kenworth for the Jet-Jackie mockup.]
You know, if I hadn't seen any of Rob Cohen's films, I might almost feel sorry for the guy. Having already been accused of making one of the worst films of 2005, fans of The Mummy franchise have been less than thrilled when the director was tasked with breathing some life back into the series. But, Cohen has decided to let fans in on the production with his blog for The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor. Launched last week, there isn't tons of information available, but Cohen did take the time to address some of the questions plaguing the film, mainly the loss of Rachel Weisz. Cohen says, "Rachel decided to leave the franchise many years ago, after 'The Mummy 2' finished shooting. We all had hopes that she would change her mind but I never had the opportunity to meet her or talk to her." Cohen also confirmed that he has "shot about five weeks of our twenty-week schedule".
Dragon Emperor reunites Brendan Fraser and John Hannah from the original films, alongside Maria Bello, Jet Li, Michelle Yeoh, Anthony Wong, and Luke Ford. The now-retired adventurers Rick and Evelyn O'Connell have a fully grown son (Ford), who has taken up the family business of archeology. This time, the action leaves Egypt far behind and instead is based in China and Li stars as the cursed Dragon Emperor. Cohen writes, "The family is reunited and high adventure ensues: crash landings, treks thru the Himalayas, Yeti, avalanches (bigger than the one I did in XXX), Shangri-la, three-headed dragons, pools of eternal life, epic battles, a shape-shifting Jet Li....I could go on but I don't want to give it all away" -- sure, it sounds impressive, but I still wouldn't hold my breath. The Mummy 3 is set for release on July 30th, 2008.
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You know, I am really trying not to be too hard on the latest installment of The Mummy franchise. I want to give the film a fair shot and all that, but it's getting pretty hard to keep the snark at bay when Universal insists on doing stuff like this. Over at Horror Movies.ca, they have posted what is said to be the 
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