Joel SIlver Tagged Articles at Cinematical

Once upon a time, Sgt. Rock was in the hands of Guy Ritchie, and many an Easy Company fan was upset. But you'll undoubtedly wish that Ritchie and Joel Silver had made it to the finish line, because Sgt. Rock will not make it to the big screen in a form you'll recognize. According to The Hollywood Reporter, he has a new director in Francis Lawrence and a whole new space-time continuum. Joel Silver is still on board as producer, and he's bringing Akiva Goldsman on board to help. They've hired newcomer Chad St. John to pen the script.

As you may or may not know, Sgt. Rock is a WWII soldier. He's always fought in WWII. The poor guy has never even gotten to leave the European theater. (It was rumored in Swamp Thing that he was transferred to the Pacific, but never confirmed.) Any attempt at a movie adaptation has always gone forward with this central idea of keeping him in his element. But budget, politics, and popularity has always been an issue, and no one believes you can make The Dirty Dozen in this day and age unless you're Quentin Tarantino. So Warner Bros has decided to bypass the drama, and put Sgt. Rock in the future. CG is cheaper than Nazis, and a nondescript soldier of the future is less problematic than an American fighting a good fight. (While no war is a good war, I do think we can all agree that fighting Nazis was a good thing.)

Nothing else is known about this storyline, so I hate to jump to a knee-jerk conclusion as to who or what Sgt. Rock will face there, or whether he will be transported to the future from WWII. But I think this is an unfortunate thing to do to a character who resides in WWII for a very specific and honorable reason. The last thing he should become is a Universal Soldier or Terminator ripoff.

I told you that He Man and the Masters of the Universe would find a new home. Mere weeks after being booted out of Warner Bros, Variety reports that the once and future king of Eternia has found a new home at Sony. As you might remember, Joel Silver and Warner Bros were unable to agree on a direction for He-Man, and Mattel promptly took its toys and went elsewhere.

But if you really dug everything to do with Warner Bros' version (which was reportedly titled Greyskull), you'll have some cause for lament. Sony plans on starting with an entirely clean slate, which means John Stevenson will no longer be directing, and that all the script work by Justin Marks and Evan Daugherty will be scrapped. All of those concepts belong to Warner Bros, not Mattel, who was only able to bring Sony the action figure.

One also has to be concerned with just who will be overseeing He-Man's latest incarnation. Escape Artists will be developing the project for Sony, and they've been responsible for The Taking of Pelham 123 remake, Knowing, Seven Pounds, and The Pursuit of Happyness. Without writers, a director, or cast attached, I don't want to predict doom and gloom but is that the kind of resume that screams success for He-Man?

Earlier this summer, reshoot rumors were thick around Guy Ritchie's Sherlock Holmes. One of the more believable ones was that Brad Pitt was stepping in to make an appearance as Moriarty, though it was clouded in so much "Pitt must save Ritchie!" hyperbole that it was almost impossible to believe. As always, there seems to have been some truth to the tabloid rumors, because The Hollywood Reporter says Warner Bros is already prepping more Holmes, and Pitt is in talks to play the detective's legendary adversary, Moriarty.

While neither Ritchie, Pitt, or producer Joel Silver will comment on whether Pitt already makes a shadowy appearance in the upcoming film. Those who have read the script say that Moriarty does appear, but is all mysterious and silhouetted, and it's impossible to see who he really is.

As Pitt debates whether or not he wants to pit brainpower and martial arts against the elementary Robert Downey Jr., the studio has brought on Kieran and Michele Mulroney, the team behind their Justice League: Mortal project to pen the script. Though nothing is official yet, THR notes "much of the talent," notably Downey, Jude Law, Rachel McAdams, and Ritchie are expected to return. (Mark Strong isn't mentioned. Spoiler or no surprise?) It's worth noting that if Pitt signs on and the line-up remains as is, there's only one native Brit in the entire cast of this very English classic.

He-Man will really have to call on the power of Greyskull if he hopes to get a movie made anytime soon. Variety has confirmed Latino Review's earlier scoop, and reports that Mattel and Warner Bros have parted ways on He-Man. All is not lost, as Mattel fully intends to shop the muscles from Eternia to other studios, and John Stevenson is expected to remain on board as director. Producer Joel Silver, who has been involved with developing He-Man since 2007, will have to say farewell as he's exclusive to Warner Bros.

The last we heard about Warner Bros' Greyskull was that the studio brought newcomer Evan Daugherty to revamp Justin Marks' script. Clearly, not even the rewrite kindled any enthusiasm, as Variety notes that Mattel and Warner Bros just didn't see eye to eye on the film. They made a mutual decision to let the project lapse this month.

But all is not lost for a happy marriage between Mattel, Warner Bros, and Silver as they still have Hot Wheels in development. Between you and me if you were going to let an option lapse, it'd be a movie based on a line of little toy cars. I'm not knocking them, I had tons of them. But even in my wildest kid dreams, I never saw them as movie material. But He-Man? Definitely! It had swords, sorcery, and a promise of PG-13 bloodletting. Someone else will see that, and quickly snatch Greyskull up for a buff blonde boy to turn into a franchise.

Here's a project you can file under "That might be pretty cool, I guess" although I can certainly think of a thousand things that could go wrong with it. The scoop-hunters at Collider chatted with producer-of-a-thousand-projects Joel Silver, who let slip about someone he'd like to revive: Swamp Thing. "I'm developing a picture now that I'd like to do ... I'll hopefully do Swamp Thing, which is a movie we've had for a long time. We think that would be great to do in 3D." Silver later amended the comment to a "maybe" so it's not time to yell or scream too much, as it is just a whisper at this point.

Forget the Wes Craven movie or its ill-advised sequel. If you hang around a comic shop long enough, you'll hear Swamp Thing discussed in hushed and revered tones. Once upon a time, he was merely a B-movie kind of hero, a plant man who fought evil and sought the murderers of his wife while trying to find a cure for his condition. Then DC handed him to Alan Moore with a "Yeah, do whatever you want, the book isn't selling" and Swamp Thing became a member of "the Green," a defender of the environment, and a member of the Parliament of Trees. In characteristic Moore style, the character became loaded with mythology, spiritualism, and history. Grant Morrison, Mark Millar, and Brian K. Vaughan have all expanded upon the character in the years since, and other DC characters were wrapped up in his leafy mythology, notably John Constantine, Poison Ivy, and Neil Gaiman's Black Orchid.

Jaume Collet-Serra has directed three films thus far - the slasher film House of Wax, a slasher film that was marketed largely on the prospect of seeing Paris Hilton die; Goal II: Living The Dream, which answered many of the burning questions left over from the original Goal; and Orphan, starring Peter Sarsgaard and Vera Farmiga as adoptive parents who invite an unholy terror into their homes. During the press day for Orphan, which opens Friday nationwide, Collet-Serra indicated he already has his fourth film lined up and ready to go.

"It's coming," Collet-Serra said of Unknown White Male, a thriller that reunites him with his House of Wax and Orphan producer Joel Silver. "It's shooting in the winter in Berlin, and that's a great script. It's a search for identity, which is something that everybody is looking for in their lives, like who they are, so that's a great thing. The premise is just fantastic, the first 15 minutes, a guy waking up from a coma and realizing that he's been replaced by somebody else, I think that's one of the greatest first 15 minutes that I've read."

As for its stars? Collet-Serra declined to offer names, but when a journalist indicated that they'd spoken to Liam Neeson, he replied, "yeah," but added, "I don't have the contract on my desk. We don't really have anybody official yet."

Notwithstanding the general and persistent unprofessionalism of many of the journalists in attendance at this weekend's Los Angeles press junket for Orphan - which is noteworthy, but not worth going into specifics about - a few valuable tidbits of information did actually come out of the interviews (although for details on the film itself, check in later this week from our hopefully more successful New York team). But during an interview with producer Joel Silver, the subject of Zack Snyder's Watchmen came up; and Silver, who was scheduled to produce his own version of the acclaimed graphic novel series in the early 1990s, had a few things to say about Snyder's film, not to mention what his own Watchmen might have looked like.

Discussing his upcoming slate of films, Silver explained that the preponderance of graphic novel adaptations and comic book-themed material was nothing new to his eclectic filmography.

The cover of Whitley Strieber's The Nye Incidents (as well as that famous Communion cover) is enough to scare the crap out of me, so I really don't relish the idea of sitting through a big screen adaptation of it. Nevertheless, I'll have to because it's on its way courtesy of Dark Castle, who has snatched up the rights. According to Variety, Todd Lincoln is set to direct, but no screenwriter is attached.

Devil's Due (who has a preview up) claims this is the story Strieber was "too terrified to tell himself," a viewpoint that is oddly shared by Amazon's one lone reviewer. It's centered on a medical examiner named Lynn Devlin who copes, as all M.E.'s and pathologists of pop culture do, with cool, rational logic. But in true Agent Scully / Temperance Brennan fashion, she is faced with something she can't explain away ... the gruesome murder of an alien abductee, and frightening dreams of oval shaped eyes.

In other words, its exactly the kind of alien story that makes me sleep with the lights on. (I know, I'm a dork.) I'm afraid your girl geek will fail you on this one, as there's no way in hell I will read it and tell you whether or not it'll make a cool movie. However, it warms my heart a little to know that the truth is still out there, flying free and making medical examiners doubt their belief in science.

For legions of Joss Whedon fans, one of his most lovable qualities is his outspoken nature. Sometimes it gets him into a little trouble, but hey, its all in good fun right? Well, DC Comics might not see it that way now that Whedon has thrown in his two cents about why DC hasn't had the same success as Marvel when it comes to bringing comic books to the multiplex. Elisabeth brought us the bad news back in January, that WB had put their DC properties on hold for the foreseeable future (with maybe the exception of a certain caped crusader), but, there are still a few DC properties that have survived. With Jonah Hex and the Green Lantern at the top of the list.

So what makes some superheroes successful at the box-office while others are destined to languish in development? According to Whedon it all comes down to humanity -- and what else would you expect from one the biggest touchy-feely comic book geeks around. Whedon says, "DC's characters, like Wonder Woman and Superman and Green Lantern, were all very much removed from humanity. Batman was the only character they had who was so rooted in pain, that had that same gift that the Marvel characters had, which was that gift of humanity that we can relate to." Even though Whedon is an expert when it comes to comics, I'm not sure if he has me convinced. The genius of a character like Superman is exploring the feelings of isolation and the price that is paid when you become someones protector and savior -- and if you need a great example of how to bring somebody like Superman into the real world, check out Tom DeHaven's It's Superman!

After the jump, Whedon gives the lowdown on Wonder Woman...