Passengers Tagged Articles at Cinematical

For quite some time, the supernatural thriller Passengers -- starring Anne Hathaway as a grief counselor working with survivors of a plane crash (among them, Patrick Wilson) who begin to vanish -- had been quietly set on opening this Friday, September 5th.

However, as the date neared without any sign of a poster, a trailer, anything, I began rooting around the IMDb message boards and was about to post a Spanish-language trailer, complete with accompanying amateur translation, when along came a legit trailer (by way of Reelz Channel), a real poster (courtesy of IMP Awards), and a new date of October... well, just October for now.

Given his knack for ensemble dramas such as Nine Lives and Things You Can Tell Just By Looking at Her, director Rodrigo Garcia seems to be a curious pick for the material, as the focus is less on what's happened to the group as a whole and more on Hathaway and Wilson investigating one another. Otherwise, the vibe I'm getting here is the one I had from 2004's The Forgotten: it has just enough of a hook to get me to watch it, but I doubt that the pay-off will live up to it.

What do you guys think? Will September's Lakeview Terrace and October's Rachel Getting Married satisfy your Wilson and Hathaway jones, respectively? And facing this Halloween's mainstream horror fare, is Sony, under the Tri-Star banner, about to dump this in a limited amount of theaters as they had with, say, Wind Chill, which just happened to star Prada pal Emily Blunt?

The annual Black List of most popular unproduced scripts in Hollywood has been released, and the most popular are Recount, a script about the Florida election recount and Farragut North, a political thriller written by Beau Willimon. The number three script on the list was a sci-fi film called Passengers, about a guy who wakes up on a spaceship after a long, cryogenic sleep. Keanu Reeves may be circling that one. Also in the top five is a Martin Luther King biopic script called Selma. A much talked-about dramedy called The Way Back, which I've been hearing about for a long time, is also in the top ten. Also appearing on the list, but much lower down, is Diablo Cody's horror script Jennifer's Body and the script for Max Brook's World War Z, which everyone keeps talking to me about.

A new update on 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea is also on the list, as is the new Clash of the Titans which I've been hearing about forever and that script for the film about the making of Alfred Hitchcock's Psycho. The Black List gets its data from a poll of about 150 people in the Hollywood development chain. The scripts are tallied by the number of votes each one gets. The leader, Recount, got mentions from 44 different people in Hollywood, so no matter what your political inclinations, this might be one you should watch out for when it finally comes out. The town clearly loves it. As for me, I'm most looking forward to Jennifer's Body -- I've heard the premise and a few details and it sounds like it's going to reinvigorate the horror comedy genre.

Even after the whirlwind of hype surrounding Snakes on a Plane, I think most people would be hard pressed to remember the name of it's director, David R. Ellis. Considering the ... mixed reaction Snakes received from critics and audiences, it's probably in the best interest of Ellis' career that it stays that way. So despite the bad reviews and cries of manufactured zeitgeist, Ellis seems to have managed to walk away unscathed and is already hard at work on his new film, Asylum. Now Variety has announced that Ellis, a former child actor and stunt man, is also attached to direct and co-produce the action thriller High Stakes for Persistent Entertainment.

The story follows two friends on a gambling trip to Las Vegas who rack up a gambling debt to the wrong people. The friends are then forced to become the subjects of a dangerous high-stakes bet to pay off their marker. Ronnie Christensen (Passengers) wrote the script and the film is set to start shooting this spring. There is no word on a cast yet, so Ellis and company are going to have to work quickly if they want to stick to their schedule.

I think I'm pretty much the only one who wasn't crazy about Little Children, save for a second half that featured an outstanding performance from Jackie Earle Haley (someone give this guy a best supporting something -- please, I beg you). Maybe I caught it at the wrong time (trust me, 10am isn't the best time to catch a flick in the theater, especially when you were up partying the night before), but the thing just moved too slowly ... and another dull performance from Patrick Wilson didn't help. Ever notice how the one thing every Patrick Wilson flick has in common (aside from the fact that Wilson appears in a role) is that whoever co-stars outshines him in almost every conceivable way?

With that said, Wilson has signed on to star opposite Anne Hathaway in Passengers -- remember that supernatural thriller flick we told you about last month? Hathaway herself isn't the most exciting actress, but she's cute, bubbly and you can't help but kind of like her. With Rodrigo García helming, pic revolves around a grief counselor who helps assist the survivors of a plane crash, but becomes wrapped up in a whole mess of thrills and chills when each survivor begins to disappear one by one. Oh, and amidst all this, she finds the time to fall in love with Wilson's character who -- you guessed it -- is one of the survivors. Ronnie Christensen (who makes his feature debut here, having penned a few TV projects like the instant classic Chameleon 3: Dark Angel) wrote the script, and production will begin shortly with Mandate Pictures producing and Columbia Pictures distributing domestically.

It's fitting that her first major film role was as a Princess, because Anne Hathaway's career since then has been somewhat of a fairytale in the making. Granted, it took a little while for her to break out of the "family film" cave she was hiding in for four years -- though, once she did, it was smooth sailing. While she missed out on any recognition for her involvement in The Devil Wears Prada (face it, her character wasn't exactly that spectacular), the success of the film helped propel her up to leading lady status. Now, she'll be playing Jane Austen in the upcoming Becoming Jane, as well as co-starring alongside Steve Carell as Agent 99 in the big-screen version of Get Smart.

However, there's still one genre left for her to explore -- the supernatural thriller. According to The Hollywood Reporter, Hathaway is set to star in Passengers, to be directed by Rodrigo Garcia, produced/financed by Mandate Pictures and distributed domestically by Columbia Pictures. In the pic, Hathaway will play a grief counselor who is sent to assist six plane crash survivors, and then develops a "special connection" with one of them. Sounds sweet enough, right? Ah, but here comes the (supernatural?) element -- apparently, the survivors all begin to disappear one by one, forcing our cute counselor to begin investigating this bizarre occurrence herself. Written by Ronnie Christensen, the film is set to begin production early next year.

But can she handle a thriller? Not for nothing, but Hathaway is so cute and delicate -- the kind of girl you just wanna hug ... carefully -- and so I'm curious to see what she brings to a more dramatic, edgier, supernatural film. Although I still can't figure out where the supernatural part fits in (is a ghost killing everyone?), but I'm sure it will all make sense on screen. We hope.