ZackSnyder Tagged Articles at Cinematical
Shelf Life: Dawn Of The Dead
Filed under: Shelf Life »

While we'll pretty much make up any reason to watch a zombie any time day or night, much less one written and directed by the de facto creator of the genre, George Romero, the release of Zombieland gave our appetite for undead entertainment some legitimacy this week. And while Zack Snyder's 2004 reimagining of Dawn of the Dead might be the more obvious candidate for a "Shelf Life" column given Snyder's status as an emerging auteur himself, not to mention the fact it's the best American zombie movie in the last decade, we elected to go back to Romero's 1979 original and see if its classic status is still deserved.
The Facts: Also known as Zombi, George Romero's follow-up to the 1968 classic Night of the Living Dead was released May 24, 1979 after premiering in Italy almost a year before. With an estimated budget of $650,000, Romero's film grossed $55 million to date worldwide (equal to $181 million in 2009 dollars), and is widely acknowledged as the best zombie movie of all time – even if its predecessor likely remains the most influential.
Want 'The Ultimate Cut' of Watchmen?
Filed under: Action », Sci-Fi & Fantasy », Warner Brothers », Fandom », Distribution », DIY/Filmmaking », Home Entertainment », Comic/Superhero/Geek »

As we know and lament often, studios are never content to release a DVD just once, and any special edition is just a precursor to a bigger and better version somewhere down the road. Just a few months after we enjoyed Watchmen: The Director's Cut comes Watchmen: The Ultimate Cut, which hits store shelves on November 3. As you can guess from the cover art, this is the edition that will splice The Tales of the Black Freighter back into Watchmen, extending the movie's running time by another half hour or more.
Presumably, the footage with the newsstand vendor and the kid reading the comic will also be added in to help it flow better, but the official press release doesn't actually mention that. Other than the Black Freighter, the special features are just one big grab bag of what already appeared on the Director's Cut and Tales of the Black Freighter DVDs. (For reasons of space and word count, I've included the bullet list below the jump. Compare at your leisure.) It should also be noted that back in July, Zack Snyder stressed the Director's Cut was his preferred cut, and seemed to dismiss the Ultimate Edition as an excessive re-release.
I'm tempted to buy this one just so I can hang out with the newsstand vendor, and watch Black Freighter without having to swap discs. But I know that when I really want to kick back for a Watchmen viewing, I'll just put in the Director's Cut. That version of the film was good enough for me, and if I really want the ultimate fan experience, I'll just read the book again. What about you guys? Will you race to the stores and buy this triple dip? Did you hold off buying it, knowing this version would hit at Christmas? Or are you one of the Watchmen movie haters who doesn't want any version but the paper one by Alan Moore?
Jon Hamm Has a 'Sucker Punch' for Zack Snyder!
Filed under: Action », Sci-Fi & Fantasy », Thrillers », Casting », Warner Brothers », Newsstand »
Zack Snyder's Sucker Punch has been like a rare jewel of girl power with its all female cast, but a little testosterone never hurt anyone, especially if belongs to Jon Hamm. According to The Hollywood Reporter, Hamm has just signed on to be the sole man on set against the likes of Emily Browning, Jena Malone, Abbie Cornish, Vanessa Hudgens, Jamie Chung, and Carla Gugino. As you know, the film centers on a young girl named Baby Doll (Browning) who is sent away to a mental health institution by her stepfather. He intends to have her lobotomized in five days time, and the horror of that sends her and her fellow inmates planning for an escape in a twisted Alice in Wonderland world of adventure and ass-kicking. THR notes that Hamm's role is being kept under tight wraps, that he's only known to be playing someone named High Roller. But given what major role has yet to be cast, I'm willing to bet he's playing the stepfather. I wouldn't be surprised if we see Hamm doing a bit of Captain Hook duty, and popping up as the antagonist of the girls' dream world as well.
Between the cast, the concept, and the girl sized t-shirt, there's not much more Snyder could add to this film to make me long for 2011 more than I already do. But something tells me he'll find room for some 300 and Watchmen cast cameos, and then the wait will really become unbearable.
Gallery: Sucker Punch
'Wanted' Screenwriter Gets His Game On - Who's Next?
Filed under: Deals », Fandom », Tech Stuff », Scripts »
In the same way that higher-profile actors are jumping on the video game ship sans shame, so too are movie writers like Wanted's Chris Morgan. Morgan has signed up for a rather daunting task – working as the story director for the massive and practically holy sci-fi series The Wheel of Time by the late Robert Jordan.
Variety reports that this job entails "overseeing the writing on the titles, working with executive producers and writers to help develop story arcs and helping to digest the book series' 10,000 pages and over 1,700 characters."
(Of course, Morgan and the other two screenplay writers, Derek Haas and Michael Brandt, were taken to task by fans for not sticking to the original comic book story all that much. However, compared to comic book purists, the wrath of Robert Jordan fans can be deadly. Or so I hear.)
Morgan isn't the only screenwriter who has dipped his toes into the pixellated pool. Saw director James Wan is one of the writers for the Saw video game, which surprisingly got some good gamer feedback from its preview at SDCC. And David McKenna, who wrote American History X, Get Carter, Blow, and Bully, wrote Scarface: The World is Yours, which got generally mixed reviews.
SDCC: Watching the Watchmen Again
Filed under: Warner Brothers », Fandom », Home Entertainment », ComicCon »

To give you an example, the first question out of the gate was about whether or not a suspicious looking object next to the Comedian's television set was really the sort of sex toy it looked like. The answer is a big fat yes. Snyder decided the Comedian was the kind of guy who would have a very kinky and dark sex life (something all over the costumed heroes of Watchmen anyway), and that if you look closely, you'll see all kinds of things scattered over his apartment. Somehow I don't think that made it onto the DVD commentary, though I could be wrong.
This will obviously be Watchmen's last appearence at ComicCon, so I'm sad to have missed the whole live broadcast. But to come full circle, if you were there the year The Big Casting Announcements Happened, you might remember that there was a really obnoxious question about Sally Jupiter's hair. One determined fanboy was dying to know whether or not Snyder planned to keep Sally Jupiter's poodle perm, and it was just the kind of creepy thing that plagues every panel Q&A. Turns out, the whole thing was a prank pulled by one of the production / visual designers (the name was drowned out on my end of the room). "So mean," moaned Snyder. I've thought of that question every time I saw Sally's hair, and I'm glad to know there isn't a fanboy out there still angry about it!
What else don't you get from a home viewing ... swag! In proof that the machine (especially if its run by Snyder) keeps going, check out the t-shirt below. It's your first piece of Sucker Punch marketing, and officially kicks off a gallery that'll have many more additions in the future. Best of all? He had them in girl sizes. Someone in his camp knows there's female geeks in the world!
Gallery: Sucker Punch
SDCC TV: '300': The TV Show, Star Wars Live-Action Series and More
Filed under: Sci-Fi & Fantasy », Fandom », Home Entertainment », Comic/Superhero/Geek », ComicCon »
While Cinematical has been busy covering all the movie-related Comic Con treats, our sister site TV Squad has been knee deep in all-things boob tube. Similar to film, all the genre-based TV shows bring their stars to Comic Con to preview upcoming seasons and geek out with fellow fans. Today is the biggest day for television at Con, and so we'll report back tomorrow with some of the stuff our friends over at TV Squad managed to uncover -- but in the meantime, here's a taste of what they've been up to so far.-- Did you know Starz was getting ready to premiere a new show called Spartacus: Blood and Sand? No, it's not Sparta or anything (it actually takes place in Rome and follows the city's most famous gladiator), though the brand new trailer totally looks like Ridley Scott's Gladiator ... if Zack Snyder directed it instead. Seriously, the thing has such a 300 vibe that for a second I thought it was from the same team, but it's not. Know who's behind this? Sam Raimi. Yup, it's Raimi, Rob Talpert (Drag Me to Hell) and Steven S. DeKnight (Smallville) executive producing, while Lucy Lawless (Xena: Warrior Princess), Peter Mensa (300) and Erin Cummings (Dollhouse) star. The show itself looks bloody, vicious and pretty awesome, especially for those who dug the violence overload in 300.
Watch the trailer after the jump and let us know what you think ...
Joel Silver On What He Wanted 'Watchmen' To Be
Filed under: Celebrities and Controversy », Fandom »

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.
Vanessa Hudgens to Strip Naked in 'Sucker Punch'?
Filed under: Action », Casting », Warner Brothers »
How do you reconcile a potentially naked Disney star with a director of extreme violence -- and a PG-13 rating? Director Zack Snyder (Dawn of the Dead, 300, Watchmen) recently suggested that he might deliver a PG-13 rated film for the first time in his career, but without softening the action of his upcoming Sucker Punch. Now comes word that Disney star Vanessa Hudgens "will strip naked" for her role as a prostitute in the film, according to Metro UK.
Except that she doesn't actually say that. Her actual quoted words are: "I'm playing a character named Blondie and it's set in a brothel in the 1950s, so there's not a whole lot of clothes." From that, the publication surmises that she'll be naked. More likely, she'll be dressed in revealing, sexy outfits that don't show as much as her leaked private photos did (which reportedly showed everything). Unless, of course, Snyder plans to shoot additional footage that can then be released as part of an "unrated" or "director's cut" version for DVD and Blu-ray, while keeping a PG-13 rating in mind for theaters.
Whatever the case, at least this is one bit of casting news for the film that has been nailed down. Hudgens was previously reported to be "in talks." Emily Browning will star alongside Abbie Cornish, Jena Malone, and Jamie Chung. Described as "Alice in Wonderland with machine guns," Sucker Punch starts production this fall and aims for an October 2010 release date.
Zack Snyder Might Deliver a PG-13 'Sucker Punch'
Filed under: Action », Horror », Sci-Fi & Fantasy », Warner Brothers », Scripts », DIY/Filmmaking », Newsstand »
While Zack Snyder was out talking up the Watchmen Director's Cut, he managed to find a little time to sit down with Devin Faraci of CHUD and give an update on Sucker Punch. If you were dying to hear a few more details about that glorious grindhouse throwback, look no further, but beware of what might be a spoiler. The biggest surprise is that Snyder might actually aim for a PG-13 rating -- but don't think he'll soften the action any. "If you can make Taken PG-13, you can make this movie PG-13. That's what I believe. Because it's more fantastic. No one really dies in the movie. I think Sucker Punch is a smart movie. It absolutely is challenging, and it's f***ing hardcore. [A]t the end she gets ... it's dark! But it's f***ing actiony like nobody's business. We hope the action we're creating is off the charts, and it's not stupid."
The action really will be off the charts, as the institutionalized Baby Doll and her companions battle are all kinds of crazy, ranging from WWI soldiers to creatures straight out of Dungeons and Dragons, but with realistic grit. "I like fight choreography and I like being able to see what's happening in action. When the girls are fighting, [like] they're on their way to kill a baby dragon, they've killed all of these orc-like creatures and they're entering a door [and] it's this classic, real Navy SEAL style room clearing. They have machine guns but they're fighting mythic creatures, impossible creatures. The hand to hand stuff is all brutal, because Damon [Caro] did all the [fights] in Bourne and it has that vibe to it." I'm so on board with this ... even if we might already know the ending!
'Watchmen' Directors Cut to Hit Theaters for One Weekend in July
Filed under: Fandom », Exhibition », Home Entertainment », Comic/Superhero/Geek »
If you're a Watchmen fan, you surely know that the slick Director's Cut will be hitting shelves on July 21 in all of its beautiful, retro-crime fighting wonder. I'm already trying to decide if I can finally budget for a Blu-ray player because let's face it -- this is the sort of film that's meant for the highest definition possible.But for some lucky folks, July won't only mean Watchmen on the small screen. While talking to Collider, Zack Snyder revealed that the film will indeed be re-released in theaters -- but only in selected cities, for one weekend (the weekend before Comic-Con), and one theater. The lucky locales: Los Angeles and New York (of course), plus Dallas and Minneapolis.
Considering the fact that the movie wasn't exactly a box office smash, I get not having a huge re-release. But come on! FOUR screens?? Talk about teasing the rest of the masses, who will have to deal with the 27 minutes of extra violence and sexiness on our modest, small screens. At the very least, it could've been some sort of pre-sale traveling tour. I'm sure I'm not the only one who would love to see the Director's Cut on the big screen without impromptu travel. How about you?









