the orphanage poster Tagged Articles at Cinematical

Near the end of last week, Defamer spread the rumor that Picturehouse, once the indie arm of New Line Cinema and currently dangling from the edge of the hulking entity known as Warner Bros., has its days numbered. Now that New Line is history and Warners, like many studios, has faced increasing cutbacks, it may give short shrift to the shingles responsible for handling artier fare. Along with Picturehouse, this also includes Warner Independent Pictures, whose recent release slate includes David Gordon Green's magnificent Snow Angels.

Defamer suggested that Picturehouse president Bob Berney might wind up at WIP or head up a new, currently anonymous company. On Friday, Variety's Anne Thompson put it in more coherent terms: It appears quite likely that WIP and Picturehouse will merge together as a single company, with current WIP president Polly Cohen working alongside Berney. Whatever happens, let's just hope that the final result still leaves room for the sharp selection of independent and foreign titles that Picturehouse has handled since its birth three years ago. Defamer points out that Marion Cotillard's unexpected Oscar win for La Vie en Rose matters less than the flop of Run, Fatboy, Run, while the John Simpson-directed horror film Amusement might get dumped on DVD. It was just last year, however, that the company helped edgy fare like The Orphanage and Rocket Science get the sort of release most studios would never try. Let's hope that bravery lives on, somewhere.

Cinematical is absolutely stoked after receiving this exclusive one-sheet for Juan Antonio Bayona's The Orphanage (click on the image above for a larger version). Produced (in a very hands-on manner) by the excellent Guillermo del Toro, The Orphanage may, in fact, go down as the spookiest film of the year. Our own resident horror guru Scott Weinberg survived a screening in Toronto earlier this year, and had this to say: "The Orphanage is entirely captivating from start to finish. And if those Spanish movie-makers have a few more 'creepy orphanage' stories to tell, well, I'm definitely not sick of the sub-genre just yet. And whatever Mr. Bayona offers up next, you can bet I'll be first in line to check it out." But he's not the only one; just this week alone, I've had a good five people tell me this film is a gem -- the kind that will have you leaping out of your seat more than once ... if you know what I mean.

The film revolves around a charming married couple, Laura and Carlos, who along with their adopted son Simon decide to purchase and renovate the old orphanage where Laura was raised. Problems arise when Simon makes a few new friends who, well, aren't real. The poster itself is real cool; it's hard to tell from the online version, but the in-theater posters are lenticular, which means those ghoulish-looking kids will disappear and re-appear based on the way you look at the image. Folks, very rarely do we bring out the big guns, but let it be known that The Orphanage is getting the official Cinematical Stamp of Approval. And for those who do not know what that means, it's just another way of saying you're guaranteed to love being spooked-out by this film. Look for The Orphanage to arrive in theaters this December 28.