A fresh crop of films, including 'The Hate U Give,' are more likely to be inspired by personal narratives than dystopian sci-fi. With box-office returns for dystopian young adult film adaptations on the wane, producers are hunting for the teen audience's next big thing — and they're optioning a number of gritty, socially conscious coming-of-age stories. Author Angie Thomas, who wrote a book inspired by the Black Lives Matter movement, The Hate U Give, was convinced no one would want to publish it. "I knew that although the topic was timely, it was sensitive," she says of her novel, which revolves around a young black girl who sees her best friend shot by a white cop. "While there were calls for diversity in children's books specifically, as a young black woman I wondered, how diverse is too diverse? Can I write this unapologetically black girl book and you guys find it acceptable?" Not only did publishers find it acceptable, they clamored to get the rights to it. After a heated … [Read more...]

Four months after scoring an official pilot pickup, Hulu's Locke and Key adaptation has found its leading lady. British actress Frances O'Connor has been tapped to topline the highly anticipated take on the beloved Joe Hill IDW comic series. Locke and Key is a horror/fantasy series that revolves around three siblings who, after the gruesome murder of their father, move to their ancestral home in Maine only to find the house has magical keys that give them a vast array of powers. Little do they know, a devious demon also wants the keys, and will stop at nothing to attain them. O'Connor will play Nina Locke, the mother to the three siblings who moves the family to Maine after her husband's slaying. The role was played by Miranda Otto in the 2011 Fox pilot from Josh Friedman, Alex Kurtzman and Roberto Orci that did not move forward. Comic book creator Hill and Cuse (Lost, Bates Motel, The Strain) are collaborating on the script for the hourlong pilot. Cuse will exec produce … [Read more...]

Next Entertainment World unveited the news not long after major local theaters boycotted the Netflix film. Next Entertainment World (NEW), the South Korean investor-distributor that handled local distribution for Bong Joo Ho's Netflix film Okja, unveiled Thursday that it is entering the exhibition business. NEW will begin operating its first Cine Q theater on Aug. 24 in Gyeongju, a southeastern city known for being home to South Korea's top historical attractions. The city also famously serves as the backdrop for the eponymous film by Hong Sang-soo, Gyeongju. NEW plans to open a second Cine Q theater in Gumi in the country's North Gyeongsang province by the end of the year, followed by other locations across the country in the near future, including Sindorim, Seoul; Chungju, North Chungcheong Province; as well as Mokpo and Namyangju in South Jeolla Province. Cine Q Gyeongju will serve as the city's biggest multiplex, housing six screens and a total 773 seats. According to NEW, the … [Read more...]

With this week's release of its second issue, John Ridley and Georges Jeanty's The American Way: Those Above and Those Below continues its investigation into the interplay between superheroes, society and politics in the 1970s. Those Above and Those Below is a follow-up to 2006's The American Way, and takes place a decade after the original series, with the Academy Award-winning writer re-teaming with the fan-favorite Buffy the Vampire Slayer artist to revive characters such as the New American, Ole Miss and Amber Waves, superheroes created as all-American propaganda in more innocent times and now trying to come to terms with a brave new, far more uncertain, world. Heat Vision spoke to Ridley about returning to the series (and comics) after a 10-year gap, and what today's readers can learn from the past. The new series doesn't just take place 10 years after the first American Way, you and Georges Jeanty are creating it 10 years on, as well. Did that gap in working on these characters … [Read more...]

Days after seeing Shonda Rhimes exit for a game-changing deal with Netflix, ABC Studios has reunited with Lost co-showrunner Carlton Cuse. The Disney-owned studio has inked a massive four-year overall deal with Cuse and his newly launched Genre Arts banner in what is said to be a pact worth more than $20 million plus a percentage of the back-end on programming created under the partnership. Under the pact, Cuse and Genre Arts — headed by president Lindsey Springer — will create and produce content across all network, cable and streaming platforms while also working with other writers. Sources note that Cuse opted to return to ABC Studios — where he served as co-showrunner for six seasons of ABC's Lost — after fielding multiple offers from other studios, including co-financing deals. The goal will be for Cuse to help bring ABC Studios into the competitive cable landscape, where the studio thus far has been slowly building a roster of programming via its ABC … [Read more...]

It's official: USA Network is moving ahead with a potential Suits spinoff starring Gina Torres. The NBCUniversal-owned cable network on Wednesday confirmed that the backdoor pilot will air as the Aaron Korsh-created procedural's season seven finale and is slated to air in the first quarter of 2018. The episode will reunite Harvey Specter (Gabriel Macht), Mike Ross (Patrick J. Adams), Louis Litt (Rick Hoffman), Donna Paulsen (Sarah Rafferty) and Rachel Zane (Meghan Markle) with their old friend Jessica Pearson (Torres) as she adjusts to her new life in the Windy City. When she is forced to enter the dirty world of Chicago politics, Pearson must rely on her legal wits and valiant relationships from Pearson Specter Litt to navigate this unknown territory. Suits creator Korsh will pen the script alongside longtime exec producer Daniel Arkin. Anton Cropper (Suits, House of Lies, Black-ish) will direct the pilot, which like the flagship is exec produced by Universal Cable Productions and … [Read more...]

Four years, four heroes, and well more than four episodes have passed since Marvel and Netflix launched a partnership leading up to this moment: The Defenders, the television answer to the Marvel Cinematic Universe's Avengers strategy. Originally announced in 2013, the eight-episode limited series serves as the culmination of four different Marvel shows: Daredevil, starring Charlie Cox as Matt Murdock, a blind attorney who fights for justice using the law, super senses, and an impressive ninja background; Jessica Jones, starring Krysten Ritter as the title character, a hard-drinking and harder-hitting detective caught in an internal and external war against her inner demons; Luke Cage, starring Mike Colter as the hero for hire with bulletproof skin, working to keep his neighborhood free from corruption; and Iron Fist, starring Finn Jones as a man who insists he's Danny Rand, the keeper of an ancient power known as the Iron Fist. Throughout the four different shows, various … [Read more...]

The hosts will show up at "unsuspecting locations and challenge people to karaoke battles for cash." MTV International has ordered 10 episodes of a pop-up music game show called Crash Karaoke. The Viacom network has given the green light for the show that will see hosts Hannah Rad and Dylan Landon “crash" what a series description calls "unsuspecting locations and challenge people to karaoke battles for cash." They will disrupt "business as usual" at such locations as fast-food restaurants and "attempt to charm two volunteers into a head-to-head karaoke showdown for a cash prize," MTV said. "Contestants will be asked to spin the Crash Wheel to randomly select a style of music to perform. A mix of hit songs serve as the soundtrack for the series, from current tracks and global anthems to the most iconic karaoke throwbacks from the '80s." There are no judges on the 30-minute show as the crowd ultimately decides who wins. "Crash Karaoke is an innovative twist on the traditional … [Read more...]

Producers behind the politics infused anthology movie plan Japanese, Taiwanese and Thai versions. Ten Years, the award-winning yet controversy-dogged Hong Kong anthology film, is to get Japanese, Taiwanese and Thai remakes.  Ten Years Production, the production house behind the film which made twelve times its budget at the box office and won best film at the Hong Kong Film Awards, announced that it will be producing the three regional remakes following the enthusiastic reaction to the original on the international festival circuit.  “Although Ten Years was a film about Hong Kong, the questions it raised on political autonomy, social tensions, and human values, were universal,” said Ng Ka Leung, one of the directors of the Hong Kong film which was banned in China. Ten Years, which takes place in Hong Kong in the year 2025, examines the effects of changing education, culture and language. The international versions will follow the same outline, featuring five … [Read more...]

For a glorious, shining instant, it seemed as if the wait for new Star Wars was almost over. A tweet from ABC's Good Morning America Monday morning — featuring a gif from Star Wars: The Force Awakens and reading, "Alright, see you tomorrow!" — accidentally got fans very excited, with many taking the combination of the two elements as a sign that GMA was teasing a new trailer for this December's Star Wars: The Last Jedi. It wasn't the case, however, as the show's social media producer had to announce, disappointing the internet in the process. But the entire misfire did raise one important question: shouldn't there be a new Last Jedi trailer by now? There are a couple of reasons to suggest that we're overdue a new trailer by this point, beyond the simple fact of the movie's release in four months — which just so happens to be the same amount of time as its been since the release of the teaser trailer, back in April. For one thing, it's obvious that the promotional … [Read more...]

American Honey's breakout star Sasha Lane is in final negotiations to join the Hellboy reboot. Lionsgate and Millennium’s project will star David Harbour as the demonic hero from the Mike Mignola comic books. Neil Marshall, the horror director who broke out with The Descent and won raves for his work on Game of Thrones, is on board to helm. The new story sees the hero squaring off against a medieval sorceress who seeks to destroy humankind. Lane would play Alice Monaghan. In the comic books, Hellboy rescues Alice from the fairies that kidnapped her. She retains some supernatural gifts because of her time with the fairies.  Milla Jovovich and Ian McShane also are attached to star. Larry Gordon and Lloyd Levin are producing along with Mike Richardson of Dark Horse Entertainment. The project is eyeing a September shoot. The new Hellboy reboot follows two previous films that were directed by Guillermo del Toro and starred Ron Perlman as a demon raised by a kind … [Read more...]

"2 readings, 2 workshops, 3 productions and almost 4 years- hard to fathom that's it's nearly time to say goodbye to Evan and my DEH family," said the Tony winner. Ben Platt will soon be waving through a window at Dear Evan Hansen. The actor — who won this year's Tony Award for playing the titular adolescent outcast who gets caught up in an unintended lie — will exit the hit Broadway musical on Nov. 19, The Hollywood Reporter has confirmed. His replacement will be announced at a later date. "2 readings, 2 workshops, 3 productions and almost 4 years- hard to fathom that's it's nearly time to say goodbye to Evan and my DEH family," he tweeted on Tuesday. Upon seeing fans' responses online, he added, "All these #Fansens out here making me cry." It is standard practice for an actor of an original cast to depart a production after a year or less, and Dear Evan Hansen's Broadway run began previews last Nov. 14. Even more so, Platt (who is also Marc Platt's son) has … [Read more...]

Hong Kong director Wilson Yip returns to the burgeoning, bruising 'SPL' franchise with a gritty Thailand-set action thriller featuring Louis Koo and Tony Jaa. Power, corruption and lies are at the heart of Paradox, Ip Man director Wilson Yip’s brutal, bloody action thriller that (maybe) rounds out the extremely loose cops-and-robbers trilogy he started with SPL in 2005 and handed over to Cheang Pou-Soi (here a producer) for SPL 2: A Time for Consequences in 2015. Reuniting with the legendary actor and action choreographer Sammo Hung, alter ego Louis Koo (as tanned and impeccably coiffed as ever), and acrobatic Thai martial arts star Tony Jaa, Wilson whips up an efficiently sleek actioner that knows where its comfort zone is and doesn’t stray from it. Surprising as often as it is conventional, Paradox will easily find the same audiences that responded to the first two films, regardless of how unrelated they are, and that should hold for distributors as well. Like the … [Read more...]

Pan-Asian heartthrobs Eddie Peng and Shawn Yue headline Derek Kwok’s attempt to bring the legend of the Monkey King to younger audiences. Not content to simply run hot and cold, Hong Kong director Derek Kwok plays fast and loose with the Chinese legend Journey to the West in his latest, Wu Kong, which runs more like scalding and icy. Careening wildly from visually boggling to tired and stilted, Kwok's (Gallants) adaptation of Jin Hezai’s popular web novel Wukong Zhuan—an origin story at its core—is clearly an allegory about state oppression, identity and self-determination. Sadly though, he and his army of writers forget to keep the fantasy action moving and write characters deeper than sketches. Following the relative fluffiness of Full Strike, Kwok steps back into the world of legend he was allegedly unceremoniously bounced from in 2013 with Journey to the West (co-directed by Stephen Chow) for what is the fourth movie to mine the same material in the last … [Read more...]

Grey's Anatomy alum Patrick Dempsey is returning to the small screen.   Two years after his shocking exit from the Shondaland medical drama, Dempsey has been tapped to topline Epix straight-to-series drama The Truth About the Harry Quebert Affair. Directed by Jean-Jacques Annaud (Black and White in Color), the 10-episode series is based on the best-selling European novel by Joel Dicker. The thriller stars Dempsey as Quebert, a literary icon who finds himself indicted for murder after the body of a young girl is found buried on his property. Ben Schnetzer (Snowden) will co-star as Marcus Goldman, a successful young novelist who has been mentored by Quebert; Damon Wayans Jr. (Happy Endings) will portray Sgt. Perry Gahalowood, a Maine investigator on the case of the young girl who was found dead. Annaud will make his TV directorial debut and helm all 10 episodes. Virginia Madsen, Kristine Froseth, Colm Feore, Josh Close, Matt Frewer, Connor Price, Tessa Mossey, Victoria Clark, … [Read more...]

The film is billed as the first co-producition between the two countries. Val Kilmer is going international for his next project. Kilmer has signed on to star in 1st Born, a comedy from Iranian director Ali Atshani. The project centers on a newly married couple newlywed couple, Iranian-born Ben and his American Kate, who are living in California. When the couple's first pregnancy faces complications, both sides of their family must come together — a rather complicated notion as Ben's father Hamid is anti-American Iranian politician, while Kate's father Biden (played by Kilmer) is an American politician who takes a hardline stance against Iran. 1st Born is notable for being the first joint feature film co-production between Iran and Hollywood, using a cast and crew from both the U.S. and the Middle East.  Kilmer is known for roles in Top Gun, Batman Forever, Heat,Tombstone and other … [Read more...]

Summer revenue is already pacing 12 percent behind last year and could end up down 15 percent, the worst dip in more than a decade. Call it the August Death March at the domestic box office. Over the Aug. 11-13 weekend, revenue plunged 32 percent behind the same frame last year sans a successful August tentpole such as Suicide Squad (2016) or Guardians of the Galaxy (2014), furthering a steady erosion in ticket sales that has gripped the summer box office almost every weekend since War for the Planet of the Apes launched in the first half of July. To date, revenue for the season is pacing 12.4 percent behind last year — and it’s only going to get worse. The remaining three weeks of summer are notably bereft of potential big earners, and Hollywood has abandoned Labor Day altogether. There aren’t any movies opening nationwide over the holiday weekend now that STX Entertainment has taken action-thriller Renegades off the calendar and The Weinstein Co. moved up animated … [Read more...]

Russia's infamous Mad Monk was integral in bringing Hellboy to Earth, in the mythology behind Mike Mignola's beloved comic book character. Now, after decades, the story of just how the presumed-dead Rasputin got involved with the Nazis in the first place is about to be revealed — and Heat Vision has an exclusive look at the first issue of the upcoming Rasputin: Voice of the Dragon series. "In the waning days of WWII, a group of Nazi occultists led by the infamous Rasputin performed an arcane ritual to call up a demon from hell, intending to use it to defeat the Allied forces," Chris Roberson, who co-writes the series with Mike Mignola, tells Heat Vision. "When the demon arrived, though, it was adopted by an English occult investigator, Professor Trevor Bruttenholm, who named him Hellboy. But how did Rasputin, a Russian mystic who the world believed to be dead for years, come to command such a position of authority in the Nazi leadership, and did Bruttenholm and the Allies … [Read more...]

'My Blind Brother' writer-director Sophie Goodhart penned the script and will direct. Jennifer Aniston is in final negotiations to star in an untitled suburban-set comedy being developed by STX. Sophie Goodhart, who wrote and directed the Adam Scott-Nick Kroll comedy My Blind Brother, penned the script and is sitting in the director’s chair for the project. The story centers on an over-scheduled and over-burdened suburban couple who go to great lengths to try to recapture the fun of their youth. The goal is to make it R-rated. STX had a big hit with Bad Moms ($113 million domestic) and is looking to keep the good times going with not just a sequel, which it will release later this year, but with this project, which follows in the adults or parents behaving badly vein. Joby Harold and Tory Tunnell are producing. Matt Schwartz and Douglas Banker are executive producing. Sam Brown is overseeing for STX’s along with the company’s Drew Simon and Jeannette … [Read more...]

A few more names are checking into Netflix's Haunting of Hill House series. E.T. star Henry Thomas, Grey's Anatomy grad Elizabeth Reaser and Kate Siegel (Hush) have joined the drama, The Hollywood Reporter has learned. Ordered straight to series, the 10-episode project is described as a modern re-imagining of Shirley Jackson's classic 1959 novel and centers on four people living in an 80-year-old mansion. The trio's roles are being kept under wraps. The series reunites them with series writer-director Mike Flanagan. Thomas and Reaser both starred in his 2016 film Ouija: Origin of Evil. Siegel, Flanagan's wife, stars opposite Thomas in the upcoming Gerald's Game and also starred in and co-wrote Hush with her husband. The three join previously cast stars Carla Gugino and Game of Thrones alum Michael Huisman.  Flanagan will exec produce with Trevor Macy, Justin Falvey and Darryl Frank. Falvey and Frank's Amblin TV will produce with Paramount TV. Thomas' recent … [Read more...]