This week I had the chance to attend a screening of Haywire presented by The Film Society of Lincoln Center in NYC which also came with the added bonus of a long Q & A session with director Steven Soderbergh (Ocean’s 11) and the main star Gina Carano.

Here are my brief thoughts on the film before you dive into the fascinating Q & A video:

It looks like Hollywood has found its newest action star in MAA fighter Gina Carano.  She kicked so much ass that every fight scene just seemed to get more and more intense.  There were no stuntmen which made it as realistic as it could get, providing us an opportunity to see how she could handle herself amongst some of Hollywood’s elite.  Her background in MMA and her in-depth training truly paid off for the film.  While it was clear that she had never acted before, I think she did a great job of letting her fists do most of the talking.

The movie itself looked really good and I was happy to see that Soderbergh took a different approach with his action film by minimizing the amount of cuts and utilizing a great spy score.  He also never used music during a fight scene which made you feel as if you were a bystander at a real fight.

Unfortunately, the the story itself is nothing to rave about and the movie ends up being rather mediocre, or maybe slightly better than that, but it is totally worth seeing just to watch a strong woman take the lead in an action film and actually make it believable.

Now that I’ve had my say, check out the Q & A session below:

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The magazine reports that Ford is working his fashionable magic on Bond to create a refreshing new look for the character.  In a recent interview with Craig, while promoting his new film Dream House, the actor explains, “Tom’s doing the suits [for Bond]. In fact, I’ve spent a long time with Tom getting a very different look and he’s been designing a new set of things. It’s going to be a new look. It’s a new feel. I’m very excited about that.”

Normally, I’d leave the action movie news to the guys, but once we’re getting fashion involved, this is where I’d like to step in.  Almost a year ago, I reported on some rumors behind Ford’s next film project, but this is certainly a pleasant surprise.  However, Ford is credited on IMDB as doing the tailoring for Craig during the filming of Quantum of Solace.

We all saw the beauty and celebration of the 1960s in A Single Man, for which Ford made his directorial debut, showing Julianne Moore looking more stunning than ever, and providing Firth’s Oscar-nominated role as a milestone in men’s fashion on the big screen.  It’s going to be very exciting to see Craig portraying Bond for a third time, especially with the help of such a legendary and accomplished icon of contemporary style like Ford as he continues to make his mark in Hollywood.

Secondly, HB also reveals that “Rolling in the Deep” singer, Adele, has been working on recording a theme song for the film.  For the last several movies, there haven’t been that many chart-topping hits, although Alicia Keys’ collaboration with Jack White on “Another Way to Die” was pretty cool.  In the past, singers like Madonna, Sheryl Crow, and Chris Cornell have made attempts at adequately lending their talents, but Adele is such a strong powerhouse force in music right now that another number one hit for the young singer shouldn’t be too far away.

Adele is the best candidate for the job, especially being paired with producer Paul Epworth, who’s worked with the very talented and dramatic, Florence and the Machine. Also, if you look at the successful female voices from earlier Bond movies, you’ll find names like Shirley Bassey and Tina Turner, both divas who Adele is equipped to rival for the character’s cinematic legacy.  Not to mention that she’s currently up for four American Music Awards, and is already a likely shoe-in for an album-of-the-year nod from the Grammy’s for her sophomore effort, 21.

What do you think about Ford heading up the style behind 007? Do you Adele for the movie’s theme song? Do you think Craig still has what it takes to play James Bond?

The storyline of the movie probably won’t surprise viewers, but a lot has changed for dance-centered films in the industry since 1984, especially since Dirty Dancing set a big precedent for the genre only three years later.

To get an early taste of the new Footloose, you better check out the film’s soundtrack, which celebrates a contemporary marriage of country and pop.  There’s been a great deal of crossover success for country names like Carrie Underwood, Lady Antebellum, and Taylor Swift to mainstream radio, so this soundtrack will fit right in there.  Not to mention Gleek’s everywhere with some country twang will be all over this!

First and foremost, let’s talk about Blake Shelton’s cover of the movie’s catchy theme, “Footloose,” originally recorded by Kenny Loggins.  If a pop star like Justin Beiber lent his voice to the track, it would just be silly, but considering that Shelton’s a real country man’s man, I can appreciate the homage and believe that he’s not just singing to plug his own career.

Where’s there’s Blake Shelton, I guess you’d never suspect that there’d be Cee-Lo Green!  The fellow coach from The Voice lends his swagger to the bluesy “Walkin’ Blues,” with KWS, calling on legends like Muddy Waters and Chuck Berry.  Another great male-helmed track is Jason Freeman’s “Magic In My Home.”

There’s a whole lot of girl power going on here, including a cover of “Let’s Hear It For the Boy,” by Jana Kramer, which was originally recorded as a single for Deniece Williams on the first movie’s soundtrack.  This song is likely to get some seriously karaoke play.  I haven’t seen the movie yet, but I can just imagine that it’s featured in one of those montages that mixes dancing with seemingly harmless teen-aged fun, not to mention laying the groundwork for a romance between Wormald and Hough’s characters.

Rebellion is a big theme of the movie, and where there‘s rebellion, there‘s always some guitars and leather jackets. Songs like “Little Lovin’” by Lissie and “So Sorry Mama” by Whitney Duncan captured that perfectly for Hough’s daughter-of-a-preacher portrayal of Ariel. My particular favorite song on the whole soundtrack is Ella Mae Brown’s “Holding Out For A Hero,” a strong, yet heartfelt love ballad that balances out the up-tempo-heavy collection of fierce female voices.

Notable contributions also include the Grammy-winning country-rock group, Zac Brown Band with “Where The River Goes,” as well as powerhouse Gretchen Wilson featured with Big & Rich on “Fake ID.” I’ve also heard so much about rising star, Victoria Justice, who sings “Almost Paradise,“ a duet with another up and coming voice, Hunter Hayes.

If you’re not at least talking with a little bit of a twang by this point into the album, then give a listen to “Suicide Eyes” by A Thousand Horses, a rock track with heavy harmonica that gets the hips moving.  Just to make sure you get loose when listening to the soundtrack, David Banner’s dance-heavy pop / rap track “Dance The Night Away” featuring Denim, sounds like a mix of all of Rihanna’s latest and greatest radio-friendly hits.

Even though there’s big country influence in these tracks, you can’t have a movie like Footloose without such musical roots to transition the historical return of rebellious teenagers with a dancer in their hearts.  My only question is why the film’s leading lady, Hough, did not participate on the soundtrack since she had a successful debut album on Billboard’s country charts back in 2007.

Either way the soundtrack will provide country fans with a refreshing collection of southern style, fiddles, and moving stories of love. Click the video below to listen to Shelton’s theme! The album is available for purchase in stores now!

Rating: 8/10.

I woke up this morning to find in my email, a letter from the CEO of Netflix explaining about the recent changes and the future of the company. To sum up the letter basically Netflix will still exist but it will only offer streaming films, however they are going to take their DVD collection and open a new company called Qwikster which will also feature video games.  Stupid idea? Yes and no. Here is the entire letter that was sent out to what I would image would be every Netflix subscriber.

Dear Graham,

I messed up. I owe you an explanation.

It is clear from the feedback over the past two months that many members felt we lacked respect and humility in the way we announced the separation of DVD and streaming and the price changes. That was certainly not our intent, and I offer my sincere apology. Let me explain what we are doing.

For the past five years, my greatest fear at Netflix has been that we wouldn’t make the leap from success in DVDs to success in streaming. Most companies that are great at something – like AOL dialup or Borders bookstores – do not become great at new things people want (streaming for us). So we moved quickly into streaming, but I should have personally given you a full explanation of why we are splitting the services and thereby increasing prices. It wouldn’t have changed the price increase, but it would have been the right thing to do.

So here is what we are doing and why.

Many members love our DVD service, as I do, because nearly every movie ever made is published on DVD. DVD is a great option for those who want the huge and comprehensive selection of movies.

I also love our streaming service because it is integrated into my TV, and I can watch anytime I want. The benefits of our streaming service are really quite different from the benefits of DVD by mail. We need to focus on rapid improvement as streaming technology and the market evolves, without maintaining compatibility with our DVD by mail service.

So we realized that streaming and DVD by mail are really becoming two different businesses, with very different cost structures, that need to be marketed differently, and we need to let each grow and operate independently.

It’s hard to write this after over 10 years of mailing DVDs with pride, but we think it is necessary: In a few weeks, we will rename our DVD by mail service to “Qwikster”. We chose the name Qwikster because it refers to quick delivery. We will keep the name “Netflix” for streaming.

Qwikster will be the same website and DVD service that everyone is used to. It is just a new name, and DVD members will go to qwikster.com to access their DVD queues and choose movies. One improvement we will make at launch is to add a video games upgrade option, similar to our upgrade option for Blu-ray, for those who want to rent Wii, PS3 and Xbox 360 games. Members have been asking for video games for many years, but now that DVD by mail has its own team, we are finally getting it done. Other improvements will follow. A negative of the renaming and separation is that the Qwikster.com and Netflix.com websites will not be integrated.

There are no pricing changes (we’re done with that!). If you subscribe to both services you will have two entries on your credit card statement, one for Qwikster and one for Netflix. The total will be the same as your current charges. We will let you know in a few weeks when the Qwikster.com website is up and ready.

For me the Netflix red envelope has always been a source of joy. The new envelope is still that lovely red, but now it will have a Qwikster logo. I know that logo will grow on me over time, but still, it is hard. I imagine it will be similar for many of you.

I want to acknowledge and thank you for sticking with us, and to apologize again to those members, both current and former, who felt we treated them thoughtlessly.

Both the Qwikster and Netflix teams will work hard to regain your trust. We know it will not be overnight. Actions speak louder than words. But words help people to understand actions.

Respectfully yours,

-Reed Hastings, Co-Founder and CEO, Netflix

p.s. I have a slightly longer explanation along with a video posted on our blog, where you can also post comments.

Interesting huh? If you go to the site you will realize that people are not very happy at all about this and their comments show. Back when I did the research group, they asked us to select from a few different options and prices for what we felt was acceptable for this service. The vast majority chose a $15.99 a month plan that would allow streaming and one DVD or Video Game out at a time.  This did not include the $2 up-charge for Blu Ray. Now no price plan has been set or released yet but I can’t imagine them charging much more then this unless you want more out at a time.

The company is clearly trying to do damage control and I feel this email did more harm then good. There should be no reason to create another website and charge people twice on their card for basically one service. I’m not a business expert so I don’t no the tax breaks or benefits you get from splitting the company like this but I can’t imagine it being that great. Now I’m willing to give this new Qwikster a chance but once I get caught up on my DVD and Video games, I will be canceling my service and probably sticking with Netflix streaming.

Let us know how you feel about the CEO and Netflix changing their business model like this. Comment below!

The Siege of Trenchers Farm is about an American professor named George Magruder who relocates to the English countryside with his English wife Louise and daughter Karen. They decide to rent an isolated house called Trencher’s farm in Cornwall so that George can finish writing his book. One night, George and his family are driving back from a party when they run over a convicted child killer. Once the redneck-like locals of Dando Monachorum discover that George has the innocent looking killer in his home, they take to arms in an attempt to kill the man whom they suspect of killing Janice, one of the locals’ daughters.

In its most simple form, The Siege of Trenchers Farm is a home invasion thriller where our extremely pacifist lead must transform his entire belief system to one of carnage if he wants to protect his family, home, and the convicted killer from being harmed by the barbaric locals. This is the basic story of both the novel and Rob Lurie’s new film starring Alexander Skarsgard, James Marsden and Kate Bosworth.

I love home invasion thrillers and I think that’s what originally attracted me to Mr. Williams’ novel. Once I opened it and saw that it was a spaced out 225 pager, I then thought not only does it have a great premise but it is relatively short which means that anybody who can read should give this one a shot. What makes this book special is that it wastes none of your time by ignoring allthe BS associated with storytelling. Instead, Williams gives us the background of the three sets of characters that we will encounter early on and then quickly and skillfully smashes them together, resulting in the exciting story that I’ve already told you about.

While the story’s greatest strength lies in its relentless and ferocious pace, my favorite part of the novel is when the action begins and we get to witness George internally battling his life’s philosophy and value system. The guy is a pacifist and even in the most life threatening situations he still doesn’t want to really hurt the men trying to break into his home. Not only does this struggle continue for about half the time in which the men are trying to break in, his wife refuses to support him during it. She acts like a complete b*tch and then changes her position when he decides that all hope might be lost. She consistently has a negative impact on him throughout the entire story and is almost as useless as a pocket knife in a gun fight. Either way you look at it, George’s character is certainly unique and watching him struggle throughout the night up until the climax truly fascinating.

[Minor spoilers]This brings me to the story’s tagline, “everyone has a breaking point,” and, as the action progresses, that is the precise moment the reader is craving for. After an incident occurs inside the home, George becomes a “real man,” takes complete control of the house, slaps his wife in order to snap her out of whatever funk she is in, and turns into probably the most violent man of them all [end of spoilers]. It’s an exhilarating turning point in the book and one that exemplifies Williams’ skill as a writer of suspense.

By the time you reach the end of The Siege of Trenchers Farm you realize that is the perfect book for any fan of thrillers, either in the cinematic or novel form. It’s a simple and sweet adrenaline rush that grabs your attention, keeps you guessing, and is likely to turn you into a cheerleader for Professor George Magruder. What I’m trying to say is that it is well worth your time and probably one of the easiest thrillers you’ll ever read so pick it up, borrow it, read it and then go check out the film(s) [The original film stars Dustin Hoffman].

Rating: 9/10

I am a huge Kevin Smith fan and I don’t know why or how anyone could hate the man or talk bad about him, but leave it to Westoboro to prove me wrong. TMZ ran a story this weekend about WBC planning to protest Kevin Smith’s newest film Red State. The film is about a cult like church whose members kill “sinners”. It has been speculated that Kevin Smith did base the film loosely on WBC but it hasn’t been validated.

In case you don’t know who WBC is, they are the people who like to protest soldiers funerals, any event where people are a little different, and national events. When asked why the church was protesting the film, the church spokesperson said the following, “God hates fags, God hates fag enablers, therefore God hates Kevin Smith.” Hmm not really sure that is very christian like but OK. They go on to call Smith a “God-hating clown.”

TMZ caught up with Smith and asked him how he felt about the churches comments about him and their promise to disrupt the  films release . Smith who is unfazed by any of their comments had the following to say:

Well Jesus told ME he loved ‘Red State.’  He said it makes up for ‘Cop Out.’  He also said neither He nor His Heavenly Father have any affiliation with the Westboro Baptist Church.

Witty and civil, good job Kevin! But the best part came at the end of the interview when he had the following message for the members of the radical WBC and the rest of the world.

‘Red State’ is available now on VOD.

The site, which was found by a few of the guys over at Coming Soon, can be accessed by clicking HERE. Don’t expect much when you go to the site besides the following image.

In the bottom left corner of the site however there is a button that says to identify yourself. Clicking on this will ask you to log into your twitter account and post a prescripted message. What this will end up doing is still unknown but if you are interested in the viral marketing, then I strongly recommend you to sign up because it will play a part.

It seems like this is a time lock image much like the Bane picture for the Dark Knight.  What could it be you might be asking? Well we will have to wait to find out. More than likely from what I could make out of it, it seems to be a seal or emblem for The Capitol, however it could be a map of the arena or something totally random.  Here is what I have been able to make out from staring at the screen for about 5 minutes.

• Along the top you can see the words CAPITOL
• Down the sides looks to be olive branches
• On the bottom seems to be 3 blades or leafs

Keep checking back for more viral updates!

In this post we have a few photos of Tom Hardy in his full Bane attire just chilling on top of what looks like the Tumbler with a camo paint job. A few of the pictures seems to just be him standing with the crew around him, but there is one picture, which have been provided by Just Jared, that has a bit of an interesting Easter Egg in it. In the photos we see Bane holding a piece of paper but it’s not until the final one where we actually get to see what’s on it…. This next part might be a bit of a spoiler, but we really don’t know to what extent it will play….. The piece of paper which Bane tears up in  the final picture is a photo of Harvey Dent,  before he turned into Two Face.

Is this confirming that Harvey Dent is alive and will make an appearance in the film? No one really knows, but I’m sure this will sent many people into a flurry to try and find anything they can out about this.

Check out the photos below for a more peaceful looking Bane, just hanging out in the sun.

This interesting bit of information about the future of The Hunger Games comes to us via Deadline with additional confirmation from a Lionsgate representative:

Lionsgate executives told Wall Street analysts this morning to expect big things from The Hunger Games, a series of four action films that the studio will release from the trilogy written by Suzanne Collins. COO Joe Drakesaid it was “the highest selling film we’ve ever had” at the Cannes Film Festival and that overseas exhibitors consider it “the movie that can change their company.” Although Lionsgate wouldn’t disclose its budget for the films, Drake says Hunger Games could become an “outsized success” for Lionsgate. The studio says it bought the rights before the books became runaway best-sellers, and it has “retained the majority of the upside” in its talent and distribution deals.

Chris and I have touched on this subject before about planning sequels to films that have yet to be made or released yet. I understand this is a trilogy in the book series and most times then none, popular books much like ‘The Hunger Games‘ will end up making it to the end. However, we have recently seen some very popular books fail miserably and end up getting canned or resold do to poor box office numbers (Golden Compass, The Narnia books, Vampires Assistant, etc…)

We know that Lionsgate is splitting the final Twilight novel, Breaking Dawn, into two films and that the Harry Potter films have been split into two as well (which was the right thing to do), but should they do the same to Hunger Games? I haven’t read the books so I don’t know how detailed they are so please feel free to comment and let us know if you feel that maybe the second or third book needs to be split. But it seems to me like this is just another excuse for Lionsgate to squeeze a little more out of the consumers.

There is always a possibility that this film could fail miserably (Highly unlikely) and Lionsgate will scrap the deal, but for now count on four films coming to the big screen for probably the next 8 years.