The Professor's Daughter

I forgot to mention that I posted this week's Newsarama blog column on Joann Sfar and Emmanuel Guibert's The Professor's Daughter. Here's an excerpt:

"Knowing that it’s about the romance between a mummy and the daughter of the man who discovered him, I expected The Professor’s Daughter to be whimsical. And it is.

"What I wasn’t prepared for was for it to go beyond whimsy and into ridiculousness. That’s not a bad thing, but it caught me off guard when I thought I was reading one kind of book and it turned out I was reading another."

More at the link.

The Awesome List: Bond news, 100 Million BC, Host prequel, Giant Robot Paper Model, Weta on JLA, and the Shang Chi comic that Isn't

New Bond Girls

The latest couple of Bond girls have been announced. The next Bond film will feature Olga Kurylenko as the female lead. I loved her in Hitman, so that's pretty exciting to me.

What's also exciting is that the movie will be based on another Fleming story. Not a novel, but the short story "Risico." There are some minor spoilers in the link, plus the announcement that Gemma Arterton has also been cast for a secondary role.

100 Million BC

The Asylum, rippers-off extraordinaire that they are, have released a trailer for their 10,000 BC swipe. Thing is, it doesn't look half bad.

Oh, it will be. It just doesn't look it in the trailer.

The Host Prequel

I haven't seen The Host yet. Maybe I'll wait until after I see the prequel.

Giant Robot Paper Model

The things they can do with dead trees these days.

Wonder Woman Justice League Movie Looks Even Better

In spite of having no finalized cast and a stalled script, production on the JLA movie moves forward and is sounding better and better all the time. Weta Workshop is doing the costumes.

Almost Awesome

In a recent email newsletter, Warren Ellis mentioned that he's looking for old Marvel properties to resurrect and talks about some he's already dismissed. He says, "I thought about Shang-Chi for a second, but that book's useless to me without Fu Manchu, and Marvel don't have the Rohmer license anymore."

I sort of agree with him except that people have been figuring out how to do Fu Manchu books without actually calling him Fu Manchu for a while now. It's too bad. I would've loved to have read that.

3:10 to Yuma (1957 and 2007)

The remake of 3:10 to Yuma comes out tomorrow on DVD, so I thought it would be interesting to watch the original and see how they compare. I saw the remake in the theater and loved it, but I didn't write a real review of it at the time, so I'll probably let this serve for that too.

The first surprise for me was that the original's in black-and-white. That doesn't affect my enjoyment at all, but some of the art I'd seen associated with it was in color and color is a reasonable expectation of a '50s movie, so I figure it's worth pointing out.

Both movies start off the same with Ben Wade (played by Glenn Ford in the original) and his gang robbing a stagecoach by using Dan Evans' (Van Heflin) cattle. The robbery is longer and more exciting in the new version (and adds Peter Fonda's character for some great, extra flavor), but other than that the scene goes down about the same way.

There's no subplot in the old one about Dan's feuding with a neighboring rancher. Dan's still desperate for money to get his ranch through a drought, but that's as far as it goes. And it's enough really. When the stagecoach owner offers $200 to anyone who'll help transport the captured Ben Wade to the 3:10 train to the prison in Yuma, we totally get why Dan volunteers.

Most of the posse's scheme to get Ben to the train is the same, but the remake adds a lot to the journey. In the original, once the good guys have sent Ben's gang on a false trail, we go immediately to Contention City where the train station is. The remake spends a lot of time on the trip, building tension for the end, but the original saves its tension-bulding for Contention where Dan and Ben have a lot of time together waiting for 3:10.

Ford and Heflin are great actors, so the wait's not boring, but it is quiet and it's pretty long. I won't say anything about the ending in case you want to see it. It's a good movie and I can see why it got remade. The story is unique for a Western, the interplay between the two leads is fantastic, and Ben Wade is a charmingly ambiguous bad guy. And there's a damn fine shoot 'em up at the end. Not to knock Roy Rogers and Gene Autrey-type Westerns, but it's a far cry ahead of them in terms of sophistication.

The remake though takes a very good film and makes it excellent. It leaves all the important elements of the original intact, but adds sub plots, action, extra drama, an awesome ensemble cast of supporting characters, and further complicates Ben Wade in interesting ways. And with Russell Crowe and Christian Bale playing Ben and Dan, it doesn't slouch in the acting department either.

The 1957 gets four out of five lonesome whistle blows.

The 2007 gets five out of five.

Art of the Day: New Frontier Wonder Woman

There were a bunch of stills released from the JLA: New Frontier movie. This is my favorite, but there are some other awesome ones too. Make sure to check out the one of Superman and Lois. I love the shadows on that one.

Artist of the Day: N.C. Wyeth

From Golden Age Comic Book Stories.

The Awesome List: Monster Conference Disaster, Bond news, Historic Jack Sparrow, Indiana Jones, and still with the Wonder Woman casting

Monster Conference Ends in Disunity

I don't know how I'm going to be able to blog about anything else today; this is just too upsetting. "The mood of the conference became hostile as soon as the American delegation protested an ambitious program sponsored by the UN which would use funds levied from developed countries to fund giant robot mothras in less-developed regions of the world." Stinkin' Bush administration. We're all going to die.

Is New Bond Novel "Canon?"

The new Bond novel scheduled for May, Devil May Care, has been advertised as a continuation of Fleming's canon, with writer Sebastian Faulks "writing as Ian Fleming." Up until now, non-Fleming Bond books have been set in the present without explaining how Bond has agelessly bridged the time gap between Fleming's last novel and modern times. That's the main reason I lost interest in them, so it's horribly hypocritical of me to snicker even a little at how the continuity cops are already shining their badges in anticipation of a reportedly canonical adventure.

But I have another reason for not wanting to chuckle too loudly at The Literary 007 and that's because I really love the blog. Unfortunately, it's shutting down. It points disappointed readers towards CommanderBond.net, which is a really excellent and thorough site, but doesn't have an RSS feed that I could find. It may be "the best informed" James Bond website, but it's not easy to follow without actually going there to check for updates every day, which means I'll really be missing Literary 007. It's done too soon.

The Next Bond Villain

The villain for the next Bond movie has been cast and they expect to announce the female lead in a couple of weeks. Also, Jeffrey Wright will return as Felix Leiter, making him only the second actor to play the character twice and the first to do it in back-to-back films.

Yet Even Still More Wonder Woman Casting Nonsense

You know how Megan Gale is absolutely, positively, 100% confirmed to be Wonder Woman in the live-action JLA movie? Maybe not.

I like Eva Green a lot, mainly because she played my favorite literary Bond gal, but I don't get a Wonder Woman vibe from her. Maybe, again, because she played my favorite literary Bond gal and I associate her with Vesper-like characteristics. She's tough, but it's kind of a subtle, smoldering toughness rather than Wonder Woman's obvious, "I'm not messing with her" toughness.

The Historical Jack Sparrow

I was talking with my brother-in-law about National Treasure 2 and how I suspected that the clue-making timeline is probably best not thought about too hard. Which naturally makes me want to not only think about it, but to map it out in detail, just to see for sure. I was hoping someone had done it for me already, but as far as I can tell, no one has.

What some helpful soul has done though is to map out the events of the Pirates of the Caribbean movies and match them up with historical ones. And that's pretty cool too.

Indy Covers

As you can see at the top of this post, Indy's on the cover of the latest issue of Vanity Fair. Related: Annie Liebowitz did a photo shoot with the actors and (news to no one) Cate Blanchett looks incredible.

Also, the cover to the comics adaptation has been revealed.

Awesome Stuff: Shark-Man, Hobbit rumors, When Drive-Ins Attack, Lost Season 4, Crime Wave, and the Hulk movie

Shark-Man

Shark-Man #1 comes out tomorrow and I'm really excited about it. I may have mentioned it before. That's the cover for #3 above. Man, I hope the insides are as cool as those covers.

Hobbit Movie Rumors

I try not to speculate on rumors too much, but there's so much going around about the Hobbit movie that I feel like I should at least mention it. Reports are coming in about how Peter Jackson may be producing, but he's definitely not directing, so the speculation is that Sam Raimi will be. And apparently everyone thinks that they're not dividing the story into two movies, but one will be The Hobbit and the other will span the 60 years between The Hobbit and Lord of the Rings. Heidi does a great job of not only collecting the rumors, but analyzing them as well.

When Drive-Ins Attack!

ComicMonsters.com has an interview with When Drive-Ins Attack! editor Rich Stahnke. If you don't remember, Jess Hickman and I are contributing a story to that anthology, and the interview includes an illustration of a familiar-looking jungle girl.

Lost Season 4



Crime Wave

The History Channel is running a documentary starting this Sunday called Crime Wave: 18 Months of Mayhem. It's about a spree of robberies, killings, and kidnappings perpetrated by the likes of John Dillinger, Machine Gun Kelly, Baby Face Nelson, and Bonnie and Clyde during an 18-month period from 1933 to 1934.

The Incredible Hulk

Stills have been released from the Incredible Hulk movie and they look great. The Hulk looks awesome and damn if that machine Banner's in doesn't look like an homage to the one in the TV show.

Artist of the Day: David T. Wenzel

Today would've been Tolkien's 116th birthday, so to celebrate here's one of many fantastic Hobbit paintings by David Wenzel who illustrated the graphic novel adaptation of the story.

Happy Hobbit Day!

Resident Evil (2002)

I don't remember how my buddies talked me into seeing Resident Evil: Apocalypse in the theater without seeing Resident Evil first, but they did. I'm usually pretty hard-headed about seeing things in order, but they must've given me a run-down on What Came Before.

Anyway, I liked it enough to want to see Extinction when it came out, and since it was just released on DVD, I figured now was a good time to go back and finally watch the first one. Fortunately, I'd forgotten most of Apocalypse, so I was watching Resident Evil with fresh eyes.

It's probably the best video game adaptation I've ever seen. That's not high praise or anything, but the only other video game movie I remember sort of enjoying was Silent Hill and Resident Evil is a lot more exciting. Both do an excellent job of capturing the feel of playing a game (or, more accurately, watching someone else play a game), but Silent Hill is all about setting a dark mood, while Resident Evil is about kicking butt. Dark moods are cool, but I can get that by popping in a Sisters of Mercy CD. I'd rather see the butt-kicking.

If you haven't seen it, Resident Evil is about the evil Umbrella Corporation and its Top Secret facility called The Hive that's located deep beneath fictional Raccoon City. The movie opens as someone steals some samples of a deadly, experimental virus and then intentionally exposes the rest of the facility, causing the Hive's computer-controlled security system to lock down the complex in order to contain the zombie-creating infection.

Cut to Alice (Milla Jovovich) who wakes up without any memory in a shower. When Umbrella-employed soldiers show up to assess the situation and control the damage, Alice learns that she's a security agent and that the mansion she's in is actually cover for the Hive's entrance. There's also a stranger in the house named Matt, so once the soldiers arrest him, everyone goes down into the Hive to try to bring it back online.

The rest of the movie is a standard dungeon-crawl type story with the team exploring the Hive as it gets increasingly more dangerous to be in. It even culminates in a Big Boss confrontation. But just calling it a dungeon-crawl doesn't really do it justice, because the cast is big enough and the characters are interestingly drawn enough to keep things exciting even when they're basically just moving through rooms. The general feel is Aliens with zombies.

Zombies aren't a good trade off for Aliens, but that's the source material we're stuck with and the result is as good as any zombie movie. Better, actually, because it's primarily an action movie rather than a horror movie. But you have to understand that I don't really like zombie horror in general. Mix zombies with another genre like here or Shaun of the Dead (or, I'd argue, George Romero's stuff because it's more about social commentary than scares) and I'm better, but the usual gross-out zombie stuff doesn't work on me.

The best part of Resident Evil though is Alice, who's now one of my favorite butt-kickers. And I'm way looking forward to seeing her again in the next two movies.

Four out of five zombie Dobermans.

Artist of the Day: Jean-Baptiste Monge

Another from Stuart Ng Books and thanks to Jess.

Awesome Stuff: Oozing Skull, the real Jurassic Park, a Giant Robot Spider, Fleming's 100th, and more

The Oozing Skull

Cinematic Titanic (aka the original cast of Mystery Science Theater 3000) has their first DVD available to buy. They're calling it The Oozing Skull, but it's really an old grindhouse movie called Brain of Blood. I'm linking to both versions, but c'mon. It's not like there's really any decision to make here.

How do you improve on Jurassic Park?

With a robot Jurassic Park of course. Which is exactly what Dubai is building.

Giant Robot Spider

This is why you shouldn't make fun of geeks. How else are you going to convince them to let you ride in their Giant Robot Spiders?

Happy Centennial, Mr. Fleming

This year is the 100th anniversary of Ian Fleming's birth and Ian Fleming Publications has a whole site devoted to the celebration. (Thanks to The Literary 007 for the tip.)

Tiempos Finales Blog

Sam Hiti has started a new blog dedicated to Tiempos Finales, which he's starting to focus on again.

Wonder Woman movie trailer

I know, I know. It's really for the animated Justice League: The New Frontier DVD, but still. She's in it and the whole thing looks pretty darn cool.