(L to R) George Clooney, Julia Roberts and Brad Pitt. Photo: Warner Bros.
Preview:
George Clooney says ‘Ocean’s 14’ budget has been approved.
The movie, with director David Leitch attached, should be shooting next year.
Stars Julia Roberts, Brad Pitt, Matt Damon and Don Cheadle are all likely to return.
It has been years since we last saw the heist-happy crew of the ‘Ocean’s’ movies. There has been chatter about an ‘Ocean’s 14’ in recent years, and things are clearly moving forward. ‘The Fall Guy’s David Leitch was reported as in talks to direct in January, and now, per star/producer George Clooney says that it’s looking good for production in 2026.
“We just got the budget approved at Warner Bros. and we’re trying to set up. It’s just scheduling, so it’s just setting a start date for us. Probably start in about nine or 10 months, shooting.”
The cast of 2001’s ‘Ocean’s Eleven’. Photo: Warner Bros. Pictures.
The original ‘Ocean’s’ trilogy, directed by Steven Soderbergh, launched in 2001 with ‘Ocean’s Eleven,’ a critical favorite and a commercial hit with just over $450 million at the worldwide box office.
(Left) David Leitch in Paris for ‘Bullet Train.’ Credit: Oliver Vigerie/Sony Pictures. (Right) ‘Gears of War 3’. Photo: Gearsofwar.com.
Preview:
David Leitch is boarding ‘Gears of War.’
Netflix nabbed the rights to adapt the game in 2006.
It follows humanity’s battle against creatures called the Locust.
Back in 2022, Netflix looked to stay in the video game adaptation race by nabbing the rights to developers Epic Games and The Coalition’s successful title ‘Gears of War.’
Since then, it has been slow progress in development –– but then, this has been a tricky project to bring to screens.
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Way back in 2007, New Line Cinema had the rights, aiming to bring a theatrical version to life, with ‘Underworld’ and ‘Live Free or Die Hard’ director Len Wiseman attached to direct.
But it lingered in limbo for a few years, with Wiseman ditching the project and reports of budget cuts. Around 2016, word arrived that Universal and Microsoft were working on a version of the movie that would be separate from the games’ canon.
Again, things went awfully quiet until Netflix announced it had taken over the rights.
Now, via The Hollywood Reporter, word arrives that the streaming service has zeroed in on the filmmaker it wants to bring the movie to life: David Leitch.
The director has become something of a go-to for action, and ‘Gears of War’ certainly fits that bill.
Set on the planet Sera, the game thrusts players into a battle for survival between humans and a race of creatures that surface from the bowels of the planet known as the Locust Horde.
Players assume identities of soldiers on Delta Squad, a ragtag fireteam led by disgraced sergeant Marcus Fenix, which is now charged with leading humanity’s last stand as they fight to save Sera’s inhabitants.
‘Gears,’ developed by Epic Games (and now overseen by Canadian company The Coalition), became an instant success when it debuted on the Xbox 360 in November 2006.
It became one of the most popular games on the Xbox Live service, overtaking ‘Halo 2,’ and sold more than 3 million units worldwide in its first 10 weeks. It received numerous awards, including Gamespot’s Game of the Year and the Interactive Achievement Awards’ Overall Game of the Year.
Netflix has big plans for the project –– an animated series is in parallel development, with the aim to expand the franchise if this first film is a success.
David Leitch in Paris for ‘Bullet Train.’ Credit: Oliver Vigerie/Sony Pictures.
David Leitch has spun quite the career from his days as a stuntman doubling for Keanu Reeves. After graduating to stunt coordinator and second-unit director, he co-directed ‘John Wick’ with action colleague Chad Stahelski.
Last year’s ‘The Fall Guy,’ which starred Ryan Gosling and Emily Blunt, didn’t succeed at the box office but doesn’t seem to have hurt Leitch’s prospects.
(L to R) Director David Leitch and Ryan Gosling (as Colt Seavers) on the set of ‘The Fall Guy.’
He has a lot of other projects on his plate at the moment, both as a director and as producer via his 87North company, which he runs with wife and fellow producer Kelly McCormick.
Amazon MGM Studios is backing that movie, whose plot details are locked in a vault for now, but Mark Bianculli wrote the script and is an executive producer. Leitch is at work on the movie now and aims to have it in theaters on September 4th, 2026.
There’s also the long-bubbling ‘Ocean’s 14’ movie, which Leitch has been in talks to direct.
As producers, Leitch and McCormick have a wealth of projects in the works –– they’re aboard sequels to ‘Nobody’ and Christmas thriller ‘Violent Night’ and a variety of others, including ‘Ruiner,’‘Red Shirt’ and another video game title, ‘Just Cause.’
Assuming his ‘Gears’ deal goes through, Leitch will also produce that, while The Coalition is also involved.
What other video game titles are headed to screens?
Video game adaptations are certainly having a moment on screens big and small –– ‘A Minecraft Movie’ is still earning money at the box office, while ‘Fallout’ has been successful for Amazon’s Prime Video arm.
It’s not all sunshine and roses, however, as some movies in the genre haven’t performed as well –– Screen Gems’ ‘Until Dawn’ is a recent example, taking in less than $50 million worldwide so far (albeit on a relatively thrifty $15 million budget).
When will ‘Gears of War’ be on Netflix?
While Leitch is reported as in negotiations, Netflix has yet to confirm his attachment to the movie. So chances are we’ll have to wait to see whether this moves forward quickly, and will be delayed at least until after Leitch makes the bank heist movie.
Josh Hartnett as Lucas Reyes in ‘Fight or Flight’. Photo: Vertical.
‘Fight or Flight’ receives 6 out of 10 stars.
Opening in theaters May 9th is ‘Fight or Flight,’ the new action comedy which sees Josh Hartnett playing a scruffy American agent roped into tracking down and keeping a high-value asset safe.
Josh Hartnett as Lucas Reyes in ‘Fight or Flight’. Photo: Vertical.
An action movie with a line of dark, often bloody humor that puts an anti-hero with a crisis of confidence in an enclosed location where he must track something down with assassins all around him?
Based on that basic premise, you might suspect that we were talking about 2022’s ‘Bullet Train,’ which saw Brad Pitt in a similar position.
Here, in place of Pitt we have Josh Hartnett, and in the director’s chair is James Madigan, who came up as a second unit director and visual effects supervisor. He’s worked on the TV likes of Marvel’s ‘Runaways,’ but here makes a solid debut as the one calling the shots (and punches, and death-by-food tray) for a movie.
Script and Direction
(Right) Josh Hartnett as Lucas Reyes in ‘Fight or Flight’. Photo: Vertical.
The screenplay, from ‘How it Ends’ writer Brooks McLaren and D.J. Cotrona, who has mostly had acting jobs in movies such as ‘Shazam!’ on his resume, certainly sets out its intentions early, digging right into liberal swearing and a darkly comic tone while also rolling out some of the better-used tropes of action movies such as this.
It certainly does enough work to sketch out a world like this, and the smart choice to set the movie within the cramped environs of the plane amps up the tension, even as the jokes look to subvert that at every turn.
(L to R) Charithra Chandran and Josh Hartnett in ‘Fight or Flight’. Photo: Vertical.
Nothing here is likely to win awards, and it doesn’t have the polish of more mainstream action comedies, but it’s not really looking to model itself after those, preferring the wilder beats of something along the lines of 2006’s ‘Crank.’
As a filmmaker, Madigan clearly knows his way around a set-piece, and he brings the fight scenes to life with appropriate zeal, even if the look of the movie, lensed by Matt Flannery, tends to have a fairly basic sheen. And while Madigan throws a lot into the stunts, the actors themselves are usually left with more perfunctory material, the basic threads that string the clashes together.
Cast and Performances
(L to R) Charithra Chandran and Josh Hartnett in ‘Fight or Flight’. Photo: Vertical.
Josh Hartnett is clearly in his “go crazy and have fun” era and between this and M. Night Shyamalan’s ‘Trap,’ it’s certainly an entertaining one so far. Throwing vanity and caution to the wind as the bleached blond, frequently drunken and often in trouble burnout Lucas Reyes, he can also bring (and accept) the pain when called upon.
Reyes, a former Secret Service agent with a dark backstory (albeit one also with a big conscience), is an entertaining character for him to play, and Hartnett throws himself into the role with gusto.
Charithra Chandran as Isha in ‘Fight or Flight’. Photo: Vertical.
Charithra Chandran is absolutely on his level (and sometimes better) as flight attendant Isha, who discovers that her latest journey is going to be more eventful than a passenger demanding snacks. She’s got some winning chemistry with Hartnett –– never so dull as to be romantic –– and can also handle herself when the moment arises.
Likewise Danny Ashok, who is appealingly nervy as her fellow staff member Royce, called upon to deal with the dead bodies that start to stack up.
(L to R) Katee Sackhoff as Katherine Brunt and Marko Zaror as Chayenne in ‘Fight or Flight’. Photo: Vertical.
Katee Sackhoff doesn’t have enough to do as the mysterious and ice cold Katherine Brunt, but she certainly seems to be having fun in the part, delivering lines with the requisite level of calm demeanor and no-nonsense vitriol.
Around them, the likes of JuJu Chan Szeto and Hughie O’Donnell add flavor to the movie in relatively small roles.
Final Thoughts
Josh Hartnett as Lucas Reyes in ‘Fight or Flight’. Photo: Vertical.
‘Fight or Flight’ seems destined to be compared to the work of Leitch and his old ‘Wick’ collaborator Chad Stahelski, not to mention the movies they’ve produced such as ‘Nobody’ and ‘Love Hurts,’ which saw unexpected action types thrown into challenging situations.
For all the weird tics he’s allowed, Hartnett is a more conventional hero and despite some more ridiculous action moments (one sequence near the end seems to be channeling the ‘Evil Dead’ movies, and stretches even this movie’s flexible believability to breaking point), he’s never going to compete with the likes of Keanu Reeves.
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What’s the plot of ‘Fight or Flight’?
Exiled American agent Lucas Reyes (Josh Hartnett) is given one last chance to redeem himself –– the assignment is to track down and identify a mysterious, international high-value asset known only as The Ghost on a flight from Bangkok to San Francisco.
Complicating matters, the plane is filled with assassins from around the world who are assigned to kill them both. The pair must work together in a fight for their lives. At 37,000 feet, the stakes have never been higher.
(Left) David Leitch in Paris for ‘Bullet Train.’ Credit: Oliver Vigerie/Sony Pictures. (Right) George Clooney and Brad Pit in ‘Ocean’s Eleven’. Photo: Warner Bros. Pictures.
Preview:
David Leitch is in talks to direct ‘Ocean’s Fourteen.’
George Clooney, Brad Pitt and other leads would likely return.
Warner Bros. is backing the movie as always.
Las Vegas casinos, you might want to check your security setup. Because the ‘Ocean’s Eleven’ crew is looking to pay another visit.
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At least, that’s the plan for Warner Bros. and George Clooney’s Smokehouse Pictures company, which have been trying for a few years now to put together an ‘Ocean’s Fourteen.’
It would aim to reunite the reunite the crew from the previous outing, which includes Clooney, Brad Pitt, Matt Damon and more for a new movie.
Yet while Clooney seems committed to coming back, director Steven Soderbergh is apparently sitting this one out, having handled the previous three main entries.
There were rumours last year that Edward Berger, who made the Oscar-winning ‘All Quiet on the Western Front,’ (and is back in awards contention with ‘Conclave’) was in talks to take it on, but he denied them in an interview with Collider:
“Well, I feel very honored that people think of me to be able to do something like that, and of course, I would love the challenge to do either, but again, it’s rumors that are just people wanting to print some news that just have no basis in fact.”
It’s not exactly considered the greatest movie ever made, so a remake was a smart move.
The updated ‘Ocean’s Eleven’ landed in 2001, with Soderbergh directing from a script by Ted Griffin.
Clooney played Ocean, with his crew including Pitt, Damon, Casey Affleck, Scott Caan, Bernie Mac and more. They staged a sophisticated and elaborate casino heist involving robbing three Las Vegas casinos simultaneously during a popular boxing event.
It was a success for Warner Bros., earning $450 million from an $85 million budget.
Its 2004 sequel, the Europe-set ‘Ocean’s Twelve,’ also directed by Soderbergh (with a script this time by George Nolfi) saw Danny rustle up one more team member so he can pull off three major European heists and help his team pay back debts.
With a bigger budget ($110 million) it wasn’t quite as successful, but still earned $320 million.
The final film in the Soderbergh-directed trilogy, 2007’s ‘Ocean’s Thirteen’ had Brian Koppelman and David Levien on scripting duty and had Danny rounding up the crew for a third heist after casino owner Willy Bank (Al Pacino) double-crosses one of the original eleven, Reuben Tishkoff (Elliott Gould).
With a budget reduced back down to $85 million, it crept close to ‘Twelve’s earnings with $311 worldwide.
In 2018, we got spin-off ‘Ocean’s Eight,’ directed by Gary Ross from a script he wrote with Olivia Milch.
The movie was budgeted around the $70 million mark and earned $297 million worldwide.
What has George Clooney said about a new ‘Ocean’s’ movie?
George Clooney in ‘Ocean’s Eleven’. Photo: Warner Bros. Pictures.
Clooney, who is a producer on the ‘Ocean’s franchise in addition to its lead actor, told Uproxx about a development for the future back in 2023:
“We have a really good script for another ‘Ocean’s’ now, so we may end up doing another one. It’s actually a great script. the idea is kind of like ‘Going in Style.’ ”
David Leitch in Paris for ‘Bullet Train.’ Credit: Oliver Vigerie/Sony Pictures.
Leitch has spun quite the career from his days as a stuntman doubling for Keanu Reeves. After graduating to stunt coordinator and second-unit director, he co-directed ‘John Wick’ with action colleague Chad Stahelski.
Last year’s ‘The Fall Guy,’ which starred Ryan Gosling and Emily Blunt, didn’t succeed at the box office but doesn’t seem to have hurt Leitch’s prospects.
He’s also a producer via his 87North company and has the likes of ‘Love Hurts‘ and ‘Nobody 2’ on the way in that capacity.
Wasn’t there another ‘Ocean’s movie in the works?
‘Barbie’ CinemaCon 2023 Presentation and Press Line, April 25th. Photos By Eric Charbonneau.
With Jay Roach reportedly directing, Carrie Solomon’s script is set in Europe in the 1960s and may see Gosling and Robbie as Danny Ocean’s heist-happy parents.
There has been little movement on that one recently, so we’ll wait and see if it actually comes to fruition.
(L to R) Brad Pitt and Aaron Taylor-Johnson in Sony’s ‘Bullet Train.’ Photo: Scott Garfield.
Unlucky assassin Ladybug (Brad Pitt) is determined to do his job peacefully after one too many gigs gone off the rails. Fate, however, may have other plans, as Ladybug’s latest mission puts him on a collision course with lethal adversaries from around the globe—all with connected, yet conflicting, objectives—on the world’s fastest train.
When a team of mercenaries breaks into a wealthy family compound on Christmas Eve, taking everyone inside hostage, the team isn’t prepared for a surprise combatant: Santa Claus (David Harbour) is on the grounds, and he’s about to show why this Nick is no saint.
(L to R) Jason Statham and Dwayne Johnson in ‘Fast & Furious Presents: Hobbs & Shaw.’ Photo: Universal Pictures.
Ever since US Diplomatic Security Service Agent Hobbs (Dwayne Johnson) and lawless outcast Deckard Shaw (Jason Statham) first faced off, they just have traded smack talk and body blows. But when cyber-genetically enhanced anarchist Brixton’s ruthless actions threaten the future of humanity, they join forces to defeat him.
Bob Odenkirk in ‘Nobody.’ Photo: Universal Pictures.
Hutch Mansell (Bob Odenkirk), is an underestimated and overlooked dad and husband, taking life’™s indignities on the chin and never pushing back. A nobody. When two thieves break into his suburban home one night, Hutch declines to defend himself or his family, hoping to prevent serious violence. His teenage son, Blake (Gage Munroe), is disappointed in him and his wife, Becca (Connie Nielsen), seems to pull only further away. The aftermath of the incident strikes a match to Hutch’s long-simmering rage, triggering dormant instincts and propelling him on a brutal path that will surface dark secrets and lethal skills. In a barrage of fists, gunfire and squealing tires, Hutch must save his family from a dangerous adversary (Alexey Serebryakov) and ensure that he will never be underestimated as a nobody again.
An undercover MI6 agent (Charlize Theron) is sent to Berlin during the Cold War to investigate the murder of a fellow agent and recover a missing list of double agents.
He’s a stuntman (Ryan Gosling), and like everyone in the stunt community, he gets blown up, shot, crashed, thrown through windows and dropped from the highest of heights, all for our entertainment. And now, fresh off an almost career-ending accident, this working-class hero has to track down a missing movie star (Aaron Taylor-Johnson), solve a conspiracy and try to win back the love of his life (Emily Blunt) while still doing his day job. What could possibly go right?
The best part about ‘The Fall Guy’ is its clear affection and loving respect for stuntpeople and the incredibly dangerous work they do to make movies as exciting as possible. Some of the film’s many – almost too many – action sequences are designed just for this. It’s too bad, then, that the rest of the film is hampered by a sloppy script and halting pacing that the undeniable charm of Ryan Gosling and Emily Blunt can only do so much to smooth over. It’s all in the execution, and ‘The Fall Guy’ never commits to what kind of film it wants to be.
(L to R) Director David Leitch and Ryan Gosling (as Colt Seavers) on the set of ‘The Fall Guy.’
‘The Fall Guy’ is based loosely – very loosely – on the hit 1980s TV series starring Lee Majors as a stuntman who uses his skills to moonlight as a bounty hunter. Aside from the title and the main character’s name, however, nothing else remains of the series in this film from stuntman-turned-director David Leitch (‘John Wick,’ ‘Deadpool 2,’ ‘Bullet Train’). In this version, Colt Seavers (Ryan Gosling) is quite satisfied with just being a stuntman – even if the star he’s been doubling for six years, the insecure and self-obsessed Tom Ryder (Aaron Taylor-Johnson), earns all the glory for Seavers’ risky, often awe-inspiring stunts.
All that comes crashing down, however, when Colt suffers a severe injury on the set that takes him out of commission for a year, reduces him to working as a valet, and sends him into a deep depression. It also estranges him from his girlfriend, Jody Moreno (Emily Blunt), an aspiring director who in the interim lands her feature directorial debut – a sci-fi blockbuster starring none other than Ryder.
But then Colt gets a call out of the blue from the movie’s producer, Gail (Hannah Waddingham), who insists that Colt fly down to Australia to perform stunts on the film. Fearful of getting back on that horse, so to speak, Colt nevertheless heads down to the set in the hope that he can pick up his career and rekindle the spark with Jody. But when it turns out that Ryder has gone missing from the shoot, Colt is tasked with finding him – and discovers that Ryder’s disappearance may be part of a much more sinister plot than most Hollywood thrillers.
There’s no question that Ryan Gosling and Emily Blunt both have charisma and screen presence to spare, and their verbal jousting and fast-paced repartee often provides enough entertainment to just get by when ‘The Fall Guy’ lags in the pacing department. There’s also no question that David Leitch loves the profession he came up in, and the movie goes to great lengths to show just how stuntpeople do their jobs – you may come away from the movie with a newfound respect for the craft (and an understanding of why stuntpeople really do deserve to get their own Oscar category).
But the movie itself is never quite sure what it wants to be. Is it a rom-com? A movie industry satire? An action thriller? It tries to be all three, but the script by Drew Pearce (‘Hotel Artemis’) never leans fully into any of those genres, creating a tonal and narrative hodgepodge that doesn’t quite come together as a cohesive whole or has much of anything to say. The tonal shifts give ‘The Fall Guy’ a herky-jerky feel, with some scenes coming to a standstill while the action sequences are frantic if exceptionally well-staged (although one highly destructive chase through the streets of Sydney has one wondering, even in the reality of the film, why not a single cop shows up).
Of the narrative’s three threads, the mystery involving Ryder’s disappearance is the weakest and most easily dispensable: it comes across as merely a means to create some action scenes. The romance probably plays the strongest, thanks to Gosling and Blunt’s chemistry, but even aspects of that are contrived (it’s kind of murky why the relationship ended in the first place). As for the film’s satirical aspects, they jump in and out of the story, fighting for space with Leitch’s yearning to show the below-the-line folks in the best possible light.
No Stunt Casting Here
Ryan Gosling is Colt Seavers in ‘The Fall Guy,’ directed by David Leitch.
Anyone who watched the Oscars could see that Ryan Gosling and Emily Blunt had comic chemistry together as presenters, and that connection is evident in ‘The Fall Guy’ as well. The two leads are the strongest aspect of the movie. Gosling’s comedic chops are on full display again, and he can’t help but be endearing and watchable even if he is playing a variation on the lovable but dim persona we’ve seen in ‘Barbie’ and ‘The Nice Guys.’ His Colt Seavers can barely articulate himself in front of Blunt’s Jody as the story begins, locked in his own sense of failure, but his character does evolve by the climax.
Like Gosling, Blunt is always a striking, strong presence on screen, and her Jody is someone who lets her own ambitions – her heartfelt desire to become a director – get in the way of real life to a degree. One of the best aspects of the movie is the way in which Jody and Colt initially communicate through the action they’re staging on the set; as she sets him on fire over and over again, among other things, they keep talking about how to fix the movie’s third act, when clearly they’re discussing what happened to their own broken relationship. Moments like that are clever indicators of the movie’s better intentions.
The most hilarious supporting character is Taylor-Johnson’s Tom Ryder, who also represents the film’s most satirical aspects (we have to wonder which major real-life A-lister this narcissistic, petty, spoiled man-child was patterned after). His complete insecurity in the face of Colt’s immense physical talents, his inclination to believe that his delivery of even the most brainless rallying-cry speech to a crowd of extras is some sort of Shakespearean monologue, and the post-it notes that cover his apartment – constant little reminders to himself that often contradict each other – are spot-on, and Taylor-Johnson plays him at a slight remove, as if the Ryder persona is just another role for this rather small person.
The rest of the cast are terrific in smaller roles, even if many of them don’t get much to do. Hannah Waddingham (‘Ted Lasso’) fares best as Gail, the producer who knows exactly what to say to everyone and how to manipulate them to get what she wants, while Winston Duke (M’Baku from the ‘Black Panther’ movies) is a welcome wingman who we’d like to see more of. Stephanie Hsu (‘Everything Everywhere All at Once’) and Teresa Palmer (‘A Discovery of Witches’) also make good impressions even if they largely disappear from the second half of the film.
Final Thoughts
Ryan Gosling is Colt Seavers in ‘The Fall Guy,’ directed by David Leitch.
‘The Fall Guy’ has crowd-pleaser written all over it: a couple of big, attractive leads in a zany rom-com scenario, a mystery of sorts at its center, and a parade of “watch this one” action setpieces serving as its spine. Some of its elements get their chance to shine, but only intermittently, and not enough to make ‘The Fall Guy’ the fully satisfying popcorn picture it’s clearly engineered to be.
Luckily, Ryan Gosling and Emily Blunt have enough sheer star power to keep the movie from becoming the kind of empty tentpole that it pokes fun at (with ‘Metalstorm,’ the ‘Dune’ knockoff movie inside the movie), and if David Leitch and Drew Pearce found a more seamless way to blend their romance with a bit more satirical zing, we’d be rooting for them all the way.
‘The Fall Guy’ receives 6 out of 10 stars.
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What is the plot of ‘The Fall Guy’?
After a severe injury sidelines him for a year, stuntman Colt Seavers (Ryan Gosling) is recruited to perform stunts for action star Tom Ryder (Aaron Taylor-Johnson) in a new epic directed by Colt’s ex-girlfriend, Jody Moreno (Emily Blunt). Ryder’s sudden disappearance from the shoot, however, not only complicates Colt’s attempt to get back in Jody’s good graces, but finds the fall guy enmeshed in an increasingly sinister plot.
Who is in the cast of ‘The Fall Guy’?
Ryan Gosling as Colt Seavers
Emily Blunt as Jody Moreno
Aaron Taylor-Johnson as Tom Ryder
Hannah Waddingham as Gail
Winston Duke as Dan
Stephanie Hsu as Alma
(L to R) Ryan Gosling is Colt Seavers and Emily Blunt is Judy Moreno in ‘The Fall Guy,’ directed by David Leitch.
While it will certainly feature plenty of giant reptiles roaring around (and a host of others), the exact story details are trapped in amber for now.
It’ll reportedly be set in the ‘Jurassic World’ era, but won’t directly connect to the previous three movies, so an appearance from characters such as those films’ Owen Grady (Chris Pratt) or Claire Dearing (Bryce Dallas Howard) appears unlikely for now –– though we won’t rule anything out at this point.
From the sounds of it, this new movie would take the franchise in a fresh new direction, so we’re also not predicting (for now) the return of ‘Jurassic Park’ trio Alan Grant (Sam Neill), Ellie Sattler (Laura Dern) and Ian Malcolm (Jeff Goldblum).
Who is making the new ‘Jurassic World’ movie?
David Leitch in Paris for ‘Bullet Train.’ Credit: Oliver Vigerie/Sony Pictures.
David Koepp is hard at work on the script. He’s someone who has no small experience with these stories, since he wrote both 1993 classic ‘Jurassic Park’ (the movie directed by Steven Spielberg that re-ignited moviegoers’ passion for dinos in the first place) and its 1997 sequel, ‘The Lost World: Jurassic Park’ (also directed by Spielberg).
Koepp, of course, has worked a lot with Spielberg, but is also a much sought-after writer beyond those collaborations (he has two movies on the way via Steven Soderbergh) and is a filmmaker in his own right.
Longtime producer Frank Marshall, who worked on all three of the ‘Jurassic World’ movies is on board this one also, and the studio seems bullish about the progress so far.
As for Leitch, he’s become something of a producer as well as his directing work, helping to shepherd other filmmakers’ projects through the 87North company he runs with producing partner and wife Kelly McCormick. He would be an executive producer here in addition to calling the shots.
When will the new ‘Jurassic World’ movie be in theaters?
Also mentioned in Deadline’s report about Leitch is news that Universal has set the date of July 2nd, 2025 for the movie, clearly looking to take advantage of the Independence Day holiday and a prime summer movie slot that has little major competition as of yet.
Chris Pratt in 2015’s ‘Jurassic World.’ Photo: Universal Pictures.
Releasing in theaters on October 28th before premiering on Apple TV+ on November 4th is the new drama ‘Causeway’ from Lila Neugebauer (‘Room 104’).
The film stars Oscar-winner Jennifer Lawrence (‘Silver Linings Playbook’) as Lynsey, a U.S. soldier who reluctantly returns home to New Orleans to live with her alcoholic mother (Linda Emond) after she suffers a traumatic brain injury during a tour in Afghanistan.
As Lynsey struggles to adjust to civilian life, she meets James Aucoin (Brian Tyree Henry), a car accident survivor and amputee that blames himself for a family tragedy. Soon, Lynsey and James become friends and help each other cope with their grief and try to move on with their lives.
Moviefone recently had the pleasure of speaking to Brian Tyree Henry about his work on ‘Causeway,’ his character’s grief, the challenges of playing an amputee, James and Lynsey’s friendship, and working with Jennifer Lawrence.
Brian Tyree Henry stars in ‘Causeway,’ premiering November 4, 2022 on Apple TV+.
You can read our full interview below or click on the video player above to watch our interview with Brian Tyree Henry.
Moviefone: To begin with, can you talk about your approach to playing James, and embodying the grief and regret that he feels on a day-to-day basis?
Brian Tyree Henry: My approach? Well, I first wanted to just figure out a little bit about who he was, and where he came from, and why that grief was a part of his life. James, as you know, is from New Orleans. He was born and raised there, and suffered a great loss, and stayed there. I always wanted to really figure out what that was for somebody who suffered a loss that was in their home, or a place that they call their home and why they choose to stay there.
Is it because they feel like they deserve to go through this, that they deserve to have these reminders, or is it that there was no other way? I think that James is a little bit of both. I think that we find James in this place feeling like he deserves to stay where he was, especially with the loss that he suffered of losing his leg, which made it a little harder to run and leave. So, I think that I really wanted to just figure that out and get to the heart of what that meant for somebody who endured a great loss like that and chose to stay.
Brian Tyree Henry in ‘Causeway,’ premiering November 4, 2022 on Apple TV+.
MF: As an actor, can you talk about the challenges of playing an amputee?
BTH: Well, most amputees live their lives of rehabilitation trying to remain the same way they were before they were an amputee. So, I didn’t want there to be a huge movement of James always being uncomfortable walking, because that’s not how he wanted to be treated either.
So, what I really wanted to discover was what it was like for him to mask it more than to showcase it? What does it look like for someone to try to move like that? Because I think most of the times when we suffer great tragedies, we do this huge thing of trying to mask it and cover it. We don’t want the scars to show. I think that that’s where the truth shines through the most, is that you can see through that.
So, for me, I wanted to just make sure that James felt like he was standing on his own two feet. That he felt like he was the same person he was before he suffered that tragedy, so I really leaned into that. Now, when it came to removing the prosthetic and moving about with that, I did talk to a few people. I talked to a few amputees to make sure that I knew that I was putting the sleeve on the right way and things like that. But I think in essence, truly, it was about him moving in a normal way.
MF: Finally, can you talk about Lynsey and James’ relationship, why they gravitate towards each other and what it was like working with Jennifer Lawrence?
BTH: Well, there’s a thing called trauma bonding that’s been very common, especially after everything we had gone through in 2020. There’s a thing that we started relating to each other in a way of comparing traumas. It was this thing of really linking to somebody, this weird codependency that we created in our relationships through trauma. You see that in a big way in this movie between James and Lynsey, but what we also wanted to show is what the other side of that looks like. Because we didn’t want to just show the one side of these two characters steeped in their trauma, and that’s all it is.
We really wanted there to be a showcase of a connection and hope of what could be on the other side, which is an actual friendship. That was a part of a lot of the conversations that Jennifer and I had, because we realized that our connection was growing a lot in between takes. We realized that the sinew of what the movie was, was based on how we were connecting with one another, how we called each other out on our stuff, how we talked about all, it was about us. So, we discovered that, that is in essence what we wanted to see between James and Lynsey as well.
(L to R) Brian Tyree Henry and Jennifer Lawrence in ‘Causeway,’ premiering November 4, 2022 on Apple TV+.
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(L to R) Bryan Tyree Henry and Aaron Taylor-Johnson star in Sony’s ‘Bullet Train.’ Photo: Scott Garfield.
Now that the pieces have fallen into place (on a crash pad, we hope), director David Leitch and star Ryan Gosling are pushing their movie adaptation of ‘The Fall Guy’ into top gear.
When his movie work starts to dry up, Seavers pivots to become a bounty hunter, using all the know-how he’s acquired to craft film action to track down and defeat swindlers, thieves, bikers, conmen, fugitives, and corrupt officials using his fists and his vehicle skills.
Majors starred alongside Douglas Barr and Heather Thomas as Colt’s colleagues Howie Munson and Jody Banks, who helped him out on his missions. Though the show was often a giant slab of ‘80s cheese TV, the concept clearly has legs.
(L to R) Heather Thomas and Lee Majors in ‘The Fall Guy.’ Photo courtesy of IMDB.
Word of Leitch and Gosling’s take first surfaced in 2020, then referred to as ‘Unknown Stuntman Movie’ and backing via Universal.
With The Hollywood Reporter’s story on Taylor-Johnson’s casting comes fresh information as to the storyline for this one, which looks to be largely jettisoning the side-hustle part of the original show.
Gosling is playing battered and past-his-prime stuntman who finds himself back on a movie with the star he worked with long ago and who replaced him. The problem, however, is that the star is now missing…
Taylor-Johnson will be the movie star that Gosling is doubling, while Blunt is a prosthetic makeup artist that has a romantic past with our hero.
The new film will see Leitch – a former expert stuntman himself, who has used that experience in his action-packed directorial career – reunite with Taylor-Johnson after the latter played opinionated assassin Tangerine in ‘Bullet Train’.
With a script from ‘Iron Man 3’s Drew Pearce and cameras rolling in Australia, ‘The Fall Guy’ is taking aim at a March 1st, 2024, release.
(L to R) Aaron Taylor-Johnson and Brad Pitt in Sony Pictures’ ‘Bullet Train.’
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In other casting news, the ever-busy Florence Pugh has another acting job. And it’s an intriguing one – as according to Deadline, the new movie is Alexander Skarsgård’s directorial debut ‘The Pack.’
Skarsgård will kick off shooting in March, and the story follows a group of documentarians who brave the remote wilderness of Alaska in an effort to save a nearly extinct species of wolves.
When the crew is brought back together at a prestigious awards ceremony, tensions flare as a deadly truth threatens to unravel their work. This team lived through the harsh elements of the wild but will a secret they share survive the night?
Skarsgård will star alongside Pugh as well as directing.
There is some forward movement on that front, as we now know that director Jonás Cuarón is on board the movie, which will have a script by ‘Blue Beetle’s Gareth Dunnet-Alcocer.
El Muerto debuted in a 2006 issue of ‘Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man’, written by Peter David, and illustrated by Roger Cruz. The character, real name Juan Carlos, was a super-powered wrestler who originally fought Spider-Man in a charity wrestling where he nearly unmasked the hero before being stung by Spider-Man, with a paralyzing poison. After being saved from the hospital by the web-spinner when Muerto’s oppressor El Dorado came to claim the wrestler’s life, the two would team up to defeat Dorado.
Bunny apparently pursued the chance to play the character, and this would be the first leading Latino superhero in the Sony Marvel movie universe.
The musician’s most recent role was in incoming action thriller ‘Bullet Train’, which starred Brad Pitt and just crossed $100 million at the domestic box office. Sony has apparently been impressed by his performance there, moving quickly to put ‘El Muerto’ into motion to accommodate his musical and promotional schedule.
Brad Pitt and Bad Bunny star in ‘Bullet Train.’
Obviously, there are no details yet about what the story will be, but we doubt it’ll feature Spidey at this point. It’s far more likely to be an origin tale of how El Muerto got his abilities. His mask is one that is passed down through the generations, and his family has always had to face El Dorado.
Cuarón has some hefty filmmaking experience, co-writing ‘Gravity’ with his father, director Alfonso Cuarón, and then moved on to make his immigration thriller ‘Desierto,’ which starred Gael Garcia Bernal and Jeffrey Dean Morgan. The film won the International Critics’ Award at the 2015 Toronto Film Festival.
Dunnet-Alcocer, meanwhile, is quickly becoming a go-to writer for projects featuring Latino characters, having worked on DC’s ‘Blue Beetle’ (which stars ‘Cobra Kai’s Xolo Maridueña).
Sony has a January 12th, 2024, release date on the books for the movie.
‘Kraven’, which will introduce one of Spidey’s classic villains, is set to arrive in theaters on October 6th, 2023, while ‘Madame Web’, featuring the clairvoyant character who has aided the web-spinner in the past but also has her own agenda, has a February 16, 2024, release planned, though the date has changed a couple of times.
Bad Bunny stars in ‘Bullet Train.’
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