We’re all about the firepower in today’s Movie Morsels, whether it’s the agents of Kingsman: The Secret Service (in a just-annouced advance screening you can attend) or Snake Plissken in the Escape from New York remake. Ka-pow! Plus, a surprising casting update for Ben-Hur, a featurette from Blackhat, a new Fifty Shades of Grey TV spot, and the video for Gwen Stefani and Pharrell Williams’s new track from Paddington!
Kingsman: The Secret Service
Want to see Matthew Vaughn’s Kingsman: The Secret Service a month before everyone else? Ride company Uber is partnering with 20th Century Fox to hold screenings of the film in fifty different locations tomorrow, January 15th. The details are explained in a new video highlighting the film’s style (in a manner that nods to its rival at the Valentine’s Day weekend box office, Fifty Shades of Grey). Looking for something to wear to a screening? As revealed last June, the film has also inspired a real-life fashion line.
[Uber]
Fifty Shades of Grey
Speaking of Universal’s adaptation of E.L. James S&M novel… A new TV spot has just appeared which looks to be “turning it up a notch.” Fifty Shades of Grey plans to make bondage the new national pastime on February 13th.
Escape from New York
The long rumored Escape from New York remake looks like its finally moving forward. Fox has just secured the rights to the film from StudioCanal, and enlisted the original film’s director John Carpenter to executive produce. No word yet on who will play Snake Plissken or who will direct, but for the latter job I nominate Neil Marshall, whose own work has long been influenced by Carpenter’s and whose Doomsday was a love letter to Carpenter’s 1981 cult classic.
[Nerdist]
Blackhat
Michael Mann’s first film since 2009’s Public Enemies hits theaters on Friday, January 16th, and a new featurette focusing on Blackhat‘s director has just landed online.
The Chris Hemsworth-starring cyber-thriller has also inspired one of comedian Patton Oswalt’s funniest tweets in recent memory…
“Chris Hemsworth as a computer hacker is acceptable. He is a fine actor. But to restore balance, Paul Giamatti must play Conan.”
— Patton Oswalt (@pattonoswalt) January 13, 2015
Paddington
The Nicole Kidman-starring Paddington, written and directed by The Mighty Boosh‘s Paul King and based on the children’s book series by Michael Bond, has been getting surprisingly good buzz for a film pushed back from its original holiday season release date to this Friday, January 16th. To ride that wave, the Weinstein Company has just released a new music video for the film’s song “Shine”, performed by Gwen Stefani and Pharrell Williams.
Ben-Hur
After playing the “God King” of 300 and 300: Rise of an Empire (pictured above), actor Rodrigo Santoro is in talks to play God himself in a new film version of Lew Wallace’s novel Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ. Paramount and MGM reportedly want the charismatic Brazilian star for the role of Jesus opposite Jack Huston in the title role of the enslaved Jewish prince fighting his way to freedom (famously played by Charlton Heston in the Oscar-winning 1959 film). Timur Bekmambetov is directing the new Ben-Hur, slated to shoot in Europe this winter.
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