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McGYVER Heads To The Big Screen!

CBS is currently busy working on bringing a preceding story arc to its small screen adaptation of the hit ABC series, McGyver. Furious Seven helmer James Wan is executive producing and directing a pilot for that iteration in place of previously hoping to direct a feature film which has been in the works for sometime now and once thought to be not happening at all. Then, Friday came and during a third quarter earnings call among those at Lionsgate to discuss the details for 2016, and it just so happens one thing led to another with word that the studio will be working with CBS to bring McGyver to the big screen. This pretty much beat my own earlier expectations as it will be yet another testament to see if a series AND a film will stand the test of time. For those not familiar with the original show or […]

ZAMBO DENDE Takes Flight In The New Series Trailer

Lee B. Golden III

It’s taken roughly a couple of years to make happen, but now it’s finally a reality with a future certain enough that it garners a series. I speak of director Riccardo Gabrielli R.’s latest treatment of author and creator Nicolas Rodriguez’s digital comic franchise, Zambo Dende, a welcoming opportunity for film studios to venture into Latino superhero property beyond less obscure figures like Zorro or Miles Morales’s Spider-Man, or that of Marvel and DC. Martial arts action star Marko Zaror takes off in the title role with a story that sets him off into a journey of vigilantism and justice throughout 17th century Latin America against evil barons, warmongers and oppressors alike. A shortfilm was initially shot over in Bogota, Colombia and a date hasn’t been set just yet for its release, but we finally have trailer that presents it accordindly, and much to our liking, with a prime cast […]

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RANGE 15: Real Life War Heroes Battle Zombies In The New NSFW Trailer

Lee B. Golden III

Writer and director Ross Patterson didn’t have many fucks to give last year when he went to YouTube and released his no-budget hybrid creature feature, Helen Keller VS. Werewolves. Rest assured, it wasn’t exactly a setback as it garnered him just enough attention from the film-hungry folks ovet at military brands Article 15 and Ranger Up who took to Indiegogo to crowdfund their latest sci-fi zombie romp, Range 15. Much to their avail, the crowdfunder was a success and the film has since become a reality with a cast and crew comprised of all veterans, and a story that pits a ragtag team of hard-drinking, partying soldiers and centers them as mankind’s last hope against the zombie apocalypse. In short, it’s their response to Hollywood’s lack of decent military cinemafare with a film, while indie in nature and schlocky depending on who you ask, that promises to bring you just […]

Z Moves Forward With Jonas Cuaron Directing

Lee B. Golden III

Last summer, Lantica Pictures and Sobini Films announced partnering for a futuristic take on pulp author Johnston McCulley’s 1919 swashbuckling vigilante hero, “Zorro”. The project is already being shopped in the marketplace as of late last year through Pantelion Films and now we’ve moved forward with a director in the form of filmmaker Jonas Cuaron. Cuaron will write and direct Z, the latest interpretation of the character in a dystopian futuristic reimagining. Production is expected to commence this summer over in Pinewood Dominican Republic Studios with Lantica financing and Sobini Films CEO Mark Amin producing. Cuaron, who co-wrote father Alfonso Cuaron’s Oscar-winning space thriller, Gravity, made The Hollywood Reporter’s Next Gen Ten list of directors to keep an eye on. His latest winning festival favorite, Desierto, starring Gael Garcia Bernal, releases in the U.S. this Spring through STX Entertainment. H/T: THR

Scott Mann's FINAL SCORE Films In London This Year For 2017

Lee B. Golden III

Fans looking toward Heist helmer director Scott Mann for a follow-up of his 2009 action thriller, The Tournament, may be in for a longer wait. For now though, you can expect to find him around London sometime this Summer or Fall for the upcoming production of his newest hostage thriller, Final Score. The Brothers Lynch – David and Keith, are penning the script which sees a former soldier who must use his skills amid a bustling stadium during a major sporting event to rescue its 35,000 occupants, including the daughter of his fallen comrade, from a squad of heavily armed captors. Highland Film Group is representing the film at the European Film Market in Berlin next week, with Highland’s own Arianne Fraser and Delphine Perrier executive producing. Producing are Wayne Marc Godfrey and Robert Jones from The Fyzz Facility with Signature Entertainment’s Marc Goldberg who stated the following, as per […]

Stunt Veteran Bruce Fontaine's BEYOND REDEMPTION Hits Berlin Next Week!

Lee B. Golden III

Courtesy of Action Lab Films Multifaceted actor and martial artist Bruce Fontaine has cut his teeth for some time now in the stunt field since the late 80’s, with a resumé that rightfully lists itself with to Jackie Chan, Sammo Hung and Corey Yuen Kwai to name a few. Nowadays with his last known acting credit as Malcolm in the 2014 comedy, Hector And The Search For Happiness, Fontaine will likely be seen working the field as stunt and coordinator for various films at home and abroad while based in Vancouver producing films via his Action Lab Films banner. For this, we bring you Fontaine’s directorial debut, Beyond Redemption, which has since wrapped in late 2015 prior to touching base over at the 19th annual Vancouver Asian Film Festival back in October. Fontaine rejoins his wushu premiere, martial artist, stuntman and now debut actor Brian Ho since working under Fontaine’s […]

NBC's TAKEN Series Lands A Director

Lee B. Golden III

Emmy award-winning producer Alex Graves (The West Wing, Homeland, Game Of Thrones) has been tapped to direct NBC’s forthcoming pilot for the series adaptation of hit film franchise, Taken, according to Deadline. Graves will direct from a script by executive producer and showrunner, Alex Cary, which will focus on the origins of principal franchise lead character, Bryan Mills, showcasing how he acquired his particular set of skills. Actor Liam Neeson originally portrayed the role of Mills in the highly-heralded first film from director Pierre Morel before starring in two sequels through last year with Oliver Megaton at the helm. EuropaCorp’s own Matthew Gross, Edouard de Vesinne and Thomas Anargyros will also serve as executive producers along with Taken franchise producer and co-writer Luc Besson, who is also seperately working on the upcoming feature sci-fi epic, Valérian And The City Of A Thousand Planets for 2017 release.

Steven Seagal War Thriller, SNIPER: SPECIAL OPS, Lands A Trailer

Lee B. Golden III

Director Fred Olen Ray’s career of well over 100 films is a litany of DTV action, horror and other genre titles now brings us his newest, Sniper: Special Ops. Actor Steven Seagal, seen in recent years taking to his business interests in Russia, is back on set here in the role of soldier on a mission that, surely enough, goes belly up. SYNOPSIS: A Special Ops military Force, led by expert sniper Sergeant Jake Chandler (Steven Seagal), are sent to a remote Afghan village to extract an American congressman being held by the Taliban. The rescue mission is a success, but Jake, separated after a firefight with the enemy, stays behind to help an injured soldier. Sergeant Vic Mosby (Tim Abell) desperately tries to convince Major Jackson (Dale Dye) to let him go back and save the soldiers, but is ordered on a mission to retrieve a truckload of munitions […]

KICKBOXER: RETALIATION Gets A New Villain And Start Date

Lee B. Golden III

Courtesy of Acme Rocket Fuel Director John Stockwell’s Kickboxer: Vengeance has yet to release a full teaser, trailer, or even a release date for the upcoming reboot of the 1990 classic tournamemt action thriller. But, I digress, as this doesn’t seem to be stopping Acme Rocket Fuel and Our House Films from moving forward with its sequel, Kickboxer: Retaliation, with the film now rolling into pre-production as per its new artwork below! Martial artist and stuntman Alain Moussi who will be debuting as actor in the first film will reprise his role as Kurt Sloan with action star Jean-Claude Van Damme back once more as Durand, and this time they’re taking on Hafthor Julius Björnsson, formerly of Game Of Thrones fame. Dimitri Logothetis is co-writing the film, as well as producing and sitting in as director. Rob Hickman, who is further producing the franchise, shared his own excitement for the […]

Harald Zwart To Direct China-Set Race Thriller, RALLY CAR With Keanu Reeves Starring

Lee B. Golden III

Actor Keanu Reeves is long anticipated to re-emerge once more as formerly recovering hitman in John Wick 2 later this year. For now though, his other endeavors will see him racing through China in the new Chinese co-production, Rally Car, as of September, and word now has it that The Karate Kid and The Mortal Instruments: City Of Bones helmer Harald Zwart will direct. Reeves will play a nostalgic hot shot former NASCAR driver whose personal and professional become flailing, and he’s soon forced to redeem himself in a high-stakes international race through China with a young Chinese woman as his co-driver. Reeves is producing via his Company Films banner with Stephen Hamel whose script treatment was handled by scribe Jeremy Lott, while Fundemental Films, who are currently making headway in lending co-production status to various imported titles through bypassing China’s quota system in order for more revenue to split, […]

Korean Thriller MUSUDAN Gets A Second Trailer

Lee B. Golden III

Director Goo Mo’s new thriller, Musudan, is getting a Korean release on February 25 and a second trailer has arrived for us to the goods. Actor Kim Min-Jun and actress Lee Jin-Ah lead the cast with a story that center on North and South Korean forces who get swept into an eriee mystery of death cases in the demilitarized zone. Check out the new trailer below as well as batch of character posters, courtesy of Opus Pictures. View post on imgur.com View post on imgur.com

The Final FAST Trilogy Gets A Release Schedule Through 2021

Lee B. Golden III

Actor Vin Diesel is currently in a “Xander state of mind” while filming xXx3 with a wicked cast. In the meantime, Diesel isn’t about to break consistency with “Toretto Tuesday” in lieu of all things to come with the remaining films of the Fast saga. Fast 8 is poised to film later this year rejoining Diesel with A Man Apart and Straight Outta Compton helmer F. Gary Gray and Neal Moritz producing for an April 14, 2017 release as per last year’s announcement. On that note, the actor went to Instagram late in the evening to share some big news from Universal Pictures in the following post, stamping official release dates for the last two films: A photo posted by Vin Diesel (@vindiesel) on Feb 2, 2016 at 10:51pm PST No plot details are available yet but several cast members from previous films are expected to return, including Tyrese Gibson, […]

Watch The Cutting Edge New Teaser For THE FINAL MASTER

Lee B. Golden III

Director Xu Haofeng’s The Master is largely one of the most highly anticipated movies going into 2016 for cinephiles alike apart from its prior audience in China. Thankfully, United Entertainment Partners has that covered with a U.S. release for its new title, The Final Master, pending following its acquistion late last year amid festivals in this, its second China title following its initial release, Saving Mr. Wu. SYNOPSIS: The Final Master is a martial arts film set in a transformational time period in China before World War II. Based on director Xu Haofeng’s best selling novel, The Final Master follows a Wing Chun practitioner’s adventure to open a martial arts school in the northern center to fulfill his master’s death wish. He has to secretly challenge eight martial arts schools with his apprentice, but he does not realize he’s been turned into a chess piece within the power game in […]

SKIPTRACE Lands A Full Trailer!

Lee B. Golden III

With all that action star Jackie Chan is involved in these days, it’s easy and rather forgiveable to forget that his latest globetrotting action comedy, Skiptrace, still hasn’t seen a release. A date is still pending, no doubt, but all while we’ve had only a teaser since last year, we now have a full trailer that showcases a lot more and guarantees that Chan fans will have a good time with this one with actor Johnny Knoxville driving some of the high jinks. SYNOPSIS: One of the last good cops around, Hong Kong detective Bennie Black (Chan) has been tracking dangerous crime boss Victor Wong for over a decade. When Bennie’s beautiful young niece Samantha (Fan Bingbing) gets into trouble with Wong’s crime syndicate, he must track down the one man who can help her: fast-talking, American gambler Connor Watts (Knoxville). Watts, who is also on the run from the […]

RAMPAGE: PRESIDENT DOWN Scores An Explosive New Trailer

Lee B. Golden III

Filmmaker Uwe Boll hasn’t exactly won huge favor among a lot of the film community apart from his own fans. He’s achieved quite a bit with his currently-running Rampage franchise stemming back to 2009 with the first film chronicling the story of a small town man whose descent into madness compels him to arm himself and lash out against society. I haven’t seen the films yet myself, but judging from the trailers, it’s pretty grim stuff and the sequel looks just as explosive, and so the demand for a third installment has been high despite several failed fundraisers, including a failed Indiegogo campaign more than a year ago which led to Boll’s scathing condemnation of the film community and Hollywood in not one, but two personal vlogs. If you haven’t seen them, watch them…he gets pretty personal, but all in all, he’s since moved forward on his own means with […]

Gregory Hatanaka To Direct EXTREMES, Tommy Wiseau To Star

Lee B. Golden III

For better or worse, the Blu-Ray and DVD are now available for Cinema Epoch’s Samurai Cop 2: Deadly Vengeance, and you can read my review here if it suits you. The film sure meets the requirements of being just as horrible as the first one was, which is a good thing whether or not you’re a fan of the films and there’s no question that director Gregory Hatanaka has certainly done his part, especially with the casting of Tommy Wiseau who plays a Yakuza boss. So why do we care about all this? Well, you don’t have to but it matters anyway, with word from Bristol Bad Film Club that Hatanaka and Wiseau are reportedly teaming up for another film titled Extremes. The site posted the above graphic with plot details currently scant, but casting info that states the likely inclusion of previous Samurai Cop 2: Deadly Vengeance cast members, […]

Dwayne Johnson Announces Details On RAMPAGE

Lee B. Golden III

Actor Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson is getting ready to hunt down some monsters this summer following word of his attachment to star in an upcoming live-action adaptation of the hit 1986 Midway video game, Rampage. The actor just announced the core team in an Instagram post which you can read below along with other plans he will be making in accordance with the film: EXCLUSIVE: Cool news we just hired Carlton Cuse & Ryan Condal (creators of COLONY) to write our big screen adaptation of RAMPAGE for New Line. Carlton also wrote SAN ANDREAS for us, so he excels at writing big scale with family and heart as the anchor. We have a shot to raise the bar and make something cool with this one as the basic storyline is three mutated gigantic monsters (Silverback, Alligator and Wolf) destroy major cities and landmarks across the US. This summer I’ll spend […]

After 10,000 Years, Elizabeth Banks Will Be Free As Rita Repulsa In SABAN'S POWER RANGERS

Lee B. Golden III

Earth To Echo helmer Dean Israelite’s new film, Saban’s Power Rangers is currently pre-production, and after outlining its principle cast members last year, the production finally announced who would reprise the role of intergalactic power-hungry witch, Rita Repulsa. After 10,000 years, I’m free! It’s time to conquer Earth!!⚡️ Time to play #RitaRepulsa #PowerRangersMovie pic.twitter.com/ouzd2BtkUI — Elizabeth Banks (@ElizabethBanks) February 2, 2016 Rita Repulsa has been portrayed in a few iterations dating back to actress Soga Machiko’s performance in the original 1992 TV Asashi Tokusatsu show, Kyōryū Sentai Zyuranger, the show that spawned its crossover counterpart, Mighty Morphin Power Rangers. The American version of the series, as broadcast for Fox Kids, continued the role between TV and film with actresses Carla Peréz, Julia Cortez, voice actress Barbara Goodson and actress Susan Brady. Banks joins relative newcomers Dacre Montgomery, Naomi Scott, R.J. Cyler, Ludi Lin and Becky G. as respective Ranger recruits […]

Universal Pictures Is Remaking DEATH RACE Again With Manu Bennett Starring

Lee B. Golden III

It’s been eight years since director Paul W.S. Anderson led the effort to reboot the 1975 thriller, Death Race. Actor David Carradine starred in Paul Bartel’s Death Race 2000, an adaptation of Ib Melchior’s classic short story, “The Racer”, before Anderson stepped up with prime action star Jason Statham for Death Race in 2008 with 2 recast direct-to-DVD sequels thereafter. As of this week, Crackle feature, Extraction helmer Tony Giglio has written the script for a fourth in line with Half Past Dead helmer Don Michael Paul directing. In the meantime, and in confirmation of an entirely serperate production, actor Manu Bennett (Arrow, Spartacus, The Marine) has announced that he will star in a remake to be produced by Roger Corman who produced Bartel’s film. Excited to be travelling to Lima, Peru, today to start filming the remake of the 1970’s cult classic “Death Race”. I am especially excited to have […]

Martial Arts Drama, SHILO Casts Kicking New Sales Art

Lee B. Golden III

Writer, producer and director Edwin S. Nichols III is has been busy on the sales trail with his latest feature film work, Shilo, since being acquired by international sales agent, Shoreline Entertainment last July. Their next stop is at Berlin after hitting up festivals in Miami, Sundance and the American Film Market, and in recent days, a new sales poster is now circulating which you can take a look at below. The film is written and inspired by a true story which stars Nichols III as a lone drifter takes matters into his own hands when a bullish land developer threatens to foreclose on a camp for struggling children where he befriends a terminally-ill child. This will be interesting to learn more about seeing as how it was based on a real life event and with my own comparisons to films like Road House, I look forward to getting further […]