Live updates from Hall H
This morning’s Warner Bros. presentation attracted thousands who stood in the sweltering sun fending off cuties with carts carrying overpriced agua.
Genre-wise it’s going to be a busy year for the studio with the upcoming releases One Missed Call, Michael Dougherty’s Trick ‘r Treat and the Kate Beckinsale-starring Whiteout. So, without further adieu, here’s some of the finer points from the panel…
First up was One Missed Call…with Ed Burns and Shannyn Sossamon.
– Decent trailer full of ghosts with f’ed up faces. Slick look and cast.
– Burns enjoyed working with a cast of primarily women.
– The director had his cast avoid the Miike original but Shannyn says she’ll be catching up to it now
– Story concerns ghosts traveling through cell phone signals; people get a call and it’s a ticking clock until their own death.
– Shannyn plays a college student, Burns plays a cop “with a heart of gold” and they’re trying to figure the mystery out.
Whiteout with Joel Silver, director Dominic Sena and creator Greg Rucka…
– Film is due sometime in ’08.
– Rucka on the adaptation, “I’m stunned, they’ve taken the best we’ve created and have turned it into a movie. There are things we would’ve loved to have done on the comic book page, that we couldn’t do.” One scene stunned him on set, one he thought couldn’t be done.
– It was a serious set when Kate was around who had a sardonic dry sense of humor that’s too x-rated to be re-iterated to the Comic-Con attendees.
– Sena: Kate was Joel’s choice from the get-go, Joel: Carrie had to have an action vibe and credibility. Kate’s tough and really get its, she looks pretty good, his least favorite thing was she had to wear a parka the whole time.
– Film just finished a few weeks ago.
– Sharpe is not in the film, replaced by a character named Price, you get a different dynamic with the male-female thing. Rucka thinks the effect is different
– Sena says it’s an exciting experience, especially the world its set in. A unique murder-mystery set in an inhospitable environment lent something fresh. Every time you walk out your life is in your hands because of the elements.
– Rucka says the film is set in a bright world. Ice, sunlight all set an unconventional tone for the genre.
– Sena: Film was shot in a combo of real and fake snow up in Montreal.
– Sena had nothing but great things to say about the ensemble cast. Nothing had to be amputated from working in the cold.
– The cast and crew had to deal with a biting wind chill up in Canada and wore layers of thermals and parkas. There’d be at least one tow truck call a day because there’d be a stuck car, a car that wouldn’t start or one that hit a snow bank.
Beckinsale has joined the panel…
– Beckinsale, on the difference between this film and Underworld: “I slept with the director far fewer times. But yes, it is different, I was allowed to use my own teeth this time.” Feels Greg Rucka created a character that was real and human. She feels it’s hard to play an immortal (like her role in Underworld). “I got banged up and bruised on ‘Whiteout’…and I liked it.”
– Beckinsale says her time on this was relatively green screen-free. Pretty much everything she shot was practical.
– The trailer shown promised a faithfulness to the Greg Rucka graphic novel. Following a gruff voiceover that establishes the harsh climate of Antarctica, we’re introduced to U.S. Marshall Carrie Stetko (Beckinsale) – looking gorgeous, natch. She discovers, on the ice, a mutilated body with severe head trauma, crystalized skin, a nasty gash to the ass. There’s a brief line about it being the first murder in Antarctica then a flurry of images that show Stetko hurrying through a “whiteout,” someone with a nasty case of frostbite (you know who it is if you’ve read the comic) and a glimpse of a possible killer.
– Nicole Kidman was not present to talk about The Invasion but she did record a message to the crowd from the set of her latest film “Australia.”
Source: Ryan Rotten
