Genre favorite Jenna Coleman is back, this time not as the friendly companion in Doctor Who, but as Johanna Constantine in The Sandman, a new series coming to Netflix this summer. Based on Neil Gaiman’s series of graphic novels from DC Comics, it’s a dark fantasy tale of another world, a place called the Dreaming, the realm of The Sandman, Master of Dreams, played by Tom Sturridge(Far from the Madding Crowd). “When Dream is unexpectedly captured and held prisoner for a century, his absence sets off a series of events that will change both the dreaming and waking worlds forever.”
The trailer reveals a British production that has the look and vibe of the Twilight and Harry Potter movie series, and it features a long list of familiar genre faces, including Potter’s David Thewlis, plus Alien3 and Bleak House’s Charles Dance, The Hobbit and V for Vendetta’sStephen Fry, Star Wars: The Force Awakens’Gwendoline Christie, Logan and The Predator’sBoyd Holbrook, and Veronica Mars’Kirby Howell-Baptiste.
The best of British genre fare collided New Year’s Day as the new season of Doctor Who got underway. Merging a classic type Doctor Whoadventure with James Bond tropes made for what might be the best episode of Doctor Who since Matt Smith handed over his sonic screwdriver. But that’s only the beginning, as the two-part opener continues tonight on BBC America in the States and much earlier in the UK on BBC One. U.S. viewers have one chance to beat the social media spoilers: Fathom Events is hosting a unique Doctor Who event nationwide today at 1 p.m. local time, a theater broadcast of Spyfall–the New Year’s Day episode and the worldwide premiere of part two–complete with a live Q&A with the cast. Check out the Fathom Events website here for details.
Doctor Whoshowrunner Chris Chibnall had a full season to iron out the transition to a new Doctor, and if you didn’t watch the entire first season now is a good time to jump back in, because this adventure starts strong with high stakes, a new alien threat, non-stop action, and an echo from Doctor Who of the past. It all plays out like an episode written by either Russell T. Davies or Stephen Moffat, but it’s Chibnall who wrote this story. A new favorite scene can be found in the New Year’s Day Spyfall episode: It’s hard to imagine any prior Doctor could have nailed the scene where the Doctor takes on a 007-inspired role, and plays a high roller hand at cards trying to be as cool as Bond–but not quite getting there. Jodie Whittaker has the enthusiasm of David Tennant, the innocence of Matt Smith, and the daftness of Peter Capaldi, all rolled up into one. And she’s brilliant in this first episode, even better than last year.
This Doctor doesn’t need a companion any different from the twelve Doctors that preceded her, yet this new triumvirate companion works–it’s a family, or “fam” as she calls them and a mechanism to allow a distribution of the action. Yasmin (Mandip Gill), Ryan (Tosin Cole), Graham (Bradley Walsh) join the Doctor on her latest travels at the request of MI 6, and a guest appearance by Stephen Fry as C (think M in the Bond stories) and Sacha Dhawan as O (another 00 agent). It’s hard to believe it’s actually been a year since we last saw them all together in the Season 11 finale.
It’s that time of year again, time to take a look forward at what movies should be on your radar for 2019. Are you going to see them all? Heck no. These are the genre films we think borg readers will want to know about to make their own checklists for the coming year–and they are only the films we know about so far. We pulled 78 of the hundreds of films that have been finalized or are in varying stages of final production, slated for next year’s movie calendar.
What looks to top the list for most fanboys and fangirls? The last of the nine films in theStar Wars saga. Captain Marvel, Avengers: Endgame, and Spider-Man: Far From Home.Shazam!is DC’s contribution. Quentin Tarantino returns to movies to direct Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, and Martin Scorsese is back with an all-star cast in The Irishman (on Netflix). M. Night Shyamalan finishes his dark superhero trilogy with Glass. Arnold Schwarzenegger and Linda Hamilton return in Terminator. Jordan Peele is back with another horror film with Us.
Do you like sequels? This is your year. Another Men in Black, X-Men, Shaft, Happy Death Day, Lego Movie, Hellboy, John Wick, Kingsman, Jumanji, The Secret Life of Pets, How to Train Your Dragon, Fast and the Furious, Zombieland, Addams Family, Charlie’s Angels, Godzilla, Shaun the Sheep, Annabelle,and Stephen King’s It and Pet Sematary—Disney is trying to get you to move into your local theater with another Toy Story, Aladdin, Dumbo, Frozen, and Lion King–all in one year. Yep, lots and lots of sequels are coming.
Some films don’t have locked-in release dates yet. Amazon Prime and Netflix haven’t revealed dates for these 2019 releases:
Martin Scorcese’s The Irishman, a film about Jimmy Hoffa starring Robert DeNiro, Al Pacino, Joe Pesci, Harvey Keitel, Ray Romano, and Bobby Cannavale (Netflix)
The Kid, a Western biopic with Chris Pratt, Ethan Hawke, Dane DeHaan, and Vincent D’Onofrio (Netflix)
The Man Who Killed Hitler Then Bigfoot, starring Sam Elliott (Netflix)
6 Underground, a Michael Bay film starring Ryan Reynolds, Ben Hardy, Dave Franco, and Mélanie Laurent (Netflix)
The Last Thing He Wanted, Dee Rees directs Anne Hathaway, Ben Affleck, Willem Dafoe, and Toby Jones; journalist quits newspaper job to become an arms dealer for a covert government agency (Netflix)
The Laundromat, Steven Soderbergh directs Meryl Streep, Gary Oldman, Antonio Banderas, James Cromwell, about the Pentagon Papers (Netflix)
Radioactive, Rosamund Pike plays Marie Curie, with Anya Taylor-Joy (Amazon)
Some of these films will have revised release dates, or get pushed to 2020.
So grab your calendar and start making your plans–here are the movies you’ll want to see in 2019 (and many you might not):
January
Glass – Superhero, M. Night Shyamalan trilogy part 3, stars Bruce Willis, Samuel L. Jackson, James McAvoy; continues where Unbreakable and Split left off – January 18.
Serenity– Mystery/Thriller, stars Anne Hathaway, Jason Clarke, Djimon Hounsou, Jeremy Strong, Diane Lane; sorry, no relation to Firefly – January 25.
King of Thieves– Heist Comedy, stars Jim Broadbent, Tom Courtenay, Charlie Cox, Michael Gambon, and Ray Winstone – January 25.
Disney’s Alice Through the Looking Glass is almost here. Based on Lewis Carroll’s 1871 book Through the Looking-Glass, with Tim Burton producing and James Bobin (The Muppets, Muppets Most Wanted) in the director’s chair, this film looks like a fantasy lover’s dream. (We previewed the first trailer for this fantasy film here at borg.com back in November).
The return of the original cast–and an all-star cast at that–points to another winner ahead following up on the brilliant Alice in Wonderland. Mia Wasikowska, Johnny Depp, Anne Hathaway, Alan Rickman, Stephen Fry, Michael Sheen, Timothy Spall, and Helena Bonham Carter are back, with Rhys Ifans and Sacha Baron Cohen joining the cast. Danny Elfman will again be producing the musical score.
Tim Burton just released an extended preview that will convince you this is a must-see:
When Jon Favreau matched up Black Sabbath’s “Iron Man” at the end of the first Iron Man film the all-encompassing coolness of the Marvel Cinematic Universe emerged and the classic 1970 rock tune came full circle. So Tim Burton bringing the voice of Grace Slick with Jefferson Airplane’s 1967 classic “White Rabbit” into a trailer for Alice Through the Looking Glass is something that was simply meant to happen.
Disney’s Alice Through the Looking Glass is of course based on Lewis Carroll’s 1871 book Through the Looking-Glass, with Tim Burton producing this time around and James Bobin (The Muppets, Muppets Most Wanted) in the director’s chair. (We previewed the first trailer for this fantasy film here at borg.com back in November).
The return of the original cast–and an all-star cast at that–points to another winner ahead for fantasy fans. Mia Wasikowska, Johnny Depp, Anne Hathaway, Alan Rickman, Stephen Fry, Michael Sheen, Timothy Spall, and Helena Bonham Carter are back, with Rhys Ifans and Sacha Baron Cohen joining the cast. Danny Elfman will again be producing the musical score.
Here’s the latest superb trailer for Alice Through the Looking Glass:
It’s not every day that Hollywood makes a sequel to one of your all-time favorite fantasy movies. It’s Disney’s Alice Through the Looking Glass, based on Lewis Carroll’s 1871 book Through the Looking-Glass, with Tim Burton producing this time around and James Bobin (The Muppets, Muppets Most Wanted) in the director’s chair. We previewed the first trailer for this fantasy film here at borg.com back in November.
Mia Wasikowska, Johnny Depp, Anne Hathaway, Alan Rickman, Stephen Fry, Michael Sheen, Timothy Spall, and Helena Bonham Carter return, with Rhys Ifans and Sacha Baron Cohen joining the cast. Danny Elfman will again be producing the musical score.
Here’s the second, fantastic trailer for Alice Through the Looking Glass slated to air during this weekend’s Super Bowl coverage:
It’s not every day that Hollywood makes a sequel to one of your all-time favorite fantasy movies. When that movie is based on a classic story sequel then you know something unique is coming. It’s Disney’s Alice Through the Looking Glass, based on Lewis Carroll’s 1871 book Through the Looking-Glass, with Tim Burton producing this time around and James Bobin (The Muppets, Muppets Most Wanted) in the director’s chair.
Mia Wasikowska, Johnny Depp, Anne Hathaway, Alan Rickman, Stephen Fry, Michael Sheen, Timothy Spall, and Helena Bonham Carter return, with Rhys Ifans and Sacha Baron Cohen (playing Time) joining the cast. Danny Elfman rounds out the original crew providing the new film’s score.
Here’s the first, fantastic trailer for Alice Through the Looking Glass:
Whether learned or innate, the skill of a master artist is like nothing else. That is true no less for the understanding of color, light, and shadow exhibited by 17th century Dutch painter Johannes Vermeer. His work is lifelike, so much so that a Texas-based inventor devoted years of his life to try to understand why Vermeer painted in a style so much different from his peers. The result is Tim’s Vermeer, a masterful documentary by director Teller of Las Vegas magic act duo Penn and Teller fame, in limited theatrical release last year and now available on Blu-ray, DVD and Video On Demand.
Scientists and artists for hundreds of years have speculated what tools Vermeer might have used to achieve his mastery, other than his sheer artistic genius. He left no notes to this effect to assist scholars. Tim Jenison, a successful businessman with time to devote to an immense intellectual pursuit, spent years speculating, then he created his own optical device involving a simple mirror that would allow anyone to replicate perfectly any image. This is an even bigger feat than one might expect, because Jenison is not, and never was, an artist. Friends Penn & Teller accompanied Jenison on his research, meeting with experts and artists, and ultimately the magic duo decided to film Jenison’s journey of discovery. Teller directs (and co-produces with Jellette) and Jellette narrates this unusual and enlightening story.
Which is which? Tim Jenison learns what may be Vermeer’s technique in Penn & Teller’s documentary.
Does Jenison get it right or not? Penn leaves that question to the viewer, but he and Jenison give an abundance of reasons to support Jenison’s study. The mission was simple: Can a layman paint something as well as Vermeer with tools that would have been available to Vermeer in the 17th century?
Like Star Wars or the first of any good trilogy, The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey was almost a standalone story, to be watched over and over again. And like The Empire Strikes Back, The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug jumps rights into the adventure and doesn’t relent until the final cliffhanger at film’s end. The Desolation of Smaug’s triumph may be a sweeping and epic inclusion of more fantastical settings and strange, new worlds than any film before it, some beautiful in their colorful grandeur, others in their dark creepiness. And more story and subplots are fit in to keep viewers on the edge of their seats for the whole two hours and forty minute tour.
It’s hard to say if this installment of The Hobbit is better than the first. It’s a wondrous tale in the same way as the Harry Potter series included the stand-out episode Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban. Sure, it needs to be seen in the context of what comes before it, but wow, what a great ride in and of itself, almost literally. We’d seen previews of the great dwarf barrel escape scene, but director Peter Jackson didn’t just squeeze in river ride as an afterthought. It’s full of good humor and action, something like what we imagine George Lucas intended in his pod race scene, but this effort is successful, focusing on the strengths and weaknesses of dwarves and elves alike, as they dodge the grotesque and foul Orcs under the leadership of two particularly nasty fellows, Azog (Manu Bennett) and Bolg (Lawrence Makoare). Most of the action is over-the-top, but if you’re in for a penny you’re in for a pound, and the arrows flying and dragon fire ablazing are what any fantasy fan could hope for.
BBC announced yesterday that Matt Smith’s last episode as the 11th Doctor on Doctor Who, the oldest series on television, will be this year’s Christmas episode to air on Christmas Eve. He’ll also appear in the 50th anniversary of Doctor Who episode this fall. For those of us who never would have given Doctor Who a try but for Matt Smith, he will be sorely missed. Without Matt Smith’s energetic and brilliant performances, we wouldn’t have seen how awesome David Tennant was as the 10th Doctor, met Christopher Eccleston’s 9th Doctor and his long-running companion Rose, or checked out the numerous audio books, or even peeked at those earlier “other” Doctors.
But just as we quickly have embraced his new companion with Jenna-Louise Coleman’s Clara (Amy Pond who?) after we thought we’d met the best companion ever, life goes on and so will the Doctor’s next incarnation as he takes the form of another actor… or actress?
So who should be the next Doctor? Matt Smith has given us some brilliant performances. If you aren’t a Doctor Who fan and wanted to sample some of the best of Matt Smith’s Doctor, try these:
The Eleventh Hour. We meet Matt Smith’s Doctor for the first time as he must save the world in 20 minutes with a wrecked TARDIS and broken sonic screwdriver and with the help of Amy Pond–the girl who waited.
The Beast Below. The Doctor and Amy travel to a future where residents live on a spaceship called Starship UK. We meet a future Queen and learn the terrible truth about what keeps the ship–and all its inhabitants–alive.
