Latest Movie News From Moviefone |
- 'Better Off Dead' Stars: Where Are They Now?
- 'Fear the Walking Dead' Stars Are Open to Being Killed Off (As Long As It's 'A Good Death')
- 'Compton' Conquers Box Office for Second Week, 'Agent 47' Stumbles
- 'Fear the Walking Dead' Showrunner Reveals What Makes the Spinoff Different
- 'Big Brother 17' Spoilers: Will Vanessa Be Evicted Next? (Hint: She Won POV)
| 'Better Off Dead' Stars: Where Are They Now? Posted: Somewhere out there, a paperboy is still looking for his "two dollars." It's been three decades, but we're still chuckling at the absurdly surreal "Better Off Dead." When it opened 30 years ago (on August 23, 1985), the dark comedy about a lovelorn suicidal teen cemented John Cusack's newly-minted leading man status. It also introduced moviegoers to the warped sense of humor of director Savage Steve Holland. Since then, Cusack has enjoyed a celebrated career, while his castmates have taken paths as twisted as the movie that made them famous. Here's what's become of the "Better Off Dead" players in the years since they brought us one-legged ski races, dancing hamburgers, and vengeful newsboys.  This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now |
| 'Fear the Walking Dead' Stars Are Open to Being Killed Off (As Long As It's 'A Good Death') Posted:  So when you're three of the stars of one of TV's most anticipated but also incredibly hush-hush new series and you're gathered to talk about the series no one's seen without giving away any of its treasured secrets and plots twists, exactly what do you talk about?A lot, as it turns out. A trio of "Fear the Walking Dead" actors joined a small group of press prior to the show's debut, determined to explore as much of their experiences making "The Walking Dead's" spinoff/prequel show without being so revealing that the show's writers begin crafting elaborate exit-by-zombie-death scenes for them: Frank Dillane ("Sense8"), who plays Nick, the drug-addicted, downward-spiraling son of series co-lead Madison (Kim Dickens); Alycia Debnam-Carey ("The 100"), who has the role of Nick's overachieving sister Alicia; and Elizabeth Rodriguez ("Orange Is the New Black") playing Liza, the free-spirited ex-wife of series co-lead Travis (Cliff Curtis) trying to build a new life just as disaster strikes Los Angeles. And even as they sidestep spoilers, the actors reveal their thoughts on and hopes for the franchise's latest installment -- including, if it comes to it, welcoming a juicy death scene. Moviefone: Frank and Alycia, you've both done heavy-duty genre projects. Is this a genre something that you like, personally? Alycia Debnam-Carey: For me, I guess kind of go where the parts have been. I never thought of myself as this genre, specifically. But it seems to be kind of all that I do. So it looks like I found my niche. Frank Dillane: It's a good thing, regardless of genre or anything like that. As long as the character's good and the writing's good, it doesn't really matter....I had never watched "The Walking Dead." I like the show because, well, anything, it seems to me the role of television, it's more about entertainment, these days. It's very rare that you get a good part. I find it's very rare that I get...something that's somehow relevant to today's society. It seems to me that there's something in the zeitgeist at the moment about the end of the world is coming. So it's great to be a part of this generation's theme. When you signed on, one of the things we know about "The Walking Dead" is that it kills off characters -- a lot. So every time you get a script do you go, "Oh, my God, am I still on the show?" Debnam-Carey: Are we worried about being killed off? It seems like television likes killing off lead characters at the moment. Dillane: As long as I get a good death, like proper Marlon Brando [in "The Godfather"]. Debnam-Carey: Totally. If you get a good death, it's all right. I'm not too worried at this stage. Maybe in seasons to come. Do your characters represent the two different sides of this fractured family? Dillane: Probably, aesthetically, storytelling wise, that might have been an idea. I suppose we do. Debnam-Carey: Siblings normally often compensate for one another, too. If one sibling does something, the other will fill the opposite role. I found, at least for my brother and I in real life that seems to be a thing. So yeah, I guess it definitely makes this dramatic storytelling. It's always fun. At least from the first episode, it seems be as much a family drama than genre fare. Is that how you feel in working on it at this point? Or are you now far enough in blood and guts that it does feel like "Walking Dead?" Debnam-Carey: No, I found that it is heavily character-driven - even more so than the original "Walking Dead" first season. You're immersed in that world pretty automatically. For us, one of the joys is that we do get to explore these characters and you get to be attached to them before everything falls apart. Which I think is really lucky for us. Rodriguez: That last episode a lot of things happened really quickly that you definitely get a sense of - there's a slow burn, and you still have these family dramas but things go downward spiraling really, really fast at rapid speeds. Elizabeth Rodriguez: The fact that our show started with these broken families coming together... Like "Breaking Bad" started as a family drama. They take time to break down the characters and the dynamics between people, which drives like the choices I make, the choices Madison makes in this story, the choices Travis makes are based on families. Opposed to, like, a workplace drama. The thing that's different about this "Walking Dead" is you guys are starting at the beginning before it really is the full-blown apocalypse. What are you finding really interesting about that angle on the journey? Rodriguez: I think what's interesting about the journey is that we think we can be prepared, we can only fantasize about what we would do. And you take for granted that you would have communication or electricity or food or even know what's going on in the outside world, particularly now with the kind of social media we have; the fact that these things we don't think about; the fact we don't know if it's contained; we don't know how far spread it is. You assume that the government's going to take care of it. You can only connect it to natural disasters, especially in America, more so than terrorism or ISIS. That's where you go to when you think of these things. For me, it made me think of the day-to-day of people that survived these things in the world since the beginning of time. How do they have those days just to sort of feed their children, not get into fights, just have the basics. And how quickly is it that we go from having everything and taking everything for granted, to having almost nothing. It gets gory pretty fast though. Is that hard to stomach when you're there on set? Debnam-Carey: It's pretty theatrical on set because it's so broken up. It's very technical. But at the same time, it's really cool. The job they do on set is amazing. Greg Nicotero, he did all the special effects on the show. He's just amazing. But yeah, it's kind of fun on set. Rodriguez: There are moments of things that were gruesome while you're shooting it, or when you first see it, you're like, "Oh, that's so gnarly!" But then, I go straight into broad comedy, so I'll go over to something and want to kiss it. Just sort of like to really break anything that might be stuck in my conscious of it. How did each of you connect to your character? What do you see in your character where you're like, "I know that, I feel that, I can play that?" Debnam-Carey: For me, what I actually originally connected with the character, the scenes I had to shoot, some of the real scenes actually in the show, they were very edgy and it really brought out this kind of L.A. street quality. A real urban-ness. Maybe it coincided with the time, I'd been living in L.A., I finally had found the grittiness but the charm of that city the first time. And that connected me with Alicia in quite a distinct way. I guess I liked her edginess. There's a power within her that's quite strong that I hope you get to see evolve. Rodriguez: For me, I feel like what I connected with her was she's a strong woman. I'm not a mother, but I'm very nurturing...When I did research as to what qualifications one needs and everything that goes into just prerequisites to go into nursing school, there were more than I would do. But I realized that having empathy and being sensitive were qualities that are really great for being a nurse, and I have those. And because I also was playing a mother, the guy that plays my son is really easy to love him and have that mother thing for him. I think she's also a little bit, there's no B.S. and I have that quality too. I'm sort of a straight shooter. So I was excited to play her. I found that she was a really amazing, strong, independent woman. And also, the fact that I found out that Travis didn't leave her, that it was a choice that Liza made, was a breath of fresh air because it was like, oh, she's not a victim. She's not just a scorned woman. So that's not something that's part of it. She's just felt really independent and a single mother that was burning the candle on both sides and making things happen. Does doing a show like this make you look at strange things that you see out of the corner of your eyes a closer? Rodriguez: For me, it does absolutely. Especially when we were shooting in Vancouver. There's a whole area where they have a lot of homeless people because they've closed down all these mental institutions. I couldn't walk through there without being like, "All these people right here could be Walkers." Everything about it felt like an apocalypse. The way they live. The energy. You just think, there's no way that we would take for granted that they're just what we see in a big city on a day to day. Absolutely. My brain was like, "They could all be infected." Debnam-Carey: Yeah. It's crazy when they block off huge intersections or roads or parts of downtown. Then it is completely empty. That is a weird feeling. We did a Sunday straight after Comic-Con. We all arrived at 5 a.m. and we did all these scenes. It was just empty. That's bizarre to see: L.A., downtown, and to feel like you're the only person there. Rodriguez: Right. There's no way of thinking, I'm not connecting it, I think to, oh, this would be a quality that would be part of our real world. Of an apocalypse world. You get the part, you learn your lines, you shoot the scenes and you're kind of still in a bubble in production. And you go to something like Comic-Con, and you probably get a bigger sense of how huge this project really is to a lot of people. Has that sunk in? The anticipation and the built-in fans? Debnam-Carey: For me, it still hasn't sunk in. Even doing this. Especially doing the panel at Comic-Con, we were preceded with "The Walking Dead," and then "Game of Thrones" and "Star Wars." So we were like wedged in the middle and no one knows who we are. No one's seen it yet. They don't know what questions to ask. It was so awkward and everyone felt like they were on their best behavior. Like, "Don't say anything too risky." Rodriguez: We can't say anything. Debnam-Carey: "Don't laugh. Just breathe." Even then. Dillane: It's difficult as well, this thing of talking about character is a new thing, I think. It's only in the last few years. You don't get Al Pacino talking about while he was filming "Scarface," the things that made Scarface do this or do that. It's like, talking objectively about your character while it's happening is a weird new thing. A magician wouldn't tell his tricks. So it's a weird one...Those are the questions an actor asks himself, so if you tell the questions to the world, you kind of have nothing left. Even with directors, I often find I say something about the character, and I'll suddenly wish I hadn't said anything. I was giving something away and can never take it back. So this talking objectively thing, while it's happening - It's great because we finished now. It's great to talk to you guys. But while it's happening, you're picking it all apart while you're doing it. These characters didn't exist in comic books right? Did Robert Kirkman give you anything to start with beyond the script? Rodriguez: Nothing. We were left -- we didn't need it. Even if we were like, we can talk about every single character in every single episode of every single "Walking Dead," it doesn't apply to what we're doing. We're in a world that exists prior to that. We're human beings. We're a motley, broken, diverse, family unit being put up against an apocalypse with rules that we don't know, with a lot of questions and figuring it out as any other human being would. In fact, the best thing is that the audience and all the fans are a step ahead. They'll be the ones on their seats like, "Oh, I wouldn't do that. I wouldn't do that." I think it's so exciting that they know what happens before we do. We're in a world of grays and there's so much unknown. That's what's really scary, the unknowns. So we didn't need to know anything other than work the way we would with anything else we've ever worked on. What's in front of us, and deal with what scenario, what scene, how we are and the dynamics of who we are. Frank, with your character's drug addiction, do they ever give you direction like, "Don't do this because it'll look like you're a walker?" Or "Do this because we want people to think you might be turning into a walker?" Dillane: It's interesting, that question. A girl said that to me: she saw the pilot and she said, "Was your limp a homage to, like, a zombie?" I hadn't thought of that. I just got hit by a car and thought that'd probably fu-- your leg up. You mentioned this trend toward doomsday scenarios and dystopian futures and things like that in entertainment. Do you guys respond to that? Do you have any understanding why people are really intrigued by that at this moment in time? Dillane: The world is ending, make no mistake. It's coming to an end. This can't go on for much longer. Capitalism has to fall. It has to. We're coming to the peak, I think soon, before we have to come back to like humanity. Humanity needs to look, and it hasn't been looking for so long. Rodriguez: I feel like so much goes on in the world between disease, pandemics, terrorism, ISIS, that there is no way. It's around us every second of the day. There's absolutely an intrigue. How can there not be? Whether this is a genre or not, it is the looking into a microscope. Dillane: In cinema, look what's at the moment: "Mad Max," "Tomorrowland," every f--king thing in cinema was apocalypse. Debnam-Carey: It's all very relevant to our world. Dillane: Our generation. Debnam-Carey: Yes. Rodriguez: The theme, the sense of "What's in the air? What's in the air every second? Whether we turn on the TV or not. With constant random shooters. With police brutality. I don't watch the news because I wouldn't leave the house. I would not leave the house. There's not much different if you look at that and go from channel, channel, channel, to the world we're living in, other than the fact that they eat people and they walk and we named them something else. Emotionally, I think it's the same thing. It's the same amount of trauma, anxiety, and fear of the world. Dillane: All that needs to happen is Mother Nature needs to start knocking down buildings. Debnam-Carey: It's like, finally Mother Nature will take back what belongs to her. What would you guys most like people to know about "Fear the Walking Dead?" Debnam-Carey: I want them to make their own minds up about it. I think it'll come under some criticism because it is very different. But I think it stands alone and it's not trying to be "The Walking Dead," and that's what's great about it. How much does it feel like your own show, even though it's coming with the "Walking Dead" brand name? Rodriguez: It feels like it's very much our own. The producers and creators were very much clear that that was it. When we were at Comic-Con and met the wonderful, gracious cast of "The Walking Dead," they were so gracious and excited. They had heard about us and were willing to just talk us through what Comic-Con was going to bring and they were really excited about what this was. And it was very much themselves talking about that it's its own thing. They wanted to push that too. They didn't walk in, like, looking down at their noses like, "Oh, what are you doing? We were the original." It was so wonderful to have that be what they brought to us. It was very giving and generous. Everyone's been very generous that way. This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now |
| 'Compton' Conquers Box Office for Second Week, 'Agent 47' Stumbles Posted:  NEW YORK (AP) - "Straight Outta Compton" easily maintained its box-office lead with an estimated $26.8 million in ticket sales over a sleepy late summer weekend at the multiplexes.The N.W.A biopic, a much buzzed-about hit, dominated over the late August releases that often characterize Hollywood's dog days of summer. It has now made $111.5 million in two weeks. The low-budget horror sequel "Sinister 2" fared the best of the new releases, opening with $10.6 million, according to studio estimates Sunday. Fox's assassin thriller "Hitman: Agent 47," the second attempt to adapt the popular video game, disappointed with $8.2 million. Lionsgate's "American Ultra," starring Kristen Stewart and Jesse Eisenberg, also failed to spark much interest, opening with $5.5 million. "Mission: Impossible: Rogue Nation" came in second with $11.7 million in its fourth week.  This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now |
| 'Fear the Walking Dead' Showrunner Reveals What Makes the Spinoff Different Posted: No problem, right? Thus far, many of "FTWD's" opening gambits suggest Erickson's cracked the way in: the show's both a spinoff and a prequel, chronicling the earliest days of the zombie outbreak; it's set in densely urban Los Angeles, a far cry from the wide open Southern spaces of the main show; and at heart it's a family drama built around the struggles of two high school guidance counselors to keep their fracture families alive, literally and figuratively. "We purposely built the show a little bit more slowly than the original," Erickson revealed at the Television Critics Association's summer press tour. "We do have, we call them 'infected.' We don't call them walkers. We're coming up with as much cool West Coast verbiage as we can. But we will see walkers. There will be a build. We will get to a place over the course of the season where we will see elements of the original show sort of thread in throughout our story - but it is by design. We tried to slow burn the story, make it as much about the anxiety and tension and paranoia that goes with this outbreak as much as it is about the actual confrontations with zombies." Moviephone joined Erickson at a press roundtable for an even closer look at the new series. Moviefone: In his teaching, Cliff Curtis' character Travis talks about preparing people to survive in the wild in the first episode. Is that foreshadowing for what's going to come for the character and his family? Dave Erickson: It's very much a story of one of Travis's main obsessions: to bring his family together in some way, and bring his kids -- his biological son, Chris -- to the home, maintain this family. And he's a fixer. He's somebody who no matter what happens, we will turn a corner. This is going to be made well. I can help make this better. And he is suddenly put into a world and situation where two things happen. One, ironically: the apocalypse is what brings the entire family together, and you're talking about an English teacher. He's a guidance counselor. It's no one like the original show: you had police officers, you had people who had leadership qualities and who knew how to fire guns. It's a little bit, he'll be swimming in that far more. When you were engineering the show, what were the parts of the DNA of the "mothership" you wanted to maintain -- zombies, of course -- and how did you want to make the show distinctly its own? Yes, zombies, obviously. I think we're living under the same mythological umbrella, so we have to follow the same rules. And when the zombies turn, they turn a certain way. When we kill them, they have to die a certain way. I think what was important to us was starting a little bit earlier. It allowed us to focus on some thematics that hadn't necessarily been entirely explored in the original. I mean, I love the fact that we have this sort of slow burn right up to the apocalypse, that we get to live with Travis and Maddie and the family and actually, delve [into them] -- but all the issues at hand, whether it's Nick's addiction or the issues that Travis has with Chris. I mean, sort of the fundamental, everyday things that we're dealing with. Those are the problems that the family has. Those are the conflicts, and the onset of the apocalypse will only exacerbate those. And in Alicia and Frank and Lorenzo, we have three characters who are 16 and 17 and 19, so it's very much that we can explore a coming of age story through the apocalypse, which is interesting... What happens to kids of this age in a world where no one's going to come of age any more? How does that manifest? I mean, that's interesting to me. And fundamentally, one of the reasons we chose LA was because it is a place of reinvention, a place where there's a definite identity shift. And there's something intriguing as we isolate each of their stories, where they came from. Most of them are transplants. Kim [Dickens] is from Alabama -- I'm not saying that Madison is not from Alabama, but she is somebody who came to California to escape who she was. Things that were done to her, things she might have done. [Ruben] Blades' character is very much the same way. He came from El Salvador in the 80s, escaping something that we'll better define as the show progresses. But I think there's an opportunity for us to explore those identity shifts in an extended way, where I think there's this beautiful immediacy to the original show and to the comic. Middle-class teenagers in Los Angeles tend to be fairly pop culturally savvy. Does something like George Romero's "Night of the Living Dead" exist in this universe? That is a larger Kirkman question, I believe, because there's a reason they never say "zombie" on the show - I defer to Robert - the short answer is no. Because if we lived in that world - and that's a strange thing about the "Walking Dead" universe, generally - most people, you would definitely say someone is a zombie if they're behaving [like that], if somebody's coming at you in that way. For our characters - and we hopefully lay this bed of idea of, "It's a virus; there's something wrong" -- it's interesting, because one of the things that Robert wanted to explore, specifically was violence. And to commit an act of violence, what does that do to you? It's physically difficult to kill someone. And if you have to do it, especially in our show, you're dealing with your colleague, your friend, your family. It's someone you had coffee with the day before, and suddenly, they're attacking you, your first instinct is not to bludgeon them. Your first instinct is to try and help them because clearly something's wrong. Your second instinct would be to run. And third and final, if you're defending yourself, defending your family, our characters would be forced into a place where they have to commit violent acts. But when they do, it takes a toll. I mean there's a trauma. There's emotional damage. This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now |
| 'Big Brother 17' Spoilers: Will Vanessa Be Evicted Next? (Hint: She Won POV) Posted:  *Warning: BB17 spoilers ahead from the live feeds.*UPDATE: Dagnabbit. Vanessa went and won POV. She's good. She's paranoid and hypocritical, but she's good. The feeds were down for five hours on Saturday night and when they returned, The Mad Hatter had the power. Right after she won Veto, Vanessa said she would keep the nominations the same, so John or Steve may be evicted -- unless she decides to take one down and backdoor James or Meg. That's still possible, and the answer will come during Monday's POV Ceremony. Vanessa's alliance was initially leaning toward evicting John, but they're also worried about Steve. They believe Steve and John have been working together this whole time and Vanessa thinks Steve is two-faced. However, they also worry that James and Meg will work with whoever returns into the house from the jury. If Steve is smart, he'll spill the whole backdoor Vanessa plan to Vanessa to at least try to get her to use the POV on him, or maybe get her vote if he stays up, so they can turn on Austwins (with the help of whoever returns) next week. Vanessa is known for changing her mind every few minutes, so don't put too much stock in any declarative statement from her until nominations are final. Actions speak louder than words. No matter who is evicted from "Big Brother 17" Week 9 this Thursday, August 27, he or she will have a chance to return to the house within the hour. The four jury members will compete on the next live show, and one of them will stay to compete in the next Head of Household competition and try to survive Week 10. Will professional poker player Vanessa Rousso be the houseguest who has that eviction/possible redemption story? Nope! Sorry. She must have a sixth sense (haha) for when she should cover her own butt, and she won protection this week, whether she really needed it or not. Johnny Mac may end up following his girl Becky out the door this week instead. (#Jecky4Eva) But if Vanessa's former Freaks and Geeks ally Steve Moses is ultimately seen as the bigger threat, then he'll be the one crossing his fingers for the buyback. How did it come to this? Vanessa's onetime close ally, Austin Matelson, won the HoH competition that had just started on the August 20 live show. Last week, under his showmance Liz Nolan's HoH, there was a lot of discussion about possibly backdooring Vanessa. They decided to table the move until this week, and the original plan was for the Austwins alliance (Austin/Liz/Julia) to throw this HoH so they didn't have to be the ones to put anyone up. They had made deals with everyone in the house, so being HoH would show their cards. But Austin finally won a solo HOH right he should've thrown it, and as of Friday afternoon he was deciding whether to nominate Vanessa outright or try to backdoor her. He settled on nominating Steve and John. Both Julia and Liz said they wanted to evict John instead of Vanessa, since 1) they don't really trust John, 2) Steve would be forced to work with them without John, 3) Vanessa has not gone against the twins (and she never sold Julia out, unlike Austin) and 4) whoever returns to the house will be gunning for Vanessa. Vanessa is a good shield. Without her in the house, Austwins becomes an obvious target. (They're already an obvious target, with back-to-back HoHs, but anyway.)  When Austin told Steve he wanted to put up Steve vs. John, with Steve as the pawn and Vanessa (maybe) as the replacement nominee, Steve was not happy. Can't blame him. What is the point of making an alliance with people who put you up instead of the two other free people in the house -- Meg Maley and James Huling? It just shows that Austin wants to keep James and Meg as his true final five allies and sees Steve and John as expendable. On Friday, it looked like John would be evicted next if he did not win the Power of Veto. Vanessa was not even a serious backup target at that point, since Austin was leaning more toward James, if someone else had to go up. The POV competition was held late on Saturday, and the POV ceremony will probably be a formality on Monday, with Vanessa keeping the nominations the same. But stay tuned to see which way the house leans in the battle of John vs. Steve. What do you want to happen? Want more stuff like this? Like us on Facebook. This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now |
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