Tag: Tenet

Posted on in Film News, News

Christopher Nolan Developing WWII Film About J. Robert Oppenheimer, Father Of The Atomic Bomb: Cillian Murphy May Star

A new report is giving us an idea of what the next film from Christopher Nolan will look like and seemingly confirms that he’s indeed looking to leave Warner Bros. for a new studio home or at least considering it.

Deadline has revealed that Nolan is currently shopping around a new World War II film project about J. Robert Oppenheimer’s development of the atomic bomb in the Manhattan Project. His work ultimately led to the surrender of the Japanese after two atomic bombs were unleashed upon the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki by the U.S. military, killing countless civilians in an instant and even more than that slowly/painfully over time.

They also allude that longtime Nolan muse Cillian Murphy (The Dark Knight Trilogy, Inception, Dunkirk) might be in the mix to play Oppenheimer. It doesn’t hurt that Murphy has a striking resemblance to him.

I’m extremely curious if Christopher Nolan will attempt to document the Pacific War and the Japanese side of the story along with the civilians that were essentially erased from the planet as part of power move by the United States to end the bloody South Pacific campaign with an extreme show of force. One of the darkest moments in human history.

You might remember that Christopher Nolan wasn’t terribly happy how Tenet was released during the pandemic in 2020 (conflicting trade reports blame both Warner Bros. and Nolan for that hiccup with various “sources” finger pointing to each other’s camp). However, when WarnerMedia announced their plans for a hybrid release for all 2021 releases to promote HBO Max, that seemed to be the final straw for the filmmmaker and signs that his longtime relationship with Warner Bros. has come to an end.

No studios are being brought-up in the article, but we have to assume that Nolan isn’t interested in a streaming platform or a deal that doesn’t include theatrical exclusivity for the film.

UPDATE: The Hollywood Reporter mentions that Universal Pictures, Sony Pictures, Paramount Pictures, and even Warner Bros. have been talking with Nolan’s camp about the untitled movie. Although, a frontrunner wasn’t named.

It’s really not that shocking that Christopher Nolan would attempt to explore this part of history, all you have to do is look at Nolan’s films The Dark Knight Rises and Tenet to understand the filmmaker’s obsession with nuclear armament.

SOURCE: DEADLINE

Posted on in News

Robert Pattinson Signs Overall First-Look Deal With Warner Bros. – Will Include Future Film & Television Projects

British actor Robert Pattinson has been having a huge career resurgence lately with a large role in Christopher Nolan’s time-bending action film Tenet that was released last summer and landed the titular role in Matt Reeves new Batman movie, The Batman.

It sounds like Warner Bros. wants to continue to work with Robert Pattinson for the foreseeable future as The Hollywood Reporter reveals that the actor has singed a first-look deal that will allow him to be considered for projects at Warner Bros. Pictures, New Line Cinema, Warner Bros. Television/HBO, and the streaming service HBO Max.

The deal could allow Pattinson to appear on the HBO Max spinoff series Gotham PD, a prequel that will take place during the first year of Bruce Wayne acting as the vigilante known as The Batman. However, they might be more interested in having the British actor leading other original projects other than things connected to the DC Comics franchise because his Batman contract likely has him attached to sequels and Matt Reeves has talked-up his plans to make a trilogy.

Most people first noticed Pattinson when he appeared as Cedric Diggory in Harry Potter & The Goblet of Fire back in 2005 and led the popular Twilight films. Since then, he’s developed as an actor working with filmmakers such as David Cronenberg, The Safie Brothers, Robert Eggers, Christopher Nolan, James Gray, Claire Denis, and David Michod.

Having Robert Pattinson has the face of WarnerMedia could help them after heavy-weights such as Christopher Nolan and Denis Villeneuve signaled their frustration after the day-and-date announcement, Nolan has been signaling that he won’t work with the studio again and might already be looking for a new home.

The WarnerMedia-Discovery merger has led to rumblings within the business news community that this could be the beginning of a sale, although, this is unconfirmed as potential buyers haven’t been mentioned.

SOURCE: THE HOLLYWOOD REPORTER

Posted on in Film News

‘Tenet’ Star John David Washington Joins Sci-Fi Pic ‘True Love’ From ‘Rogue One’ Director Gareth Edwards

Actor John David Washington has been gathering a lot of steam after his lead role in Spike Lee’s fantastic BlacKkKlansman showed-off his acting chops and charming personality., giving Hollywood some insight to his ability to play a leading man. Washington became the main protagonist in Christopher Nolan’s action flick Tenet last summer and joined the next David O’Russell moving alongside folks such as Christian Bale and Margot Robbie among others.

His next big project will be teaming up with Godzilla and Rogue One: A Star Wars Story director Gareth Edwards on his sci-fi flick True Love at New Regency, according to a report coming from Deadline. Details on the project are scarce at the moment but it’s setting is said to be “near future.”

True Love will be both written and directed by Gareth Edwards.

This would be the first big project for Edwards since the production/editing hiccups on Rogue One led Lucasfilm to bring on Tony Gilroy to reshoot a bunch of things in the first A Star Wars Story installment, including the third act as revealed by photos and earlier trailer footage. Seeing the filmmaker moving away from existing IP is likely going to allow him to be a bit more creative. Then again, he helped launch Legendary’s MonsterVerse cinematic universe back in 2014 with his impressive Godzilla movie starring Bryan Cranston and Aaron Taylor-Johnson.

It’s unclear when they’ll begin shooting True Love.

SOURCE: DEADLINE

Posted on in Film News

Christopher Nolan Unlikely To Work With Warner Bros. In The Future

A new report from The Wall Street Journal (spotted by The Playlist) is claiming that Warner Bros. golden-child director Christopher Nolan is now “unlikely” to make future films at the studio due to their decision to embrace a new day-and-date release model that is meant to boost subscriptions to HBO Max on the backs of the film division and filmmakers. This wouldn’t be terribly surprising as Christopher Nolan has been vocal against this release model since it’s announcement caught most directors it affected off guard and almost led to a potential lawsuit from production partner Legendary Entertainment.

The filmmaker made his opinions widely known in various interviews including the following quote from The Hollywood Reporter.

NOLAN: “Some of our industry’s biggest filmmakers and most important movie stars went to bed the night before thinking they were working for the greatest movie studio and woke up to find out they were working for the worst streaming service. Warner Bros. had an incredible machine for getting a filmmaker’s work out everywhere, both in theaters and in the home, and they are dismantling it as we speak. They don’t even understand what they’re losing. Their decision makes no economic sense, and even the most casual Wall Street investor can see the difference between disruption and dysfunction.”

Dune director Denis Villeneuve also made a similar plea to the studio in an op-ed at The Hollywood Reporter, suggesting the studio could be killing the Dune franchise.

This would be the first time in twenty years that Nolan had a movie that wasn’t made for Warner Bros. or distributed by them since 2001’s Memento. The filmmaker is one of the few people that can convince a studio to give him a blockbuster-level budget to make original films as seen with Inception, Interstellar, Dunkirk, and last summer’s Tenet.

Here is a rundown of the global box office earnings of the Warner Bros. films made by Christopher Nolan over the years.

  • INSOMNIA (2002) – $113.7 Million
  • BATMAN BEGINS (2004) – $373.6 Million
  • THE PRESTIGE (2006) – $109.6 Million
  • THE DARK KNIGHT (2008) – $1 Billion
  • INCEPTION (2010) – $836.8 Million
  • THE DARK KNIGHT RISES (2012) – $1.08 Billion
  • INTERSTELLAR (2014) – $701.7 Million
  • DUNKIRK (2017) – $526.9 Million
  • TENET (2020) – $363.1 Million

If Nolan ultimately exits the studio this could be a huge loss for Warner Bros. and a sign of more creative fallout from WarnerMedia/AT&T’s new day-and-date model. The model sees WarnerMedia adding a bulk of their 2021 theatrical releases to their struggling streaming service HBO Max exclusively for a month at the same time the film is being released domestically in theaters, having HBO Max and theaters going head-to-head for audiences.

AT&T CEO John Stankey had previously alluded to The Washington Post in an interview, that this is likely going to be a release model they’ll be using beyond 2021 and the pandemic giving the impression they wouldn’t be turning back to regular release windows that gave theaters a proper amount of time to earn money.

STANKEY: “In March, we unleashed a new normal in society. That horse left the barn. I don’t think any of us are going to change that dynamic.”

Nolan could stick around at Warner Bros. if they change their minds on the release model or more likely he could easily find a home at another studio. I don’t think he’d have much trouble getting the same deal elsewhere given his track record.

SOURCE: THE WALL STREET JOURNAL

Posted on in Film News

Christopher Nolan Reacts Negatively To News of WarnerMedia Moving Their 2021 Film Slate To HBO Max – Upset They Didn’t Consult With Filmmakers Beforehand

The announcement that Warner Bros. slate of films from 2021 heading to HBO Max certainly sounded like a gut punch to U.S theaters but the people who made the films aren’t terribly happy either. It sounds like WarnerMedia and AT&T failed to tell production partners and the filmmakers themselves they were planning on making the move to a day-and-date model. Today, there were reports that director Denis Villeneuve is upset that Dune (part one of at least two planned films) will be negatively impacted by the move and Legendary Entertainment may end up suing WarnerMedia if they can’t work something out.

One of WarnerMedia’s biggest assets also isn’t terribly pleased with how they announced the plan either.

Entertainment Tonight was able to speak with director Christopher Nolan about the whole thing and as you’d imagine he has some stern words for the company calling it a “controversy” along with a suggestion that they’re simply doing this to pump-up the new streaming service while mistreating the people who actually worked on the films without even consulting with them.

NOLAN: “Oh, I mean, disbelief. Especially the way in which they did. There’s such controversy around it, because they didn’t tell anyone. In 2021, they’ve got some of the top filmmakers in the world, they’ve got some of the biggest stars in the world who worked for years in some cases on these projects very close to their hearts that are meant to be big-screen experiences. They’re meant to be out there for the widest possible audiences… And now they’re being used as a loss-leader for the streaming service — for the fledgling streaming service — without any consultation. So, there’s a lot of controversy. It’s very, very, very, very messy. A real bait and switch. Yeah, it’s sort of not how you treat filmmakers and stars and people who, these guys have given a lot for these projects. They deserved to be consulted and spoken to about what was going to happen to their work.”

“Long-term, I think all of the studios know that the movie theater experience will bounce back and be a very important part of the ecosystem long-term. What you have right now in our business is a lot of the use of the pandemic as an excuse for sort of grappling for short-term advantage. And it’s really unfortunate. It’s not the way to do business and it’s not the best thing for the health of our industry. But when the theaters are back and people are going back to the movies, when the vaccine has been rolled out and there’s an appropriate health response from the federal government, I’m very bullish on the long-term prospects of the industry. People love going to the movies and they’re going to get to go again.”

UPDATE: Christopher Nolan had even more choice words when speaking with The Hollywood Reporter.

NOLAN: “Some of our industry’s biggest filmmakers and most important movie stars went to bed the night before thinking they were working for the greatest movie studio and woke up to find out they were working for the worst streaming service. Warner Bros. had an incredible machine for getting a filmmaker’s work out everywhere, both in theaters and in the home, and they are dismantling it as we speak. They don’t even understand what they’re losing. Their decision makes no economic sense, and even the most casual Wall Street investor can see the difference between disruption and dysfunction.”

Nolan isn’t without his own bit of controversy as his latest film Tenet had been released in the height of the pandemic over the summer, where there was plenty of finger-pointing when it came to who had the bright idea to keep the theatrical release date in the summer instead postponing. I don’t think it’s lost on Christopher that Tenet could have easily been part of this group of films thrown on HBO Max without having any real discussions beforehand.

SOURCE: ENTERTAINMENT TONIGHT

Posted on in Film News

Athens-Set Thriller ‘Born To Be Murdered’ Starring John David Washington and Alicia Vikander Lands At Netflix – Produced By Luca Guadagnino

The Hollywood Reporter has learned that Netflix has secured a new thriller titled Born To Be Murdered that stars Tenet’s John David Washington and Ex Machina’s Alicia Vikander that takes place in Greece. It’s unclear how much Netflix paid for the acquisition.

The film that shot back in 2019 is produced by Luca Guadagnino (Scarface) and is the directorial debut of Ferdinando Cito Filomarino, who was the second unit director on Luca’s films Call Me By Your Name and Suspiria.

Set in Athens and the Epirus region of Greece and tells of a vacationing couple, played by Washington and Vikander, who fall prey to a violent conspiracy with tragic consequences.

John recently worked with Christopher Nolan on the sci-fi action film Tenet and Alicia Vikander had been expected to shoot a sequel to Tomb Raider in the near future.

Born To Be Murdered is expected to be released sometime in 2021 but hasn’t been given a drop date officially.

SOURCE: THE HOLLYWOOD REPORTER

Posted on in Film News

Aaron Taylor-Johnson Is The Latest Addition To Brad Pitt’s Assassin Action Flick ‘Bullet Train’

Deadline reports that British actor Aaron Taylor-Johnson has landed a role in the upcoming action flick Bullet Train from John Wick and Atomic Blonde director David Leitch.

Aaron’s credits include Kick-Ass, Godzilla, Avengers: Age of Ultron, Tenet, and the upcoming Kingsman prequel film The King’s Man.

The film from Sony Pictures has recent Oscar-winner Brad Pitt in the lead role with Joey King and Andrew Koji also playing fellow assassins on a Tokyo bullet train.

SOURCE: DEADLINE

Posted on in Film News

‘Tenet’s John David Washington Open To Playing Reed Richards In Marvel’s ‘Fantastic Four’ Reboot – “Where Do I Sign?”

We’ve been excited to see what Marvel does with the Fox properties now that they have the film rights to fully explore both a Fantastic Four and X-Men after the merger between Disney and 21st Century Fox led to the rights heading over to Kevin Feige’s Marvel Studios. 

Marvel seemingly hasn’t decided on the main actors for the Fantastic Four reboot. Despite some recent evidence, they are moving forward with a film via LLC information spotted by Muprhy’s Multiverse that Solve Everything Productions LLC just might be Marvel getting their reboot of Fantastic Four ready. 

The recent news that they’ve cast Jonathan Majors in the role of supervillain Kang The Conqueror or Ant-Man 3 (unconfirmed by Majors or Marvel) could suggest if they indeed make the villain a future relative of Reed Richards, as in the comics, that we could be seeing a black version of the iconic character. 

This has led fans to suggest people such as Tenet’s John David Washington after he got endorsed for the Green Lantern role by director Christopher Nolan. 

While speaking with Nerd Reactor, they asked him about playing Richards and Washington seems really open to the idea. 

NR: I think Marvel is going to do a new Fantastic Four movie, so, let’s pretend I’m Kevin Feige I come up to you ‘What to be part of the Fantastic Four, maybe, Reed Richards the main lead’. Would you do it’?

WASHINGTON: Wow, I’d say ‘Well, thank you for having me, thank you for taking this meeting where do I sign?”

You can watch that exchange below. 

There had been a massive fan campaign online to see real-life married couple John Krasinski and Emily Blunt in the roles of Mr. Fantastic and Sue Storm respectively. However, that doesn’t to seem have come together as fans had hoped it would.

Honestly, I as long as they make a compelling story that has audiences finally caring about the Fantastic Four it really doesn’t matter who they end up picking for the roles as long as the character development is there and they can act. I’m optimistic about Marvel handling these characters as I had zero interest in the last three films from 20th Century Fox.

SOURCE: NERD REACTOR 

Posted on in Film News

Second Round of Shutdowns In The UK and Elsewhere Could Have A Huge Impact On Hollywood’s Recovery

Movie theaters around the globe are trying to recover from the last couple of months but it looks like they could be closing again in multiple countries sooner than expected. The United Kingdom and Canada are currently seeing spikes of new cases of Coronavirus that has led to new restrictions along with promises from governments that a second national shutdown isn’t off the table if things don’t improve. 

New cases in the United Kingdom could hit as high as 50,000 per day by mid-October, which would be more than the United States is currently seeing as September 20th numbers were 34,586. The UK’s numbers on Monday were reportedly 4,368, a steady increase going the wrong way as the numbers have been doubling every seven days. The idea is to prevent 200+ deaths per day. 

Spain has already instituted restrictions on Madrid just months after European countries eased restrictions back in July. The continent is now seeing rises just like the UK with Spain seeing 31, 428 new cases since Friday. 

France also hit 13,000 new cases on Saturday and 10,569 on Sunday. 

Not the direction you want to see when there are predictions of a massive second wave in the fall and winter. 

The film industry has seemingly shrugged off the lackluster domestic returns thinking that international box office numbers will keep studios afloat. However, if places like the UK, Europe, and Canada shut down theaters again a massive movie like No Time To Die might lose a lot of money and end up hurting Hollywood’s recovery. 

The United Kingdom is also trying bounce-back concerning film production with large studio films such as The Batman, Fantastic Beasts 3, and Mission: Impossible 7-8 said to be currently filming. A shutdown could see those shoots placed on pause again if the government suddenly decides it’s not a good idea while the country is seeing significant COVID-19 spikes. Robert Pattinson had reportedly tested positive for Coronavirus despite the strict safety precautions promoted ahead of the production resuming in London. 

Other projects expected to shoot in the United Kingdom soon include Doctor Strange In The Multiverse of Madness (Longcross Studios), Ant-Man 3 (Pinewood Studios UK), The Flash (Warner Bros. Studios Leavesden), and Marvel’s Moon Knight series. Some of these shoots could see hiccups in the pre-production/prep stages if not massive filming delays if there is a prolonged shutdown. 

Dwayne Johnson and his family tested positive for COVID-19, he’s already back on the set of Netflix’s Red Notice in Atlanta, Georgia. Filming on The Falcon & The Winter Soldier has also resumed in Atlanta as well with expectations that Loki and other shows will begin there soon. 

It seems extremely irresponsible on the part of studios to chug along like nothing is wrong given that the state of Georgia with a population of 3.7 million has more new cases of COVID-19 than the entire country of Canada that has a population of 37.4 million, the latter on the cusp of greenlighting a second shutdown that could see productions in Toronto, Montreal, and even Vancouver stop entirely again. Not to mention, pulling down theater ticket sales as Canadian box office dollars are included in the domestic cumes.  

We’ll have to see the numbers can be turned around without national shutdowns but it doesn’t seem like it can be avoided at this point. 

Posted on in Film News

Warner Bros. Is Withholding ‘Tenet’s Actual Opening Weekend Box Office Numbers

We were a little underwhelmed last weekend when Christopher Nolan’s massive action film Tenet had an estimated $20.2 million three-day weekend. However, what was shocking it had been released over Labor Day domestically and we never saw the actual box office returns from the studio. Normally, with this data studios are extremely happy to share given the nature of a holiday long weekend boosts attendance. 

It was indeed underwhelming because that number would make Tenet the lowest box office opening for a Nolan film in the last twenty years, slightly below Insomnia’s $20.8 million back in 2002. You also have to factor in Tenet’s massive production of reportedly over $200 million that makes it extremely tough to turn a profit during a global pandemic. 

Here is a rundown of Christopher Nolan’s domestic box office openings. 

  • THE DARK KNIGHT RISES $160.8 MILLION
  • THE DARK KNIGHT – $158.4 MILLION
  • INCEPTION – $62.7 MILLION
  • DUNKIRK – $50.5 MILLION
  • BATMAN BEGINS – $48.7 MILLION
  • INTERSTELLAR – $47.5 MILLION
  • THE PRESTIGE – $40 MILLION
  • INSOMNIA – $20.8 MILLION
  • TENET – $20.2 MILLION 
  • MEMENTO – $ 235K

Almost a week later and Warner Bros. still hasn’t given up that data which might suggest they were bullish with that estimate of $20.2 million and are trying to make the film’s opening weekend seem stronger than it was. This would also include how well the film has done over the last two weeks in Canada as those numbers haven’t been made public by Warner Bros. either and are generally lumped into the U.S./North American total, a number the studio has yet to make public.

Variety is now pointing towards the studio potentially worried their iffy numbers will be spun by outlets and journalists as hurdling towards a flop as weaker numbers would suggest given the scale of the film and the timing of the release. 

The studio, however, was concerned that reporters and rivals would misinterpret or unfairly analyze the results — leading to headlines that may incorrectly label Tenet’s debut as a flop. 

Warner Bros. also recently bumped Wonder Woman 1984’s release date from October 2nd to Christmas Day. The move most likely happened because of this Tenet data they are now refusing to share with the public and rival studios. The report from Variety adds that the rival studios are complaining of the lack of transparency because they were hoping on making release schedule adjustments based on Tenet’s performance. 

This is really on Warner Bros. as they were warned about releasing their massive film too soon during the pandemic/theater reopening as most of the summer movies bailed to 2021 and reports of infighting within the studio seemed more like a weird PR move if anything else.