In May 2011, the Alamo Drafthouse hosted “Day of the Apes,” an epic 8-hour marathon of all five Planet of the Apes films on 35mm. Above all other things, this should be celebrated as one fine event. Every single Apes film in glorious 35mm? What could possibly improve such a situation? How about a brilliant set of posters from some of Mondo’s sinister cabal of artists, the likes of Ken Taylor, Martin Ansin, Phantom City Creative and Jason Edmiston. In an unprecedented exclusive that spans across four of the web’s most popular film blogs (and also Film School Rejects), the poster set, created to commemorate the event, is finally unveiled to the public with each film tackled by a different artist.

First, lets have an exclusive look at Ken Taylor’s Beneath the Planet of the Apes print:

Click below to view the other exclusive posters at io9, Movies.com, Collider and Badass Digest.

And finally, here’s a look at Jason Edmiston’s limited edition lithograph:

Here’s the specifications on the line-up:

PLANET OF THE APES
Artist: Martin Ansin
Size: 24” x 36”
Edition: 415

BENEATH THE PLANET OF THE APES
Artist: Ken Taylor
Size: 24” x 36”
Edition: 390

ESCAPE FROM THE PLANET OF THE APES
Artist: Rich Kelly
Size: 24” x 36”
Edition: 320

CONQUEST OF THE PLANET OF THE APES
Artist: Phantom City Creative
Size: 24” x 36”
Edition: 370

BATTLE FOR THE PLANET OF THE APES
Artist: Florian Bertmer
Size: 24” x 36”
Edition of 345

GO APE*
Limited Edition Lithograph
Artist: Jason Edmiston
Size: 24” x 36”
Edition: 295

*Only available with purchase of the full poster set.

The posters, created in partnership with Sideshow Collectibles, will be sold as a set on Thursday, January 26th for $230.  The set will also include an exclusive print “Alamo Drafthouse Wants You To Go Ape!” This limited edition lithograph is a variation of the famous 20th Century Fox poster created for the 1973 re-release of all five films in theaters, where the artwork “aped” Uncle Sam.  The “Go Ape!” lithograph will only be available with purchase of the full set.

The prints will be sold as a set on Thursday, January 26th for $230. Any remaining individual prints will go on sale on Friday, January 27th.  Follow @MondoNews for on sale announcements.

With my review and claim that Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy is a near-masterpiece, I don’t believe it’s possible to get more hyperbolic about this film. Perhaps my fourth viewing, which will inevitably take place soon, could make that happen. Why such grand enthusiasm for a slow-burn “thriller” that’s splitting plenty of folks? Well, go see for yourself.

Thankfully for you lot, director Tomas Alfredson‘s film is expanding into 800 theaters today. To further urge you wise readers to go see the film, Focus Features was kind enough to give us these exclusive behind-the-scenes shots of Alfredson shooting the breeze and working with Gary Oldman and John Hurt on set. They’re black and white, meaning they’re all prestigious and such.

If you want more info on Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy, make sure to give our interviews with Mark Strong and Gary Oldman and Tomas Alfredson a read. To learn even more, I also highly recommend checking out a behind-the-scenes video the Matt Patches posted on Hollywood.com, which gives insight into one of the film’s best scenes.

Director Tony Kaye‘s debut was 1998′s stunning tour de force, American History X. The film stars Edward Norton as a recovering skinhead trying to set things right in the present while remembering his misdeeds of the past, and if you haven’t seen it I can’t recommend enough that you stop reading and seek it out immediately. It’s an incredibly affecting film anchored by a tremendous performance from Norton. Sadly, Edward Furlong also stars.

Kaye and Norton had a very public falling out during the film’s post-production, and the director seemingly vanished into thin air in the decade-plus since. Except he’s actually been making films at a steady pace. You just most likely haven’t seen them.

Now thirteen years after reportedly trying to remove his name from American History X (and replace it with Humpty Dumpty) Kaye’s latest film looks to return him to the limelight. The critically acclaimed indie Detachment stars Adrien Brody as a man who chooses to avoid personal connections as the ones he was born with begin slipping away. A dead mother, a father falling into dementia…he avoids intimacy to avoid the pain, until his latest teaching assignment finds him forming an unexpected bond.

Check out the clip below, and head over to the film’s official site for more info.

Unseen in the clip is the rest of the film’s amazing cast including Bryan Cranston, William Peterson, Tim Blake Nelson, Lucy Liu, James Caan, and more.

The official synopsis is below.

In Director Tony Kaye’s Detachment, Academy Award® winner Adrien Brody stars as Henry Barthes, an educator with a true talent to connect with his students. Yet Henry has chosen to bury his gift. By spending his days as a substitute teacher, he conveniently avoids any emotional connections by never staying anywhere long enough to form an attachment to either students or colleagues. When a new assignment places him at a public school where a frustrated, burned-out administration has created an apathetic student body, Henry quickly becomes a role model as a teacher who actually cares about the well-being of these students.  In finding an emotional connection to the students but also fellow teachers and a runaway teen, he finds that he’s not alone in a  life and death struggle to find beauty in a seemingly vicious and loveless world.”

Detachment hits Movies On Demand from Tribeca Film starting Feb 24th and will receive a limited theatrical run in March.

This month, the folks at Titan Books have released a book that cult film fans will be dying for, right in time for you to add it to your Christmas shopping list and satisfy the most hardcore of your movie loving loved ones. It’s called “The Hammer Vault,” promising treasures from the archives of Hammer Films, Britain’s most famous film studio and the keepers of many great cult films. We’ll have more about the book and author Marcus Hearn in an upcoming features. But for now, we’d like to present some exclusive art from the book, some of which is a little NSFW (that means it has bare breasts in it).

About the Book

Packed with sensational, never-before-collected material, The Hammer Vault is a visual romp through the archives of Britain’s most famous film studio.

For both die-hard fans, and those just discovering Hammer’s rich cinematic legacy, this remarkable book provides an unmissable journey into the history of the company, as told through previously unseen treasures from the vault. Beginning with the company’s incorporation documents from 1934, moving through the many unforgettable horror classics which cemented their reputation and made worldwide stars of Christopher Lee and Peter Cushing, and coming right up to date with a behind the scenes look at 2010’s Let Me In and the 2011 release The Resident, The Hammer Vault presents original correspondence, lobby cards, script pages and scores of rare and previously unpublished photographs, alongside a commentary from Hammer archive consultant Marcus Hearn, and the people who made some of the company’s greatest films.

The book also contains pages from press books and publicity manuals, letters to and from some of the company’s stars, pages from managing director Michael Carreras and Peter Cushing’s scrapbooks, pre-production artwork, trade advertisements and production designs. It is both a compelling visual history of the legendary film production company, and the greatest scrapbook of Hammer collectables ever assembled!

“For over 20 years, Jimmy Testagross has lived his childhood dream: being a roadie for his childhood heroes, Blue Oyster Cult. But the band’s Arena-Rock glory days are a distant memory. County fairs and club gigs pay the bills. And Jimmy has become a casualty of these leaner times. With no place to go, no job prospects, and no real skills outside of being a roadie, Jimmy needs to regroup. So he returns to his childhood home in Queens, NY. There, he revisits old relationships: his ailing, widower mom, a high school crush, a former nemesis and, most importantly, his relationship with himself.” I’m not sure about all of you, but they had me at Blue Oyster Cult. Super 8‘s Ron Eldard stars in Roadie as Jimmy, a middle-aged man child, who is featured in this exclusive clip we’ve received. Of course, this clip also involves Bobby Cannavale and Jill Hennessy.

Watch the clip:

Roadie is available on VOD platforms December 2nd, followed by a January 6, 2012 theatrical release.

Sure, Film School Rejects is an international publication. But as far as the IRS is concerned, we’re a resident of the great city of Austin, Texas. And as residents of Austin, we’re required to celebrate all that is weird. It’s just part of the cost of living here. It helps that much of our staff is already into the strangest that cinema can provide, from the depths of the horror genre to oddities from around the world. As a general rule, we love a good midnight movie. Chillerama is said to be the “ultimate midnight movie,” at least according to its Blu-ray packaging. This genre anthology features films from the likes of Adam Green, Joe Lynch, Adam Rifkin and Tim Sullivan bringing you titles like Wadzilla, I Was A Teenage Werebear, The Diary of Anne Frankenstein, and Zom-B-Movie. It’s quite a treat for anyone with a little moviegoing courage. And to celebrate its DVD and Blu-ray release today, we’ve rounded up an exclusive behind the scenes clip in which star Sean Paul Lockhart explains what its like to be a Teenage Werebear, struggling with animalistic urges, suggen hair growth and his own sexuality.

Check out the exclusive Blu-ray clip below. Chillerama is on Blu-ray and DVD today, November 29, 2011.

Sure, what we’re about to show you is a 30-second commercial for The Descendants, the George Clooney led indie comedy that’s beginning to spark up some Oscar buzz. And sure, it will likely be preceded by a 15-30 second advertisement, courtesy of our advertising company and our robust hosting bill. But isn’t it nice, just knowing that you, the reader of Film School Rejects, are seeing something that people who read /Film aren’t seeing… like a commercial with a big pull-quote from Peter Sciretta at /Film? It’s the must-see TV spot of the night, especially if you’re into things that involve George Clooney.

Watch the Exclusive spot below:

About the Film

From Alexander Payne, the creator of the Oscar®-winning Sideways, The Descendants is set in Hawaii and follows the unpredictable journey of an American family at a crossroads.  Matt King (George Clooney), a husband and father of two girls, must re-examine his past and navigate his future when his wife is in a boating accident off Waikiki.  He awkwardly attempts to repair his relationship with his daughters – 10 year-old precocious Scottie (Amara Miller) and rebellious 17 year-old Alexandra (Shailene Woodley) – while wrestling with a decision to sell his family’s land. Handed down from Hawaiian royalty and missionaries, the Kings own some of the last priceless virgin parcels of tropical beach in the islands.

When Alexandra drops the bombshell that her mother was in the midst of a romantic fling at the time of the accident, Matt has to take a whole new look at his life, not to mention his legacy, during a week of momentous decisions.  With his girls in tow, he embarks on a haphazard search for his wife’s lover.  Along the way, in encounters alternately funny, troublesome and transcendent, he realizes he’s finally on course toward rebuilding his life and family.

Fox Searchlight Pictures presents, an Ad Hominem Enterprises production, The Descendants, directed by Alexander Payne with a screenplay by Alexander Payne and Nat Faxon & Jim Rash and based on the novel by Kaui Hart Hemmings.  The ensemble cast includes George Clooney, Shailene Woodley, Beau Bridges, Robert Forster, Judy Greer, Matthew Lillard, Nick Krause, Amara Miller, Mary Birdsong, Rob Huebel and Patricia Hastie.

The Descendants is currently in limited release. Check your local listings.

Take a moment to think about Santa Claus. Chances are that you’re thinking of a jolly, fat white dude with a big beard and red tights, being hauled around by 12 overworked, miraculous reindeer, hurling through the night from house to house to deliver magical consumerism to the masses. Don’t worry, you’re not alone. Unless you are Finnish filmmaker Jalmari Helander. His idea for Santa, steeped in some folklore, is far more dangerous, violent and worth burying underneath a mountain if you have such resources. It was a vision come to life in his film Rare Exports: A Christmas Tale, perhaps one of the most brilliant yuletide ho-ho-horror movies since the original St. Nick was putting coins in the shoes of unsuspecting children.

And if that description wasn’t enough, we’ve also got some exclusive original artwork created for the film. I’ve included it as large as our layout will allow, so as to maximize the creep factor.

Rare Exports: A Christmas Tale is currently on DVD and Blu-ray in the US. It comes highly recommended by both Rob Hunter (in This Week in DVD), yours truly (in This Week in Blu-ray) and Cole Abaius (who reviewed it at Fantastic Fest 2010). Those three stars almost never align unless it’s due to a very special movie. This is such a film.

We have to hand it to the folks at Indominia — for a newish on the scene distro, they are picking a wicked slate of titles. So much of what we’ve seen from them has been interesting. That, and we’ll support anyone who imports as much international cinema as they do. The Pack, which hits VOD today (9/27), is right along those lines. It’s a French horror film about a gal named Charlotte, who picks up a hitchhiker on a road trip she’s taking alone. As 100+ years of cinema have taught us, this is a bad idea. When we meet Charlotte in this clip, she’s been captured by a woman named La Spack, played by the always excellent Yolande Moreau. This hard-nosed old dame is the leader of a mysterious pack and they’ve got plans for young Charlotte. We’ll let you watch the clip from this Franck Richard directed film and you’ll see what’s in store for her.

As I mentioned, The Pack is out on VOD today. For more release info, check out Indominia.com.

It’s not often that two tough guys like Jason Statham and Paddy Considine share their feelings, but it does happen. And while we don’t know much about Blitz, a new direct-to-DVD actioner starring the pair, we do know that some feelings will be shared in between rounds of ass-kicking. In fact, we’ve got an exclusive clip to debut for you that proves said assertion. Don’t worry though, the trailer for this film also indicates that many a mean person has their face kicked in by a big ole’ Statham boot, so it’s not all therapy sessions.

Check out the exclusive, slightly NSFW (language) clip below:

Here’s the official synopsis and trailer for Blitz, which hits DVD, Blu-ray and digital markets on August 23rd:

The film stars Jason Statham as Brant, a tough cop with questionable ethics who teams up with Officer Nash (Paddy Considine, The Bourne Ultimatum) to hunt down a crazed serial killer (Aidan Gillen, “Game of Thrones”) targeting their police brethren. Based on the novel by Ken Bruen and written for the screen by Nathan Parker, this non-stop action film was directed by Elliot Lester.

Tough, uncompromising and totally un-PC cop Brant (Statham) joins forces with Officer DC Porter Nash (Considine) to hunt down a serial killer (Gillen) who has been targeting police officers. This fast-paced action-thriller is a raw, gritty tale of moral ambiguity, outsiders and the sacrifices the police make to keep crime off the streets.

As you saw earlier this week in my This Week in Blu-ray entry, I very much recommend you see Exporting Raymond, the documentary about Everybody Loves Raymond creator Phil Rosenthal’s journey to Russia with hopes of translating the hit sitcom into an equally successful Russian show. It’s a charming and strange journey, and even the deleted scenes are funny. Like this one, which we have the pleasure of debuting exclusively. It involves Phil meeting the pair of twins who will play the kids on the Russian Raymond show, both of whom have a penchant for eating things that aren’t really food.

Watch the Exclusive clip from Exporting Raymond below:

Exporting Raymond is on Blu-ray and DVD now. Click here to check it out on Amazon.

Since it’s Friday and we’re not expecting a rambunctious news wire, we’re happy to focus on other things that might be of interest to our astute readers. Such as Alex Gibney and Allison Ellwood’s Magic Trip, a documentary about One Flew over the Cuckoo’s Nest author Ken Kesey and his wondrous, drug-fueled trip in 1964. Check out the clip for yourself after the jump and decide if you’d like to go on this fantastical journey. You probably will.

Watch our exclusive spot for Magic Trip:

Here’s the official synopsis: “In 1964, Ken Kesey, the famed author of “One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest,” set off on a legendary, LSD-fuelled cross-country road trip to the New York World’s Fair. He was joined by “The Merry Band of Pranksters,” a renegade group of counterculture truth-seekers, including Neal Cassady, the American icon immortalized in Kerouac’s “On the Road,” and the driver and painter of the psychedelic Magic Bus. Kesey and the Pranksters intended to make a documentary about their trip, shooting footage on 16MM, but the film was never finished and the footage has remained virtually unseen. With MAGIC TRIP, Academy Award-winning filmmaker Alex Gibney (Taxi to the Dark Side) and co-director Alison Ellwood were given unprecedented access to this raw footage by the Kesey family. They worked with the Film Foundation, HISTORY and the UCLA Film Archives to restore over 100 hours of film and audiotape, and have shaped an invaluable document of this extraordinary piece of American history.”

Magic Trip will be available on VOD starting Friday, July 1st.

One of my own personal areas of expertise, beyond being a guy who writes about movies for a living, is being chubby. I’ve been pretty chubby since I was in the 4th grade and lets face it, movies generally get it right when it comes to the plight of the fat kid. He’s got it rough. So I can’t imagine not somehow connecting to Azazel Jacobs’ new film Terri, one of Sundance 2011′s breakout hits. It follows the odd bromance between a vice principle (John C. Reilly) and an overweight 15-year old (Jacob Wysocki) as they both try to navigate the horrors of high school. The film drops into theaters in limited release on July 1, and today we’ve got for you an exclusive gallery of photos.

I’ve also included the film’s trailer below. As someone who hates seeing the fat kid get picked on, I may or may not have wept through most of the trailer. I’m not proud of it, but it happened. Our own Robert Levin said in his Sundance review that director Jacobs “ably intersperses moments of cutting, ribald humor with a deep-rooted affection for the misfits at the core of the story, all tied together by his understated willingness to let us learn from them.” So yes, he seemed to like it a great deal. Now, here’s that trailer:

James Franco has been a busy guy lately, hosting the Oscars and getting involved in just about every high-profile project in development. But did you know that he also does direct-to-DVD psycho-thrillers? I didn’t, either. But apparently he does. In Shadows & Lies, Franco plays William Vincent, a quiet and mysterious criminal. When he falls for a New York gangster’s (Josh Lucas) favorite call girl (Julianne Nicholson), Vincent is forced to flee the city, threatened with death if he should ever return. But after four years in exile, Vincent secretly returns intent on rescuing the woman he loves from her dangerous fate.

In this clip, which we are pleased to present exclusively, we see the moment when the quiet criminal, having just stolen a wallet, meets gangster Josh Lucas in a chance encounter. I suspect it won’t be the last time.

Shadows & Lies is available on DVD, Blu-ray and via Digital Download on June 7, 2011.

One of our favorite things to do is bring a potentially under-the-radar film to the attention of our audience. We spend so much time whining about the big-budget follies of Hollywood, that sometimes it’s easy to lose sight of smaller, more interesting fair. With that, we’re proud to present the exclusive poster debut for Point Blank, from director Fred Cavayé (writer of The Next Three Days). It’s a runaway thriller about Samuel (Gilles Lellouche), a hospital employee whose pregnant wife (Elena Anaya) is kidnapped before his very eyes. Knocked unconscious, he comes to and discovers that a dangerous criminal named Sartet (Roschdy Zem) is responsible, and if he’s ever to see his wife again, he must do Sartet’s bidding. Samuel quickly finds himself pitted against rival gangsters and trigger-happy police in a deadly race to save the lives of his wife and unborn child.

It’s a film that Film.com and recurring Reject Radio guest Eric D. Snider called “exactly the king of taut, fast-paced, intelligent thriller that audiences love” when he reviewed it at the Tribeca Film Festival. Nick Newman of The Film Stage added, “walking out of Point Blank, I found myself thrilled in a way that few action movies over the past few years have managed to make me feel.”

A simple premise, a strong serving of positive buzz and now a poster with a sense of urgency. Not a bad start for Point Blank, which hits theaters on July 29th.