The new trailer for Marc Webb’s Amazing Spider-Man reboot has just hit the web… and it doesn’t look bad at all! The film stars Andrew Garfield as the titular and angst-filled hero and Emma Stone as the love interest alongside Martin Sheen, Sally Field, Denis Leary, Rhys Ifans, C. Thomas Howell and Campbell Scott (and yes, probably Stan Lee). It claims to tell the “untold story” but appears to be an origin tale, so who knows what Webb and friends have up their sleeve. (Beside the web shooter I mean.) Check out the new trailer below.

When Sony released the “Untold Story” tagine for The Amazing Spider-Man, it rang about as true as a career politician and lobbyist claiming to be a Washington Outsider (or, for a less current joke, like Hot Pockets claiming they wouldn’t cause your bowels to erupt). It’s a rebooted franchise – essentially a remake of an earlier film that came out of the same studio a decade ago. However, there were always elements that hinted at Sony and direct Marc Webb going big instead of going home. A new synopsis, uncovered by the Times of India (via Screen Rant), shows off exactly what they mean by an untold story, and as it matches up to the original Sam Raimi film – it’s pretty damned untold. Sure, there are the teenage elements of angst and that certain feeling of being lost in a sea of hormones without a rudder or a helping hand. Hopefully there will be some playfulness and some sarcasm. Of course there will be a spider bite. All of it rings familiar, except the rest of the plot. In fact, much like a comic book, it reads like an alternate history of a character delivered by a new writer. Check it out for yourself:

Amidst the pinky-out prestige of awards season sits the manic pixie of The People’s Choice Awards. Perhaps they can easily be dismissed by the cinephile crowd for not being nearly well-rounded or interesting enough, but looking at the nominees and the winners can provide a bird’s eye view into the abyss of mass-entertainment. With over 200 million votes cast, according to a press release, the winners included Emma Stone, Ryan Reynolds as The Green Lantern, Adam Sandler‘s comedy and Bridesmaids. To put that into perspective, that’s a ridiculous amount of people. To really put it into perspective, it’s 7.6 million more people than the entire population of Brazil, and it’s 2/3rds the population of the United States. The giant, faceless wad of “the people” have made these their movie champions of 2011:

Things are starting to look up for screenwriter Michael Dillberti. Not only did his screenplay 30 Minutes or Less get made into a pretty high profile comedy last year, but another one of his scripts, Little White Corvette, made it onto this year’s Black List. The list’s description of the movie reads as follows: “A down and out brother and sister go to Miami to sell a duffel bag of cocaine that they found in the trunk of a corvette left them by their dead father.” Sounds like it has some potential, especially when you factor in that the script already has Emma Stone attached to star. She’s had a year even better than Dillberti’s, starring in the wildly successful The Help and just finishing shooting on superhero tentpole picture The Amazing Spider-Man, and apparently she’s been interested in doing something with Little White Corvette for quite a while now.

The marketing machine behind The Amazing Spider-Man, the upcoming reboot of Peter Parker’s coming-of-age origin tale, hasn’t been giving us much to chew on lately. It was all the way back in July when they released the first teaser trailer for the film and here we are, entering a new year and still only teased. Though there is no indication of when the studio might release a meatier trailer with more finished effects work, so we can get a better idea of how this movie is really going to look, there were a handful of still images recently released via the movie’s official Facebook page. These new images don’t focus so much on Spider-Man and his battles with the villainous Lizard, but they do give us a glimpse into the sequences where he’s figuring out his powers. There seem to be scenes where he discovers that he suddenly has what it takes to fight back against bullies, that he has mad ups on the basketball court, and that it’s not so hard to swing around on suspended chains at abandoned construction sights as it used to be. I think it’s all a metaphor for puberty. Also there’s a shot of Emma Stone all decked out in her Gwen Stacy garb and holding some hefty books to remind us that Gwen Stacy is and forever shall be a prettier, smarter, less annoying romantic interest for Peter to pursue than that catchphrase-spewing ball of drama Mary Jane Watson.

A couple weeks ago it was reported that Adam McKay and Will Ferrell’s production company Gary Sanchez had spent about a million dollars to pick up a spec script called He’s F***ing Perfect. Today it was reported by Deadline that actress Emma Stone is negotiating to be in said film, only they’re referring to the project as He’s Fuckin’ Perfect. I’m not sure which is actually the official title of this movie, but it doesn’t matter because there’s no fuckin’ way this thing is getting all the way through development and keeping either. More than likely it will be called something pseudo hip but still generic like He’s the Bomb or Friend Request, so there’s no point debating that issue. The thing to focus on is that Emma Stone would be perfect for this role. The story is about a girl who uses her advanced social media skills to dig up dirt on all of her friends’ loser boyfriends to convince them to dump them. A wrinkle comes when she finds that one of her friends is actually dating the perfect guy, so she uses those same social media skills to figure out what his perfect girl would be, and then become her. Essentially, she’s trying to break people up, and then steal her friend’s boyfriend. What a bitch. That’s not going to be a character that’s easy to like, no matter how funny writer Lauryn Kahn’s script is.

If you haven’t been reading along, I’ve been gushing about Ruben Fleischer’s upcoming crime drama The Gangster Squad for quite a while. Story details about the cops and gangsters flick about real life gangster Mickey Cohen can be found in my first article about the movie, where it was announced that Sean Penn, Josh Brolin, and Ryan Gosling had all been cast in key roles. Penn is in the starring role as Cohen, and Brolin and Gosling are two of the members of the titular gangster squad that is put together to take him down. After hearing that, I didn’t think that life could get much better, but then it did. The second Gangster Squad related bomb that Fleischer dropped on me was that man about town Bryan Cranston would also be joining the cast as a rough and tumble member of the LAPD by way of Texas. Suddenly the original Triumvirate of Awesome that was the Gangster Squad cast became the Cornerstones of Awesome instead. And now that the film has such a solid foundation to build a metaphorical house on, it’s time to start picking out pretty curtains and stuff by filling out the cast further. The big news of the day from Deadline Monowi is that grizzled, crazy actor Nick Nolte has also been cast. He will play Bill Parker, the incorruptible chief of police who takes it upon himself to form this so-called gangster squad. That sounds like a big role. Seeing as Nolte’s upcoming movie [Due to Content Scraping and Theft, we have been forced to try abbreviated feeds. We apologize for any inconvenience this may cause and woud very much appreciate you clicking through to view the full article on FilmSchoolRejects.com]

This week, Fat Guy Kevin Carr makes big plans to publish a best-selling book that women across the nation will read in hoity-toity book clubs. Step one: Move to the deep south and get raised by an African American maid. While Kevin tries to figure out how to move past that step, he gets a job delivering pizzas and lives in constant fear he’ll be used in a bank heist. Then he cheats death by avoiding the Glee concert movie, but lives in even more constant fear that the flick will hunt him down and make him watch it.

This week, Fat Guy Kevin Carr runs screaming from little blue people invading his life and seeks refuge in the old west, hoping that James Bond and Indiana Jones will protect him. When he returns home, he has a fight with his wife and uses the events of Crazy, Stupid, Love to put his relationship back together. What a godsend Hollywood can be for marriage woes. Finally, Kevin curls up for a long nap after an exhausting summer movie season with many more arrests than he ever thought he’d incur.

In Glenn Ficarra and John Requa‘s Crazy, Stupid, Love., we meet Cal and Emily, a long-standing couple in which only one half of them recognizes that the “standing” could in fact be traded out for “suffering.” Cal and Emily have some lovely kids and a nice house and what appear to be stable jobs, but there’s something missing. Within the film’s first ten minutes, Emily (Julianne Moore) has asked for a divorce (in the middle of a dinner out, no less) and revealed that she’s had an affair (with one her co-workers, played, of course by Kevin Bacon), leading Cal (Steve Carell) to purposely fall out of their car and announce to both their son and babysitter what has just transpired during the world’s worst date night (and Carell knows from bad date nights). And thus begins Cal and Emily’s halting journey to return to a state of normalcy, if not a state of reaffirmed union.

With Crazy, Stupid, Love, writer-director duo Glenn Ficarra and John Requa are coming off of the criminally under-seen I Love You Phillip Morris. Very few saw commercial appeal in their Ewan McGregor and Jim Carrey-starring love story, and the box office numbers were further proof that there was a definite, and very sad, truth to those predictions. It doesn’t appear they have anything to worry about when it comes to their new, star-filled romantic comedy though. I Love You Phillip Morris has a dark and divisive sensibility. Crazy, Stupid, Love is the opposite and shows obvious mass appeal. In making a film for a broader audience, Ficarra and Requa managed to make love stories — it is an ensemble film — that are neither cynical nor dopey. Here’s what Glenn Ficarra and John Requa had to say about taking on the commercial project, their 3-hour version of the film, and their important lessons at film school:

If movies are to be believed, it’s easy for couples to meet in some cute way, fall in love, and tumble right into the sack without any trouble in the world. Yes, some films address the clumsiness of lovers’ first times together, but by the end of the scene they have figured out each other’s ticks, pleasures, and even kinks. No matter how long the on-screen couple has dated, their comfort with each other develops quickly, never leaving the audience time to question their accelerated level of intimacy. It’s as if they know each other perfectly or had a well-paid sex choreographer on retainer. But, truth be told, steamy intense intimacy doesn’t always need to involve gyrations.

What is Movie News After Dark? It’s a nightly movie news and link collection column that is running late, but it’s not sorry about it. Tonight it went to see Cowboys & Aliens, which was a lot of fun. So deal with it. As you know, it is always worth the wait, baby. We begin tonight with the first look at Blake Lively and Chloe Moretz in Hick, which was released as part of the Toronto International Film Festival laying down its Gala and Special Presentation line-up. Lively is a drifter, Moretz is a runaway and in this scene, they’re moving quickly away from something. Perhaps its Lively’s cinematic career thus far. Someone should tell her there’s no escaping that wooden performance in Green Lantern.

For all we know, The Amazing Spider-Man could turn out to be a lot of fun. It does have a lot of things going for it, such as a very solid cast — the likes of Andrew Garfield, Emma Stone, Dennis Leary, Rhys Ifans, the list goes on. It also has a director in Marc Webb who has shown a fair amount of promise. Then there’s the stuff that doesn’t bode well for the franchise reboot, namely the retelling of Spidey’s origin story and, well, this awful trailer. In fairness, it’s not a complete wreck. The first 3/4 of this trailer show some visual panache, some characters we’ll recognize and that same old spider bite. The last bit, one would imagine, is a CGI sequence intended to show off the 3D elements of the film. It looks like something we’d be playing on a Playstation, not seeing a movie theater. See for yourself via the official embed just after the break.

In the newest edition of Entertainment Weekly, Andrew Garfield is keen to point out that his work in the new Amazing Spider-Man isn’t a “replacement” for the work done by Tobey Maguire even though, by definition, it is. While Sony won’t be scouring the world destroying copies of the other movies, Garfield is undoubtedly the new face of the franchise. That status was made official with the first look at his character  in action – perched on a subway train ceiling, clinging to Emma Stone while shirtless and staring over his shoulder dramatically. Ladies and gentlemen, here’s your new Spider-Man:

Don’t be surprised if Emma Stone is very savvy when it comes to killing the undead. With her work in Zombieland, she proved herself to be an apt killer of those who hunger for brains. She will now take those skills and (most likely) apply them in Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, the Craig Gillespie-directed adaptation of the popular Seth Grahame-Smith-written adaptation of the famed Jane Austen book. Phew. She has been offered the lead role of Elizabeth Bennet, according to Heat Vision, who sets off on a quest to find love and independence in a world populated by the undead. The project itself seems to be personifying its main antagonists, continuing to cling to life despite directors leaving, financing problems and a serious lack of cast. Consider Stone to be a step toward actually making it happen. Good or bad, this retread will retread its way toward treading all over your sense and sensibility (see what I did there?) soon.

James Vanderbilt, the man who wrote the script for Sony’s upcoming franchise relaunch The Amazing Spider-Man, has already been put to work writing the script for the sequel. And I don’t mean that he’s just getting some ideas together. Heat Vision reports that he has already met with studio execs, got the thumbs up for his proposal, and has been sent off to put pen to paper. Is this good news? Is this bad news? How do we react to something like this? Not only has the first film yet to be released, it hasn’t even finished shooting. What we might have stumbled upon here with this bite of news is the ultimate example of modern information overload. But, despite all that, I’m kind of happy to hear that a sequel is already in the works. If you would have told me when I was walking out of Spider-Man 3 that I would be looking forward to a reboot of the franchise I would have thought you were crazy. If you told me I would be ready for it only a couple years after Raimi’s trilogy ended I would have had you committed. But here I am kind of looking forward to seeing The Amazing Spider-Man. I think it mostly has to do with the actors. Andrew Garfield really charmed me last year in The Social Network, and Emma Stone is just a doll. I would be looking forward to any project that paired these two promising young names up. [Due to Content Scraping and Theft, we have been forced to try abbreviated feeds. We apologize for any inconvenience this may cause and woud very much appreciate you clicking through to view the full article on FilmSchoolRejects.com]

As 500 Days of Summer director Marc Webb gets closer to putting Andrew Garfield (The Social Network) into Spidey’s spandex, casting of the smaller roles continues. We’ve already got the principles for Sony’s next Spider-Man reboot: Garfield as Parker, Emma Stone as Gwen Stacy, Rhys Ifans as The Lizard, Martin Sheen as Uncle Ben and Sally Field as Aunt May. Now we get to add Denis Leary as George Stacy, the father of Gwen.

Sony’s newly rebooting Spider-Man, under the direction of Marc Webb (500 Days of Summer) and lead of Andrew Garfield (The Social Network) appears to have secured a feisty red-head blonde for its Mary Jane Watson Gwen Stacy. Emma Stone, known for her roles in Superbad, Zombieland and the recently released comedy Easy A, is said to be on the cusp of being has been offered the role. Mary Jane Stacy will be a second primary love interest in this new saga, according to reports, as the film will first introduce (the currently not cast) Gwen Stacy Mary Jane Watson as Peter Parker’s secondary lady. With the casting of Stone, Sony is showing their hand in wanting to take things in a different direction. She’s sexier, sassier and plenty more dynamic and fiery than her predecessor, Kirsten Dunst Bryce Dallas Howard. To say the least, I approve. [Deadline]

This week, Fat Guy Kevin Carr is stuck in an elevator reviewing movies, but he realizes that being in there with the Devil isn’t nearly as bad when you’re also stuck in there with faux-slut Emma Stone. To pass the time, he robs a few banks in The Town of Boston with Ben Affleck and embroiders a scarlet Easy A on his chest. Sigh… if only he had worn a shirt when he did that…