The Man With the Iron Fists is an ambitious first feature film. Not only because it cost more than the average directorial debut, but it’s from a nearly nonexistent genre with an unproven director at the helm in the form of rapper-turned-actor-turned-director RZA. Many would scoff at this project, but one man who didn’t is Eli Roth. It became a labor of love for both RZA and Roth, who came on as both a producer and co-writer of the film. From the sounds of it, RZA and Roth wanted to make the Star Wars of Kung-Fu movies. The long haul process of making the movie was about achieving that level of scope and world-building with a small amount of means, which is $15m, to be exact. Still, with that amount of money, The Man With the Iron Fists isn’t as big of a financial risk as it is a creative one. This wasn’t an easy project to get going, but as Roth told us, nothing worthwhile is ever easy. Here is what The Man with the Iron Fists producer and co-writer Eli Roth had to say about the scope of the film, the importance of filmmaker buddies, and how Five Easy Pieces inspired Cabin Fever:

RZA is excited for The Man with the Iron Fists. Whether it’s of high-quality or not, the Wu-Tang Clan leader got to make a martial arts movie — and, to sweeten the deal, as his first film to boot. That’s something to get giddy over, the chance of introducing an audience to a whole new world. Based on his name drop of Star Wars, that’s what RZA set out to do. Some may be surprised RZA is taking a crack behind the camera, but speaking with the writer/director while on his Man with the Iron Fists tour, we learned it’s been a dream ever since he was a kid. Now that the dream has come true, The Man with the Iron Fists already seems to have built up his directorial stock, considering all the projects he’s been signing on to make. Hopefully we’ll see more movies from him where he’ll, once again, tell his crew, “I want him looking like fucking Rod Stewart.” Here’s what RZA had to say about the sober mind directing requires, controlling a team of 400 people, and the importance of preparation:

This Tuesday is the 20th anniversary of the theatrical release of Reservoir Dogs, the film that not only put Quentin Tarantino on the map as an era-defining filmmaker but also gave the 3rd wave ska scene its own Phenix City Story (or Guns of Navarone or Dr. No or Scarface). Never mind the movie’s immediate legacy, though, because two decades later the story of “five total strangers” who “team up for the perfect crime” has outlasted the oddly inaccurate marketing (i.e. those lines from the posters, which also feature Chris Penn in a suit), the many copycats, the ska album samplings and even the overshadowing success and popularity of Pulp Fiction as the director’s big breakthrough to remain a significant pioneer and classic of American independent cinema. During its run in U.S. cinemas, which followed a debut at Sundance and appearances at Cannes and Toronto, not to mention earlier openings in parts of Europe, Reservoir Dogs never played on more than 61 screens, yet it earned close to $3 million. I’m certain it never hit my town in the suburbs, but I recall the first time ever hearing about it via a drawing of an ear in Entertainment Weekly illustrating a short note about the famously violent scene (my memory of this could be slightly off). And like so many of the film’s fans, I didn’t see it until the video came out the following Spring, at which time the torture bit became just one of numerous memorable moments. In

If you want to go into Django Unchained unspoiled, then watching the second trailer isn’t the brightest idea. While the first teaser was all about attitude, this one is much more story heavy. It has the set up, the conflict, and some rather spectacular money shots. A few of those shots may be best to experience on the big screen first, so if you want to go in fresh, stick with the first trailer. However, if you want to see more of a slave owning Leonardo DiCaprio, then check it out:

This content series is in partnership with smartwater. smartwater, good taste travels well. Click here to learn more. It’s widely known that Quentin Tarantino worked at a video store before making it big, but it’s a widely held misconception that he earned his movie education while restocking the shelves of Video Archives. The filmmaker told MSN in 2009: “I want to clear something up about this. People always say I became a movie expert by working in a video store. I was employed by the video store because I was a movie expert. Before I went to Video Archives, I’d get the TV guide every week and read it cover to cover. Look at every movie playing. Circle all the movies I was gonna record. When I first discovered Howard Hawks, I spent a year and a half reading the TV guide and they played about 80 per cent of his entire oeuvre on Los Angeles TV.” Obviously, “Watch as Many Movies as Possible,” isn’t much of a secret, but it’s a more honest, tougher-to-take method for success than our vision of Tarantino soaking up movie knowledge through osmosis in Manhattan Beach. The secret involves a lot more homework. In that same spirit, here are 3 other secret ingredients that made great films as great as they are (and in some cases, possible at all).

The moviegoing world was saddened earlier this week when it was learned director Tony Scott had died. Despite the manner of his death, it’s no less sad when a filmmaker such as Scott, who continued making films well into his 60, had many more films to helm. We felt it was time to hear some filmmaking insight from the man himself, which leads us to True Romance. The movie itself is a modern classic, an energetic tale of love, drugs, and a whole bunch of bullets courtesy of fledgling – at the time – screenwriter Quentin Tarantino. He also provides a commentary for the film, a rarity for the Pulp Fiction writer/director, but we’ll cover that another time. This is Tony Scott’s time, and here, without further ado, are all the things we learned listening to him speak about his film, True Romance.

RZA punches someone’s eyeball out of its socket. That should be all you need to know to skip all this drivel and watch the red band trailer for the rapper’s directorial debut, The Man with the Iron Fists. Presented by Quentin Tarantino and co-writer Eli Roth, this kung fu flick looks bloody, ridiculous, and wonderful. It stars Lucy Liu, Russell Crowe, Jamie Chung, Rick Yune, Daniel Wu and a host of others in a plot that seems more like an excuse for constant on-screen melees and an empty weapons rack. Seven warring clans…a shipment of gold…yeah, yeah, yeah. Just keep kicking metric tons of ass and turning your body into bronze. Check it out for yourself (and click to change the setting to HD while you’re at it):

As many of you might have guessed, Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter is what one might call a craze-induced summer blockbuster. The United States’ 16th President hunting vampires is actually the least of the film’s bizarro nature; this is a film with a vampire throwing a horse and the weaponization of forks against confederate vampire soldiers. Making all of this a world audiences can buy into isn’t a simple task for an actor, but Mary Elizabeth Winstead and the rest of the cast  go about it as seriously as they can. Timur Bekmambetov made a very specific film, yet Winstead is acting in one of her own since, when 99% of the lunacy is happening onscreen, Mary Todd Lincoln usually isn’t around. When she is onscreen, Winstead faces another kind of challenge with her extensive makeup. Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter marks another entry in Winstead’s career with a world-building director at the helm, and, speaking with us at the press day, that seems like the main appeal for projects such as these. Here is what Mary Elizabeth Winstead had to say about Timur Bekmambetov’s “idea machine” method of directing, the specificity in physical & dialog-driven action, and the strong life of Scott Pilgrim vs. the World:

No one would blame you if you were under the impression that Quentin Tarantino‘s Django Unchained had finished casting, especially since we’ve seen no less than two trailers and rumors swirled that the film could have unfurled some footage at last month’s Cannes Film Festival, but apparently the film isn’t quite done lining up talent. Deadline Burlingame reports that Jonah Hill is now set for an unspecified role in the upcoming film. While we don’t know who Hill will play, we know who he won’t – Scotty Harmony, a part he was originally being looked at for when the production was initially starting casting. Harmony is “the kid who loses Django’s slave wife Broomhilda (Kerry Washington) to Calvin Candie, a charming but utterly evil plantation owner, played by Leonardo DiCaprio, which sets up a showdown with Django, the former slave turned bounty hunter played by Jamie Foxx.” Even if we don’t know what Hill’s role will be, it signals the Oscar-nominated star’s continued wing-stretching when it comes to his works.

Quentin Tarantino‘s Inglourious Basterds was one of the best films of 2009, if not the best, and it was also his first foray into history. He’s returning to theaters this Christmas with a movie that goes even further back in time to tackle our nation’s sordid past and present love of violent comeuppance and cameos. Django Unchained stars Jamie Foxx as a slave named Django who enters into a deal with a fastidious dentist (Christoph Waltz) for his freedom. If Django helps the good doctor find and identify some wanted men he’ll be granted his freedom as well as the chance at rescuing his wife (Kerry Washington) from a sadistic land baron (Leonardo DiCaprio). The film promises bloody violence and action, sharp dialogue and a dark sense of humor which is exactly the kind of movie you want to watch on Christmas. Check out the new international trailer below.

Yesterday’s brief first look at Quentin Tarantino‘s Django Unchained in motion was interesting and compelling enough to warrant a full post on it, despite the video being unfortunately over-laden with all sorts of Entertainment Tonight branding. That was certainly good news for fans of the auteur, but thirty or so seconds of minced-together bits from one of the year’s most anticipated films is just that – thirty or so seconds of minced-together bits. While we’ll have to wait until the end of the year to see the full film, Django‘s first full trailer has finally arrived, and – well, it’s certainly a Tarantino trailer. Surprisingly enough, this first look puts quite a bit of emphasis on Christoph Waltz‘s bounty hunter, Dr. King Schultz, with Jamie Foxx‘s escaped slave Django playing a quiet second fiddle until things get really going towards the end. Of course, Leonardo DiCaprio pops up again as the evil plantation owner Calvin Candie, but he’s limited to much of what we already saw yesterday. Style, pop, flash, head nods, dead bodies, and a revisionist take on history, yes, this is a fine first look indeed. Watch it after the break.

As is becoming scarily prevalent, Entertainment Tonight has nabbed a very cool first look at a film that most of their viewership probably don’t give a flying you-know-what about, but thems the breaks. This time around, it’s a first look at Quentin Tarantino‘s Django Unchained, and while this video spot is overlaid with bad voiceover, flying logos, and that zingy old ET jingle, buried underneath that is some great, great stuff. In less than thirty seconds, you’ll catch a first listen at Leonardo DiCaprio going Southern, a first look at some dazzling facial hair on DiCaprio, Jamie Foxx, and Christoph Waltz, along with lots of shooting, winking, and nodding. You know, like any good Tarantino film. The spot doesn’t let you forget that tomorrow! tomorrow! TOMORROW! we’ll be getting a more sizable look at the film’s first scenes, but this is good enough for a watch right now.

Based on very positive buzz from Cannes, thanks to some special footage airing, Quentin Tarantino‘s Django Unchained is already picking up quite a bit of steam, so it’s no surprise that more marketing materials are surfacing. We’ll get our first look at the film’s teaser trailer when it plays in front of Ridley Scott’s Prometheus in a few short weeks, but for now, we’re just going to have to make do with some new stills from the film and just imagine all that snappy dialogue and shocking violence that Tarantino surely has in store for us. This new batch features glimpses of Jamie Foxx, Christoph Waltz, Leonardo DiCaprio, and a ton of guns and smoking. If that doesn’t scream “spaghetti Western!” to you, well, maybe you’re a traditionalist, but everything we’ve seen from Tarantino’s latest so far has been quite encouraging, and these stills are no exception. Check out a few more Django Unchained pictures after the break!

Right from its very beginning, Quentin Tarantino’s upcoming spaghetti Western wannabe Django Unchained was a project whose casting rumors involved far more actors than could have actually been included in its cast. In addition to names being thrown around that just turned out to be wishful thinking, actors like Jonah Hill and Joseph Gordon-Levitt were said to be close to taking roles in the film, but ultimately never signed up due to scheduling conflicts. Even Kevin Costner, who had signed on to play the role of Ace Woody, eventually had to be replaced by Kurt Russell because of scheduling issues. What’s the deal with all of these scheduling issues? What does Tarantino have going on out there in the desert? There may be no hard and fast answers to that question coming, but what is clear is that, even though shooting on the film has commenced, two more names have now dropped out of the cast. The Film Stage brought to our attention that, during an appearance on Howard Stern, Sacha Baron Cohen announced that he wouldn’t be able to make his planned appearance in the film due to promotional commitments for The Dictator. Soon after, Variety’s Jeff Sneider broke the news on Twitter that Kurt Russell had also left the cast.

Inglourious Basterds was one of 2009′s best films, and depending on who you ask (re: me) it’s also writer/director Quentin Tarantino‘s finest film to date. His first real foray into a period piece mixed World War II action and intrigue with memorable characters and performances, sharp wit and a smart script. The Academy Award-nominated result was also his highest grossing film worldwide. And now he’s back hoping to recreate that success with Django Unchained. Once again he’s pairing high profile actors and a historical setting, but this time his genre mash-up combines the spaghetti western with 70′s era blaxploitation. The film stars Jamie Foxx as a slave freed by a bounty hunter (Christoph Waltz) in exchange for help in catching and killing a pair of wanted men. Django’s ultimate goal however is to find his wife (Kerry Washington) who’s fallen into the hands of a dastardly fellow named Calvin Candie (Leonardo DiCaprio) whose plantation, Candie Land, is home to gladiator-like battles between slaves forced to fight for their survival. EW.com has just posted the first two pics from the film showing DiCaprio, Waltz and Foxx in character. Christmas Day can’t come soon enough.

Recently, Flavorwire got a kick out of a post from Slacktory where they used that ever-present man behind the curtain called Google to see what our internet age connects with celebrities. Then, we got a kick out of Flavorwire’s answer which involved 25 famous authors and what the search engine had to say. The experiment is simple. Type a name into Google Image Search, and the program automagically suggests more words to narrow down your search. Judging from entries like “white people problems” for J.D. Salinger and “death, oven, daddy” for Sylvia Plath, it seems like Google might be kinder to famous movie directors. Some of the responses fully encapsulate the person’s artistic output while others push toward the fringe, but all are shaped by what we’re searching for. Here’s a few things Google thinks you should add to the names of some of your favorite filmmakers.

A week and a half ago, Anthony Hemingway’s Red Tails was released. On the surface, the film breathes Hollywood oxygen through-and-through. It’s a WWII era action film that uses its setting for broad family-friendly cheese-banter and CGI-heavy eye candy rather than an opportunity for a sober interrogation of history. Red Tails looks and feels like any Hollywood film geared toward as mass an audience as possible. But the studio that’s distributing it – 20th Century Fox – didn’t pay a dime to produce it. The reported $58 million cost to make Red Tails came solely out of the pocket of producer George Lucas, who had been attempting to get a film about the Tuskegee Airmen made since the early 1990s. He was continually met with resistance from a studio system that saw anything less than the biggest guaranteed appeal to the largest possible audience as a “risk,” including a heroic true story about African-American airmen. The ideology that closed the doors on George Lucas of all people reflects the same business mentality that inspired Jeffrey Katzenberg’s lengthy warning to other studios in a memo written during the same years that Lucas was first trying to get Red Tails financed.  In the memo, Katzenberg warned studios regarding their practice of exponentially centralizing all their resources in a few very expensive projects, resulting in high risk, little room for experimentation, and an increasing reliance on that coveted monolith known as the “mass audience” (which, to make things even more complicated, now includes

While looking through most critics’ best of 2011 write-ups, I mostly kept wondering when we were going to get Quentin Tarantino‘s list. His best of 2010 rankings had some odd picks, by most standards. And, to no real surprise, his 2011 list has some… unconventional picks as well. For example, Tarantino counts The Three Musketeers and Red State amongst the best, while Oren Moverman‘s fantastic Rampart made his worst section. You gotta give the man credit, he’s unquestionably got an acquired taste and stands out.

I break Quentin Tarantino’s career up into two stages. The first stage consists of his first three films, which are all crime movies, are all set in L.A., and which all just feel very much like “Quentin Tarantino movies” (a genre unto itself back in the 90s, if you lump in all the pretenders). After those first three films, he took a pretty lengthy six year break, and then he came back and started exploring other genres, making movies that were largely homages to the B-cinema he enjoyed in his youth. While there’s a soft spot in my heart for most of Inglorious Basterds, in general I prefer that first stage of Tarantino’s career to what came after. And as far as that first trilogy of crime films goes, I think most people are in agreement that Pulp Fiction is the masterpiece. It was the one that broke down the doors of the movie industry and ushered indie filmmaking into the mainstream, and it’s the one most often referenced when people talk about his career; so I’m not going to focus on that one here. I’m going to focus instead on Tarantino’s debut feature Reservoir Dogs, which was the film that first got heads turned in his direction, and which still gets mentioned right alongside Pulp Fiction as badass things from the 90s. And also I’m going to focus on Jackie Brown, which is kind of the forgotten Tarantino film. This is one that doesn’t get brought up much these

It’s one thing when we’re talking about Alfred Hitchcock having a walk-through in every single one of his films, including one that exclusively takes place on a lifeboat (he appears in a newspaper ad for that one). Sure it’s eccentric but it’s not surprising because, well, they’re his films and he can appear in them as he pleases. What does strike me as weird is when a director shows up totally unexpected in someone else’s film. Usually there is a good reason – either they are producing the film or friends with the cast. However despite the later explanation, it’s still a bit jarring to see, say… the director of Kill Bill in an Adam Sandler comedy…