It’s been difficult to pin down what exactly happened to writer/director Andrew Niccol after his 1997 debut, Gattaca, but theories ranged from him having been replaced with a lookalike to him having had a stroke. A double feature of S1mone and In Time suggests the latter, but what then to make of the film sandwiched between them? Lord of War is a blackly comic morality play that never saw the eyeballs it deserved, but as if he were being punished for creating something thought-provoking, he disappeared for the next six years only to return in 2011 with a legitimately terrible, feature-length wrist-watch commercial starring Justin Timberlake. The release of his latest film sees him once again crafting lazy, simplistic sci-fi, this time adapting a novel by bestselling hack Stephenie Meyer, but in addition to being laughably bad, The Host may actually offer an answer to the question above. What happened to turn the man behind Gattaca and The Truman Show into a seemingly clueless boob who thinks shiny, silver cars and idealized talk about mankind’s value are enough to qualify a film as speculative fiction? Having seen the movie the answer seems so obvious now. An intergalactic jellyfish slipped into a paper cut fifteen years ago, curled up around his brain stem, smothered his creativity, talent and curiosity and then turned his body into a fleshy, bipedal rental car. And Niccol’s been fighting to be heard from the back seat ever since.

What is Casting Couch? It’s where Hollywood moms come every day to find out if their actor kids have gotten a job. Remember that movie about the day JFK got shot that Tom Hanks was putting together because these days he’s such a history loving, lame dad? It’s called Parkland, and it just put together an awesome cast. According to Collider, director Vincent Bugliosi has signed the terrific trio of Paul Giamatti, Jackie Weaver, and Billy Boy Thornton to headline the cast. There’s no word on what characters they’ll be playing, but my guess is Giamatti will be JFK, Thornton will be Jackie O, and Weaver will be Lee Harvey Oswald. Makes sense, no?

Every day, come rain or shine or internet tubes breaking, Film School Rejects showcases a trailer from the past. Today’s trailer is truly thrilling. It helps that it’s for an insanely brilliant movie, but since movie marketers today can’t seem to sell the hard stuff, maybe this spot can teach a few lessons in doing it right. William Hurt teams up with Ken Russell to do a few experiments on himself in a sensory deprivation tank that ends up unlocking the millions of years of mankind’s memories stored DNA. It causes his arm to do some pretty strange stuff at any rate. Such a great movie. Such a great trailer. Think you know what it is? Check the trailer out for yourself:

This week, Fat Guy Kevin Carr isn’t a very merry man, taking a look at Robin Hood, Letters to Juliet and Just Wright.

It appears as if William Hurt is now set to play one of the men who were present at the signing of one of the most important charters in British history. It is likely that is won’t make it into Ridley Scott’s new movie, though.

In the tradition of X-Men and Spider-Man, this version of The Incredible Hulk is a solid adaptation for the big screen that retains its comic book feel.

We are not kidding about this, unfortunately — the AMAA is claiming that there is too much smoking in The Incredible Hulk, and that it should be downgraded to an R rating. Personally, we want to know what they’re on…

After the emotionally draining experience that was Iron Man in early May, the fanboy inside of me was sure that there was no way that Marvel Studios could go two-for-two in the Summer of ’08. Go figure, I was wrong.

After being in comic books, on television and in a feature film in 2003, the Hulk franchise is getting rebooted. Like the television series, this film finds Bruce Banner (Edward Norton) on the run, trying to discover a cure for the gamma radiation that turns him into the Hulk when he gets angry.

Why does it feel like The Incredible Hulk is the odd-man out when it comes to this year’s summer movie line-up? In my mind, it has something to do with the slow manner in which Universal Studios has marketed the film, waiting until only recently to release the first teaser trailer. Or at least, that is how it may seem. Few people realize that The Incredible Hulk is seemingly on pace with movies that come out near it, namely The Dark Knight. What might have thrown us all off is the barrage of media being thrown out there for Iron Man, Marvel’s other big superhero flick this summer. We forget that Iron Man will be here in a few weeks (Yes!), while Hulk is still a few months away. But enough about the waiting game, today we have something new, courtesy of National CineMedia. It doesn’t show us much more footage from the film than the first trailer, which isn’t much at all, but it does go into the story a bit. This should help explain the non-origin story better for those who were worried. Personally, I am warming up to The Hulk, getting excited, and hoping that he doesn’t get buried in the mix of summer movie marketing all at the same time. Watch the behind-the-scenes featurette below: [flv:http://media.filmschoolrejects.com/clips/incredible-hulk-bts.flv 480 290] The Incredible Hulk is directed by Louis Leterrier, who previously brought us The Transporter series. The script was written by Zak Penn (X-Men 2, X-Men 3) and then

Henry Bean’s latest film, Noise, about a man who tries to silence New York City by breaking into cars and disconnecting the alarms is based on a true story. It’s partly his own. I don’t just mean he wrote the script. I mean it’s based on his own life.

Al Gore has global warming. Rev. Jim Phelps has homosexuality. Uwe Boll has film critics. Everyone needs something to fight whether it matters to the rest of the world or not and director Henry Bean takes noise pollution to task in his sarcastic, clever, witty David and Goliath comedy Noise.

You know it’s better than yours…

Three down and almost out strangers become unlikely friends and seek to help each other as they journey through the tough part of their lives.

The Yellow Handkerchief seems like a very odd film, but I am a least interested.

We all have guilty pleasures. Chocolate. Hannity & Colmes. John Tesh music. Snorting blow off the buttocks of a Thai hooker. The one thing all those have in common though is their general acceptance by polite society. My own guilty pleasure is more embarrassing than these, and I rarely find myself able to talk about it without fear of recrimination and judgment. I like Kevin Costner. This is not a new affliction for me. I’ve been a fan since he stole Silverado from the more seasoned ensemble around him. The rest of the movie-going public joined me in the late eighties through the early nineties as he churned out hit after hit… movies that not only made money but were actually damn entertaining. No Way Out, The Untouchables, Bull Durham, Field of Dreams, Dances With Wolves… How quickly people forget. Granted the man then went on to make some incredibly bad movies, like 3000 Miles to Graceland, which was without question the worst film released in 2001. (Yes, the same year that saw Freddy Got Fingered, Pearl Harbor, and Britney Spears’ Crossroads.) But mixed in with the bad and mostly mediocre there have been some great performances in really good films… Tin Cup and The Upside of Anger come immediately to mind. Which brings me to the newly released DVD of Costner’s latest film, Mr. Brooks. Costner plays Earl Brooks. Husband, father, businessman, serial killer… This isn’t a spoiler as the movie’s entire advertising campaign was built around Costner’s portrayal

I didn’t expect to like Mr. Brooks although I was originally intrigued by the idea of Robin Hood playing a serial killer.