Leo Finally Wins an Oscar!

The 88th Annual Academy Awards... Much props to Leonardo DiCaprio for finally winning a Best Actor trophy for his role as a vengeful bear attack victim on The Revenant tonight! Along with Brie Larson (who won Best Actress for her amazing performance in Room) and Alicia Vikander (who took home the Best Supporting Actress trophy for The Danish Girl), this makes up for The Force Awakens getting ravaged by Mad Max: Fury Road in three of the categories they were both nominated for (Best Sounding Editing, Sound Mixing and Film Editing). The Force Awakens also lost Best Visual Effects to Ex Machina and Original Film Score to The Hateful Eight. Oh well. Maybe Rogue One: A Star Wars Story will win something at the Academy Awards next year...with Episode VIII after that in February of 2018.

And Spotlight won Best Picture while Birdman's Alejandro González Iñárritu repeated as Best Director for helming The Revenant, yadda yadda yadda. If you want to win an Oscar for Best Original Song, write one for a James Bond flick. Just ask Adele for Skyfall and now Sam Smith for Spectre. Carry on.

STAR WARS: EPISODE VIII... Check Out the Video that Announced the Start of Filming!

Earlier today, Lucasfilm posted a press release which confirmed that principal photography on Star Wars: Episode VIII is now in progress. Along with featuring the video below that shows Mark Hamill and Daisy Ridley re-playing the moment where Luke Skywalker and Rey meet at the end of The Force Awakens (the two actors went back to Skellig Michael in Ireland late last year to re-shoot this scene with director Rian Johnson), the press release also confirmed that Benicio Del Toro will indeed be showing up in that Galaxy far, far away next year. Joining him are Laura Dern (from Jurassic Park and Jurassic Park III) and newcomer Kelly Marie Tran. Welcome aboard!

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STAR WARS: EPISODE VIII Has Begun Filming!

According to Disney CEO Bog Iger in an article by Entertainment Weekly, Lucasfilm has just begun principal photography on Star Wars: Episode VIII (out in theaters on December 15, 2017) at Pinewood Studios near London. Along with this news came word that Rogue One: A Star Wars Story (out in theaters this December 16) is looking great in post-production, while pre-production has commenced on Star Wars: Episode IX (which will be released in 2019) as well as the currently-untitled Han Solo spin-off flick (to be released in cinemas in May of 2018). Also, ground is set to be broken at Disneyland in Anaheim, California and Walt Disney World in Orlando, Florida later this year for the amusement parks' much-anticipated Star Wars Land.


Jonathan Olley - ©Lucasfilm 2016

Unlike the announcement for The Force Awakens when it began filming in May of 2014, Disney did not precede today's news with a photo of a table read (the Episode VII table-read photo is shown below) for Episode VIII's screenplay—assuming that a read was actually held (I'm pretty sure there was...as is customary in TV and movie productions). While it is known that essentially everyone except Harrison Ford (unless the late Han Solo appears in a dream sequence or a Force-induced hallucination by Kylo Ren) will be returning for the next installment, we don't officially know which new actors and actresses will join the cast from last December's $900-million-dollar domestic grosser. Just who is Benicio Del Toro playing in Rian Johnson's science-fantasy flick? Stay tuned.

INDEPENDENCE DAY: RESURGENCE... Check Out Its Super Bowl TV Spot and Poster Below!

Yesterday, Twentieth Century Fox unveiled a new TV spot for Independence Day: Resurgence (IDR) during Super Bowl 50. While the 1996 TV spot that aired during the Super Bowl that year showcased the White House getting blown to pieces by a single laser beam fired by an alien destroyer hovering above, this year's ad revealed a new type of way the extraterrestrial invaders will wreak havoc on Earth: By using anti-gravity weaponry that lift entire cities into the air, only to have skyscrapers and everything else come crashing down and wiping out the populace below as a result. The new theatrical poster for IDR was unveiled (above) this morning...showing that the marketing campaign will soon hit full steam on one of this year's most highly-anticipated summer blockbusters.



It would've also been cool if Disney released a teaser for this December's Rogue One: A Star Wars Story during the Big Game as well (I rooted for the Denver Broncos, by the way), but it's all good. Check out the rest of the IDR screenshots and Super Bowl spot below.

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THE FORCE AWAKENS: The $900 Million Threshold Will Soon Be Crossed...

By the end of Super Bowl Sunday (this coming Sunday), The Force Awakens will have achieved two major milestones as it soon completes its historic theatrical run around the world. By the end of tonight, it will have crossed the $900 million domestic box office mark in the United States and Canada, while tomorrow will see J.J. Abrams' uber-successful Star Wars installment passing the $2 billion box office mark internationally. By the end of its run, The Force Awakens will possibly pass Titanic to become the second highest-grossing film worldwide (James Cameron's 1998 Best Picture winner grossed $2.19 billion globally) but fall short of Avatar's mammoth gross (at $2.78 billion) in 2010. Go to Deadline.com for more details.

THE FORCE AWAKENS: The Visual Effects Society Bestows Four Awards (Including the Top Trophy) Onto the Movie!

Much props to Industrial Light & Magic for nabbing four trophies—including the top prize (for Outstanding Visual Effects in a Photoreal Feature)—for Star Wars: The Force Awakens at the 14th annual VES Awards. The Force Awakens had to compete against other 2015 blockbusters such as Mad Max: Fury Road, The Martian and Furious 7 during tonight's ceremony...which was hosted by actor Patton Oswalt and held at the Beverly Hilton hotel in Beverly Hills. Ridley Scott, who directed The Martian as well as the 2001 Best Picture winner Gladiator, took home the VES Lifetime Achievement Award.

The four awards that The Force Awakens won (out of a total of seven nominations) are listed below. I join my fellow Star Wars fans in hoping that this momentous night bodes well for Episode VII in regards to winning the Best Visual Effects trophy at the 88th annual Academy Awards on February 28... Carry on.

Outstanding Visual Effects in a Photoreal Feature:

Star Wars: The Force Awakens
Roger Guyett
Luke O’Byrne
Patrick Tubach
Paul Kavanagh
Chris Corbould

Outstanding Virtual Cinematography in a Photoreal Project:

Star Wars: The Force Awakens; Falcon Chase / Graveyard
Paul Kavanagh
Colin Benoit
Susumu Yukuhiro
Greg Salter

Outstanding Created Environment in a Photoreal Feature:

Star Wars: The Force Awakens; Falcon Chase / Graveyard
Yanick Dusseault
Mike Wood
Justin van der Lek
Quentin Marmier

Outstanding Models in a Photoreal or Animated Project:

Star Wars: The Force Awakens; BB-8
Joshua Lee
Matthew Denton
Landis Fields
Cyrus Jam

Courtesy of Deadline.com

STAR WARS: EPISODE VIII... Rey, Finn and Kylo Ren Set to Return to the Big Screen on December 15, 2017

Considering how successful The Force Awakens was during its record-breaking box office run over the past month or so, it's no surprise that Disney and Lucasfilm have decided to try catching lightning in a bottle twice by changing Star Wars: Episode VIII's release date. Instead of bowing in theaters on May 26, 2017 (which would've marked the 40th anniversary of Star Wars: A New Hope's theatrical debut on May 25, 1977), Episode VIII will instead be unleashed in cinemas seven months later. And just like how Marvel's decision to release Captain America: Cvil War (Marvel is also owned by Disney) on May 6 prompted Warner Bros. to change Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice's release date to March 25 instead (Dawn of Justice was originally intended to come out on May 6 as well), Episode VIII's schedule change has prompted FOX and director James Cameron to indefinitely delay the release of Avatar 2—which was set to debut on Christmas Day, 2017.

FOX cites Cameron's pace on the sequel's lengthy pre-production period as reason for the delay, but it's also likely that the idea of clashing with the follow-up to the most successful domestic film of all time (inflation aside) was another catalyst for not releasing Avatar 2 next year. If it was a choice between going up against Episode VIII in 2017 or the Han Solo spin-off film in December of 2018, I think that FOX would prefer the latter...unless Harrison Ford decides to make a cameo in the Han Solo flick. Carry on.

Suicide Squad...

"We're bad guys. It's what we do." So are the words of Harley Quinn (Margot Robbie) as she, Deadshot (Will Smith), Enchantress (Cara Delevingne), Killer Croc (Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje) and company are recruited by a clandestine government agency to save the world in Suicide Squad. Check out the newest trailer for the upcoming DC Comics film (which opens in theaters nationwide on August 5) below. All I can say is, you can never go wrong with featuring the Queen song 'Bohemian Rhapsody' in a movie trailer. That is all.

"What was that? I should kill everyone and escape? Sorry... The voices. I'm kidding! It's not what they really said." - Harley Quinn

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Meet Matt: Starkiller Base's Radar Technician...

Check out this funny Saturday Night Live skit with Adam Driver reprising his role as the villainous Kylo Ren during last night's SNL broadcast, which Driver hosted. All I can say is, this skit—which spoofed the reality TV show Undercover Boss—was hi-larious! I think I came close to watching this video as many times as I viewed the trailers and TV spots for Star Wars: The Force Awakens themselves. The million dollar question is: Would Undercover Boss: Starkiller Base (a.k.a. Undercover Ren) be considered Star Wars canon? Wouldn't be surprised if the official Star Wars website someday had an article about Lieutenant Colonel Zack and the tragic tale of his son losing his life as a Stormtrooper...to Kylo himself. Plus, I'm curious as to what a calcinator is. I reckon it's a device that checks the calcium levels of First Order personnel who've been stationed at Starkiller Base for a prolonged period of time. Yes, I'm being kinda serious.

"Hearing that Zack lost his son really struck a nerve with me. Especially since I'm the one that killed him." - Matt, the radar technician

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Images of the Day: THE FORCE AWAKENS Posters Courtesy of AMC Theatres!

On every Sunday from December 20th of last year to January 10 (two days ago), AMC Theatres handed out these four cool posters if you watched Star Wars: The Force Awakens in IMAX 3-D at any theater owned by this chain. I'd have to say that my favorite one is the final poster depicting Finn engaged in a lightsaber duel with Kylo Ren (shown at the bottom of this entry); my second favorite (directly below) being of Poe Dameron watching as Resistance X-Wing fighters fly overhead.



I'm wondering if AMC and Lucasfilm/Disney will have this promotional campaign for Rogue One: A Star Wars Story this December as well. In all honesty, I hope not! I dished out at least 15 bucks each time I watched The Force Awakens in so-called premium large format over the past four weeks. That's how the movie currently made more than $813 million domestically at the box office...