We have a new pic from Tim Burton’s big screen adaptation of 60’s gothic soap opera, Dark Shadows. We get another look at Johnny Depp as vampire Barnabas Collins, this time with Eva Green’s witch, Angelique.

As a fan of the original television show as well as the 90’s remake with Ben Cross, I’m really looking forward to this. I expect creepy and atmospheric from Burton, maybe even campy, but I’m not really expecting ‘dark’. We’ll see.  The cast is certainly capable of going either way.  It includes Michelle Pfeiffer, Helena Bonham Carter, Chloe Moretz, Jonny Lee Miller, Jackie Earle Haley and Christopher Lee.

Dark Shadows opens May 11 in the US and the UK.

Here are two new pics from Rupert Sanders’ Snow White and the Huntsman, with Kristen Stewart as Snow and Chris Hemsworth as the Huntsman.  In one, we have Snow in full armor in attack mode and in the other, Huntsman Hemsworth would seem to be protecting Snow and she appears a tad vexed about it. This is a different take on the Snow White fable. Unlike Tarsem Singh’s candy colored confection Mirror Mirror, Sanders’ version of Snow White is just as tough as the boys and with the Huntsman’s guidance goes into battle to vanquish the Evil Queen (Charlize Theron).  Snow White and the Huntsman opens everywhere June 1.

In other Snow White news: Disney just announced it is proceeding with The Order of the Seven with Saorise Ronan, it’s own version of Snow White and the Seven Dwarves. In it, the dwarves are warriors from all over the world and Snow has become Olivia Sinclair (Ronan).

“The seven are a 19th century-set disparate band of international warriors belonging to a centuries-old order who have lost their way. Their meeting with an Englishwoman being chased by an ancient evil is the catalyst for their redemption. While the project is set in China, the warriors will be from locales near (the U.S.) and far (Russia), and each warrior will have a unique fighting style”

Here is your first look at the new sci-fi action adventure a version of of Judge Dredd simply titled, Dredd. I have hope for this for a few reasons. Chief among them, Sylvester Stallone has been replaced by Karl Urban.  (Not that we’ll see him. He’s confirmed that true to the original comic book character, his helmet will stay put throughout the film.)

The director is Pete Travis, for whom I have a lot of respect. Travis is responsible for two of my favorite Brit miniseries, The Jury (with Gerard Butler, Derek Jacoby, Mark Strong) from 2002 and Henry VIII (with Ray Winstone, Mark Strong, Helena Bonham Carter)from 2004 as well as feature films 2008’s Vantage Point (Dennis Quaid, Forest Whitaker – massive all-star cast) and 2009’s Endgame (Mark Strong and Chiwetel Ejiofor).  The script is by Alex Garland who was responsible for the screenplays for Never Let Me Go, Sunshine, 28 Days Later (’07) and The Beach.  That’s some serious chops involved here.

The basic plot: In a violent, futuristic city where the police have the authority to act as judge, jury and executioner, a cop teams with a trainee to take down a gang that deals the reality-altering drug, SLO-MO.

Dredd also stars Lena Headey, Olivia Thirlby and Domhnall Gleeson. It opens September 21 in the US and the UK.

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The big one this week is undoubtedly Johnny Depp in The Rum Diary.  Based on a novel by Hunter S. Thompson (as was Depp’s 2001 film, Fear & Loathing in Las Vegas),  the movie follows itinerant journalist Paul Kemp (Depp) on an alcohol-fueled journey across the pristine island of Puerto Rico. Adopting the rum-soaked life of the island, Paul soon becomes obsessed with Chenault (Amber Heard) the wildly attractive fiancée of Sanderson (Aaron Eckhart), an American businessman involved in shady development deals. When Kemp is recruited by Sanderson to write favorably about his latest unsavory scheme, the journalist is presented with a choice: to use his words for the corrupt businessman’s financial benefit or use them to take him down.  Rum soaked comedic hijinks abound.

Along for the ride are Giovanni Ribisi and Michael Rispoli as well as the always solid Richard Jenkins as Lotterman, Kemp’s editor at the broken-down newspaper that brought him to Puerto Rico.

The film was announced back in 2003 and finally filmed in early 2009 then languished on the shelf at Film District before becoming one of the last projects out their door in October 2011 before they went belly up.  While the legions of Depp fans certainly didn’t flock to the theaters to see The Rum Diary, it’s worth a look on dvd and it’ll probably do well.

Special Features:

-A Voice Made of Ink and Rage: Inside The Rum Diary
-The Rum Diary Back-Story

Take Shelter centers on Curtis, played by Michael Shannon,  a husband and father who is starting to experience bad dreams and hallucinations. Assuming the same mental illness that tortures his mother and has informed his life, he seeks medical help and counseling. At the same time, just in case his apocalyptic visions are real harbingers of doom, he starts to build an elaborate and expensive storm shelter in his backyard. This storm shelter threatens to tear apart his family, threatens his sanity and his standing in the community. Is he saving his family or ruining it?  Jessica Chastain costars as his wife, Samantha.

This is a film that deserves to be seen. After debuting at Sundance in 2011, Take Shelter screened at Cannes, TIFF and festivals all over the world and received a (VERY) limited release in the US last fall before going the way of most indies…fading into obscurity. Hopefully it will find a wider audience now that it’s on dvd and blu-ray. Shannon gave a powerful awards-worthy performance, as many festivals and critics associations agreed. Both he and the film were on many  “best of” lists for last year and it was definitely one of my personal favorites. (So naturally Oscar completely ignored it.) It has been nominated for five Independent Spirit Awards, including Best Actor for Shannon and Supporting Actress for Chastain. (Of all of the eligible performances she gave this year, why the Academy chose to recognize her for The Help, is beyond my comprehension. I’m not saying her Celia Foote was terrific, but her Samantha is better.)

Here’s a clip from IFC to whet your appetite. It’s one of the disc’s bonus features wherein the film’s director and Shannon’s co-stars discussing just how amazing his performance is:

Special Features:

-Commentary with Jeff Nichols & Michael Shannon
-Behind the Scenes of Take Shelter
-Q&A with Michael Shannon & Shea Whigham
-Better Safe Than Sorry

A sharp comedy making its Criterion Collection debut, 2010’s Tiny Furniture by actress/writer/director Lena Dunham, who got her start making YouTube videos, garnered the twenty-four-year-old comparisons to the likes of Woody Allen.

The filmmaker herself plays Aura, a recent college graduate who returns to New York and moves back in with her mother and sister (played by their real-life counterparts). Though Aura is gripped by stasis and confusion about her future, Dunham locates endless sources of refreshing humor in her plight. As painfully confessional as it is endlessly amusing, Tiny Furniture is an authentic, incisive portrait of a young woman at a crossroads.

Special Features:

-New digital transfer

-Director Lena Dunham talks about filmmaking and autobiography in a new interview

-New interview with writer-director Paul Schrader

-Creative Nonfiction, Dunham's first feature film

-Four short films by Dunham

-Trailer

-PLUS: A booklet featuring an essay by critic Phillip Lopate

And finally, a zombie movie. Who doesn’t love zombies!  The Dead, follows USAF Lt. Brian Murphy who, after crashing off the coast of Africa, battles for survival across the vast terrains of the sub-continent in search of a way to get back to his beloved family. Joined by local military man Daniel Dembele, who is also searching for his son, both men join forces, all the while battling against the ever-present threat of the living dead!  Bwhahahahaha…

Directed by brothers Howard and Jon Ford and starring Rob Freeman, as far as zombie movies go, The Dead is a pretty good one. Check out the trailer:

Special Features:

-Audio Commentary — The Ford brothers join forces once again for this lively and energetic commentary track. The two men talk with a deserving sense of pride in their movie and share memories on shooting on location, the cast and various anecdotes about being on set. Many of the technical tidbits, like make-up effects and working with the people of the area, are quite informative and make the conversation worth a listen for fans.

-Behind the Scenes (SD, 5 min) — Basically, a varied assortment of footage shot during filming, set to music and some comparison scenes of the final product.

-Deleted Scene (SD, 2 min) — This scene is shared with the U.K. release and shows Murphy talking with a doctor.

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It was a mere two months ago that we told you that Disney, in it's infinite wisdom, had pulled the plug on The Lone Ranger, starring Johnny Depp as Tonto. Well, apparently after some major retooling, the film is back on Disney's production schedule with Gore Verbinski still attached to direct and Johnny Depp still attached to star. Not only that, Deadline has confirmed that the film has been given a summer tent-pole opening date of May 31, 2013. Not only does that appear to be a show of faith in the project, but they've also moved semi-sure thing Thor 2 from July 2013 back to November 15, 2013.

At the time of the shutdown,  it had been announced that Prince Andrew Alcott (of the untitled Tarsem Singh Snow White),  Armie Hammer, had been chosen as the Lone Ranger himself and Ruth Wilson ("Luther") had just been added as the female lead. No word yet if they are returning to the fold as well.

The Lone Ranger will go into production February 6 2012. The film was originally supposed to start this fall, but that was before Disney freaked out over the reportedly $275 million + price tag and they shocked the world by putting the kibosh on the whole thing. Makes one wonder if that super massive turkey, The Tourist, made Hollywood rethink Depp's drawing power. Supposedly, Verbinski, producer Jerry Bruckheimer and Depp all did some financial juggling and numbers crunching and brought the budget down to around $215 million.

Johnny Depp fans don't have to wait until 2013 since he will, of course, be seen later this month in The Rum Diary.

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Johnny Depp was on the Hollywood Boulevard at a bar called 25 Degrees over the weekend when he and a  friend fell down really hard, but bounced right back up again. 

It looks like Johnny could be drunk or a bit drunk so chances are he didn't feel too much from the fall. His security was shoving the cameras out of the way but they got a great shot of him in the back of the car giving a 'salute' of some kind. It looks like his friend turned around and knocked Johnny to the ground and he fell on top of him. Who hasn't had an awkward moment like that?

Check out the video.

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Disney did WHAT? Apparently Disney has pulled the plug on a really big deal project. According to Deadline, The Lone Ranger that was supposed to be a tent-pole for the studio in the winter of 2012, has gone so far over the bottom line that Disney had set for it, they’ve shut it down entirely.

Johnny Depp had been signed (a long time ago waiting for this thing to get off the ground) to play Tonto and as recently as a month ago it was announced that one of the Winklevi (okay actually both them) Armie Hammer, had been chosen as the Lone Ranger himself and Ruth Wilson (“Luther”) had just been added as the female lead. Jerry Bruckheimer was producing, Gore Verbinski was directing. This is the combination that made billions for Disney with The Pirates of the Caribbean franchise, which makes the decision all the more mystifying. Apparently the studio only wanted to spend $200 million, but even after slashing $20 million from the budget, the price tag was still hovering around $230 million. When you’re talking numbers like that, $20 million doesn’t seem like a lot, but then neither does the difference between $200 and $230 million. I think we’re all jaded after listening to the government bandy about numbers in the TRILLIONS so much lately.

Part of their financial apprehension comes from the cost-overruns on John Carter, due out in March. That one cost inexcess of $300 million. It had better be damn good to justify that! Pulling the plug on The Lone Ranger is just another sign that the economy has affected even one of the more robust industries we still have left.

In the meantime, there is talk of retooling The Lone Ranger and perhaps evntually rebooting the production, which had been counting on the presence of Depp to lure ticket buyers. They should probably hurry. That’s guy’s booked solid. There are 15 more titles in various stages of production with his name attached. I wouldn’t worry too much about Depp in any case. I’m sure he’s got a “pay or play” clause in his contract (which means he gets paid no matter what.) Armie might be a little too new to the game to warrant one of those, but he’s already got another high profile gig, playing the Prince to Lily Collins’ Snow White in Tarsem Singh’s Untitled Snow White Project. (I think that’s what they should call it.)

Ricky Gervais shared some pretty fabulous news with us via his blog and I have to say, I am pretty stoked.  First of all, Johnny Depp is for sure going to be in the upcoming sitcom ‘Life’s Too Short,’ that will be co-written by Gervais.  Yes!  That is seriously, ridiculously COOL.

Ricky Gervais Invited To Host Golden Globes Again

‘Life’s Too Short‘ follows the exploits of a little person with a larger-than-life personality (Warwick Davis) who runs a talent agency for dwarf performers. The BBC2 series, in development now, is also expected to air on HBO in the States.

Okay, as if that wasn’t enough “happy” news for the day.  Ricky will be guesting on the season finale of The Office coming up on May 19.  OMG.  This is insane.  Will Ferrell…. Ricky Gervais…. BOTH!  I cannot wait!

Photo: WENN