Category Archives: Books

Film Focus: Natalie Portman Ventures Into The Unknown In “Annihilation”

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By Creative Media Times

Paramount Pictures

Sometimes movies are only as good as what viewers bring into them. Story-tellers give us the words and actions, and they’re enhanced or diminished by the viewer’s interpretation and point of view.

Such is the case with Annihilation, one of the best sci-fi films released of recent years. It is ambiguous and thought-provoking for being a lot of things, and its lose ends both frustrate and tickle the imagination.

The film opens with Lena (Natalie Portman) in quarantine, being interrogated by a team of doctors about what had happened. She is questioned about the fate of a few characters, to which she replied that some were dead; for the others she mumbled “I don’t know.”

The scene was followed by a meteor crashing on a lighthouse, which produced some sort of an alien zone bounded by a weird energy field (think water color dissolving and floating in the air). The phenomenon apparently happened three years prior and surrounded the Blackwater National Park, and anyone who goes in never comes back. They call it the Shimmer. But what happens inside is unknown.

Enter Kane (Oscar Isaac), Lena’s husband and soldier who mysteriously shows up on her door a year after he ventured into the the Shimmer with an expedition team. But it didn’t take long for Lena to realize that he is no longer the same person, and questioned what had happened during his expedition.

Hoping to find answers, she decides to join an all female team put together by Dr. Venress (Jennifer Jason Leigh), a psychologist who works at the quarantined zone, to trace back her husband’s footsteps inside the Shimmer.

What transpires after this is both intriguing and terrifying.

Not long after they entered, they begin to lose their memory and get disoriented, their sense of time gets out of whack, their navigation equipment and compass start to fail, they get attacked by mutated alligator, and then, in one of the film’s most intense and horrifying scenes, they get attacked by a mutated bear that echoes the screams of one of its victims.

They realize then that it was in fact a suicide mission, and that Dr. Ventress herself has cancer, which explains her abrasive fearlessness to go to the center of the Shimmer. We also see flashbacks of Lena having an affair, the guilt of which led her to the join the expedition. “I owe him,” she said. It appears everyone on the expedition has a reason to be there and, albeit unwittingly, had a baggage which led some to their demise.

Based on the novel by Jeff VanderMeer of the same name, the film is full of allegory, subtext and symbolism, from broader topics of biology, cancer, and environmental damage to more personal issues of depression, suicide and extra-marital affairs. At the center, it is about self-destruction, where human impulses lead to bad decisions.

Director Alex Garland expertly weaves these all together in its near 2 hour run-time. And like his highly acclaimed directorial debut “Ex Machina,” the film is thematically and visually ambitious.

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2017 Top Grossing Domestic Films

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By Creative Media Times

Walt Disney Studio’s latest film in the Star Wars saga is officially the top grossing film of 2017 in North America. As of Sunday, December 31, Star Wars: The Last Jedi has grossed $517 million, ahead of the studio’s own Beauty And The Beast which ended its theatrical run at $504 million.

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New “A Wrinkle In Time” Trailer And Character Posters

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By Creative Media Times

Walt Disney Studios


Happy New Year! What better way to ring in the new year than these new character posters and new TV spot for “A Wrinkle In Time,” Disney’s highly anticipated science fantasy adventure film from director Ava DuVernay.

The motion posters showcase the film’s three pivotal characters, Mrs. Who (Mindy Kaling), Mrs. Which (Oprah Winfrey) and Mrs. Whatsit (Reese Witherspoon), while the trailer shows some of the footage previously released by Disney as well as a look at Meg Murry’s mother Dr. Kate Murry (played by Gugu Mbatha-Raw).

The film tells the story of Meg Murry who, after learning her astrophysicist father is being held captive on a distant planet deep in the grip of a universe-spanning evil, travels the cosmos to save him. Joining her in the rescue adventure through space are his highly intelligent younger brother Charles, and their friend Calvin.

Based on Madeleine L’Engle’s 1962 novel of the same name, the epic adventure was first adapted for a 2003 television film.

‘A Wrinkle in Time’ stars Storm Reid, Reese Witherspoon, Chris Pine, Mindy Kaling, Deric McCabe,Levi Miller, Gugu Mbatha-Raw, André Holland, Michael Peña, Zach Galifianakis, and Oprah Winfrey. The screenplay was written by Jennifer Lee.

Set to be one of the year’s biggest blockbuster hits, ‘A Wrinkle in Time’ opens March 9th, 2018.

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First Look At “The Little Stranger” From Director Lenny Abrahamson

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By Creative Media Times

Focus Features


Focus Features has just revealed a first look image of “The Little Stranger,” from Irish film and television director Lenny Abrahamson.

Based on the 2009 gothic novel of same name by Sarah Waters, The Little Stranger was written by Lucinda Coxon (The Danish Girl) and stars Domhnall Gleeson (Brooklyn) as Dr Faraday, Will Poulter (The Revenant) as Roderick Ayres, Ruth Wilson (The Affair) as Caroline Ayres, and Charlotte Rampling (45 Years) as Mrs Ayres.

Abrahamson recently helmed the Oscar-winning film “Room” (2015) received academy award nominations for best picture and director, as well as earned star Brie Larson a best actress honor.

Focus Features will release The Little Stranger on August 31, 2018.

Here is the film’s official synopsis”

THE LITTLE STRANGER tells the story of Dr Faraday, the son of a housemaid, who has built a life of quiet respectability as a country doctor. During the long hot summer of 1948, he is called to a patient at Hundreds Hall, where his mother once worked. The Hall has been home to the Ayres family for more than two centuries. But it is now in decline and its inhabitants – mother, son and daughter – are haunted by something more ominous than a dying way of life. When he takes on his new patient, Faraday has no idea how closely, and how disturbingly, the family’s story is about to become entwined with his own.

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Fincher Digs Deep In “Mindhunter” Trailer

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By Armando

Netflix


The latest trailer for director David Fincher’s Mindhunter has been released, ahead of its debut on Netflix on October 13, 2017. Produced by Fincher and actress Charlize Theron, the drama series is based on Mark Olshaker and John E. Douglas’s book “Mind Hunter: Inside The FBI’s Elite Serial Crime Unit“.

In the new series, Jonathan Groff plays Holden Ford, an FBI special agent for the agency’s Behavioral Science Unit who interviews imprisoned serial killers in an effort to understand what goes on in a killer’s mind and how they operate.

He is joined by Holt McCallany who plays Bill Tench, and together they pioneer criminal psychology and profiling in its early days of development, and use their research findings to solving ongoing murder investigations.

Set to Talking Heads’ “Psychokiller,” the trailer shows the duo meet Edmund Kemper, also known as the “Coed Killer,” all the while arguing and worrying if their superiors will discover their activities. “Certainly our goal is to be preemptive,” Holden says to Bill. “We’re the FBI, Holden. That is not our goal. Yet,” says Bill.

The book’s author Douglas, himself a notable name in the history of criminal profiling, is the basis of the character Ford, which guarantees some interesting insider stories. He was also previously an inspiration for the Jack Crawford character which appeared in Thomas Harris’ novels such as The Silence of the Lambs. The character was played in the movie of the same name by Scott Glenn.

Netflix seem to have a lot of confidence in what Fincher and co. has crafted that they already renewed it for Season 2. Not surprising since Fincher himself directed Mindhunter’s pilot episode, as he did successfully with Netflix’ House of Cards. It also certainly helps that chronicling characters pursuing killers is familiar turf to Fincher (“Se7en” and “Zodiac” come to mind.)

See Mindhunter’s trailer and official synopsis below:

In the late 1970s two FBI agents expand criminal science by delving into the psychology of murder and getting uneasily close to all-too-real monsters.

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Celebrate 30 Years of Star Trek: The Next Generation with New Book Critiquing Its Alien Lifeforms

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A Field Guide to the Aliens of Star Trek: The Next Generation
By Joshua Chapman, an 11-Year-Old Boy in 1991, Available September 12

Grab a cup of tea (Earl Grey, hot) and enjoy a good read in your command chair. In honor of Star Trek: TNG’s 30th anniversary this September, Devastator Press – the only all-humor press in America – is releasing A Field Guide to the Aliens of Star Trek: The Next Generation. The guide is an informative, exhaustive, and surprisingly personal ranking of every alien lifeform in the series and the TNG films, as written by a boy in the ’90s.

The book collects a series of popular handmade zines attributed to “Joshua Chapman,” thousands of which sold in bookstores across the country. Chapman allegedly began the zines as a class project when he was 11-years-old and the hit sci-fi series was still on the air. He continued rating aliens through his awkward teen years. The book was edited and compiled by Zachary Auburn, author of the bestselling satire How to Talk to Your Cat About Gun Safety.
Continue reading →

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Amazon Studios And Ridley Scott To Develop “The Beast Is An Animal”

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By Creative Media Times

Margaret K. McElderry Books

Peternelle van Arsdale’s dark atmospheric fantasy debut ‘The Beast is an Animal’ is being developed by Amazon Studios into a movie. According to Variety, the project will be developed by Ridley Scott’s Scott Free Productions production company. Directors Bert & Bertie, who previously helmed Dance Camp (2016), are set to direct and the adapt the film.

Released earlier this year by Margaret K. McElderry Books, BCCB describes the book as a “horrifying tale of revenge, murder, and evil.”

Scott Free Productions is behind Ridley Scott’s own Alien: Covenant released early this summer, as well as “Blade Runner 2049”, sequel to 1982’s classic Blade Runner and a remake to “Murder on the Orient Express”.

Here is the book’s synopsis per its profile on Amazon:

Alys was seven the first time she saw the soul eaters.These soul eaters are twin sisters who were abandoned by their father and slowly grew into something not quite human. And they feed off of human souls. When her village was attacked, Alys was spared and sent to live in a neighboring village. There the devout people created a strict world where fear of the soul eaters—and of the Beast they believe guides them—rule village life. But the Beast is not what they think he is. And neither is Alys.

Inside, Alys feels connected to the soul eaters, and maybe even to the Beast itself. As she grows from a child to a teenager, she longs for the freedom of the forest. And she has a gift she can tell no one, for fear they will call her a witch. When disaster strikes, Alys finds herself on a journey to heal herself and her world. A journey that will take her through the darkest parts of the forest, where danger threatens her from the outside—and from within her own heart and soul.

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Book Review: The Shadow Land

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By Elizabeth Walker

If you don’t know a lot about the history of post-war Eastern Europe, prepare to be drawn in. Elizabeth Kostova’s newest novel is set in Bulgaria, both in the forties/fifties and new millennium. The Shadow Land tells two stories in parallel – one about a violinist named Stoyan Lazarov, another about a recent college graduate – and interweaves them in a masterful tale of grief, mystery, and adventure.

Alexandra is in her early twenties and has lived the past decade in the shadow of her brother’s untimely death. In attempt to both escape Jack’s memory and yet also become closer to it, she chooses to teach English in Bulgaria. On her first day in this foreign land, she crosses paths with a family en route to bury the ashes of Stoyan Lazarov. When Alexandra mistakenly picks up the ashes, she becomes a player in Stoyan’s fascinating story. She makes friends with Bobby, a philosopher poet, and together they travel across the country trying to unravel the intricacies of Stoyan Lazarov’s life and return the ashes to the family.

Most readers will be familiar with the horrific stories of Hitler’s concentration camps, but many remain oblivious to the violence inflicted on political prisoners under other administrations. The Shadow Land gives gruesome depictions of the pain and disease these people experience often based only on trumped-up charges. The fact that these atrocities are experienced by a gifted musician only serve to make them more ghastly.

The Shadow Land does drag at times. The way Kostova describes Alexandra’s grief does not seem wholly believable, and it is easy to be exhausted by the cyclic, repetitive nature of Alexandra and Bobby’s search for the Lazarov family. Essentially they spend hundreds of pages going to a place, not finding the Lazarovs, and going somewhere else.

That said, Kostova has obviously painstakingly researched her setting and has woven an intricate mystery comparable to her debut novel, The Historian. This makes the reader want to stick with The Shadow Land, despite its length, less to find out what happens to Alexandra than to the gifted musician and the family who want to offer him eternal peace.

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Nicholas Hoult Eyed To Play Young Tolkien

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By Creative Media Times

Nicholas Hoult by GabboT


Nicholas Hoult is in early talks to play as author J.R.R. Tolkien in Fox Searchlight and Chernin Entertainment’s “Tolkien,” Deadline reports Tuesday.

The film will be directed by Finnish film director Dome Karukoski, from a script by Stephen Beresford and David Gleeson.

J. R. R. Tolkien was the author of the fantasy classics The Lord of the Rings, originally a sequel to his children’s fantasy The Hobbit, then later turned into three volumes The Fellowship of the Ring, The Two Towers and The Return of the King. Since then, The Lord of the Rings has become one of the best selling novels ever, and together with The Hobbit became the source for Peter Jackson’s blockbuster hit films.

According to Deadline, the film will focus on the orphaned Tolkien’s experiences during his youth on the outbreak of World War I, experiences which influenced his work on The Lord of the Rings novels.

Hoult gained recognition from his role as a divergent schoolboy Marcus Brewer in 2002’s critical and boxoffice hit About A Boy. He also played Nux in George Miller’s Mad Max: Fury Road and as Hank McCoy/Beast on three X-Men films (X-Men: First Class, X-Men: Days of Future Past, X-Men: Apocalypse). He will reprise the role in next year’s X-Men: Dark Phoenix.

In addition to Tolkien, Hoult seem to attract real life character roles in biographical dramas lately. Later this year, he will be playing another celebrated author J. D. Salinger in Danny Strong’s Rebel in the Rye and then as inventor Nikola Tesla in this December’s “The Current War.”

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First Trailer For “The Greatest Showman”

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By Armando

20th Century Fox


20th Century Fox just released the first trailer for it’s biographical musical drama about P.T. Barnum, the man who “invented” show-business.

Starring Hugh Jackman as the showman himself, the film follows the story of Barnum, founder of the circus that later became a circus traveling company “Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus” in the 19th century.

His shows were once billed “The Greatest Show on Earth”, and served as the setting for that 1952 movie of the same title which starred Charlton Heston.

The trailer shows Barnum being unemployed, then later recruiting unique talents and inspiring them for his famous circus acts. “No one ever made a difference by being like everyone else,” says Barnum.

Jackman is also the producer of the film, along with Laurence Mark. Some might remember that Jackman showcased his musical skills while hosting The 81st Annual Academy Awards in 2009, an event which Laurence Mark co-produced with Bill Condon, who is now credited as co-author of the screenplay for The Greatest Showman. Its interesting how Hollywood works, huh.

The film is directed by Michael Gracey who is currently attached on another biopic, “Rocketman”, based on Elton John with Tom Hardy attached to star. Also in The Greatest Showman are Zac Efron, Michelle Williams, Rebecca Ferguson and Zendaya. The film is slated for release later this year on December 25.

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