Rama's Screen

Ever since Gore Verbinsky who directed all three Pirates Of The Caribbean said he won’t be handling the fourth installment, Disney has been trying to find a worthy replacement, I didn’t think it’d be a big problem, any director would love a chance to work with Johnny Depp. This past summer, it was said that that one of the top candidates was Rob Marshall (Chicago, Memoirs Of A Geisha). I think Marshall is a great director, but God forbid he turns PIRATES OF THE CARIBBEAN: ON STRANGER TIDES into a musical movie, I’m exaggerating of course. Well, Marshall’s involvement has been confirmed, he said it himself… Read the rest of this entry »

I don’t know about you but I’m a big fan THE RING remake back in 2002 directed by Gore Verbinski before his Pirates of the Caribbean days. The reason was that I’d watched the original Japanese version, RINGU and it didn’t come close to how freaky, creepy and diabolically twisted Verbinski’s version was. I remember watching it in the theater, feeling the suspense so much so that I could hear my heartbeat going faster and faster. What an excellent remake.. hey, I should make a top 10 list of decent remakes.
Unfortunately THE RING 2 (2005) was a total disaster. Director Hideo Nakata completely ruined it with those stupid deers, how was that supposed to scare us?!

The Japanese RINGU was actually a trilogy and BloodyDisgusting has heard there is talk of making THE RING 3 in 3D. A third installment to the story about the video tape that can cause the death of anyone in a week of viewing it. No more info beyond that for now. But this goes to show that horror genre is riding on the 3D action like it’s nobody business. MY BLOODY VALENTINE 3D, FINAL DESTINATION 3D, the upcoming THE HOLE 3D, HALLOWEEN 3D, RESIDENT EVIL: AFTERLIFE in 3D, SAW VII in 3D… am I missing anything? To refresh your memory, check out what made the 2002 THE RING so awesome, after this jump… Read the rest of this entry »

BIOSHOCK survives! The death of Halo movie is not contagious and Gore Verbinski’s departure did not shake Universal’s faith to under the sea to bring this video game adaptation to the big screen. Variety has spoken that the director of 28 Weeks Later, Juan Carlos Fresnadillo is going to be the helmer of BIOSHOCK using the script written by John Logan. Verbinski is still attached as a producer.

Quick recap here, a while back Universal put a temporary stop to the effort of BIOSHOCK Movie and even had to let go some of the staff mainly because the studio thought a budget of $160 Million is too damn costly. Universal and director Verbinski have been looking for ways to find a more reasonable budget, one way is to try and shoot the film in London or anywhere outside the U.S. to take advantage of a tax credit. But Verbinski didn’t want to go abroad and eventually had to let go because he wanted to work on Paramount’s animated movie Rango starring his Pirates of the Caribbean star Johnny Depp and now we’re here.

Quite a gamble, from a director of one of the biggest franchises ever to a director that’s barely known. Many even have said 28 Weeks Later was mediocre compared to its predecessor, the Danny Boyle-directed 28 Days Later.
The studio and Fresnadillo agreed to film BIOSHOCK offshore.
In the video game’s story, barely surviving a plane crash, a pilot lands in icy uncharted waters and discovers an undersea city called Rapture, a failed utopia whose citizens had embraced genetic engineering before the city descended into pure anarchy. Power and greed have run amok and the city has succumbed to civil war. It is a gripping game that forces the pilot to make complex moral choices.

It’s been a year now since the first announcement that Gore Verbinski would be bringing the popular video game BIOSHOCK to the big screen. But then he took on all kinds of projects along the way including RANGO, CLUE, THE HOST The Remake, I’m not sure why he said yes to so many. And the unexpected happened, a couple of months ago, Universal put a temporary stop to the effort of BIOSHOCK Movie and even had to let go some of the staff mainly because the studio thinks a budget of $160 Million is too damn costly. Universal and director Verbinski have been looking for ways to find a more reasonable budget, one way is to try and shoot the film in London or anywhere outside the U.S. to take advantage of a tax credit.

But things aren’t looking up, because Verbinski said this to L.A. Times

“The bottom line is it has to shoot out of the States for budget reasons and my schedule may be prohibitive,” he says. “There’s a great script and a really interesting cast. It really comes down to the financial model now. Big movies are just not being shot in the States. I’m weighing whether I can physically go the U.K. or Australia
or one of those other places with a tax rebate for a year-and-a-half.”

What a shame.. especially considering that at one point both Universal and Verbinski promised the fans that the fate of BIOSHOCK will not end up like HALO movie project that got cancelled because of budget problem too.
This could only mean there’s a chance that Verbinski might exit this project. I hope it doesn’t have to come down to that.
Funny he mentioned “interesting cast”, not too long ago, Wentworth Miller (TV’s Prison Break) hinted his involvement in BIOSHOCK

Barely surviving a plane crash, a pilot lands in icy uncharted waters and discovers an undersea city called Rapture, a failed utopia whose citizens had embraced genetic engineering before the city descended into pure anarchy. Power and greed have run amok and the city has succumbed to civil war. It is a gripping game that forces the pilot to make complex moral choices.

How bout a little rumor just to keep things light?! Before we get to it, I’d just like to say that I’m glad the TV series Prison Break got canceled, the first two seasons were adrenaline rush but I didn’t enjoy the Panama prison and that stupid sylla and the whole mom issue in the third and fourth seasons, like a desperate cry to get more ratings but it failed to do just that. So what’s Wentworth Miller up to next? How bout BIOSHOCK movie? well at least his twitter page seems to tease us with that hint.

“Prison Break may be ending, but I’ve got things in the works. Hint…one word: Bioshock.”

Take this whole thing with a grain of salt for now because the fact is, it was announced last month that Universal put a temporary stop to the Gore Verbinski-directed project and even had to let go some of the staff mainly because the studio thinks a budget of $160 Million is too damn costly for a movie.
Universal and Verbinski are looking for ways to find a more reasonable budget but they promised the fans that the fate of BIOSHOCK will not end up like HALO movie project that went through the same problem and was shot dead.

Gore Verbinski decided not to do the fourth Pirates of the Caribbean movies because he wants to tackle a bunch of other projects that have his name attached to them. One of them, as you know, is BIOSHOCK movie based on the popular video game. The project was said to be in pre-production but according to Variety, Universal put a temporary stop to the effort and even had to fire some of the staff mainly because the studio thinks a budget of $160 Million is too damn costly for a movie.

Universal and director Gore Verbinski are looking for ways to find a more reasonable budget, one way is to try and shoot the film in London or anywhere outside the U.S. to take advantage of a tax credit.
Both Universal and Verbinski assure the fans that the fate of BIOSHOCK will not end up like HALO movie project that got cancelled because Universal and Fox had cold feet due to the same problem.

Barely surviving a plane crash, a pilot lands in icy uncharted waters and discovers an undersea city called Rapture, a failed utopia whose citizens had embraced genetic engineering before the city descended into pure anarchy. Power and greed have run amok and the city has succumbed to civil war. It is a gripping game that forces the pilot to make complex moral choices.

PIRATES OF THE CARIBBEAN 4 is in the planning and it’s gonna happen whether or not you like the previous third installment.. and I hated At World’s End, I’m sorry but killing off Chow Yun Fat too soon and too easy like that was blasphemous.
According to Variety, super producer Jerry Bruckheimer is going to have to find another director because Gore Verbinski is calling it quits.. not on a bitter note but he’s moving on.
He has decided not to return to helm the fourth installment which is expected to set sail in 2010. Well, he had a good run and probably banked a crapload of money too.
As some of you may know, Verbinski is one of the busiest filmmakers in Hollywood, he’s got so many projects that include the adaptation based on the board game CLUE and the animated film RANGO starring the voice of Johnny Depp.
But the report stated that his next gig will most likely be BIOSHOCK based on the popular video game, with John Logan’s script.
In the words of Captain Jack Sparrow.. “Bring me that horizon!”