The Emotional Reason Rocketman Should Be Seen In A Theater, According To Taron Egerton

The Emotional Reason Rocketman Should Be Seen In A Theater, According To Taron Egerton

Classic rock icons are becoming staples at our local movie theaters. Queen powered last year’s Bohemian Rhapsody, which attracted huge crowds (and got the Academy’s attention). And this year, movies focused on Bruce Springsteen (Blinded By The Light) and The Beatles (Yesterday) will be making a play for audience ticket dollars.

Before those drama/comedies hit, though, Paramount wants people to flock to the movies to see Rocketman, Dexter Fletcher’s movie-musical that’s inspired by the life and times of the legendary Elton John. The song-and-dance blockbuster uses the hazy memories of John’s rock escapades to craft a winning narrative. And when CinemaBlend recently sat down with Rocketman lead Taron Egerton, who plays John, we landed on the emotional reason why he thinks this movie deserves the bog screen treatment. He told us:

Elton’s music is something we all share. I would go so far as to say as a species now. We are all united over the fact that everyone knows – and if they have any taste at all – loves his music. And so, I think the shared experience of going to see it in the cinema… now look, obviously, I’m here selling my movie as well. But I really believe this. I think going to see it in the cinema with a whole group of other people will heighten your emotional reaction to it. And aside from that, just the sound. It needs to be blasted at you.

There’s something to be said about these big-screen treatments of the classic-rock icons of decades gone by. You’ll never be able to see Queen in concert again. So paying for a movie ticket to see a faithful recreation of the band’s Live Aid set becomes the next best thing.

The same goes for Rocketman. With Elton John tickets currently tracking north of $300 for his farewell concert, there’s a very good chance that fans reading this now won’t be able to make it to a local concert. And while Rocketman doesn’t necessarily replace the feeling of seeing Sir Elton on stage, it does bathe you in the power and solemnity of his songs, while also giving fantastic insight into the creative collaboration between John (Taron Egerton) and Bernie Taupin (Jamie Bell).

Directed by Dexter Fletcher, Rocketman is told from the perspective of Elton John while he’s in rehab. It starts during his youth, and continues through his hall-of-fame career. And while we agree with Taron Egerton that his quotes make it sound like he is selling his movie, we can ALSO vouch for the fact that the costumes, the sets and the musical arrangements found in Rocketman absolutely demand that you go see this full-blown musical on the biggest screen possible.

Here’s Taron Egerton talking Rocketman with us:

And you will be able to see for yourself once the movie musical bops into nearby theaters on Thursday night. Get your tickets now, if you haven’t yet.

Hey Avengers, Stop Releasing Trailers, TV Spots And New Footage

Hey Avengers, Stop Releasing Trailers, TV Spots And New Footage

Last Thursday, when the final receipts were still coming in for Captain Marvel’s fantastic first week in release, Marvel unexpectedly dropped a new trailer for this year’s biggest movie: Avengers: Endgame.

The trailer had the Avengers rocking fancy suits and new hairdos, lots of great character moments and plenty to obsess and speculate over. It was an intense and emotionally fraught two-and-a-half minutes that poetically honored the Marvel Cinematic Universe’s past and its decade-long journey, while getting you amped to go into a battle where the cost of victory will be high. The Avengers: Endgame trailer was everything you could possibly want it to be and more. It’s also the last thing I want to see from this movie before its release.

Like the Jedi, it’s time for the Avengers: Endgame trailers (and TV spots, and new footage) to end.

Now, upfront it should be said that the newest trailer is seemingly the ‘Final Trailer’ so we may be safe on that account. But there are no guarantees. There is still over a month left to go and the marketing campaign hasn’t really ramped up yet. I am not so naïve as to think that there won’t be any TV spots prior to this film’s release, heck there haven’t really been any-- yet sans the Super Bowl trailer.

What I am arguing for here is that there should be no new footage for Avengers: Endgame put out, beyond what has already been released. The reasons for that are simple: we don’t need to see anymore, and each new bit of footage at this point would reveal more of the story and open up the possibility of spoilers.

This is not to say that the trailers thus far have shown us too much, on the contrary they have shown us just enough in what has been a pitch perfect marketing campaign. To date, there have been two full trailers and a Big Game spot for Avengers: Endgame. They have all been focused on establishing the tone and the stakes for the characters, than they have been about laying out the plot of the movie.

We’ve been shown the fallout of The Decimation and the bleakness the characters face after Avengers: Infinity War. It's also been shown that the Avengers can’t just accept their losses and move on, and will do whatever it takes to try and change what happened. What we haven’t been shown is the exact contours of their plan and the plot itself. Sure, fans that read sites like this one can probably make an educated guess at the ‘how’ of it all, but the trailers haven’t explicitly laid that out, giving us only hints.

To this point I don’t even think we’ve seen much of Endgame’s third act, beyond a few shots like Cap’s grimace, Ant-Man’s eraser launch and Nebula’s battle cry in the most recent trailer. However, some have said that seeing Nebula and Tony Stark with the rest of the team in the white suits is a spoiler that those two make it back from Titan. But let’s be real, just like nobody thought Jon Snow was going to stay dead, literally no one thought that Nebula and especially Iron Man were going to die from lack of oxygen on a ship.

Consider that the trailers haven’t even really shown Thanos beyond a Gladiator-esque shot of him walking through a field. We haven’t seen the Hulk either, so as far as we know he and Bruce Banner are still working out their performance issues. Even the cute Captain Marvel and Thor moment isn’t really a spoiler if you watched the end-credits scene of Captain Marvel.

You’ll often hear movie fans complain about trailers that spoil too much, and justifiably so. Yet, despite the fact that the Avengers: Endgame trailers have committed any spoilery sins, I still don’t want to see any more; no more trailers and no new footage in any form, be it TV spots or otherwise. Every new bit of footage runs the risk of further fleshing out the plot and spoiling us on something.

The trailers for Endgame have done their job and they’ve done it marvelously. They have been awesome, emotional and chill inducing. With Hawkeye-like precision, the trailers have hit the sweet spot of being enough to sell me, but not enough to spoil me. I’m already sold and I couldn’t possibly get more hyped for this movie than I already am.

Marvel doesn’t need to show us another frame of footage to sell Avengers: Endgame. The film is already tracking to have the biggest opening weekend ever and there’s not a single person who is on the fence about seeing this movie that can be pushed over the edge by another trailer. You’re either out, or, like most of the world, you’re in on this movie and would have been even if there had never been a single trailer. Just recut the already released footage for a variety of TV spots and you’re good to go.

Asking for the footage from this year’s most anticipated movie to stop is admittedly a strange request. Especially given that in the long drought after Infinity War and Ant-Man and the Wasp, we were begging to see the trailer for Avengers 4. And a year before that, fans were demanding to see the Avengers: Infinity War trailer. Right now Star Wars fans are going through their own test of patience, waiting to find out the title and see the first footage from Episode IX.

Nevertheless, there is such a thing as too much of a good thing, and any more Endgame footage risks doing more harm than good. I’ve always believed that movie trailers are part of the experience, and I’m glad we’ve seen what we’ve seen so far to get us as hyped as possible for this unprecedented cinematic event. If there’s new footage I’ll have to watch it, but Marvel has achieved the perfect balance with the Avengers: Endgame trailers, it would be a shame for that balance to be upset by showing us too much.

Avengers: Endgame opens in theaters on April 26. Check out our 2019 Release Schedule to see all the movies that are not Endgame headed to theaters this year.

The Part of Rocky IV That Makes Dolph Lundgren Emotional

The Part of Rocky IV That Makes Dolph Lundgren Emotional

The Rocky movies have been something of a, well, rocky franchise. The original Rocky was a deeply involved character study of an underdog boxer that earned multiple Academy Awards. Rocky IV was more about Cold War flag waving. Having said that, the movie does get a very strong emotional reaction from co-star Dolph Lundgren, who says the scene where Ivan Drago emerges to fight Apollo Creed always gets to him. According to Lundgren...

I remember when we shot the Apollo Creed fight. Yeah, it was at the MGM Grand in Vegas. They had me down in this elevator that was going to go up, part of the stage show...When I came up the elevator, I was stunned. That's the one moment in Rocky IV where you see Dolph Lundgren, at 27, because that Drago mask kind of fell off and I'm just there going, 'What the hell happened,' you know? And that's kind of a beautiful moment. I always get a little emotional when I see that, because I see that young kid."

Rocky IV was the movie that introduced the world to Dolph Lundgren, but at the same time it was also the movie that introduced Dolph Lundgren to the world. Lundgren had technically made his acting debut a few months earlier when the James Bond movie A View to a Kill came out, but when Rocky IV hit the screen he made a massive leap to playing the opponent of Rocky Balboa in a much larger role.

It all had to feel somewhat surreal to Lundgren, and based on comments the actor makes on the special features attached to the Creed II Blu-ray release, it absolutely was. The actor says the look on his face as he came out into the MGM Grand wasn't acting anymore, it was his actual feelings as he saw this massive crowd that had come to watch him film the boxing match between himself and Carl Weathers. You can watch the sequence play out in the clip below.

It's been a while since I've seen Rocky IV but I'd forgotten how much of a deer in the headlights Ivan Drago looks like here. He's clearly out of his element, which is an odd thing to see from a character who's supposed to be an unstoppable machine. He shows basically no emotion for the entire film, but he''s clearly off balance here. It turns out that part of the reason for that is that this isn't really the reaction of Ivan Drago, it's the reaction of Dolph Lundgren.

Rocky IV would help launch Lundgren's career in action movies throughout the 80s and 90s before coming full circle and seeing him return to the role of Ivan Drago in Creed II, a movie which shows us a side of the character we never saw the first time around.

Creed II is available now on Blu-ray and Digital HD.

Peter Jackson Turned Down Directing Aquaman More Than Once

Peter Jackson Turned Down Directing Aquaman More Than Once

When it was originally announced that James Wan was going to direct the first ever Aquaman movie, it actually made quite a bit of sense. The filmmaker not only had some tremendous success with the making and release of Furious 7 (his debut in the blockbuster realm), but also had established a great working relationship with Warner Bros. (specifically by launching The Conjuring Universe). That in mind, it may surprise you to learn that he apparently wasn't the studio's first choice for the gig, as Peter Jackson was originally pitched on the project... not once, but twice.

This revelation comes from the latest issue of Empire, though exactly how the subject came up in conversation with the filmmaker isn't entirely clear. The director apparently was pitched on the underwater superhero adventure by Former Warner Bros CEO Kevin Tsujihara - with whom he worked on theHobbit trilogy - and an attempt was apparently made twice because the executive seemingly forgot Peter Jackson's response the first time he was asked. Said the director,

[Former Warner Bros CEO Kevin Tsujihara] said, ‘Are you a fan of Aquaman?’ I said, ‘No.’ Six months later: ‘Peter, are you a fan of Aquaman?’ I said, ’No, Kevin, I already told you this’

One can understand why Kevin Tsujihara was interested in having Peter Jackson make the Aquaman movie, given the fact that the filmmaker both has a lot of experience with giant blockbusters, and because he has a lot of ambition when it comes to the realm of visual and special effects - both of which were definitely needed in the making of the DC Extended Universe title. But apparently it just wasn't a job that appealed to Jackson, to the point where he shut down the opportunity twice.

So why did he turn down the gig? Apparently stories about costumed vigilantes just aren't really his thing - though he obviously doesn't have anything against the comic medium at large. After all, he had a major hand in developing Steven Spielberg's The Adventures of Tintin: The Secret of the Unicorn as a producer. That, however, was very much a passion project for the New Zealand-born writer/director, and he simply didn't connect with the material that inspired Aquaman in the same way. He explained,

I’m not a superhero guy. I read Tintin… Look, films are hard. I only want to make something that I have a deep passion for.

As a result, things turned out quite well for James Wan, who did connect with the adventures of Arthur Curry and made a movie that reflects that. Aquaman not only ultimately got a warm reception from critics, but now stands as the highest grossing DC Comics adaptation of all time - making more than a billion dollars at the global box office.

So if he's not making superhero movies, what is Peter Jackson doing these days? Right now we can't say with any certainty what his next narrative feature will be, but a lot of his focus and attention as of late has been in the documentary realm. Last year we saw the release of They Shall Not Grow Old, which showcases immaculately restored footage from World War I, and right now he is working on a documentary about one of the greatest and most beloved bands in rock and roll history: The Beatles.

Being big fans of Peter Jackson's work , we here at CinemaBlend will update you with all the latest news about his developing projects - and also deliver the latest about what's happening with Aquaman on the big screen. So stay tuned!

6 Questions We Still Have About Captain Marvel

6 Questions We Still Have About Captain Marvel

We are just a few days away from the release of a brand new Marvel movie. Thanks to critics, we have an idea of Captain Marvel's quality, and it's tracking for a massive $100 million domestic opening, with some analysts going as high as $135 million. But there's still a whole bunch that we don't know about Captain Marvel. Those answers aren't going to come to us until Thursday night, but we can't help lingering on the mysteries.

Marvel has gotten pretty good at keeping its cards close to the chest for its blockbusters; It wouldn't even share the title of Avengers: Endgame until last December. That secrecy extends to Captain Marvel, which has a few mysteries involving characters names, origins and the true nature of a certain cat. Things are bound to leak, but unless it's been confirmed by Marvel, then it doesn't really count. Here are the six big questions we still have about Captain Marvel.

How Does Carol Get Her Powers?

Captain Marvel is an origin story, but it bucks the trend by starting with a fully-formed superhero. The twist is that Carol doesn't remember how she got her powers, and it's an answer she (and the audience) will discover throughout the film. That's a nice way to ditch the origin story formula, and at the moment we are left guessing as to how she learned to shoot photon blasts. There aren't too many hints, but footage has shown Carol during her years as pilot getting caught in an explosion that's likely related to the Kree. In the comics, a blast of Kree DNA is what gives Carol her tremendous powers, so we'll see if that's still the case for the film.

How Does Carol End Up On Hala?

Captain Marvel was raised on Earth, but she somehow finds herself on an elite team of warrior heroes for the Kree. Carol lives on the homeworld of the Kree, known as Hala, which is maybe trillons of light years away from Earth. One would figure that the Kree took her under their wing after whatever incident grants her her powers. It's pretty significant when you just move to a new state, so a new planet is a pretty far leap. With Carol's amnesia, I have to wonder if her relocation was entirely her choice to begin with. Given that Carol doesn't know anything about her past, that increases the chances that the Kree haven't been entirely truthful to her.

Why Does Captain Marvel Have Amnesia?

Well, this woman is just a regular bag of mysteries, right? The reason that Carol doesn't know the origin of her powers or of her time on Earth is because she has amnesia. An incident with the Skrulls sends her back to Earth in search of answers, which are likely to be a big revelation. It's possible that the incident that gave her powers also caused the amnesia or that her memories were hidden by the Kree to cover something up. Amnesia is usually a pretty suspicious thing to have and I doubt it's a random side effect of her powers. At least a good chunk of the film will be devoted to Carol piecing together the remnants of her past.

How Will Nick Fury Lose His Eye?

You know that joke in Hot Tub Time Machine where the guy is destined to lose his arm, and you just keep waiting for some horrible accident to take it from him? That's what I'm going to feel like watching young Nick Fury in Captain Marvel. Nick Fury's eye patch is an iconic part of his look, but he hasn't yet lost an eye when he first meets Carol Danvers in the '90s. There's no way that we aren't going to see him lose the eye, so it's just a matter of how. Fury once said it was because he trusted someone, so could a shape-shifted Skrull be the cause? Another important question with Fury is how this experience leads him to become the always-prepared Director of S.H.I.E.L.D. we know best.

What Are the Skrulls After?

The center of the conflict of Captain Marvel is the centuries-old war between the Kree and the shapeshifting Skrulls. Captain Marvel and Earth will be right in the middle of this conflict, and the Skrulls have been billed as the main villains of the movies. We can see a group of them on Earth led by Talos (Ben Mendelsohn), but their ultimate objective is unclear. Are they looking for Carol? If so, then why? Is there some kind of MacGuffin on Earth to turn the war in their favor? They must have a reason for infiltrating the planet and it might be leading to a major comic book storyline called Secret Invasion for further down the road.

Is This Cat An Alien Or What?

Finally, we get to the most important question! Goose the cat may seem like an ordinary cat, and for all we know he will be, but comic book fans know that he's more than what he seems. In the comics, Goose -- actually called Chewie -- is an alien that just looks like a cat, but on the inside it's got a bunch of purple tentacles for swallowing people whole. The alien species is called Flerken, they lay eggs and are generally really weird. There's been no indication that's the case for the movie, but given how much the cat has been involved in the marketing, it might just be a secret alien.

So, clearly, there's still a lot that we don't know about Captain Marvel. Carol Danvers is a ball of secrets wrapped inside of an enigma waiting to be unpackaged by moviegoers. Marvel has become so skilled at secret-keeping over the past decade that it can build hype for their films by barely telling us anything. At least we don't have to wait too much longer for the answers to finally be revealed because the movie is out in theaters on March 8. But seriously, that cat better be an alien.

How Much Men In Black International Could Make Opening Weekend

How Much Men In Black International Could Make Opening Weekend

Although the Men in Black organization above all else seeks anonymity, to not stand out in any way and be dismissed just as quickly as déjà vu, Sony is hoping that Men in Black International stands out in a big way and is not dismissed by audiences when it opens in theaters next month. The latest tracking is in for the upcoming spinoff, and Men in Black International is headed toward a $40 million opening weekend.

People with access to the early tracking data, as well as individuals at Sony Pictures, are both pegging F. Gary Gray's Men in Black International to open at $40 million, according to The Hollywood Reporter. This number is right in line with the long-range tracking of a $30-$50 million domestic debut that came out last month. So if the tracking is right, Men in Black International should land in that neighborhood.

A $40 million debut isn’t quite a ‘push the little red button’ kind of incredible launch for the spinoff, but it would show that audiences haven’t been neuralized and still remember this franchise seven years after Men in Black 3. However, an opening weekend around $40 million for Men in Black International would be the lowest debut for a film in this franchise.

Men in Black opened to $84.1 million in 1997, but it came out on a Wednesday in advance of the July 4 holiday, so its 3-day total was $51 million. 2002’s Men in Black 2 also opened right before Independence Day and enjoyed an $87.2 million 5-day performance and a $52.1 million 3-day performance. The most recent film in the franchise, Men in Black 3, opened on Memorial Day weekend in 2012 and made $54.6 over the Friday-Sunday frame and $69.2 million when factoring in Memorial Day.

So not accounting for inflation, this franchise has overall been pretty consistent with its opening weekend performances and MIB International would be a bit below them. But as mentioned, all of the previous films have opened on holiday weekends and likely benefitted from that even in the 3-day numbers. Men in Black International comes out on Flag Day and that Sunday is Father’s Day, but it will not enjoy the kind of long weekend where people are off work.

The previous Men in Black films had the star power of Will Smith and Tommy Lee Jones, and the latter two were also sequels to a beloved film and had that to their advantage. As a spinoff, Men in Black International has to prove itself. While stars Chris Hemsworth and Tessa Thompson have major recognizability thanks to their roles in the MCU, neither has really proven to be a box office draw yet outside of those films.

That said, the two actors’ chemistry in Thor: Ragnarok and the proximity of Avengers: Endgame might compel some audiences to see them together in something else. While the tracking has held steady around that $40 million mark, tracking is inexact and Men in Black International could still theoretically see a swing in either direction depending on the final marketing push and the reviews/early reactions to the film.

On the competition front, Men in Black International opens the week after Dark Phoenix and The Secret Life of Pets 2. Opening opposite Men in Black International is the new Shaft, which is R-rated, but unlike some of its predecessors, it's going for a comedic approach. That could make it something of a direct competitor to Men in Black for audiences looking for comedy that weekend.

Jim Jarmusch’s zombie flick The Dead Don’t Die, starring Bill Murray and Adam Driver, also opens that weekend, but that’s a smaller movie and Jarmusch’s work doesn’t usually play to the mass market.

Men in Black International opens on June 14. Check out our 2019 Release Schedule to see everything headed your way this summer.

Triple Frontier’s Big Twist Even Surprised Its Premiere Audience

Triple Frontier’s Big Twist Even Surprised Its Premiere Audience

Warning: SPOILERS for Netflix’s Triple Frontier are in play. If you haven’t seen the film yet and would like to remain unspoiled, please bookmark this story and return once you’ve caught up.

Towards the end of Triple Frontier’s second act, a pretty big death occurs. As the team of veteran warfighters are making their way through the treacherous mountains that stand between them and their rich escape, a surprise shooter gets the jump on the team.

That shooter is the son of a farmer murdered by Ben Affleck’s Tom “Redfly” Davis, and as fast as you can say “karma,” the young man sneaks up behind Redfly and shoots him in the head. If you thought you were surprised when co-writer/director J.C. Chandor dropped that twist into the film, just wait until you hear about how the audience at the film’s big premiere, courtesy of two of the film’s producers.

During a recent talk with CinemaBlend, producers Charles Roven, Alex Gartner and Andy Horowitz were on hand to discuss Triple Frontier, one of the recent Netflix projects made under their Atlas Entertainment production company. In particular, it was Roven and Horowitz who recounted how Triple Frontier’s killer reveal hit one of the first audiences to see the film. That story went as follows:

Roven: ‘In our premiere screening, the whole auditorium gasped. It was, really, nobody saw it coming.’

Horowitz: ‘As soon as you saw that guy pop up behind [Ben Affleck,] there was just an audible gasp. And then, of course, when the deed happened, I remember people around me just screaming, ‘No!’ It was really quite a moment at the premiere.’

As if surprising audiences watching Triple Frontier at home wasn’t enough, Ben Affleck’s big death scene turned a Hollywood premiere into a setting as interesting as any theater showing a moment of that caliber. Listening to Charles Roven and Andy Horowitz discussing this moment only made the story that much sweeter, as you could tell that they had a lot of fun keeping that big twist secret.

Hearing that the Triple Frontier twist played so well in front of an audience of professional peers is pretty entertaining, but it’s also pretty much a vindication of the request that Ben Affleck made for Redfly’s fate during the production of the film.

During the extensive reworking that J.C. Chandor had done on the original Mark Boal script for the film, Affleck had the idea to sacrifice Redfly instead of an unnamed secondary character. This idea met with the approval of the powers that be, and flash -orward to the finished product, you’re met a tense as hell gun battle in the mountains. It’s also capped off by one of the most surprising movie deaths since Janet Leigh in Psycho.

The shifting rhythm of Triple Frontier’s action-fueled and drama-driven halves of the plot at hand needed a moment to jump start its pulse, so as to shake up the audience. Redfly’s death did just that, and if focus group data isn’t enough to support that, then try the fact that even those who work in the Hollywood industry had their minds blown during that fateful premiere of this very film. A fact that makes any possible sequel talk all the more complicated, because how do you beat a moment like that?

Triple Frontier is currently streaming on Netflix.