Phoo Action

The BBC have officially announced Phoo Action, their TV series adaptation of Jamie Hewlett's Get the Freebies, a strip he did for Face magazine. One of the writers for the TV show is Jessica Hynes, nee Stevenson, so that's two film ick fan flags up already, while Peter Martin and Matthew Enriquez Wakeham are the other two members of the script team.

Quite incredibly, Carl Weathers has signed on to star as Police Chief Benjamin Benson. His daughter, Whitey Action is to be played by Jaime Winstone while Eddie Shin has been cast as Terry Phoo (that's them in the picture above). Filming started this week under Euros Lyn, director of several Dr. Who episodes - including The Girl in the Fireplace and The Runaway Bride.

In case you don't know the strip, this is going to be the kind of show in which zombies get dusted by some impossible kung fu moves while old school hip hop and dub reggae play and the online editor starts pressing as many buttons at once as they can.

As the two comics are translated to live action this may drift even closer to Scott Pilgrim territory. The movie version of Pilgrim is in the hands of Hynes' Spaced co-conspirator Edgar Wright and I can't help but fantasise about Simon Pegg feeling a little left out and cooking up his own undead chopsocky opera.

Do note that the Phoo Action MySpace page announces not only a TV series but a feature film too. Wishful thinking? Contractual small print? Or are the Beeb keeping the best bit of news back for now?

Results Of The Second film ick Poll

Seems like you guys like Edgar Wright. Me too - but he wasn't my selection from this list... And, no, neither was Mary Lambert.

Movie Minesweeper - The Bad Punting Edition

I can't punt. I've been listening to Kodachrome by Paul Simon. Again.

- Chud have come out and reported that Billy Crudup will be Dr. Manhattan in Watchmen. Suits me.

- More Comic-Con details are out.

- A Hulk casting call has revealed that - surprise, surprise - there will be soldiers in the film.

- What is Indiana Jones looking for this time? Aint It Cool have a very interesting theory. I hope it's true, and I expect it is.

- Neil Gaiman linked to a piece on Travis Knight, the lead animator on Coraline. It confirms that the film is being shot digitally and in stereo vision. I love 3D.

- Aisha Tyler has joined Karl Urban and Larry Fishburne in the cast of Tony Kaye's Black Water Transit. Come on Tony: I'm rooting for you.

- David Morell's novel The Brotherhood of the Rose has been optioned by Warner Bros.

- Variety have today given Trailers form Hell some kind of official launch - months after I first linked to it. As well as (my favourites) Joe Dante and John Landis performing commentary tracks for exploitation trailers, the site now features the more-readily hip Edgar Wright and eternally unhip Mary Lambert.

- The Swing Vote cast has been rounded out to include Dennis Hopper, Kevin Costner, Nathan Lane, Kelsey Grammer, Stanley Tucci, George Lopez and Madeline Carroll. The stars is out (and so is Madeline Carroll).

And I need to take a breather, so I'm publishing this and coming right back with another heavy load.

Oh - and if you're interested, I'm listening to all of Tapestry by Carole King. Best. Album. Ever.

Movie Minesweeper - The Snow On The Roof Edition

- Ron Perlman and Barbara Hershey have signed to star in Kenny Golde's Vacuuming the Cat. What on earth is that going to be about?

- John Waters' former agents at CAA quit, so he did too: now he's signed to the William Morris Agency. One of his former CAA agents, Kevin Iwashina, has remained in the family though, and will be producing Fruitcake, Waters next film as a director. According to the same piece, Cry-Baby is en route to Broadway at the moment, also with Iwashina involved. Perhaps it will end up as a movie all over again, ala Hairspray?

- David Goyer is to write and direct an Invisible Man remake-come-sequel for Universal. This one will see the nephew of the original 'badaged one' working for MI5 during the second World War.

- Giuseppe Tornatore's next is to span five decades in the history of one Sicillian village. This has placed his English-language epic Leningrad back on the shelf - again.

- Dave Stewart and The Blue Man Group are creating the soundtrack to an animated film about chimps in space called - you guessed it - Space Chimps. I'd prefer a film about space chimps called Chimps in Space, personally, but I'll settle. With those musical talents attached, this is already looking like quite the odd biscuit. Barry Sonenfeld is producing. The Hollywood Reporter have quite a detailed synopsis: Andy Samberg will play Ham III, the ne'er-do-well grandson of the first chimp astronaut sent into space (loosely based on NASA's real-life space chimp Ham). Seeking to capitalize on the Ham family name, a senator (Stanley Tucci) recruits Ham III to travel through a black hole to a planet where he and his simian colleagues (Cheryl Hines, Patrick Warburton) help rid the local aliens of an evil leader (Jeff Daniels). Kristin Chenoweth will play a helpful alien, and Kenan Thompson will play Ham III's mentor.

- According to The Hollywood Reporter, Justice League of America is far ahead of The Avengers in the race to the box office (I was going to say silver screen as if that's the goal they have in sight, but let's face facts, this is a race to the cash registers, every step of the way). Justice League of America is a laughable title, I'm afraid - and that's only partly the fault of Team America. If you take the Reporter piece at face value, Ant Man is almost certainly to be the next film from Edgar Wright. We'll see.

- Collin Chou has joined the cast of The Forbidden Kingdom.

- The Corkscrew Hill themepark ride is being developed as a 3D animated movie.

- Christine Vachon's Killer Films are to develop TV series.

- The Posh Spice reality show will now not be a series, just a one hour special. I suppose that's a good thing - but no show at all would probably be less of a time waster.

- John Cusack wants to play Dan Dreiberg. I want him to play Dan Dreiberg too. Will Snyder yield to our desires?

- Tarantino has only just wrapped his scene in Sukiyaki Western: Django.

- Fox are adapting R. L Stine's Rotten School and Goosebumps series as feature films. Goosebumps was already a popular TV show, if I recall, but the Rotten School books only date back a couple of years.

- Variety have the first look at the US trailer for No Country for Old Men. Of course, they're presenting it in the incorrect aspect ratio and it looks awful as a result.

- The special features are coming together for the next attempt at a My So Called Life DVD set.

- Is Tobin Bell just playing a dead body in Saw IV? It really is starting to look that way. They'll let him walk and talk in flashbacks, but most of the time, he'll just be on the slab..?

- A projectionist has lost his job for sending an early Fantasic Four 2 review to AintItCool. He says that Fox were behind the suspension.

Movie Minesweeper - The Almost Everything Is A Movie Minesweeper These Days Edition

- JoBlo have a YouTube clip from after the credits of Pirates 3. Clearly, the clip was obtained illegally (not by JoBlo, but the original uploader) but, on the upside, it'll save you sitting through the end credits when really, all you'll want to do is get out of there and restart your circulation.

- MTV are bringing back Unplugged. The new epsiodes will apparently include Mary J. Blige, The Police, Bon Jovi, Kenny Chesney and John Mayer.

- Mark Verheiden has announced that his Teen Titans script will find the kids at 'an interesting (and universal) crossroads in their lives'.

- Twitch were on an absolute role today. They've had pictures from Be Kind, Rewind (Mos Def and Jack Black about to bust some ghosts, it seems); Daybreakers; Eastern Promise; and Doomsday.

- Feed have Mike Maguire's Comcast ad. Download it and watch it 'all big' for the best effect.

- On June 10th, the Prince Charles Cinema will be given over to a reprise of the Hot Fuzztival. Hard Boiled at 11am, The Last Boy Scout at 1.45, Point Break at 4.30 and then (!) at 8pm, Hot Fuzz with a live audio commentary from Edgar and company.

- The Poor Things schedule is being rejigged just so Lindsay Lohan can be in the film. What a waste of effort.

- Broken Lizard's next will probably be The Babymaker.

- Time Magazine's Ocean's 13 interviews are a nice, sparky read.

- IESB loved Hostel 2 too.

- Animation Magazine have some clips from the US version of Creature Comforts.

The Fuzzball Rally

Get ready for a double-dip, UK-based Spaced Cadets. The US DVD of Hot Fuzz is to contain an exlusive feature, The Fuzzball Rally. Think Nick, Simon and Edgar in cars (or not - see below), acting daft (definitely - see... well, everythign else they've ever done). You get the idea.

Movie Minesweeper - The Scent Of Green Marker Pens Edition

- A Fantastic 4/Silver Surfer ad aired during the Heroes series finale. Now, it's online. Do you see a shadow of Galactus' helmet in it or not?

- Reading between the lines, it seems that Southland Tales may not get a theatrical release, even in it's 'repaired' version. Have any of you seen it? Be honest - is it as outrageously bad as it looks?

- Seems like Soundwave the Transformer will be an iPod or, perhaps more accurately, a similar mp3 player.

- The entirety of Masters of Horror season 1 is available in 2 cheap boxsets here in the UK. The US will be getting their compendium in a single hulking pack this August, and Dread Central have the first look at the eco-unfriendly packaging. I'll split my sides laughing if this is a huge, huge sales winner and IDT are forced to realise what a mistake they've made letting season 3 go to Lionsgate.

- Extra scenes and songs featuring ghosts have been cut from Sweeney Todd, thankfully before they were even filmed. That means Christopher Lee's role no longer exists. The film is now pretty much a straight adaptation of the stage production - at least in terms of story structure and cast of characters. There's no reason given as to why the scenes have been axed, but schedule problems caused by the earlier production hiatus are likely at fault.

- Just Jared has a set of new Ocean's 13 stills. I'll have my up-close-and-personal look at the film's script coming soon...ish. Well, within hours, anyway.

- Only 20 minutes of Death Defying Acts were shown at Cannes, but it has sold very well to distributors worldwide. Lionsgate are my home team, and I hope they'll have it out sharpish.

- Terry Gilliam names The Apartment and Pinocchio as his favourte films in the new Radio Times, and also gives praise to Kung Fu Hustle, Paths of Glory and the paintings of Bruegel. The article isn't on their website, sadly...

- Bob Shaye is sticking to his guns over the whole Peter Jackson/Hobbit issue. Shame he's so utterly wrong.

- Bryan Lee O'Malley has unveiled a single page of Scott Pilgrim's fourth volume. Is the Edgar Wright/Michael Bacall film adaptation still going to happen? I'm starting to doubt it...

- Scorsese, for some reason considered the grand old man of cinema, announced the World Cinema Foundation today. The non-profit's mandate is simple: "to preserve and share films that are no longer shown or available on video". Also on the board of advisers? Variety list Fatih Akin, Souleymane Cisse, Guillermo Del Toro, Stephen Frears, Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu, Abbas Kiarostami, Ermanno Olmi, Cristi Puiu, Walter Salles, Abderrahmane Sissako, Elia Suleiman, Bertrand Tavernier, Wim Wenders and Wong Kar Wai.

- Rob Schmidt's Bad Meat has a vegetarian agenda, and he tells ShockTilYouDrop all about it.

Eli Roth Hopeful For Second Grind House Double Bill

Speaking to Rotten Tomatoes, Eli Roth has suggested that a second Grind House double bill would feature Thanksgiving and Don't as full length films. Thanksgiving would be easy enough, I'm sure, but the supposed continental European heritage of Don't might cause Edgar Wright some headaches in the adaptation to full length.

Besides, there's really not much chance of a Grind House sequel being commissioned, is there? I doubt we'll ever see Machete completed and there's over a third of that in the can already.

Was Hot Fuzz Really A Documentary?

Sandford has been added to TownPup, with a really rather amusing entry.

The Original Nicholas Angel

Nicholas Angel in Hot Fuzz may have the name of a music supervisor, but his character was inspired by a Bill Bailey sketch, directed by Edgar Wright. That's according to Edgar, anyway. The full sketch, co-starring Simon Pegg, is on YouTube now.

You Really Must Read This Post If You Love Films For Film Lovers

Let me remind you all that, yes, the majority of cinema audiences are still made up of people who talk through the film, answer calls in the film, don't go to see a film in particular but duck into whatever is showing at the time they arrive, really aren't interested in the film at all...

...but if you're here, you're not that kind of person.

So, today, please, American readers consider this: Hot Fuzz is released. It isn't perfect. But it is very good. And I really think it needs your support. This isn't a huge release in the American marketplace - Vacancy and Fracture are out in the US today also, and they're much higher profile (though neither of them have anything like the buzz Hot Fuzz had over here).

Help Hot Fuzz - which will in turn help Edgar Wright and Simon Pegg which will, ultimately, help us. This film was made for film lovers, really, first and foremost. Not that it alienates 'the casuals', mind... just that it does mean something special to a real film lover.

Take your friends to see Hot Fuzz tonight. Failing that, take them tomorrow. You will all enjoy it, possibly love it, and there's every chance you'll disagree with my (minor) criticisms of it - lord knows just about everybody else has.

The Top Twenty-One British Directors Of All Time

The Telegraph have compiled a list of those they would say are the best 21 British film directors ever. I'll run the list by you, and then tell you what I make of it; then, please, chime in with your own comments too.

1) Alfred Hitchcock 2) Charlie Chaplin 3) Michael Powell 4) David Lean 5) Nicolas Roeg 6) Carol Reed 7) John Boorman 8) Terence Davies 9) Alexander Mackendrick 10) Stephen Frears 11) Ridley Scott 12) Michael Winterbottom 13) John Schlesinger 14) Danny Boyle 15) Lindsay Anderson 16) Bill Douglas 17) Ken Loach 18) Thorald Dickinson 19) Mike Leigh 20) Shane Meadows 21) Ken Russell

Let's delete some of those, first of all. My list would never feature Shane Meadows, Michael Winterbottom, John Boorman or Charlie Chaplin and Powell would be admitted only in the company fo a chaperone - that is, as an adjunt to Emeric Pressberger.

So who would I add? Alan Clarke, without a shadow of a doubt. How he was left off in the first place I could never suppose. Lynn Ramsey - even if she'd only ever made shorts and her career was curtailed before Ratcatcher, she'd deserve a spot in the top twenty. Jonathan Glazer too - he'd be notable if he'd never 'graduated' to features from promos and adds. For the more mainstream-friendly picks, I'd go for Edgar Wright and Garth Jennings, directors of the second-best and best film I've seen this year so far this year (those being Hot Fuzz and Son of Rambow).

Notable mentions in no particular order - some of these would make it into the twenty one and I guess some wouldn't, though they're better choices, I believe than the 'delete list' above: John and Roy Boulting, Paul Greenaway, Mike Hodges, Iain Softley, Bruce Robinson, Derek Jarman, Nick Park, Chris Menges, John Hough, Richard Eyre, Michael Reeves and Lewin Fitzhamon.

Definitely Lewin Fitzhamon.

If You Are Thinking Of Watching Edgar Wright's Grind House Trailer On YouTube...

...Don't.
It was filmed illegally from the audience. And by now, actually, it has probably been removed.

Even More On The Hot Fuzz DVD

Want to know what the Easter Egg on the Hot Fuzz DVD is? Me too. I know that it's called Fence Jump - but there's also a deleted scene with that name, and a non-deleted scene with that nature. The Egg version is 23 seconds long - I expect it might be Simon coming a cropper trying to vault a fence. Confirmation if and when I get it.

I told you previously that Dead Right, Edgar's homespun cop film from before he wuz famous, was included. I can now confirm that a 10 minute making of Dead Right is also included, called Am Blam.

More featurettes: Sgt. Fisher's Perfect Sunday; Cranks, Cranes and Controlled Chaos; Friends, Family, Etc. - they're all pretty short, from just over a minute to around five.

Remember the comic-strip-come-animatic Plot Holes on the Shaun of the Dead disc? Those included here are How the NWA Killed Tim Messenger; How Danny Knew to Stab Angel and How Everyone Survived the Explosion. Expect them to be a shade less serious, and viable, than their Shaun counterparts.

We must be getting to the end of the line here. How much more can there be to reveal? We've now mapped out just about every last inch of the DVD's capacity.

What's Black And White And Edgar All Over

If - and it's a pretty big If - Edgar Wright's film of Jon Ronson's Them ever gets made, it looks like Jack Black is going to be the star.

Mike White is writing the script for this fiction film adaptation of a non-fiction book, so it should come as no surprise Black is involved.

From Edgar's comments on the matter, inclduing his latest to SlashFilm, however, it doesn't seem like Them will be going before the cameras anytime soon.

That moves the Scott Pilgrim, Ant Man and Untitled Simon Pegg Time Travel Project pieces each a square forward on the Edgar Wright gameboard. By my reckoning, Ant Man's in the lead but quite near a snake's head.

Hot Fuzz Deleted Scenes

The upcoming R2 DVD of Hot Fuzz - out June 11th, start putting pennies aside now and you'll be able to afford it with only your accumulated change from the chip shop - features a decent string of deleted scenes.

There's an alernative opening, running over 11 minutes; a short epilogue, just over a minute long; and a big list of snips from heare there and everywhere. Here are the scenes' titles as they will appear on the DVD Menus:

Travelling to Sandford
The station tour
Pub lunch
The grassroots approach
A slow afternoon
Meet the NWA
Lonely Angel
The Fridge Magnate
Fence jump
Traffic Duty
Crockett and Tubby
Webley's Farm
A night at The Crown
Hoodie Fight
Point Break
Investigating Merchant's Death
A fete worse than death
Angel on the case
Prime suspect
Sandford Castle

Of course, many of those seem to refer to scenes already in the film so you can expect longer and alternative versions. They each run from around 45 seconds to 2 minutes.

All of the video blogs are on the disc too, including 'the lost blog', "The Police Station Tour".

For more on the many Hot Fuzz DVD special features, hit the Hot Fuzz label below to look for the previous posts on the matter here at film ick.

Rolling Stone Interview Thing With Grind House Trailer Directors

While flicking through the magazines on my virtual coffee table I stumbled across an excellent article in Rolling Stone. Quentin, Rodriguez, Eli, Zombie [EDIT: What's his name Zombie Rob? Hey! You have a point! That's a much better name] and Edgar chin wag about the inspirations behind their fake trailers, as bookended by Planet Terror and Death Proof. It's a six page beast and an entertaining read. Knock yourself out.

Film Handling Rules Were Made To Be Broken, Scratched And Duffed Up In The Street

From Framestore CFC's April newsletter:

Edgar Wright, the enormously talented young director of Hot Fuzz, was so pleased with his experience at Framestore CFC on that film that he then brought us the 90 second 'fake trailer' he's preparing as his contribution to the hugely anticipated Tarantino/Rodriguez project, Grindhouse – their homage to sleazy 70s exploitation flicks. In order to create a piece of footage that really looked like it was 30 years old, our diligent DI team shot Wright's material out to film several times, taking the prints out on the street to be duffed up, with even a street sweeper's broom enlisted to scratch and scuff the celluloid. Our trained professionals report that there was something incredibly satisfying about breaking every film-handling rule in the book…

A Pub Shoe, Innit?

Tonight's Culture Show on BBC2 featured Mark Kermode playing pool with Danny Boyle, and a trailer for next week when he's going to play darts with Shane Meadows. I hope Michael Winner's getting better, they'll needing him at the fruit machine the week after, I expect.

Why are so many British filmmakers so bad? As fars as true greats go, wll, we've got Edgar Wright and Lynn Ramsey and... Garth Jennings... (of course, how could I forget Garth Jennings... doh!)...

Er... Um... there's always Richard Curtis. How many of you are going to agree with that? I love Curtis, but I know he's not a popular choice amongst bloggers and blog readers.

Some of the greatest directors of all time came from the UK: Alfred Hitchcock, Alexander Mackendrick and Alan Clarke (The Three Als) are amongst the very best from anyplace, at any time. And now?

I suppose there's Terry Gilliam. He's forfeit his US citizenship, so I think we can claim him now.

Maybe the fact that there's almost no film industry in the UK is part of the problem; maybe the fact that the prevailing British film culture is one of imitation is another.

Doing The Don't Again