BrianGriggs.com » Movie

Okay, so I’m starting to dig the art direction for the Hunger Games movie.

Brian — Tue, 31 Jan 2012 01:26:24 +0000

The Hobbit trailer

Brian — Wed, 21 Dec 2011 04:02:16 +0000

I didn’t expect the trailer to have so much stuff from the book already. Check it out here.

We have our Ender Wiggin!

Brian — Thu, 24 Nov 2011 17:24:14 +0000

Asa Butterfield will play the young space prodigy from Ender’s Game. He was also the lead in the film adaptations of Hugo Cabret and The Boy in the Striped Pajamas.

Yeah, it’s going to be good.

Mitchell 20 – Host a screening

Brian — Wed, 16 Nov 2011 00:00:06 +0000

I love the AZ K-12 Center. I went to one of their technology conferences thinking that I was pretty hot stuff and left with my brain aching trying to absorb everything. I attended a leadership conference a few summers ago and chatted with some heavy-hitters in education across the state and felt good just being able to keep up.

The AZ K-12 Center has exceeded expectations again by working with Randy Murray and creating Mitchell 20, the story of 20 teachers who vow to improve what they have control over: the quality of the teacher.

The Mitchell 20 Trailer from Mitchell 20 on Vimeo.

Looks great! I really want to see it. The showings are very limited right now, but venues do have the opportunity to book their own screening.

I like that one of the options on the form is “I have a crazy idea”. It very much fits in the teacher mindset. More than once, when planning a way to engage students in the curriculum, I’ve said, “I have a crazy idea.”

There are many reasons to support the film. It’s about a local school, Mitchell Elementary. It’s from AZ K-12. It’s narrated by Edward James Olmos. Most importantly, it’s about teachers doing what they can to help students.

The official Hunger Games trailer has been released

Brian — Mon, 14 Nov 2011 18:34:36 +0000

Check out the trailer on iTunes by clicking here. I won’t spoil too much, just that it does include the platform/minefield scene that made me realize back in 2008 that Hunger Games was going to be different than other dystopias.

Vanity Fair’s Hunger Games cast photo

Brian — Wed, 02 Nov 2011 15:53:12 +0000

Check out Vanity Fair’s article and photo of the Hunger Games cast. As you hover over the actors, more info pops up. An interesting fact I learned from the article: the girl who plays Rue wore twigs and mud to her audition.

Will the Ender’s Game movie finally get made?

Brian — Wed, 26 Oct 2011 16:09:56 +0000

One of my favorite books of all time, Ender’s Game, has been in the process of being made into a movie for a very long time. Orson Scott Card has been diligent about making sure the screenplay stays accurate to the feel of the book. He has had to stand up to movie executives who have wanted to cast twenty year-old heartthrobs as the six year-old protagonist. A major theme of the book is innocence lost and Ender’s age plays a huge role in that.

Well, Summit Entertainment just announced a release date of March, 2013. That’s interesting, considering they don’t have a cast yet. I guess release dates can always be moved. Anyone who has talked to me about book to movie adaptations knows that I’m always distrustful of a February/March release date *cough* Hunger Games *cough*. The big movies come out during Summer or Winter Break, not Spring Break.

Orson Scott Card did have some comments about the film that you can find here.

Joss Whedon’s Much Ado About Nothing

Brian — Tue, 25 Oct 2011 20:20:27 +0000

I’m a fan of Shakespeare’s Much Ado About Nothing. I’m a fan of Joss Whedon. (Check out his writing credits – have you ever heard of Toy Story?)

He’s also the screenwriter and director for the new Avengers movie that’s coming out next summer. Last month, they finished filming the Avengers movie and have sent it to post-production. Whedon was supposed to take a month’s worth of vacation, but his wife encouraged him to make the movie he’s always wanted to do: Much Ado About Nothing. Here’s the movie’s site.

He filmed it in 12 days at his house and used his own production company. This may prove to be a technology landmark if this movie forgoes the traditional movie release process. Theatrical releases may have to compete with Internet streaming.

Check out the cast list. Many are friends with author P.J. Haarsma.
The Players:

Amy Acker – Beatrice
Alexis Denisof – Benedick
Nathan Fillion – Dogberry
Clark Gregg – Leonato
Reed Diamond – Don Pedro
Fran Kranz – Claudio
Sean Maher – Don John
Spencer Treat Clark – Borachio
Riki Lindhome – Conrade
Ashley Johnson – Margaret
Emma Bates – Ursula
Tom Lenk – Verges
Nick Kocher – First Watchman
Brian McElhaney – Second Watchman
Joshua Zar – Leonato’s aide
Paul M. Meston – Friar Francis
Romy Rosemont – The Sexton
And introducing Jillian Morgese as Hero

Is Netflix trying to psych us out?

Brian — Fri, 26 Aug 2011 23:36:38 +0000

edited 8/26/11 4:40pm: Clear your cookies for Netflix. Cookies store passwords and other information for websites. If you don’t want to clear all your cookies, you can check your browsing history and right-click (in Firefox) on the site in the list and ‘Forget this site’. It will look different on other browsers, but the idea is the same.

As September 1, and the new Netflix pricing, approaches, many people I’ve talked to are ditching the DVD portion of their Netflix subscription.

I find it interesting that since last night I’ve seen this on Netflix’s homepage:

Are they trying to prove that streaming is not reliable? It’s just on the website; my 360 is still streaming fine. Will the website have improvements? Is Netflix going to surprise us with a Watch Instantly library that includes more than low-budget movies from the early 90s? Is this another attack from Anonymous?

Whatever the cause for the outage, have you seen downrightnow.com? For any website, you can visit this site instead of hitting refresh over and over again (if you’re like me). downrightnow can help you diagnose if the site is really down or if it’s simply on your end of things.

More info on the Uglies movie

Brian — Wed, 27 Jul 2011 20:10:46 +0000

We’ve been waiting since, like, 2007 to hear solid details about an Uglies movie. Scott Westerfeld mentioned during Comic-Con that the Lola special effects group (the people who put Captain America’s head on a scrawny body in the new film) are doing work on the film. The surges should be pretty cool looking.

Westerfeld also mentioned a manga to be published by Del Rey that takes Shay’s side of the story and expands on it.