The Others, Taylor-Joy, Buck Rogers: Weekly Round Up

19th October 2020

The Others, Taylor-Joy, Buck Rogers: Weekly Round Up – Another week, another round-up, and boy is this one a doozy. We’ve got post-apocalyptic shenanigans, Egyptian epics, and sci-fi classics to get through. But first, let’s talk about The Others.

Released in 2001, the Nicole Kidman starring Gothic ghost story, The Others, fell into that sort of early 2000s Shyamalan trend of slow, melodramatic movies built around atmosphere and a twist. Of course, it’s not really a spoiler at this point to mention the twist in The Others, but I’m reluctant to anyway in case you’re one of those lucky people who gets to experience it unsullied. Suffice it to say that it’s a great one.

Calling back to classic ghost stories like Henry James’ The Turn of the Screw or the works of M R James, The Others has the feel of a classy movie with the thrill of some great genre scares, and it boasts a fantastic central performance from the then top of her game Nicole Kidman. Although it was generally well received on release, it did have its detractors, but in more recent years the movies had become somewhat highly regarded, at least in certain corners of the horror community.

It’s no surprise then that a remake is on the cards. Afterall, the film is nearly twenty years old. Universal studios have partnered with Sentient Entertainment, the studio behind TV’s Feud: Bette and Joan, to begin work developing the project, and there have been reports that this will be a modernized take on the material.

Quite what modernized means, or indeed how it fits into the concept of the film, I don’t know. One of the key things that makes The Others work so well is that it plays with the audiences’ expectations and knowledge of traditional ghost story tropes. Setting it in the present day seems sort of counter-productive to me. It’s also unknown what the creatives behind this reboot intend to do about the twist, given how well known it is at this point. Nonetheless, I’m watching this one curiously (and with warning – haha. M R James fans will get it) to see just where it all winds up going.

Now, speaking of reboots to beloved properties, is there a better example of one that has been handled so well and so successfully as George Miller’s Mad Max: Fury Road? The film was an Oscar darling, did big bucks and the box office, and wowed critics and audiences alike. Rightly so, too. It’s a crazy good movie.

Since its release, however, things have been rather quiet on the Mad Max front. At one point we were supposed to be getting two sequels to the thing, but these seemed to disappear into nothingness. So, if you’re like me, and were somewhat disappointed we weren’t able to dive straight back into the mad world Miller created, then this week’s news that prequel film, Furiosa, which we first learned about back in March and is centered around Charlize Theron’s character from the aforementioned Fury Road, is that much closer to going in front of the cameras.

First up, Anya Taylor-Joy has been confirmed as taking over the title role from Theron (this is a prequel, after all), while the God of Thunder himself, Chris Hemsworth, has reportedly been cast as a character called Dementus (yep! More Miller craziness already), who has a large silver scar on his face. Taylor-Joy and Hemsworth are to be joined by Aquaman’s Yahya Abdul-Mateen II, who is reportedly playing a character called Pretorian.

This is probably one of my most anticipated movies at this point. Miller plans to begin filming in 2021, which suggests we likely won’t be seeing the film until 2022 or, even, 2023, but I’m pretty sure he’s got something absolutely batshit planned to wow all of us, so let’s go!

Wowing audiences has become more and more difficult in recent times, and that is something that Paramount Pictures will no doubt be mulling over given this week’s announcement that Gal Gadot will be reteaming with her Wonder Woman director Patty Jenkins for a new movie based on the life of Cleopatra VII, the final ruler of the Ptolemaic Kingdom of Egypt.

Cleopatra is no stranger to the movie treatment and has been a favorite subject for historical epics, from the iconic 1934 movie starring Claudette Colbert and directed by Cecile B. DeMille, to the extravagant Elizabeth Taylor starring 1963 film. Gadot and Jenkins will, reportedly, be reteaming for this project before then combining forces again on a third Wonder Woman outing, although we’re yet to see the second one.

Another classic property looking for a big budget update this week comes in the form of Legendary Productions’ announcement that they plan to reboot the classic character of Buck Rogers for modern audiences. Buck Rogers has been rebooted several times since his first appearance in 1928, including as a popular comic strip and serial star in the 30s and 40s, and as a beloved cult TV series in the early 80s entitled Buck Rogers in the 25^th Century.

Nothing much is known about this proposed reboot at the moment, but it will likely take the central concept of a man frozen in suspended animation for several years being awoken in the future. There’s no word on what version this movie will be adapting, nor whether it will feature any of the other famous characters from the various adaptions, but I think this had the potential to be a lot of fun.

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