The Lion King takes pride of place at Number 1 on this week’s Official Film Chart.
Following its full physical release, the CGI remake of the animated ‘90s Disney classic starring Donald Glover and Beyoncé, roars its way to the top spot brandishing the title of the UK’s biggest DVD and Blu-ray of the week.
Swatted down one place is last week’s chart hero Spider-Man: Far From Home, while screeching in at Number 3, the highest new entry and biggest download of the week, it’s the digital release of Fast & Furious – Hobbs & Shaw, the first spin-off film from the action movie franchise.
Toy Story 4 retreats one place to Number 4 ahead of a non-mover for Aladdin at 5. Danny Boyle’s Yesterday (6) and Taron Egerton’s depiction of Elton John in Rocketman (7) each slip this week, while the original Frozen glides all the way back into the Top 10 boosted by the release of Frozen 2 in cinemas.
Avengers Endgame is down two places to 9 this week, just ahead of supernatural horror sequel Annabelle Comes Home. And finally, the festive season looks to be arriving already as The Grinch and Elf pull up their sledge just outside the Top 10 at Number 11 and 16.
On this week’s Official Film Chart online show take a look at a sneak peek from animated adventure, Playmobil: The Movie, available to download & keep from December 2nd.
The superb new South Korean crime thriller THE GANGSTER THE COP THE DEVIL features a unique and ingenious premise: a serial killer stalking the city streets, unwittingly targets a notorious crime boss, who fights back and survives. The mobster teams up with a police detective in charge of the case, forming an unlikely alliance. The cop wants to arrest the murderer. The mobster has other ideas.
It’s little wonder that this sensational, twist-packed thrill ride has already been snapped up by none other than Sylvester Stallone for a US remake, who has signed up the brilliant Ma Dong-seo to reprise his role as the gangster, a man driven by honour and revenge, with a penchant for brutal violence.
The cinema from the likes of South Korea and Hong Kong has proved fertile hunting ground for producers looking for fresh and innovative big budget stories. Here are six more thrillers that have inspired big-budget Hollywood reboots.
The Departed (2006)
Top director Martin Scorsese took the sensational 2002 Hong Kong police thriller, Infernal Affairs, about an undercover cop playing cat and mouse with a police department mole, and relocated it to Boston. The remake – with box office heavyweights Leonardo DiCaprio, Matt Damon and Jack Nicholson in the cast – proved to be a good idea – the film was a big hit, making nearly $300million at the box office, and winning four Oscars, including Best Picture and Best Director; and a TV series is in currently in development.
Mirrors (2008)
In the 2003 South Korean original, called Into the Mirror, an ex-cop working as a security guard investigates a series of deaths linked to mirrors. It was remade with Jack Bauer himself, Kiefer Sutherland in the role of the ex-cop, made a tidy profit, and spawned a sequel two years later.
Oldboy (2013)
Spike Lee directed this US version of Park Chan-wook’s sensationally violent South Korean masterpiece, about a businessman who is inexplicably kidnapped and imprisoned in a grim hotel room-like cell for 15 years without knowing his captor or the reason for his incarceration. Eventually released, he embarks on a quest for revenge. Josh Brolin took the main role, and Lee tried not to disappoint fans of the original, by ensuring he kept the infamous sequence where the character single-handedly dispatches a whole heap of attackers.
Extreme Job (2019)
Kevin Hart has got his eyes on rebooting this action comedy, which is currently the highest grossing South Korean film of all time. It’s the story of a team of cops going undercover in a fried chicken restaurant to catch a gang of criminals – only they come up with an incredibly delicious chicken recipe that interferes with their plans.
I Saw the Devil (2020)
American director Adam Wingard, currently making monster blockbuster Godzilla vs Kong, is planning a remake of the intense South Korean revenge thriller about a cop going after the psychopath who has killed his fiancee.
The Killer (2020)
Top action director John Woo is finally remaking his 1989 Hong Kong classic about a hitman (played by the legendary Chow Yun Fat) who takes on a dangerous job in order to make amends for a woman injured during a shootout. The film is being seriously retooled for this new version, with actress of the moment Lupita Nyong’o (Us, 12 Years A Slave) playing the title character.
The Gangster, The Cop, The Devil is available on digital in the UK and Ireland by Vertigo Releasing
Tesla Edition: Bits & Pieces. Mario Cerrito III creator of Human Hibachi is having his sophomore film, The Listing (Winner 2019 HNN film festival) released worldwide by SGL Entertainment on November 12th. Mario was recently featured on the Travel Channel television show Ghost Nation, when his South Jersey home was investigated for paranormal activity. The Listing stars Bernard Glincosky John DiRenzo and Horror scream queen Jessica Cameron.
6 Underground introduces a new kind of action hero. Six individuals from all around the globe, each the very best at what they do, have been chosen not only for their skill, but for a unique desire to delete their pasts to change the future. The team is brought together by an enigmatic leader (Ryan Reynolds), whose sole mission in life is to ensure that, while he and his fellow operatives will never be remembered, their actions damn sure will.
Levan Akin’s beautiful and gripping love-story AND THEN WE DANCED launched in Directors Fortnight at Cannes. Set against the backdrop of Georgia’s traditional dance scene, the film follows an obsessive young dancer Merab (Levan Gelbakhiani), who has been training at the National Georgian Ensemble with his partner, Mary (Ana Javakishvili), since he was a child. Merab’s world is turned upside down, when the carefree and charismatic Irakli (Bachi Valishvili) arrives, rivalry soon turns to longing as the two draw closer together.
Tesla Edition: Bits & Pieces. Troubled college freshman Luke (Robbins) suffers a violent family trauma and resurrects his childhood imaginary friend Daniel (Schwarzenegger) to help him cope. Charismatic and full of manic energy, Daniel helps Luke to achieve his dreams, before pushing him to the very edge of sanity and into a desperate struggle for control of his mind — and his soul.
You might not have heard of controversial Polish director Patryk Vega but his films have been major cinematic hits both in Poland and the UK. On its UK cinema release his brutal mob saga Women of Mafia took nearly £900,000 while gory surgical potboiler Botoxx amassed over £1m making it the third highest foreign language film that year. In Poland, Women of Mafia was the second highest grossing film of 2018 outstripping everything from Avengers: Infinity War to Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom. His latest film Polityka has just recently been released to UK cinema audiences, earning over £500,000 in its opening weekend and bringing the theatrical total to date for all Vega’s films to over £3m in the UK.
Oran Zegman’s retro musical shares a story about society’s unrealistic demands on women and was recently acquired by Fox Searchlight. This wonderfully dark live action short film has garnered numerous high profile accolades including Best Musical Film at Rhode Island, Best Musical Film at Manhattan Film Festival and a Student Academy Award finalist!
Quentin Tarantino is the most influential filmmaker of the past 30 years. His bloody, talky, nonlinear films pull together dozens of influences to form bracingly original cinematic events. In a Hollywood that worships at the altar of franchises and remakes, Tarantino’s films are the best kind of tentpoles – wholly unique cinematic visions from a filmmaker at the peak of his powers.
Tesla Edition: Bits & Pieces. Cats stars James Corden, Judi Dench, Jason Derulo, Idris Elba, Jennifer Hudson, Ian McKellen, Taylor Swift, Rebel Wilson and introduces Royal Ballet principal dancer Francesca Hayward in her feature film debut. Featuring Lloyd Webber’s iconic music and a world-class cast of dancers under the guidance of Tony-winning choreographer Andy Blankenbuehler (Hamilton, In the Heights), the film reimagines the musical for a new generation with spectacular production design, state-of-the-art technology, and dance styles ranging from classical ballet to contemporary, hip-hop to jazz, street dance to tap.
An assemblage of futuristic, high concept stories about artificial intelligence, 5 Galaxies features Pom Klementieff (Guardians of the Galaxy), Eric Roberts (The Dark Knight, “Suits”) and Neil Jackson (“Sleepy Hollow”) in in a powerful profusion of science-fiction, featuring segments from such visionary filmmakers as Nelson Lee, Kristen Hilkert, Amir Reichart, Vitaly Verlov and Marc-Henri Boulier.
A frightening futon rears its springs this November in Black Fawn Films’ The Dwelling, on Digital and DVD November 26 from Uncork’d Entertainment. Four people find themselves stuck on a haunted antique bed where leaving means suffering a gruesome death. Plagued with frightening hallucinations, they must figure out the bed’s secrets before they are ultimately picked off one by one. Directed by Jeff Maher, and written by Maher and Cody Calahan, The Dwelling features a hot young cast including Slasher’s Alysa King and Gwenlyn Cumyn (“Barbelle”).
Spider-Man: Far From Home finally swings its way to Number 1 on this week’s Official Film Chart.
In his fourth week on chart, Spider-Man finally snares glory, snatching the Number 1 spot ahead of a big new entry from Disney. Spider-Man: Far From Home, starring Tom Holland, Samuel L. Jackson and Jake Gyllenhaal, also claims the week’s biggest hit on DVD and Blu-ray.
Leader of the pack digitally, it’s a new entry for Disney’s The Lion King (2). Journeying to the African savannah where a future king is born, John Favreau’s photorealistic remake of the ‘90s animated classic, starring Donald Glover and Beyoncé, stampedes into second place on digital downloads alone. With 110,000 digital sales, The Lion Kinghas been downloaded more times in its opening seven days than the rest of this week’s Top 40 combined, the Official Charts Company can confirm.
Meanwhile, Toy Story 4 slips to Number 3, and though Paul McCartney may have been announced as Glastonbury’s 50th anniversary headliner next year, Beatlemania cools off on the Official Film Chart, as Danny Boyle rom-com Yesterday falls two places to Number 4. Aladdin is still in the game at Number 5, with Elton John biopic, Rocketman, falling one place to 6.
Regaining this week is Avengers: Endgame, up one place to 7, but minor tumbles are unavoidable for The Secret Life of Pets 2 (8) and Men in Black: International (3).
On this week’s Official Film Chart online show take a look at a clip from Fast & Furious: Hobbs & Shaw, available to Download & Keep from Nov 22nd & to buy on DVD, Blu-ray & 4K ULTRAHD from Dec 2nd.
The British Independent Film Awards (BIFAs) today announced the first of this year’s award winners for its nine film Craft categories.
The Personal History of David Copperfield, Armando Iannucci’s retelling of Charles Dickens’ classic novel, has received three awards: Best Casting sponsored by Casting Society of America and Spotlight for Sarah Crowe, Best Costume Design for Suzie Harman and Robert Worley and Best Production Design sponsored by Studio Juice for Cristina Casali. Sarah Crowe and Cristina Casali both also won these awards in 2017 for their last film with Iannucci, The Death of Stalin.
Beats, the story of two Scottish boys who risk everything to attend an illegal rave, won two awards: Best Cinematography for Benjamin Kracun and Best Sound supported by Halo Post for David Bowtle-McMillan, Joakim Sundström and Robert Farr.
Tom Harper’s Wild Rose, which stars Jessie Buckley as a troubled Glaswegian who dreams of becoming a country music star, picked up Best Music sponsored by Universal Music Publishing Group for Jack Arnold.
The Best Make Up & Hair Design award, which is sponsored by MAC Cosmetics, went to Jeremy Woodhead for Judy, Rupert Goold’s biopic of legendary performer Judy Garland starring Renee Zellweger.
Chloe Lambourne and Simon McMahon won the award for Best Editing sponsored by Intermission Film for For Sama, one of the year’s most impactful documentaries, filmed on the front line of the Syrian civil war.
Visual Effects Supervisor Howard Jones was the winner of Best Effects for A Shaun the Sheep Movie: Farmageddon. Howard won this award last year, also, for Early Man.
BIFA introduced these nine award categories in 2017 to better recognise the wealth of exceptional talent working on British independent films. The nominations and winners have been chosen by BIFA voters over the course of three rounds of viewing, discussion and voting.
As previously announced, Kristin Scott Thomas will receive this year’s Richard Harris Award for Outstanding Contribution by an Actor to British Film. Winners in the remaining categories will be unveiled at the BIFAs ceremony on Sunday 1 December at Old Billingsgate.
