Welcome to the MTV Movies Blog, updated throughout the day with exclusive movie news, trailers, interviews and more. Our team of film experts joins with celebrity contributors - from Eli Roth to Judd Apatow - to ensure that when it comes to the hottest flicks, you'll hear it first. tips@mtvmoviesblog.com
FROM MTV.COM: Seventeen years ago, the legendary Harvey Keitel launched the second act of his movie career with a pair of tough-guy instant classics: Quentin Tarantino's "Reservoir Dogs" and Abel Ferrara's "Bad Lieutenant." A crack-pipe-smoking breath of fresh air, "Lieutenant" predated "The Shield" by a decade in telling the NC-17 story of a junkie, gambler, killer cop on a downward spiral.
During the past year, film buffs have been up in arms over director Werner Herzog's "Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans." Starring Nicolas Cage as the type of at-wit's-end madman who puts a gun to an old lady's temple to get information, the flick co-stars Eva Mendes and Val Kilmer and packs one potent surprise: Although it has little to do with Keitel's movie, it is a deranged, worthy successor.
Recently, we caught up with Cage to discuss a return to his over-the-top roots — and the joys of winning over haters like myself.
FROM MTV.COM: Do fish have dreams? Do they dream of ominous iguanas, perhaps? Or maybe the disembodied breakdancing souls of freshly capped gangsters? More to the point, will Nicolas Cage ever make another movie that makes sense? Judging by his new one, "Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans," and considering his current financial straits, the prospects seem dim.
The director — the esteemed Werner Herzog, stupefyingly enough — claims never to have seen Abel Ferrara's original 1992 "Bad Lieutenant," and I think we can take him at his word. The Ferrara movie, which I'd recommend seeing before — or better yet instead of — this one, concerns a viciously bent New York City cop; and Harvey Keitel, in the title role, is the embodiment of rank, skeezy corruption. In Herzog's take on the story, the action has been relocated, for no reason at all, to New Orleans, "in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina."
It should be understood that the new film "Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans" is not technically a remake. Filmmaker Werner Herzog has supposedly never even seen Abel Ferrara's original 1992 film, simply titled "Bad Lieutenant," and the only connections are the title and the fact that both films' protagonists are indeed bad police lieutenants.
Now, according to statements made to the Los Angeles Times in a piece about the second picture, producers Alan and Gabe Polsky hope to continue the "Bad Lieutenant" name as an ongoing franchise. Read more...
Want to see crazy Nic Cage being crazy? I love this guy. He makes the strangest choices with his career, and I mean that in an awesome way. From "Leaving Las Vegas" to "Face/Off"?! "Con Air"? "The Wicker Man"? Freakin' "G-Force"? Cage is the best. I don't even want to know what this "Season of the Witch" wackiness is all about; I just want to go in cold and behold the actor in all of his deranged fury.
So "Witch" sounds like a medieval-era, swords & sorcery road movie. Knights bring a suspected witch to a monastery, only to learn that she might be behind the Black Plague. The trailer carries the strong scent of Sam Raimi. In short, I dig. You will too.
Nicolas Cage is often viewed as a love-'em or hate-'em kind of actor, so his involvement in the Tobey Maguire-produced "The Hungry Rabbit Jumps" is bound to further divide movie fans. MTV News spoke with James D. Stern, one of the film's producers, to get the official rundown on the project.
"It's a thriller about a guy who has something quite untoward happen to his wife," Stern said of the film's premise. "He's approached by a vigilante group and they can take care of it, because it doesn't look like the police will be able to. In exchange, he'll have to owe them a favor. He mistakenly takes them up on it and finds himself in a bind that's hard to get out of." Read more...
-- Rebecca De Mornay, who I'll always identify with the delightfully cheesy "The Hand That Rocks The Cradle," gets to roll out her sadistic mommy act again when she stars in the upcoming remake of the 1980 horror flick "Mother's Day." Latter-day "Saw" director Darren Lynn Bousman is directing, so expect plenty of greasy, grimy gore to keep you up at night when De Mornay and her band of twisted sociopaths terrorize a family living in their old home. (Variety)
-- Nicolas Cage has signed on to star in the revenge flick "Driving Angry," which will be a 3-D release. Cage will play a man who sets out on a quest for bloody murder after his daughter is killed and her child is kidnapped. Patrick Lussier will direct a script that he co-wrote with Todd Farmer. Lussier previously directed "My Bloody Valentine 3D," so he's got plenty of experience in looking at a scene with an eye towards multi-dimensional spectacle. (The Hollywood Reporter) Read more...
Would that I could spend a day basking in the gloriously weird presence of Nicolas Cage. My initial compulsion would be to pick his brain for production related anecdotes from such modern classics as "Raising Arizona," "Gone in 60 Seconds" (it's classic to me, so shut up), "Leaving Las Vegas," "Face/Off"... the list goes on and on. Ultimately however, I think I would cave and ask him odd questions just to see what kinds of answers I get. Questions like whether or not he can talk to animals. That's exactly what MTV's Josh Horowitz asked at the press junket for "G-Force," which hits theaters tomorrow. Watch this video, that's all I can say.
Wow is this a busy week. After the runaway success of "Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince" last week -- and other shoe-in blockbusters in the weeks before it -- it's nice to see a little bit of variety for Friday's releases. "G-Force," with showings in two and three dimensions both, is an easy weekend win for families, provided they're not making a repeat (or first-time) trip to Hogwarts.
The CG animated adventure about a secret agent force of talking guinea pigs is a big-ticket item for a number of reasons. It is Disney's first (non-concert) live-action release shot in Digital 3-D. It is also produced by blockbuster-meister Jerry Bruckheimer in his 3-D debut. Then there's the knockout ensemble cast, which includes Nicolas Cage, Penélope Cruz, Steve Buscemi, Tracy Morgan, Will Arnett, Bill Nighy and Zach Galifianakis. Yeah, wow. Read more...
In Hollywood, there are rumors, and then there are the nutso, WTF, no freaking way gossip stories. Toss this tidbit into the latter column: according to recent tabloid reports, Nicolas Cage got freaked out after two car accidents in the span of a few days on the New York City set of his new Disney film, "The Sorcerer's Apprentice." First a stuntman lost control of a Ferrari and careened into pedestrians in Times Square. Then an SVU struck a parked car, injuring several crew members. Cage was said to have become convinced a curse had descended on the movie and drastic measures were necessary. So he reportedly hired a voodoo priestess to break the evil spell and restore order to the production.
Crazy, right? Cage himself certainly thinks so, and when MTV News paid a visit to the "Apprentice" set on Wednesday night, the actor went out of his way to dispel the rumors. Read more...
A high-speed chase in Times Square for the upcoming Nic Cage fantasy flick "Sorcerer's Apprentice" turned into a disaster this week as a stunt car lost control and careened into a crowd of sightseers. In a video obtained by the New York Post, a black Ferrari attempts to slip through a heavily trafficked avenue, but is put into a skid before slamming into the center island, hitting street lamps and people. No word yet on the condition of those struck, although none of the injuries appear to be life-threatening.
FROM MTV.COM: Seventeen years ago, the legendary Harvey Keitel launched the second act of his movie career with a pair of tough-guy instant classics: Quentin Tarantino's "Reservoir Dogs" and Abel Ferrara's "Bad Lieutenant." A crack-pipe-smoking breath of fresh air, "Lieutenant" predated "The Shield" by a decade in telling the NC-17 story of a junkie, gambler, killer cop on a downward spiral.
It should be understood that the new film "
Wow is this a busy week. After the runaway success of "
In Hollywood, there are rumors, and then there are the nutso, WTF, no freaking way gossip stories. Toss this tidbit into the latter column: according to recent tabloid reports, Nicolas Cage got freaked out after two car accidents in the span of a few days on the New York City set of his new Disney film, "The Sorcerer's Apprentice." First a stuntman lost control of a Ferrari and careened into pedestrians in Times Square. Then an SVU struck a parked car, injuring several crew members. Cage was said to have become convinced a curse had descended on the movie and drastic measures were necessary. So he reportedly hired a voodoo priestess to break the evil spell and restore order to the production.