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Fri/Sat/Sun March 2~4, 2018

Pitt, DiCaprio to star in Tarantino’s movie

BRAD PITT and Leonardo DiCaprio are reuniting with Quentin Tarantino to star in the fi lmmaker’s latest feature, “Once Upon a Time in Hollywood,” Sony Pictures announced.

Tarantino describes it as “a story that takes place in Los Angeles in 1969, at the height of hippy Hollywood. The two lead characters are Rick Dalton (DiCaprio), former star of a Western TV series, and his longtime stunt double Cliff Booth (Pitt). Both are struggling to make it in a Hollywood they don’t recognize anymore. But Rick has a very famous next-door neighbor — Sharon Tate.”

The fi lm is set to be released worldwide Aug. 9, 2019.

The movie is an expensive proposition for the studio, as both actors had been tipped to star in the project for weeks but negotiations had been strenuous. In fact, sources said DiCaprio was ready to walk away at one point in January.

But Sony is now pointing to the Oscar breath of the actors’

previous collaborations with Tarantino and the successful box offi ce, as well.

Tarantino worked with Pitt in 2009’s “Inglourious Basterds,” which grossed over US$321 mil-lion globally and was nominated for eight Academy Award, with Christoph Waltz winning for best supporting actor.

DiCaprio, for his part, also starred in Tarantino’s “Django Unchained,” which was also an Oscar player with fi ve nomina-tions and two wins (best original

screenplay for Tarantino and best supporting actor, again for Waltz).

“I’ve been working on this script for fi ve years, as well as living in Los Angeles County most of my life, including in 1969, when I was 7 years old,” Tarantino said Wednesday in a statement. “I’m very excited to tell this story of an L.A. and a Hollywood that don’t exist anymore. And I couldn’t be happier about the dynamic team-ing of DiCaprio and Pitt as Rick and Cliff.” (SD-Agencies)

IS China’s movie box offi ce back to boom? The fi rst two months of 2018 would certainly seem to suggest, yes.

Total ticket revenue for Janu-ary and February soared 39 percent to 15.05 billion yuan (US$2.37 billion), up from the 10.82 billion yuan total in the fi rst two months of 2017.

Already the world’s second-biggest theatrical market, China is once again rapidly closing the gap with North America, still the world’s largest. The roar-ing start to the year is further evidence that the Chinese fi lm market has fully bounced back from a shock correction in 2016, when growth stalled at 3.7 per-cent after half a decade of 35 percent annual expansion.

Hollywood, however, has been somewhat absent from the scene in 2018. The three

biggest U.S. fi lms this year so far are “Jumaji: Welcome to the Jungle” (US$77.9 million), “Maze Runner: The Death Cure” (US$49.7 million) and “Star Wars: The Last Jedi” (US$42.6 million), all of which have been dwarfed by an imported Bollywood blockbuster, Amir Kahn’s musical drama “Secret Superstar” (US$117 million).

The real engine driving the big gains was Chinese New Year, which saw six new releases col-lectively earn US$901 million in a single week beginning Feb. 16. At the close of February, Wanda Film’s action comedy blockbuster “Detective China-town 2,” a ribald local spin on the Sherlock archetype, was 2018’s frontrunner, having pulled in US$454.5 million since Feb. 16. It was closely trailed by Bona Film Group’s

military action fl ick “Operation Red Sea,” which has ridden red hot word-of-mouth to become 2018’s biggest surprise, with a US$395 million total so far. Edko Entertainment’s family fantasy sequel “Monster Hunt 2” has slumped somewhat since its record-setting US$85 million opening day, but it still earned a whopping US$335 million.

Rounding out the holiday power set were “The Monkey King 3: Kingdom of Women” with US$111.5 million and ani-mation “Boonie Bears: The Big Shrink” at US$85 million.

Ridley Scott’s “All the Money in the World” will attempt to shake things up when it opens in China on Friday. But major Hollywood muscle won’t hit the market until Marvel Disney’s “Black Panther” opens March 9. (SD-Agencies)

China box offi ce surges 39% in two months

ACTOR Chris Hemsworth is in early negotiations to star in Sony’s self-styled spinoff of the sci-fi action-comedy franchise “Men in Black.”

F. Gary Gray, who directed last year’s “Fate of the Furious,” is due to helm the movie, which has a script by “Iron Man” writers Matt Holloway and Art Marcum. The pic is slated for release June 14, 2019.

Akin to how “Jurassic World” revived the “Jurassic Park” fi lm series, Sony’s reboot is to fea-ture new characters rather than Agents K and J, portrayed by Tommy Lee Jones and Will

Smith, respectively, and build on the contemporary sci-fi world in which they operated.

Sources say that the studio is hoping to round out a diverse ensemble cast and may be potentially eyeing the leads to be white male, a female of color and an older man. The story will be a global adventure.

Smith and Jones powered the fi rst “Men in Black” fi lm to US$589 million at the global box offi ce in 1997 and subse-quently starred in two sequels — one in 2002 and one a decade later in 2012.

(SD-Agencies)

AFTER the success of “The Greatest Showman,” Fox has found its next musical fi lm.

Fox 2000 has picked up an original musical fantasy cen-tering on prolifi c author Hans Christian Andersen from an A-list musical creative team.

“Wicked” composer and lyri-cist Stephen Schwartz is behind the musical elements of the fi lm, which is being scripted by “Mary Poppins Returns” writer David Magee.

Andersen’s public domain works like “The Little Mer-maid,” “The Snow Queen” and “The Ugly Duckling” have

long provided fodder for Hol-lywood.

The studio is already looking to cast a young Andersen, who in the musical gets trapped by his own imagination in the worlds of his own making. “Baby Driver” star Ansel Elgort, who has a side career as a musi-cian, is a top contender for the role.

“The Greatest Showman” has grossed over US$300 mil-lion at the global box offi ce and is competing for an Oscar this weekend for the movie’s main anthem, “This Is Me.” (SD-Agencies)

Chris Hemsworth in talks to star in ‘Men in Black’ spinoff

Ansel Elgort circling Hans Christian Andersen musical

Brad Pitt Leonardo DiCaprio Quentin TarantinoBrad Pitt Leonardo DiCaprio Quentin Tarantino