The coronavirus pandemic has been a threat to all countries worldwide and has been the cause of concern for every nation. Easily spread among the populace, the coronavirus would have proliferated even more than it already has if public places weren’t essentially shut down. So places like restaurants, bars, theaters, etc. all had to be shut down worldwide to keep the virus from spreading. Now, businesses are starting to slowly reopen with restrictions all over the place. Theaters are beginning to slowly reopen worldwide and the UK seems to have decided upon a time frame in which they would like to reopen their theaters.
Here in the United States, a few states have started to reopen some businesses that had to close down when the pandemic began. Restaurants, bars, and theaters are now beginning to reopen slowly state by state with heavy restrictions to keep the spread of infection minimal if not completely contained. Theater chains such as AMC and Regal have decided to stay closed until around the summer season, but other theaters have started reopening where they can. The ones that have reopened must take temperatures, have people where masks and gloves, groups must be limited in size, people must stay seated apart from one another, and everything must constantly be sanitized.
Cinemas in the United Kingdom are planning on reopening their doors some time in mid-June. When the theater chains AMC, Cinemark, and Regal shut their doors in mid-March other nation’s theaters followed in their footsteps. It only makes sense that they would follow in their footsteps in their plans to reopen. They will still need to have the same plans in place there that we have here in order to prevent a resurgence of the virus. So things there will not be the same way they used to be just like in the rest of the world.
Some people believe that businesses reopening, such as theaters, means that everything will be back to the way it was before we know it. That is not at all what is going to happen because the threat of the virus is still looming with no real way to treat it. As such, we need to start preparing ourselves mentally to deal the aftermath of all of this pandemic business and how we will have to adjust to the world around us. The only hope for us at this point to allow things to go back to the way they were before is a vaccine for the virus. Anything less than the inoculation against the virus will not help the world as a whole, and there are people all over the world who are against this life-saving measure.
George Orwell was, and still is, a well known novelist due to his lucid prose, biting social criticism, opposition to totalitarianism, and outspoken support of democratic socialism. Many of his novels are cornerstone books that many in society view as important material. Scholars are the ones who mostly look at his works and believe that his words should be read, and they should be read as a warning. The stories that Orwell wrote gave a very descriptive look into his worlds that he wrote, and how easily they could become reality. Almost none are as well known as his novel 1984 which eventually was adapted into a motion picture.
‘1984’ is a movie that shows an alternate dystopian reality in which the world the people live in is governed by a repressive regime. In this society, there are laws against nearly everything that has to do with liberalism and democracy. Everyone has had their most basic freedoms taken away and no one can speak out in fear of retaliation by the government or people indoctrinated by them. There is absolutely no privacy in that society as anybody that speaks out, even in their own home, will then have Big Brother listen in and come for them.
Now, we recently found out that one of the writers for the new 2021 film ‘The Batman,’ Mattson Tomlin, is working on a so called “spiritual sister” to Orwell’s ‘1984.’ Tomlin is a new name on the scene, but has managed to find his way into writing for ‘The Batman,’ an untitled Jamie Foxx and Joseph Gordon-Levitt film, and now ‘2084.’ They are managing to keep plot details in short order with no one in the outside world knowing what it is about. All we know is that besides Tomlin writing for the film, there is producer Lorenzo di Bonaventura who has worked on other films such as ‘Transfromers,’ ‘The Matrix,’ and ‘Infinite,’ a new Mark Wahlberg movie.
It is sort of assumed at this point that the new ‘2084’ will be an action-filled take on the original source film ‘1984.’ The story of totalitarianism is one that always shows us a dystopian future of our current society. So the idea is to try and show a world similar to the one we live in, but with absolutely no civil liberties whatsoever. I feel as though it won’t be difficult to come up with a world like that, but deciding on what level to take it to and the level of technology available in that world will truly be interesting to see. All I know is that this is certain to be an interesting film to some degree and it will more than likely be worth a watch.
The coronavirus pandemic has resulted in a world in which movie productions are now something that seem almost foreign. No productions are currently running because groups of people are not allowed to gather together. With no productions running, it is no surprise that we have no proper release dates for new films, especially the Marvel Cinematic Universe films. The MCU is a universe where the films must be released in a proper or and with the virus around, premiere dates have had to moved around.
‘Black Widow’ has currently been pushed back to a November release date, which is when ‘The Eternals’ was meant to make its premiere. Now the entire lineup of Marvel films has been pushed back and changed their entire production schedule. That is, of course, whenever productions are able to start up again. There is no official production schedule because they don’t know when they can restart the productions again. So productions are currently cancelled until further notice and now even Disney’s CEO Bob Chapek isn’t sure about when they will restart.
Marvel films are entering an entirely new era because of the end of the Infinity Saga last year. As such, this new phase, Phase 4 of the MCU, is meant to start an entirely new chapter for it, but this isn’t a great start for it at all. Phase 4 has a number of films that people are interested in due to it being full of characters that haven’t been seen by most people before. Lesser known characters being a part of the MCU isn’t a bad thing and could could give us a really interesting saga going forward. After all, the Guardians of the Galaxy were a lesser known group of heroes that became a big part of the MCU.
Sadly, it will be a while longer before we get to see how these films will end up playing out and what story we will get to see them tell. There are plenty of sagas that we can see the stories for in the future, but the set-ups need to be made. The domino effect caused by delaying ‘Black Widow’ has changed everything about the way Marvel Studios must approach the universe moving forward with everything being push by about six months. Even when they are able to restart production there will surely be new rules in place for them to follow which could change the entire way that the films play out. Hopefully something will happen that can help things go back to normal soon.
Over the past few years, the Star Wars franchise has had a resurgence beginning with ‘Star Wars: The Force Awakens.’ The idea that Lucasfilm had following that film was that they planned on making spin-off films for every off year that there wasn’t a main film. After only the second spin-off film’s release, Lucasfilm scrapped the idea to continue to make spin-offs. With the spin-offs not on the docket anymore, there were a lot of issues that came up with any future films. There was only one more spin-off that was supposed to be made after ‘Solo: A Star Wars Story’ and that was the Boba Fett movie.
There was no one who knew what was going on with that film other than the people working on it. ‘Solo’ didn’t do as well as Lucasfilm and Disney thought it would and decided that it just wasn’t worth making another spin-off film. With that in mind, the director left the next project and they called off the Boba Fett movie. Josh Trank was the director who was supposed to be working on the film, but decided to leave of his own accord. He recently made a statement about why he left the project in the first place.
Trank has said recently that the only reason that he quit the project of making the Boba Fett movie in the first place was because he was going to be let go. When ‘Solo’ under-performed in theaters Lucasfilm was cancelling movies on the docket, so it would only make sense that they were going to be letting him go. So before they could fire him as the director, he quit ahead of time. It has essentially become known by this point that Lucasfilm has had issues keeping directors due to “creative differences.” Whether this is why he actually quit is unknown, but it doesn’t change the fact that he quit due to the plans LucasFilm had in place.
Despite the fact that they said no more spin-off films would be made and the new trilogy is finished, Lucasfilm is continuing the franchise. Of course there are shows in development for the franchise, but there were no other films lined up. That is, until recently when Lucasfilm announced that they would be having Taika Waititi directing the next Star Wars film. No one other than those working directly on the film have any idea what kind of film it will be, but with Waititi directing, there is some hope. The only question now is whether he will be staying on the project by the time filming begins.
Very recently, we discovered that Tom Cruise was planning to talk with NASA alongside Elon Musk to try and make a film in space. The film would be the first feature length movie filmed in outer space and would be a technical achievement for the movie industry. The movie was only revealed at the time to be an action-adventure film. Cruise’s new unnamed film will see Cruise working with Elon Musk’s SpaceX and alongside NASA who have now confirmed that they would help with the project. This film will be unlike any other film that has ever been shot before and will be a landmark achievement for many.
Tom Cruise is an actor, at this point, who has tried to push the boundaries of everything that he does. The ‘Mission: Impossible’ series is a perfect example of him doing just that. Every one of those movies has some kind of insane stunt that most people, let alone actors, would try and attempt even with all of the safety equipment on set. Due to Tom Cruise not liking the idea of using stunt doubles, he did a few stunts that easily could have killed him. In the most recent films ‘Rogue Nation’ and ‘Fallout,’ Cruise did a number of stunts that put him in a lot of danger.
Cruise has had to complete an action shot underwater with no way of breathing, he’s had to make approximately 100 jumps from an airplane to get a three minute scene done, and he had to hold onto an airplane while it was taking off. Not to mention, he has had to get certified to make the skydiving jumps and he has had to get certified to pilot a helicopter for a chase scene. It is obvious that Cruise has no aversion to crazy stunts and putting everything into the role and scene he is given. So now that he will be going to space, what can we expect from the big-time actor in this upcoming film.
Not much is really known about the new film except that it is an action-adventure narrative film. NASA administrator Jim Bridenstine sent out a tweet saying that the movie would be filmed aboard the International Space Station, or ISS. Bridenstine has hopes that Cruise’s new film will “inspire a new generation of engineers and scientists.” The ISS is a low orbit space station, which is operated and manned by five different nations and their respective space agencies. So, with this in mind, it will be interesting to see how they decide to approach the filming of the movie. With so much work needed for the film, it will certainly be an interesting project to see a final product for, and it will definitely be worth a watch.
Today is Revenge of the Fifth, the second part of the annual celebration of the Star Wars universe by its fans. I was reading a couple of articles, and it seems like there is something a few people got off their chest within these past two days. The new Star Wars trilogy doesn’t measure up to the original trilogy. So now I pose the question above, was it worth starting up the mainline films again. Fiscally, it made all of the sense in the world and restarting the series’ main films gave a good excuse to start selling new merchandise as well. While the movies generate a lot of revenue for Disney, most money comes from the merchandising.
Fans have often said in the last few years that this trilogy just doesn’t measure up to the original trilogy. So, the question posed above is best answered with another question. Was the story of the new trilogy worth it? Were there a lot of people who went to see all three films and come out of it feeling satisfied in the end? The movies themselves managed to sell a lot of tickets and get people excited enough to go out and buy merchandise. Critically, the new trilogy did fairly well and it was only ‘The Rise of Skywalker’ that did do so well critically.
One of the biggest problems with the way the new trilogy ended was that the ending was considered a let down by many fans. The film itself helped to validate some stuff about previous films, but there was so much going on in the film that more questions were brought up. To put it bluntly, the movie just ended up as a disappointment by many because there was so much hype for it. People have said that out of all three trilogies, this one ended up being the least satisfying. The satisfaction of the ending is the biggest thing that can change how people feel about a movie.
‘The Rise of Skywalker’ answered a lot of questions that fans were left with by the end of ‘The Last Jedi.’ However, there were a lot more questions that ended up being posed by fans at the end of it all that make the third film feel worse than the previous two films. Most of the feelings people have towards the movie stems from them not properly coping with how it ended. So, people end up saying that the way this new trilogy ended wasn’t as good as the original trilogy, but in a few years that will be subjective. In the end, was the film worth it to the fans.
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