Informed Art - Comic-Con Revealed

Casting Announcements Come to Hall H

Comic-Con has never opened the 6,500 seat Hall H venue on Thursday before this year. Paramount took the gamble on going first and it paid off. Crowds are larger for Thursday than any other year before. Friday and Saturday are already sold out. Paramount’s panel is one of the premiere panels of the entire event, including looks at Iron Man, Star Trek, Indiana Jones 4, Stardust, Beowulf, The Spiderwick Chronicles, Hot Rod and Drillbit Taylor.

The panel kicked off with SNL comedy trio Andy Samberg, Akiva Schaffer and Jorma Taccone on their upcoming comedy, Hot Rod, which follows a wannabe daredevil, who learns that his abusive stepfather has a terminal illness and decides to do a charity stunt to save his life so that he can kick his butt. The trio fielded questions from the crowd and showed a new clip from the film, which spoofs several ‘80s films, especially Footloose.

Next up was Neil Gaiman and Stardust screenwriter Jane Goldman with her hard to miss long pink hair. After fielding some questions, they set up an extended clip from the film where the fallen star Yvaine (Claire Danes) is being set up by the witch Lamia (Michelle Pfeiffer). Harry Potter fans would have caught Mark Williams (aka Mr. Weasley) as a goat who is turned into a human. After Stardust, Gaiman left the stage only to return with screenwriter Roger Avary to talk about Beowulf. Gaiman and Avary have been trying to bring their take on the story to the screen for years. Avary credits Gaiman as coming up with the idea for how to transition the script across the large time jump in the original text. Avary actually said that he pitched the idea of the film once as a puppet film with Jan Svankmajer. The motion capture film, which hits theaters Nov. 16, 2007, will be released in the regular version, a digital 3-D version and an IMAX 3-D version. Gaiman showed the trailer, which just hit the Net last night. The near photoreal CG is really walking the line into uncanny valley area, where the animation looks enough like live-action, that it feels slightly creepy. The less than explosive reaction to the trailer seems to speak about how this issue is carrying over to viewers. However, fans did have two chances to catch two 20 minute previews of the film in 3-D in town. So we will see whether this boundary pushing film will do when it debuts in the fall.

The trailer for J.J. Abrams’ untitled monster movie, which releases on 1/18/08, played next. Abrams came out and didn’t give the title, but did unravel a cool poster of the Statute of Liberty missing its head. The Spiderwick Chronicles writer Holly Black and illustrator Tony DiTerlizzi came to the stage next with visual effect legend Phil Tippett to show off the creatures from Nickelodeon Movies adaptation of the bestselling children’s series. Tippett displayed conceptual versions of the goblins, which were based on DiTerlizzi’s original artwork. Using amphibian references, CG and later clay models were made for the goblins. Besides the trailer, the trio showed clips of various levels of the shot builds including test passes that include crew models running with model goblins.

Paramount previewed the new Owen Wilson comedy, Drillbit Taylor, which sees Wilson playing a homeless man who poses as a top bodyguard to a threesome of high school students who need protection from the school bullies. Next Jon Favreau gave a video presentation from the editing studio on Iron Man, saying he would show a rough animation test, which actually turned out to be a clip from the awful, low-budget 1960s Iron Man toon. In actuality, he was able to appear, videotaping the audience, and showed footage from the film, including both the grey and red and yellow suits. A fan of practical effects, stressed that all the grey suit footage was done on-set. Kicking off the 2008 summer season, this superhero spectacle looks like another CG extravaganza.

For Indiana Jones 4, a live feed from the set included Steven Spielberg, Harrison Ford, Ray Winstone and Shia LaBeouf. The audio “conveniently” went out when Spielberg said the name of the film. He says that after making personal films for the past few years this one is for the fans. With Spielberg and Ford there, LaBeouf commented that he doesn’t know why he was there, which Spielberg said, “Because you have some talent, young man.” Then Spielberg brought out another chair with the name Marion Ravenwood printed on the back, thus announcing Karen Allen’s return to the series since her signature role in Raiders of the Lost Ark.

Closing out the Paramount panel, the filmmakers behind the Star Trek prequel came out to officially introduce their new Spock to the Comic-Con crowd. Heroes star Zachary Quinto will don the ears and turn Vulcan for the big screen. He said that he has the approval of Leonard Nimoy to put his own spin on the character, yet stay true to the spirit of the original performance. In answering a fan question, Quinto he has had a chance to find out what fellow Heroes cast member and former Star Trek star George Takei thinks about his casting as the venerable Vulcan. Abrams teased the audience with more casting announcements finally bringing out Nimoy, who will play an older Spock in the film. Abrams admitted that he was more of a Star Wars kid than a Trekkie, but understands how much the series means to its fans and takes the responsibility of getting it right very seriously.

Well, that’s the Paramount panel
from Rick’s View