If the goal of the CinemaCon convention in Las Vegas is to heighten anticipation for the studios' upcoming movie slates, then mission accomplished. All six major studios are represented at the show this year with product previews, and on Tuesday it was Warner Bros. and Disney's turn to show off their wares.
In 2011, Warner Bros. celebrated its third year in a row tallying $4 billion in global box office, and the upcoming movies it highlighted augur another tremendous year. First up was Tim Burton to present the extended trailer for Dark Shadows, which looks like an awful lot of fun. Burton recalled running home from school to watch the original supernatural daytime TV soap opera, which he blamed for "a generation of bad students" neglecting their homework. He admitted that he and eight-time collaborator Johnny Depp share "a strange love of weird cult phenomena," and then brought to the stage a reticent-looking Depp, who said all of two words: "Have fun."
Next was Dark Knight Rises writer-director Christopher Nolan, who recalled his visit to CinemaCon predecessor ShoWest in 2010 to preview Inception, which he humbly admitted must have seemed like "high-end gibberish" at the time. Nolan's $2.5 billion track record at the worldwide box office has allowed him to "craft a large-scale conclusion" to his Batman series, and to "finish it in the biggest way possible." "We're partners in putting on a show," he told exhibitors, offering the equivalent of "many thousands of live performances." For the CinemaCon audience, Nolan prepared a montage of scenes from The Dark Knight Rises that promised a movie filled with both action and stunning visual spectacle.
Rock of Ages director Adam Shankman began his intro confessing he wanted to be Chris Nolan. "You fucker!" he marveled at the preceding montage. "That's badass shit!" Shankman then described going to the Broadway production of the hit '80s hard-rock musical and noticing that every straight man in the audience was singing along and knew all the words. He predicted Rock of Ages would be the first movie musical that straight men will take their girlfriends to see.
Jay Roach, director of the Austin Powers and Fockers franchises, is back with The Campaign, a comedy co-starring Will Ferrell and Zach Galifianakis as rival candidates for U.S. Congress who get down and dirty. Judging by the raucous reaction to the trailer, this looks like a potential comedy blockbuster. The timing in this election year is perfect--perhaps too perfect. As Roach noted, during the making of the film,"we kept checking the Internet to see if we were still as funny as the real-life stuff."
Greeting the audience on tape was Baz Luhrmann, director of the new 3D version of the F. Scott Fitzgerald classic The Great Gatsby, starring Leonardo DiCaprio, Tobey Maguire and Carey Mulligan. This may not be a literary adaptation for purists, but, like Luhrmann's wild take on Romeo and Juliet, it looks like a lavish, ultra-stylish treatment that fully justifies the unexpected third dimension for a romantic drama.
Warner's preview ended with a moment of movie history: ten minutes of scenes from Peter Jackson's The Hobbit, the first digital 3D feature shot at 48 frames per second (versus the standard 24 frames). The New Zealand landscapes were incredibly sharp, and more intimate scenes looked hyper-real. (In fact, I overheard some viewers griping that the images looked more like high-def TV than a movie.) The 48 FPS future is nearly here: The enhanced Hobbit opens in select engagements this December.
Tim Burton was back for the Disney preview event, showing a very amusing classroom scene from Frankenweenie, his 3D stop-motion feature version of his own early live-action short about a young boy who reanimates his dead pet dog a la Dr. Frankenstein. And so was Johnny Depp, accompanying producer Jerry Bruckheimer to talk up The Lone Ranger, which also re-teams them with Pirates of the Caribbean director Gore Verbinski. This time, Depp had just a few more words to say, admitting that Jay Silverheels, the original actor who played the Masked Man's Indian sidekick Tonto, might not approve of Depp's interpretation.
Depp and Bruckheimer's appearance was preceded by a surprise visit from Kermit the Frog on a cardboard horse, putting in his bid to play the Lone Ranger, and Miss Piggy emerging from the opposite end of the stage to demand a role in Disney's Oz: The Great and Powerful. Disney production president Sean Bailey told them the roles were already cast, but reassured them with the official news that there will be a Muppets II.
Talking up Oz were director Sam Raimi, producer Joe Roth, and stars James Franco and Mila Kunis. Roth, a onetime Disney chairman and producer of the mega-hit Alice in Wonderland, called Oz "more Disney than any film I can remember." The prequel shows how the Wizard, the Wicked Witch and Glinda the Good Witch evolved into the characters we know from the 1939 classic, with Kunis turning bad after she's dumped by Franco's character, a con man/magician. "A woman gets her heart broken and she goes craaazy," Kunis told the crowd.
Pixar co-founder and Disney Animation chief John Lasseter took over the final portion of the program, first previewing a highly original and delightful-looking new feature from Walt Disney Animation, Wreck-It Ralph, which explores the secret lives of videogame characters. Ralph, voiced by John C. Reilly (who also appeared on stage), is an 8-bit villain from the dawn of videogames who longs to break out of his designated identity and do something good and heroic. Directed by Rich Moore of "Futurama," this looks like a major crowd-pleaser.
Lasseter also gave us a first glimpse at the 3D version of Finding Nemo, which looked sensational with the added dimension--like a giant fish tank up on the big screen. The 3D trailer for Monsters University, the prequel to Monsters Inc. (also getting a 3D reboot), earned big laughs, and Lasseter revealed that Pixar's dinosaur project (due May 30, 2014) finally has a title, The Good Dinosaur, and that there's a new project in the works about the eerie Mexican holiday called Dia de los Muertes, from Toy Story 3 director Lee Unkrich.
As a final treat, CinemaCon got to see the first half-hour of Pixar's next release, the Scottish adventure Brave, and it's another meticulous and masterly effort from this remarkable studio. In related news, Dolby revealed that Brave will be the first feature to go out with its new, highly immersive audio format Dolby Atmos, on 15 test screens.
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