Park Chan-wook Is Back To Work!

Fifteen full years ago (!!!) in 2009 I posted about Oldboy director Park Chan-wook following up his vampire film Thirst with an NYC-set adaptation of Donald E. Westlake’s novel The Ax from 1997. The book is about:

"... a middle aged, middle class salaryman loses his job after a downsizing, and after spending the following two years downsizing his lifestyle, he decides to overcome competition in his own personal way: chopping down anyone who gets in the way of his path back into fiscal solvency."

Obviously that movie didn't happen then -- he did come to America but he made the great and underrated Stoker with Nicole Kidman and Mia Wasikowska instead. But it looks like he's come back to the project -- The Film Stage has word that he is beginning shooting his adaptation this week (!!!) and it's to be called No Other Choice now. And that is the teaser poster up top too! The film will be shot in his homeland of South Korea now though, and it will star our long-standing crush Byung-hun Lee!

I've long been surprised that the two of them haven't worked together since Joint Security Area way back in the year 2000 before either one of them were really anybody... 

... so this is an overdue reunion we're thrilled to see finally happen. Also announced in the cast are actors Son Ye-jin, Park Hee-soon, Lee Sung-min, Yeom Hye-ran, Cha Seung-won, and Yoo Yeon-seok -- Sung-min was in The Good, The Bad, and the Weird with Byung-hun in 2008, Yeom Hye-ran was in Bong Joon-ho's fantastic movie Memories of Murder, and Yoo Yeon-seok played the young version of the villain in Oldboy (that's him then and now below) but other than that I'm not super familiar with any of the cast. Not that I have anything but immense trust in Master Park! (As long as Robert Downey Jr. is nowhere to be seen anyway.) 

Gratuitous Martin Sensmeier

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There was a lot to look at in Antoine Fuqua's 2016 remake of The Magnificent Seven, which is hitting blu-ray on December 20th -- there were Chris Pratt's really tight cowboy pants, there were Byung-hun Lee's really tight cowboy pants, there were Manuel Garcia-Rulfo and Peter Sarsgaard and Matt Bomer's really tight cowboy pants. The movie in this way is a most faithful adaptation of John Sturges' 1960 film, which boasts the tightest cowboy pants ever put on screen. But even with all them cowboy bulges bouncing around bareback it wasn't a cowboy I kept looking at at all, it was...

... male-model turned actor Martin Sensmeier playing the Native American member of the team called Red Harvest that kept catching, and catching, and catching my eye. I think you can see why. I mean even standing beside a pleasingly beefy Chris Pratt...

... my eye wanders still. And thankfully my eye keep wandering and wandering until it wandered right over to Martin's Instagram account, which is when I realized...

... this post was necessary. Required! My duty, you might even say. The Magnificent Seven remake was not very good (if you're looking for a good update of that story check out Takashi Miike's 2010 film 13 Assassins, which is one of the best action movies of our new century) but I do hope it leads to Martin Sensmeier getting more work. We must encourage Hollywood to cast him more! So hit the jump for over 40 more pictures worth of encouragement...

I Saw the Devil Actor

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As promised (or threatened I suppose you could say if you're some sort of delicate hot-house flower terrified of strangers speaking directly at you, in which case you really need to get off the internet!) I went to the New York Asian Film Festival last night to see the actor Byung-hun Lee in person (and to see his latest South Korean thriller Inside Men, but more on that probably later). And there he was, in person! (Here's another shot on Instagram.)

What a lark! I didn't plan on sitting in the front row but I ended up sitting in the front row, right in front of him, so I managed to score some fine pics. He was charming and humble and very funny - did you know he was the first Korean presenter at the Oscars last year? He told the story of going and how drunk he got to cover his nerves, and how he forced Sofia Vergara (his presenting partner) to rehearse their bit over and over again. He said he even rehearsed walking the red carpet and sitting in his seat!

It was adorable. Anyway he was also asked about his upcoming American movie (besides South Korean classics like I Saw the Devil and JSA and The Good the Bad and the Weird he's starred in plenty of American blockbusters like the Red movies - in which he got mostly naked! - and Terminator: Genisys and GI Joe), Antoine Fuqua's remake of The Magnificent Seven with Chris Pratt and Denzel Washington, and I got his response on video! So here's that:

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As usual thanks to the fine folks at The Film Society 

and the fine folks at NYAFF for setting up the fine event!

Love, Lee

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The New York Asian Film Festival's going on right now and tonight's the night I told you about when the schedule was first released - tonight's the night my South Korean boyfriend Byung-hun Lee will be in attendance, and you best believe I will be there too. He is there to do a Q&A alongside a screening of latest crime-thriller Inside Men, as well as to receive the "Star Asia" award, as well as to get ogled mercilessly by yours truly. And good times were had by all! Stay tuned for updates via my Instagram, probably.

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Byung-hun Lee Twelve Times

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Earlier this week The New York Asian Film Festival announced the guests they've got in town for the festivities (which run from June 22nd to July 9th) and you should've heard the sound that came out of me when I read that Lee will be showing his face here in New York for it. We've been a champion of his since I Saw the Devil in 2010...

... it was only after that film that we realized we'd seen him in several things like of Three Extremes and JSA: Joint Security Area and The Good The Bad and The Weird. Anyway even living in a big city like New York it's pretty rare we get the International Stars, and it always comes as a happy surprise. Never thought I'd see this guy in the flesh! (Mmmm flesh.) He's appearing alongside his new film Inside Men, which is a corporate thriller in which he plays "a one-handed thug." Mkay. Anyway hit the jump for nine more shots...

I Am Link

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--- Sex Clown - Whoever's been in charge of Stephen King's It the past few years is absolutely determined Pennywise the Clown be played by a twink of some sort - a little over a year ago 23 year old Will Poulter was cast in the doomed Cary Fukunaga version, while today we're hearing that Mama director Andy Muschietti, who's directing the project now, has just cast Alexander Skarsgard's younger brother Bill in the role. You might know him from Eli Roth's godawful Netflix show Hemlock Grove, where he perked things up by getting his hot ass out. His brother taught him well. Anyway I kind of don't wanna be attracted to Pennywise so this news is weirding me out.

--- Marvel At That - The big news is coming hot and hard today - within five seconds of reading the previous story did I see this here headline, that The Babadook director Jennifer Kent is one of a couple of names up for the gig to direct Captain Marvel, Marvel's first superhero movie starring a (gasp) female. (I mean, can you imagine? Women don't even have penises, I don't know how they could possibly be superheroes.) And if you missed the news last night the rumor going around is that none other than Oscar winner and darling lovely Brie Larson is maybe probably going to be cast in the lead role. All I have to say about that is...

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EXCLUSIVE FIRST FOOTAGE FROM THE CAPTAIN MARVEL MOVIE pic.twitter.com/bNkH4VZmhE

— Jason Adams (@JAMNPP) June 2, 2016

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--- Final Forever - Stacie Ponder is requesting your attention, please! She's going to be celebrating her blog Final Girl's anniversary very soon and she'd like you to email her your Five Favorite Horror Movie Moments. Click on over to read exactly what she means, but this is your opportunity to be immortalized on the best blog in the entire world, so probably you should go ahead and do it.

--- Eastern Boys - Over at Pajiba our pal Kristy is using an interview with the actor Jack Choi, in which he legitimately bemoaned the desexualization of Asian men in Hollywood Movie-making, as a jumping off point to offer up many many suggestions of places that Hollywood could start. In other words, sexy men alert! There are several faces familiar to use here at MNPP offered, including our favorite Byung-hun Lee, whom we've gratuitized on several occasions - click here and then here for the especially good posts.

--- Skeleton Crew - It would be lovely if we could get a proper big-budget film from director Andrew Dominik of Killing Them Softly and The Assassination of Jesse James fame, since those are two of the greatest achievements of the new millennium cinematically speaking, but they both flopped kind of terribly so he's making music docs instead - that said I think a 3D concert film about musician Nick Cave grappling with the death of his son might turn out to be something extraordinary.

--- Who's Pure Now - Daniel Craig is making a twenty episode (spread over two seasons) series for Showtime called Purity, which is based on a book by Jonathan Franzen. (thanks Mac) Variety describes the story as "a morally complex story of youthful idealism, extreme loyalty and cold-blooded murder" which totally reminds me of Kramer reviewing that book on Seinfeld. "Unbridled enthusiasm" much? Anyway what this really means to me is that Daniel Craig and Eva Green, the sexiest Bond couple ever, have taken over an entire television network, and now I'm hoping for a cross-over. Daniel totally needs to show up on Penny Dreadful and make out with Josh Hartnett.

--- French Kisses - Alejandro Aja proved himself a fairly deft horror movie director with High Tension and the remake of The Hills Have Eyes, and then kind of petered out (although the Piranha remake had its moments). He's got a psychological thriller with Jamie Dornan in the can but it appears he's turning his attentions to a non-genre flick next - it's a period romance called The Marquis, about the "the doomed and passionate relationship between the Marquis Louis Henri de Montespan and his wife Athenais - the ambitious woman who became the mistress of Louis XIV."

--- Peaks Fever - They're really dragging the headlines out on this one but it's worth the hype - David Lynch's new episodes of Twin Peaks will begin to air in "the second quarter of 2017," which means sometimes in Spring, April to June-ish. I suppose eventually we'll have an actual proper date and I will share that too! Speaking of Lynch you should click over to The Film Experience today to consider the opening titles of Blue Velvet, because you literally have nothing better than that to do. I mean it. You don't.

--- Call Coming Later - If I were making a list of the five movies I'm most looking forward to this year JA Bayona's A Monster Calls would most definitely make it - an adaptation of the devastating children's book by Patrick Ness, it stars Felicity Jones, Sigourney Weaver, Toby Kebbell, Lewis MacDougall, and the voice of Liam Neeson, and the less I say about what it's about the better. I went into the book fresh and it hit me like a ton of bricks. But you can totally watch the first trailer, which keeps things pretty vague. Anyway the release date just got moved a week further away to October 21st, which is testing my patience. I want it now!
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Matthew Bomer Is Magnificent

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If you'd have told me that I'd be writing multiple posts on another version of The Magnificent Seven in 2015 I'd have, you know, been all, like, "Huh?" But here we are! Matthew Bomer has just joined the cast as the latest chap in a parade of hotness - last Wednesday we'd heard that Byung-hun Lee and Jason Momoa are in it! The week before that it was Brazilian hottie Wagner Moura! Before that it was Chris Pratt! (For some of you Denzel Washington and Ethan Hawke probably count as well, but I'm not the biggest fans of theirs.) It's a veritable beefcake fest, and I'm on board. You know what I think? I think that working with Jake Gyllenhaal's nipples on Southpaw made director Antoine Fuqua understand the value of a hot slice of man ass, that's what I think. He's suddenly all up in it, and I am thankful.
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More Than Magnificent

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Sometimes there are moments where I'm convinced that I individually am being trolled by casting people, and this here is one of those moments -- The Magnificent Seven remake from director Antoine Fuqua just added Byung-hun Lee and Jason Momoa to its roster. Byung-hun Lee and Jason Momoa! Jason Momoa and Byung-hun Lee! Oh my. To see why we're obsessed with Lee click here. Or just look above. I mean, really. And we just posted about this movie super recently when Wagner Moura was cast; we also dig him. And and besides those three there's Chris Pratt too. Magnificent is maybe too small a word for all of this manliness. What's bigger than magnificent? What is the verbal equivalent of this? Splendiferous? Make that The Splendiferous Seven.

Re Genysis Trailer

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A quick scan across Twitter showed me a lot of complaints about the new Terminator trailer but it pretty much gave me all I was asking for, plus more! Like Naked Jai Courtney and Scarred Jason Clarke In A Uniform staring into each other's eyes and touching, for instance.

And like more shirtless Jai Courtney.

And like more shirtless Jai Courtney.

Oh and Byung-Hun Lee in a cop uniform!

I mean really, what do you people want?

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Oh and more shirtless Jai Courtney, after the jump.

Good Morning, World

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I'd like to wish the makers of the just announced remake of Kim Jee-woon's terrific 2010 Korean action-horror movie I Saw the Devil the best of luck in not only making a movie anywhere near as good as the original, but also in finding a leading man as drop-dead everything as Byung-hun Lee.

Hey maybe they can just use Lee himself? He's making movies here in the US now, after all - he's in the next Terminator, for example. (IMDb doesn't say who he's playing - please let him be doing some naked time-travel!)

Back to the remake - it's Adam Wingard and Simon Barrett, makers of You're Next and the imminent (and lots of fun) thriller The Guest, that're apparently doing it. So I do wish them well - I like their movies so far. This is a high bar to jump, though. We shall see.
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Byung-hun Lee Nine Times

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Today's Fanboy Delusion

Today I'd rather be...

... checking Byung-hun Lee for weapons.

Well one good thing's come out of the news that I Saw the Devil is being remade, at least - it reminded me that Lee had talked about getting his bum out in Red 2, which I didn't see in the theater but knew was on DVD now, and now we can cap it. And judging by what I'm seeing I'm glad I skipped it in the theater since this was the only reason I'd have gone (the first movie was monstrous) and he barely shows cheek. Still what he's got going on above the belt's nothing to sneeze at! Hit the jump for more...

I Am Link

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--- Devil May Care - The great great great 2010 Korean thriller I Saw the Devil, which was all over my end-of-the-year awards that year, is getting an American remake, says The Playlist. Yeah good luck with that, guys. No Byung-hun Lee equals flop!

--- New Past - Over at The Film Experience Amir got to talk to Iranian director Asghar Farhadi! I'm holding off on reading it until after I see The Past (probably not til next week, sigh), but this man's certified brilliant from all I've seen so far.

--- Lil Wizard - JK Rowling is working on a play that will tell the story of Harry Potter before any of the books, when he was a wee little orphan. I guess his early years with the Dorsleys living under the stairs then? Well that sounds totally depressing.

--- I Love Lex - I wrote up a few thoughts yesterday over at The Film Experience about the news that Joaquin Phoenix's name is being tossed out to play the villain in the Superman Vs. Batman movie, which everybody thinks is gonna be Lex Luthor. Post-Her I am pro-Joaquin, so it's complicated.

--- And Speaking of Her, here's an interview with Spike Jonze about the making of that movie, which is out in limited release right this very second oh my god why aren't I sitting in a theater watching Her right now you guys?

--- Frances On Down - Tis the time of year for Top Tens, and so I direct you to our pal Joe Reid's, because Joe is awesome, full stop. I love pretty much everything on his list, even if I think my final list when I get to it literally months from now (you know how I roll) will probably look pretty different. This was a good year, you guys! Also, Joe made a late change to his list, and so here he talks about the act of list-making.

--- Mutant Pride - Let's hope they can work their magic again - Bryan Singer's bringing back the team from the best X-Men movie by far X2, Michael Dougherty and Dan Harris, to write the next X-Men movie. Dougherty made Trick r' Treat, so he wins obviously.

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Good Morning, World

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And a happy 43rd (yes, he's forty-three) birthday to Lee Byung-hun, star of I Saw the Devil and the GI Joe Movies and the upcoming Red 2. We have gratuitized him a couple of times - see here and see here. He's one of our faves. I actually didn't have a clue he was in Red 2 until I saw him in a trailer the other day, and then when I was looking him up this morning for his birthday I found this quote from him about the film:

"It's going to be a fresh, exciting movie. I don't have just a revealing scene. I have a nude scene. It felt nice. I took it all off.

I worked out by myself without a trainer. I was in England for about 2 months and went to the nearby gym, but the trainer was busy, so he never made time. Later, I told him I was an actor, and he said that if that was true then he was a singer."

Alright that second paragraph is kind of sad, but the first one's not! He has shown his butt before - see right here - and I assume (def: making an ass out of him and him) that's what he's talking about since I doubt the PG-13 Hollywood action movie Red 2 will feature him strolling around like he's Michael Fassbender or something. Indeed a check of the IMDb "Parents Guide" for the film (which is apparently a thing, I am now learning) has this to say - "A man's rear end is seen, though mostly obscured." Thanks, Parents Guide! I think I'll use you from now on to know for the exact opposite of what you're actually there for - to see just how much nakedness I will be getting. Hooray!

I Am Link

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--- Horror Show - Hey look over here's a chat with Bryan Fuller about Hannibal, which is so close I can practically taste it. (Mmmm fleshy.) April 4th, y'all! He tweeted that picture from the set last night of himself with stars Hugh Dancy and Mads Mikkelsen (oh and a corpse dangling from antlers, natch), saying they're just about done shooting the entirety of the first season. I only got to visit the set one time, boo. Well here's to hoping we get tons more seasons and I can go back.

--- End Sooner - Edgar Wright tells us via Twitter the good news - The World's End, his third film with Simon Pegg and Nick Frost following Shaun of the Dead and Hot Fuzz, is going to hit the US a couple of months earlier than expected - it'll be out on August 23rd.

--- Winter Treatise - Our pal Sean chatted with a Game of Thrones writer about the upcoming season and its adherence, or lack thereof, to the corresponding book. If you read between the lines, let's just say... Reek, right? Reek.

--- Here Comes Trouble - I'm gonna sneak a little music news in here, just cuz - Pitchfork has some info on The National's new album, including its cover which you can see there to the right. It's called Trouble Will Find Me and it's set to come out in May. There's also a doc about them that will be opening up the Tribeca Film Fest. We love The National! We're seeing a collaboration between one of the band's members and Sufjan Stevens in Brooklyn this weekend, about which we are pants-wettingly enthusiastic.

--- Fired Up - Also in music news - Arcade Fire is working on a new album right this minute! Well maybe not right this actual minute, it's still sort of early in the day in NYC for that sort of thing. But probably later today, and tomorrow, and so on until they're done! (thx Mac)

--- We Fight Hard - When you label something as "ninja on ninja action" and one of said ninjas is possibly played by our big-time crush Lee Byung-hun, then you'd better deliver what I am thinking of. This clip does not deliver what I was thinking of.
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--- Mars Landing - If you want some details on the Veronica Mars movie that we paid for - you have paid some, right? RIGHT? - then head on over to The Playlist, where they've rounded up some of what Rob Thomas has had to say on the subject. I am still getting such a thrill writing "the Veronica Mars movie" and knowing it's a thing. A thing!!!

--- The Other Man - Bridesmaids adorable Chris O'Dowd apparently has a cameo in the second Thor movie, but it's him on a date with Natalie Portman and not him on a date with Chris Hemsworth, so nobody cares.

--- Sunny Side Benedict - I haven't watched the new Cumberbatch-centric Star Trek Into Darkness trailer but it's right here so's you and I can do that when we do that. I was just tempted to write "Yo Gabba Gabba Cumberbatch" and I have no idea where that came from but let's pretend it never happened.
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--- Start Good - Here's a list of what Film.com calls The 50 Greatest Opening Scenes Of All Time, although I'd say "All Time" is a misnomer because I don't see anything B.C. up on there.

--- Bigger Ben - We don't know much about it except it's called Silk Road and it's a thriller in the vein of The Prisoner, but British horror director Ben Wheatley - he made Kill List and Sightseers - is setting up a tv show at HBO. Don't trust the execs there, Ben! They're Enlightened-murdering monsters!

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