Feature Category: Article

[ENDED] Win a Copy of WELLINGTON PARANORMAL SEASON ONE on Blu-ray

Dazzler Media has kindly given us a copy of the brilliant comedy series Wellington Paranormal to give away! To be in with a chance, just read on and enter below…

Dazzler Media proudly presents smash-hit comedy series Wellington Paranormal, from Jemaine Clement and Taika Waititi, with all seasons coming to Blu-ray, DVD & Download-to-Own, and the first season arriving July 5th. The fourth season has recently been filming and will also be available to own.

Wellington Paranormal follows hilariously hapless officers Mark Minogue and Karen O’Leary as they are assigned to the new Paranormal Unit of Wellington’s police force, tasked with tackling the increasing number of local crimes and misdemeanours of a supernatural nature.

From Jemaine Clement and Taika Waititi, the visionary creators behind What We Do in the Shadows, comes the smash hit New Zealand comedy series which has taken the UK by storm.

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Dazzler Media presents Wellington Paranormal: Season One on Blu-ray, DVD & Download-to-Own from July 5th.

A TANGLED WEB: THE HISTORY OF BLACK WIDOW IN COMICS

Launching the next phase of big-screen MARVEL CINEMATIC UNIVERSE content with a character who died in the big, phase-ending AVENGERS: ENDGAME is a brave move. There’s not much you can do with a dead character, let alone one whose body was never recovered from the planet Vormir, but when that character has as fascinating a comic book history as the BLACK WIDOW, it’s an easy sell. Let’s uncover her four-colour past….

Natalia ‘Natasha’ Alianovna Romanova first appeared in Tales of Suspense #52 (1964), a book that at the time was spotlighting the adventures of Iron Man as part of a run that also introduced future Iron Man arch-enemy the Mandarin, future Avenger Hawkeye, and sidekicks Happy Hogan and Pepper Potts. The early Iron Man stories leant heavily on the Cold War; no surprise since the Cuban Missile Crisis was fresh in the minds of American comic book readers. Having already tussled with such Soviet super-soldiers as the Red Barbarian, the Crimson Dynamo, and, erm, Nikita Khrushchev, the latest threat to Tony Stark’s dual existence came not from a powerful man (although the issue did mark the return of the Dynamo) but from a captivating beauty, presenting herself as Madame Natasha. In reality, Natasha was the Black Widow, a master spy loyal to the Kremlin. At the end of her first appearance, the Widow had failed in her mission and was abandoned by her Soviet spymasters. On the run, she attempted to return to the good graces of the USSR by seducing Stark, who by now was aware of her duplicity but still underestimated her guile. She again failed and escaped once more, returning to pick up hapless archer Clint Barton, himself on the run after being wrongly accused of robbery.

Together, a lovelorn Hawkeye and the Black Widow tried to steal Stark tech but were frustrated by Iron Man, after which Black Widow returned to the USSR. She came back to inveigle Hawkeye into another scheme, this time in a new, tricked-out costume that allowed her to walk on walls and fire ‘spider bites’, deadly venom blasts. Failing once more, and considering defection to the USA because of her love for Barton, the Widow was gunned down by her spymasters, and spirited away back to Russia from her hospital bed.

Black Widow’s origin story has changed over the years, perhaps fitting for someone whose past is shrouded in espionage and mystery. Natasha was not even the first Marvel character to go by the name; a hero by the name Claire Voyant (yes, really) appeared in Mystic Comics in 1940, killing wrongdoers and sending them to Hell for her master, Satan. Look, it was a different time, and let’s not judge history too harshly.

The original backstory for the Black Widow had her raised by a man named Ivan Petrovich, who found her as a young child with her dying mother at the Battle of Stalingrad in 1942. Later retcons had her in Petrovich’s care earlier than that, but regardless, she entered the Soviet spy program to prove her loyalty to Petrovich and her homeland. That origin, fleshed out in the Black Widow’s earliest solo adventures in Amazing Adventures in 1970, was later overwritten by a revised history, one that saw Natasha raised as part of the Black Widow Ops program, trained in the Red Room alongside other young women, and given biological enhancements that would explain her longevity. As part of a deep cover operation, Natasha was also given false memories, the story she told in her earliest adventures.

Still under Soviet control, the Black Widow returned to the US and hired the Swordsman and the first Power Man to attack the Avengers with her. By now, Hawkeye had gone straight and joined Earth’s Mightiest Heroes, and his presence broke through the brainwashing of her puppetmasters, so she defected, joining the Avengers as an associate member.

A woman of her talents could not remain free of the spy world, however, and Nick Fury recruited her to be an agent of S.H.I.E.L.D. In order to take the assignment, she had to publicly disassociate herself from the Avengers, and break up with Hawkeye, which led the American public to regard her as a traitor once more.

Her first mission – to China to spy on the Mandarin – went poorly and she was captured, which led to the Avengers and the Widow’s ex-husband, the Soviet hero Red Guardian, coming to her rescue. Natasha was successfully retrieved, but the Red Guardian died in the resulting battle. Returning to the US, the Black Widow decided to give up the life of a costumed adventurer, although she remained in a relationship with Hawkeye.

This was to prove short-lived, as a bored Natasha accepted another S.H.I.E.L.D. mission, which again went awry and needed intervention from the Avengers. After this, the Black Widow decided enough was enough and left the team to strike out on her own, eventually settling in San Francisco, where she found herself in a relationship with Daredevil.

For a while, Daredevil’s comic book was retitled, at least on the cover, to include the Black Widow, and the two made quite the couple, swinging around the city’s Victorian neighbourhoods, but all good things come to an end, and Natasha was on her travels once more. She ended up in Los Angeles, where she formed one of the oddest superhero teams, the Champions, with the demonic do-gooder Ghost Rider, half-god Hercules, and Angel and the Beast from the original X-Men. Always a bit different, the title ended in 1978 after seventeen issues when the team went bankrupt, but did notably manage a storyline that reduced Magneto and his Brotherhood of Evil Mutants to babies!

Later that year, the Black Widow re-joined the Avengers in time for the legendary Korvac Saga but didn’t stick around past the conclusion of that story. Instead, she went solo once more but kept being brought into the orbit of Daredevil, whose title at the time had been revitalised under Frank Miller. It’s hard to believe now, after years of dross, but Miller’s writing was compelling and his art innovative, and Daredevil became a critical success under his control, with storylines such as the death of Elektra earning a dedicated following.

Daredevil’s Matt Murdock never had much luck with the ladies, and Natasha too fell afoul of his curse when she was killed by the supernatural ninja clan the Hand, in Daredevil #188. Resurrected by Daredevil’s associate Stone (who also did the same for Elektra), the Black Widow struck out on her own again, making sporadic appearances throughout the Marvel Universe during the 1980s, but always returning to Daredevil, in whose book she became an occasional guest star.

In 1991, as they do with alarming regularity, the Avengers decided to shake up their membership and invited their alumni to select the new roster. Earning a place on the team, the Black Widow remained with the Avengers through to the end of the first volume of their title, a run of seventy-four issues, until 1996’s Onslaught Saga, which saw the core Avengers exiled to another dimension, where they could appear in a poorly drawn comic book by Rob Liefeld. This new team – Captain America, Thor, Iron Man, Vision, Hawkeye, Scarlet Witch, Hellcat, and the Swordsman – starred in Avengers Volume Two, which lasted for just over a year until the experiment was deemed a failure and the characters folded back into the mainstream Marvel Universe.

This kicked off a third volume of The Avengers, and Natasha became an occasional team member but was kept busy by her first solo title, launched as part of the Marvel Knights range of comic books overseen by future Marvel head honcho Joe Quesada. This first series, one of several limited runs over the next few years, introduced another Black Widow into Natasha’s life in the shape of Yelena Belova. Also trained in the Red Room, where she claimed she received higher scores than her rival, Belova became a recurring figure in Natasha’s story and was every bit as conflicted as the original Black Widow as to her motives and true calling. Belova later died in a clone storyline every bit as complicated as the famous Spider-Man one.

The appearance of a second Black Widow led Natasha to discover her true origins and the revelation that other young women underwent the same ordeal. This would influence her character over the coming years, and she would eventually go on a hunt for other Black Widows and the men who created them. Finding that the Red Room was in league with American corporation Gynacon, she tracked down and killed the heads of both organisations, which led to her being branded America’s most wanted criminal.

Nick Fury, though, cares not for such things, and involved Natasha in bringing down the government of Latveria, Doctor Doom’s former kingdom, and then wiping her memory afterwards. Her legal status was settled when the Superhero Registration Initiative was enacted, which led to the superhero Civil War. Natasha complied with the act, was pardoned and guided a task force for her old enemy Iron Man, the man behind the Initiative.

Two competing teams of Avengers were formed as a result of the Initiative, one legit and the other not so much. Natasha joined the official team, alongside Iron Man, Ms (later Captain) Marvel, the Wasp, and others, while Luke Cage and Captain America led an outlaw team. This was a point when Marvel lurched from line-wide crossover to line-wide crossover, and Civil War soon gave way to The Siege, in which Norman Osborn took over the Initiative and did terrible things (Natasha assumed the identity of Yelena Belova to infiltrate Osborn’s administration), and then Secret Invasion, when it was revealed that a bunch of prominent Marvel characters had been replaced by the shape-shifting alien Skrulls years before.

This crisis was the catalyst for Natasha to leave the Avengers once more, and she returned to solo adventures, appearing in more self-titled limited series before finally being given an ongoing title of her own in 2010. Scripted by paranormal romance novelist Marjorie Liu, the series set the Black Widow off on a hunt for whoever ordered a hit on her, eventually leading her to uncover a massive conspiracy against spies led by rogue Russian agent Alexi Shostakov.

With Natasha encountering Elektra, Hawkeye, and Mockingbird along the way, as well as a cadre of Russian superheroes including a new Crimson Dynamo, the story closed out the Black Widow series, and our hero once again joined the Avengers, this time a ‘secret’ incarnation led by Steve Rogers, before aiding the main team in their battle against the X-Men. The Black Widow even died for a second time, killed in an explosion while trying to rescue people from Earth, which was destructing as part of an incursion by an Earth from another reality.

Once again, death didn’t take, and the rebirth of the multiverse saw Natasha resurrected. She returned to a life of espionage but found herself on the run from S.H.I.E.L.D. after being framed by the Weeping Lion. Tracking the Lion, Natasha discovered that the Red Room’s former headmistress had resumed her activities, opening up the Dark Room Academy and training innocent young girls to become living weapons. Finding the two linked, Natasha ended the activities of the Dark Room and led the girls to a life of safety, although only after they had exacted their revenge on the Weeping Lion.

The world was turned upside down when Steve Rogers declared his loyalty to Hydra and proclaimed the USA to be Hydra territory under his control. The resulting Secret Empire storyline, which resonated throughout the Marvel Comics line, saw the remaining heroes hunkering down and forming an underground resistance to Hydra’s tyranny. The Black Widow joined them and vowed to stop Rogers by killing him, but before she could carry out her assassination, she stumbled across a group of young heroes calling themselves the Champions. Enlisted into training them for the horrible new world, Natasha kept her plan on the backburner.

One of the Champions was the Miles Morales Spider-Man, and he had been prophesied to kill Rogers by an Inhuman precognitive. Seeking to take the burden of murder from the young man’s shoulders, Natasha vowed to carry out her own takedown of Rogers, but things went awry and Spider-Man confronted Rogers alone. Just as Rogers was about to deny the prophecy and end Spider-Man’s life before he could end his, Natasha appeared and took a killing blow meant for Spider-Man, snapping her neck and killing her instantly. Spider-Man flipped, and savagely beat Rogers, but did not kill him after Natasha had urged him not to have murder on his conscience.

The Secret Empire was eventually overthrown, and things have returned to normal – or as normal as things ever get – for the Marvel Universe, with one big exception: the Black Widow is dead. Yes, she’s been dead before and it hasn’t stuck, and just like her Marvel Cinematic Universe counterpart, this hasn’t stopped her appearing in comic books, with 2019’s Web of Black Widow acting as a ‘year one’ origin story, much as May’s movie will do for Scarlett Johansson’s Natasha Romanoff. And with rumours of a multiverse in the MCU being at the forefront of Phase Four, we might not have seen the last of either Natasha yet…

BLACK WIDOW will be released July 9th in cinemas and via Premier Access on Disney+

[This article was originally published in issue 471, April 2020]

THE TELEPHEMERA YEARS: 2003 – PART 2

Ah, telephemera… those shows whose stay with us was tantalisingly brief, snatched away before their time, and sometimes with good cause. They hit the schedules alongside established shows, hoping for a long run, but it’s not always to be, and for every Knight Rider there’s two Street Hawks. But here at STARBURST we celebrate their existence and mourn their departure, drilling down into the new season’s entertainment with equal opportunities square eyes… these are The Telephemera Years!

2003-04

By the turn of the twenty-first century, the hegemony of the big three networks had well and truly been blown apart by a new, multi-channel reality. While ABC, CBS, and NBC still churned out a new season of promising hopefuls each year, they had to contend with competition from the cable networks, and while Alias, NYPD Blue, ER, and the final season of Friends were all blockbuster hits on ABC and NBC, the likes of Fox and UPN were stealing eyeballs across the schedules.

Offbeat humour from King of the Hill, Malcolm in the Middle, That 70s Show, The Simpsons, and new arrival Arrested Development ran wild on Fox, while The WB ensured teens were well catered for with Angel, Charmed, Smallvile, and their new emo show One Tree Hill, rivalled only by The OC beginning its four-season run on Fox. In response, the only new network shows to make any kind of impact were Joan of Arcadia and Two and a Half Men on CBS, but that’s not why we’re here. This is the story of even more 2003 shows that didn’t catch on…

Tarzan (The WB): The legend of Tarzan has been given the present-day treatment before, but rarely has it had to contend with the teen and twentysomething target audience of The WB, who want to see as many bare chests (male, of course, always male) as they can get their eyes on and don’t particularly care whose chest it is.

The chest in this remake, from the pen of future Supernatural creator Eric Kripke, belongs to Travis Fimmel, an Australian model making his acting debut as the titular lord of the apes, transported to twenty-first-century New York after having been lost in the jungle for twenty years. Firmly under the thumb of his rich uncle (played with sinister glee by Mitch Pileggi), Tarzan finds respite by exploring the urban jungle, where he encounters NYPD detective Jane (get it?) Porter.

Kripke wrote the pilot and was satisfied with his work but, he told Livejournal, he hadn’t intended it to become a series, and when The WB ordered twelve more episodes he was in bind. Still, a gig’s a gig and he gamely wrote a full season, which he called “a piece of crap,” but The WB yanked the show off the air after just eight episodes.

The cast was good – with Lucy Lawless, Leighton Meester, and The Walking Dead’s Sarah Wayne Callies – but it was thin gruel and even the bare-chested Aussie model wasn’t succour enough for the network or its viewers. There are clips on YouTube but if you want full episodes you’re out of luck. And possibly a bit desperate.

Wonderfalls (Fox): From the ridiculous to the sublime, and Bryan Fuller’s follow-up to the bittersweet Dead Like Me, cascading onto TV screens in March 2004. Set in Niagara Falls, Wonderfalls stars Caroline Dhavernas as Jaye Tyler, a university graduate avoiding starting real life by living in a trailer and working in the eponymous gift shop.

So far, so normal, except that the various trinkets she hawks start talking to her, giving her cryptic instructions that, at first, make little sense. Convinced she is having a breakdown, Jaye tries to ignore the voices but finally comes to see that they are pushing her towards solving the problems of those around her, and the people who pass through this most touristy of traps.

A native French speaker from Quebec, Dhavernas is incredible as world-weary Jaye, and Fuller gives her solid backing in the shape of cocktail waitress best friend Tracie Thoms, love interest Tyron Leitso, and put upon sister Katie Finneran, and the whole thing is wrapped up in a bundle of Fuller magic.

Fuller wrote the first season to be standalone, but with windows for sequels if it were successful enough to be picked up, but alas the ratings just weren’t as strong as Fox would have hoped, and any prospect of that second series went over the falls in a barrel. The second of what would eventually be a trilogy of delights when Pushing Daisies appeared in 2007, Wonderfalls is available – and recommended! – on DVD.

Skin (Fox): The works of William Shakespeare have not only provided the backbone of provincial theatre and lazy English Literature teaching, they’ve also been quite the inspiration for TV producers across the globe. In 2003, Jim Leonard – who had earlier guided the US version of Cracker to fourteen disappointing episodes – was moved to develop a modern-day retelling of Romeo and Juliet, a story of two lovestruck teenagers from warring families.

Adam Roam’s mum and dad are a senior judge and District Attorney, respectively, so it’s pretty poor form for their golden boy to fall in love with Jewel Goldman, a pretty sixteen-year-old whose dad happens to be one of Los Angeles’s foremost pornographers. To make things worse, Adam’s dad is up for re-election and children are disappearing, possibly linked to child pornography, and he’s a Catholic, she’s a Jew!

DJ Cotrona and Olivia Wilde are game enough as the star-crossed lovers, and Ron Silver admirably chews scenery as Larry Flynt Goldman, but even the appearance of Ginger Lynn Allen couldn’t get a rise out of viewers, who deserted the show in their droves, leaving Fox to pull the plug after just three episodes.

The remaining five episodes did get an airing two years later, on SOAPnet, leaving those who did see promise in the show to wonder if it hadn’t just been mis-scheduled; if you want to join their number, you can find some episodes on YouTube.

Kid Notorious (Comedy Central): The Kid Stays in the Picture, the 2002 adaptation of film producer Robert Evans’s autobiography of the same name, was a fascinating look at the career of the man behind Rosemary’s Baby, Love Story, Chinatown, and The Godfather, and the obvious next step was an animated Comedy Central show, with Evans as a James Bond-like playboy who gets into sticky situations. Obviously.

Directed by Pete Michels, whose cv includes The Simpsons, Family Guy, and Rocko’s Modern Life, Kid Notorious was an absurd take on Evans’s life, with rap-themed Godfather musicals, forbidden love with middle eastern princesses, Martha Stewart’s bum, and the infiltration of a Neo-Nazi cell among the scrapes Evans finds himself in.

Evans played himself, as did Slash and Rob Schneider, and while the show is a million miles away from the documentary film that inspired it, it’s an irreverent take on Hollywood and the excesses of its denizens. It divided audiences, though, and its critics felt it self-indulgent; its first season ran through its run of episodes, and even with South Park as a lead-in there wasn’t enough of a response to warrant a second.

Although there was no DVD release, the full run can be found on video sharing sites, and it’s a fun tribute to Evans, who died in 2019 aged eighty-nine.

Next: Fire! Inventions! Ke-mo Sah-bee! The unsold pilots of 2003!

Check out our other Telephemera articles:

The Telephemera Years: 1966 (part 1, 2, 3, 4)

The Telephemera Years: 1968 (part 1, 2, 3, 4)

The Telephemera Years: 1969 (part 1, 2, 3, 4)

The Telephemera Years: 1971 (part 1, 2, 3, 4)

The Telephemera Years: 1973 (part 1, 2, 3, 4)

The Telephemera Years: 1975 (part 1, 2, 3, 4)

The Telephemera Years: 1977 (part 1, 2, 3, 4)

The Telephemera Years: 1980 (part 1, 2, 3, 4)

The Telephemera Years: 1982 (part 1, 2, 3, 4)

The Telephemera Years: 1984 (part 1, 2, 3, 4)

The Telephemera Years: 1986 (part 1, 2, 3, 4)

The Telephemera Years: 1987 (part 1, 2 , 3, 4)

The Telephemera Years: 1990 (part 1, 2, 3, 4)

The Telephemera Years: 1992 (part 1, 2, 3, 4)

The Telephemera Years: 1995 (part 1, 2, 3, 4)

The Telephemera Years: 1997 (part 1, 2, 3, 4)

The Telephemera Years: 2000 (part 1, 2, 3, 4)

The Telephemera Years: 2003 (part 1, 2, 3, 4)

The Telephemera Years: 2005 (part 1, 2, 3, 4)

The Telephemera Years: 2008 (part 1, 2, 3 , 4)

Titans of Telephemera: Irwin Allen

Titans of Telephemera: Stephen J Cannell (part 1, 2, 3, 4)

Titans of Telephemera: Hanna-Barbera (part 1, 2, 3, 4, 5)

Titans of Telephemera: Kenneth Johnson

Titans of Telephemera: Glen A Larson (part 1, 2, 3, 4)

Titans of Telephemera: Quinn Martin (part 1, 2)

Ash Zukerman, Darrell Brett-Gibson, and Gillian Jacobs | FEAR STREET

With Netflix’s Fear Street trilogy, writer-director Leigh Janiak created a new vision for the world conjured up by the series of young adult horror novels from writer R.L. Stine and shot three films at once to create a wholly unique universe. It’s a massive undertaking and one that has had horror fans champing at the bit to see since the films were first announced several years ago. The first film of the series, Fear Street Part 1: 1994, is available now on Netflix, and we spoke with three of the series’ stars – Ashley Zukerman (Sheriff Nick Goode), Darrell Britt-Gibson (Martin), and Gillian Jacobs (C. Berman) – about bringing Fear Street to the screen.

STARBURST: Gillian and Ashley, you get to have this thing in the second movie, where there are your younger selves. When working on the film, did you interact with the actors playing your younger selves and did that inform your performances?

Gillian Jacobs: Sadly, no. That sounds like a much better way to go about things, and it would have been much more professional of me, but sadly, I never got to meet my younger self.

Ash Zukerman: The crossover was so small, but I think it was for the better, as well, because I think the characters that Gillian and I play are stuck back in the ’70s, so it was important that they actually just lived the life of those kids, whatever that was. It was important that it was isolated under that. These characters went on a 20-year journey between those two things, and it’s important that they’re different. I think. The work we did was definitely to think about and to inhabit those events, but I think it was important that they are what they are.

Darrell and Gillian, what I find interesting is you were the two of the few actors who don’t play multiple characters. How did that affect how you moved through the story?

Darrell Brett-Gibson: For me, what’s so interesting about playing Martin is because I don’t play multiple people. I feel like he’s experiencing what’s happening the way an audience would experience what’s happening in the film because he only has what he knows of it. Everybody else has sort of a history and an understanding of what’s predated whatever’s happened. So for Martin, it’s sort of like he gets thrown into something, and it’s just as the audience is – like, “What are we doing, Martin?” I don’t know what we’re doing. So it was also easier not having to play 12 different people.

Gillian Jacobs: For me, it meant that I came and went from filming more and other people were there for the entirety of the three film shoots. I don’t know why I only played one character, but I was lucky and happy to be playing the character I was.

What was it like shooting an entire trilogy at once, as opposed to just one film? These are three feature films, and while all of you have worked in television, one has to imagine a film shoot is different from episodic television.

Darrell Brett-Gibson: It’s really cool because I think that the momentum and the energy that you’re all producing with each other stays consistent, as opposed to doing the film and then coming back two years later, or a year later, or whatever it may be and doing another one. By doing it all together, there’s a collective energy. I think that you could lose some of that when you cut it off and come back to do it again. Just doing it straight through; I actually really enjoyed it. I hope that every film I do now, just five of them in a row.

Ash Zukerman: Yeah, that’s true. And then there’s not a sense of self-awareness in between the films that everything we were doing was raw. So as Daryl said, the energy did maintain for the entire shoot.

Director Leigh Janiak was familiar with the books from when she was growing up. Were you all familiar with them at all? And if so, did you go back and reread any before you started work on this project?

Darrell Brett-Gibson: Never heard of them.

Gillian Jacobs: I definitely had read a lot of R.L. Stine as a kid – Fear Street, Goosebumps. I didn’t go back and reread them. It felt like that inspired this trilogy, but it was also its own thing, so I don’t know if there would have been literal one-to-one for any of the books for what we’re doing with this. I didn’t go back and reread the books, but now you’re making me feel like I should. As I say that, I can picture myself in the room in the house I grew up in, where I used to read books. I feel like I’m right back there,

Ash Zukerman: I think when you read these books, you can go right back there. I didn’t read Fear Street as a kid, but I read Goosebumps. I tried reading Fear Street, but I was, I think, a little too young when I tried, and then I just never went back. I read one or two – one and a half, I think – before we started shooting, just to understand.

I think, as Gillian said, these are really an extrapolation of those books that this takes that world and puts it in 2021. So this is a 2021 lens of that world. But I think what it did show me is just how the writers were thinking about it and how the story moved and the freedom it has to move between time and the energy and the heartbeat of it.

Darrell, going back to what you had said about being the audience surrogate in this – what appealed to us about this is just like, “Oh my God, they’re making Fear Street movies!” – but as an audience surrogate in the film, what appealed to you about the script when you first read it and attracted you to these three films?

Darrell Brett-Gibson: One was getting to speak to Leigh. I mean, you, you speak to her for five minutes, and you’re like, “Whatever you want to do, let’s do that,” ’cause she’s just so dope. She just knows exactly what she wants. She’s going to get what she wants. It hasn’t been said enough that she directed three whole feature films back to back to back and wrote three feature films back to back. It’s truly like, I honestly don’t know if we can give some type of award for that. I don’t know what it is. I’m going to mould something together for her because I just think it’s truly an incredible feat. Speaking to her, I was in, you know? I loved the scripts, but getting to meet her and knowing that she’s the mind behind the scripts was a no-brainer.

Fear Street Part 1: 1994 is available on Netflix now, Fear Street Part 2: 1978 follows on July 9, and the series concludes with Fear Street Part 3: 1666 releasing globally on Netflix on July 16. More information can be found here.

[ENDED] Win Stunning Sci-Fi Drama ARCHIVE on Blu-ray

We’ve teamed up with Dazzler Media to give three lucky readers a chance to win Archive on Blu-ray. All you have to do is watch the trailer, read on, and enter below…

It’s 2049, and a roboticist, George Almore, is on the verge of a breakthrough. Stationed at a remote, secret facility, he has been working on a model that is a true, human equivalent android. His latest prototype, J3, is almost complete.

Development of J3 has been achieved through two earlier prototypes, J1 and J2. Each prototype is an increasingly advanced version of his wife, Jules, who died in a brutal car crash. Driven by love for Jules, George has secretly skewed the focus of his work: developing the robots towards the goal of creating a simulacra of Jules.

As his work approaches its final and riskiest stages, external forces threaten to discover and shut down his facility while the introduction of the highly advanced J3 collapses the delicate ‘family’ balance inside the facility.

Written and directed by Gavin Rothery, Archive stars Theo James (Divergent trilogy) and Stacy Martin (The Serpent), with a top supporting cast including Rhona Mitra (Doomsday), Peter Ferdinando (Hyena) and Toby Jones (Uncle Vanya).

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Dazzler Media presents Archive on Blu-ray and DVD from July 12th. Pre-order the film here.

Five Films to Check Out on Horror Channel This Week – 050721

Need more reasons to avoid the kickball games that everyone else is talking about? Here are some of our picks for the next seven days on Horror Channel:

Tuesday July 6th, 9pm – Lakeview Terrace (2008)

Fabulous social thriller in which an angry cop (the ever brilliant Samuel L. Jackson) has a beef with his white neighbour and his Asian girlfriend. A neat twist on the racist angle and a brooding atmosphere make it one to watch.

Wednesday July 7th, 9pm – It Follows (2014)

Director David Robert Mitchell’s superb film proves that modern horror can still be effective to the ‘seen it all before’ crowd. The film mixes the supernatural terror with anxieties about STDs and intimacy with great effect.

Friday July 9th, 11.10pm – Victor Crowley (2017)

Adam Green returns with the fourth film in the Hatchet series with the titular boogie man chopping more unfortunate victims in Honey Island Swamp. Sleepaway Camp’s Felissa Rose is along for the gory action this time too.

Saturday July 10th, 2.35am – The Sand (2015)

Just when you thought it was safe to go back to the beaches, this killer sand movie might give you second thoughts. This fun creature feature is a must for the night owls out there.

Sunday July 11th, 9pm – Starry Eyes (2014)

Some people will do anything for fame. Unfortunately, a waitress pays the price for wanting a role too much. Demon worship and self-mutilation, and a wicked look at the filmmaking business are just some of the delights that make this smart horror worth watching.

Tune into Horror Channel on Sky 317, Virgin 149, Freeview 68, Freesat 138.

Elizabeth Mitchell | WITCH HUNT

Elizabeth Mitchell as Martha Goode and Abigail Cowen as Fiona in Elle Callahan feminist supernatural thriller Witch Hunt

Elizabeth Mitchell stars as Martha Goode in Elle Callahan’s sophomore feature film, Witch Hunt. Also starring Gideon Adlon (The Craft: Legacy, Blockers) and Abigail Cowen (The Chilling Adventures of Sabrina, Fate: The Winx Saga), Witch Hunt is set in a modern America where witches are real, and witchcraft is illegal. Claire (Adlon) is a sheltered teenager whose mother (Mitchell) is part of an underground movement in charge of smuggling women accused of witchcraft across the southern border, to asylum in Mexico. When the witch hunters find their way to their door, Claire is forced to confront her own prejudices and risk it all for the two young witches (Cowen, Echo Campbell) under their care.

Ahead of the release of Witch Hunt, STARBURST spoke with renowned Lost and Revolution actress Elizabeth Mitchell about working with women, the film’s political relevance, and who she considers to be today’s heroes.

First off, how did you come to be involved in this project?

Elizabeth Mitchell: About four years ago, I realised that I had worked with very few female directors. I wasn’t sure why, but the realisation made me start to actively seek them out. So I think the initial draw was that Elle was directing, and I had heard so many incredible things about her. And I really liked the script – it’s going to sound strange, but I liked the softness of it. I felt like it approached the genre in a particularly female way, and I liked that. I thought all the characters were really interesting, and I thought the parallels it drew with what’s happening in our world now were pretty precise. And then I heard Gideon was doing it, and I was basically all in. I think she’s incredible.

She’s brilliant. You mention this softness that attracted you, and I feel a lot of that comes from the mother-daughter relationship between Martha and Claire. And there’s not much in the way of exposition, so how did you go about building that depth?

Elizabeth Mitchell: It was so easy with Gideon. From the minute I met her, I had that feeling of wanting to protect her, wanting her to be everything that she could be. She brings that out. She is an incredibly creative, kind, and talented woman. So that relationship came about really quickly for us. I think creating the tension between them was probably where we did the most work. She’s so easy to love that that was the hard part [laughs]. We had to work out the obstacles to explain why they can’t connect, why they’re not on the same page, and where the friction comes from.

So that aspect had collaborative elements?

Elizabeth Mitchell: Yes! As we went through the days and through what we were doing, we would create that tension and craft their relationship together. The fun thing about an independent film is that everyone comes in with so many amazing ideas, and then you marry those ideas together and find something you didn’t even know would happen. A lot of the reactions and such that ended up in the movie were riffing off of what was there. Elle let us do that and I thought that was really exciting. She is an incredibly insightful filmmaker and a real joy to work with.

You mentioned not getting to work with many female directors – what did you find was different about the feeling on set and the way the production developed?

Elizabeth Mitchell: I think “inclusive” is the word that I would probably use. It felt different, less like a hierarchy; it felt like we were all working together for exactly what we wanted, and it was very nurturing. Well into the night, we would all have huge conversations about our lives, about how it feels to be women in this business, the different things we had gone through.

You mentioned collaboration, which I think is spot on. And Elle is very kind, of course, but she’s also powerful: she knows exactly what she wants, but she’s not rolling over anybody to get it. She is precise about what she needs, and I think that direction makes things easier for us as actors and easier for the crew, because there’s a definite leader. Yet at the same time, she absolutely welcomes creative input, and anything that might make the shot better. It was a really fun collaboration for us, out in the middle of the desert [laughs]. We had a great time!

And you got to shoot in that amazing house that’s got some horror history [the location is also where Annabelle: Creation was filmed].

Elizabeth Mitchell: Oh my gosh, and all the bats [laughs]! Has anyone told you about the bats?

I heard about the bats, it sounded like they were a fun supporting cast [the house was inhabited by its fair share of bats, to the point that a bat wrangler had to be brought in].

Elizabeth Mitchell: It was! You know, as actors we try so hard not to be in our heads. We try to just be reactive creatures, and I think that having the possibility that a bat might fly into your face at any moment definitely changed the dynamic.

I’m sure it also helped establish the ambience.

Elizabeth Mitchell: It really did! It definitely had that creaky feeling to it. And of course, it’s in the middle of nowhere and it’s so disconnected – generators are brought in for electricity, the whole thing is really odd and dusty, and quiet, and it was really something. I took 8 million pictures there because everything had such a cool vibe to it [laughs].

Beyond that, what did you find most intriguing about Witch Hunt’s concept when you first read the script? Politically, it does feel very appropriate to the times.

Elizabeth Mitchell: It really is. There has been such a rebirth in understanding a woman’s path through the world, and I feel like this was such an interesting take on our rights as women, our freedoms as women. What can be taken away from us, what we are sometimes allowed to have by people who are not women. I think that this film really spelled out – almost in a Handmaid’s Tale kind of way – the fear there is towards powerful women. And it shows what can happen in a patriarchal society when women’s power, women’s magic, is regulated or contained. That’s probably what I found to be so interesting about it.

There must also have been some level of catharsis in playing this role, especially since you were filming during the Trump presidency.

Elizabeth Mitchell: There was, and it was something we all talked about. There are some really fierce women in this movie, Gideon being one of them. It’s fun being on her Instagram because she is such a passionate and intelligent activist, and I felt like she was just the perfect choice for this role. I loved that part of it.

And what did you find most interesting about your character, Martha?

Elizabeth Mitchell: I love strong mama bears. I so often play sociopaths and women on the verge, it was really nice playing someone that I felt was a little bit more like me. I loved this softness in her, but I also loved her strength. She is quietly doing the right thing and not calling any attention to herself, she doesn’t defend herself, nor does she say, “Hey, look at me and all this good stuff I’m doing!”. She’s a chameleon dedicated to what she thinks is best, and I loved that. I also really enjoyed playing all the different colours that you have to present in order to hide in plain sight. One of my favourite scenes is when Martha is questioned by a neighbour. I found that to be so interesting, questioning how do we blend in when we are absolutely opposed to the person that we’re trying to blend in with?

In that respect, there are obviously many historical echoes to Nazi Germany, or as far back as the Underground Railroad which resembles the smuggling network that Martha is a part of. Did you do much in the way of historical research, to better understand the thoughts and motives of those persons?

Elizabeth Mitchell: You know, I did do a fair bit. I’m an avid book reader and I am captivated – and have been since I was really young – by the heroes of the Underground Railroad, and every single person who has hidden the oppressed and guided people towards freedom. And you’d love to think that you’re going to be that person, but going against the flow is a lot harder than it seems in the abstract. Those people are true heroes to me, people that I look to. So yes, I did a fair bit of reading, but I had also steeped myself in that sort of research in my early 20s because I was so curious to understand what a hero meant to me.

What do you think that role looks like today? Beyond historical references, Witch Hunt also reflects the Black Lives Matter movement and issues of immigration, so what does that kind of hero look like today?

Elizabeth Mitchell: I think it’s very difficult to speak your truth, especially with so many trolls online. There’s the fear of saying the wrong thing, the possibility that you will then have a whole group of people who are offended and who come after you. I’m still fascinated by all our heroes. Gideon is one of mine, for sure! That girl is fearless. It’s the most incredible thing to me, to watch how she navigates the world. She lives fully in her truth, and I think she’s really something special.

I do think it is challenging to be the hero in today’s world. And I’m always amazed at how many brave and vibrant women – and for me, that’s who I tend to watch – who have come forward and stated their truth. I navigate that every day; I’m always drawn to heroes, to the strong, to the outspoken. I do think it’s challenging in this day and age to speak your truth.

Do you believe that’s particularly the case for people with substantial platforms, like actors and entertainers?

Elizabeth Mitchell: I’m relatively new to social media, so my experience has been so lovely. It’s such a small audience and they’re all so kind and amazing, but I’ll go on some of my friends’ Instagram’s and I will see horrific trolling, all based on small statements of their truth. I do think there’s an intense responsibility, but I’m also amazed that people continue to say what they mean and use their platform for good, especially when the backlash is so horrific.

As I said, I’m pretty new to it. I just avoided it because I lead a very quiet life – not because it’s not intriguing to me, but I just spend a lot more time in the garden than I do on my phone. But I am very amazed at the bravery of Gideon and many actors like her with huge platforms, who continue to be brave and put themselves out there. I suppose I would count them as my heroes. Ruby Rose is another one – I’m absolutely nuts about her. And every time there’s any kind of backlash, I’m always on there like, “I’ll send her a DM to say that I’m here, and not to worry.” [laughs] They’re amazing women.

It’s those mama bear instincts coming through.

Elizabeth Mitchell: They always do. I mean, I grew up in a pretty matriarchal society, which my dad would freely admit to. He loves strong women. I have a lot of sisters and a lot of female cousins, and I’m nuts about all of them! I love women. I want them to feel supported and like they can do anything in the world that they want to. I was certainly not brought up thinking there were any limits for me. It was only when I got out in the world that I realised that that was possibly the norm in the worlds.

And so, when Witch Hunt finally comes out, what are you hoping people take away from it? I ask because I have a feeling your answer follows a similar vein.

Elizabeth Mitchell: I always hope with movies that they provide people a little bit of catharsis, but I also want them to gain strength from it. I think that movies were such great teachers for me in my teen years, and in my 20s. And I would hope that every person walking away from it will feel empowered to do the things that they need to do, that they’re called to do and that they think are right. That’s my hope. Wouldn’t that be fun [laughs]! But I also want people to feel entertained, and I want them to get that shiver and those goosebumps which Elle is so good at giving us. I suppose I want people to come away feeling entertained and empowered. How’s that?

Perfect! And it’s also great because as well as the history it honours, there’s also all kinds of throwbacks to cinematic works like Thelma & Louise, which helps Witch Hunt to feel like part of a feminist film lineage.

Elizabeth Mitchell: Yes, I completely agree! It has that element of fun but also of that fearless femininity. I love it!

And as we wrap up, do you have any projects that you’re seeking to pursue in the near future, or any upcoming releases you’re excited to share?

Elizabeth Mitchell: Oh, I do! It’s been a really busy year for me. I realise it wasn’t the same for everybody, so I have a certain measure of guilt about that. I did a really lovely show, the second season of Outer Banks, and I’m playing a character that I’m excited for people to meet. I can’t say anything about it except that she’s a true piece of work and I got to do some real film school stuff, which I loved [laughs]. You know, where you get to do all these things that are outside your norm? That was really fun. And right now I’m playing a vampire in a show called First Kill. I’m really loving that, and also can’t say anything else [laughs]. You know how it is with these shows!

And there’s one that I did in Canada, a movie called When Time Got Louder. It’s really powerful and pretty wonderful, about a family dealing with autism. And then Queen Bees is out now, in which I got to play opposite Ellen Burstyn, and Ann-Margret, and James Caan, and that was one of those career goal things where you pinch yourself! I actually went to the theatre to see that one a few days ago because, when does that ever happen? I got to share a screen with Ellen Burstyn! It was amazing and I loved every second of it. There’s another one that I feel I’m missing, but I feel like that’s enough [laughs].

You weren’t joking when you said you’d been busy!

Elizabeth Mitchell: I know! I am proud of the work we were all able to do.

Signature Entertainment presents Witch Hunt on DVD and Digital Platforms 5^th July.

Vanessa Harryhausen | RAY HARRYHAUSEN: TITAN OF CINEMA

When it comes to stop-motion effects on the big screen, Ray Harryhausen was the master. His creatures were always the stars of the movies they were part of, and the adoration of film fans hasn’t waned at all. The largest display of his work is currently on display at the Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art. We caught up with Ray’s daughter Vanessa to talk about the Titan of Cinema exhibition.

STARBURST: When you started going through your father’s work for the new exhibition, did you find anything that surprised you?

Vanessa Harryhausen: There was a lot of things; sketches on the back of lots of things. He had dozens and dozens of sketchbooks, some of them I brought back from America when he asked me to go and check the garage out there to see if he had anything worthwhile bringing over because he couldn’t remember. So everything that you look at, you have to double-check, especially with sketchbooks or notes, and then we’ve got several little storage boxes where we have bits of material. We were trying to figure out what these were, whether they were part of something or he was playing around, experimenting with the ball and socket things. You never know what you find, and we’re still discovering stuff, so I always say it’s like Christmas when you go into one of his boxes, you don’t know what you’ll find, and it’s always a pleasant surprise. We found an armature, and it was Talos’ hand. We found just a basic skeletal thing that dad had been tinkering around with. Or you might find the odd foot or leg or something, and we’d go ‘I wonder what that was for?’ So it’s great fun discovering all these things.

What can people expect from the exhibition?

People know dad from his films, so I really wanted to get over with the museum his incredible artistic skills. His beautiful pictures and sketches to his basic pencil things that you see in the exhibition, the very basic stuff he did when he was 17. There’s one of a gorilla, and there’s one of a skeleton, and I wanted that to be put in for our youngsters to understand that you’ve got to start somewhere. You know, he didn’t just suddenly produce all these beautiful films; he had to really work at it. So it’s about his art, and all his techniques and what influenced him. It’s a good collection of all sorts, and, of course, his models are there.

John Landis did the dialogue track for when you’re walking around; he’s very enthusiastic. At the end of the exhibition, there’s a green screen where you can fight with the harpies or the hydra. You’ve got all the sound effects, so you’re this little person with all these creatures. I could spend hours there, honestly, because I had great fun.

There’s a reason why the exhibition is in Scotland that harks back to your mother’s family, isn’t there?

Yeah, many people ask what the link between an American and the Scottish was, and it’s because my mom was a great, great, great-granddaughter of David Livingstone the Explorer. Dad was very enamoured with Livingstone’s story of going through Africa. As you’re coming in, there’s a sculpture of Livingstone being attacked by a lion in the exhibition. So yeah, he had that commission by Gareth Knowles at Blantyre, which is just between Glasgow and Edinburgh; there’s a David Livingstone exhibition there. So that’s the connection between the Scottish and the American; we’ve got some history on my mom’s side, which is lovely.

What was it like also working on the book that accompanies the exhibition?

Terrifying! I’ve never written a book in my life, and everyone kept saying, ‘oh, you should do something to commemorate your dad’. I was like, ‘Where do I begin?’ I always promised I wouldn’t because it was a standing joke with Daddy that you’re not going to write anything about me when I’m dead, are you? So I’d go ‘No dad’. Ray Harryhausen: The Titan of Cinema is a collection of different stories, a little look into our home life and some funny moments. There are also some of his dear friends talking about dad’s influence and doing things with him. There are some lovely early models that some people have seen, some they haven’t. I think your blue snake lady is in it too. There are some sad bits too at the end of the book, but it’s a celebration.

You said it was daunting going into writing the book, but would you be interested in doing another one if they asked you?

Well, I could, we wrote way more in the chapters, but obviously, the publishers had to narrow it down to 100 items, so if I had to do another book. I’ve got a good start because some stories still haven’t been told. I don’t know; it was quite stressful and emotional writing. Happy emotional.

Ray Harryhausen: Titan of Cinema is at the Scottish National Gallery Of Modern Art in Edinburgh until February 20th, 2022. You can find out more here and book to see the exhibition in person or via a virtual exhibition experience. Find out more about the Ray and Diana Harryhausen Foundation here.

Main Image by Mark Mawston.

Leigh Janiak | FEAR STREET

With the Fear Street trilogy for Netflix, writer-director Leigh Janiak not only created a new vision for the world conjured up by the series of young adult horror novels from writer R.L. Stine but also shot three films at once to create a wholly unique universe. It’s a massive undertaking and one that has had horror fans champing at the bit to see since the films were first announced several years ago. Ahead of the first film of the series, Fear Street Part 1: 1994, hitting Netflix today, we spoke with Janiak about bringing Fear Street to the screen.

STARBURST: What is necessary to build a trilogy all at once. Where do you begin or what’s your starting point?

Leigh Janiak: [laughs] I think your starting point is blissful ignorance, I would say. And then, a really amazing team of people that are all of our brains working at once, trying to stay creative, trying to be engaged in this like mammoth task. I think we all had a little bit of kind of blissful ignorance of like, “Yeah, of course, this is just like doing a series.”

I don’t know. There was something very exciting about doing this thing, which hasn’t been done very much – if at all – and also reminding ourselves, “We are telling one story,” too. Keeping in mind that thing was important, but yeah – a lot of blissful ignorance.

It seems like you started with putting visual clues and building everything right from the start. That opening scene has some nods to the books right there and hints are being sewn from the very beginning.

Yeah, totally. That was something I’m glad that you noticed. I’m happy about that. That’s good to know. Definitely: there was a lot of time spent on like, “How can we start weaving this stuff in very early? Where can we add it later?” It existed as far as little Easter eggs that narratively would hold more weight when we got later into the movies. Then, also kind of visually, as we were shooting, we were able to revisit frames, revisit spaces and places and have those echoes. We called them “echoes” as we were shooting. It was very much part of the experiment and the fun of making the three movies was finding ways to do that.

The fact that you used the word “’fun’ is perfect because one of the things that’s so fun about Fear Street is that it is just so jam-packed with music. Where did that idea come from?

For me, I think that whenever I’m coming on to a new project, I make a playlist and that’s the easiest way for me to start really living what I want the movie to feel like. With Fear Street, it was the same thing: I made playlists very early on when I was first pitching the project to my producers and to the studio, then that playlist continued to grow. I had one for each movie, and then I shared that with the cast, with the crew.

It was always kind of a way to remind ourselves of “this is the era, this is the tone. This is what it feels like to live in the ’90s with this grunge or this gangster rap” or whatever it may be. In the ’70s, it was a good, healthy dose of disco and then also Buzzcocks and Bowie and everything. I was super important, super important.

It was also one of the things I think I was the most nervous and scared about because I wrote Bowie into the script. Having Bowie and Nirvana in the script and to have it crafted around this moment and then just have all of our fingers crossed that we’re going to get the support that we need on the backend to actually include these songs was huge. Netflix was amazing for that. They all understood and they really backed us up and gave me everything that we needed and we wanted for the movies.

The series is all about building its own mythology, but then you’ve got this series of books that has its own sort of mythology. How do you make it to where you’re paying homage to R.L. Stine’s past work, but also creating something new?

That was a challenge for me because I was a huge fan of the books as a teenager and so I kind of knew that they’re – first of all, there are hundreds of them – but there’s not really a unifying mythology across the books. There are certain things that repeat obviously: Shadyside is the unifying thing of the world of Fear Street and Fear Street itself is a character in these books, and there’s the Goode family and there’s the Fier family and all of these things exist, but part of the fun of the books, I think, is the fact that the universe does seem infinite. Anything kind of crazy can happen in them.

Our challenge was, “How do we create something that feels complete and satisfying across these three movies?” and what we ended up doing was kind of, yes, reinventing a mythology that’s specific to our story, but then trying to preserve the spirit of the books which I loved so much, which was a little bit of subversive edge around it and also fun, more than anything else.

Speaking of subversive edge – because this is the opening scene and it’s not really spoiling anything for anybody – you kill Maya Hawke in the mall.

Yes, I do.

Was that something along the lines of, “Hey, Netflix, will you let us do it?”

Totally. 100%. And my husband [Ross Duffer] is actually one of the co-creators of Stranger Things, so there was a lot going on in that scene.

That’s a meta in-joke, right there.

We were obviously paying homage to Scream and Drew Barrymore and the amazing opening of that movie, and then there was a lot of other things going on, too. [laughs]

That adds a third layer because you directed a couple of episodes of the Scream series for MTV. What’s it like as a director, working with these already extant properties, but coming about it in a new way?

Yeah. I mean, Scream was interesting that, because obviously, I was stepping into that as an episodic director, so it wasn’t a world that I was creating, but even when I was doing those, it was about looking for ways that we could pay the respect that those, that those movies deserve and then also try to keep them new and fresh.

With Fear Street, it was the same thing with the books. I wanted to make sure that we were sending a proper love letter to them and then also, to the films of that era, which I was a huge fan of as a moviegoer. The conversation was, “How do we do this and not just make it nostalgia? How do we warrant and justify making three movies?”

For me, that came back to the characters and being able to craft the three movies around characters that normally haven’t had their day in the sun and haven’t had a chance to be protagonists or heroes. It’s not often that you have a young black queer woman that’s leading three horror movies. She’d usually be dead before the movie even started, so that was a cool opportunity for me to balance doing the thing and then also making it new.

With the Fear Street trilogy, you’ve gotten to do your Wes Craven movie and your ’70s Carpenter movie, and you got to make a Dave Eggers folk horror movie. Now that you’ve gotten to do these three things, what’s next for you?

Well, what’s next practically is that I’m going to go and shoot a couple of episodes of The Staircase with my friend Antonio Campos which is also very horrific, but very horrific in the real world, based on a terrible event that happened in reality. As far as slashers and things like that? I don’t know. I’m excited about kind of the opportunities that the Fear Street universe holds. I’m really interested in a ’50s Night of the Hunter-esque kind of a slasher thing, so that is something that I’m also thinking about a lot.

Fear Street Part 1: 1994 releases globally on Netflix on July 2nd, Fear Street Part 2: 1978 follows on July 9th, and the series concludes with Fear Street Part 3: 1666 releasing globally on Netflix on July 16th. More information can be found here.

The 3 Best Gambling and Casino Movies That You Must See

If you are looking for an exciting and action-filled movie, maybe you should watch a movie about gambling? They have become very popular, and people love to watch films set in the huge world of casinos, games, hotels, and money. If this sounds intriguing, you should take a look at some of these movies.

The House (2017)

We are starting strong and in the world of comedy with this 2017 film about a seemingly normal family in an unexpected life situation. In the movie, we meet Johannsen, played by Amy Poehler and Will Ferrell. They have come in an unfortunate situation and lost their daughter’s college scholarship and are now trying to fix the problem. The solution? A casino in the basement. While this could be a good idea, things are getting out of control fast, and soon the police start snooping around. The House is a movie that certainly will make you laugh!

Casino Royale (2006)

It doesn’t get much better than a good old James Bond film. There is something about the cool 007 and the thrilling missions he set out on. In Casino Royale, the agent has gotten the ‘00’ title, which comes with the license to kill. He then sets out on a mission to find a private banker funding terrorist and defeat him in a game of poker in the casino in Montenegro. It is the talented Daniel Craig that stars as the agent in this film that is based on the novels of Ian Fleming. The novels date back to 1953, and this movie was long-awaited in its time. Casino Royale will undoubtedly set you in the gambling mood and showcase the exciting world of poker.

Atlantic City (1980)

Movies set in casino settings are popular for many reasons. The viewers like watching thrilling scenes, the slightly dangerous plot, and the mysterious and risky situations. Atlantic City is considered to be one of the best old-fashioned gambling movies. It features young Susan Sarandon and the fantastic Burt Lancaster. The story revolves around Atlantic city that was, in many ways, saved by the legalization of gambling. We follow regular people that are trying to adapt to the changes and make it in the gambling world. The timeless drama tells a part of history that has since been important for many people.

Create your casino

There is no doubt that these movies tell a thrilling story in an ever-changing, exciting environment. We all wish we could be as cool as 007, go back in time to the first days of gambling, or maybe build a casino in the basement? While the two first will be difficult to achieve, the latter might not be that farfetched! If you are inspired by the movies, you could host a casino night at home with your friends. Buy a poker set and maybe a green cloth, dim the lights and shake up some good drinks, and you are all set. If you want to play at a casino alone or don’t have time for a whole night dedicated to it, you could try your luck with an online casino. It is the perfect way to enjoy your time off and to practice all the classic casino games. Find your inner James Bond and defeat all your friends in a game of Blackjack or Texas Hold’em!