The Playlist

Warner Bros. Lines Up Juan Antonio Bayona For Sci-Fi Flick, Picks Someone For 'Robotech'

By Kevin Jagernauth
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January 28, 2013 10:41 AM
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1 Comment

News

While "The Impossible" didn't quite become the Oscar player some might have expected (though it did earn a nod for Naomi Watts) the film established Juan Antonio Bayona as a director who could deliver big screen spectacle with ease and power. And Warner Bros. has decided to tap that talent.

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5 Directors Who Could Helm The Next James Bond Film

By Oliver Lyttelton
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November 13, 2012 12:20 PM
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41 Comments

Features

Even by the standards of the second most successful franchise in cinema history, "Skyfall" is doing extraordinarily well. The 23rd James Bond film, which has picked up some of the best reviews in the history of the franchise, has topped off an amazing couple of weeks at the box office with a $90 million opening weekend in the U.S., bringing it to over $500 million worldwide in only 17 days. By next weekend, it will easily have overtaken "Casino Royale" to be the franchise's top worldwide grosser, and could be on course to be the first billion-dollar Bond.

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Fox Director Shortlist For 'Dawn Of The Planet Of The Apes' Both Predictable & Surprising

By Kevin Jagernauth
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September 25, 2012 10:40 PM
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8 Comments

News

With Rupert Wyatt bailing on the director's chair just over a week ago, 20th Century Fox now have a vacany to fill for "Dawn Of The Planet The Apes" and it's one they want to move on fast as a release date is on the horizon. So here comes the shortlist and it's both predictable and kind of totally random at the same time.

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Poster For 'The Impossible' & Two New Clips From The Tsunami-Set Drama

By Edward Davis
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September 11, 2012 4:51 PM
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0 Comments

News

The L.A. Times made us chuckle when they recently wrote, "One man's ambitious, iconoclastic, like-nothing-ever-before-seen passion project is another man's 'Battlefield Earth.' " They were of course talking about the Wachowski's polarizing "Cloud Atlas," a picture some adored and some loathed (our review was on the negative side, but not quite as damning as some). The same ideas could apply to Juan Antonio Bayona’s “The Impossible” starring Naomi Watts and Ewan McGregor.

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Watch: New Spanish Trailer & Pics Of Ewan McGregor & Naomi Watts In J.A. Bayona's Tsunami Drama 'The Impossible'

By Oliver Lyttelton
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July 24, 2012 11:28 AM
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1 Comment

News

Juan Antonio Bayona has looked like a serious talent ever since his top-notch ghost story "The Orphanage" premiered at Cannes in 2007. Five years later, we're finally getting a follow-up from the Spanish director, with his much-anticipated and long-in-the-works tsunami drama "The Impossible" selected to premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival. And some new pictures have debuted, showing Ewan McGregor and Naomi Watts, along with their children, as a couple torn apart by the 2004 Boxing Day tsunami in the Indian Ocean.

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Watch: Excellent Spanish Trailer For Tsunami-Inflicted Disaster Film 'The Impossible' Starring Ewan McGregor & Naomi Watts

By Edward Davis
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April 20, 2012 2:44 PM
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8 Comments

News

One of the best horror-esque ghost story films of the previous decade was Juan Antonio Bayona's "The Orphanage," likely because it was much more than your average, spooks-in-the-attic horror, and was a rich and emotionally textured drama just as much as it was a classic ghost tale. It instantly made Bayona, a protege of Guillermo del Toro, one to watch.

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It Looks Like Francis Lawrence Is Going To Direct 'Catching Fire'; Tomas Alfredson, Joe Cornish, Duncan Jones & Cary Fukunaga Were Also Shortlisted

By Kevin Jagernauth
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April 19, 2012 9:31 PM
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15 Comments

News

...and then there was one. The hunt for the director to take the helm of "Catching Fire" looks to be nearing an end. Just a couple days after we reported that Francis Lawrence and Bennett Miller were in the hunt for the job, it now looks like Lionsgate has decided on their man.

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As Whit Stillman Returns, Here's 5 Other Long-Absent Directors Making A Comeback In 2012

By Oliver Lyttelton
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February 14, 2012 3:53 PM
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11 Comments

Features

Late last night, the trailer for Whit Stillman's "Damsels In Distress" debuted, and for those who didn't catch it on the festival circuit last year, it was the first time they'd seen any new footage from the "Metropolitan" and "Barcelona" helmer in over a decade. By the time that 'Damsels' is released, nearly fourteen years will have passed since the release of Stillman's third film, "The Last Days Of Disco," a near-Malickian absence. While he's been absent for longer than most, he's far from alone. As we've discussed both last year, and last week, there's plenty of other filmmakers who have been missing in action for some time.

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As 'Junebug' Helmer Phil Morrison Announces A New Project, Where Have These 5 Long-Absent Indie Directors Been?

By Oliver Lyttelton
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February 10, 2012 2:21 PM
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12 Comments

News

We were just having a conversation around The Playlist's office pinball machine this week ("Ghostbusters 2"-branded, in case you were wondering) about whatever happened to director Phil Morrison, who helmed the excellent "Junebug" back in 2006 (launching the career of Amy Adams in the process) only to seemingly disappear from the scene, with only a recent credit on HBO's "Enlightened" to his name. And then, barely 24 hours later, the news arrived that Morrison was back, with the comedy "Lucky Dog," which will star Paul Rudd, Paul Giamatti and Sally Hawkins.

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Watch: Eerie, Striking Spanish-Language Teaser For 'The Orphanage' Director J.A. Bayona's Tsunami Drama 'The Impossible'

By Oliver Lyttelton
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December 27, 2011 9:00 AM
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2 Comments

News

It's nearly five years since we heard a peep from Juan Antonio Bayona, the Spanish helmer who made such a splash with his Guillermo del Toro-produced debut "The Orphanage," one of the most commandingly made and effective horror films of the last couple decades.

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