By: Henry J. Fromage –

Steven Spielberg’s going to switch it up a bit after a couple of Oscar-y historical epics.  At least I’m going to assume that Robopocalypse will be light on war horses and Civil War politics.  What it will have is some Chris Hemsworth, who’ll reunite with his Cabin in the Woods director Drew Goddard, who’s handling the script.  The other piece of the puzzle to fall into place recently is the female lead, Anne Hathaway, who Spielberg is pursuing for the role.  And Spielberg gets what Spielberg wants.

One way or the other.

Another project to have it’s casting fall into place all of a sudden is Prisoners.  This had been bouncing around in development hell for awhile before landing Canadian arthouse director Denis Villenueve (Incendies).  Melissa Leo and Jake Gylenhaal have both come on board, but it’s Hugh Jackman who will star as a small-town carpenter whose best friend and daughter are both kidnapped.  The film follows him as he waits patiently for real professionals to solve the case and reunite him with his loved ones.

Oh, wait. Maybe he does the opposite of that.

One of my favorite films of the year so far is the Jay Baruchel/Sean William Scott hockey dramedy Goon.  While it got strong reviews and did decent limited release business in the States, in Canada it apparently did great.  Good enough to spawn Goon 2, anyway.  Baruchel will co-write the script again, this time with Jesse Chabot, and director Michael Dowse is back on board.  While the track record of comedy sequels isn’t exactly great, I’m already going to watch it regardless.

Because hockey fights.