Author: Empire

The title of this week’s episode of the Empire Podcast is a delightful phrase that comes from none other than our star guest, Ethan Hawke, who tells Jamie Graham all about his new film, The Weight, and how it was one of the biggest challenges of his storied career. Either side of that, Chris Hewitt is joined in the podbooth by Helen O’Hara, James Dyer, and Amon Warmann for a fun episode that asks the big question: are there any good short Best Picture winners? And then very quickly moves onto the biggest question of them all: why didn’t Predator…

In 2018, J.A. Bayona — then perhaps best known as the director of The Orphanage and A Monster Calls — injected a fresh shot of Gothic horror into the Jurassic Park franchise’s DNA with Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom. It may have divided critics and fans upon release, but we praised it from day dot for bringing the fear factor back to the dino saga, and it has steadily grown in audiences’ estimations in the eight years since its release. Which may prove just as well, as The Wrap is reporting (via The InSneider) that Bayona is the surprise frontrunner to…

If you’re among the 10 million people who have seen Dylan Clark’s viral horror short film ‘Portrait Of God’, then you will no doubt have been very excited to hear last December that a feature-length version of the film is in the works, with Jordan Peele and Sam Raimi teaming up through their respective Monkeypaw and Ghost House Pictures production companies to help bring the project to life. Well, prepare to get even more excited, as Lionsgate — who took the reins on this one from Universal earlier this year — have just revealed that Chase Infiniti, breakout star of…

The annals of cinema history are strewn with great screen Santa Clauses. From traditional Kris Kringles (Richard Attenborough in Miracle On 34th Street) to bad Santas (Billy Bob Thornton in, er, Bad Santa), sheepish Clauses (James McAvoy in Arthur Christmas) to kick-ass Father Christmases (David Harbour in Violent Night, Kurt Russell in The Christmas Chronicles), we’ve had ’em all. Well, not quite all. This year, three decades after starring in holiday turkey Jingle All The Way, Arnold Schwarzenegger is back in festive mode and stepping into the boots of the man with the bag in Prime Video’s aptly titled The…

By any metric, Zach Cregger is on a hell of a filmmaking run just now. Having burst out of the blocks in 2022 with AirBnB chiller Barbarian, the sketch comedian turned genre filmmaker has since gone on to bewitch audiences with last year’s noodle-twisting psychological thriller Weapons, and is currently riding high at the box office with survival horror game adaptation Resident Evil. And in his bid to continue this hot streak, Variety is reporting that Cregger has just recruited Oscar winner Jennifer Lawrence to star in his buzzy upcoming sci-fi thriller The Flood.Cregger is set to write, direct, and…

It’s no great secret that Andrew Scott is one of the most versatile actors working today. Whether he’s reenacting the most important conversation ever had about the weather (Pressure), playing every part in a one-man production of a Chekhov classic (Vanya), or living rent-free in all of our heads as The Hot Priest (Fleabag), the man is a true actor’s actor. Now, in Simon Stone’s true-story inspired Elsinore, Scott is an actor playing another actor — namely Chariots Of Fire star Ian Charleson — as he defies HIV complications and fights to play Hamlet in the National Theatre’s 1989 production…

In 2009, James Cameron’s Avatar became the highest-grossing movie of all-time with a whopping $2.78 billion box office haul. In 2019, The Russo Brothers’ Avengers: Endgame took the Na’vi Nation’s title with a super $2.81 billion global haul. Then, in 2021, a cheeky Avatar re-release saw Cameron’s sci-fi smash reclaim the top spot, with its lifetime total now sitting at an eye-watering $2.92 billion. Now, in the latest round of the battle between cinema’s biggest A-named blockbusters, Avengers: Endgame Encore has just assembled itself an impressive $86 million worldwide opening weekend, reopening the race for that coveted all-time No. 1…

This week’s episode of the Empire Podcast is all about birthdays, folks. Partially because Chris Hewitt just had one, but also because this week’s listener question asks our Three Colleagues Of Such Lethal Cunning — Chris, Helen O’Hara, and James Dyer — to discuss the best movies released on their birthdays. The answers will shock and, in one case, depress the hell out of you. Elsewhere, our intrepid trio — joined by this week’s workie, Grace — discuss a number of trailers, including The Further Mis-Adventures Of Cliff Booth, and compare audiobook casts for starriness; and review David Ayer’s Brad…

In 2026, Tom Holland has held down the Ithacan fort — and fired an arrow or two — in Christopher Nolan’s The Odyssey, thwipped into action alongside The Punisher and faced down a Savage Hulk in Spider-Man: Brand New Day, and done a Pepsi advert with footballing GOAT Lionel Messi. But as we reported back in July, the in-demand actor isn’t stopping there — he’s already limbering up to finally make his long-gestating Fred Astaire biopic with Wonka director Paul King. And now Deadline has confirmed that the project has just cast actor-turned-pop-megastar Sabrina Carpenter and The Substance’s Margaret Qualley…

After two failed attempts to revive the iconic Saw franchise in the last decade — first with 2017’s barn-bound Jigsaw, then 2020’s bizarre Chris Rock starrer Spiral: From The Book Of Saw — it had, until fairly recently, seemed that the Jigsaw puzzle was one Hollywood simply couldn’t piece together any longer. But after 2023’s fan-pleasing Saw X and last year’s exciting announcement that Blumhouse Atomic Monster had bought Saw’s rights, things have been looking up for the bloody billion-dollar saga. And now, per Deadline’s reporting, Saw’s next chapter has found its director: Beware Boiúna director Mike P. Nelson.No stranger to bringing something new…