Behind the scenes video and image preview underwater stunts Tom Cruise performed for Mission: Impossible – The Final Reckoning

The recently released trailer for Mission: Impossible – The Final Reckoning (which you can watch in the embed above) showed that there’s going to be a lot of water-based action in this new sequel, and now a behind-the-scenes video has arrived online to show us a moment of star Tom Cruise preparing to perform some of those underwater stunts. Cruise himself also shared an image of him working on the movie underwater with the caption, “The training and preparation we put into this film is a culmination of all before it. From the depths, to the skies, I can’t wait to share more with you.” The video and the image can be seen below.

The director, creator, and stars of the adaptation of the best-selling novel discuss the meta-humor of the new series.

Taika Waititi has brought various projects to the screen over his career. From mockumentaries like What We Do In The Shadows to superhero epics like Thor: Ragnarok to his Oscar-winning film about Hitler as a boy’s imaginary friend in Jojo Rabbit, Waititi has covered the gamut in genres, tones, and creativity. His latest project is the adaptation of the National Book Award-winning novel Interior Chinatown by Charles Yu. With Yu on board to adapt his novel, a book that seemed impossible to translate to the screen has become a ten-episode series unlike any show I have seen before.

Interior Chinatown follows Willis Wu, played by Jimmy O. Yang, a waiter in a Chinese restaurant who wants more out of life than being a supporting player in his own story. When he witnesses a kidnapping, Willis is recruited by Detective Lana Lee (Chloe Bennet) to help solve the case and maybe find his missing brother along the way. It also becomes apparent that Willis is not just a supporting character in his own life but within a television series. Trying to break free of the tropes and cliches of television shows, Willis discovers much more than he bargained for.

I got the chance to talk with the cast and crew of Interior Chinatown about the new series. Star Jimmy O. Yang, who played a supporting background character a decade ago in Chloe Bennet’s series Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., discussed taking on a lead role that has him doing comedy, drama, and martial arts. Chloe Bennet talked about the deeper story of Lana Lee and how it fits into this world, while Ronny Chieng talked about the fun of shitting on people. Sullivan Jones and Lisa Gilroy discussed playing cops and whether they based their roles on famous television detectives. Archie Kao talked about his character of Uncle Wong, who is not in the novel. In contrast, legendary veteran Tzi Ma talked about reuniting with The Farewell co-star Diana Lin and how Interior Chinatown fits into cinematic history alongside similarly themed projects like Everything Everywhere All At Once. Charles Yu and Taika Waititi also discussed how they adapted this series and used creative filming techniques to not spoon-feed the audience into what is happening in Chinatown. Check out the full interviews in the embed above.

Interior Chinatown is now playing on Hulu. Read our review!

About the Author

Alex Maidy has been a JoBlo.com editor, columnist, and critic since 2012. A Rotten Tomatoes-approved critic and a member of Chicago Indie Critics, Alex has been JoBlo.com’s primary TV critic and ran columns including Top Ten and The UnPopular Opinion. When not riling up fans with his hot takes, Alex is an avid reader and aspiring novelist.

Jackie Chan returns to Indiana Jones-like action in this new film, which will also feature a de-aged Chan in period piece flashbacks.

Jackie Chan once attempted to break out of his signature comedy style in the early part of the millennium when he made New Police Story, which had him playing a more dramatic role as an alcoholic ex-cop. He would follow it up with 2005’s The Myth, which would be half of an Armor of God-type movie where he played an archeologist and half of a period film where Chan also played a General of a historical Chinese army. Chan returns with a new sequel to The Myth, titled A Legend. This film reunites him with director Stanley Tong, who directed Chan in movies like Rumble in the Bronx and Police Story 3: Supercop.

Well Go USA has just released the trailer for A Legend. Not long after the company unveiled the trailers for the upcoming action films of other martial arts icons, Tony Jaa’s Striking Rescue and Donnie Yen’s The Prosecutor. A Legend‘s cast includes Jackie Chan, Lay Zhang, Na Zha, Aarif Lee, Li Chen, Peng Xiaoran and Shawn Dou.

The official synopsis reads,
“While investigating the history of a newly discovered ancient artifact, a renowned archaeologist (Jackie Chan) unwittingly establishes a mystical connection with a heroic Han dynasty general, blurring the lines between past and present right as the general prepares to wage war against the brutal Hun army.”

Chan will also be seen in the upcoming Karate Kid: Legends, where he and Ralph Macchio team up for a new pupil. Macchio would regale viewers of The Talk with his excitement when he stated, “I’m not allowed to say a lot about it, except another awesome chapter is on its way. Ben Wang is a young kid in the show, he’s very exciting to watch. And working with Jackie [Chan], he’s a legend. They found, you know, it’s its own story in the vast universe, you know, so it’s another chapter in a different area that connects the mythology of where it all began. And fortunately, I was the guy that was there when it all began.“

In addition to Macchio and Chan, Karate Kid: Legends stars Ben Wang (American Born Chinese) as a young teenager from China who finds identity and strength in martial arts. During his journey of self-discovery, Wang’s character meets a disciplined martial arts master. Joshua Jackson (Fatal Attraction) and Ming-Na Wen (The Mandalorian) also appear in the movie, alongside Sadie Stanley (Cruel Summer) as the romantic lead. Jonathan Entwistle (The End of the F***ing World) directed the movie from a script by Rob Lieber (Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good Very Bad Day).

About the Author

E.J. is a News Editor at JoBlo, as well as a Video Editor, Writer, and Narrator for some of the movie retrospectives on our JoBlo Originals YouTube channel, including Reel Action, Revisited and some of the Top 10 lists. He is a graduate of the film program at Missouri Western State University with concentrations in performance, writing, editing and directing.

Clint Eastwood knows he’s made some bad movies in his storied career but refuses to dwell on their impact on his legacy.

Clint Eastwood remains, at 94, one of the most legendary presences both on and off the screen. And you don’t get 70 years in the industry by releasing dud after dud. And that was kind of Eastwood’s plan at a certain point, especially when he first stepped behind the camera for 1971’s Play Misty for Me, lest he be tossed out of Warner Bros. unceremoniously – not unlike them rushing Juror No. 2 to streaming, but that’s another story entirely…

Clint Eastwood sat down with Metrograph (via IndieWire) to discuss his legacy and how he had no choice but to persist even when handing over lousy movies that nobody bothered seeing. “After you get a few films that are reasonably successful, people kind of stick with you. But if you’re grinding out turkeys, they don’t stick with you.”

With that, Clint Eastwood was asked about what his legacy is, again going back to films that might not have landed. “That would be up to them, to the audiences, to answer. Up to the people on the outside. I just kind of go along. I consider this, again, emotional. It comes upon you. You have a story, you make a movie of it. You have to just go for it. If you think too much about how it happened you might ruin it. I go back and look at films I’ve made, and I could easily ask, ‘Why the heck did I make this?’ I don’t remember! It might have been a long time ago…” While Eastwood didn’t name-check any of his clunkers – as he put it, “I’m sure I’ve had disappointments. If I did, I wouldn’t dwell on them.” – surely we’re in the realm of Blood Work, Firefox, J. Edgar, The Rookie, and, yes, plenty of others.

But there’s no denying that Clint Eastwood’s talents – perhaps more so than his contacts or his luck, punk – have kept him a mainstay in the industry. As he prepares to possibly ride off into the sunset with Juror No. 2, we’ll always go back to the great ones, of which there are plenty.

What do you think Clint Eastwood’s legacy will be? What are your favorite films he directed?

The series that was originally believed to be a spin-off of Ray Donovan shakes up the title and starts production.

Last month, it was reported that Tom Hardy, Helen Mirren and Pierce Brosnan were in talks to star in a new Guy Ritchie series called The Associate, which was to believed to be a spin-off of the Showtime series Ray Donovan. The Associate was also once thought to be called The Donovans, which had the following synopsis: “With the most powerful clients in Europe, The Donovans will see family fortunes and reputations at risk, odd alliances unfold, and betrayal around every corner, and while the family might be London’s most elite fixers today, the nature of their business means there is no guarantee what’s in store tomorrow.” Guy Ritchie was to direct The Donovans and executive produce alongside series writer Ronan Bennett.

Deadline now reveals that the new show is now currently not intending to sport the name The Associate, but production has officially taken off. According to Deadline, “Hardy will star as Harry Da Souza, a professional conciliator on behalf of the Harrigan family; Brosnan will play Conrad Harrigan, the head of a very successful Irish crime family based in London and Harry’s boss; Mirren will play Maeve Harrigan, Conrad’s wife and the Harrigan family matriarch.”

The logline states that the show is “an electrifying, new global crime series centered around two warring families based in London whose enterprises stretch all corners of the globe and the fiercely loyal ‘fixer’ charged with protecting one of them at all costs.”

Keith Cox, Nina L. Diaz, David C. Glasser, Guy Ritchie, Jez Butterworth, Ronan Bennett, Kris Thykier, Ivan Atkinson, Tom Hardy, Dean Baker, Ron Burkle, David Hutkin, and Bob Yari are all on board to executive produce the series.

Chris McCarthy, Paramount Global Co-CEO and President/CEO of Showtime/MTV Entertainment Studios, stated, “Tom Hardy, Pierce Brosnan and Helen Mirren are masters at their craft and we are honored to have them lead the cast for Guy Richie’s new global, original series. Guy, Jez Butterworth and Ronan Bennett’s creative prowess, coupled with these gifted actors, is the perfect recipe for what we believe will be the next brand-defining series for Showtime on Paramount+.”

Jeff Grossman, Executive Vice President of programming for Paramount+ says, “The firepower on and off the screen in this new Guy Ritchie crime series will deliver exactly what audiences expect from Paramount + with Showtime: high-caliber acting, high-impact storylines, and high-level production from some of the best in the business.”

Jaleel White revealed that he was recently approached to do an Uriel standalone series but reasoned why he turned it down.

Did I do thaaaaaat? Irritating nerd next door Steve Urkel did a lot throughout Family Matters’ nine seasons but one thing he didn’t do was get his own series. Cereal, board games and pull-string dolls, sure, but a spin-off? Not if Jaleel White had his say.

In his new book (via EW), Growing Up Urkel, Jaleel White reveals that he was approached to have his own Urkel show to capitalize on the nostalgia wave of shows like Fuller House and Girl Meets World, both spin-offs of beloved TGIF shows. In it, Urkel would have married Laura (Kellie Shanygne Williams) – something teased in “Pop Goes the Question” but pushed aside for the odd two-part finale where Urkel goes to space(!) – and the two would have had a son. On the premise, White noted, “I was offered the chance to do a reboot of Family Matters but I turned it down for several reasons. The script would have been the same, and the show’s dynamics no longer work in the world that we live in.” On the potential premise, he was told, “Carl and Harriette will stop by from time to time, perhaps two episodes out of the first season order. But this incarnation of the show will revolve more around you and Laura and your new family, and your son who is so much like you when you were his age.”

But that doesn’t mean Jaleel White doesn’t have his own plans for how to bring Steve Urkel back into living rooms. “Instead of a sitcom reboot, ’cause none of them work, quite frankly, we make a single-camera show like Young Sheldon. We cast a good actor and a smart kid to play Jaleel, a twelve-year-old from Pasadena who lands the part of Steve Urkel. We depict all the challenges that came with growing up in the nineties and being the kid who played that character. The show could explore the dynamic between me and my parents, struggling to adapt to fame while trying to live regular lives.”

Look, who doesn’t love Urkel? OK, a lot of us found him insanely annoying but that was part of his charm, which Jaleel White brought so much of that he made the character a lead despite being meant to be a one-off, becoming the sort of breakout character in the mold of Fonzie. Of course, with that, White could never really shed the glasses and suspenders and will always be known as Steve Urkel, which obviously he has leaned into with the name of his book.

Were you a fan of Family Matters? What is Urkel’s place in sitcom history?

Heading into production on Monarch: Legacy of Monsters season 2, Anna Sawai said she hopes her character has more agency this time around

The first season of Legendary’s MonsterVerse TV series Monarch: Legacy of Monsters ran on Apple TV+ from November into January (you can read our own Alex Maidy’s review of the first batch of episodes HERE), and while Godzilla was an important figure in that season, it wrapped up with an episode that indicated Kong might be taking the spotlight if there were to be a follow-up. In April, it was confirmed that Monarch: Legacy of Monsters season 2 was a sure thing – and earlier this month, the new season officially began filming. The first season’s star Anna Sawai is back for season 2, and in an interview with TV Line she said she hopes her character will be less of a victim this time around.

Monarch: Legacy of Monsters is the latest chapter in Legendary Entertainment’s MonsterVerse series, which currently consists of Godzilla, Kong: Skull Island, Godzilla: King of the Monsters, Godzilla vs. Kong, Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire, and the Netflix animated series Skull Island.

The ten episode first season was set after “the thunderous battle between Godzilla and the Titans that leveled San Francisco and the shocking revelation that monsters are real” (as seen in Godzilla 2014). It tracks two siblings following in their father’s footsteps to uncover their family’s connection to the secretive organization known as Monarch. Clues lead them into the world of monsters and ultimately down the rabbit hole to Army officer Lee Shaw, taking place in the 1950s and half a century later where Monarch is threatened by what Shaw knows. The dramatic saga – spanning three generations – reveals buried secrets and the ways that epic, earth-shattering events can reverberate through our lives.

The cast includes Anna Sawai, Kurt Russell, Wyatt Russell, Kiersey Clemons, Ren Watabe, Mari Yamamoto, Anders Holm, Joe Tippett, and Elisa Lasowski. Season 2 brings the addition of Prey star Amber Midthunder.

Sawai told TV Line, “I feel like Cate should have more agency. In Season 1, she is kind of the victim — thrown into it all and sometimes wanting to go back to her normal life. But after going down to Axis Mundi, she should come out as a different person. She’s seen stuff that she didn’t know before. They have answers and things to do now.“

Monarch: Legacy of Monsters comes our way from Legendary Television. Matt Shakman (WandaVision) directed the first two episodes. Black, Fraction, and Shakman executive produce the series with Joby Harold and Tory Tunnell from Safehouse Pictures, as well as Andy Goddard, Brad Van Arragon, and Andrew Colville. Hiro Matsuoka and Takemasa Arita executive produce on behalf of Toho Co., Ltd., the owner of the Godzilla character.

Are you looking forward to Monarch: Legacy of Monsters season 2? What do you think of what Anna Sawai had to say about her character? Let us know by leaving a comment below.

Jude Law and Nicholas Hoult play against type in this compelling true crime thriller.

PLOT: A burnt-out FBI agent (Jude Law) tries to shut down a right-wing militia run by a white supremacist (Nicholas Hoult) who’s planning an armed insurrection.

REVIEW: The Order is a slickly made, true-crime thriller that tells a pretty compelling story; in the mid-eighties, a group calling themselves The Order pulled off a series of violent robberies and also bombed synagogues and porn theatres, all of which was inspired by a book called “The Turner Diaries”, which was written by the leader of the National Alliance, which was one of the most powerful Neo Nazi organizations in the United States. 

In The Order, Nicholas Hoult, in a role that casts him way against type, plays Robert Jay Mathews, who put together a violent, heavily armed militia that began carrying out a series of brutal assassinations and robberies. In the film, this puts them in the crosshairs of Jude Law’s Agent Husk, who has experience taking down chapters of the KKK and the Cosa Nostra but is badly burnt out, and an alcoholic chain-smoker recovering from a heart attack who’s been put out to pasture in a quiet field office. His investigation of The Order teams him with a young deputy played by Tye Sheridan, who grew up with many of the members and is the only one in his department who views them as a credible threat.

The film marks a change of pace for Justin Kurzel in that it’s a relatively commercial thriller done in the vein of a solid nineties flick, which seems primed to find him a much wider audience than his recent (good) movies, The True History of the Kelly Gang and Nitram. Jude Law has a strong contemporary role and seems to relish playing a hard-boiled cop, with him nailing the driven and obsessive Husk. A seen-it-all veteran with many skeletons in his closet, he’s well paired with Sheridan, whose wide-eyed deputy still believes in humanity and thinks he can make a difference.

While this may sound like it’s comprised wholly of cop movie cliches, Kurzel’s craft is impeccable, with his staging of several impressive action sequences. At the same time, his brother Jed Kurzel contributes an atmospheric score that is being singled out in many of the movie’s reviews (for good reason). The performances are great, with Hoult chilling in that the movie portrays his cult leader-style antagonist as charismatic and intelligent. He expertly exploits the resentments his members feel to build a deadly, lawless organization whose violent legacy can be felt to this day. 

In addition to Law, Hoult, and Sheridan, Jurnee Smollett also impresses as a field agent colleague of Husk’s, whose own rage against the racism of The Order memorably gets the better of her in one sequence. Plus, there’s Marc Maron in a small but memorable role as a Jewish radio DJ named Alan Berg, whose eagerness to confront racists put a target on his back.

The Order is set to come out via Vertical this month, and hopefully, it gets a decent theatrical push, as Kurzel made a pretty slick thriller that would play well in theatres. It’s lean and mean enough that, in another era, it would have been a big-budget studio film. Thrillers like this used to be a lot more common, so it’s refreshing to see a throwback like this, which reminds me (in the best ways) of the kinds of studio-made thrillers I loved watching growing up in the nineties. 

The Order hits theaters on December 6th!

The head of Cannon Pictures hated Bloodsport so much, he nixed a Lone Wolf McQuade sequel which would have co-starred JCVD.

While Bloodsport, the 1988 martial arts tournament movie, is widely considered by fans to be Jean-Claude Van Damme’s best film, it almost never saw the light of day. Indeed, according to Nick De Semlyen’s book, “Last Action Heroes” (buy it here), the film was deemed unreleasable by Cannon Pictures head Menachem Golan. The film sat on the shelf for fourteen months and was considered so bad that Golan intended to release the movie direct-to-video. Things got so heated that Golan refused to go ahead with a proposed sequel to Lone Wolf McQuade, which would have featured Van Damme teaming up with Chuck Norris (who was an early mentor to JCVD). He wanted Michael Dudikoff instead.

According to the book, Van Damme, who had returned to his old job as a limo driver when Bloodsport wrapped, convinced the studio to allow him to re-edit the film with Towering Inferno editor Carl Press. The two reworked the fight scenes and trimmed down some of the drama, resulting in a faster-paced cut that the studio allowed them to release. However, in 1988, the studio was on the verge of going under, thanks to their attempt to hit the big time with a trio of would-be blockbusters in 1987. The films Over the Top, Masters of the Universe and Superman IV: The Quest for Peace all tanked at the box office, and in 1988, the studio could barely afford to promote Bloodsport. Thus, JCVD and the film rolled out in Asia and Europe before hitting North America, and by then, the film’s international success meant that the film was already profitable. It only grossed $11.7 million domestically, but overseas, it made over $50 million, all on a budget of only $2.3 million. On VHS, it became one of the biggest-selling titles in the Warner Bros library.

It’s incredible that Menahem Golan didn’t think the film was worth releasing, given how bad some of the product Cannon put out in their heyday was. Most studios would have never released Superman IV in the shape it was in theatres. Of all the films Cannon produced, Bloodsport is arguably the one with the most staying power. It is considered by many (myself included) to be one of the best American Martial Arts movies ever made.

Of course, after Bloodsport was a hit, JCVD was immediately put into two more Cannon films, Cyborg and Death Warrant. But the time the latter film came out, Golan had left the company. If JCVD had been stuck in a long term contract with Cannon, many believe his career would have never taken off. Take for example what happened to Michael Dudikoff. He should have been cast in bigger movies post American Ninja and Avenging Force, rather than smaller films. In many ways, their spendthrift ways doomed him to a career dominated by DTV movies.

Bloodsport has the following synopsis: U.S. soldier Frank Dux (Jean-Claude Van Damme) has come to Hong Kong to be accepted into the Kumite, a highly secret and extremely violent martial-arts competition. While trying to gain access into the underground world of clandestine fighters, he also has to avoid military officers who consider him to be AWOL. After enduring a difficult training and beginning a romance with journalist Janice Kent (Leah Ayres), Frank is given the opportunity to fight. But can he survive?

Do you think Bloodsport is JCVD’s best movie? Let us know in the comments.

Chris Morgan and Dwayne Johnson currently collaborated on Red One, but he says the Hobbs & Shaw sequel is still up in the air.

Screenwriter Chris Morgan has been a big contributor to the Fast & Furious franchise, having started with the series’ third entry, The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift, and writing each sequel up to The Fate of the Furious. Morgan would opt to work on the spin-off Hobbs & Shaw for Dwayne Johnson and the business partnership would continue as he also wrote the script for Johnson’s latest Christmas movie Red One. The Hollywood Reporter recently sat down with Morgan as he talks the future of the Fast & Furious franchise and how another Hobbs movie was supposed to fit in.

After Johnson made a surprise cameo appearance in Fast X, fans of the franchise breathed a sigh of relief as he and Diesel seemed to have put their differences aside for one more collaboration and the stage had been set for Hobbs to re-join the family. It was once announced that another Hobbs movie (that doesn’t seem to partner him up with Shaw this time around) was planned to set up Fast 11. When THR asked if that is still being developed, Morgan answered,

That’s really something the studio would have to speak to. We’re talking about what comes when and how, but I’ll leave that to greater minds than mine.”

However, he would also reveal a possible related project he’s working on but isn’t at liberty to divulge much detail,

It’s under lock and key. I can say that I’m working on a Hobbs & Shaw kind of script. So we’ll see where that goes, but I’m excited about it.”

One thing the writer is incredibly excited to talk about is the revelation from past years that the Academy Award-winning director of Oppenheimer, Christopher Nolan, is a fan of the Fast & Furious series and cites Morgan’s Tokyo Drift as his favorite. When asked if that news had floored him when it came to light, Morgan responded, “How could it not? He is literally one of the greatest filmmakers in the history of humanity, and he likes my movie. By the way, I’ve spoken to him about it since then.” Morgan is also happy that the reception on that film has come around since it first released, “When the movie came out, the reviews weren’t great; people didn’t like it. […] So, from where we started to now, you have no idea how good it feels to hear that everyone appreciates what we’ve always appreciated about it, which is Japan and drifting culture.”

About the Author

E.J. is a News Editor at JoBlo, as well as a Video Editor, Writer, and Narrator for some of the movie retrospectives on our JoBlo Originals YouTube channel, including Reel Action, Revisited and some of the Top 10 lists. He is a graduate of the film program at Missouri Western State University with concentrations in performance, writing, editing and directing.