Ronald.phillips

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Kabosu the Shiba Inu has inspired an enduring internet meme and cryptocurrencies worth over $70 billion.

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Nowadays, it feels like more games than ever play it safe, coming in with repetitive mechanics, minimal innovations, and featuring multiple technical issues on launch.

Tom Hanks stars as the one person you would want to survive the Apocalypse. Miguel Sapochnik directs the sci-fi road trip, soon to stream on Apple TV+.

[Read the whole post on screenanarchy.com...]

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The U.S. Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) on Wednesday released a list of roughly 300 vulnerabilities that are known to have been exploited, and it has issued a binding operational directive (BOD) instructing government organizations to patch these security flaws.

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A lot of people like to refer to fall and winter as “soup season,” but I’ve always considered these colder months to be “mashed potato season.” Whether eaten as a (non-negotiable) Thanksgiving side, or as a mid-week meal, few things comfort and satiate quite like a bowl of creamy, smushed spuds.

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Cast one of the most charismatic, lovable A-list actors around? Check. Pair him with a sentient robot slowly learning the ways of being human? Check. Wrap it all up in a heartwarming tale about appreciating the loyal and unconditional love of dogs? Check and check. Despite the familiar trappings of "Finch," the specific combination of all three is precisely how you sell this movie as one that I simply have to see ... just as long as we get some official confirmation that nothing bad will actually happen to that aforementioned dog, of course. This new behind-the-scenes look at "Finch" is all about showing some love to our canine companions, even as Hanks' character seems to be the very last man left on a post-apocalyptic Earth. Check out the clip below.

Finch First Look

"Who doesn't love a good dog?"

Hanks almost sounds incredulous asking this question -- and rightfully so. America's Dad, of course, has some prior experience playing essentially the only human being we see on-screen for hours at a time in 2000's "Cast Away." But this time around, his eponymous character of Finch will attempt to stave off the onset of loneliness-induced madness with the help of his beloved dog Goodyear and his technical ingenuity in building a walking, talking (and occasionally barking) robot named Jeff played by Caleb Landry Jones. Between the two of them and their four-legged friend (portrayed impeccably and possibly to some late-season awards buzz by Seamus), Hanks and Jones pretty much make up the entire cast of the movie.

Formerly titled "Bios," "Finch" is written by Craig Luck and Ivor Powell and directed by Miguel Sapochnik, a name that should be very familiar to "Game of Thrones" fans who found themselves thrilled by some of the most epic and downright cinematic episodes in the show's later seasons. In addition to directing several episodes of "House MD," "True Detective," and "Altered Carbon," his directing work on "Game of Thrones" included such acclaimed hours as "Hardhome," "Battle of the Bastards," "The Winds of Winter," "The Long Night," and the rather controversial "The Bells."

"Finch" comes exclusively to Apple TV+ on November 5, 2021. You can read the synopsis below.

Tom Hanks is Finch, a man who embarks on a moving and powerful journey to find a new home for his unlikely family -- his beloved dog and a newly created robot -- in a dangerous and ravaged world.

Read this next: The 20 Best Dystopian Movies Of All Time

The post Finch First Look: Tom Hanks Builds a Best Friend for Man's Best Friend appeared first on /Film.

If you were hoping to see Michael Rooker's character, Yondu, make his live-action return to the Marvel Cinematic Universe, it won't be happening ... not if writer-director James Gunn has anything to say about it.

Gunn and Rooker reteamed this year for "The Suicide Squad," so the pair have continued their working relationship outside the MCU, but Yondu died at the end of "Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2." It was a big, emotional moment in which the blue-skinned Ravager sacrificed himself to save his surrogate son, Peter Quill, aka Star-Lord (Chris Pratt). Prior to his death, Yondu revealed that the reason he had kidnapped Quill from Earth as a boy was because he wanted to save him from his real father, the evil Ego (Kurt Russell).

Replying to a fan comment on Twitter, Gunn reiterated that, despite the comic book precedent for resurrecting any and every beloved character, there are no plans to bring back Yondu while he's around.

As you can see from the tweet above, Gunn is dead set against robbing Yondu's death of meaning. He wrote, "As I've said many times before, as long as I'm a part of the Guardians, Yondu is dead, 100%, forever, no magic resurrections. Any other way would be belittling his sacrifice and what his story means to so many people."

Yondu Already Returned This Year ... In Animated Form

It seems clear that Gunn is discussing Yondu in the context of the mainstream MCU, as seen in Marvel's live-action movies and TV shows. However, Rooker actually did return as Yondu this year in the animated series, "What If...?"

In "What If...?" we met a version of Yondu from an alternate timeline who kidnapped T'Challa (Chadwick Boseman), the boy who would otherwise grow up to be "Black Panther," instead of Peter Quill. T'Challa helped shape the Ravagers into something more like Robin Hood and his merry band of space thieves, stealing from the rich and giving to the poor.

If fans are really jonesing to see Yondu again, all they need to do is go watch "What If...?" You'll hear Rooker's voice and you'll see Yondu summoning his Yaka Arrow by whistling, same as he's always done. Producer Kevin Feige has even teased that we may begin to see characters from "What If...?" crossing over into the core MCU, so it's always possible that some parallel-universe Yondu could show up after Gunn concludes his "Guardians of the Galaxy" movie trilogy.

With the Marvel's multiverse opening up more and more in everything from "Loki" to the upcoming "Spider-Man: No Way Home" and "Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness," characters who are dead in one reality could theoretically show up alive again in another reality, or jump from one reality to another. Flashbacks could also be employed to feature Yondu, and if all else fails, you can always just go back and watch the first two "Guardians of the Galaxy" movies and enjoy the time we had with Yondu there.

Read this next: Every MCU Post-Credits Sequence Ranked From Worst To Best

The post James Gunn Confirms Yondu is Not Mary Poppins Y'All, Will Not Be Coming Back appeared first on /Film.

Although PCs are still selling at a greater volume than before the COVID-19 pandemic, demand is starting to drop. In Q3 2021, shipments of laptops, desktops, and tablets dropped 2 percent compared to Q3 2020, according to numbers that researcher Canalys shared on Monday. Interest in Chromebooks dropped the most, with a reported decline as high as 36.9 percent. Demand for tablets also fell, showing a 15 percent year-on-year decline, according to Canalys. From a report: Both Canalys and the IDC's Worldwide Quarterly Personal Computing Device Tracker shared Q3 numbers for Chromebooks and tablets on Monday. Canalys said 5.8 million Chromebooks shipped globally during this time, while the IDC said the number was 6.5 million. Both pointed to a huge decline compared to Q3 2020. Canalys reported the drop at 36.9 percent, and IDC pegged it at 29.8 percent. Canalys said that Q3 Chromebook sales took a "major downturn" as the education markets in the US, Japan, and elsewhere became saturated. Demand lessened as government programs supporting remote learning went away, the research group said. After reaching a high of 18 percent market share since the start of 2020, Chromebooks reportedly represented just 9 percent of laptop shipments in Q3 2021.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

A fellow was fishing with two friends in Brasilandia de Minas, Brazil when a swarm of bees arrived. They jumped into the lake to escape but the first man never made it to shore. Yep, piranhas. From 7News.com:

The fire department was called and an officer was about to dive into the lake when he was informed it was filled with piranhas.

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The Title Update 2 Patch Notes on the Ubisoft Forums have details on a new patch that's now available for the console editions of Far Cry 6, saying this will come to the PC edition of the open-world...

Microsoft on Tuesday announced the upcoming availability of Microsoft Defender for Business, an enterprise-grade endpoint security solution catered for small and medium-sized businesses (SMBs).

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Hanks turned down the offer to go to space.

(Welcome to ...And More, our no-frills, zero B.S. guide to when and where you can watch upcoming movies and shows, and everything else you could possibly stand to know.)

Few literary characters have returned to the screen as frequently as the scheming, titular vampire introduced in Bram Stoker's classic 1897 gothic horror novel "Dracula." That hasn't changed in the 21st century, either, with recent depictions of the blood-thirsty monster running the gamut from the serious (Mark Gatiss and Steven Moffat's "Dracula" mini-series) to the supremely silly (Drac in the "Hotel Transylvania" movies). There are even dual Dracula re-imaginings in the works from directors Karyn Kusama ("Jennifer's Body," "Destroyer") and Chloé Zhao ("Nomadland," "Eternals"), all while Chris McKay ("The LEGO Batman Movie," "The Tomorrow War") prepares to call the shots on a horror-comedy about Drac's put-upon henchman R. M. Renfield.

Yet, out of all the Dracula-related movies on the horizon, none of them have been in development as long as "The Last Voyage of the Demeter" — a film that finally completed production in October 2021 after nearly 20 years' worth of pre-production delays.

The Last Voyage Of The Demeter Release Date And Where You Can Watch It

"The Last Voyage of the Demeter" is scheduled to open exclusively in theaters on January 27, 2023. The film has seen multiple directors — nearly all of whom know a thing or two about supernatural horror — come and go over the years, with David Slade ("Hard Candy," "30 Days of Night"), Neil Marshall ("The Descent," "Hellboy"), Marcus Nispel ("The Texas Chainsaw Massacre" and "Conan the Barbarian" reboots), Stefan Ruzowitsky ("Deadfall," "Cold Hell"), and Robert Schwentke ("R.I.P.D.," "Snake Eyes: G.I. Joe Origins") among those set to helm the movie at some time. Interestingly, Noomi Rapace ("Lamb") and Ben Kingsley ("Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings") were the only actors reportedly attached to the project while all those directors played musical chairs — although Viggo Mortensen was apparently in talks for a role early on.

Still, despite the constant stop-and-go progress, Amblin Partners and Universal Pictures never quit on the project, hoping it would eventually see the light of day. There's a joke about Dracula and light in there somewhere but moving on...

What Is The Last Voyage Of The Demeter?

Stoker's "Dracula" is an epistolary novel that tells its story through journal pages, diary entries, written letters, telegrams, and newspaper articles. "The Last Voyage of the Demeter" draws inspiration primarily from part of the book's seventh chapter, where the captain of the eponymous cargo ship details the strange and disturbing events that transpire over the course of the Russian vessel's voyage from Transylvania to England in his personal log. Of course, it turns out Dracula is secretly hiding in a crate full of Transylvanian dirt aboard the Demeter and snacking on its crew one member at a time, leaving their shipmates confused and horrified by what's happening.

The premise for "The Last Voyage of the Demeter" begs comparison to "Alien," "The Thing," and other horror movies that revolve around unsuspecting humans being preyed upon by a preternatural creature in a remote, contained setting far from the rest of civilization. Whether things will work out any better for the film's characters than they did in Stoker's novel, well, that's a good question.

The Last Voyage Of The Demeter Cast

"The Last Voyage of the Demeter" stars "Straight Outta Compton" and "Kong: Skull Island" actor Corey Hawkins opposite a cast that includes Aisling Franciosi ("Black Narcissus"), David Dastmalchian ("Dune"), Liam Cunningham ("Game of Thrones"), Jon Jon Briones ("Blood Ransom"), Stefan Kapičić (the "Deadpool" movies), Nikolai Nikolaeff ("Power Rangers Jungle Fury"), and Chris Walley ("The Young Offenders"). However, fans of monster horror cinema may be most excited to learn that Dracula himself is being played by Javier Botet.

For those unfamiliar, Botet is one of the modern "Men of a Thousand Faces" actors in the tradition of Lon Chaney, along with his fellow creature specialist Doug Jones. Botet's most famous roles include the ghoulish Tristana Medeiros in the "REC" movies, the titular specter in Andy Muschietti's "Mama," multiple ghosts in "Crimson Peak," and KeyFace in "Insidious: The Last Key." Basically, if you've watched a horror film that features a tall, lanky, non-CGI monster and/or supernatural entity released over the last two decades, odds are it was either Botet or Jones who played them.

The Last Voyage Of The Demeter Director, Writers, And More

Bragi Schut, the co-writer of the "Escape Room" movies and, amusingly enough, the "Ninjago" animated series, wrote the original screenplay for "The Last Voyage of the Demeter," with Zak Olkewicz ("Fear Street: Part Two — 1978") providing the final script draft. Production began in July 2021 in Berlin under the direction of André Øvredal, a Norwegian filmmaker who broke out with the found-footage horror/comedy "Trollhunter" before making his English-language debut with the critically acclaimed horror/thriller "The Autopsy of Jane Doe" in 2016. He went on to make a bigger splash at the box office three years later by helming "Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark," a film adaptation of Alvin Schwartz's notoriously spooky children's horror short story collections.

"The Last Voyage of the Demeter" reunites Øvredal with his "Jane Doe" and "Scary Stories" cinematographer Roman Osin and features historical costumes designed by Carlo Poggioli ("Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter," "The Young Pope"). Its production crew also includes set designer Carlo Poggioli ("Bridge of Spies") and art director Charlo Dalli ("Murder on the Orient Express"), both of whom certainly know how to make a handsome period film.

Read this next: The 12 Best Vampire Movies Of All Time

The post The Last Voyage of the Demeter: Release Date, Cast, And More appeared first on /Film.

In "King Richard," Will Smith plays the father of tennis superstars Venus and Serena Williams -- a man so determined to have his daughters succeed that he wrote a 78-page plan for their whole career before they were even born. 

Smith has transformed himself physically for previous roles, gaining forty pounds of muscle to portray the title boxing champion in "Ali." He's also donned accents before, including the slippery one he utilized in "After Earth" (a film that he later called "the most painful failure" of his career). For "King Richard," Smith was prepared to sit in the makeup chair for three hours to achieve the right look, but the film's director, Reinaldo Marcus Green, drew a line in the sand.

In an interview with Insider (by way of Indiewire), Green revealed that Smith and Warner Bros. originally had a makeup team applying prosthetics to his face in order to mold it into the likeness of Richard Williams. He said:

"They made him look like Richard Williams, it was straight-up shocking. I was like, 'Look, you guys did an incredible job, but I don't want that.' Will has his acting coach who has been with him for 30 movies, he had a dialect coach so he could speak similar to Richard, we have so much. And it would have been three hours of Will being in the makeup chair every day. Who wants to do that?"

Saying No To Will Smith

Above, you can see what the real Richard Williams looked like in 2007, the year that Smith appeared in "I Am Legend." Besides the beard, there's not much resemblance, really ... which is maybe why Smith and the studio were initially so keen on transforming the actor with prosthetics. However, Green was having none of it. He explained:

"I looked at Will straight in the eye and said, 'Look, we don't need that.' We don't need him to look like [Richard Williams]. We need him to sink in and disappear, but that doesn't mean making him look like Richard."

Who says you can't say no to an actor like Will Smith? If Hollywood makeup artists can make Colin Farrell look like Richard Kind in "The Batman," I'm sure they could have made Smith look more like Richard Williams. But there are plenty of movies, biopics and otherwise, where an actor has disappeared in a role based on a real person without necessarily bearing a close resemblance to that person.

I'm just glad they were trying to do practical makeup effects and that they're using a flesh-and-blood actor to play Williams. Right now, digitally de-aging or recreating people is mainly limited to blockbusters, but it feels like we're not so many years removed from the day when even sports dramas like this will be utilizing mo-cap performers as stand-ins (or deepfake technology, or whatever else) to embody real-life figures.

"King Richard" has been garnering Oscar buzz for Smith, and it arrives in theaters and on HBO Max on Friday, November 19, 2021.

Read this next: Jackie Chan's 15 Greatest Fight Scenes Ranked

The post Will Smith Wanted Three Hours of Make-Up to Play His King Richard Character, But the Director Said No appeared first on /Film.

35 years ago, John Hughes released "Pretty in Pink," arguably the "Return of the Jedi" of his trilogy of teen films starring Molly Ringwald. The story centers on a hip and stylish teenager named Andie, a girl from a lower-class family attending a wealthy private school in Chicago. Andie works at the record store, does everything with her best friend, the equally lower-class Duckie (Jon Cryer), and navigates a world filled with teenage hormones surrounded by wealthy classmates who might as well be from a different planet. Things change for Andie when the rich and dreamy Blane (Andrew McCarthy) asks her out, thrusting them both into a fish-out-of-water situation of trying to understand one another, while heartbroken Duckie realizes that Andie only sees him as a friend.

Toward the end of the movie, Andie pushes Blane away, calling him out for avoiding her and not returning her calls, knowing full well it's because his rich friends do not approve of his relationship with her. Andie then goes to the prom in a dress she made herself, reunites with heartbroken Duckie, and then later, reconciles with Blane, admitting the two are in love. It's a Hughes era classic, but the film's original ending had a much different ending ... one that audiences absolutely hated.

No Love For The Duckman

In the film's original ending, Andie's reunion at the prom with Duckie was also a romantic one. According to director Howard Deutch from an interview with USA Today, "Up to that point, the screening had been like a rock concert. And we got to the ending, and they started to boo," says Deutch, who insists there were actual boos. "That young audience, they did not want Molly to end up with Jon Cryer. The girls were like, 'Forget the politics. We want her to get the cute boy."

Test audiences hated the idea of Andie ending up with Duckie so much, Hughes quickly wrote a new five-page ending having Andie wind up with Blane. The ending betrays the underdog setup of Andie and Duckie making it out of their privileged high school together, and the crew was only given one day to re-shoot the entire ending. Andrew McCarthy had already changed his appearance for a Broadway play and was forced to wear a wig for the final moments, Duckie was given a new love interest in the form of Kristy Swanson, and Blane's redemption needed to look sympathetic. 1986 audiences loved the new ending, but in the years since, many have argued that the new ending has aged poorly, and that the film would have been better suited with Andie and Duckie ending up together. 

In reality, the new ending is the correct one. Let me explain.

Duckie Not-So Secretly Sucks

Jon Cryer's "Duckie" is a beloved character, frequently cited as one of the underdog heroes of cinema and the president of the dreaded "friend zone." Here's the thing, though: Duckie secretly sucks. As a best friend, he never communicates his true feelings to Andie and just expects her to pick up on his subtext. He immediately judges her with harsh intensity for daring to have feelings for someone other than him, tries to win her over with giant, unsolicited gestures, and throws a public tantrum when things don't turn out his way. Duckie is the de facto "nice guy" who feels entitled to the object of his affection's attention just because he's not a total piece of garbage.

That said, Duckie is also frequently read as a closeted queer character, and if that's the case, his anger and outbursts would be rooted in fear, and his actions feel a lot more justifiable. However, if Duckie is straight, his actions are a step above a whiny incel. To be perfectly honest, the best ending would have been if Andie told all of the men in her life to kick rocks, gone off to art school, and lived her best college life. That way, Andie could truly let them all know that they couldn't break her.

Read this next: Every King Kong Movie Ranked From Worst To Best

The post The Original Pretty In Pink Ending Test Audiences Couldn't Stand appeared first on /Film.

"Where must we go, we who wander this wasteland, in search of our better selves." That quote appears on the screen at the end of "Mad Max: Fury Road," attributed to the (fictional) book "The First History of Man." And while "Finch," the new Apple TV+ movie starring Tom Hanks, has none of the jaw-dropping stunts or pulse-pounding action of "Fury Road," that quote would be perfectly at home within the confines of this story, too. 

"Finch" is an unconventional post-apocalyptic flick, one where the doom and gloom exist more on the margins. That's not to say this is some candy-coated, ultra-positive look at the end of the world. There's an undeniable melancholy here; a tragic loneliness that can't be shaken off. But there's also an element of acceptance. Acceptance that what happened happened, and sometimes there's no way to undo that. There will be no solution to the end of the world here, but there is a glimmer of hope. Hope that we might still find our better selves. And hope that a piece of us can still go on long after we've returned to the dust. 

"Finch" feels slightly cobbled together from other, similar pieces of entertainment. It's impossible to look at the empty, dust-choked wasteland here and not recall "WALL-E." The road trip element that sets in after the intro reminds one of the more recent "Nomadland." And, what with this being an Amblin production and all, there are also Spielbergian tropes on display, with moments that immediately remind us of "E.T.", "A.I.", and more. Indeed, watching "Finch," I couldn't help but think that the film would probably be even better had Spielberg himself helmed it. It feels perfectly in line with his sensibilities -- there's even a bit late in the film about an absentee father. 

But this is not Spielberg's work. Instead, "Finch" is in the hands of Miguel Sapochnik, who helms the film with a light touch, working from a script by Craig Luck and Ivor Powell. No one will ever confuse Sapochnik with Spielberg, but the director does more than hold his own, blending an unexpected sweetness with a harsh, violent reality that threatens to tear everything apart. "Finch" is often a kind, charming, even heart-warming movie. It's also a movie where desiccated corpses lay sprawled about, and danger lurks in the darkness. 

Don't Take Tom Hanks For Granted

Have we begun to take Tom Hanks for granted? There was a time when a new Hanks film was treated as some sort of event, but in recent years it's begun to feel as if we've all just accepted that Hanks is good at what he does, and moved on. To be fair, at this point it really seems like Hanks has nothing more to prove -- he's a multiple Oscar winner and a beloved famous person. Yet time and time again, the actor will turn in a great performance that's met with little more than a polite nod. 

Last year's "News of the World" may not have been a great movie, but Hanks' work therein was as good as it's ever been. And yet ... no one seemed to take much notice. Hell, one of the best performances of his career, his lead role in "Captain Phillips" in 2013, didn't even score him an Oscar nom. And watching Hanks in "Finch," where he plays a dying man in a dying world, I found myself a tad emotionally wrought, thinking that one day the actor will be gone, and all that will be left for us is his stellar work. We shouldn't overlook it, and we should cherish it while we can. 

All that is a long-winded way of saying Hanks is predictably great here. Very few modern actors could carry a movie like this -- a movie where Hanks' co-stars are a robot and a dog. But Hanks wrings pathos from every scene. His inherent everyman charm makes his character, a scientist named Finch, almost immediately likable. Finch lives in a ruined world; holes in the ozone layer have killed off huge swaths of the population and made the world itself largely uninhabitable. When Finch does venture out for supplies, he puts on a cobbled-together protective suit and travels around in a fortified RV. 

Home for Finch is a secluded laboratory that he shares with a dog and a cute little robot named Dewey (Dewey seems heavily inspired by WALL-E, right down to the sounds it makes). But Finch is hard at work at a bigger, more advanced robot -- a humanoid figure that will probably remind some people of the abysmal "Chappie," for better or worse. The robot, voiced by Caleb Landry Jones, eventually names itself Jeff, and there's never a moment where we don't buy into Jeff as a character. He may not be a human, but he feels completely alive, helped by Jones' motion-capture performance. The digital work to bring Jeff to life is flawless; he feels tangible, and that is no small feat. Jeff has been created for a very specific reason: Finch, who has been poisoned by gamma radiation, knows his time on this planet is growing shorter by the day, and he needs someone to watch over his beloved dog, Goodyear.

A Man, A Dog, And A Bot

While Goodyear is given the occasional funny reaction shot, the dog is always presented as a dog. He doesn't talk, he's not anthropomorphized, he's just a dog. A very good dog, but a dog all the same. A clunkier movie might've made the dog more of a character, but "Finch" wisely forgoes this, realizing that most people can immediately relate to a dog who is just a dog. The bond between Finch and Goodyear is sweet and simple, but it's not exactly love at first sight between Goodyear and Jeff the robot. Jeff is still learning as he goes along, and while he tries to connect with Goodyear, the dog is having none of it. This is a bit of a problem since Jeff is meant to be Goodyear's new companion after Finch is gone, but there's no problem a road trip can't solve, right?

Soon, Finch, Jeff, and Goodyear are hitting the road in the RV, heading towards San Francisco. Finch grows sicker along the way, and there's some doubt as to whether or not he'll even make it to the end of the trip. First, though, he'll have to teach Jeff some valuable lessons about life, and how to survive and protect Goodyear. Jeff, being a newborn and all, isn't instantly adept at his new tasks, which also helps make the character relatable. If this were a perfect machine we'd have less to connect with. By making Jeff a bit of a walking disaster, "Finch" endears him to us. 

The road trip element keeps the narrative moving, although when all is said and done, I was slightly taken aback at how small "Finch" feels. But perhaps that's part of the movie's strength. Yes, this is a post-apocalyptic world, but we never meet any other human survivors beyond Finch. A few are glimpsed here and there, but we only see bits of pieces of them from a distance. Later, when Finch and the gang encounter a potential human threat, the menacing character is never once shown on screen -- we simply see their dark car following the RV. This shrinks the world of "Finch" down while crafting something oddly intimate. These characters are our only point of reference for this damaged world, and we can either cling onto them or toss them aside. 

On The Road

Hanks carries the entire film on his back, and this is yet another great bit of work from the actor. I fear it's also yet another performance that will be overlooked since "Finch" is destined for Apple TV+ and not the big screen or a more popular streaming service. But the humanity that Hanks radiates is essential to making "Finch" work, and work well. When Finch has a heart-to-heart moment with Jeff in the landscape of Death Valley, it's heartbreaking, primarily because Hanks downplays his dialogue. He's giving a BIG SPEECH, in all caps, but it never feels that way. We are blessed to have Hanks as an actor who still seems like he has great work ahead of him.

That Death Valley segment comes late in the film, but it's this sequence that makes "Finch" truly memorable. There are moments here where we see Jeff, alone against the landscape, that are nothing short of stunning. To see this robotic, synthetic creation – all clanking, rough-hewn metal, and hydraulic wires -- contrasted against the dry, natural beauty of the desert as the sun goes down like a ball of fire casting beautiful shadows is something special. 

The elements play a big part throughout the film, and they're presented as both destructive and nurturing. There's dust that whips at breakneck speed; disastrous storms that can rip structures apart; bursts of angry lightning. And then there's that fading sunlight in the desert. And the road that continues on, taking our characters further on their journey. A road that opens up, and sprawls, and seemingly never ends. There's hope out there. Somewhere. 

/Film Review: 7.5 out of 10

Read this next: The 25 Best Movie Robots Of All Time

The post Finch Review: Tom Hanks Travels The Post-Apocalyptic Wasteland With a Very Good Dog and a Very Good Robot appeared first on /Film.

Inflation and market growth hide from us the true prices of old things, and software is no exception. Rob Griffiths charts the high cost of software in the 1980s.

Want to play Ultima, an open-world fantasy role-playing game? Its graphics are just as stunning as those of Missile Defense.

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There's no end in sight to the saga of Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson and the "Fast and Furious" franchise. Or is there? Johnson has had an ongoing feud with franchise star and producer Vin Diesel, and he most recently said that he regrets his part in making that feud public. Over the summer, he confirmed that he is done with the "Fast & Furious" film series. Of course, outside the main series, the franchise now extends to include the spin-off film "Hobbs & Shaw," starring Johnson and Jason Statham.

Speaking to Sirius XM (via CBR), Johnson teased an idea for a "Hobbs & Shaw" sequel that would give his character, Luke Hobbs, a definitive ending. Here is what he said:

"When it comes to Hobbs and Shaw, which we loved and loved making that movie, there's an idea that I had that I called [Universal Pictures chairwoman] Donna Langley, called our writer Chris Morgan, our producer Hiram Garcia, and I said, 'I have this idea and this direction for [Hobbs and Shaw 2].' And I pitched, and it would be, without giving it away... it would be the antithesis of what Fast & Furious movies generally are in that they continue to go on and go on and go on.

"In this case, I wanted to and still want to do the quintessential Hobbs movie that, again without giving it away, that you watch a man walk off into the sunset... I said, 'We have an opportunity here to go against the grain and let's disrupt things a little bit and let's create a movie within the Fast & Furious world that is unexpected.' "

Driving Off Into The Sunset

It's understandable why Johnson might say that the "Fast and Furious" movies have gone on and on, but in all fairness to that franchise and its fans, it does have a planned ending. The tenth and eleventh movies will be a two-parter concluding the main series. So with it already getting ready to drive off into the sunset, I don't necessarily think that having Hobbs "walk into the sunset" would make a "Hobbs & Shaw" sequel the antithesis of "Fast & Furious."

It seems more like Johnson and Diesel are just the antithesis of each other and this is part of that -- Johnson's way of saying he's not going to do things like his rival "alpha," as he's called Diesel before. But maybe I'm just reading into these comments too much?

In recent years, we've seen other big franchises kill off major heroes to give a sense of closure to their arcs and provide an out for the stars playing those heroes (who had made no secret in the press of wanting to be done with their characters). I'm thinking of two specific examples here: Iron Man is one, but another is more recent.

If they killed off Hobbs, that would give him a definitive ending, but it would also rather conflict with the idea of Hobbs walking off into the sunset (unless Johnson is just speaking in extremely loose metaphors). Johnson is already the type of image-conscious actor to have a contract stipulating how much he gets beaten up onscreen, so it wouldn't be a stretch to imagine him having another clause stipulating that he can never die.

Will Hobbs have a happy ending, or no ending at all other than the one we've already seen? Time will tell.

Read this next: Jack Nicholson's 15 Most Iconic Roles Ranked

The post Hobbs and Shaw Sequel Could be the 'Antithesis' of a Fast and Furious Movie, Says Dwayne Johnson appeared first on /Film.

The Grand Theft Auto: The Trilogy – The Definitive Edition PlayStation 5 file size has been revealed today, and it is smaller than the size of the Xbox Series X|S version.

According to the reliable PlayStation Game Size Twitter profile, Grand Theft Auto III – The Definitive Edition will be 5.293 GB big without the day one patch on PlayStation 5, Grand Theft Auto: Vice City – The Definitive Edition 10.768 GB big, and Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas: The Definitive Edition 22.679 GB big, for a total of 38.74 GB.  As such, the PlayStation 5 version is over 10 Gb lighter than the Xbox Series X|S release, which will require a total of 49 GB of free storage space for all three games.

Grand Theft Auto III – The Definitive Edition (PS5)

Download Size : 5.293 GB (Without Day One Patch)

Pre-Load : November 9
Launch : November 11

#PS5 #GTATrilogyDefinitiveEdition pic.twitter.com/lCSeGXsLuw

— PlayStation Game Size (@PlaystationSize) November 3, 2021

Grand Theft Auto: Vice City – The Definitive Edition (PS5)

Download Size : 10.768 GB (Without Day One Patch)

Pre-Load : November 9
Launch : November 11

#PS5 #GTATrilogyDefinitiveEdition pic.twitter.com/h0gD4T1mjk

— PlayStation Game Size (@PlaystationSize) November 3, 2021

Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas – The Definitive Edition (PS5)

Download Size : 22.679 GB (Without Day One Patch)

Pre-Load : November 9
Launch : November 11

#PS5 #GTATrilogyDefinitiveEdition pic.twitter.com/xxI85rOkmS

— PlayStation Game Size (@PlaystationSize) November 3, 2021

Grand Theft Auto: The Trilogy – The Definitive Edition will include a variety of visual and gameplay improvements that will improve the experience in all three games, such as improved controls, targeting, and lock-on aim, NVIDIA DLSS support on PC, and more.

Grand Theft Auto: The Trilogy – The Definitive Edition introduces wide-ranging modern control upgrades, including improvements to targeting and lock-on aiming, updated Weapon and Radio Station Wheels, updated Mini-Maps with enhanced navigation allowing players to set waypoints to destinations, updated Achievements, Trophies, and more. The Nintendo Switch version also features Switch-specific controls including Gyro aiming, as well as touch screen camera zooming, pans, and menu selections, while the PC version includes support for NVIDIA DLSS and additional new Accomplishments via the Rockstar Games Social Club.

Grand Theft Auto: The Trilogy – The Definitive Edition launches on November 11th on PC, PlayStation 5, PlayStation 4, Xbox Series X, Xbox Series S, Xbox One, and Nintendo Switch.

The post Grand Theft Auto: The Trilogy – The Definitive Edition PlayStation 5 File Size Revealed by Francesco De Meo appeared first on Wccftech.

Cloud computing has been a game-changer for how people access and store data. However, even as its popularity soars for business and personal use, there are still numerous cloud storage issues and challenges to overcome.

That is a cursed headline from a cursed timeline, but at least it's ours. In a not at all surprising, but still fairly silly move, Quentin Tarantino, your ex's favorite director, is coming out with his very own line of NFTs. Sometimes when I'm experiencing something that feels very much like a trend, I think back to that VH1 show "I Love... the '70s" (or '80s or '90s) and I imagine funny, yet not especially successful, comedians skewering these trends for the future "I Love... the '20s" show. It doesn't make me feel better, but it does make me feel vaguely prescient. Like a sadder lamer version of Paul Atreides, doomed to view life through the lens of long canceled VH1 shows. It's a living, I guess.

But you didn't click on this article to read about my sad VH1 thoughts, you came to hear about Tarantino's NFT scheme, and may god have mercy on your soul. Basically, your good pal Tarantino is releasing a few never before seen scenes from what is probably his most famous film, "Pulp Fiction," as NFTs because ... Branding? Marketing? Jumping on the cultural bandwagon? For whatever reason (and the reason is definitely money), Tarantino is teaming up with Secret Network to unleash these secret scenes to the right buyers. As Tarantino explains in a statement about the new NFTs: 

"I'm excited to be presenting these exclusive scenes from 'Pulp Fiction' to fans ... Secret Network and Secret NFTs provide a whole new world of connecting fans and artists and I'm thrilled to be a part of that."

Did You Just Order An NFT?

If you're a "Pulp Fiction" super-fan, it might be worth forking up the cash just to check out these secret scenes, and to sweeten the pot, it looks like this new content will include a look at the original handwritten "Pulp Fiction" script plus some exclusive commentary from Tarantino himself. Look, I would never tell a huge fan or a completionist how to spend their hard-earned money, but this just feels like something that could go into a special "Pulp Fiction" Blu-ray re-release instead of an NFT. Also, there's no word on what these scenes entail, so while they could be super sweet and may enrich your "Pulp Fiction" viewing experience, they might be really lame. I guess that's all a part of the NFT gamble here.

Of course, this comes at the heels of the news that David Lynch is joining forces with the band Interpol to release their own NFTs, a sentence that is just as perplexing.

Read this next: David Lynch's Feature Films Ranked From Worst To Best

The post Quentin Tarantino is Releasing Never-Seen Pulp Fiction Scenes ... As NFTs appeared first on /Film.