I’m camping in hall H today, and while I wasn’t sure it was going to be worth it, things got going fast with Neil Gaiman’s announcement of Coraline details and some unexpected comedy from Ben Garant and Thomas Lennon.
12:23 Neil Gaiman, Henry Selick. You can almost see Selick animating himself frame by frame, step by step. They’re announcing a special work in progress Coraline screening this eve. Huh. Will have to try to make that. Full cast announced. (Ian McShane!) Opens ’08 late summer, early fall.
12:27 Balls of Fury. Ben Garant. "It took us seven months for us to do ping pong CGI. Peter Jackson did about 7000 orcs in the time it took us to do one ping pong ball." Dan Fogler comes out. He looks like he’s ready for the Superbad fan film. Thomas Lennon comes out in full East German ping pong spandex. Little homophobic gag — "It looks a little gay." / "Yeah, we don’t want to alienate the fans." (That was Fogler.)
Lennon: "Some asswipe dressed like Daredevil, and I mean new Affleck Daredevil, was pointing at me like I was a douche." Clip shown (the first match, between Fogler and Terry Crews) and it’s actually pretty funny…when Foglen isn’t talking. Sniff.
12:41 October 20 – The State on DVD. Everything. Deleted scenes. Commentaries.
12:56 If I could have transcribed this whole panel I would have. They kicked it into gear. Fogler matched a fan’s crappy Walken impersonation with his own. James Hong stormed the stage and did his standup routine. To Garant: "You are fake Caucasian!" They got the camera to pull back out for a full body shot when Slave Ship Leia got up to ask a question. She had Sarlaac teeth, though. Cedric Yarbrough went through the fan line to ask why they cast Terry Crews instead of him. James Hong and Dan Fogler did a romantic dance. They killed.
1:03 The Strangers. Brian Bertino. Scott Speedman. Liv Tyler. No one should have to follow James Hong and The State boys. Showed a clip of Liv Tyler facing down a couple of home invaders. Looks pretty good out of context.
1:18 The Oh Don Piano of the day: would Scott Speedman play Captain America? Answer: sure!
1:22 A plain girl steps up to the mic to recount an anecdote where she met Scott Speedman and says he was the nicest guy. Him: "Things have changed."
1:26 Asked what they’re doing next, Speedman mentions he’s doing an Atom Egoyan movie in September. No audience reaction.
1:28 Nice teaser for The Strangers. Very well cut.
1:30 Neil Marshall and Doomsday. Well cut, definitely has a Thunderdome feel. But I’m really not sure about this one. Anti-Descent prejudice is kicking into gear. Marshall makes more than one Apocalypse Now reference. Um. Says it’ll most likely be an R picture, no surprise.
1:42 Marshall says that his The Ninth Legion script is ready to go. (That’s his The Warriors in ancient Rome story.)
Break time. Disney/Pixar is up next, and I’ll be here sitting through it, waiting for the Marvel panel in a couple hours.