Chris Pine talks about playing Jack Ryan

Chris Pine is the new Jack Ryan in Kenneth Branagh's upcoming action thriller Jack Ryan: Shadow Recruit, based on the popular Tom Clancy novels. Pine's Jack Ryan is a CIA analyst who unwittingly discovers a Russian terrorist plot and is sent into the field to continue the investigation.

Chris Pine, is the fourth actor to take on the titular role of the CIA Operative (following in the footsteps of Alec Baldwin, Harrison Ford and Ben Affleck), The film co-stars Keira Knightley, Kevin Costner and Kenneth Branagh.

His films include Just My Luck, Blind Dating, Smokin’ Aces, This Means War, People Like Us, Rise of the Guardians and Star Trek Into Darkness.

You’re following in the shoes of Harrison Ford, Ben Affleck and Alec Baldwin. How did you make the role your own?

I think I make the part my own simply by the fact that I’m in it so there are certain things that I bring to it that are different. I watched the films and enjoyed them growing up and I really like the spy genre. What I loved about Harrison is that he has an intrinsic humility to him that I think he brings to everything he does, whether it’s Clear And Present Danger or Patriot Games, where Anne Archer drives a Porsche and he has a Volkswagen Jetta and he has a tweed jacket that he seems to have had forever and I just loved that. I did this movie called This Means War that was all about a man in great suits who wants to be the James Bond type of spy and if you see some of the suits I wear in this you’ll know that Jack Ryan is not a man interested in threads – he would much rather go to a first edition book store. So I always loved that humility of Harrison and with Alec Baldwin I just love that kind of sharp, incisiveness he brought to it. He was like a razor in terms of his ability to cut up information and put it together and process it. And I loved that in The Hunt for Red October, in order to avert nuclear catastrophe, he had to figure out the mind of one man and it all came down to this man missing his wife. So there was a psychology to it I really liked. And I think what sets our film apart is that there is great action in this film and when Ken and I started, we talked about how often in films you see so much death and mayhem and violence and no one ever really pays attention to it – you know that a bad guy dies but he maybe also had a wife and a kid but you don’t know his background. So we thought it would be interesting to see the face of that part of the experience. What happens when an everyman is thrown into an extraordinary situation where he has to do things that you wouldn’t necessarily do on any given day and how does he deal with seeing death? How does he deal with inflicting violence? How does he deal with potentially killing someone? And I thought that was really interesting because I can’t recall where you see that happen in films of this genre; where you see people killed but you never see the effects of it. So I like that human aspect it has.

How did you prepare for your role?

I came to the UK last year before we started shooting and Ken organized some things for me. We went to the American Embassy in London and we had this little spy game to do, which was a lot of fun.

What did you have to do?

It’s known as a ‘drop’ in spy parlance and the whole thing was like being at spy camp. Ken was really proud of himself and he was like, ‘I’ve organized a little something for you Chris...’ and then we ended up at the American Embassy and the security team there were in on the plan. I had to find the people that were watching me and there was a drop at one point where I had to pick up a memory stick and do all kinds of stuff. It was a fun but as fun as it was even in that scenario, when you know that there are people out there watching you, your senses are immediately heightened and your heart starts to race.

Did it give you a taste of what it would be like to work for the CIA?

Yeah, and it certainly did that (laughs). And I obviously wasn’t in any danger so I can only imagine what people, real operatives, have to deal with.

Did you talk to any real CIA agents?

I talked with a guy there who was the head of security at the Embassy in London, which is the biggest Embassy in Europe, and his stories about being in Beirut were just crazy. And it’s often less about the stories but more about the energy you get from people like that. I talked to Bob Baer and he’s written a couple of books and he was in the CIA and being around someone like that was really helpful and his stories are great, too. It’s all about the energy that people put out in the room.

Jack has been injured at the start the story. Did you do any research into that?

Jack Ryan has suffered a major back injury and he has to recuperate I went to a facility outside of London where veterans are recuperating from major traumatic events from Afghanistan and Iraq and I got to talk to some of them. And again, we were bringing it back to the facts – if you are in a helicopter crash, what does that mean? It’s major and traumatic and if you see violence and death and all sorts of horrible stuff, that has an effect on you. And it’s the idea that this is a man who is wounded, like any of us would be, psychologically as well as physically, but he still wants to serve. And I met many people who were gravely wounded and still wanted to serve. And I wanted to get my head around that because I am certainly not that courageous. I wanted to understand what that was all about and that was a real eye opener.

Does it make a difference that Kenneth Branagh is also acting as well as directing Jack Ryan?

What’s nice about working with an actor/ director that there is an understanding of the experience of the actors. Ken knows intrinsically what you are going through and what you may need at any given moment because he’s been there himself. And there’s a level of communication that’s better and easier often than with someone who hasn’t been an actor. Ken knows the experience and how it needs to be said to get across for me to achieve what he is looking for in a scene. And then he also brought things to it that was purely down to his talent as a director. This is a big action film and we were shooting relatively easy 11, 12-hour days and that just comes from Ken not over shooting it. Ken would have three cameras and he would block it off and we’d finish a three or four page scene in a day or less, which doesn’t happen very often and I like that. So I think with Ken, a lot of it is the way he communicates and a lot of it is has to do with his talent as a director.

Were you a fan of Tom Clancy’s Jack Ryan novels growing up?

I was born a fan of the films, that’s what brought me into the fold, and then I read some of his books.



And did you get the chance to meet Tom Clancy before his passing?

Sadly I didn’t know the man at all but I’m playing a character that he created that I love and I’ve loved for many years and I’m thankful that I have this opportunity. I wish I’d had the chance to meet him. My thoughts go out to his family.

How close do you think your character, Jack Ryan, is to reality?

We talked to people like Bob Baer who was an analyst with the agency for a while, and not only are the tricks and gadgets we use in the film very real but that this kind of thing – the financial terrorism that is a big part of our story – is very current. As we all know, we are in a new world where warfare and terror takes on many, many different forms and the financial system is so complicated as it is that you would need a PhD to figure out what is going on. But Jack has one. It’s really scary. It starts with a bank and goes beneath a bank and I think it is based in reality but hopefully this won’t happen.

You could argue that a good spy thriller has to reflect the time in which it is made and the Jack Ryan books have changed according to the time. Was it important for you that the film reflects the geo-political reality of our times?

It was of the utmost importance to me and I can’t tell you how many conversations I had with everyone involved. For me, the question always came down to what it meant to be a patriot because Jack is a patriot of sorts. And my contention was that in a post 9/11, era the world is much grayer than it was 25, 30 years ago. With the Cold War, there was a kind of easy black and white, much in the same way we view World War II, there was good and there was bad and it made life a lot easier. But it was different after 9/11 and I wasn’t interested in making a film that was about espousing the ideals of America or that America was great. For me, it was like watching what Harrison was about when he did the role, that this wasn’t a man that was tied to ideology – this is a man with a great internal moral compass who knew what right and wrong was. It’s a man who would stand up for what was right and I love that. I love the fact that he has an internal flag, that’s what he goes by, and if it meant disobeying, he would do that. And I always think that’s a definition of a hero that we all connect to that more than anything else. Once I found an inroad into the character, it made a lot of sense to me and I thought if we could make a film about an American spy post 9/11, a spy who is a good man but conflicted about what he has to do and he wanted to make sure he was serving on his own terms – I could understand that and I felt comfortable with it.

The spy genre has produced some great films and some enduring characters – James Bond, Jason Bourne for example – what will Jack Ryan bring to the audience?

I would say that James Bond has Q, Jason Bourne has his fists and Jack Ryan has his mind. And it’s about a regular man, albeit a smart man, who is way more comfortable in the world of his mind, in the world of the intellectual puzzles that he likes to figure out, who finds himself inextricably pulled towards the front line. Jack Ryan has a great amount of intellect and he has to find his way out of very dangerous physical and intellectual situations. It’s about a man who has to deal with all of this stuff that we know to be a part of the spy genre like death and intrigue and it’s about how a man like that deals with committing violence and protecting the people that he loves and all of that affects who he is and he doesn’t do it easily.

And how are plans for another Star Trek movie progressing?

I have no idea. Like I’ve said before, we are the last to know. I think they have broken ground on a script and I think JJ (Abrams) was meeting with directors but beyond that, I don’t know. We all have ideas about what we want to do and I think from the last film there is a lot of different ways for it to go so I’m fascinated to see what will happen. But I’m pretty sure it will be made in 2014.

“Jack Ryan: Shadow Recruit” is released and distributed by United International Pictures through Solar Entertainment Corp.

SHOWING on JANUARY 15, 2014. NATIONWIDE

Kenneth Branagh playing villain and directing Jack Ryan: Shadow Recruit.

Kenneth Branagh playing villain and directing Jack Ryan: Shadow Recruit.

When Kenneth Branagh is working on a project – whether it’s playing Macbeth in front of a small, lucky few in a deconsecrated church or directing, and starring in, a big Hollywood thriller, namely Jack Ryan: Shadow Recruit – he wants the experience to be as authentic as possible.

The chance to direct a bang up to date contemporary thriller and to introduce Jack Ryan, a character who has featured in eight novels by Tom Clancy and several films based on his books, to a modern audience was one that he seized upon immediately. Quite simply, he says, the script was a ‘page turner’ – a great compliment from an actor and director who has seen plenty down the years.

Did you read the Jack Ryan novels before taking on this project?

I had read some, but not all of them. One that I read that was very helpful for this was one of the Russian set novels, The Cardinal of the Kremlin. It’s very effective and it’s about someone in the Russian military who decides to betray the military, and Jack Ryan goes to Russia. It was very interesting and it was helpful to look at some of those novels.

There have been movies featuring Jack Ryan in the past so was there anything you had to follow or acknowledge from what had gone before?

Nobody said ‘it has to be this or that’ but the thing that David Koepp and I both identified was that Jack Ryan is a man with a very brilliant mind – he is the best of the best and in that regard we took him right back to his academic time at the London School of Economics – and numerous Nobel Prize winning economists have come from there – but that he was, in many other senses, an everyman. So he has a revolutionary mind and a rather bourgeois background in terms of his life in Washington and Baltimore. So if you like, in the crudest sense, he is an everyman with a brilliant mind.

Does the villain who you play hark back to the Cold War?

I didn’t see it that way and I guess I would say that because I’m playing him (laughs). We never referred to him as the ‘villain’ or the ‘heavy guy.’ And I’ve just played Macbeth here in the summer and there were four other versions of Macbeth going on so everything has been done before, everything in the world of classical drama and in the world of richly trodden genre stuff, so there is no question that we have the elements of things with which we might be familiar. But for us, the starting point was, ‘who is Jack Ryan?’ Jack Ryan lives in a world that we live in and know about from newspapers today where you have people questioning what should remain secret and what should not be secret. Do secrets revealed endanger the lives of us all or endanger the lives of those who allegedly are operating on our behalf? And so apropos are its Cold War antecedents; it’s interesting and not as easy nowadays for someone like Jack Ryan to make a decision about how he enters the CIA. So the first third of our film is interesting territory where Kevin Costner’s character has to some extent persuade or explain to a Jack Ryan in the 21st century why potentially working for a covert operation, if you believe such things are possible anymore, is a sensible way to serve and help your country. And we explore the difference between America and Russia.

And there are the other divisions that we have in this movie, which are between East and West, old and young, older and younger in terms of protagonist and antagonist, and old empire and new empire – in this case old empire is America and new empire is Russia potentially. And it’s about financial empires and the way politics blurs into that and they are the kinds of things that Jack Ryan wants to know about and wants to take a view about. Jack Ryan is not a paid assassin; he’s not being de-programmed and doesn’t have a ton of fancy gadgets. He’s a guy with a really sharp mind who wants to know why he is doing what he has been asked to do so it means he asks a lot of questions up front before he decides he’s going to arrive abandoned, friendless, deceived and deceiving in Moscow.

Chris Pine was already attached when you came to the project. Why is he the right actor for Jack Ryan?

Chris is a very smart, sexy lad and he’s also very complex and has wit. I so loved his performance as Kirk in the first J.J. Abrams Star Trek movie. That’s a terrific movie with substance and it’s partly because the actors are all so good in it. Chris has intelligence and he has wit and he doesn’t take himself too seriously and he has a bit of a twinkle in his eye. Chris can make you believe that his Jack Ryan is as smart as we needed him to be but kind of also in terms of the image that we could present, very WASPY. And that’s what Jack Ryan is on the surface and we weren’t denying that kind of DNA. And Chris is a very, very committed actor and performer. And when he arrived we had supper together on a Sunday night and I hadn’t told him what I was planning to do.

So the preparation with Chris was all about linking up to various aspects of Jack Ryan’s life?

Yes. For example, we took him to a rehab hospital in the southeast of England where they work with war veterans and that helped in terms of understanding the types of injuries that he might have sustained in a helicopter accident that we witness in the movie and so we already were into a whole different territory in terms of what we wanted to do with that character. And so by the end of that week of preparation, the first week that Chris had arrived in England and into proper rehearsals, and as soon as you put him into a room with Costner or Keira Knightley, it started to feel like we were doing a sort of character piece that happened to have an action movie built around it. And yes, we’ve seen Russian villains before, we’ve seen East versus West before, we’ve seen spy movies before, but our chance to make it different or original was to try and bring that specificity of character from the inside out and Chris was the one we started with and then we tried to apply it to everybody else.

What about casting the actor who plays the Russian villain?

(laughs). Yes, the director had a hand in casting that particular actor. He discovered he was very, very cheap and very available and we knew where he was every minute of the day. Paramount kept asking me to do it and so did Chris and I realized that with that part we had actually managed to stop people from talking about it as the ‘villain’ or ‘the baddie’ and they started talking about Victor or Cherevin and everything became a bit more specific.

incompetence at high levels within famous financial institutions or misappropriation of funds. And what we also know is that even if you put that financial bond in the perfect place and that is perfectly understood by a brilliant mind then, if all the variables we’ve talked about go together, it can be catastrophic and this does happen. There was an enormous impact, as we know, on the economy after 9/11 because of the reaction of the markets to that degree of instability, so it’s something that is part of what is considered by those who wish to destabilize the financial order from the point of view of terrorism.

Tell us about casting Keira Knightley as Cathy. A contemporary thriller seems like a bit of a departure from the kinds of roles she has done in the past…

Well first of all, we were trying to take the characters seriously and make sure that they have believable backgrounds. And essentially, one of the things David Koepp wanted to write about was deception inside a relationship. Jack and Cathy are not married at the beginning of the picture and Jack is hiding something. When you are in the CIA, you can’t tell people you are a covert operative unless you are married and so there is a pressure that ultimately becomes something that she is suspicious of. And he wants to marry her so that he can tell her he is in the CIA, which is obviously not very romantic if you choose to absorb it only in that way. She is a smart professional woman in her own right, she is an eye surgeon and we get a sense of her own world as a professional in this and that she is a strong and passionate character rather than just the frightened woman that can be part of the cliché traps of this world. And I’ve always thought that Keira is a terrific actress.

What was it like filming in Moscow?

It’s a hectic pace (laughs). I wasn’t quite geared up for how fast everybody drives in Moscow. I thought I had been in cities where people drive fast but they drive really fast in Moscow so crossing the road is tricky and if you are filming in the road, it’s very tricky. I found it no more or less challenging (than filming in other places) but it’s very noisy, very packed, and very dense and you have a sense of the landscape of that city changing very quickly. I felt that even in the time we were there I saw buildings go up and come down. There’s a lot of construction and it gives a kind of physical energy to the place – it’s fast and noisy and there’s a tremendous intensity. It was quite a contrast to our time in New York, a city of equal but different intensity. And for me as a filmmaker I’d not been to Moscow before so that was interesting to try and evoke what it was like and then evoke it elsewhere. I hadn’t shot as a director in New York before so that was interesting, too and in both cases we employed the policy that Jack Ryan has in the movie – we had to be very fast moving and light on our feet.

The intelligence agencies in the US and Britain have been in the news a lot lately, not least because of Wiki-Leaks. Do you think there should be subject to tighter controls about how intelligence is gathered?

I think it’s inevitable and necessary that there is a debate and the issue is addressed. The world has changed and without simply saying ‘our film is so contemporary’ it is true that one of the things David Koepp was interested in writing about was whether there is a line you draw beyond which we say to a government, an elected body in a so-called democratic society, ‘it’s all right, you make a decision for us, you decide what we need to know and if you think that a lot of people knowing this information makes us more at risk, then we empower you to make that choice.’ The spirit of the new digital age is that information should be available to everyone and it should democratize our lives. And that’s one point of view but on the other hand, we have so-called professionals telling us that it endangers us so it’s a pretty vital area of debate. And the first third of our film is Jack Ryan asking those things of Kevin Costner’s character and saying, ‘why would I join up?’ And also, ‘why would I join up and trust you? I might be one of those 50,000 secrets and the first thing that happens is my wife gets killed...’

Let’s talk about the character you play. Did you have any reference points in creating the character?

I think you look for anything where you feel you have been surprised by that kind of antagonist. You look at it from every which way. One was to look at the world of the Russian oligarch, ex Russian military – people from my generation who would have lived during the communist regime through to the explosion of the economic redevelopment with the invasion of other people who were telling the new Russia how to make money and then kicking out those people and saying, ‘no, we’ll have the money thank you very much..’ And then there were the political/ commercial turf wars and everything. Cherevin is of an age that he would have lived across all of that. And it was interesting to find models that had been there before the wall came down in another part of the empire and who had lived through a period of economic and social wild, Wild West as some people I spoke to described it. And to have survived all of that, you have to be pretty tough. And sometimes you don’t survive it even if you don’t stay in Russia – as we know there are instances of people who have met bitter ends here in the UK in unusual ways. So that generation lived across a revolutionary period and so that in itself was a way of understanding that this is a different kind of person who isn’t out to just rule the world.

‘Jack Ryan: Shadow Recruit’ is released and distributed by United International Pictures through Solar Entertainment Corp. Showing January 15. Nationwide.

Chris Pine Versus Mother Russia in Jack Ryan: Shadow Recruit

Based on a script by Adam Cozad and David Koepp and directed by Kenneth Branagh, Jack Ryan : Shadow Recruit takes us back to the earliest years of the titular character’s career in the CIA, working for the Financial Intelligence Unit. Working undercover in Mocow for a company owned by a mysterious billionaire (Branagh), Jack (Chris Pine) discovers a terrorist plot that would shut down the entire United States economy. Working with his handler (Kevin Costner) , the hero must work to save millions of lives from an incredible threat. Also star Keira Knightley, Nonso Anozie and David Paymer.

Jack Ryan: Shadow Recruit is scheduled to hit theatres January 2014! Released and distributed by United International Pictures through Solar Entertainment Corp.

Disney's "Into The Woods" Ventures Into Production

BURBANK, Calif. (Sept. 16, 2013) – Disney’s “Into the Woods” kicked off production last week, featuring an award-winning production team and all-star ensemble cast. Rob Marshall, the talented filmmaker behind the Academy Award®-winning musical “Chicago” and Disney’s “Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides,” helms the film, which is based on the Tony®-winning original musical by James Lapine, who also penned the screenplay, and legendary composer Stephen Sondheim, who provides the music and lyrics—including an all-new song for the big-screen adaptation.

“Into the Woods” is produced by Marshall, John DeLuca, “Wicked” producer Marc Platt and Callum McDougall. Shooting in studio and on location throughout England, the film is slated for a December 25, 2014, holiday release.

“Into the Woods” is a modern twist on the beloved Brothers Grimm fairy tales, intertwining the plots of a few choice stories and exploring the consequences of the characters’ wishes and quests. This humorous and heartfelt musical follows the classic tales of Cinderella, Little Red Riding Hood, Jack and the Beanstalk, and Rapunzel—all tied together by an original story involving a baker and his wife, their wish to begin a family and their interaction with the witch who has put a curse on them.

The all-star ensemble cast includes:

Meryl Streep (“The Iron Lady,” “The Devil Wears Prada,” “August: Osage County”) portrays the Witch who wishes to reverse a curse so that her beauty may be restored.

Emily Blunt (“Looper,” “The Young Victoria,” “The Devil Wears Prada”) is the Baker’s Wife, a childless woman who longs to be a mother.

James Corden (Broadway’s “One Man, Two Guvnors,” “The Three Musketeers,” “Gavin & Stacey”) plays the role of the Baker, a hard-working man who desperately wants to start a family.

Anna Kendrick (“Pitch Perfect,” “Up in the Air”) fills the shoes of Cinderella, who finds herself on a journey of self-discovery.

Chris Pine (“Star Trek Into Darkness,” “Jack Ryan”) portrays Cinderella’s Prince, charming and impossibly handsome, who is on an endless quest to find his bride.

Johnny Depp (“Pirates of the Caribbean” films, “The Lone Ranger,” “Sweeney Todd”) steps in as the Wolf, who sets his sights on Little Red Riding Hood.

Lilla Crawford (Broadway’s “Annie”) makes her feature-film debut as Little Red Riding Hood, a smart and spunky girl who journeys into the woods, finding unexpected adventures along the way.

Daniel Huttlestone (“Les Misérables”) lands the role of Jack, an absentminded and adventurous boy who trades his treasured cow for five magic beans.

Tracey Ullman joins the cast as Jack’s Mother, a poor and exasperated mom who is overwhelmed, yet fiercely protective of her son.

Christine Baranski (“Mamma Mia!,” “Chicago” “The Good Wife”) takes on the infamous Stepmother who wishes for riches and grandeur; she'll do anything to marry off one of her daughters to a prince.

MacKenzie Mauzy (“Brother’s Keeper,” Broadway’s “Next to Normal”) plays Rapunzel, a sheltered young woman who experiences the world beyond her tower for the first time.

Billy Magnussen (Broadway’s “Vanya and Sonia and Masha and Spike,” “Boardwalk Empire,” “The East”) is the dashing and eager Prince who courts Rapunzel.

Celebrated actors from the stage and screen fill the supporting roles, including Tammy Blanchard (“Blue Jasmine,” “The Good Shepherd”) and Lucy Punch (“Bad Teacher,” “Dinner for Schmucks”) as Cinderella’s spoiled stepsisters, Florinda and Lucinda. Richard Glover (“Sightseers,” “St. Trinian’s”) is the Princes’ royal steward, Frances de la Tour (“Hugo,” “Alice In Wonderland”) portrays the giant, and Simon Russell Beale (“The Deep Blue Sea”) is the Baker’s father. Actress Joanna Riding (“My Fair Lady,” “Carousel”) portrays Cinderella’s late mother, and Little Red Riding Hood’s beloved granny is played by Annette Crosbie (“Calendar Girls,” “The Slipper and the Rose”).

The big-screen adaptation welcomes songs from the stage musical, including “Children Will Listen,” “Giants in the Sky,” “On the Steps of the Palace,” “No One Is Alone” and “Agony,” among others. Additionally, Sondheim has penned an all-new song for the story’s theatrical debut.

The award-winning production team includes Dion Beebe (“Collateral,” “Chicago,” “Nine”), Oscar® winner for the Marshall-helmed “Memoirs of a Geisha,” as director of photography. Dennis Gassner (“Skyfall,” “Quantum of Solace”), who won his own Oscar for “Bugsy,” serves as production designer, and three-time Oscar winner Colleen Atwood (“Memoirs of a Geisha,” “Chicago,” “Alice In Wonderland”) is costume designer.

“Into the Woods” premiered on Broadway on Nov. 5, 1987, at the Martin Beck Theatre. The production, which ran for 764 performances, won Tony® Awards for best score, best book and best actress in a musical. Among other awards, the musical received five Drama Desk awards, including best musical. “Into the Woods” has been produced around the world, including a 1988 U.S. tour, a 1990 West End production, Broadway and London revivals, in addition to a television production, DVD recording and a 10-year-anniversary concert.

Star Trek Into Darkness Non-Spoiler Review

I've seen JJ Abrams' follow-up to his rebooted Star Trek movie entitled "Star Trek Into Darkness" courtesy of Solar Entertainment. Is it a victim to the 'sequel curse' or does it stand in line proudly with the pedigree of the first movie?

Let me just get out of my system that initially I didn't have any respect for Benedict Cumberbatch. That statement alone will probably earn me some flak from the British actor's fangirls (there's a lot actually, the screening I attended alone had lots of young to teen-ish girls lining up to see Kh err, John Harrison).  Yes, now stick around and find out what I think of him after cut. 

The Final Trailer for Star Trek Into Darkness Plus New Kirk Poster

Star Trek Into Darkness has released it's final trailer today together with a new character poster featuring Captain Kirk (played by Chris Pine).

Check out the trailer after the cut.

Still No Khan in International Trailer for Star Trek Into Darkness

Still no Khan in the newly minted International trailer for Star Trek Into Darkness.

Together with the release of the new trailer is a new poster which IMHO, looks really uninspired...

New Images for Chris Pine in JACK RYAN

Paramount is full of Jacks this year with the release of Tom Cruise's JACK REACHER and the subsequent release by December of the film JACK RYAN which stars Chris Pine as the titular character. Here are new photos that surfaced the web featuring Pine and his mentor played by Kevin Costner.

Jack Ryan was a character created by novelist Tom Clancy. The character appeared in a number of books that Clancy did until it became a household name with the release of "Hunt' starring Alec Baldwin. No synopsis yet for the film but it centers on a younger Ryan before the events of "HUNT FOR RED OCTOBER", "THE SUM OF ALL FEARS" and "AIR FORCE ONE". This is a Ryan that's still being groomed to become the best CIA Agent. 

New Hi-Res Images for Star Trek Into Darkness

The much anticipated sequel to "Star Trek" entitled "Star Trek Into Darkness" is very pretty to look at and to whet our appetites before it's release within the year, here are several new hi-res images from the film.

 

Mind you some of the images have already appeared in the first trailer for the film. Still it's a pretty cool spectacle. 

More images after the cut...

New Star Trek Into Darkness Photos from Empire

Here's a look at the 2013 sneak peek for Empire Magazine featuring Dominic Cumberbatch as ex-Starfleet employee and Khan-ish character John Harrison.

There's actually another variant of this Cumberbatch cover featuring a clean look with no text. Sadly the said cover will only be available for Empire subscribers...

New Teaser Poster for Star Trek Into Darkness

The official Star Trek facebook fanpage released this new teaser poster for the upcoming sequel to J.J. Abrams' Star Trek saga entitled "Star Trek Into Darkness".

Official Synopsis: "When the crew of the Enterprise is called back home, they find an unstoppable force of terror from within their own organization has detonated everything the fleet stands for, leaving our world in a state of crisis. Captain Kirk leads a manhunt to a war-zone world to capture a "one man weapon of mass destruction."

Rise of the Guardians Movie Review

With Christmas fast approaching, Solar-UIP is proud to release their newest offering, "Rise of the Guardians" which features the voices of Chris Pine, Alec Baldwin, Jude Law, Isla Fisher and Hugh Jackman. 

I'm really impressed with the quality that was placed in this film. Not only do they spin a pretty damn nice story about these classic characters but they also provide a "re-introduction" of sorts for the kids who are unfamiliar with these guys. 


So what's this all about. Well the short of this is that these legendary characters (who also happen to be the personification of some kid's concepts) band together in order to fight the rising threat of one of their peers. The balance however lies with the outsider Jack Frost who is thrust in this war. 

Rise of the Guardians One Sheet Posters and Official Synopsis

"Rise of the Guardians" is an epic and magical adventure that tells the story of Santa Claus, the Easter Bunny, the Tooth Fairy, the Sandman, and Jack Frost - legendary characters with previously unknown extraordinary abilities. When an evil spirit known as Pitch lays down the gauntlet to take over the world, the immortal Guardians must join forces to protect the hopes, beliefs and imagination of children everywhere. The film features the voices of Chris Pine, Alec Baldwin, Hugh Jackman, Isla Fisher and Jude Law.

 

Sneak Peek at Comedy-Drama "People Like Us"

From DreamWorks Pictures comes “People Like Us,” a drama/comedy about family, inspired by true events, starring Chris Pine, Elizabeth Banks, Olivia Wilde, Michael Hall D’Addario, Philip Baker Hall, Mark Duplass and Michelle Pfeiffer.

Alex Kurtzman directs the film from a screenplay written by Kurtzman & Roberto Orci & Jody Lambert. “People Like Us” marks Kurtzman’s feature-film directorial debut.

Movie Review for This Means War - Post Valentine Chaos and Laughter

Doing a movie review for the film "This Means War" starring Chris Pine, Tom Hardy and Reese Witherspoon from 20th Century Fox and directed by McG. 

Looking for the perfect post-Valentine's Day movie to watch with your date? Then I can certainly recommend you catch This Means War which will be released locally on February 22 in local cinemas. 

Find out what makes this such a fun movie to watch and why McG could be sitting with a certified winner with this new movie. 

Tom Hardy is Making a Killing With This Means War

Actor Tom Hardy is definitely making a name for himself this year after his appearance in Christopher Nolan's "Inception" as he appears opposite Chris Pine in "This Means War".

Chris Pine and Tom Hardy portray the world’s deadliest CIA operatives who are also inseparable partners and best friends… until they fall for the same woman (Reese Witherspoon) in “This Means War.”  Having once helped bring down entire enemy nations, they are now employing their incomparable skills and an endless array of high-tech gadgetry against their greatest nemesis ever – each other.