The superhero genre continues to thrive, with various cinematic universes competing at the box office. The Spider-Man franchise has always been popular, which is why fans freaked when three different universes collided for Spider-Man: No Way Home. And after Andrew Garfield returned as Peter Parker, the Green Goblin actor Dane DeHaan addressed his possible return.

DeHaan played Harry Osborn/ Green Goblin in The Amazing Spider-Man 2 (which is streaming with a Disney+ subscription). After the star-studded cast list of Spider-Man: No Way Home brought back villains from Andrew Garfield's franchise, DeHaan was asked by ScreenRant if he'd like to reprise his role in an upcoming Marvel movie, where he said:

Alright, then. While he's not opposed to playing Harry/Green Goblin again, the 38 year-old actor also made it clear that he hasn't heard anything from Kevin Feige and the powers that be at Marvel. So maybe we shouldn't hold our collective breath for his return.

Fans who spent years watching the Marvel movies in order were thrilled to see so many villains, as well as trio of Peter Parkers, together in No Way Home. And while we saw Amazing Spider-Man villains like Jamie Foxx's Electro, Rhys Ifans' Lizard got to get in on the fun, DeHaan's Green Goblin was noticeably missing. 

Of course, there was another version of Green Goblin in a major role in that blockbuster: Willem Dafoe's Norman Osborn from the Tobey Maguire Spider-Man movies. He ended up being the main antagonist of the blockbuster, so there simply wasn't room for another Goblin... especially sine DeHaan's verison of Harry was so different from the one played by James Franco.

In many ways No Way Home felt like a redemption for the Amazing Spider-Man franchise. Andrew Garfield's Peter Parker was able to rescue MJ in the way he couldn't save Gwen Stacy, which was a big emotional payoff. And fans responded so strongly to his return that they campaigned for The Amazon Spider-Man 3 to finally be produced all these years later. It doesn't seem like the studio has plans for that, but if it does that would be the chance to bring Dehaan's Green Goblin.

The Amazing Spider-Man franchise is streaming now on Disney+, and the next MCU movie hitting theaters is Deadpool 3 on July 26th. For now, check the 2025 movie release dates. 

When Spider-Man: No Way Home’s trailer showed the return of fan-favorite villains like Green Goblin, Doc Ock and Electro, the question we had in mind following the promo was whether or not Andrew Garfield would return. He played the web-slinging hero in Marc Webb’s Amazing Spider-Man movies, but a third movie was scrapped when the Marvel hero moved to the MCU to join the Avengers crew. As we saw the British actor make his return to No Way Home, his Amazing Spider-Man co-star, Dane DeHaan, recalls when he also got a whirlwind of questions if he’d come back too.

As we know Garfield said yes to returning as Spider-Man for No Way Home, there were rumors on if we’d see the return of his nemesis too. Dane DeHaan, who played Harry Osborn/The Green Goblin, spoke to ScreenRant about being given a whirlwind of questions from fans who were making their own theories about his return:

So much happened at the end of The Amazing Spider-Man 2 that was left unfinished. Peter lost the love of his life, and his nemesis Harry Osborn, who'd been jailed at the Ravenscroft Institute, revealed he was forming a new team, which we know as The Sinister Six. But with a third Amazing Spider-Man movie canceled, we had no idea what was to come of Andrew Garfield’s Peter or Harry Osborn for that matter.

When looking back at all of the Spider-Man: No Way Home returning character rumors, we weren’t exactly crossing our fingers with hope that DeHaan’s Green Goblin would return. While the Oppenheimer actor gave a very convincing performance playing Peter’s old friend-turned-foe character, we didn’t have much time with the character for him to feel iconic.

When No Way Home’s trailer revealed Willem Dafoe’s Green Goblin, this was a real treat for fans of the Sam Raimi movies. Norman Osborn performance as Green Goblin makes Spider-Man one of Dafoe’s best movies, and he had a memorable presence in the trilogy as the villain we loved to hate. With Dane DeHaan’s Goblin, he would have needed more movies and development to anticipate his character’s return.

But, there’s no need to feel bad for Dane DeHaan not being asked to reprise the Green Goblin. He actually expressed a disinterest in bringing Harry back. While the Chronicle actor said he would have been open to doing more Amazing Spider-Man movies if the Marc Webb series continued with its original plan, he felt that it’s been a long time since he played the villainous role that he’d want to try something new. As the 38-year-old actor’s newest movies have been biopics like Oppenheimer and Dumb Money, I’d say he’s come a long way since the superhero flick.

With so many iconic characters from the Spider-Man movies making their way into MCU’s No Way Home, Dane DeHaan remembers being flabbergasted when asked if he was coming back as Green Goblin. It seems like Andrew Garfield’s co-star has been completely out of the loop on Marvel news and wasn’t approached about the possibility of returning. On the other hand, it appears like DeHaan is ready to move on to other projects compared to reappearing in the superhero realm again. Y

ou can see him in The Amazing Spider-Man 2, which is available on your Netflix subscription and your Disney+ subscription.

The world cannot seem to get enough of true crime - be it a feature-length drama, a series, a documentary, or a docuseries to get every last detail out of the case of the week. It also appears that some stories are more obsessed over than others, such as that of Michael Peterson, whose long-debated case involving of his wife, Kathleen - who was found dead at the bottom of a staircase in 2001 - has been the subject of a feature-length Lifetime movie, a docuseries on Netflix, and now an eight-episode HBO Max original drama called The Staircase.

Whatever your opinion is regarding the shocking trial, I think few can argue that creator Antonio Campos’ miniseries - available to stream on HBO Max Thursday, May 5 - doesn't look like a gripping representation of the events that took place. See for yourself by taking a look at who is playing whom in The Staircase cast.

Colin Firth (Michael Peterson)

Playing novelist Michael Peterson - convicted of murder in 2003 before charges were reduced to manslaughter in 2017 - is Colin Firth, whose last true crime title was 2013’s Devil’s Knot. The British actor is better known for literary costume dramas like 1995’s Pride and Prejudice miniseries, biopics like The King’s Speech (for which he won an Oscar), rom-coms like Bridget Jones’ Diary, musicals (namely when he joined the Mamma Mia! cast), or even cartoonish spy thrillers like the action-packed Kingsman movies. 

Firth more recently played Stanley Tucci’s partner in Supernova, a British Naval officer in 2022’s Operation Mincemeat, and (speaking of war dramas) will reunite with 1917 director Sam Mendes for Empire of Light.

Toni Collette (Kathleen Peterson)

Playing Kathleen Peterson - whose mysterious death is the main focus of the story - is Toni Collette, whose previous experience with true crime includes Netflix’s Unbelievable and Imperium. The Australian actress’ eclectic filmography ranges from horror movies like The Sixth Sense (for which she received an Oscar nomination) and Hereditary (for which she should have received an Oscar nomination), to dysfunctional family dramedies like Little Miss Sunshine, the Showtime series United States of Tara (which earned her an Emmy), or more fun mystery thrillers like Knives Out. Collette recently starred in Netflix’s I’m Thinking of Ending Things in 2020 and Guillermo del Toro’s Best Picture Oscar nominee, Nightmare Alley, the following year.  

Michael Stuhlbarg (David Rudolf)

As Michael Peterson’s lawyer, David Rudolf, we have Michael Stuhlbarg, who (in addition to recently starring on another legal drama, Showtime’s Your Honor) has played a lot real people in fact-based titles. He joined Hulu’s Dopesick cast as former Purdue Pharma president Richard Sackler, gave an Emmy-nominated performance as national security expert Richard Clarke on The Looming Tower, was crime boss Andrew Rothstein on Boardwalk Empire, and sparred with Michael Fassbender in the title role of Steve Jobs as software engineer Andy Hertzfeld, to name just a few. 

He also led Joel and Ethan Coen’s A Serious Man in 2010, played an alien in Men in Black 3, played a human afraid of aliens in Arrival, and is reprising his Doctor Strange role in its sequel in 2022.

Parker Posey (Freda Black)

As Freda Black - the prosecuting attorney in the Michael Peterson case - we have Parker Posey, who first broke into the mainstream (like many of her co-stars in the 1993 classic) as Darla in Dazed and Confused, before becoming a recurring cast member of Christopher Guest and Eugene Levy's mockumentaries after first appearing in 1996’s Waiting for Guffman. 

She is also known for classic rom-coms like You’ve Got Mail, horror movies like Scream 3, and comic book movies like Blade: Trinity and Superman Returns. Posey has also had recurring roles on many notable series (such as The Good Wife), starred on Netflix’s Lost in Space reboot, and will appear in AMC’s upcoming anthology Tales from the Walking Dead.

Dane DeHaan (Clayton Peterson)

Playing Michael Peterson’s son, Clayton, is Dane DeHaan, who has a few credits in common with his The Staircase co-stars - namely Devil’s Knot with Colin Firth and Lincoln with Michael Stuhlbarg. He is even better known as Andrew Detmer in the acclaimed 2012 found footage thriller Chronicle, Harry Osborn in The Amazing Spider-Man 2, Lockhart in A Cure for Wellness, and the title character of Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets. 

Other notable miniseries credits for DeHaan (who recently joined Christopher Nolan’s Oppenheimer cast) include the suspenseful The Stranger (formerly a Quibi exclusive) and Apple TV+’s adaptation of Stephen King’s Lisey’s Story.

Patrick Schwarzenegger (Todd Peterson)

Playing Michael Peterson’s son, Todd, is Arnold Schwarzenegger’s son, Patrick Schwarzenegger - who made his acing debut in the 2006 comedy, The Benchwarmers, before reuniting with David Spade and Rob Schneider in 2013’s Grown Ups 2. Before playing the title role of 2019’s Shudder exclusive movie, Daniel Isn’t Real, his first horror efforts were Scouts Guide to the Zombie Apocalypse and an episode of Scream Queens in 2015 and, in the years in between, he played a soldier on National Geographic’s The Long Road Home and shared a romance with Bella Thorne in Midnight Sun (not to be confused with the Twilight spin-off book). 

Schwarzenegger has since shared the screen with Michael Shannon in Echo Boomers, Amy Poehler in Netflix’s Moxie, and Thomas Jane and more in the dystopian ensemble drama, Warning. 

Sophie Turner (Margaret Ratliff)

Playing Michael Peterson’s adoptive daughter, Margaret Ratliff, is Sophie Turner, although she goes by the last name Jonas since her marriage to Joe Jonas in 2019. Like some of her fellow The Staircase cast members, the English actress has starred in comedic spy movies (2015’s Barely Lethal), Marvel movies (as the X-Men’s Jean Grey), and Quibi original thrillers (Survive from 2020). Of course, Turner (who more recently leant her voice to HBO Max’s animated comedy, The Prince) is best known for her Emmy-nominated performance in the Game of Thrones cast as Sansa Stark. 

Odessa Young (Martha Ratliff)

Playing Michael Peterson’s adoptive daughter, Martha Ratliff, is Odessa Young, who previously worked with Colin Firth in 2022’s Mothering Sunday and Michael Stuhlbarg in Shirley two years earlier. Following her starring roles on the Australian dramas Tricky Business (also starring The Boys cast member Antony Starr) and Wonderland, the actress made her feature-length debut in 2015’s The Daughter and later starred in A Million Little Pieces and played the lead of Sam Levinson’s coming-of-age satire, Assassination Nation, in 2018. In 2020, she joined Paramount+’s The Stand cast.

Olivia DeJonge (Caitlin Atwater)

As Caitlin Atwater - Kathleen Peterson’s daughter from a previous marriage - we have Olivia DeJonge, who, like some of her fellow The Staircase cast members, has starred in found footage thrillers and worked with M. Night Shyamalan (2015’s The Visit), in Shakespearean costume dramas (TNT’s short-lived series, Will), and dystopian supernatural TV shows (Netflix’s The Society). The Australian actress made her feature-length debut in 2014’s teen mystery The Sisterhood of Night, later starred in the 2016 holiday horror movie Better Watch Out, and will soon appear in Baz Luhrmann’s Elvis as Priscilla Presley.

Rosemarie DeWitt (Candace Zamperini)

As Candace Zamperini - Kathleen Peterson’s sister - we have Rosemarie DeWitt, who last played Toni Collette’s onscreen sister on the aforementioned United States of Tara. Also like some of her fellow The Staircase cast members, she has starred in dysfunctional family stories (Rachel Getting Married and Your Sister’s Sister), period TV shows (a recurring role in the Mad Men cast), horror movies (2015’s Poltergeist remake), musicals (La La Land), and modern satirical dramas (Men, Women & Children). DeWitt also tried dystopian sci-fi with one of the best Black Mirror episodes from Season 4 (“Arkangel”) and was part of Hulu’s Little Fires Everywhere cast in 2020.

Tim Guinee (Bill Peterson)

Playing Michael Peterson’s brother, Bill, is Tim Guinee, whose last role on a fact-based miniseries this year was on Netflix’s Inventing Anna, after previously starring in the 2019 biopic Harriet, and playing John Denver in the 2002 TV movie Warning: Parental Advisory. His lengthy, versatile filmography also includes vampire movies (John Carpenter’s Vampires and 1998’s Blade - also his first Marvel movie before appearing in the first two Iron Man movies), and a couple other appearances alongside Rosemarie DeWitt (The Odd Life of Timothy Green and Promised Land). He also has recurring roles on several hit series - such as The Good Wife, Hell on Wheels, Elementary, and Homeland. 

Vincent Vermignon (Jean-Xavier de Lestrade)

As Jean-Xavier de Lestrade - the Oscar-winning documentarian behind the docuseries also called The Staircase - we have Vincent Vermignon. Originally from the French-Caribbean island of Martinique, the actor is best known for the 2016 drama Gangs of the Caribbean, the interactive series Cut, and lending his voice to the spooky animated French film Little Vampire in 2020. English-speaking audiences may also recognize the actor from an episode of the Idris Elba-led crime series, Luther, in 2019.

Juliette Binoche (Sophie Brunet)

Playing Sophie Brunet - Jean-Xavier de Lestrade’s editor who become romantically involved with Michael Peterson during the making of The Staircase docuseries - is Juliette Binoche, who last starred opposite Colin Firth in the Best Picture Oscar winner The English Patient, for which she also won an Academy Award. Like Firth, the French actress is also known for literary romance dramas (1992’s Wuthering Heights), rom-coms (2007’s Dan in Real Life), and big budget blockbusters (2014’s Godzilla), to name a few. The Chocolat star is also known for Michael Haneke’s thriller, Caché, the romantic anthology Paris, je t’aime, and two unique thrillers opposite Robert Pattinson (2012’s Cosmopolis and High Life from 2018).

Murder. Mystery. Romance. Family drama. A talented cast. What more could you ask for from a true crime series like The Staircase on HBO Max?

Having previously explored World War II for 2017’s Dunkirk, Christopher Nolan will delve into a different aspect of that conflict for his follow-up to the time-twisty Tenet. The filmmaker is making a biopic about J. Robert Oppenheimer, the theoretical physicist who played an integral role in developing the atomic bomb for the Manhattan Project. Based on the book American Prometheus: The Triumph and Tragedy of J. Robert Oppenheimer by Kai Bird and Martin J. Sherwin, this will be Nolan’s first movie since Insomnia that’s not being housed at Warner Bros., with Universal Pictures instead financing and distributing the biopic.

We are closely approaching the highly-anticipated release of Oppenheimer on the big screen, for which Nolan and his team have assembled a top-notch cast. Let’s go over the actors who have been brought aboard for the biopic, starting with the man who was selected to play the title character.

Cillian Murphy (J. Robert Oppenheimer)

Cillian Murphy and Christopher Nolan go way back, with the former starring as Jonathan Crane, a.k.a. Scarecrow, in 2005’s Batman Begins. In addition to Murphy briefly reprising Crane in The Dark Knight and The Dark Knight Rises, he also appeared in Inception as Robert Michael Fischer, followed by Dunkirk as a shell-shocked shivering soldier. Now he gets to take center stage for a Nolan movie by playing J. Robert Oppenheimer, who’s been called the “father of the atomic bomb.” Outside of Nolan’s sphere, along with leading the TV series Peaky Blinders, Murphy was also recently seen as Emmett in A Quiet Place Part II, which is where he worked with the next actor on this list.

Emily Blunt (Katherine Puening)

In the role of Oppenheimer’s wife, Katherine Puening, we have the second actor announced to star in the biopic, Emily Blunt, who previously played a woman heavily involved in a war in the classic time loop movie, Edge of Tomorrow. Her character of Evelyn Abbott and her children crossed paths with Murphy’s character during the chaotic events of A Quiet Place Part II, but if horror isn’t your thing, maybe you’ve seen the actress in Disney flicks like Mary Poppins Returns and Jungle Cruise, or in 2006 in her breakout performance in The Devil Wears Prada. 

Robert Downey Jr. (Lewis Strauss)

While it was initially unclear whom Robert Downey Jr. would play when his casting was reported, we’ve since learned he scored the role of Lewis Strauss – the U.S. Atomic Energy Commission Chairman who frequently clashed with Oppenheimer post-World War II over a number of issues to the point where he questioned the scientist’s patriotism and got his security clearance revoked in 1954. Anyone who follows along with the Marvel Cinematic Universe and is a fan of Iron Man, especially, doesn’t need to be told who this Oscar nominee (for Chaplin) is, but others may recognize him from Guy Ritchie’s Sherlock Holmes movies and should keep an eye out for his upcoming Max original series, The Sympathizer. 

Matt Damon (Lt. General Leslie Groves)

At the same time Downey’s casting was announced, Matt Damon (who had a surprise role in Interstellar) was revealed to be joining the Oppenheimer cast and eventually confirmed to play Manhattan Project director, Lt. General Leslie Groves, who was one of the few people confident in the titular scientist’s abilities. The Academy Award winner (for co-writing Good Will Hunting) has kept a steady presence on the film front in recent years with Ford V. Ferrari, No Sudden Move, Stillwater, The Last Duel, Jay and Silent Bob Reboot (the latter of which saw him reprising his Dogma character Loki), and Amazon Prime’s Air.

Florence Pugh (Jean Tatlock)

Cast in the role of Jean Tatlock – a Communist Party member Oppenheimer had a romantic connection to – is Florence Pugh. In recent years, the Midsommar actress has been getting more on-screen attention than ever as Amy March in Greta Gerwig’s Little Women (which earned her an Oscar nomination), Yelena Belova in the MCU, and leading the Don’t Worry Darling cast alongside Harry Styles.

Benny Safdie (Edward Teller)

According to Deadline, acclaimed writer and director Benny Safdie stars in Oppenheimer as Edward Teller – a theoretical physicist who worked on the Manhattan Project and is known as the “father of the hydrogen bomb.” Arguably best known for making movies like Uncut Gems with his brother, Josh, he’s also been assembling an acting resume that includes playing opposite Robert Pattinson in Good Time (which he and Josh also co-wrote and helmed), Licorice Pizza as politician Joel Sachs, and Disney+’s Obi-Wan Kenobi cast in the brief role of a Jedi in hiding.

Dylan Arnold (Frank Oppenheimer)

Playing Robert’s younger brother, Frank Oppenheimer, is Dylan Arnold. If that name doesn’t ring a bell, maybe you’ll recognize him as Cameron Elam in 2018’s Halloween and its sequel, Halloween Kills, or from his recurring stints in the short-lived The Purge series and Nashville, or his starring role in the You Season 3 cast for Netflix. 

Michael Angarano (Robert Serber)

Playing Robert Serber, another member of the Manhattan Project, in his biggest movie in a long time (or, arguably, ever) is Michael Angarano. Those of you who were kids/teens in the 2000s likely remember him as Will Stronghold from Disney's non-Marvel or DC superhero movie, Sky High. Others may remember him better in his younger years recurring as Elliot on Will & Grace or from his more recent work, which includes starring in Cinemax’s The Knick and Showtime’s I’m Dying Up Here, along with recurring on This is Us. 

Danny Deferrari (Enrico Fermi)

Another important member of the Manhattan Project who will be present in Oppenheimer is Enrico Fermi – creator of the world’s first nuclear reactor and nicknamed “the architect of the nuclear age” – whom Danny Deferrari has been tapped to play. Some may remember him as Andrew Madoff in ABC’s 2016 miniseries, Madoff, the acclaimed 2021 indie Shiva Baby, or appearances on Chicago Med, Blue Bloods, and Ray Donovan: The Movie.

Josh Peck (Kenneth Bainbridge)

In Oppenheimer, Peck will play Kenneth Bainbridge, who worked on cyclotron research and directed the Manhattan Project’s Trinity nuclear test in 1945, which was the first detonation of a nuclear weapon. A good chunk of you reading this likely grew up watching him on The Amanda Show and/or Drake & Josh on Nickelodeon in the 2000s or remember him as the voice of Eddie in the Ice Age movies. He more recently starred in short-lived shows Grandfathered and Turner & Hooch, landed a recurring role alongside Hulu’s How I Met Your Father cast, and other big and small screen projects. 

Emma Dumont (Jackie Oppenheimer)

Emma Dumont will appear in Oppenheimer as Jackie Oppenheimer, a UC Berkeley economics student and Communist Party member who marries Frank Oppenheimer, despite the protests of his older brother. If you’re an X-Men fan, you might have seen the actor bring Lorna Dane, a.k.a. Polaris, to life in the short-lived Marvel TV show, The Gifted, or play Brenda in Paul Thomas Anderson’s Licorice Pizza. 

Gustaf Skarsgård (Hans Bethe)

Another scientist who will be represented in Christopher Nolan’s Oppenheimer is Hans Bethe, who was head of the Theoretical Division at the Los Alamos laboratory, where he helped in calculating the critical mass of the atomic weapons and developed the implosion method used at the Trinity test and the “Fat Man” bomb dropped on Nagasaki. Bethe will be played by Gustaf Skarsgård, whom Vikings fans will recognize as Floki. Skarsgård also recurred on five episodes of Westworld and played Merlin in the short-lived Netflix series, Cursed.

Devon Bostick (Seth Neddermeyer)

Devon Bostick is slated to appear in Oppenheimer as Seth Neddermeyer, the physicist from the Manhattan Project who discovered the muon elementary particle and later championed for the Implosion-type nuclear weapon. In his younger years, Bostick starred in three of the live-action Diary of a Wimpy Kid movies as Rodrick Heffley and, on TV, he chiefly impressed as Jasper Jordan four seasons on The CW’s The 100. 

Rami Malek (David Hill)

Working  with Nolan for this first time is Rami Malek as physicist David Hill in Oppenheimer. Along with having starred as Eliot Anderson in the TV series Mr. Robot, Malek has impressed with his Academy Award-winning performance as Freddie Mercury in Bohemian Rhapsody, as well as for antagonizing Daniel Craig’s James Bond as Lyutsifer Safin in No Time to Die.

Josh Hartnett (Ernest Lawrence)

Playing Nobel Prize-winning nuclear physicist and close friend of Oppenheimer, Ernest Lawrence (according to The Daily Mail), finally gives Josh Hartnett the opportunity to work with Nolan after he turned down the role of Bruce Wayne in Batman Begins. The actor is no stranger to war movies, having appeared with Ben Affleck in 2001’s Pearl Harbor and led the cast of Black Hawk Down, but film fans may also recognize him from Halloween H20: 20 Years Later, the Sin City cast, or as Ethan Chandler/The Wolf Man in Penny Dreadful. 

Dane DeHaan (Kenneth Nichols)

As Kenneth Nichols -- District engineer of the Manhattan Project -- we have Dane DeHaan, who first broke out as Andrew Detmer in the acclaimed found footage thriller, Chronicle, before playing Harry Osborn/The Green Goblin in The Amazing Spider-Man 2. The actor would more recently build up a crime and horror following thanks to projects like A Cure for Wellness, The Stranger, and Lisey’s Story. DeHaan more recently starred in Max’s The Staircase cast, but Oppenheimer marks his first movie since starring as Billy the Kid in the 2019 Western, The Kid. 

Jack Quaid (Richard Feynman)

Jack Quaid confirmed on his Instagram that he is playing theoretical physicist Richard Feynman in his first Nolan Project. The son of Dennis Quaid and Meg Ryan, who got his start in the first Hunger Games movie cast, is another Oppenheimer star with superhero cred thanks to playing Hughie Campbell in The Boys, as well as a Scream King for playing Richie Kirsch in the fifth Scream movie, and a sci-fi veteran having voiced Brad Boimler in Star Trek: Lower Decks.

Matthew Modine (Vannevar Bush)

According to ScreenRant, Matthew Modine is playing the head of the U.S. Department of Research and Development, Vannevar Bush, in his first collaboration with Nolan since playing Peter Foley in The Dark Knight Rises. He rose to fame by starring in movies like Full Metal Jacket and Pacific Heights, but fans of Netflix’s Stranger Things cast will recognize him as Dr. Martin Brenner.

Olli Haaskivi (Edward Condon)

If you didn’t catch Olli Haaskivi’s recurring roles on shows like The Sinner, The Deuce and Manifest, maybe you’ll know him as the face of Dr. Wilfred Nagel, the man who recreated the Super Soldier Serum, in the MCU series, The Falcon and the Winter Soldier. Haaskivi is also set to play Phil Knight in HBO’s Winning Time, but fingers crossed that his role as Edward Condon in Oppenheimer paves the way for him to appear in more high-profile movies.

Alden Ehrenreich (Senate Aide)

Alden Ehrenreich made his first big splash in Hollywood as Hobie Doyle in 2016’s Hail, Caesar!, but more people undoubtedly know him as young Han Solo in 2018’s Solo: A Star Wars Story. Since then, Aldenreich has starred in Peacock’s Brave New World series, appeared in Elizabeth Banks’ 2023 horror-comedy, Cocaine Bear, and is, sort of, taking a cue from his Oppenheimer co-star, Robert Downey Jr., by joining the Ironheart cast for Disney+'s upcoming Marvel TV show. 

David Krumholtz (Isidor Isaac Rabi)

David Krumholtz shared an Oppenheimer still of himself with the caption “Isidor Isaac Rabi” on Instagram, indicating that he is playing the Nobel Prize-winning physicist known for discovering nuclear magnetic resonance. Some of you may know the actor best as Head Elf Bernard from the first two Santa Clause movies, while others may be more familiar with him as Charlie Eppes on CBS’ Numb3rs or remember him fondly as Goldstein from the Harold & Kumar movies. Regardless, these are just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to the man’s resume, with some of his other notable TV credits including Serenity, This Is The End, The Good Wife, The Deuce and The Plot Against America.

Kenneth Branagh (Niels Bohr)

For his third time working with Christopher Nolan, having previously starred in Dunkirk and Tenet, Kenneth Branagh stars as Danish, Nobel Prize-winning physicist, Niels Bohr. From early work like Henry V to his outings as Hercule Poirot in Murder on the Orient Express and Death on the Nile, Branagh has taken part in all sorts of cinematic endeavors, both in front of and behind the camera. Regarding the latter, he won the 2022 Best Original Screenplay Oscar for his semi-autobiographical coming-of-age drama, Belfast. 

David Dastmalchian (William L. Borden)

Christopher Nolan is an especially important person in the professional life of David Dastmalchian, who plays executive director of the United States Congress Joint Committee on Atomic Energy, William L. Borden, in Oppenheimer. The director cast him as Thomas Schiff in The Dark Knight, his first movie, where he shared screen time with Christian Bale’s Batman and Aaron Eckhardt’s Harvey Dent. Since then, Dastmalchian has racked up major credits like Prisoners, the first two Ant-Man movies, Blade Runner 2049, The Suicide Squad, and Dune.

Jason Clarke (Roger Robb)

As Roger Robb -- an attorney who participated in a hearing regarding Oppenheimer's security clearance -- we have another person who’s working with  Nolan for the first time: Jason Clarke. You’ll recognize him from movies like Dawn of the Planet of the Apes, Terminator Genisys, Mudbound, Chappaquiddick, First Man, the Pet Sematary remake, Netflix’s The Devil All the Time, and HBO’s fact-based basketball drama, Winning Time: The Rise of the Lakers Dynasty.

Louise Lombard (Ruth Tolman)

As American psychologist Ruth Tolman, we have Louise Lombard, who was arguably best known film-wise for 2004’s Hidalgo, but now fans of the After movies are well acquainted with her as Trish Daniels from the last three installments. Her TV resume, on the other hand, is much longer, with some of the bigger shows including the BBC’s The House of Eliott, CSI, Grimm, and Lethal Weapon. Now she’s taking part in Christopher Nolan’s Oppenheimer, which is unquestionably her biggest cinematic appearance yet.

James D'Arcy (Patrick Blackett)

As British physicist Patrick Blackett, we have James D'Arcy,  whom Marvel fans will remember as Edwin Jarvis in the Agent Carter TV series and Avengers: Endgame, while others may know him better from shows like Broadchurch, Secret Diary of a Call Girl, and The Hot Zone. Oppenheimer marks the actor’s second time being paired with  Nolan, with the two of them first working together on Dunkirk, in a career that also includes movies like Cloud Atlas, Hitchcock, Jupiter Ascending, and The Snowman.

David Rysdahl (Donald Hornig)

Starring as chemist and explosives expert Donald Hornig is David Rysdahl, whom fans of the Hulu horror movie No Exit will recognize as Lars -- one of the four suspects at the rest lodge. Rysdahl also made a name for himself in the independent film world with appearances in Nine Days and Dead Pigs, the latter hailing from Cathy Yan, who would go on to direct Birds of Prey. Oppenheimer is a major cinematic credit to add to his filmography and, perhaps, will open the door to him appearing in more mainstream fare.

Guy Burnet (George Eltenton)

Fans of the Chicago Fire cast might remember Oppenheimer's George Eltenton actor, Guy Burnet, for his recurring role as Grant back in Season 5, while others might know him from multiple episodes of shows like Hand of God and Counterpart. On the film side of things, Burnet has appeared in Asher, Mortdecai, Pitch Perfect 3, and the 2022 horror flick, Bed Rest, starring Scream’s Melissa Barrerra.

Harrison Gilbertson (Philip Morrison)

Looking over the resume of Harrison Gilbertson -- a student of Oppenheimer's whom he recruited onto the Manhattan Project -- among the big things that pop out are his role as Pete Coleman in 2014’s Need for Speed, as well as playing Travis McKean in Netflix’s adaptation of the Stephen King/Joe Hill story, In The Tall Grass. Also prior to being brought into the Oppenheimer family, Gilbertson recurred alongside The Peripheral cast for Amazon’s sci-fi series hailed from Westworld creators Jonathan Nolan (Christopher’s brother) and Lisa Joy. 

Matthias Schweighöfer (Werner Heisenberg)

As influential German theoretical physicist Werner Heisenberg, we have Matthias Schweighöfer, who popped up in the Tom Cruise-led political thriller Valkyrie back in 2008, but it wasn’t until 2021 that a lot of American moviegoers got to know him. Schweighöfer starred as Ludwig Dieter in Netflix’s Army of the Dead cast for writer and director Zack Snyder, and months later, reprised that role for the prequel, Army of Thieves, which he also directed. He is keeping his run with the streaming platform going with Gal Gadot’s 2023 Netflix movie, Heart of Stone. 

Alex Wolff (Luis Walter Alvarez)

Prior to being cast in Oppenheimer as Nobel Prize-winning physicist, Luis Walter Alvarez, Alex Wolff hit the entertainment scene in his youth as one of the leads of Nickelodeon’s The Naked Brothers Band, and younger moviegoers will recognize him as Spencer Gilpin from the recent Jumanji movies. As far as Wolff’s more “adult” work goes, his film appearances include, Hereditary (one of the best A24 horror movies), The Cat and the Moon, Bad Education, Pig with Nicolas Cage, and M. Night Shyamalan’s Old. 

Gary Oldman (Harry S. Truman)

The Dark Knight Trilogy’s James Gordon actor, Gary Oldman, is reuniting with  Christopher Nolan to play President Harry S. Truman in Oppenheimer, according to Esquire. This will be the second time the chameleonic actor has portrayed a notable WWII-era political figure after his Academy Award-winning turn as Winston Churchill in Darkest Hour. 

Trond Fausa (George Kistiakowsky)

Playing Ukrainian chemist George Kistiakowsky is Trond Fausa, whose credits largely consist of Norwegian productions, but some might know him from Lilyhammer -- the Norwegian-American TV series Netflix provided as its first exclusive offering in North America. Fausa also lent his talents to the later Netflix series, The Innocents, which only lasted a season.

Christopher Denham (Klaus Fuchs)

According to The Digital Fix, Klaus Fuchs – a German scientist who shared information from the research effort with the Soviet Union as a spy, as a New York Times article recalls – will be portrayed in Oppenheimer by Christopher Denham. Fans of the Showtime series Billions will recognize the actor for playing Oliver Dake, while on the movies side of things, he’s popped up in Shutter Island, Argo, and, most recently, the Being the Ricardos cast, to name a few. Coincidentally, Oppenheimer won’t be Denham’s first time acting in a project focused on the Manhattan Project, as he played Jim Meeks in the short-lived WGN series, Manhattan. 

Josh Zuckerman (Giovanni Rossi Lomanitz)

The majority of Josh Zuckerman’s acting work before playing American physicist Giovanni Rossi Lomanitz in Oppenheimer has been on TV, from guest stints on series like House and The Big Bang Theory, to recurring on shows like Desperate Housewives and 90210. That being said, you might recall Zuckerman appearing in Austin Powers in Goldmember as a young Dr. Evil, the independent sci-fi horror comedy, Useless Humans, or Paramount+’s The Offer cast (which chronicles the making of The Godfather).

Olivia Thirlby (Lilli Hornig)

As Czech-American scientist and feminist Lilli Hornig, we have Olivia Thirlby, whom some may also recognize as Judge Anderson in Dredd. In more recent years, the Juno star appeared on TV in shows like Goliath and The L Word: Generation Q, had role in the Y: The Last Man cast for its short time on FX, and starred alongside Oppenheimer co-star Jason Clarke in another historical drama called Chappaquiddick.

Tom Conti (Albert Einstein)

We know from a recent teaser for Oppenheimer that Albert Einstein will be depicted in the film and we know from a Variety article that the influential German scientist is portrayed by Tom Conti. The Academy Award-nominated actor (for 1983’s Reuben, Reuben) previously worked with Nolan when he played one of Bruce Wayne’s fellow prisoners of the Pit in The Dark Knight Rises.

Casey Affleck (Boris Pash)

Reuniting with Nolan on Oppenheimer for the first time since he appeared in Interstellar is Casey Affleck as Boris Pash, who was put in charge of security at Los Alamos. The actor is best known for starring alongside his brother, Ben -- whose marriage to J. Lo he missed, unfortunately -- and fellow Oppenheimer star, Matt Damon, in Good Will Hunting and his Academy Award-winning performance in the 2016 drama, Manchester by the Sea.

Can you recall another movie with an ensemble this large and exploding with renowned, high-profile names? The stacked Oppenheimer cast is just one of the many reasons why Nolan’s latest became one of the biggest 2023 movies. 

Rather than introduce a new villain or two, so far Spider-Man: No Way Home is bringing back an assortment of familiar faces from other Spider-Man film series. Just like Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness, the third Tom Holland-led Spidey flick is embracing other realities, with Jamie Foxx and Alfred Molina confirmed to be reprising Electro and Doctor Octopus, respectively, and an assortment of other established villains also rumored to appear. But one name that isn’t part of the lineup is Dane DeHaan, who played Harry Osborn, a.k.a. Green Goblin, in The Amazing Spider-Man 2, and it turns out we shouldn’t expect DeHaan to play that character in No Way Home… or ever again.

While promoting his new Apple TV+ miniseries Lisey’s Story (based on the same-named novel by Stephen King), Dane DeHaan spoke with The Playlist about how although he enjoyed his brief time working in the Amazing Spider-Man film series, he’s more interested in tackling new roles rather than revisit Harry Osborn. The actor explained:

At the time The Amazing Spider-Man 2 came out, big things certainly on the horizon for Dane DeHaan in the superhero franchise. The sequel saw Harry Osborn transform into the Green Goblin during a desperate attempt to cure his genetic illness. Upon donning the Green Goblin gear, he flew to fight Spider-Man and quickly learned that the Web-Slinger was Peter Parker. Their conflict ended with Gwen Stacy’s death, and although Harry was thrown into the Ravencroft Institute, he tasked the mysterious Gustav Fiers with putting together a team, with Paul Giamtti’s Aleksei Sytsevich, a.k.a. Rhino, being the first recruit.

This laid the groundwork for not just at least one more Amazing Spider-Man installment, but also a Sinister Six movie, and Dane DeHaan confirmed last year he would have been involved with that. However, The Amazing Spider-Man 2’s underwhelming critical and commercial performance resulted in Sony Pictures scrapping the franchise and teaming up with Marvel Studios to bring Spider-Man into the Marvel Cinematic Universe. So while Spider-Man: No Way Home will at least reunite us with Electro, The Amazing Spider-Man 2’s other main villain, as far as DeHaan’s Harry Osborn is concerned, he’s still languishing within Ravencroft’s walls.

Now all this isn’t to say that Dane DeHaan will never appear in another comic book movie. Quite the opposite, as he added in the interview that he’d “like to be a part of” such a project, so long as it was “different.” So there’s still a chance we could see him in the MCU someday, it just won’t be as any version of Harry Osborn. Or maybe DeHaan will head over to the DCEU instead. As for the folks out there who wanting to see some kind of Green Goblin on the big screen, you may be in luck, as Willem Dafoe’s Norman Osborn is rumored to be appearing in Spider-Man: No Way Home.

Those of you simply wanting to see more of Dane DeHaan’s acting work can watch him play Jim Dooley in Lisey’s Story, with the first two episodes now being available on Apple TV+. Spider-Man: No Way Home swings into theaters on December 17, and stay locked on CinemaBlend for more news about upcoming Marvel movies.

By now, you have either started or plan to start Lisey’s Story, the new Apple TV+ limited series based Stephen King’s 2006 psychological horror novel of the same name. With the first two chapters of the eight-episode series premiering on Friday, June 4, now is the perfect time to go back and see where all you’ve seen the Lisey’s Story cast, including Julianne Moore, Clive Owen, Dane DeHaan, and Joan Allen before they appeared in this tense and other-wordly television adaptation from the mind of one of the world’s best and most prolific living authors.

But outside of the Apple TV+'s main stars, you may be asking yourself where you have seen the Lisey's Story cast before. Well, fear not, as we have put together a quick rundown of the show's biggest stars, where they fit into the story, and some of the movies, television shows, and stage productions that they have called home over the years.

Julianne Moore (Lisey Landon)

Julianne Moore plays the titular heroine on Lisey’s Story, a woman that is not only still dealing with the death of her husband but also a dangerous stalker obsessed with her late husband’s body of work. Outside of leading the latest in a long line of Stephen King adaptations, Moore has given one remarkable performance after another in film and on television, earning an Academy Award and Golden Globe for her role in 2015’s Still Alice, as well as two additional Golden Globes for Game Change and Short Cuts. Moore has also appeared in everything from Boogie Nights to The Big Lebowski and The Kids Are All Right to Children of Men, which also featured her Lisey’s Story co-star Clive Owen.

Clive Owen (Scott Landon)

Clive Owen plays Scott Landon, a prolific author and husband of Lisey’s Story’s heroine who has been dead for two years prior to the start of the Apple TV+ limited series. In addition to the aforementioned Children of Men, which remains just as impactful today as it did upon its release 15 years ago, Owen has received an Academy Award nomination for Closer, lead films like Sin City and Inside Man, and had his fair share of hits on the television side of things with celebrated performances in everything from Hemingway & Gellhorn to The Knick, which earned him nominations for a Primetime Emmy and a Golden Globe, respectively.

Joan Allen (Amanda Debusher)

Portraying Amanda Debusher, Lisey’s older and sometimes catatonic sister whose episodes transport her to another world, is Joan Allen. Prior to landing one of the main roles on Lisey’s Story, Allen made a name for herself on Broadway, winning a Tony Award in 1988 for her debut in Burn This. She has also earned three Academy Award nominations over the years including a nomination for Best Supporting Actress in Nixon and The Crucible and a Best Actress nomination for The Contender. Other memorable movies from Allen include Pleasantville, The Notebook, and Room. Allen also received multiple nominations for her portrayal of iconic American artist Georgia O’Keeffe in the 2009 Lifetime movie Georgia O’Keeffe.

Dane DeHaan (Jim Dooley)

Dane DeHaan lends his talents to Lisey’s Story, bringing the novel’s antagonistic Jim Dooley, to life in a frightening display of obsession. Prior to taking on the role of a man who will do anything to get Lisey’s late husband’s unpublished work out of the shadows, the talented DeHaan appeared in everything from The Amazing Spider-Man 2 to Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets. He also gave memorable performances in The Place Beyond the Pines, Kill Your Darlings, and Lawless, to name only a few.

Jennifer Jason Leigh (Darla)

Jennifer Jason Leigh appears throughout Lisey’s Story as Darla, the middle child in Lisey’s family who helps her two sisters with their other-worldly conditions. Since breaking through with Fast Times at Ridgemont High, Leigh has led a remarkable career in film, television, and various stage productions over the course of the past 40 years. With Academy Award and Golden Globe nominations for her turn as Daisy Domergue in The Hateful Eight, another Golden Globe nod for Mrs. Parker and the Vicious Circle, and various other decorated performances, Leigh as cemented her place on the list of greatest living actresses. And this isn’t even the first time Leigh has appeared in a Stephen King adaptation, having had a pivotal role in 1995’s Dolores Claiborne.

Ron Cephas Jones (Professor Roger Dashmiel)

Ron Cephas Jones appears in Lisey’s Story, taking on the role of Roger Dashmiel, a professor at Scott Landon’s alma mater who wants to see the late author’s unpublished work see the light of day. Fans of This Is Us will immediately recognize Jones as William “Shakespeare” Hill, a role which has earned the actor two Primetime Emmys for his performance on the NBC drama series. Jones’ other television work includes Luke Cage and Mr. Robot, among others. Jones has also shown up in movies like He Got Game, Venom, and Dolemite Is My Name.

Sung Kang (Officer Dan Boeckman)

Taking on the role of Officer Dan Boeckman, the police officer assigned to watching over the Landon house in Lisey’s Story is star of the Fast and Furious franchise Sung Kang. Mostly known for his portrayal of Han Lue (and the Justice for Han movement) in five entries in the multi-billion-dollar franchise starting with The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift, Kang has shown up in everything from Live Free or Die Hard to We Can Be Heroes with a ton of other movies in between. Over on the television side of things, Kang has had main roles on shows like Power and Gang Related, and even appeared on an episode of Monk like so many up-and-coming actors before him.

Remember, this is just the main actors in the Lisey’s Story cast, as the limited series written by Stephen King and directed by Pablo Larraín features a large supporting cast who will all play a role in some shape or form. You can watch Lisey’s Story every Friday on Apple TV+ through mid-July, but if you want to know what else is coming out this summer, check out CinemaBlend’s 2021 TV schedule.

Stephen King fans were originally supposed to see the release of Apple TV+'s Lisey's Story in 2020... but then the pandemic happened. As a result, production on the miniseries had to hit pause, and plans were delayed. For a long time we were left with no idea what was going on, and it was only back in February that the streaming service teased that the adaptation would premiere during the summer – but now we are over Boo'ya Moon excited to reveal not only that we now have a release date, but also a wonderful set of first look images.

AppleTV+ officially announced today that Lisey's Story, which will run as a eight-episode miniseries, is now set to premiere on Friday, June 4. Stephen King wrote the adaptation by himself, and the story follows the eponymous character (Julianne Moore) as she copes with the death of her husband, a world-famous writer, and faces down events that cause her to reflect on her marriage and recognize that she has a number of repressed memories. The limited series has an absolutely phenomenal cast, including Julianne Moore as the titular Lisey, Clive Owen, Joan Allen, Jennifer Jason Leigh, Dane DeHaan, and Ron Cephas Jones, and we now have actual stills that show us what the characters will look like.

Up at the top of this article is obviously a shot of Julianne Moore's Lisey, but below you'll find a shot of her from a flashback with her husband, Scott Landon (Clive Owen). Without giving away too much, this still is from an absolutely crucial scene where the couple sit under what they call the yum-yum tree, and Scott reveals a vital secret about his childhood that changes Lisey's perspective on everything.

Also playing vital roles in Lisey's Story will be Lisey's sisters – with whom she has some complicated relationships. The oldest sister is Amanda, who sadly suffers from emotional and mental issues, though at the same time Lisey is closer to her than anyone else in her family. She is prone to spells of catatonia, which looks to be what's going on with her in the below still (this is notably the second time that Joan Allen has starred in a Stephen King adaptation, having previously played the lead in Peter Askin's A Good Marriage)

Lisey's other key sibling relationship in the series is with Jennifer Jason Leigh's Darla, though that has its own complications, drama, and personality clashes . At the start of Lisey's Story, Amanda has one of her episodes, and Lisey and Darla have to come together to figure out what to do (Jennifer Jason Leigh is also Stephen King veteran, having previously starred alongside Kathy Bates in Taylor Hackford's Dolores Claiborne.

Having covered the people closest to Lisey in Lisey's Story, let's now take a moment to discuss the streaming miniseries' main human villain: Dane DeHaan's Jim Dooley. One of the stresses that the titular character has to deal with in the book are all of her deceased husband's never-published writings, which she is constantly hounded for by aggressive individuals that she dubs "Incunks" (a play on/short for "incuncabilla," which itself is a misremembering of the word "incunabulum"). There are a lot of assholes, but they are mostly harmless. Not Jim. Instead, Jim is an insane, obsessed fan who makes an agreement with a third party to get all of Scott's works by any means necessary.

Next up we have another still from a flashback, and one showing off the character played by Ron Cephas Jones. In Lisey's Story, Jones will be playing Roger Dashmiel, a professor at Scott Landon's alma mater who, during a flashback, introduces Scott during a special event that winds up going horribly, horribly wrong and sees the writer encounter a brush with death.

As for this last image... it's possible that the less that is said, the better – for spoiler reasons. Without explaining too much to those of you who have not yet read Lisey's Story, let's just say that it fits into the Stephen King tradition of seemingly normal stories being hit with an extreme dose of the fantastical. What's pictured below is an otherworldly location called Boo'ya Moon where some of the most consequential events of the book take place.

Lisey's Story is now less than two months away from its premiere – and fans can get extra excited because on June 4 the first two episodes will be made available to AppleTV+ subscribers. Hopefully the release of these stills means that the first ever trailer isn't long off; I'm keeping my fingers crossed. To learn about what other adaptations are currently in the works, be sure to check out our Upcoming Stephen King Movies And TV guide.

Stephen King's works have done quite well in the streaming age. In 2016, the novel 11.22.63 was developed as a miniseries for Hulu that turned out to be exceptional, and since then there have been both shows (The Stand, Castle Rock, Creepshow) and movies (Gerald's Game, 1922) that have created an exciting new subsection in the author/filmmaker's awesome legacy. That particular legacy will further expand later this year with the launch of Lisey's Story on Apple TV+, and King is getting us hyped for it simply by highlighting the remarkable talent that is involved.

Ever the active Twitter user, Stephen King took to his personal account this morning and gave his followers a preview of his next adaptation with some name-dropping and some short, content-rich sentences. Preparing Constant Readers for what's to come, he wrote,

It feels a bit blasphemous to make a New York Yankees reference while discussing Stephen King, but I'm going to make it anyway: that's a murderers' row of talent right there – both in front of and behind the camera. And what adds a bit of extra fun is that there are some Stephen King adaptation veterans highlighted in this list, including Jennifer Jason Leigh (who played the daughter of Kathy Bates' eponymous character in Dolores Claiborne) and Joan Allen (who is one half of the lead betrothed couple in A Good Marriage).

Based on the novel of the same name, which was first published in 2006, Lisey's Story will feature Julianne Moore in the titular role (pronounced "Lee-See") and begin as she works to sort out her life in the wake of the death of her husband, renowned fiction author Scott Landon (Clive Owen). Her greatest obstacle in this task is in the handling of Scott's unpublished manuscripts and dealing with rude and pushy "Incuncs" who want her to give up the works – and things quickly ratchet up from "nuisance" to "violent threat." Throughout this scary drama, Lisey reflects on her years with the man she loves, and while doing so uncovers repressed memories that unveil whole new worlds of possibilities.

It was back in 2017 that Stephen King first expressed public interest in the book being adapted – having prior to that named it as his favorite among those he has written. Apple became involved in 2019 when the company purchased the rights, and inside that same year Lisey's Story started production. Unfortunately, production had to halt as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, which hindered plans to start releasing episodes of the miniseries last year. Now, however, filming has been completed, and while there is no firm date set, the premiere is being planned for the summer.

Pablo Larraín, who is best known for directing the Natalie Portman-starring biopic Jackie, took the helm of all eight episodes of Lisey's Story, and Stephen King has adapted the book himself – his first time doing so since 2006's Desperation (obviously not counting the coda he wrote for The Stand).

With summer really not all that far away at this point, I'm hoping that it won't be too much longer before we get our first look at Lisey's Story – be it in the form of some official stills or possibly even a trailer. CinemaBlend is keeping an eye out, and I'm keeping my fingers tightly crossed that the Apple TV+ miniseries can live up to its phenomenal potential. (And in the meantime, do yourself a favor and read the book, because it truly is one of his best.)

To see what other Stephen King adaptations are currently in the works, be sure to check out our Upcoming Stephen King guide.

You may not be familiar with the Stephen King novel Lisey’s Story, but, frankly, that’s an issue that you’d be doing yourself a favor by resolving. The book is a haunting and creepy thriller that both celebrates the art of writing, and will invade your dreams. It’s also a work that the author has also wanted to see adapted for many years, and now that’s actually happening courtesy of the upcoming miniseries.

But where can you see Lisey’s Story? Who is making it? And when will it be released? For all of the questions that you may have about the project now, we have answers, and you can find them all in our quick rundown below!

Lisey’s Story Will Be An Apple TV+ Exclusive

Netflix has Gerald’s Game, 1922, and In The Tall Grass. Hulu has 11.22.63 and Castle Rock. Paramount+ has The Stand. And now Apple TV+ will also have its very own Stephen King programming too. Lisey’s Story has been developed as an exclusive for the streaming service – though it’s not impossible that the show could one day get a physical home video release as well.

Stephen King Considers Lisey’s Story To Be His Favorite Novel Of Those He’s Written

Lisey’s Story was first published in 2006, but just because it isn’t one of Stephen King’s older classics doesn’t mean it doesn’t have a special place in his heart. In fact, during a 2013 AMA session on Reddit he called it the favorite of the novels that he has written. (It should be noted that he has written 11 novels since then, and it’s possible his feelings have changed, but the praise is more than significant enough to warrant a mention, and he hasn’t exactly been shy about sharing his affection for it elsewhere).

Stephen King Has Adapted Lisey’s Story Himself

The rate at which Stephen King has produced books over the last five decades is nothing short of extraordinary – but what makes his work all the more impressive is that he also somehow finds time to write his own screenplay adaptations for film and television projects. His credits as a screenwriter include 1985’s Silver Bullet, 1989’s Pet Sematary, and 2006’s Desperation, and most recently he wrote the teleplays for the entirety of Apple TV+’s Lisey’s Story.

Lisey’s Story Will Be An 8-Episode Miniseries

Because Stephen King has a tendency to immerse readers in details and deeply explore his characters, filmmakers frequently find themselves challenged to adapt the entire scope of a novel into a two hour movie. That won’t be an issue for Lisey’s Story, however, as the Apple TV+ version will have eight commercial-free hours to work with.

Pablo Larrain Is Directing The Full Lisey’s Story Miniseries

Chilean filmmaker Pablo Larrain is probably best known to cinephiles as the director behind the 2016 Jackie Kennedy biopic Jackie starring Natalie Portman, but he’s making his first American miniseries with Lisey’s Story, and is credited as the director on all eight episodes. This marks the first time since 2011’s Bag Of Bones that a single director has made every chapter of a small screen Stephen King adaptation.

J.J. Abrams Is Producing Lisey’s Story

There are few pop culture pies that J.J. Abrams doesn’t have a finger in these days, and that extends to Stephen King adaptations as well. The two creatives first had the chance to work together when Abrams produced the 11.22.63 miniseries for Hulu, and that project with the streamer was followed up by a collaboration on the show Castle Rock. Sadly the Maine-set show won’t be coming back for a third season, but the Abrams-King relationship has held strong thanks to the former having a hand in developing Lisey’s Story for Apple TV+.

Julianne Moore Is Playing Lisey

The titular character in Lisey’s Story is Lisey Debusher Landon, who we meet while she is trying to figure out her life two years after the death of her husband, author Scott Landon. This includes dealing with the literary works that her husband never had published – which unfortunately winds up bringing trouble to her doorstep. Julianne Moore is set to play the lead role in the Apple TV+ miniseries, marking her second time being in a Stephen King adaptation after the Kimberly Pierce-directed remake of Carrie (though she does also have a part in the horror anthology Tales From The Darkside: The Movie, which features a segment based on King’s story “The Cat From Hell.”)

Clive Owen Is Playing Lisey’s Late Husband Scott

Clive Owen is another newbie in the world of Stephen King adaptations, but he will play the key role of Scott Landon in Lisey’s Story. Though Scott is dead when the book begins, he has a massive part to play that emerges through the narrative’s non-linear structure. Trying not to reveal too much to those who haven’t read the novel, let’s just say that it’s not just the baggage of Scott’s books that Lisey has to deal with, as he is a character with a complicated and horrifying past.

Joan Allen And Jennifer Jason Leigh Have Key Supporting Roles

Unlike Julianne Moore and Clive Owen, both Joan Allen (A Good Marriage) and Jennifer Jason Leigh (Dolores Claiborne) have been a part of Stephen King adaptations before, and they will both be back in action for key supporting roles in Lisey’s Story. While the part played by Leigh has not yet been confirmed, Allen will be play Amanda Debusher, Lisey’s emotionally fragile sister who winds up being a key piece in the plot’s central mystery.

The Lisey's Story Cast Also Includes Sung Kang, Dane DeHaan, And Ron Cephas Jones

In case the aforementioned four award-winning stars weren’t enough to get you excited, Lisey’s Story also has an outstanding supporting cast that includes Sung Kang, Dane DeHaan, and Ron Cephas Jones. Kang will play Dan Beckman, a police officer who is assigned to watch over Lisey’s house after she receives a disturbing threat; DeHaan is bringing to life Jim Dooley, the man responsible for said disturbing threat; and Cephas Jones is Professor Roger Dashmiel, a professor from Scott Landon's alma mater.

Lisey’s Story Will Be Arriving June 4

Lisey’s Story was originally planned as a 2020 release, but the COVID-19 pandemic interrupted production before shooting was finished. As a result the schedule had to be delayed, but now the project has finished filming and is in post-production – and it means that we are only months away from seeing it in its finished form. It was officially announced by Apple in January 2021 that the Stephen King adaptation is on their slate for the year, and it's been clarified since that it will arrive on June 4 with a two-episode premiere. So you may proceed waiting for it with baited breath.

Hopefully it won’t be long before more information is revealed about Lisey’s Story, and when it arrives we’re keeping our fingers crossed that it will contain some first-looks. We’re as excited as you are to see what this miniseries is going to be, so stay on the lookout for more news, features, and updates!

By now, the rumors surrounding the multiverse of returning cast members from the Spider-Man universe have become so extensive we’ve all probably been recast as “Spider-Man audience members” at this point. But with Spider-Man 3’s web of intrigue is bound to come some reports that are flat out dismissed by those who are at the center of them. Even in that respect, it sounds like The Amazing Spider-Man 2’s Dane DeHaan really truly isn’t returning for the Spider-Man: Far From Home sequel, as even he is skeptical about how that would even work.

While promoting his brand new series ZeroZeroZero with Radio Times, Dane DeHaan seemed to be taken off guard by the suggestion that his variant of Harry Osborn/The Green Goblin from the second and last Amazing Spider-Man movie would be able to join the Spider-Man 3 party. And of course, this could just be another case of an actor playing cagey around a casting that seems to have been all but settled, but he does a really good job of convincing us otherwise. Here’s what he had to say:

By the end of The Amazing Spider-Man 2, Harry Osborn had fully turned into his universe’s version of The Green Goblin thanks to some genetic experiments meant to improve his health (gone horribly wrong, of course). Imprisoned following his battle with Spider-Man, and seemingly on the road to starting the Sinister Six, there was chatter about his deceased father Norman coming back from the dead and joining him through the use of his severed and preserved head. What I’m getting at is, in a world where these sort of antics are possible, interdimensional incursions that transport metahuman nemeses do seem like they might be on the table.

However, there is a force greater than any science fiction macguffin that Spider-Man 3 could come up with: the power of the writers. With Jamie Foxx’s Electro already on board to show up in Tom Holland’s third time out as Peter Parker and his superheroic self, perhaps those crafting this new web-slinging story found themselves content reviving only one villain from the oft-maligned Amazing Spider-Man 2. It seems that Dane DeHaan’s rumored return could be one of the first cases of a Spider-Man resurgence that was born purely out of opportunistic fluff.

Of course, that’s still not going to stop plenty of eager Marvel Cinematic Universe fans to start trying to connect the dots in the hopes that their latest theory could be the one that just proves that Dane DeHaan is going to be in Spider-Man 3. And for all anyone knows, Mr. DeHaan is playing a long game, waiting for the appointed hour where he can finally reveal his involvement. If this is speaking directly to you, just to be sure you’re prepared to show your work, and know that you might want to ration your supplies of push pins and red yarn, as the new webslinger blockbuster looks to be arriving in theaters just in time for the holidays on December 17.

Sony’s Marvel universe finally got off the ground in 2018 with Venom, but the studio had initially intended to launch a shared continuity filled with Spider-Man-related characters much earlier. The original plan was to use the Amazing Spider-Man movies as a launching pad for such an expanded franchise, with Sinister Six being one of the planned movies.

Given the way The Amazing Spider-Man 2 ended, it was expected that Dane DeHaan’s Harry Osborn, who transformed into the monstrous Green Goblin, would be among this supervillain team’s members. Sure enough, DeHaan has now confirmed that Green Goblin would have appeared in the Sinister Six movie. When recently asked if he knew any of the specifics of where Harry’s arc would have taken him, DeHaan responded:

In case you need a refresher on The Amazing Spider-Man 2, Harry Osborn turned into the Green Goblin when he injected himself with one of the venom samples from OsCorp’s genetically-altered spiders, the same kind that gave Peter Parker his special abilities. Harry did this in an attempt to cure his hereditary illness, but his physiology is instead horribly mutated, and he then steals an OsCorp battle suit and glider to exact vengeance on Peter. Although Green Goblin is ultimately defeated and incarcerated in the Ravencroft Institute, their battle resulted in Gwen Stacy’s death.

Dane DeHaan commented on what little he knew about what was in store for his version of Green Goblin from that point forward during his conversation with Collider. While Sinister Six never got far enough along for the actor to learn what exactly the next chapter of Harry Osborn’s story would be, it makes sense that Harry would have appeared in the project since he’s the one who tasked Gustav Fiers to recruit a small team of supervillains who would make use of other specialized equipment hidden within OsCorp.

In addition to Sinister Six, Sony’s original incarnation of a shared Marvel universe would have included more Amazing Spider-Man sequels and a Venom movie. Alas, The Amazing Spider-Man 2 ended up underperforming, so the expansion was scrapped. So although Rhino was freed from prison and characters like Doctor Octopus, Vulture, Mysterio and Kraven the Hunter were teased at the end of the sequel, we’ll never see Green Goblin wreak havoc with whomever else would have comprised this team dedicated to bringing down Andrew Garfield’s Spider-Man.

However, that’s not to say a different Sinister Six movie couldn’t happen someday. It’s among the many movies that Sony’s fully-realized Marvel universe has in development, and now that the Morbius trailer has indicated that this continuity and the MCU are one and the same, there’s a good chance that Tom Holland’s Spider-Man could finally battle this group of adversaries on the big screen someday.

As for Dane DeHaan, following The Amazing Spider-Man 2, he’s starred in movies like Life and Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets. You can currently see him in the Quibi series The Stranger.

You would have a hard time finding a more iconic comic book villain than The Joker. In the decades since he was introduced in 1940's Batman #1, the clown-themed villain has turned into one of pop culture's most well-known and beloved bad guys. Because of that popularity, the character has been adapted time and time again on the silver screen, and the search is now officially on to find a brand new Joker for the upcoming non-DCEU movie exploring the origins of the character.

No final casting announcements have been made yet (as it's far too early for that), but we've decided to go through the Hollywood landscape and pick out nine actors that we think have the potential to nail the role. With that in mind, let's dive in and take a look at our first possible Mr. J.

Will Poulter

It's hard to think that only four years ago Will Poulter was that nerdy kid from We're the Millers, particularly after he delivered incredible performances in films like The Revenant and War Machine. However, it is his recent turn as corrupt, racist police officer Krauss in Detroit that has definitively proven what he can do as a super villain. His work in Kathryn Bigelow's 2017 thriller combined equal amounts of despicability, authority and menace that made him an unpredictable (yet oddly magnetic) screen presence. You hate him while you're watching him, but it doesn't make him any less of a scene-stealer. If any villain in the pantheon of DC Comics fits that description, then it has to be Mr. J.

Caleb Landry Jones

Caleb Landry Jones will look familiar to fans of the mutant universe out there from his brief stint as Banshee in X-Men: First Class -- before he was unceremoniously killed off in the interim between First Class and Days of Future Past. However, despite his experience on the heroic side of the comic book genre, Jones' experience as an actor seems to have prepared him to delve far deeper into the more evil side of things than anything morally righteous. Most recently making a name for himself as the sadistically macho Jeremy Armitage in Jordan Peele's Get Out, Jones can crack a seriously creepy smile and leave audiences completely on-edge, just like a proper Joker should be able to.

Bill Skarsgård

Okay, so this one feels like we're cheating a little bit since Bill Skarsgard has already proven his ability to play a killer clown with his upcoming stint as Pennywise in the IT adaptation. That said, there's a reason people often like to adhere to an "if it ain't broke, don't fix it" mentality. Skarsgard is bringing a lot of charisma, and even more creepiness, to his role as the iconic, murderous clown originally played by Tim Curry. But it actually only seems to represent an appetizer of what he could be capable of if a Joker solo movie were to allow him to step out from the sewer and don the infamous purple suit and green hair.

Lakeith Stanfield

With Lakeith Stanfield, we have yet another Get Out veteran on the list of possible young actors who could potentially play a brand new version of The Joker. Possessing one of the most diverse resumes in Hollywood (with credits on everything from Atlanta to Death Note), Stanfield has proven that he knows how to deliver comedy, drama and everything in between with gusto. Beyond that, when the announcement of a Joker origin movie actually occurred online, Stanfield was one of the first actors to take to Twitter in order to throw his hat into the ring for the role. He may not look like a traditional Joker, but he has all of the inherent traits that the part requires.

Karen Gillan

Although Joker is most typically portrayed as a man in the pages of DC Comics, there's ample precedent to flip the script and turn him into a her. With that in mind, Guardians of the Galaxy actress Karen Gillan recently came out and admitted that she wants a crack at the role at some point, so now feels like a perfect opportunity to give her a shot. In her role as Nebula, Gillan has shown an ability to throw herself into a dark and intense part, while also leaving room for comedy. If any actress young enough to play a Joker origin story has the chops to take on this role, then it's definitely her. Besides, we've seen the Joker story told from a male perspective before; maybe it's finally time to see a female Joker.

Robert Pattinson

Let's get one thing straight: it is not 2009 anymore, and the jokes about his role in the Twilight films have completely run their course. In the years since Robert Pattinson achieved fame and heartthrob status for his work as Edward Cullen and Cedric Diggory, the 31-year-old Brit has proven time and time again that he has the gumption and talent to take on increasingly challenging roles with each passing year. Between his work on Cosmopolis, The Lost City of Z and the recently released Good Time, Robert Pattinson is one of Hollywood's bravest actors, and his tall, wiry frame could potentially make him a dead-ringer to don the role of The Joker when the upcoming origin film finally starts rolling.

Paul Dano

At 33 years old, Paul Dano is the oldest entry on this list by a slight margin. Having said that, the Swiss Army Man star has also amassed an enormous filmography in the years since he began acting, and most of his roles have maintained the creepy (yet oddly comical) stylings that we would need to see in a Joker origin movie. In most of his best roles, Paul Dano has excelled at conveying an underlying sense that there's something not entirely sane lurking beneath his unimposing exterior. If a Joker origin story wants to explore a sad man's descent into madness, then there are few actors more naturally gifted at telling that type of story than Paul Dano.

Iwan Rheon

After achieving fame for his performance as Ramsay Bolton on HBO's Game of Thrones, a comic book villain seemed like an obvious direction for an actor like Iwan Rheon. Although he will flex those particular muscles on Marvel's upcoming Inhumans TV series as Maximus, it's hard to deny the fact that there's still a bit more potential for this 32-year-old actor as a silver screen bad guy. Often regarded as one of the worst villains to ever grace Game of Thrones, there's an argument to be made that Rheon's performance as the Bastard of Bolton even elevated him above King Joffrey. Able to portray ruthlessness, deceptiveness and sadism in every conceivable way, Iwan Rheon legitimately seems tailor-made for a role like The Joker.

Dane DeHaan

Between his work on The Amazing Spider-Man 2 and Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets, Dane DeHaan arguably hasn't had the best experience working in the comic book movie genre. Having said that, there's an equally valid argument to be made that he simply hasn't found the right character yet. With his roles in films like A Cure For Wellness, The Place Beyond The Pines, and Chronicle (among others), the 31-year-old actor has proven his ability to delve into dark material and deliver truly haunting performances. Couple that experience with some of the better elements of his Green Goblin, and he could do some severe damage as a young (and completely unhinged) Clown Prince of Crime.

This poll is no longer available.

So far, the summer blockbusters have taken us to the surface of a Living Planet (in Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2), to the mythical island of Themyscira (in Wonder Woman), and on an expedition through the stars in Alien: Covenant. But later this season, Luc Besson plans on putting all of these adventures on blast with his adaptation of Valerian, a tentpole that promises to deliver nearly one thousand planets and matching species. Impossible? We thought so, too, until we got a look at this fascinating and detailed behind-the-scenes video on the making of Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets. Watch!

In the video, Luc Besson admits that the idea behind his Valerian adaptation dates all the way back to when he was working on The Fifth Element, a sci-fi thriller that obviously took cues from the classic Valerian comic books. And that's the important thing to note. Valerian has been around since 1967, telling the intergalactic tales of space cops Valerian (Dane DeHaan) and Laureline (Cara Delevigne). The comic book's influence can be seen in countless sci-fi movies that came after it, including the grand daddy of them all, George Lucas' Star Wars saga.

Now Luc Besson is setting out to give Valerian a proper adaptation in this July's Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets. And as he states in the video, he's able to do it right because James Camaeron's Avatar changed the game when it comes to special effects. Anything is possible now, which is how Besson is able to create endless species populating endless worlds. Filmmakers are only limited by their own imaginations.

This deep dive into the creative process on Valerian gives away some significant plot details. We learn that Valerian and Laureline are the grounded, human guides through this fantastical journey, on a case that takes them to Alpha, aka the City of a Thousand Planets. It's there that they will allow Besson to take technology on a test run, showing off the worlds and creatures he is able to bring to the biggest screen possible. As he says, all of the knowledge of the universe in IN Alpha. It sounds like it has the potential to be THE tentpole environment of the summer.

We have to wait until July 21 for Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets to reach theaters. But as Luc Besson says in the final moments of this great reel, "Have fun, and I'll see you in space." If you want to know what you can watch before Valerian opens, head over to our complete rundown of 2017 movie release dates.

Back in November, I took an exclusive trip to the edit bay of Luc Besson's upcoming Valerian And The City of A Thousand Planets -- and one thing I learned about in heavy detail was an alien species called the Kortan Dahuk. I was given a multi-page fact sheet that revealed everything about the creatures, from where they were from to how they first interacted with humans. It turns out, however, that this was just the tip of the iceberg of Besson's creation, as the filmmaker actually created a full-blown bible for the cinematic universe. The writer/director recently told me,

Earlier this month, both Luc Besson and Valerian star Dane DeHaan were in Los Angeles for a book signing at Meltdown Comics, and I had the opportunity to talk with both of them about their upcoming sci-fi blockbuster. I asked about the fact sheet and the detailed work that went into the making of the film, and learned about the tremendous depths of Besson's fanhood in regards to the long-running French comic series by writer Pierre Christin and artist Jean-Claude Mézières. Both men went into detail about why it was so important for their individual processes, and how it legitimately aided the movie.

Going further with his point, Luc Besson explained how he used the bible as a means of authenticating both the world being established in Valerian, but also the interactions between characters. Leads Valerian and Laureline have a long history of encountering a wide-variety of alien species, and the filmmaker felt that familiarity could be replicated through heavy research. Said Besson,

Taking Luc Besson's thoughts and running with them, Dane DeHaan added that the fact book did legitimately help him immerse himself in the world -- but also gave him the opportunity to learn a lot more about the character he was playing. Said the actor,

The exciting finished results of this endeavor are still a few weeks away, with Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets not hitting theaters until June, but audiences will get a brand new taste of the blockbuster when the new trailer arrives tomorrow morning:

Valerian And The City Of A Thousand Planets arrives in theaters on July 21st, and be sure to tune in here on CinemaBlend for the exciting trailer launch!

Most people remain on the fence regarding the use of 3D in movies. The problem is when it's incorporated seamlessly, lulling viewers into a film and making them truly feel part of the action, it almost goes unnoticed. Unfortunately, people only really pay attention when it become too gratuitous and makes them feel queasy. So, I have to admit that I was a little apprehensive going into a special presentation of the brand new trailer for Valerian And The City Of A Thousand Planets on Monday (the trailer should land online shortly), which was being held in a cinema so that the 3D could truly sing. I'm pleased to say that it did just that, though, and it instantly reminded me of the power that this divisive cinematic enhancement can really have.

Set in the distant future and across a number of eclectic terrains, Luc Besson's adaptation of Pierre Christin and Claude Mezieres' sci-fi comic book series clearly contained the perfect material to fully utilize the 3D technology. In under three minutes, we zip from a desert landscape to a huge spaceship in the outer regions of space, then down into an underwater abyss, while there's a variety of foreign and alien objects and creations that provide the opportunity for prolonged depth of field, too. For the time being at least, there was a lack of items crashing out of the screen and making you cower. But considering how the use of this device is so often misused, that's probably for the best.

But it's not just the use of depth of field that truly impressed me with Luc Besson's Valerian And The City Of A Thousand Planets trailer. Because it was really the trailer's use of color, and how it went from blindingly bright to moodily murky, that truly beguiled, as it suggested that Besson and his Valerian team have done a pitch perfect job of juxtaposing the playfulness of the story and genre with a menace and terror that's inherent in films set out in space.

While it's obviously way too early to declare Valerian And The City Of A Thousand Planets a triumph, the success of creating a trailer that both sets out the stall of its plot and showcases its 3D in an eye-catching and gripping manner is worth celebrating. Speaking from my own personal experience, I've repeatedly found myself more than nonplussed with trailers that overzealously incorporate 3D. The first trailer for Spider-Man: Homecoming genuinely made me feel like I was going to throw up my popcorn over the person sat in front of me. Sorry for that visual.

With 3D still proving to be so divisive amongst audiences, and Hollywood studios intent on releasing films with it at their fulcrum, it's well worth lauding the times when the technology is used proficiently. Even if it is admittedly only in a trailer. We'll get to see if Valerian And The City Of A Thousand Planets can build upon this success when it's released into cinemas on July 21.

Check out the first trailer for Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets on the next page.

Horror and thrillers are some of the trickiest genres of film. While they have the potential to produce tons of money on limited budgets, the process of routinely terrifying the actors (and eventually the audience) during filming is something unique. Plenty of horror actors and scream queens have opened up regarding the emotional or physical trauma they have suffered while working in the genre, like Shelley Duvall in The Shining. So when I got the chance to speak with Dane DeHaan about Gore Verbinski's A Cure For Wellness, I was eager to hear the horror stories behind the horror.

When speaking with Dane DeHaan about his lead role in A Cure for Wellness, I asked which scene was the most difficult or scary to film. And while he went through tons of crazy and scary scenes (you'll see), it appears that his work in the sensory deprivation tank we see in the trailers was the hardest. He elaborated:

You know that feeling of being in a pool for too long and feeling your fingers getting wrinkled? That was basically Dane DeHaan's reality for the weeks it took to film his scenes in the tank.

The scene where Dane DeHaan's character Lockhart was in the sensory deprivation tank is one of many thrilling and scary moments from A Cure for Wellness. And it makes sense that production was forced to film the scene for two whole weeks. Not to give away any spoilers, but there was a significant amount of CGI used during the sequence, so it stands to reason that plenty of extra shots were needed in the can before the visual effects artists and editors could craft the movie magic. And having a variable as big as a full tank of water and oxygen tubes is sure to result in a longer shoot time than traditional scenes.

You can check out my full conversation with Dane DeHaan about the soon to be infamous tank scenes below.

Dane DeHaan did have to be quite brave in order to shoot in the tank for so long. Because communication can only be done through hand signals, and he was already acting in a scary scene, there seems to be a terrifying margin for error. We saw just how bad this type of filming could get in Now You See Me; actress Isla Fisher nearly drowned while filming a scene where she had to escape from a water tank. While she attempted to signal the crew for help, it just seemed like Fisher was doing a phenomenal job acting as if she was drowning. But she was actually calling for help, and luckily was saved before suffering any permanent damage.

A Cure for Wellness will swim into theaters on February 17. Read our full review for the movie by clicking right here.

Actors have a tricky job. Because while it's challenging enough to become immersed in filming and transform into a character, there are usually quite a few obstacles in their way. From hitting your mark to fight choreography, performers usually have to split their focus between their physical presence and emotional journey. And this process can be even more challenging when actors are put out of their comfort zone or physically interrupted in some way. Case in point: Dan DeHaan in Gore Verbinski's A Cure For Wellness. As the protagonist, DeHaan found himself in some precarious positions while filming, including having to wear a cast on his leg for around half of the film's runtime.

I recently got to speak with Dane DeHaan about his work on A Cure for Wellness. Among other subjects, I asked him how working with that bulky cast for so long was. Surprisingly, he actually enjoyed lugging the clunker around set during filming. He said,

Well that's what I call turning lemons into lemonade (hey Beyonce).

While it might seem crazy to grow fond of a heavy cast that restricts your movement, Dane DeHaan makes a pretty excellent point. During the film we see how DeHaan's character Lockhart attempt to procure his company's CEO, only to get into a car accident that breaks his leg. This physical limitation functions two fold; it allows both the audience and the the character to accept that he's going to have a hard time leaving the wellness center. Otherwise, the suspension of disbelief would have been far too much considering the craziness that A Cure for Wellness entails. And as an actor, DeHaan was given physical asset to help him live within Lockhart's psyche.

You can check out more from my conversation with Dane DeHaan below, also known as his ode to the cast.

Lockhart's broken leg was just one of many moments in A Cure for Wellness that has the potential to make the audience extremely uncomfortable. Anyone who has ever seen The Ring knows that Gore Verbinski has a way of inducing anxiety and fear from audiences.

A Cure for Wellness will debut in theaters on February 17th, 2017.

Before his heady days guiding Johnny Depp through four Disney movies, Gore Verbinski made a name for himself with a particularly effective horror film: the 2002 American remake of The Ring. Back before the days of jump scare-dependent PG-13 offerings, or R-rated torture porn, Verbinski created an atmospheric tale of dread and fear that remembered to make its horror out of actual materials, and not just turning up the volume on a slamming door. Now he's returned to the genre with the brilliant A Cure For Wellness, and frankly, it's a film that proves he belongs in this genre, as Gore Verbinski has delivered the best horror throwback we've seen since Crimson Peak.

Mr. Lockhart (Dane DeHaan) is working for a shady financial outfit that's going through some woes borne out of an impending merger. To prove himself to the board, and in the name of successfully closing the merger, he's sent to the Swiss Alps to retrieve the company's errant CEO. However, a car crash and a helpful but mysterious physician (Jason Isaacs) keep preventing him from going home, drawing him deeper into a mystery surrounding this idyllic spa that no one seems to ever want to leave.

Part of the fun of watching A Cure For Wellness is the fact that the film is constantly a gorgeous treat to look at. From the costume design to the backdrops of the Swiss Alps and Hohenzollern Castle (where Verbinski filmed), everything on the screen has a pleasing aesthetic that offsets the horrors that eventually overtake the film. But using such visuals helps the film build a slow stream of dread and enclosure. Rather than give the viewers a jump cut-laden, door-slamming tale of a boogeyman, Verbinski allows his film to play out in front of your eyes, and doesn't force the scares. If anything, you'll scare yourself expecting the traditional sting of music or elements of surprise.

A Cure For Wellness is what happens when you mix the noir-ish shades of Shutter Island with the Hammer Horror overtones of Crimson Peak, and mix in a dash of Bioshock for good measure. Yet the film never feels too derivative of any of those sources, as the story stands on its own two feet. If anything, with the right mindset, the film also doubles as a political satire, as a spa of eager patrons shut out the modern world in favor of a simpler time. Quite possibly the best compliment that can be paid to the story, a product of the imaginations of Gore Verbinski and co-writer Justin Haythe, is that it's not totally spoiled by the commercials. In fact, it's dense and twisted enough that the best parts aren't even shown in the marketing. How often can one say that?

As far as the performances are concerned, the starring trio of A Cure For Wellness more than carries this gothic noir horror tale. Dane DeHaan shows off his imitation of Jack Nicholson to great effect, as Lockhart starts off as a cocky ladder climber and slowly unravels into a man who can't help but question his surroundings. Jason Isaacs, on the other hand, portrays the head of the institute, Dr. Volmer, with control and confidence to spare. For a while, you really do question if he's the villain of the piece, as the film plays its mysteries with such conviction that it causes us, the viewer, to question our perception of what's going on. And finally, but assuredly not least important, is Mia Goth's Hannah. A resident of the spa, and a "special case" for Dr. Volmer's research, her fairy tale innocence is matched only by her curiosity for the world, which gives the film a couple of great lighter moments that break up the terrifying nature of the film.

Films like A Cure For Wellness don't come around that often, and that's a real shame. Methodically paced, beautifully orchestrated, and deliciously creepy, Gore Verbinski's return to horror really made me sad he never got to make his Bioshock film at Universal. You can tell that Fox is concerned that people are going to reject this film, as its release was moved from last August to this February, usually a slower period at the multiplex. Don't let that happen. I urge you, the audience, to engage in this beautifully dark trip into the sinister corners of cinema, and take A Cure For Wellness as it's directed: in a comfortable theater, with eyes open and popcorn in hand, ready to be impressed by the first true horror film in years.

Before he travels to outer space with Cara Delevingne later this year in Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets, Dane DeHaan will be delving into creepy territory on with A Cure for Wellness. Directed by Pirates of the Caribbean's Gore Verbinski, the horror thriller is a month away from release, and we've been provided an exclusive new TV spot to show that doesn't skimp on the suspense. Check it out!

If you haven't seen any trailers for A Cure for Wellness yet, fear not. This 30-second TV spot does a good job outlining the basic plot of the movie. Dane DeHaan's Lockhart is visiting an ominous sanitarium standing over an ancient aquifer that was rebuilt after a devastating fire. If that doesn't scream sinister already, it gets even worse, as it's shown that almost certainly unethical experiments have been conducted at this place for hundreds of years. Unfortunately for Lockhart, he discovers what's afoot there, but is dismissed as "unwell." Some of the more unsettling imagery from the TV spot include a woman in a bathtub with some kind of creepy, tentacled monster and a deer being struck by a car. Yeah, this movie is sure to be a bone chiller.

To provide a little extra context, 20th Century Fox's A Cure for Wellness begins when Dane DeHaan's Lockhart is sent to this "wellness center" to fetch the CEO of his company. On the surface, this center in the Swiss Alps looks pleasant enough, but when Lockhart suspects that not all is at it seems, that's when things go to hell for him, as he finds himself diagnosed with the same mysterious illness that all the other patients within the center have, which keeps them there desperate for the cure. This is what happens when you ask too many questions about weird medical procedures at a creepy sanitarium, people. You'll discover the horrors within and be trapped there against your will.

As someone who is rarely into the horror genre, I'm intrigued by the mysteries in A Cure for Wellness, namely what kind of supernatural/science fiction forces these doctors and scientists are manipulating for their malevolent plans. This is also Gore Verbinski's first psychological horror movie since 2002's The Ring, so it will be interesting to see whether he still has the right touch for this kind of story. Aside from Dane DeHaan, the movie's cast includes Jason Isaacs, Mia Goth, Adrian Schiller, Celia Imrie and Ashok Mandanna.

A Cure for Wellness creeps into theaters on February 17. Let us know what you thought of this TV spot in the comments below.

People forget that before he set sail for a trio of Pirates of the Caribbean movies over at Disney, Gore Verbinski staked his claim in the horror genre with the chilling and sparse The Ring (which is part of the reason why he was hired for the supernatural seven-seas series in the first place). Well, Verbinski is returning to the genre in grand fashion with next year's anticipated A Cure for Wellness, which is an offbeat title for an offbeat movie that's starting to pull back its curtain and hint at its scares. An international, South Korean trailer for Fox's thriller hit the Web, and it's worth checking out. More on A Cure for Wellness after the vid:

Snakes. Why did it have to be snakes? Using music, chanting, and an ominous shot of a disturbing bath tub, this teaser for A Cure for Wellness does a fantastic job of setting the gothic tone of the new movie, which stars Dane DeHaan, Mia Goth, and Jason Isaacs. After going up and over the lip of the bath, to reveal the disturbing replacement for water, the trailer devolves into a montage of imagery that -- if you freeze frame at the right time -- may give you nightmares. Especially if you have a teeth issue. Teeth. Why did it have to be teeth?!

We were lucky enough to recently attend a 20th Century Fox event in New York City where the first 30 to 40 minutes of Gore Verbinski's A Cure for Wellness screened. And while we're not yet able to get into specifics about what was shown, we can confirm what this trailer suggests -- that Dane DeHaan's character is going to endure some mental and physical trials at the hands of some demented physicians in this movie. The thing that helps A Cure for Wellness stand out is that it's NOT based on an existing property. There's no comic tie-in, no pre-existing source material from which Gore Verbinski and his team was pulling. Because of that, what we watched was wildly unpredictable, and unsettling... in the best way possible.

We'll get into the details for Gore Verbinski's A Cure For Wellness as we get closer to its release. The movie will be everywhere on February 17.

Last summer, French action auteur Luc Besson had one of his biggest hits with the Scarlett Johansson-fronted sci-fi actioner Lucy. Sticking with the genre for his next outing, he’s adapting the popular French comic Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets, and bringing along a couple budding young stars Cara Delevingne and Dane DeHaan along for what promises to be an epic production and what he calls the "biggest challenge" of his filmmaking career.

Besson has never been on social media before, but went whole hog today in order to announce Valerian to the world. The 56-year-old Fifth Element director took to Twitter to unveil the first logo for the film:

Over on his brand-spanking-new Facebook page, Besson offered up a longer explanation of the project, as well as his motivations for attempting to bring this story that he loves to life:

While the 800 days of work he mentions surely includes various stages of pre and post production, as well as the actual filming of the movie, that is still in hell of an undertaking. Principle photography is set to kick off at the end of this year, and they have their eye on a release in the summer 2017 neighborhood. But it also sounds like this will more than be worth the wait.

If your not familiar with Valerian, it garners frequent comparisons to Star Wars and Star Trek, which aren’t bad things to be associated with for a sci-fi property. Created by Pierre Christin and Jean-Claude Mezieres in 1967, the title has sold more than ten million copies, and tells the story of the adventures of Valerian (DeHaan) and his gorgeous, sharp-witted partner Laureline (Delevingne). They explore the planet Syrte, the capital of a system with 1000 worlds, trying to figure out if the Syrtians are a threat to Earth. They discover an empire in decline, led by a debauched ruling class who lives in opulence, a mysterious class of masked wise men, and a population primed for revolt. Before long, Earth will have to choose a side.

This sounds like an epic, promising space opera that will translate like gangbusters to the big screen. We know that Luc Besson can handle sprawling action on this scale, and Delevingne and DeHaan are both charismatic young actors to have in the lead. By the time Valerian hits, we’ll already have seen her as part of Suicide Squad, where she plays Enchantress. DeHaan, who first made waves with Chronicle, has moved on to the likes of The Amazing Spider-Man 2 and will even play a young Karl Rove in Young Americans (and let us not forget the weird post-apocalyptic Metallica concert movie).

This marks producers EurpaCorp’s most ambitious project to date, and with all kinds of crazy futuristic machines, exotic worlds and peoples, and complex, crazy alien architecture from the comics, Valerian promises to be an epic, inventive time. Maybe it will be all of the things Jupiter Ascending wanted to be but wasn’t.

We're almost through 2014, and for some of us, this is an event worth celebrating. This was an interesting year for movies and movie stars. There was a lot of mud slung from a massive privacy breach. And there were the usual bad choices (and ill fortune) that some of our favorite stars suffered through. It's amazing what anything as small as a cameo or as large as a sleeve of films can do to a person's career, and 2014 showed us that no one is safe from failure in the business they call show.

Here now are 10 movers and shakers who are going to have to put in some overtime in 2015 to repair their damaged images.

10. Will Smith

What's The Damage: Will Smith lost a lot of clout in 2013, with the M. Night Shyamalan stinker After Earth, and he's still paying for it up to this day. Yet despite this horrific waste of a man who's clearly talented when he's at his peak efficiency, there could have been a shot for him to redeem himself this year, with even the smallest of performances. Anyone who's seen Winter's Tale can attest to the fact that his small, but effective, performance as a mysterious character could have granted him some much-needed good will. The only problem is, he decided to use the vastly unseen Winter's Tale as the venue for his talents.

Chances For Recovery In 2015: Good, especially with his casting in Suicide Squad, as well as an NFL drama and a return to cocky R-rated action/comedy in the rather good looking Focus.

9. Chris Pine

What's The Damage: Star Trek alone should be pushing Chris Pine into the stratosphere of modern acting, considering how great he is in the iconic role of Captain Kirk. Unfortunately, this year brought Pine's career out of warp, with Jack Ryan: Shadow Recruit performing rather meh-tacularly at the box office. If Stretch had made it to theaters, Pine could have put himself at even money. Alas, the film was buried on VOD. The kicker for Chris Pine's 2014 is, of course, his performance in Into The Woods, which has garnered positive mentions, but has been overshadowed by the under-performance that is known as Horrible Bosses 2.

Chances For Recovery In 2015: Not Good. Z For Zachariah is the only film Chris Pine has on his slate for 2015, and while that might pull in some teen spending money, it surely isn't going to be anywhere near what other YA adaptations will be bringing in next year.

8. Dane DeHaan

What's The Damage: Dane DeHaan is still somewhat of a rising star, and 2014 should have been his year to shine – especially considering he scored his first big franchise role on the back of a pretty good 2013. It didn't help that said franchise was none other than the sinking ship we call The Amazing Spider-Man 2, and it helped even less that the film turned DeHaan into a sneering mutation of a character that looked like he was going somewhere in the first half. Much like anyone else who had more than one film with Sony this year, Dane DeHaan took a 1,2 punch as Life After Beth wasn't anything to write home about either.

Chances For Recovery In 2015: Good, as he has two films replete with amazing co-stars lined up for 2015: Tulip Fever and Life.

7. Sylvester Stallone

What's The Damage: If you believe in brevity being the soul of wit, there's only one title you need to drop that sums up 2014's damage to Sylvester Stallone's career: The Expendables III. What once was the resurrection of kick-assed, over-the-top 80's action turned itself into a PG-13 kids' table of weak tea carnage. Considering The Expendables was Stallone's huge comeback into the action fold, it's even sadder that the franchise that gave him much to be thankful for would be the one to take it all back. Also, did anyone manage to watch the trailer for Reach Me and not feel like it was some DTV remake of Crash?

Chances For Recovery In 2015: Not Good. Stallone has no films lined up for 2015, but should stay busy making the Rocky reboot/sequel, Creed and an animated film, Animal Crackers. We'll see if either really takes off.

6. Adam Sandler

What's The Damage?: The funny thing about Adam Sandler’s 2014 track record is that he didn’t play it completely safe. Sure, he had a traditional Sandler comedy in the summer bomb Blended, but he hedged his bets big time with two roles outside of his normal wheelhouse. The failure of Men Women And Children was particularly damaging, as it looked like a return to form for Jason Reitman, as well as a dramatic redemption for Sandler. At least, that’s what it looked like heading out of the festivals this year. In the case of The Cobbler, the festival circuit was much less kind, which has the film without any sort of wide release platform as of yet.

Chances For Recovery In 2015: Pretty Good, considering Sandler’s going back to the well with two comedies that look poised to bring back the Happy Madison brand: Pixels, and Hotel Transylvania 2. Not even the Sony hack could stop those two.

5. Angelina Jolie

What’s The Damage: Angelina Jolie’s 2014 is a rather interesting case, considering she had a hell of a year with Maleficent being one of the only non-comic based blockbusters this year had to offer. If she was interested in continuing her acting career, she wouldn’t even be on this list. What’s landed Jolie on this list is a film that should be riding high on a wave of praise. Unbroken, which was snubbed by the Golden Globes, has a 51% on Rotten Tomatoes. What should have been a slam dunk has now become a shaky prospect for future awards consideration, and a middling mark on Jolie’s still fresh directorial career. It also doesn't help that she has been caught up in the controversy involving the hacked Sony emails, which didn't exactly paint her in a positive light.

Chances For Recovery In 2015: So-So. While she and husband Brad Pitt showed a lot of chemistry in Mr. And Mrs. Smith, Angelina Jolie wasn’t writing or directing that picture. To The Sea has her doing both, and that could either spell brilliance or disaster.

4. Liam Neeson

What’s The Damage?: This entry really hurts, as Liam Neeson hasn’t slipped in the quality of his acting, at least not enough that he should be put in movie jail. Rather, his choices have been the factor that’s lead to his sub-par 2014. The biggest dud in Neeson’s canon this year was A Million Ways To Die In The West, but even A Walk Among The Tombstones’ failure to spark anything short of the minimum of praise called the usual Neeson charm and toughness into question. Even his hilarious performance in The LEGO Movie was mitigated by the fact that he was in The Nut Job.

Chances For Recovery In 2015: Good, though Tak3n can harm them just as much as it can help them. Other than that, Ted 2, Run All Night, and Silence all sound interesting enough to fans to hang in for Neeson’s grand return.

3. Johnny Depp

What’s The Damage?: Transcendence should have been a walk in the park for Johnny Depp. Sadly, the lukewarm script and the horrible marketing left this film DOA in the pre-summer months that a film of its stature could have raked in major money. Of course, a big piece of that failure is thinking that a film solely powered on Johnny Depp could have taken on Captain America: The Winter Soldier. As if he hadn’t taken enough of a hit, Into The Woods failed to bring back the musical Johnny Depp everyone remembers fondly, and instead trotted out a man dressed in a silly looking cross between a shag carpet and a zoot suit.

Chances For Recovery In 2015: So-So. Mortdecai looks like the type of film that can either be an unsung masterpiece or an overbloated disaster, while Yoga Hosers might do as much for his career as Tusk did (i.e. nothing.) Fingers crossed for Black Mass

2. Jamie Foxx

What’s The Damage?: The career of Jamie Foxx has been a real grab bag in the past couple of years, with roles both famous and infamous making their way onto his resume. 2014 was pretty consistent though, in that it provided only goose eggs for Foxx, with two of them being massive let downs for the unluckiest studio in town. The Amazing Spider-Man 2 and Annie proceeded to take premises that could have set Foxx up for some prime acting gold, and turn them into huge let downs that had us wondering, "Is this the same Jamie Foxx that made Ray?"

Chances For Recovery In 2015: So-so. All Jamie Foxx has lined up for 2015 is Harmony Korine’s latest film offering, The Trap. Considering Korine’s track record, it’s perfectly OK to start worrying for Foxx’s career right about now.

1. Cameron Diaz

What’s The Damage?: Say what you will about Annie, but at least Jamie Foxx came out of the trailers looking like he could do something with the material that was given to him. The same cannot be said for his co-star, and biggest hit taker of the year, Cameron Diaz. Every advertisement leading up to the film’s release showed that Diaz was going to be a bit hard to watch as an updated Miss Hannigan, and from what’s been said about the film, the rumors were true. Then there was the summer’s biggest misfire since The Amazing Spider-Man 2, Sex Tape, which landed with a thud at an already slumped summer box office.

Chances For Recovery In 2015: Horrible. All that’s on her plate at this point is Bad Teacher 2, and there’s no way that’s being prepped for 2015. Her schedule is open for redemption, provided she doesn’t bail like she did with Men Women And Children.

A hero is usually only as entertaining as his villain. Batman’s nothing without the Joker. Superman pretty much needs Lex Luthor to thrive. And in Marc Webb’s The Amazing Spider-Man 2, our web-slinging crimefighter stares down two classic antagonists from his rich history: Electro (Jamie Foxx) and the Green Goblin (Dane DeHaan).

Admittedly, this is a bit of a departure from classic Spider-Man lore, as Gobby – in Webb’s version – will be played by Harry Osborn, and not Harry’s father figure, Norman Osborn. Recently, Sony was nice enough to invite me and my son to New York City to participate in the press junket for The Amazing Spider-Man 2 and interview the cast. When we sat across from Jamie Foxx and Dane DeHaan, I asked DeHaan to address this important change, and to elaborate on the backstory of the characters of Harry Osborn and Peter Parker (Andrew Garfield), because it is a relationship that is going to be tested in this movie… and in future movies.

My son, P.J., is a huge Spider-Man fan. He loved the character of Electro – a one-time OsCorp employee who encounters a deadly accident on the job site and now has the ability to absorb and channel raw energy. He asked Jamie Foxx what characteristics from his own personal life he drew on to create the identities of Max Dillon and Electro, and was surprised to hear that Foxx drew inspiration from a four-time Oscar-winning actor, director and silver screen icon:

The Amazing Spider-Man 2 exists on an unusual timeline, where Marc Webb and select members of his cast already know that they are expected back for The Amazing Spider-Man 3 and possible spinoff titles like The Sinister Six. But when I asked DeHaan if that knowledge changed the way he approached the role, he surprised me with this confession:

And after grilling them for an interview session P.J. figured he’d get Jamie Foxx and Dane DeHaan out on an easy one. He asked them what scene they most enjoyed filming, and Foxx couldn’t decide on just one, so he shared two hysterical memories from the set.

Marc Webb’s The Amazing Spider-Man 2 will be out in theaters on May 2. We will have plenty more coverage from the New York press day leading up to the film’s release, so keep it locked to CinemaBlend for all of your Spider-Man news!

The very fact that there’s a Tumblr for The Amazing Spider-Man 2 is, in a bubble, completely understandable. Several films have been using that social network service to reach out to audiences and it gives a chance to advertise photos, videos and text at the same time, as well as interact with eager fans. The issue is just, in a bubble, how it fits in with the new approach to the character over at Sony, who charged hard away from Sam Raimi’s analog trilogy to have a sexy, spiky-haired Spidey skateboarding and playing games on his cell phone. It’s an aggressive strategy to appeal to young audience. It’s also, in keeping with Sony’s flashy new edict for the character, absolutely desperate: Tumblr is so two years ago.

A new article just popped up at the Daily Bugle Tumblr (cute), teasing a little more about the film’s plot. The piece explains exactly why the Osborns were not in the first The Amazing Spider-Man, pretending it wasn’t because they were trying to launch a new franchise a la Batman Begins and sought to avoid repeating old foes. Norman Osborn (Chris Cooper) remains in isolation for a period of months, due to some sort of sickness, which could either be helped by the Goblin Serum of the comics, or it could be a red herring, an excuse to get him, and the obvious father-to-son villain progression, out of the way. Harry Osborn (Dane DeHaan), meanwhile, is more of a party boy than his father (and more than sullen James Franco) and he’s partying/studying in Europe, delaying his eventual takeover of the company, which would involve a return to New York.

The trailer seems to suggest that Osborn and Peter Parker are old friends, so an admittedly fresh twist would be the tension between two young friends who have changed greatly since they last saw each other. Having Harry in Europe as a jet-setting type certainly accomplishes this, and the prospect of Garfield and DeHaan (so good as a superpowered type in Chronicle ) acting against each other does promise more charge than pitting Tobey Maguire against James Franco. The article also closes with this painfully-winking quote: "He may be a little green, but the future is bright." At the very least, they aren’t pretending that Osborn becoming the Green Goblin is a surprise, but do these movies really have any surprises anymore? They’ve been promoting this film, half a year away, as if surprises are the enemy.

A very cute detail is that the article is penned by a Joy Mercado, who is actually a character in the Marvel universe, a Bugle writer who eventually became one of the bevy of women Peter Parker dated over the years. She was never turned into a villain, which tends to be the fate of most of Parker’s friends, but the Sinister Six movie is still a few years away. Keep hope alive, Joy Mercado.

"When someone tells you not to be that ambitious, at least me, my first gut reaction is 'I can prove them wrong.' "

That's John Krokidas talking, the writer and director of Kill Your Darlings, but it just as easily could have come from Allen Ginsberg, the central figure of Krokidas's feature directing debut, played as a curious but ambitious college student by Daniel Radcliffe. Krokidas wrote the script with his college roommate Austin Bunn and spent nine grueling years trying to get the film made, frequently reminded that a period piece from a first-time director was no easy sell. After bringing his NYU thesis short film Slo-Mo to the Sundance Film Festival in 2002, "I vowed to come back two years later with my first feature," Krokidas says. That film was Kill Your Darlings. It premiered at Sundance 11 years later.

I met John Krokidas for coffee on the Upper West Side of Manhattan just a week after this year's Sundance Film Festival, where he was staying at a friend's house and still recovering from the whirlwind of the festival. The film earned plenty of attention as "the Daniel Radcliffe gay sex movie," featuring one brief scene of Allen Ginsberg's first gay sex experience, but had plenty of rave reviews in its own right, capturing the energy bordering on insanity of the early Beat movement, when Ginsberg and Jack Kerouac and William S. Burroughs first met and experimented with the drugs and music and literature that would lead them to start a revolution. The actual crux of the story, though, is Lucien Carr, a student at Columbia with Ginsberg who introduced him to Burroughs and Kerouac and who was an writer in his own right until he murdered a man named David Kammerer, and it changed his life.

Kammerer's murder, depicted in the press as an "honor slaying," was a largely secret part of the Beat origin story. Carr, Burroughs, Kerouac and Ginsberg all conspired to put the event behind them. "In the biographies there's always only one paragraph written about the murder," Krokidas explains. "It's almost like the Manchurian Candidate, because all of these paragraphs are written exactly identical to each other." Carr was convicted of manslaughter and served a brief 2-year sentence in jail, and only after his death in 2005 were two key texts about the murder made available to the public-- the short story "And the Hippos Were Boiled in Their Tanks," by Kerouac and Burroughs, and Ginsberg's own college journal. "They all waited until after Lucien passed away," Krokidas says, pointing out that Carr started going by "Lou" after the murder, married a woman and lived a fairly mundane life as an editor for the United Press International. "Once Lucien got out of jail, he made it a strict point that he wanted to live a normal life, the exact life that he was rebelling against a year and a half before."

The historical record is fuzzy on the precise nature of Carr's relationships with both Kammerer and Ginsberg. Kammerer essentially stalked Carr from St. Louis to New York, and was interested in Carr since he was a teenager, but Krokidas says he learned in his research that "there was much more to this relationship than was suggested in the biographies," and that Carr was often as attached to Kammerer as the older man was to him. "All it took was a couple of minutes of research to find out that Lucien got everyone in line-- Burroughs, Kerouac and Ginsberg-- to help him try to portray his relationship with David, which they all knew was a friendship and possibly a deeper relationship, as a relationship where David was a sexual predator." And though Ginsberg is one of history's most famous and outspoken gay writers, and called Carr his first love, it took Krokidas's research to uncover "a weird co-dependent relationship" that the two had for the rest of their lives. Regardless of the truth, Krokidas says, "it's Allen's need to see their relationship, and believing they were once in love, to give him the confidence to write his first story."

Radcliffe has earned plenty of attention, for Kill Your Darlings, and rightly so-- he does fine work to shed his boyish Harry Potter image, he's promoted the film relentlessly, and according to The New York Times he even personally closed the deal for the film's foreign sales rights. Krokidas insists that Radcliffe was his first pick for the role even after Jesse Eisenberg was cast as Ginsberg; "The financier at that time wanted to move really quickly on the film, so I chose my other first choice, which was Jesse." That earlier incarnation of the film, which would have had Chris Evans as Kerouac and Ben Whishaw as Carr, lost its funding, and not long after Eisenberg called Krokidas to say that, after The Social Network, "I think I need to play grown-ups now." Radcliffe still had two Harry Potter films left to go when Krokidas turned to Eisenberg, and when he dropped out the franchise happened to be finished. "I thought to myself, alright-- the role of Allen, in the beginning of the movie he's the dutiful son," says Krokidas. "The world only knows one color of his personality. But he knows he has so much more inside of him that he wants to express. Of course by the end of the movie, he's a rebel, he's a poet, and he finally gets the chance to open up and show the world all the emotions inside him that he's been hiding for so long. And I had a feeling Daniel Radcliffe would be able to relate to this."

Radcliffe jumped on board in late 2011, and despite sales agents who said he "couldn’t open a movie without a wand in his hand," Radcliffe became the crux of finally assembling an indie project that had stopped and started so many times. "I knew he was an incredibly hard worker, and I had heard what a sensitive and smart person he was," says Krokidas, describing their first meeting as an hourlong meeting that turned into six. "But what I didn't know was that he had written some of his own poetry, and loves literature, and was attracted to this role not just on a career level, but on a very personal and intimate level as well."

Krokidas began building a cast around Radcliffe that included a number of buzzy up-and-comers, including Boardwalk Empire's Jack Huston as Kerouac, Martha Marcy May Marlene (and former Sundance sensation) Elizabeth Olsen as Kerouac's girlfriend Edie, Ben Foster as Burroughs and Michael C. Hall as Kammerer. But it's Dane DeHaan's performance as Carr-- alternately sexy, chilly, pretentious and inspiring-- that kicks the film into a more intense, emotional gear, highlighting Ginsberg's intense attraction to him as well as Carr's own ambivalence about the attraction he feels in return. DeHaan, who starred in Chronicle and this year's The Place Beyond The Pines, read with Radcliffe, and as Krokidas describes it brought a laid-back confidence that's only barely present in his real-life personality. "Dan and I both looked at each other like 'Oh my God, do we just offer him the part right now?' What really sealed the deal and let me know that he could play it is after the audition, I said to him as you often do to an actor you're potentially interested in, 'So what's your life like the next couple of months?' And he just leaned back and with a shrug and a smile said 'I don't know, you tell me.' It was that moment that we knew, OK, that seductiveness and cockiness was there."

He doesn't say it out loud, but it's very likely Krokidas borrowed some of that bravado when he stepped on the set, tapping back into the knowledge he'd learned in film school 12 years earlier and grappling with an absurdly shoot 24-day shooting schedule, not only wrangling his large cast but transforming New York City to match the 1944 setting. "The thing about doing a period piece for no money is it's not what you can frame, it's what you can't frame," he says, explaining how they shot a key scene by the banks of the Hudson River way uptown in Inwood, with both DeHaan and Hall descending into the frigid water. "Before we started filming, to build that level of trust, I told them I wouldn't ask them to do anything that I wouldn't do myself. I just exposed them to my confidence and everything that I was afraid of." And the first-time director also got some advice from Radcliffe, who worked with a series of different directors and a massive, experienced crew for his entire childhood on the Harry Potter set. "Dan did say to me, though, he gave me a good lesson-- when the shit hits the fan during production and very one's falling apart or nervous or worried they won't get the scene, I did have to be the leader, and I did have to be confident. And one of the ways I did that was to think of all of my friends, who were just if not more talented than I am, who still haven't gotten their shots. To be honest, that worked."

Since Sundance Krokidas has traveled the globe with the film, to festivals in Cannes and Venice and Toronto, enjoying a spotlight and rave reviews for a film he says was born, primarily, out of anger. "In order for me to write anything, there was to be something that pisses me off. When I learned that in 1944 you could literally get away with murder by portraying your victim as a homosexual predator, it infuriated me." Krokidas was also inspired by Ginsberg as a teenager, like millions of other teens, but particularly as a closeted 17-year-old living in suburban Connecticut. "Reading Allen Ginsberg-- he wrote decades before, but he was so explicit about his sexuality, his emotions. He really put his gut into his art, and dare I say his semen out there. And how attractive is that to a closeted 17-year-old who's really afraid to express himself?" A major thread in Kill Your Darlings has Ginsberg and Carr reading and reveling in books so naughty they were banned by the Columbia library, an experience Krokidas had himself with Ginsberg's own work. "I remember sitting in a college library reading Reality Sandwiches, and I was reading it like it was a dirty novel. I didn't want other people to see." Carr gave Ginsberg the ambition to write what seemed forbidden and impossible to him. And Ginsberg did the same for Krokidas.

(Photo of John Krokidas with Daniel Radcliffe via ChinellatoPhoto / Shutterstock.com)

Cinema is a place where coincidence, fate and potentially terrible decisions abound on a daily basis. Try this one on for size. Back in 2001, James Franco played the title role in the TV movie James Dean, making people think that Dean has been resurrected, and soon after took the role of Harry Osborn in Sam Raimi’s Spider-Man. Fast forward 11 years, where Dane DeHaan is filling the young Osborn role in Marc Webb’s The Amazing Spider-Man 2 next year, and ScreenDaily reports he has now signed on to play James Dean in Life, Anton Corbijn’s biopic about the near-legendary road trip between Dean and photographer Dennis Stock, as printed in Life Magazine. Playing Stock is none other than Robert Pattinson, though I don’t have any coincidences to bring up where his role is concerned. Just a very concerned raised eyebrow.

FilmNation Entertainment will be in Toronto in search of buyers for the script, written by Australian poet and novelist Luke Davies, who adapted his own novel for Neil Armfield’s 2006 romance with Heath Ledger. I’m guessing there’s going to be quite a bit of interest. Or perhaps even more raised eyebrows.

Back in 1955, Stock was a photographer for Magnum, and struck up a friendship with Dean, following him and taking his photographs across the country. This was right before Dean’s stardom took a huge leap with the release of East of Eden, and seven months before his untimely death and subsequent icon status. One of Hollywood’s most memorable actors after all these years, and Dane DeHaan is stepping into that role. I have to keep saying his whole name to try and work my brain around the idea. I’m less familiar with the image and persona of Stock, so my judgment of Pattinson for the part is mostly clouded by a blasé non-appreciation for him in most movies. (Fingers crossed that David Cronenberg’s Maps to the Stars is outstanding.)

FilmNation is reteaming with their King’s Speech co-producers at See-Saw Films, which could be a good or a bad sign. FilmNation also has Mud and The Skin I Live In behind them, as well as a bunch of lame thrillers. But they’ve been wading in more prestigious waters, with Terrance Malick’s next project down the road. (Along with a couple of thrillers whose lameness is pending.)

A Canadian production is already being planned for February, but don’t forget the James Dean Blu-ray collection is coming out in November. Get on that.

This has been an unusually strong year for star-studded horror comedies, most notably Thomas Lennon and Robert Ben Garant’s Hell Baby, Jacob Vaughn’s Bad Milo, and even Jonathan Levine’s Warm Bodies and Paul Middleditch’s Rapture-Palooza. Hollywood’s biggest and brightest are no longer so wary of starring in flicks that mix scares with the laughter. XYZ Films’ Life After Beth, the directorial debut from I Heart Huckabees co-writer Jeff Baena, is the latest star-studded sub-genre offering. And according to ScreenDaily, it has wrapped its Los Angeles production just in time for the producers to seek international distribution at the Toronto Film Festival, which begins this week. Sony Pictures Classics will be handling the film’s U.S. release, which means it might make it to more than just three theaters.

Since we last reported on Life After Beth, the film has amassed a major cast. Not only are Parks and Recreation’s Aubrey Plaza and John C. Reilly starring, but there’s also Dane DeHaan (The Place Beyond the Pines), Molly Shannon (Saturday Night Live), Paul Reiser (Mad About You), Cheryl Hines (Curb Your Enthusiasm), Anna Kendrick (Pitch Perfect) and Matthew Gray Gubler (Criminal Minds). Kendrick gets extra credit for also having starred in Rapture-Palooza, but then loses those points since that movie wasn’t that great.

Produced by American Zoetrope, Starstream Entertainment and Abbolita Productions, Life After Beth falls into the vastly overworked zombie subset, and follows Zach (DeHaan), a young man whose life is turned upside-down when his recently deceased girlfriend comes back to life. I’m not even sure if Kendrick or Plaza is the zombified love interest. As far as I can tell, Shannon and Reiser will play the parents to DeHaan and Gubler, while Hines and Reilly will play Plaza’s parents.

It’s unfortunate that Baena has no previous work to compare this film to. Considering Huckabees was a David O. Russell movie, there’s no telling where his work ended and Baena’s began. We can’t even tell if this will be a balls-to-the-wall comedy or something more subtle. The only other thing Baena has been attached to is Revenge of the Jocks, a plot flip on Revenge of the Nerds, which doesn’t get my hopes up. DeHaan and Reilly make it especially hard to gauge, since they’re also known for their dramatic work. But Reilly can act in just about anything under the sun, so I’m not too worried.

XYZ Films, who released the ridiculously awesome horror Frankenstein’s Army, is taking a few other potential sales to Toronto, including another horror comedy, Stung, and the Dutch crime thriller Wolf. Another one of their films also finished shooting recently, the highly anticipated sequel to Gareth Evans’ The Raid: Redemption.

I wouldn’t expect it to take long for someone to snatch this film up, as its $2.4 million budget makes it seem like an easy movie to profit from, given the popularity of its central cast. Does it sound interesting to you guys?

It’s positively mindboggling that hard rock artists Metallica have created a film whose existence is even more indecipherable than the feature-length therapy session that was Metallica: Some Kind of Monster, but Metallica Through the Never is indeed that film. The film’s first theatrical trailer seen above that they premiered at Comic-Con, via iTunes Movie Trailers, looks like the kind of lucid dream one would have after passing out on a needle filled with testosterone and fireworks. It isn’t entirely a concert film, it isn’t entirely a narrative film, and it damned sure isn’t entirely in two dimensions. I think this may be the film that whiskey was invented for.

Here are the pieces of Through the Never that I understand. Metallica is holding a concert on a huge ass stage for thousands of adoring fans that love screaming the chorus of “Enter Sandman” probably more than lead singer James Hetfield at this point. Meanwhile, on the fictional front, Dane DeHaan (The Amazing Spider-Man 2) plays a roadie for the band who is tasked with going find an out-of-gas truck in the middle of the city. Because he does what they tell him. He gets into an awful car accident, and then he wakes up in the middle of a riot or something. Hundreds of guys with bandanas over their faces take on a slew of cops in riot gear. There are bloody handprints. Metallica’s stage show gets insanely over the top and destructive.

And then this guy shows up.

Then they start playing “One,” and I kind of started rocking out, not bothering to make sense of the cop cars on fire and DeHaan shaking the Earth when he smashes a guitar into the ground. Unless they’re really hiding where the rest of the story goes, it doesn’t look like the narrative is much more than a few sequences of surreal anarchy.

This movie exists for two reasons (besides making Metallica money, that is): to give fans around the world that can’t make it to their concerts a chance to see the band play a stage show unlike any other, and to make lasers look cool in 3D. I’m not a big 3D fan outside of animation, and I don’t think a concert film in 3D is all that enticing, but I have to admit that would be the way I’d go if I’d ever watch it. I mean, somebody lassos a guy in 3D. In a Metallica movie. I’m getting goosebumps, people.

Metallica Through the Never, which has yet to actually feature the song “Through the Never,” will hit IMAX 3D theaters exclusively on September 27, eventually branching out to all theaters on October 4.

Take a look at the film’s new poster, which was unveiled along with the trailer. Notice the band playing in DeHaan’s bandana. It’s kind of cool, right?

We've been paying close attention to the photos from the set of The Amazing Spider-Man 2 that reveal Jamie Foxx in costume as Electro, especially since they seem to suggest the character is fusing somehow with an eel. But now we've gotten a look at another of the film's potential villain, with Dane DeHaan himself tweeting our first look at Harry Osborn, which you see above.

The look is everything we expected, and not just because Harry looks pretty much like Dane DeHaan with very carefully controlled hair. He's stepping into the kind of black SUV every New Yorker has seen parked outside a fancy establishment, waiting for rich kids just like Harry to slip into the back. He's wearing a suit, as you'd expect for a rich college boy, but it's got a checked pattern that suggests he's not your average prepster, something that will probably help him fit in with Andrew Garfield's version of Peter Parker, who's a bit hipper than Tobey Maguire's take on the character.

Does this image tell us much about the film? Not really. But we've been over the moon about DeHaan's presence in the film since he was first cast, and that excitement has only built after seeing him kill it in films like Sundance's Kill Your Darlings and the recent The Place Beyond The Pines. The Amazing Spider-Man 2 has set up an incredible cast, but even with Paul Giamatti and Jamie Foxx playing elaborate villains, it's DeHaan I'm most excited to see turn dark.

The Amazing Spider-Man 2 opens May 2.

The Place Beyond the Pines is being sold as a matchup between two of the most popular and well-regarded leading men working today, Bradley Cooper and Ryan Gosling. But what you might not know, thanks to his leading role in the film's final half-hour, is that Dane DeHaan plays just as large a role, and is rising so fast you'll know his name as well as Cooper's and Gosling's very soon.

DeHaan broke out big time last year with his lead role in the surprise hit Chronicle, playing the troubled teen with newfound superpowers who eventually uses his strengths for evil. With a vital supporting turn in Lawless and quick appearance in Steven Spielberg's Lincoln DeHaan soon became a familiar face, and now that he's been cast as Harry Osborn in the upcoming The Amazing Spider-Man 2, he's about to become a whole lot more familiar to movie fans. But why not get to know him now and be the first person on the bandwagon?

In the video above I talk to DeHaan about his role as a deeply troubled teenager-- the son of Gosling's character, who we meet 16 years after Gosling's story takes place-- in The Place Beyond the Pines, and how at 27 years old he still finds satisfaction playing characters nearly a decade younger than he is. He also talks about how director Derek Cianfrance's intensive working process on Pines is something he'll take with him into other roles-- including Harry Osborn. The Place Beyond the Pines is currently open in limited release, and it's really good. You can click here to find out where it's playing near you.

James Franco, God love him, has pretty much stopped caring if you like him. In fact he seems to take complete glee in subverting the idea of what a movie star should be; at Sundance, when he was premiering his experimental and very explicit film Interior Leather Bar, he seemed to be glowing from within with the knowledge that he was about to headline a huge Disney movie, Oz The Great And Powerful, in just a few months.

Franco can't come right out now and say he thinks Oz The Great And Powerful will be silly, but he has no fear saying that about other franchises-- and especially those that mimic one he already made. Asked by MTV at Sundance what he thought about The Amazing Spider-Man, Franco didn't exactly trash it, but he certainly didn't mince words about the film that he too thought was a little too similar to the original Spider-Man.

At the beginning of the clip Franco is being asked about Dane DeHaan, who has been cast as Harry Osborn in the next Spider-Man film, and was having his own good run at Sundance with a supporting role in Kill Your Darlings. DeHaan seems to have what it takes to be the next Franco-- a talented actor who could use the exposure in Spider-Man to move on to bigger things-- and maybe Franco knows it, which explains why he doesn't seem to care. But really, this isn't the start of a cat fight. This is an actor being honest for once, and saying what we were all thinking when The Amazing Spider-Man came out: why isn't this more original? It worked out, for the most part, but I can't necessarily blame Franco for thinking it didn't.

What on earth did the world need with another movie about the Beats? The loose-knit band of writers who inspired millions of high schoolers to recreate their own On the Road-style adventures have been celebrated endlessly in culture, and pretty much zero adaptations of their work have ever matched their fluid, emotional style. Kill Your Darlings, which premiered here at Sundance, doesn't really do that either, but it's got plenty else going to recommend it-- including a performance from Daniel Radcliffe that seems to prove, at last, that he really is an actor worth watching.

Casting Harry Potter as a young, sexually confused Allen Ginsberg reeks of the worst kind of stunt casting, and it's very possible that plenty of the Sundance audiences that flocked to it here were just in it for the shock of seeing Radcliffe in a gay sex scene. But with dark brown contact lenses and a mop of curly hair, plus Ginsberg's signature blocky glasses, Radcliffe slips seamlessly into the role, and offers a stillness and vulnerability that the Harry Potter films simply didn't give him time for. As the wide-eyed newcomer to the world of Kerouac and Burroughs, Ginsberg is probably the least interesting character in Kill Your Darlings, but Radcliffe makes him relatable and sometimes heartbreaking, with canny indications of the genius he would become.

And it's through Ginsberg's eyes that we meet the film's most dynamic, fascinating and terrifyingly sexy character, Lucien Carr (Dane DeHaan), a classmate of Ginsberg's at Columbia who introduced him to Kerouac and Ginsberg and was fundamental in founding the Beat movement. DeHaan put in two fantastic performances in 2012, as the lead in Chronicle and a supporting part in Lawless, but he too is transformed here, playing the seductive and mercurial Carr as exactly the kind of charismatic talker who has the power to start revolutions. Even saddled with chunky lines of dialogue like "Let's come up with our own words, new rhythms" DeHaan's Carr is perfectly convincing, and when his flirtation with Ginsberg becomes less innocent for both of them, both boys' confused longing puts a flourish of heartbreak on a story that might have steered too intellectual.

Rounding out the quartet of big thinkers are a fantastic and dryly funny Ben Foster as Burroughs and Jack Huston, best known as Richard Harrow on Boardwalk Empire, as a brawny Kerouac. There's plenty of time spent with this bunch as they wax poetic about their ideas-- and director John Krokidas nicely illustrates their rhythmic, hallucinatory writing with scenes set in jazz clubs both imaginary and real-- but the main story centers on a murder in which all four were implicated. Handed a narrow story with its own narrative power, Kill Your Darlings does away with the exhausting biopic tendency to show off every aspect of greatness, and simply tells this one slice of Ginsberg's life in intimate, fascinating detail.

Picked up by boutique label Sony Pictures Classics, Kill Your Darlings is even more accessible and entertaining than last year's Kerouac adaptation On the Road, and fans of Radcliffe and DeHaan could have the power to make it a small-scale hit. Even audiences who think they're exhausted by the endless lionization of the Beats ought to be able to find something new in this surprisingly resonant and beautifully acted film.

For our entire Sundance Film Festival coverage, click here.

With The Amazing Spider-Man set for a 2014 release, the casting process is happening fast, and one big piece of the puzzle clicked into place today when Dane DeHaan signed on to play Harry Osborn, Peter Parker's best friend and eventual nemesis.

Odds are you know who Harry Osborn is, since he was played by James Franco in the original Sam Raimi-directed Spider-Man trilogy. But much as Franco was when he was first cast as Harry, DeHaan is a major unknown, with only a handful of roles that introduced him to Hollywood-- and almost all of them in films that have come out in the last year. So lucky for you, even though DeHaan isn't a household name right now, it won't take long to catch up. Here's your quick guide to getting to know the new Harry Osborn.

In Treatment

The intense HBO drama was a showcase for all kinds of recently up and coming actors, notably Mia Wasikowska, and DeHaan appeared on the third season of the show as the gay, defiant and promiscuous teenager Jesse. And like most everyone else who's ever appeared on the show, he earned raves for his deeply felt performance. You can see a clip of DeHaan's work on the show here.

Chronicle

This surprise hit movie-- $126 million worldwide gross on a $12 million budget-- was a huge breakthrough for nearly everyone involved, but as the intense central character Drew, DeHaan may have had the biggest impact. He transforms the character from emotionally overwhelmed teenager into a terrifying force with remarkable subtlety, and really anchors the movie as the character holding the camera through the majority of the found-footage film. If you want to see what he can do with a character like Harry Osborn, fated to become a villain, Chronicle is the perfect place to start.

Lawless

This stylish Depression-era bootlegger film sadly went unnoticed when it was released this summer, despite a killer cast that includes Tom Hardy, Jessica Chastain, Guy Pearce and Shia LaBeouf. DeHaan more than held his own among those big names, as the physically handicapped Cricket, eager accomplice to LaBeouf's enterprising bootlegger. It's solid proof that, even in a wide-ranging film with bigger names, DeHaan will be able to make an impact.

Lincoln

DeHaan's role in Steven Spielberg's new film is so small it's almost silly to include it, but it is playing in theaters now, and he does get to recite part of the Gettysburg Address to the President himself in the film's opening scene. I have no idea why he's got such a tiny role in this film, but doesn't it speak well of him that Spielberg wanted him on board?

Dane Dehaan is no stranger to the superhero world. Earlier this year the young star got his breakout role playing the dangerously powerful Andrew Detmer in Josh Trank's found footage thriller Chronicle, and now he's turning that underground turn into his first blockbuster role. Dehaan has been confirmed to star as Harry Osborn in the upcoming sequel to The Amazing Spider-Man.

The casting news comes from the most reliable source you can find: the director. Marc Webb, who helmed the first movie as well, took to his Twitter account this morning and wrote the simple message, "Meet Harry Osborn. @danedehaan" with a picture of Dehaan attached.

The role most most notably played by James Franco in the Sam Raimi trilogy, playing both a friend of Peter Parker's (Tobey Maguire) and a deadly enemy of Spider-Man's. Harry also happens to be the son of Norman Osborn, who is generally identified as webhead's greatest foe, the Green Goblin.

In addition to Andrew Garfield and Emma Stone, who are set to reprise their respective roles as Spider-Man and Gwen Stacey, the new film has also cast Shailene Woodley as Mary Jane Watson and Jamie Foxx as the villainous Electro.

Little is known about the plot of the sequel - which doesn't even have an official title yet - but the script is being done by Star Trek Into Darkness scribes Alex Kurtzman and Bob Orci. Columbia Pictures has announced that the movie will be released on May 2, 2014, and stick around for more news about the project as it develops.

Who will be the next James Franco? Not actually replacing James Franco, of course-- I'm not sure anybody could do that if they tried. But one young up-and-coming actor is going to get the same big break Franco did 10 years ago: the chance to play Harry Osborn in a big Spider-Man movie.

Though Peter Parker's pal Harry was absent from this summer's The Amazing Spider-Man, the character will appear as a college-aged kid in the upcoming sequel, and according to The Hollywood Reporter director Marc Webb is already eyeing a few specific actors to take the part. There's Brady Corbet, who's made his name in indies like Martha Marcy May Marlene Simon Killler; there's Dane DeHaan, who was stunning in the low-budget superhero smash Chronicle earlier this year; and there's Alden Ehrenreich, who's staring in the upcoming novel adaptation Beautiful Creatures. THR is careful to note that the character is still evolving, and the list of actors could change-- Harry was to start off as a big, athletic type but has apparently been adjusted to be more "dark and edgy," which sounds like it will make him pretty similar to the version Franco played in the original Spider-Man.

It continues to be fascinating to watch how the new Spider-Man movies handle age, since their star Andrew Garfield is a 29-year-old playing a high school kid, and everyone has to be cast to look reasonable around him. There's already the challenge of 21-year-old Shailene Woodley being cast as Peter's future love interest, Mary Jane Watson, and now all three of these actors listed for Harry are younger than Garfield by about 4 years. Of course, this is movie magic, and they can make these things work. But given that Dane DeHaan is 25 and looks about 15, it could be very odd seeing him square off against a very grown-up looking Garfield.

We'll let you know if they confirm anyone for the cast, of course, as soon as we know ourselves. The Amazing Spider-Man is currently set for release on May 2, 2014.

As Atom Egoyan's West Memphis Three drama The Devil's Knot heads toward its fast-approaching start date, its cast is filling up fast with incredible talent. Earlier this week, Alessandro Nivola, Collette Wolfe, Kris Polaha and Justin Castor joined the ensemble that already boasts Mireille Enos, Reese Witherspoon and Colin Firth, and now Variety has uncovered that Oscar-nominee Amy Ryan (Gone Baby Gone) and Chronicle's Dane DeHaan have entered into early negotiations to see if they can fit the feature into their hectic summer schedules.

Based on investigative journalist Mara Leveritt's bestselling book that explored the infamous murder case, Devil's Knot unfolds the mystery of who killed three young boys in West Memphis, Arkansas in the spring of 1993 through the eyes of Ron Lax (Firth), a private detective who took on the case pro bono. Through his exhaustive investigation Lax uncovered DNA evidence that linked one of the murdered boy's stepfather (Nivola) to the crime, making the first step to setting free Damien Echols, Jessie Misskelley Jr., and Jason Baldwin, who'd been dubbed The West Memphis Three.

Ryan has just wrapped on the Stallone-Schwarzenegger action-thriller The Tomb, but if Devil's Knot producers can cajole their shooting schedule to serve her, she'll portray Lax's frustrated wife, who is well on her way to divorcing her husband during the course of the drama. As for DeHaan, the rising star is getting married this summer, but should he be able to fit in this feature he'd play "a teen who has some history with the three murdered boys."

The Devil's Knot will roll into production in Georgia, on June 25th.

Michael B. Jordan has certainly kept busy over the years. He had The Wire back in 2002, then it was on to All My Children for nearly four years after which he moved over to The Assistants and then hit Friday Night Lights and Parenthood. When did this guy have time to make two movies? Jordan had a part in the January 20th release Red Tails and now he’s returning to the big screen yet again in Josh Trank’s Chronicle.

Jordan stars as Steve Montgomery, the quintessential big man on campus. He’s a star athlete, running for class president and is a favorite amongst the ladies. However, one night, Steve winds up adding another skill to his resume – superpowers. When Steve and Matt (Alex Russell) stumble upon a bizarrely deep hole in the woods during a party, they recruit Matt’s cousin Andrew (Dane DeHaan) to bring his camera and film what happens when they go inside – but the bigger deal is what they end up filming after.

As a self-proclaimed comic book nerd, playing a super powered teen is a dream come true for Jordan. Sure it wasn’t easy working within the found footage realm, which required him to be on his toes for particularly long takes, but having the ability to fly and move cars with his mind-- or at least seem like he could-- made it worth it.

In advance of Chronicle’s February 3rd debut, Jordan took the time to run through the whole procedure from landing the role and working with a rising young cast and crew to manning up for his stunts. Check it all out in the interview below.

You’ve done a few films, but your resume is packed with TV work. How did Chronicle sneak in there? Was it just the right time when the script came along?

Yeah, I think it was just the timing and everything worked out for it. When I read the script, it was like I was picking up a comic book for the first time; I was super excited about it. It was a really good read. As soon as I picked it up, I didn’t put it down. I read it twice, back to back. I called my team and I was like, ‘Look, I’ve gotta get on this project. This is it. This is the one I wanna do,’ and it just worked out. I was finished with Parenthood and had the opportunity to go and shoot for a couple of months and I took it and I went.

Did you have any preconceptions about found footage films or superhero movies before getting involved?

A little bit. You have your stereotypical superhero films and you have your typical found footage films. I guess if you had to put us in a box, it’d be a found footage movie, but it’s so much more than that. It’s not about what happens next or shaky camera angles and this monster or this building, whatever it may be; it’s about these characters that you find yourself with at the beginning of the movie. And it’s a new take on superheroes. It’s a fresh take on an old idea. There’s no tights, no spandex, no masks, none of that stuff; it’s real kids and what they would do if they had powers. That’s one of the things that drew me to it because it was such a grounded film.

Are these the kind of things you’d do if you had superpowers?

Yeah, I think along those lines. I think you’d start off small scale, me figuring out what it was, what I could do, my limits and then the mischievous stuff with the girls and all that stuff, however it could benefit me and then I’m pretty sure I would do something that was completely out of line and got completely out of hand and I would probably get in trouble and have to reel it back in and then make an apology and then hopefully everything would be fine. [Laughs]

I’m thinking just the flying would help. Anything to keep me off the subway.

Oh, yeah! That’d be awesome to be able to travel. I love traveling. You would go wherever you wanted to go, no TSA. No TSA, how awesome would that be?

So, once you got the part, what’d you do next? Is there any personal preparation you like to do after landing a role?

Not really. This is actually one of those fun roles where it’s like I’m a comic geek. I grew up watching cartoons and Marvel comics, X-Men and all of that stuff, so when I finally had the chance to play a superhero and use my imagination, it was just like a dream come true. It was just fun. There wasn’t a lot of prep I had to do besides knowing things for all the high wire stuff, the flying rigs and really getting my core strong. That was kind of the only real prep that we did as far as shooting’s concerned. I was in the best shape of my life a couple of months ago! [Laughs]

I’m going to give away my Friday Night Lights obsession with this, but Steve is an all-star athlete who throws a mean football. Did you find any of Vince sneaking into him?

No, not even a little bit. Steve and Vince are two completely different characters and I think that was another reason why I was drawn to this character. Steven Montgomery was originally Steven Kaczynski. He used to be written for a white Jewish guy, which was cool because there’s no stereotype for a black guy playing a Jewish guy, so I went in there and I kind of had a completely fresh new take that he’s well off, he wants to go into politics, Steve is running for senior class president. Yeah, he’s a jock. He just so happens to be playing football, Vince played football, so that’s the only similarity between the two characters.

And how about working on the project with Josh? What kind of direction and advice did he have for you?

Josh is great. He had this project mapped out in his head. He knew exactly what he wanted and being a first time film director at 27, I’m in my early 20s, Dane’s in his 20s, Alex’s in his 20s, Max Landis, the writer, is in his 20s, it was like a new fresh wave, a new energy, just the next generation. Josh was great with letting up collab. What we thought was relevant. We spoke the same language. And it was the first time I was working with a director that was so close in age to myself so I felt like I could do that a little bit more on this project. A lot of growing was done on this film.

What was the environment like on set? A group of guys in their 20s, I’d like to bet you had a good time.

Yeah, for the most part. Well, it was long days. We were all in a position of like, ‘Oh my god, we can’t fuck this up. Don’t fuck this up!’ That was everyday, we’d just go to work and give it 110% all day, every day because we know what’s at stake. I think when you have everybody from the PA to the writer to the director to the producers to the actors, everybody doing the best job they can do to make a great movie, that translates to the film and I think that’s what we got and that’s what we did.

And what was the set like in terms of equipment? Did you actually shoot any of it on a smaller camera?

No. I think we shot on an Alexa. We shot on a big camera. They had a prop small digital camera, but everything was done with the big boy, so we shot with all the regular equipment that a full-sized production would have shot on. We didn’t hold back anything. If anything, we used new technology on this film.

How’d that work with the blocking because you’ve got to appear like you’re holding the camera at times?

Yeah, it was a lot of off screen lines. The greatest thing about the film is usually how a conventional film is shot, I’ll shoot your coverage, you shoot my coverage, you do a wide establishing shot, etc. With this film, there’s only one take. There is no edits, there’s no cuts. Each scene would be somebody turning on and off a camera, so we’d start off in a wide shot and then it could turn into a single and then turn into another single and everybody’s on all the time. There is no saving your performance for the next take or saving your performance until it’s your close-up. Everybody was on all the time. And that was something to get used to. That was a muscle I hadn’t used in a long time. It kind of reminded me of theater. As we continued to shoot and the weeks went on, I got more and more comfortable with this single camera style of shooting.

You’ve got the single camera and are doing really long takes, but how many takes are you doing? Did you have enough shooting time to do each shot a few times?

Yeah, we got some takes in. If you mess up, you start over. [Laughs] We have these scenes, it’s like a minute and a half, two-minute, three-minute scenes and for an actor to be on beat emotionally or wherever you need to be and make sure you’re where you need to be with the blocking. Everything was precise. Rehearsal and preparation was very key to shooting this film and if we got it wrong or some timing was off, you start over from the beginning and do it again.

How do the stunts factor in? I imagine there was a lot of green screen here.

We did most of our own stunts for the most part. We did a lot of them. There were certain things that obviously we couldn’t pull off like smashing the cars, but the scene where I dive into the lake, that was all me. With stunts it was pretty extensive. A lot of our gags were practical, like the car, but also a lot of special effects were added in after. We could actually see the practical rigs and everything. The green screen stuff was more of less with the flying. Everything else that you see us doing was more or less practical.

So, for example, what about the baseball scene? What’s the movie magic behind that one?

I actually hit Alex in the face with the baseball the first couple times. [Laughs] And then another few times, there was nothing there at all. Everybody’s just trying to be on the same page, everybody have the same eye line, stuff like that.

Red Tails just hit theaters a few weeks ago and now you’ve got this, but do you have anything else on your plate right now?

I’ve got House coming out later on this month. I shot that a few weeks ago and that was a lot of fun, House on FOX, and I play Will Westwood, he’s a blind character. He’s been blind since birth, which is a very interesting role. It’s a fun episode, so you guys are gonna really enjoy that. And then after that it’s just literally trying to figure out what I’m doing next. I’m enjoying myself. I’ve been enjoying this time. I know it’s very rare when you get two movies in two weeks. To shoot two movies a year, that’s a big deal, so for me I’m just kind of enjoying this ride right now because I know it doesn’t happen often.