Recently, a rumor swept the web that Battleship star and pop singer Rihanna had been offered a villain role in Fast Six, Justin Lin’s newest installment in the popular Fast and Furious franchise. The source wasn’t exactly reputable (I won’t even link to it now to give it the extra traffic), but many – myself included – speculated that the 24-year-old Rihanna wasn’t going to be much of a threat to guys like Vin Diesel, Paul Walker, Dwayne Johnson, or even female co-stars Jordana Brewster and Michelle Rodriguez. Now it appears that rumor may have been indeed been unfounded, because Twitch is reporting that the villain role in Fast Six has been offered to British actor Luke Evans.

Keep in mind this is still just an offer, but this is more like it when it comes to a potentially threatening villain. Evans doesn’t have nearly the physical presence of guys like Diesel and Johnson, but in films like The Raven, Immortals, and even The Three Musketeers, he’s shown that he can balance physicality with intelligence.

Since the Fast Six is set to be shot in the UK and Germany, it makes sense for the team to be facing off against a British actor. Unfortunately that won’t be Jason Statham – seriously, how awesome would that have been? – but Evans is a decent enough replacement and will certainly add to the talent involved, which includes recent addition Gina Carano.

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Following the $600m+ success of Fast Five this summer Universal wasted no time in getting Vin Diesel, Paul Walker, writer Chris Morgan and director Justin Lin back for the next film. Recently there were murmurs that a back-to-back shoot was being planned for the sixth and seventh films, and now reports suggest they could have one big linking storyline.

From 24 Frames:

Eager to move ahead with new installments of what’s currently the studio’s hottest series, Universal Pictures is considering shooting its sixth and seventh “Fast and Furious” movies back-to-back with a single story connecting the two films.

Universal already has penciled in a May 24, 2013, release for “Fast and the Furious 6,” but the consecutive shooting schedule may result in a later launch, as Lin would be shooting the seventh film before he could edit the sixth. By making the two movies together, the seventh film could be in theaters sooner than the typical two-year gap between the Vin Diesel movies.

Shooting both movies at the same time is often less expensive than if both movies were shot separately. The Matrix, Pirates of the Caribbean and The Lord of the Rings sequels were shot back-to-back, and James Cameron will be doing the same for Avatar 2 and 3.

Story details on Fast and Furious 6 and 7 haven’t been released, although Universal chairman Adam Fogelson said he hopes to transform the street-racing franchise into a series of heist films to attract a wider audience. The thinking is that more people will turn up if they are action films with cars, rather than car films with action. Fogelson also said Dwayne Johnson (who played a federal agent assigned to track down the Fast Five gang) will be “integral to the action in Fast Six.”

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Following the success of Fast Five ($600m worldwide) director Justin Lin suddenly found himself in demand. He signed a two-year production deal with Universal (which involved directing Fast Six), a first-look deal with Sony Pictures TV to develop TV projects, and became the director of choice for Terminator 5 following discussions with Arnold Schwarzenegger.

However, the problem for Lin is that both Fast Six and Terminator 5 are priority projects for those involved, and with both hoping to get started next year Lin has had to leave the Terminator franchise behind. For now.

From Deadline:

Things are starting to move on The Terminator franchise, but a plan by rights owner Megan Ellison and Arnold Schwarzenegger to put the first of two pictures in production for the fourth quarter of 2012 has forced director Justin Lin to drop out. But borrowing the film’s signature phrase “I’ll be back,” Lin has left the door open to a return if Ellison and Schwarzenegger will wait until he completes the sixth installment of The Fast and the Furious franchise.

The rush to continue the Terminator franchise is mainly due to the fact in 2018 the Terminator rights will revert back to James Cameron, who directed the first two films, but until then whoever holds the rights has time to make at least two more movies. True Grit producer Megan Ellison bought the rights back in May, and is now hoping to get a screenwriter, director and studio involved so production can begin in late-2012.

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Things are moving forward on the Terminator front. According to Deadline True Grit producer Megan Ellison has won an auction for the rights to make at least two more Terminator movies, with Justin Lin (Fast Five) attached to direct and Arnold Schwarzenegger attached to star.

Apparently Lionsgate were on the verge of wrapping up the auction, but Ellison’s Annapurna Films came in with a higher bid which is speculated to be around $20 million.

What’s interesting is that Megan Ellison and Annapurna Films appear to be decent producers. They have crime drama The Wettest County in the World with Shia LaBeouf, Tom Hardy, Gary Oldman and Mia Wasikowska out next year, and recently wrapped Cogan’s Trade starring Brad Pitt.

No studio is currently attached to the Terminator project yet, but it will only be a matter of time. Personally I think the franchise has run its course, but if they bring good writers on-board to write the script it will boost confidence in the project. Fast Five may just be a summer popcorn flick, but it’s actually the best reviewed movie of franchise so Justin Lin may be able to make something worthwhile with a decent script.

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I’m an unapologetic fan of the Fast and Furious franchise. Justin Lin has revitalized a franchise once thought to be near death, and by restructuring the timeline (which currently sits at 1, 2, 4, 5, 3) writer Chris Morgan has turned what was once simply a remake of Point Break – set in the world of street racing instead of surfing – into one of the most entertaining action franchises currently in Hollywood. The newest addition, Fast Five, reunites all the major players of the series and continues its tradition of providing audiences with big, dumb, overcharged fun drenched in testosterone.

The film picks up where Fast and Furious left off: Dominic Toretto (Diesel) has been sentenced to 25 years without parole, and it’s up to former FBI agent Brian O’Connor (Walker) and his girlfriend Mia Toretto (Brewster) to bust Dom out. After a ludicrous bus crash sequence, our lovable group of antiheroes flees to Rio de Janeiro, where they can catch their breath and lay low for a while. (The audience never forgets they’re in Rio, because there are no less than four excessive sweeping helicopter shots of the giant Jesus statue overlooking the city.) But since the audience doesn’t want to see a movie about people sitting around and waiting for the heat to blow over, Brian and Mia sign up for a job almost instantly after arriving. Their mission: boost a series of cars from a moving train. This sets up one of the best action sequences in a movie full of them – I won’t go into the details, but it’s a great sequence, well paced and executed with style by Justin Lin, who I really feel is coming into his own as a director.

The worst part about this new gig is the boosted cars belonged to Reyes, the resident villain who practically owns all of Rio (including their entire police force). He’s none too pleased to be put out; he’s searching for something that’s in one of those cars. So it’s up to Dom, Mia, and Brian to find out what it is and use it to take Reyes for all he’s worth. And good news for fans of this series: there are a ton of familiar faces, including Tyrese and Ludacris from 2 Fast 2 Furious, Vince from the original, Han from Tokyo Drift, and many more. But that’s not all: this franchise gets a boost of energy from Dwayne Johnson as Hobbs, a special agent tasked with tracking the Toretto crew down. I imagine Chris Morgan relished writing this character, a seemingly no-nonsense guy who ironically spouts nothing but nonsensical one-liners. A sample: a lackey tells Hobbs he has good news and bad news, to which Hobbs replies, “You know I like my dessert first.” Johnson is particularly well matched with this material, considering his professional wrestling background; Hobbs is basically a pro wrestler, complete with two inch staredowns with other sweaty men.

There is a much-touted fight scene between Vin Diesel and Dwayne Johnson that was worth the price of admission if you’re a fan of either of those guys. Unlike Stallone in The Expendables, Lin knows how to make a star-studded face-off engaging and bone-jarringly effective. (Sorry Sly. You’re my boy, but that movie was disappointing.) Like its predecessor, Fast Five also sets up for potential sequels, and Johnson has expressed interest in being a major player in The Fas6 and the F6rious or whatever they end up calling it. By the way, make sure to stick around for the post-credits sequence in Fast Five – fans of the series will definitely walk away intrigued.

I alluded earlier to Justin Lin’s impressive abilities behind the camera, and now I’ll go a step further: I think Michael Bay finally has some true competition in this genre. Bay has always been a master of expertly staged set pieces, but the extended vault heist sequence at the end of Fast Five is as equally destructive, ridiculous, and frenetic as anything I’ve seen in a Bay film. And after Lin dropped briefly into the TV world and directed Community’s “Modern Warfare” paintball episode, it’s even clearer to me the man has a deep understanding of all things action and can successfully walk the line between parody and legitimacy. None of the Fast and Furious movies should be taken seriously, but that’s the fun of them – the actors all play it straight while the audience sits back and laughs at the audacity and preposterousness of their scenarios.

The acting here is terrible, and the plot is the kind of stock story that fans of action films have come to expect, but none of that matters when the movie is this well-executed. I caught some flack recently for not liking Scre4m: my detractors were using the tried-and-true “what were you expecting? You know what you’re getting into with a movie like that” argument. While that may be true with some of the series-specific gags and such, I felt like that movie should work as either a comedy or a horror film (or both), and I didn’t think it succeeded on any level. In the case of Fast Five, some may use the same “what were you expecting?” argument when it comes to the characters, dialogue, story, etc. But the best part of Fast Five is this: it works as an action movie. It’s well paced, and there are some truly thrilling sequences, chases, shootouts, and heists. Even if you hate the characters and think the story is idiotic, you can’t deny that this is a worthy action film.

The floodgates of Summer 2011 have officially opened, and if the rest of this summer’s lineup has the same spirit as Fast Five, this will be a good year. This is a movie that features car surfing, Vin Diesel using his bulging forearms to block a hit from a metal pipe, and a finale chase scene that rivals The Blues Brothers. Go ahead and mark me down for Fas6 and F6rious – if it’s more of the same, I’m totally fine with that. Until next time…

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Two weeks ago Fast Five director Justin Lin said he had spoken to Arnold Schwarzenegger about making another Terminator movie, but “it has to be the right circumstances” and with “the right people”. Plus he’s getting more offers now, so it may not be the next thing he directs.

Well now according to Deadline things are moving forward. Schwarzenegger, who is now in his 60s, has officially attached himself to the movie, which is currently being shopped to studios. Universal, Sony and Lionsgate are said to be “looking hard at the package”, and the producers have chosen the right time to put it out there as Lin’s Fast Five is set to be #1 at the box office this weekend.

Deadline also mentions that in 2018 the Terminator rights will revert back to James Cameron, who directed the first two films. But until then whoever holds the rights has time to make at least two more movies. They don’t need to, and I’m with Cameron when he says the franchise has run its course, but it’s a well known property and there’s money to be made.

No screenwriter is attached at the moment, but it shouldn’t be long before a studio buys the Arnie/Lin package and a writer is hired.

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In February we heard that Universal were interested in making another Terminator movie, and their plan was to pair Fast Five director Justin Lin with screenwriter Chris Morgan on the project.

Santa Barbara hedge fund Pacificor won the rights back in 2009 so whatever happens with the Terminator franchise in the future will have to involve them, however in a recent interview Justin Lin revealed that directing a Terminator movie could be in his future, and he’s spoke to Arnold Schwarzenegger about it.

From Omelete (via Collider):

I think one of the great things is that when I got started, no one would return my calls, and now I get a lot of phone calls, which is good. I have options. Terminator was one of my favorite films growing up. And I feel I have a take that I would love to see, and I’ve talked with Arnold and we’ve talked and we’ll see. Again, I would love to do it, but it has to be the right circumstances. It has to be the right people. And there’s other projects too. But I’m in a position now that I can choose more than I could a year ago, two years ago. So that is something that is potentially in my future, but when I get home I will sit down and look at my options and choose what I want to do.

James Cameron, who directed the first (and best) two film thinks the franchise has ‘run its course’ and I have to agree with him. The Fast and Furious franchise is fun mindless action, but if the Terminator franchise is to continue it needs a director with a unique vision or take on the mythology. We don’t need another movie where things just blow up.

The return of Arnold Schwarzenegger would be welcomed, but that doesn’t guarantee we’ll get a good movie. It’ll be interesting to see what Justin Lin has planned, and if it will ever happen.

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In 2009 Santa Barbara hedge fund Pacificor won the rights to the Terminator franchise at auction after beating the likes of Lionsgate and Sony. As Pacificor had no experience with making movies they began talks with both Sony and Lionsgate to see if they could continue the franchise. Eventually those talks fell apart, and Pacificor began looking elsewhere.

Things have been pretty quiet since then, but now according to Deadline Universal is interested in making another Terminator movie, and their plan is to pair Fast Five director Justin Lin and screenwriter Chris Morgan on the project.

Nothing is official yet, but it’s interesting that this news comes after the recent announcement from Arnold Schwarzenegger that he is finally returning to acting after a number of years in politics. There’s no guarantee Schwarzenegger would return to the franchise, but I suppose it’d make it more watchable if he did.

Before the Terminator rights went to auction Terminator Salvation director McG had plans for its sequel to follow John Connor (Christian Bale) battling machines in a modern day 2011. Those plans evaporated when the rights changed hands, but then William Wisher, James Cameron’s writing partner on the first two films, scripted a detailed 24-page treatment for Terminator 5 and a 4-page concept outline for Terminator 6 which “continued the post-apocalyptic battleground scenario from Terminator Salvation, but added in the element of time travel.”

It is unknown whether this will happen now, but I can’t see where Justin Lin and Chris Morgan could go with the franchise. James Cameron thinks the franchise has ‘run its course’ and I have to agree with him. The Fast and Furious franchise is fun mindless action, but this franchise needs a Nolan-style reboot/sequel/re-imagining more than anything (not that Nolan should direct, but someone with talent and vision should).

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A box office gross of $350 million worldwide last year for Fast & Furious proved that people haven’t tyred (get it?) of the franchise, so Universal are making a 5th one. According to Variety Vin Diesel, Paul Walker and director Justin Lin will be returning, and the film currently has the title Fast Five. Nothing more has been given, other than a brief plot outline which says “Dom (Diesel) and Brian (Walker) are fugitives being pursued by relentless lawmen.”

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USA Today has the first three official images from the currently filming Fast and Furious movie!

The movie is a sign of the strength of “quiet giants,” franchises that “might not be James Bond or Indiana Jones but still have a rabid following, especially overseas or on DVD,” says Paul Dergarabedian of Media by Numbers.

Even Justin Lin, who directed 2006′s Tokyo Drift, has been surprised by the franchise’s reach.

“I was in Barcelona, and a kid from Spain comes up and just says ‘Fast and Furious,’ ” Lin says. “It’s amazing how many kids know it.”

Indeed, the series has made $600 million worldwide and is one of Universal Studios’ best-selling DVD titles.

“We were doing a movie about illegal racing before most people even knew how popular it was,” Diesel says. “How many franchises are that based on the real world?”

But it’s not all current events, Walker says. “Who doesn’t like fast cars and hot women?”

Erm… indeed?

F&F rolls its way into theaters June 9, 2009.

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