Earlier today we got a quote from Rachel McAdams saying she wouldn’t be playing Black Cat in Spider-Man 4 after there was talk she had met producers. Now we have word of another actress who has apparently been meeting with the Spidey team: Julia Stiles.

From UGO:

UGO has learned that Julia Stiles has met with a casting company in New York to discuss the upcoming Spider-Man 4!

This makes sense based on the recently debunked rumor that Rachel McAdams was set to star. Could this mean we’ll be seeing the Black Cat saving Spidey’s last dance? We haven’t heard specifics about which role she was eyeing and assume it’s all early talks, but why not?

We haven’t really seen Stiles in a big way since The Bourne Ultimatum in 2007, however I think she would be a great choice for Black Cat, if that is in fact who they are looking to cast. From all the rumors it looks like they are looking for a new female character anyway, and if they’ve been talking with actresses such as Rachel McAdams and Julia Stiles then it’ll probably be a significant role.

Last week a rumor started floating around the interweb saying that Rachel McAdams would be playing Black Cat in Spider-Man 4, and that she had already met with the producers. Well according to McAdams herself that is indeed, just an internet rumor.

From Entertainment Weekly:

“That’s a total rumor, I have to say,” the actress, who will next be seen in the Dec. 25 action-adventure tentpole Sherlock Holmes, tells EW. “I was hanging out in Toronto the other day and someone came up to me and said, ‘I just heard you’re doing Spider-Man 4.‘ And I said, ‘Really? No one told me!’ It’s not true.” A rep for Sony Pictures concurs: “It’s an Internet rumor, as so many things are these days.”

It could be the case that McAdams is denying it as things haven’t been finalized yet, although I’ve got a feeling that it wasn’t true to begin with. Hopefully we’ll find out who will be in Spider-Man 4 in the near future, as we know casting is certainly under-way.

Sam Raimi said a few weeks ago that Spider-Man 4 will begin filming in March, which means over the upcoming months and weeks we should be hearing about casting, and what villains might be appearing. Dylan Baker revealed he would be returning to play Dr. Curt Connors, which rose speculation that The Lizard could be the main villain. However Mania are now saying that the villain could be Black Cat, the skilled cat burglar, and they apparently know which actress is the front runner to player her.

We can exclusively reveal that actress Rachel McAdams has met with the producers of the film for a major role. McAdams (of ‘Wedding Crashers’ and ‘Sherlock Holmes’ fame) is said to be a top contender for the role of Felicia Hardy, known to comic fans as The Black Cat.

Our sources tell us that the Black Cat’s story fits well with Raimi’s Spider-Man formula, which always finds the villains troubling not only the costumed hero, but also becoming entangled in Peter Parker’s personal life as well.

In other casting news actress Romola Garai (Atonement) wrote in The Observer that she recently audition for a role:

“Love is at the root of everything good that has ever happened and will happen.” This phrase swam into focus as I moved up the escalator at Oxford Circus tube on Tuesday morning on my way to put myself “on tape” for a part in Spider-Man 4. This is the acting equivalent of the London Marathon in that it’s important to try your best as long as you understand that you aren’t going to win.

It looks like Mary Jane may have some more competition in Spider-Man 4, that is, if the Black Cat rumour is true.

Every time Warner Bros. release a new trailer for Guy Ritchie’s Sherlock Holmes it makes me want to see the film just that bit more, which I suppose is their aim, so well done to them. The December release date is nearing and the effects are almost complete, which means we have a more action packed trailer for our viewing pleasure!

I’m warming to the Robert Downey Jr. and Jude Law on-screen partnership. Ritchie and the writers have given them quite a few funny lines, I just hope they aren’t all in the trailers. Sherlock Holmes will be released on December 25th.

Cinematical received a brand new (rather blue) poster for Guy Ritchie’s Sherlock Holmes. It features all the gang including Robert Downey Jr, Jude Law, Mark Strong and Rachel McAdams. There’s also a bulldog which we haven’t seen much of in the trailers. I wonder if he/she has a large role?

Sherlock Holmes sends Holmes and his stalwart partner Watson on their latest challenge. Revealing fighting skills as lethal as his legendary intellect, Holmes will battle as never before to bring down an evil cult leader named Lord Blackwood (Mark Strong) and unravel a deadly plot that could destroy the country.

You can watch the latest trailer by clicking here!

It’s been 5 months since we got our first look at moving footage from Sherlock Holmes so it’s about time we got a new trailer. This one is slightly darker than the first one and contains more action, more slo-mo fights and more Holmes/Watson flirting.

Sherlock Holmes will be released on Christmas Day and is directed by Guy Ritchie.

You know how ready the world is for a Sherlock Holmes movie from Guy Richie, Robert Downey Jr, Jude Law and Rachel McAdams? They’re already gearing up for a sequel, that’s how ready.

The movie doesn’t come out until Christmas this year, but already Warner Bros has brought on some writers to start scripting the sequel, according to Risky Business:

The studio is poised to bring on Kieran and Michele Mulroney, the scribes who are penning its “Justice League: Mortal” tentpole, to pen a draft of the new tale. Brad Pitt has had discussions with producers to star as Holmes’ nemesis Moriarty in the new pic, say people familiar with the project, though there is no deal in place for him to take the part.

Susan Downey, Dan Lin, Joel Silver and Lionel Wigram produced “Holmes,” a holiday release that, from well-received footage at Comic-Con, appears to be an action-heavy rendition of the world Sir Arthur Conan Doyle created.

Guy Ritchie helms the pic, and Downey stars as the title character; Jude Law plays protege Watson, and Rachel McAdams stars as love interest Irene Adler. Much of the talent is expected to return in the new pic, as could Ritchie as director.

The kicker in this news is the rumors that Brad Pitt has already flown to London to shoot a few scenes as Moriarty for the first Sherlock. Counter-acting those rumors are statements from people who have seen part of the movie, or claim to be in the know, saying that Moriarty only appears in the first film as a shadow and you can’t tell who the actor is.

Prediction? Speculation? How about this: if they are writing film 2 now and can turn out a script before early December, couldn’t Warners lock Pitt for the sequel then cut in a shot of his face?

That’s what I do if I were a studio.

There are so many alternate things you could call The Time Traveler’s Wife: the third Eric Bana movie of the summer, Rachel McAdam’s mature Notebook, director Robert Schwentke’s first film that doesn’t rely heavily on being a thriller, writer Bruce Joel Rubin’s return to fantastical romance after winning an Oscar for Ghost, the movie that has the misfortune of opening against District 9 or just the adaptation of the best-selling book by first-time novelist Audrey Niffenegger.

The question is, which one is the most accurate to the experience of the film? And it might be none of them.

The Time Traveler’s Wife tells the story of Henry (Bana) who was born with a genetic disorder that has him dissolving through time at seemingly random intervals he cannot control. I say “seemingly random” because Henry can’t control when he leaves, but does return to times and places of significance. Along the way, he meets Claire (McAdams), who claims to have known him from her childhood. This strikes Henry as odd, because he doesn’t remember Claire at all. The two fall in love and time-traveling drama ensues.

The Time Traveler’s Wife opened last Friday in the US, one week after another movie aimed at the female audience; Julie & Julia. Does this adaptation have what it takes to lure audiences into its saccharine sweet clutches?

As a guy, romances don’t always work for me. Since Ghost was also written by Bruce Joel Rubin and featured a love story set with supernatural elements, I initially approached it in a similar fashion: there’s gonna be some kissin’ and cryin’, but also some other stuff that I should be able to latch on to. And time travel is another pet-subject of mine, so I was hoping that the film would do something cool with it.

It was my focus on trying to find something to latch onto that kept me engaged with The Time Traveler’s Wife. There’s nothing wrong with the movie, but there isn’t a great deal for the non-romantics among us to latch on to. For instance, the film sets up very early on that you cannot change the past, then abandons changing the future at the same time without explicitly mentioning it. Hence, we have fate. This movie is about two people fated to be with each other, it’s just what is a linear relationship for one is a non-linear relationship for the other.

Claire meets Henry for the first time when she is around 10 years old and he is somewhere around 30. Henry can’t travel with his clothes so a naked man steps out of the bushes, tells her that they are going to be friends and that he’s a time traveler. Little Claire is a bit of a spark plug, neglected by her wealthy parents and soon bonds with this naked guy who – seemingly at random – shows up in the meadow near her house. Henry explains that he’s drawn to certain places and moments in time frequently, as if there was some sort of metaphysical gravity pulling him there. The meadow is significant for several reasons, so he returns there more than anywhere else. Claire, meanwhile, keeps a journal and when Claire grows older and finds Henry working at a library (Henry is unaware of who she is), he sneaks a peek at her journal so he can have vague ideas about when he’ll get to see younger Claire.
Things become more complicated after Claire has a series of miscarriages and Henry gets a vasectomy only to realize that for a time traveler, this procedure is useless.

The film manages to add a new layer to the romance or the time traveling whenever I started to get bored: kids in time, a single event that propels Henry forward in time (which rarely happens), questions about why no one has seen an old version of Henry: does he get cured or something more sinister?

Time Traveler’s Wife is a romance first and a movie about time travel second, and that’s about where it lost me. The questions about how much choice either party had when falling in love were ultimately less interesting than questions about the nature of time, and that’s not the way this movie needed to go to make me want to see it again or to recommend it to anyone.

At my screening, I sat next to a woman who had read the book and she was excited that it kept the parts she liked and stayed mostly faithful to the story. If you happen to be one of the many that enjoyed the novel, I’m guessing this won’t be disappointing to you.

For the rest of us, the movie doesn’t know how to balance its momentum well enough to satisfy. For men, especially, the film is like a magician; tricking you into engaging only to reveal it was slight-of-hand masked by glitz and showmanship. It suffers from novel-adaptation syndrome where certain relationships and characters that feel like they should be important go through sudden changes in their core value, though we never see what causes it. Much ado is made about Henry and Gomez (Ron Livingston) being friends, but when Henry finally has to say goodbye, the moment is hollow.

Bana and McAdams have some pretty good chemistry all things considered, but they don’t get many huge romantic moments where both of them know the reality of the situation, which added a level of frustration for me that I usually associate with horror films and television. Because Henry experiences the relationship differently, he sometimes lets his emotions get the best of him. However, because this is fate anyway, almost all the bumpy moments in the relationship have their drama stripped from them. Like any time travel movie, secrets are kept, but in this one they are kept for unapparent reasons, most likely to keep the plot taught enough for the audience to engage with it.

Maybe I would deal with time traveling a different way, like always being completely honest with my spouse about what I saw and knew. But here’s the thing: I shouldn’t be thinking about that sort of stuff while I’m watching a romance, and here I was, which isn’t praise for the film.

Something about The Time Traveler’s Wife is flat, and I think it’s the fatalist aspect, at least for me. As soon as the plot becomes about romance, I resigned myself to waiting for the next sequence that deepened the mystery or the next time-travel effect, and that’s not what should happen in a romance.

There is one sequence where the film worked exactly like it was supposed to: It’s Claire and Henry’s wedding day and right before Henry is supposed to take his place at the alter, he gets sucked through time. A few minutes later, an older, salt-n-pepper haired Henry shows up to replace the young one. McAdams marries an older version of her husband, only for the younger one to return for the first dance of the married couple. Broken Social Scene plays the band in the film and the happy husband-and-wife dance in each other’s arms. We cut to the honeymoon sweet where both Claire and Henry decide to jump on the bed, and right as the happiness is about to turn sexual, Henry disappears, leaving even his ring behind.

The balance between fated love and the sadness of being left behind is encapsulated in this sequence with the right balance of emotion, humor and the supernatural, but – sadly – the film doesn’t reach that balance again.

I’m not sure Guy Ritchie will appreciate this. Or maybe he would? Someone who goes by the name of AEmovieguy has decided to give the Sherlock Holmes trailer we got earlier this week a little remix. It’s amazing how different things look when you add different music.

If anyone is wondering the song is “It’s Almost Over Now” (a.k.a. “Rockstar”) by N.E.R.D.

Do you prefer this trailer or the original?

The trailer for Guy Ritchie’s Sherlock Holmes is now online! Among many things seen in the 2 minute 18 second montage, some shots we see include: Rachel McAdams in a corset, 300-style slow mo shots of Holmes punching a guy in the face and Holmes being sexually suggestive towards a maid. Watch below!

It looks better that what I expected. However, my only complaint is Downey’s accent. Being an Englishman myself I can tell that it’s a bit off, but he has obviously worked hard on it so I can live with it.