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Mel Gibson and Vince Vaughn joined forces for this criminally overlooked thriller, which has finally found success thanks to free streaming. Released back in 2018, the crime thriller Dragged Across Concrete finds the pair as cops who, in desperate need of money after being suspended over footage of them assaulting a suspect, must descend into the criminal underworld. It’s a dark thriller that will leave you feeling dirty thanks to all the grit and violence, and is well worth checking out. As many clearly now are.

Written and directed by S. Craig Zahler, Dragged Across Concrete features an ensemble cast that includes Tory Kittles, Michael Jai White, Jennifer Carpenter, Laurie Holden, Fred Melamed, Thomas Kretschmann, and Don Johnson alongside Mel Gibson and Vince Vaughn. Dragged Across Concrete is now streaming on Freevee, and has reached #6 in the platform’s top 10. You can check out the official synopsis below.

RelatedJason Statham...

Vince Vaughn is known primarily as a comedic actor. Most recently, these humourous tendencies were exhibited in his performance in the Apple TV+ series Bad Monkey. Based on the book of the same name by Carl Hiaasen, the story saw Vaughn play a bumbling cop who is passionate about solving a high-profile case regarding a suspicious death. Bad Monkey was renewed for season 2, giving Vaughn another chance to play the role of the wisecracking, ungraceful but lovable Andrew Yancy.

In addition to Bad Monkey, Vaughn's comedy roles on screen have included parts in Dodgeball and Wedding Crashers. Comedy is not all Vaughn is capable of, however. While he is mostly known for the laugh-inducing genre, the actor has also been in several more dramatic roles. One such part was playing Norman Bates in Gus Van Sant's 1998 shot-for-shot remake of Psycho. While notoriously panned, this film showed off what Vaughn...

Vince Vaughn was once the torchbearer for rapid-fire, coked-up shenanigans. His high, gravelly laugh is probably ringing in your head right now. But after his run of over-quoted crass comedies of the aughts, Vaughn took a very laudable swing at serious acting roles in the True Detective series, Brawl in Cell Block 99, and Hacksaw Ridge. His latest project, the crime comedy Bad Monkey for Apple TV+ has just been renewed for a second season.

Related Apple TV+'s Hit Series Wouldn't Work Without Vince Vaughn

Bad Monkey has become one of the most popular series streaming right now, and that has a lot to do with Vince Vaughn and his portrayal of the lead.

Based on the novel by Carl Hiaasen, Vaughn plays Andrew Yancy – a disgraced cop who becomes a health inspector after being tossed off the Miami Police Department. But after stumbling into a case involving a mysterious severed arm,...

Few filmmakers within the last decade have announced themselves quite like S. Craig Zahler, an idiosyncratic artist known for pushing the boundaries of “extreme cinema.” Zahler certainly earned acclaim for his bone-crushing action thriller Brawl in Cell Block 99 and his police drama Dragged Across Concrete, but it was his terrifying debut, Bone Tomahawk, that established him as a filmmaker to watch. Prior to Bone Tomahawk, Zahler was a fairly prominent novelist and initially planned to adapt his Western novel Wraiths of the Broken Land. Although Zahler was unable to put together the finances needed to make his adaptation, Wraiths of the Broken Land was almost turned into a movie directed by Ridley Scott.

Hollywood, like the rest of the world, wasn't feeling so hot about the United States in the 1970s. Faced with the relentless cruelty of the Vietnam War and the overt racism of President Richard M. Nixon's "law and order" dictates (plus his wanton abuse of power via the cover-up of the Watergate scandal), the most excitingly talented filmmakers of that era offered up "The Godfather," "Serpico," and "Nashville." Even a rollicking mainstream comedy like "The Bad News Bears" carried an anti-establishment charge.

All of this was juxtaposed against the realization that John Wayne was dying. The quintessential American movie star who, alongside his frequent collaborator John Ford, transformed the Western into manifest-destiny mythmaking, was grasping for relevance in hoary oaters and toothless cop flicks while losing his second battle with cancer. Moviegoers were alternately hostile to and unsettled by this; the man they either dearly wanted or steadfastly did...

Vince Vaughn has always been widely praised for his iconic comedic performances, but one of his more nuanced dramatic turns in True Detective season 2 remains criminally underrated. Since he broke out in the 90s, Vaughn has been primarily known for his comedic roles in movies like Anchorman, Wedding Crashers, and Dodgeball: A True Underdog Story. Along with frequent co-stars Ben Stiller, Owen Wilson, and Will Ferrell, Vaughn became renowned as a member of the Frat Pack, a group of actors who dominated the comedy genre with movies like Old School and Zoolander throughout the 2000s.

But Vaughn has always mixed more complex dramatic roles into his filmography alongside those iconic comedic performances. He played Norman Bates in the 1998 remake of Psycho, the hard-edged Sergeant Howell in the World War II epic Hacksaw Ridge, and vengeful prisoner Bradley Thomas in the brutal action thriller Brawl in Cell Block 99. These dramatic...

Ridley Scotts long-gestating Western novel adaptation would be the perfect movie follow-up to the Kurt Russell-starring Old West cannibal thriller Bone Tomahawk. Although it wasnt a massive hit on its initial release in 2015, in the decade since, Bone Tomahawk has become a beloved cult classic. It starts off as a typical Western, with a search party riding out into the frontier to find three missing townspeople, but it morphs into a gruesome horror film when they encounter a bloodthirsty tribe of cave-dwelling cannibals.

Bone Tomahawk marked the directorial debut of novelist S. Craig Zahler. Zahler has since gone on to direct similarly gruesome, violent thrillers like Brawl in Cell Block 99 and Dragged Across Concrete, but hes never returned to the Western genre. So, Bone Tomahawk fans hoping to see another grisly, blood-drenched Western from Zahlers twisted mind have had no luck. But there is a Zahler-adjacent Western project...

Let it be said that every offbeat crime series should begin with the discovery of a severed limb. Vince Vaughn has proven time and again his ability to transition from the snark that defined many an early role into a career that’s allowed him to stretch his less-humorous chops via dour turns on the worst-received season of “True Detective” to some aggression in “Brawl in Cell Block 99.” “Bad Monkey,” the latest from Apple TV+ prodigy Bill Lawrence and based on a book by Carl Hiaasen, sees Vaughn ease back into a character no one else but he could inhabit, surrounded by a show unsure of what it’s trying to accomplish.

Continue reading ‘Bad Monkey’ Review: Vince Vaughn Does The Heavy Lifting On This Unusual Apple TV+ Crime Outing at The Playlist.

As the star of everything from “Swingers” to “Brawl in Cell Block 99,” “Wedding Crashers” to “Freaky,” Vince Vaughn has made an impression on moviegoers that looms even larger than his 6’5” frame. Be it comedy or horror, on the big screen or small, his performances often feel oversized but always exude a lived-in authenticity, which is why so many of them have endured as stand-outs and staples of the genres he’s explored. And yet, when facing an honor commensurate with his impact on the entertainment industry, a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, Vaughn reacts a bit more like a shrinking violet than you might expect.

“I get shy somewhat with these things,” Vaughn tells Variety. “I was fortunate years ago to be included in a Mann’s Chinese [handprint ceremony] and that was out of nowhere — and very nice as well. But it’s definitely something that is nice...

S. Craig Zahler has proven to be one of the boldest, albeit controversial, voices in genre cinema to emerge within the past decade. It often takes a standout directorial debut for filmmakers to identify themselves. Zahler certainly did that with his 2015 horror western Bone Tomahawk, which is regarded as one of the most violent films in recent memory. Any notion that Zahler was going to sand off his edges as he worked on bigger projects evaporated upon the release of his brutal prison movie Brawl in Cell Block 99, which featured an unusually gritty performance from Vince Vaughn as an incarcerated criminal setup on an undercover mission. While pairing up the former star of Fred Claus with an uncompromising voice of exploitation cinema seemed odd at first, Brawl in Cell Block 99 proved to be no fluke. Vaughn reteamed with his Brawl in Cell Block 99 director for the controversial cop thriller Dragged Across Concrete.

Exclusive: Jennifer Carpenter (Dexter) has been cast in the Paramount+ series 1923 in a recurring role for Season 2. Production is set to begin later this year.

She will portray ‘Mamie Fossett,’ a highly capable U.S. Deputy Marshall who serves warrants and makes arrests with confidence ahead of her time.

1923 introduces a new generation of Duttons and explores the early 20th century when pandemics, historic drought and the end of Prohibition all plague the Mountain West and the Duttons who call it home.

Season 1 starred Helen Mirren, Harrison Ford, Brandon Sklenar, Aminah Nieves, Darren Mann, Brian Geraghty, Sebastian Roche, Jennifer Ehle, Marley Shelton and Robert Patrick, among others.

Produced by MTV Entertainment Studios and 101 Studios, the series is executive produced by Yellowstone co-creator Taylor Sheridan, David C. Glasser, John Linson, Art Linson, Ron Burkle, David Hutkin, Bob Yari, Ben Richardson, Michael Friedman and Keith Cox.

Season 1 is available to stream on Paramount+.

A few weeks ago, it looked like S Craig Zahler would be making the noir thriller The Big Stone Grid as his first movie since Dragged Across Concrete back in 2018. Now, it turns out that Zahler will indeed be making a new film, but it will be an all-new project that re-teams him with his frequent star Vince Vaughn. The movie The Bookie and the Bruiser is a period crime flick that teams Vaughn with Adrien Brody, and the film is set to be shot later this year.

According to the release from Anton, the company financing the film, “The Bookie & the Bruiser is set in 1959 New York City and features a pensive, Jewish fellow named Rivner and an oversized Italian-American tough named Boscolo from the Lower East Side, both of whom served overseas in World War II and returned changed men who no longer fit inside the lives they’d left behind.

Bone Tomahawk and Dragged Across Concrete writer-director S Craig Zahler has a new film in the works. The Bookie & The Bruiser will star Vince Vaughn and Adrien Brody.

Ever since he made his eye-catching debut with 2015’s horror western Bone Tomahawk, S Craig Zahler has established himself as a specialist of tense, gritty films about tough men backed into even tougher situations.

Zahler’s latest project, The Bookie & The Bruiser, sounds similarly uncompromising. A period piece set in late 50s New York, it’s about two World War II veterans, one Jewish, one Italian, who team up to create an “illicit gambling operation”. Their new enterprise soon gets them in trouble with Irish gangsters and the Mafia.

According to Variety, Zahler has signed up his regular collaborator Vince Vaughn, who starred in Brawl In Cell Block 99 and Dragged Across Concrete (pictured above), to appear in this latest project. Given his stature,...

Writer-director S. Craig Zahler (“Bone Tomahawk”) is set to reunite with his “Dragged Across Concrete” and “Brawl in Cell Block 99” star Vince Vaughn and Oscar winner Adrien Brody (“The Pianist”) for upcoming crime thriller “The Bookie & the Bruiser.”

Anton will introduce the film to international distributors at the upcoming Marche du Film in Cannes. UTA Independent Film Group and Range Media Partners arranged the financing and will be representing the North American distribution rights.

Set in 1959 New York, “The Bookie & the Bruiser” follows a pensive, Jewish fellow named Rivner and an oversized Italian-American tough named Boscolo from the Lower East Side, both of whom served overseas during WWII and returned changed men who no longer fit inside the lives they’d left behind. Uninterested in taking orders from bosses or playing by the rules of polite society, the two friends partner up as a bookmaker and an enforcer and...

Writer/director S. Craig Zahler made quite the splash with his gnarly genre films “Bone Tomahawk,” “Brawl In Cellblock 99,” cementing himself as an auteur with a very particular point of view. It’s been almost six years since 2018’s cops and robbers thriller “Dragged Across Concrete,” and if you’re curious about what Zahler is up to next, well, he’s delivered an overdue update in trying to clear up some misinformation.

Continue reading S. Craig Zahler Has Two Movies In The Works, & Says Michael Mann Cop Thriller ‘The Big Stone Grid’ Won’t Be Next at The Playlist.

After directing three films in four years with Bone Tomahawk, Brawl in Cell Block 99, and Dragged Across Concrete, it’s now been six long years since the latest new feature from S. Craig Zahler. While he’s chimed in on his recent avorite films and beyond, it’s been fairly silent regarding his next potential project. We now finally have an update on what’s on his plate.

“A number of articles have announced The Big Stone Grid as my next picture, which is not quite correct,” Zahler noted on his blog. “I am sending that script around as a possible fifth movie, but I’ve made far more progress with another different original project to direct for my fourth one: I am negotiating deals to see if it will become a reality. I will give more information about this when things are more certain. Continue to look here for my next movie announcement.

Don Johnson is the latest addition to the cast of Ryan Murphy’s upcoming ABC series “Dr. Odyssey.”

Variety has confirmed that Johnson will star in the series alongside previously announced lead Joshua Jackson. Plot and character details for the show are being kept under wraps, but sources say the series is believed to be a medical procedural. It is slated to premiere during the 2024-2025 broadcast season.

Johnson is best known for his starring roles in the police dramas “Miami Vice” and “Nash Bridges.” The former aired on NBC for five seasons between 1984 and 1989, while the latter aired on CBS from 1996-2001 for six seasons. He won a Golden Globe for his work on “Miami Vice.” Recently, Johnson appeared in shows like the NBC comedy series “Kenan” and the Emmy-winning HBO series “Watchmen.” His film credits include “Knives Out,” “Brawl in Cell Block 99,” “Tin Cup,” and “Harley Davidson and the Marlboro Man.

Way back in 2011, Sony Pictures acquired a spec script titled The Big Stone Grid, which was written by S. Craig Zahler – who is best known these days for writing and directing the films Bone Tomahawk, Brawl in Cell Block 99, and Dragged Across Concrete. As of early 2012, Michael Mann was in talks to work on script revisions with Zahler and to direct the film. The Mann take on the material didn’t come to fruition, and four years later the project moved over to Lotus Entertainment, with Pierre Morel on board to direct. Morel couldn’t get it into production, either. Eight more years down the line, World of Reel reports that Zahler is now set to direct the film himself.

Part of the reason why Zahler has gone six years without directing a new film is the fact that the project he was pursuing, Hug Chickenpenny (an adaptation of...

Mubi has unveiled next’s streaming lineup, featuring notable new releases, including Molly Manning Walker’s debut How to Have Sex, Kevin Macdonald’s High & Low: John Galliano, and Quentin Dupieux’s Yannick. Ahead of Bong Joon Ho’s Mickey 17, two of his earlier films will arrive on the platform, along with a pair of features from All of Us Strangers director Andrew Haigh, as well as S. Craig Zahler’s Brawl in Cell Block 99, and more.

“The story can be translated into many different settings and I think it’s still relevant in terms of house parties, clubs, and even in relationships,” Molly Manning Walker recently told us about her debut How to Have Sex. “On the other hand: I wanted to make something that was very cinematic, but not set in a domestic environment. But the reason that this particular setting felt perfect was that––at that time,...

Each week we highlight the noteworthy titles that have recently hit streaming platforms in the United States. Check out this week’s selections below and past round-ups here.

The Beekeeper (David Ayer)

It’s the time of year for smooth-brained relaxation. Moviegoers can recover from the holidays with the comfort of knowing Gerard Butler, Liam Neeson, or Jason Statham will be here to satisfy their mid-budget, action-programmer needs. Is it really the new year if one of those cherished Kings of January doesn’t appear on the release slate? There’s no Gerry or Liam, but the ever-reliable Statham dons a trucker hat and blue jeans to grit his way through David Ayer’s The Beekeeper, an overall valiant, occasionally fun attempt to take us out of Q1 doldrums. – Conor O. (full review)

Where to Stream: VOD

Brawl in Cell Block 99 (S. Craig Zahler)

S. Craig Zahler is the...

Exclusive: Bluestone Entertainment has preemptively acquired rights to “Support Group for the Formerly Possessed,” an original horror short story written for Assemble Media by J. Preston Witt, with plans to produce a feature adaptation alongside Assemble.

Scribes set to adapt the pic are Andrew Deutschman and Jason Pagan, the duo behind Paramount’s found footage title Project Almanac, as well as Paranormal Activity: The Ghost Dimension.

In Support Group, a patient, charged with a murder they cannot remember, finds themselves subjected to a 5150 psychiatric hold in an institution. There, they uncover a chilling truth: the facility is dedicated to treating disorders that stem from supernatural causes.

The Assemble team came up with the original concept before developing it into a short story, featured in the third edition of its genre-focused quarterly short story magazine Assemble Artifacts, which is published through Blackstone Publishing. Producers of the adaptation will include Richard Saperstein for Bluestone,...

Dragged Across Concrete is currently the number two streaming movie on Netflix, meaning that an entire potential new audience is discovering writer-director S. Craig Zahler’s rough, take-no-prisoners 2019 crime epic. The film’s two problematic leads, Vince Vaughn and Mel Gibson, play longtime friends turned cops Anthony Lurasetti and Brett Ridgeman, who get involved in robbing a professional thief after being suspended from duty for viciously beating a drug dealer.

Desperate for money after their suspension, the two cops are soon in the midst of a disastrously escalating battle with the thief and his henchmen, with allegiances switching throughout. Through it all only Lurasetti and Ridgeman remain steadfastly loyal to each other, even as they descend into an extremely murky moral gray zone that leaves no one—not even the ostensible “good guys”—untouched.

We say “ostensible” because Lurasetti and Ridgeman are far from heroes. Reactionary cops who long for...

Exclusive: Sony‘s Screen Gems is in very early development on a Paradise Court film based on the horror comic book series from Zenescope Entertainment, and has enlisted Assemble Media to produce it, Deadline has learned.

Related Story Robin Thede Developing HBO Comedy Series ‘Disengagement’ Related Story Screen Gems Lands Package 'Border Patrol' With 'Resident Evil: Welcome To Raccoon City's Johannes Roberts Directing Related Story 'Horrorscope': 'Pennyworth's Harriet Slater Latest To Join Horror Pic From Screen Gems, Alloy Entertainment

Created by Zenescope’s CEO Joe Brusha, Paradise Court takes its name from a luxurious and exclusive gated community where beneath an idyllic facade lies a deadly secret — all the residents are serial killers with unique proclivities and manicured lawns cut as sharp as the knives in their kitchens.

The project was brought to Screen Gems by Jack Heller and Assemble Media. Assemble principal Heller will produce,...

The ending of Alfonso Cuarón’s Children of Men continues to provoke discussion decades after its release, contributing to its cult-film legacy. As a dystopian sci-fi drama, Children of Men makes use of a bleak, Orwellian aesthetic to blend philosophy and religion in its exploration of human nature. Set in a world where humanity has reached a crisis of infertility, the movie follows Theo (Clive Owen), a bureaucrat-turned-drifter who takes on the task of protecting Kee (Clare-Hope Ashitey), the one woman who miraculously becomes pregnant. What follows is a gripping and ultimately tragic tale of post-apocalyptic survival.

Alfonso Cuaróm's best movies are character-driven, and Children of Men focuses specifically on the fate of its two leads. However, the end of their story carries a greater meaning for the rest of humanity — a message that the screenplay manages to convey without too much exposition or genre cliches. With a healthy dose...

Don Johnson is a personal hero of mine. One of my prized possessions is a framed, autographed copy of his 1987 album, “Heartbeat”, which I have hanging on my living room wall. Being a child of the eighties, I always thought he was the coolest of the cool. As a youngster, I got into Miami Vice in a big way through re-runs, and I loved him in action flicks like 1989’s Dead-Bang, and 1991’s Best Movie You Never Saw fave Harley Davidson and the Marlboro Man. Plus, there was Nash Bridges!

This week, Johnson, who’s been carving out a terrific niche for himself as a character actor in recent years, stars alongside Michael Shannon and Kate Hudson in the comedy-drama A Little White Lie. In it, Johnson plays a famous writer whose big personality hides a certain degree of insecurity. I was lucky enough to sit with Johnson for a great interview where,...

Udo Kier's real-life World War II history confirms that he was the perfect casting choice for Hunters season 2's Hitler. Treading the same path as its predecessor, Hunters season 2 coasts on intriguing historical references, relentless violence, and the strength of its solid cast. Using Hunters season 1's Nazi-hunting themed storyline as its foundation, it sets out to raise the stakes for its titular team by introducing Adolf Hitler as the new villain.

After a season-long cat-and-mouse game between Hitler and the hunters, Hunters season 2 ends on a satisfying note, where the German dictator gets captured and sent to prison. While Hunters' revenge-fantasy take on alternate history is arguably a little too ambitious, it shows deep sincerity towards the real-world sufferings of World War victims, especially in season 2. One major casting choice made for Hunters season 2 plays a crucial role in further nailing down the show's earnestness towards its underlying themes.

Welcome to The Best Movie You Never Saw, a column dedicated to examining films that have flown under the radar or gained traction throughout the years, earning them a place as a cult classic or underrated gem that was either before it’s time and/or has aged like a fine wine. This week we’ll be looking at Harley Davidson And The Marlboro Man!

The Story: The year is 1996 – the future. A biker (Mickey Rourke) and his cowboy pal (Don Johnson) team up to save their favorite bar from going under. To pull this off, they plan a heist but wind up in possession of a massive load of a popular new street drug called “Crystal Dream.”

The Players: Starring: Mickey Rourke, Don Johnson, Chelsea Field, Giancarlo Esposito, Tom Sizemore, and Daniel Baldwin. Directed by Simon Wincer.

“I was fortunate enough to work on a film with Don, the...

Gina Corano will star in a new horror thriller from Near Dark and Hitcher screenwriter Eric Red. The film is called White Knuckle and is based on the Red's own novel.

The film is being produced by Bonfire Legend who are behind some pretty stellar films like S. Craig Zahler's Bone Tomahawk, Brawl In Cell Block 99 and Dragged Across Concrete, along with Vfw.

Synopsis:

There's a killer on the road... He'...

Though it’s fair to say Vince Vaughn never really went away, you could argue that his A-list status has diminished over the past decade, as he has become pickier regarding his roles, often appearing in indies like “Brawl in Cell Block 99” and “Dragged Across Concrete” or straight dramas like “True Detective.” But last year, we saw him show up in “Freaky,” a major Blumhouse horror film, as well as the Hulu comedy film, “The Binge.” And for his next project, Vaughn might be leaping back into the mainstream in a big way with “Bad Monkey.”

Read More: ‘Freaky’: Vince Vaughn’s Killer Performance Carries This Horror-Comedy With Few Surprises [Review]

According to THR, Vince Vaughn has signed on to star in the upcoming Apple TV+ series, “Bad Monkey.” Based on the best-selling novel from Carl Hiaasen, “Bad Monkey” tells the story of a former detective who is now...

“Ted Lasso” co-creator Bill Lawrence has landed a series order at Apple for the drama “Bad Monkey” with Vince Vaughn attached to star, Variety has learned.

The series is based on Carl Hiaasen’s 2013 novel of the same name. It tells the story of Andrew Yancy (Vaughn), a one-time detective demoted to restaurant inspector in Southern Florida. A severed arm found by a tourist out fishing pulls Yancy into the world of greed and corruption that decimates the land and environment in both Florida and the Bahamas. And yes, there’s a monkey.

Lawrence is writing the series and will also serve as executive producer under his Doozer Productions banner. Vaughn will executive produce in addition to starring. Doozer’s Jeff Ingold will also executive produce along with Matt Tarses. Doozer’s Liza Katzer will serve as co-executive producer. Warner Bros. Television, where Lawrence is under an overall deal, will produce for Apple.

Exclusive: Tommy Martinez (Good Trouble), Emily Rudd (Fear Street) and Udo Kier (The Painted Bird) are set for recurring roles in Season 2 of Amazon Prime Video’s conspiracy thriller drama series Hunters, created by David Weil and executive produced by Jordan Peele.

The plot for Season 2 is being kept under wraps as are Martinez, Rudd and Kier’s characters. The first season of Hunters followed a diverse band of Nazi hunters living in 1977 New York City. The Hunters, as they’re known, have discovered that hundreds of high-ranking Nazi officials are living among us and conspiring to create a Fourth Reich in the United States.

Season 2 of Hunters, produced by Amazon Studios, Peele’s Monkeypaw Productions and Sonar Entertainment, is executive produced by Weil who serves as showrunner, Peele and Win Rosenfeld from Monkeypaw Productions, Phil Abraham, David Rosen, Jerry Kupfer and Alfonso Gomez-Rejon as well as David Ellender and Matt Loze from Sonar.

The body swap comedy has proven to be fertile creative ground for decades now, with countless twists on the basic setup roping in some big names over the years including Jodie Foster, Jamie Lee Curtis, Ryan Reynolds… and Rob Schneider. Blumhouse’s latest effort, Freaky, gives the sub-genre a new twist, though, as a high school student finds herself trapped in the body of a notorious serial killer.

Stephen King already thinks that Vince Vaughn deserves an Academy Award nomination for his performance based on the first trailer alone, and while that might seem like a bit of a stretch, the movie does look like a lot of fun. Vaughn has been doing some of the best work of his career in recent years, and Freaky seems to strike the balance between the comedic efforts that first launched him to fame and the more serious and gritty turns that he...

You might not expect Cinestate — the right-leaning Dallas production company responsible for “Dragged Across Concrete,” “Brawl in Cell Block 99,” and allegedly enabling a pattern of sexual abuse by producer Adam Donaghey — to create a sensitive and thought-provoking film about America’s epidemic of school shootings, but even if you lowered the bar down to the ninth layer of hell the company’s latest and least defensible effort would still manage to slink under it. An unholy cross between “Elephant” and “Die Hard” that depicts an armed attack on a Texas high school with all the realism of Dana Loesch’s wet dreams, “Run Hide Fight” is . It’s a movie made by someone who’s seen too many movies, and now made at least one too many as well.

Poor Thomas Jane. No one who brought us “The Mist” and that one scene at the end of “Boogie Nights...

The Venice Film Festival has completed the lineup of its 77th edition with the addition of “Fiori, Fiori, Fiori!,” a short film shot during the lockdown by Luca Guadagnino, the director of Oscar-nominated “Call Me By Your Name,” and U.S. film “Run Hide Fight,” about a high-school massacre.

Both titles will play in the Out of Competition section of the festival, which runs on the Lido as a physical event Sept. 2 to 12.

Venice artistic director Alberto Barbera described the films as “two irreducibly different models of filmmaking, which are the expression, however, of an identical and compelling creative energy.”

In documentary “Fiori, Fiori, Fiori!,” shot during the Covid-19 lockdown, Guadagnino travels to Sicily to knock on the doors of childhood friends and discuss with them their experience during the pandemic.

Barbera describes the film as a “personal escape” for Guadagnino “in search of the people, places and relationships of his youth.

Russell Crowe is going to save cinema! So goes the marketing push for road-rage thriller “Unhinged,” the first new film to open in theaters since lockdown. Yet it’s worth acknowledging that Crowe hasn’t exactly saved cinema in the past decade, where “Les Misérables,” “The Water Diviner” and “The Nice Guys” are the only moderate highlights. To buy into the hype around “Unhinged,” one has to accept the cult of Crowe and pretend that he’s still a relevant movie star, to pretend it’s no later than 2003’s “Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World” and Crowe remains a gladiator of cinema.

But even that mind game can’t rescue the lazy B-movie routine of this cheap entertainment from director Derrick Borte, which could be generously described as an homage to Joel Schumacher’s “Falling Down” by way of Steven Spielberg’s “Duel.”

“Unhinged” is the...

Vince Vaughn is attached to executive produce an animated comedy series in the works at Fox, Variety has learned exclusively.

Fox has given Vaughn, Victoria Vaughn, and Peter Billingsly’s Wild West Picture Show production company a blind script deal for an animated series. No writer is currently attached, but Fox Entertainment will produce. Vince, Victoria, and Billingsly will all executive produce.

Should the project go to series, it would be the second animated series that Wild West Picture Show has produced. The company is also behind the Netflix animated series “F Is for Family.” That show, which was created by Bill Burr and Michael Price, follows an Irish-American family in the 1970s. The fourth season was released on Netflix back in June. Vaughn also guest starred in the show in its third season.

In addition to his work as a producer, Vaughn is primarily known for his work onscreen.

Texas-based independent film producer Adam Donaghey made headlines last month when a woman came forward to say the filmmaker sexually assaulted her when she was 16. While Donaghey (best known for producing David Lowery’s “A Ghost Story”) was arrested and charged, he was released from custody on $25,000 bail on April 28. A new report from Marlow Stern in The Daily Beast, where several interview subjects compare him to Harvey Weinstein, reveals that Donaghey had a pattern of abuse prior to the charge. According to the report, his toxic behavior was well known within, and even abetted by, certain members of the Dallas film scene, including movie studio Cinestate.

“The first time I was ever on set I was warned about Adam Donaghey,” one female filmmaker told The Daily Beast. “I was told he was the Harvey Weinstein of Dallas.”

One individual, Cristen Leah Haynes, revealed that she was sexually harassed by...

Exclusive: Dallas Sonnier’s Cinestate, the production outfit that also owns horror brand Fangoria, is ramping up its distribution activities and has hired Brandon Hill as VP of acquisitions and distribution.

Based in La, Hill will acquire films for Cinestate, including its horror label Fangoria, for distribution across theatrical and all other platforms.

The Dallas-based company has produced titles including S. Craig Zahler’s Bone Tomahawk, Brawl In Cell Block 99, and Dragged Across Concrete. Since acquiring Fangoria in 2018, it has also produced four titles through that label: Puppet Master: The Littlest Reich, Satanic Panic, and the upcoming Vfw and Castle Freak.

Fangoria distributes some of its titles in-house, and acquires outside produced movies for platform distribution, an effort headed up by Rob Galluzzo in La. Now, the company is looking to expand beyond home entertainment as part of Cinestate’s wider push into theatrical releasing.

Hill joins from his role...

Happy Death Day helmer Christopher Landon has lined up his next project. Unfortunately, it won't be a third entry in his sci-fi horror franchise, but it sounds rather interesting nonetheless. Described as an Untitled Body-Swap Thriller, the movie has lined up its main stars, with Vince Vaughn and Kathryn Newton set to topline the cast. While that sounds like it could be wacky, it also sounds like this won't be skimping on the deranged horror elements either.

According to multiple reports, the untitled movie centers on a teenager, played by Kathryn Newton, who winds up swapping bodies with a deranged serial killer, played by Vince Vaughn. After the incident takes place, Newton's character comes to learn she only has 24 hours to undo it until the change becomes permanent. Blumhouse Productions, the studio behind the Happy Death Day series, as well as a number of low-budget horror hits, is behind the project.

To celebrate the release of Dragged Across Concrete, coming to Digital Download on 12th August and on Blu-ray and DVD 19th August, we’re giving 3 of you the chance to win a copy on Blu-ray.

From the cult director of Bone Tomahawk and Brawl in Cell Block 99, and starring Mel Gibson, Vince Vaughn and Tory Kittles, Jennifer Carpenter and Don Johnson, Dragged Across Concrete follows two police detectives who find themselves suspended when a video of their strong-arm tactics is leaked to the media. With little money and no options, the embittered policemen descend into the criminal underworld and find more than they wanted waiting in the shadows.

Watch our exclusive Dragged Across Concrete interviews here:

Please note: This competition is open to UK residents only

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Dragged Across Concrete Is Available On Digital Download 12th August 2019 On Blu-ray & DVD 19th August 2019

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Stars: Udo Kier, Thomas Lennon, Alex Beh, Barbara Crampton, Nelson Franklin, Skeeta Jenkins, Michael Paré, Jenny Pellicer, Charlyne Yi | Written by S. Craig Zahler | Directed by Sonny Laguna, Tommy Wiklund

[Note: With the film finally getting a physical release in the UK, here's a reposting of my review of Puppet Master: The Littlest Reich from last years festival run]

Recently divorced and reeling, Edgar returns to his childhood home to regroup his life. When Edgar finds a nefarious looking puppet in his deceased brother’s room, he decides to sell the doll for some quick cash. Girl-next-door Ashley and and comic book pal Markowitz join Edgar for a doomed road trip to an auction at a convention celebrating the 30th Anniversary of the infamous Toulon Murders. All hell breaks loose when a strange force animates the puppets at the convention, setting them on a bloody killing spree that’s motivated by an evil as old as time.

I’m going to be honest, there’s absolutely no way this review is unbiased.

Shazam! tops slow weekend; top new opener is Lionsgate’s Red Joan.

Today’s Gbp to Usd conversion rate: 1.30

RankFilm (Distributor)Three-day gross (Apr 19-21)Total gross to date Week 1 Shazam! (Warner Bros) £976,000 £12m 3 2 Dumbo (Disney) £926,000 £21.6m 4 3 Captain Marvel (Disney) £641,000 £38.1m 7 4 Red Joan (Lionsgate) £430,060 £566,872 1 5 Wonder Park (Paramount) £298,000 £3.1m 2 Warner Bros

The vibrant weather in the UK over the Easter bank holiday weekend spelled bad news for cinemas, with no film taking more than £1m over the Friday-Sunday session and 50%+ drops registered by most of the key holdovers.

For Warner Bros, superhero feature Shazam! dropped 54% this weekend, taking £976,000 for a cume of £12m to date.

‘Greta’, ’Dragged Across Concrete’ among new titles.

Holdovers look set to dominate the UK box office this weekend, with Trevor Nunn’s spy drama Red Joan amongst the new openers.

Produced by David Parfitt’s Trademark Films, the Lionsgate-distributed feature is led by Judi Dench and 2014 Screen Star of Tomorrow Sophie Cookson, and based on the novel of the same name by Jennie Rooney. Cookson plays Joan Stanley, a Cambridge physics student in 1938 who falls for a young communist; while Dench takes up the character in 2000 when MI5 come to arrest her.

The film will be aiming to top...

S. Craig Zahler is a filmmaker with a flare for violence but more interestingly is going beyond this with his intriguing characters and stories.

With only three films to date he is an eclectic director with a western (Bone Tomahawk), prison thriller (Brawl in Cell Block 99) as well as cop drama under his belt already.

In his third film, Dragged Across Concrete sees the director delve into the cop genre that showed at the Glasgow Film Festival this year. Read our glowing review of the film here.

We once again see Vince Vaughn, currently enjoying a ‘Vaugn-aissance’ (?) of sorts, team up with Zahler as well as Mel Gibson who knows a thing a two about playing a law enforcer.

We catch up with Zahler to talk all things Dragged Across Concrete and more.

Congrats on Dragged Across Concrete. Where did the idea or inspiration come from for this film?...

Following on from Bone Tomahawk and Brawl in Cell Block 99, S. Craig Zahler is back with Dragged Across Concrete, a brutal crime thriller starring Mel Gibson, Vince Vaughn and Tory Kittles. We had the pleasure to sit down with the latter, alongside his director, to discuss this compelling, and somewhat controversial piece of cinema.

Zahler tells us where the idea first originated from, and what his biggest influences were. He comments on the casting of Mel Gibson, and what he perceives to be a continuing theme that runs through his movies. He also discusses the notion of the antihero, and crafting three-dimensional characters that are, to put it frankly, not very nice guys. Meanwhile Kittles tells us what attracted him to the project, and how he became aware of Zahler’s work from Samuel L. Jackson. He tells us what it was like collaborating with Gibson, and whether he...

Stars: Mel Gibson, Vince Vaughn, Tory Kittles, Michael Jai White, Jennifer Carpenter, Thomas Kretschmann, Laurie Holden, Jordyn Ashley Olson, Don Johnson, Udo Kier, Fred Melamed | Written and Directed by S. Craig Zahler

Dragged Across Concrete is the third feature film from writer-director Craig S. Zahler in his, at this time of writing, scorching assessment of America in a social-political discourse in a trilogy of films beginning with Bone Tomahawk and Brawl in Cell Block 99 released in 2015 and 2017 respectively, with his latest feature the most scathing and exciting film yet. A sordid and thrilling epic that throttles your anticipation and expectations with a seismic shift of tense insipid nature that results in a magnificent display of craft in a thrilling atmospheric venture.

Let’s start with the running time. Each feature before Dragged Across Concrete for Zahler has clocked in at a sturdy one hundred and thirty-five minute running time.

To celebrate the release of S. Craig Zahler’s thrilling new film Dragged Across Concrete on April 19, we’re giving 3 of you the chance to win a Blu-ray bundle containing copies of critically-acclaimed films You Were Never Really Here, Free Fire and Hell Or High Water, plus the striking poster.

From the cult director of Bone Tomahawk and Brawl in Cell Block 99, and starring Mel Gibson, Vince Vaughn and Tory Kittles, Dragged Across Concrete follows two police detectives who find themselves suspended when a video of their strong-arm tactics is leaked to the media. With little money and no options, the embittered policemen descend into the criminal underworld and find more than they wanted waiting in the shadows.

Please note: This competition is open to UK residents only

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Dragged Across Concrete Is In Cinemas April 19

The Small Print

Open to UK residents only The competition will...

“Unplanned” is exactly the movie you expect it to be, which is why it’s making healthy profits despite minimal advertising and overwhelmingly negative reviews. Like other faith-based films before it — the “God’s Not Dead” series, “Heaven Is for Real,” and “I Can Only Imagine” all come to mind — Cary Solomon and Chuck Konzelman’s anti-abortion drama is preaching to the choir. Pure Flix Entertainment knows that its self-selecting audience would rather have its existing views affirmed rather than challenged, a strategy they’re far from the first to employ. Christian moviegoers are hardly the only demographic guilty of wanting to see their ideals reflected back at them, as evidenced by the reception to any number of toothless prestige pictures.

But what about when viewers like a movie or TV series despite its values, not because of them? Do conservative “Game of Thrones” obsessives resent the fact that it...

Dragged Across ConcreteS. Craig Zahler dares his audiences to walk out of his films early—either in protest, or for a bathroom break. At 158 minutes long, the director’s new film, Dragged Across Concrete, is a particularly drawn-out and nasty piece of work. The violence is calculated to elicit gasps of disgust; the dialogue tends to be provocative or provocatively mundane; and Zahler knowingly casts Mel Gibson as Ridgeman, a law enforcer who’s reprimanded for racist behavior. “I don’t politic, and I don’t change with the times,” Ridgeman complains. “And it turns out that that shit’s more important than good, honest work.” Gibson does, at least, refrain from winking at the camera.Yet perhaps the most polarizing moment in the movie occurs during a spell of peaceful silence. Vince Vaughan’s Lurasetti, a fellow police officer on a stakeout with Ridgeman, occupies himself with an egg salad sandwich,...

There's a bank-robbery sequence in the thriller Dragged Across Concrete, the Mel Gibson, Vince Vaughn starrer from gritty indie auteur S. Craig Zahler (Bone Tomahawk, Brawl in Cell Block 99), in which actors Tory Kittles and Michael Jai White put on white-face.

The racially tinged drama, revolving around a pair of cops who descend into an underworld of sorts alongside violent criminals after getting suspended for roughing up a Latino suspect, was shot well before the most recent blackface scandals (the Virginia governor's yearbook photos; Gucci's "blackface" sweater) but the Colony star, in particular, still had questions ...