Total Film

Loved chatting to everyone involved on The Penguin. Clancy Brown assured me that Colin Farrell's Oz Cobb will be as iconic as Highlander's Kurgan. There can be only two? A thrill to have a supersized chat with Sir Ridley Scott about his expanded director's cut of Napoleon and his relationship to editing. It's well worth a revisit on Apple TV+, if you have 205 minutes going spare… It was fantastic covering the D23 convention in Anaheim, California. The entertainment showcase featured so many famous faces, but I was genuinely star-struck by the presence of The Dude, Jeff Bridges. My summer holiday in Sweden came with an unexpected dash of Hollywood glam: Kiefer Sutherland and his band gigging at the local theme park! Had a great time exploring the Laika: Frame x Frame exhibition at…

Jon M. Chu is transporting us back to the world of Oz for his adaptation of the Broadway phenomenon Wicked. It's something the In The Heights director has dreamt of for a long time, and it's coming to fruition as not just one film, but two, due for release in consecutive years. ‘I just remember being blown away by how cinematic it was,’ Chu says of seeing the stage show for the first time. ‘I loved, emotionally, how it moved me, the relationship between these two women.’ The two women in question are Elphaba – an ambitious girl born with green skin, who's better known as The Wizard of Oz's Wicked Witch of the West – and Galinda, who would later become Glinda the Good in the famous 1939 movie. Wicked…

At just 20 years of age, Millie Bobby Brown has already starred in the global phenomenon Stranger Things, produced and starred in multiple feature films and written a debut novel alongside ghostwriter Kathleen McGurl. If that wasn't enough to put her on the map, Brown's now set to produce a feature adaptation of that novel. Titled Nineteen Steps, it's a love story set against the backdrop of World War Two. The feature should further cement Brown as Netflix's biggest star, with reports saying that the young actor is also looking to take on the leading role in the film – a character based on her grandmother. Playing the telekinetically gifted Eleven in Netflix's Stranger Things shot Brown to stardom, and since then the actor has become one of the streamer's go-to…

For a legendary folk hero who united Switzerland, popularised the crossbow and inspired a timeless overture, William Tell hasn't exactly set the silver screen on fire. Yes, the Friedrich Schiller play from 1804 has been filmed numerous times, while 1953's The Story of William Tell would have seen Errol Flynn portray him… had Jack Cardiff's directorial debut not run out of money. For all that, the tale of Tell – capably served though it has been by television, theatre and Rossini's 1829 opera – hasn't enjoyed the cinematic exposure that the likes of Robin Hood and Zorro have had. Indeed, it is surely telling that Rossini's William Tell Overture is now better known as the theme music for The Lone Ranger. High time, then, for a star-studded, action-packed epic dedicated to…

A follow-up to the all-conquering Gladiator (a box-office titan that also bagged five Oscars, including Best Picture) has been mooted since way back, but it's never quite worked out. Director Ridley Scott tells Teasers an attempt was made as recently as four years ago, but: ‘It didn't work. I said, “Nah, this is not working.” And we all bailed out.’ The idea – from Scott himself – that proved key to cracking the sequel was to focus on a relatively minor character from the original: Lucius (played there by Spencer Treat Clark). ‘I thought, you know, the only surviving member of Gladiator, frankly, is the son, Lucius… And, of course, Lucilla [Lucius’ mother, and daughter of Marcus Aurelius] is still a survivor, and is surviving within the context of the ever-corrupt…

You talkin’ to me? Yes, I am talking to you, and what a pleasure it is to do that. I'm sitting in my garden and the sun's out; the weather's nice, and I can't wait for the next question! Why don't you tell me the story of your life? I was born in Hounslow. Mum and dad moved out to the suburbs, then my dad told me to do law. I did that and didn't like it, so then I went to drama school. Then I got out of drama school and was out of work for years, then found work when I was in my 30s, started paying my bills. I'm 43 now, so I'd say it's been a good sort of 10, 12 years of being a working actor. How much can…