The Week In Geek: Christian Bale:Bad Ass, Natalie Portman Pissed Over Thor 2, Clint Eastwood & More

Does Christian Bale Think He Really Is Batman, Or What?

So is Christian Bale trying to prove that he really is as bad ass and fearless as Batman? Accompanied by CNN cameras, Christian Bale has been caught on film this week being assaulted by Chinese authorities, and then later pursued for over thirty minutes in a high speed chase while he attempted to leave the vicinity. Bale was there to try and meet blind human rights activist Chen Guangcheng (thank you, copy/paste function) in order to bring attention to his situation. Guangcheng has been detained on house arrest for over 15 months in typical Chinese fashion for speaking against the government. Maybe Christian was hoping if he got arrested and did some time while protesting human rights violations, people would finally stop giving him shit about that whole yelling at a crew member thing that ended up being a Youtube sensation from a couple of years ago. 

Natalie Portman Having A Fit Over Patty Jenkins Exit From Thor 2

Last week I mentioned how the second director attached to Thor 2, Patty Jenkins, walked away from the movie citing “creative differences” with Marvel Studios. Well, it now seems she didn’t so much “walk away” as she was just plain fired out of the blue. And actress Natalie Portman is apparently way pissed off about it. It seems Portman was behind Jenkins getting the job in the first place, as she was eager for a woman director to get such a huge summer tentpole type gig. Now with Jenkins being fired, Portman is said to be furious, and letting everyone at Marvel know it.

According to the Hollywood Reporter, Portman had “begun to question whether she wanted to continue acting at all right now — possibly for several years — because she wants to spend time with her baby boy”  Despite this, she was said to be excited over Thor 2 simply because her involvement would have helped another female in the business get such a high profile job.  Portman is contractually obligated to stay with the movie no matter what, and Marvel is now said to be bending over backwards and kissing her ass, making sure she’s involved in finding a replacement director for the movie. Hopefully Natalie is going to be engaged in the movie making process enough to not sleepwalk through it like she did the Star Wars prequels. I want Black Swan Natalie, not Attack of the Clones – “I’m just here for the paycheck” Natalie present.

Will Michael Chabon’s Kavalier and Clay Make It To HBO?

One of the most acclaimed novels of the past decade is The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay, Michael Chabon’s love letter to the Golden Age of comics. The book follows the lives of two cousins, Sam Clay from Brooklyn and Czech refugee Joe Kavalier, who find themselves creating a new icon in the Golden Age of the comic book industry with their super hero creation The Escapist .After winning the Pulitzer Prize for fiction back in 2001, the novel has been bandied about as a film property ever since, with nothing coming of it. At 600+ pages, the book was deemed too long for a standard movie. But now director Stephen Daldry (Billy Elliot, The Reader) is hoping to bring the novel to life not on the big screen, but as mini series on HBO. Right now this is all just talk, but Daldry seems to have it all mapped out in his head, even how many episodes the show should be. In speaking with Collider earlier in the week, he had this to say:

Yeah I wanna do Kavalier & Clay on HBO as an eight-parter. It’ll be so much better as a series, honestly. If you could put that in the article and ring up HBO and tell them that’s what I wanna do, I’d really appreciate it.

From your lips to God’s ear, Mr. Daldry. Or at least to the ears of whoever is the current HBO president in charge of programming. 

Latest Hollywood Spin On King Arthur Might Be The Latest Big Budget Movie To Get Aborted

It seems like Hollywood’s latest take on Arthurian legend, director David Dobkin’s Arthur and Lancelot, is possibly getting axed by Warner Brothers just as it was about to start production. This is after actors were cast as the two title leads, Joel Kinnaman (The Killing) and Kit Harington (Game of Thrones) The studio was clearing hoping that by hiring two television actors it would keep the budget down. But regardless, The budget went from a reported $90 million to over $130 million, and in this economy that’s a lot of money to spend…especially in this climate of rapidly declining tickets sales for movies. With higher 3D ticket prices, a lot of people are just saving their cash and waiting for Netflix or Redbox, as evidenced by lackluster attendance in 2011 at the movies. The major studios simply can’t afford to spend tons of money on movies just to break even years down the road. That’s the reason such wanted geek friendly properties like At The Mountains of Madness, The Dark Tower and Lone Ranger all got cancelled by their respective studios when the budgets got too high. Only Lone Ranger went back into production after the cost was brought way down and everyone involved agreed to a salary cut.

It seems Hollywood was banking on America reacting to their movie output the way they did during the Great Depression of the 30’s…by going to the movies A LOT. But, in this day and age we have way more entertainment options, and many of them are free. People aren’t going to rush out to the latest blockbuster just because. Hollywood is going to start having to figure out how to make these movies cheaply and economically, and maybe look to the District 9 model and less the Avatar model if they want to survive the coming decade and on.

OK, Seriously Clint? A Reality Show?

This last bit of news definitely goes in the “Wtf?? Really?” File; it seems the E Network is currently filming a reality show based on the lives of Clint Eastwood’s family, specifically his two teenage daughters and his 35 years- younger wife Dina. Look, I’m not the biggest Clint Eastwood fan here, I admit that. Nothing against the man, but the movies he made in his youth held no appeal for me for the most part, and his old age Oscar bait movies don’t set my world on fire either. (well, I did like Changeling well enough.) Nevertheless, the man is a legend in the truest sense of the word, I cannot deny that. The last thing he needs to do is subject himself or his family to the cultural indignity of a reality show on the E Network.

I’m gonna pretend Clint Eastwood reads Geekscape for a second and speak directly to him: reality television is simply beneath you Clint. It’s for rich people with enough money to buy themselves celeb status (see: The Kardashians, Paris Hilton) washed up former celebrities with no dignity (see: Anna Nicole Smith,The Osbournes, Gene Simmons Clan, The Two Coreys) or the worst kind, people just randomly connected to a real celebrity in one reality show who somehow get fame and a spinoff (see: that blonde ditz who fucked Hugh Hefner and now has a show, a book and a perfume.)  That’s just not you Clint. After fifty years in the business you really are Hollywood Royalty, and have never embarrassed yourself in public. Don’t subject yourself to this crap just because your daughters crave fame and didn’t inherit any of your talent or charisma. They might want this now, but they’ll thank you of saying no to it when they’re in their thirties.