Hasta La Gadget!

The folks at Sony Home Entertainment have teamed up with the folks at both UltraViolet and Sony Pictures Imageworks to bring to you an iPad-based interactive “Movie Touch” experience for the home video release of Men in Black 3. What you’ve got here is a vast collection of features that help you immerse yourself in the film, the plotline in and outside the film, and the creation of the film as well. The app itself is free, including a 10 minute preview of the movie inside, and if you’ve got the Men In Black 3 movie in your UV collection you can work with the full timeline right away.

Inside the app you can also purchase the app with a link to the UltraViolet collection – once you’ve got it going, you can download the movie to hook up directly with the app as well as the rest of the features – also available for download. You have the option to either download everything for offline playing or you can stream till the cows come home. If you download everything – movie, Movie Touch content and all – you’ll have just a bit over 1.5GB of space taken up on your iPad. Then the fun begins.

What you’re seeing is a set of features including Cast data, Multi-Angle break-downs of scenes, Production Design, Scene Deconstructions, Photos and Illustrations, 360 Turnarounds of models, and Fun Facts – lore, in this case, direct from the Men in Black universe. You’ll also get to see videos showcasing Special Effects, this and several of the other video-based features showing clips direct from the folks at Sony Pictures Imageworks.

The user interface here could not possibly be more intuitive and watching the movie like this is rather interesting to say the least. If you’re thinking about picking up Men in Black 3 from the UltraViolet collection, there’s no reason why you shouldn’t try this app out as well as it’ll be absolutely free to you. You can share clips from the movie via the app to Twitter and Facebook, you can stop and go throughout the movie with more information than you could possibly want about the movie, and it’s all synced up with the picture as it goes along.

And therein lies what’s easily the best feature of the system here – the entire feature collection rides along with you as you roll through the film. You get a timeline of features below the video display, each of them moving forward at a pace which sets the correct features in place when they’re relevant. Tap them at will, and devour them gleefully!

Men in Black 3 Movie Touch app Review is written by Chris Burns & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

Jaguar has given up some details on a short film starring Damien Lewis of Homeland fame. The short film is called Desire and is being created by Jaguar in association with Ridley Scott Associates. The short film is set to be released in early 2013.

Jordi Molla will play the villain of the short film. Desire will also feature Shannyn Sossamon as the female lead. The short film will begin shooting on location in the Chilean desert at the beginning of December. Interestingly, Jaguar will allow viewers to follow the filming of the movie offering an insider’s view of the set and the filming process all the way through production.

The movie will have a soundtrack written by senior songwriter Lana Delray with an exclusive track called Burning Desire inspired by the new Jaguar F-Type. The movie follows a man named Clark who delivers cars for a living. Clark runs into trouble after he meets a young woman in the middle of the desert.

The film was directed by Adam Smith and is described as a story of betrayal, retribution, passion, and greed. It sounds like the film is basically a long commercial for the new Jaguar F-Type two-seat convertible, which is powered by a V8 engine and starts at $69,000.

Damien Lewis stars in Desire short film for Jaguar is written by Shane McGlaun & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

While HDX video has been a trademark for the Vudu service for years, when it launched streaming and Vudu-to-go downloads for PCs last year, they were limited to standard definition. That’s been corrected recently, as the service is now offering 1080p or 720p HDX video via the web. What you still won’t get on the PC unfortunately is higher quality sound as it’s still limited to stereo audio for now, and in our tests we weren’t able to access the Flash streams on a phone or tablet. Just log into the website and you should be able to try it out for yourself, however you will need adequate internet speed and an HDCP-compliant display — check out the details at the link below.

Filed under: Home Entertainment, HD

Vudu brings HDX 1080p streaming and downloadable movies to PCs originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 15 Nov 2012 22:49:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Tom Hardy, the British actor who played Bane in The Dark Knight Rises, has signed on to play the main protagonist, Sam Fisher, in the upcoming adaptation of video game franchise Tom Clancy’s Splinter Cell. The movie is still in its planning stages and the series’ developer Ubisoft is still in talks to sign on a movie studio.

The upcoming film will be written by Eric Warren Singer, who also wrote The International which starred Clive Owen and Naomi Watts. This will be Singers third movie as a writer. The Splinter Cell film doesn’t yet have a studio locked in, but Ubisoft is said to have had preliminary talks with Warner Bros. and Paramount.

Jean-Julien Baronnet, CEO of Ubisoft Motion Pictures, says that Hardy “is currently one of the biggest talents in the film industry, and he has a phenomenal ability to take on complex and varied roles with his broad range of acting skills.” Hardy is most known for playing the infamous role of Batman’s nemesis, Bane, in the recent Dark Knight sequel The Dark Knight Rises.

Ubisoft has sold over 23 million copies of Splinter Cell since the series’ debut in 2002. Six games have been released so far, with Splinter Cell: Blacklist releasing next spring. Ubisoft is also working on an Assassin’s Creed movie, which will feature Prometheus star Michael Fassbender, who is also on board to co-produce the Splinter Cell film.

[via Variety]

Image via Flickr

Splinter Cell movie will star Dark Knight Rises actor Tom Hardy is written by Craig Lloyd & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

It’s time for the directors and writers to chime in on the idea that Star Wars Episode 7, that taking place in the storyline after the first 6, will be made and released in 2015. This news came this week concurrently with the fact that George Lucas had sold the entirety of LucasFilm (his own production company) to Disney along with the rights to Star Wars itself. Lucas will remain part of the universe as a creative consultant, and the 7th, 8th, and 9th movies have been confirmed all at once – several big names in the film industry have commented in the short time since this announcement was made.

It was none other than Robert Rodriguez who made the comment about how quickly the film needed to be made. The excitement that many current big-names in directing and writing are feeling is a direct result of them having been draw into the industry originally by the first trilogy of Star Wars films. Rodriguez is certainly of age to remember the explosive nature of the first time Star Wars came into our universe.

“What an amazing world and legacy George Lucas has created — and it needs to continue in capable hands. I do think Disney is the best studio for the job and the fact that they brought in Kathleen Kennedy? I can’t imagine a better scenario. And 2015 can’t get here fast enough.” – Rodriguez

Kathleen Kennedy was up until now second in command at LucasFilm, and she’ll be in charge of operations now once the company is owned by Disney. Director J.J. Abrams had similar feelings about the situation, having once noted that it was difficult to pull Star Trek out into a major motion picture now in the present while Star Wars was still big, saying now that he’s pumped: “Part of me? Thrilled. Part of me? Terrified. Most of me? Thrillified.”

Disney also acquired Marvel Comics back in 2008, and since its acquisition made several films possible: Iron Man, Iron Man 2, The Incredible Hulk, Captain America, Thor, and The Avengers. Director of Iron Man Jon Favreau spoke up about the situation as well, noting that “The idea of another trilogy that further shrouds the Force in mystery as its secrets are lost to time – that’s extremely compelling. “I want so bad for it to be good. Can you imagine?”

We’ll be waiting too – and SlashGear will be running with no lack of insight on the goings-on inside LucasFilm and Disney as the next three years pass before Star Wars Episode 7 – prepare yourselves, readers!

NOTE: The image at the head of this post is a section of the cover art for Heir to the Empire, one of many possible next-episode storylines that will be followed by the ongoing Star Wars saga. Read it today!

[via Entertainment Weekly]

Star Wars Episode 7 “can’t get here fast enough” is written by Chris Burns & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.