Hasta La Gadget!

THQ may no longer be amongst us, but its Relic Entertainment-developed game Company of Heroes is still in the all clear with its movie adaptation. The straight-to-DVD movie is set for release next week on February 26 in North America, with a European release roughly a month later on March 25.

The full-length film, based on Relic Entertainment’s real-time strategy series, is about a band of soldiers that are tasked with stopping the Germans from completing their own atomic bomb during the Battle of the Bulge during World War II. The movie will be available on both Blu-ray and DVD, and will include two behind-the-scenes featurettes, as well as deleted scenes.

The movie is directed by Don Michael Paul, who is known for directing a handful of smaller movies, as well as starring in The Island. Company of Heroes stars Tom Sizemore, Vinnie Jones, Neal McDonough, Jurgen Prochnow, and Chad Collins. Sizemore has starred in past war films, including Saving Private Ryan and Black Hawk Down.

Earlier last month, THQ sold most of its assets to other companies, and Relic Entertainment ended up being snatched by Sega for $26.6 million. There’s no word on what will happen to the Company of Heroes video game series, but we at least have the movie to look forward to. Hopefully it’s good, but it probably won’t live up to Steven Spielberg’s and Tom Hank’s own WWII films.

[via Joystiq]

Company of Heroes movie set for DVD and Blu-ray February 26 is written by Craig Lloyd & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

Raymond Teller once said that the secret to fooling people is to put in so much more effort than the trick seems worth. It seems that the bods at Industrial Light and Magic followed his wisdom when concocting the effects for The Avengers. If you’d marveled at how seamless the team had blended shots of the Big Apple with the Chitauri invasion, then we’ve got a surprise for you — almost none of it is real. Rather than shoot parts of the New York-based finale in the city (or any other city), the effects house created a 20-block “digital playground,” complete with individually detailed office windows. Interested in learning just how much of those breathtaking set pieces were filmed in a green screen in New Mexico? Head on past the break.

Filed under: Misc, Home Entertainment, Alt

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Via: Luke Edwards (Twitter)

For dedicated fans, money is no object when it comes to obtaining the perfect piece of memorabilia. But when dealing with random EBay auctioneers selling “authentic” merchandise sight-unseen, you might not be getting the genuine article you paid for. Amazon’s new Entertainment Collectibles service, however, offers everything from autographs to instruments and wardrobes—and only from vetted, pre-approved merchants. Here are a few of the 350,000 pieces on sale right now. More »

If Choose Your Own Adventure books weren’t your go-to in fourth grade there’s something seriously wrong with you. But you’re going to have another chance to dictate the creative process thanks to a movie that chooses its ending based on sensor data from the audience. More »

It’s time for the mother of all casting calls in the next Star Wars movie: Han Solo – and wouldn’t you know it? It appears that none other than Harrison Ford will be reprising the roll. That is, according to Latino Review – a source that (later in this post) you’ll find has been a surprisingly well-informed source in the past! It’s not every day that we get to report on a new Star Wars movie (even though that may change in a few years time) so it’s all excitement from our end!

The details are not known at the moment on what Harrison Ford will be doing as Han Solo at this point. The amount of movies he will be in is not known. What is known is that Harrison Ford has signed a contract to reprise his role as Han Solo in an upcoming Star Wars film – so says El Mayimbe. This writer has made it clear that he only knows that Ford has signed on to do a film or films in the future, all that’s left is for the studio – Disney or Lucasfilm – to do a formal announcement.

Sound like an awesome deal to you? It’s now possible that they’ll either be doing flash-forwards to when Han Solo was the age Ford is now, or that they’ll have the first (or subsequent) films set in an amount of time relative to our actual timeline. There’s also been rumors of break-away films with character-centric storylines, Han Solo being one of the possibilities too. How about some Tron: Legacy action with The Dude’s face being retro-ized with many virtual markers for a much younger Han?

The possibilities are endless in this extremely advanced virtual effects-driven universe of ours. And we know good and well that the Star Wars franchise is no stranger with the VFX universe – a universe right here and now, up close and personal!

Also note: Our own Philip Berne called it three years ago in a column called How Lucas ruined Star Wars and how to save it.

And as far as this leak goes from Latino Review: If you’ll have a look back at the post Marvel Reporting from the writer named Da7e on their website, you’ll see that they’ve literally been contacted by Marvel Comics in an attempt to bribe them out of their inside sources in the film industry. And this isn’t the first time they’ve had a major scoop either. The scoop we’re having a look at here was so important that writer El Mayimbe went to Fox News Latino to let it be known. Have a peek at this video to see him make it public:

Be sure to stick with SlashGear in our Star Wars tag hub for all the information leading up to, during, over, and past the release of Star Wars VII. We’ll be pumped up and jumping in every single day with the biggest tips, leaks, and final news releases all the way!

Report: Harrison Ford signed for Star Wars VII as Han Solo is written by Chris Burns & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.