August 18, 2022

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'Das Boot,' 'Perfect Storm' director Wolfgang Petersen dies

Director Wolfgang Petersen died Tuesday at age 81. His production company confirmed the news to Variety.

Deadline added that Petersen died of pancreatic cancer. He died in his Brentwood, Calif., home in his wife's, Maria Antoinette, arms.

After directing German film and television in the '60s and '70s, Petersen's 1981 film Das Boot brought him international acclaim. The story of a German U-Boat in WWII exists in a theatrical and director's cut, and a further extended TV miniseries version.

Petersen's next German production was the English-language family film The Neverending Story. The tale of a boy reading and interacting with the characters in a storybook brought Petersen to Hollywood.

Hollywood films like Enemy Mine and Shattered followed. Petersen directed Clint Eastwood's first starring role after his Unforgiven Oscar win with In the Line of Fire.

The film showed Eastwood as a Secret Service agent in his '60s. Having failed to stop John F. Kennedy's assassination, the agent gets a chance at redemption when he faces a new assassin (John Malkovich).

Petersen directed the hits Outbreak and Air Force One. The Perfect Storm was a blockbuster of the Summer of 2000, and pioneered visual effects that created the giant wave.

Petersen had another hit with the mythological epic Troy starring Brad Pitt as Achilles. Poseidon, a remake of The Poseidon Adventure, was his last Hollywood movie.

Petersen's last film was the 2016 German film Vier Gegen die Bank, or Four Against the Bank. It was his first German-language film since Das Boot.

Robert de Niro to headline gangster drama 'Wise Guys' in dual role

Legendary actor Robert de Niro will star in Wise Guys, an upcoming gangster film for Warner Bros., reuniting him with the genre that first made him a household name.

A period drama centered around Italian-American crime bosses Vito Genovese and Frank Costello, the film will take place during the mid 20th-century, as the men attempt to bring their families to the height of the Mafia world.

Sources told The Hollywood Reporter, who reported the casting on Tuesday, that de Niro will be playing both characters.

Warner Bros. has not commented on de Niro's involvement, although the news was corroborated by numerous other industry outlets, including Deadline and Variety.

Wise Guys will bring de Niro back together with a number of the gangster filmmakers he has collaborated with on past projects.

The film will be directed by Barry Levinson, whom de Niro has previously worked with on films like Wag the Dog and What Just Happened. The veteran director is best known for his Academy Award-winning film Rain Man with Dustin Hoffman and Tom Cruise.

The script for Wise Guys was reportedly written by Nicholas Pileggi, whose 1985 book -- coincidentally called Wiseguy -- was the basis for Martin Scorsese's 1990 gangster classic Goodfellas, which also starred de Niro.

For the veteran actor, Wise Guys will bring de Niro back to the genre that first put him on the map.

Besides the aforementioned Goodfellas, the 79-year-old de Niro starred in crime films like Casino, The Godfather Part II, Heat and The Untouchables.

In more recent years, he has ventured into other genres and can also be seen in comedy films like Meet the Fockers and Dirty Grandpa.

He recently returned to the gangster world, reuniting with Martin Scorsese in 2019 for the Netflix film The Irishman.

That pair is also helming another upcoming Netflix crime film, Killers of the Flower Moon, which began production in 2021 and also stars Leonardo diCaprio.

Wise Guys is the first original film from Warner Bros. Discovery, the company that was born out of the April mega-merger between Hollywood studio icon WarnerMedia and the documentary channel Discovery.

A release date has not been set for the film, though it was reported that Wise Guys will receive a theatrical release.

'Wednesday' teaser: Jenna Ortega plays Wednesday Addams in Netflix series

Netflix is giving a glimpse of the new series Wednesday.

The streaming service shared a teaser trailer for the horror comedy series Wednesday featuring Jenna Ortega (Jane the Virgin, You).

Wednesday is based on The Addams Family character Wednesday Addams. The series follows Wednesday (Ortega) as she attends Nevermore Academy, where she attempts to master her psychic abilities and solve a supernatural mystery connected to her family's past.

"Little did I know that I'd be stepping into a nightmare," Ortega says in the trailer. "Full of mystery, mayhem and murder. I think I'm going to love it here."

Catherine Zeta-Jones and Luis Guzmán play Wednesday's parents, Morticia and Gomez Addams.

Riki Lindhome, Jamie McShane, Percy Hynes White, Gwendoline Christie and Christina Ricci also star.

Wednesday is created by Alfred Gough and Miles Millar and directed by Tim Burton. The series features music by Danny Elfman and Chris Bacon.

Netflix has yet to announce a release date for the show.

WATCH IT NOW" Wednesday Addams - Official Teaser

'The Mole' reboot to launch on Netflix

Netflix will be streaming a rebooted version of the classic reality competition The Mole, it was reported Wednesday.

According to Variety, the show is expected to premiere sometime this fall with an initial 10-episode run.

The new show is based on a series of the same name that originally aired on ABC from 2001 to 2009. The ABC show itself was based on a Belgian reality series called De Mol that started in the late 1990s.

The premise of The Mole involves 12 players working to complete a series of challenges, with each completed challenge adding money to a pot. Most of these challenges involve physical tests and stunt work.

One unknown player, though, is designated as 'the mole,' whose job it is to sabotage the rest of the group.

By the end of the game, only one player will outlast the others and expose the mole to win the entire pot.

Netflix has mostly remained quiet about the details of the reboot, although Vulture reported that the streaming giant is calling the show a "reimagined version" of the original.

That original show saw significant success during its initial run, and was hosted for its first two seasons by a pre-CNN Anderson Cooper.

While these first two seasons involved ordinary people as the contestants, later editions would switch to a celebrity format.

The Mole even survived a four-year hiatus after initially being canceled, before being axed after its fifth season following a drop in ratings.

Previous attempts to reboot the series over the years have failed, but despite this, the original show has gained a cult following.

Rumors began to swirl that Netflix was working on a reboot after seasons two and three of the show were added to the streaming platform last year.

A casting call for a project called The Insider was reportedly put out by Netflix around that same time, leading to further speculation that this had been a codename for The Mole.

Wednesday's announcement marks the first time, though, that the reboot was officially confirmed.

Beyond a fall release time frame, no official date for The Mole has been set, and no host has been announced.