The Congress, the highly-anticipated follow up to Ari Folman’s Waltz with Bashir, premiered last month at the Cannes Film Festival, and now Drafthouse Films alongside Films We Like plans to bring it stateside.  The movie is a fascinating blend of live action and animation that adapts Stanislaw Lem’s classic short story, “The Futurological Congress”, and follows an aging actress desperate for work (Robin Wright) who takes one last job to support her disabled son (Kodi-Smit McPhee).  Wright plays herself, and then is scanned into an animated world where the studio now owns her, but she will be forever young.  Judging by the trailer, the movie looks like an absolute trip, and one I’m excited to take.  Sadly, we’ll have to wait until 2014 for the movie’s theatrical/VOD release.

Hit the jump for the press release and a new image from The Congress.  The film also stars Jon Hamm, Danny Huston, Harvey Keitel, and Paul Giamatti.

Quite the prestigious voice cast for an animated feature adaptation of the classic childrens book The Little Prince is being put together.  Heat Vision reports that James Franco, Rachel McAdams, Jeff Bridges, Marion Cotillard, Benicio Del Toro, and Paul Giamatti have all signed on to lend their voices to the pic.  For those unaware, French author Antoine de Saint-Exupery’s story centers on a pilot who crash lands in the Sahara Desert and stumbles across a young boy who claims to be a prince that has fallen to Earth from his home on an asteroid.  As the pilot works to repair his plane, the young boy tells him fantastical stories with heavy thematic resonance.

Mark Osborne (Kung Fu Panda) is onboard to direct the project, with Onyx Films’ Aton Soumache and Dimitri Rassam producing.  Additionally, The Wrap reports that Paramount is eyeing the prospect of distributing the animated pic and Mackenzie Foy (Twilight) is in talks to take on a voice role.

Here’s the latest big screen casting news:

• Paul Giamatti (Sideways) will join the Bill Pohlad-directed indie Love & Mercy, The Beach Boys’ Brian Wilson biopic starring John Cusack and Paul Dano.
• Nikolaj Coster-Waldau (Game of Thrones) is in talks to lead Alex Proyas’ epic fantasy, Gods of Egypt.
• Don Johnson (Miami Vice) is in final negotiations to join The Other Woman, Nick Cassavetes’ comedy starring Cameron Diaz.

Hit the jump for more on each project.

Yesterday, we saw some set photos of a pre-CG Rhino (Paul Giamatti), but it looked like test shooting rather than something they were using partly because of what Giamatti was wearing (polo shirt and jeans), and partly because the character’s tattoos were mostly gone.  Today, Giamatti looks more in character wearing an undershirt and with the barbed wire tattoo back on his forehead.  Most of that tattoos are still gone, so I continue to wonder how much of the Rhino suit will cover the actor.  Perhaps we’ll see the some concept art at the film’s Comic-Con panel.

Hit the jump to check out the set photos.  The film also stars Andrew Garfield, Emma Stone, Dane DeHaan, Shailene Woodley, Felicity Jones, Chris Cooper, and Sally Field.  The Amazing Spider-Man 2 opens in 3D on May 2, 2014.

In earlier set photos from The Amazing Spider-Man 2, we’ve seen the Rhino (Paul Giamatti) face off against Spider-Man (Andrew Garfield), and getting pantsed for his trouble.  New set photos show that the Rhino may be retaliating with some kind of exoskeleton.  You’ll notice that most of the Rhino’s prison tattoos are gone, so this scene could takes place before the stuff we’ve seen, or other parts of the suit are coming to cover up Giamatti (no need to do the makeup if no one’s going to see it).  There are also some images of our hero hanging out with a kid dressed as Spider-Man.  I don’t know if that’s an actor or a Make-a-Wish thing, but either way: adorable (although the latter has some sadness attached to the adorableness).

Hit the jump to check out the set photos.  The film also stars Emma Stone, Dane DeHaan, Shailene Woodley, Felicity Jones, Chris Cooper, and Sally Field.  The Amazing Spider-Man 2 opens in 3D on May 2, 2014.

The last time we heard anything about The Congress, Ari Folman‘s follow-up to his remarkable 2008 film, Waltz with Bashir, was back in 2011.  The movie is a blend of live action and animation that adapts Stanislaw Lem’s classic short story, “The Futurological Congress”, and follows an aging actress desperate for work (Robin Wright) who takes one last job to support her disabled son (Kodi-Smit McPhee).  We hoped to see the film in 2012, but now it will finally debut at this year’s Cannes Film Festival.  The trailer has debuted online, and the movie looks beautiful and enchantingly strange.  Wright plays herself, and then is scanned into an animated world where the studio now owns her, but she will be forever young.  Even though there’s a bit of sci-fi in here, it’s not too far removed from reality where motion-capture has become a regular part of filmmaking.

Hit the jump to check out the trailer.  The film also stars Danny Huston, Harvey Keitel, and Paul Giamatti.  The 2013 Cannes Film Festival runs from May 15 – 26th.

Another batch of images from the set of The Amazing Spider-Man 2 have landed online, and they appear to be a continuation of the sequence that was snapped yesterday involving Spidey, a bus, and Paul Giamatti’s villain Rhino.  In these new images, Andrew Garfield’s titular character comes face-to-face with Giamatti’s villainous Rhino and the two become involved in a bit of a skirmish that ends, well, somewhat cartoonishly.

Hit the jump to take a look at the images.  The film also stars Emma Stone, Dane DeHaan, Shailene Woodley, Felicity Jones, Chris Cooper, and Sally Field.  The Amazing Spider-Man 2 opens in 3D on May 2, 2014.

The set photos from The Amazing Spider-Man 2 continue to roll in.  This past weekend, director Marc Webb gave us an official look at Paul Giamatti as The Rhino, and now we not only have more images of tattooed Giamatti, but Spider-Man (Andrew Garfield) engaging in some superheroics.  That bus full of innocent passengers will most likely be saved unless Webb is considering a dastardly twist where Spider-Man lets it fall on the little girl.  In all fairness, she is wearing a stupid-looking backpack.

Hit the jump to check out the set photos.  The film also stars Emma Stone, Dane DeHaan, Shailene Woodley, Felicity Jones, Chris Cooper, and Sally Field.  The Amazing Spider-Man 2 opens in 3D on May 2, 2014.

Marc Webb is a talented director, but his true talent may lie in tweeting.  Webb has tweeted a number of great behind-the-scenes photos from the set of The Amazing Spider-Man 2.  The latest Webb tweets give us a much clearer introduction to Paul Giamatti as Aleksei Sytsevich (aka the Rhino) after a grainy set photo previewed the makeup.

Andrew Garfield, Emma Stone, Dane DeHaan, Shailene Woodley, Paul Giamatti, Felicity Jones, Chris Cooper, and Sally Field also star.  The Amazing Spider-Man 2 opens May 2, 2014.  See the full image after the jump.

We’ve already seen that Electro (Jamie Foxx) will be a colorful villain in The Amazing Spider-Man 2, but he’s not the only baddie lurking about.  Paul Giamatti was cast as the Rhino, a kind of silly character in the comics who wore a super-powered suit that resembled a rhino (it’s grey and the helmet has horns) and smashed stuff until Spidey came to save the day.  The Rhino’s real name is “Aleksei Sytsevich”, and if you want to have a Russian bad guy, take the visual shortcut and deck him out in a track suit and prison tattoos.  Set video has reportedly been taken of a stunt driver sporting this look who is apparently wearing a Giamatti mask.  The scene involves a tow truck dragging an Oscorp truck and crashing through police cars.

Hit the jump to check out the video.  The film also stars Andrew Garfield, Emma Stone, Dane DeHaan, Shailene Woodley, Paul Giamatti, Felicity Jones, Chris Cooper, and Sally Field.  The Amazing Spider-Man 2 opens in 3D on May 2, 2014.

The first trailer for director Carlo Carlei’s adaptation of Romeo & Juliet has landed online.  Written by Julian Fellowes (Downton Abbey, Gosford Park), the film stars Hailee Steinfeld (True Grit) as Juliet and Douglas Booth (The Pillars of the Earth) as Romeo, with a rather impressive supporting cast that includes Paul Giamatti, Stellan Skarsgard, and Homeland’s Damian Lewis.  Carlei maintains the original setting of Shakespeare’s play and looks to be taking a rather classical approach to the storytelling.  Following a rather awkward opening with “movie trailer guy” reciting Shakespeare, the clip sufficiently teases the romantic and intense aspects of Shakespeare’s source material.  However, with a story that’s been told countless times, it’s tough to be excited by a new adaptation unless its told in an original or interesting fashion.

Hit the jump to watch the trailer.  The film also stars Ed Westwick, Kodi Smit-McPhee (Let Me In) and Natascha McElhone.  Romeo & Juliet is set for release in the U.K on July 26th, but a US distribution deal has yet to be made.

Fox Searchlight is getting its Oscar plans in order by announcing that they’ve set Steve McQueen‘s Twelve Years a Slave for December 27th.  Based on Solomon Northup’s autobiography of the same name, Chiwetel Ejiofor plays Northup, an educated and married black man living in 1853 New York.  Northup was approached by two men about a job offer in Washington D.C., but when he showed up he was kidnapped and forced into slavery.  The film has lined up one of the best casts in recent memory.  In addition to Ejifor, the film also stars Michael Fassbender, Brad Pitt, Paul Dano, Scoot McNairy, Quvenzhane Wallis, Paul Giamatti, Sarah Paulson, Garrett Dillahunt, Alfre Woodard, and Benedict Cumberbatch.  Fox Searchlight’s Oscar odds also go up when you consider that two films involving slavery—Lincoln and Django Unchained—grabbed Best Picture nominations last year (somehow, Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter missed the cut).

The only other film set for December 27th’s is The Weinstein Company’s Oscar-hopeful Grace of Monaco starring Nicole Kidman as Grace Kelly.  I can’t wait to see Twelve Years a Slave, and I hope it will play at TIFF like McQueen’s first two features, Hunger and Shame.

A new trailer and poster have been released for DreamWorks Animation’s Turbo.  The story follows a snail (voiced by Ryan Reynolds) who dreams of being able to go fast, and gets his wish after a freak accident.  He then goes to pursue his dream of racing in the Indy 500.  The trailer looks cute, but I’m not sure if the movie has an antagonist.  I hope it’s salt.

Hit he jump to check out the trailer and poster.  The film also features the voices of Paul Giamatti, Michael Pena, Luis Guzmán, Bill Hader, Richard Jenkins, Ken Jeong, Michelle Rodriguez, Maya Rudolph, Ben Schwartz, Kurtwood Smith, Snoop Dogg, and Samuel L. Jackson.  Turbo opens in 3D on July 19th.

Check out new images and synopses for the following films from the 2013 Tribeca Film Festival:

• Adult World – Scott Coffey’s comedy starring Emma Roberts (Celeste and Jesse Forever) and John Cusack (The Raven) that centers on a recent college graduate with dreams of becoming a famous poet who ends up working at an adult book store instead.
• Almost Christmas – Phil Morrison’s comedy features Paul Rudd (This Is 40) and Paul Giamatti (Sideways) as two French Canadian Christmas tree salesmen who travel to New York to sell trees.
• Bottled Up – Previously titled Something in the Water, the Enid Zentelis’ film starring Josh Hamilton (Dark Skies) and Melissa Leo (The Fighter) centers on struggles with addiction.

Hit the jump for the images and synopses.

Earlier today, we reported that Marc Webb’s The Amazing Spider-Man 2 began production in New York.  Now, we have the full press release that reveals the first official synopsis and the principal cast.  We knew that Paul Giamatti was in talks to join the production and can confirm that now, but his role has yet to be specified.  Another new name that joins the sequel’s cast is Colm Feore (Thor), but his role is also unspecified (Norman Osborn?).  Hit the jump to check out the synopsis and read the press release.