The first trailer for the third entry in the Madagascar franchise has been unveiled. Madagascar 3: Europe’s Most Wanted finds the zoo-friendly characters on the lam in Europe, where they join a traveling circus. It looks as though they might be going the spy thriller route (uh-oh), with Ben Stiller‘s character doing his best Tom Cruise impression. There are a few cute scenes here, especially with the penguins and Sacha Baron Cohen‘s character, and kids are sure to eat this movie up, but there’s really not much to convince your average adult moviegoer that this isn’t a straight-to-DVD cartoon sequel. Noah Baumbach (Fantastic Mr. Fox) penned the screenplay, so hopefully the full film offers something for a more mature audience to enjoy as well.

Hit the jump to check out the trailer. The film also features the voices of Chris Rock, Jada Pinkett Smith, David Schwimmer, and Frances McDormand. Madagascar 3: Europe’s Most Wanted opens June 8th, 2012.

Believe it or not, from Adam Sandler’s extensive body of films, he has never made a sequel. Now some of you may argue that his basic plot is rehashed in 90% of his films (and I wouldn’t disagree), but the fact remains that there has never been a second installment of any of his films. It seems that the creative well has run even drier as Showblitz (via Variety) reports that Sandler is in talks with Grown Ups scribe, Fred Wolf to discuss a potential sequel. I can’t exactly blame him. Sony and Happy Madison Productions’  Grown Ups was the highest-grossing film for Sandler at a worldwide total of $271 million. Though Sandler is not yet signed on for the sequel, his involvement is contingent upon the script. Perhaps we’ll see him in a reunion with Kevin James, Chris Rock, Rob Schneider and David Spade. Hit the jump for more, including why this is all America’s fault.

With our continuing coverage of the 2012 Sundance Film Festival’s Spotlight line-up, we’re bringing you some early looks at next year’s films. Hit the jump for synopses and images from writer-director Julie Delpy‘s 2 Days in New York, starring Delpy and Chris Rock; writer-director Nicholas Jarecki‘s Arbitrage, starring Richard Gere, Susan Sarandon and Tim Roth; writer-director Leslye Headland‘s Bachelorette, starring Kirsten Dunst, Isla Fisher and Lizzy Caplan; and writer-director Josh Radnor‘s Liberal Arts, starring Radnor and Elizabeth Olsen.

The 2012 Sundance Film Festival runs from Thursday, January 19^th to Sunday, the 29^th.  Click here for all our coverage.

The level of optimism for Eddie Murphy’s career is high right now—the highest since at least since Dreamgirls, maybe in over a decade.  Tower Heist doesn’t look god-awful.  The live Oscar stage could reinvigorate the former stand-up.  And recently, Murphy denounced his recent work in family films.  (Notwithstanding A Thousand Words, finally coming out in March after years on the shelf.)  That leaves the question of what he would like to pursue going forward.

It’s worth noting that Tower Heist was originally conceived for a cast of black comedians such as Chris Rock, Dave Chapelle, Tracy Morgan, and Martin Lawrence.  The development process whitewashed the project (Ben Stiller and Matthew Broderick seem absurdly white in this context), but Murphy hasn’t abandoned the central idea.  Murphy says he is writing an alien abduction comedy he whimsically refers to as Jamal and Tyrell and Omar and Brick and Michael’s Wack-Ass Weekend.  More after the jump.

The cast of director Kirk Jones’ (Everybody’s Fine) baby book adaptation What to Expect When You’re Expecting keeps growing, as Chris Rock and Anna Kendrick have just signed on. The Love Actually-esque movie will follow six expectant couples through the ups and downs of pregnancy. Lionsgate announced that Kendrick will play a woman who reunites with an old flame following a turf war between their food trucks.

Per Deadline, Rock will play the leader of a group of expectant fathers who “lectures them on what it’s really like to have a baby and become a father.” Rock and Kendrick join a cast that includes Cameron Diaz, Jennifer Lopez, Isla Fischer and Brooklyn Decker. Filming begins this summer, with What to Expect When You’re Expecting slated for a May 11^th, 2012 release.

As a connoisseur of comedy, I love learning about the craft and process of stand-up comedians and the brilliant work they do on stage. So you can imagine my excitement about the forthcoming comedy special Talking Funny, a casual conversation about comedy and life as a comedian from some of today’s greatest funnymen. Jerry Seinfeld, Chris Rock, Ricky Gervais and Louis C.K. all sit down to shoot the shit, share anecdotes, talk about adding new material to their acts and more. Check out the funny trailer below, and don’t forget to check out the special when it premieres on Friday, April 22nd at 9/8c on HBO.

Steve Carell and comedian David Steinberg will be teaming up to produce a documentary about the history of modern comedy.  According to Deadline, the documentary will “chronicle the evolution of comedy over the past sixty years through the eyes of several generations of comedians.”  Carell and Steinberg are already working on the currently untitled documentary, which will include interviews with such comedians as Carl Reiner, Mel Brooks, Lily Tomlin, Don Rickles, Carol Burnett, Jerry Seinfeld, Ellen DeGeneres, Judd Apatow, Robin Williams, Sarah Silverman, Chris Rock, Jane Lynch, and Tina Fey.  The amount of talent involved with the film is definitely impressive and Carell seems to agree by saying, “We’re honored that so many legendary comedic performers have chosen to be part of this.”

The duo plan to target the film for a TV distribution deal and I’m sure that more than one channel will be happy to air the documentary when it’s finished.  This would also mark Carell’s second venture into producing a work for television after yesterday’s announcement that NBC has picked up a comedy series based on Carrell’s early days working as a mail carrier in Littleton, Massachusetts.

Earlier this year, we watched Columbia/Sony’s marketing department go absolutely crazy with their push for audiences to see Grown Ups, a comedy starring Adam Sandler, Chris Rock, Kevin James, David Spade, and Rob Schneider.  Apparently, that push worked:  Grown Ups earned well over $160m at the box office, a figure that’s truly astounding.  Having avoided the film like the Red Death when it was in theaters over the summer, I was curious when Collider’s overlords handed me a copy of the Blu-ray for review:  Would Grown Ups be as bad as I was expecting it to be, or were those $160m worth of people right all along?  Read on for the full review after the jump…

In a bit of casting news that’s surprising (though not entirely out of left field), Chris Rock has joined the cast of Julie Delpy’s 2 Days in New York, the sequel to 2007′s 2 Days in Paris.  Delpy wrote, directed, and starred in the first film, which saw her on vacation with her American boyfriend in France.  Delpy stated that her follow-up is about “the difficulty of relationships, but also about the main character’s evolution in general.”  Details are scarce in the Production Weekly tweet that broke the news, though TheWrap speculates that Rock may play Delpy’s new lover in the sequel.  Production is set to begin this October with hopes of landing a spot in Cannes 2011.

The most recent phase of Rock’s career has revealed the funnyman to be a disciple of world cinema.  Both Death at a Funeral and I Think I Love My Wife were inspired by foreign comedies, with a remake of the French Le premiere toile in the works.  He’s even penning the script for the Mike Nichol take on Akira Kurosawa’s High and Low. Hit the jump for the official synopsis of 2 Days in Paris.

Sony has provided us with 5 clips from director Dennis Dugan’s Grown Ups starring Adam Sandler, Kevin James, Chris Rock, David Spade, Rob Schneider, Salma Hayek, Maria Bello, and Maya Rudolph.  The movie is about five men who were best friends when they were young kids and now are getting together for the Fourth of July weekend to meet each others’ families for the first time.  If you’ve seen the trailer and the TV spots, you’ve seen most of the footage.  Hit the jump to check the clips out.  Grown Ups gets released June 25.

We’ve got a nice batch of trailers for you this fine Friday morning.  First up, there’s the great trailer for the action-comedy Knight and Day starring Tom Cruise and Cameron Diaz.  I’ve come to accept that Tom Cruise: The Celebrity will always be a figure of ridicule, but I still believe that Tom Cruise: The Actor is a lot of fun.

Then there’s the awful trailer for Grown Ups starring Adam Sandler, Kevin James, Chris Rock, Rob Schneider, and David Spade.  Let me sum it up right now: Fatty fall down, woman breast-feeds 4-year-old, men pee in swimming pool.  Oh the hilarity.

Finally, there’s the trailer for Ondine starring Colin Farrell.  It’s worth checking out because it looks like an old myth but told with originality.  Hit the jump to see all three trailers along with a synopsis for each movie.

Opening this Friday is director Neil LaBute’s Death at a Funeral, which stars Chris Rock, Martin Lawrence, Tracy Morgan, Zoë Saldaña, Columbus Short, Luke Wilson, Peter Dinklage, Danny Glover, Regina Hall, and Keith David.  The movie is a remake of the 2007 British film with the same name, and while most remakes recast everyone, Peter Dinklage is playing the same character again.  So if you’ve seen the 2007 film, you know who he plays and some of the twists and turns.

To help promote the movie, I got to sit down with Danny Glover and Regina Hall.  Hit the jump to watch the interview:

I’ve always wondered if Tracy Morgan is playing himself on 30 Rock, or if it’s all an act.  Also, I’ve seen Morgan on David Letterman and have always wondered if he’s pulling an Andy Kaufman with the way he acts…or if it’s really him.  Based on the Los Angeles press junket for Death at a Funeral, I’m going to say it’s not an act.

The reason I can say that is while waiting in a hallway for my interview with Tracy Morgan and Luke Wilson, I got to hear Morgan saying some of the craziest things during other interviews.  Most of them are not safe to print – let alone say on television.  While we couldn’t hear everything behind the door, we heard enough that every journalist waiting and a few publicists were laughing a lot.   Actually, I felt added pressure walking in to my interview, as I was hoping to get some wild and crazy answers.  Hit the jump to see if I did….

Opening this weekend is director Neil LaBute’s Death at a Funeral, which stars Chris Rock, Martin Lawrence, Tracy Morgan, Zoë Saldaña, Columbus Short, Luke Wilson, Peter Dinklage, Danny Glover, Regina Hall, and Keith David.  The movie is a remake of the 2007 British film with the same name.  If you saw the previous version, the remake is the same story set in America.

To help promote the film, I recently got to speak with James Marsden.  In the film, Marsden gets accidentally drugged and spends most of the film dealing with vivid hallucinations.  While the film is a comedy, we talked about how he found the right balance for his performance.  He also told me about some of his deleted scenes, and I asked him what’s up with Enchanted 2.  Check out what he had to say after the jump:

If you were going to remake a classic film noir by one of the world’s greatest directors, whom would you pick to write the adaptation?  That’s the question faced by Mike Nichols, who’s next project is an update of Akira Kurosawa’s classic High and Low.  And his answer?  According to BlackVoices, it’s Chris Rock.  That’s right: the writer of I Think I Love My Wife is adapting Kurosawa.

Kurosawa’s original 1963 film is about a businessman who must decide whether he will give up his substantial life savings in order to save his chauffer’s kidnapped son.  It’s a tense, intelligent drama, not exactly the kind of work Rock is know for.  One has to assume that he will not be attempting to create a modern noir, but that he will be turning it into some kind of comedy.

Hit the jump for my thoughts on Rock taking this surprising gig.