I generally don’t like to check out extended clips of footage from films ahead of their release. Call me old fashioned but, similar to how I try and avoid cherry picking music singles before listening to the entire album, I like to think of records and movies as complete bodies of work. Of course, I say all of this only to preface breaking my own general rule. I implore you to watch the first 12 minutes of writer/director/actress Brit Marling’s Sound of My Voice. I did, I don’t regret a single moment of it, and now I can’t wait to check out the entire film as soon as possible.

All self-contradiction aside, in this week’s “Top 5″ installment you’ll find Ghost Rider Spirit of Vengeance interviews with talent like Nicolas Cage, Idris Elba, Johnny Whitworth, and directors Neveldine/Taylor, a recap of our 21 Jump Street set visit, trailers and a featurette for Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter, Transformers 4 news, and Avengers, Star Wars, and G.I. Joe: Retaliation toy images from the 2012 Toy Fair. Check out a brief recap and link to each after the jump.

With Neveldine/Taylor’s Ghost Rider Spirit of Vengeance opening today, I recently interviewed a lot of the cast in New York City.  In the sequel, Johnny Blaze (Cage) is hiding out in Eastern Europe when a motor-cycle riding warrior monk (Idris Elba) recruits him to save a young boy (Fergus Riordan) from the Devil (Ciaran Hinds). The film also stars Violante Placido, Anthony Head, Christopher Lambert and Johnny Whitworth. For more on Ghost Rider Spirit of Vengeace, here’s my Romania set visit, on set interviews, new images, five movie clips, and 12 minutes of behind the scenes footage from when the production was filming in Europe.

During my exclusive video interview with Mark Neveldine and Brain Taylor, we talked about how they got involved in the project, working with Nic Cage, the stunts and action sequences, deleted scenes, test screenings, what will be on the eventual Blu-ray/DVD, filming in Eastern Europe, and so much more.  If you’re a fan of Neveldine/Taylor, you’re going to love the interview.  Hit the jump to watch.

Now this is a director-material pairing that makes perfect sense. Brian Taylor, one half of the directing team behind the Crank franchise and Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance, has been tapped to write and direct an adaptation of the video game Twisted Metal. Deadline reports that the film will revolve around the underground death fights from the game series, as weaponized cars race for the proprietor Calypso, “a string-puller dedicated to examining the human condition.” Fan favorites like Sweet Tooth and Doll Face are poised to appear in the feature film.

Taylor and his directing partner Mark Neveldine are known for their active directing style, in which they hook themselves up to rigs and wires in order to get in-your-face camera angles. A Twisted Metal adaptation already has the makings of an insane moviegoing experience, but with Taylor onboard I think it’s safe to say that we’ll be in for one hell of a ride. Avi Arad is set to produce the pic for Sony Pictures. If you’re unfamiliar with the game series, hit the jump to watch a trailer.

With Ghost Rider Spirit of Vengeance opening next weekend, Sony has just released the EPK (electronic press kit) and it’s loaded with cool stuff from the film.  Just a little while ago we posted five clips, and now we’ve got around twelve minutes of behind the scenes footage from when the production was filming in Romania and across Eastern Europe.

In addition, for fans of directors Neveldine/Taylor, the footage features the two doing some crazy stunts to get a shot, and it’s also got the entire cast (Nicolas Cage , Violante Placido, Fergus Riordan, Ciaran Hinds, Idris Elba, Christopher Lambert, Anthony Head, and Johnny Whitworth) filming stunts and acting crazy on the set.  Hit the jump to watch and look for my exclusive video interviews with the cast next week.

We’ve been provided with five movie clips from the upcoming sequel Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance to share with our readers.  Nicolas Cage returns at the titular Ghost Rider, and Crank directors Mark Neveldine and Brian Taylor bring their signature visual style to the comic book franchise.  Cage finds himself tasked with rescuing a young boy from the grip of the Devil.  The film also stars Violante Placido, Fergus Riordan, Ciaran Hinds, Idris Elba, Christopher Lambert, Anthony Head, and Johnny Whitworth.

Hit the jump to watch the clips and click here for our previous coverage on the film which includes Steve’s set visit and tons of on set interviews with the cast. Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance opens in 3D February 17th.

Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance, the sequel that no one wanted but which we will all nonetheless watch at least once in our lives to see Nicholas Cage pissing fire, hits theatres next month. In anticipation, the interwebs were flooded with a torrent of images from the film, featuring a heavily tattooed (and apparently still-alive) Christopher Lambert, helmers Mark Neveldine and Bryan Taylor (Crank) making a scene ten times more awesome by directing it on rollerblades, and Cage’s CGI alter-ego not only pissing fire, but vomiting it. Hit the jump for a bevy of images (some of which we’ve seen before) from Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance.

With less than a month to go before directors Mark Neveldine and Brian Taylor’s Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance hits screens, a new behind-the-scenes featurette has been released. While Nicolas Cage remains the star of the film (upstaged only slightly by the flaming skull of Ghost Rider himself), directors Neveldine and Taylor are the focus in this short piece. Known for their insane camera work on films like Crank and Gamer, Neveldine/Taylor have only gotten crazier. The featurette spends as much time spotlighting the movie’s stuntwork professionals  as it does the directors themselves.

Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance also stars Idris Elba and Ciaran Hinds and opens February 17^th. You can check out Steve’s set visit here. Hit the jump to check out the explosive featurette.

With awards-season upon us, I’ve been doing my best to catch up with any potential contenders that I may have missed up to this point. Without a doubt, the standout of late has been writer/director Tate Taylor‘s The Help. I had heard from several friends that the pic was solid but nothing special. After finally getting a chance to sit down with it myself, I have to say that I disagree. I think it’s better than that. Not only is it filled with great performances, but it also finds a way to be more than a story of how a caring white person can help those otherwise hopeless black people. If only 2009′s The Blind Side could go back in time and take note.

But enough of my own cinematic experiences, in this week’s “Top 5″ you’ll find a recap of our visit to the Romanian set of Ghost Rider Spirit of Vengeance, Benedict Cumberbatch talking about his villainous role in J.J. Abrams‘ Star Trek sequel, our interview with Mondo creative director Justin Ishmael, the possibility of a Bridesmaids world without Kristen Wiig, and video interviews with War Horse‘s Jeremy Irvine, Emily Watson, Tom Hiddleston and more. Hit the jump for a brief recap and link to each.

Nicholas Cage, Idris Elba and Violante Placido are walking into a very large cave.  As they get further inside, I notice the walls and huge metal shelving units are filled with hundreds of semi-automatic machine guns, sniper rifles, and boxes of ammo.  The cave even has old-school weapons like swords and armor decorating the walls.  It’s easily the biggest arms cache I’ve ever seen, and I can only imagine what they’ll be used for.  As I take in the extremely cool surroundings, I hear director Brian Taylor say cut.  I guess now would be a good time to mention I’m standing on a soundstage about forty minutes outside Bucharest, Romania.

Let me back up a second.

It’s Sunday, February 20, 2011 and I’m sitting on a plane flying back from Europe.  A few days ago I got to visit the set of the Ghost Rider Spirit of Vengeance with a few other online reporters and we were treated to a really great day filled with awesome interviews and I learned a tremendous amount about the movie.  While I have serious issues with the first Ghost Rider, everything I learned on set tells me they have a much better story and a much better team of filmmakers and actors trying to bring Spirit of Vengeance to life.  For a full recap, hit the jump.

As the directors of Crank, Crank: High Voltage, and Gamer, Mark Neveldine and Brian Taylor (Neveldine/Taylor) have definitely shown a crazy sensibility and an offbeat sense of humor.  So when they were announced as the directors of the Ghost Rider sequel, Ghost Rider Spirit of Vengeance, some fans might have wondered about the choice, but I was extremely enthusiastic.  After all, no matter what the story was about or who was going to get cast, I knew the movie would look and feel like an original creation, and not some cookie cutter Hollywood product.  And if you’ve seen the trailer for GR2, you know what I’m talking about, as one scene features Ghost Rider pissing fire.  Need I say more?

Anyway, last year I got to visit the set of the Ghost Rider sequel when the production was filming outside Bucharest, Romania.  While on set I got to participate in a group interview with director Brian Taylor and he talked about why they were filming in Eastern Europe, the interesting and unique locations they scouted, how they weren’t going to change their style for 3D, working with Nicolas Cage to create an all new Ghost Rider, how Cage’s character is a dual role, and a lot more.  Hit the jump for more.

While fans might have a lot of concerns with the Mark Neveldine/Brian Taylor-directed sequel Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance, they can now remove “legal battle over property rights” from that list. After the first Ghost Rider film debuted in 2007, comic book author and co-creator Gary Friedrich was none too pleased. In 1971, Friedrich, also known for his work on Sgt. Fury and his Howling Commandos, was a freelancer working for Marvel. Absent from the comics world for decades since then, Friedrich popped up to raise a rights issue in 2004 when Marvel had announced  plans to release the first Ghost Rider film. Yesterday, less than two months from the February 17^th release of the sequel, a New York federal judge ruled that Ghost Rider is a Marvel property, case closed. Or maybe not. Hit the jump for more on this case.

With the fall film season now in full swing, I’m 100% ashamed to admit that I’ve yet to see two of my most anticipated fall films: Moneyball and 50/50. Now, I have every intention of ending this charade at some point this weekend but, for now, I hope you’ll give me a pass. If I’ve still yet to check them out when we meet here next week, I’ll understand if you choose to revoke my “mildly credible film blogger” credentials. In the meantime…

…In this week’s “Top 5″ installment, you can find all of our Fantastic Fest 2011 coverage. After that, interviews abound with the cast of Jonathan Levine’s dramedy 50/50, the cast, creators, and real-life inspiration for Machine Gun Preacher, Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance director Brian Taylor, and Thor/The Avengers‘ Tom Hiddleston. Check out a brief recap and link to each after the jump.

A few days ago, I got to sit down with director Brian Taylor for an exclusive interview on Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance.  With a February 17, 2012 release date fast approaching, Taylor is currently in post-production finishing up the movie.   However, while the movie is still almost five months from getting released, they already have a few deleted scenes and Taylor says the sequel will be 90 minutes (the original was 114).

During the interview we talked about where they are in the editing process, the experience of post converting to 3D and his thoughts on 3D, what to expect from Idris Elba and Nicolas Cage in the film, the deleted scenes, the run time, what will be on the DVD/Blu-ray (they captured thousands of hours of footage: interviews, features, behind-the-scenes stuff), what it was like to film in Eastern Europe (he tells some crazy stories), will there be other Marvel characters in the sequel, the full trailer, and a lot more.  Trust me, if you’re a fan of Neveldine/Taylor and have been looking forward to Ghost Rider 2, you’re going to like this interview.  Hit the jump to watch.

New posters for Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance, Melancholia, and Abduction are now available online. Beginning with Ghost Rider, the film stars Nicolas Cage, Idris Elba, and Ciaran Hinds. The pic centers on Cage’s reprised Johnny Blaze who, while kicking it in Eastern Europe, is called upon to stop the Devil (Hinds) from taking human form. Although I prefer the teaser promos found at this year’s San Diego Comic-Con, this new sheet seems effective enough in positioning the film as a grittier take on the character than its predecessor. The new Melancholia poster is essentially the full, hi-res shot of a Kirsten Dunst image we seen back in April while the Abduction sheet features star Taylor Lautner running from a city skyline.

Check out each of the posters after the jump. Directed by Mark Neveldine and Brian Taylor, Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance opens on February 17th, 2012. Written/directed by Lars von Trier, Melancholia will hit VOD platforms on October 7th before opening in theaters on November 11th. Directed by John Singleton, Abduction will be released on September 23rd.

For Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance, Nicolas Cage is back as Johnny Blaze, a man who struggles with his curse as the devil’s bounty hunter. Hiding out in a remote part of Eastern Europe, he is recruited by a secret sect to save a young boy from the devil and, although he is reluctant to embrace the power of the Ghost Rider again, he knows it is the only way to protect the boy, and possibly rid himself of his curse forever. With a new villain, a new sidekick and a new look, Ghost Rider is now seen through the eyes of filmmakers Mark Neveldine and Brian Taylor.

Following their Comic-Con panel presentation in Hall H (read our recap here), co-stars Nicolas Cage and Idris Elba, along with directors Neveldine and Taylor, talked about what they wanted to do with the story and character this time, how the chose not to consider the first movie in making this one, pushing it to the limits for stunts, all of the extras they’ll have for the eventual DVD/Blu-ray release, and what they enjoy about the Comic-Con experience. Check out what they had to say after the jump: