Sylvester Stallone has developed a strong with his relationship with his fans.  Years ago, he did an ask-me-anything on AICN before AMAs even existed.  He’s willing to critique his past work, and he’s happy to share what’s happening with his latest projects.  Stallone recently took to his Twitter feed to provide some updates on The Expendables 3.  He revealed the return of Mickey Rourke by tweeting, “Mighty Mickey is back…..”.  Then Stallone teased a couple of new additions to the cast.  In December, Jackie Chan said he was on board, and Stallone tweeted yesterday, “What’s the plan? Ask Jackie Chan….”  And now that Wesley Snipes is out of prison, Stallone says, “Talked to WESLEY today … He can not WAIT to fight to the top again !!!!!!! Over…”  I’m sure Wesley Snipes’ stunt double will be glad to hear it.

Hit the jump for what Stallone had to say about The Expendables 3 trying to outdo one of the best action films in years, The Raid.

A director has been set for the next Expendables film.  Though franchise gatekeeper Sylvester Stallone admitted that he reached out to Mel Gibson for the Expendables 3 directing gig to no avail, he has now filled the chair with relative newcomer Patrick Hughes.  Stallone announced on Twitter that The Expendables 3 needed “freshness, class, and much badass” and that he had found it in the Australian filmmaker, who made his feature directorial debut on the 2010 thriller Red Hill.

Little is known about the plot for The Expendables 3 at this point, but Stallone recently stated his intention to add more humor to the franchise and noted that he hopes Jackie Chan will join the cast.  Hughes received strong marks for Red Hill (read Steve’s interview with the director here), and it’s refreshing to see a young talent like him being brought into the franchise.  With a director now set, we should start to hear more solid word about The Expendables 3 soon.  Hit the jump to watch Hughes’ short film Signs.

You can tell Sylvester Stallone is having a helluva good time with The Expendables franchise, but the writer/director/actor wants to bring a bit more humor into the mix.  Taking to Twitter this evening, Stallone commented on the tone of The Expendables 3, which he is currently writing, and hopefully getting Jackie Chan into the cast as was previously rumored.  He also gave a brief update on an action star who would not be making the cut and alluded to an injection of “young blood” into the franchise.  Hit the jump to see what he had to say.

When we first got word that Robert De Niro (Raging Bull) and Sylvester Stallone (Rocky) would meet in the ring as aging boxers in Grudge Match, we were curious as to what shape they both be in.  Now, thanks to the first image from the set, we have a pretty good idea.  They look a little bloody and beat up, but in more than decent enough shape to knock in the teeth of your average movie blogger.

Also starring Kim Basinger, Peter Segal’s Grudge Match opens this November 15th.  Hit the jump to check out the first look at De Niro and Stallone.

Conventional wisdom tells us that people don’t go to the movies on Super Bowl weekend. Of course, that wisdom has been tested by the big debuts of Hannah Montana: The Best of Both Worlds, Taken and Dear John, in recent years. In 2013, Warm Bodies should become the latest title to buck Super Bowl convention. The teen-zombie romance earned an estimated $8.1 million from 3,009 locations on Friday, including $600,000 from its midnight premieres. That puts the film on track for a three-day total of $20 million instead of the low-to-mid teens that had been projected. Projections also failed to gauge the future of the frame’s second wide release: Bullet to the Head. The Sylvester Stallone action movie was expected to earn between $6 and $7 million this weekend – in the manner of Schwarzenegger’s recent The Last Stand. Instead, Bullet to the Head took in an estimated $1.7 million from 2,404 locations on Friday, placing its three-day prospects at just $4.6 million. We’ll have full details tomorrow.

If you need a little encouragement to go see Walter Hill’s Bullet to the Head this weekend, we’ve got three new clips that will give you a shot in the arm.  Bullet to the Head stars Sylvester Stallone as Jimmy Bobo, a hitman out to avenge his dead partner, Sung Kang as Washington, D.C. detective Taylor Kwon and Jason Momoa as Keegan, their common enemy.

For more on Bullet to the Head, be sure to read up on Steve’s set visit, two interviews with Walter Hill, plus more on-set interviews with Jason Momoa, Sarah Shahi and Sung Kang.  Bullet to the Head is in theaters now.  Hit the jump to watch the clips plus an additional fifteen minutes of B-roll footage.

Jason Momoa is dressed in a sharp black suit with his hair slicked back.  With his size and stature, he’s clearly someone you don’t want to fuck with.  He’s walking towards the back of a local Crescent City (New Orleans) bar, and after walking down a short, narrow hallway, he gets to an open door.  As he turns to enter the room, he quickly glances around to take in the surroundings.  Sitting at a table in a small room are four men playing cards, with another reading the local paper.  The man reading the paper appears to be the one in charge.  As Momoa moves closer to the table, he says to the man reading the paper, “Open the safe.”  The man responds, “What did you say?” Momoa responds, “Open the safe.”  Surprised by Momoa’s statement, the man says, “Who the fuck do you think you are?” Then, almost a millisecond later, Momoa responds, but not with words but with bullets.  Boom. Boom. Boom.  And just like that, Momoa has shot three of the people in the head.  “I said open the safe.”  A moment later, Boom! He’s shot the final card player at the table in the head.  “Please, open the safe.”  Clearly taken aback by the brutal killings, the final man left alive stands up, and leads Momoa towards the safe, opens it and takes a step back.  As Momoa reaches in to grab a thin tan file, we hear “Boom!” He’s shot the boss in the head.

Let me back up a second.  It’s August 23, 2011, and I just left New Orleans. I’m sitting on a plane flying back to Los Angeles because I spent yesterday on the set of director Walter Hill’s Bullet to the Head.  For more on the visit, hit the jump.

We’ve got a pair of first clips from the following movies to share today:

• jOBS – Starring Ashton Kutcher as Steve Jobs and Josh Gad as Steve Wozniak, this first clip shows off the passionate vision and understated genius of the respective Apple co-creators.  jOBS opens this April.
• Bullet to the Head – Starring Sylvester Stallone as hitman Jimmy Bobo, this first action-packed clip reveals Bobo’s bathroom brawl with Keegan (Jason Momoa), a precursor to the eventual ax fight.  Walter Hill’s Bullet to the Head opens February 1st.

Hit the jump to watch both clips.

Warner Bros. has released a batch of high-resolution images from director Walter Hill’s upcoming action-thriller Bullet to the Head.  The graphic novel adaptation stars Sylvester Stallone as Jimmy Bobo, a New Orleans hitman who teams up with a New York City cop (Sung Kang) to bring down the killers of their respective partners.  These images show off plenty of Stallone toughness, as well as looks at supporting players Christian Slater, Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje, Sarah Shahi, Jon Seda, and of course Jason Momoa.

Hit the jump to check out 20 high-resolution images from the film, and click here to see 14 more images.  Bullet to the Head opens on February 1st.

Warner Bros. has released a number of new high-resolution images from some of their upcoming 2013 titles.  Briefly:

• Bullet to the Head – Written and directed by action veteran Walter Hill, the film stars Sylvester Stallone, Sung Kang, and Jason Momoa.  The film opens on February 1, 2013.
• 42 – Directed by Brian Helgeland, the Jackie Robinson biopic stars Chadwick Boseman, Harrison Ford, and Jon Bernthal.  The film opens on April 12, 2013.
• The Great Gatsby – Directed by Baz Luhrmann, this 3D adaptation stars Leonardo DiCaprio, Tobey Maguire, and Carey Mulligan.  The film opens May 10, 2013.
• We’re the Millers – Directed by Rawson Thurber (Dodgeball), this pot comedy stars Jennifer Aniston, Jason Sudeikis, and Emma Roberts.  The film opens on August 9, 2013.
• Getaway – Directed by Courtney Solomon and Yaron Levy, this thriller set within the confines of a car stars Ethan Hawke, Selena Gomez, and Jon Voight.  The film opens on August 30, 2013.

Hit the jump to check out the images and synopses.

Fans of the original action hero mash-up The Expendables are in for higher stakes, twice the explosions and more grizzled cast members in The Expendables 2, now available on Blu-ray. While the sequel managed to top the experience of the first film, the Blu-ray has plenty of extras to keep fans busy, including a commentary track by director Simon West (Con Air) that provides a lot of behind-the-scenes info. Want to know what weapons the Expendables used? Want to know how much bigger the sequel could have been? Want to see the real life Expendables the movie characters referenced? Well then hit the jump for my review of The Expendables 2 on Blu-ray. 

Walter Hill’s Bullet to the Head has already released a few trailers for the film, but a slew of new images have just been made available online. The graphic novel adaptation stars Sylvester Stallone as Jimmy Bobo, a New Orleans hitman who teams up with a New York City cop (Sung Kang) to bring down the killers of their respective partners. The new images feature plenty of shots of Stallone and Kang, along with a bloodied-up Christian Slater. Also starring Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje, Jason Momoa and Sarah Shahi,  Bullet to the Head is set to debut in theaters on February 1, 2013. Hit the jump to check out the new images.

A few casting notices:

• Benicio del Toro is in final negotiations to play Colombian drug lord Pablo Escobar in Paradise Lost, which is not exactly a Pablo Escobar biopic.
• Scoot McNairy booked two roles.  He will star opposite Michael Fassbender in Frank, and joins Guy Pearce and Robert Pattinson in The Rover.
• The full cast list for Reach Me features Tom Berenger, Kevin Connolly, Thomas Jane, Sylvester Stallone, Kyra Sedgwick, Kelsey Grammer, Nelly, Terry Crews, Ryan Kwanten, and more.

Details on each project after the jump.

Sylvester Stallone has reportedly wrapped on a small role in Reach Me, an indie drama written and directed by Stallone’s Cobra co-star, John Herzfeld. Details on the role of The Expendables star are being kept under wraps, but Variety reports that the story “follows a group of people who all have a connection to a self-help book authored by a reclusive former football coach.” Reach Me also stars Nelly, Omari Hardwick, Elizabeth Henstridge, Danny Aiello and Rebekah Chaney. 

Herzfeld most recently directed the indie The Death and Life of Bobby Z starring Paul Walker, Laurence Fishburne and Olivia Wilde. Stallone can next be seen in Walter Hill’s Bullet to the Head, followed by The Tomb with Arnold Schwarzenegger and Grudge Match opposite Robert De Niro.

It appears that Nicolas Cage has forgotten how to use the word “no.”  The actor has signed on to a large number of projects as of late, including a reboot of the Evangelical Christian series Left Behind.  He’s now adding another project to his slate, though this one is more in line with the fun Nic Cage of the 1990s.  We learned back in August that producers were trying to rope in some high profile names for the invetiable action sequel The Expendables 3, and Cage was on said wish list.  Now Sylvester Stallone has revealed a bit about the confirmed follow-up, stating that Cage is indeed onboard.  Hit the jump to see what he had to say. [Update: A new report indicates that Cage is not actually signed on.  Hit the jump for further explanation.]