(Rated-R for naughty language)

This is a teaser for The Strain, which is actually about vampires, not taking a dump.  Oh, and it’s a book, not a movie.  Written by Guillermo Del Toro and Chuck Hogan, The Strain: Book One of The Strain Trilogy releases June 2nd.

Del Toro says he teamed with award-winning crime writer Hogan to give The Strain the feel of a science-injected modern television show (which is ironic, because the novel began as del Toro’s outline for a vampire TV series)*. “I’m not good at forensic novels,” del Toro told Wired magazine. “I’m not good at hazmat language and that CSI-style precision. When [Bram] Stoker wrote Dracula, it was very modern, a CSI sort of novel. I wanted to give The Strain a procedural feel, where everything seems real.” [Wired via Cinematical]

With all the good books out there, I hope you wouldn’t spend your time reading Guillermo Del Toro’s dopey vampire book, but whatever.  I post this teaser for two reasons: 1. At the 10-second mark, the old man appears to pop up out of the floor – awesome.  2.  50-second mark.  The line, “What, like a pinche zombie?”  I keep playing it over and over again.  Does he actually say “pinche”?  Most people who pepper their speech with Spanish words know how to pronounce them.  This pinche libro looks puro awesome, ése.

*Not ironic

^{Wait, which one is “Before”?}

You can already buy 11 hours worth of Lord of the Rings, not including making-ofs or special features.  But Peter Jackson and Guillermo Del Toro still have a whole other book to film, and you better believe they’re gonna milk those hairy homoerotic midgets for all they’re worth.  Two more movies worth, to be exact.  Said director Del Toro to Empire magazine…

“We’ve decided to have The Hobbit span the two movies, including the White Council and the comings and goings of Gandalf to Dol Guldur.”

The White Council AND the coming and goings of Gandalf to Dol Guldur? In two movies??!! That’s worth at least a 10-part miniseries! This is a travesty!  Adds producer Jackson:

“We decided it would be a mistake to try to cram everything into one movie. The essential brief was to do The Hobbit, and it allows us to make The Hobbit in a little more style, if you like, of the trilogy.”

Well I just hope they’ll add a few weeks worth of extra footage for the DVD.  The great thing about Lord of the Rings is that the bad guys are evil and the good guys are good, but they’re always fighting!  And it’s all like, whoa, who’s gonna win!  I mean, I could watch that forever.  Yay, here comes another epilogue!

A court in LA has barred the estate of J.R.R. Tolkien from seeking punitive damages from New Line Cinemas in their suit over Lord of the Rings. Keep in mind, punitive damages is when someone is ordered to pay money above and beyond what they actually owe as punishment for what they did and as a warning to others.  The estate still seeks compensatory damages in excess of $150 million.

Tolkien’s heirs claim New Line Cinema has failed to pay any royalties from the estimated $6 billion they say the movie has grossed worldwide.

The lawsuit claims New Line sent millions of dollars to Time Warner Inc.‘s AOL, improperly claiming they were for advertising expenses. The lawsuit also claims the studio built production offices and facilities in New Zealand and listed them as expenses for the “Lord of the Rings” films, although the heirs claim they are now being used for other New Line projects.

Besides damages, the lawsuit seeks a court order that would terminate New Line’s rights to make a two-film prequel based on “The Hobbit.”

Guillermo del Toro has signed on to direct that film and its sequel in New Zealand alongside executive producer Peter Jackson. [Yahoo/AP]

Seeing as how Guillermo del Toro and Peter Jackson are both big fat guys with beards, I think their best strategy here would be to roll into court with a couple of big beer steins from which they could drink  while joining arm in arm to lead the crowd in a merry sing along.  No one could rule against a fat drunk Santa Claus singing a song.  No deal if they’re skinny now, that shit’s creepy.

Filmschoolrejects reports that Guillermo Del Toro is already signed on to projects through the next decade.  Smart man.  When the world ends in 2012 (as Mel Gibson prophesied), Del Toro will have already gotten advances on several projects and can use the money to buy — oh I don’t know — let’s say whimsically large teeth and hooded sweatshirts.

Right now Del Toro is signed on (or rumored to be signed on) to do two Hobbit movies, a Frankenstein remake, a Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde remake, a Slaughterhouse-Five remake, Drood, a third Hellboy movie (or “H3llboy”), and a segment of Heavy Metal, as well as still being involved in an adaptation of H.P. Lovecraft’s At The Mountains Of Madness.

The movie Del Toro will most likely be filming after the Hobbit movies wrap is Drood, based on a novel by Dan Simmons that hasn’t been published yet.  This is how Dan describes his novel, and I’ll have to take his word for it as it hasn’t been freaking published yet:

Drood looks at the lives and secrets of Charles Dickens and his novelist friend Wilkie Collins in the period 1865-1870. History records that Dickens was in the terrible Staplehurst train accident of 1865 and suffered injuries – both physical and psychological — from which he never recovered. He died suddenly on the fifth anniversary of that accident on June 9,1870. Drood fictionally explores the dark secrets that came to obsess both Dickens and Wilkie Collins during those five years — secrets that not only ended their long friendship but brought each writer to the brink of murder.

Brokeback Dickens?  Probably not, but if a guy is named “Wilkie” I just assume.

– RoboPanda

In an interview with rgbfilter, Heavy Metal publisher Kevin Eastman revealed that a-listers Guillermo Del Toro, Zack Snyder, and Gore Verbinski, will be directing segments of the Heavy Metal animated film for Exec Producer David Fincher.

The feature is scheduled to include eight or nine segments, and is being envisioned as an adult-themed R-rated film. Animator Tim Miller and Eastman himself are also expected to direct segments. The original 1981 film was also an anthology of sci-fi and fantasy stories adapted from the Heavy Metal magazine. The magazine and the film are known for their overuse of bloody violence, nudity and sexuality. [/Film]

Whoa, whoa, whoa, what exactly do you mean by “overuse”?

^{Time to play “Guess Who’s Getting Paid for This”}