He's a magician. She's a cop. Together, they fight crime.

Mommy, why do bad things happen to good comic books?

Rachel Weisz (The Mummy) is in talks to star opposite Keanu Reeves in Warner Brothers' upcoming Constantine, a movie based on the DC/Vertigo comic series Hellblazer, according to The Hollywood Reporter.

Francis Lawrence is directing Constantine, described as Dirty Harry set in the occult world. Reeves will star as John Constantine, a man who dabbles in the occult and teams with a female police officer to fight evil forces, the trade paper reported. Weisz would play Angela, an officer who becomes involved with Constantine when her twin sister dies in a mysterious suicide.

Kevin Brodbin (The Glimmer Man) wrote the original script, with a rewrite by Mark Bomback and Frank Cappello.

Lemme summarize that for you:

  • Keanu;
  • Dirty Harry with "magic";
  • Supermodel cop;
  • Twins!
  • "You killed my sister, prepare to die";
  • GLIMMER MAN!
    (In case you've forgotten: "Steven Seagal is a soft spoken, mystical, new age New York cop with a checkered past. He is transferred to Los Angeles." Actually, it sounds like the same plot.)
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35 Responses:

  1. lilmissnever says:

    No.

    No no no no no.

    John Constantine is not Dirty Fuckin' Harry. It's not enough that they cast Keanu Reeves, but they seem to have forgotten to make Constantine British. I bet he doesn't smoke either.

    The sound you hear is my head banging against the desk.

    • jwz says:

      You'd rather hear Keanu trying to do an accent, then?

      • thealien says:

        "Hath not a dude eyes? If you prick us, do we not get bummed? If we eat bad guacamole, do we not blow chunks?"

        Accent or no, I think there are some parts he just should walk away from.

      • lilmissnever says:

        I'd rather that Keanu suffered a tragic boat accident that left him unable to accept roles based comic books. In a perfect world, he would develop severe Vertigo-phobia, though I might grant him a reprieve if he agreed to play Arseface in Preacher: the Movie.

        • jlindquist says:

          Are you saying that just because you'd like to see Keanu eat a shotgun?

          Keanu Reeves, has dry heaves, he is tormented by LEAVES!

      • jlevetin says:

        I proudly admit that I am a fan of Keanu.

    • flipzagging says:

      John Constantine is not Dirty Fuckin' Harry.

      and Keanu Reeves is not Dirty Fuckin' Harry.

      Therefore, Keanu Reeves is John Constantine.

  2. adameros says:

    Ouch! My head is now hurting at the thought of this movie.

    I love Hellblazer, but that description makes it sound aweful!!!

    If only Christopher Walken was younger... He would be an amazing John Constantine.

  3. psymbiotic says:

    I can't begin to describe how nauseated I feel right now.

    Egan

  4. cnoocy says:

    I'm starting to think that there should be a moratorium on all movies based on comic books. While we're at it, let's put one on movies based on any non-motion-picture medium. If you want to write a screenplay, write a freaking screenplay. Okay, maybe that's a bit trollish. But worth saying.

    • jwz says:

      Yes, they should stick to making only movies that are remakes of other movies.

      Oh wait, that hasn't been working out so well either.

      • cnoocy says:

        On one hand, The Italian Job. On the other, The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen.
        Seems to me if you're going to be less-than-creative, you're better off with something that's already worked on film.

        • denshi says:

          Or use the 98% of films that never make it off the independent film festival circuit?

          • flipzagging says:

            This article claims that movie execs are so unimaginative and ignorant of film, they sometimes rely on the local video store clerk. ("Hey, The Ring is doing well! What other Japanese movies can we remake? You know, the GOOD ones?")

            It's Salon, so you either click-through a commercial or pay up.

  5. tfofurn says:

    I can say nothing of the comic book characters of whom you speak, but I can tell of the horrors of The Glimmer Man. I couldn't believe that in the explanation of the name, they'd come up with such nonsense. "You'd see a glimmer, then you'd be dead", which leads me to wonder who was there to relay the story of the glimmer?

  6. jkingfish says:

    NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

    • skington says:

      Thanks to your one-huge-word comment, my browser had to fit everyone else's posts in the same horizontal space as your AOL-type comment, which meant that they didn't fit on my screen, so I had to repeatedly scroll left and right if I wanted to read posts that were more than one line long. Happily, I found out who was responsible for this before I gave up trying to read the comments on this entry because of RSI in my scrolling finger.

      Please kindly choke on a bucket of dicks.

      • jwz says:

        I guess you're using a browser that doesn't implement the <wbr> tag? Something (presumably either the posting client, or LJ itself) inserted a <wbr/> after the 40th character, which (in Mozilla, and Netscape before it) allows the line to wrap there.

  7. jdredd5150 says:

    hola! been lurking around your lj for a while. actually, i've been lurking around here for a few years and all... then i befriended (as much as one can casually through lj) <lj user="hepkitten"> and.. yeah.. anyway. come to find out that you've got an lj too. so i'll go back to doing my fanboyish stuff in the corner in a bit.

    anyway, the actual point, not sure if with the keanu re-write if they've done it or not, but the original reports for Constantine on comics2film.com was that they had changed constantines base. the last reports i had read said that he was going to be from the south, GA, most likely. reason being? A) to attract a bigger name star to the title and B) because american audiences won't understand all the references to the queen, and the such.

    It's a total crock, if you ask me, but they slaughtered Extraordinary Gentlemen, i'm not surprised to see John get his too.

  8. suppafly says:

    Kinda reminds me of the episodes of Angel where he teams up with that chick cop.

  9. zhixel says:

    Anyone remember Brimstone?

  10. rzr_grl says:

    I read that as "Harry Potter set in the occult world."

    When really, it's "Dirty Harry meets Harry Potter."
    *shudder*

    • jlindquist says:

      And tonight's "Tonight Show" repeat used the bad joke of an older Harry Potter fighting evil as "Dirty Harry Potter". Complete with a "make my day" quote...

      TV and Hollywood I expect would make that something miserable. But I wonder if there's a decent fanfic of that concept somewhere...

      • king_mob says:

        ...decent fanfic...


        I know what both those words mean, but that sentence doesn't make any sense.

        • jlindquist says:

          You say that like the only people who can write quality fiction are commercially published authors and produced screenwriters.

          Admittedly, much of what's out there is gonna be dreck, and I could see it argued that such material never measures up with the original works. But your statement implies an impossibility.

          Somehow, I don't buy that...

          • king_mob says:

            No, now see, I'm not saying this idly, I've actually read quite a bit of it thinking that some of it had to be interesting. Even if you discard all the "It sure would be hot if Mulder fucked Krychek" slash, the stuff that's written seriously is generally poorly put together, drips with wish-fulfillment rather than actual character insight, and tends towards the preachy.

  11. blackthorne6 says:

    The "Constantine" movie has been promised and cancelled so many times,it probably won't get made.
    (And I hope it does not.)
    I was bummed when I had heard of Nick Cage doing it,I didn't know it could get worse.
    I had always wanted Jude Law to play a younger constantine.
    Or hell...anyone british. But,not..Not..NOT..Keanu.

    Again,it will probably not get finished.

  12. violentbloom says:

    you know I have almost the entire series from when it started in the eighties. And I'm quite sure reeves aka "human block of wood" is not bad ass enough to be constantine.
    though I suppose it's not as implausable as that movie where he plays the scientist that invents cold fusion.

    I think I'm going to go cry.

    anyone want to buy a large collection of hellblazer from the beginning? I don't think I want them anymore.

  13. internebbish says:

    I think that's the worst movie news I've heard like - ever!

    Please cast Jude Law instead.

    I had the pleasure of seeing Neil Gaiman read in '96 and he talked about similar issues
    bringing the Sandman to the big screen. Somebody in the hollywood circlejerk
    actually suggested Arnold for the role.

    Neil after relating that story to us said in his best Ahnold accent,
    "Sveet Dreams Muddahfuckah"