Videogum » Andy Serkis

Andy Serkis Acting His Banana Off

Gabe — Tue, 17 Jan 2012 16:45:07 +0000

As by now you probably know, Andy Serkis and his boys are making a big, somewhat grandiose push this year to get him an Oscar nomination for his work on Rise of the Planet of the Apes. Sure. He played the role of “The Monkey.” Andy Serkis is widely known as one of the best motion capture actors in the game after his work on the Lord of the Rings trilogy, and King Kong, and now this. Actually, I think he’s the only known motion capture actor in the game. I literally cannot think of another person who has been given so much credit for his motion capture work. This means one of two things: either Andy Serkis has cornered the market, or there is no market and Andy Serkis is trying to pretend like there is a market. (How sad would it be to be the second biggest motion capture actor out there, just constantly living in the shadows. There goes big Andy Serkis, getting another multi-million dollar franchise, and you have to be, like, a tortoise swimming in the background of A Dolphin Tale or whatever. So sad! Hang up your cleats!) Anyway, as part of the Andy Serkis Oscar Circus (see what I did there? I used a word that sounded like another word and then drew attention to it like it was a thing: IT’S CALLED BLOGGING) a behind-the-scenes clip of Andy Serkis acting out a Planet of the Apes scene pre-CGI over-mapping has been released, and well, uh, so, here you go:

The Videogum Why Don’t YOU Caption It? Contest: Andy Serkis “Acting”

Gabe — Tue, 10 Jan 2012 22:45:45 +0000

Yes, OK, smart alecs (or is it smarts alec?), this is theoretically “old news.” It’s a photo of Andy Serkis, Freida Pinto, and James Franco on the set of Rise of the Planet of the Apes, which is a movie that came out 100 years ago. But some of us never saw it until this week, and we’re never going to break the VICIOUS CYCLE of the INTERNET if we don’t cut each other some slack every once in awhile. Because the fact of the matter is that this photo is INCREDIBLE. It makes me feel CRAZY! I feel like Bob Hoskins is looking down from the great Who Framed Roger Rabbit? soundstage in the sky and shaking his head and whispering “I don’t know how they do it.” I would rather act with a tennis ball on the end of a broomstick than have to actually look at Andy Serkis in his bodysock, and they have to TOUCH HIS BACK AND STUFF? Oh my God, Becky. This is seriously so embarrassing. If I was in this photo and someone posted it on Facebook I would be like UNTAG UNTAG UNTAG. The time is now, indeed. What does Andy Serkis want a Moonman for? Best supporting making everyone uncomfortable? I guess no one ever likes to see how the sausage gets made, but I didn’t realize everyone had to TOUCH THE SAUSAGE’S BACK AND STUFF. Eek. What do you think Freida Pinto and James Franco said to their agents after the director yelled cut? Or their parents? Or their therapists? Or the lady at craft services? Caption it.

Winner will receive special placement in this week’s Monsters’ Ball and will probably never have to do anything even remotely like what is happening in this picture, which is a nightmare. (Photo via FilmDrunk.)

The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey Trailer Open Thread

Gabe — Wed, 21 Dec 2011 15:15:03 +0000

The most anticipated movie trailer since the release of The Dark Knight Rises movie trailer is finally here! (Our one day streak of not having a big movie trailer to talk about is finally broken. Watch it in HD on Apple’s website. It’s just better that way!) It’s The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey! Gettin’ the ol’ gang back together! Minus Aragorn, of course. (I really hope they don’t do some kind of X-Men: First Class Wolverine-drinking-at-a-bar-in-Cuba style 2 second cameo. Or do I? Perhaps I wish that MOST OF ALL.) But when God closes an Aragorn, he opens a Martin Freeman. We love Martin Freeman! Obviously, I am excited for this movie and will see it and I really liked the Lord of the Rings trilogy, and for the most part I still think Peter Jackson has it in him to make good movies (see also: Heavenly Creatures) although at times he allows his enthusiasm for visual effects to replace human emotion with a two-dimensional brand of melodrama set to an Enya score, but still, I think he’ll make it pretty good. My main concern, though, is just that what we really want is a fourth LOTR movie and the fact of the matter is that The Hobbit just isn’t one. (NO NERDO.) You know what I mean, though? All of the sneaked in references to the old movies in this trailer are cute but they are NOT ENOUGH. And how are you not going to show the dragon? I would rather see the dragon than some old Gollum. If it makes him feel better, you can let Andy Serkis play the dragon, too. Who cares. Anyway, I am excited but also nervous, but also not really, I mean it’s just a movie trailer and when it comes out it will just be a movie. Occupy Wall Street is entering its fourth month. The final convoy of American troops has left Iraq. I’m just saying, let’s keep things in perspective. And let’s hear what you guys think of this HOT TRAILER!

The Andy Serkis Oscar Campaign Is A Bit Much

Gabe — Tue, 06 Dec 2011 17:30:46 +0000

After building a long and illustrious film career by playing CGI goblins and Mega Apes, Andy Serkis is apparently tired of not getting the credit he deserves. (If you ask me, I feel like he gets a lot of credit, and I’m not saying that dismissively, I am just saying that as much as someone who is responsible for wearing a motion capture suit and translating his body language into on-screen monsters without anyone really knowing very well what he looks or sounds like, I feel like Andy Serkis is doing GRRRRRREAT!) After his apparently subtle and nuanced performance as Cesar in The Rise of the Planet of the Apes–”apparently” because I haven’t seen it, but I’ve heard it’s pretty good, and I’m sure Serkis’s computer monkey was very subtle and nuanced compared to James Franco as a “scientist”–FOX is launching an all-out publicity campaign to get him an Oscar nomination for best actor. Fair enough! Seriously, sure. Why not? He seems like he really knows what he’s doing, and I’m sure he’s as good of an actor as 1996 Academy Award winner Cuba Gooding Jr. (won for Snow Dogs, I believe?). We live in a time of extraordinary technological innovation, and being able to turn a Photoshop into a believable character that you can have actual human feelings about seems like no small trick. So, yes, OK, Andy Serkis for President of Movies 2011. But now that the actual publicity campaign ads are coming out, GOOD GRIEF, that is a bit MUCH, don’t you think?! “The Time Is Now”?!?!?!?!??! Take it easy. (It’s also kind of funny that they used a side-by-side comparison in which Andy Serkis and the ape are actually making pretty different faces? Rest your case, poster, rest your case before the judge’s gavel!) Honestly, though, you’d think Andy Serkis was the new Rosie the Computer Programmer based on this poster. THE TIME IS NOW! Garbage. It’s so weird that something associated with the Academy Awards is puffed up, self-congratulatory, overly dramatic, and treats the already impossibly well-compensated work of movie-making as some kind of noble sacrifice for the human good. So weird. So unlike them. Go figure. (Via /Film. Click through to enlarge if you want to read the quote about Andy Serkis’s performance from TIME MAGAZINE*!)

At a certain point, we’re all going to have to agree that Time* magazine is not as powerful and weighty of an imprimatur of quality and integrity as it used to be, based mostly on the fact that who the fuck reads Time magazine anymore?

Here Are Some Afternoon Links!

Kelly — Wed, 30 Nov 2011 21:15:48 +0000

Fox is campaigning for motion capture actor Andy Serkis, AKA Gollum, AKA monkey, AKA British, to win a best supporting actor Oscar for his work in Rise of the Planet of the Apes. And I think that is GREAT! Oh, I hope Andy Serkis wins. It would be an honor just for Andy Serkis to be nominated, but I really hope Andy Serkis wins. -FilmDrunk
Look at all of the things this guy, Aung Zaw Oo, can do with his body! You probably can’t do even HALF of these things! -TheDailyWhat
“Hugh Jackman’s wife says he’s not gay.” LOL. I would hope so! Right! Since she’s married to him! But seriously folks can’t we all just leave Hugh Jackman alone? The man deserves his privacPEE, just like anyone else! Hahahahaha. Do you get it. -TheSuperficial
Deadwood creator David Milch is developing a series for HBO based on the works of William Faulkner. Would you watch this? I am certainly a fan of reading William Faulkner but I’m ALREADY asleep about this fairly vague idea. Granted I am already asleep about 98% of ideas I hear because I have both a very short attention span and a very grim outlook on life. So. Maybe you feel differently! -SlashFilm
Chris Meloni may be on True Blood next season. Is that a good thing or a bad thing to you? To me that is a fine thing. Chris Meloni doesn’t seem like he’s doing a lot lately and we could all use a little more Chris Meloni. -Dlisted
Because it is a day, here are some new photos from Ryan Gosling on the set of his gangster movie. -JustJared
Ali Lohan, the seventeen-year-old, is battling plastic surgery rumors. OH COME ON. Even if she did have plastic surgery, I don’t want to know! That’s gross! What happens when her face grows now! Weird things?! -Celebuzz
A movie called Camp Hell that Jesse Eisenberg is in for five minutes put Jesse Eisenberg on the cover and Jesse Eisenberg is PISSSSSSSSSED! -E!
Salon asks, “Why is Hollywood so terrified of abortion?” Uh, I don’t know, because it’s pretty SCARY? But yeah otherwise I don’t know. What do you think, Salon? -Salon

A Fake Interview With Andy Serkis

Gabe — Thu, 03 Nov 2011 21:45:22 +0000

[Andy Serkis is best known for his motion-capture roles in such movies as The Lord of the Rings, King Kong, and Rise of the Planet of the Apes, in which his body movement and facial expressions provide the template for digitally animated creatures. He is very busy. And he might not even actually exist for all we know. So this is a fake interview.]

Videogum: Hello, Andy Serkis!
Andy Serkis: Allo, guv’nah!
VG: Oh, right. You’re British.
AS: Oy!
VG: A lot of people probably don’t know that because of how you don’t ever have any lines in movies and also are almost kind of not in movies really.
AS: I’m in movies, mate. Loads of big budget Hollywood smashers.
VG: Smashers.
AS: How do you say, euuhhh, in the states?
VG: Now you sound kind of French.
AS: Well this interview is fake, so if my accent isn’t holding up, I would say that’s more your fault, innit?
VG: It was announced in the press today that you just signed up for a series of Planet of the Apes sequels, so congratulations on that.
AS: Cheers.
VG: You were also in the Lord of the Rings trilogy. You played Gollum.
AS: Aye, brutha.
VG: Now you’re Desmond from Lost?
AS: Your collection of Britishisms is fairly limited.
VG: Sorry.
AS: At’s awright.
VG: I have a pretty funny story about your performance of Gollum in the Lord of the Rings movies. Have you heard it?
AS: Have I heard your story?
VG: Yeah.
AS: Uh, no. How would I have heard it?
VG: Hey, who’s interviewing who here, hahahahhahaha.
AS: …

The Andy Serkis Thing Is Weird: Open Thread

Gabe — Tue, 09 Aug 2011 18:45:54 +0000

Rise of the Planet of the Apes is the number one movie in America this week. I haven’t seen it yet, have you seen it? 55 million dollars worth of people saw it. Perhaps, if you saw it, you can answer this question I’ve been having: how many apes DOES an average American city have in it at any one time? We know it’s enough to take over the world, clearly, but how many. 40,000? 40,000 apes per city? Anyway, congratulations to Frieda Pinto and the rest of Frieda Pinto’s Planet of the Apes on their huge success! Today another film blog posted a blog post called Andy Serkis Won’t Be Nominated For An Oscar This Year, But He Doesn’t Need To Be about Andy Serkis as the Premiere Motion Capture Actor and can we just talk for a second about how the Andy Serkis thing is kind of weird? Like, he was Gollum and King Kong and now he plays Ape #1 in this movie. His career highlights are all CGI creatures. It’s just weird! God bless him. I hope his family is literally COVERED in food. And he seems to be good at something that apparently is very hard to be good at. I’m not saying that sarcastically. I believe it! You might not think that it would be hard, but if he’s the only one who is ever hired to do it, then it must be pretty hard, because he’s probably pretty expensive at this point. Anyway, I don’t know. It’s kind of weird! He’s probably one of the more unlikely CELEBRITIES out there. Wanna talk about it? Hey, wanna talk about it? #SUMMERTUESDAYS

Beyonce Knowles To Star In The Hobbit

Gabe — Wed, 21 May 2008 12:20:22 +0000

The casting news today is that director Guillermo Del Toro (Pan’s Labyrinth, Hellboy, Blade II), who has been signed on to direct the Lord of the Rings prequel, The Hobbit, is trying to wrangle some of the original cast from Peter Jackson’s trilogy to reprise their roles, namely Viggo Mortensen as Aragorn, Andy Serkis as Gollum, and Sir Ian McKellen as Gandalf. This is very exciting to fanboys and women who have sexual emotions for Viggo Mortensen, but I think we shouldn’t rush into things. The Hobbit is not really a prequel so much as a separate book (no nerdo). And I’m pretty sure Aragorn isn’t even in The Hobbit originally, ladies. They’re going to have to work him in (that’s what she said), probably by just having him smoke his shire weed pipe in the background wearing only his ancient leather g-string, forged in the fires of Mount Sex Object.

So we’ve got a separate legend, and a new director, I say we need a new cast as well.