Disney News

Category: Movies

  • Yara Shahidi Cast as Tinkerbell in New Live-action ‘Peter Pan’ Movie

    Yara Shahidi Cast as Tinkerbell in New Live-action ‘Peter Pan’ Movie

    Disney reportedly cast “Grown-ish” star Yara Shahidi to play Tinker Bell in its upcoming live-action adaptation of “Peter Pan.”

    Shahidi will be the first woman of colour to take on the iconic role of the character, previously assumed by Julia Roberts in 1991’s Hook and Ludivine Sagnier in 2003’s Peter Pan.

    The 20-year-old actress seemingly confirmed the news on Instagram Friday, sharing a picture of Tinker Bell drawn as a Black woman as you can see in th post below:

    “Thank you for all of the love. It, truly, means so much to me,” she wrote in the caption. “I’m excited for this next adventure!”

    She also shared a photo of herself dressed in green and wrote, “lettssssgooooo #Tinkerbell.”

    Shahidi is best known for her starring role on ABC’s “Black-ish,” as well as being a star and producer of Freeform’s “Grown-ish.” The actor and activist recently signed an overall deal with ABC Studios. On the film side, Shahidi recently led the YA drama “The Sun Is Also a Star.”

    Alexander Molony and Ever Anderson are set to take flight with Shahidi’s Tinker Bell as the two titular children in Peter Pan and Wendy, while Jude Law has been tapped to play Captain Hook in the upcoming movie, which will be directed by David Lowery and produced by Jim Whitaker from a script co-written by Lowery and Toby Halbrooks.

  • Metallica Re-Writing ‘Nothing Else Matters’ for Disney film ‘Jungle Cruise’

    Metallica Re-Writing ‘Nothing Else Matters’ for Disney film ‘Jungle Cruise’

    Disney has enlisted iconic heavy metal band Metallica to create an orchestral version of “Nothing Else Matters” for their upcoming film “Jungle Cruise.”

    Speaking in a new interview with Collider, the band’s drummer Lars Ulrich revealed that they have rewritten their 1991 hit with Oscar nominated composer James Newton Howard for the new film, starring Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson and Emily Blunt.

    “James Newton Howard, the man, the myth, the absolute legend! Considering what’s he’s done, it’s an absolute honour to have done this with him, and we’re excited for the world to hear it,” Ulrich said.

    The thought of the heavy metal giants working on a Disney movie was certainly a surprise for fans of the band. But it turns out that Sean Bailey, who is the production president over at the studio, isn’t just a huge Metallica fan, but that Ulrich loves Disney movies, too.

    “It really goes back to (Bailey), who is a lifelong rock fan, and is just all-around one of the greatest, most friendly, generous, warm, and embracing people you’ll find in the music business,” Ulrich said.

    “My wife and I are big Disney fans, so there’s a great friendship there, and he’s always looked for the right match where there was a way that Metallica could contribute to some project of theirs.”

    “It’s kind of an interesting morph,” Ulrich said, “but it’s a very unusual morph in that it’s kind of his arrangement of ‘Nothing Else Matters’ that we’re playing.”

  • ‘Moana’ Star Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson, family all test positive for COVID-19

    ‘Moana’ Star Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson, family all test positive for COVID-19

    Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson, star of Disney’s Moana, and his family have tested positive for the novel coronavirus (COVID-19), the star revealed Wednesday.

    Johnson says that he and his wife, and his two daughters tested positive for COVID-19 and have been battling the virus for the past two to three weeks.

    Now Disney’s upcoming Jungle Cruise star and one of the most popular entertainers on earth is urging fans to wear a mask and protect each other from this disease as you can see in the Instagram post below:

    “I wish it was only me who tested positive, but it wasn’t, it was my entire family,” the star said in an Instagram video Wednesday.

    “I wanted to give you guys a little helpful update on things that have been going on on my end for the past two-and-a-half to three weeks now. So the update is this: my wife Lauren as well as my two baby girls and myself, we have all tested positive for COVID-19,” Johnson began his video message.

    “I could tell you that this has been one of the most challenging and difficult things we have ever had to endure as a family, and for me, too, personally as well,” he continued. “And I’ve gone through some doozies in the past.”

  • New ‘Hocus Pocus’ Cookie Dough from Toll House Will Put a Spell on You

    New ‘Hocus Pocus’ Cookie Dough from Toll House Will Put a Spell on You

    With Halloween right around the corner its time to start streaming Hocus Pocus on a loop and to help celebrate, Nestle Toll House has released some Sanderson Sister’s inspired cookies that will have you running “Amok Amok Amok!”

    You can now find ready-to-bake Hocus Pocus cookie dough in your grocer’s freezer in 14-oz. packages. Inside is oatmeal peanut butter cookie dough with chocolate morsels and candy-coated gems.

    The gems come in three colors—orange, purple, and yellow—in an apparent nod to the immortal Sanderson sisters: Winifred, Sarah, and Mary as you can see in the post below:

    Each package comes with enough dough to make 20 cookies, and each cookie has only 90 calories. So not only is there enough dough to last you through repeat viewings but also you don’t have to feel guilty by the time you finish the whole package.

  • Whoopi Goldberg Urges Disney to Build Wakanda Theme Park to Honor Chadwick Boseman

    Whoopi Goldberg Urges Disney to Build Wakanda Theme Park to Honor Chadwick Boseman

    “The View” co-host Whoopi Goldberg is calling on Disney to build a Wakanda theme park in honor of the late actor Chadwick Boseman.

    The actor’s 4-year battle with colon cancer ended Friday, his family said in a statement. Boseman portrayed King T’Challa in the Marvel blockbuster superhero movie “Black Panther.”

    On Sunday, “The View” co-host posted on Twitter to call on Disney to not build “another Frozen land BUT what we could use is Wakonda,” as you can see in the post below:

    “Dear People in charge of building NEW experiences Disney Land and World we don’t really need another Frozen land BUT what we could use is Wakonda,” she tweeted. “Please Disneyworld Disneyland PLEASE build in Chadwick Boseman’s name WAKONDA (Sic).”

    Last year, Disney announced that the “Avengers” Campus would open in 2022 at Disney California Adventure park.

    While Disney hasn’t mentioned anything about a Wakanda theme park, visitors at the “Avengers” park will find “heroic encounters throughout the campus, including Black Widow, Ant-Man and The Wasp, Doctor Strange, the Guardians of the Galaxy, Super Heroes from Wakanda and Asgard, and Iron Man.”

  • ‘Mulan’ Releasing for Free to All Disney Plus Subscribers in December

    ‘Mulan’ Releasing for Free to All Disney Plus Subscribers in December

    Starting in December, Mulan will become available to all Disney+ subscribers, just three months after its theatrical and Premier Access streaming release.

    The movie will be their first Premier Access release. It will cost Disney+ subscribers $29.99 to watch the movie unlimited times starting September 4. But if you wait another three months, subscribers will be able to stream Mulan for free as part of the regular service starting December 4.

    Disney hasn’t been shouting the news about when Mulan will be free to stream on Disney+ from the rooftops for sure by any means, but news ended up on an international advert for Mulan as you can see below:

    Like every big theatrical release in 2020, Mulan faced delays due to the ongoing coronavirus pandemic. The film had its premiere on March 9, 2020, and was originally set to have its wide release on March 27. However, with social distancing guidelines in place and the closure of movie theaters around the world, the film was delayed. First to July 2020 and then again to August, before Disney removed it from their release schedule altogether. Disney then announced Mulan would be available for purchase on Disney+.

    The animated version of Mulan is based on the Chinese legend of Hua Mulan and follows a young woman in China who poses as a man in order to take her father’s place in the war against the Huns.

    Yifei Liu plays the character Mulan in the live-action movie, which will follow the same story as the original movie, but this time it’s rated PG-13 for sequences of violence and is fashioned as a more realistic telling than the animated musical.

  • New ‘Haunted Mansion’ Movie in the Works at Disney

    New ‘Haunted Mansion’ Movie in the Works at Disney

    Disney is once again materializing a new “Haunted Mansion” live-action movie, based on its Disneyland theme park ride.

    After trying to bring the famous attraction to the box office back in 2003, and other attempts at a reboot being put in development, the studio has found another good spirit to bring the 999 haunts back to the big screen.

    Director Guillermo del Toro was attached to a reboot of the property in 2010, even going so far as to co-write the script before the project was abandoned. 

    Screenwriter Katie Dippold has been tapped to pen the project. No stranger to ghosts on the screen, Dippold previously collaborated with Paul Feig on the 2016 reboot of Ghostbusters.

    Disney previously adapted The Haunted Mansion into a feature film back in 2003, the same year that they released another theme park attraction based movie in Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl, but with little success. Eddie Murphy starred in the film which incorporated characters and even direct quotations from the Disneyland ride.

    Disney used the ride as inspiration for its 2003 horror comedy “The Haunted Mansion” with Eddie Murphy portraying a workaholic realtor who buys a mansion that turns out to be haunted. The movie, directed by Rob Minkoff, grossed $182 million worldwide on a $90 million budget.

    The film is being spearheaded by producers Dan Lin and Jonathan Eirich and their Rideback production banner. Lin and Eirich previously saw success with Disney with the live-action reboot of the Aladdin remake which went on to gross over a billion dollars at the worldwide box office and kick start yet another new franchise for the House of Mouse.

  • BREAKING: Chadwick Boseman, Star of ‘Black Panther,’ Dies at 43

    BREAKING: Chadwick Boseman, Star of ‘Black Panther,’ Dies at 43

    Chadwick Boseman, known for his role as Marvel’s noble Black Panther, died at his Los Angeles home Friday at age 43.

    The actor has been battling colon cancer since 2016, and died at home with his family and wife by his side, according to a statement posted on his Twitter account.

    “A true fighter, Chadwick persevered through it all, and brought you so many of the films you have come to love so much,” his publicist, Nicki Fioravante, said in a statement.

    “A true fighter, Chadwick persevered through it all, and brought you many of the films you have come to love so much,” the statement said. “From ‘Marshall’ to ‘Da 5 Bloods,’ August Wilson’s ‘Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom’ and several more, all were filmed during and between countless surgeries and chemotherapy.”

    Boseman was best known for his role as T’Challa, or the Black Panther, king of the fictional African nation of Wakanda in the 2018 Marvel superhero movie “Black Panther.”

    The film was a cultural touchstone — the first major superhero movie with an African protagonist; the first to star a majority Black cast; and in Ryan Coogler, the first to employ a Black writer and director.

  • Disney’s Live-Action ‘Mulan’ Headed Straight to Disney Plus in September for $30

    Disney’s Live-Action ‘Mulan’ Headed Straight to Disney Plus in September for $30

    After being postponed multiple times, Disney has announced that its tentpole film “Mulan” will bypass American theaters and go straight to Disney Plus next month.

    Disney Plus now has over 60.5 million paying subscribers as of last month, just nine months after the launch of the direct-to-consumer streaming platform. And after several delays to its theatrical release date, Disney CEO Bob Chapek said that “Mulan” will premiere on the service on a “premiere access” basis on Sept. 4 for $29.99. The film will be released theatrically in markets in which access to the movie on Disney Plus is not available.

    Chapek was quick to emphasize on the call with analysts that the “Mulan” release on Disney Plus is a one-time event.

    “We’re looking at ‘Mulan’ as a one-off, as opposed to saying there’s some new business windowing model that we’re looking at,” he said.

    “We find it very interesting to take a premiere offering to consumers at that $29.99 price and learn from it,” said Chapek, noting that they would study the number of transactions and the number of subscribers generated by the movie.

    He also said that the premiere access window created on Disney Plus for “Mulan” acts as a “fairly large stimulus” for new consumers to sign up for the streaming service.

  • New Iridescent ‘Hocus Pocus’ Mug, Complete With a Broom Spoon now on shopDisney

    New Iridescent ‘Hocus Pocus’ Mug, Complete With a Broom Spoon now on shopDisney

    The halloween season is nearly upon us and Disney has released a new Hocus Pocus Mug and Spoon Set that will have you running amok amok amok!

    The Sanderson sister-inspried might is in the shape of a cauldron and has an iridescent design with gold lettering that says “Hocus Pocus” with a high-gloss finish.

    To complete the set, the mug comes with a wooden broomstick-inspired spoon so you can stir up trouble (and your pumpkin coffee or tea) in style.

    The Hocus Pocus Mug and Spoon Set is available on shopDisney for $19.99. The mug holds 12 ounces, and even with the detailing, is dishwasher- and microwave-safe.

    Since it’s available to ship right away, you can order it now so you’re guaranteed to have it in your hands when Hocus Pocus airs on TV for the first time in the fall season.