Ansel Elgort, Brenton Thwaites, and More Up for New Role in 'Pirates of the Caribbean 5'

 It may have taken Disney a little bit longer to get all of their ships in a row, but movement is finally happening on Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales.  Of course Johnny Depp and his eyeliner are back as Jack Sparrow, with co-directors Joachim Rønning and Espen Sandberg looking to make their big studio debut after their Oscar-nominated film, Kon-Tiki. And though there were some rumors Orlando Bloom could return to the franchise, it looks like a new young actor is set to take the other "dashing" male lead.

Deadline says Ansel Elgort (The Fault In Our Stars), George MacKay (Pride), Taron Egerton (Kingsman: The Secret Service), Brenton Thwaites (The Giver), Mitchell Hope (Descendants), and Sam Keely (In the Heart of the Sea) are up for the role of Henry, and that's all we know about the character. Well, we also know that it's one of the most sought-after roles in Hollywood right now, which means it should come with significant screen time opposite Depp. Out of all of these, Elgort is the biggest prize. He's had quite a year already with The Fault In Our Stars, Men Women & Children, and Divergent. He comes with franchise experience, but so does Thwaites who led The Giver earlier this year and had a role in Disney's Maleficent. The dark horse here may be Hope, who stars in Disney's TV movie Descendants as the son of Beauty and the Beast.

There's plenty of time for a decision to be made as Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales opens July 7th 2017.

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Trailer for 'Monsters: Dark Continent' Brings the Action

The film that basically earned Gareth Edwards his shot at reviving Godzilla was the atmospheric monster flick, appropriately titled Monsters. And it's safe to say that Edwards brought a similar moody aesthetic to Godzilla; never overusing the creatures themselves and sparing them until they were most effective. Unlike the $500M blockbuster, Monsters can't be categorized as an action movie. It was a character piece and allegory about immigration policy more than anything else. But with Edwards out of the picture the sequel Monsters: Dark Continent has gone a totally different direction.

Directed by Tom Green (no, not Drew Barrymore's ex), Monsters: Dark Continent appears to be more of a war film than anything else, with more monsters lurking over every hill. Johnny Harris (Snow White and the Huntsman) stars as a soldier desperately trying to find his friend while the U.S. sends the military in to deal with the growing monster threat.

Edwards is only on board here as an exec-producer and he seems to have left Green to his own devices, crafting a movie that is completely separate from the first one. That said, the action looks pretty good, better than the tiny budget would suggest. In that way it shares at least one thing in common with Edwards' film. Monsters: Dark Continent has yet to gain a U.S. date but opens in the U.K. this November.


Monsters Dark Continent - Trailer by itsartmag

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Ken Jeong Boards 'Ride Along 2'; Oliver Platt Joins 'Bessie'; 'Chef' Adds Sam Keely

* Ken Jeong has joined Ice Cube, Kevin Hart, and Olivia Munn for Ride Along 2, the sequel to this year's buddy cop comedy that broke $150M at the box office. He'll play "a cocky computer hacker who fancies himself a ladies man but who also is key in solving the case that Cube and Hart are working on." While this could possibly be very irritating having Jeong and Hart sharing scenes together, this will be the rare time when Jeong can look down on somebody. [THR]

* HBO is adding some familiar faces to the cast of Bessie, Queen Latifah and Dee Rees' biopic on blues singer, Bessie Smith. Oliver Platt has come aboard the film along with Bryan Greenberg (How to Make It In America) and Tory Kittles (True Detective), with Latifah as the iconic singer who became known as the Empress of the Blues for her acclaimed performances in the 1920s and '30s. Platt will play photographer and writer Carl Van Vechten, Kittles is Bessie brother Clarence, and Greenberg is renowned record producer and music critic John Hammond  [Deadline]

* That other Chef movie, the one led by Bradley Cooper, continues to add a number of promising ingredients to the pot. Cooper, Sienna Miller, and Omar Sy have now been joined in the kitchen by Irish actor Sam Keely. Keely's a rising star who has a role in Ron Howard's In the Heart of the Sea and the upcoming sequel Monsters: Dark Continent. Chef, which hopefully will undergo a name change to avoid confusion, has Cooper as a Parfs chef who loses everything because of his hard partying ways. After sobering up he assembles a team to start anew by heading a restaurant that can earn the coveted 3-star Micheline rating.

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