Happy New Year everybody! With HBO Max’s coming attractions trailer for 2022, the appropriate title for this update should be “First Seconds” really, since we get a blink-and-you-miss it moment of the upcomig miniseries “The Staircase”. But these moments are worth pausing since they reveal a first look at most of the series’ characters, including Colin Firth as Michael Peterson and Toni Collette as his wife Kathleen. In the courtroom scene we can also spot Michael Stuhlbarg as his lawyer David Rudolf, Parker Posey as the defense attorney Freda Black (this will be one performance to look forward to), as well as Sophie Turner and Patrick Schwarzenegger as two of the Peterson children, as well as Dane DeHaan as Peterson’s son, standing next to Toni Collette. No airdate has been released yet. Catch the first look below.

“Nightmare Alley” opened in US theaters this Friday, unfortunately to a dismal box office revenue. As Forbes let’s us know, “Guillermo del Toro’s very good and very ambitious Nightmare Alley never had a chance. Even with solid reviews and decent buzz, the period piece film noir melodrama earned just $1.192 million yesterday, setting the stage for a $1.95 million opening weekend. That’s below even the over/under $5 million “Covid normal” for the likes of King Richard, The Last Duel and Last Night in Soho, closer to the $2.3 million launch of Lisa Joy’s Reminiscence. Again, these are exactly the kind of big-budget, adult-skewing, star-driven, non-franchise studio programmers everyone claims Hollywood never makes.” The film hasn’t been released in European countries yet (which won’t make a big difference with everything shutting down due to the new Covid variant), so here’s hoping for a swift home-video release. To wrap-up the updates on the film, new pictures, tv spots and a making of featuring an interview with Toni Collette have been added to the site. Enjoy.

While we’re eagerly anticipating next week’s theatrical release of “Nightmare Alley” in the US (and hopefully a press tour for the film that will include at least some virtual appearances by Toni), an international trailer for the United Kingdom has been released, giving us more glimpses of Toni’s Zeena Krumbein, a featurette with a focus on the film’s noir effect, as well as a couple of television spots have been released. All clips can be viewed below and in the video archive.

Released Thursday by Searchlight Pictures, the trailer for del Toro’s first film since the Oscar-winning Shape of Water teases a neo-noir psychological thriller that features Cooper starring as down on his luck but charismatic “carny” Stanton Carlisle. While at a traveling carnival, Carlisle meets and endears himself to Toni Collette’s clairvoyant Zeena, as well as her mentalist husband Pete, played by David Strathairn. Eventually, with the aid of mysterious psychiatrist Dr. Lilith Ritter (Blanchett), the duo begin to plot a grift with some newly acquired knowledge, setting their target on dangerous and skeptical tycoon Ezra Grindle, played by Richard Jenkins. In the minute and a half trailer, Cooper’s Carlisle is seen admitting under the pressure of a lie-detector test that he is a medium and someone who can read minds “under the right circumstances.” But when asked if Carlisle is in contact with the beyond, Jenkins’ character responds as Cooper’s character is seen fake fainting in front of a crowd. “We’ve had our fair share of snake charmers in the past. We deal with them,” Grindle ominously promises. Fellow stars Collette, Rooney Mara, Willem Dafoe and Clifton Collins Jr. also make appearances in the trailer that features a colorful collage of fire, money, violence, blood and deception. Based on William Lindsay Gresham’s 1946 novel of the same name, with a screenplay co-written by Kim Morgan and del Toro, Cooper and J. Miles Dale serving as producers, Nightmare Alley opens in theaters on Dec. 17.

The stars are aligned for Guillermo del Toro’s “Nightmare Alley,” his adaptation of William Lindsay Gresham’s 1946 noir novel that was quickly turned into a 1947 movie starring Tyrone Power. As GoldDerby writes, The Searchlight movie, out December 17 in theaters only, is among the top early contenders for Best Picture and Best Director according to the Gold Derby odds. “Is he man or beast?” Dafoe’s character, who oversees the fringe carnival where Cooper’s Stanton Carlise initially works, intones twice in the teaser – before and after images of tension, fright and oddity flash across the screen. But Stanton isn’t a werewolf, so much as anti-hero whose soul is corrupted by his decisions. “The carnival is almost like a microcosm of the world,” del Toro told Vanity Fair. “Everybody’s there to swindle everybody. But at the same time in the carnival, the [workers] know they need each other. In the city, much less so.”

It feels *almost* normal to cover a new film release and collect all the available press junket videos – how great to have some film coverage back. Last week, Toni Collette sat down for a virtual press junket for the theatrical releases of “Dream Horse” in the United States and the United Kingdom. Clips from lots of news outlets and the British daytime talkshow Lorraine have been added to the video archive, alongside a couple of new clips from the film. A complete list of all added videos can be found below. Screencaptures from all appearances have been added to the photo gallery as well.