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ISSUE 57 NOV '14

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INSIDE: DAWN OF THE PLANET OF THE APES • DOCTOR WHO

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CONTENTS

Founder Nic Short Editor John Ferguson Contributors

Issue 57 NOVEMBER 2014

Games Editor Paul Jones Creative Director Karl Lock DVD Consultant Jason Hewitt

Extras pg 8-14

DVD&BD pg 15-32

Music pg 33-46

Games From back pg 1-14

Games Consultant Sachi Fernando Production Manager Craig Patterson Social Media Manager Sally Carlier-Hull Contributors Graham Reid, Ricardo Kerr, Robin Martin, Judy Ewens, GarethThompson, Duncan Holland, Scott Hocking, Jonathan Alley, Zoë Radas, Doug Wallen, Ryan Huff, Emily Kelly, Simon Winkler, Chris Murray, Dan Rule, Denise Hylands, Bec Rowlands Correspondence 31B Bertram Street Warkworth Auckland 0910

Pg 08-14 News Monty Python, The Hobbit , JB Hi-Fi Blu-ray exclusives, homegrown hit The Dark Horse, and Assassin’s Creed. Pg 10 COMPETITIONS & QUIZ Dawn of the Planet of the Apes , Far Cry 4 nd more. Pg 12 EXTRA Rising star Idris Elba, STACK salutes Morgan Freeman, Whatever happened to… Geena Davis. Pg 14 HOMEGROWN Composer, performer and producer Age Pryor wears many musical hats.

Pg 16-17 DAWN OF THE PLANET OF THE APES Director Matt Reeves demystifies performance capture, praises Andy Serkis, and talks ape parkour. Pg 18 TRANSFORMERS: AGE OF EXTINCTION After the third, Michael Bay was ready to walk away, but then Mark Wahlberg dropped in. Pg 20 BIG SCHOOL First class comedy from David Walliams. Pg 22 DOCTOR WHO Peter Capaldi may be an older Doctor but his energy has revitalised an already great series. Pg 24 DELIVER US FROM EVIL The Devil vs. the NYPD in this chilling exorcism thriller. Pg 26-32 REviews What’s hot in-store this November on DVD and Blu-ray.

Pg 34 JB LISTENER The month ahead in music. Pg 38 FOO FIGHTERS We ride along with guitarist Pat Smears on the band’s Sonic Highway . Pg 40 brooke fraser With a new sound, a new look and a new attitude, Brooke Fraser is finally ready to unleash her new record. Pg 42 BLACK RIVER DRIVE The Auckland rockers went to Nashville to record their second album as singer/guitarist Sam Browne explained. Pg 44 reviews Inc. Lost on the River, Ariel Pink. and Royksopp. Pg 46 neil diamond Graham Reid on the not inconsiderable charms of this veteran crooner.

Pg 04 GTA V You’ve probably already played GTA V . Here’s some reasons why you should play it again. Pg 06 Far cry 4 The hunt begins in the Himalayas. Pg 10 assassin’s creed: Unity Maxime Durand talks the French Revolution with STACK . Pg 11 Assassin’s creed: rogue The final chapter in the American trilogy is here. Pg 14 HALO REMASTERED 343 Industries brings The Master Chief Collection to JB Hi-Fi.

All information believed correct at time of printing. All images used for promotional purposes only. Copyright of respective owners is acknowledged. © 2014 Scribal Custom Pty Ltd. No part of this magazine may be reprinted without the written permission of the publisher. Further details read fine print

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what’s next from the pythons?

Legendary British comedy troupe Monty Python’s final performance in its sell-out series of live shows is to be released on DVD and Blu-ray on November 13. Monty Python Live (mostly) - One Down Five to Go was filmed in High Definition on July 20 at The O2 in London and will be available as both a standard DVD and BD edition, plus a deluxe set, which will Although it is likely to be the last time the team will perform together live as Monty Python, the British comedy legends have reunited for the comedy Absolute Anything , which is due to be released next year. Directed by Terry Jones, it stars Simon Pegg who gets mixed up with some aliens from outer space, voiced by Jones and his fellow Python pals John Cleese, Eric Idle, Michael Palin and Terry Gilliam. So what else can we can look forward to from the Python gang? At press-time, we’re still waiting on a local release date for Gilliam’s latest directorial effort, the sci-fi fantasy The Zero Theorem , which stars Christoph Waltz, Matt Damon and Tilda Swinton. Gilliam also has a cameo in the upcoming Jupiter Ascending and is also reportedly looking again at a screen version of Don Quixote. Meanwhile, Palin and Cleese have been working on live shows based on their recent memoirs. Palin has just wrapped up a one-man stage show adapted from the third volume of his diaries, while Cleese will soon be embarking on a similar autobiographical tour that ties in with his his latest book So, Anyway . No word yet whether any of the performances will be filmed for later DVD release. include both versions, plus a double CD audio and a 60 page hardback book of exclusive photographs.

The Hobbit: Battle OfThe Five Armies

Bumper box sets, exclusive reissues and collectors editions. HOBBIT-GEDDON?

T he final installment in Peter Jackson’s epic Tolkien odyssey is due to hit cinemas next month with the release of The Hobbit: The Battle of Five Armies , with Bilbo Baggins (Martin Freeman), Thorin Oakenshield (Richard Armitage) and his company of wolves now having to face both Smaug and Gandalf’s greatest enemy Sauron. To get you in the mood for the final film in the trilogy, this month also sees the release of the extended edition of The Desolation Of Smaug , which includes 25 minutes of extra footage. The extended editions – available on both 2D and 3D Blu- ray and DVD – also feature more than nine

hours of new bonus features, including commentaries from Jackson and co-writer/ producer Philippa Boyens, plus extensive behind-the-scenes documentaries. As well as the second parts of New Zealand: Home Of Middle-Earth and Into The Wilderland: The Chronicles of The Hobbit , there is also The Journey To Erebor , a multi part documentary focusing on the work that Weta Workshop and Weta Digital undertook to create the new characters and creatures of The Desolation of Smaug . The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug is out on DVD and Blu-ray on November 5.

The Zero Theorem

Screened earlier this year on Prime, New Zealand FromAbove takes viewers on an aerial journey over New Zealand, from the alpine glories of the South Island to the tip of the North. It is out on November 13 on Blu-ray and DVD.

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Californication

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A monster Planet of the Apes box set is among the Blu-ray exclusives at JB Hi-Fi this month. go ape for planet of THE apes!

Dawn of the Planet of theApes comes out swinging on November 19 and will be available in a variety of configurations, including an exclusive DVD and Blu-ray double bill, which includes the first film in the rebooted franchise, Rise of the Planet of theApes . However, if you really want to go ape, then you should grab the JB exclusive box set Planet of theApes: Caesar’s Warrior Collection , featuring all eight films in the series in stunning HD and specially packaged in a Caesar bust sporting his penetrating, simian stare. It will also be released on November 19. JB Hi-Fi has also lined up a special Transformers movie collection on DVD and Blu-ray to mark the release of the latest addition to the blockbuster series, Transformers: Age of Extinction , which is out on November 26.The latter will also be available as an exclusive 2-disc standalone edition at JB. Another box set sci-fi buffs will be eager check out will be a new Battlestar Galactica collection, which includes the prequel Blood & Chrome and two otherTV movie spin-offs, Razor and The Plan . Meanwhile, kids – and probably a few grown-ups, too – will be pleased to learn that Spongebob Square Pants is turning Blu, with both The Spongebob Squarepants Movie and It’s a Spongebob Squarepants Christmas being reissued in HD on November

Better Call Saul , the eagerly anticipated prequel to Breaking Bad , is due to premiere in the US in February next year – let’s hope that it arrives on NZTV screens around the same time. The series is set six years before Saul Goodman (Bob Odenkirk) met Walter White; at the time he was still known as Jimmy McGill and was a small time lawyer hustling to make ends meet. Better Call Saul will track his transformation into the smooth-talking Saul, the man who puts “criminal” into “criminal lawyer”. Jonathan Banks will also reprise his role from Breaking Bad as fixer Mike Erhmantraut, while other series regulars will include Michael McKean ( This Is Spinal Tap ), Rhea Seehorn ( House of Lies ) and Patrick Fabian ( Big Love ). In the meantime, JB Hi-Fi has lined up a cool new Breaking Bad box set, which brings together all six seasons and is available on both Blu-ray and DVD; both sets also include UltraViolet digital files. 26 – only from JB Hi-Fi. In addition, JB has added two more cult favourites to its growing collection of exclusive Blu-ray reissues. Directed by Spike Jonze and penned by Charlie Kaufman, Being John Malkovich (1999) tells the wacky story of a down-on-his-luck puppeteer (John Cusack) who discovers a portal into brain of John Malkovich (playing himself). It is out on November 5, alongside the Blu-ray edition of Steven Spielberg’s debut 1971 feature Duel , in which a salesman (DennisWeaver) is pursued by a mysterious truck driver.

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The Dark Horse

homegrown hits at xmas The Dark Horse and WhatWe Do in the Shadows due on DVD in time for Christmas. Although they couldn’t be more different – a horror mockumentary and an inspiring true story – both movies have received acclaim at overseas film festivals and have been box office hits on their home turf. The Dark Horse , which has taken almost $1.9 million at the cinema, was written and directed by James Napier Robertson, and is based on the true story of Kiwi speed chess champion Genesis Potini. Cliff Curtis plays the inspirational chess master and James Rolleston ( Boy ) his nephew. It is set to be released on DVD on December 10. The makers of What We Do in the Shadows were being more coy about their home entertainment release plans, but told STACK that it would be out before Christmas. The hilarious vampire flick was co-written and directed byTaikaWaititi ( Boy ) and his old Flight of the Conchords ’ pal Jemaine Clement, and has taken more than $2.5 million at the box office, making it one of the top 10 grossing NZ films of all time. What We Do in the Shadows offers a fly-on-the-wall portrait of three vampires, Viago (Waititi), Vladislav (Clement) and Deacon (Jonathan Brugh), who share a flat inWellington. ROGUE GOES TEMPLAR A ccording to Ubisoft, fans of its Assassin’s Creed franchise have petitioned long and hard for the opportunity to play as a Templar. Well, this month they will finally get a chance. “Our fans have been expecting to experience the “other side” for quite a long time -- as early as AC1 and AC2,” reveals producer on Assassin’s Creed: Rogue , Ivan Balabanov. “During our early discussions on the concept of Rogue, we decided that we have the perfect opportunity to close off the North American Trilogy. Rogue takes place after Black Flag and before ACIII. In Black Flag , we see the star of the Assassin brotherhood in the NewWorld on the rise. In ACIII, the Brotherhood is completely broken, and Connor needs to rebuild it. With Rogue , and its Templar protagonist, we’ll explain what happened between these two periods.” You can read all about Assassin’s Creed: Rogue in this issue on page 46, and play it on November 13.

WhatWe Do in the Shadows

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COMPS & QUIZ For details on how to enter competitions, head online to www.stack.net.nz

Three Far Cry 4 Prizes Up for Grabs! In Far Cry 4 , you are in Kyrat, a perilous region of the Himalayas, struggling under the regime of a despotic self- appointed king. Head to stack.net.nz for your chance to WIN one of three

Three Assassin’s Creed: Unity Prizes Up for Grabs! The brand new Assassin’s Creed: Unity is landing in JB Hi-Fi stores this month and we have three copies to give away. Fight your way to stack.net.nz for your chance to WIN! Thanks to Fiveight

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The best will win $ 25 JB Hi-Fi Vouchers! basic plotline for which 1996 movie? Q4 Between 1942 and 1967, these two off-screen lovers made nine movies together. Name both the stars. Q5 Which movie title refers to a breed of rose which whilst extremely pretty on the surface, is prone to rot at its roots? Q6 Which Hollywood actor was taught to tap dance by Gene Kelly’s brother? Q7 What 2009 movie features a

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Q1 The director of this 1964 film advertised it as a “suspenseful sex mystery”. But audiences found it too Freudian. Name the director and his movie. Q2 What was the first film to win the Best Actress Academy Award without being nominated in any other category? Q3 A banned ice-hockey player finds that his power drive is an asset on the golf course. That’s the

scene that is a direct homage to the cover of Jimi Hendrix’s classic album Electric Ladyland ? Q8 This actor was discovered by Kevin Spacey whilst appearing on stage playing a 17-year-old autistic boy. Name him. Q9 Which film director taught both Oliver Stone and Spike Lee at New York University? Q10 Why did Israel ban the James Bond movie Goldfinger (1964) when it was first released?

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A10. Woody Allen - with 14 Written Directly for the Screen nominations.

A9. Prince Valiant

(1953) A8. Keanu Reeves

) A7. Dean Martin & Jerry Lewis -

(2002) A6. James Stewart & Anthony Mann (

A5. John Anderton (Tom Cruise) in

Scared Stiff

The Man from Laramie

Minority Report

Faulkner. Both Nobel Prize winners.

A3. Quo Vadis (1951) A4. She debuted in To Have and Have Not (1944), which was written by Ernest Hemingway and adapted for the screen by William

A1. Witness (1985) A2. The American President

Quiz Answers October 2014 (Issue 56) -

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Pokémon: The Heritage Collection A unique, hand painted Poké ball mould for the true Pokémon fan. Complete seasons 1-9 on DVD, including over 168 hours of Pokémon adventures. All 460 exciting episodes from Kanto, Orange Islands, Johto and Hoenn!

Limited Edition Collector’s Sets Get in quick before they are gone.

Sonic The Hedgehog Collector’s Edition Over 23 hours of exciting Sonic adventures! Includes a limited edition Sonic t-shirt.

Super Mario Bros Collector’s Edition Over 18 hours of classic Super Mario Bros! Includes a limited edition Super Mario t-shirt.

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DID YOU KNOW? When the topic of Liam Gallagher was raised with Idris Elba in an interview with GQ in the US, the actor responded with “F*ck that idiot”.

STACK SALUTES

We love him because... MORGAN FREEMAN

IDRIS ELBA

He always turns up to explain what’s going on in a movie. He’s played God ( Bruce Almighty ), the US president ( Deep Impact ), and Nelson Mandela ( Invictus ). He drove Miss Daisy. He’s Lucius Fox in the Dark Knight trilogy. He’s Red in The Shawshank Redemption . He’s Detective Somerset in Se7en . He’s a perennial narrator. He starred in Dreamcatcher and kept his reputation intact. He loves to work and currently has 106 credits as an actor, according to IMDb. He’s the go-to guy when Samuel L. Jackson is unavailable. How can you not love that mellow, authoritative voice?

With a career spanning film, television, theatre and music, London-born Idrissa Akura Elba is red hot right now. His considerable screen presence makes him the perfect fit for roles requiring an authoritative air, or cool characters upon whom the survival of humanity depends. He’s also played a ruthless drug lord and a homicide detective in two of his signature roles for TV. And he’s a hip-hop artist and DJ, the latter under the name Big Drills. During his youth, Idris assisted with his uncle’s DJ business before scoring a grant allowing him to attend the National Youth Music Theatre. Encouraged by his high school drama teacher to pursue acting, he auditioned for a number of roles in television in between working odd jobs and nightclub gigs as a DJ. Throughout the nineties he found regular work in TV series like the Ruth Rendell Mysteries (1996), Insiders (1997) and Ultraviolet (1998). Idris’s big break came when he landed the role of Baltimore drug lord Stringer Bell in HBO’s acclaimed drama series TheWire – a part that has since required him to adopt an American accent when meeting fans of the show. “I almost feel guilty turning around and saying, ‘Ello mate. My name’s Idris and I’m from London’. I don’t want to break the illusion,” he says. The runaway success of TheWire has led to bigger things for the actor, and Idris is now one of those faces that appears to be in everything – his name even came up as a possible contender for the new Doctor Who this year! Filmgoers will know him best as Janek, Captain of the Prometheus ; Heimdall, the imposing guardian of Asgard in Thor and Thor: The Dark World ; and Stacker Pentecost, who rallies humanity against monsters in Pacific Rim with a rousing call to arms: “Today we are cancelling the apocalypse!” Idris has also portrayed the late Nelson Mandela in the biopic Mandela: LongWalk to Freedom – surely his most challenging role to date. Moreover, he still maintains a high profile on television as the eponymous detective in the British crime drama Luther, for which he won a Golden Globe in 2012. Fans of the series, note that a feature is currently in the works!

The Wire (2002-2004)

Luther (2010-2013)

Prometheus (2012)

Pacific Rim (2013)

Morgan on DVD:

Unforgiven (1992) The Shawshank Redemption (1994) Batman Begins (2005) Wanted (2008) The Lego Movie (2014)

Mandela: Long Walk to Freedom (2013)

Geena Davis

Throughout the ‘80s and ‘90s, the statuesque presence of Geena Davis was a regular fixture on cinema screens in popular films like Beetlejuice , The Fly , The Accidental Tourist , Thelma & Louise , and The Long Kiss Goodnight . However, following a couple of flops ( Speechless and Cutthroat Island ), we saw less and less of the cherubic-faced star outside of a couple of Stuart Little films. Geena’s disappearance from the big screen in the ‘00s was largely a consequence of the demands of motherhood, and competing for a semi-final berth with the 2000 Summer Olympics US archery team.

She had also done what a lot of stars of her era do these days – find a comfortable niche on the small screen. While her self-titled sitcom The Geena Davis Show (2000) didn’t make it to the end of its first season before the axe fell, her subsequent TV venture Commander in Chief (2005) was more successful. Not only did she win a Golden Globe for playing the first female US president, she also co-executive produced the series. Since then she’s travelled Down Under to star in the dysfunctional family dramedy Accidents Happen , and appeared in the mini-series remake of Coma .

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Age Pryor (bottom left)and the Wellington International Ukulele Orchestra

AGE PRYOR

Your debut album Be MineTonight is made up of covers of Kiwi classics – how did you narrow down the final list? Firstly we made a huge list of NZ songs that all the band members suggested. After an initial edit, we played through as many of them as we could to hear how they might sound on the ukulele. The songs that work best normally stand out straight away. We also wanted to cover as broad a range of NZ music as possible, from the old to the very new, and including pacific and te reo Maori pieces as well. Adapting and arranging the songs for ukulele is a really enjoyable process. The 11 band members have very different styles and skills in their playing and singing. So we have fun mixing and matching those skills to suit each song. When a song starts to take shape with all the elements combined it’s really exciting. What was the trickiest song to convert? Team by Lorde was pretty interesting, because the original is more of an electronic How hard was it to adapt the songs for the ukulele? production. Bringing the warmth and acoustic sound of ukes to that made for a nice blend. What production challenges does the ukulele present when it comes to recording? The ukulele is a quiet instrument, and for both recording and live performance it takes a lot of care to capture the uke’s natural warm tone. Neil Maddever was our recording engineer for this album and he specialises in live acoustic recording, so that helped us a lot in achieving the sound we wanted.

Have any of the original artists heard your versions?What do you reckon they will make of them? Not many have heard our versions yet – we really hope they like them! Flight of the Conchords’ Bret Mckenzie was a co-founder of the orchestra: how good a ukulele player is he? Bret is a great musician but we haven’t yet done any formal examinations of his ukulele technique. Next time we see him we’ll sit him down and work out his ranking. When was the last time that he played with the orchestra and is there any chance of some future guest appearances? He hasn’t played with us for a while now. Because our band has always had the same line-up from the beginning, we think of the 12 players as permanent members, even though we don’t always have them with us. So hopefully Bret will join us again some time soon, but if he doesn’t, that’s fine. We mix and match pretty easily these days, depending on people’s availability. Aside from the orchestra, what are your plans for the next 12 months – any new solo or band projects on the go? Yes, I’m starting up a couple of new projects for 2015, and will be focusing on new original material. Working with the ukulele orchestra is fantastic and I also need to balance it with other personal creative work, so 2015 is my year for that! What was the last DVD you bought? Hayao Miyazaki’s The Wind Rises – I love his films.

For those who haven’t heard you guys yet, tell us a little aboutWellington International Ukulele Orchestra? We’re an 11-piece band comprising 10 ukulele players who also all sing and a bass player who doesn’t sing - although we keep trying to get him to sing because he’s really got a good voice! We play cover versions of songs we like and arrange them to sound extra special for the ukulele. We love to arrange extravagant harmonies to sing too. We formed nine years ago in a really small cafe inWellington called Deluxe. We didn’t get together on purpose. It just happened because the members were all regular coffee drinkers at Deluxe. Composer, performer and producer, Age Pryor has been a key figure on the New Zealand music scene for more than 20 years. As well as solo albums such as Shank’s Pony and City Chorus, he was one of the original members of the collaborative ensembles Fly My Pretties and TheWoolshed Sessions. Pryor is also the musical director and executive manager of the Wellington International Ukulele Orchestra, who release their debut album this month.

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TRANSFORMERS: AGEOFEXTINCTION

DAWN OF THE PLANET OF THE APES • DOCTOR WHO

YOUR MONTHLY DVD & BD GUIDE TO WHAT’S IN-STORE HOT

DVD&BD FEATURE

From monsters in Cloverfield and vampires in Let Me In , to the DAWN OFTHE PLANET OFTHEAPES. Director MATT REEVES’s first big franchise film is still all about the story and emotions amidst the spectacle.

How challenging was it working on a big budget franchise film? I’d never made a movie on this scale, but the job is exactly the same, which is you are telling a story and you are trying to find the emotional reality of the scenes with the actors. I thought maybe the technology would be an obstacle to doing these things and I didn’t really know what Andy Serkis did. I knew he was an actor and I also knew he was legendary for the motion capture work that he had done. I knew that I had been moved by his performances, especially by his performance in Rise of the Planet of the Apes , but I didn’t understand if there was some technical thing he was doing. And when we began, I learned very quickly that there was nothing technical that he was doing. It was just about him wearing a device that recorded his performance and the big secret as to why Caesar is so powerful is that Andy is a powerful actor. So I was like, ‘Oh, it is all performance driven!’ You push the technology to the back and think about the story because if you don’t, you’re in trouble. I think a lot of these tent-pole movies end up being driven by the spectacle itself and you can lose your compass as to what the story is, what the emotions are supposed to be. As a filmmaker, the only way I know what to

offered to me where I felt like I had the way in. To me, unless I have an emotional way into something, I feel like I don’t have the compass to tell me where to put the camera or how to talk to the actors, or what the story is really about. I always look for the personal. So when they came to me with this one, it was the first time that someone had approached me about a big tent-pole movie where I felt I really had something personal to say. So it was exciting to me. I was thrilled. We had an ape camp where [the actors] had to learn to be quadruped, and learn to let go of their human movements.

How did you become involved with Dawn of the Planet of the Apes ? MATT REEVES: It is a very interesting thing. I did Cloverfield and that brought me to a lot of people’s attention, but strangely it was my last film [ Let Me In ] that got me the most attention in Hollywood. So I think it was a combination of the fact that I had done something that was rooted in special effects with Cloverfield and we did that on a budget, and then my next film was more performance driven even though, of course, it also had effects and was a genre piece. That combination of someone who cared about the interior life of the characters but could also do special effects created a lot of opportunities for me. I was approached by a lot of studios with tent-pole movies for the first time, and I had never done anything on that scale. I never found any that had been

do is by following that compass. So in a way, you have to push that stuff into the background.

How does it work with Andy Serkis; do you direct him? Of course. He is another actor. There is such confusion about this – and I had it as well when I started – whereby somehow, people think that motion capture is this really technical thing. There is nothing technical about it. The technical part

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is that the equipment is recording his motion. Dealing with him is simply dealing with an actor, so when you are staging a scene it is no different. I don’t stage a scene differently because of performance capture. I get in the room with Andy and the actors and we look at the scene and we go, ‘Where do you think you will stand? Where do you think you are coming from? What did you do in the previous scene?’ You are doing it just like with any other scene.One of the exciting things for me was discovering that Andy was one of the best actors I have ever worked with, and what was cool was that the performance capture enables all the other actors to relate to each other. I directed Andy in the way I directed any other actor that I have worked with. What preparation did your ape actors have to go through? We had a movement specialist, Terry Notary, a former Cirque du Soleil performer – he plays Rocket, actually. He is a wonderful actor as well, and a great artist in terms of body movement. He trained all of the actors to move like they were apes. We had an ape camp where everybody had to learn to be quadruped, and everybody had to learn to let go of all of their human movements. He was like our Zen ape master. In the last movie, whenever there were stunts that became impossible, they started doing what we call key-frame animation instead of performance capture, which broke the methodology of how this is done. The problem is that when you are getting performance capture, the actors are bound by gravity, by the real energy of being in a real space, the real topography. Yet if you start key-frame animating at that transition, they suddenly start looking a bit more like The Amazing Spider-Man. They just have that little bit more elasticity because it is very hard to perfectly recreate those things. So in this movie we decided to use stunt people to do all of those tricky stunts, and we hired parkour guys. Now, the guys who can do parkour can do amazing things. They defy gravity; they are incredible. But if we had them just do it exactly the way they do it in real life, it would seem as though the apes knew human parkour, which would look really weird! SoTerry had this training camp where he trained these guys to do parkour as apes. So we had like ape parkour, which was bizarre! But all of these things add to the reality of the film because there is real performance capture for virtually all of what you are seeing.

me! And because of that, a series of dolls came out and I had all the dolls and the tree house and the records. I had all of that merchandise. That became my entry into all of the movies. I saw Planet of the Apes , which is my favourite, but Beneath the Planet of the Apes also really terrified me – when the guys take off their faces and they are praying to the bomb. I thought, ‘this is pretty terrifying stuff’. So I am a huge fan of the franchise. When I saw Rise of the Planet of the Apes , I was really excited by it because I thought, ‘Well, they have found a way to re-enter this universe but in a way that is more emotional, from a different point of view.’ Without remaking

One of the exciting things for me was discovering that Andy was one of the best actors I have ever worked with.

Apparently the Apes films were something of an obsession for you growing up?

Yes, I was obsessed with Planet of the Apes and I was introduced to it by the television show, which somebody recently told me had only been on air for three months. That surprised me, because my memory of it was that it lasted most of my childhood – it was that important to

any of the films, it was a way into that world again, and I thought that was really exciting.

Dawn of the Planet of the Apes is out on November 19

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MarkWahlberg joins Optimus Prime and theAutobots in Transformers: Age of Extinction , which director Michael Bay considers to be the best in the series to date.

Transformers:Age of Extinction is the fourth installment of the Transformers franchise. What should fans expect?

What’s different about Transformers:Age of Extinction compared to the previous three.

This one is more grounded. It starts inTexas farm country among people living a simple, innocent life. But of course doesn’t stay that way.We go into outer space, to other parts of the US.We are in China and Hong Kong.While it is more cinematic than the previous films, we have Mark’s character, a father, and we see the story through his eyes and his relationship with his daughter.That’s completely different.The previous films we saw it through Shia’s eyes and he was fantastic. Mark gives it a different feel. So because it is grounded in family relationships, Age of Extinction is more serious. It’s not a kid battling robots – there’s more on the line here. It feels a little grittier. Yes, that’s really it.There’s a reason “Extinction” is in the title of this film.This is our fourth film and the franchise has matured.We have to keep on improving, keep it fresh, keep the audience involved.That’s why this one has a more serious tone. It’s still fun, but definitely grittier and more grounded. It also seems like we get to know the personalities of the robots more this time around. T hat’s true.We wanted the audience to know more about them and theTransformer world. Their personalities.Their characters.We mainly just focus on five robots this time.That creates more of a connection with the audience.We have also tinkered with their design a little so you’ll notice Optimus and Bumblebee still largely look the same, but there’s slight design changes. It’s like when Batman gets a new suit for each movie.

MICHAEL BAY: I think this one is the best. It’s got a really fresh feel about it.The cast is amazing.

We’ve got MarkWahlberg starring and Mark’s record speaks for itself.We had a great time working on Pain & Gain together.

It’s the same on this. In fact, we have such a strong cast.There’s Kelsey Grammer, Stanley Tucci, Jack Reynor, BingBing Li and Nicola Peltz. There was talk after the last one, Transformers: Dark of the Moon , that you’d step away from directing this movie. Shia LaBeouf walked away, but here you are.Were you contemplating handing over the directing reins of the franchise to somebody else? I did think about it, but I came to the conclusion I didn’t want to hand it off to somebody else. The franchise has a big, loyal audience all around the world.We started working on the script and I worked with Mark on Pain & Gain and it was great fun.When Mark showed interest in doing aTransformers film it got me really excited.We redesigned the robots a little.That gives this film a totally different look and feel. Let’s talk about Mark for a second. Can you describe his character and what he brings to the movie? Mark plays a father who is struggling to protect his daughter.We all know Mark’s previous work so you know just what he will bring to that. He’s a devoted family man, a great father away

Pain & Gain was so good it seemed like a natural fit.We also give this film some gravitas with Kelsey and Stanley. Kelsey plays the bad guy. They are just great actors. TheTransformers franchise is known for its big action scenes. But it seems like this time, you really took it to another level and pulled off some really complex action scenes. Yeah (laughs).We really pushed ourselves. We had some single 30 second shots with explosions, actors.That was great. It takes a lot of preparation and setting up, but it was definitely worth it. Our audience will appreciate it.

from the set and he really brings that into this role. Mark’s always prepared. I just love working with the guy. He’s a pro. He knows his lines and all of the other actors’ lines. He knows where to stand.

The franchise has a big, loyal audience all around the world.

Mark is obviously a lot older than Shia.Was there any talk of going with a younger actor as the lead instead of an older, established star like MarkWahlberg? Yes there was. The

Transformers: Age of Extinction is out Nov 26

studio suggested that, but I liked the father- daughter story and my experience with Mark on

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FEATURE

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British comic DavidWalliams changes tack in his new faculty-based show Big School . He spoke with Zoë Radas.

D avid Walliams – the taller, “computer says no” of the Little Britain duo – has created a new series with the effervescently self-deprecating Catherine Tate. While Walliams always thought a high school would be the perfect domain for neurotic potential between teachers, he straight away professed his idea had an Australian catalyst. “The best one is Summer Heights High ,” says Walliams, when asked about other shows he looked at that were set in the education system. “I’m a big fan of Chris Lilley, so I’ve seen all his work. I think he is amazing. But... even though that is a piece of genius, I didn’t

feel there couldn’t be another show set in a school.”

It was the singularly claustrophobic nature of school that the comedian wished to use as a backdrop for another kind of trope. “I really wanted to do a love story, first and foremost,” he explains. “I was thinking, ‘I’d love to do a love story about two dysfunctional people who can’t get it together’. You don’t get a lot of privacy at school, so if you fancy someone, you never get a moment of peace to talk to them. Then the more I thought about it, a school is a good situation for a sitcom because it’s so universal.” In terms of Lilley’s multi-character approach, Walliams has obviously had great experience working the same way within one series. Little Britain featured scores of characters

Walliams and the rest of the cast visited schools to do some research and get a “feel for what it’s like to be at a modern school” and speak to teachers and pupils. “At first we were just relaying all our different school experiences ... it’s weird how you go to different schools and you still have lots of similar experiences with people,” he says. “With Catherine Tate’s character – the French teacher who thinks herself very sophisticated but she’s never actually been to France – I felt that was a trait [some teachers] do have: being sophisticated, but they might not necessarily be out there in the big world.” But Walliams makes sure his respect for the profession is clear. “It’s a very honourable tradition and I feel a huge gratitude to my teachers ... I’ve seen them in recent years and it is very lovely to go and thank that person [for] encouraging me to do what I love doing.” While Tate is not credited formally, Walliams explains she contributed thoroughly. “She’s obviously a brilliant writer herself,” he says, “and she did actually have a lot of input in the script. A fellow comedian or writer approaches [things] differently [to an actor]; they see the script as something that can be bent, changed to get the best out of it. It was

that were shared between Walliams

and collaborator Matt Lucas. This

time, Walliams was interested in playing one character with an overarching storyline. “It was amazing to be a part of Little Britain , [but] I felt like it was good to move on and take on a new challenge,” he says.

I’m a big fan of Chris Lilley. I think he is amazing.

“I thought a sitcom is such a hard thing to do because you’ve got

to juggle not just the characters and jokes, but also plots as well, and plots are hard. Having done a show where you play a different

just so great having her being there and having her opinion on everything, ‘cause I sort of trust her taste implicitly ... I knew it wouldn’t work unless I had someone of her calibre in there.”

Big School is out on DVD on Nov 1

character every two minutes, it would be really lovely to sit with one character for six half-hours and have that character have a bit more of an emotional life.”

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visit www.stack.net.nz Who is Peter Capaldi?

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Scottish actor Peter Capaldi finds himself in the thick of it once again, this time at the controls of theTARDIS as the 12th DoctorWho.

THE FIRES OF POMPEII Capaldi appears in this Doctor Who episode from the fourth season, as a family man who is saved by David Tennant’s Doctor prior to the eruption of Vesuvius.

hardcoreWhovians have never been comfortable with) did prove instrumental in the success of the new series. Attend an Oz Comic-Con or similar pop culture expo and you’ll find a legion of teenaged girls wearing Matt SmithT-shirts and/or a fez – an audience that the classic series had never reached. But will they embrace an older Doctor? Fortunately, both Capaldi and Coleman are adamant that there is no potential for romance between their characters. Instead, Clara has been given a love interest this season in the form of Danny Pink (Samuel Anderson), a former soldier turned schoolteacher. Not only is Capaldi’s Doctor older, he’s also more alien, enigmatic and angry, once again inviting comparisons with Hartnell’s original. “He doesn’t quite understand human beings or really care very much about their approval,” Capaldi explains – a fact that frequently exasperates travelling companion Clara Oswald (Coleman). “In the scripts, the Doctor and Clara think they’re ok, but the Doctor can change,” Coleman notes. “Clara is still trying to work out who the new Doctor is.”

TORCHWOOD In Children of Earth he plays John Frobisher, a civil servant assigned to negotiate with a malevolent alien that has sinister plans for our planet’s kids.

W hen it was announced on 4 August 2013 that the 55-year-old star of BBC political comedy TheThick of It would be replacing the youthful Matt Smith as TV’s Time Lord, the first thing that sprang into Doctor Who fans’ minds was his previous involvement with the long-running programme. Capaldi is no stranger to theWhoniverse, having appeared in the 2008 story The Fires of Pompeii and also Who spin-off Torchwood: Children of Earth (2009) – a fact that wasn’t lost on writer and showrunner Steven Moffat, who included a subtle reference to the Doctor’s “familiar” new face in the Season Eight opener Deep Breath . A longtime fan of the show, Capaldi admitted that playing the Doctor “wasn’t something I ever thought I’d end up doing”, during a recent world tour with co-star Jenna Coleman to promote the new series. “But it’s a huge privilege and very exciting,” he added. He also revealed that, prior to the official announcement of his casting, he mingled with unsuspecting fans in London’s sci-fi store Forbidden Planet, slyly acknowledging that “they didn’t realise they were standing next to the new Doctor”. Capaldi’s casting as the Doctor harkens back to the series’ beginning; first Doctor William Hartnell was also 55 when he took on the role in 1963. It’s a refreshing change from the more youthful actors – Christopher Eccleston, DavidTennant and Matt Smith – who have played the part since the series’ return in 2005. However, having a younger Doctor plus a hint of romance with his female companion (something

[Playing the Doctor] wasn’t something I ever thought I’d end up doing.

THE THICK OF IT As Malcolm Tucker, the volatile and foul-mouthed Director of Communications for the British Government, Capaldi‘s expletive-laden tirades are f–ing brilliant!

Season Eight reflects the Doctor’s edgier, unpredictable new persona, which Capaldi describes as “more mysterious and not as user-friendly”.The mood of opening episodes Deep Breath and Into the Dalek , directed by British filmmaker BenWheatley ( Kill List , Sightseers ), is both ominous and grim; the jokey and sometimes frivolous tone that flavoured the Matt Smith adventures has been replaced with a darker approach. It’s a welcome new direction that highlights the programme’s ability to continually regenerate itself. “It’s unmistakably Who , but there are less larks,” offers Capaldi. “Tonally it’s representative of where the series is going, but you never know with Doctor Who .”

WORLD WAR Z As a scientist with the World Health Organisation, Capaldi assists Brad Pitt in stopping the zombie apocalypse. He’s credited as playing ‘WHO Doctor’ – spooky coincidence or destiny?

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© 2014 Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation. All Rights Reserved. © 2014 Twentieth Century FoxHome Entertainment LLC. All Rights Reserved. TWENTIETH CENTURY FOX, FOX and associated logos are trademarks of Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation and its related entities. Includes additional interviews and insights from Ali’s children, Former World Heavyweight Boxing Champions George Foreman and Ken Norton, Fo mer NBA All Star player Karl Malone, and clo e friends Sir Tom Jones and Kris Kristofferson.

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