Q: How gratifying was it to see the success of Hellboy II in the opening weekend, after moving to a different studio and all of that?
Ron Perlman: Incredibly gratifying. That's rarefied air and when you get to be my age, you realize it's not only something that you never take for granted, but a tiny little fraction of those of us who throw in to this adventure ever get the chance to experience something like that. It's so overwhelming that I haven't even begun to take it in. Luckily, I'm doing Sons of Anarchy and I jumped right from the frying pan into the fire. Yesterday we shot six scenes, so I didn't have time to think about much but learning my lines and delivering them. But yeah, I cannot tell you how vindicated we all feel; what a tough struggle it was for Guillermo to get the movie made with me and seven years of struggling. You know, we got a first one out and it was a modest success. We got a second one out and the stories are… you could fill volumes, just telling the stories about what it was like to get that movie made and here we are. The world has given us this cosmic hug and it feels really good.
Q: Does a third one seem in the offing? Is it something you guys have talked about?
Perlman: Well, I certainly think that it's not without the realm of possibility at this point. Yeah, I can only imagine the discussions that are taking place in some other dark room right now.
Q: Guillermo's going to be busy with The Hobbit for the next couple of years. Have you talked about what that might mean if they want a Hellboy III soon?
Perlman: You know, I haven't. I know Guillermo has a very compelling idea for how to end the trilogy and I hope he gets the chance to tell it and I hope he gets the chance to do it exactly as he wants to do it, and that's all I can say about that. I don't know. I'm not privy to anything, because we didn't want to start counting our chickens before they hatched. So none of those discussions have ever been had. We just talk about what we're gonna eat together and have dinner and stuff like that.
Q: Has he broached the idea of you being in The Hobbit to you at all? Has he talked about that?
Perlman: Well, no he has not, except to say when I first saw him after it had been announced that he was going to be in New Zealand for four years, I said, "I'm gonna miss you, pal." He goes [mimicking Del Toro's accent], "Oh no, you're not!" That's all I know.
In the film, set in post-apocalyptic 2018, Bale stars as John Connor, the man fated to lead the human resistance against Skynet and its army of Terminators. But the future Connor was raised to believe in is altered in part by the appearance of Marcus Wright (Worthington), a stranger whose last memory is of being on death row. Connor must decide whether Marcus has been sent from the future, or rescued from the past. As Skynet prepares its final onslaught, Connor and Marcus both embark on an odyssey that takes them into the heart of Skynet's operations, where they uncover the terrible secret behind the possible annihilation of mankind.
Quicktime Trailer HERE
Windows Media Player HERE
Operation Checkmate will be told from the point of view of the Colombian military rescuers, who infiltrated the intelligence network of FARC (the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia) and freed Ingrid Betancourt and 14 others. The final 22 minutes of the film will unfold in real time, depicting the dramatic release as the rescuers tricked the kidnappers into thinking they were a humanitarian group.
L.A.-based Colombian director Simon Brand is in negotiations to direct the film for the Sony genre label.
Operation Checkmate will receive the cooperation of the Colombian government and have access to RCN footage that was never made public.
But when ComingSoon.net cornered Abrams at a big Hollywood event this week, we were surprised that he seemed finally ready to reveal a few tiny, tantalizing hints about his version of the final frontier, as well as his feeling about the franchise and his film's old school standard bearer – and we didn't even have to pull a phaser on him.
CS: You've said that you didn't start out as an uber-fan of "Star Trek," but you quickly became a fan. Can you talk in general terms about what you fell in love with about the whole franchise?
Abrams: I fell in love with the relationships between the characters. I fell in love with the characters. The idea of – it's so funny because you hear something so often and it loses it's meaning. But "space, the final frontier" – if you actually consider space as uncharted territory there's something about the idea of these people, because any ship flying by isn't going to get you excited. It's who's on the ship that matters. I feel like these characters actually going out into that nothingness and finding something is great. Having lived with it now and gotten to know the characters and worked with amazing actors who portrayed them, it made me fall in love with that notion, that idea that for some reason never struck me the way that "Twilight Zone" did.
CS: Are you ready to talk about the Jennifer Morrison character? There's been a lot of speculation and confusion as to exactly who she's playing.
Abrams: She is so great. I'll just say that she plays Kirk's mother. She's awesome. Great.
CS: Does the film feature many flashback sequences? We also know that Winona Ryder is playing Spock's mother.
Abrams: Yeah, most of the movie is not - I wouldn't call them flashbacks, but she's in a great sequence and is so good. I love her.
CS: What can you say about about working with Leonard Nimoy?
Abrams: It was really just a dream experience, working with him. He is everything you want him to be. He's funny and incredibly thoughtful and was surprisingly open and receptive to direction. He's just got an amazing wife and family and working with him was literally... Like the other day we were doing some ADR and he was there and because we weren't shooting anymore I was standing there and I just looked at him while he was doing his thing. I wanted to burn it into my head. It was so great to get to work with that guy. He's just an amazing man and is terrific in the movie.
CS: Is he a major presence in the film?
Abrams: Yeah. I think he's a major presence in any scene he's in. He's terrific.
Release date August 5. Not getting my hopes up too much but from the trailer it looks a lot better that #2.