Headlined by Margot Robbie as Harley Quinn
The next DC project to arrive from Warner Bros will be Birds Of Prey, a live-action take on the all-female, Gotham City-based team of crimefighters. The movie will be updating the roster, though, to include Margot Robbie’s Harley Quinn – the villain turned antihero who made her first big-screen appearance in 2016’s Suicide Squad.
Mary Elizabeth Winstead, plays team member Huntress (more on her below). She describes the film as “sort of a spinoff of Suicide Squad” and that “it kind of follows Harley Quinn…and this sort of girl gang that she puts together. I play Huntress, and we’ve got Black Canary, played by Jurnee Smollett-Bell, and Rosie Perez and Ewan McGregor. It’s a really fun, fun cast.”
The latest news on the flick, which will be released in February, is that some reshoots have improved the footage already in the can by a significant amount. Variety wrote that a series of those reshoots “dramatically improved test screening results” and, as a result, Warner Bros is now “confident Birds of Prey will be a hit”, which …kinda insinuates that the studio wasn’t all that sure beforehand, doesn’t it? Still, good news.
Birds Of Prey sneak peek
Warner Bros used its platform at CinemaCon recently to hype up several of its big upcoming movies. The audience was treated to some behind the scenes footage of Birds Of Prey, and a few new interesting bits of info about the film’s story.
Margot Robbie appeared in the video (via IndieWire) to confirm that Harley Quinn isn’t one of the titular Birds Of Prey, but that she just hangs out with the girl gang, who are “batshit crazy”. The actress described her character in the film as “absolutely insane”. Apparently, a shot of Ewan McGregor as villain Black Mask also went down a storm at the presentation, with Robbie summing everything up with “this is not Batman’s Gotham.”
Birds Of Prey trailer
Birds Of Prey started shooting in January 2019 and the filmmakers immediately released a stylish early teaser via a mysterious YouTube account, featuring each of the film’s major characters in costume for the first time.
Birds Of Prey title
The film’s full title, as first revealed by Margot Robbie via an Instagram post, is a bit of a mouthful: Birds Of Prey (And The Fantabulous Emancipation Of One Harley Quinn).
The full title puts the Joker’s ex-girlfriend front and centre, and hints that she’ll be integral to the film’s plot. Harley wasn’t actually a member of the original Birds Of Prey in the comics (although she did have a few run-ins with them), but rumour has it that the film will see her taking over from the comics’ Oracle – aka former Batgirl Barbara Gordon – as the head of the supergroup.
Birds Of Prey cast
Joining Margot Robbie’s baseball bat-wielding, not-entirely-sane Harley Quinn in the titular supergroup are Mary Elizabeth Winstead’s Huntress – the orphaned mobster’s daughter turned heavy-hitting vigilante – and Jurnee Smollett-Bell’s Black Canary – a skilled martial artist with the ability to emit a high-powered, ultrasonic scream.
“In Birds Of Prey I play this assassin who’s been trained since childhood,” Winstead told the NY Times. “It’s all women and genuinely funny and weird. It feels from the 90s, in the best way.”
Starring alongside that trio will be Ella Jay Basco as Cassandra Cain – a youngster whose comic-book counterpart went on to assume the mantle of Batgirl – and Rose Perez as Renee Montoya, a Gotham City PD detective.
On villain duty is none other than Ewan McGregor, who’s playing Black Mask – a ruthless crime lord who clashes with the Birds while hunting down Cassandra. He’ll be joined by Chris Messina as Victor Zsasz, a knife-wielding serial killer – known to carve a tally mark onto himself for each of his victims – who’s apparently working “in cahoots” with Black Mask.
Dana Lee (Curb Your Enthusiasm) stars in the film as ‘Doc’ and he’s revealed a bit more about his character to YEC:
“[Doc owns] this little restaurant and [his] residence is above there,” Lee said. “Every time Harley Quinn gets in trouble with the Joker, she would come and stay with me. And I’m like her — like she says in the story — I’m her Taiwanese grandfather she never had.”
Birds Of Prey director
The film is being directed by Cathy Yan, a former reporter whose first feature film – last year’s eccentric Chinese comedy-drama Dead Pigs – caught the eyes of the DC team at Warner Brothers. She’s working from a script by Christina Hodson (who wrote Transformers spinoff Bumblebee), while the film is being co-produced by Robbie herself.
Birds Of Prey release date
Filming has now wrapped on Birds Of Prey (And The Fantabulous Emancipation Of One Harley Quinn) and it’ll be released in cinemas on 7 February 2020.
