Early last month, Warner Brothers announced plans to delay the availability of its movies for rent and streaming by up to 56 days, and it looks like Redbox isn’t willing to go along with WB’s plans.

After discussions between the two in an attempt to sort everything out, Redbox announced today that its agreement with Warner Brothers has expired, meaning that you won’t have to wait an extra 56 days to rent a newly-released Warner Brothers movie from Redbox.

“Redbox will continue to provide our consumers with affordable access to new release movies from all major studios including Warner Brothers at our more than 28,000 locations nationwide,” said Gary Cohen, senior vice president of marketing and customer experience at Redbox. “We will work to provide Warner Brothers’ movies through alternative means. Redbox maintains direct working relationships with every other major studio.”

Redbox didn’t specify how, exactly, they would be able to continue to provide Warner Brothers movies at Redbox kiosks, but this would most likely mean that Redbox would have to pick up the movies straight from retail.

In response to the news, a Warner Brothers spokesperson had this to say:

“The consumer is best served by a windowing and pricing structure that ensures a healthy film business continuing to deliver quality movies. We hope to continue discussions with Redbox and reach a mutually agreed upon solution to this situation, but we fully intend to do what is best for our business, our consumers and the industry as a whole.”

Redbox backs out of agreement with Warner Brothers over 56-day delay is a post from: The Inquisitr

Though The Dark Knight Rises doesn’t hit theaters until July 20th, fast thinking by enterprising theater owners has the film already selling out midnight showings.

Fandango began discreetly selling tickets to the summer juggernaut on Monday, selling out midnight screenings in New York and Los Angeles.

But why? Well, back in December, theater chain AMC held a couple of pre-release screenings of Mission Impossible: Ghost Protocol in IMAX before public release for itchy fans dying to see The Dark Knight Rises‘ 6-minute prologue on an IMAX screen. While it was happening, AMC managers in New York, Los Angeles and San Francisco had an impromptu poll, asking those in attendance who among them would be interested in buying midnight tickets for the July 19th showing of Christopher Nolan’s final entry into his epic Batman film series.

Despite the fact that the film doesn’t screen for several more months, the response was an overwhelming “Hell YES!”, and tickets began selling out instantly.

Based on the on-site demand, Fandango decided to start selling additional tickets for the IMAX-worthy film. In case you didn’t know, The Dark Knight Rises contains about 40 minutes of film shot entirely with IMAX format cameras, meaning you’re not going to get the ideal picture unless you make the pilgrimage to your nearest IMAX venue come July.

IMAX is already working a strategy to be your number one choice for theater film-going, and alongside Nolan’s typical guerilla-marketing style of teasers and hints, IMAX is helping build a hum before the wide release.

The Dark Knight Rises stars Christian Bale as Bruce Wayne/Batman, along with Anne Hathaway, Tom Hardy, Marion Cotillard, Miranda Tate and Joseph Gordon-Levitt. It’s being brought to you by the same crack-team that put together the first two installments, Batman Begins and The Dark Knight.

Do I even need to ask if you’re going to go see The Dark Knight Rises? For the two of you that aren’t planning on it, would seeing it in IMAX change your mind?

The Dark Knight Rises Tickets Are Already Selling, Here’s Why is a post from: The Inquisitr

I will warn you once and only once. Below be (potential) spoilers. If ye not want to be spoiled, tread no further.

If you find spoilers to your liking and they just whet your taste for this summers’ biggest blockbuster, you can find them after this picture of Anne Hathaway wearing an oh-so-subtle mask, whispering into Christian Bale’s ear (and if you’re like me, this is how you are pretending to receive the information I’m about to give you).

Alright, off we go.

So you’ve probably heard a few things (as yet unconfirmed) about The Dark Knight Rises. Joseph Gordon Levitt will be Robin (or maybe Batman II), Ra’s Al Ghul is coming back to life, Marion Cotillard is playing his vengeful daughter, Cillian Murphy will be making his third appearance as The Scarecrow. Maybe you saw Bruce Wayne’s reflection early in the trailer, shortly after which a figure approaches a table leaning on a cane…

One of the biggest question marks of the upcoming film is Anne Hathaway’s Catwoman. Who’s side is the sneaky seductress on?

In the plot leak, a couple of goons under the employ of the feral Bane (Tom Hardy) are dragging a hooded figure – Bruce Wayne – through a crowd, as Catwoman clears the way.

“Sorry to spoil things, boys, but Bane needs these guys himself.”

Looks like the bad-girl is playing with the bad-guys.

Or is she?

Catwoman is known for her flip-flopping. Is she playing double-agent for Batman?

In other, less-exciting news, Hathaway (doing right by Nolan in a recent interview by balking at plot questions) revealed that she didn’t look to Michelle Pfeiffer, Julie Newmar, or Halle Berry (thank God) for inspiration as she stepped into the role of DC’s most iconic costumed femme-fatale. Rather, she took her cues from golden-age Austrian-American actress Hedy Lamarr.

Hathaway had this to say about Lamarr:

“I know this sounds odd, but her breathing is extraordinary. She takes these long, deep, languid breaths and exhales slowly. There’s a shot of her in ‘Ecstasy’ [1933] exhaling a cigarette and I took probably five breaths during her one exhale. So I started working on my breathing a lot.”

Cool story, bro.

What do you think of these spoilers? Let us know in the comments section below.

Notable ‘Dark Knight Rises’ Plot Leak (SPOILERS AHEAD) is a post from: The Inquisitr

Warner Brothers officially released the full trailer to “The Dark Knight Rises” online today after much weekend anticipation.

The trailer was attached to “Mission Impossible: Ghost Protocol” and “Sherlock Holmes 2: Game of Shadows” over the weekend, and pirated versions have been posted online constantly over the past few days by iPhone-wielding fan-boys only to be removed at the request of Warner Brothers mere hours later.

IMAX showings of “Mission Impossible: Ghost Protocol” also boasted the added bonus of carrying the six-minute prologue to “The Dark Knight Rises” in lieu of the official trailer. The prologue treats those fortunate enough to live near an IMAX venue, or those bold enough to sit through a strained bootlegged copy on the internet, to an introduction to the film’s villain, Bane.

Bane, portrayed by Thomas Hardy (Bronson, Inception), is the villain most famous in the comic books for breaking Batman’s back.The character has been portrayed once before on film by wrestler Jeep Swenson, in the film-which-shall-not-be-named.

Though Christian Bale is fighting his own battles in the world today, his greatest battle of the coming year is against the little-known villain portrayed by the up-and-coming Hardy. Tom Hardy’s Bane has his work cut out for him. There is some concern online that he won’t be able to top Heath Ledger’s chilling and whimsical performance as The Joker in 2008′s “The Dark Knight”.

But Bane is a different kind of animal. Given the comic history of the character, he’s going to give Batman a run for his money mentally, as well as being the first truly dangerous physical threat Batman has faced in the Nolan-verse.

Which leads to the question that’s on everyone’s mind, but that everyone is too afraid to ask: Is Nolan going to do it? Is he going to kill Bruce Wayne? Leave us your thoughts in the comments below.

As promised, here is the official trailer for your viewing pleasure:

Dark Knight Rises Trailer Officially Released Online [Video] is a post from: The Inquisitr

TorrentFreak has blogged about a vacancy originally posted by Warner Bros. UK, seeking an “anti-piracy intern” on that side of the pond.

If you like stealing content but have a secret narc side, you can apply up until March 31st for the position, which pays around $26,200 USD- or £17,000 in England money. Tasks include spying on your friends and returning information on the illegal exchange of copyrighted material. The job description is as follows:

During the 12 month internship, duties will include: monitoring local Internet forums and IRC for pirated WB and NBCU content and in order to gather information on pirate sites, pirate groups and other pirate activities; finding new and maintaining existing accounts on private sites; scanning for links to hosted pirated WB and NBCU content and using tools to issue takedown requests; maintaining and developing bots for Internet link scanning system (training provided); preparing sending of infringement notices and logging feedback; performing trap purchases of pirated product and logging results; inputting pirate hard goods data and other intelligence into the forensics database; selecting local keywords and submitting local filenames for monitoring and countermeasure campaigns and periodically producing research documents on piracy related technological developments. Various training will be provided.

In addition to gathering intelligence on sites that offer downloads of copyrighted WB and NBC material, duties include sending “takedown requests and infringement notices” to sites and people you might befriend in your anti-piracy travels. Amusingly, TorrentFreak supported the WB’s efforts:

We encourage all eligible TorrentFreak readers to apply for this exciting internship and provide us with regular updates on Warner Bros’ anti-piracy efforts.

Rumors of a stipend of unlimited cheese available to anti-piracy interns were not immediately confirmed.

Warner Bros. now hiring professional snitches is a post from: The Inquisitr

No this isn’t another story about Warner Brothers sending their RIAA or MPAA storm troopers after a single mom or an ailing grandmother. Those they would probably succeed into forking over a pound of flesh for some perceived crime against humanity. Their latest victim of a DMCA takedown notice on YouTube is a horse of a different color.

Yup folks, they have pulled the ultimate boner by going after none other than the King of Fair Use himself – Larry Lessig. I shit you not as you can see from Larry’s tweet to the world when it happened

When asked on Twitter if he would be fighting the takedown notice Larry’s reply was

Way to go Warner Brothers. you couldn’t have picked a better way to show the world just how stupid you are and how little you understand how things work anymore.

Yet another really dumb move by Warner Brothers is a post from: The Inquisitr

Watchmen, the movie which Fox studios is trying to stop you from seeing, ironically has an exclusive video sneak preview on Myspace. Ironic because Myspace is owned by Fox.

20th Century Fox was locked in a copyright battle with Warner Bros. over the movie “Watchmen.” A federal court judge handed his judgement into the mater down on Christmas eve.

The Judge ruled in favor of Fox which came as a surprise to pretty much everyone, including Fox, who abandoned the project about a decade ago.

The decision came in an order which stated that: “Fox owns a copyright interest consisting of, at the very least, the right to distribute the Watchmen motion picture,” the ruling read.

The Judge also wrote that he will issue a more detailed order soon. The judge advised the studios to focus on reaching a settlement or appealing the decision. “The parties may wish to turn their efforts from preparing for trial to negotiating a resolution of this dispute or positioning the case for review,” he wrote.

Warner Brothers hasn’t commented on the ruling except to say that it has not backed away from its March 6 release date, of the Watchmen.

So enjoy the Watchmen sneak peek, before Fox figures out that they can take it down.

Watchmen Exclusive

Watchmen Exclusive Sneak Peek Video is a post from: The Inquisitr