Throughout the 1930s and into the 1940s, genre movies dominated Hollywood and each studio had its specialty. MGM made its living on splashy movie musicals, while Warner Bros. practically invented the gangster film. Meanwhile, with films like Frankenstein and Dracula, Universal became a major player thanks to its monster movies. One of its later entries into the genre was 1941’s The Wolf Man . Now, the studio reinvents the classic with Benicio Del Toro in the role made famous by Lon Chaney, Jr. all those years ago.

In real life, John Travolta loves Paris. He was married there. It’s a fact that might escape you when you see him drop into town with his guns-a-blazin’ in From Paris with Love, the new action flick from producer Luc Besson and director Pierre Morel. Morel is hot off of last year’s surprise hit Taken, but whereas audiences were game to follow Liam Neeson’s vengeful dad on his action-packed mission, I don’t foresee the same result for Travolta’s abrasive secret agent.

It’s not a stretch to imagine James Cameron himself as the techo-geek who finally achieves what Cromwell’s Canter does in Surrogates. If we get depressed because we can’t stay in Pandora, why not develop the technology to make that very thing possible? If reality can’t be made to work for eight billion people, why not deliver the ultimate opiate to the masses? Surrogates, of course, is the cautionary-tale response to those questions. Part of society rebels against the artificiality of it all, setting up autonomous surrogate-free zones. Sure, they’re surrounded by rubble—but as Willis’ Greer finds out once he leaves his surrogate body behind, there’s a lot of simple Eden to be found if we but consign our avatars to their proper places.