Watch: Joel Edgerton and Teresa Palmer in first trailer for Sundance thriller “Wish You Were Here”

December 2, 2011 | Posted by Linda Ge in Videos Leave a comment

Just yesterday we unveiled the first images from Australia’s Sundance entry, “Wish You Were Here”, and today, the first trailer from the film has been released as well. Starring fast-rising stars Joel Edgerton and Teresa Palmer, as well as fellow Aussies Felicity Prince (who also co-wrote the script) and Anthony Starr, the film revolves around four friends who go on a vacation to Cambodia only to return to Australia one member short.

Looks fairly standard tropical-vacation-gone-wrong in certain respects but intriguing in others. Edgerton’s and Palmer’s characters seem to be hiding something from Price’s and the action appears to revolve around their secrets unfolding in the aftermath of “that fateful night” rather than the event itself. The turmoil and shady dealings that lead to the disappearance of one of their own being contained within the circle of leading characters is much more interesting than the cliched vilifying of local residents of Places White People Like to Vacation in other destination horror flicks and certainly indicative of potential for some good psychological drama.

“Wish You Were Here” will be released in Australia in 2012 but will surely try for stateside distribution as well when it opens the World Cinema Dramatic Competition at Sundance on January 19th.

First Look: Gemma Arterton and Jeremy Renner are battle-ready “Hansel and Gretel: Witch Hunters”

December 2, 2011 | Posted by Linda Ge in Images Leave a comment

In the midst of the dramatic battle of the Snow Whites, it seems we’ve forgotten that there’s about two dozen more revisionist fairy tale adaptations coming our way as well. Today Entertainment Weekly has our first look at one of the first ones that will be released next year. Gemma Arterton and Jeremy Renner suit up in black leather and wield big guns to star as “Hansel and Gretel: Witch Hunters”, a – you guessed it – dark and twisted take on the Grimm fairy tale.

Renner and Arterton are those two little kids lost in the woods who get lured to a witch’s gingerbread house all grown up and with a real grudge against all witches. Their first kill, which, here, takes place in the timeline of the story that we are all familiar with, will be immortalized in flashback form, reveals Arterton. “You see a series of flashbacks with their experience of killing that first witch, which is brilliant. I remember being on set for the final few days of that. The candy house, and the witches are really repulsive and quite frightening. The make-up is out of this world. It’s this bone-chilling scene. Very dark. The girl who plays my character is brilliant, with the horrified expression she has.” Sure, almost all fairy tale adaptations are promising to be dark and scary nowadays, but with the guy (Tommy Wirkola) who directed a Nazi zombie film at the helm, maybe this time it’ll actually be true.

“Hansel and Gretel: Witch Hunters” will be the first fairy tale out of the gate in 2012, on March 2. It will be followed by Tarsem Singh’s awful looking “Mirror Mirror” on March 16. Rival pic “Snow White and the Huntsman” opens on June 1, and will be followed immediately by Bryan Singer’s “Jack the Giant Killer” on June 15. Is the world hungry for four fairy tale movies in a three month span of time? Well, Bryan Singer better hope so…

Watch: That awesome “The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo” 8 minute trailer is finally online

December 2, 2011 | Posted by Linda Ge in Videos Leave a comment

Back in September, moviegoers who showed up to see an advance screening of Sony Pictures’ remake of “Straw Dogs” were treated to a welcome surprise: An unprecedented eight minute long trailer for one of the most highly anticipated movies of the year, “The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo”, directed by David Fincher, adapted from the international bestseller by Stieg Larsson and starring promising talent Rooney Mara as the iconic goth punk cyber genius Lisbeth Salander. I saw the trailer back in September and, after being completely blown away, have lamented ever since at not being able to watch it again, pause it and see everything I missed. Well, finally, the trailer has now made its way online. Let’s not waste any more time. Just go watch it below, or in glorious high definition on iTunes, where you can also download a 35 minute, 6 song sampler from the soundtrack.

“Twilight” actress and “Gossip Girl” star join indie crime thriller “Pawn”

December 2, 2011 | Posted by Rebecca Lewis in Casting 4 Comments

“Twilight” star Nikki Reed and TV’s “Gossip Girl” Jessica Szohr have both joined the cast of indie crime thriller “Pawn”, reports THR.

Also starring Michael Chiklis, Sean Faris, Stephen Lang, Forest Whitaker, Ray Liotta and Common, the film centres around a hostage situation and an ex-con, who “becomes entangled in a manipulative chess game between the Feds, local police and the mob”. To be directed by first-time director David A. Armstrong from a script by Jay Anthony White, filming started yesterday in Connecticut.

Szohr has been slowly but steadily been making a transition into film, after leaving NBC’s “Gossip Girl”, joining indie films “Light Years” and “Love Bites” as well as teen comedy “Owned”. Reed, who broke out in 2003′s “Thirteen” but is more famous for her role in the “Twilight Saga” films, currently only has one other film in production – Downers Grove, a high school thriller with Hayden Panettiere

Lea Seydoux and Paula Patton get physical in new “Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol” clip

December 2, 2011 | Posted by Rebecca Lewis in Videos Leave a comment

It’s all action and no talk in this new clip for “Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol”.

In this fourth film in the franchise, Tom Cruise‘s Ethan Hunt, and colleagues, are tasked with clearing the name of IMF which has been framed for a terrorist bombing. Also starring Jeremy Renner, who will be taking over the franchise after this film, Lea Seydoux, Paula Patton and Simon Pegg, the clip focuses on Patton and Seydoux trading blows, perhaps indicating one of them may be a traitor to Hunt’s team.

Seydoux was one of our 20 Faces to Watch in 2011 feature but apart from a small role in the charming Woody Allen flick “Midnight in Paris”, has continued to star in mostly European films, including “Farewell, My Queen” with Diane Kruger and “As Linhas de Torres” with John Malkovich. This will also be a high profile role for Patton, who has yet to break out but has a few interesting upcoming roles, including the thriller “Disconnect” with Jason Bateman and Alexander Skarsgård.

Felicity Jones wins role of Charles Dickens’ mistress in Ralph Fiennes film

December 2, 2011 | Posted by Rebecca Lewis in Casting Leave a comment

2011 has been a breakout year for many female actresses, but perhaps none more so than for Felicity Jones, the British actress who this year has won the Sundance Grand Jury prize for Dramatic Actress, been named NBR’s breakthrough performance of the year as well as gaining nominations forthe Gotham Awards breakthrough actor of the year and BAFTA’s Rising Star longlist.

Jones also has some exciting future projects lined up; taking the female lead in Warren Beatty’s long gestating Howard Hughes biopic and joining “Like Crazy” director Drake Doremus in his next feature film with Guy Pearce and Amy Ryan, and Britain’s Daily Mail have now confirmed that Jones will also be taking on the lead in Ralph Fiennes film “The Invisible Woman” which tells the true story of Charles Dickens’ 13 year love affair with actress Nelly Ternan.

Back in July, we reported that Jones, along with fellow rising actresses Imogen Poots and Abbie Cornish, was meeting with Fiennes to discuss the role but no word has come out since. With this casting, production on the film, which is to be directed by Fiennes with a screenplay from Abi Morgan (“Shame”), can begin moving forward, and cameras are ready to start rolling in spring or summer 2012.

Based on the biography by Claire Tomalin, the story follows Ellen “Nelly” Ternan, who was only eighteen when she met forty-five year old novelist Dickens, but their compatibility and passion was immediate, and a year later, when Dickens’ wife Catherine found out about the affair, the marriage came to an end. His relationship with Ternan continued until his death but was never made public for fear of scrutiny.

Marion Cotillard offered Morgana in “Arthur and Lancelot” opposite Kit Harington and Joel Kinnaman

December 1, 2011 | Posted by Linda Ge in Casting Leave a comment

Still no Guinevere in sight for the new adaptation of “Arthur and Lancelot”, but looks like Warner Bros and director David Dobkin are closing in on some heavy talent for the role of sorceress Morgana, half-sister to Arthur (and spoiler alert: the mother of his child, Mordred). Vulture reports French actress and Oscar winner Marion Cotillard has been offered the role opposite “Game of Thrones” star Kit Harington as Arthur and “The Killing” star Joel Kinnaman as Lancelot.

Recently THR unearthed some specifics to the previously vague plot. Harington’s Arthur will be an illegitimate son being raised by a poor knight in a small village while Lancelot is a disillusioned nobleman. Arthur’s eventual rise to becoming an inspiring leader positions him “as the first man to say all men are created equal”, according to Dobkin. Disappointingly, THR believes that at this stage of the game, Guinevere will most likely only have a small role, with more prominence if the film is successful enough to garner sequels. Morgana, on the other hand, may prove to be a pivotal role, if it could attract the level of talent and star power that Cotillard possesses (if she accepts, of course).

Cotillard, who won an Oscar for Best Actress for her role as French chanteuse Edith Piaf in 2007′s “La Vie en Rose”, is a favorite of Warner Bros, having starred for them in “Inception”, then “Contagion” and next “The Dark Knight Rises.” She was also recently seen as a 1920s seductress in Woody Allen’s charming Oscar hopeful “Midnight in Paris.”

“True Grit” star Hailee Steinfeld in talks for “Ender’s Game” female lead opposite Asa Butterfield

December 1, 2011 | Posted by Linda Ge in Casting Leave a comment

“True Grit” star Hailee Steinfeld’s post-Oscar-nomination career seemed to be unfolding slowly, but she takes a big leap forward now with Variety reporting Steinfeld is now in negotiations to play the female lead role of Petra Arkanian in the highly anticipated adaptation of iconic sci-fi novel “Ender’s Game.” It was made official just yesterday that “Hugo” star Asa Butterfield had been officially locked in for the titular role, after beating out several other young actors.

Author Orson Scott Card has been heavily involved in the big screen adaptation of his novel, which has started and stopped several times since at least 2003. Card has adapted the screenplay, with director Gavin Hood involved with rewrites. Set in a futuristic world where the human race has been all but wiped out by a race of bug-like aliens called Formics, the government recruits the best and brightest children to attend Battle School, where they are trained in the art of war through a series of games, including one in an anti-gravity Battle Room. When Ender’s genius is revealed, he is promoted to Command School to act as a leader of children’s armies to “simulated” wars against the Formics, to largely successful outcomes. Steinfeld’s Petra is the only girl in Ender’s Salamander Army, who quickly becomes his only trusted ally and best friend. Other key characters include Ender’s older siblings, the protective Valentine and cruel Peter. The role of Colonel Hyrum Graff, who trains the young recruits, is said to be targeting Harrison Ford or someone of equal status.

Steinfeld was plucked from obscurity by the Coen Brothers to headline their 2010 remake of western “True Grit” and her big screen debut also led to her first Oscar nomination for Best Supporting Actress. While studios were quick to snap up starring vehicles for the hot new rising star – with Steinfelds’ name attached to a spec revisionist Sleeping Beauty script and Paramount developing teen novel “Forgotten” for her – neither project has managed to get off the ground thus far. Instead, Steinfeld locked in to play a new version of Shakespeare’s classic tragic heroine Juliet Capulet in Carlo Carlei’s new traditional adaptation of “Romeo and Juliet”, set to begin filming next month. Strangely, a revisionist romantic comedy based on the same tale, but based around Romeo’s jilted lover, the titular “Rosaline”, is also targeting Steinfeld for the Juliet role.

“Ender’s Game” begins filming early 2012 for a set release of March 15, 2013.

NBR names “Hugo” Best Film, Rooney Mara and Felicity Jones Breakthrough Performers

December 1, 2011 | Posted by Linda Ge in Awards 2 Comments

So early into the 2012 Award Season and already so many unexpected twists and turns. The National Board of Review, traditionally the first group to announce their winners but upstaged this year by the New York Film Critics, have released their list of the best movies and filmmakers of the year, and there are, once again, some surprises.

Martin Scorsese’s family-friendly 3D love letter to filmmaking, “Hugo”, takes Best Picture honors, with the director also taking Best Director, putting the film firmly into the hunt for a repeat at the Oscars. David Fincher’s highly anticipated and still barely-seen “The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo” also makes its first showing, listed in NBR’s Top 10 Films of the Year as well as a Breakthrough Performance award for star Rooney Mara. Mara will share the award with Felicity Jones, who lands another Breakthrough award (and another win over “Martha Marcy May Marlene”‘s Elizabeth Olsen) for “Like Crazy.” Jessica Chastain is left out in the cold this time around after dominating early, NBR instead choosing to give Best Supporting Actress to Shailene Woodley for “The Descendants.” Unable to choose between his four incredible performances this year, Michael Fassbender will get a special Spotlight Award for “Jane Eyre”, “X-Men: First Class”, “Shame” and “A Dangerous Method.”

Full list of winners and lists via press release below, thanks to Awards Daily.

Watch: Jeremy Irvine, Tom Hiddleston and the cast talk “War Horse” in new trailer

December 1, 2011 | Posted by Linda Ge and Rebecca Lewis in Videos 2 Comments

We’re still a few weeks off from it’s release date, but Steven Spielberg’s Christmas offering, “War Horse”, has been highly anticipated since word first came out and it ranks high on many Oscar prediction lists.
Starring rising actors Jeremy Irvine, Tom Hiddleston and Benedict Cumberbatch, the film is based Michael Morpurgo’s novel, which follows Albert (Irvine), a young boy who is separated from his equine best friend, Joey, when the horse is sold into the British cavalry and sent off to World War I. Albert is too young to enlist in the army, so he sets off on a dangerous and clandestine mission to go to the front lines in France to bring Joey home.

We saw the first theatrical trailer back at the beginning of October, giving us our first glimpse at Hiddleston as the kind solider who becomes Joey’s rider, and received some gorgeous new images back in November which also featured young actress Celine Buckens, along with Irvine, but in this new TV spot for the film, the cast wax poetic about the positive messages that can be taken from the film, using keywords like “friendship”, “hope” and “bravery”.

“War Horse” is out on Christmas Day.

Page 131 of 232« First «...10 20 30...129 130131132 133...140 150 160...»Last »