May 14 2009 'Nine' Trailer: Some Babes Dancing Around Daniel Day-Lewis
Hey, there's this now: a trailer for Nine. No, not numeral 9, the animated, post-apocalyptic ragdoll film that looks so promising--this is spelled-out Nine, a new film by Chicago director Rob Marshall that, to the untrained eye, looks basically like Chicago with mostly better actors. (To my untrained eye, anything with burlesque musical numbers is some kind of variant of Chicago.)
So here it is, Chicago 2:
Continue Reading " 'Nine' Trailer: Some Babes Dancing Around Daniel Day-Lewis "
May 13 2009 Nicole Kidman Getting Out of This Woody Allen Business
Welp, Nicole Kidman must have seen the trailer for Whatever Works, because she is totally bailing on Woody Allen's new movie:
Nicole Kidman has ankled her role in Woody Allen's latest, untitled project.Pic, which co-stars Antonio Banderas, Anthony Hopkins, Josh Brolin, Naomi Watts and Freida Pinto, is set to start shooting in London in the summer.
There is no word yet on who Kidman's replacement will be.
Don't fret, Woody; there are other, younger, more naïve fish in the sea for you to cast opposite an older guy clearly playing you.
Nov 12 2008 'Australia' Finds a Happy Ending
Australia spoilers! Looks like Watchmen isn't the only film that's had its ending changed. According to The Guardian, when Baz Luhrmann's romantic epic Australia opens in two weeks, it may not have the original, heart-rending finale the director planned:
It seems the film's tragic ending proved a little too harrowing for Hollywood studio chiefs. After "intense" discussions with officials at 20th Century Fox, Luhrmann agreed to rewrite the final scenes to keep alive Kidman's love interest, played by Hugh Jackman.The decision was made after negative responses to the movie's initial cut at test screenings.
One reviewer said: "There is no reason to kill off Wolvie [Jackman played Wolverine in the X-Men trilogy]."
Yeah, trust that reviewer. He knows what he's talking about. There's no reason Wolvie should be killed. Wolvie has a mutant healing factor and an adamantium skeleton, and he's awesome. You have to, like, decapitate him to stop his superhuman regeneration. Everyone knows that. Pull your head out, Luhrmann. And while you're at it, you should also listen to "Wolvie" guy's other suggestion that, "The Others should show her tits and it turns out she's Mystique and Wolvie has been doing her. What then, ya know?"
Oct 13 2008 'Australia' Poster: It's 'Gone with the Wind' Meets 'The Other Sister'
Can the kiss of Hugh Jackman turn Wax Nicole Kidman back into Semi-human, Usual Nicole Kidman? Only one films holds the answer. This November... get Australia'ed.
Australia Poster [Trailer Addict]
Oct 1 2008 New 'Australia' Trailer: A Romantic Adventure with Wolverine and The Others
If Crocodile Dundee II were a big-budget Lifetime Original Movie based loosely on Pearl Harbor, this is what it would look like. Except this is directed by Moulin Rouge's Baz Luhrmann, stars Hugh Jackman and Nicole Kidman, and will surely be nominated for several Oscars, whereas the Lifetime version would be called Danielle Steel's Down Under, and would be watched by only sad housewives. It looks pretty good if you're into that whole sweeping, epic romance sort of thing (no one is judging you):
Continue Reading " New 'Australia' Trailer: A Romantic Adventure with Wolverine and The Others "
Sep 17 2008 Nicole Kidman is a Treasure Hunter Now
The treasure-hunting adventurer complexion average is about to get about three shades paler. Nicole Kidman is signed to star as some kind of character-driven Indiana Jones-type. Yeesh:
[20th Century Fox] has picked up "The Eighth Wonder," an action-adventure pitch from [Simon] Kinberg, with Kidman attached to star and produce.Details of the plot are being kept under wraps, but the story centers on an archeological discovery that sets off a globe-spanning race. The goal is to create a movie that will be to "Raiders of the Lost Ark" what the "Bourne" movies are to James Bond movies: a character-driven, treasure-hunting thriller.
Yeah, alright. If Nicolas Cage can run around hunting for a map tattooed on a scrap of Thomas Jefferson's back skin or whatever, Nicole Kidman might as well go for it too. That will be our new standard. All of our archaeological adventurers will be composed of mostly forehead, and the new faces of treasure hunting will stretch ten inches above the brow line, and that's fine.
May 20 2008 Baz Luhrmann's 'Australia' Trailer--Now With ACTUAL Aussies!
Set in northern Australia just prior to World War II, Baz Luhrmann's Australia (starring Nicole Kidman and Hugh Jackman)--like his prior work on Romeo + Juliet and Moulin Rouge!--looks like a visually rich, masterfully composed piece of cinematic artistry. Seldom is a trailer capable of portraying equal parts epic, romantic adventure and steak sauce commercial. This one does it.
Observe, under the cut.
Continue Reading " Baz Luhrmann's 'Australia' Trailer--Now With ACTUAL Aussies! "
Apr 18 2008 'Australia' Photos Teach Proper Lady-Care
The official site for Baz Luhrmann's appropriately-named Australian epic, Australia, has been updated with a bunch of new production stills. Like this one of a mounted Hugh Jackman petting the subservient Nicole Kidman, for instance. More here, if you're so inclined.
Dec 4 2007 Five Unappetizing Minutes of 'The Golden Compass'!
Yahoo's preview of the first five minutes of The Golden Compass comes off like an appetizer sampler at Applebee's, a sad, unfulfilling attempt at whetting my appetite with blandness and some fancy garnish that somehow manages to be both not enough and too much, all at once.
Am I meant to be most impressed that it takes half the time to explain that, in this world, there's some kind of golden compass that does something very non-specific (finds hidden things?), that children speak through dull dialogue, or that dust there is very old? At least it gives a peak at the CGI animals that house the souls of the people of this world. With uncomfortably fluid movement, they still look worse than most of the dinosaurs from Jurassic Park, but remain passable enough that a new generation, unexposed to Beastmaster, will again be begging for pet ferrets.
The Golden Compass 5-Minute Preview [Yahoo!]
Oct 10 2007 Two 'Golden Compass' Posters, Two Marketing Strategies
I love it when you can see exactly the strategy being used to sell a film to different markets. This first poster says, "With gifted and renowned actors Daniel Craig and Nicole Kidman in featured roles, and led by Oscar-nominated director Chris Weitz, The Golden Compass is a layered, fantasy-rich story over an epic landscape. 'There are worlds beyond our own. The compass will show the way.'" Meanwhile...
Second poster's message: "Hey, check it out! This shit's got crazy big armored bears tearing the shit out of each other! Oh, and it's called The Golden Compass."
It goes without saying, the second is infinitely better.
Final 'Golden Compass' Posters! [Cinematical]
Oct 10 2007 New 'The Golden Compass' Trailer Fun for All Non-Jaded Ages
The Golden Compass is the kind of movie that I would have loved as a child, or even a few years ago, but with The Lord of the Rings Trilogy and a seemingly bottomless well of Harry Potter films, I'm too exhausted for another fanciful three-movie investment. It's not even just the length; it's that I'm going to have to yet again learn the rules to an entirely new world where more oddball characters chase around a MacGuffin.
That's just a polar bear, right? No, it turns out polar bears here wear armor and have the voice of Ian McKellan. And that ferret.... just a ferret? Of course not. You'd know it was a daemon if watched the sub-trailer to this trailer, "defining daemons," which explains the roles of soul-bound animals in this world. Duh.
If you have the energy, watch above, or in higher quality on Yahoo!
Jul 5 2007 The Invasion Poster
The new poster for The Invasion looks very good to me because it effectively communicates the film's two key highlights:
1. That they've made Invasion of the Body Snatchers into a much darker, serious sci-fi thriller than its predecessors, as seen in the recent trailer.
2. That they've hired only Aryan actors.
