Posts with tag StanleyTucci
Posted Aug 1st 2008 9:03AM by James Rocchi
Filed under: Comedy, Drama, Disney, Theatrical Reviews, Politics
It must be a horrible, wonderful thing to be a movie star in this modern age -- rewarded and yet tightly caged by the public's perception of you. Stay within the expectations of the ticket-buying public, and you're likely (or, more accurately, more likely) to not fall off the public's radar; at the same time, that gilded cage must, at some point, feel more and more like a prison. I mention this in talking about
Swing Vote because
Kevin Costner manages a somewhat nifty trick in his performance as Bud Johnston, a New Mexico ne'er-do-well who, thanks to a close-fought election and a voting machine error, gets to pick the next president. Oh, sure, we all do that on voting day -- but, due to a electoral college tie and a tie in New Mexico, it turns out Bud's vote will be the deciding one. For, well, everyone. Before this is established by Jason Richman and Joshua Michael Stern's screenplay, though, we get a sense of Bud -- and, at first, Bud seems like another in a long line of Kevin Costner likable rascals from
Bull Durham's Crash Davis to
Tin Cup's Roy MacAvoy. But Bud is something more interesting -- a man whose charm can't quite cover up the holes in his soul. Bud's a drunkard. Bud's lazy. And if it weren't for his daughter Molly (
Madeline Carroll), Bud would be even more adrift and frayed. Early, Bud tells his civic-minded daughter that " ... voting doesn't count for a goddamn thing." Bud's the kind of guy who's wrong a lot -- and he knows it -- but, thanks to the gentle contortions of
Swing Vote's plot, never more so than now.
Continue reading Review: Swing Vote
Posted Jun 28th 2008 1:32PM by William Goss
Filed under: Animation, Universal, Family Films, Trailers and Clips
Disney has Pixar. Fox has Blue Sky. Paramount has, for now, Dreamworks. As seemingly the last studio to get into animated features, Universal has offered up the trailer for their maiden effort, The Tale of Despereaux, over at Yahoo! Movies.
Based upon the 2003 Newbury Award-winning novel by Kate DiCamillo, the film follows the adventurous antics of Despereaux (voiced by Matthew Broderick), a mouse with large ears and - I'm just guessing here - an even bigger heart, as he bucks the status quo of cowardice that seems to have imprisoned his kind to a fearsome existence.
Besides being an animated tale of a brave rodent with a tongue-tricky title and thus fated to merit comparison to those which have recently set lofty standards for similar fare, this project genuinely looks and sounds pleasant enough for all its yay-for-being-yourself familiarity. Besides, there's only more hope to be had when we're looking at a voice cast that includes the likes of Broderick, Kevin Kline, Dustin Hoffman, Sigourney Weaver, Stanley Tucci, William H. Macy, and Tony Hale, not to mention a Harry Potter veteran or two.
With its eye on the year-end holiday season, The Tale of Despereaux is scheduled to hit theaters on December 19th.
Posted Jun 10th 2008 12:02PM by Erik Davis
Filed under: Comedy, Independent, Fandom, Movie Marketing, Posters
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Cinematical just received this exclusive poster for
What Just Happened? (click to enlarge), which comes to us from director
Barry Levinson (
Rain Man, Wag the Dog). Based on producer Art Linson's memoir
What Just Happened? Bitter Hollywood Tales from the Front Line, the film stars
Robert De Niro as a middle-aged Hollywood producer who tries to juggle an actual life with an outrageous series of crises in his day job.
As you can see from the poster, however, this puppy is packed with talent. You've got De Niro, Sean Penn, Bruce Willis, John Turturro, Stanley Tucci, Catherine Keener and the list goes on. When
What Just Happened? premiered earlier this year at the Sundance Film Festival,
Cinematical's James Rocchi described it as "movie geek heaven," saying De Niro produces "his best 'sly' comedic work since (probably)
Wag the Dog." And how can you not love that poster and its tagline? Hilarious. Really looking forward to seeing this one when it arrives in a few months. (Check out the full synopsis after the jump)
What Just Happened? is set to hit theaters on October 3.
Continue reading EXCLUSIVE: 'What Just Happened?' Poster Premiere!
Posted May 22nd 2008 11:02AM by Erik Davis
Filed under: Fandom, Family Films, Movie Marketing, Posters
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Cinematical has just received this exclusive poster for the film
Space Chimps (click to enlarge), fresh from one of the primates that brought you
Shrek. Featuring a voice cast that includes Andy Samberg, Cheryl Hines, Jeff Daniels, Stanley Tucci and Patrick Warburton,
Space Chimps follows Ham III (Samberg), the grandson of the first ever chimp in space, who's recruited by a scheming senator (Tucci) for a dangerous mission to help thwart a powerful tyrant (Daniels) from taking over an alien world. Of course, Ham III will have a little help from his friends along the way. You can scope out the first trailer for
Space Chimps over on Moviefone, then buckle yourself in and prepare to go bananas for
Space Chimps when it touches down in theaters on July 18.
Posted May 21st 2008 1:02PM by Eugene Novikov
Filed under: Drama, Casting, Scripts, Peter Jackson, From Page to Screen
First things first: "From Page to Screen" is a new column I'm trying here at
Cinematical. Each week I'll discuss in detail a book that serves as the source material for either an upcoming or a past film adaptation. In the case of forthcoming films, I'll talk about the prospects for the adaptation: the challenges of bringing the particular book to the screen, the casting, the plot, the literary intangibles that so often wind up missing from the resulting movies. In the case of past films, I'll discuss the adaptation's approach to its source: what changed, what stayed the same, what worked and what didn't. Oh, and I'll actually have read the books.
I never tire of repeating my simple philosophy when it comes to adaptations: books are not movies. What works on the page won't always work on the screen. To demand total faithfulness to the book is folly, and will usually lead to a crappy movie. (This is also the case, by the way, for "true stories" and biopics -- people's lives, no matter how interesting, don't always, or even often, make for good films.) But that, I think, makes my task here more interesting rather than less. What does it take for an adaptation to work -- as a film in its own right, or as a translation of the source material?
The idea for this came from a number of discussions I've had here on the site. People are passionate about the books they love, and protective of them. The adaptation process is fun to talk about -- and even more fun when you've read the book and can have an informed conversation. I hope you'll join me, and I plan to be active in the comment threads.
Continue reading From Page to Screen: 'The Lovely Bones'
Posted May 7th 2008 9:45PM by Eric Kohn
Filed under: Comedy, Independent, Casting, Deals, New Releases, Cannes, Slamdance, Sony, Distribution, DIY/Filmmaking, Home Entertainment, Movie Marketing
With five nominations, it looks like
Superbad will be the star of
the 2008 MTV Movie Awards, and its three jubilant male leads --
Michael Cera,
Jonah Hill, and
Christopher Mintz-Plasse -- deserve the kudos. But one major talent behind the whole affair has stayed relatively anonymous while these young up-and-comers bathe in the spotlight: Director
Greg Mottola. The erstwhile independent filmmaker, responsible for some of the best installments of
Arrested Developed and
Undeclared, launched his career a solid decade before the rise of
Judd Apatow with a charming little low budget comedy called
The Daytrippers. Starring
Stanley Tucci,
Hope Davis,
Liev Schreiber, Parker Posey and a host of other fantastic character actors, the film follows a wildly dysfunctional family over the course of a single day, as Davis, playing a worrisome housewife, tries to track down her unfaithful husband (Tucci).
Mixing warm humanity with pitch-perfect screwball timing,
Daytrippers marked the sort of debut that told you a filmmaker had a big career ahead of him. After a modest premiere at the Slamdance Film Festival, it landed at Cannes, barely got a theatrical release and promptly vanished thereafter. Mottola turned to TV work, and slipped out of the film scene for a good ten years. These days, it's no easy task to track down
Daytrippers on DVD --
you can nab second-hand copies on Amazon for decent rates, but not a single retail outlet carries it. Aside from the occasionally airings on cable, the movie has vanished.
Continue reading Sony Hopes to Release Greg Mottola's 'Daytrippers'
Posted May 7th 2008 12:02PM by Erik Davis
Filed under: Comedy, Fandom, Movie Marketing, Images
Cinematical has just received a whole bunch of new images from the upcoming film
Swing Vote, starring
Kevin Costner,
Kelsey Grammer,
Dennis Hopper and
Paula Patton. I'm loving the concept behind this one -- imagine if an entire presidential election somehow came down to one vote ... and it was yours. That's exactly what happened to Bud Johnson (Kevin Costner), a simple man living a simple life -- and
Swing Vote follows Bud, as well as his 12-year-old daughter, when they're suddenly thrust into the national spotlight.
Grammer and Hopper play both presidential candidates, while Nathan Lane and Stanley Tucci chime in as their campaign managers. Additionally, a whole mess of real-life personalities will pop up -- like Larry King, Bill Maher, Arianna Huffington, Tucker Carlson and more. With the country stressing out over our current presidential election, it'll be nice to take in a sweet comedy that pokes fun at this ridiculous process and the even more ridiculous people who take part in it. Can't we just elect an average guy ... like Bud?
Check out the gallery below for a slew of brand new pics from the film.
Swing Vote arrives in theaters on August 1.
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Posted Apr 4th 2008 11:32AM by Monika Bartyzel
Filed under: Fandom, Family Films, Trailers and Clips
Take note, studio marketers -- there are movies out there that can show a lot, and explain a lot
without spoiling the whole movie. Back in November,
I posted about the first
Kit Kittredge: An American Girl trailer. It was cute, but it didn't really say much. This time around, it describes all the players, giving enough cuteness for those that love cute kids and family films, and enough about the adults to pique some more mature tastes. (It's not perfectly spoiler-free however. There's a certain brief clip that I would bet comes at the end of the film, but this is family fare for tykes, so it's not really a surprise to see it, and I can forgive it.)
*Correction: The trailer is exclusive to KOL, and was leaked to YouTube, so the post has been changed to embed the KOL trailer.
Continue reading Check Out the Full Kit Kittredge Trailer!
Posted Jan 19th 2008 3:32PM by Scott Weinberg
Filed under: Drama, Sundance, Theatrical Reviews, Remakes and Sequels
If you're a big fan of
Stanley Tucci and
Patricia Clarkson, then I have some potentially good news: the actors' latest film consists of little more than the two of them ... sitting in a bar ... talking ... for about 80 minutes. And since these are a pair of exceedingly fine actors, the experience of
Blind Date is not what you'd call unpleasant -- but it sure isn't all that exciting.
Based on the 1996
Theo Van Gogh film of the same name,
Blind Date is about an estranged married couple who, despite clearly loving one another, have all sorts of painful problems to work through. To that end, the couple stage a series of "blind dates" at the husband's seedy lounge -- most of which don't go off all that well. Toss in a clueless bartender who pops up every once in a while, and that's the long and short of
Blind Date -- two great actors trying to breathe some life into a premise that begins as simplistically "symbolic," and gets progressively less subtle as the film moves forward.
Continue reading Sundance Review: Blind Date
Posted Jan 11th 2008 2:33PM by Monika Bartyzel
Filed under: Independent, Deals, Executive shifts
First, they both took part in remakes of slain director Theo Van Gogh's Dutch films.
Steve Buscemi took on
Interview, which had him helming and starring with tow-headed actress Sienna Miller in a story about a jaded political journalist sent to interview a B-rated actress.
Stanley Tucci took on
Blind Date, the story of a married couple who roleplay a blind date -- which stars himself and Patricia Clarkson. The film was recently completed, and will have its premiere at Sundance this month. But aside from honoring Van Gogh,
Variety reports that the actors have teamed up to start a film, television, and commercial production company called Olive Productions.
With a plan to develop features that have budgets from $3 to $12 million, both the Tooch and Buscemi will produce, right, direct, and nab talent for the banner. They even have some projects already underway. Before the writer's strike began, Tucci and Nicholas Pileggi were working on an adaptation of Gay Talese's nonfiction book
Unto the Sons for HBO. It should be a great move for both actors -- Buscemi really stepped up to the plate and proved his worth in Interview, and imagine Stanley will do the same thing this year at Sundance. Just imagine -- lots of new indie fare with the likes of Tooch and Steve. I'm sold!
Posted Dec 10th 2007 1:32PM by Christopher Campbell
Filed under: Comedy, Casting, Sony
Anyone who has seen
Big Night knows
Stanley Tucci is great in films about food. Sure, that movie was actually about grander things than the culinary arts, but it is best remembered for its timpano and other traditional Italian treats. Now, Tucci will co-star in another foodie movie, and just as in
Big Night, he'll be leaving the cooking to his partner.
According to Variety, the actor has been cast as
Julia Child's husband, Paul, in
Julie & Julia. Obviously this rules out
the original theory that the famous cookbook author and cooking show host would merely show up in the movie as an apparition. The trade reports that the movie, based on Julie Powell's food blog and her book
"Julie and Julia: 365 Days, 524 Recipes, 1 Tiny Apartment Kitchen", will have an additional focus on Julia Child's years in Paris during the '40s and '50s. Following her service in the OSS (precursor to the CIA) during WWII, Julia met and married wealthy diplomat Paul Cushing Child, who introduced her to fine cuisine and financially supported her ventures as a chef.
As
we've previously learned, 14-time-Oscar-nominee
Meryl Streep will be playing Julia. The addition of Tucci should be interesting to fans of
The Devil Wears Prada, as the actor played Streep's co-worker in that film. The other title character in
Julie & Julia will be played by ever-rising star
Amy Adams, who is currently charming audiences in
Enchanted (for which she's also guaranteed a slot in the Golden Globe nominations, to be announced this week). The movie follows Julie, a "frustrated temp secretary who embarks on a yearlong culinary quest to cook all 524 recipes in Julia Child's "Mastering the Art of French Cooking." She chronicles her trials and tribulations in a blog that catches on with the food crowd." The screenplay was written by chick-flick master
Nora Ephron, who is also directing.
Posted Nov 24th 2007 5:02PM by Monika Bartyzel
Filed under: Family Films, Trailers and Clips
Back in February of this year,
I posted about the American Girl doll Kit Kittredge, who was finally making her way to the big screen by means of HBO, who had taken the reigns from Walden Media. A "resourceful girl during the Great Depression," Kit is a writer who tries to keep life going through her words.
Mansfield Park director Patricia Rozema helmed the movie, titled
Kit Kittredge: An American Girl, from
Narnia scribe Ann Peacock's script, and it has one heck of a good cast for a family film. Abigail Breslin is starring as Kit, Chris O'Donnell and Julia Ormond are her parents, Stanley Tucci and Joan Cusack are her uncle and aunt, and there's also Wallace Shawn as a Register reporter.
Now, finally, a trailer has popped up over at the film's
American Girl website. It's looking like a cute, retro
Nancy Drew, with mystery spy equipment traded in for an old-school typewriter and Breslin's insidious quirk. As the story goes, Kit is a writer, and a kid, who is trying to get her foot in the door at the local paper. Obviously, she isn't taken very seriously, but gets involved with a mystery to get the scoop and get the job. Breslin looks cute as the lead, although I have to say that I'm most intrigued by Joan Cusack's stint as some wild-driving crazy aunt. (That, and it's nice to see her co-star without brother John.)
Nancy Drew had only a moderate response, so I'm wondering if putting the girl in the retro period, rather than putting her in retro clothes in modern-day, will help the film out. Besides, the flick already has a whole legion of girls with American Girl dolls waiting to see this.
Posted Aug 24th 2007 9:07PM by Christopher Campbell
Filed under: Comedy, Independent, Disney, Distribution, Michael Moore, Cinematical Indie
Disney might be the last studio I'd trust to get behind a political comedy, but Disney's Touchstone Pictures has picked up distribution rights for
Swing Vote,
an indie starring
Kevin Costner that began filming last month. In the movie, Costner plays a single father whose vote will determine the outcome of a Presidential election. Disney chairman Dick Cook
likens the film to a Capra classic, which hopefully doesn't mean it will be as bad as Disney/Hollywood's
Mr. Smith sorta-remake,
The Distinguished Gentleman.
As the candidates,
Dennis Hopper is the Democrat contender and
Kelsey Grammar is the Republican (in my imagination: Frank Booth vs. Sideshow Bob -- who would be the better Prez?). As
reported previously, the cast also includes
Stanley Tucci,
Nathan Lane,
George Lopez and little
Madeline Carroll.
Variety now adds
Judge Reinhold (hopefully as a Supreme Justice -- "Mr. Reinhold's Courtroom"!), former Brat Packer
Mare Winningham, NASCAR racer
Richard Petty (as himself) and
Willie Nelson (returning to political comedy after his great cameo in
Wag the Dog). The IMDb also lists
Deja Vu's
Paula Patton in a major role.
You may remember that Disney refused to distribute
Fahrenheit 9/11 due to its politics. Sure,
Swing Vote is likely very far from being so specific in its attacks or its comedy -- it may not even be meant as a relevant or biting satire -- but I'm still surprised the studio would want to touch anything political. Costner, who is co-producing and financing
Swing Vote, considers himself a conservative, so maybe the movie is closer to Disney's interests. But then again, CelebPolitics.com
rates the actor as "somewhat liberal" and he's reportedly been voting for Democrats since the mid-90s (he's registered as Independent). I guess real politics don't need to come into play with a comedy like
Swing Vote and I'm simply letting my mind wander with regards to all this information. The movie, which is scheduled for release next year (in time for the 2008 elections, perhaps?) was co-written by
Jason Richman (Joel Schumacher's terrible
Bad Company) and
Joshua Michael Stern, who is directing.
Posted Jul 31st 2007 4:31PM by Jennifer DeFilippo
Filed under: Drama, Casting, Newsstand, Peter Jackson
Susan Sarandon is about
to play a grandmother in one of the best novels of 2002, but I was taken aback when I first read that last week -- is she really grandmother-age already? Anyway, I tend to trust
Peter Jackson's decision-making (as long as an oversized ape is not involved.) He'll of course be directing an adaptation of Alice Sebold's novel,
The Lovely Bones. It's an incredible story about a young woman who is abducted, raped and murdered; we follow the aftermath from her point of view as she rests in heaven, looking over the lives of her family and her killer. She (and we) watch as some family members try to get on with their lives, the sister grows into adulthood and the killer continues on his own journey. The book is a tragic, compelling story that could really benefit from a big-budget, big-screen push, and the fantastical but true-to-the-source world of
Lord of the Rings that Jackson created is proof enough that he can balance his own creativity with honoring an author's vision.
The film has not only nabbed Sarandon, but another favorite of mine,
Stanley Tucci, to play the murderer. Playing the kid watching everything from above will be newcomer
Saoirse Ronan. And, of course, the cast also includes
Rachel Weisz and
Ryan Gosling. Production begins this fall and the pic will probably be ready for release by fall of 2008.
Posted May 29th 2007 8:31PM by Monika Bartyzel
Filed under: Comedy, Casting, Deals, Scripts, Cinematical Indie
We're about to get another World War II comedy from those British filmmakers overseas. Previously, we've
shared word on
Jackboots on Whitehall, the puppet-like action figure film about what would've happened if the German's had won the Battle of Britain, only to be defeated by the Scots. The intrigue factor on that was upped a million times by the comprehensive British cast that includes Alan Cumming as Hitler, Richard O'Brien as Himmler and Ewan McGregor as the Scot who brings ze Germans down. There's not even a murmur of a release date yet, and we've already got another UK-comedy feast on the way.
It seems that comedian
Lee Evans is teaming up with
Stuart Silver to co-write and then star in
I Was Hitler's Weatherman. It'll be a bit of a detour from their usual work, as Silver usually collaborates with him on comedy specials. Now, if you're not familiar with Evans' comedic work, you will probably remember him as Tucker from
There's Something About Mary. The movie will star Evans as a young Jewish man who goes into hiding during the war and ends up nabbing the identity of a Nazi meteorologist named Ernest Deisin. He's so good at his new-found work that he's soon promoted to Hitler's own personal weatherman. Oft-British TV director
Stuart Urban will helm it. So, it sounds like it could be funny, and it's definitely got the quirk. However, what really makes it for me is the name they're trying to cast to play Hitler --
Stanley Tucci. Oh yes, The Tooch as the sinister, infamous German. I'm sold, and they haven't even made it yet!
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