MSN Movies Blog

To be directed by 'Bridesmaids' helmer Paul Feig

By Kate Erbland 5 hours ago
Director Paul Feig hit on comedic gold with his female-led "Bridesmaids," so it's no surprise that he's getting back in business with a pair of funny ladies. Feig will next direct his "Bridesmaids" stand-out, the very talented and very spirited Melissa McCarthy, in a buddy cop comedy - co-starring Sandra Bullock! While Bullock has, as of late, kept her work on the more dramatic side of things (after her tremendous success with her Oscar-winning role in "The Blind Side," she was last seen in "Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close" and will next be seen in "Gravity"), she's also a skilled comedienne, making this a wonderfully inspired pairing.

Variety reports that the script for as-yet-untitled film also comes from another funny lady, Katie Dippold, who has written for both "MADtv" and "Parks and Recreation." Details on the project are scarce, but we do know that it will follow "the strained working relationship between a high-strung FBI agent (Bullock) and an unconventional Boston cop (McCarthy) who team to take down a Russian gangster." McCarthy is quite adept at pushing her co-stars into amusing brinks with her style of comedy (look no further than her work in "Bridesmaids," starring opposite her own husband, playing the air marshal), and Bullock is solid at reacting to wacky antics, so this sounds like potential comedy magic. 

The film will reportedly start filming quite soon, just this summer, after McCarthy finishes starring opposite Jason Bateman in Seth Gordon's "Identity Thief."

Are you excited to see Bullock and McCarthy play opposite each other in a lady-skewed buddy cop comedy?
 

Why nothing ruins a film festival like famous people

By James Rocchi 11 hours ago
Nawt You, Nawt You, Nawt You, Nawt You, and NAWT YOU! Earlier yesterday, I was trying to get from the press mailbox area to the American Pavillion, and the easiest way to do that was to go out the side exit on that upper floor, across the top of the Palais, by the Salle Soixsianteme -- the theater "temporarily" added to the top of the Palais 5 years ago -- but I couldn't do that, the brown-suited Cannes ushers explained, as that area of egress was cut off. In 10 minutes the cast of "Lawless" -- Shia LaBeouf, Tom Hardy, Jessica Chastain, et al -- were going to be coming in for their press conference; right now, though, they were just to the right of where I wanted to go, being photographed. Which is when I noted, via the miracle bon mot machine of twitter (@jamesrocchi, if you like cooking and movies) that "Nothing ruins a film festival like famous people."

(Also, please note: I'm not in any way groaning or complaining about being here, I assure you; it's just that, hey, if I'm talking about being at Cannes and what that's like besides the movies, then, yes, like any diary, it'll be a chronicle of the occasional victory and a thousand small defeats, a mix of frustration and elation. It's amazing being here, of course, but suggesting it's all sunshine, lollipops and les arcs du ciel is as wrong as saying it's the Bataan Death March with subtitles.)
 

(It's really not.)

By Kate Erbland 15 hours ago
Perhaps everyone behind John Hillcoat's "Lawless" (formerly known as "The Wettest County," and based on Matt Bondurant's 2008 book, "The Wettest County in the World," based on his own family's exploits) was just so excited that long-wrapped film is finally getting a release and a premiere at Cannes that they forgot to craft posters for the film that look anything at all like the actual film. Or everyone on the film's marketing team just really, really liked "The Avengers." Or these new character posters are a cruel joke. There's pretty much no other reason for why the true-life tale about a family of bootleggers in Prohibition-era Virginia look like something ripped from the pages of Frank Miller's "Sin City." Yow.

Bad marketing aside, the film follows three Bondurant brothers (Shia LaBeouf, Tom Hardy, and Jason Clarke) as they bootleg and rumble their way across Franklin County, Virginia. Familial complications, love interests, rival 'leggers, and the long arm of the law all threaten the Bondurants' livelihood...and their very lives. The outstandinf cast is rounded out by Gary Oldman, Jessica Chastain, Guy Pearce, and Mia Wasikowska.

The film recently premiered at Cannes to mixed reviews, and it will open in the U.S. on August 31. Check out the rest of the new posters, thanks to /Film, after the break. 
 

Or, 'Independence Day' meets 'Blind Date'

By Kate Erbland 15 hours ago
Spanish filmmaker Nacho Vigalondo has won fans over the past few years with two clever independent sci-fi features ("Timecrimes" and "Extraterrestrial"), his winning personality, and his interest in interacting (in person) with fans and other film geeks. He's the sort of modern filmmaker that everyone should be paying lots of attention to. 

In "Extraterrestiral," Vigalondo flips the script on two very different genres - the awkward morning-after maybe-romance and the alien invasion actioner. He stirs it all up with the ever-amusing "random people thrown together in crisis" trope, and voila! "Extraterrestrial"! The film's first official teaser trailer lays out all that (and more) in a neat and tidy thirty second burst. The trailer also quite wisely features a quote from another filmmaker - Jason Reitman - who accurately sums up both Vigalondo and his style. Per Reitman, Viaglondo is "the Woody Allen of science fiction." That is not something you hear every day. 

"Extraterrestrial" will open in limited theaters and on VOD on Jun 15. The film can also be brought to your city by way of the Tugg platform, which you can read more about at their official site. Head over to Apple to see the full teaser trailer. 
 

The filmmaker’s third film won the Jury Prize at last year’s Cannes Film Festival

By DannyMiller Sat 4:35 PM

Francophiles, rejoice! It’s turning out to be a banner year for excellent French films that are hitting our shores (if you’re lucky enough to be in a city that appreciates foreign films). The newest import from la belle France is a taut psychological drama called “Polisse” (meant to be a child’s spelling of “Police”) about a group of hardscrabble police officers working in a Child Protection Unit in Paris. In the course of their work, the officers must deal with everything from underaged Gypsy pickpockets to the most heinous child molesters, pedophiles, and abusive parents you can imagine. The professionals in this close-knit group have learned to balance the grisly aspects of their work with a kind of gallows humor but some are unable to keep the stresses of the workplace out of their personal lives. A young photographer (played by Maïwenn herself) enters this intense world to document the activities of the group. Will she remain objective as she follows the officers in their work or will her presence be a breaking point in the already taut environment?

 

“Polisse,” Maïwenn’s third film as a director, was nominated for 13 César Awards and won the Jury Prize at the 2011 Cannes Film Festival. The film features a phenomenal ensemble cast including co-writer Emmanuelle Bercot, Karin Viard, Marina Foïs, Nicolas Duvauchelle, Frédéric Pierrot, and French rapper Joeystarr. I spoke with the director in Los Angeles.

 

MSN Movies: I know that you spent a lot of time with an actual Child Protection Unit in France. Did you feel a bit like Melissa, your character in the film, when you were shadowing their activities? Did any of the officers resent you for being there or were they mostly supportive of your efforts to make a film about this difficult line of work?

 

Maïwenn: To be honest, they weren’t very supportive at all, most of them were kind of rude to me when I started my internship. I think they were suspicious of me as a woman director who wanted to make a movie about cops.  

 

It seems like this particular field in law enforcement has more female officers than other divisions, no?

 

Yes, but because these women have to constantly prove their worth in this male-dominated world I’m afraid many of them are very competitive and not exactly welcoming to other women, including me!  

 

Some of the things these officers see on a daily basis are beyond upsetting. When you were researching this material, were you surprised at what you found? Was it worse than you thought it would be?

 

You know, I was shocked almost every day. I had a feeling before I started the internship that it was going to change my life. I think the day I freaked out the most was when I spent time with the Internet group because then I saw the actual images that were out there. Horrifying stuff.

 

There are scenes in the film in which we see the humor that the officers use to get through the day, some of it wildly inappropriate. Did that reflect what you saw among the real cops?

 

Blood will tell in Brandon Cronenberg's directorial debut

By James Rocchi Sat 11:19 AM

Rating: 2.5/5


Here at Cannes, where photographers will gladly and literally run over you to photograph red carpet luminaries pausing only to ask, as one did to me one year, "Whozzat bird, then?", you get to see celebrity worship at its worst. But in the directorial debut of Brandon Cronenberg -- yes, David Cronenberg's son -- celebrity worship in a 20-minutes-from-now future goes beyond even that. The result is a story that may be a little over-long -- the film could do with a few cuts off-screen to go with the many slashings and stabbings on -- but it's also one that demonstrates Cronenberg is a talent to watch, especially if he can find his own voice and not echo (albeit echo superbly) his father in later films.


Syd (Caleb Landry Jones, of "X-Men: First Class" and "Contraband") works at the sterile, high-end Lucas Clinic medical clinic -- which is ironic, as he looks like death warmed over, sniffling, sneezing, trembling with fever. The Lucas Clinic  offers a unique service to wealthy clients -- infecting them with the same viruses that the celebrities the clinic has exclusive contracts with, re-spun through high-tech wizardry and made both non-contagious and copy-proof. A pallid and shaken young man comes in, plunks down his ATM Card … and gets injected with a strain of herpes simplex "A" taken from mega-star Hannah Geist (Sarah Gadon). "Biological communion," as Syd notes … for a price.


Syd, though, has been breaking one simple rule: He's been taking his work home with him … literally, injecting himself with the clinic's newest additions to their germ and virus library from their superstar specimens and  making black-market deals with Arvid (Joe Pingue, scruffy and strong in a bit part) for money on the side. It's pretty stupid for Syd to be doing this, but I bought it -- it felt like the William Gibson version of "getting high on your own supply." And when Syd tries a little something something after picking up a vial of blood to make sure the latest malady suffered by the Clinic's biggest name is on the Clinic's menu fast, he falls asleep in a fever … to wake two days later with every news source blaring that the Clinic's biggest-name germ-and-virus provider is dead. 

 

Alex Pettyer will learn from the best

By Kate Erbland Sat 10:53 AM
Steven Soderbergh's "Magic Mike" can go one of two ways: it can be a fabulously bizarre slice-of-life that delights audiences and makes uses of its all-star cast, or it can just be a weird movie about male strippers, a laughable big screen Chippendales. The film's first trailer, which focused on one of the film's love stories and Channing Tatum's big dreams (of professional wood-working, of all things) seemed to point to the latter - a disappointment. And yet, a second (international) trailer for the film has been released, and while it makes use of many of the same shots (and even that pounding Rihanna song which does fit in quite well with some of the film's aesthetic) as the first trailer, there's something different about the tone, and that's a very good thing.

This time around, the focus is shifted to Tatum's new best friend, played by Alex Pettyfer. "Magic Mike" has long been touted as being based on Tatum's own experiences as a young male stripper, with Tatum assuming a mentor role and Pettyfer playing the bright-eyed and bushy-tailed newbie learning the ropes. This trailer gives us our first good look at Pettyfer's struggles in entering the wide world of male stripping, and it works to solid effect. Suddenly, there's some real emotion to the film. 

The film also stars Matthew McConaughey, Cody Horn, Olivia Munn, Matt Bomer, Riley Keough, Joe Mangianello, Kevin Nash, Adam Rodriguez, and Gabriel Iglesias.

"Magic Mike" opens on June 29. Check out the film's new international trailer after the break. 
 

Netflix Instant has a veritable festival of Roger Corman's best

By SeanAx Sat 10:38 AM

How timely: in the wake of the DVD and Blu-ray release of the documentary "Corman's World: Exploits of a Hollywood Rebel" a couple of months back and a long overdue Oscar, a veritable festival of films directed by Roger Corman have been made available this month on Netflix, bumping their library up to a dozen or so of his best films.

 

His cycle of Edgar Allan Poe films were the first to really be taken seriously: stories of madness and melancholia set in gloomy, crumbling mansions and shot in rich, bleeding color and CinemaScope, most of them starring Vincent Price, whose theatrical flourish gives his brooding heroes a sense of tragedy. The success of "The House of Usher" (1960), the first of the cycle, paved the way for the more ambitious "The Pit and the Pendulum" (1961), highlighted by Barbara Steele’s savage eyes and feral smile, Price’s cackling transformation into a sadistic ghost, and the grandiose bladed pendulum set piece. Ray Milland takes over for Price in "Premature Burial" (1962) as the doomed, brooding aristocrat gripped by a paralyzing fear of being buried alive, and Price is back for "The Raven" (1963), a comic take on Poe co-starring Peter Lorre and Jack Nicholson, and "The Tomb of Ligeia" (1964).

 

Corman's crowning achievement in the cycle is "The Masque of the Red  Death" (1964), a deliriously colorful gothic horror (vividly shot by future director Nicolas Roeg) of a demented, debauched Prince whose castle is the sole sanctuary during the plague, but the price to enter is to become a plaything of the sadistic tormentor. Vincent Price is no longer the haunted gothic hero but the sadistic Prince Prospero, a sadist who wields the power of life and death with no pity: his subjects are toys and he revels in their humiliation and torture. This is Corman’s most daring character study and most stylistically impressive film.


Continue reading at Videodrone


For more releases, see Hot Tips and Top Picks: DVDs, Blu-rays and streaming video for May 15

 
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