Wednesday, August 31, 2011

One More Slice

The East Great Falls gang is back!

Those randy kids from American Pie have reunited for the first time in more than a decade since we met them for the aptly titled American Reunion. Click here to get an update on the cast and a quick preview on whats to come.

You can expect to see lots of crazy shenanigans up on the big screen when Jason Biggs & Co. bring out the fun, and their baked goods, on April 6.

Until then then!

Photo: People.com.
The Burden of Heroism

Jessica Chastain, that mesmerizing It Actress of the moment, gets in a pretty bloody fight at the beginning of John Madden’s The Debt, the remake of a 2007 Israeli movie.

Its a good, long, thrilling while before we revisit what happens next and we learn the truth, about the fight, and about what came to be of Chastain’s Rachel, Sam Worthington’s David, and Stefan (Marton Csokas), three Mossad agents on an important and secret mission in mid-1960s East Berlin.

The actress (who’s making quite good on the buzz surrounding her Hollywood ascension, thanks to turns in The Tree of Life and The Help, and will continue to do so this fall, btw, in a couple more projects opening before year’s end) is something both fierce and vulnerable in the brutal scene and throughout the movie.

This is is due, in part, to the fact that Rachel’s the lone female in an operation that requires not only precision but a presence of mind – the agents are on a covert mission to bring a Nazi war criminal, an infamous doctor named Vogel (Jesper Christensen), to justice that we don’t usually associate with a woman’s role in ’60s-set movies.

A housewife she ain’t: She is the key to trio’s success, and, as it turns out, a a big reason for the complications that arise in middle of what should be a cinch of an extraction. Well...as much of one as it could be in heavily guarded East Berlin.

The Debt flashes forward to 1997 Tel Aviv and back. In the ’90s, we meet older Rachel, David, and Stefan. They’re played by Helen Mirren, a broken Ciarán Hinds, and a wheelchair-bound Tom Wilkinson.

Venerated for three decades by their country, they have grown apart, torn asunder by the secret they swore to keep the night of the fight that changed the course of their operation and their lives, which were well on their way there thanks to the deflections and inevitable romantic entanglements encouraged by their task.

The pressure is on more than ever now that Rachel and Stefan’s daughter has written a book about their heroism, but the question that arises once we revisit the fight that left Rachel forever scarred is whether the trio is actually deserving of the praise.

To make matters worse, allegations out of the Ukraine threaten to cast an irreparable shadow not only on them but on Mossad as well.

The secret, one of them says, must be protected, but the cost may be much to high to pay anymore.

The suspense of The Debt builds steadily in the past, the most accomplished narrative. It’s a potboiler, and I recommend that you don’t see this movie in between manis because you run the risk of biting your nails, and then you’ll be stuck with fugly fingers for a week or so. The intensity, though, get a little diluted with the time jumps, but the payoff in the end, as implausible as it seems, is well worth the liberties the script takes. That, I believe, has lots to do with the great cast Madden has on deck – it’s a good one.

My Rating ***

Photo: Focus Features.
A Fantine for Hugh

If Hugh Jackman has his way, Anne Hathaway will join him in
Tom Hooper’s adaptation of Les Misérables.

The One Day star is lined up, much to the Aussie’s plaisir, to play the Fantine to his Jean Valjean in the eagerly anticipated musical, much to the chagrin, btw, of a good friend of mine who would rather see Marion Cotillard in the role.

The project is, which is set to begin production next winter, is drawing major talent to its rumor mill, including Russell Crowe, Geoffrey Rush, and Emma Watson, among others.

Photo: SunnySunnyLipGlossAndCat.blogspot.com.
Hot S!

The gym seems to be working out great for Henry Cavill.

Check out the Brit on the set of Man of Steel.

Yum much?

Photo: Towleroad.com.
Long Time No See, Bad Boy

Where, oh, where has Jason Dohring been?

Not sure – but I can tell ya where he’ll turn up next?

The erstwhile Logan from Veronica Mars is returning to The CW, specifically to recur on Sarah Michelle Gellar’s Ringer. He will play a teacher at the high school attended by the stepdaugher of one of the twins Gellar plays (the Manhattan socialite, not the stripper on the run).

Ringer being a sure-to-be-sexy thriller, I can only imagine Dohring will go shirtless and smolder quite a bit.

And that is A-OK with me.

Photo: TheVampireClub.wordpress.com.

Tuesday, August 30, 2011

The Bombshell Jeff Bridges

Marisa Miller is ready for her close-up.

The Victorias Secret model will be playing Jeff Bridges in RIPD – well, you know...kinda. The project has Ryan Reynolds in the role of a murdered cop who joins the Rest in Peace Department in exchange for the chance to hunt down his murderer (Kevin Bacon).

Bridges will portray Reynolds’ partner on the beat, who, when walking among the living, will take the stunning form of Miller.

Yowza!

Photo: SeductiveEye.com.

Monday, August 29, 2011

The Voices

Real-life BFF Ryan Reynolds and Sandra Bullock are fixing to work together again.

The actor, who didn’t quite have the summer we all wanted him to have (right, Green Lantern?), is setting himself up for a surefire success by recruiting Bullock to come on board as a producer and fellow voice talent on this new Fox show called And Then There Was Gordon.

The project, for which Reynolds will co-write the pilot as well, will chronicle the adventures of an average kid whose siblings and mother are wicked smart.

It’s not the only TV venture R2 has in the works: The guy sold another show to Fox just last week (a live-action buddy comedy he is overseeing through his producing shingle).

Photo: Zimbio.com.

Sunday, August 28, 2011

Mama B

Beyoncé made a surprise announcement at tonight’s MTV Video Music Awards, thus ensuring the show didn’t spiral down toward irrelevancy completely: She and Jay-Z are expecting their first baby.

So this is the child of destiny she was singing about all those years ago....

Sorry, I had to say som’in’ like that.

Congratulations, you two!

Photo: EW.com.
Mister GaGa

Lady GaGa seems to be out of girl outfits...so she put on her best drag to open the MTV Video Music Awards as her alter, Jo Calderone, singing a rousing
“Yoü and I.

Alrighty then.

Love the song, hate the shtick (like, she shoulda had the hot stud from the video on stage with shim, but, oh no, she had to trot out Brian May from Queen instead).

Like, Adele didn’t need one, and she knocked out her Someone Like You” right out of the park in such a way that gave me the goosebumps, honey.

That voice...oy. Right?

Anyway, some awards also were given. But I can tell what the The Moment of the VMAs will be.

Photo: EW.com.
Urgh, Well Now I Feel Bad...

Josh Pence is my age? And he looks like that?

Grr!

Yeah, yeah, he gets paid to be abstastic 24/7, but still....

Oh well.

Here’s to seeing ya in Battleship and The Dark Knight Rises next year, guy. And HBO’s More As This Story Develops, too.

Ooh, Pence should totally get himself cast in Magic Mike, huh.

Photo: VMan.com.