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05/16/2012 7:36 AM
Andrew Dominik's last film was "The Assassination Of Jesse James By The Coward Robert Ford," so even if all we knew is that this movie, based on the novel "Cogan's Trade," is his reunion with star Brad Pitt, that would be enough to get us excited. But this crime story looks like a strong chance for Dominik to play to audiences that missed his gorgeous elegy for an American West that may never have actually existed. -Drew McWeeny
Cr HitFix
05/16/2012 7:40 AM
Not that we’re complaining, mind you. This is our 39th Cannes — 31 years reporting for TIME and a dozen for TIME.com — and we haven’t lost the Riviera addiction yet. The Venice Festival may have more charm, and Toronto more clout in the American movie marketplace, but Cannes remains the greatest concentration of film talent, glamour and power this side of George Clooney’s home when he throws an Obama bash.
Last year, Cannes hosted world premieres of three of the nine films that the Motion Picture academy nominated for Best Picture: Midnight in Paris, The Tree of Life and the winner, The Artist. The Festival also presented Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides, which, though neither great cinema nor a good movie, did peddle enough tickets to become the ninth picture in film history to register $1 billion at the worldwide box office. Another Cannes movie, Kung Fu Panda 2, earned two-thirds of a billion.
Not that Oscar éclat and blockbuster status are priorities for Thierry Frémaux, Cannes’ selector-in-chief. He simply seeks the finest movies, in the fairly narrow, Eurocentric definition of film artistry: assured, demanding, often grim and with a much slower pulse than the standard Hollywood product. But Cannes does love its Hollywood stars. The 2012 Festival’s iconic image, splashed 60 feet wide above the red-carpet entrance to the Grand Palais, shows Marilyn Monroe blowing out a birthday-cake candle. (This summer marks the 50th anniversary of Monroe’s death.)
The name value of the directors is lower than last year — when Woody Allen, Terrence Malick, Pedro Almodóvar and, most notoriously, Lars von Trier were represented — but Cannes’ star wattage is predictably incandescent. Among those with films here: Brad Pitt, Bruce Willis, Shia LaBeouf, Reese Witherspoon, Bill Murray, Nicole Kidman, Zac Efron, Matthew McConaughey and, in different films, both top stars of The Twilight Saga: Robert Pattinson in David Cronenberg’s Cosmopolis and Kristen Stewart in Walter Salles’ film of the Jack Kerouac novel On the Road.
Gilles Jacob, the former Festival boss who still hovers paternally over Frémaux’s shoulder, has said the American movie royalty really knows how to work the red carpet. And who better than Pitt, the patron star of Cannes? The actor came to the Côte d’Azur with Babel (2006), Ocean’s Thirteen (2007), Inglourious Basterds (2009) and The Tree of Life (2011) and escorted Angelina Jolie in 2008 when she starred in Clint Eastwood’s Changeling. Pitt will be here again, starring in the crime drama Killing Them Softly.
There’s no Johnny Depp blockbuster showing out of competition, which is fine: Cannes has plenty of pirates roaming the Croisette trying to sell or buy films, or steal a cell phone. But the official competition, which culminates in the awarding of the Palme d’Or and other big prizes a week from Sunday, contains many works by esteemed directors, from the art-house A and B-plus list, such as the Austrian master Michael Haneke, former Palme winners Ken Loach and Abbas Kiarostami and the 89-year-old French grandmaster Alain Resnais, whose first Cannes film was Hiroshima, mon amour in 1959.
Here’s a preview of 10 Cannes enticements: six Competition films with brand-name actors, four that have the critics hoping for revelations.
BIG STARS, BIG RISKS
Killing Them Softly. Pitt reunites with Andrew Dominick, the New Zealand visionary who directed him in The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford. In this filming of George C. Higgins’ novel Cogan’s Trade, Pitt is a mob enforcer is the Boston underworld. His suspects include James Gandolfini, Ray Liotta, Richard Jenkins, Sam Shepard and Ben Mendelsohn, who was scary-great as the mama’s boy killer in Animal Kingdom. (Plays here next Tuesday; opens in the U.S. Sept. 21.)
05/17/2012 7:20 AM
Scott also is developing Gertrude Bell, about the British writer, adventurer and spy who teamed with T.E. Lawrence in then-Arabia -- possibly starring Angelina Jolie -- all while considering Prometheus 2, which he hopes will come next, and developing a Blade Runner sequel, which the original's co-screenwriter, Hampton Fancher, is penning.
Cr THR from an interview with Ridley Scott
05/17/2012 7:42 AM
And your next project, after the Cormac McCarthy adaptation, The Counselor, also boasts a strong female lead.
I’m working on a project with Angelina Jolie called Gertrude Bell, which is a very interesting period piece of a woman in the 1900s whose tramping ground was very much part of Mesopotamia, which we now know of as Iraq. She’s involved with a person called King Faisal, and she was partly instrumental in seeing him to the throne of Iraq. She’s an important political figure.
Cr Thedailybeast
05/17/2012 12:55 PM
While the plan for a sequel to the upcoming film isn't news, THR now notes that the project is something Scott "hopes will come next," presumably after "The Counselor." Lensing on the latter will begin this fall with a star-studded cast including Michael Fassbender, Brad Pitt, Javier Bardem, Cameron Diaz and Penelope Cruz for what Scott describes as "'No Country For Old Men' on steroids." Could the "Prometheus" sequel be happening straight after that? Possibly, but we're sure Scott's and the studio's plans are highly dependent on the box office performance of the upcoming film.
Cr IndieWire
05/17/2012 2:04 PM
05/17/2012 3:54 PM
Juno Temple is joining the cast of Maleficent, Disney’s live-action retelling of the Sleeping Beauty fairy tale that is starring Angelina Jolie.
Jolie is playing the title character in the fantasy that tells the fairy tale from the point of view of the witch that cursed Aurora to a permanent sleep on her 16th birthday. Robert Stromberg is directing.
Elle Fanning already is on board as Aurora and Sharlto Copley is Stefan, the half-human and half-fairy bastard son of the human king. Also in the cast are Imelda Staunton (Vera Drake), Miranda Richardson (Harry Potter), Kenneth Cranham (Made in Dagenham), Sam Riley (Brighton Rock) and Lesley Manville (Another Year).
Temple would join Staunton and Manville as the three pixie fairies in the classic fairy tale who are tasked with taking care of Aurora in the cottage in the woods. Temple will play Thistletwit who, like the other two pixies, Knotgrass and Flittle, is neglectful and superficial.
The movie is shooting this summer in London.
Temple, repped by UTA and Troika, will appear in this summer’s Batman movie, The Dark Knight Rises and is one of the stars of William Friedkin's Killer Joe, which just screened at the Cannes Film Festival. She recently wrapped Magic Magic opposite Michael Cera and Emily Browning.
Cr THR
05/17/2012 6:24 PM
Well, it's pretty simple. The scene shows Sam Shepard and a beefy colleague (probably named Vinny, or Bull) knocking at Ray Liotta's door and throwing him about -- first through the window and then through a door.
"I can tell you that the worst is yet to come for Ray," says Dominik. Is he swimming with the fishes? "You just have to see the movie."
The film's shotgun-enforcing star in the underworld flick, Brad Pitt, is not featured. But he and a whole gang of others -- Liotta, James Gandolfini (who knows a thing or two about roughing folks up) as well as Pitt's fiance Angelina Jolie -- are expected to walk the Cannes red carpet for the film, which is one of the festival's sure hits.
It does seem strange that we haven't seen a trailer for this movie in an era where constant trailer previews are the new norm in terms of unveiling a movie. "We're a little behind the eight ball on that," says Dominik. "We only finished the picture last week."
Dominik did explain that the movie's name change, from Cogan's Trade, was to help out Pitt. The movie always going to be Killing Them Softly he insists, which is how Pitt's character describes his low-key killing method.
But Dominik, who directed Pitt in The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford, says he didn't want that key "softly" line to have too much emphasis in the dialogue.
"There's a danger that the actor might make a meal out of the line," says Dominik.
So for a long time the movie was referred to as Cogan's Trade.
"Brad's character calls what he does 'killing them softly' --- with a minimum of fuss," says Dominik. "It sounded like a movie title to me. Cogan's Trade kind of sounds like a Clint Eastwood title to me from 1972."
Cr USAToday
05/17/2012 6:26 PM
Following a great first clip, we’ve got another brief look at Andrew Dominik‘s follow-up to The Assassination Of Jesse James By The Coward Robert Ford, the ensemble crime drama Killing Them Softly. With the film previously going under Cogan’s Trade, this new clip should give some explanation as to the switch, as Brad Pitt reveals to Richard Jenkins just exactly why he murders people the way he does. And if that isn’t enough, the director himself has explained the title in a USA Today interview.
He first remarked about the first clip featuring Ray Liotta, saying “the worst is yet to come for” the character and then went into the post-production coming down to the wire. The only reason we haven’t seen a trailer yet is because they completed the film last week, but considering it hits in the fall, I assume we can expect one this summer.
As for the title change, he said the film was always going to be called Killing Them Softly, but he didn’t want to emphasis the delivery of the line by Pitt, as seen below in this new clip. Dominik was afraid to create too much of a “fuss” about the line and remarked, “There’s a danger that the actor might make a meal out of the line” and as for the title of Cogan’s Trade, he said that “kind of sounds like a Clint Eastwood title…from 1972.”
Dominik ultimately went with Killing Them Softly because it sounded like an “actual movie” title to him. I feel the opposite, but we’ll see if it fits for the film soon, when it premieres at Cannes on May 22nd.
Based on George V. Higgins‘ novel, which has dark comedy elements and violence, the crime drama follows ”a professional enforcer who investigates a heist that went down during a mob-protected poker game.” The cast also includes James Gandolfini, Sam Shepard, Garret Dillahunt, Max Casella, Bella Heathcote, Scoot McNairy, Ben Mendelsohn and Vincent Curatola.
Cr FilmStage
05/20/2012 7:15 AM
But that’s old news. We knew Jolie wanted to do the project; she kick-started it! The sensationalism can now be found in the slew of all-star names who have enlisted to join her in the film, some of them more surprising than others.
While we knew that the film would obviously be spending a lot of time focused on Ms. Jolie due to the fact that she’s playing the titular role, there still remained the question of who would be the princess.
Not to fear, Elle Fanning, Dakota’s younger and more impish sister, will manage the role with as much grace as the little actress can muster. So that brings us to our next question: if this is to be a true remake, who will play the three lovely fairies to guide the young lady through the adventure?
And this is where it gets interesting. In true Robert Stromberg style (he won an Oscar for his production design for Avatar, and he also worked on Tim Burton’s Alice in Wonderland), the three fairies resemble nothing like frumpy old nannies but instead are each rather striking in their own way.
Imelda Staunton (Harry Potter), Lesley Manville (Another Year), and Juno Temple (Atonement) will play the three magical ladies. Temple will have to squeeze in some shooting time between premieres of Killer Joe, Little Birds, Jack and Diane, and The Dark Knight Rises.
So that settles all the big roles— except the prince. No worries; they snatched up Sam Riley, while Shartlo Copley plays a half-human king, and the commanding Miranda Richardson (Harry Potter) will play the queen.
I’m not quite sure what debuting director Stromberg will do with all these names; that’s a lot of egos to balance. But hopefully, because it’s a fairytale-come-to-life sort of set, everyone will be as accommodating as the staff members of Disneyland…
05/20/2012 6:11 PM
05/21/2012 10:42 AM
While Norton and the rest of the cast attending the Cannes Fest were clearly enjoying the adulation of the international film community, Moonrise Kingdom is only one of his focal points. He founded and runs Class 5 Films, in partnership with Oscar-nominated screenwriter Stuart Blumberg and producer Bill Migliore. They are completing Thanks for Sharing -- Blumberg's directorial debut, starring Mark Ruffalo, Gwyneth Paltrow and Tim Robbins, about sex addiction -- and preparing Undaunted Courage, about the Lewis and Clark expedition. Who is his exec-producing partner on this mini-series for HBO? Another actor with a film in Cannes Competition this week: Norton's Fight Club co-star Brad Pitt, who is here with Andrew Dominik's Killing Them Softly.
05/21/2012 7:44 PM
EXCLUSIVE: Paul Dano has joined the cast of Twelve Years A Slave, the Steve McQueen-directed adaptation of Solomon Northup’s novel about a free black man who, promised a job playing violin in the circus, is drugged and dragged to Louisiana and sold into slavery. Dano will play one of the slave owners who brutalize him. Chiwetel Ejiofor, Michael Fassbender and Brad Pitt also star for New Regency.
Dano stars in and is executive producer of Ruby Sparks, the Fox Searchlight film that was directed by Little Miss Sunshine’s Jonathan Dayton and Valerie Faris, with script by Zoe Kazan. That film opens July 25, and he follows with Looper and For Ellen. He’s repped by CAA and Anonymous Content.
Cr Deadline
Posts: 3356
05/22/2012 9:48 AM
05/22/2012 11:02 AM
05/22/2012 12:07 PM
05/27/2012 6:21 AM
FlaglerLive | May 26, 2012
June 1st is the start of hurricane season for Florida, a marker that signals ramped up media specials about hurricane preparedness, along with some mandatory hyperbole about death and destruction. Sure, I know about hurricanes. In my lifetime, I’ve been in five Category 3 or higher, including living at ground zero when Category 5 Andrew roared ashore in 1992.
I take hurricanes very seriously, and am prepared for them with the essentials of food, water, flashlights, batteries, generator, gasoline, and such. That’s just plain smart and what responsible people living in the target zone should do. Hopefully, you’re prepared, too.
But today’s Coastal View is not about being ready for hurricanes. It is about a unique recovery program begun after Hurricane Katrina struck the Gulf Coast of Louisiana and Mississippi in 2005. In what became my first column published in FlaglerLive on May 11, 2011, I wrote about a project I discovered while in New Orleans. That column resulted from my fascination with the Make It Right Foundation, founded by movie actor Brad Pitt.
New Orleans' Ninth Ward. Click on the map for larger view. (© New Orleans Online)
If you read reports or saw television features about Hurricane Katrina’s impact on New Orleans, you likely learned about this area–where close to 2,000 lives were confirmed lost–when more than 4,000 homes were destroyed by floodwaters surging over the levee of the Industrial Canal.
The Make It Right Foundation has now built 75 homes, which are occupied, with others in various stages of construction. I visited the Lower Ninth Ward earlier this month and was impressed by the number of new homes but was chagrined to see many empty lots overgrown with weeds. I learned that there is a community effort to clean up the lots, but it is a slow process because of the large number. You can track the progress of the construction here.
Pitt brought together architects, financiers, landscape designers and others to design and build the homes. All of the homes are elevated, incorporate green (environmental) features, and are offered at affordable prices and terms. Here are the various designs.
I plan an annual update on this project through the construction of its final home. Perhaps another project will be added by other private groups. I believe that, in many cases, the private sector can move faster and better than government agencies. In my opinion, that is the record of Brad Pitt’s vision and action in New Orleans. Bravo, Mr. Pitt.
05/27/2012 6:47 AM
Q: How are you? I’m still up a bit since last night.
Q: Cannes does that to you doesn’t it? Yeah it does.
Q: Has it been a long day for you already? So yeah, up since last night. I’ll try to be as coherent as possible, if it makes no sense, rewind this. (laughter)
Q: It looks like it’s becoming a tradition for you, coming to Cannes. It’s almost every year now right? I thought you were talking about staying out all night. (laughter) Yeah, I enjoy Cannes, I enjoy Cannes very much. It’s a place that has great appreciation for the filmmaker, as I do, it’s great being in competition with other filmmakers I admire, and we are on the Riviera for Christ’s sake.
Q: So we saw you last year. What changed since then? Nothing, doing the same thing and I worked a lot last year, this year mom is working a lot and I get to be dad.
Q: How do you choose a project from the 1,000 scripts that you must get. How do you choose a project and why did you choose this one? I choose it just by feel. That inexplicable feeling that feels like the next interesting thing to go through, something new, something to tackle, something different. Andrew Dominik has become a great friend of mine, and Jesse James remains one of my personal favorites and wanted to do something with Andrew again, and I’ll tell you what, I hate seeing Andrew struggle. I thought he made one of the best movies of certainly that I’ve been a part of and he was really struggling for a while, just to get something made. And so when he came up with this idea and I fit into it, I was thrilled with it. I knew immediately when we first sat down, he came over, told me the story, found this book, it was just at the collapse of the mortgage scandal, and I knew immediately. It’s just an inexplicable feeling.
Q: Women don’t exist in this movie. Why is that? Well, they are always talking about women, all the characters are deeply affected by the women in their life, or the lack of women in their life and that inability leads to a great sadness in many of the characters.
Q: We remember when you got a life by these two women in Thelma and Louise, that was already some years ago. Did you think at that time that it could be the right decision that put you where you are now? You are never really thinking that far in advance. I just love movies and wanted to be a part of movies, and there’s so much just trying to figure out who you are in the business and what you want to do with the opportunity, once you get the opportunity. Mainly, it’s chasing opportunity and to be fortunate enough to get that. Then what do you do with it once you get it? And that was the 90s for me.
Q: But do you think when you see one of your own movies like Thelma and Louise and you watch it… First of all, I don’t. (laughter)
Q: Are there films that your kids can see? Yeah, there’s some of them that I’ll proud that they will see one day. I hope they will be proud. But I don’t really focus on going back. I don’t really. I figure I will do that when I can’t do this anymore.
05/27/2012 6:54 AM
05/27/2012 7:10 AM
Happy Birthday, Shiloh Jolie-Pitt!
The daughter of Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt, who was born in Swakopmund, Namibia, turns six-years-old today (May 27). Shiloh has three older siblings – Maddox, 10, Pax, 8, and Zahara, 7 – and two younger siblings – twins Knox and Vivienne, 3.
Shiloh has grown into quite the prankster, often making faces at photographers and hamming it up for the cameras. We loved when Shiloh and her sis Zahara pressed their faces against a window to make funny faces!
WHAT IS YOUR FAVORITE photo of Shiloh Jolie-Pitt?
Cr Just Jared
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