ReportWire

Tag: kate winslet

  • How Kate Winslet’s Decades-Long Acting Career Prepared Her for Her Directorial Debut

    [ad_1]

    For her directorial debut, Kate Winslet made a star-studded family drama, in which she was one of the actors, over just seven weeks, securing star Helen Mirren for only 16 days.

    The schedule and Winslet’s dual roles were just some of the many challenges she faced helming Goodbye June.

    “We were constantly trying to make sure that we were all making our days. I never wanted to drop anything, and I didn’t. I was very proud of that,” Winslet recently told The Hollywood Reporter at a special screening of the Netflix movie in New York, speaking of the shortened filming schedule. “We had seven children in the film as well as all of our adult actors, so just the constant juggle of that and being in front of the camera as well as behind it, just the juggle of it all we had to adapt to very quickly.”

    Still, she “loved” the experience, she said, unprovoked, adding, when asked if she wants to direct again, “I really hope I do. I would love to direct again.”

    And Winslet’s extensive acting career, including the bonds she’d developed with others in the industry through her 30 years in front of the camera, was key to this endeavor.

    “Being able to really lean on great relationships that I’ve developed over the years, that was very meaningful, because we needed to have that sense of goodwill around us,” Winslet said, adding that it was imperative to have people who were “good humored, really willing and supportive of one another.”

    For the role of June’s (Mirren) husband Bernie, Winslet approached Timothy Spall, with whom she’d worked 30 years before on a production of Hamlet, and it was this past experience as well as the strength of the script, written by Winslet’s son, Joe Anders, that convinced Spall to board the project.

    “I knew that she was a very special person and a very special actress,” Spall told THR of Winslet at the Goodbye June screening. “When I read the script, I said I wouldn’t be able to do it because I was working too hard. But I read it the following day and told her I wanted to do it because it’s so fantastic. And she, I knew, would be all over it because of the way she spoke about it. It was so close to her and such a sense of what it was going to be about. Given her brilliance as an actress and what she’s experienced as an actress, I knew she’d be absolutely perfect. It was time for her to direct.”

    And as a director, Winslet lived up to Spall’s expectations, with him calling her “one of the best directors I’ve ever worked with” and praising her for doing “a massive amount of preparation” but making the process “feel completely natural.”

    “She did all the work, all the amazing work it takes. She covered every department; she cast it so well; she chose the people to be behind the camera and in front of the camera,” Spall explained. “She was so brilliant about being in charge of things and making you feel as though it’s all happening at the same time. That takes a bit of genius. That takes a very good heart, massive intelligence, a lot of confidence and a lot of openness, and she’s got all of those things. It’s not an easy thing to direct a movie because it’s like being the president or the prime minister. You’ve got a lot of things to take into consideration.”

    Co-star Toni Collette, who plays one of Winslet’s character’s sisters and June’s daughter, echoed this praise of the low-key set.

    “It was just easy. It was like a totally natural progression for her, having worked in film for 30 years and worked with so many wonderful directors,” Collette told THR. “She creates an incredible atmosphere of freedom. It just felt very grounded, very accepting, very relaxed and free.”

    The Wayward star also spoke about how Winslet’s experience as an actress helped her behind the camera.

    “The one thing I think we have on our side as actors is we get to work with a lot of different directors. Directors don’t get to do that,” Collette told THR. “So they get to see how other people work. She could obviously have her own intelligence and intuition but also take from all of the wonderful people she’d worked with.”

    And for Collette personally, working with Winslet was the fulfillment of a decades-long desire to collaborate.

    “I have wanted to work with Kate for decades. I have been a fan. There’s so much in her that I admire as a person, her work, her career, everything, what she stands for, what she fights for,” Collette said. “I got a call out of the blue saying she wanted to talk to me about a project. Then I heard that she was directing. I mean, I would have been happy acting, but when someone chooses you to be in their directorial debut, it’s such an honor. I spoke to her within 48 hours. She took me through the story. I was like, sign me up.”

    She continued, “When I read [the script], it was completely heartbreaking and also made my heart soar in the best possible way because it’s such a realistic, gorgeous story about this average, dysfunctional family going through something really, really challenging. I just think it’s a really special story. And she just put the most incredible group of people together on and offscreen. It was such a magical experience, one of the best.”

    Goodbye June is now streaming on Netflix.

    [ad_2]

    Hilary Lewis

    Source link

  • Kate Winslet ‘Desperately Tried’ to Recast Herself in ‘Goodbye June’ Directorial Debut: ‘I Cannot Do Three Jobs’

    [ad_1]

    Kate Winslet is opening up about the challenges she faced while making her directorial debut, “Goodbye June.”

    Written by her son, Joe Anders, the actress revealed that she only planned to star and produce the film. When she was also offered the opportunity to direct the feature, Winslet said that her initial thought was that she “cannot do three jobs.”

    “I know I’m good at multitasking, but this is too many things,” Winslet told Digi Spy. “I desperately tried to recast myself [and] had a really good list of a handful of people who would have been absolutely brilliant in that role.”

    She continued, “But at that point… well, first of all, Netflix was like, ‘Uh-uh,’ and secondly, I’d cast all these incredible actors. How could I not go and play with them? Because that’s what we do. We play, we pretend, and it’s an amazing thing.”

    Now playing in select theaters, “Goodbye June” follows four adult siblings and their father as they navigate their family dynamic as their sick mother’s health takes a turn for the worse. Winslet stars as Julia, one of June’s children, with Helen Mirren playing June, the matriarch of the family.

    “I know it sounds a bit sickly, but we had to really become a family in order to make it feel as real as possible and as relatable as possible,” Winslet added. “You can’t just show up and do the job and go home again; it becomes something else. We were lucky on this film that that really happened.”

    In addition to Winslet and Mirren, “Goodbye June” stars Toni Collette, Johnny Flynn, Andrea Riseborough and Timothy Spall. Additional cast members include Stephen Merchant, Fisayo Akinade, Jeremy Swift and Raza Jaffrey.

    After its theatrical run, the film will arrive on Netflix on Dec. 24.

    [ad_2]

    Giana Levy

    Source link

  • Netflix Hosts Kate Winslet for Afternoon Tea in Celebration of Her Directorial Debut ‘Goodbye June’: “I Had to Be Really, Really Ready”

    [ad_1]

    At afternoon tea with Kate Winslet and Andrea Riseborough, it’s a case of waiting your turn.

    The beloved British actresses were in central London Tuesday for a screening and informal discussion about their upcoming Netflix film Goodbye June. Winslet’s directorial debut — anchored by a gut-wrenching script from her 21-year-old son, Joe Anders — is a Christmas film with just as much joy as it has heartache.

    Helen Mirren stars as the titular character who, upon receiving a terminal cancer diagnosis, has her swarm of four children (played by Winslet, Riseborough, Toni Collette and Johnny Flynn) and their families descend on her hospital room ahead of Christmas Day. Winslet’s Julia and Riseborough’s Molly are forced to confront their long-running feud while everyone tussles with their bubbling grief. Timothy Spall, Stephen Merchant and Fisayo Akinade also star in the movie, in theaters Dec. 12 and hitting Netflix Dec. 24.

    Winslet and Anders spoke in depth with The Hollywood Reporter this week about just how the Oscar-winning actress brought her son’s script to the screen.

    And over a cup of tea and a macaron at a Netflix-hosted event, the Titanic star further detailed bringing a brilliant batch of actors together. “They are great people. I had to cast people who not only were going to be the only people who could play those parts, but who were going to be lovely,” Winslet says. “I knew they all were — even if I didn’t know them personally, I knew their reputations, because word gets around if someone’s tricky.”

    The original plan had been to take the film out to financiers and get another director on board, but Winslet didn’t want to let Goodbye June go. The magic she and Anders were able to conjure on set was more than enough validation. “He really found it fascinating,” she says about Anders seeing his project come to life through his mother.

    “We shot it in 35 days, and I had Helen Mirren for 16 days,” she continues. “So I had to be really ready. All those adult actors, all those children, the whole group, loads of different locations, I had to be really, really ready. So for [Anders], there were moments when he turned to me and [would] go, ‘What’s happening? How have we done all this?’ I’m like, ‘I don’t know! Let’s keep going!’ We just had to hold hands and run at it.”

    Some stellar performances from the film’s child actors strengthen an already solid cast. “The trick with children is you just mother them,” Winslet explains about working with the kids. “I used all of my own experience as a mother in empowering children, showing them how to have fun by saying to them, ‘Don’t learn any lines and make lots of mistakes. OK?’”

    What you don’t want is a child memorizing an abstract bit of dialogue, Winslet says. “We didn’t want that, because children bring the joy. And when you’re in a situation where there’s tragedy happening … they just get on with what they’re doing with the coloring or playing or hiding in the bed.”

    “It was so funny,” she recalls, “because I would carry the little ones on to set. They always felt like, ‘Oh, where’s Kate taking us?’ I said to them: ‘Do you know, that in that bed, I’ve actually hidden something…’ So then they’re looking for the hidden thing under the sheets [with] no idea that we were filming an entire scene around them and quite complicated emotions.”

    Those in attendance at the Netflix event were desperate to get the chance to talk with a prolific actress who has masterfully executed her long-awaited turn in the director’s chair. But Winslet is also just a mother gushing with pride. “He has brilliant ideas. He’s very, very smart,” she says about Anders. “For as long as I can remember, he’s always written… He’s very humble and very shy.”

    “I just wanted him to learn,” she continues. “And I wanted him to be around all these incredible actors.”

    Goodbye June hits Netflix on Christmas Eve.

    [ad_2]

    Lily Ford

    Source link

  • Acclaimed Hugh Grant Movie Gets Theatrical Rerelease for 30th Anniversary

    [ad_1]

    Sony Pictures has announced the Sense and Sensibility theatrical release date for the upcoming special screening of the classic romance period drama based on Jane Austen’s iconic 1811 novel of the same name. It was led by Academy Award winners Emma Thompson and Kate Winslet, along with Golden Globe winners Hugh Grant and Alan Rickman. Since its debut in 1995, the movie has maintained its near-perfect Tomatometer rating of 97% on Rotten Tomatoes, based on 67 reviews.

    “The film tells the story of the Dashwood sisters: pragmatic Elinor and passionate Marianne. When their father dies unexpectedly, his estate must pass by law to his son from his first marriage, leaving Mr. Dashwood’s current wife and daughters without a home and with barely enough money to live on,” reads the official synopsis. “As both sisters struggle to find romantic fulfillment in a society obsessed with financial and social status, Elinor with shy, charming Edward, and Marianne with either the dashing Willoughby or the haunted Colonel Brandon, they must learn to mix sense with sensibility in their dealings with both money and men.

    When is the rerelease date for Hugh Grant’s Sense and Sensibility movie?

    In celebration of its 30th anniversary and Austen’s 250th birthday, Sense and Sensibility is officially returning to select theaters in 4K for a limited engagement in North America on December 14, December 16, and December 17. In addition to its critical success, the movie was also a box office hit. During its original theatrical run, it earned a worldwide gross of $135 million against a reported budget of around $16 million.

    The movie adaptation was directed by acclaimed filmmaker Ang Lee, with Thompson writing the screenplay. The ensemble cast also included Greg Wise as John Willoughby, Gemma Jones as Mrs. Dashwood, Harriet Walter as Fanny Dashwood, James Fleet as John Dashwood, Imogen Stubbs as Lucy Steele, Hugh Laurie as Mr. Palmer, Imelda Staunton as Charlotte Palmer, and more. It was produced by Lindsay Doran, with Sydney Pollack serving as an executive producer.

    [ad_2]

    Maggie Dela Paz

    Source link

  • 40 Titanic Memes That Are Sure Make to Waves….

    [ad_1]

    I have to admit, I’m a bit obsessed with the Titanic. I can’t explain what it is about the ship, but this is quite literally my Roman Empire. I think about it regularly, and I think about it often.

    It’s a fascinating tragedy and I can’t seem to get it out of my head.

    Luckily there are an infinite amount of Titanic memes. Whether you’re into making fun of dead billionaires, or Leo DiCaprio’s preference for younger women, we’ve got you covered.

    Ahoy!

    [ad_2]

    Zach

    Source link

  • Jude Law Would Revive Mr. Napkin Head for ‘The Holiday’ Series on One Condition

    [ad_1]

    Jude Law seduced more than a few viewers in the Christmas rom-com The Holiday. Released in 2006, the film starred Law as Graham, a widower and father of two little girls who gradually falls in love with Amanda, a recently separated Californian played by Cameron Diaz. Last month, fans of the romantic comedy that has become a holiday classic learned that the feature film would be adapted into a mini-series. The AppleTV+ project follows the original synopsis. Namely: the story of two young women, one British and one American, who swap homes for the festive season—and not without surprises, as they each end up finding true love during their journey.

    In an interview with Today to promote his new Netflix series Black Rabbit, Law spoke about the return of the cult film. A project he didn’t know existed until the original director, Nancy Meyers, told him about it. “You know, I’ve heard of it. I don’t know anything about it. Nothing, except that I don’t think I’m part of it. I don’t know,” he said. “I think Nancy wrote to me and asked, ‘Have you heard of it?’ literally.”

    So when asked if he’d be up for starring in the miniseries, Law had just one condition: that the director of the iconic rom-com be at the helm of the project. “Nancy Meyers would have to be involved [for me to accept],” he said. “She’s the one who gave the film its magic back in the day.” A pretty simple condition to meet, don’t you think? Well, far from it, since Meyers discovered the Apple TV+ project like millions of other Internet users—that is, on social media. It was in an Instagram story that the filmmaker shared her astonishment at the project’s announcement last August. “First news. Imagine my surprise when I opened Instagram and this was the first publication I saw,” she wrote.

    In addition to the romance between Law and Diaz under the gray skies of the UK, The Holiday followed the adventures of Iris (Kate Winslet), a British journalist staying in Los Angeles who falls for Miles (Jack Black), a music composer. So, while Law doesn’t appear to be reprising his role in this Apple TV+ adaptation, it remains to be seen who will step into the shoes of his character Graham. Last month, casting began for the lead roles, formerly played by Diaz and Winslet. According to Deadline, the project should receive the green light once the stars align.

    Originally published in Vanity Fair France.

    [ad_2]

    Olivia Batoul

    Source link

  • Caught In The Lens – Kate Winslet’s Weak Take On Lee Miller

    Caught In The Lens – Kate Winslet’s Weak Take On Lee Miller

    [ad_1]

    When good intentions triumph over art, one winds up with a film like Lee. It features Kate Winslet as Lee Miller (1907-1977), a model, surrealist muse, and a pioneering fashion, fine art, and war photographer who captured some of the most devastating and damning images of World War II.

    Full trailer released for Sky Original film LEE starring Kate Winslet.

    – YouTubewww.youtube.com

    Full trailer released for Sky Original film LEE starring Kate Winsletwww.milkpublicity.com

    Miller’s was an uneasy – if accomplished – life. Blonde and strikingly beautiful, she was underrated and undervalued according to the sexist behavior and views of her era. And ours. One has the feeling that Winslet was compelled to dedicate nine years to a passion project that rescues Miller from history because the actor knows precisely what Miller went through. Her understanding of Miller’s struggles likely stems from Winslet’s own experiences with sexism in the film industry – women continue to be underrepresented behind the camera as directors, producers, and in other key creative roles – allowing her to bring insight and empathy to the role.

    – YouTubewww.youtube.com

    When she was seven, Lee Miller was raped by an adult friend of the family – who gave her gonorrhea. Lee then endured a painful and shaming treatment for the disease. She ditched an undistinguished academic career for a highly successful stint as a fashion model.

    Miller’s ambitions went beyond merely being photographed; she wanted to take the pictures herself. In the late 1920s she traveled to what was then the world’s capital of the arts: Paris. La Ville Lumière still offered easy, inexpensive freedom thanks to the strength of the American dollar and the lax social norms of a city that had seen it all.

    She fell in with the surrealists and adopted their iconography and strategies of fragmenting the human body, tilting the images, and zooming in on details. Miller created radical surrealist images of the nude form as well as the streets of Paris.

    Miller became involved romantically and artistically with the saturnine expat Man Ray, (Emmanuel Radnitzky American, 1890–1976) whose photos and paintings had brought him to the attention of the leaders of the Surrealist movement. Miller’s technical and artistic contribution to Ray’s achievements were only properly attributed long after the fact. Sexist ambition once again reared its ugly head.

    After this stint abroad, she enjoyed a successful career as an American photographer and was married to an Egyptian railroad man. When that alliance ended she returned in the late 30s to Paris and marriage to the British painter Roland Penrose brings Miller’s history to the point where Lee begins.

    However, none of the people or events that molded her life are coherently dealt with in the film. In the role of Duchess Solange d’Ayen – fashion editor of French Vogue, Marion Cotillard’s talents are completely wasted. And I doubt that those unfamiliar with pre-war French artistic circles can guess that Ray and the poet Paul Eluard are also characters in the film. Their names are dropped to no effect and make no impact whatsoever. In terms of character portrayal, Lee is simultaneously overheated and undercooked.

    Winslet chooses to play Miller in the-artist-as-walking-disaster mode. She goes to great lengths to show us how damaged Miller was by life and by her self-destructive behavior. If Winslet isn’t lighting another unfiltered cigarette, she’s downing another glass of booze before indulging in another tantrum about how badly she and her photographs are being treated. The way Miller’s rape as a child is dramatized is par for the course. The ugly fact of venereal disease is simply too much for the filmmakers to address.

    Miller comes off as a troublesome, clumsy boor. It’s a brave performance in its way, unflattering and unfettered, but it’s an obvious one. A monotonous one, as well. The viewer soon wearies of Lee Miller. Surely that’s the last thing Winslet wants to accomplish with Lee.

    It’s disappointing – a wasted opportunity. In a male-dominated world, Miller was a groundbreaker as a photographer and as a woman. Her work is of intense artistic and historical interest. The World War II photos – of the London Blitz, liberation of Paris, and Buchenwald and Dachau concentration camps – are as painful and moving as any taken during those horrible years, whether it’s the wounded soldier whose face and hands are swathed in bandages…or the naked corpses piled in boxcars at Dachau.

    Winslet and her artistic collaborators are to be applauded for choosing to make a film about Lee Miller. I wish, though, the film had been a less fractured and simplistic look at a fascinating and – yes – troubled woman.

    [ad_2]

    Honor Molloy

    Source link

  • On Carrie Bradshaw Developing the Idea for Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind

    On Carrie Bradshaw Developing the Idea for Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind

    [ad_1]

    Although it’s easy to shit on Sex and the City in the present, there are occasional moments in the show when one realizes how truly visionary it was for its time. You know, going to a tantric sex workshop and vaguely acknowledging white privilege while you’re getting a pedicure—things like that. But one thing Sex and the City rarely gets credit for is providing the kernel of the idea for Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. This occurred in season four of the series; specifically, episode six: “Time and Punishment” (the same episode where Charlotte York [Kristin Davis] was shamed for having “free time” instead of working). Which aired three years before Eternal Sunshine… was released in 2004.

    But back in July of 2001, when “Time and Punishment” first aired, Carrie Bradshaw (Sarah Jessica Parker) had the sudden “revelation” that cheating on Aidan Shaw (John Corbett) back in mid-season three was the worst mistake of her life—or at least her romantic life (which, in truth, embodies one hundred percent of Carrie’s existence). Therefore, narcissist that she is, Carrie obviously believes it’s within her power to get him back…just because she decides on a whim that’s what she wants. And apparently, she’s not wrong in her assumption, wearing Aidan down with her seduction methods (however stalker-y) until he concedes that, sure, he wants to get back together.

    But before that glorious (for Carrie) moment, Bradshaw gives us one of her signature voiceover “insights” from the column de la semaine she’s writing, ruminating on a person’s inability to forgive if they can’t really forget. So it is that she tell us: “Later that day, I got to thinking about relationships and partial lobotomies. Two seemingly different ideas that might be perfect together, like chocolate and peanut butter. Think how much easier it would all be if there was some swift surgical procedure to whisk away all the ugly memories and mistakes and leave only the fun trips and special holidays.” Yes, Carrie is perfectly describing what Charlie Kaufman would call “Lacuna Inc.” in Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. Minus the part where even the fun trips and special holidays are remembered. For, in Carrie’s ideal version of relationship memory erasure, you still at least remember the person existed in your life prior to the “procedure.”

    Kaufman and Michel Gondry did that concept one better by making it key for all traces of the person to be forgotten. Even though it only set up someone like Clementine Kruczynski (Kate Winslet) and Joel Barish (Jim Carrey) for the trap of gravitating right back toward the person they ended up finding toxic in the first place. Which is also something that Zoë Kravitz’s Blink Twice addresses in a more ominous way. But what Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind prefers to do is position the inevitable “re-attraction” between two people who were already unable to make it work before as something with a more hopeful tinge. Not just more hopeful than what Blink Twice does with the concept, but also with what ends up happening to Carrie and Aidan by the end of season four (hint: total emotional catastrophe/an even more painful breakup than the first time around).

    However, before the reasons for their first breakup are proven yet again (and tenfold), to conclude her thoughts on the matter of “forgiving and forgetting,” Carrie adds, “But until that day arrives, what to do? Rely on the same old needlepoint philosophy of ‘forgive and forget’? And even if a couple can manage the forgiveness, has any[one] ever really conquered the forgetness? Can you ever really forgive, if you can’t forget?” In Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, there’s no need to forgive because all has been forgotten.

    As for setting up the premise for “Time and Punishment,” the episode that precedes it, “Baby, Talk Is Cheap,” also refers to the “unforgettability” (therefore, unforgivability) of what Carrie did to Aidan. An egregious sin he feels obliged to remind her of when she has the gall to come to his door late at night and plead her case for getting back together. None of her “logic” trumps the fact that, as Aidan screams, “You broke my heart!” But Carrie sees that only as a “minor detail” when presenting him with the “argument,” “Look, I know that you’re probably scared and I would be too, but it’s different now. Things are different. I-I’m different.” She then tries to prove it by taking a pack of cigarettes out of her purse and declaring, “Cigarettes, gone.” Of course, if they were really “gone,” they wouldn’t have been in her purse in the first place.

    Nonetheless, Carrie continues to insist that this “new” her was clearly not responsible for the actions of the old her and, thus, shouldn’t be punished by being denied another chance. She assures Aidan, “Seriously, all bad habits gone. This is a whole new thing because I miss you. And I’ve missed you.” As though her desire for him alone should be enough for him to want to forget about all the pain she caused him. And when Aidan screams the aforementioned line at her audacity, Carrie displays the kind of immaturity and embarrassing behavior she’s known for by simply running away instead of staying to face the firing squad, as it were.

    Ultimately, though, she gets what she wants: for Aidan to submit to her. Granted, not without an initial bout of passive aggressive behavior in “Time and Punishment” that finally prompts Carrie to say of the co-worker he’s been openly flirting with, “Why don’t you just fuck her, then we can both be bad.” When he comes to her door at the end of the episode, Carrie tells him, “I know that you can’t forget what happened, but I hope that you can forgive me.” But she was onto something before in her column—the idea that no true forgiveness can be attained without forgetting. Ergo, her wish for a Lacuna Inc.-like enterprise that wouldn’t “exist” until three years later…perhaps after Kaufman caught sight of Carrie’s column. And while Carrie might not have been the first to wish for this form of a “relationship lobotomy,” she was the only one to say it out loud in such a crystallized way before Eternal Sunshine… came along to perfect the notion.

    [ad_2]

    Genna Rivieccio

    Source link

  • The Boons and Banes of Memory Erasure in Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind and Blink Twice

    The Boons and Banes of Memory Erasure in Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind and Blink Twice

    [ad_1]

    Romy Schneider once said, “Memories are the best things in life, I think.” But are they, really, if some of them serve only as a brutal, triggering source of trauma? In both Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind and Blink Twice, that’s the main type of memory being dealt with, therefore suppressed. But while one is a “rom-com” (Charlie Kaufman-style), the other is a horrifying thriller with a #MeToo slant. Both, however, do center on “the necessity” of memory erasure as it pertains to the relationship between men and women.

    Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, of course, is much “lighter” by comparison. Even though, in its time and its place, it was considered just as “bleak” as it was “quirky.” It’s also more hyper-focused on one relationship in particular, in contrast to Blink Twice speaking to the overall power dynamics between men and women as it relates to sex rather than “romance.” More to the point, the power dynamics between rich men and “regular” women. In Michel Gondry and Charlie Kaufman’s narrative, the main “sufferers” (or beneficiaries, depending on one’s own personal views) of select memory loss are Clementine Kruczynski (Kate Winslet) and Joel Barish (Jim Carrey). But it is the former who “brings it on both of them,” as she’s the one to initially enlist the memory-erasing services of Lacuna Inc., run by Dr. Howard Mierzwiak (Tom Wilkinson). Joel merely follows suit after comprehending what she’s done, deciding that she shouldn’t be the only person in the relationship permitted the luxury of forgetting about all that they shared together. Good and bad.

    So it is that he, too, undergoes the procedure, briefed on the ins and out of it by Mary Svevo (Kirsten Dunst), the receptionist at Lacuna, and Dr. Mierzwiak before opting to excise Clementine from his brain as well (in a scene later to be repurposed by Ariana Grande for the “we can’t be friends [wait for your love]” video). Of course, this isn’t to say he’s not extremely hurt by her “whimsical” decision to “remove” him. Alas, by way of explanation, Dr. Mierzwiak can only offer, “She wanted to move on. We provide that possibility.” One can imagine that Slater King (Channing Tatum) tells himself something similar about his own nefarious operation on a private island that might as well be referred to as Little Saint James (a.k.a. the former “Epstein Island”).

    Sex and the City, incidentally, provided something of a precursor to the Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind “idea kernel” (de facto, the Blink Twice one) in the form of the season four episode, “Time and Punishment.” This due to Carrie’s (Sarah Jessica Parker) theme for her column of the week being whether or not you can ever really forgive someone if you can’t forget what they did (to you). The answer, in both Eternal Sunshine… and Blink Twice, seems to be a resounding no. Though, in the former, there appears to be a greater chance for redemption even after the couple remembers everything that happened between them (and still decides to give it another shot). This courtesy of Mary, who not only unveils the truth to all of Lacuna’s clients (or “patients”), but also unearths her own bitter truth vis-à-vis memory erasure: Howard did it to her (per her request) after the two had an affair. And yet, just as it is for Frida (Naomi Ackie) in Blink Twice, it’s as though we are doomed to repeat the same behavior/gravitate toward the same toxic person regardless of whether the slate (a.k.a. the mind) is wiped clean or not.

    In Blink Twice, Zoë Kravitz’s directorial debut (which she co-wrote with E.T. Feigenbaum), that gravitation proves to be much more harmful for Frida, who drags her best friend, Jess (Alia Shawkat), along for the ride after infiltrating Slater’s fancy benefit dinner for his requisite “foundation.” Although the two are initially working the party as cater waiters, Frida has them both switch into gowns (which scream “trying too hard” while still looking embarrassingly cheap). Naturally, Slater invites them to accompany him and his entourage back to the island where he’s been sequestered in order to “work on himself” as part of a grand performance of a public apology for “bad behavior” past (there’s no need to get specific about what that might have entailed, for there’s a whole range of bad behavior [typically, sexual abuse/harassment-related] that female viewers can easily imagine for themselves). Though, usually, if one is truly working on themselves, they do so by not buying a private island to retreat to. By actually trying to exist in and adapt to the world around them, rather than creating an entirely new one that fits their own “needs.” But that’s the thing: Slater and his ilk don’t want to adapt, don’t want to acknowledge that things have changed and so, too, must their old ways. Instead, they’ve set up a “paradise” for themselves that happens to be every woman’s hell.

    The only requirement to keep them there? Scrubbing any memories they have of being sexually assaulted every night on the island. In lieu of Lacuna, Slater needs only a perfume called Desideria, conveniently crafted from a flower that’s only found on that particular island. It’s, in many ways, a slightly more implausible method for making someone forget a traumatic experience than all-out memory erasure through a “scientific procedure” like Lacuna’s. But, for Kravitz’s purposes, it works. Those purposes extend not only to holding up a mirror to the ongoing and new-fangled ways that men, even post-#MeToo, still manage to behave like barbarians, but also to the ways in which women “self-protect” by conveniently “removing” memories that are too painful to deal with, especially when it comes to men and their egregious comportment. This, in part, is why the Desideria is so effective. There’s a sense that the women of the island are only too ready to forget/ignore what horrors befell them the previous night.

    In the abovementioned Sex and the City episode, there’s a scene at the end where Carrie repeats (seven times) to Aidan (John Corbett), “You have to forgive me” in different “Oscar-worthy” manners. Just as Slater repeats, “I’m sorry” in different dramatic ways until he then askes Frida if she forgives him yet. Seeing (and expecting) that she definitely doesn’t, it only serves to prove his point that, no, you cannot forgive without forgetting (though, to be fair/in this case, maybe just don’t act like women owe you unfettered access to their bodies/treat them like disposable objects designed solely for your amusement and there won’t be any need to forgive).

    Thus, he considers himself in the right (or at least that he “had no choice”) for doing what he did in order to get what he wanted out of her and the other women he lures to the island with his charm (and, of course, the allure of his wealth). In Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, there is also a belief, on Clementine’s part, in being “in the right” for willingly expunging her own memories without any man needing to do it for her. In this sense, one might say that Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind is all about the importance of agency in having certain aspects of your memories erased for the sake of self-preservation.

    [ad_2]

    Genna Rivieccio

    Source link

  • Kate Winslet: Kissing Leonardo DiCaprio wasn’t ‘all it’s cracked up to be’ – National | Globalnews.ca

    Kate Winslet: Kissing Leonardo DiCaprio wasn’t ‘all it’s cracked up to be’ – National | Globalnews.ca

    [ad_1]

    Many people would swoon at the chance to kiss Leonardo DiCaprio, but Kate Winslet is here to set the record straight: “It was not all it’s cracked up to be.”

    The famous on-screen kiss between Winslet and DiCaprio at the front of the Titanic is one of the most iconic scenes from the 1997 film. But shooting that moment was far from romantic, Winslet revealed in an interview with Vanity Fair published Thursday that it was a “nightmare.”

    The Oscar-winner shared that she was constantly out of breath because her corset was so tight, and that her and DiCaprio’s makeup kept rubbing off on each other during takes.

    “Oh god, it was such a mess,” she said.

    The format of the Vanity Fair interview had Winslet rewatching and commenting on iconic scenes from her career. When the Titanic kiss scene came up, Winslet immediately reacted: “Oh my lordy. This might be really cringe.”

    Story continues below advertisement

    Winslet was only 22 when Titanic came out and DiCaprio was 23. The actors, both of whom have gone on to win Oscars, were still very early in their careers.


    The movie “Titanic”, written and directed by James Cameron. Seen here from left, Leonardo DiCaprio as Jack and Kate Winslet as Rose. Winslet revealed in a Vanity Fair interview that kissing DiCaprio wasn’t “all it’s cracked up to be.”

    Photo by CBS via Getty Images

    As Winslet watched the scene she commented: “See I look at that and I just see how much I couldn’t breathe in that bloody corset.”


    The email you need for the day’s
    top news stories from Canada and around the world.

    “Yep. See I can’t breathe,” she said later in the scene. “My boobs practically up to my chin,” she chuckled.

    Winslet explained that this scene needed to be reshot four times in order to get the perfect sunset glow, and her co-star wasn’t exactly making the process easy.

    “Oh this was a nightmare, shooting this, because Leo couldn’t stop laughing and we had to reshoot this about four times, because the light — Jim wanted a very specific light for this, obviously, and the sunsets kept changing where we were.”

    Story continues below advertisement

    (Director James Cameron sometimes goes by Jim.)

    Another factor that made this scene difficult was that it wasn’t shot on the normal Titanic ship set. The set used for kiss scene was a “a little sort of sawn off bit” of just the ship’s bow, Winslet said.

    “We had to climb up a ladder to get to it,” Winslet said, noting that hair and makeup artists couldn’t reach them up there, so she stepped up as the on-set makeup retoucher. She had makeup and brushes and sponges hidden in her costume for the two of them.

    “Between takes I was basically redoing our makeup,” she revealed.

    And while it may not be noticeable, Winslet confirmed that DiCaprio was wearing makeup for the scene, to give him a “fake tan.”

    “So we kept doing this kiss, and I have a lot of pale makeup on,” she said. “I would end up looking as though I had been suckling a caramel chocolate bar after each take. Because his makeup would come off on me.”

    Winslet’s makeup would also come off on DiCaprio, leaving him with a patches of pale makeup around his mouth.

    Despite discussing all the issues with the scenes, even Winslet couldn’t seem to deny DiCaprio’s charm.

    Story continues below advertisement

    “My god, he’s quite the romancer, isn’t he? No wonder every young girl in the world wanted to be kissed by Leonardo DiCaprio,” she said.

    After the scene was finished, Winslet reflected on the impact that 1997’s Titanic continues to have.

    “I do feel very proud of it, because I feel that it is that film that keeps giving. Whole other generations of people are discovering the film or seeing it for the first time, and there’s something extraordinary about that,” she said.

    “It doesn’t mean that people don’t get me to try and reenact this every time I’m on a flipping boat, which does my head in,” she said, annoyed. “Every time, without fail.”

    Titanic was a mega-hit when it first premiered. It was the first film ever to make over US$1 billion worldwide and maintained its position as the highest-grossing film of all time until Cameron beat his own record with Avatar in 2009.

    Story continues below advertisement

    It is currently the fourth highest-grossing film ever, behind both Avatar movies and Avengers: End Game.


    Click to play video: 'James Cameron on Titanic sub disaster: ‘One wreck lying next to the other for the same damn reason’'


    James Cameron on Titanic sub disaster: ‘One wreck lying next to the other for the same damn reason’




    &copy 2024 Global News, a division of Corus Entertainment Inc.

    [ad_2]

    Kathryn Mannie

    Source link

  • Hugh Grant Had Never Died On Camera Before ‘The Regime’

    Hugh Grant Had Never Died On Camera Before ‘The Regime’

    [ad_1]

    Edward Keplinger, we hardly knew ye. On the fourth episode of The Regime, “Midnight Feast,” Hugh Grant finally appears as the former chancellor, who resides in a prison underneath the palace. Yet Grant’s stay on The Regime was surprisingly short-lived.  After befriending newly imprisoned Herbert Zuback (Matthias Schoenaerts), the Butcher murders Keplinger in a fit of rage—getting back into Chancellor Elena’s good graces as she continues to lose her grip on her country. Grant stops by a new episode of Still Watching to discuss his short but impactful stint on The Regime, reuniting with Kate Winslet after almost three decades, and dying on camera for the first time.  

    It surprised even Grant when he realized that over the course of his four-decade career, he’d never perished on camera before The Regime. “I had no idea how to do it,” Grant told Still Watching hosts Hillary Busis and Chris Murphy. Though the scene is gripping, the famously curmudgeonly actor was less convinced by his own performance. “I said, Stephen [Frears, the show’s director], I think I’m going to be shit. He said, ‘No, no, it’s wonderful.’ But I think it was shit, because I’ve noticed they put in an extra shot of someone’s hand. And it’s not even mine.”

    Hand-double or no, Grant had a pleasant time shooting The Regime, particularly reuniting with Winslet 29 years after they costarred in Sense and Sensibility. “She had done Heavenly Creatures, but she was new enough for Ang Lee to say things to her,” Grant said. “He’s a lovely man, as you may know. But partly because of the language barrier, he came across as quite blunt. He said to Kate at the end of her first week, ‘You will get better.’” Grant also recalled Lee giving some tough constructive criticism to himself and costar Emma Thompson. “He also said to me and Emma Thompson after our first scene, ‘Very boring.’ So, he was quite blunt.” 

    Grant imagined that Keplinger and Elena had a complicated past together, perhaps even actual love lost between the two. “I always had as a back story that he’d probably had an affair with Elena years ago, at university or something, but that maybe he hasn’t been a great success in bed,” says Grant. “I think that Keplinger might be a bit lapsang souchong between the sheets, and was a bit jealous of Zubak, who probably isn’t.”  

    As for whether Keplinger was a better chancellor than Elena, Grant remains unconvinced. “I think he was stale buns,” said Grant. “I think he’d had his go at chancellor and there was probably about five minutes when the people thought he was the bee’s knees. And then I think they thought, ‘Uh, he’s a bit of a wanker, really. He’s not really one of us. He’s university educated and part of the liberal elite.’” The actor doesn’t necessarily disagree with this assessment either. “He’s a bit snobby and he kind of despises the uneducated, especially when they go populist and, and, you know, vote for an Elena or some bullshitter like that.” 

    Are Elena and Zuback officially back on? Has Chancellor Elena fully lost control of her regime? Only two episodes remain in this season of The Regime. As always, send any questions, comments, or thoughts about the series to Still Watching at stillwatchingpod@gmail.com.

    [ad_2]

    Chris Murphy

    Source link

  • Guillaume Gallienne Loved Living With Kate Winslet During ‘The Regime’

    Guillaume Gallienne Loved Living With Kate Winslet During ‘The Regime’

    [ad_1]

    Oh, how The Foundling has fallen. In the third episode of The Regime, “The Heroes’ Banquet,” Matthias Schoenaerts’s Corporal Zubak is banished from the palace after an intense and violent confrontation with Kate Winslet’s Chancellor Elena. On a new episode of Still Watching, hosts Hillary Busis, Richard Lawson, and Chris Murphy dissect Elena’s sudden change of heart, and how it may shape Zubak’s future. Plus, Guillaume Gallienne drops by the podcast to discuss playing first gentleman Nicky. 

    Zubak starts the episode riding high as Elena’s right-hand man, convincing her to eat dirt and employ sweeping land reform in the state we’re still calling Genovia. However, Zubak turns on Elena after she reveals that she and her cabinet have been “skimming off the top” of the country, stealing billions from her citizens and storing the money in an offshore bank account called the Belize Fund. But Elena has bigger things to worry about then Zubak, as an impulsive decision to annex the Faban Corridor may have landed her in international hot water, without any allies.

    Although Zubak has seemingly driven a wedge between Elena and her husband, Nicky, Regime star Guillaume Gallienne still believes in their relationship.  “I’m sure that there is love,” says Gallienne regarding Nicky’s relationship with Elena. “There must have been passion at first, because he left everything, his wife, his kid. He left everything.” And despite being cast out of his marital bed, Gallienne believes Nicky still has a certain sway over Elena that no one else has—not even Zubak. “He’s got one advantage that the others don’t have—he’s not scared of her,” he says. “That is a very important thing. He can actually speak the truth to her.”

    While Nicky may be able speak truth to the chancellor, the power dynamics of their relationship are set in stone. “He’s a bit of a masochist,” Gallienne says. “I think he quite likes to be dominated by her. He likes to be her rug.” Gallienne’s offscreen relationship with Winslet was much less fraught. “The first scene we had was in the car, and we laughed so much,” Gallienne says. “We were laughing so much in this car, that Stephen [Frears] came to us and went, ‘Calm down, kids.’” 

    They apparently had such a great time that Winslet invited Gallienne to stay with her during the shoot. “She very quickly said, ‘I’m living in this house during the shooting. Don’t go to the hotel, come to the house,” Gallienne recalls. “And so we lived together for quite a long time during the shooting.… We got along very, very well. She’s so honest and very clever, and she’s very courageous.”

    Will Nicky and Elena make it to the end of The Regime still happily wed? Is this the last we’ll seen of Corporal Zubak? Has Elena unwittingly kicked off a civil war in Genovia by annexing the Faban Corridor? We’re halfway through The Regime, and it’s still anyone’s guess as to who will end up in charge by the series’ end. As always, send any questions, comments, or thoughts about the series to Still Watching at stillwatchingpod@gmail.com.

    [ad_2]

    Chris Murphy

    Source link

  • Ariana Grande’s “we can’t be friends (wait for your love)” Video: A Postmodernist’s Wet Dream

    Ariana Grande’s “we can’t be friends (wait for your love)” Video: A Postmodernist’s Wet Dream

    [ad_1]

    It’s safe to say that, of all the pop stars working today (apart from, of course, Madonna), Ariana Grande is the one most blatantly enamored of postmodernism—wherein no distinction exists between high and low art, and references galore are placed in a “pastiche blender.” Even more than her contemporaries, Lana Del Rey and Taylor Swift, Grande is the most obvious in how she’ll take a piece of pop culture and “reinterpret” it. Though perhaps some would say she’s merely recreating it, shot-for-shot, à la Gus Van Sant with Psycho. That much can practically be said of the video for her second single from Eternal Sunshine, “we can’t be friends (wait for your love).” This following her other pastiche-drenched video for “yes, and?,” which is a knockoff of Paula Abdul’s “Cold Hearted” video. 

    As with “yes, and?,” Christian Breslauer also directed “we can’t be friends (wait for your love),” marking their second collaboration. Perhaps they didn’t end up working together sooner due to Grande’s long-standing devotion to Hannah Lux Davis, who has brought us so many Grande music videos over the years, including “Bang Bang,” “Love Me Harder,” “Focus,” “Into You,” “Side to Side,” “breathin,” “thank u, next” (also filled with movie-related pastiche), “7 rings,” “break up with your girlfriend, i’m bored,” “boyfriend” and “Don’t Call Me Angel.”

    But “we can’t be friends (wait for your love)” has a different vibe from all of those aforementioned light-hearted videos (of which, even “breathin” was more light-hearted than this). Suffused with the kind of melancholia and restraint that comes in the wake of a breakup, Grande and Breslauer take what Michel Gondry and Charlie Kaufman did in Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind and distill it down to four minutes and forty-three seconds (something Kaufman would likely be horrified by). Starting with Grande being in the waiting room of “Brighter Days Inc.” (dumbed down from the more “esoteric” company name in Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, Lacuna Inc.—lacuna meaning “an unfilled space; a gap”), Grande’s penchant for pastiche might even extend to the 2004 (also when Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind was released) video for Gwen Stefani’s “What You Waiting For?” In it, Stefani also finds her in a dubious, nondescript waiting room filling out a form filled with odd questions (e.g., “Do you like the smell of gasoline?”). Except it isn’t to help erase her memory, but rather, “be inspired” a.k.a. get rid of her writer’s block. Grande doesn’t tend to have any issues with that, especially when she’s in her “after a breakup/new relationship” phase. 

    Riffing on Clementine Kruczynski’s (Kate Winslet) look, Grande sits in the waiting room of Brighter Days Inc.—an air of uncertainty about her—styled in a fur-trim coat, tights with knee-high boots (featuring a 70s-esque flower pattern) and a flower flourish drawn in white around her eye. This particular detail gives more Katy Perry than Clementine vibes (especially in the former’s hippie-dippy “Never Really Over” video), but it’s part of Grande’s own spin on the character. Which now also incorporates some version of herself thanks to her recent experience of wanting to erase the memory of a botched relationship. Namely, the one that resulted in her two-year marriage to Dalton Gomez. Hence, like Joel Barish (Jim Carrey, who Grande is a well-known fan of), we see Grande-as-“Peaches” (a none too subtle allusion to Clementine) filling out a form that basically denies Brighter Days Inc. any legal responsibility for what might happen after the procedure—including a lingering and barely dormant sense of regret. 

    So it is that we see “Peaches” checking the “Yes” box under the statement, “You have given extensive thought behind your decision and give Brighter Days Inc. the exclusive permission to remove this person completely from your memory.” Clementine herself, of course, didn’t give much extensive thought to it, later telling Joel, “You know me, I’m impulsive.” Peaches is likely the same way, simply wanting to rid herself of the pain that comes from remembering a failed relationship. Thus, despite seeing the anxiousness radiating from her as she resolves to go through with the decision, Peaches knows that it’s “for the best.” 

    Watching the “technicians” remove key mementos of the relationship from the box she brought in (the same way the patients in Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind do), viewers soon see the wall of the “operating room” open up behind her (kind of the way the wall opens up behind Miley Cyrus in the “Used To Be Young” video) to reveal the first memory to be scraped. The one that relates to the tiny teddy bear in the box. A bear plucked from what the Brits (and Arctic Monkeys) call a teddy picker by Grande’s ex, played by Evan Peters…who is labeled simply as “Lover” where credited (how Swiftian). The memory then starts to black-out around her (the same way it does for Joel just as he’s remembering all the “good stuff” he loved about being with Clementine). Startled by the abyssal nature of the process, this is the moment where the lyrics, “Me and my truth, we sit in silence/Mmm, baby girl it’s just me and you.” And as the very “Dancing On My Own” by Robyn beat swells again, the blackness around her is replaced by another memory, one in which Lover’s back is turned to her in bed. While she sits up in the place next to him, it’s as though the two are at the point in their relationship where things have become strained, and words have lost all meaning. 

    From this memory, Grande runs out to open the door, leading her into a snow-filled landscape where “Brighter Days” of them making snow angels together exist. This being Grande’s version of Joel and Clementine lying on the ice of the frozen-over Charles River (though, in actuality, that scene was filmed in Yorktown Heights). A “cut” is then made by way of a sheet falling over the scene to transition us from Peaches lying on the snow to Peaches lying in bed with Lover (side note: the sheets’ pattern gives off a decidedly “hospital bed” feel—maybe an unwitting allusion to how love makes you crazy). And in the same way that Clementine is literally yanked away from Joel while they’re lying on the ice together, so, too, is Lover while he and Peaches are looking at each other with the same loving fondness in bed. 

    In the next scene, Breslauer cuts to the memory box again, as a technician picks up a framed photo of the two arranged in “Samantha Baker (Molly Ringwald) and Jake Ryan (Michael Schoeffling) pose” with a cake between them, exactly as it was in John Hughes’ Sixteen Candles. It is at this moment that viewers might realize Grande is incapable of sticking to just one movie as a visual reference point (even with “34+35,” she couldn’t “only” refer to Austin Powers with her fembot aesthetic….there had to be a Frankenstein premise as well)—something we saw at a peak in “thank u, next.” A video that, although it wields Mean Girls as its primary inspiration, also sees fit to devolve into nods to Bring It On, Legally Blonde and 13 Going on 30. 

    While it’s unclear if Lover is doing this Sixteen Candles homage deliberately because he knows how much Peaches adores the movie or it’s simply another instance of Grande incorporating a pop culture reference apropos of nothing (which is understandable, as many women and gay men’s minds function that way), the point is that Lover disappears from the picture just as they lean into kiss one another over the birthday candles (something that was just as stressful to watch in Sixteen Candles for those fearing a fire hazard). Sitting there alone as the lyric, “So for now, it’s only me/And maybe that’s all I need” plays, Grande blows out the candles before we see the map of her brain again. In the style of Joel freaking out when the “eraser guys” manage to find Clementine hidden within a memory of his childhood (a suggestion made by Clementine so that he could hold onto her in some way even after the process), Grande starts panicking and crying before the computer flashes a sign that reads, “Relinking.” 

    In another memory still, we see Grande on the couch with Lover as he presents her with a necklace that then turns into a dog collar before Lover himself is transformed into a dog (for, as Birds of Prey taught us, dogs are the animals women are most likely to replace men with). This is where Grande takes the most liberties with her reinterpretation of the movie, for it seems that Brighter Days Inc. isn’t just capable of erasing memories, but also reworking them entirely. As such, the interior decor around her continues to, let’s say, shapeshift, while the TV in front of her plays back the memories one last time before we see Peaches shaking hands with the doctor and nurse for doing their job, the procedure now over. 

    The image of the box of memories, teddy bear and all, being incinerated then leads into Peaches walking down a street with a new boyfriend and passing Lover with his new girlfriend, neither party registering any kind of recognition. And just like that, Peaches forgets all about her pain. Just as viewers might forget all about the original Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. But that’s what pastiche is about: subverting collective memories for the sake of consumption.

    [ad_2]

    Genna Rivieccio

    Source link

  • What to Watch on Streaming This Week: March 1-7

    What to Watch on Streaming This Week: March 1-7

    [ad_1]

    Kate Winslet stars in The Regime. Photograph by Miya Mizuno/HBO

    From Oscar-nominated dramas to delightfully funny new series, streaming is overflowing with quality content this week. Whether you want to see Adam Sandler play introspective, Kate Winslet do her most absurd work or Joaquin Phoenix star in a historical epic, your A-list options are covered.

    What to watch on Netflix

    Spaceman 

    Adam Sandler stars in this sci-fi drama from the award-winning director of HBO’s Chernobyl. Spaceman sees Sandler play Jakub, an astronaut off on a solo mission that sees him exploring the furthest regions of our solar system. While he’s there, he realizes that he may never be able to return to the life he left back on Earth. How does he reconcile with this difficult emotional realization? Well, he talks to a strange spidery creature from the beginning of time (voiced by Paul Dano) that has taken up residence on his ship. Spaceman premieres Friday, March 1st.

    The Gentlemen

    Guy Ritchie has made a career out of snappy British crime movies, and now he’s bringing that talent to television. The Gentlemen stands as a spin-off of his film of the same name, with warring drug lords and mob bosses holding all of the power. Theo James stars as Eddie, a man who stands to inherit a massive estate from his father. However, that land belongs to one of the country’s biggest weed-growing operations, and it turns out it’s much sought-after by other members of the criminal underground. Kaya Scodelario, Daniel Ings, Joely Richardson, and Giancarlo Esposito also star. The Gentlemen premieres Thursday, March 7th.

    What to watch on Hulu

    The Favourite

    While Poor Things is on the road to racking up a few Academy Awards, it isn’t the first time that the likes of Yorgos Lanthimos, Emma Stone, and Tony McNamara have worked together to create cinematic greatness. That would be The Favourite, a deliciously dark period dramedy that revolves around the strange reign of Queen Anne. Olivia Colman stars as the monarch, a troubled and insecure woman who relies on the attention of her woman in waiting, Lady Sarah (Rachel Weisz). But when Sarah’s troubled cousin Abigail (Stone) enters the fray, it becomes a twisted love triangle for the ages. The Favourite streams starting Friday, March 1st.

    What to watch on Amazon Prime

    Ricky Stanicky

    The newest movie from comedy whiz Peter Farrelly, Ricky Stanicky revolves around a trio of best friends (Zac Efron, Jermaine Fowler, and Andrew Santino) who have come to rely on their imaginary friend Ricky well into their adulthood. Whenever something goes wrong and they need to explain it, well, it’s Ricky’s fault. But when these guys’ partners and families ask if they can actually meet the fabled friend, the men decide to hire a middling actor (John Cena) to take on the role. Naturally, the guy decides to go a bit method, meaning that Efron and co. get much more than they paid for. Ricky Stanicky premieres Thursday, March 7th.

    What to watch on Max

    The Regime

    A cutting political satire featuring an all-time great performance from Kate Winslet, The Regime is a devious and delightful new miniseries. Winslet stars as Chancellor Elena Vernham, the autocratic leader of an unnamed, vaguely Central European nation. She rules her country according to her own fleeting whims, until a strapping (and slightly unstable) former soldier comes into her life. Herbert (a hulking Matthias Schoenaerts) wins Elena and her policies over with his, er, rural charm, kicking off a political comedy of errors. Winslet is far and away the highlight of the show, serving up a fascinatingly funny performance. The Regime premieres Sunday, March 3rd. Read Observer’s review.

    What to watch on Apple TV+

    Napoleon 

    A historical drama of epic proportions, Napoleon goes big on everything. Ridley Scott boldly directs this dubiously accurate chronicle of the French ruler’s life, and it’s overflowing with action, horses and period details (it’s nominated for costume and production design at this year’s Oscars, after all). Joaquin Phoenix stars as Napoleon Bonaparte, imbuing the little corporal with his unique brand of moodiness. Vanessa Kirby plays Josephine, Napoleon’s all-but-doomed first wife who was there for his ascent to power. It’s a big, bombastic film with more than a few surprises up its sleeve. Napoleon premieres Friday, March 1st. Read Observer’s review.

    The Completely Made-Up Adventures of Dick Turpin

    British comedian Noel Fielding may be better known for his Bake Off hosting these days, but he returns to his oddball roots with The Completely Made-Up Adventures of Dick Turpin. The historical comedy series presents a fictional take on the life and times of infamous highway robber Dick Turpin. It’s sure to have the same wit and silliness as genre predecessors Blackadder and Monty Python, with good ol’ Dickie becoming the leader of a gang of outlaws despite being the least-skilled rogue of the bunch. The Completely Made-Up Adventures of Dick Turpin premieres Friday, March 1st.

    What to Watch is a regular endorsement of movies and TV worth your streaming time.

    What to Watch on Streaming This Week: March 1-7

    [ad_2]

    Laura Babiak

    Source link

  • Kate Winslet Says She and Leonardo DiCaprio “Clicked Immediately” on ‘Titanic’

    Kate Winslet Says She and Leonardo DiCaprio “Clicked Immediately” on ‘Titanic’

    [ad_1]

    Kate Winslet and Leonardo DiCaprio‘s chemistry in Titanic made its way offscreen as well.

    The Oscar-winning actors starred in the classic film early in their careers and have remained close friends since they played Jack and Rose in James Cameron’s romance drama. In a behind-the-scenes featurette from the film’s upcoming 4K Ultra HD DVD release, the Mare of Easttown actress opened up about her relationship with DiCaprio.

    “Once I started working with Leo, we were able to kind of find our own rhythm,” she said in a clip obtained by Entertainment Tonight. “And it’s amazing to kind of look back and think about it all over again,” adding that they “clicked immediately, right away.”

    She continued, “He was this kind of mess of long, skinny, uncoordinated limbs, and he was just very free with himself, and he had this effervescent energy that was really magnetic. And I remember thinking, ‘Oh, this is gonna be fun. We’re definitely gonna get along.’ And we just really did. We just really did.”

    Winslet described her Titanic co-star as a “ferociously intelligent man” and detailed his technique when preparing for the role. She said he was fascinated with the period, the people who were in the lower classes, where they had come from and how they paid for their tickets, among other things.

    Winslet and DiCaprio formed a close bond at the time and remain friends today, she shared, saying that they speak regularly and in real time, without either of them being too busy to connect, despite both of them working on projects often.

    “You know, if you think about it, in the world that we live in now,” she concluded, “to have friendships that bind you, and that shared history, it’s really something.”

    [ad_2]

    Christy Pina

    Source link

  • ‘We did it, and it became something’: When Leonardo DiCaprio revealed Kate Winslet and he worked on USD 2.2 billion movie as an ‘experiment’

    ‘We did it, and it became something’: When Leonardo DiCaprio revealed Kate Winslet and he worked on USD 2.2 billion movie as an ‘experiment’

    [ad_1]

    One of the most famous sequences in Titanic is Leonardo DiCaprio in a tux and tail standing atop a large staircase in front of a clock, turning and extending his hand to Rose, played by Kate Winslet. Meanwhile, Winslet was unquestionably stunning in her performance as Rose. And their chemistry was incredible, leaving viewers in awe of the two of them. Titanic is one of the best films of all time, and no one could have done justice to Jack and Rose’s love tale other than DiCaprio and Winslet. However, DiCaprio acknowledged in 2016 that he and Kate Winslet did the film as an experiment. Who would have anticipated that an experiment would turn out to be so beautiful and record-breaking?

    ALSO READ: ‘It was a hard time for me’: When Johnny Depp revealed he tortured Leonardo DiCaprio during the filming of USD 10 million film

    Leonardo DiCaprio revealed that he and Kate Winslet did Titanic as an experiment

    Leonardo DiCaprio reflected on his experience filming Titanic alongside Kate Winslet and discussed how the part changed his career. In an interview with Deadline in 2016, the Titanic actor stated why the 1997 James Cameron film was an experiment for him and his co-star.

    He said, “Titanic was very much an experiment for Kate Winslet and me. We’d made all of these independent films. I admired her as an actress, and she told me, ‘Let’s do this together; we can do it.’ We did it, and it turned into something we could never have predicted.

    DiCaprio, who was only 22 years old when Titanic was released, said that he didn’t realize the scope of the project at the time. “‘Do you realize how big of a movie this is? ‘Yeah, it’s big,’ I said. It’s a big movie. They’re like, ‘No, no, no. ‘ No, it’s the largest movie ever,’ she says, and I’m like, ‘Well, what does that mean?’ I knew there was an expectation for me to do something at that point, and I knew I had to get back to what my intentions were from the beginning.

    DiCaprio admitted that he could have gotten any part he wanted after Titanic, but he’s always wanted to produce different movies. He said, “By then, I knew exactly what kind of films I wanted to do. I used [my fame] as a blessing, making R-rated movies and different kinds of movies and taking a chance on things I wanted to act in. People would want to fund those films right now. That was something I’d never had before the Titanic.”

    Leonardo DiCaprio was recently spotted enjoying ice cream at Lionel Messi’s game

    The internationally recognized actor Leonardo DiCaprio kept a low profile as he watched the Herons defeat MLS rivals LAFC 3-1 from the stands. The seven-time Ballon d’Or winner caught the interest of Hollywood’s A-Listers, with celebrities flocking to see him play.

    Despite his best efforts to blend in with the crowd at BMO Stadium, the Titanic and Wolf of Wall Street legend’s meal selection revealed him. The Oscar winner was seen eating an ice cream stick during the second half, with Vice City already up 2-0.

    Leonardo DiCaprio (IMDb)

    He tried to fit in by wearing his normal baseball cap and sunglasses, but it was futile. At the very least, the 48-year-old megastar looked completely ignorant that he was being recorded by Apple TV cameras. This was not, however, the first time the Los Angeles native had been photographed watching a game in recent memory.

    Leonardo DiCaprio, on the other hand, was most recently seen in the 2021 film Don’t Look Back. The actor will soon be seen in Killers of the Flower Moon, which will premiere at the Cannes Film Festival in 2023. The film will be released on October 20, 2023.

    ALSO READ: Sam Asghari thinks he’s the ‘same’ as Leonardo DiCaprio amid split from Britney Spears; Here’s why

    [ad_2]

    1136970

    Source link

  • Melanie Lynskey Says the End of Friendship With Kate Winslet Was “More Heartbreaking Than Some Breakups I’ve Had”

    Melanie Lynskey Says the End of Friendship With Kate Winslet Was “More Heartbreaking Than Some Breakups I’ve Had”

    [ad_1]

    Think back to sleepaway camp, and the pals you made there. Intense bonds are formed over relatively short periods of time. Inside jokes are born, friendship bracelets are weaved. Promises are made to write every day! Remain friends forever! As anyone who’s found an old crumpled note in the back of a desk drawer full of inscrutable references written by a person whose name you vaguely remember can attest, those bonds don’t always last. Movie sets, it turns out, can be kind of the same way. Melanie Lynskey confirmed that this can also be the case on-set, remembering the painful way she learned that lesson. 

    In a wide-ranging conversation on Josh Horowitz’s podcast, Happy Sad Confused this week, Lynskey opened up about her first big role, in Peter Jackson’s 1994 film Heavenly Creatures. She starred opposite Kate Winslet in both of their feature film debuts, playing a pair of intensely bonded girls who plan and commit a murder together. Winslet and Lynskey, too, naturally bonded on set. It didn’t last. 

    “When I lost touch with Kate it was more heartbreaking than some breakups that I’ve had,” Lynskey said. “It was so painful. It wasn’t like anything happened, she just became a gigantic international movie star, and she didn’t have a lot of time, and then suddenly she’d be in Los Angeles and not have time.” 

    Eventually, even Winslet’s jaunts through LA didn’t even have the attempt to make plans. “When I was living here, and she’d be there and I wouldn’t hear from her,” Lynskey said. “It sort of gradually happened. It happens in relationships, people kind of drift apart, but it was so painful for me.” 

    Lynskey and Winslet have both been working consistently in the nearly 30 years since breaking out in Heavenly Creatures, but, Lynskey revealed, they’ve never reconnected. The last time she says she saw Winslet, in fact, was at the 2009 premiere for Winslet’s then-husband Sam Mendes’ Away We Go, in which Lynskey had a supporting role.

    “That’s the last time I saw her,” she said, not going into further detail on whether they spoke, or if they were simply in the same theater at the same time. 

    She did call Winslet “a huge inspiration for me” in how she handled the media attention that came with her early fame, particularly cruel comments about her body. 

    “I know she’s a very, very confident person, but everyone’s sensitive, and she’s very sensitive,” Lynskey said. “ And the way she was dissected and talked about, I remember at the time being so furious on her behalf, especially because, like, Kate Winslet is now in the world. Kate Winslet is doing movies, and you’re getting to witness that talent. This is like a life-changing actor, an actor that comes along once in a generation. Just focus on that. And also—she was tiny, and still is tiny. It infuriated me so much and I just was always amazed by how gracefully she handled all of it.”

    Lynskey, too, has faced criticism about her body even recently, responding to shaming comments about her appearance on The Last of Us made by Adrianne Curry. “I am supposed to be SMART, ma’am. I don’t need to be muscly,” she said in one of a string of tweets in response. She’s also been open about the eating disorder she struggled with from the age of 12. 

    Winslet wasn’t Lynskey’s only platonic showmance that didn’t last. “It happened a couple of times,” she said, including one actor who told her “I don’t stay friends with actors” after Lynskey expressed her fondness at wrap. 

    “I was so shocked by it,” she said. “This woman had been working longer than me and was used to, ‘no, we move on. This was just a couple months of our life.’ But I was so sensitive, I was always so injured by losing these great loves I was having, and you know, it got easier.”

    Hollywood isn’t all cliquishness and fleeting connection, however. During the interview, Lynskey talked about taking on her role in The Last of Us at the bequest of her friend Craig Mazin, co-creator of the massively popular show. They first met playing the party game Mafia, she said, and then “we became very good Mafia friends.” She went on to tease her strategy (“I’m not very good at lying”), but wouldn’t reveal it, by the way. All she’ll tell you is that she is very, very good at the game. “Someone said to me, I’ll never trust you again.”

    Now, with roles on shows like Yellowjackets and The Last Of Us, Lynskey is more visible than ever, but reminds audiences that she’s not new here. “It is funny to have like a 30-year career,” she said, and have people frame her success with a wink: “But now…”

    “I’m proud of my career,” she said. “I worked really hard! I was a working actor. For me, that was all I’d ever wanted. My dreams had come true.” 

    A representative for Winslet declined to comment.

    [ad_2]

    Kase Wickman

    Source link

  • James Cameron ‘Proves’ Jack Couldn’t Have Survived Titanic Sinking

    James Cameron ‘Proves’ Jack Couldn’t Have Survived Titanic Sinking

    [ad_1]

    Titanic director James Cameron says he commissioned a scientific study that proves Leonardo DiCaprio’s character could not have survived the “floating door” scene with Kate Winslet’s Rose, a response to angry fans saying the makeshift raft could hold them both. What do you think?

    “Then how is Leonardo DiCaprio still alive?”

    Sonny Meldal • Assistant Mail Carrier

    “I think I’ll wait until this study is peer-reviewed to form an opinion.”

    Diego Johnsen • General Screener

    “Now prove that the ship couldn’t have survived.”

    Katherine Huang • Bubble Wrap Designer

    [ad_2]

    Source link

  • Kate Winslet And Cameron Diaz In ‘The Holiday’ Sequel? Director Nancy Meyers Says ‘Not True’

    Kate Winslet And Cameron Diaz In ‘The Holiday’ Sequel? Director Nancy Meyers Says ‘Not True’

    [ad_1]

    By Becca Longmire.
    Published:

    Director Nancy Meyers has responded to rumours that a sequel to “The Holiday” is on its way.

    The beloved 2006 flick saw Kate Winslet’s Iris and Cameron Diaz’s Amanda swap houses. Winslet’s character ended up dating Jack Black’s Miles after they met in Los Angeles, and Diaz’s got together with Jude Law’s Graham in a country village near London, U.K.

    The Sun claimed that a follow-up was now in the works 17 years later, with the main characters all signing up.

    However, Meyers wrote on Instagram alongside a grab of a story about the rumours: “So many DM’s about this – sorry but it’s not true. ❤️”


    READ MORE:
    Kate Winslet Says She ‘Couldn’t Stop Crying’ At Emotional Reunion With Leonardo DiCaprio

    The Sun claimed a source had told them: “The plan is to start filming next year. The main talent are all signed up.”

    An insider added: “The plan is to start rolling on scenes next year, primarily in the U.K. and in Europe, but the main talent are all signed up and on board.”


    READ MORE:
    Kate Winslet Holds On To James Cameron As Pair Reunite At ‘Avatar: The Way Of Water’ Photocall

    “It’s one of the most successful movies of its kind and still enjoyed every year by millions of fans around the world – it makes perfect sense to revisit those characters and find out what became of their lives after they hooked up.

    “It’ll be funny, poignant, and heartwarming – just what everyone wants for Christmas.”

    Click to View Gallery

    Stars Get Into The Holiday Spirit




    [ad_2]

    Becca Longmire

    Source link

  • How Leonardo DiCaprio Almost Lost Out on Playing Jack In ‘Titanic’—Twice

    How Leonardo DiCaprio Almost Lost Out on Playing Jack In ‘Titanic’—Twice

    [ad_1]

    One of the most iconic shots in the past three decades of film is Leonardo DiCaprio, in tux and tails, standing atop a grand staircase in front of a clock in Titanic, turning and extending his hand to Rose, played by Kate Winslet. That shot almost didn’t happen, because according to director James Cameron, DiCaprio nearly talked himself out of the movie. Twice. 

    In an interview with GQ ahead of the release of Avatar: The Way of Water, Cameron continued his hit parade of comments and anecdotes, this time reminiscing about the making of the hit 1997 movie, and casting DiCaprio as Jack in particular. According to Cameron, DiCaprio was a hit in his audition, “charmed everybody, myself included.” That’s not to mention the accountants and various other random staff who made their way into the audition room to get a glimpse of the actor. Then came the chemistry read with Winslet. When Cameron took him to read with his eventual romantic co-star, the first of several on-screen pairings for the duo, DiCaprio balked.

    “He said, ‘you mean I’m reading?’” Cameron recalls. “And I said yeah, he said oh, I don’t read. I said, ‘well,’ I shook his hand, I said, ‘thanks for coming by.’ And he said, ‘wait, you mean if I don’t read, I don’t get the part? Just like that?’”

    Yep, just like that. 

    “I said, ‘oh yeah, come on, this is like a giant movie that’s going to take two years of my life, and you’ll be gone doing five other things while I’m doing post-production and all the model work and everything, so I’m not gonna fuck it up by making the wrong decision in casting, so you’re gonna read or you’re not gonna get the part,’” Cameron says. That did the trick—Leo read. 

    “He comes in and he’s like every ounce of his entire being is just so negative, right up until I said action, and then he turned into Jack and Kate just lit up and they went into this whole thing and played the scene. Dark clouds had opened up and a ray of sun came down and lit up Jack. I’m like, alright, he’s the guy.” Crisis averted, or so Cameron thought. 

    A few weeks later, DiCaprio got in touch with Cameron and told him he thought Jack should have “some affliction or some problem or some traumatic thing from the past,” which Cameron took as a sign that maybe the young DiCaprio wasn’t actually the right guy for the role. 

    “I said, ‘You’ve done all these great characters that all have a problem, whether it’s addiction or whatever it is, I said you’ve gotta learn how to hold the center and not have all that stuff. This isn’t Richard III. When you can do what Jimmy Stewart or Gregory Peck did, they just fucking stood there. They didn’t have a limp or a lisp or whatever, then you’ll be ready for this, but I’m thinking you’re not ready, because what I’m talking about is actually much harder. Those things are easier, those are props, those are crutches, what I’m talking about is much harder and you’re probably not quite ready for it.’ 

    DiCaprio powered through after Cameron’s tough love pep talk.

    “The second I said that, it clicked for him that this was a really hard, challenging film for him, and this was my mistake: I hadn’t sufficiently laid out the challenge for him,” Cameron says.

    And that, it would appear, is how you win a Best Director Oscar, as Cameron did for Titanic. Scene. 

    [ad_2]

    Kase Wickman

    Source link