If there's anyone who has pulled off a wickedly impressive image transformation, it's Angelina Jolie. She used to be the wild child who'd wear bloody tees to her wedding (with Jonny Lee), or bloody vials around her neck (as she did with Billy Bob). Then she did a 180, becoming a goodwill ambassador and starting her own multicultural Brady Bunch with Brad Pitt.

I'm happy for her, but I can't help but miss the good ol' days. She might have been wild, and she might have shocked many -- but she had a great spark, one that seems to have disappeared inside the current carefully manufactured icon she is today.

The gleam might be hidden these days, but luckily we're living in a world of DVD entertainment. We can head back to the past whenever we want to. What follows are my two favorite Jolie gigs. They're far from the best movies, but they definitely embody both the old Angelina, and a certain period of '90s rebellion. I give you: Hackers and Foxfire.

I guess whether we like it or not, viral campaigns are hot, hip and here to stay. Universal pictures has launched the viral site for Timur Bekmambetov's Wanted, and it all revolves around a shadowy group known as the Fraternity of Weavers. Now for the tricky part: to crack the code on the website you must enter five secret words to earn a peek at the handbook for the fraternity -- plus you get a little bit more info behind Angelina's bad-ass hand tattoo. So if you're the kind of person who likes puzzles, then feel free to figure it out on your own. But, if you're like me and a little impatient, you can click over to Coming Soon and they have the solution -- I won't spoil it here.

Wanted is based on Mark Millar's graphic novel about an everyday schmo (as played by James McAvoy) who turns out to be the heir to a secret society of assassins. Angelina Jolie stars as Fox, the second in command and mentor to McAvoy. Morgan Freeman plays the elder statesman and co-founder of the group, while hip-hop artist Common stars as the weapons expert, The Gunsmith.

The viral site provides plenty of background info on the history of the ancient fraternity, but for the most part it's a bunch of spiritual mumbo-jumbo about fate, destiny, the Cathars, and ancient weaving cults -- oh, and plenty of Wikipedia links. There's also a sign up page if you're interested in becoming a member of the fraternity (hazing optional?). One imagines more viral goodies will most likely show up at some point before Wanted opens in theaters on June 27th.

Warning: This post contains excessive grasping at straws.

Most knowledgeable folks seem to think that the upcoming Wanted looks like a piece of junk. I can understand their position: the trailer was kind of a sensory assault, and didn't exactly make the film seem original. For my part, I'm not ready to write it off. I like James McAvoy, director Timur Bekmambetov is a fellow Russian, and I tend to enjoy the wildly implausible brand of action that the film seems to be going for. So I'm happy to report a piece of news that kind of surprised me: Wanted has been rated R by the MPAA for "strong bloody violence throughout, pervasive language and some sexuality." That elaboration makes it seem like they won't be trying to trim the bad parts to earn a PG-13.

Now, okay: obviously that doesn't mean much. I mean, the similarly (identically?) themed Hitman was rated R too, and look how that turned out. But for me, the R rating speaks not directly to quality, but to the kind of film Wanted is likely to be. Seeing the trailer (and not knowing the source material), I thought that while it looked kind of cool, it also looked like a broad, inoffensive, second-rate action romp -- my first association, probably due to the presence of Angelina Jolie, was with Lara Croft Tomb Raider. But maybe it won't be. Maybe it'll turn out to be harsh, and sexy, and over-the-top in ways that are actually interesting. Maybe it'll be more like Running Scared or Shoot 'Em Up than like Ghost Rider. You might think that those comparisons don't help and that it still looks like crap, but it seems to me that an R rating for a movie like this increases the odds of it being worthwhile. Or am I off my gourd?

Universal was out in full force over the weekend, hosting panels for The Incredible Hulk (see our report here), Wanted and Hellboy II: The Golden Army. Though less attention has been given to Wanted and Hellboy II so far, both films will provide, perhaps, some of this summer's most spectacular visuals.

Wanted

We mentioned it the other day, but prior to the Wanted panel at NY Comic Con, Cinematical was invited to Universal's suite high on the 52nd floor of the Mandarin Oriental Hotel to hang with director Timur Bekmambetov and watch the Wanted Comic Con footage a drop early. Following the brief screening (on a monstrous flat screen TV), I caught up with Timur and spoke to him about the film. One thing, in particular, was whether he planned on a Wanted franchise, or if this would be a one-off film. Timur laughed when I asked, and said we'd have to wait to see if people go to see this one first. Also of note, when I asked if he planned to continue his very successful Night Watch/Day Watch series of films, Timur shot back: This [meaning Wanted] is it! This is the third film. Even though it has different story, the tone is the same from the other films."

Oh, and then came the footage ...

Above you can see a photo of the Exclusive Comic Con poster for Wanted (click on the image to enlarge). Wanted is just one of the films that will host a panel tomorrow during New York Comic Con, with the film's director Timur Bekmambetov on hand to answer questions ... and a little birdie told me there might be some new footage screened as well. I was able to meet Timur tonight during a private function at Universal's fatdaddy suit in the Mandarin Oriental Hotel here in New York City. I could sit here all day and talk about this friggin' suite -- remember the apartment they rocked out in Cloverfield, way up overlooking Central Park? Yeah, this was the exact same view. Unreal.

I'm not allowed to talk about what went down in this suite, but I believe we're allowed to show you this poster and urge you all to head out to Comic Con tomorrow to check out Timur and Wanted. Screw it ... based on what I saw, this movie looks pretty damn ridiculous. Action. Lots of it. Crazy car chase. Jolie with marks all over her body. Lots of red. I'll shut up now. .

Wanted hits theaters on June 27th.

I've been mulling over the whole issue of the Atlas Shrugged film adaptation, which, at the moment at least, seems to be churning ahead to start filming later this year, and I wanted to talk about something several commenters have mentioned: whether it would be better to film Atlas as a miniseries, as opposed to a two-hour-or-longer movie. Of course, attempts have been made to bring Ayn Rand's most famous book to the screen before, and they've never made it past the script stage.

Why? Well, first of all, there are a lot of politics around this book. The Ayn Rand Institute and Leonard Peikoff have been notoriously protective of it for years, and trying to make a film that's going to please both the hardcore Objectivists (those who follow Rand's philosophy) and the average moviegoer who just wants to be entertained is, in my opinion, just an exercise in futility. Then I read this interview over on The Atlasphere with John Aglialoro, producer and CEO of Cybex, International, who paid $1 million for the film rights to Atlas.

Despite the talk and the buzz, I never thought it would actually happen. If any novel merits the term "unfilmable," certainly Ayn Rand's Atlas Shrugged is it. I mean, the climax is a 60-page radio broadcast! And the entire thing is what can charitably be called a screed, preaching Rand's extremely unliberal "objectivist" political philosophy. So when I heard that Vadim Perelman (The House of Sand and Fog and the upcoming The Life Before Her Eyes) was developing the project, with Angelina Jolie attached to star as Dagny Taggart, my reaction was quite simply: Pfffffft.

But it looks like I pfffffted too soon. Comingsoon.net talked to Perelman this week, and he told them that he's finishing up the script, and that Lionsgate wants to start shooting in December. So, uh: it looks like this might actually happen.

I would commit atrocities to get my hands on a copy of Perelman's screenplay. I can only imagine what it does to condense the thousand-page-plus book into even a very long movie. What worries me most is that the novel doesn't really exist without Rand's politics, if that makes any sense: they're so integral to the story that cutting them out would make everything else pretty much pointless. And I'm not sure Hollywood -- even the relatively adventurous Lionsgate -- has the stomach for a politically faithful adaptation.

Is there another woman on the planet who can look as beautiful with semi-automatics as Angelina Jolie? It's just not fair. (Does anyone find it slightly ironic that a woman who is so dedicated to humanitarian aid has such a fondness for spraying bullets on film?)

The new Wanted trailer has debuted online over at MySpace (it's still not on YouTube, so I can't embed it for you), and it's one of those things you shouldn't like. Like Twinkies or Skittles. But then Angelina Jolie defies physics and scoops up poor James McAvoy in a furious red sports car.

You may roll your eyes at the slow-motion "Goodbye" bullet at the end, but ultimately, this is going to be one of those films to crash to on a hot summer night with a few friends -- a decent thrill ride you'll probably feel silly about going to later. (And it certainly has Timur Bekmambetov's stamp all over it.)

There are also a bunch of new pictures, mostly stills from the trailer. There's James McAvoy's washboard abs for the ladies, Angelina looking coy and suggestive for the boys. . .and well, let's be honest, everyone else. My taste favors Scotsmen, and I still can't look away.

And, if you're a diehard fan of the graphic novel, prepare to be disappointed. I'm hearing that it has only the basic premise in common.

Wanted opens on June 27, 2008.

Cinematical is live at the 2008 Independent Spirit Awards! Our own Patrick Walsh will report back throughout the afternoon.

It is officially raining, and the big-time stars are rolling out. Javier Bardem is looking very dapper, I'm pretty sure I just saw indie favorite The Rock (?), and crowd just collectively spazzed out over Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie. I was just interviewed (insulted) by Jiminy Glick on Good Morning America so watch for that, though I'm not sure how much of it they'll be able to use. The discussion culminated with him dumping a barrel of popcorn on himself. Some quality journalism there! Seriously, I can't quite convey how funny Martin Short has been here today. Favorite line -- "I have lost weight, I'm doing Atkins. Not the diet, his widow."

Raining has given way to pouring, and the red carpet is looking soggy and bare. It's ten minutes to showtime and I'm about to head under the big tent for the show. I'll do my best to update you on the winners as they happen, and if you get the Independent Film Channel you can join in the Rainn Wilson-hosted fun live. My thanks to Netflix for setting up this sweet little blogging suite for me, and as an active subscriber, I don't even have to feel like a shameless whore saying that. Sorry for the rambling nature of these posts, but it's been pretty hectic...

For more photos and coverage, head on over to Moviefone.

Judging by the amount of work being offered to the Scottish actor James McAvoy, it looks like Hollywood might have found a new 'It' boy -- plus two Oscar nominated films in just under two years is one hell of a calling card. Variety reports that James McAvoy has signed to star in the comedy thriller Perrier's Bounty. The story centers on three unlikely fugitives who are forced on the run from a mobster bent on revenge for the death of one of his top lieutenants.

Bounty was written by Mark O'Rowe, an award winning novelist and sometimes screenwriter. Ian Fitzgibbon is in the director's seat; Fitzgibbon is a relative newcomer with a few TV credits to his name for both acting and writing. He also has another comedy thriller in production, A Film with Me in It, but so far it doesn't look he has had the same luck with casting as he had this time around. Bounty is going to be produced in the UK through Number 9 Films. There is no other cast confirmed right now, but Anne-Marie Duff is in negotiations to star alongside McAvoy.

McAvoy seems to be keeping his options open by choosing a variety of projects. The first will be the comic book adaptation Wanted with Angelina Jolie, which is probably about as far from the refined period romance of Atonement as you can get -- although I think we are going to have to wait for the box office receipts for Wanted before McAvoy's Hollywood status is cemented. Now that he is throwing in some comedy it looks like McAvoy has all his bases covered. Perrier's Bounty is scheduled to start production later this year.

Perhaps desperately needing an influx of star power, The Santa Barbara Film Festival, which is going on right now, put together a big celebration of Angelina Jolie's work and persuaded the star to appear the other night. I know nothing about these SBIFF events, but according to the NY Post they seem to be half honorarium, half roast, as the honoree is asked to watch old clips of their bad movies and then acknowledge them. The problem, of course, is that this comes on the heels of Jolie being snubbed for an Oscar nomination for her performance as Marianne Pearl in A Mighty Heart, so the ribbing seems to have been toned down considerably. (I wouldn't go so far as to say Jolie's was a great performance in that film, but considering that the academy tapped Cate Blanchett for a noticeably bad performance in an exceptionally awful film, Elizabeth: The Golden Age, Jolie would have every right to be upset.)

So a planned montage of clips from Jolie's old movies was shelved at the last minute. The actress did speak about the old days, though, calling her earliest movies "cheesy" and saying of Cyborg 2, "The first one was Jean-Claude Van Damme, the second was me at 17." In other words, 'not my fault.' She also had the following to say about Hackers: "As Brad knows, he's in the audience, I really don't know how to turn on a computer." Jolie also seemed to take a halfway-swipe at Mr. and Mrs. Smith, which isn't a bad movie in any sense. "It's one of those that I think Brad and I both tried to get out of," Jolie said. "Obviously I'm grateful I did [the movie] because it changed my life," apparently referring to meeting the afore-mentioned Brad.

John Orloff got his break writing two episodes of the Emmy-winning HBO mini-series Band of Brothers. His latest script is another true-life tale -- Michael Winterbottom's A Mighty Heart, just out on DVD. Heart focuses on Mariane Pearl (Angelina Jolie), a reporter whose husband Daniel, an American journalist, was kidnapped and murdered in Pakistan. The script just earned Orloff an Independent Spirit Award nomination for Best First Screenplay. The awards will be held on February 23rd.

Cinematical: When did you know you wanted to be a writer?

John Orloff: I still don't know whether I want to be a writer! I went to UCLA Film School, and I had a great writing teacher who thought I had a particular skill in that department. So I kept taking that teacher for the whole time I was at UCLA, kept on writing. At the end of it I was 22, it was the late 80s, and people weren't really hiring young writers, so I started to work in advertising. Spent about ten years miserably working in commercials, until I met a woman -- who is now my wife -- who was working in the business as a development exec at HBO. And she was bringing home all these screenplays, and they were horrible! Just awful! And these people had agents, and they were working. So I pitched my wife a non-fiction movie that I had been thinking about writing for ten years, with the incredibly commercial idea of a sixteenth century English melodrama. It was actually about the Shakespeare authorship issue -- who wrote the plays? I wrote the script and had the misfortune of writing it two months before Shakespeare in Love came out. But I sent out this script, trying to get an agent, and did finally get "hip-pocketed" by an agency.

Cinematical: And that script eventually got you your big break with Tom Hanks -- pretty decent guy to start out with, no?

JO: Tom Hanks and Steven Spielberg, yes! The most important thing that happened out of the Shakespeare script was that Tom's company was among the readers. They liked it, and I met with Tom about another project, but every time I sat down with him I would ask if he had hired writers on Band of Brothers. I'm a huge World War II buff, and I think I eventually just wore him down. He finally asked me to write a script, and I wrote one episode. He was very happy with it and asked me to write another. So, that was my first paying gig.

Before the days of Brad and babies, Billy Bob and blood vials, or Jonny Lee and bloody tees, there was just Angela and Viril. The year was 1993, and Angelina Jolie popped up in a short by Steven Shainberg, the man who would later direct the saucy Secretary, and last year's Fur: An Imaginary Portrait of Diane Arbus. It's a simple, black and white short -- Angela sits on a bed in the lotus position, meditating, while Viril types rhythmically the numbers 1-1,000 on an old typewriter. That is, until he gets trapped by a strange feeling.

But this wasn't the only time that Viril found himself at the service of his woman's whims. The film was later followed by Alice and Viril, also starring Jolie. This time around, the film is in candy-color, and Viril meets Alice at a convention for lawn products. She asks him to hold his head underwater for 3 minutes. He does so in fishtank -- once again suffering as Jolie lounges.

But before I get to the quiz, I thought I'd give you one more goodie, to break the Christmas carol monotony -- Angelina in Meatloaf's Rock 'n' Roll Dreams Come Through. Enjoy!




Answer for the last poll: The consensus was right this time around -- Kelly Macdonald was the actress who never played the Shrew. It was actually her Trainspotting co-star Shirley Henderson.

The release dates, they are a-changing! Universal just moved the release of the action flick Wanted, which stars Angelina Jolie and James McAvoy, from March to June 27th, 2008. That June release date was also held by Pixar's new one, WALL-E, and the Tom Cruise "Hitler assassination plot" flick -- Valkyrie. According to Coming Soon, Valkyrie has officially budged (though I think it would have absolutely crushed Wanted and it's courting a different audience than Wall-E). United Artists will now release the film on October 3rd of 2008 -- a date also held by less intense competition -- Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist and Guy Ritchie's Gerald Butler drama RocknRolla.

Valkyrie is directed by Bryan Singer and written by Christopher McQuarrie (The Usual Suspects) and Nathan Alexander. Tom Cruise has become everyone's favorite punching bag lately, and reaction to the trailer, particularly Cruise's lack of a German accent, was pretty hostile. (Although probably not as hostile as it would have been had he...attempted a German accent!) But the plot sounds awesome, Singer is a great director (Superman Returns aside), and it's got a hell of a cast -- including Bill Nighy, Kenneth Branagh, Stephen Fry, Eddie lzzard, Terence Stamp, Tom Wilkinson, and Black Book's stunning Carice Van Houton. How bad could it be? It's got to be better than Wanted -- have you seen the trailer for that thing? Haven't I seen that movie, oh, a thousand times already?