There's a new biopic finally gaining steam that hasn't been mentioned on Cinematical before -- HBO's Temple Grandin project. Back in August, Claire Danes signed on, and now The Hollywood Reporter posts that David Strathairn, Julia Ormond, and Catherine O'Hara have joined the cast.

Temple Grandin is a 61-year-old woman with autism known to be one of the leading voices in autism advocacy. As a child, she was derided by her classmates for being different -- nicknamed "tape recorder" because of her tendency to repeat things numerous times. But bursting out of that, Grandin went to college and eventually earned a PhD in animal science, ultimately becoming an advocate of humane slaughterhouses as well -- an ideal candidate to show both the struggles and successes that can come from autism.

A passion project that's been in the works for almost a decade, filming begins this month in Austin with Danes playing Grandin, while Strathairn plays her university science teacher, Ormond will play her mother, and O'Hara, her aunt. It's a great story to see come to fruition, and with this cast, I'm hoping for good things -- Danes breaking out of that older seductress habit, O'Hara getting a chance to be serious. Ormond is good and, well, Strathairn always ups the ante. Thoughts?

(ed. note: This post was accidentally published at 1AM, instead of 1PM, so we're re-publishing it at the correct time.)

I've been thinking about the largely negative response to Wong Kar-wai's My Blueberry Nights (6 screens), a film I quite liked. As of today it's at 43% on Rotten Tomatoes, though it opens wider this weekend (including here in the Bay Area) and more reviews are surely coming in. Most critics I've spoken with around here likewise didn't think much of it. What are the reasons for all this disappointment? The main reason has to do with its weight. It's a lightweight movie, a trifle, flimsy, vapid, thin, etc. Wong is considered one of the world's greatest filmmakers, a maker of "weighty" works of art, and so this "lighter" film is beneath him. It's a letdown, a step backward.

Well, I say that's nonsense. Many great filmmakers dallied in lightweight, lesser trifles during their careers, and it didn't make them any less great. Martin Scorsese has made lots of them. After Hours (1985) and The Color of Money (1986) may not pack the punch of Raging Bull, but they are quite enjoyable, and pure Scorsese. (His current Shine a Light, 277 screens, feels like a trifle.) Fritz Lang came to the United States from a position of great power and unlimited resources in Germany and found himself assigned cheap crime pictures. Yet few critics today would complain about the "lightness" of The Big Heat or Scarlet Street. Max Ophuls also made crime films in Hollywood (Caught and The Reckless Moment), and his reputation remains intact. Some consider John Ford the greatest American director of all time, and even though his goofball Donovan's Reef (1963) isn't counted among his classics, I love it just as much. It has moments of great beauty that reflect its maker's personality. My Blueberry Nights may not stand up to In the Mood for Love, but it's unquestionably a Wong Kar-wai film.

Cinematical has just received this lovely exclusive poster (click on above image to enlarge) for the new film My Blueberry Nights, starring Norah Jones (in her feature debut), Natalie Portman, Rachel Weisz, Jude Law and David Strathairn. The film, which is just exploding with beautiful colors (see above poster for a small taste), marks famed director Wong Kar Wai's English-language debut -- and it centers on a young woman (Jones) who embarks on a soul-searching trip across America, running into an assortment of offbeat characters along the way. Definitely one of my favorite posters of the year so far -- once you move away from the dazzling color scheme, you're then left with the gorgeous faces of Weisz, Portman and Jones. Mmm, I can stare at this one all day long.

For more on My Blueberry Nights, feel free to check out James' review from last year's Cannes Film Festival, as well as the movie trailer over on Moviefone. My Blueberry Nights hits theaters (in limited release) on April 4.

After mentioning the wonderful Joe Morton in my DVD picks this week (for his stint in American Gangster), I started thinking about one of his early roles -- the lead in John Sayles' The Brother from Another Planet. (One I listed in my Sayles primer last year.) It's a great film, even in its cheesiness, but there's nothing quite like this absolutely terrible trailer, which you can check out above.

I wonder what Sayles thought when he saw that, because while it's endlessly amusing now, it's pretty embarrassing for such a solid film. Sporting tacky review quotes like: "It's Cheers goes to Harlem"and "it's E.T. rides the underground railroad," the trailer is just terrible and says pretty much nothing about the film. However, you can enjoy bits of Morton's alien, as glimpses of a very young Fisher Stevens, and both Sayles and David Strathairn as creepy aliens. And to think -- one day he'd bring down the world with Cyberdyne.

Empire has the exclusive first look at the new poster for Wong Kar Wai's My Blueberry Nights. While the first poster release chose to put Rachel Weisz front and center, the latest one-sheet lets you know right from the get-go that this film is an ensemble in every sense of the word. The story centers on a young woman (played by Norah Jones in her acting debut) who wastes away hours in a local cafe run by a romantically philosophical type named Jeremy (played by Jude Law). The story then follows our broken hearted gal as she rambles about the country, coming into contact with an alcoholic cop and his wife (David Strathairn and Rachel Weisz) and a gambling con-artist as played by Natalie Portman.

My Blueberry Nights marks Wong Kar Wai's first attempt at an English language film, and will also be one of the few films he has shot without the services of his usual cinematographer, Christopher Doyle. Instead, the famed director hired Darius Khondji, who has worked with Woody Allen (Anything Else) and David Fincher (Panic Room). The film premiered in Cannes back in May, and while reviews were mixed (mainly directed at Jones' acting abilities), the overall impression was that the film marked some new territory for the director -- you can read James' review here. Wong Kar Wai is a master at conveying love and longing for another person. So, even though there have been some changes in his usual methods, you know you are still in some pretty capable hands. Plus, if you consider the cast and the skill of people involved in the production, it would be a shock if it didn't all somehow work. My Blueberry Nights is set to open for a limited release on February 13th, 2008.

Project Greenlight producer Chris Moore is already busy with his directorial debut, Killers, but now The Hollywood Reporter posts that he's also executive producing a miniseries and feature-length documentary based on A People's History of the United States by Howard Zinn. First published in 1980, the book follows the history of the United States from Columbus and Native Americans right through the twentieth century. However, instead of your ordinary historical book, Zinn critically looked at both the triumphs and tyranny of the country.

The project is titled The People Speak, and it's looking like it could be a pretty successful documentary, if the collaborators are any indication. The history will be brought together by music and readings that focus on the country's war, class, race, and women's rights struggles. Actors like Matt Damon, Viggo Mortensen, Marisa Tomei, Danny Glover, David Strathairn, Kerry Washington, and Josh Brolin will perform, while the likes of Eddie Vedder and John Legend will add some music into the mix. This collaboration will be topped off by Zinn himself, who will give introductions and historical contest to the pieces of the film.

As Moore describes it: "It's going to be a great piece of entertainment, but more importantly, something people can watch and learn and remember how great this country has been and how individual people have changed the course of history. It's going to make them think, laugh, and cry and be proud to be American." Yet the cynic in me is waiting for those people who will say all of this is anti-American. Hopefully, it will just be a well-received, good, accurate film that teaches as well as entertains. But what do you think?

The 1990s had no shortage of dysfunctional family movies, but Jodie Foster's second (and still most recent) directorial effort Home for the Holidays (1995) sends them all packing by bringing the family together for Thanksgiving dinner. Most movies in this genre handle the wide tapestry of characters by assigning them one-dimensional, easily defined personality types, but Foster and her screenwriter, the great W.D. "Rick" Richter, fit in dozens of remarkable little moments that bring everyone into three-dimensional relief. It begins with Claudia Larson (Holly Hunter, at her pluckiest) happily at work, restoring old paintings. (The opening credit sequence is rich with information, such as using egg yolks as a base.) Unfortunately, she gets laid off, tries to make out with her boss and comes down with a cold. Her teenage daughter (Claire Danes) announces that she's spending the holiday with her boyfriend and will be having sex for the first time.

With failure and humiliation hung around her neck, she returns home for turkey day. To rub it in, Claudia loses her fancy, big city coat at the airport and must settle for wearing her mother's puffy, hideously out-of-date coat for the rest of the visit. On the plane, she calls her closest companion, her brother Tommy (Robert Downey Jr.) and begs him to come too. It's an awkward, babbling message, but touchingly honest. Tommy, a cackling, gay nutcase full of mischievous energy, does turn up and brings the sexy Leo Fish (Dylan McDermott). Claudia is single, and in a lesser movie -- Dan in Real Life, for example -- everyone in the family would pester her to find a man, as if they had no concerns of their own. And certainly the subject comes up, most heartbreakingly in a scene with the sad-sack David Strathairn as an old classmate -- a meeting arranged by Claudia's mom (Anne Bancroft).

I had the chance to see The Sensation of Sight when it played the New Hampshire Film Festival last month in Portsmouth, NH where it won the award for Best Feature Film. We don't get a lot of films shot here in the Granite State, particularly ones with relatively high profile stars like David Strathairn (The Bourne Ultimatum, Goodnight and Good Luck) and Ian Somerhalder (probably best known for his work on ABC's Lost) so there's been some local buzz about this one ever since it wrapped production a few years back.

The tagline on the poster is "When life becomes a second language..." The film's promotional materials describe Strathairn's character Fin as undergoing a mid-life crisis, but he's better described as a man who has been crippled by despair. Fin is a high school teacher who, in the wake of a tragedy involving a student for which he feels responsible, leaves his wife and son and moves into a boarding house. He spends his days walking around his small picturesque New England town, pulling a Radio Flyer wagon that carries the encyclopedias he tries to sell to the townspeople. "I didn't know they did that anymore," remarks one character about Fin's new vocation. "I don't think they do," he replies. More importantly, he only appears to have the one set of books (whose origin becomes important late in the film) and the whole process seems to be a sad desperate attempt to give meaning to a life he no longer understands..

Just when you thought summer was beginning to wind down, remember that there's still at least one more big-budgeted action-packed threequel gearing up to invade theaters in a couple weeks. The Bourne Ultimatum arrives on August 3, and Cinema Blend has a pretty nifty gallery of stills for you to sift through. Check out Matt Damon as he reads a book, uses a laptop, rides a motorcycle, inspects a slide thingy and, of course, runs ... fast. Fellow cast members Julia Stiles, David Strathairn, Paddy Considine and Joan Allen also show up in a few shots, as the search for Jason Bourne intensifies when the man decides to return home and wag his presence in the face of those seeking him out.

Recently, Damon has gone on record saying that this will mark the last time he reprises his role as Jason Bourne, leading lots to assume that this franchise will stop at three films. Of course there's always a chance someone will change their mind and greenlight a fourth adventure, although they'll have to find someone alluring enough to fill Damon's shoes. Those interested in learning more about the film are more than welcome to check out some additional trailers and posters -- other than that, there's not much I can do for you. Will director Paul Greengrass produce a film that's on par (or even better) than the previous installment? Will Julia Stiles find a way to keep us awake this time while she delivers her lines? Will Jason Bourne finally learn his real identity -- that he's not actually an ex-CIA operative, but an ex-Burger King employee who watched way too many action films growing up? So many questions left unanswered; how will they wrap it up?

Although I never actually saw the film, I never forgot the poster for A Tale of Two Sisters, Ji-woon Kim's horror thriller that came out in 2003. With a pristine backdrop with well-dressed parents, two girls in white bloody dresses stared out, looking dazed and confused. The movie had a pretty successful run, and now it's been picked up by DreamWorks for an English-language adaptation. Although we usually groan at the myriad of Korean thriller remakes that hit the screen, I'm actually kind of interested in this one. Not only was the original considered the alternate way to make a thriller (different than The Grudge or The Ring), but David Strathairn has been added to the cast.

He's just one of those actors you can't help but like -- and it doesn't hurt that he has the talent to boot -- grabbing an Oscar nomination for Good Night, and Good Luck. Or, if you want to go really old-school, his uber-excellent portrayal of a tough-guy alien in John Sayles' Brother From Another Planet. Strathairn will play the father of two girls who have just come home from a mental institution, and find that home life isn't so comfortable -- between an unbalanced stepmother, who is being played by Elizabeth Banks (The 40 Year-Old Virgin), and a ghost who haunts the home. The film will be the first directorial feature for Thomas and Charles Guard, from a script adapted by Carlo Bernard and Doug Miro. I'm not entirely interested in a psycho-Banks, but hopefully this remake can live up to its potential.