Geez, poor Sybill Trelawney has the crappiest luck. First, Dolores Umbridge goes after the zany teacher and tries to get rid of her, and then we learn that she's been written out of the next installment, even though she plays an important part in Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince. And now, well, now we don't even get to look forward to her in the final double installment. No big-screen goodbye for us, unless Order of the Phoenix heads back to theaters. (This is assuming the Harry Powers That Be don't recast her for the final film.)

Emma Thompson has told MTV that she's given up the Harry Potter world to make another Nanny McPhee film. It makes sense -- she wrote and starred in the first, so naturally it "means much more" to her. So, while she won't be magical with Harry, Hermione, and Ron, she will delight in magic with the tentatively titled Nanny McPhee and The Big Bang. This time around, it's one hundred years after the first film, and focuses on "The big war, and a war between these two sets of extremely different children."

I can't help but wonder -- is this why she wasn't in Half-Blood Prince too?

Well my friends are gone
And my hair is gray
And I ache in the places where I used to play
And I'm crazy for love but I'm not coming on
I'm just paying my rent every day In the tower of song
-- Tower of Song, Leonard Cohen

Harvey Shines (Dustin Hoffman) is a New York jingle-writer who doesn't quite toil in the tower of song; maybe in a small office in a nearby strip mall. But the rest of it applies; he's older, tired, headed to London for his daughter's wedding and obsessing about getting back fast in time for a job-related meeting. Harvey's dreading the trip before he even takes it, which guarantees it will be dreadful, but then he meets Kate Walker (Emma Thompson), another single, singular person unwilling to confront the terrifying possibility of happiness. ...

Written and directed by Joel Hopkins (who previously gave us the younger-skewed Jump Tomorrow), Last Chance Harvey may be easily -- in fact, too easily -- dismissed as "Before Sunrise for the sunset years," as Harvey and Kate meet accidentally, mesh immediately, dare to hope, get brought together by chance and separated by accident. Younger audiences will ignore Last Chance Harvey like a an overdue bill notice in the post, but if you've been around the block of life a few times -- on the bus or under it -- you'll find that it wins you over, bit by bit, in no small part thanks to the mix of effortless charm and contemplated sincerity Hoffman and Thompson bring to their work; the whole film has an air of lightweight gravity to it, and Hopkins may not be swinging for the fences, but he knows just how to swing and hit for a solid double.

Cinematical has just received these exclusive images from the upcoming film Last Chance Harvey, starring Dustin Hoffman and Emma Thompson. You can view all three images in the gallery below. Last Chance Harvey follows a down-on-his-luck jingle writer (Hoffman) who, after missing a flight, losing his job and getting dissed by his daughter at her wedding, bumps into an over-worked mama's gal (Thompson) at the airport bar and finds himself energized by her presence.

You wouldn't necessarily think Hoffman and Thompson as an on-screen pair in a light romantic comedy, but I kinda dig it. Perhaps what this genre needs is some better acting to revitalize the same old stories, so I'd give it a chance. Written and directed by Joel Hopkins, Last Chance Harvey opens in limited release (NY and LA) on December 26th, and goes wide on January 23rd. For more, check out the website here, and feel free to hop into our exclusive gallery below.

Some might question whether Brideshead Revisited, the classic novel by Evelyn Waugh, needed to be revisited in a film adaptation; the novel, after all, has been adapted once before in a lengthy and well-beloved British television serial. Fortunately for fans of Waugh's work, this film version of Brideshead, directed by Julian Jarrold (Kinky Boots, Becoming Jane) off a screenplay written by Jeremy Brock and Andrew Davies, is beautifully shot, painstakingly directed, and well worth watching. For the most part, the filmmakers avoid mutilating Waugh's work, although the end result does place a greater emphasis on certain aspects (romance) and limit or eliminate others altogether (the brilliantly written discourses on religion and love that permeate the book).

The film is shot in Castle Howard, also the setting for the miniseries version, and Brideshead itself is a majestic, imposing character that looms over all who encounter it. The screenplay is rather a masterful adaptation; the film handles the compression of years through the storyline with a bit of book-ended time-jumping to both introduce us to the lead characters and close out the story, and Brock and Davies do an able job of whittling the story down to meet the needs of a cinematic experience without losing the feel of Waugh's novel in the process.

If you caught Kim's recent post about revisiting Brideshead Revisited, you'll remember that we're about to get more Emma Thompson in theaters as Lady Marchmain. As the film's July 26 release date zooms closer, buzz for the film is increasing, but it's not all run-of-the-mill Q&A's and that typical PR chatter. Vanity Fair just threw up a great discussion with the actress, one that took an appropriate, literary angle. Instead of the usual, they had her answer the classic Proust Questionnaire.

I could do without a lead-in that lists "ponders her thighs" as the first mention of what Thompson discussed, but the actual answers are a fun read. Thompson covers a number of areas, from her loving women with the "ability to laugh in the face of disaster," to discussions of those she admires, and her love of wine. It's amazing how much information can be jam-packed into one word answers that provide a quick and fun interview. I'm surprised that in this modern day, where brevity is adored, more people aren't getting Proustian.

*They've also put one up for the late and great George Carlin, from 2001.

[via Anne Thompson]

One of my favorite classic novels, Evelyn Waugh's Brideshead Revisited, is coming your way in a new adaptation starring what looks to be a perfectly suited cast. Matthew Goode, (Match Point, The Lookout) stars as Charles Ryder, the tale's protagonist and narrator, who befriends the wealthy Sebastian Flyte (Ben Whishaw). When Sebastian brings Charles for a visit to his family's estate, Brideshead Castle, Charles meets Sebastian's sister, Lady Julia Flyte (Hayley Atwell, Cassandra's Dream).

Emma Thompson plays Lady Marchmain, Sebastian and Julia's aristocratic mother, a Roman Catholic for whom her husband, Lord Marchmain, converted his faith from Anglican; in the book, at least, Catholicism is an influence on both the lives and conversations of the characters, especially Lady Marchmain, who uses the duel thumbscrews of guilt and manipulation to control others ... this is a character Thompson can really sink her teeth into, and I look forward to seeing her take on the role.

Poor Sybill Trelawney.* First Umbridge has at her in Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, in front of all the students, no less. Now she's really been sacked! At least, she has been from the next movie. After hearing that Moaning Myrtle was left out of Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, Snitch Seeker reports that so is Emma Thompson's Trelawney. A Hamilton Hodell rep said: "She is not in the Half-Blood Prince."

As the site points out, this means that she won't be able to play helpful informant to Harry. (What she tells him, I'll leave out to save the eyes of those who haven't read the books yet.) With two important players out of the film, it begs the question of how the story will come together. I imagine their important roles in this part of the story will be given to another character, but who? We'll have to wait until November 21 to find out.

*The UK/Canada spelling is being used. I've no idea why it's spelled "Sibyll" for the US.

A retro film set in 1960s London is interesting. Hearing that Nick Hornby wrote the script makes it intriguing. An awesome cast -- that just makes the upcoming film An Education sound downright tasty. Variety reports that Lone Scherfig, the Danish filmmaker behind Happy-Go-Lucky, is gearing up to helm the feature, and these are the names she'll get to mold with her directorial hands: Peter Sarsgaard, Orlando Bloom, Alfred Molina, Sally Hawkins, Rosamund Pike, Emma Thompson, Olivia Williams, and newcomer Carey Mulligan. (Some of the cast signed on earlier this month.)

While I vowed that I learned my lesson about great actors not necessarily making great movies after Derailed, I so, so, so want to see this. The film will focus on a 17-year-old girl played by Mulligan who lived in the quiet burbs of London. However, it's during the swinging '60s, and she gets pulled into craziness by a 30-something Brit played by Sarsgaard. (Cradle robber.) As THR described it: "He courts her with chic dinners, clubs, and foreign trips, charming her father (Molina) but putting her future at Oxford University in jeopardy." Thompson, meanwhile, plays her school's headmistress.

Dumb joke of the day #2: She should've bought a SarsGuaard.

Production begins in London this March.

It took a little longer than expected, since production schedules almost never start on time, but principal photography is now gearing up on Last Chance Harvey. With the cameras about to roll, The Hollywood Reporter has posted the rest of the cast, plus a little more about the plot. Back in June, I shared news of the film, which was written for stars Dustin Hoffman and Emma Thompson by screenwriter Joel Hopkins. It's about an unlucky man who meets an "unlikely female companion" when he goes to his daughter's wedding in London.

Hoffman and Thompson are being joined by an impressive supporting cast that boasts: Kathy Baker (The Jane Austen Book Club), James Brolin (The Hunting Party), Eileen Atkins (Gosford Park), Richard Schiff (Ray), and Liane Balaban (New Waterford Girl). Hoffman's character is described as "a down-on-his-luck New York jungle writer," who has a tough boss played by Schiff. Balaban plays his daughter, who is getting married in London, and Baker is her mother and Hoffman's ex-wife -- who is also now married to Brolin. Rounding things off is Atkins, who will play Thompson's overbearing mother. It all seems like pretty spot-on casting to me, and they've come up with some great pairings -- such as Baker being the ex-wife who has moved past Hoffman's unlucky life, and Thompson having to deal with the snark of Atkins. Shooting starts today in London.

I loved Will Ferrell's Stranger Than Fiction. When I saw it, the only thing that bummed me out was the lack of air time between Professor Jules Hilbert (Dustin Hoffman) and writer Karen Eiffel (Emma Thompson). There's just something about a man who entertains the notion of being realistically stuck in a novel, and a woman who sits in the rain imagining her character's death, while obsessively puffing away at her smoke, that makes the pair seem like romantic kismet. If you agree, you'll probably be happy to hear that they're pairing up for an upcoming dramatic romance called Last Chance Harvey -- and no, this isn't a big rabbit Harvey sequel.

According to Variety, the project is the creation of Joel Hopkins, who won a BAFTA award with producer Nicola Usborne for the 2001 indie film, Jump Tomorrow. Hopkins penned the script with both actors in mind and will direct them in the world where an unlucky man attends his daughter's wedding in London and "finds an unlikely female companion." I can only hope that within that drama, some of the quirk and humor that both actors are so perfect at shines through. So, I'm banking on that "unlikely" bit being something cinematically tasty. The movie will begin filming this September in London, as the latest project for the recently-launched Overture -- who is also cooking up Ferris Wheel with Charlize Theron, 105 Degrees and Rising and Mad Money, which stars Diane Keaton, Queen Latifah and Katie Holmes.