Gillian Anderson Tagged Articles at Cinematical

I've never read Laurence Sterne's "The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman," and apparently, that's no small feat anyhow. After all, Sterne's protagonist starts out just before his birth and spends his time describing so many tangents of his existence that the book ends by the time his life has barely begun.

But I was delighted by the approach with which director Michael Winterbottom and writer Frank Cottrell Boyce adapted the seemingly unfilmable novel -- by making a movie about making the movie, which itself never quite gets around to unfolding. Steve Coogan plays a version of himself who's trying to keep his supporting actor/co-lead down and his girlfriend and newborn happy, in addition to juggling the production and the press and the pressures that come with the shoot as a whole.

It's all so delightfully twisty and sly, and I suspect that it's very much keeping in spirit with Sterne's work. I'm not sure that I could pick one favorite scene (actually, maybe the bit where an exceptionally perky Gillian Anderson gets hired), but YouTube has cut my work out for me. There's only one full scene I can embed here, but it's as much a doozy as most, as Coogan acts like he's coping with a hot chestnut in his trousers, only to then try it with an actual hot chestnut (or did he?).

As for the entire movie -- which also stars Dylan Moran, Kelly Macdonald, Stephen Fry, Jeremy Northam, and Naomie Harris -- at least I can promise it'll only run about ninety minutes. Talk about making a long story short....

Watch the video after the jump

Six years have passed since "The X-Files" went off the air after nine seasons; fans agree that it left with a whimper rather than a bang, and ten years have passed since the first and only feature film. So the question of the day is: why a sequel? Why now? But perhaps a better question is "why not?" The fact is that FBI special agents Fox Mulder (David Duchovny) and Dana Scully (Gillian Anderson) always had vats of chemistry; they arguably outstripped and outranked any other male-female couple in the history of television. Their pairing was perfect: Mulder believed -- or wanted to believe -- in the supernatural while Scully was a scientist, a doctor and a Catholic who believed in God but looked for reasonable, logical explanations in everything. In each episode, the team was called in to investigate some kind of paranormal activity, and they debated and discussed the various possibilities behind each. In the end, hardly anything was ever proved or disproved.

The X-Files: I Want to Believe offers the viewer many mysteries to contemplate -- and only one of them is on-screen; as David Duchovny and Gillian Anderson return to roles and a franchise that last graced our TV screens in 2002 (and was last on the big screen in 1998), your mind swirls around the behind-the-scenes facts as fiercely as it does around the events playing out before your eyes. As reclusive, retired ex-FBI agents Fox Mulder and Dana Scully (Duchovny and Anderson) help the FBI with an abduction case, you're not following the plot as such; instead, you're thinking things like Hey, didn't this show get canceled six years ago? Haven't Duchovny and Chris Carter, the star and director of this film, both sued the studio behind it? Who, out in the movie going audience, is really clamoring for this movie? If you're an X-Files fan, is this film's freestanding creepy tale, with no link to the weird and convoluted mythos Carter came up with for the show, going to satisfy whatever itch you may still have for the franchise? And if you're not an X-Files fan, is the idea that this film stands alone enough reason to come to the franchise now?

This just in off the AP: This summer's X-Files flick has finally been given a proper title. Wanna know what it is? Of course you do -- it shall be known as The X-Files: I Want to Believe. 20th Century Fox signed off on the title today, and that's what they're going with. Fans of the television series will recognize the slogan 'I Want to Believe' from a poster Mulder (David Duchovny) had hanging in his basement office where he and Scully (Gillian Anderson) worked.

On the title, director Chris Carter said, "It's a natural title. It's a story that involves the difficulties in mediating faith and science. `I Want to Believe.' It really does suggest Mulder's struggle with his faith." It's an appropriate title on many different levels; ever since the show went off the air, fans wanted to believe it would make a comeback on the big screen. And it did. The first film came and went, and since then fans have wanted to believe that Mulder and Scully would one day reunite -- either on the small or big screen. That day will finally come on July 25th, when The X-Files: I Want to Believe arrives in theaters.

What do you think of the new title? Speak ya mind folks -- speak it!

The National Post ran a story today about the press conference the X-Files cast and crew held on Wednesday. (Minus Gillian Anderson, who seems to be practically absent from this whole circus in general.) The cast and crew thanked Vancouver and revealed that those photos of Mulder and Scully kissing were fake.

"We staged that," David Duchovny told reporters. The article mentions the photo causing "breathless speculation about the characters' are-they-or-aren't-they romance" which makes me wonder what sites they visited. Only the most diehard sites could be breathless about it -- and only fans who completely forgot the whole offspring element.

Director Chris Carter complained about the attention focused on the production. "It's been a two-way street. To tell you the truth, I would like to make the movie secretly and put it out there on July 25, have everybody get a gift they could open." Is that why your movie still doesn't have a title?

Oh, X-Files. There was a time in say, 1996, when the sight of these photos would have sent me racing to the official X-Phile board, logging in under my screen name IMScully33 (and yes, if you see it in the AICN Talkbacks -- that is me), and engaging in excited speculation.

Now I can only rouse a mild interest in these spy photos, courtesy of Flynet Online and fresh from the set of The Untitled X-Files Sequel. It's my duty to warn you of spoilers (although I pretty much gave it away in that title) but I have to say. . .is this really a spoiler? Didn't Mulder and Scully have sex off-screen and produce a child, thus rendering this pretty unexciting?

The time for them to kiss was back in X-Files: Fight the Future -- and you let us down, Chris Carter. Stop trying to make up for that off screen consummation!

This truly causes me pain. It brings to mind my blissfully misspent youth, which I spent pondering aliens, conspiracy theories, and buying all those episode guides. I was even a Scully lookalike at the tender age of 17. (I even appeared in an issue of The Official X-Files Magazine. I was that good.) In so many ways, The X-Files helped make me the geek I am today -- and also the bitter cynic who sits snarking on this post now. I want it to be 1996 again so I'm actually excited by the release of a second X-Files movie, and sighing over the possibility that two brilliant and lonely FBI Agents will get together.

I shouldn't be surprised that X-Files fans are back to their old tricks again and scrutinizing every little detail they can get their hands on when it comes to the sequel. X-Files News is reporting that Mitch Pileggi, aka Walter Skinner, will be reviving his character for Untitled X Files Sequel. They really are going to have to come up with a title one of these days, by the way. According to the site, they are in possession of a schedule with Pileggi named in the worksheet for the day's shoot.

Pileggi starred on the TV series as Assistant Director Skinner, a former Marine and Vietnam vet. Skinner was the direct supervisor of the paranormally inclined FBI Agents, Dana Scully (Gillian Anderson) and Fox Mulder (David Duchovny). The character started off with ambiguous allegiances, but as the story wore on, Skinner clearly became one of the good guys.