MarisaTomei Tagged Articles at Cinematical

The first thing I noticed the morning after the Oscars was that a lot of people were searching for images of Marisa Tomei as a stripper. Guess it's good folks took something away from last night's ceremony. For those of you who didn't make it to the end credits or simply changed the channel as soon as Slumdog Millionaire was announced the winner of Best Picture, the Oscars did a little something different this year. Instead of showing us a recap of the night while the credits scrolled, they aired brief snippets of video from some of 2009's hottest and most anticipated films.

The Academy rules were that these clips be brand new, and while there was no dialogue, folks enjoyed their first looks at movies like Sherlock Holmes , Funny People , The Taking of Pelham 1 2 3 , Public Enemies , Julie & Julia , The Soloist , Up , Fame , Terminator Salvation , (500) Days of Summer , Amelia , Whatever Works , Inglourious Basterds , Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian , Monsters vs. Aliens , Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince , Angels & Demons , Old Dogs , Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs , The Boat That Rocked , An Education , State of Play , Imagine That and G-Force.

Check out the video below and let us know which flick you think looks the best.

What is it we love so much about big-screen strippers, aside from the obvious? Is it the eyes that reveal a trapped soul? The bruises that reveal a wounded heart? The solitary dances that reveal a lonely spirit? Obviously the stripper makes for a very complex character on screen as she (and he) has appeared in countless films over the years, spanning several different genres. The latest stripper to hit the stage comes in the form of actress Marisa Tomei, who may just nab an Oscar nod for her performance in The Wrestler (in limited release this weekend). And in the past couple of years, we've watched a number of different strippers do their thing -- from the fantastic ensemble cast of Abel Ferrara's Go Go Tales to the somewhat fascinating ensemble cast of Zombie Strippers, our thirst for people who take their clothes off for money has not gone away; it's just become a little more absurd.

Inspired by EW's recent piece on Stars Who Played Strippers, we'd like to know who your favorites are -- and why, exactly, you think the stripper is such a popular character in film. To help you, we've pieced together a gallery full of some of the most popular big-screen strippers. (Note: Bachelor Party's Nick the D*ck was Weinberg's choice -- but, c'mon, watch this clip and tell me he doesn't belong here.)

Warning: Gallery may be NSFW

(We're reposting our review of The Wrestler from the Toronto International Film Festival to coincide with the film's theatrical release.)

By James Rocchi

After winning top honors at the Venice Film Festival, Darren Aronofsky's The Wrestler rapidly became the must-see of the Toronto International Film Festival, with huge lines at the press and industry screening this afternoon seemingly unaffected by the news that Fox Searchlight had purchased the film. After seeing The Wrestler for myself, I feel the need to extend a note of caution about the film, which sailed into Toronto buoyed by advance raves for Mickey Rourke's performance as Randy "The Ram" Robinson, a low-level professional wrestler -- and we soon see how really, both those words could be in quotation marks -- whose '80s glory days are long over, scraping by at low-level, low-paying matches until a heart attack forces him to leave the ring and look at his life in the shadow of death. Many have already written about the parallels between Mickey Rourke and the swaggering, scarred wrestler he plays -- early success, fame and notoriety, a series of mis-steps and mistakes taking it all away bit by bit as the years advanced -- and the charge Rourke's own rise and fall offers a filmmaker like Aaronofsky looking to explore ruin and redemption.

But don't believe the hype -- or, more importantly, look past it; if a complicated, messy personal life were all it took to deliver a great performance, Paris Hilton and O.J. Simpson would have more Oscars than Katharine Hepburn. Rourke's work as Randy is physical, invested, powerful and sprawling -- but it's also quiet, sad and hauntingly wounded, too. And The Wrestler offers viewers far more than just Rourke's performance -- which, it must be said, is excellent -- if they're willing to not flinch from what it has to say: The Wrestler is a fascinating, rich, unblinking look at the dark, hunched mean streak that lies curled and poisonous inside of so much American popular entertainment and of so much American life. It's early to say this, but The Wrestler is one of the most grimly exciting, magnetically repellent movies we've had in a long time; it's flat-out one of the best American movies of 2008.

I don't know about you, but when I play the "actors who could be related game," like Jeffrey M. Anderson did back in July, I always start with Marisa Tomei being the perfect person to play Jonah Hill's mom. Really. Don't they look alike? The long, lean ... okay, forget it. I never dreamed of pairing the two up, but Fox Searchlight has.

The Hollywood Reporter posts that Marisa Tomei, Jonah Hill, and John C. Reilly are in talks to star in a new intergenerational comedy. (Note: I originally misread "intergenerational" as "intergalactic." Those three in space would have been so much cooler, but I digress.) Right now, the Jay and Mark Duplass (who are making their studio debut after several successful indie mumblecore-ish movies) film is without a name, but it was once called Safety Man. Tomei will play a woman starting a new relationship with Reilly, only to have her pesky son (Hill) try to foil the romance.

I love the idea of this trio, and can't wait to see what it would bring. However, why does Tomei always get paired with the less sexy of Hollywood? I know that it happens a lot in Tinseltown -- men who would be looked over normally become prime pieces of arse when they transform into successful actors. But did getting paired with Joe Pesci back in '92 curse her? Mickey Rourke with a face lift. Philip Seymour Hoffman. William H. Macy. Even the love interest of George Costanza on TV. Now, Reilly. Hollywood: Pair her with a sexy leading man in a really good film already, would ya?

"Darren did not put a strip pole in his office." -- Marisa Tomei.

Does the New York Film Festival still matter? The 46th edition opened last Friday, and while the fest may not have the celebrity cachet and discovery intent of Sundance and Cannes, or the welcoming populist mentality of Toronto, it stubbornly insists on being recognized as the gatekeeper for all that is worthwhile in world cinema.

Nonetheless, press conferences with a big-name American director and a resurrected American star (and his fetching, Academy Award-winning co-star) have stolen the spotlight during the first week of the festival. Looking somewhat like a guerilla himself, Steven Soderbergh arrived to promote his four-hour epic Che, starring Benicio del Toro as the revolutionary leader. According to the director, "There are a million Ches -– he means something different to everyone."

That attitude has irked some critics; Karina Longworth at Spout felt that Soderbergh's "unwillingness to make a statement may be a major part of the problem." On the other hand, Glenn Kenny of Some Came Running opined: "Silly me, I imagined that such an approach constituted a statement sufficient unto itself, but apparently not." The film will get a rare "roadshow" treatment when it opens in December: trotted around in its four-hour entirety to selected cities for one week only by IFC Films in December, complete with elevated ticket prices and a fancy giveaway program of some sort. Dreamgirls for the intelligentsia?

After the jump: The Wrestler and two fresh new films about those darn kids.

After winning top honors at the Venice Film Festival, Darren Aronofsky's The Wrestler rapidly became the must-see of the Toronto International Film Festival, with huge lines at the press and industry screening this afternoon seemingly unaffected by the news that Fox Searchlight had purchased the film. After seeing The Wrestler for myself, I feel the need to extend a note of caution about the film, which sailed into Toronto buoyed by advance raves for Mickey Rourke's performance as Randy "The Ram" Robinson, a low-level professional wrestler -- and we soon see how really, both those words could be in quotation marks -- whose '80s glory days are long over, scraping by at low-level, low-paying matches until a heart attack forces him to leave the ring and look at his life in the shadow of death. Many have already written about the parallels between Mickey Rourke and the swaggering, scarred wrestler he plays -- early success, fame and notoriety, a series of mis-steps and mistakes taking it all away bit by bit as the years advanced -- and the charge Rourke's own rise and fall offers a filmmaker like Aaronofsky looking to explore ruin and redemption.

But don't believe the hype -- or, more importantly, look past it; if a complicated, messy personal life were all it took to deliver a great performance, Paris Hilton and O.J. Simpson would have more Oscars than Katharine Hepburn. Rourke's work as Randy is physical, invested, powerful and sprawling -- but it's also quiet, sad and hauntingly wounded, too. And The Wrestler offers viewers far more than just Rourke's performance -- which, it must be said, is excellent -- if they're willing to not flinch from what it has to say: The Wrestler is a fascinating, rich, unblinking look at the dark, hunched mean streak that lies curled and poisonous inside of so much American popular entertainment and of so much American life. It's early to say this, but The Wrestler is one of the most grimly exciting, magnetically repellent movies we've had in a long time; it's flat-out one of the best American movies of 2008.

TITLE: The Wrestler
DIRECTED BY: Darren Aronofsky
STARS: Mickey Rourke, Marisa Tomei, Evan Rachel Wood

WHAT IT'S ABOUT: A big-name pro wrestler back in the 1980s, Randy "The Ram" Robinson now bides his time with performances at high schools and community centers. A heart attack threatens early retirement, but Randy the lure of one more chance to get back in the ring with his biggest rival forces him to choose between his health and another shot at the spotlight.

WHY WE'RE EXCITED ABOUT IT: Aronofsky just missed the mark with the ambitious but over-reaching The Fountain; his direction of that film, nonetheless, was intriguing enough to make this a film worth catching. Tomei has been one of our faves for years, turning in particularly solid performances in 2001's In the Bedroom and last year's Before the Devil Knows You're Dead, and the prospect of her and Evan Rachel Wood in the same film would make this one worthwhile, even if we didn't want to see it just to see Rourke in long hair and wrestling outfits.

Back to TIFF Preview page ...

Give Joshua Seftel some credit; he didn't pull any punches on War, Inc. In his first feature film, written by star/producer John Cusack, Jeremy Pisker, and Mark Leyner, Seftel attempts to make a scathing commentary on the War on Terror, the privatization of the military, the commercialization of societies all over the world, and other shenanigans. In a former life, Seftel was a former network news producer, and became known around Hollywood circles for directing documentaries like Breaking the Mold: The Kee Malesky Story.

He was nice enough to speak to me about the experience from a very blue room at the Tribeca Film Festival press office. Text and video are after the jump.

What do you say when a film is so bad that you actually feel physical pain for everyone involved? You literally sit there for an hour-and-a-half and feel sorry for everyone who put such a hard effort into the making of the film, only to see it lay there like a lox when it's finally projected on the big screen. As a reviewer, there's not much more you can do than just endure it and hope to see a fleeting moment or two of quality, just so you don't think you've completely wasted your time.

That's all the thoughts that were going through my head as I watched War, Inc., an ambitious film that fails miserably at everything it attempts to be. As a comedy, it's not funny. As a satire, it's as subtle as a sledgehammer. And as a treatise on war, the corporatization of the military, and the horrors of pop stardom, it doesn't tell you anything that you don't already know if you just watch the 24-hour news channels or read the news online even a little bit.

Perhaps Marisa Tomei liked all the publicity she got from shedding her clothes in Before the Devil Knows You're Dead (for practically the entire first half of the film), because the gal seems to be looking for some more provocative projects. Now before I link to the Variety story, I have to give JoBlo credit because they coughed this one up last week in what appeared to be a random throwaway line that took me by surprise. Yes, Tomei will star as an aging stripper, and girlfriend to Mickey Rourke, in Darren Aronofsky's The Wrestler. And Variety has just confirmed it. Phew. Back when JoBlo casually mentioned it, I thought I was the only one who didn't know about this casting. Apparently no one did.

The Wrestler stars Rourke as an over-the-hill 1980s-era pro wrestler who retires after a heart attack, but then fights his way back into the ring for one last chance at defeating his arch-nemesis. Tomei will play his girlfriend, the stripper, and throughout the film our wrestler will attempt to build a relationship with her son. Talk about a dysfunctional family right there. "Yeah, my mom's a stripper and her boyfriend is an over-the-hill wrestler. You should see the moves they put on one another when I'm not looking." Production is currently taking place in New York and New Jersey. So, how much Tomei nudity do you think we'll get this time around?

Oh, and if you want to see what Tomei as a stripper might look like, head after the jump ...