OprahWinfrey Tagged Articles at Cinematical

Click the image below to view entire poster

Cinematical has just received this beautiful exclusive teaser poster for Disney's The Princess and the Frog, which marks the studio's triumphant return to 2D hand-drawn animation. Featuring the voices of Anika Noni Rose (as Princess Tiana), Oprah Winfrey, Keith David, Jim Cummings, John Goodman, Jenifer Lewis, Bruno Campos, Michael-Leon Wooley, Peter Bartlett and Terrence Howard, The Princess and the Frog is based on E.D. Baker's classic novel The Frog Princess, except this film -- written and directed by the filmmaking duo of John Musker and Ron Clements (The Little Mermaid, Aladdin, Hercules) -- is set in New Orleans, stars a singing crocodile and features Disney's first African-American princess. Famed songwriter/composer Randy Newman (Toy Story, Monsters, Inc.) lent his familiar voice to the soundtrack, which I'm sure will carve out its special place alongside Disney's long list of memorable tracks.

The first trailer for The Princess and the Frog was also just released on Apple (watch it there or after the jump), and folks will have a chance to see the film when it hits theaters in New York and LA on November 25th before expanding wide on December 11th. Click the image below to view entire poster -- does this look like vintage Disney, or what?

Just a couple of weeks back, it seemed that only film bloggers could bring themselves to crack jokes about how Dakota Fanning's super-power sub-performer Push might get confused with the award-winning and far-from-fantasy Sundance title Push: Based on a Novel by Sapphire -- and lo, most did.

Well, hopefully, they've gotten that out of their system, because attached today to the release of Tyler Perry's Madea Goes to Jail is a trailer that now refers to it as Precious: Based on a Novel by Sapphire, after the protagonist's preferred nickname.

Having not seen the film -- which our Eric D. Snider referred to as "unsettling and bleak," though "ultimately triumphant and hopeful" -- I can't help but think that the change not only avoids confusion with that other film's eventual DVD release (an admittedly unlikely scenario), but it adds a sense of the personal that was lacking before (having seen the trailer, which is not yet online, I still wouldn't know what "Push" referred to). Wouldn't you rather want to know who this Precious is exactly and what she's about?

Better yet, the very word itself lends a hint of the positive, which could very well make the difference between some Academy voter either picking it up or passing it over in their mounting pile of screeners in favor of something a bit more obvious like So The Holocaust Kinda Sucked.

Look who wants to fight Oprah over an illiterate, overweight African-American girl: Harvey Weinstein. Actually, Harvey isn't fighting Oprah Winfrey directly; The Weinstein Company (TWC) and Lionsgate filed lawsuits against each other yesterday, both claiming the right to distribute Sundance award-winner Push: Based on a Novel by Sapphire, according to indieWIRE.

On the surface, this is patently absurd. We're not talking about a sure-fire box office smash, are we? The premise of Push (not to be confused, of course, with the super-powered action movie opening tomorrow) is so "unsettling and bleak that no one would blame you if you didn't want to see it:." That's how Eric D. Snider began his review from Sundance. Even with Oprah and Tyler Perry getting behind the release, Push sounds like a tough sell. So why is Harvey suing?

His lawyer claims it's because a deal was in place with sales agent Cinetic Media, who went "behind their backs" to make a better deal with Lionsgate. Cinetic says that a deal with TWC was not in place. Beyond the 'he said, she said' legal disagreements, David Poland commented: "Unlike Lionsgate, TWC is NOT a company with a strong history of releasing films for black audiences. On the other hand, they now have Tom Ortenberg, who was probably drooling at the opportunity to top Lionsgate with TWC's first real urban film."

One of the minor eyebrow-raisers at this year's Sundance Film Festival was that the fest ended without its most acclaimed film being picked up by a distributor. That would be Push: Based on a Novel by Sapphire (not to be confused with that Chris Evans/Dakota Fanning super-power thing coming out this week), the harrowing drama that won both the grand jury prize AND the audience award -- a rare feat. Would it languish in obscurity and go straight to DVD, despite its critical and popular acclaim?

No! It won't! And as usual, we have Oprah to thank. Her production company and Tyler Perry's company will help finance distribution of the film, which has been officially purchased by Lionsgate. Lionsgate tends to be frugal in its marketing (at least in comparison with the bigger studios), hence the need for partners. Plus, the film is a hard sell: It's about an obese, illiterate Harlem teen who's pregnant for the second time by her father and who lives with her abusive mother. It's not the usual Lionsgate product (i.e., a Saw sequel) and not the kind of thing that will have a $20 million opening weekend.

But Ms. Winfrey and Mr. Perry evidently recognize its value, and don't worry -- since the film is already done, it's too late for either of them to mess it up. (Had Perry made the film, surely he would have played the overweight teenage girl himself.)

My rave review for Cinematical can be found here. But if my word and the words of Oprah and Madea aren't enough to convince you, look at what Variety, Film School Rejects, IndieWire, and the New York Post said about it. Lionsgate hasn't said when they plan to release it, but I wouldn't be surprised if they wait until fall and give it a push for awards season.

Oprah Winfrey might be one of the most powerful women in the world, but one thing's for sure: the gal has no talent for spotting literary scams. Variety has reported that Herman Rosenblat's Oprah-endorsed Holocaust memoir, Angel at the Fence, has been pulled from publication by Berkley Books just weeks before the book was scheduled to hit the shelves. But that's not all -- plans for a $25 million film based on the book have been compromised following allegations by scholars, friends and family members that Rosenblat's tale was fabricated (New Republic has the whole story over at their website).

According to Rosenblat's tale, his family was forced into the Schlieben Labor Camp in Germany, where he supposedly met his "angel" -- a young Jewish girl who lived outside of the camp and met Rosenblat at the fence to give him apples and bread, and he never learned her name. After the war, he relocated to New York and on a double date finally met the young girl who had kept him alive during his time at the labor camp. The two eventually fell in love, and it was that love story that earned them the spot the Oprah show (twice!) where she referred to their tale as "the single greatest love story" she had encountered in her 22 years on the show. Oprah has since declined to comment on the current controversy.

During a Disney showcase in Los Angeles this afternoon, a few fairly big announcements were made -- most notably the fact that Cars 2 is being bumped up from 2012 to the summer of 2011. John Lasseter also announced a series of animated shorts related to the Cars franchise called Cars Toons, and those will air on the Disney Channel, as well as (possibly) screen theatrically. With Toy Story 3 arriving in 2010, this means Pixar will shovel out back-to-back sequels for the first time ever. Those Pixar fans seeking an original product will get one next year with Up.

Also during the showcase, it was announced that Oprah Winfrey has joined the voice cast of The Princess and the Frog, where she'll play Eudora, the mother of the main character Princess Tiana (Anika Noni Rose). Due out on Christmas Day in 2009, The Princess and the Frog returns Disney to their classic 2D animation and it follows a young girl who lives in the New Orleans French Quarter during the Jazz Age. Princess and the Frog also marks the first time Disney has featured an African American princess.

We'll update this post should more info come out ...

Here I was thinking that this whole movie into musical and then back into a movie trend had finally come to an end. How wrong I was. The MTV movie blog recently spoke with former American Idol winner Fantasia Barrino and according to her, Oprah Winfrey is planning to produce a big-budget movie musical of The Color Purple. The musical will use the Broadway adaptation of Spielberg's 1985 film as a blueprint and Barrino told MTV, "That's going to happen and I'm going to do it."

The original feature film was based on the novel by Alice Walker about the struggles of a young black woman in early 20th century America. The film was a big Oscar contender, but ending up losing most of the awards to the more 'colonial style' of Out of Africa. Just on a side note, it still kills me to this day that Whoopi Goldberg didn't win for her performance as Celie. Instead, she won for the vastly inferior romance, Ghost -- but I'm getting a little off topic.

The Broadway show premiered back in 2005, and Barrino took over the main role of Celie last April. Barrino is planning on taking some time off to work on her own music now that the run of the show has ended, but she won't stay gone long. Barrino tells MTV, "They're going to work with me. They don't have to [but] that's a favor, working with someone like Miss Oprah who's so talented and amazing - It's a blessing." It might be blessing for her, but I'm just not convinced that it's a great idea to begin with. How about you?

When you think of the classic 'sports movie' formula, you probably run through your favorite baseball or football movies, but make no mistake: Denzel Washington's The Great Debaters is every bit the sports flick that Hoosiers, The Natural and Remember the Titans are. It's only the extra-curriculars that have changed. Whether or not that's a good thing is entirely up to you, but if you're a big fan of totally predictable yet effectively entertaining "competition" movies, then there's very little chance you won't dig what's offered here. And even if you find the screenplay to be the pinnacle of all things obvious, the performances are still pretty excellent.

Plus, hell, if cheerleading is a sport, then so is debate.

Denzel Washington (directing his second film after 2002's Antwone Fisher) does a reliably excellent job of elevating basic material -- when he's on the screen, anyway; his character here is Melvin B. Tolson, debating coach for a black Texas college. The year is 1935, the civil rights movement is just starting to gain (a little) traction, and Tolson (despite being an unquestionably dedicated educator) is in big trouble thanks to his "questionable" politics.

The latest debate team for Wiley College is a broadly interesting one: the soft-spoken girl, the passionate hunk, the youthful prodigy, and ... the chubby one. Again, it's a good thing this movie has such a strong cast. Each of the young actors do exceedingly fine work with some fairly one-note roles. As the angry yet powerfully articulate Henry Lowe, Nate Parker is particularly excellent, and I wouldn't be surprised to see a lot more movies from him in the future.

I can't be the only one who saw this title of the film and thought of the old joke about "master debaters," but that is probably not the best association to make when you are talking about a family film. Variety reports that Kimberly Elise has signed on to the period flick The Great Debaters. The movie is the second directorial effort from Denzel Washington and centers on a small East Texas debate team that challenged Harvard's famed team to a debate. The film is set in the 30's, which will probably add an extra "feel-good" element to it, as its sure to be not only a story of triumph over adversity, but some deep-seated discrimination. The cast also includes Nate Parker (Pride), Forest Whitaker and Washington who will play the coach of the debate team. Elise is set to play Whitaker's wife and the mother to the team's star debater.

Elise must have had an inside track on the role since one of the film's producers is media queen Oprah Winfrey, who gave Elise one of her first big-screen roles in the adaptation of Toni Morrison's Beloved, and Elise has already worked with Washington on The Manchurian Candidate. After shooting has finished in Louisiana, Elise will return to work on the international drama Red Soil. The Great Debaters is set for release in 2008.

Seriously, how much do you trust Tom Hanks? Would you let him babysit your kids? Borrow your savings? Take your new car out for a spin? This is the question raised by a new list made by Forbes magazine, which ranked 1,500 celebrities by how trustworthy they are. The top ten includes mostly movie stars, including Hanks, who rated #1. The actor seems a likely choice, as he's possibly the most popular person in Hollywood these days, but does likeability equal trustworthiness? Some of the other names don't even make as much sense as Hanks, though. At first I thought maybe the list was using the term trustworthy to mean that we have trust in the celebrity's work. Hanks, for instance, can sell a movie better than anyone, meaning people trust his role choices and go to see his movies based on this trust. As for Oprah? We all know millions of people trust her recommendations. But some of the names just aren't the most bankable or even the most popular stars. Michael J. Fox? James Earl Jones? Ron Howard?

Satoshi Kanazawa, an evolutionary psychologist, points to the obvious: that people can't differentiate between reality and fiction, and this list is made up of people whose on-screen personalities are who we trust, not the performers themselves. Certainly he would correlate this to our obsession with the political opinions, and possible electability, of movie stars.

So, what exactly are we supposed to be trusting these people with? And who might you trust enough to add to the list?

Check out the ten most trustworthy celebs after the jump.