ThandieNewton Tagged Articles at Cinematical

The first teaser trailer for Roland Emmerich's 2012 has just arrived online, courtesy of Moviefone, and from the looks of it the director has returned to his most successful end-of-the-world form for this film about the Mayan prophecy that predicts the world will end in the year 2012. Starring John Cusack, Amanda Peet, Thandie Newton, Woody Harrelson and more, 2012 will follow a group of survivors as they deal with the catastrophic events occurring on their planet as the world as they know it slowly comes to an end. In addition to this teaser, you can Google 2012 and surf through tons of information about the prophecy -- including this site, Institute for Human Continuity, which allows users to register for a lottery number to ensure their chance of survival once that dreadful day arrives.

2012 is due in theaters on July 10, 2009, and you can find out more about the film over on its official website (which just launched with this teaser). Watch below, or over on Moviefone in glorious HD. Thoughts?

You'd think that being married to Madonna, Guy Ritchie would have picked up on the value of occasionally reinventing oneself. But no, he keeps making the same movie, the same ultra-cool exercises in British gangster violence and stylish criminal shenanigans, and RockNRolla is the latest entry. Then again, the one time he did try something different, the result was Swept Away, so maybe he's wise to stay in his comfort zone.

At any rate, RockNRolla inspires strong feelings of "meh" in me. It's not nearly as clever, funny, or stylish as Snatch or Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels, though the accents are a lot less indecipherable this time around, so that's nice. It's also not as good as Gangster No. 1 or Sexy Beast or many of the other gritty British gangster capers that have come around in the last several years. It feels like a rerun -- which isn't necessarily a bad thing, after all. People watch reruns all the time.

Our narrator is Archie (Mark Strong), who works as the calm, suave right-hand man to Lenny (Tom Wilkinson), the most powerful money-lender and underworld boss in London. Half the city's councilors, judges, and cops are in Lenny's pocket, and he has leveraged this influence into a massive fortune in real estate.

Lenny is not a figure to be messed with, but the Russians don't know that. A new mover and shaker named Uri (Karel Roden) has come to town to strike a deal with Lenny -- it involves paying Lenny to bribe city officials to get a construction project underway -- and he's a formidable figure himself. Lenny is old school; Uri is dangerously modern.

More photos from Oliver Stone's upcoming George W. Bush satire, W., have arrived online via USA Today, and a good amount of them show what it looked like behind the scenes on one of this fall's most talked-about films. Above you get a pretty good look at Stone going over notes with Thandie Newton (Condoleeza Rice), Scott Glenn (Donald Rumsfeld), Bruce McGill (George Tenet), Josh Brolin (George W. Bush), Jeffrey Wright (Colin Powell) and Richard Dreyfuss (Dick Cheney). Also featured in this selection of images is James Cromwell as President George H.W. Bush.

Apparently the film opens with Bush Jr. standing in the middle of a baseball field, listening to the roar of the crowd as an announcer calls forth the 43rd president of the United States. However, the camera pans back to reveal no one there but Bush. What's up with what? Stone notes, "We all have retreat fantasies. He did have the express desire to be baseball commissioner, and I think some people, historically, would say if he had become baseball commissioner, it would have saved us a lot of problems."

As far as the target audience for W. goes, Stone adds, "I'm not interested in that radical 15% that hate Bush or the 15 to 20% who love Bush. That's not our audience. Those people probably won't come. I'm interested in that 60% in the American middle who at least have a little more open mind."

Will you be seeing Oliver Stone's W. when it hits theaters on October 17? Check out two new photos of Bush and Bush Jr. below, then head to USA Today for the rest.

Considering the critical reception that a Roland Emmerich film usually receives, I am always a little surprised by the actors who are willing to sign on for one of his films. Although to be fair, it wouldn't be the first time that John Cusack had signed on the dotted line for a less-than-stellar project. The Hollywood Reporter has now announced that Thandie Newton, Danny Glover, and Oliver Platt are all in talks to join Cusack in Emmerich's apocalyptic thriller, 2012. According to THR, "Glover is in talks to play the President, with Newton in discussions to play his daughter. Platt is in negotiations to play the president's chief of staff."

Thanks to Erik, we now have a few more details about the story, and that it centers on an academic researcher (Cusack) who "opens a portal into a parallel universe and makes contact with his double in order to prevent an apocalypse predicted by the ancient Mayans." Emmerich co-wrote the script with fellow 10,000 B.C. scribe, Harald Kloser -- which is probably not a great selling point for most audiences. Columbia has projected a budget of $200 million for the end-of-the-world flick -- I guess all that destruction doesn't come cheap. But, Columbia has also stated that they're hoping to bring the thriller in under budget. Emmerich has promised to start production by July, barring any hiccups from a possible SAG strike.

2012 is scheduled to arrive in theaters on July 10, 2009.

Oh Ari Fleischer -- the David Cross of Press Secretaries. Wait a minute -- why didn't they get David Cross for this role? He'd be perfect. Anyway, MTV tells us that Rob Corddry (The Daily Show, Semi-Pro ... and a bunch of other random comedies) has signed on to play former Press Secretary Ari Fleischer in Oliver Stone's W. Corddry joins a cast that continues to get larger by the minute, and includes Josh Brolin (George W. Bush), Elizabeth Banks (Laura Bush), James Cromwell (George Bush Sr.), Ellen Burstyn (Barbara Bush), Thandie Newton (Condi Rice), Ioan Gruffudd (Tony Blair) and 50 Cent (as Colin Powell).

Yes, I'm kidding about that last one.

Earlier today, we clued you into a script review of W currently circulating the internets. According to some, the film seems to be taking the Bush is a moronic alcoholic fratboy route, which, if you watch, well, The Daily Show, is kinda old news. As Eugene put it, "Most people -- whether or not they accept it -- have already absorbed the meme that Bush is an arrogant, reckless, hard-drinking buffoon, and I'm not sure that this perception merits its own movie." I completely agree -- and I'd much rather have watched Stone return to Vietnam with Pinkville than sit down for a feature-length version of a joke that's way past its prime.

I'll say one thing for Oliver Stone's W: it makes for some fun casting updates. Watching this movie come together has had much more novelty value than I would have thought. I guess that's what happens when you set out to make a movie about the most controversial figures in the world right now, instead of decades ago.

Anyway, here's what we have so far:

• Josh Brolin is George W. Bush
• Elizabeth Banks is Laura Bush
• James Cromwell and Ellen Burstyn are George H.W. and Barbara
• Rampant speculation about other roles

And you may now take Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and former U.K. Prime Minister Tony Blair off your to-cast lists. Those roles have been filled with Thandie Newton and Ioan Gruffudd (respectively, though I think it would have been much more interesting in reverse order). Both actors are British, but this won't be the first time Newton has played an American. My worry about her isn't her accent so much as the fact that she seems too damn nice. I think they should have followed the lead of the ultraconservative 2006 TV miniseries and cast 24's Penny Johnson Jerald (a.k.a. the terrifying Sherry Palmer). That's about as on-the-nose as it gets.

According to the tabloid rags, Guy Ritchie has his hands full with his marriage to Madonna, but he's also been busy trying to reinvigorate his career. We've got RocknRolla on the way, the story of a Russian mobster doing shady land deals and attracting the attention of London's crime world, and it stars Gerard Butler, Tom Wilkinson, Thandie Newton, Ludacris, and Idris Elba. But before we even see if that helps rip him from the sinking world of Swept Away, Thandie tells MTV that the new film will be one of three.

The actress says: "RocknRolla is one of three films and Guy's keen to get going on that straight away." It will include Newton, who makes it through this first film, but she says many others have not, and that the sequel "will follow whoever's left." Apparently the shoot was swift, with only three weeks of pre-production, so Ritchie could get going on this at any time.

That being said, since this is a story where only some survive for the sequel, Ritchie might want to wait for 2 and 3 until after the first one premieres, to prevent potential spoilers and all. But maybe he just wants to get these in the bag before the verdict lands on the first. It could go either way, but since Tom Wilkinson has been on a hotter than hot roll lately, I'm hoping for good things. How about you?

When I refer to David Schwimmer's Run Fatboy Run as "a modern-day screwball farce," that's a nice way of saying it's outrageously predictable, unabashedly sappy, and completely formulaic through and through. You know where the movie is going from frame one, and it sure doesn't take a lot of detours getting there. But the phrase "screwball" probably wouldn't have come to mind if Run Fatboy Run wasn't at least a little bit funny. Which it is. So if you don't mind an amiable-yet-seriously familiar 90 minutes -- and you're a big fan of British actor Simon Pegg -- I'd have no problem recommending the flick. Even if I'd never come close to calling it something brilliant.

The effortlessly likable Simon Pegg stars as one of those lovably lazy sad-sack types that you only come across in comedic films: Despite the fact that he left his pregnant fiancee (Thandie Newton) at the altar five years earlier, Pegg's "Dennis" is one of those losers we love to root for. (How a doofus like this ever scored a catch like Thandie Newton -- and then abandoned her! -- is one of the film's sillier conceits.) So when his former flame's smarmy new boyfriend (Hank Azaria) mentions that he'll be running in an upcoming marathon, Dennis senses a shot at redemption.