american beauty Tagged Articles at Cinematical

At first glance, it's just another Kate Winslet looks for love-type flick. Look a little closer and you'll realize that Revolutionary Road marks the first on-screen reunion for Winslet and Leonardo DiCaprio since Titanic. Ooohh, the goosebumps! Some of the first pics of Winslet from the set of Revolutionary Road have arrived online, and from the looks of it she's gone all 1950s on us -- I mean, what's up with those weird button-like things on her dress? From what I can tell, there are a host of other pics online at the Kate Winslet fan website, but you have to register and stuff in order to see those galleries. I didn't have the time, but feel free to dive in you Winslet fanatics.

Based on the 1961 novel by Richard Yates (and adapted for the screen by Justin Haythe), Revolutionary Road is set in the 1950s and finds Winslet and DiCaprio married and stuck in a boring, same-old-routine kind of marriage. In an attempt to spice things up, the couple (along with their two kids) move to France, but not even a geographical shift can save these two from jumping ship. Directed by Sam Mendes, pic seems to place the helmer back in American Beauty mode as both films appear to share similar suburban themes, except for the fact that one takes place a few decades before the other. Another interesting little sidenote is that this will mark the first time that Mendes and Winslet (who are married in real life) work together on the same film. (I'm not aware of any Little Children-esque sex scenes, but I imagine it would have to be tough for a guy to watch his wife with another man, let alone be the one giving directions.) Due out in 2008, there's currently no release date. But, as soon as we have pics of both Titanic stars together, you'll be the first we share them with.

Looks like we're going to get a tasty Titanic reunion for Sam Mendes' Revolutionary Road. Not long after Leonardo DiCaprio and Kate Winslet signed on to star, comes word from the Hollywood Reporter that Kathy Bates (who played the unsinkable Molly Brown in that ship flick) has joined a cast that also includes David Harbour, Michael Shannon and Zoe Kazan. It's weird, for someone who appeared in five films last year, currently has four in post-production and one in pre-production, I feel like we never see her. Perhaps it's because Bates has made a name for herself by taking on smaller, more memorable roles -- stuff that sort of blends her into the background, until you leave the theater trying to come up with the name of the actress who stole the show. "Oh yeah, Kathy Bates. That's it. Didn't she try to kill James Caan once?"

Based on the 1961 Richard Yates novel, Revolutionary Road places Mendes back in a familiar, comfortable, award-worthy arena. Somewhat like his break-out Oscar-winning hit American Beauty, Road is a 1950s-set drama which chronicles the life and times of a married couple whose relationship is sinking faster than ... well, ya know. Bates will play the friendly woman who sells the couple their new home and helps introduce them to the town. The film begins shooting outside New York in June, with an eye on a (fall?) 2008 release. Though it's a fine novel, I'm worried too many people will immediately compare this pic to American Beauty; I mean, it's set in suburbia, features a guy so fed up with his corporate job that he turns to the bottle (instead of pot) and embarks on an affair with his secretary. All we need now is a trippy soundtrack and rose petals, and we have ourselves a sequel. In all fairness, it's a different story with some fantastic talent involved. I'm a huge fan of Mendes' work (even if Jarhead felt like an awkward acid trip following the gems that were Beauty and Road to Perdition), and so I'm sure his take on troubled marriage in the 1950s will, at the very least, be entertaining to watch.

• Lisa Schwarzbaum discusses the really misleading trailer for ATL. It's a roller skating movie!
• In honor of Sharon Stone's return as Catherine Tramell in Basic Instinct 2, EW lists 10 femmes fatale. Some great choices, but do Renee Zellweger and Nicole Kidman really deserve to be in the top 10 of all-time? Who's missing from this list?
• Is American Beauty really the worst film ever to win the Best Picture Oscar?
• New movies: they give Basic Instinct 2 a B-, Ice Age 2: The Meltdown a B , and Slither a B .
• New on DVD (not online, for some reason): they give a B- to The Mel Brooks Collection, a B to The Billy Wilder Collection, an A to 9 to 5, and a B to the Director's Cut of Crash.

You know the rule: If a film has the word American in its title, then that means it's going to kick ass. C'mon, you've got American Pie, American Beauty, American History X, American Splendor...oh, it is so a rule. If that's the case, then Universal's American Gangster should thrive, assuming this time it's finally moving forward.

Awhile back, Steven Zaillian wrote a script for Gangster that was to star Denzel Washington and Benicio Del Toro, with Antoine Fugua (Training Day) attached to direct. However, feeling the story was a bit too edgy and afraid the budget would soar to over $100 million, the studio put the project on hold.

Afterward, Terry George was brought on to re-write the original script and tone things down, though producer Brian Grazer was having a hard time letting go of Zaillian's version. That's when Ridley Scott became interested in directing and, after convincing Russell Crowe to jump on-board, Universal decided to go back to Zaillian and pay him a sweet seven-figure deal to, well, re-write his own damn script. The good news is that the film is now on the move and Washington is still attached - and the budget will remain the same as it was before. Yeah, you figure it out - because I sure as hell can't. That's Hollywood for ya.

• Breaking News - Hong Kong action director Johnny To delivers this watchable Woo-alike about a police force that loses the support of the public when a robbery goes bad and is covered by a local news program. The set pieces are pretty tight, even if the drama and the statement To tries to make about the power and responsibility of the media doesn't fully come through.
• Free Enterprise: Special Edition - A self-effacing turn akin to Marlon Brando's in The Freshman and Pauly Shore's in Pauly Shore Is Dead is William Shatner, sending up the cult of personality that has followed him since the original Star Trek series ended its five year mission two years early in 1969. When fanboys Rafer Wiegel and Eric McCormack meet their boyhood idol, he is far from the super-cool man for all seasons they have long worshiped. He's bent on staging a one-man musical version of Shakespeare's Julius Caesar, a great running joke that culminates in the brilliant payoff that is the Shatner/The Rated R rap duet, "No Tears For Caesar". Writer-director Robert Meyer Burnett has created a love letter, not just to Trek, but to anyone who has ever loved anything with fanatical passion, and this long-overdue 2-disc treatment gives it the respect it was not afforded when it was first released in 1999. Check out the Pop-Up Video style trivia track, which annotates the geekery, new special effects, the making-of feature Where No Man Has Gone Before, and the unaired TV pilot, Café Fantastique, which features the real fans who inspired this smart, hardy-har-har trek. A sequel, My Big Fat Geek Wedding, has been listed on the IMDB for nearly 3 years now, and Mindfire Entertainment's website features a rudimentary mention of it, though no firm details are available as yet.
• Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire: Special Edition - Death, and the gloomy heft that comes with it, visits Hogwarts in the fourth and most satisfying installment in the ongoing series so far. When an evil thought vanquished literally rears its ugly head again, Harry (Daniel Radcliffe), Ron (Rupert Grint) and Hermoine (Emma Watson) team up to expose it. Like the overwhelmingly dark Revenge Of The Sith, this is the first to bear the PG-13 rating (for "sequences of fantasy violence and frightening images"), though its decidedly down ending makes it feel more like The Empire Strikes Back. It is not unreasonable to expect studio Warner Brothers to keep their three leads on through Harry Potter and the As-Yet-Unwritten-and-Untitled Year 7 Story. This, of course, is despite the fact that they will be in their early 20's by then, but let us not forget that at least one of the 90210 kids was practically eligible for Social Security by the end of that run. Even at 157 minutes, the book has still been truncated, but it is doubly encouraging to know that kids will know what is missing and will sit still for that long in order to be able to go on smartly about it. The second disc is chock-full-o' extra goodies, and is available in full- and widescreen editions. A single disc version is also available.