biopic Tagged Articles at Cinematical

Watch enough movies and you learn pretty fast that they aren't about reality, they're about entertaining us. Which sometimes makes the world of the biopic a little tricky, because not only do you have to work in the truth, but you still have to keep those butts in the seats -- and the results are not always good. Over at Moviefone they've compiled some of the worst movie biopics, and no one was safe -- with films earning a spot for mixing up their facts, ridiculous casting, or just downright lazy filmmaking.

So who made the list? Well, you've got your usual suspects like Oliver Stone's Alexander, a film that has so much wrong with it I don't know where to put the blame (oh, that's right, on everyone). Other films that made the cut for the less than flattering title of 'Real Life Catastrophes' were Kevin Spacey's Bobby Darin flick, Beyond The Sea, Luc Besson's The Messenger, and Alan Parker's Evita. But don't think the classics made it out unscathed either, because both Captain Eddie and The Babe Ruth Story also earned a mention.

As a genre, I love biopics -- especially the bad ones. I've watched everything from made-for-TV movies on The Beach Boys to high art flicks like I'm Not There. So no matter what kind of biopic it might be, I will usually give it a chance. Over the years, I've seen movies that bend the truth and those that just mess it up entirely, but that doesn't mean I didn't enjoy them. Besides, if you're looking for unadulterated facts, you should probably head to the library and not the multiplex.

After the jump: five of my favorite movie biopics...

It looks like things are getting more interesting each day when it comes to the music biopic The Runaways -- and I'm not talking about Joan Jett making Kristen Stewart cry. No, instead, there is news that Alia Shawkat (who will forever be known as Maeby Fünke) is joining the cast as famed bassist and 'Bangle' Micki Steele ... or at the very least an approximation of Steele. Latino Review is reporting that Shawkat has joined the cast as an 18-year-old bass player named Robin (aka Steele), and judging by the photo above, you have to admit that Shawkat would be a great choice to play the sexy bassist. I mean, just look at those lips.

Rather than get into a long and convoluted explanation about the awesomeness that is Steele, here is a little primer: Steele was one of the first members of The Runaways when they were touring the club circuit in L.A. and was considered the 'feminine' one in a group of bad girls. By 1976 she had left the band after the addition of Lita Ford (played in the film by Scout Taylor-Compton) and Cherie Currie (played by Dakota Fanning). Steele would go on to join another famous girl band, The Bangles, and create music history by teaching the world about 'Manic Mondays'.

There has been no word on why Steele isn't going to be named in the film; possibly because the film makers didn't secure the rights to use her image, or maybe her split from The Runaways wasn't an amicable one. My guess is that the character of Robin will be based on Steele, but also be an amalgam of some of the other band members that won't be featured prominently in the film.

The Runaways is still filming on location in L.A., but will arrive in theaters in 2010.

The speedy cyclist may have had his own chances to shine on the big screen, most notably when he shamed Vince Vaughn's Peter La Fleur in Dodgeball, but it's time for Lance Armstrong to get his biopic. The Hollywood Reporter posts in a surprisingly short news blip that the athlete's cinematic story might finally be coming out of gestation. An unnamed writer "well-versed in sports comeback stories" has signed on, and production could kick into gear early next year.

It's about time. There's only so many times one can watch Breaking Away before they want something new, and Armstrong's story is not only ripe for a bio, it's also a ridiculously recognizable story. There aren't many athletes who become as recognizable outside their sport as the cancer-beating cyclist. He beat the disease out of his testicles, lungs, abdomen, and brain, and went on to break records and win the epic Tour de France seven consecutive years.

Almost three years ago, Jake Gyllenhaal was seen all over the place with Armstrong, and it soon came out that Sony was quietly developing a feature and Jake wanted to nab the part. But three years is a long time, and Jake's busy with Persian life, so I imagine the casting door is wide open. So who should play Lance? Is Mr. Gyllenhaal right for the part, or is someone else better suited to battle cancer and kick arse in the Tour?

I'm sure that if Notorious B.I.G. and Tupac Shakur were still alive today, they would have loved to brag over which one got their life story on the big screen first. Tupac wins if you count the doc in 2003, though Notorious made Biggie the first to receive a biopic -- so I'm not sure who wins, exactly. Nevertheless, Tupac's family wants a biopic now and The Hollywood Reporter has confirmed that Shakur's mother, Afeni Shakur, and her production company, Amaru Entertainment, are suing Morgan's Creek Entertainment over their deal for a biopic of the murdered rapper, leaving the hip-hop flick in legal limbo.

There have been rumblings regarding a film for almost a year now, and with the success of the B.I.G. flick, Notorious, it would seem to be the perfect time for Shakur. But Morgan's Creek's deal first started going south when they filed a lawsuit "claiming that Amaru, which controls the Tupac estate, backed out of a done deal to sell life rights for a biopic about the slain rapper-actor." Now Amaru is countersuing, and according to their complaint, "Morgan Creek allegedly was one of several suitors for the project, including Paramount, Fox Searchlight, Kennedy/Marshall and Brett Ratner's Rat Entertainment. The cross-complaint says key details of a deal, including an executive producer credit and backend participation for Afeni Shakur, were not worked out with Morgan's Creek and that she hadn't even seen the proposed contract."

Picture this: the year is 1985; a little girl is in her pajamas and seated in front of the TV entranced by the awesomeness that is Krush Groove. I've listened to a lot of music over the years, but I always came back to hip-hop. Come to think of it, I've listened to it, read about it -- heck, I've even watched every junky documentary that came my way. Not to mention that, to this day, when I hear It's Tricky, I make sure the volume is maxed out. So you would think that a Run DMC biopic would be good news, right? I don't want to sound like a pessimist, but I'm not keeping my fingers crossed, and here's why: The Hollywood Reporter announced that Notorious screenwriter, Cheo Hodari Coker, has signed to adapt Bill Adler's (the group's former publicist), Tougher Than Leather: The Rise of Run-DMC -- The Authorized Biography.

So what has me so worried? Well, if Coker managed to gloss over one of the biggest mysteries in pop music history, just what exactly does he have planned for Run DMC? But that's not all: an even bigger problem is that the film has yet to receive an 'all clear' from any of its subjects (Run, DMC or Russell Simmons). But of course that might have a lot to do with a competing biopic that Simmons and Reverend Run were shopping around last year.

You probably wouldn't expect a fine art biopic from the gal best known as the bad girl on Buffy the Vampire Slayer, but stranger things have happened at Sundance. Eliza Dushku (star of Joss Whedon's upcoming series, Dollhouse) recently announced to E! online that she would be co-producing a biopic of the acclaimed photographer, Robert Mapplethorpe. Dushku tells E, "Literally this week after quite some time, we finalized the deal with the Mapplethorpe estate,"

Mapplethorpe earned fame in the 1970's when his portraits of his socialite friends earned the notice of the New York 'scene' -- some of you might even have some of his art and don't even know it; that is if you own a copy of Patti Smith's debut album. But for most of us the name of Mapplethorpe probably brings to mind his controversial later works. In the early 90's there was no more contested artist than Mapplethorpe, he was known for his large-scale, highly stylized black and white portraits, photos of flowers and naked men -- and let's just say his nudes weren't for the 'faint of heart'. His work was a lightening rod for the debate on public funding for the arts and when Mapplethorpe displayed sexually explicit photographs that were supported by the National Endowment for the Arts, it caused an outcry over what exactly our tax dollars are supporting.

Dushku has already made a few in-roads to big-screen stardom, and some have been more successful than others. Maybe she has found her stride as a producer, and so like any good producer she already has her star in mind. The actress confirmed that her brother Nate would be playing the renowned photog. Dushku told E, "Nate physically has an uncanny resemblance to Robert, some pictures are really eerie" -- proving once again that in Hollywood, it really is who you know.

In the midst of battling Coco Chanel biopics, the first image of Audrey Tautou (Amelie) as the legendary fashion figure has just emerged over at Vanity Fair. I'll admit that after getting my first look at Tautou in that famous 'Coco recline', it is starting to make perfect sense that an entire biopic was shaped around the French actress. If nothing else, you have to admit the the lady is a dead ringer for the style icon.

Coco Avant Chanel was partly based on Edmonde Charles-Roux's book, L'Irrégulière: Ou, Mon Itinéraire Chanel, and was adapted for the screen by Christopher Hampton (Dangerous Liaisons) and Anne Fontaine, who is also directing. The film will not attempt to tell the entire life story of Chanel, probably because it would be impossible to contain that much fabulousness in one film. Instead, Fontaine will be focusing on some of the highlights of Chanel's youth, and what would any biopic be without a little dirt? Some of the juicier bits in the story will include Chanel's time as a cabaret singer, and her love affairs with the influential and powerful men that helped her break into the fashion world.

After a long delay, the project finally kicked into high gear last summer, and shooting began back in September. Now that Tautou is officially the first Chanel we have seen, you can't help but wonder if the rest are going to suffer by comparison -- I mean, I still haven't gotten my head around the casting of Demi Moore. So much like the label that shares the lady's name, it looks like Fontaine and company are also going to have to put up with their fair share of 'knock-offs'.

Coco Avant Chanel should arrive in theaters later this year.

Oliver Stone's docudrama W. opened last week to mixed critical response (including our own review) and a modest box office take of just over $10 million. Now, as Stone has promised in interview after interview, a rather thorough fact guide has been posted online, a bibliography with which one can corroborate several facts in a film admittedly filled with all manner of re-enactment and artistic license.

For those much more inclined than I, there are over eighty pages to delve into regarding where dialogue was lifted from actual quotes and where inference was otherwise made, like an exhaustive scene-by-scene commentary or (I'm guessing) a similar supplement for the eventual DVD release.

To quote Stone off his MySpace profile: "I am not trying to be a historian; I'm a dramatist -- and sometimes one who does a dramatic interpretation of history." Even those who enjoyed the film can't deny that statement as being just as accurate -- if not more so -- than anything in the film, and as for those who didn't, they might now struggle to say it was for lack of research.

It's football season, which means it's also the season for at least one heartwarming and inspiring movie about the sport. This year the film comes from Universal -- The Express, a biopic of Ernie "The Elmira Express" Davis, the first African-American to win the Heisman trophy, back in 1963. However, the movie divides its time between Davis and his coach at Syracuse University, Ben Schwartzwalder, and shows the ways in which the two characters changed one another (for the better, natch).

The movie opens during the notorious Cotton Bowl game of 1960, when Davis (Rob Brown) was a running back on the Syracuse University team that played The University of Texas, which had not yet allowed black varsity team members. It's a rough game, but Davis is handling himself until all hell breaks loose ... and then we flash back to Davis's childhood in the 1940s and see how he learned to handle nasty racist situations even at an early age. He's stubborn and he's speedy, and eventually decides to use those assets to strive for his goal of playing professional football. His idol, Cleveland Browns running back Jim Brown, advises Davis to play for his alma mater Syracuse because Schwartzwalder (Dennis Quaid) is such an excellent head coach. But Davis encounters difficulties in the ways Schwartzwalder handles the black team members. The coach's primary goal is to avoid "trouble," so they're warned away from the white female students, and worse yet, at certain Southern games they're not allowed to score touchdowns. The real action culminates when the film returns to the Cotton Bowl game in Dallas.

Oh, if only all biopics were as aptly titled as Big Eyes, a movie about the artist Margaret Keane. If you're not familiar with her work, simply do a Google image search and you'll see why the title makes sense. Of course, I would have gone a little further and named it Creepy Big Eyes. According to Variety, the production has cast Kate Hudson as Keane, who is still alive to possibly assist the actress with the role. The independently financed film was scripted by biopic masters Scott Alexander and Larry Karaszewski (Ed Wood; The People vs. Larry Flynt; Man on the Moon) and it will also be the duo's directorial debut, who will also direct (they last helmed the 2000 comedy Screwed). Scheduled to begin shooting in June, depending on how the SAG contract negotiation goes, Big Eyes will be produced by Dan Halsted (Garden State), Albert Berger (Little Miss Sunshine), Ron Yerxa (Little Miss Sunshine) and financier Andrew Meieran.

Variety reports that Big Eyes will deal with Keane's personal life, specifically her lawsuit against her second husband, Walter Keane, who had taken credit for her mass-produced artwork until the 1960s. Not to give away spoilers, but according to Keane's Wikipedia page, she finally won the rights to her work in divorce proceedings that went all the way to Federal court. How did she prove she was the real talent? She painted in court in front of the judge (Walter meanwhile declined to do the same). I apologize for ruining the ending of the film, but I figured I'd share that info so that when the scene pops up in Big Eyes, you'll know it isn't just some cinematic tool used to make the story more visually interesting.

Regardless of how the movie is received now, though, it's sure to be one of the most popular movies come 2173 (see Woody Allen's Sleeper, which claims that in the future Keane is considered one of the greatest artists of all time)