brenda blethyn Tagged Articles at Cinematical

Folks looking for this summer's Little Miss Sunshine might find similarities in Introducing the Dwights (previously known as Clubland when it premiered at Sundance earlier this year). Like Sunshine, Dwights revolves around a somewhat eccentric family whose members all aspire to be bigger than they are. While there's no physical road trip in Dwights, each character embarks on an inner journey -- one of physical exploration and, eventually, transformation. It's sweet, quirky, sincere, and provides a perfect escape from the hustle and bustle of those big-budgeted extravaganzas currently invading your local theater.

Told from a few different perspectives, this Aussie coming-of-age tale is, essentially, about growing up and giving in to the forces that control our own personal universe. Jean (Brenda Blethyn), a UK-born comedienne and stage performer nearing middle age, works tirelessly to keep her family and career on track. She's up at the crack of dawn for the morning shift at the canteen, and in between giving music lessons to the neighborhood kids, she's practicing for her own shows later that night. Somewhere amidst the hectic schedule, she needs to find time to be a mother to her two teenage boys; one of which suffers from brain damage, while the other is being wooed into his first mature, sexual relationship with the opposite sex. And the more Jean fights for control, the harder it becomes for her to just let go.

Thought that Sundance had generated enough deals today? Think again! Here's another round of distribution news related to the festival.

• The Weinstein Company and Lionsgate secured worldwide distribution rights to Teeth (pictured at right), the bizarre horror movie about a young woman with a case of vagina dentata. It's the feature debut for writer-director Mitchell Lichtenstein. No financial details have yet been disclosed. One important detail: Harvey Weinstein doesn't want the film cut to qualify for an R rating -- apparently he thinks those more graphic scenes are "the fun part." As David Poland explains, TWC normally partners in theatrical releases with MGM, which is required to go through the MPAA ratings process. Since Teeth will likely remain unrated, Lionsgate would handle the U.S. theatrical release. Scott Weinberg enjoyed the film very much, calling it "one of the grade-A highlights of this year's Sundance Film Festival." I originally found the concept of this film extremely distasteful, but I'm starting to reconsider this Austin-shot film.
  
• Warner Independent Pictures has made its first deal of the festival, buying the North American and UK theatrical distribution rights for the Australian feature Clubland at an estimated price of $4 milllion. The film was directed by Cherie Nowlan, who's directed movies for Australian television. The cast includes British character actress Brenda Blethyn. Clubland, which premiered Sunday night at Sundance, is a coming-of-age film about a young man's romance that affects his family. This one sounds like my kind of movie -- I'm a sucker for anything where the family is described as "unconventional."

We reported back in March that Keira Knightley had agreed to join her fellow Pride & Prejudice alums Joe Wright (director) and Paul Webster (producer) in the screen version of Ian McEwan's Booker-nominated novel, Atonement. After lying dormant for several month, the movie is once again in the news, and its cast is growing. According to Variety, Knightley will be sharing the screen with some pretty impressive talent: In addition to James McAvoy, already cast as the male lead, the cast now included British screen queens Brenda Blethyn and Vanessa Redgrave, as well as Romola Garai (you remember her, I'm sure, from Dirty Dancing: Havana Nights).

Currently shooting in the UK, the film "tells a series of interconnected stories, all of which hinge loosely on the childhood actions of Briony Tallis [to be played by Saoirse Ronan as a child, and Knightley as an adult], a privileged young girl with an overactive imagination." Among other things, young Briony imagines that her sister's boyfriend is a criminal, an erroneous accusation that causes problems for a whole lot of people.

Atonement will be released in the US by Focus some time next year.

Edit: Though Knightley was originally (erroneously, it appears) reported to be playing the adult Briony, she in fact plays Cecilia, the sister whose boyfriend is the victim of Briony's accusation. Thanks to Gerry for providing the correct casting information.

There are some films that adhere so closely to type that you know everything about them the moment the trailer has ended: characters, relationships, goals, dreams -- all are revealed in those two minutes. And you know, too, if this is a movie you want to see because it will move you to tears with its well-loved cliches, or if those same cliches will fill you with rage, and you need to avoid it like the plague. Gaby Dellal’s On a Clear Day is one of those films.

If you’ve seen The Full Monty, you’ve seen On a Clear Day. Hell, if you’ve seen Brassed Off, you’ve seen it. Or even Calendar Girls. Like those films, it’s just what it appears to be: a heart-warming story about someone who is hit with bad news, and hatches a crazy plan which, though he might not know it at the time, will restore not just his self-worth, but also the love of his drifting, distant family. It’s never surprising, but it doesn’t want to be; in fact, the whole thing is shamelessly tear-jerking and cliched, and also, impossibly, immensely likable.

• Capote - Truman Capote spent five years researching In Cold Blood - the book that would be his last - and sophomore director Bennett Miller's film is a telling and rather literate fly-on-the-wall dramatization of that time. The biggest appeal is Philip Seymour Hoffman's bravura Oscar-winning performance as the eccentric author, which he takes beyond mere affectation and into full-on obsession as Capote's research into the 1959 murders of a Kansas family consumes him in every way. It is nice to see professional seether Catherine Keener in another nice-gal role, here as Capote friend and soon-to-be To Kill A Mockingbird scribe (Nell) Harper Lee. Miller and writer Dan Futterman (adapting Gerald Clarke's book) do not quite commit to a direction for the story, and humanizing killer Perry Smith (a dependable Clifton Collins Jr.) is time unwisely spent, though Hoffman, who also produced, sees that we remember the film for other reasons.