emily watson Tagged Articles at Cinematical

It's not like my love of British comedian Ricky Gervais is a secret around these parts. No worries, though I'll be keeping my inner fangirl at bay, and you don't need to worry about this turning into a 'gush-fest'. The first trailer for The Invention of Lying has debuted over at Yahoo! Movies UK and we have our first glimpse at the story of an alternate universe where human beings have never learned the art of deception. Gervais plays a man working in the film industry who becomes the inventor of lying, and quickly uses his newfound skill for romantic and financial gain.

Gervais seems to have no trouble inspiring praise from his peers, and the cast list for Lying is proof of that comedy clout. Just some the names in the Lying cast are; Jonah Hill, Louis C.K., John Hodgman, Tina Fey, Christopher Guest, Jeffrey Tambor, and Jason Bateman. Gervais has even gotten his first advance review for Lying from J.J. Abrams, who said, "The Invention of Lying' is as funny as it is biting, wholly original, and surprisingly moving. Is there such thing as an important comedy? Turns out there is, and this is it." It's an unlikely source of praise, but after watching the trailer, I guess the big question is: could Abrams be right? The Invention of Lying arrives in theaters on September 25th, 2009.

After the jump: Gervais' working class 'dramedy', Cemetery Junction, goes into preproduction and Gervais stalks the paparazzi...

Click image below to view entire poster

Cinematical has just received this incredibly freaky exclusive poster for Cold Souls, which premiered at this past Sundance Film Festival and stars Paul Giamatti as an actor (appropriately named Paul Giamatti) who decides he wants to put some of his soul in storage in order to help better tackle a new role. Folks are already making comparisons to Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind and Being John Malkovich, though this isn't a Charlie Kaufman film -- it was written and directed by first-timer Sophie Barthes, and it also stars Emily Watson and David Strathairn.

Reporting for Cinematical at Sundance, James Rocchi had this to say about the film: "Cold Souls is a beautifully shot film, and it also becomes more than a little bit moving, as Giamatti struggles with a question we've all asked ourselves: Is it possible to remove the burden of our soul without taking away the benefit of it? Is it the very weight we struggle under that makes us strong? Deep questions, but Cold Souls is also funny; there are fast, laugh-out-loud gags like Giamatti's compensation anxiety over the small size of his extracted soul ("It looks like a chickpea!") or the Russian trophy wife obsessed with getting an American actor's extracted soul so she can implant it and do better Soap Opera work."

Cold Souls arrives in theaters on August 7. Click the image below to check out the entire poster (which you simply must do, because this is easily one of my favorites of the year so far).

It's inevitable Cold Souls -- with its pseudo-scientific commercialized metaphysics and actor's angst -- will be compared to Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind and Being John Malkovich; it's the first post-Charlie Kaufman film, where the writer-director's weird, wooly aesthetic becomes a genre unto itself. Starring Paul Giamatti as, in a blatant piece of typecasting, actor Paul Giamatti, Cold Souls begins with Giamatti rehearsing the title role in Chekhov's Uncle Vanya, and it's obviously taking its toll as he plunges into sad-sack Russian angst and anomie. Giamatti's agent tips him to an article in The New Yorker, profiling a new service called "Soul Storage," wherein melancholy Manhattanites are having their souls extracted by Dr. Flintstein (David Strathairn) and held in escrow so they can live less complicated lives. Giamatti, wondering if having less soul would help him better play the part and get through the day, goes to Flintstein's office to get the details: "Your soul can be stored here ... or if you'd prefer to avoid the sales tax, it can be shipped to our storage facility in New Jersey. ..."

And again, you get the Kaufman vibe from writer-director Sophie Barthes; the dry humor, the everyday acceptance of the ludicrous, the ludicrous nature of the everyday. But while the comparisons to Eternal Sunshine and Being John Malkovich are inevitable, they're also not quite right. Eternal Sunshine was about the messy business of loving another; Cold Souls, with the equally messy proposition of living with one's self. Being John Malkovitch riffed comedy out of celebrity and stardom; Cold Souls examines sub-lebrity and acting. Cold Souls is a beautifully shot film, and it also becomes more than a little bit moving, as Giamatti struggles with a question we've all asked ourselves: Is it possible to remove the burden of our soul without taking away the benefit of it? Is it the very weight we struggle under that makes us strong?

Let's see: a serious, multigenerational, semi-autobiographical family drama starring Willem Dafoe, Emily Watson and Julia Roberts -- it sure sounds like Oscar buzz for Fireflies in the Garden should have gotten turned up to 11 by now. There hasn't really been any; the bad reviews from the film's out-of-competition premiere at Berlin probably didn't help. Still, that cast is tough to beat (there's also Ryan Reynolds, Carrie Anne-Moss and Hayden Panettierre), and the movie should be able to land with at least a minor splash if its eventual US distributor puts in a bit of effort.

There's now a full international trailer up at one of the film's websites. If the movie does indeed suck, the trailer doesn't telegraph the suckage -- it makes the film look solid, respectable. The reviews, on the other hand, make it sound embarrassing, with the sort of logistical difficulties (Texas failing to stand in for Chicago; implausible casting of younger and older versions of the same characters) that shouldn't really plague a production this high-profile.

Director Dennis Lee is making his feature debut after directing a well-received short film called Jesus Henry Christ. It's a heck of a pedigree for a first film, though the scenario and the reviews (and the director's last name) make me think of Jieho Lee's The Air I Breathe -- a feature debut by a director with a strong short on his resume, and a spectacular cast, that turned out to be completely unwatchable.

Take E.T., set it in World War II Scotland, and make the creature a mythical water creature instead of a space alien, and you have The Water Horse: Legend of the Deep, directed by Jay Russell (Tuck Everlasting, My Dog Skip). This is the last of this season's family films to come to a theater near you, just in time for Christmas. And for parents looking for a movie to take their kids to over the holidays, this one isn't half bad. The tale, bookended by a grizzled old Scottish guy spinning a yarn for a couple of fresh-faced backpacking tourists, is about a young boy, Angus, whose father went off to fight the Nazis with the Scottish Navy, leaving behind his young wife, Anne Macmorrow (Emily Watson) and two young children, Angus (Alex Etel) and Kirstie (Priyanka Xi).

Young Angus is at the beach one day, daydreaming about the water, which he both longs for and fears. As he walks along the shore, Angus finds a mysterious rock which he takes home to add to his collection in his father's workshop. The rock, as it turns out, isn't really a rock at all; the moss-covered exterior hides a mysterious, milky-blue egg, and that egg hatches an even more mysterious creature which Angus decides to care for himself. He calls the creature Crusoe, and keeps it hidden in a waste bin filled with water in the workshop, feeding it on scraps he pilfers from the manor's kitchen.

Cinematical has just received the first of four behind-the-scenes clips from the upcoming film The Water Horse: Legend of the Deep. Based on the book by Dick King-Smith, the film takes us back to the 1930s where a young Scottish boy discovers a mysterious egg that has washed up on shore. Little does he know, but out of the egg comes a creature he names Crusoe, which just happens to look a whole lot like something we like to call the Loch Ness Monster. At first, the boy tries to hold onto Crusoe, raise it in a bathtub -- the whole nine -- but eventually the thing grows so large, there's only one place to put it: Loch Ness. In the video above, go behind the scenes with director Jay Russell, producer Charlie Lyons and those dazzling magicians over at WETA as they show what went into creating this amazing looking creature. This is the first of four videos we'll be showing you, so sit back and enjoy -- The Water Horse: Legend of the Deep stars Emily Watson, Alex Etel and David Morrissey, and it arrives in theaters this Christmas.

Is it just me, or does it seem weird these days to see a movie poster that excludes images of its stars? I would especially expect a movie starring Julia Roberts to capitalize on her famous face. Yet here is the new one-sheet for Dennis Lee's Fireflies in the Garden, and it is completely void of the usual celebrity portraits. It doesn't include the young, rising-star face of Hayden Panettiere (Heroes), the handsome mugs of Ioan Gruffold or Ryan Reynolds, the distinguished features of Willem Dafoe or the stunning eyes of Emily Watson or Carrie-Anne Moss. The poster does list all of these actors, though, so for attracting an audience for the film, name recognition will have to do. Apparently the designers of the poster think we'll be more interested in a movie about a large farmhouse and a giant field (not even a garden) than in a movie starring Roberts and the rest. The design is boring, familiar and seems to do nothing in terms of appealing to anyone.

The film, which keeps making me think of my favorite animated film, Grave of the Fireflies, is a semi-autobiographical family drama involving an unexpected tragedy (sounds almost like Roberts' return to weepy Steel Magnolias territory). I haven't been interested in that genre for a long, long time, and after the badly spoofed version in Christopher Guest's latest, For Your Consideration, I can't imagine wanting to see any sappy family drama anytime soon. Unfortunately, I tend not to avoid films in which Watson appears (though I can't believe Panettiere is playing her character, younger), and I have to admit the rest of the cast is mostly worth watching, too. So, I may actually have to rent this one someday.

So much for my belief that St. Trinian's is the best cast movie in production right now. The film, which began shooting in March with top-notch British talents like Emily Watson, Colin Firth and Rupert Everett, has just added a young, American actress to sour up the mix. According to Variety, in a report from Cannes, Mischa Barton has joined the cast, which also includes Brits Toby Jones, Lena Headey, Stephen Fry, Celia Imrie, Anna Chancellor, Lucy Punch, Fenella Woolgar and possibly (still rumored, and not actually British) Richard E. Grant. To quote my favorite Sesame Street game: "One of these things is not like the other."

Hopefully Barton will simply be playing the bland girl from the States who happens to be studying at an English girls' school, and will not be expected to pull off an accent. Either way, she'll at least make the elder cast appear even greater. The former O.C. actress joins rising stars Jodie Whittaker (Venus), model Lily Cole, Talulah Riley (Pride & Prejudice), Tamsin Egerton (Driving Lessons), Juno Temple (Notes on a Scandal), Gemma Arterton and possibly (still rumored) singer Amy Winehouse, all of whom presumably play students at St. Trinian's, which they save from going bankrupt. St. Trinian's still seems to be, as Cinematical writer Monika Bartyzel called it, "a British film fan's wet dream," but thanks to the casting of Barton, the dream has gotten a little bit drier.

For five years, there have been rumors floating around about another St. Trinian's movie. Based on cartoons from British cartoonist Ronald Searle, there were a series of films in the 50's and 60's, followed by one terribly-received stab in 1980. St. Trinian's is a fictional girl's school full of wicked girls and questionable teachers. In 2002, there was talk about Rupert Everett and Kylie Minogue starring in the feature. However, word fizzled until now, and it is looking, frankly, delectable! Variety has listed the cast set to star in the latest remake -- Emily Watson, Colin Firth, Russell Brand and as earlier reports hoped, Rupert Everett.

I'm not sure on Watson's role. Variety has her in the "central teacher" part as previously played by Joyce Grenfell, but she actually played Sargeant Ruby Gates. Firth will play Geoffrey Thwaites (according to IMDb) and Brand will be Flash Harry, a small-time crook and bad influence on the schoolgirls. But, the best is Everett -- he will cross-dress for this role, playing both the headmistress and her brother. That's enough of a reason for me. Other cast includes Caterina Murino from Casino Royale, Jodie Whittaker from Venus, Talulah Riley (Pride & Prejudice) and Tamsin Egerton. As if that's not enough, there's also cameos scheduled for Richard E. Grant and Stephen Fry. This isn't a film, it's a British film fan's wet dream! Production will start at the end of this month, and will be the directorial debut of Barnaby Thompson, who is co-directing with Oliver Parker.

There's no more retirement for Julia Roberts. In fact, after lending her voice to both The Ant Bully and Charlotte's Web, she is starting to pile up the live-action film roles. Her political drama, Charlie Wilson's War is in post-production, and she's going to be knitting up a storm in The Friday Night Knitting Club. Apparently hungry for more, she has also signed on to star with Fido's Carrie-Anne Moss, ex-Alanis beau Ryan Reynolds and British actress Emily Watson in the upcoming family drama, Fireflies in the Garden.

The film will be directed by Dennis Lee. Not to be confused with the popular Canadian children's book author, Lee is a screenwriter and director who made his debut with student Academy Award-winning short film, Jesus Henry Christ, in 2003. Fireflies is Lee's partially-autobiographical story -- dealing with the struggle of commitment and love when a family is challenged by an unexpected tragedy. It sounds like the usual fare for Roberts -- love, mounting challenges and two-hankie drama, but I'm curious about Reynolds' involvement. The rest of the cast are no stranger to drama, but the Double-R is the kid from Fifteen who made it big in goofy comedies like Van Wilder. Will this be his Truman Show? It worked for one Canadian. Maybe it can work for another!