jena malone Tagged Articles at Cinematical

Zack Snyder's Sucker Punch has been a revolving door of casting and schedule conflicts. Last month, the film lost Amanda Seyfried but quickly replaced her with Emily Browning. Now, he's cast Jena Malone and Jamie Chung, who have stepped in to replace Evan Rachel Wood and Emma Stone, respectively.

Wood and Stone were both forced to drop out due to schedule conflicts and as of now, only Abbie Cornish and Vanessa Hudgens remain out of the original line-up, which was always in negotiation anyway.

But don't despair, because every casting report gives us a bit more of its grindhouse plot. According to The Hollywood Reporter, Malone will be playing Cornish's younger sister, both of whom have the unfortunate luck to be locked in this hellish mental institution. Chung will be playing Annie, "a country girl with a big heart." (I want to add "as big as all Texas" but I'm not going to jump to geographical conclusions. Maybe she's from West Virginia or Tennessee.)

There's not much more to say about the casting, except that I'm glad to see a little diversity by way of Chung, and I'm uncertain about Malone. She's certainly a very respectable young actress (and co-producer these days) but she always comes off so brittle and humorless. Maybe all she needs is a part like this where she can cut loose and have fun ... and how can you not have fun with a film like this? It's a laugh just writing about it.

You could put Zooey Deschanel in a 50-minute black and white silent film about brick walls and I'd still watch that sucker 10 times. Excuse me? What's a stalker? Ahem. Above you will find the trailer for The Go-Getter, which premiered at the Sundance Film Festival wayyy back in 2007, and appears to be finally seeing the light of day. I, personally, haven't seen this movie, but James wasn't crazy about the film in his review; saying "this isn't filmmaking any more than unpacking an Ikea box and busting out the Allen key is to making furniture." However, Peter from Slashfilm announced it as one of his favorites from the year; calling it "Garden State meets Into the Wild."

Lou Taylor Pucci stars as a dude who steals a car and heads out on a road trip to find his brother following his mother's death. According to the trailer, along the way he meets up with Jena Malone, meets up with Maura Tierney, and all the while continues to build a phone relationship with the girl whose car he stole (played by my gal Zooey). The Go-Getter does look to have a bangin' soundtrack and some interesting cinematography, so it seems worth checking out. For you. Me? I was sold on starring Zooey Deschanel. (But I'm easy like that.)

Oren Moverman's upcoming directorial debut, The Messenger, already seemed pretty tasty when Jessica posted that the super-talented Ben Foster had signed on to star. Then Jena Malone and Eamonn Walker signed on. Now, The Hollywood Reporter posts that Woody Harrelson and Samantha Morton have also joined the cast. Unfortunately, there's no word on who they'll all be playing, beyond Foster starring.

Foster will play an army dude who is assigned to one of the crappiest jobs out there, aside from cannon fodder. He gets teamed up with someone he doesn't like and has to inform families when their loved ones have died in combat. Somehow, he ends up falling for a soldier's widow, which I imagine complicates matters. THR goes on to state that this is being billed as "a poignant, life-affirming road movie." As a "road movie," it could be that Foster drives around to tell these families. However, he needs enough time to fall for a widow, so maybe we're going to get some military Three for the Road type action? Whatever the case, the film starts production on May 20, so maybe we'll hear more soon.

Who would you rather be on the road with: Ben Foster or Woody Harrelson?

The Ruins opened on Friday like most horror films, with a single, late Thursday night "promo" screening, to which the press was gamely invited in full knowledge that it would be too late for review, even for any reasonable web deadline. What's different about The Ruins is that it's not a remake or even a copy of any horror film of recent years. We're talking first-class material, adapted from a novel by Scott B. Smith, who wrote both the mesmerizing 1993 book A Simple Plan as well as Sam Raimi's masterful 1998 film of the same name. It's a terrific airplane novel, surprising and gripping, and Dreamworks could have made an outstanding film of it. But they threw it away, perhaps deliberately, hoping for some of that fast opening weekend green, and little caring about making something worthwhile or lasting (like A Simple Plan).

Since February, I've been keeping you up-to-date on The Ruins, the latest adaptation by Scott B. Smith, the guy who wrote the novel and Oscar-nominated screenplay to A Simple Plan. Bugcrush man Carter Smith had signed on to direct, and last month, Black Donnelly star Jonathan Tucker was cast as Jeff. Now we've got the rest of the lovebird couples who stupidly think it's a good idea to follow a stranger into the jungle to find his missing brother. It's got all those thrilling aspects in place -- well meaning but stupid people, and a remote, nature location.

With principal photography beginning at the end of the month in Queensland, we've got the rest of the vacationing couples. Unfortunately, there's no word on who plays who, so you can pair the actors up for now as you see fit, and then see if you're right. There's Laura Ramsey, from Lords of Dogtown and The Covenant. Next comes Jena Malone, the Kevin Kline-kissing, Saved! pregnant Christian girl. Finally, there's none other than Shawn Ashmore, Mr. Iceman himself. It's not a bad cast -- an interesting collection of supporting actors -- although I prefer Malone much more when she's in a good comedy than in a serious piece. Then again, this is a deadly jungle thriller, so I'd say they're all up to the task. Are they enough to make you want to take a trip to The Ruins?

These days, almost every indie actor (or actress) has their own band. On top of that, they also have their own MySpace page or YouTube page that's colorful, creative and has way too much going on. Personally, I don't have a MySpace page (sorry to let my legion of fans down) and cannot stand when someone sends me a link to one because, more often that not, the damn page gives me a headache. So what -- this person has 4,365 friends and likes to bombard us with the colors red, black, purple and orange set against some random image that gets in the way of the text you're (apparently) supposed to read. This should mean what to me, again?

So it's refreshing when an indie actor (or actress) comes along and wants to share their music without shoving it down our throats. Case in point: Gen Art's Pulse recently stumbled across a YouTube page for a user named of wild animals, who apparently turned out to be none other than indie actress Jena Malone (Saved!, Donnie Darko). According to Pulse, Jena spends a lot of her down time at some remote cabin in Tahoe where she likes to create experimental short films and music videos for her band. Yes, they're a little odd (hence the word 'experimental'), but I dig her voice and creativity. If you've got nothing to do tonight, swing on over there and let us know what you think. Jena can next be seen in The Go-Getter which will be screening at this year's Sundance Film Festival.