russellcrowe Tagged Articles at Cinematical
Scenes We Love: L.A. Confidential (Again!)
Filed under: Action », Classics », Noir », Mystery & Suspense », Scenes We Love »
It's the most wonderful time of the year! The time of year when I watch L.A. Confidential a dozen times because "It's Christmassy!", complain that it didn't win Best Picture, and fall in love with Russell Crowe and Guy Pearce all over again. It's not as if I don't watch this at any other time of the year, but this film is like my holiday heroin. It's the perfect antidote to the holly and the ivy. Yeah, I posted a scene from it earlier this year, but as its been taken down by YouTube, I figured I'd post another in honor of the upcoming holidays. There's not a lot of scenes available (my favorite Rollo Tomasi moment still eludes me), but luckily one of the reader favorites was up for grabs. So, today's Scene We Love is indeed a scene we all love: "She is Lana Turner."
It's also good timing, as this week we finally get to see a glimpse of Pearce in The Road. It's another one of those maddening cameos he likes to tease us with (no spoiler intended, it's just a fact), and I constantly wish he'd take bigger and more high profile roles. A Bedtime Stories is all well and good, and I have great hopes for Don't Be Afraid of the Dark, but I long for him to land another role like Lt. Ed Exley.
Go below the jump for the scene
Quick List: Celebrities With The Worst Reputations
Filed under: RumorMonger », Celebrities and Controversy », Fandom », Tom Cruise »
Perception is everything, and I don't mean to get all metaphysical on you, but sometimes it's how the world sees us that can define who we are -- but what if the world thinks you're a psycho? In an interview with American Psycho director Mary Harron, she was reminiscing about the black comedy, and as it turns out, her star Christian Bale based his vision of the murdering yuppie on -- wait for it -- Tom Cruise. According to Harron, she and Bale had been collaborating on the character when "...he [Bale] called me and he had been watching Tom Cruise on David Letterman, and he just had this very intense friendliness with nothing behind the eyes, and he was really taken with this energy."
Actors take inspiration from all kinds of places, but you can't help but wonder if Bale saw something that we would all be made painfully aware of: the 'crazy' side of Cruise. And it was that same energy that worked so well in P.T. Anderson's Magnolia when Cruise played motivational speaker Frank T.J. Mackey. But for me, what made this story truly funny, is that who could have predicted that soon enough Bale would be dealing with his own troubled image in Hollywood as a rage-aholic and something of a bully? On the upside, though, maybe Bale's on-set rant will one day inspire another young actor (ahh, the circle of life).
These guys aren't the only ones to battle troubled reputations (whether or not they're deserved), and after the jump: a few more stars who have run their reputations into the ditch...
Liam Neeson Knows Where He'll Be For 'The Next Three Days'
Filed under: Action », Foreign Language », Thrillers », Casting », Lionsgate Films », Newsstand », Remakes and Sequels »
I'm beginning to think that Liam Neeson owns Hermione Granger's Time Turner, or that he has a lifelong supply of Red Bull because he's signed on for another role -- and this one would appear to be filming simultaneously with The A-Team. According to The Hollywood Reporter reports that Neeson has just joined Russell Crowe and Elizabeth Banks in Paul Haggis' The Next Three Days. Days is a remake of the 2008 French thriller Pour Elle, and accuses an ordinary woman (Banks) of a gruesome crime she insists she didn't commit. She's sent to prison and becomes suicidal, and her desperate husband (Crowe) plots to break her out. (Ah, love!) But she'll have a little help from Neeson, who plays an ex-con who has broken out of prison multiple times, wrote a how-to guide about it, and offers his assistance to Crowe. The role is being described as "cameo in nature" which suggests Neeson might be narrating his own Dummy's Guide to Escaping From Prison, or is at least available to Crowe by cell phone to work out the tougher bits.
Filming just started on Days in Pittsburgh last Friday, and wraps on December 12. The A-Team just started filming too, so I'm honestly surprised that their schedules can coincide so neatly. Maybe Neeson is ducking down to Pittsburgh and filming this one on the weekends. I think they're missing a prime opportunity here to tie The Next Three Days into The A-Team universe. If there's one thing Hannibal Smith knows anything about, it's being accused of crimes you didn't commit, and evading the law until you're free of them.
When Hollywood Goes Gay For Pay
Filed under: Comedy », Drama », Gay & Lesbian », Romance », Casting », Politics », Trailers and Clips »
There's a long-running joke in Hollywood that one of the easiest ways to earn an Oscar is to either 'Ugly it up" or contract a disease. But, in recent years, one of the newer trends that can lead an actor to the podium is for them to take on a role where they play a person of same-sex orientation (a fact that has already become the stuff of satire). Over the past 10 years, plenty of actors have earned Oscars for playing gay roles, and the latest actor to join the club could be Matt Damon, who has signed to play Liberace's lover in Steven Soderbergh's biopic of the flamboyant musician.
So what's the big deal? Don't actors pretend to be different people all the time ... isn't that their job? Well, yes, but it's a little more complicated than that. Gay and lesbian political advocates have long lamented the sad state of affairs where straight actors are getting gay roles, instead of giving 'out' actors their chance to shine. So, while I question the idea that only gay actors could play a gay character, just as only straight actors can play straight characters, the sad fact is that Hollywood is still relatively puritanical when it comes to allowing their actors and actresses to be out and proud -- and that needs to change. But, that doesn't mean I think an actor (gay or straight) shouldn't play role any role they want ... just as long as they're good at it.
So on that note, I decided to give a little credit to five performances by straight actors in gay roles that transcended orientation and, ultimately, are just damn fine performances.
After the jump: my picks for the best of straight actors going gay for pay...
More 'Master and Commander'? Aye-Aye, Captain!
Filed under: Action », Drama », RumorMonger », 20th Century Fox », DIY/Filmmaking », Newsstand », War »
I know from comments on past posts that I'm not the only moviegoer desperate for more of Captain Jack Aubrey. I'll go on record and say that as much as I enjoyed Captain Jack Sparrow, I'd much sooner take another journey with Aubrey and Stephen Maturin over a fourth Pirates.There's a glimmer of hope now, as Russell Crowe talked to USA Today and said that very early talks were underway for a new Master and Commander installment. A script based on Patrick O'Brian's The Reverse of the Medal has been written, and like Far Side of the World, it's a combination of several different stories. Negotiations are currently underway to obtain the rights, but USA Today doesn't specify if they've lapsed, or if Fox lacks the neccessary books of the 20 volume series.
Crowe said that "there's still a long way to go," and that it's one of several projects he's considering, so we can't hold our breath. Medal would be quite the follow-up, since it would be an older Aubrey than we met before, and one who is embroiled in fraud charges and dealing with illegitimate offspring. It would also introduce that other side of Maturin, one that's distinctly different from his naturalist ways. I hope it happens, though. It would be a good time on land and sea for all!
400 Screens, 400 Blows - As the Crowe Flies
Filed under: Columns », 400 Screens, 400 Blows »
400 Screens, 400 Blows is a weekly column that takes an in-depth look at the films playing below the radar, beneath the top ten, and on 400 screens or less.
State of Play (240 screens) continues playing this week, and despite its lukewarm performance and reviews, something about it makes me happy. In mid-2003, I got myself into hot water with a Russell Crowe fan club. I reviewed a very minor film called The Hard Word, starring Guy Pearce, who of course had been Crowe's co-star in L.A. Confidential (1997). I took the opportunity to compare the two actors, praising Pearce for his work in interesting films like Ravenous and Memento, and questioning the much more fashionable Crowe. I did this mainly because I was irritated at the enduring popularity of two terrible films, the sludgy, brooding mess Gladiator (2000) and the manipulative Oscar bait A Beautiful Mind (2001).
I felt that Crowe went through the former film with one single expression, a glower, and through the latter with an unchanging collection of tics and actor's tricks; neither one was a particularly interesting or deep performance. Both performances received Oscar nominations, and Crowe won for Gladiator. I was also irritated that the immeasurably superior Memento, and Pearce, didn't get the same attention. In any case the Crowe fan club grabbed my review, posted it on one of their forums and went to town. I started getting all kinds of angry, nasty e-mails. The fact that I presented one, small opinion contrary to their perfect, orderly world absolutely infuriated them.
Hugh Jackman and Robert Pattinson Are Cowboys?
Filed under: Drama », Casting », Deals »
It's a strange coincidence, but just the other day I was having a conversation with a friend and we turned to each other and said: "Hey, whatever happened to Madeleine Stowe?" Well, she hasn't been making many appearances on the big screen lately, but that doesn't mean she hasn't been busy. Variety has announced that Stowe will be make her directorial debut for Hyde Park Entertainment with the period drama, Unbound Captives. The film stars Rachel Weisz, Hugh Jackman, and Robert Pattinson and centers on a woman, "whose husband is killed and her two children kidnapped by a Comanche war party in 1859." Stowe wrote the script herself back in 1993 as a starring vehicle, but at the time no one was jumping at the chance to finance the film of an actress and first time screenwriter. But that doesn't mean that the studios didn't like what they saw, because according to Variety, "Fox offered Stowe $3 million, and later $5 million, for her script, with Ridley Scott poised to direct and Russell Crowe to star. She turned down what was among the highest sums offered a first-time scribe because there was no promise she would be anything more than screenwriter." Stowe was convinced that it was better to let the project die on the vine rather than have somebody else mess with her script -- and I have to hand it to her, I doubt I would have been as principled.
Remember "Gladiator 2"? Nick Cave's Script Discovered
Filed under: Action », Sci-Fi & Fantasy », Fandom », Scripts », Remakes and Sequels », Religious »
I have the deep suspicion that despite being picked up round the Internet, this Nick Cave "synopsis" will end up being some kind of hoax. If it does, the story someone has concocted for Gladiator 2 is so brilliantly crazy that it's worth reading. Gone Elsewhere has the rundown for you. This script meets up with Maximus seconds after he comes to in the afterlife. Our deceased gladiator isn't met by his family, but by a mysterious figure named Moredecai. He introduces him to the Roman pantheon who mock him, and offer a deal to kill their brother Hephaestos. If he can, they'll reunite him with his wife and son. Once out of immortal earshot, Moredecai tells Maximus these are lies and that his wife, Maria, sacrified her place in Elyisium to allow their son, Marius, to cheat death. He's now back in Rome living a mortal life. Disbelieving this, our undead hero marches to find Hephaestos who is trying to usher in an age of a "one, true God" and sends him hurtling back to mortal Rome. There Maximus encounters the adult Lucius who is pretty busy slaughtering Christians for the Emperor, a situation that Maximus finds himself embroiled in ... and not surprisingly, one that reunites him with his adult son. There's the cue to unleash hell.
Needless to say, it's a unique read. Cave really took the "What we do in life, echoes in eternity" tagline literally. (You'll know what I mean when you get to the end.) It's so easy to let your mind get carried away imagining scenes like Lucius passing a bust of Maximus and realizing he just saw him in a mob that I'd like to see this filmed, albeit not as a Gladiator sequel, but as pure Roman fantasy. Read it, and see if you agree.
[via IMDB]
Russell Crowe Draws His Bow For 'Robin Hood'
Filed under: Action », Drama », Romance », Universal », Newsstand », Movie Marketing », Images », War »
The first photo of Russell Crowe as the titular archer in Ridley Scott's Robin Hood has appeared online, courtesy of USA Today. (The whole photo is below the jump.) It's a nice, atmospheric shot with a very respectable and relatively accurate costume. The medievalist in me is automatically annoyed at Brian Grazer bragging about the costume: "He's got armor. He's very medieval. He looks, if anything, more like he did in Gladiator than anything we're used to seeing with Robin Hood." I mean, do people still expect Robin Hood to wear tights? I suppose they do, even though its not accurate, and no one has sported them onscreen since the days of Errol Flynn and Douglas Fairbanks (not counting Cary Elwes). Most Robin Hoods wear sturdy, cool outfits nowadays, with lots of leather.
I do think it's funny Crowe went back to his Gladiator haircut after wearing that weird shaggy thing in State of Play that was supposed to be his Robin Hood coif. While this looks nicer, it's funny you'd go through one movie looking rather badly groomed, and go all sleek and Roman for a medieval film!
Anyway, there's not much else to say, so I'll leave you with a fun fact. Did you know that medieval peasants hated the longbow? You had to bulk up to use it, creating what they considered to be "unsightly" muscles and bodies. Eventually, you could rip open your chest muscles and be lame for the rest of your life. But making the lower classes so proficient in it was kind of a mistake, as the nobility found out during the Peasant's Revolt.
Gallery: Robin Hood
Review: State of Play
Filed under: Thrillers », New Releases », Universal », Theatrical Reviews », New in Theaters »
Newspapermen occupy that movie middle ground between detectives and action heroes. They dig up clues, but the clues are hard-won, based on experience and the building up of contacts and sources. The clues are rarely left at the scene of the crime. Newspapermen rarely get into danger, but when they do it's not something they're really prepared or trained for. Coming face-to-face with a deadly killer, Washington Globe reporter Cal McAffrey (Russell Crowe) can barely make eye contact. Cal doesn't fight or outwit the bad guy; he just runs and hides. It's not important that he try to be a hero. It's more important that he survive to write the story.
Of course, real reporters don't get to solve murders and uncover international corporate conspiracies every day, and that's where Hollywood comes in. The new film State of Play is based on a six-hour BBC mini-series from 2003. I haven't seen the original, but I'd bet that it's much distilled and sped up, and no one is going to argue that the new film is any kind of improvement. But taken on its own, it's probably the best newspaper/journalism movie in years -- perhaps since Shattered Glass (2003) -- even if it falls far short of the purity of All the President's Men (1976). It's also the first movie of its kind to address the inherent feud between sturdy, superior, old-fashioned print reporting, and reckless, inexperienced, sloppy blogging. (Guess which side the movie is on?)
Jeremy Renner Wants To Be An Avenger
Directors We Love: Jim Jarmusch
Indie Roundup: 'Sweetgrass,' 'Clarkworld,' 'Broken Embraces'
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Watch: Famous 'Matrix' Scene Re-Created with LEGOs
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