stephan elliott Tagged Articles at Cinematical

In this day and age, why can't someone be both? Jessica Biel's dramatic turn as a stripper in Timothy Linh Bui's Powder Blue, which just hit DVD and Blu-ray, has been competing for attention with the theatrical release of Stephen Elliott's Easy Virtue, which opened in New York and Los Angeles before expanding this weekend. Throw in the tempest in a teacup about her interview with Allure Magazine, in which the actress was quoted as complaining that her beauty was causing her to miss out on more serious roles that instead went to Natalie Portman or Scarlett Johansson, and it may be hard to know what to think of the actress.

I don't know if the Allure quotes are accurate are not, taken out of context or completely made up, but watching her in Easy Virtue made me forget all the career stuff and gossip and get caught up with the characters and the story. That's not something I expected from a period piece based on a play by Noël Coward. Biel plays Larita, an American race car driver from Detroit who marries the young, very British John Whittaker (Ben Barnes) after a whirlwind romance. John takes her home to meet his very proper mother (Kristin Scott Thomas), his remote yet welcoming father (Colin Firth), and his two flighty sisters (Kimberly Nixon and Katherine Parkinson).

It wouldn't be fair to say that Biel steals this very funny film (with a more serious streak that's gradually revealed). For one thing, Firth is exquisitely good; for another, Elliot's direction is quite engaging. Still, Biel is something of a minor marvel in the role.

Deals. Michel Gondry's doc The Thorn in the Heart may not have generated much positive buzz when it premiered at Cannes last week, but it impressed the folks at Oscilloscope Laboratories. They acquired North American rights to the film and are planning a theatrical release, according to indieWIRE. Thorn examines the life of Gondry's aunt, a schoolteacher for more than 30 years in rural France. David Hudson at IFC's The Daily gathered links to the coverage, in which one critic calls Thorn a "glorified home movie" and another predicts that "normal people will simply walk out of it," while others defend it as "a lovely, minor-key ode" and "mildly diverting."

Box Office. Stephen Elliott's Easy Virtue led the way, earning a very tidy $110,443, according to Box Office Mojo, which averages out to $11,044 per screen. Jessica Biel gives her best performance so far as an American race car driver who marries a young British man (Ben Barnes) after a whirlwind romance, and then must deal with his stuffy mother (Kristin Scott Thomas), curiously distanced father (Colin Firth), and flighty sisters. It's a romantic comedy with dramatic depth, light on its feet yet unafraid to stand still and contemplate fate and mortality.

Expanding into 52 theaters in its second week of release, Rian Johnson's con man comedy The Brothers Bloom rode a wave of appreciative reviews to a per-screen average of $7,394, just a little ahead of Olivier Assayas' critically-acclaimed family drama Summer Hours, starring Juliette Binoche. (We've embedded the lively trailer for the latter title below.) The highly-praised doc Burma VJ opened on one theater with a modest take of $5,554 -- not bad on a crowded weekend.

After the jump: The festival beat goes on in Seattle and at Silverdocs.

A highbrow festival like Toronto doesn't offer many opportunities to laugh, and I was grateful for this one. Easy Virtue, an adaptation of an early Noël Coward play, is a droll and witty delight, a superb showcase for its cast, and a return to fine form for The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert director Stephan Elliott, who last turned in the unsettling but incomprehensible Eye of the Beholder nearly 10 years ago. Where most TIFF films seemed to glower at me from the screen, this one winked and smiled.

Noël Coward may seem a strange choice for Elliott, whose films have favored the bizarre and the obscure. I don't know what attracted the filmmaker to this project, but I'm glad that something did. The material may seem almost purely verbal, all clever turns of phrase and sardonic interjections (what Americans think of as "Britishness"), but Elliott is constantly concerned with how the movie looks and sounds. Fittingly, he manages to give it a curious, otherworldly feel. This is most pronounced in the opening sequence, which marries choppy black-and-white footage, odd angles, and a jazzy soundtrack to introduce us to the characters and transport us to a universe that is ever so slightly off-kilter. It's a welcome recognition that these hyper-literate, impeccably constructed old comedies – Coward, Wilde, etc. – don't take place in a world quite like ours.

Last month, Monika brought you the announcement of Rose McGowan's upcoming film, Black Oasis. When I saw the title, I was thinking maybe this would be some kind of strange biopic with Dave Chappelle and Chris Rock singing "Wonderwall," but alas, I was mistaken. Black Oasis tells the story of B-movie queen Susan Cabot. Cabot was bludgeoned to death by her own son -- who suffered from dwarfism. Sounds intriguing to say the least, and call me crazy but I find that Rose McGowan rather attractive! The movie will be written and directed by Stephan Elliott, who also did the cult cross-dressing flick Priscilla, Queen of the Desert. And speaking of cross-dressing, Oasis has just added Rodrigo Santoro, who certainly appeared to be rocking some sort of drag look during his scenes in 300.

I recall seeing Love, Actually in the theater and hating Santoro. Not because of his performance, but because when he took his shirt off, every woman in the audience gasped and squealed. I actually assumed he'd be a much bigger star by now. Known as the "Brazilian Tom Cruise," Santoro was #12 on People Magazine's 2006 "Sexiest Men Alive" issue -- beating me out by just two spots. He was in Charlie's Angels: Full Throttle, he played the universally hated Paulo on Lost (where the hell did he come from, by the way?), the absolutely ridiculous character Xerxes in 300 (please don't hate me, commenters!), and he hasn't really been in much else here in America. His role in Black Oasis sounds like it will be the one that decides whether or not he's got the talent to back up the looks.