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Which of this year's actors are worthy of the industry's highest honor?
If the screenplay is the backbone of a movie and the director its eyes, the actors and actresses who bring the characters to life on screen are its heart and soul. A bad script in the hands of wonderful actors can still make for a pretty decent movie, but give a wonderful script to bad actors and you're gonna get a bad movie every time. This year, there were a considerable number of exceptionally well written movies starring talented actors and actresses released by both independent studios and the majors so there are almost too many eligible candidates to consider for Academy Award nominations. We already asked you to tell us which actresses deserve consideration come Oscar time — so far, you've chosen Jennifer Lawrence for her leading role in Silver Linings Playbook and Anne Hathaway for her supporting role in Les Miserables — now tell us which actors are worthy of the movie industry's highest honors, whether Best Actor or Best Supporting Actor.
Rate the Top 10 Most Oscar-Worthy Actors of 2012 >>
Posted 12.15.12 by BrentJS -
How do you like them apples?
Hunting for a good movie? >> Posted 12.05.12 by Chris -
British secret agent James Bond first sprung to fictional life in author Ian Fleming's 1953 novel, Casino Royale, which needed three printings to keep up with the demand. Fleming followed with a series of novels and short stories featuring Bond until his death in 1964, at which point the character was also a big screen success as well.
Conversely, Robert Ludlum wrote his first Jason Bourne novel with 1980's The Bourne Identity, writing two more before his death in 2001. Ludlum did not live long enough to see 2002's The Bourne Identity or its subsequent sequels, but, like Fleming, Ludlum's character lives on, with other authors taking over the characters for the novels and the film franchises continuing to find success.
Yet, with Bond making his 23rd big screen adventure in this weekend's Skyfall, we began to wonder: which spy rules the other? There's only one place for Bourne and Bond to face off against one another and that's in our Character Cage Match!
review their strengths and weaknesses before voting in our poll >> Posted 11.12.12 by Ryan -
It's Will Hunting vs. Jim Halpert in this politically and environmentally-charged dramedy
No matter where you stand on the issue of natural gas drilling, otherwise referred to as fracking, it looks like the upcoming indie drama Promised Land looks like it will build a case for both sides. Written by and starring Matt Damon (Contagion, Good Will Hunting) and John Krasinski (NBC's The Office), Promised Land follows corporate salesman Steve Butler (Damon) who is hired to sell the small farm community of McKinley on drilling for natural gas, which becomes a problem when a local farmer (Krasinski) tries to rally the town against it. The first trailer for the movie, it could be argued, may wear its intentions on its sleeves, but doesn't posit Damon as the villain or Krasinski as the hero, an element of character development that was key to the actor-writers. In January, Krasinski told MTV that the movie emulated the kind of movies made by Joel and Ethan Coen (No Country For Old Men, Fargo).
unearthing the best trailersSaturdays 10:00a ET / 7:00a PT
watch the trailer and read about Krasinski's inspiration >> Posted 09.24.12 by Ryan -
Sony's panel at the San Diego Comic-Con concentrated on their upcoming sci-fi projects, and one of the more highly-anticipated is Elysium, writer-director Neill Blomkamp's follow-up to his 2009 debut District 9. Blomkamp was on hand to discuss the movie, along with producer Simon Kinberg and stars Matt Damon, Jodie Foster and Sharlto Copley. The Comic-Con was a first for both Damon and Foster.
Seven minutes of footage from the movie were shown, though parts of it were unfinished, and a good amount of the shots were still in the pre-visualization phase. It didn't matter — the footage was still incredibly impressive and fans of District 9 will no doubt be pleased with the finished product. What the footage ultimately accomplished was to explain the movie's mysterious plot, which has been kept under wraps until a synopsis was leaked out last month that confirmed Blomkamp's previous description of Elysium as a movie with "sociopolitical ideas" inside a "Hollywood action film."
damon and copley breathed fecal matter for the shoot >> Posted 07.15.12 by Ryan -
In most of the early promotion for writer-director Tony Gilroy's The Bourne Legacy, Universal Pictures seemed determined to make it clear to potential moviegoers that the Bourne franchise is continuing on without Matt Damon as rogue Treadstone operative Jason Bourne, rather than rebooting with Jeremy Renner. Apparently, the studio feels confident that the message is now clear because the three action-packed new TV spots for the movie that recently began airing are less concerned with connecting Legacy with the Damon-driven movies as they are in showing how Renner's Aaron Cross is smarter, stronger, and more deadly than Jason Bourne ever was.
The Bourne Legacy picks up after the events depicted in The Bourne Ultimatum, with the CIA scrambling to perform damage control by shutting down Operation Outcome, the successor to Operation Treadstone, by having the remaining operatives assassinated. Aaron Cross (Renner) doesn't take kindly to being discarded after committing his life — and his DNA — to Operation Outcome, so he goes on the run from the ruthless Byer (Edward Norton) and his hit squads, with Operation Outcome scientist Stephanie Snyder (Rachel Weisz) along for the ride.
watch the new tv spots >> Posted 07.09.12 by BrentJS -
After being able to operate mostly out of the public eye, more is finally being revealed from writer-director Neill Blomkamp's upcoming sci-fi movie Elysium, with the first official photo from the movie released in the print edition of Entertainment Weekly. Though it is Blomkamp's follow-up to his extraordinary 2009 feature debut, District 9, not much has been known about Elysium outside of the director's reveal that the movie would contain "sociopolitical ideas" inside a "Hollywood action film." That is, until a synopsis was leaked online last month. "Well, I suppose it was going to happen eventually," Blomkamp told EW, while confirming that the plot synopsis would indeed be about a futuristic society where the wealthiest citizens dwell in an enormous space station while everyone else lives on a inhospitable Earth.
"Even though it's set in the future there are a lot of things that are relevant to today," said Blomkamp. "When I'm generating ideas, they tend to be based on something real to begin with, like looking at an issue in a new way. Then I immediately start thinking about how we can get guns and explosions and slime in there." That is certainly true in the first photo, dutifully scanned by The Playlist, which depicts star Matt Damon as the bald Max holding a giant gun labeled "Chemrail" (no explanation on that) and revealing the mechanized arm apparatus initially revealed in set photos last year.
check out the full photo >> Posted 07.05.12 by Ryan -
ReelzChannel Celebrity Rundown
California Congressman Dana Rohrabacher ripped the Kardashians claiming "They don't give a damn about the American people" after allegations made by Star magazine said their clothing line is manufactured in child slave labor sweat shops in China. The Kardashians say there is no truth to the story and are preparing to sue Star for the "libelous" claims.
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In related news, Kris Humphries made his New Jersey Nets debut Wednesday night against the Knicks in Madison Square Garden and was mercilessly booed when he took the floor (video). When he was on the bench the crowd chanted "We want Humphries" so they could boo and heckle him some more.
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Matt Damon has slammed Barack Obama, telling Elle he would prefer a "one-term president with some balls" to what he believes the prez has been since his election. For his part, Obama took First Dog Bo shopping at PetSmart to pick up treats and a large bone, while Sarah Palin is criticizing the Obama's Bo-themed Christmas card because it emphasizes a dog instead of traditions like "family, faith, and freedom."
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Jersey Shore's Jenni "JWOWW" Farley looks to have invented the solution to bikini lines with a new bikini line that uses a silicon-based adhesive in place of straps. Does silicon stick to silicon?
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Where are they now? The Blair Witch Project star Heather Donahue quit Hollywood shortly after the hit movie to grow medical marijuana, and has written a book entitled "GrowGirl: How My Life After The Blair Witch Project Went to Pot" about the experience that will be released next month.
Posted 12.22.11 by reelz -
The comedy/drama We Bought A Zoo is up against some pretty tough competition when it opens later this month, competing with action movies (Mission: Impossible -- Ghost Protocol, The Darkest Hour), gritty and intense dramas (The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo), as well as other family movies like The Adventures of Tintin and War Horse, both of which were directed by Steven Spielberg.
Clearly, 20th Century Fox believes in the movie, likely because it stars Matt Damon as a single father who tires to rebuild a rundown zoo with the help of Scarlett Johansson, and also because the movie is in the hands of writer-director Cameron Crowe (Almost Famous, Jerry Maguire). Two new preview clips have been released from the movie, both of which show the movie's humor, while also revealing Crowe's trademark — a protagonist with earnest and sincere intentions.
watch the clips >> Posted 12.02.11 by Ryan -
In 2003, actor Jeremy Renner co-starred in what could have been the beginning of a franchise with S.W.A.T. Almost a decade later and after appearing in independent and lower-budgeted fare like The Hurt Locker and The Town (both of which earned Renner Academy Award nominations), Renner is in four established or potential franchise movies — Mission: Impossible -- Ghost Protocol, Hansel and Gretel: Witch Hunters, Avengers and The Bourne Legacy.
As Renner explained to ComingSoon, being a part of so many franchises was not something the actor anticipated.
I never went after a big franchise. I never went after a big action movie. They just sort of kind of manifested in a way... It started off by me saying, "Why not be in a movie that will play all over the world, but that still has something that I can do in it? Why not?" It was kind of impossible for me to say no [to these movies] as long as there was stuff for me to do character-wise, selfishly, it's just a bigger setting. A bigger stage.
Renner on his many, many projects >> Posted 11.30.11 by Ryan