Please enable javascript to view this site.

Image Image Image Image Image Image Image Image Image

The Latest in ShowBiz News

Mack Chico

By

2009/05/12 at 12:00am

Antonio Banderas in ‘The Big Bang’

05.12.2009 | By |

Antonio Banderas in 'The Big Bang'

Antonio Banderas is set to star in The Big Bang,” a neo-noir detective story to be directed by Tony Krantz.

Richard Rionda Del Castro, Krantz and Erik Jendresen will produce the film, based on a script by Jendresen (“Band of Brothers”). Production begins in Spokane, Wash., in September.

Banderas stars as an L.A. private detective who’s hired to find a missing stripper. The trail leads to the New Mexico desert, where the private eye finds a trail of bodies and contends with a brutal Russian boxer, three LAPD detectives and an aging billionaire looking to perfect the nuclear physics equivalent of the Big Bang.

Exec producing will be Patricia Eberle, Richard Salvatore and Ross Dinerstein.

Rionda Del Castro’s Hannibal Pictures is financing and handling foreign sales at Cannes. U.S. representation is being handled by WMA and Endeavor.

Pic marks the first theatrical feature for Krantz, one of the few ex-agents to make that leap. Krantz, who spent 15 years packaging series at CAA and later heading Imagine TV, previously directed two Jendresen-scripted films — “Sublime” and “Otis”– that were designed to go direct to video through Raw Feed, a venture Krantz co-created.

Krantz now owns Flame Ventures, whose slate includes a NASCAR Imax film in 3-D that Krantz will direct, and “The Conversation,” a series for AMC based on the Francis Ford Coppola film that is being written by Jendresen and Christopher McQuarrie.

Banderas most recently completed a starring role in Woody Allen‘s as-yet-untitled next film.

Mack Chico

By

2009/05/10 at 12:00am

‘Star Trek’ is #1 at the box office!

05.10.2009 | By |

'Star Trek' is #1 at the box office!

Resistance proved futile: “Star Trek,” the Paramount Pictures prequel, sold an estimated $76.5 million in tickets at North American theaters in its first three and a half days of release, the top draw of the weekend.

The opening was propelled by a megawatt marketing campaign and unexpectedly strong critical notices. Going into the weekend, though, Paramount was a bit nervous about how the film, which cost $140 million, would perform.

Would the average moviegoer dismiss it as a geek flick? What about older women, an audience that has been tough for science fiction films to crack but is needed for a movie to reach blockbuster status? Historically “Star Trek” movies have performed poorly overseas. Would Paramount’s harder-than-usual sell in Europe pay off?

Rob Moore, Paramount’s vice chairman, sounded giddy in an interview on Sunday morning. “A giant new audience came along for this ride,” he said. “It’s a great relaunch to this classic property.”

The studio, Mr. Moore said, thinks “Star Trek,” directed by J. J. Abrams and starring the newcomer Chris Pine as a young James T. Kirk, has “a real shot” to make more than $200 million domestically, a big number for a film with this size of opening weekend. Overseas, where sales information is slower to trickle in, Mr. Moore said “Star Trek” could sell more than $100 million in tickets, more than double the previous showing for the franchise.

Paramount executives said they had hoped the movie would perform like “Batman Begins,” the 2005 series reboot that opened to about $49 million in ticket sales. Helping “Star Trek” was the decision to start showing the movie in limited release on Thursday evening, a move meant to spur water-cooler talk in the office on Friday and give some padding to the weekend total.

Imax also helped boost results, selling an estimated $8.2 million of “Star Trek” tickets over the weekend, an Imax record. “We’ve never even been close to this kind of turnout before,” said Greg Foster, chairman and president of Imax Filmed Entertainment.

In general the box office continues to sizzle. So far this year North American moviegoers have bought $3.44 billion in tickets, a 16 percent increase over the same period in 2008, according to Hollywood.com. Attendance is up 13 percent.

“X-Men Origins: Wolverine” (20th Century Fox),which had the year’s biggest opening last weekend, taking in more than $85 million, was No. 2 this weekend, with an estimated $27 million for a cumulative total of $129.6 million (including weekday sales). “Ghosts of Girlfriends Past” (Warner Brothers) earned an estimated $10.5 million for third place (and a new total of $30.2 million).

Rounding out the Top 5 were “Obsessed,” a low-budget thriller from Screen Gems, with $6.6 million ($56.2 million), and the Warner Brothers comedy “17 Again,” with $4.4 million ($54 million).

Jack Rico

By

2009/05/08 at 12:00am

Rudo y Cursi

05.8.2009 | By |

Rated: R for pervasive language, sexual content and brief drug use.
Release Date: 2009-05-08
Starring: Carlos Cuarón
Director(s):
Distributor:
Film Genre:
Country: Mexico
Official Website: http://www.rudoycursilapelicula.com/

Go to our film page

Rudo y Cursi

“Rudo y Cursi” is a lively and engaging comedy that highlights some drama in its storyline. Regrettably, in the end, feels a little thin, largely because it is unsure of how earnestly to treat its own lessons about fate, ambition and brotherly love. There is a lot of velocity in this ultimately familiar tale of rising and falling, but not much gravity. “Rudo y Cursi” is partly about the consequences of taking a game much too seriously, but at the same time it treats everything else — life, death, love, money — like a game.

 

Beto (Diego Luna) and Tato Verdusco (Gael Garcia Bernal) are half brothers who work together at a banana plantation and live with their extended family in a village in southern Mexico. When the two of them are suddenly (and somewhat improbably) plucked from rural proletarian obscurity and turned into professional soccer players in Mexico City, they achieve fame as Rudo and Cursi, nicknames that can be translated more or less as tough and corny.

 

But Mr. Cuarón also has trouble managing the tone of the film as it swerves from light-hearted absurdity toward a darker, more cynical view of its characters and their fate. Too often he allows “Rudo y Cursi” to coast on the likeability of its stars, who seem at times to be enjoying themselves more than their characters are able to.

Mack Chico

By

2009/05/08 at 12:00am

Star Trek

05.8.2009 | By |

Rated: PG-13 for sci-fi action and violence, and brief sexual content.
Release Date: 2009-05-08
Starring: Roberto Orci, Alex Kurtzman
Director(s):
Distributor:
Film Genre:
Country: USA
Official Website: http://www.startrekmovie.com/

Go to our film page

Star Trek

2009’s ‘Star Trek’ is a youthful, and very entertaining modern revival of the classic and outdated TV series and movie franchise starring William Shatner and Leonard Nemoy. This new version is an all out action film that manages to balance it with some terrific casting, CGI effects and humor. Very similar to what ‘Iron Man’ as a movie offered. Star Trek has been designed with the lofty goal of keeping current fans, repatriating lapsed ones and, by re-branding the name, opening the Trek universe to millions of new viewers. J.J. Abrams‘ attempt has mostly succeeded.

 

The storyline is essentially the deep exploration of the beginnings of Captain Kirk and Spock. This allows the story to establish the origins of all the classic characters and the circumstances that brought them all together. Within this framework, Kirk and Spock meet and soon become competitive cadets-in-training. With their drastically opposite styles, one driven by passion, the other by rigorous logic, they become defiant adversaries, each going all out to be th4 captain of the U.S.S. Enterprise.

 

Leonard Nimoy (the original Spock) makes a cameo in the role that made him famous, and the connection between “new Trek” and “classic Trek” is created.  Just like Nimoy’s appearance, there are a myriad of subtle homages to the old television series and Patrick Stewart films that the true Trekkies will appreciate. Oddly enough, Shatner was nowhere to be seen.

There are some narrative cracks though. Abrams and his screenwriters, longtime Trek fans Roberto Orci and Alex Kurtzman (Transformers, Mission Impossible 3), do their best to keep things engaging despite the tremendous constraints of the “origin” format, but there are times when the material feels rushed. When considering pace, this is most definitely that anti-Star Trek: The Motion Picture. No loving, languid shots here.

Star Trek is clearly an action-oriented motion picture, with an intensity that exceeds even that of The Wrath of Khan. The pace is blistering, and the movie is littered with the eye candy of expertly realized space battles. The special effects are beyond those seen in any of the previous ten Star Trek features. In addition to the battles, there are also chases, fight scenes, and all the other staples one expects from an action movie.

The casting could not have been better Chris Pine (Kirk) and Zachary Quinto (Spock) truly embody the essence of the priginal characters. The dominican actress Zoe Saldaña plays Uhura, but with a new sexiness absent from the previous versions.

Ultimately, when the end credits roll, we’re left with the sense that Star Trek represents a good beginning. As a film tasked with getting all the characters together, re-booting a timeline, and finding a way to return a veteran actor to his beloved role, Star Trek works. There is some awkwardness here – it feels like the “hybrid” it is (or, as it has been called, “Not Your Father’s Star Trek”) but, considering how ponderous and stilted the Star Trek movie series had become, perhaps that’s not a bad thing. Still, as with any prequel/re-start, the real test will arrive with the next movie (purportedly in two years – assuming this one does not flop at the box office). The setup is complete; now it’s time to see whether the implied potential of this first entry into a new series can be realized in its sequel. If you can watch it in IMAX.

Mack Chico

By

2009/05/08 at 12:00am

Katie Holmes to star in Guillermo del Toro thriller

05.8.2009 | By |

Katie Holmes to star in Guillermo del Toro thriller

Katie Holmes will star in “Don’t Be Afraid of the Dark,” a thriller for Miramax Films that was scripted by Guillermo del Toro and Matthew Robbins.

Del Toro is producing with Mark Johnson and the film will be directed by del Toro protege Troy Nixey.

The film will shoot this summer in Melbourne as a “Guillermo del Toro Presentation.”

“Don’t Be Afraid of the Dark” is based on a 1973 ABC telepic about a young girl who moves in with her father and his girlfriend and discovers they are sharing the house with devilish creatures.

Nixey, a comicbook artist, is making his feature directing debut. Del Toro sparked to “Latchkey’s Lament,” a Nixey-directed short that captured the tone del Toro wanted for “Don’t Be Afraid of the Dark.”

Del Toro and Johnson are also teamed with Gary Ungar to produce “Hater,” an adaptation of the David Moody horror novel that will be directed at Universal by Juan Antonio Bayona (“The Orphanage”).

Holmes most recently completed “The Extra Man,” directed by Shari Springer Berman and Robert Pulcini.

Del Toro is busy readying “The Hobbit,” which he’s writing with Peter Jackson, Fran Walsh and Philippa Boyens. That film shoots next year.

Mack Chico

By

2009/05/07 at 12:00am

Next Day Air

05.7.2009 | By |

Rated: R for pervasive language, drug content, some violence and brief sexuality.
Release Date: 2009-05-08
Starring: Blair Cobbs
Director(s):
Distributor:
Film Genre:
Country: USA
Official Website: http://www.nextdayair-themovie.com/

Go to our film page

Next Day Air

Far from the worst of Tarantino knockoffs, “Next Day Air” takes the standard formula of dimwits chasing bags of drugs to the ‘hood.

A stoned deliveryman (Donald Faison) mistakenly delivers a huge box of cocaine to the wrong address, where lowlifes Guch (Wood Harris) and Brody (Mike Epps) try to figure out what to do with it. On the couch sleeps a huge guy neither of them invited to live with them, but both of them are too afraid to ask him to leave.

The package was supposed to be delivered to another small-timer, Jesus (Cisco Reyes), who, in between fights with his sassy girlfriend (Yasmin Deliz), is about to get killed by a drug lord if he can’t find the stash.

Routine stuff, but things move quickly, with several offhand funny moments. Mos Def is hilarious in a cameo as another delivery guy.

Mack Chico

By

2009/05/06 at 12:00am

‘Deadpool’: the next ‘X-Men’ spinoff

05.6.2009 | By |

'Deadpool': the next 'X-Men' spinoff

Twentieth Century Fox has begun development on “Deadpool,” an “X-Men” spinoff that will be crafted as a star vehicle for Ryan Reynolds, who played the character in “X-Men Origins: Wolverine.”

The character is one of the most popular in Marvel Comics’ X-Men universe. Deadpool is Wade Wilson, a mercenary who, dying of cancer, submits himself to the Weapon X genetic alteration experiment and emerges as an indestructible semi-sane anti-hero. Reynolds seemed destined to play the character. In one reference in the Marvel Comics, Deadpool is described as a mix between “a Shar Pei and Ryan Reynolds.”

In one of the “Easter egg” endings of “Wolverine,” Deadpool is seen rising from the rubble and whispering “Shhh” to audiences.

The film will be produced by Lauren Shuler Donner and Marvel.

Fox is also in the formative stages of a “Wolverine” sequel that will encompass the samurai storyline that was hinted at as Wolverine sat in a bar in Japan as the film concluded.

Separately, Fox is developing “Magneto,” a film about the X-Men villain with a script by Sheldon Turner, and “X-Men: First Class,” which Josh Schwartz is penning.

Reynolds next stars with Sandra Bullock in the Anne Fletcher-directed “The Proposal,” which Disney releases June 19. He also completed the Kieran and Michele Mulroney-directed “Paper Man.”

Jack Rico

By

2009/05/05 at 12:00am

The Curious Case of Benjamin Button

05.5.2009 | By |

Rating: 4.0

Rated: PG-13 for brief war violence, sexual content, language and smoking.
Release Date: 2008-12-25
Starring: Eric Roth, F. Scott Fitzgerald (historia)
Director(s):
Distributor:
Film Genre:
Country:USA
Official Website: http://wwws.warnerbros.es/benjaminbutton/?frompromo=movies_comingsoon_curioiuscaseofbenbutton

 Go to our film page

Mack Chico

By

2009/05/05 at 12:00am

Dom DeLuise, actor, comedian and chef, dies

05.5.2009 | By |

Dom DeLuise, actor, comedian and chef, dies

Dom DeLuise, the portly actor-comedian whose affable nature made him a popular character actor for decades with movie and TV audiences as well as directors and fellow actors, has died. He was 75.

DeLuise died Monday night, son Michael DeLuise told KTLA-TV and radio station KNX on Tuesday. The comedian died in his sleep after a long illness. Calls to his agent were not immediately returned.

The actor, who loved to cook and eat almost as much as he enjoyed acting, also carved out a formidable second career later in life as a chef of fine cuisine. He authored two cookbooks and would appear often on morning TV shows to whip up his favorite recipes.

As an actor, he was incredibly prolific, appearing in scores of movies and TV shows, in Broadway plays and voicing characters for numerous cartoon shows.

Writer-director-actor Mel Brooks particularly admired DeLuise’s talent for offbeat comedy and cast him in several of his films, including “The Twelve Chairs,” “Blazing Saddles,” “Silent Movie,” “History of the World Part I” and “Robin Hood: Men in Tights.” DeLuise was also the voice of Pizza the Hutt in Brooks’ “Star Wars” parody, “Spaceballs.”

The actor also appeared frequently in films opposite his friend Burt Reynolds. Among them, “The End,” “The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas,” ‘Smokey and the Bandit II,” “The Cannonball Run” and “Cannonball Run II.”

Another actor-friend, Dean Martin, admired his comic abilities so much that he cast DeLuise as a regular on his 1960s comedy-variety show. In 1973, he starred in a situation comedy, “Lotsa Luck,” but it proved to be short-lived.

Other TV credits included appearances on such shows as “The Munsters,” “The Girl From U.N.C.L.E.,” “Burke’s Law,” “Sabrina the Teenage Witch” and “Diagnosis Murder.”

On Broadway, DeLuise appeared in Neil Simon‘s “Last of the Red Hot Lovers” and other plays.

Because of his passion for food, the actor battled obesity throughout much of his life, his weight reaching as much as 325 pounds at one point. For years, he resisted the efforts of family members and doctors who tried to put him on various diets. He finally agreed in 1993 when he needed hip replacement surgery and his doctor refused to perform it until he lost 100 pounds.

He and his family enrolled at the Duke University Diet and Fitness Center in Durham, N.C., and DeLuise lost enough weight for the surgery, although he gained some of it back afterward.

On the positive side, his love of food resulted in two successful cookbooks, 1988’s “Eat This — It Will Make You Feel Better!” and 1997’s “Eat This Too! It’ll Also Make You Feel Good.”

At his Pacific Palisades home, DeLuise often prepared feasts for family and friends. One lunch began with turkey soup and ended with strawberry shortcake. In between, were platters of beef filet, chicken breast and sausage, a bowl of spaghetti and meatballs and a saucer of lettuce.

He strongly resembled the famed chef Paul Prudhomme and joked in a 1987 Associated Press interview that he had posed as Prudhomme while visiting his New Orleans restaurant, K-Paul’s Louisiana Kitchen.

DeLuise was appearing on Broadway in “Here’s Love” in the early 1960s when Garry Moore saw him and hired him to play the magician “Dominick the Great” on “The Garry Moore Show.”

His appearances on the hit comedy-variety program brought offers from Hollywood, and DeLuise first came to the attention of movie-goers in “Fail Safe,” a drama starring Henry Fonda. He followed with a comedy, “The Glass Bottom Boat,” starring Doris Day, and from then on he alternated between films and television.

“I was making $7,000 a week — a lot of money back then — but I didn’t even know I was rich,” he recalled in 1994. “I was just having such a great time.”

He was born Dominick DeLuise in New York City on Aug. 1, 1933, to Italian immigrants. His father, who spoke only Italian, was a garbage collector, and those humble beginnings stayed with him throughout his life.

“My dad knows everything there is to know about garbage,” one of the actor’s sons, David DeLuise, told The Associated Press in 2008. “He loves to pick up a broken chair and fix it.”

DeLuise’s introduction to acting came at age 8 when he played the title role of Peter Rabbit in a school play. He went on to graduate from New York City’s famed School of Performing Arts in Manhattan.

For five years, he sought work in theater or television with little luck. He finally decided to enroll at Tufts College and study biology, with the aim of becoming a teacher.

Acting called him back, however, and he found work at the Cleveland Playhouse, appearing in stage productions that ranged from comedies such as “Kiss Me Kate” to Shakespeare’s “Hamlet.”

“I worked two years solidly on plays and moving furniture and painting scenery and playing parts,” he remarked in a 2006 interview. “It was quite an amazing learning place for me.”

While working in summer stock in Provincetown, Mass., he met a beautiful young actress, Carol Arthur, and they were soon married.

The couple’s three sons, Peter, Michael and David, all became actors and all appeared with their father in the 1990s TV series “SeaQuestDSV,” in which Peter and Michael were regulars.

Mack Chico

By

2009/05/04 at 12:00am

Andy Garcia’s ‘City Island’ wins in Tribeca Festival

05.4.2009 | By |

Andy Garcia's 'City Island' wins in Tribeca Festival

“City Island,” an ensemble pic set in a semi-obscure area of the Bronx, captured the Heineken Audience Award at the Tribeca Film Festival.

The film, which world-preemed at Tribeca, stars Andy Garcia, Julianna Margulies, Alan Arkin and Emily Mortimer. It’s a family comedy about the foibles of the Rizzo clan.

Director Raymond De Felitta will receive a cash prize of $25,000 for the audience honor.

Select a Page