This is one of the worst posters I have seen this year. I guess they were going for some kind of flag design but it looks like someone just slapped another poster down in the bottom right hand corner.

The New York Times is reporting tha the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences is expected to bring back Jon Stewart as the host of next years Oscars. Stewart hosted the awards in 2006 and did a wonderful job. I have to say I'm a little bit disappointed though. I may be in the minority but I was really hoping that they would bring back Ellen DeGeneres who I thought was the funniest host since Steve Martin (I would but Stewart second on that list). Oh well, at least it isn't Whoopi Goldberg.

IGN has posted the teaser trailer for Francis Ford Coppola's Youth Without Youth. The film is about, well, it doesn't matter what it is about. It's a new film from Francis Ford Coppola that he isn't making just to get out of bankruptcy and that should be enough of a reason to see it. After all, this is the man that brought us The Rain People, The Godfather, The Conversation, The Godfather II, and Apocalypse Now all in a row. No other filmmaker has had a succession of movies like that. He also made one of my favorite movies for the 80's, Rumble Fish.

3:10 to Yuma

I saw this film this last Friday and haven't had the desire to write about it yet. Not because it's bad, it is actually very good, but because I don't think anything I say will convince anyone to see this. This is a Western and you probably already know if you like those or don't.

This isn't a post modern take, Yuma fully embraces the genre and stays within its confines. Like a lot of other great Westerns the film basically boils down to being about morals more than anything else. Sure you get pistols and horses but the movie is basically about being good or evil, with a surprising amount of gray area.

The movie contains two wonderful central performances from Russell Crowe and Christian Bale, plus a violent and intense supporting one from Ben Foster. It is filled with action but it is essential to the story and never gets in the way of the smaller, quieter moment. There is a scene towards the end of the movie where the two main characters just speak to one another in a hotel room. It is just the two men buying time and trying to figure the other one out. The way it is written and acted it is as thrilling as any of the shoot outs in the film. That is what basically makes the movie, two men alone together and trying to stay alive.

Screen Daily reports that Roman Polanski will no longer direct the epic drama Pompeii due to scheduling conflicts.

The site says that the director pulled out after Summit International indicated it may have to postpone principal photography in Europe next summer due to concerns over a possible industry strike.

On one hand I'm disappointed about this. I wanted to see what Polanski could do with a big(er) budget disaster film. On the other, I really want Polanski to make more personal, smaller films. These are the ones that always turn out best for him.

I have no opinion about this either way but Jennifer Hudson is joining the cast of the Sex and the City movie. The Academy Award-winning actress (Dreamgirls) has been cast to play an assistant to Sarah Jessica Parker's Carrie Bradshaw in the big-screen version. The movie follows the show's four main characters four years after the series ended. I'm not sold on Hudson as an actor and didn't think she deserved the Oscar last year. Not that I think she was bad in Dreamgirls, I just don't think she was that good.

I really hope this is true. While I was reading this book I kept trying to picture actors that could play the main role (I had already read it was going to be a movie). The two people that kept coming to mind was Christian Bale and Viggo Mortensen. Anyway, a rep for Viggo Mortensen confirms that the Lord of the Rings star is in early talks to star in the big-screen adaptation of Cormac McCarthy's best-selling The Road. The story, about a man and his young son traveling through a desperate, post-apocalyptic world, is being adapted by Joe Penhall (Enduring Love). Aussie John Hillcoat, who helmed last year's down-under Western The Proposition (one of my favorite movies from last year), will direct.

I saw this commercial earlier today and thought it was really well made. Turns out it was directed by Michael Mann. If the music sounds familiar it's because it is the score from The Last of the Mohicans, also directed by Mann.

Apple has the trailer up for next summer's Iron Man starring Robert Downey Jr., Terrence Howard, Jeff Daniels, Gwyneth Paltrow and directed by John Favreau. I wouldn't normally be excited or interested in an Iron Man movie (I know next to nothing about the character) but with talent like that involved you have to assume that they are doing something right. The trailer is actually really good, even though it contains the most obvious musical cue in the history of trailers.

Sean Penn will play gay 1970s politician Harvey Milk in Gus Van Sant's biopic of the first openly gay prominent elected official. Matt Damon is attached to play Milk's assassin, Dan White, who shot the San Francisco city supervisor along with Mayor George Moscone in 1978. After serving five years of a seven-year sentence, White committed suicide in 1985. I guess this is good news, it sounds like Van Sant is getting back to making a "real" movie after his recent minimalist efforts (Gerry, Elephant, Last Days, Paranoid Park).

So the VMAs were tonight, I wasn't watching the show but apparently Shia Lebouf was there and let slip that the new Indiana Jones movie would be titled Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull. I don't know what that means or what they are searching for but it's nice to have a title finally.

Yahoo has posted another trailer for The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford. It isn't quite as good as the last one, this one more concerned with the plot than the dreamlike quality of the last one. You do get your first view of Paul Schneider in this clip and, surprisingly enough, James Carville.

I think it takes a lot to shock me when it comes to seeing explicit violence or sex in movies or television but I have to be honest that I was quite surprised that the new HBO drama Tell Me You Love Me shows balls. This has to be the first time (outside of maybe Caligula or the Weatherford High School classic Learning Curve) that testicles have played such a predominant role in mainstream entertainment.

Justin Timberlake and Andy Samberg's Saturday Night Live collaboration, Dick in a Box, won an Emmy for Outstanding Original Music and Lyrics at Saturday's Creative Arts Primetime Emmys. I know this means nothing but I like the fact that we live in a country where something called Dick in a Box wins awards. I would sort of like to know what the other nominees for this category was but I am too lazy to try and find them online.

According to the credits in the There Will Be Blood trailer Jonny Greenwood is doing the score, not Jon Brion who has worked on all the other P.T. Anderson movies.

Just came from seeing 3:10 to Yuma (more on that later) and my biggest surprise (well, second biggest. There is a cameo in Yuma that was pretty damn surprising) was that there was a full length There Will Be Blood trailer that played before it. I was really excited to be able to come home and watch this in all it's HD glory but the only place the trailer is online is at myspace. It is definitely worth viewing, even in the crappy format. The film looks like it could be the next great American epic and Daniel Day-Lewis looks terrific in the clip.

UPDATE: Apparently the trailer has been removed from the link above. Try this one.

I was re-watching Marie Antoinette for the fist time since I had seen in the theater last year. I realize a lot of people still haven't seen it, thinking it to be a boring period piece. I had forgotten how good the movie is, it's basically Lost in Translation in Versailles. Below is a clip that basically sums up the entire feeling of the movie.

I came across this on cable earlier and had no idea that Waylon Jennings was in this movie. Probably because the last time I saw this I had no idea who Waylon Jennings was. On a side note, Van Dyke Parks co-wrote the score to the movie.

Here is a slightly different, more fleshed out (and funnier) trailer for the music biopic spoof, Walk Hard.

Last night I watched Live Free or Die on DVD (the film is in no way connected to the new Die Hard) and had an enjoyable enough time. The film seems to get better as it goes along and everything is tied together in a creative and not predictable way. The main problem I had was with the main character of Rugged. He is essentially playing the same character that Vincent Gallo played in Buffalo '66 but the filmmakers never let the audience get in anyway involved with him. It's all surface and one note. The best part, of course, was Paul Schneider as Lagrand. His character isn't all quite there and Schneider gets to steal every scene he is in. It was also nice to see Michael Rapaport is good in a low-key performance that explains itself as the movie progresses.

Here is the trailer for the film.

What do a bunch of British actors and one American superstar have in common? Well, nothing really other than they are all starring in Valkyrie together. I sort of hope that the filmmakers go the Last Temptation of Christ route here and be damned with accents and let the actors speak in their normal voices. If you are going to do in English and not German what does it matter? I doubt that will be the case though, I'm fully expecting a movie full of fake German accents when this opens next year. Anyway, here is a group picture of all the actors.

This is the best commercial I have seen in ages.

A little while back Awards Daily held a poll to see what the readers of the sites favorite movies were from 1996-2006. I'm actually surprised with the number one pick and really have no argument with. I was disappointed that Sideways didn't even make the list. Oh well, I guess I should have voted. To see the full list clickhere/

I know I posted the test version of this that leaked onto the internet sometime ago but here is the final poster.

Seems the Wes Anderson short Hotel Chavalier will not be shown in theaters before The Darjeeling Limited. Even though the short is thematically linked to the full movie it will only be shown at other festivals and on the internet before eventually showing up on the DVD. I have always like the idea of the short playing before the movie, sort of a hipster version of the cartoons that play before Pixar films.

This is taken from Jeffery Wells' Hollywood Elsewhere but I agree with it whole heartedly.

The process that refines raw life into art is often necessarily harsh. And one thing that seems to work against good art or well-crafted entertainment is when the artist-filmmaker has chosen to absorb life from within the comfort of a protected membrane and is thereby absorbing less of the stuff that tends to inform and clarify and lead to some droppings of insight. It follows, therefore, that an artist who's been through an especially rough and traumatic patch is on some level better positioned to create something richer and fuller than one who's been gliding along on his own fumes.

Nothing too earthshaking in this, but it does, I believe, cast light upon the situation of Owen Wilson and his longtime collaborator Wes Anderson, as well as, accor- ding to Venice Film Festival reviewers, the "smug", "airless", "chilly," "under glass" and "self-satisfied" element that colors The Darjeeling Limited (Fox Searchlight, 9.29), which Anderson directed and co-wrote and Wilson costars in.

Put bluntly and at the risk of sounding insensitive, Wilson's recent attempted- suicide trauma may very well -- in the long run, at least -- make him a better artist, a better actor and a much funnier man. (Anderson's comment during a Venice Film Festival press conference that the recovering Wilson has "been making us laugh" indicates an admirable rock-out attitude.) Lying crumpled at the bottom of a dark pit does wonders for your game if you can climb out of it. Ask any artist who's been there.

Perhaps Wilson's near-tragedy will rub off on his good pal Anderson (how could it not?) but what this obviously gifted director-writer with the carefully-tailored suits seems to desperately need -- and his critics have been saying this for years, beginning with the faint disappointments of The Royal Tennenbaums -- is to somehow climb out of his fastidiously maintained Wes-zone (i.e., "Andersonville") and open himself up for more of the rough and tumble.

I'm not saying Anderson is necessarily leading a bloodless life (he's very tough and exacting, and can get pretty damn angry when rubbed the wrong way). And I'm not suggesting that he try to become someone else. Wes has obviously found a highly developed style and a sensibility of his own, and it would be folly to veer away from this in any drastic way. (Jacques Tati was Jacques Tati, Luis Bunuel was Luis Bunuel, etc.) At the same time Anderson needs to...I don't know, do something.

Maybe there's no remedy. Maybe we're all just stuck in our grooves and that's that. What's that Jean Anouilh line from Becket? "I'm afraid we can only do, absurdly, what it has been given to us to do. Right to the end."

What do I know about all this? Not that much. But I know -- remember -- Wes a little bit, and I know people who know him.

Working with Wilson again on screenplays might help. (Although I've been told that Wilson's writing-discipline issues may have gotten in the way of this in the past.) The general consensus seems to be that the somewhat stilted, self-enclosed qualities have seemed more pronounced in The Life Aquatic and The Darjeeling Limited, which Wilson didn't co-write. Another thing to consider might be to focus more on two- or three-character stories (a la Rushmore) rather than ensembles.

Paul Schrader told me in an early '80s interview that the two things that tend to kick your art up to the next level are (a) a jarring episode that turns your head around and reorders your thinking and (b) a mentoring by or a collaboration with someone you trust sufficiently to allow for experimentation and growth. Anderson has now had a taste of the former, and there's nothing stopping him from at least attempting the latter.

Below are the first two images and plot description from Jason Reitman’s (Thank You For Smoking) Juno, which premiered at the Telluride Film Festival.

Ellen Page stars as Juno (also the film’s title), a whip-smart teen confronting an unplanned pregnancy by her classmate Bleeker (Michael Cera). With the help of her hot best friend Leah (Olivia Thirlby), Juno finds her unborn child a “perfect” set of parents: an affluent suburban couple, Mark and Vanessa (Jason Bateman and Jennifer Garner), longing to adopt. Luckily, Juno has the total support of her parents (JK Simmons and Allison Janney) as she faces some tough decisions, flirts with adulthood and ultimately figures out where she belongs.

I somehow came across the the official Stanley Kubrick website tonight and became excited by the prospect of Kubrick's plans for his unfilmed Napoleon script to be published. As I continued to read this story I realized that it was from 2002 and there was little hope five years later for it to actually be released. Intrigued I came across this story from Salon.com about the same film that went into great detail about the film. I could recap what it says but there is much too many interesting details about the preproduction and eventual downfall of the film in the article. Towards the end they actually give a little insight into what the actual script is like, even describing a few scenes.

An old man stumbles from a house, brandishing a pitchfork and babbling insanely. Napoleon's soldiers laugh at him, until the old man runs through a soldier with his pitchfork. An officer executes the old man with a pistol, but in the act of doing so blows off the hand of one of his own soldiers.

Marching 1,000 miles home through a terrible winter, Napoleon's army becomes "a starving, feverish mob, without purpose." Then follows an incredible scene in a Russian village, in which officers and soldiers try to fend off the winter freeze by squashing themselves into a tiny house with their horses. They blockade themselves in to stop the other soldiers left outside to die from fighting their way in. But then a fire breaks out and those inside are unable to escape the flames. Other men rush forward from where they have been huddling in an open field to warm themselves, and cook horsemeat on the ends of their swords.

They also end their article with a quote from Kubrick about his planned vision for the film.

"There's a weird disparity between the sheer visual and organizational beauty of the historical battles and their human consequences," Kubrick said. "It's rather like watching two golden eagles soaring through the sky from a distance; they may be tearing a dove to pieces, but if you are far enough away the scene is still beautiful."

While I was trying to find out if I had spelled Jason Schwartzman's name correctly in the last post (I hadn't) I came across this interview with him from a fan site. I'm not sure if the Q & A is from somewhere else or just for the site but the some of it is posted below. To read the rest click here.

Q: You wrote “The Darjeeling Limited” with Wes Anderson and your cousin Roman Coppola. Where did the idea come from?

A: Years ago, Wes said to me, “I’d like to do a movie about brothers on a train,” and he wanted me to be one of the brothers. We ended up living together in Paris when he was promoting “The Life Aquatic” and I was filming “Marie Antoinette,” and the story crystallized. We’d walk around and tell each other stories about our lives, and we’d ask each other what these brothers were doing on the train and where they were going. It felt like a murder mystery that we were trying to figure out.

Q: What was the co-writing process like?

A: Wes was in Paris and I was in Los Angeles with Roman, and we would do these three-to five-hour conference calls every morning where we’d brainstorm ideas and concepts. Wes would type up scenes, and we’d read them over the phone, acting them out and making notes. After about three weeks of doing that, we’d fly to wherever Wes was and we’d all stay together for another three weeks, sitting in a room together and writing.

Q: Were there any challenges to shooting the film on location in India?

A: I wouldn’t call them challenges, but one of the great things about India is the feeling that anything can happen. I think it’s foolish to go into a foreign country with your cameras and expect to control it. I remember Wes saying that if we ask for a red car and tomorrow they show up with a blue truck, we’re going to shoot the blue truck. It was unpredictable, and that’s the beauty of the place.

Q: Did you feel the same spiritual presence that the characters in the movie did?

A: It would be difficult to walk around India and not feel moved or changed. Religion there is not just something that people do once a week. It’s a constant in every minute of their lives. I loved it because we were always hearing people singing religious songs, music playing out of speakers, yelling, horns honking - it’s an audio extravaganza.

Q: It was nice to see you as the cool, brooding ladies’ man instead of your usual nebbish. How much of the character Jack comes from your own personality?

A: Jack and I are different in that I have a tendency to try to make things comfortable if there’s an intense or quiet moment, and I like to ask a lot of questions. Jack is content to just sit there and observe. He’s very quiet and still. But I have two brothers myself and I understand how fortunate it is to have them and to love them, and how hard it can be sometimes. And obviously, the brooding ladies’ man thing comes so easy to me. [laughs]

Q: Why is Jack always barefoot?

A: In the short [test] film we shot, he wasn’t wearing shoes because he was in a hotel room, and we liked the look of him wearing a suit with no shoes. When we got to India, everyone was trying on shoes and Wes said, “How about no shoes for you?” I was nervous at first because I didn’t want to step on a piece of glass or something. Later I was talking to these Jains - it’s a religion over there - and the hard core Jains never wear shoes because they don’t want to step on any animals or bugs. It forces you to consider each step you take.

Also, here is a still from the short film that plays before The Darjeeling Limited called Hotel Chevalier. It stars Jason Schwartzman and Natalie Portman.

Richard Corliss has posted the first review of Wes Anderson's The Darjeeling Limited which is playing at the Venice Film Festival. Below is an excerpt from it, click here to read the whole thing. It sounds like Anderson is relying on his old trademarks again, that can either be a good thing or not. I want him to try new things and grow as a filmmaker, then again, I really like all of his movies.

In his elaborate visual construct, virtually every shot is followed by with the camera point-of-view shifted 90 or 180 degrees -- which is geometrically groovy, no question, but pretty quickly predictable. Same goes for his stories, which rely on gifted people behaving goofily. Anderson has the attitude for comedy, but not the aptitude. His films are museum artifacts of what someone thought could be funny. They're airless. Movies under glass.

"[Owen] Wilson has appeared in all five of Anderson's feature films (Bottle Rocket, Rushmore, The Royal Tenenbaums, The Life Aquatic With Steve Zissou and the new one) and co-wrote the first three -- the ones I prefer in the the director's oeuvre. The Darjeeling script is by Anderson, Schwartzman and Roman Coppola (Francis' son, Sofia's brother) and it doesn't add luster to anyone's reputation.

"The Darjeeling program includes a related 13-min. film, Hotel Chevalier. Schwartzman's Jack seems uneasy when he gets a call from an ex-girlfriend (Natalie Portman) who insists on showing up in his swank hotel room. He draws a bubble bath for her. They flirt and parry and wind up in bed, exchanging dialogue that we hear again, at the end of Darjeeling, as part of a story Jack has written.

"It's a beguiling vignette that, as Closer and My Blueberry Nights did, shows Portman as a comic actress in fresh bloom. I wish that she, and some of the feeling and wit of the short film, had been in the long one.