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Good news! (At least, “Good news” for people who like films in which folks are stitched together to form grotesque, insect-like monstrosities!) EW can exclusively reveal that Human Centipede star Dieter Laser has settled his differences with director Tom Six and will appear in the third film of the notoriously gruesome horror franchise.
Image Credit: Eliza Truitt
Cannes, take note.
Call it feminist, call it a full shift in the zeitgeist, call it the seeds of a movie industry revolution, but the Sundance Film Festival has shoved Hollywood into the 21st century when it comes to the inclusion of women filmmakers.
Last May, the Cannes Film Festival’s competitive Palme D’Or line-up sparked controversy over its dearth of female directors. This year’s annual Sundance fest in Park City, Utah, which runs from Jan. 17-27, for the very first time features an equal number of male and female directors in its 16-film U.S. Dramatic Competition category, ranging from Lynn Shelton’s Touchy Feely, starring Rosemarie DeWitt (pictured in the exclusive photo above), to Liz Garcia’s The Lifeguard, featuring Kristen Bell, Francesca Gregorini’s Emanuel and the Truth About Fishes, starring Jessica Biel, Jerusha Hess’s Austenland with Keri Russell, Lake Bell’s In a World, also starring the actress-director, and Stacie Passon’s Concussion.
EW connected with Shelton, Garcia, Gregorini, Hess, Passon, and Bell, as well as actresses Casey Wilson and June Diane Raphael, who co-wrote the saucy Sundance Midnight screening selection Ass Backwards, and Richard E. Robbins, who directed the CNN Films documentary Girl Rising, which will have scenes shown at Sundance. Absolute joy and excitement resonated through phone and email conversations with the filmmakers, who touted the bright future for women directors — Kathryn Bigelow’s name may be the biggest out there these days, but many more are on the horizon.
READ FULL STORY »
Image Credit: Justin Lubin
This Friday, the festive squeals of delighted children and the electrical hum of holiday lights will be replaced by the screams of tormented twentysomethings and the grinding of mechanical wood-slicing devices when horror sequel Texas Chainsaw 3D hits cinemas. A direct sequel to Tobe Hooper’s infamous 1974 shocker The Texas Chainsaw Massacre this seventh entry in the franchise is directed by John Luessenhop (Takers) and stars Alexandra Daddario, Trey Songz, Scott Eastwood, and Dan Yeager as the iconic Leatherface.
Image Credit: Cindy Ord/Getty Images; Frederick M. Brown/Getty Images
Anne Hathaway has some cautionary advice for Seth MacFarlane as he preps to host the Oscars: “Have … a … plan.”
She pauses, laughs a little mordantly and adds: “Have several.”
Hathaway’s ultra-chipper co-hosting experience opposite a low-energy James Franco two years ago provoked a lot of dislike — including from her, when she finally saw a little bit of it.
This year, the Les Miserables star will likely be back at the ceremony as a supporting actress nominee, and she’s actually offering some very good, very practical advice to the Family Guy creator for when he steps out onto that stage Feb. 24.
Family? It’s complicated … but also bloody, at least when it comes to Oldboy director Park Chan-wook’s thriller Stoker, which stars Nicole Kidman and Mia Wasikowska.
Case in point, check out this exclusive one-sheet poster for the film that features an unusual holiday-esque portrait warning “DO NOT DISTURB THE FAMILY” with a blood splattered twist.
Image Credit: LLC; Jerod Harris/WireImage With Academy Awards voting underway, EW’s Prize Fighter is kicking off the “Consider This” series, asking folks with Oscar histories of their own to share their personal favorites of the year. Jason Reitman, who had a best director nomination for
Here’s a fun fact… you know what Alien, Blade Runner, Close Encounters and The Matrix have in common? I mean, outside of being timeless groundbreaking movies that changed the way we watch cinema. None of these films were acknowledged for their screenplays — which makes me wonder, is it just because they have flying cars and hyperbaric sleep chambers and creatures with acid in their blood? Perhaps we’re so thoroughly engrossed that we dismiss how these films triumph in their examination of complicated ideas. Or maybe, as writers, we have some sort of prejudice against futuristic costume and production design. READ FULL STORY »
Image Credit: David Livingston/Getty Images With Academy Awards voting underway, EW’s Prize Fighter is kicking off the “Consider This” series, asking folks with Oscar histories of their own to share their personal favorites of the year. Alfre Woodard, who had a supporting actress nomination in 1983 for
In Middle of Nowhere, we experience an exquisite, intimate tale of a woman in progress — as told through the vivid screenplay and deft direction of Ava DuVernay and the breakout performance of Emayatzy Corinealdi.
These are the kind of women artists rarely heard in modern day cinema. They are women of color telling a universal tale in a very specific way. And it is important that their work in Middle of Nowhere be seen by those of us who truly care about film. READ FULL STORY »
Director Jim Mickle made a splash with his 2010 vampire-apocalypse movie Stake Land and his follow-up film, an English language remake of the acclaimed Mexican chiller We Are What We Are, is set to premiere at Sundance next year. To say too much about the original movie would be to slightly spoil both that and, presumably, Mickle’s version, which stars Julia Garner (Martha Marcy May Marlene), Ambyr Childers (The Master), Bill Sage (Nurse Jackie), Kelly McGillis, and newcomer Jack Gore. So, to be safe, we’ll just parrot the remake’s official plot synopsis and say that it concerns “an introverted family struggling to keep their macabre traditions alive, giving us something we can really sink our teeth into.”
We can, however, show you an exclusive photo of Gore from the new movie. Check it out and tell us what you think. (And those who don’t mind their ghoulish fun being spoiled a little should feel free to take a look at the trailer to the Mexican original.)
Image Credit: Jose Haro; inset: Ian Gavan/Getty Images
With Academy Awards voting underway, EW’s Prize Fighter is kicking off the “Consider This” series, asking folks with Oscar histories of their own to share their personal favorites of the year. Reese Witherspoon, who won the best actress award in 2006 for Walk the Line, shared with us a letter she wrote to Naomi Watts about her role in The Impossible, playing Maria Belon, a mother of three fighting for her family’s survival in the 2004 tsunami:
Hi Naomi,
I know we don’t know each other well. I hope it’s ok that I am reaching out to you, because I simply could not contain my enthusiasm about your performance in The Impossible.
Wow. Just wow. I was blown away by the film. The story of survival and the incredible images of the tsunami and the performances of the entire cast were astounding. By far, one of the best films I have ever seen in my life.
I could not speak for 24 hours after seeing the film. It was more than a movie. It was a mediation on life and family and humanity. It was fortifying.
But the life-breath of the film is you. READ FULL STORY »
With Oscar voting in full swing, EW’s Prize Fighter is kicking off the “Consider This” series, asking folks with Oscar histories of their own to share their personal favorites of the year. James Franco, a lead actor nominee for 127 Hours two years ago, made his breakthrough on the coming-of-age TV series Freaks and Geeks and gave us this love letter to another story in that genre: The Perks of Being a Wallflower, which stars Logan Lerman as a meek kid grappling with a troubled past, Emma Watson as a girl isolated by a bad reputation, and Ezra Miller as their defiant gay friend (nicknamed “Nothing”) who refuses to be shamed into hiding who he is.
It’s hard to do a film about high school nowadays and not have it suck. READ FULL STORY »
