Cele|bitchy

Review of ‘Crazy, Stupid, Love’: Emphasis on the “stupid”
Angelina Jolie: “I’ve never not been grateful to be an actor”
Zara Phillips & Mike Tindall’s Scottish wedding: the gown, the hats, the love
Aaron Johnson (21) & Sam Taylor-Wood (44) are expecting their second child

Review of ‘Crazy, Stupid, Love’: Emphasis on the “stupid”

Posted: 31 Jul 2011 08:40 AM PDT

I know, I know, my reviews of films are always late. Sometimes I see a movie over the weekend, and I just want to talk about it, and I don't care if it's late in coming. So, I saw Crazy, Stupid, Love yesterday and… it wasn't that good. Would you like the basic no-spoiler gist? Julianne Moore's character and Steve Carell's character are married, and in the first scene in the movie, they split up. Steve is distraught, and he starts hanging out in what must be the only cool bar in town, where all of the beautiful women in the city hang out, but only long enough to spend one night with the bar's only young, handsome regular, Ryan Gosling. Gosling takes Steve under his wing, gives him a Cinder-fella makeover and teaches Steve how to pick up women. Chaos ensues. Early on, Gosling meets Emma Stone, and she refuses his advances (because she's in a relationship with a completely nerdy and scene-stealing Josh Groban), but then Emma comes around and Emma and Ryan end up spending the night together… and then chaos ensues.

There were some good parts, and yes, I was actually "surprised" by the "twist". But overall, I feel like they wasted a lot of good talent, and I really think the screenplay could have been a lot better. It was like some hack wrote a completely average and boring romantic-comedy screenplay, then someone talented came in and started rewriting some of the scenes, and then the talented guy got bored. Some of the scenes were so great, I wish the entire film had been so awesome. But it wasn't.

The best part? Ryan Gosling, without a doubt. He LOOKED amazing and he was just… this character was like The Fantasy Man. I'm not talking about the fantasy of the good guy who will be a great husband and father. I'm talking about the fantasy of the obscenely good-looking dude who comes on to you at the bar and takes you home and you have dirty, mind-blowing sex and that's it. Girls need that too, and it's as much of a fantasy as the other "marriage and babies" fantasy too. Gosling got the best suits, and when he took off his gear, he just looked… like heaven. He had ridiculous chemistry with both Emma and Steve too.

The worst part? Julianne Moore. It's become a shtick for her at this point, playing these harried, neurotic wives and mothers, and beyond Julianne's kind of sleep-walking performance, her character just sucked. Another bad part was the too-"precious"-ness of Steve and Julianne's 13-year-old son. His story line involved him being in love with a 17-year-old girl, and when the girl rebuffed his advances, he started stalking her. It was creepy, not cute. The same could be said of Carell's character too - there were a couple of times where the character was just kind of gross and creepy. Rom-com FAIL.

Oh, and did you know that The Bacon is in this movie? He is. He looked great, and I liked seeing him do a smaller little part, but I still have residual warmth for him because of X-Men: First Class.

My verdict: RENT it, but only for The Gosdong. It's worth viewing for his scenes alone. Just fast-forward through all of the other crap.

Photos courtesy of WENN.

Angelina Jolie: “I’ve never not been grateful to be an actor”

Posted: 31 Jul 2011 07:55 AM PDT

Yesterday, Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt made an appearance at the Sarajevo Film Festival, and we don't have access to any of the photos! Boo. You can see some here and here, though. Angelina wore an oddly bright Elie Saab gown and Brad looked nice. Angelina was there because she was awarded the "Honorary Heart of Sarajevo" Award for directing a film about the war, The Land of Blood and Honey, which will be out later this year. When Angelina's leading lady, Zana Marjanovic, presented Angelina with the award, Angelina received wild, non-stop applause, and an insider says Angelina was nearly moved to tears. Angelina told reporters, "I love this country. I was honored to have a chance to meet everybody. This movie was a chance to bring attention to the situation that happened so long ago, and I hope that it brings attention and more dialogue to remind people what everybody here went through.” Damn, I wish we had ANY photos from this film festival - Michael Fassbender was there a few days ago with a newly shaved head too. BOO on our photo agencies for not buying these photos.

Anyway, Angelina has a new interview in The Financial Times this weekend. You can only read the whole thing by subscription, which I'm not going to do, but various outlets had excerpts from the piece:

Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt have maintained a nomadic lifestyle with their six children over the years, but the kids have strong connections to their own cultures, Jolie reveals in a new interview. The actress, 36, who adopted three of her children – Maddox, 9, from Cambodia; Pax, 7, from Vietnam; and Zahara, 6, from Ethiopia – and gave birth to Shiloh, 5, in Namibia, and twins Vivienne and Knox, 3, in France, makes sure her kids know where they came from.

“They are all learning about each other’s cultures as well as being proud of their own,” she tells the Financial Times. “So it’s not like just the boys get to do the Asian thing. They all have their flags over their beds and their individual pride.”

Of course, keeping up with their international visits is a challenge. “We owe Vietnam a visit, because Pax is due,” she says. “Z wants to get back to Africa, and Shiloh too. So everyone takes their turns in their country.”

Jolie also opened up about becoming a mom of six has changed her relationship with work.

“I’ve never not been grateful to be an actor,” she says. “But I think when I was younger I needed [acting] more. I was trying to question things in life so you find these characters that help you find things and grow.”

“It’s like being in therapy, in a way. You’re drawn to certain roles because they question something about life, or about love, or about freedom. You ask these questions as you grow up: am I strong enough, am I sane enough? Do I understand love, do I understand myself?” Now, she adds, “I’m older and I know who I am … and I’m less interested in the character helping me answer something … than in being able to answer it for myself, as a woman, as an adult, with my family.”

Talking about Salt, Jolie explains: “I’d just had the twins,” she recalls. “I’d been in a nightgown for a very, very long time. And I was sitting in the hospital breastfeeding and reading this script in my nightgown, feeling so soft and mama … and I was flipping these pages and it was all fighting and shooting guns. I thought, ‘That’s what I need. I need to get out of my nightgown and I need a gun.’ I’m sure many a woman who has been through childbirth has thought ‘It would be nice to get a little physical, get a little wild … to remember what that other side is like.’ ”

Jolie and her longtime love Brad Pitt have six children together — Maddox, 9, Pax, 7, Zahara, 6, Shiloh, 5, and 3-year-old twins Knox and Vivienne — and the family is famous for their nomadic lifestyle. “Home is wherever we are,” she says. But does she ever feel rootless? “Yes, but happily. I’m very bad at staying in one place. I’m also bad at sitting still… There’s so much to explore in the world… So I love travel. If you can travel I think it’s the best way to raise kids.”

Her directorial debut — In the Land of Blood and Honey — is a love story she also wrote, which is set in the Bosnian war. “I prefer [being behind the camera] to acting,” she admits. “I think I’ve learnt something from all of [the directors I've worked with] — even the ones I didn’t like… I also learned a lot from Clint Eastwood about how to appreciate the members of the crew, empowering them to do their job.”

But Jolie doesn’t plan to stay in the business forever. “As Brad and I get older we’re going to do fewer films. I’ve been working for a long time, he’s been working for a long time,” she says. “We’ve had a nice run and I don’t want to be doing this our whole lives. There are a lot of other things to do.”

She has been to Cambodia this year, to shoot an advertising campaign for Louis Vuitton with Annie Leibovitz. An impoverished country might seem like an odd place for a luxury fashion house to shoot an ad campaign but the final decision was made by Jolie herself. “To actually do it there, to highlight the beauty of the country, was something I was very happy to do because it is a place people should travel to,” she says. Indeed, she and Pitt have a house there—”it’s a little place on stilts”. Her fee from the campaign will go towards charitable projects in the country, she says, building on work she began with a foundation the family established in Maddox’s name. “It’s focused on protecting mountains from deforestation, poaching and clearing landmines. We put it together for Mad so when he’s older he’ll hopefully take it over.”

China is on her list of places still to explore, and she would love to see Burma, “but not in the wrong circumstances”, given that the country is under the control of an oppressive military junta. “And Iran. I’d love to go [to] Iran.” Her dream, however, is to “cross the Sahara. It takes 28 days … it would have to be on a camel. I wonder if I could do it in pieces and station the kids along the way,” she muses.

[From The Financial Times, via Us Weekly & People Mag]

I understand that Angelina's top priority is being a mom, and good for her. But I'm getting so friggin' tired of hearing her talk about how she's going to be cutting back or phasing out working and all of that. She's been saying it for years, and she needs to find a new topic of conversation for all of the interviews she does year after year to promote all of films she does year after year. I don't begrudge her working, nor do I begrudge her the time she spends with her family. But I just get tired of her ringing the same "I'm taking time off, I'm spending more time with my family" bell when she works about the same as always.

UPDATE: Ah, Slate has the full Financial Times article here. It's a pretty good piece. The best part is her response when she's asked about The News of the World, the tabloid which she and Brad sued after they reported that she and Brad were breaking up. "I did hear something about that … clearly I never read it. So it’s hard to know how much of a loss it is." Diplomatic.

Photos courtesy of Fame & WENN.

Zara Phillips & Mike Tindall’s Scottish wedding: the gown, the hats, the love

Posted: 31 Jul 2011 07:12 AM PDT

Zara Phillips and Mike Tindall went through with it! And there were no "Princess Charlene" moment where the bride attempted to flee to another country in tears. Thank God. The bride wore a gown by Stewart Parvin - exposed arms! NOES! That's so not royal, but I guess they made an exception for Zara. Maybe because she's not a princess and because the whole wedding took place in Scotland, not Westminster or something? Perhaps. Here's more about the wedding:

Zara Phillips, Prince William’s cousin who is 13th in line to the throne, and Mike Tindall, captain of England’s rugby team, were married on a glorious, sunny day in historic Edinburgh Saturday.

The 3 p.m. ceremony took place at Canongate Kirk, a small Church of Scotland venue where the Queen worships when she stays in Edinburgh. The modest church dates back to 1688.

The bride made her arrival at a fashionably late six minutes past the hour in an ivory silk and duchess satin gown by Stewart Parvin – the personal couturier to the Queen – and a silk tulle cathedral veil. She carried a huge bouquet of cream-colored flowers and accessorized with Jimmy Choo shoes and a tiara on loan from Princess Anne. Tindall wore a suit adorned with coattails and a light grey stripe on the trouser legs.

Guests began arriving at 1 p.m. via private coach bus, and the women were resplendent with colorful hats and fancy fascinators.

Princess Beatrice was among the first guests to arrive, wearing a turquoise hat with matching floral dress. Prince William and wife Kate (who wore a cream suit and matching hat) pulled up right afterwards in a black Jaguar. Princess Anne and her husband Tim Laurence followed and then another car brought Prince Charles and Camilla, also dressed in cream.

The guests posed for the throngs of people lining the narrow cobblestone streets, while Queen Elizabeth, in a dignified peach dress and hat, and Prince Phillip smiled to the crowd upon their arrival.

At the bride’s request, the Gordonstoun Chamber Choir – the student chorus from the Scottish private school she attended – sang at the ceremony, performing the “Gaelic Blessing” and then “Amazing Grace” at the signing of the register.

The reception will be held at the Palace of Holyroodhouse, the Queen’s residence not far from the church. Zara spent many school holidays visiting her grandmother there. The use of the venue (which is being closed to the public for five days) is valued at an estimated $60,000. It will cost a reported $800,000 to police the wedding, and marksmen are expected at vantage points to protect the royal guests.

With guests expected to number no more than 300, the couple looked forward to a private, family affair. “My wedding will be nothing like Kate and William’s. For a start, there won’t be anywhere near as many people. It will be a lot smaller, just close family and friends. Kate and William’s wedding was amazing but ours will be very different,” Phillips told Hello Magazine.

[From People]

As you can see from the photos, Duchess Kate recycled outfits for both the pre-wedding party (in green Diane Von Furstenburg) and for the wedding (a suit that Kate first wore in 2006). Any thoughts on Kate wearing such a light color to another woman's wedding? Eh. Are the rules different in the UK? Because I would never wear something so light to a wedding. Of course, I can't pull off these kinds of hats either.

PS… I love the Queen in pink. She looks so cute!

Photos courtesy of WENN, Fame.

Aaron Johnson (21) & Sam Taylor-Wood (44) are expecting their second child

Posted: 31 Jul 2011 06:34 AM PDT

Last year, some of us followed the story of a young, 19-year-old British actor named Aaron Johnson, and his engagement to and impregnation of a 43-year-old woman, British photographer and director Sam Taylor-Wood. They were fascinating, and many of us had strong feelings about them, not all of them good. Anyway, last year, Sam gave birth to Aaron's first daughter, Wilda Rae, and now the woman is knocked up AGAIN. Aaron is 21 years old now. Sam is 44, and this will be her fourth child overall - she has two older daughters with her first husband. Oh, and Sam and Aaron have never gotten around to getting married, I guess…? So they're still just "engaged."

Aaron Johnson is getting ready to pull double-daddy duty – his fiancée, filmmaker Sam Taylor-Wood, is expecting the couple’s second child, her rep confirms to PEOPLE.

The Kick-Ass star, 21, and Taylor-Wood, 44, whose romance raised eyebrows because of their 23-year age difference, are already the proud parents of a baby girl, Wylda Rae, who just turned 1.

After stepping out together as a couple last spring, Johnson defended their relationship. “I’ve got a wonderful woman. I’m an old soul, and she’s a young soul.”

Taylor-Wood, who also has two daughters from her first marriage to art dealer Jay Jopling, met in 2009 on the set of her directorial debut, Nowhere Boy.

[From People]

Like I've said before, it's their perrogative, their choices, etc. They are both technically adults, and I don't doubt that Aaron is very mature for his age and that he and Sam are in love right now. But at the end of the day, I just don't think Sam is being fair to him, I really don't. He was 18 years old when they got together, and he's been thrown into a world that few young men would realistically be equipped for, long-term. Maybe they're both "live in the moment" people, which isn't the worst thing. I don't know.

Do you want to see one of Aaron and Sam's latest collaborations? Here's REM's music video "UBerlin" directed by Sam and starring Aaron… he has such a great body.

Photos courtesy of WENN.

Sunday, July 31, 2011

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