Will Ferrell and Zach Galifianakis face off as political rivals vying for the same Congressional seat in The Campaign — but should Democrats or Republicans be more worried about being skewered for laughs in the August 10 comedy? Movieline pal Grace Randolph hit the star-studded NYC premiere with Beyond the Trailer for the scoop from candidates Ferrell and Galifianakis, catching up with a flurry of SNL alums, 30 Rock players, ABC News vet John Stossel and Jon Hamm to discuss the pressing issues of the day. Such as: Are babies good at improv? And yes, Will Ferrell. Anthony Weiner would make a fantastic politician guest for Between Two Ferns , if only to see what Galifianakis would do with the poor guy. MAKE THAT HAPPEN NOW. Rubbing elbows with The Campaign set, guests at the premiere party hosted by The Peggy Siegal Company swilled specialty cocktails courtesy of SVEDKA Vodka, who designed special red, white, and blue bottles to match the patriotic theme. The Campaign hits theaters August 10. Follow Movieline on Twitter .
I should admit up front that I’ve long been skeptical of Kristen Stewart and Robert Pattinson ‘s off-screen romance. They make a beautiful couple, as the Twilight franchise box-office numbers demonstrate, but, if you ask me, their real-life relationship has always had an odor of Hollywood hoodoo — the inspired idea of some marketing or public-relations executive who saw a way to keep fan interest in the blockbuster saga alive between movies. Then again, a slew of respectable publications and websites are telling me it’s real, and so who am I to disagree? People.com reported today , for instance, that a “heartbroken and angry” Pattinson had moved out of the Los Angeles home that he shared with Stewart, despite her head-turning public apology for cheating on him by making out in a car with married Snow White and the Huntsman director Rupert Sanders . The whole episode and the media frenzy it has provoked brings out the armchair analyst in me (I do have a Bachelors in psychology, by the way) and, whether I look at this from the perspective of a couples counselor or a cultural critic, I can’t help but think that Stewart — subconsciously or consciously — is telling us that she doesn’t want us to think of her as Bella anymore. Although she seems to have become better adjusted to being in the spotlight recently, Stewart has never appeared comfortable with the insane kind of fame that the Twilight movies brought her. (Indeed, the last time she had to issue an apology was when she compared the paparazzi’s photographing of her to being raped.) I’ve never met her, but I wonder if that discomfort has to do with her self-image as an actress instead of teen idol movie star. Stewart’s excellent performances in Into the Wild and the extremely underrated Adventureland tell me that she has Oscar potential. (I also thought she did Joan Jett justice in The Runaways .) With the right roles, she could be her generation’s Jodie Foster . But at the moment, she’s got to feel more like Mark Hamill. Stewart’s headlines-making cheating episode reminds me of the furor that erupted in 2008 when Vanity Fair published a tastefully topless photo of Miley Cyrus in the magazine. Like Stewart, Cyrus apologized for the incident saying she was “embarrassed” by the photo. But the episode was really a smart bit of positioning on Cyrus’ part: the image sent the message that Cyrus was leaving the adolescent world of Hannah Montana behind. Intentionally or impulsively, Stewart has sent a similar message to the millions of Twi-hards out their who breathlessly monitor her every move. Bella, and maybe Robsten too are history. As one friend told People: “I’m not sure they’ll be able to recover from this.” I bet that friend is right. Sometimes you have to break a few hearts to get what you want. Even when those hearts belong to your biggest fans. Follow Frank DiGiacomo on Twitter. Follow Movieline on
Slick and mean and full of piss and chicken grease, Killer Joe has worse manners than its deadly, courtly antihero. But in its own way and to its own detriment, William Friedkin ’s splattery, southern gothic return to the screen seeks to amuse as well as shake and stir. What begins as a set of open provocations and genre tweaks propping up the story of a trashily blended Texas family’s encounter with an alpha hitman takes a turn through Coen and Lynch Lanes before winding up at the corner of Friedkin and Peckinpah. There a trailer ignites with violence and the tone of alternately abject and mordant depravity begins flailing like a rogue firehose. That the Smiths are low, stupid people is easily understood, but Friedkin hardly tires of reminding us. Killer Joe opens on the middle of a stormy Texas night, and the wailing and window-banging of a fuck-up named Chris ( Emile Hirsch ), who is locked out of the family’s trailer. When his stepmother Sharla (Gina Gershon) finally responds, Chris (and the audience) comes face to fat, mossy minge with her naked crotch. Chris’s complaints find no truck with his exceptionally dense, defeated dad Ansel (Thomas Haden Church), who echoes Sharla’s involuted logic about not being expecting to find her stepson on the other side of the door. It feels unpromising that what could be a funny gag gets lost in the scene-flattening commotion of idiocy, which too often gets cranked so high little else gets through. The Smiths have all kinds of boundary issues, not least when it comes to Dottie (Juno Temple), the gauzy baby doll daughter with a couple of little pink screws loose. Dottie sleepwalks, and either has crazy good hearing or crazy-girl intuition, because she cottons to Chris’s plan to kill their deadbeat mother (who remains deadbeat; we only get a brief glimpse of her corpse) from the moment he privately proposes it to Ansel. In deep to some coke dealers, Chris has word of his mother’s fifty thousand dollar life insurance payout (to Dottie) and a line on a police officer/hitman named Killer Joe Cooper ( Matthew McConaughey ). No good can come of such a scheme, of course, and no good does. Perhaps the family’s shouty moron shtick is designed to make the arrival of a glossy, black-clad sociopath feel more like a relief. McConaughey has toned down his surf bum beam (and highlights) for the role: in his bad sheriff getup he’s a cold-eyed buck with asses to stomp. Sharing a tight frame with Joe in a typical low-angle shot, Hirsch becomes a mini-pony of a man. But it’s McConaughey’s scenes with Temple that form the twisted center of the movie; they make a pair as riveting as it is unlikely. That it is not as simple as beast-meets-beast of prey is largely a credit to the actors – each exudes an unnerving charisma that enwraps the other and together they create the movie’s only dramatically persuasive atmosphere. It feels a little wrong saying that, given the terms of their relationship. When Chris and Ansel can’t cough up half of Joe’s fee in advance, he proposes taking Dottie as “a retainer.” Because the Smiths’ is a desperate world dulled into moral nihilism by poverty and other indignities, Ansel’s response to the idea of pimping his virgin daughter out to a hired killer is that it “might just do her some good.” We feel scared for Dottie, though after being soothed out of her initial upset she doesn’t seem that scared herself, which of course is really scary. The lead up to Joe’s claiming of his collateral and the chillingly erotic scene that results feels like Friedkin hitting a mesmerizing stride. Instead it forms a peak in what slackens into another, if notably performed and perverse, pulp fiction paradox: Though desperate to shock, its success depends on our desensitization. ( Killer Joe received an NC-17 rating and is perhaps the latest rival to the kink and violent degradations of 2010’s The Killer Inside Me .) Much of the film takes place in close quarters, spaces well parsed by Friedkin’s camera and imbued with a sense of confined desperation instead of plain old claustrophobia. Pulitzer Prize-winner Tracy Letts adapted the script from his own play (this is Friedkin’s second Letts adaptation, after 2006’s Bug ), and as often as a dark, stage-y laugh line falls flat, Joe’s embroidered (and then fearsome) tones and Dottie’s loaded non sequiturs (including her casual mention, after things have gone miserably awry, that it might still all work out — “as long as I don’t get mad”) seem to land exactly how and where they’re meant to be. It seems likely it was the creepy sexual content and not the horrific violence that earned the MPAA’s admonishment, a bias Killer Joe seems to repeat in moving from its glimpses of genuine human darkness toward the more generic drawing of bright red blood. Killer Joe is in limited release Friday. Follow Michelle Orange on Twitter . Follow Movieline on Twitter .
Annnnnnd the fawkery between Terrence Howard and his ex-wife Michelle continues : According to TMZ reports : Howard was in L.A. County Superior Court today to deal with his exceptionally nasty divorce from Michelle Ghent Howard … and was ordered to shell out more than $50,000 to hold her over until they hammer out a long-term arrangement. Here’s the breakdown … the judge ruled that Michelle needs: – $10k in temporary support for rent, food, etc. – $20k so she can pay her lawyers – $20k so she can pay her accountants – and $1,800 per month for her Range Rover car payments Terrence has to fork over the dough within 30 days. As TMZ previously reported, Terrence HATES Michelle with a passion … claiming she often called him a “n**ger” … tried to extort him … and even threatened to have him killed by “The Russians.” Michelle also HATES Terrence … and claims he violently assaulted her on numerous occasions since they tied the knot back in 2010. SMH. We wish “Baby Wipes” would go ahead and get his life all the way together… Getty Images More On Bossip! R.I.P. Whitney Houston: The First Look At The Official Obituary Of The Fallen Icon Sidepiece Showdown: The NBA’s Most Notorious (Alleged) Mistresses And Jumpoffs Korean R&B Singer Hospitalized For Paranoid Schizophrenia After Racist Twitter Rant Calling For A World Without Blacks! Breezy And His Boo Thang Hit The Beach… Do You Believe She’s Not Threatened By His RihRih Reunion?
