The Twilight film franchise may have worked its way through Stephenie Meyer’s books, but that doesn’t necessarily mean it’s over. Just watch my red-carpet interview with Elizabeth Reaser at Thursday night’s New York premiere of Breaking Dawn — Part 2 . The actress, who plays Esme Cullen, suggests that there may be more life in store for this undead saga. Other stars of the blockbuster franchise get misty over the final film and how awesome their fans are. They also share their thoughts on the movie’s surprise ending, which is different from Meyer’s book. Watch my red carpet interviews below to find out! The premiere, which was hosted by The Cinema Society and Samsung Galaxy, drew cast members Ashley Greene, Kellan Lutz, Dakota Fanning, Peter Facinelli, Maggie Grace and Mackenzie Foy as well as Howard Stern and his wife Beth, Jennifer Esposito and Tony Danza and Diane Neal. After the screening at the Landmark Sunshine Cinema on Manhattan’s Lower East Side, guests partied at a new appropriately named night spot on the Bowery, Finale. Follow Movieline on Twitter . Follow Grace Randolph on Twitter .
Also in Friday’s news round-up, the studio suits are jubilant on Skyfall ‘s box office prospects; Ted passes a b.o. milestone and a quick look at the weekend’s new Specialty Releases including Silver Linings Playbook and Anna Karenina . Helen Hunt to Receive Palm Springs Film Festival Fete The possible Oscar contender will receive the Spotlight Award at the 24th Palm Springs International Film Festival on January 5th. In The Sessions , Hunt plays a therapist who helps a 38-year-old man, who has lived most of his life in an iron lung, lose his virginity for the first time, THR reports . Jane Goldman to Write Pinocchio for Robert Downey Jr. Tim Burton will direct the pic which has been in the works for months. Goldman’s hire will likely bring the “courtship” to a close. The story revolves around the children’s classic. Downey will play Geppetto, the woodcarver who creates the puppet who wants to become a real boy, THR reports . Skyfall to Exceed $800M Worldwide MGM expects the latest James Bond to be the highest grossing film in the franchise of all time. Additionally, the Blu-ray package, Bond 50: The Complete 22 Films Collection was a “tremendous success at retail,” Deadline reports . Ted Crosses $500 Million Mark The R-rated comedy is Universal’s highest rated film of 2012, crossing the $500 million mark worldwide, beating Todd Phillips’ The Hangover which took in $467.4 million, THR reports . Specialty Preview: Anna Karenina , Silver Linings Playbook , Price Check , Mea Culpa Maxima More Oscar contenders are lined up at the specialty gate this weekend, most notably The Weinstein Company’s Silver Linings Playbook ,, whose strategy has evolved in the run-up to Friday’s launch. The title will start with a handful of bookings before expanding gradually into wide release. Focus Features’ hopeful Anna Karenina will also hit the same number of cinemas in its initial outing, targeting women and the art-house crowd, Deadline reports .
If Quentin Tarantino ‘s demonstrative hand gestures don’t distract you too much, here’s an interesting clip in which the Django Unchained director discusses the influence that crime novelist Elmore Leonard had on his formative years as a screenwriter and filmmaker, as well as his appreciation of actress Pam Grier. Rolling Stone posted this exclusive video , which is part of the bonus material included in Tarantino XX , a 10-disc Blu-Ray box set that collects the eight movies from the first 20 years of his career: Reservoir Dogs , True Romance, Pulp Fiction , Jackie Brown , both Kill Bill films, Death Proof and Inglourious Basterds . In what appears to be a Film Independent Q&A on Tarantino’s 1997 film Jackie Brown , which was adapted from a Leonard novel, the filmmaker explains that he used to read the writer’s books and “adapt them into movies in my mind,” asking himself: “How would I turn this into a movie?” He adds that engaging in that mental exercise, “years before I could ever afford to make a movie, really..helped me with my structure.” There’s also a curious moment at the end of the clip where Tarantino talks about wanting “to be Josef von Sternberg” to Pam Grier’s “Dietrich.” While I appreciate Tarantino’s appreciation of Grier’s talent, I think that line says more about him than her. Von Sternberg made the little known Marlene Dietrich a star when he cast her in The Blue Angel and then worked with her for five more films. Grier was hardly an unknown when Tarantino began working with her. Thanks to her roles in Coffy and Foxy Brown , Grier was already a cult icon. Tarantino merely reminded us of that. He also didn’t exactly make her a star. [ Rolling Stone ] Follow Frank DiGiacomo on Twitter. Follow Movieline on Twitter.
Writer/director Dee Rees has spent six years with Pariah , a film she wrote as a full-length script in 2005, then recalibrated as a short subject in ’07, and finally re-adapted as a feature film that premiered at this year’s Sundance Film Festival. Pariah concerns a teenager named Alike (Independent Spirit Award nominee Adepero Oduye), an expressive girl who only encounters more identity issues as she tries establishing herself as an out lesbian. Though Rees came out as a lesbian in her 20s, she feels a deep connection to Alike — especially in her resistance to “butch” and “femme” labels. Movieline caught up with Rees to discuss Pariah ‘s wonderful story, the visibility of the LGBT coming out experience in 2011, and Rees’s unexpected connection to Dallas . Since Pariah ’s genesis as a short film years ago, there’s been a lot more visibility about the coming-out experience. Did you find it necessary to tailor the movie to the burgeoning sense of awareness about the topic? When I first wrote the script in ’05, I had a sense of who Alike was and where she was going, so there was no pressure to change it because I wanted to stay true to her and what her experience was. I didn’t want to make Alike’s experience vary from anyone else’s experience or make it topical. I just let it be what it was and just trustd that if we’re honest about the character and honest about the world, that it would be relevant no matter when it came out. It’s funny because some people along the way have said, “Is this an issue anymore? Is being gay cool now?” And it’s like, no. It’s not OK now, and it’s not “cool.” Although people’s experiences of coming out are changing and it’s becoming much more visible, that’s not necessarily everyone’s experience. It was about remaining true to the character and what this story was. I’m glad to see that coming out is relevant and people are aware of it, but I definitely didn’t feel compelled to make it fit anything. You’ve said that you came out in your 20s, but you wrote about the coming-out experience of a teenage girl. How did you find the inspiration for her character? It was just my own coming-out experience sort of transposed onto a 17-year-old. I chose to make her 17 because it’s such a higher-stakes age; figuring stuff out that young, it’s going to be higher because you’re still dependent on your parents and so much is still uncertain about you. You don’t know what you’re going to be. For her to make that discovery at that age, it makes her more interesting. For me, it’s also inspired by being in New York and being among out teenagers, which is something I’d never seen in Nashville, Tennessee. I barely saw out adults. To see out teenagers who were not only out, but out in the streets was inspiring for me. It made me wonder, “Even if I had known at 17, would I have that courage to be the person in the film?” – this woman who was trying to live in two worlds. Do you have particular favorite teenager characters from movies? No, not really! I just like Alike because she’s imperfect. Initially she isn’t courageous. In teen movies, we see characters who get to say exactly what’s on their mind and say what they want and thumb their nose in the face of adult authority. For Alike, I wanted someone who didn’t feel quite comfortable – someone who’s not so self-possessed, not so self-assured, and is figuring things out. Pariah ’s lead actress Adepero Oduye just earned an Independent Spirit Award nomination. Can you describe watching her on set? What did she bring to the character? Watching her on set was an experience of watching her inner life. Adepero is so expressive and yet so subtle. It was great to watch changes going on in her eyes and going on in her body language and behavior – those unspoken things. I felt like I was watching her internalize the characters’ feelings. She was really in that moment. She was really feeling what Alike was feeling. The feeling like she wanted to cry, feeling like she wanted to laugh – the changes were literally visceral. They were changing her, moving through her body. Getting to watch somebody unfold on camera is like watching a flower open. Amazing. In recent years, we’ve seen more in the media about gay men’s coming out experiences than lesbians’. Do you think Pariah highlights the specificity of a woman’s coming-out? I think Pariah highlights that there’s this gray area within the gay or lesbian community. Sometimes there’s a pressure to check a box, to either be hard and be butch or be feminine and wear heels. Alike’s neither of those things, so there’s a gray area. And her coming-out experience is different because she’s coming into a different space. Alike’s not figuring out if she’s gay – she knows she loves women, that’s not her question. It’s more “How [do I] be in the world?” The first half hour isn’t “Am I gay?” It’s, “Laura’s telling me I should be butch. Mom’s telling me I should be femme.” Versus other coming out experiences, like… when she’s wearing the club clothes, that’s not really her. When she changes into this different thing for Mom, she’s not that either. We don’t see her changing from her true self into another self – she’s neither of things she’s taking on or off. We don’t know who she is. She doesn’t really want to be this butch lesbian. She just wants to be Alike. You’ve been talking about this project everywhere for years and years. You’re the Carmen Sandiego of the indie film circuit. Which was the best kids’ game show ever! Indeed! What have you gained from spending so much time introducing the film to festival audiences? Specifically from being on tour with the film, I’ve gained a huge connection with audiences – an affirmation that we told the story truthfully. To your point, we weren’t writing it based on what people were saying or what was going on in the world. We stayed in a cocoon and wrote this thing. When we finished, we didn’t know how people would respond. But people felt we told a story and were honest with the experience, so we gained a feeling of affirmation. And personally, having gone from a point where when I was coming out and I was not quite sure the world that the world would accept me for who I have, or not quite sure that I could be loved or find love, and going to this press tour and seeing audiences embrace the film and saying, “We love you,” Pariah basically gave me the courage to be who I am. I came out behind the shield of this film. This tour has been this amazing wash of affirmation and love. It makes me feel good about audiences. They’re smart and progressive and open. They’re willing to see stories beyond themselves, images that don’t exactly look like them. It restored my faith in cinemagoers. They are hungering for good stories and are willing to step outside their experience to get them. Lastly, what do you have coming up? I imagine your new projects differ from Pariah because this movie is so emotional. One project coming up is called Large Print , a spec script I did, which is about a 50-something insurance adjuster who is recently divorced and lately incontinent, and has to redefine happiness for herself. Though she’s 56, it’s still a coming-of-age story. It’s going to be an emotional film because she’s played life by the rules and nothing’s turned out the way she’s expected. The other film I’m writing is called Bolo , a thriller set in the south. It’s also about, “What is home?” What if where you grew up changes? How do you accept that? Though it has more of a genre element, it goes back to these human things. I’m working on a TV series with HBO and Viola Davis about corruption in education, which will be cool. I’m working on another TV series called Reveal set in Nashville. It’s Dallas meets The Wire , about a city going through an identity crisis. I continue to be drawn to characters, and characters that are flawed especially. I love exploring flawed people trying to make their way. Did you just say “ Dallas meets The Wire ?” Yeah! Do you know how exciting that is? Ha! We’ll see! Dallas was the soap growing up. All my aunts gathered around the TV. We should not have been the target audience for Dallas . Pariah debuts in limited U.S. release December 28. Follow Louis Virtel on Twitter . Follow Movieline on Twitter .
Marlene Dietrich is one of the most talented, intelligent, and iconic actors of all time, and not just because everyone from Madeline Kahn to Madonna and Suzanne Vega has invoked her image with staggering results. The ferocious screen icon and cabaret star is the very definition of a vision , a cutting and defiant actress with gusto and guts galore. On the occasion of her 110th birthday, let’s commemorate her finest work. Though she garnered an Oscar nod for her turn in 1930′s Morocco , there can be no mistaking Dietrich’s amazing, beguiling work in 1957′s Witness for the Prosecution . As the mysterious wife of an accused murderer (Tyrone Power, in his last role), Dietrich tears up the screen with dramatic testimonies, cryptic declarations, and the icy conviction of a Teutonic high priestess. Here’s the climactic scene, wherein she reveals her entire plans to the dumbfounded Wilfred Robards (Charles Laughton). What’s your favorite Marlene moment? Follow Louis Virtel on Twitter . Follow Movieline on Twitter .
Nick Broomfield’s documentary Sarah Palin: You Betcha! , which premieres this week at the Toronto Film Festival, has made a domestic theatrical deal with Freestyle Releasing. The crowd-funded film is said to scrub away the sheen of the miserably received pro-Palin doc The Undefeated , trickling into limited release in New York and L.A. on Sept. 30 — not long after when the ex-governor’s long-rumored presidential bid would likely launch, if it launches at all. Intrigue! [ Deadline ]
The new Dior short film/luxury ad starring celebrity spokesmodel Charlize Theron makes a number of assumptions off the bat. First and foremost, that you’d believe screen icons Grace Kelly, Marlene Dietrich, and Marilyn Monroe would shill for any designer even in death, but more so? That Theron, statuesque living goddess that she is, is the natural glam heir to those ladies’ legacy. Then again, it was filmed inside of Versailles . Point, Charlize!
