Fans get a sneak peek at ‘Anchorman: The Legend Continues’ (or, at least, the guys’ feet) in first official poster. By Fallon Prinzivalli “Anchorman: The Legend Continues” poster Photo: Paramount The road to the highly anticipated “Anchorman 2” has been a long one . Since “Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy” arrived in 2004, there were reports from cast and crew confirming a sequel and announcing a script was in the process of being written. But the words were then taken back, leaving fans dizzy and disappointed believing they wouldn’t see the anchormen reunite. Finally, when all hope was lost, Ferrell made a surprise appearance on “Conan” as the legendary Ron Burgundy to announce that the sequel was greenlit. With the “Anchorman 2” teaser trailer playing before Sacha Baron Cohen’s “Dictator,” the Lebanese Cinema Movie Guide released the first official poster. It shows the Channel 4 news team’s feet standing on set in the studio, the bottom of their suits — including Ron’s signature burgundy number, presumably not bought at the toilet store — keeping it classy as always. The official title of the film appears at the bottom in big, bold print (“Anchorman: The Legend Continues”) with a release date of 2013. While the film is still in the very early stages of development, the first movie’s director and co-writer Adam McKay will reunite with Ferrell to pen the script and the principal cast is set to return, including Steve Carell and Paul Rudd. When MTV News spoke with McKay back in 2010, he told us he expected much of the cast to come along for the sequel. “We had an idea, and we contacted Steve and Paul and [David] Koechner and Christina [Applegate] and checked in with everyone, and they were all game for it,” McKay said. “It’s a tricky movie, because everyone went and did really well after it, so everyone’s prices went up and everyone’s time got a little more valuable. But at the same time, graciously, Steve and Paul and everyone agreed to cut their price to come and do it, which you don’t see very often in Hollywood — and cut their price substantially.” Thanks to the cast’s commitment, Ron and the rest of the anchormen are set to hit theaters in 2013. Until then, stay classy, moviegoers. Check out everything we’ve got on “Anchorman: The Legend Continues.” For breaking news, celebrity columns, humor and more — updated around the clock — visit MTVMoviesBlog.com .
This is Thursday in Cannes: Zac Efron in tighty-whities, Nicole Kidman as a luscious sex kitten, Matthew McConaughey as a journalist with a sexual secret and a very creepy John Cusack. Such was just the tip of the iceberg this morning in Lee Daniels’s outrageous The Paperboy , which will have its world premiere tonight as the festival hits its final swing. Opinions seemed to range wildly in all directions following the film’s early morning screening: Applause and cries of “Bravo!” mixed with boos, laughter and a swift rush out of the huge Lumière Theatre to get reaction from Daniels and the cast at the press conference. The conversation in the press room took cues from the film’s flamboyant flare, and then it went from there. What many girls (and some boys) may have secretly wished to see back in the High School Musical days they can now get a big dose of it here: Efron is tan, trim and spends a good chunk of his scenes in his underwear, at one point dancing in the rain in his briefs with a very platinum and seductive Nicole Kidman. Never one to mince words, Lee Daniels set the record straight when asked about Zac Efron being “eroticized” in the new film: “He’s good looking, the camera can’t help but love him… And I’m a gay man – you know!” “I don’t think I was supposed to feel comfortable,” said Efron, laughing after Daniels’s quip. “This character is learning the ways of the world and it is uncomfortable. It was a great character to play.” Based on a novel by Pete Dexter, The Paperboy is set in late ’60s Florida. Efron plays Jack, a young guy who’s aimless and living with his dad and soon-to-be step mother. His older brother (McConaughey) is a journalist who comes to town to investigate a death-row inmate (John Cusack) he believes is wrongly convicted of murder. Meanwhile, Cusack is corresponding with a platinum blonde (Nicole Kidman) with a fabulous wardrobe, fake eye-lashes and pillowy lips. She’s also the object of Jack’s raging hormones — and things get complicated. “I felt like I was let out of some cage,” Cusack said Thursday morning in Cannes about his role. “Lee [Daniels] and I talked at the Chateau Marmont about a film I made called The Grifters and then he looked at me and said, ‘I think you have more to give than you’ve been giving lately,’ and that is just music to an actor’s ears.” In 2010’s Rabbit Hole , Nicole Kidman earned an Oscar nomination as an upper middle-class mother in mourning following the untimely death of her young son. Her Paperboy character Charlotte Bless could not present more of a contrast: Simulating sex in a prison visitation room, wearing flashy outfits and playing an untamed seductress, she at one point comes to Jack’s rescue after he’s attacked by a swarm of jellyfish. While he lays barely conscious on the sand as welts appear on his six-pack, she gives him the remedy required to treat a jellyfish sting. “I had to step into the character and put myself in a place where I didn’t step out of it,” Kidman said. She explained that she met Daniels at a party while she was promoting Rabbit Hole and became curious about how she might fit one day into one of his films. “I haven’t seen the movie yet and I’m nervous about seeing it, but that’s my job – to give over myself to someone and have them bring out in me what I can give.” “I had the most lovely time in the world playing with Nicole,” Efron followed. “I’ve been in love with her since Moulin Rouge . It was the best opportunity in the world.” The Paperboy is loaded with laughs especially for audiences who appreciate a bit of camp, but the film also takes a darker, more serious turn and Thursday’s post-screening followed the movie’s lead. Daniels, who received a Best Director Oscar nomination in 2011 for Precious , said that all the characters in The Paperboy are real for him personally, from the young kid to the woman who writes letters to prisoners to the house servant (played by Macy Gray). He also said he knows the prisoner. “I live in the truth. Every character here I know,” he said. “My brother — I raised his children. He has been in jail for murder. So I know this cat and when [Cusack] did anything that’s not true, I said, ‘You have to come at me in a different way.'” Continuing, Daniels said: “I say this to all filmmakers: You never take no for an answer. Making sure my vision is executed means never taking no, never.” “Lee has a hyper-sensitive mind, and as soon as you nail it he says, ‘Now, where can we take it?'” McConaughey said. Daniels offered up that McConaughey will be in his next film, The Butler , as John F. Kennedy. Cusack will play Richard Nixon. Starring Forest Whitaker as the White House butler who served multiple U.S. presidents, the cast also includes Kidman and Oprah Winfrey. Lee said that the new film will be decidedly more PG-13 than The Paperboy . Read more of Movieline’s Cannes 2012 coverage here . [Top image of (L-R) Zac Efron, John Cusack, Lee Daniels, Matthew McConaughey, Nicole Kidman and Macy Gray: AFP/Getty Images]
The Intouchables hits so many audience-pleasing buttons, meticulously and dutifully, that it ought to be called The Irresistibles . This is the French movie you’ve been hearing about, a megahit in its native country and currently spreading across Europe like a cheerful, robust strain of flu. Based on a true story about a wheelchair-bound rich guy and his caretaker, a small-time crook from the projects, The Intouchables is a movie about life, love and the enduring power of Earth Wind & Fire. You have been forewarned. Actually, The Intouchables isn’t bad — its merely shameless, but at least it’s overtly so. The picture, written and directed by Eric Toledano and Olivier Nakache, stars François Cluzet as Philippe, the lonely wheelchair guy. Philippe is paralyzed from the neck down, the victim of a paragliding accident; he also lost his beloved wife years ago and is left with only a wiseacre teenage daughter who barely features in the story (she’s played, in a few fleeting, pouty scenes, by Alba Gaïa Kraghede Bellugi) and a houseful of servants, some of whom — like the super-efficient Yvonne (played by the earthbound and appealing Anne Le Ny) — seem to actually care for him. But Philippe also needs a strong, masculine caretaker, and when a strapping Senegalese fellow named Driss (Omar Sy) applies for the job, he’s hired almost against his own wishes. (He’d shown up for the interview at Philippe’s tony Paris mansionette only to get his papers signed, showing that he’d attempted to find work, in order to receive state benefits.) Philippe is an aesthete, a lover of fine art and classical music, and he has everything money can buy. But he needs a pal and a few laughs, as well as a companion who will treat him normally and not like a freak. When a concerned friend, suspicious of Driss and his motives, warns Philippe, “These street people have no pity,” Philippe responds firmly, “That’s what I want — no pity.” Driss, for his part, provides Philippe with more Live! Laugh! Love! moments than you or I could possibly count, despite the fact that he comes from a tough neighborhood and has some unresolved family troubles. And even though he steals a precious Fabergé egg — one with great sentimental value — from Philippe’s collection of same, the two form an indissoluble bond. Driss cheers Philippe up with his bad puns, he grins and/or dances infectiously whenever he hears “September” or “Boogie Wonderland,” and he helps Philippe court a new lady love. Philippe gradually loses his glum demeanor (Cluzet is really good at the glum stuff) and becomes guardedly cheerful, enjoying life for the first time in eons. Not much else happens in The Intouchables , though not much else needs to. The movie has the carefully calibrated inner workings of a watch movement: As it efficiently ticks away, it speaks to everything we want and need to believe about human frailty and the importance of connection. Toledano and Nakache keep the gears running smoothly — to their credit, they don’t throw in any moments of serious endangerment in order to up the drama quotient. (They were inspired to make the film after seeing a documentary about the real-life Philippe, Philippe Pozzo di Borgo, and his relationship with a man named Abdel, a young guy from the projects who came to work for him and changed his life around.) The friendship between Philippe and Driss, as the filmmakers present it, certainly is solid and life-changing, on both sides. I hesitate to use the term “magical Negro” because I think the term is too carelessly slapped onto any story in which white people learn something from people of color. Even in our racially mixed world — particularly here in the United States — the reality is that most white people live mostly around other white people, and sometimes it really does take an encounter with someone whose life, and whose skin color, is not like yours to shake things up. If you ask me, those encounters are less magical than they are necessary. That said, there is something a little magical about Driss, but that could be just because Sy is a charming, criminally likable presence. Sy has worked extensively in French movies and television, and he appeared in a previous feature made by Toledano and Nakache, the 2006 comedy Those Happy Days . (He also appeared in Jean-Pierre Jeunet’s 2009 whimsical windup toy Micmacs .) Sy makes The Intouchables worth watching, not because he adequately fulfills any perceived notion of the joyful person of color, but because he quite simply seems filled with joy. He earns bonus points for maintaining such boundless joie de vivre even as he spends so much time hanging around a French sourpuss like Cluzet’s Philippe. The Intouchables is not particularly complex, but it certainly hits its target. Whether or not you want that target hit is up to you. Meanwhile, Sy’s performance almost makes you forget how calculated the whole thing is. Plus, Driss is damn right about Earth Wind & Fire. Follow Stephanie Zacharek on Twitter . Follow Movieline on Twitter .
Pop star Kylie Minogue is in Cannes, and she’s showcasing a career move: Starring in a film. Not just any film mind you, but Leos Carax’s Holy Motors , which attendees here are calling the wackiest selection to hit the festival in years, a pretty amazing feat. With cyber-monsters, talking machines and a story that is a complete trip, Minogue plays two characters in Carax’s tale, which centers on Monsieur Oscar — who himself is in fact many characters: a captain of industry, assassin, beggar, monster, family man and a half-dozen more. Taking on the role, Minogue said she decided to shed some of her persona and that she was thrilled to be in Cannes. “It feels like a dream to have a film here in Cannes and to be welcomed into this family with Leos,” she said Wednesday afternoon. “My involvement was deep and emotional and fun. I banned my entourage of coming with me. I stripped myself of ‘Kylie’ and wanted to be a blank canvas for Leos.” In Holy Motors , Monsieur Oscar (Denis Lavant) journeys from one role to the next, accompanied by Céline (Edith Scob), the woman driving a massive engine that transports him through Paris. He’s a “conscientious assassin,” going from one place to the next in pursuit of a mysterious driving force and the women and spirits of past lives. “I pass bridges every day and this old gypsy woman with her bag; for years I’ve passed these women and rarely given money,” Carax said, adding, “So I thought there is no way to communicate with this woman — there is no way. So I’d imagine myself slipping into a café and changing into old woman clothes and becoming that woman and that’s how this whole story started.” Carax and Minogue met a year ago through their mutual friend, the French filmmaker Claire Denis, and the two decided to collaborate. The former Australian soap star’s return to acting, however, was not entirely devoid of her current day (or night) job as a world-famous pop star. Carax gave her the chance to sing in the film and do it in a very unconventional way — at least for movies. “Obviously I’m used to a pop music world,” she said. “There was a song in the movie and I thought we’d record it, but Leos said, ‘No, let’s do it live in a scene.’ I don’t think that happens much in movies, and it was amazing for me. It combined both worlds and it was just fantastic.” Continuing, Minogue noted: “For me it was entirely exciting to step into this unknown situation. That doesn’t mean I wasn’t slightly terrified, but I was more than happy to venture into this strange experience.” Read more of Movieline’s Cannes 2012 coverage here .
Actor plays title role in Sam Raimi’s ‘Wizard of Oz’ prequel, which also stars Mila Kunis, Zach Braff. By Fallon Prinzivalli, with reporting by Josh Horowitz James Franco Photo: Neilson Barnard/ Getty Images At this point, we’re pretty sure there’s nothing that James Franco can’t do. He’s an Academy Award-nominated actor. He’s the author of a collection of short stories called “Palo Alto.” He directs, produces and writes his own films. He’s cast in project after project, including Harmony Korine’s “Spring Breakers” and the new Nick at Nite series “Hollywood Heights.” He’s even directing a documentary based on the world of pornography, all the while attending school in some fashion, as either a student or a teacher. We can hardly keep up! One of the most anticipated projects on his plate is the Disney film “Oz: The Great and Powerful,” in which Franco plays the title role alongside Mila Kunis, Rachel Weisz, Michelle Williams and Zach Braff. When MTV News caught up with the ever-talented actor, he told us that he enjoys being attached to a multitude of ventures, especially something as legendary as “Oz.” “I do like to do a lot of different things, and I think there is something really nice about being part of a bunch of institutions by being in this film,” he explained. “Disney is a place that’s been a big part of my life, and a lot of people’s lives, since I was a kid. ‘The Wizard of Oz’ has also been a huge part of my life. The [L. Frank] Baum books were some of the first books I read on my own, so I like being attached to something as iconic as this.” The film, directed by Sam Raimi , is a prequel to “The Wonderful Wizard of Oz” that explains how the wizard came to power in the land. And while the cast is tight-lipped about their roles in the movie, Mila Kunis offered up a tiny explanation about her character, Theodora, to MTV News’ Josh Horowitz. “She’s a good person who gets her heart broken,” the actress explained. “What happens to young ladies when their heart gets broken?” “They turn into horrible, evil witches,” Horowitz answered. With a smile, Kunis replied, “You said it, not me.” Check out everything we’ve got on “Oz: The Great and Powerful.” For breaking news, celebrity columns, humor and more — updated around the clock — visit MTVMoviesBlog.com .
‘He’s been to comedy what Marlon Brando was to acting,’ director Larry Charles tells MTV News. By Kevin P. Sullivan Sacha Baron Cohen in “The Dictator” Photo: Paramount Pictures For each of Sacha Baron Cohen’s onscreen conquests, one man has been there every step of the way. Larry Charles made a name for himself as supervising producer and occasional writer for “Seinfeld,” but his work directing Baron Cohen’s films brought him a new kind of recognition. Baron Cohen asked Charles once again to helm his film with “The Dictator,” and MTV News spoke with the director in the lead-up to the film’s release. One of the biggest challenges posed by their new film was the creation of an entirely new character. Unlike Baron Cohen’s previous films, which came out of his work on “Da Ali G Show,” the writers of “The Dictator” created the concept for General Aladeen with the comedian in mind. This meant that Baron Cohen had to work through the specifics of Aladeen to make him as fully realized. “Unlike the other movies, where Sacha had a character that he had been working on for years and years and years and was to hone, he knew how this character walked and talked and reacted to every situation when it came to Bruno or Borat or Ali G, but this is a brand-new character,” Charles said. “He had to create this character from the ground up, from the accent to the look to the body language. We needed to give him as much time as possible to evolve that character to where he was ready for the camera.” Additionally, “The Dictator” did away with Baron Cohen’s old format of real-life people interacting with the character. The more traditional structure allowed Charles to get additional takes with Baron Cohen for the first time. “I had never had a second take with Sacha in any of the movies,” he said. “We would do one take. Now that one take may last eight hours for some of the scenes we did in ‘Borat’ or ‘Bruno.’ Eight straight hours of him having to do a character. Eight straight hours of filming it. Here we didn’t have to do that.” Considering that some of the “Borat” and “Bruno” interviews resulted in lawsuits and physical threats, Charles said the “Dictator” set was indeed much safer, but that security came at a price. “It’s certainly physically safer, no question about it,” Charles said. “To be in the United States with a full crew and security and have some kind of permission to be there and not encounter the hostility that we have encountered all over the world and here. At the same time, the danger here is complacency.” The real reason Charles has been willing to work with Baron Cohen repeatedly is that he genuinely believes him to be a comedic genius. “I really classify him in that rare company of comic geniuses. I think there have been a handful of them in film and television history,” Charles said. “He has changed the face of comedy like few other people have. He’s been to comedy what Marlon Brando was to acting. Comedy will be different after him. You can’t go back to some of the old-fashioned ways after you’ve seen Sacha do his thing at his best.” Check out everything we’ve got on “The Dictator.” For breaking news, celebrity columns, humor and more — updated around the clock — visit MTVMoviesBlog.com .
Kid Cudi tells MTV News watching himself on seven screens simultaneously during 30-minute film ‘was weird! But it was dope.’ By Alicia Malone Kanye West and Kim Kardashian attend the “Cruel Summer” premiere during the Cannes Film Festival Photo: Getty Images CANNES, France — Kanye West is nothing if not ambitious. The rapper/designer/mogul has added a few more slashes to his name, as producer, writer and director of the experimental short film “Cruel Summer,” which had its premiere during a splashy party Wednesday night during the Cannes Film Festival. The 30-minute short, inspired by West’s upcoming G.O.O.D. Music compilation of the same name, was projected onto seven screens inside a tented pyramid, designed to give viewers a fully immersive experience. “Cruel Summer” stars G.O.O.D. artist Kid Cudi as a car thief who falls for a blind Arabian princess. The seven screens alternately come on and off, sometimes showing different angles of one shot, other times acting as an extended wide screen, complete with a ceiling and floor. This means the audience looks around them at the images, instead of staring straight ahead, which, as Kanye explained in a speech, was to reflect real life. “It related to a post-Steve Jobs, post-Windows era, where we’re always on our BlackBerry in a ball game or at the movies,” West said. “I was very particular about having the screens separate, where your mind puts the screens back together, the way you put memories together. I’m not the best director in the world, but I had an idea that I thought would be amazing to inspire people, like a dream of one day this being the way people watch movies. You know, [Quentin] Tarantino doing a movie like this or a horror movie like this, animation, 3-D … in this form that surrounds you. People want to go back and see it more and more because they missed something to their left or to their right, and it feels more like the experience of life.” “Cruel Summer” plays like an extended music video, in a similar way to ‘Ye’s 2010 online film for “Runaway,” with sparse dialogue and striking slow-motion images set to a rocking soundtrack. The music is provided by various G.O.O.D. artists, many of whom make cameos in the film, and there’s a super quick appearance by comedian Aziz Ansari. Among the celebrity names attending the premiere party at the Palm Beach Club were Jay-Z, Kim Kardashian and Kid Cudi, who told MTV News the experience of watching himself on seven screens was surreal. “It was weird! But it was dope,” Cudi said. “I’m nervous, just like with anything I do, with people watching, but I’m really proud of it. I’m happy that Kanye had me as part of it. It’s so humbling. He’s a genius, he’s the best, the illest … you can quote me on that!” “Cruel Summer” was co-directed by Alexandre Moors, who previously worked with ‘Ye on the videos for “Runaway” and “N—as in Paris.” The script was based on a screenplay by Elon Rutberg, and it was shot entirely in Qatar in the Middle East. “We were literally shooting in Qatar less than a month ago,” West said. “It was the most impossible feat, all odds were against us having this moment, showing this at Cannes. The reason why I went so hard is that this is my goal. What I want to do post-Grammys is I want to change entertainment experiences. Like if [late fashion designer Alexander] McQueen or [director] Tarsem [Singh] was to meet the entertainment value of Cirque du Soleil or Walt Disney. We’re going to bring it to New York to Qatar and re-edit it … so you guys are seeing the rough draft of this concept.” Although the world premiere of “Cruel Summer” coincided with the Cannes Film Festival, it is not in competition or part of the official screenings. The film is now open to the public in Cannes until May 25. Related Artists Kanye West Kid Cudi
It’s been over a year since rumors started circulating that Kristen Stewart would be letting much more than her hair down as uninhibited teenage bride Marylou i n the film adaptation of On The Road . Of course, we’ve been let down by K-Stew before (Exhibit A: Welcome to the Rileys ), but now that On the Road has officially premiered at Cannes and the reviews are in, all signs point to four separate sex scenes in Kristen’s nude debut , which IndieWire reports is ” cruising into NC-17 territory in the thrusting department .” New York magazine reports that ” Stewart takes her top off so many times that even the perennially shirtless Taylor Lautner would be impressed…she and Hedlund go nude in their very first scenes in On the Road, and Stewart later takes part in a m
‘It’s the first time it’s in 3-D — my ears are in 3-D for the first time,’ Smith tells MTV News. By Kara Warner Will Smith in “Men in Black 3” Photo: Columbia Pictures If you are a fan of “Men in Black” and “Men in Black 2,” then you should definitely plan on seeing the franchise’s third film, “Men in Black 3” when it hits theaters this weekend. Not only are our favorite suited-up agents J and K up to their old tricks, witty banter and all, but their third outing features an appropriately science-fiction-y element of time travel that introduces us to a young Agent K, expertly played by Josh Brolin . If those plot points don’t have you ready to buy tickets, take it from the series’ star Will Smith himself, who says you won’t want to miss seeing his ears in 3-D. “The fun of [this film] is trying to make it new but not so new that it don’t match,” Smith told MTV News recently. “We had to be able to create something that was brand-new, that stands on its own, and it’s been 10 years since the first movie, so there were a lot of things working against it. But it’s the first time it’s in 3-D — my ears are in 3-D for the first time,” he said with a laugh. “I’m very happy with it.” Smith went on to tell a story about another part of the film that made him happy: watching an alien chicken trip and fall. “With these types of movies, the set tends to take on the tone of the movie, the amount of silliness and things. You just see the most bizarre things on movies like this,” he said. “I saw a 7-foot-tall chicken trip and fall. You would never see that anywhere in the world! There was a chicken alien and she had these foot-and-a-half heels on so she was 7-foot-tall in a chicken outfit, and she trips and falls. I just thought that was fantastic.” Bring up the “favorite moments during filming” subject with director Barry Sonnenfeld and he’ll tell you a tale of his star’s acting skills being a bit rusty at the start of production. “On the first day of photography, we filmed Will on a blue-screen stage having to jump down [from the top of the Chrysler building], and what was great about it was that he hadn’t acted in three years and was really bad,” Sonnenfeld recalled. “Luckily, we cut out the bad stuff, but that first take we did after he hadn’t acted in three years, I was sweating because he was no good. After I yelled, ‘Cut!’ Will said, ‘Baz, I can do better! I’m really rusty!’ And within a day or two, it all worked out fine. But man, it was interesting. You know how they say ‘Once you learn how to ride a bicycle, you never forget?’ Well, Will forgot how to act for the first day or two. Luckily he wasn’t acting with other actors or it would have been really embarrassing.” Check out everything we’ve got on “Men in Black 3.” For breaking news, celebrity columns, humor and more — updated around the clock — visit MTVMoviesBlog.com . Related Videos MTV Rough Cut: ‘Men In Black 3’
Here is everyone’s “favorite couple” Kanye West and Kim Kardashian taking a walk at Cannes port around 5am during the film festival. Kim’s cakes made an appearance as well… More shots below: GSI/WENN
