From a bitch on wheels to the model rehab patient? We really have now seen it all from Lindsay Lohan. Following reports that the fiery crotched one was flipping out at the Betty Ford Clinic because she craved some Adderall, sources now tell TMZ that Lohan has been on her best behavior. She’s attending group therapy. She’s showing up (on time!) for her personal counseling sessions. She’s opening about about issues of self-control. She’s – gulp ! – on the path to recovery?!? Lohan is reportedly telling those close to her that the program is challenging, but she has no intention of backing down. And visitors to Betty Ford have been shocked over how good Lindsay actually looks, which is amazing on numerous levels, not the least of which being how strongly Lohan believed she did not need treatment just a couple weeks ago. See Amanda Bynes ? There’s hope for you yet.
This is all very encouraging. First Lindsay Lohan says she’s going back to rehab, next she shows up to the Scary Movie 5 premiere looking hot again. You know, as much as people like to hate on Lindsay, I really missed that freckled cleavage. So I know we’ve heard it all before, but I’m hoping Lindsay’s big comeback is actually going to stick this time. Her hotness comeback that is. She can do whatever the hell she wants in her personal life. Who am I, her parole officer? » view all 44 photos Related Articles: Lindsay Lohan’s Breasts Are Looking Healthy Lindsay Lohan Bikini Top Boobs Heaven Lindsay Lohan Looking A Little Swollen Lindsay Lohan’s Breasts Went Back To Court Photos: WENN.com This is all very encouraging.
Lindsay Lohan? Not thrilled to be posing for a new mug shot apparently. The star was booked today by the Santa Monica, Calif., Police Department, after pleading no contest to reckless driving and lying to a police officer. Behold, the latest in a LONG line of Lindsay Lohan booking photos: Even though Lindsay Lohan’s plea deal allowed her to escape jail (she’s off to rehab soon), it required to appear within seven days to be processed. Which she duly did, after hitting up nightclubs Monday night obvi. Sexy makeup? Check. Disheveled, hot mess hair? Check. Meticulously groomed eyebrows? Oh yeah. Fatigued, hung over, strung-out, rage-filled b!tch-stare? Legendary. Compare it to some of her past modeling work:
Edward who? Robert Pattinson has made some smart post- Twiligh t choices. After working with David Cronenberg in the memorably weird Cosmopolis , the heartthrob actor has now gone completely off-road for Animal Kingdom director David Michod’s gritty, violent follow-up, The Rover , which is shooting in the unforgiving Australian desert. And judging from this first still from the set, the bedroom-eyed actor’s sparkly vampire days are well behind him. In this shot, Pattinson is oozing blood, not drinking it and looking a little hot under the collar as he is threatened by an even grungier looking Guy Pearce . According to Hey Guys.co.uk , the movie is set in the near future where “a worldwide financial collapse has sent people to the mines of the Australian desert.” Pattinson is described as a “troubled and damaged soul” who’s a member of the gang that has run afoul of the “dark, dangerous and murderous” Pearce. Here’s the official synopsis: Eric (Pearce) has left everything, everyone and every semblance of human kindness behind him when a gang of desperate criminals steals his last possession. Eric sets off on a ruthless mission to track them down, forced along the way to enlist the help of Rey (Pattinson), the naïve and injured junior member of the gang who was left behind in the chaos of the gang’s most recent robbery. The movie is expected to hit theaters in 2014, and it also features the very talented Scoot McNairy who played memorable characters in Killing Them Softly , Argo and Promised Land last year. [ Hey Guys ] Follow Frank DiGiacomo on Twitter. Follow Movieline on Twitter.
The disappearance of a pregnant preteen exposes the raw wounds at the heart of an isolated southern New Zealand community in the absorbing and richly atmospheric Top of the Lake . Centered around Elisabeth Moss’ excellent performance as a detective for whom the case uncovers disturbing echoes of her own troubled history, this multistranded crime saga from writer-director Jane Campion and co-creator Gerard Lee is satisfyingly novelistic in scope and dense in detail. Yet it also boasts something more, a singular and provocative strangeness that lingers like a chill after the questions of who-dun-what have been laid to rest. Prestigious berths in Park City and Berlin will precede a distinguished smallscreen life for the Sundance Channel miniseries, which begins airing March 18. The six-hour, seven-part production (reviewed from a six-episode version prior to its festival bows) should prove an enticing proposition for fans of investigative dramas in the vein of Twin Peaks and The Killing , even though the yarn’s less procedural-oriented nature and primary focus on a rape case provide early clues that Campion and Co. are treading different thematic territory here. But by far the material’s most distinctive element is its setting, a wooded region of stunning natural beauty and surpassing human ugliness that lends a uniquely bleak and bitter tang to this well-worn genre format. Sharing helming duties with Aussie newcomer Garth Davis, Campion has delivered her first work set and shot in her native New Zealand since The Piano 20 years ago. Fittingly, it marks a reunion of sorts with that film’s star, Holly Hunte r, cast here as GJ, an enigmatic, silver-haired guru who has come to the town of Laketop to open a camp for abused and/or abandoned women. Unfortunately, the camp has been built on a piece of land — the ironically named Paradise — that has long been eyed by local drug lord Matt Mitcham (a superb Peter Mullan), who seems to own everyone and everything in town. Mitcham also seems to have fathered half the local population; the youngest of his offspring is 12-year-old Tui (Jacqueline Joe), his daughter by his third (ex-)wife, a Thai immigrant. One frigid morning, Tui is seen wandering into the titular lake, as though in a trance; a subsequent medical examination reveals she’s five months pregnant, though she won’t disclose who the father is. The determined but relatively inexperienced Det. Robin Griffin (Moss) is called in to lead the statutory-rape investigation, although she soon finds herself looking into a possible kidnapping-murder scenario when Tui suddenly goes missing. Over the course of the six-hour running time, the story abounds in the requisite twists and complications: The lake coughs up the body of a local businessman, while suspicion falls on a hermit who turns out to be a convicted sex offender. But these developments are doled out at a measured clip, and the filmmakers seem less interested in sustaining forward momentum than in painting a vivid panorama of this broken community, a town cloaked in a dark and vaguely incestuous malaise. From the hooligans (Jay Ryan, Kip Chapman) who carry out Mitcham’s bidding to the sad-sack women who gather at GJ’s camp, there’s a pervasive sense of human lives either wasted or forced into familiar and depressing patterns. The wildness of the surroundings informs the wildness of the characters: Parents and children are forever at odds, and acts of violence and violation are distressingly commonplace, to the point where even Mitcham reacts to the news of Tui’s ordeal not with outrage, but with a cynical roll of the eye (“She’s a slut, like her dad was a slut!”). Despite its narrative breadth, Top of the Lake is first and foremost Robin’s story. As the detective rekindles a romance with another Mitcham son (Thomas M. Wright) while flirting erratically with her superior officer (David Wenham), she finds her personal life bumping up against her investigation to a near-ludicrous degree. Much of the third hour is devoted to exploring Robin’s past traumas as a teenager, and while the idea that she sees a younger version of herself in Tui represents perhaps the tale’s most conventional conceit, it supplies a potent emotional fulcrum that pushes the drama into its moving, startling if not always plausible final hours. Moss, a long way from Mad Men , brings a gripping combination of pluck, vulnerability and intense anger to the complicated role of a woman who fights for every inch of ground and at one point drives a broken bottle into a man’s chest. Campion’s films have long gone against the grain with their strong, embattled distaff protagonists and daring portrayals of female sexuality, and if Top of the Lake isn’t in quite the same neighborhood as In the Cut , it nonetheless calls on Moss and others to bare themselves physically and emotionally in a story located at the juncture of sex and violence. The other commanding turn here comes from Mullan, playing the unkempt Mitcham as a rough-mannered scoundrel who is not without a certain gruff, randy charm. Other bright spots in the excellent ensemble include Robyn Nevin, tough and sensible as Robin’s cancer-stricken mother; Joe, who invests Tui with a fiery refusal to be victimized; and Hunter, making the most of dialogue that basically consists of a string of gnomic pronouncements. Adam Arkapaw’s lensing of this unspoiled and unruly landscape is one of the production’s chief pleasures, and composer Mark Bradshaw supports the action with a melancholy score that sounds entirely endemic to the setting. Editor’s Note: Top of the Lake begins airing on the Sundance Channel, Monday, March 18. Follow Movieline on Twitter.
News of Lindsay Lohan’s plea deal puts her one step closer to a comeback. Back in February, I wrote that if Lohan could avoid going to jail over charges of reckless driving and lying to police and reinstitute some self-discipline into her life, her raw performance in Paul Schrader’s The Canyons could mark the beginning of her redemption as an actress. Details of Lindsay Lohan’s Plea Deal As of this afternoon, Lohan can check off that first box on what could be the path back to a productive acting career worthy of her talent. As USA Today reported, she and her legal team, led by Mark Jay Heller, struck a plea deal with prosecutors in which the Herbie Fully Loaded actress will do 90 days in a lockdown rehab facility and 30 days of community service. She’ll also undergo psychological counseling for 18 months. The newspaper reported that, following Lohan’s court date, Heller told reporters outside the Los Angeles Superior Courthouse, “I am very confident that you won’t be seeing Lindsay Lohan in any criminal courts any time in the future.” He also explained why Lohan took the plea deal: “At the conclusion of this case, Lindsay will have a completely clean record. And I think that’s an extremely important element to this case.” The Canyons Director Paul Schrader’s Reaction To LiLo’s Sentence When I first heard about the outcome, I emailed Schrader to get his reaction. When I interviewed him for post I wrote in February, the Affliction director hinted that he was interested in working again with Lohan. (The New York Times reported that Schrader was interested in casting in the lead role for a remake of Gloria, — about a mob moll and a six-year-old boy being chased by hitmen and law-enforcement officials — that originally starred the great Gena Rowlands.) The filmmaker’s response was cautiously optimistic. Schrader wrote he and his wife, actress Mary Beth Hurt, had dinner with Lohan last week at Minetta Tavern in Greenwich Village. Lohan, he wrote, “saw the film again and is enthusiastic to promote it. There will be international festival appearances in the future which she hopes to attend. We also discussed future work but, for now, we wait and see how the plea bargain plays out.” One Lingering Cause For Concern: Lindsay’s Dad, Michael Lohan Sounds promising. Now, if only Lohan could put more distance between her and her attention-starved father who seems to have no shame about turning his daughter’s legal woes into a press opportunities for himself. Here’s what USA Today reported about Daddy’s post plea-deal performance: Heller was quickly chased away from the press conference by Lohan’s father, Michael, who was present during the hearing. Michael Lohan then took to the microphones and proceeded to bash Heller, accusing him of not keeping Lindsay posted on negotiations. Michael said that Heller needs to “stop using Lindsay to make money and a name for himself.” However, the actress’ father did say that the sentence to rehab would probably be a good thing for her. Papa Lohan is doing a bit of projecting here. Someone should get him a muzzle. [ USA Today ] More on Lindsay Lohan: Light of Day: ‘The Canyons’ Could Save Lindsay Lohan’s Career What People Are Missing In The NY Times Story On Lindsay Lohan Follow Frank DiGiacomo on Twitter . Follow Movieline on Twitter .
Lindsay Lohan has an incompetent lawyer representing her. Straight from the mouth of Judge Jim Dabney, the man in charge of her criminal case. Dabney reamed out Mark Heller, saying he was incompetent to practice law in California and Lohan has to get another lawyer who knows what he’s doing. That or waive her right to a competent California lawyer. Seriously. The judge informed Heller he screwed up the legal documents he filed by not following California law, and denied his motion to dismiss Lohan’s case. Heller tried to blame the previous lawyer, but the judge had none of it, questioning his knowledge of criminal law or competence to handle the case. To make matters worse, the California lawyer who’s sponsoring Heller to appear in LiLo’s case didn’t show up today, and the judge made note of that. Prosecutor Terry White made it clear that he’s ready for trial on March 18, where Lindsay Lohan faces jail time for lying to cops and violating probation. Quick refresher: She wrecked her car in June and said her assistant was driving, which was not true. This also triggered a probation violation, potentially. Heller pleaded that Lindsay Lohan should be shown both “mercy and compassion,” but offered little in the way of legal specifics … or competence. There was also no mention made of the ongoing plea bargain negotiations, which Lindsay has put the kibosh on so far because they involve rehab. She’s a moron , but it sounds like Heller far exceeds her in that arena.
This girl is either crazy like a fox or just full-on crazy at this point. Lindsay Lohan has rejected a plea deal that would have kept her out of jail in her lying-to-cops case, opting to take her chances at trial. Why, you ask? Because she’s totes innocent and doesn’t have a problem, OBVI! Her lawyer, Mark Heller, has been trying to pull a rabbit out of his hat this week, and was close to a deal with Santa Monica and L.A. City prosecutors. They insisted that the actress accept a significant amount of time in a residential rehab facility – and NO JAIL TIME – but Heller still wasn’t having it. Prosecutors even bent a little and offered somewhere around 30 days rather than the 60 they initially wanted her to be in rehab, still Heller didn’t accept. The deal fell through, however TMZ sources say ” negotiations are ongoing .” As expected, Lohan and Heller are reportedly not on the same place here. He’s willing to accept a deal that involves counseling and rehab, even BS’ing that she would undergo extensive psychotherapy and set up a youth foundation. To Lindsay, though, this is all just “punishment for something I didn’t do.” Always in denial, never taking responsibility. Not that we’re surprised, but Heller said earlier this week that she had finally seen the error of her ways. Guess that’s what happens when you try to speak for Lindsay Lohan . In the end, prosecutors aren’t worried if they can’t strike a plea bargain, because they like their chances if it comes down to trial, beginning March 18. Lohan is charged with lying to police regarding her June car crash, and for violating her probation as a result. Both aspects could land her in a jail cell. Take the plea deal and go to rehab, girl. For your own legal sake as well as your life expectancy and that of anyone who happens to live near you.
Throwing everything against the wall in hopes that something will stick, Lindsay Lohan ‘s attorney says she is going to seek help – and devote time and money to helping others. Mark Heller, filed a motion requesting that Lohan’s probation-violation case be put on the “slow track” so she can pursue “certain activities which will benefit her.” Ones which will make her a ” productive and responsible contributor to society.” We just have to ask: Does he know who his client is? Heller says this multifaceted plan includes psychotherapy sessions, public-service efforts and a proposal to establish a foundation benefiting young people. “Lindsay has asked me to facilitate an in-person meeting… not to discuss the merits of her [legal defense], but rather for Lindsay to introduce herself,” he writes. She wishes to “help in the process of our determining what the best course would be for her future and to personally affirm her commitment and dedication to fix the problems.” It’s true, Lindsay Lohan is nothing if not dedicated. He promoses she “will gladly be participating in intensive psychotherapy” and will be “contributing her time to the production of public-service messages.” In addition, she’ll make “periodic visits to schools, hospitals and venues to provide inspirational talks, encouraging children to pursue positive goals and avoid bad habits.” Try not to roll on the floor laughing if you’re in public, okay people? LiLo’s “finally made a decision to turn her life around,” he says. Mmm hmm. Heller also says she’s “exploring the establishment of a Lindsay Lohan Foundation” whose goal is to “provide a nonprofit program to benefit young people.” As we reported earlier in the week, he wants charges against Lohan dropped in the car crash/lying to cops case because she wasn’t read her rights . Mmm hmm. Gonna have to do better than that, Mark, although the attorney is reportedly working on a new plea deal that would somehow keep her out of jail as well. That could be struck any moment, supposedly. Stay tuned.
I come to praise Lindsay Lohan , not to bury her. Yes, you read that right. Just a few months ago, I had declared the 26-year-old actress a lost cause who had swapped a promising career for a rap sheet. And then Paul Schrader let me see The Canyons . ‘The Canyons’: A Porn Star & A Miniscule Budget Before I focus on Lohan, let me say this about the film: Despite the drawbacks of working with a miniscule, crowd-sourced $250,000 budget, and a cast that included porn star, James Deen , as its leading man, Schrader has made a taut, visually gripping movie that says some really smart things about the movie business and the Los Angelenos in their 20s who populate it today. It’s an unsentimental West-Coast Girls , done as tragedy instead of comedy. Lindsay Lohan In ‘The Canyons’: A Career-Saving Role? Anchoring the movie is a performance by Lohan that should mark the beginning of the 26-year-old actress’s path to professional redemption. Lohan plays Tara, a former struggling model/actress who’s made a Faustian bargain for a more comfortable life, and under Schrader’s shrewd direction, she gives an acrid, wounded performance that is going to change the minds of quite a few people who have written her off. “A lot of people are going to be asking, ‘What happened to the girl from Parent Trap ‘?” Schrader told me. “It’s really tough with young performers. By the time they’re 16 or 17, they have been taught that they are perfect and that everything in the world belongs to them. And then about three years later, somebody comes to them and says, ‘Okay, you have to start over again. And nothing you earned before is going to help you.’” Lohan has endured a lot of misery — much of it self-inflicted — since the giddy heights of her America’s Sweetheart days in Freaky Friday and Mean Girls, and, like Tara, she’s made some regrettable compromises, too, but her performance in The Canyons shows that she is really good at using the drama from her life to inform the character she’s playing onscreen. Her performance in The Canyons is more than a reminder that she’s got real talent: it’s an announcement that she’s ready to play complicated women instead of older ingénues. Paul Schrader Compares Lohan To Ann-Margret “This is her Ann-Margret Moment,” Schrader told me, referring to the 1960s bombshell who graduated from fizzy romantic comedies and musicals by portraying a woman in an abusive relationship in Carnal Knowledge (and earned an Oscar nomination in the process.) “When we were working, I kept noticing that Lindz was this blowsy, tough girl who, at times looked like Gena Rowlands, who, at times, looked like Ann-Margret and at times looked like Angie Dickinson.” That’s quite a compliment from the writer of Taxi Driver , The Last Temptation of Christ and the director of Auto Focus and Affliction (which he also adapted from Russell Banks’ novel) — especially since Schrader was reluctant to cast Lohan in the first place and then, as a lengthy piece in The New York Times Sunday Magazine r eported, the actress behaved like a diva on the set. But Schrader’s praise is leavened with some tough love: After noting that Lohan has got the the chops and a “mesmerizing” quality that can’t be taught in acting school, he adds: “Unfortunately, you also have to have self-discipline. And so, if she can organize her life better, I don’t see why she can’t have a career. A lot of people want to hire her. It’s just that she’s not helping them do that.” Is A Career Comeback Out Of The Question For Lindsay? In other words, it doesn’t matter who’s rooting for Lohan to make a comeback. It ain’t happening unless she gets her act together. And her track record is not exactly encouraging. As Schrader knows too well, there’s also a very loud and distracting contingent of blogosphere voices that envision only failure for Lohan. Their caustic response to Times story, which was snarkily titled Here Is What Happens When You Cast Lindsay Lohan In Your Movie , almost dashed his attempts to secure a distributor for the picture. Schrader says the cruelty of the comments leveled at Lohan and his movie surprised him. “I think that largely because of the Internet, it is now possible to publicly say things that used to be said in bars and locker rooms. We’re seeing a manifestation of vindictiveness and a viciousnessa cruelty — that’s also become evident in our political rhetoric, by the way — that was not acceptable at an earlier time.” The filmmaker says he feels “vindicated and legal” now that IFC Films has acquired rights to the picture and will release it theatrically and via VOD in the summer. Lohan could end up feeling vindicated, too. Nothing speaks louder than asses in seats, and if The Canyons finds an audience — and Lohan’s new lawyer Mark Heller keeps Lohan from going back to jail — Schrader will have given the actress her last best hope of resuming an acting career worthy of her talents. The rest is up to Lohan. And I’d like to offer this quote from the America’s original Sweetheart, the late Mary Pickford, for inspiration: “What we call failure is not the falling down but the staying down.” [ TMZ , The New York Times ] Follow Frank DiGiacomo on Twitter . Follow Movieline on Twitter . More On Lindsay Lohan & ‘The Canyons’: Lindsay Lohan In ‘The Canyons’ — The Preview Looks Pretty Terrible Lindsay Lohan: ‘The Canyons’ NY Times Piece On Making Of Paul Schrader’s Film Lindsay Lohan In ‘The Canyons’ Teaser Trailer — LiLo & James Dean Get Retro
