Posts Tagged ‘Angelina Jolie’

Those Who Wish Me Dead

Director: Taylor Sheridan

Cast: Angelina Jolie, Nicholas Hoult, Finn Little, Jon Bernthal, Aiden Gillen, Jake Weber, Medina Senghore, Tyler Perry

Oscar winner Angelina Jolie (Girl, Interrupted) lights up the screen in Taylor Sheridan’s adaptation of a novel by Michael Koryta entitled Those Who Wish Me Dead which centres on a fire jumper Hannah played by Jolie who becomes the protector of a young boy named Connor played by Finn Little after he witnesses his father being murdered by two heartless assassins Patrick and Jack played respectively by Nicholas Hoult (The Favourite, A Single Man) and Aidan Gillen (Bohemian Rhapsody, King Arthur: Legend of the Sword).

The father Owen, a forensic accountant came across some dodgy financial dealings and was targeted by a crime boss Arthur played by Tyler Perry (Gone Girl).

Unfortunately, the writer of Hell or High Water and Wind River, Taylor Sheridan who also directs this explosive action thriller does not provide sufficient background information on the motives for the killings or even frame the plot within a larger context which is the inherent weakness of a film, which should have been great, but turns out to be average. This is despite the star power of Angelina Jolie who simply looks too beautiful to be a fire jumper in the Montana wilderness.

Jolie should stick to doing more prolific roles like Maleficent.  Even Nicholas Hoult who was so good in the Oscar winning film The Favourite opposite Rachel Wiesz and Olivia Colman, was wasted in a film with minimal dialogue although due to Hoult’s massive physique he was impressive as the ruthless assassin Patrick who has to battle Hannah as she attempts to protect Connor during a raging forest fire.

Jon Bernthal (The Wolf of Wall Street) stars as the county sheriff Ethan who gets caught up in the middle of the action as the assassins go after Connor as he is left to fend for himself with the help of Hannah in the Montana wilderness. Hannah keeps telling Connor to run to the rivers which leads to the towns and to safety.

The action scenes in Those Who Wish Me Dead are very impressive and the forest is almost a character on its own, however the dialogue and the back story for this confusing action thriller needed to be clearly developed. Which is considerably disappointing since director Taylor Sheridan was the writer and director of such brilliant films as Wind River and the Oscar nominated Hell or High Water.

Those Who Wish Me Dead is an explosive action thriller with Angelina Jolie taking the lead as the gung ho gorgeous heroine, which is light on dialogue and heavy on action and suspense. This film is fun and enjoyable but the story is too weak to make the viewers empathise sufficiently with the plight of the characters.

For those that enjoy an action heavy adventure story, catch Those Who Wish Me Dead in cinemas now. This Montana set action thriller gets a film rating of 6.5 out of 10.

Those Who Wish Me Dead is now showing in Cinemas

Maleficent: Mistress of Evil

Director: Joachim Ronning

Cast: Angelina Jolie, Elle Fanning, Michelle Pfeiffer, Sam Riley, Harris Dickinson, Chiwetel Ejiofor, Ed Skrein, Lesley Manville, Imelda Staunton, Robert Lindsay, Juno Temple

Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales director Joachim Ronning directs the highly anticipated lavish sequel to Disney’s 2014 fantasy film Maleficent. Oscar winner Angelina Jolie (Girl, Interrupted) reprises her role of Maleficent the Fey protector of Aurora in Maleficent: Mistress of Evil and this time she is up against Queen Ingrith wonderfully played by Oscar nominee Michelle Pfeiffer (Love Field, Dangerous Liaisons, The Fabulous Baker Boys).

In Maleficent: Mistress of Evil, Maleficent and Queen Ingrith first meet at a pre-marital dinner for Aurora played again by Elle Fanning (Mary Shelley, The Beguiled) and her beau Prince Philip played by Harris Dickinson last seen on the small screen as the kidnapped J. Paul Getty III in the excellent TV series Trust directed by Oscar winning director Danny Boyle (Slumdog Millionaire).

Immediately Queen Ingrith and Maleficent do not hit it off, as the vivacious and calculating Queen sets a trap for the fairies at the impending wedding of Aurora and Prince Philip.

Soon Maleficent is sent wounded into the underworld where she is rescued by Conall played by Oscar nominee Chiwetel Ejiofor (12 Years a Slave) and the hunky looking Borra played by Ed Skrein (Deadpool, The Transporter Refuelled).

British stars Juno Temple (Atonement, Wonder Wheel, Black Mass), Lesley Manville (Phantom Thread) and Oscar nominee Imelda Staunton (Vera Drake) reprise their roles as Thistlewit, Flittle and Knotgrass respectively.

Whilst the plot of Maleficent: Mistress of Evil is certainly not as original as the 2014 film, the stunning visual effects and marvellous pace of the film make up for any shortcomings. The best casting choice was Michelle Pfeiffer playing the vicious Mother-in-Law to be much to the consternation of the utterly oblivious son and husband.

Fans of Maleficent will certainly savour this fabulous sequel even if it is to watch the gorgeous Angelina Jolie make her big screen comeback, post her highly publicized divorce from Brad Pitt.

All the secondary characters pale in comparison to the diva rivals onscreen namely Jolie and Pfeiffer as they battle it out in this glittering fantasy adventure to truly claim the nefarious title of Mistress of Evil.

While not as brilliant as the original, Maleficent: Mistress of Evil gets a Film Rating: 7 out of 10 and will surely keep audiences entertained while giving viewers further ideas for future Halloween ensembles.

The 57th Golden Globe Awards

Took place on Sunday 23rd January 2000 by the Hollywood Foreign Press Association

Golden Globe Winners in The Film Categories:

Best Film Drama – American Beauty

Best Actor Drama – Denzel Washington – The Hurricane

Best Actress Drama – Hilary Swank – Boys Don’t Cry

Best Actor Musical/Comedy – Jim Carrey – Man on the Moon

Best Actress Musical/Comedy – Janet McTeer – Tumbleweeds

Best Film Musical/Comedy – Toy Story 2

Best Supporting Actor – Tom Cruise – Magnolia

Best Supporting Actress – Angelina Jolie – Girl, Interrupted

Best Director – Sam Mendes – American Beauty

Best Foreign Language Film – All About My Mother (Spain)

Maleficent

Director: Robert Stromberg

Cast: Angelina Jolie, Elle Fanning, Sharlto Copley, Sam Riley, Kenneth Cranham, Imelda Staunton, Juno Temple, Leslie Manville

The classic Disney tale of Sleeping Beauty is gorgeously reinvented entirely from the perspective of the jilted fairy Malificent who after a brief romance with a young teenage boy, Stefan soon discovers humanity’s tendency for greed and ambition.

Oscar winner Angelina Jolie’s magnetic screen presence reverberates throughout this spectacular fantasy as she transforms from an innocent though powerful fairy to an evil, caustic fairy who avenges the older Stefan, played by District 9’s Sharlto Copley, who in his ambition to become King of the Human Realms, clips Malificent’s powerful wings while she is sleeping.

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Malificent in turn seeks revenge on the nearby kingdom with a spectacular entrance at the christening of Stefan’s only baby daughter, the cute and adorable Aurora, casting a spell on the child that by the time she turns 16 she will have pricked her finger on a spinning wheel and fall into a treacherous sleep, only to be broken by the kiss of her true love. Naturally Stefan bundles the child off to a safe haven in the countryside with the help of three hapless fairy guardians, played by Imelda Staunton, Juno Temple and Leslie Manville away from Malificent and any lethal needles from nearby spinning wheels, most of which have been tossed into a dungeon and burned.

Meanwhile the war between the fairies and humans intensifies as Stefan sends his burly soldiers to destroy Malificent’s magical realm only to be met by an impenetrable wall of thorns. Curiosity gets the better of the teenage Aurora, a luminous performance by the new Hollywood It girl Elle Fanning (Somewhere, Super 8, Ginger and Rosa) who ventures into Malificent’s domain and naturally meets the menacing if not curious evil fairy who soon harbours an unnatural affection for the cursed youth.

Malificent is ably assisted by Diaval, a changeling creature, played by Sam Riley which enables her to keep an eye on Stefan’s Kingdom.
The stage is set for a showdown between Malificent and King Stefan with the wandering Aurora a luscious pawn in their bitter fight representative of eternal unrequited love.

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What makes this cinematic retelling of Sleeping Beauty truly astounding is the spell bounding special effects and an astounding powerful performance by the dazzling Angelina Jolie, whose star power clearly is the main reason Disney Studios choose to reinvent a darker more accessible version of the original animated Sleeping Beauty classic.

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Malificent is dazzling, intriguing and while retaining its childhood charm, balances a subtle attraction for older audiences, who prefer their fairies darker and vengeanceful. Angelina Jolie is central to this fine balancing act and the scenes between her and Fanning as Aurora are especially infused with delicacy and dimension, making Malificent one of the more complex and sympathetic hero/villain characters ever created in the pantheon of modern day fairy and folklore tales.

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Malificent is highly recommended viewing not just for Angelina Jolie’s powerful and superb performance but also for the brilliant special effects orchestrated by first time director Robert Stromberg who served as a Visual Effects Supervisor on such films as 2012, The Hunger Games and Shutter Island. Watch out for newcomer Australian actor Brenton Thwaites as the naive Prince Phillip aka Prince Charming.

72nd Academy Awards

26th March 2000

Oscar Winners at the 72nd Academy Awards

Best Film – American Beauty

Best Director: Sam Mendes – American Beauty

Best Actor: Kevin Spacey – American Beauty

Best Actress: Hilary Swank – Boys Don’t Cry

Best Supporting Actor: Michael Caine – The Cider House Rules

Best Supporting Actress: Angelina Jolie – Girl Interrupted

Best Original Screenplay – Alan Ball – American Beauty

Best Adapted Screenplay – John Irving – The Cider House Rules

Best Foreign Language Film – All About my Mother directed by Pedro Almodovar  (Spain)

Best Documentary Feature – One Day in September directed by Arthur Cohn and Kevin Macdonald

Best Original Score – John Corigiliano –  The Red Violin

Best Cinematography – Conrad L. Hall – American Beauty

Best Costume Design – Lindy Hemming – Topsy Turvy

Best Film Editing – Zach Staenberg – The Matrix

Best Visual Effects – The Matrix

Source – http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/72nd_Academy_Awards

The Tourist

Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck stylish comic thriller The Tourist is more a film to showcase some European and British talent than it is a blockbuster for the two major American stars, Angelina Jolie and Johnny Depp.

Jolie and Depp shine as the leading couple especially in a wonderful scene at the Hotel Daniela in Venice, when Jolie who plays Elize Ward tells Frank (the Tourist) that after a dinner out, he has to sleep on the couch in the deluxe suite. Frank imagines the glamorous Elize undressing in the next bedroom, as he curls up on the crimson sofa with his spy novel.  The next morning Frank is suddenly escaping Russian gunmen on the rooftops of  Venetian villas and falls victim to the idiosyncrasies of the Italian police force when questioned about his supposed pursuers.

Venice is a much a character in The Tourist as the rest of the cast, and the ancient Italian city built on water is murky with a seductive intrigue whilst von Donnersmarck shows off this superb location, from wide-angle shots of the Piazza San Marco to subtle references in the script. One of the characters a cameo by Rufus Sewell even says if this intrigue had happened someplace else it would not be the same as it happening Venice.

The Tourist is a tribute to sophisticated comedies of the fifties and sixties complete with gorgeous costumes, a dash of intrigue and a beautiful location to match. Depp and Jolie are a wonderful pair as foils to each other’s deceptions. There is obvious tribute to the James Bond films in the Tourist, from Moonraker and Casino Royale both set in Venice, to Timothy Dalton as the head of M16 and a sinister impressive performance by Steven Berkoff, playing the billionaire gangster Shaw, reprising the role of the villain as he did with menace in the 1983 James Bond film Octopussy.

The Tourist is a heady cocktail of intrigue, deception, humour and glamour letting the audience feel that like the title, they too have travelled on holiday to an exotic location and discovered a world unfamiliar to their own.

Director von Donnersmarck won the 2007 Oscar for best Foreign language film for The Lives of Others and is clearly enjoying making a less serious more glossy cinematic production whilst not compromising on the European style and sophistication of The Tourist‘s main locations, Paris and Venice.

Which always begs the question, why would a maths teacher from Madison, Wisconsin in the American mid-West be traveling alone on a TGV from Paris to Venice?

Salt

Salt is a fast paced action thriller which is intriguing and admirable for the wonderful casting of Angelina Jolie as the title character and Liev Schrieber so refreshing in this female version Mission Impossible style thriller set in Washington DC and New York, shot with the same vigour and energy as the Bourne trilogy less the exotic locations.

Australian Director Philip Noyce whose impressive credits include the brilliant Rabbit Proof Fence and The Quiet American directs Salt with panache and a strong control of the pace, plot and environment of shady double agents and counter-intelligence. Noyce has worked with Jolie before on the serial killer thriller The Bone Collector back in 1999, so he returns to familiar territory with the new thriller Salt set in the murky world of US counter-espionage with a superb supporting cast including Liev Schrieber and the hugely underrated Chiwetel Ejiofor of the famed Stephen Frears film, Dirty Pretty Things and Ridley Scott’s American Gangster.

Salt is a combination of the Boys from Brazil and In the Line of Fire with a fast-moving plot and fantastic action sequences reminiscent of Angelina Jolie’s earlier roles in Tomb Raider, Wanted and Mr and Mrs Smith.  Salt is a riveting thriller and worth the twist in the tale.