(Photo by Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures)
After drawing some mainstream attention for her role in the preposterous, very ’90s guilty pleasure Hackers, critical acclaim came for Angelina Jolie with 1998’s Gia. That biopic of the tragic ’70s supermodel was an HBO movie, limiting its reach, but Jolie would only have to wait one more year to cross the megastardom threshold. 1999 not only saw her first box office smash (The Bone Collector, co-starring Denzel Washington), but also her first (and only) Oscar win, as Supporting Actress in Girl, Interrupted.
After that, it was pedal to the metal for Jolie’s career. Literally, her next role was the grand-theft-auto blockbuster Gone in 60 Seconds. She would quickly go on to star as Lara Croft in two Tomb Raider movies, attempt to revive the swords-and-sandals epic with Alexander, and release the action crowd-pleaser Mr. & Mrs. Smith. Jolie had her best run with the critics at the end of the 2000s with Wanted, Kung Fu Panda, Beowulf, and A Mighty Heart all released next to each other, all Certified Fresh. In A Mighty Heart, Jolie stars as Mariane Pearl, wife of American journalist Daniel Pearl, who was murdered in Pakistan in 2002. The film appeared to mark a new humanitarian drive to part of her work; the specter of war hangs heavy over three movies Jolie has directed since: In the Land of Blood and Honey, Unbroken, and First They Killed My Father.
Jolie was nominated for an Oscar thanks to Changeling, and Salt was a credible action effort, but The Tourist with Johnny Depp in 2010 was a high-profile misfire. Ditto By the Sea, which she directed with then-husband Brad Pitt. But no worries! She’s been accepted with welcoming arms into the Disney family after kickstarting the Disney live-action remake trend through 2014’s Maleficent, as well as its sequel Mistress of Evil. She joins the MCU later this year with Chloé Zhao’s The Eternals, but before that releases, we’re celebrating her birthday by looking back on all Angelina Jolie movies, ranked by Tomatometer!
(Photo by Disney)
Jude Law made his breakthrough splash in The Talented Mr. Ripley, though anyone who had been following his early career through Gattaca, Music From Another Room, and Wilde already knew what he was capable of by the time the world saw him in the Anthony Minghella thriller. Not too long after that, Law would be working with the likes of Steven Spielberg (he was the robot Gigolo Joe in A.I. Artificial Intelligence), taking lead roles (Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow, Alfie), and showing off his dark side as nasty villains (Road to Perdition).
And sometimes it seems Law is at his best in large ensemble casts: Just check out Cold Mountain, I Heart Huckabees, Contagion, The Grand Budapest Hotel, or even Captain Marvel for proof. His latest film was The Rhythm Section, starring Blake Lively. See where it places as we rank all Jude Law movies by Tomatometer!
This week on streaming video, we’ve got a big blockbuster sequel and a video game adaptation for motorheads leading the bunch. Then, Netflix offers up a couple of action classics, well-received remake of a French comedy, a bodybuilding documentary featuring a young Governator, and a period action film set in an alternate 1939. Read on for details:
This time out, Peter Parker (Andrew Garfield) has a lot on his mind: his relationship with Gwen Stacy (Emma Stone) is fraught with complications, and he becomes increasingly haunted when new information about the deaths of his parents comes to light. As if that wasn’t enough, our hero must protect the city from the likes of Electro (Jamie Foxx) and the Rhino (Paul Giamatti).
Aaron Paul stars as Tobey Marshall, a hotshot driver and mechanic with something to prove: he was framed in the vehicular death of a friend and served time in prison. He decides to avenge this injustice by entering a risky cross-country race against his former nemesis.
Robin Williams, Nathan Lane, and Gene Hackman star in this lighthearted farce about a gay couple who pretends to be straight to put some uptight prospective in-laws at ease.
Available now on: Netflix
Robert Fiore and George Butler?s fascinating look at the 1975 Mr. Olympia bodybuilding competition introduced a pair of future stars who?d trade in heavily on their physiques: Arnold Schwarzenegger and Lou Ferrigno.
Available now on: Netflix
The heroic Sky Captain (Jude Law) and a Royal Navy led by the eyepatch-rocking Francesca “Franky” Cook (Angelina Jolie) goes up against the giant robot army of the nefarious Dr. Totenkopf (Sir Laurence Olivier, in a display of technology both thrilling and sort of creepy) in an alternate version of 1939.
Available now on: Netflix
Over the course of a career spanning two decades and dozens of movies, Jude Law has become one of the most successful actors of his generation — in fact, just a few years ago, he made the industry’s “top 10 most bankable” list. This weekend, he has the honor of starring in the HBO miniseries The Young Pope, which centers on the reign of the first American pope, Pius XIII. To celebrate, we decided to take the opportunity to pay tribute to some of Mr. Law’s biggest critical hits. Of course, given his propensity for smaller parts, we had to prune a few entries from the upper reaches of Law’s Tomatometer; his roles in films like The Aviator, Hugo, and The Grand Budapest Hotel weren’t quite substantial enough to make the grade. Still, we think you’ll find plenty to love in this week’s list. Without further ado… Jude Law’s best movies!
If a person wanted to film an Oscar Wilde biopic, they could hardly do better than Richard Ellmann’s Pulitzer-winning biography for source material — and they couldn’t ask for a more perfect leading man than Stephen Fry, who uses 1997’s Wilde as an acting clinic. In fact, although most critics agreed Brian Gilbert’s film was flawed, they were too enthralled by Fry’s performance — in addition to solid supporting turns from Jennifer Ehle, Michael Sheen, and Law (who plays Lord Alfred Douglas, the self-absorbed object of Wilde’s ultimately ruinous affections) — to find much fault with Wilde. In the words of the Sunday Times’ Shannon J. Harvey, “There’s never been a better story about the misadventures of one of the world’s greatest writers. Fry should have been Oscar nominated, and Law is equally electrifying.”
It suffered from close proximity to The Matrix — not to mention an unfortunately spelled title — but most critics thought David Cronenberg’s eXistenZ was one of the more enjoyable, and overlooked, futuristic thrillers of the ’90s. This is admittedly a rather short list (Johnny Mnemonic, anyone?), but still — given Cronenberg’s track record, eXistenZ‘s ignominious commercial fate is a little puzzling. On the other hand, Cronenberg didn’t do himself any favors with a storyline about a game developer (Jennifer Jason Leigh) and a low-level employee at her company (Law) on the run from bad guys wielding freaky guns that shoot human teeth. Sound bizarre? It is, and that doesn’t even take into account the script’s constant shifts between the real world and an increasingly difficult-to-detect virtual reality. Not a film with particularly broad appeal, in other words, but it tickled the neuroreceptors of critics like Jim Ridley of the Nashville Scene, who wrote, “Cronenberg makes leaps of logic, character, and setting so baffling that they don’t become clear until the end. Even then, the final outcome is so devious you’ll sit poking yourself to make sure you won’t disappear with the click of the projector.”
As a book, Charles Frazier’s Cold Mountain was a bestselling phenomenon, and just the kind of sweeping, romantic period piece that cried out for a film adaptation. That cry was answered with Anthony Minghella’s stately take on the tale of a Confederate Civil War soldier (Law) who deserts and slowly wends his way back to his beloved (Nicole Kidman) while dodging Union troops and the southern Home Guard. Released on Christmas Day 2003, the Cold Mountain movie was a $173 million hit, but not without its detractors; Cinema Crazed’s Felix Vasquez Jr., for instance, called the Miramax production “So utterly manufactured for Oscar, it was nauseating.” Still, most critics were willing to look past the flaws in Minghella’s beautifully filmed epic; in the words of Philip Martin of the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, “There are intimations of a genuinely moving film; in its best moments, Cold Mountain is a fantasy that — like the Lord of the Rings movies — aspires to Shakespearean heights.”
One of a mind-boggling six movies Law starred in throughout 2004, Kerry Conran’s Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow was sort of a beta Avatar, combining live action and computer-generated effects in new and exciting ways. Adding to the gee-whiz factor was Conran’s gleefully retro storyline, which pitted the heroic Sky Captain (Law, natch) against the giant robot army of the nefarious Dr. Totenkopf (Sir Laurence Olivier, in a display of technology both thrilling and sort of creepy) in an alternate version of 1939. Captain mimicked the Golden Age matinee serials so successfully that many modern filmgoers didn’t quite know what to make of it, and as a result, it went the fate of Totenkopf’s army at the box office — but it was welcomed with open arms by critics like Ed Park of the Village Voice, who wrote, “His nostalgia enabled by technology, Conran takes the ghosts in his machine seriously, and the results appear at once meltingly lovely and intriguingly inhuman.”
A project Stanley Kubrick had been working on since the early 1970s, A.I. was the Hollywood equivalent of vaporware for years; even after Kubrick handed the reins to Steven Spielberg in 1995, the movie remained largely in stasis until Kubrick’s unexpected death in 1999. As has been the case with more than one sci-fi epic (see: Avatar), the delay was at least partially fortuitous — by the time production started in earnest, special effects had evolved to the point where the tale of a robot boy (Haley Joel Osment) on his quest to become real could be believably told. A.I. was criticized for its uneasy blend of darkness and sentimentality, exemplified by Osment’s character’s friendship with Gigolo Joe, the prostitute robot played by Law. Despite grossing more than $230 million, A.I. was regarded by many as a disappointment — but most critics saw through the catcalls, including Jimmy O of Film Snobs, who wrote, “A.I. stands as a work that allows us to see ourselves in the things that we have created. For good or for bad, it is an eye-opening experience.”
Adapted from the Guardians of Childhood series authored by writer and illustrator William Joyce, Rise of the Guardians took the novel premise of the books — basically, that magical kids’ legends like Santa Claus and the Tooth Fairy are members of an Avengers-like team of action heroes — and used it as the basis for a colorfully animated adventure with an all-star voice cast that included Alec Baldwin, Isla Fisher, Hugh Jackman, Chris Pine, and Law as the group’s deliciously evil adversary, Pitch the Nightmare King. Although this would-be franchise starter was regarded as a box office disappointment, it resonated with a good number of critics — including the Atlantic’s Christopher Orr, who called it “A children’s fable reimagined as a superhero flick — a peculiar but delightful hybrid that just may be the best animated offering of the year.”
In 1996, Dolly the sheep made headlines as the first cloned mammal, sending previously sci-fi-worthy topics like genetic engineering and eugenics to the forefront of public debate. You’d think that would make an instant smash out of a futuristic thriller about a man hiding behind someone else’s genetic identity — Columbia Pictures certainly thought so — but Andrew Niccol’s Gattaca still went down as one of 1997’s more notorious flops. Ethan Hawke starred as Vincent Freeman, a genetic “in-valid” who flouts the rules preventing him from joining the space program by buying off Jerome Morrow (Law), a paraplegic ex-swimmer with perfect DNA, setting in motion a chain of events that puts Freeman on a collision course with a squad of detectives led by his own brother (Loren Dean). It’s undeniably juicy stuff, and it was greeted with critical applause, but audiences weren’t interested for some reason — a disappointment for scribes like James Sanford, who called it “a smart, beautifully crafted piece of not-so-science-fiction that manages to successfully mix social commentary and suspense into a generally enthralling story.”
Tom Hanks as a ruthless Mafia assassin? It sounds like a sketch Saturday Night Live might have aired after Forrest Gump, but Sam Mendes’ Road to Perdition was no joke — particularly not in the casting department, which surrounded Hanks with rock-solid supporting players like Paul Newman, Daniel Craig, and Jude Law as Harlen Maguire, the crime scene photographer/icky hitman hired to murder Hanks and his young son (Tyler Hoechlin). The only one of the movie’s characters not adapted from Max Allan Collins and Richard Piers Rayner’s graphic novel, Maguire could easily have provoked a negative response from fans of the book — but Law made a great, creepy villain, mussing his good looks behind sallow skin and bad teeth. Ken Hanke was one of the many critics who enjoyed Road, writing “It’s all done with tremendous style and backed by exceptional performances. Jude Law and Paul Newman are both brilliant and chilling, but the real revelation is Tom Hanks.”
Matt Damon got a lot of attention for his performance in the title role — and deservedly so — but The Talented Mr. Ripley revolves around the machinations of a sociopath who finds himself irresistibly drawn to a casually cruel, devastatingly handsome playboy, and who better to play that part than Jude Law? The BBC’s Stella Papamichael was one of several critics who singled out Law’s performance, saying “In a starry lineup, it’s Jude Law who commands most presence, playing the charmer so well that his absence in the latter half leaves a gaping void.” Anthony Minghella’s adaptation of the Patricia Highsmith novel had a lot of pitfalls to avoid on the way to the screen, and it didn’t sidestep all of them; still, 83 percent on the Tomatometer and a small boatload of awards (including Law’s BAFTA and Blockbuster nods) is pretty impressive for a deeply unsettling Christmas release with amoral, misanthropic overtones. Calling it “a gorgeously unsettling film,” New York Magazine’s Peter Raniner warned, “You can hide in the shadows, but luminescence exposes who you are, and the only escape is into another identity.”
Before they hooked up for Side Effects, Law and Steven Soderbergh worked together in Contagion, a chilly 2011 medical thriller that uses our ever-more-connected modern lifestyle as a framing device to demonstrate just how quickly and easily a contagious disease could spread across the planet. With a showy cast that included Matt Damon, Kate Winslet, Laurence Fishburne, and Gwyneth Paltrow, Contagion ran the risk of undermining its dramatic impact with a parade of famous faces, but as David Denby argued for the New Yorker, “The presence of movie stars helps: their authority is part of what keeps us fascinated by the gruesome fable, juicing it a bit, so that we can actually enjoy it.”
I definitely had a handful of "Iron Man" comics when I was a kid, but I don’t think I remember this Pepper Potts character. Apparently she’s Tony Stark’s secretary, so to call her a potential love interest would seem kind of redundant. Anyway, you guys can stop worrying if the movie version of Pepper is going to be cute: She’s going to be played by Gwyneth Paltrow.
According to Variety, Ms. Paltrow joins Robert Downey Jr. and Terrence Howard in the Jon Favreau-directed Marvel Comics adaptation, and …. well, gee. That’s all we got, fresh news-wise, but I have to assume this is fairly big "geek" news: Gwyneth Paltrow in a superhero movie? The indie darling and award magnet? That gal?
Paltrow in "Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow"
Well, sure. Say what you like about "Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow," but I say the actress jumped into the geek/technology pool with both feet, and actually added some tongue-in-cheek charm to the movie. ("Sky Captain" rocks; I say give it a second chance!)
So it looks like the "Iron Man" cast is shaping up pretty nicely. Fingers crossed on the screenplay.
A few more buzzings have leaked out regarding Zack Snyder‘s "300," which is of course the highly-anticipated action flick based on the novel by Frank Miller. Apparently another guy saw it — and loved it.
From AICN: "Overall, this is a great film that, along with Sin City and Sky Captain, will change everything. Despite what some thought, I think what Zack Snyder did with Dawn of the Dead was inspired. He really takes his game to a whole new level with this film. I can only imagine that the people that truly care about how this film turns out will be overjoyed to see the final product. When it’s all said and done, Snyder pulls it off…and I couldn’t be more excited to see what he does with The Watchmen."
Click here for the rest; I just skipped to the bottom.
(And … did "Sky Captain" actually change anything? I really liked that flick, but … really?)
Wrestler-turned-actor The Rock suffered the worst opening of his career with the football drama Gridiron Gang, but thanks to weak competition, it was still enough to capture the number one position at the North American box office.
The new murder mystery The Black Dahlia bowed in second place with moderate results, but fellow freshmen Everyone’s Hero and The Last Kiss both failed to excite moviegoers. For the first time in over a year, only three movies were able to gross more than $5M during the frame. Overall ticket sales rose slightly from last weekend’s dismal showing, but still managed to post the second worst performance of 2006 giving the fall season a worrisome start.
For the third time in the last four weekends, football ruled the box office as Gridiron Gang topped the charts with an estimated $15M kickoff. Playing extremely wide in 3,504 theaters, the PG-13 drama averaged a decent $4,281 per site and gave The Rock the fifth number one opener of his career, but also his smallest debut ever. The action star continued to see diminishing returns on opening weekend with Gang which followed last fall’s Doom ($15.5M), 2004’s remake of Walking Tall ($15.5M), The Rundown ($18.5M) in 2003, and 2002’s The Scorpion King ($36.1M). The Rock also saw a $23.5M bow for 2005’s John Travolta flick Be Cool, but his comedic turn was only a supporting role.
In Gridiron Gang, the charismatic actor plays a juvenile detention camp counselor who inspires delinquent kids by coaching them in football. Budgeted at about $30M, the pic played to a younger and more male audience, as expected. Studio research showed that 52% of the crowd consisted of guys and 55% was under the age of 25. Reviews were not very good.
For Sony, Gang’s top spot bow marked the tenth number one opening of the year for the studio setting a new industry record. Having already banked over $1 billion in box office this year, Sony aims to extend its record performance with promising sequels like The Grudge 2 and Casino Royale which debut in October and November, respectively. The studio has opened a whopping 18 films so far in 2006, the most of any distributor. It has placed films in the top ten in all but two weekends this year.
September is often the worst month of the year at the box office as people shift their attention to other distractions like a new school year, a new television season, and the return of NFL football. But this year, the late summer and early fall have been especially slow at theaters. Over the past two months, only one film (Talladega Nights) has managed to open north of $30M. Four films did the deed during the same period in each of the last two years while five surpassed that mark in 2003.
Universal debuted its new crime thriller The Black Dahlia in second place with an estimated $10.4M. Playing in about 1,300 fewer theaters than Gridiron Gang, the Brian De Palma-directed pic averaged a moderate $4,655 per location giving it the best average among all the weekend’s wide releases. Starring Josh Hartnett, Scarlett Johansson, Aaron Eckhart, and Hilary Swank, Dahlia played to a mature adult audience with its tale of the investigation behind the brutal murder of a Hollywood starlet in the 1940s. The $60M film needed strong reviews to score with its target audience, but was met with little support from critics. In fact, the film scored only a 30% rating on RottenTomatoes.com’s critic scale which was even lower than Gridiron Gang’s 43%.
The weekend’s two other new national releases were mostly ignored by moviegoers. Fox opened its animated baseball kidpic Everyone’s Hero to an estimated $6.2M from a very wide 2,896 theaters. Co-directed by the late Christopher Reeve, the G-rated film averaged a soft $2,124 per site. 2006 has seen nearly a dozen toons invade the multiplexes. Hero’s opening ranks as the second worst of the year for an animated pic trailing only Doogal‘s $3.6M launch in February.
Paramount quietly opened its DreamWorks romantic comedy The Last Kiss in fourth place with only $4.7M, according to estimates. Landing in a mere 1,357 theaters, the R-rated film starring Zach Braff as a soon-to-be-dad with jitters averaged a mild $3,465 per location. Reviews were mixed.
Falling from first place was the supernatural teen thriller The Covenant which grossed an estimated $4.7M as well, off 47% from its debut. With $15.7M collected in ten days, Sony’s $20M pic could end its run with $24-26M. Another former number one, Buena Vista’s football drama Invincible, placed sixth with an estimated $3.9M, down only 31%, lifting the total to $50.9M.
A pair of solid word-of-mouth hits from smaller distributors followed. Yari Film Group’s period mystery The Illusionist slipped just 17% to an estimated $3.8M in its third weekend of wide release and upped its cume to $23.3M. Fox Searchlight’s indie hit Little Miss Sunshine became the company’s second-biggest grosser of all-time this weekend taking in an estimated $3.4M, down just 22%, raising the sum to $46.4M. The distributor’s only bigger hit has been 2004’s Sideways with $71.5M thanks to a prolonged Oscar run.
The George Reeves murder mystery Hollywoodland fell sharply in its second weekend tumbling 54% to an estimated $2.7M. Suffering the worst decline in the top ten, the Focus release has taken in a disappointing $10.5M in ten days and looks headed for a quick finish with only $15-17M. Rounding out the top ten was the Jason Statham actioner Crank with an estimated $2.7M as well, down 45%, giving Lionsgate $24.4M to date.
Buena Vista offered sneak previews in 800 theaters on Saturday for its upcoming marine adventure The Guardian and drew a well-balanced audience with males slightly edging out the women with 51% of the crowd. The Ashton Kutcher–Kevin Costner pic played to 70% capacity and will officially open on September 29 opposite Sony’s animal toon Open Season and MGM’s comedy School for Scoundrels.
Arthouses were flooded with new product this weekend as a number of films platformed in hopes of generating strong indie buzz. Lionsgate got off to a good start with its documentary The U.S. vs. John Lennon which debuted in only six theaters and grossed an estimated $72,000 for a solid $12,000 average. The film expands on September 29 into more than ten additional markets.
Proving once again that he is not much of a box office draw without pirates or Hobbits around, Orlando Bloom‘s new revenge thriller Haven flopped in its debut grossing an estimated $38,000 from 24 sites for a dismal $1,588 average for Yari Film Group. Fox Searchlight also struggled with its new wedding mockumentary Confetti which debuted to an estimated $20,000 from a dozen sites for a poor $1,701 average. Both films still plan to expand this Friday with Haven widening to about 75 theaters and Confetti falling into over 130 playdates.
Four films dropped out of the top ten this weekend. The Thai action pic The Protector grossed an estimated $2.5M in its sophomore frame falling 51% from its opening. The Weinstein Co. has kicked up $9M in ten days and should end up with only $13-15M. Nicolas Cage‘s suspense thriller The Wicker Man dropped 48% to an estimated $2.1M pushing the cume to a lukewarm $20.7M. The Warner Bros. title looks to complete its run with around $25M.
The summer’s top-grossing comedy, Tallageda Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby, slipped 34% to an estimated $2M in its seventh lap and boosted its stellar total to $145M. Sony’s Will Ferrell smash could cross the $150M line before calling it quits. Paramount’s Barnyard, another late-summer hit, grossed an estimated $1.6M while also in its seventh weekend. Down 40%, the animated entry has laughed up $69.1M thus far and is headed for $72-74M.
The top ten films grossed an estimated $57.4M which was down 14% from last year when Just Like Heaven debuted at number one with $16.4M; and down 4% from 2004 when Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow opened in the top spot with $15.6M.
Author: Gitesh Pandya, www.BoxOfficeGuru.com
Veteran filmmaker Jon Avnet has signed on to direct an action thriller called "Second World," which he promises will be a "ride from beginning to end." The concept sounds solid, Jon, so we’re holding you to that promise.
From Variety: "Jon Avnet is set to direct action thriller "Second World," which Emmett/Furla Films will produce with Avent’s Brooklyn Films.
Avent, who is in post-production on Al Pacino starrer "88 Minutes," is skedded to begin shooting this fall. Cast has not been set.
"Second," from a spec script by Scott King, revolves around a top assassin — and mother — who must stop a deadly virus from spreading. But in order to halt the potential pandemic, she must team up with the virus’ creator, who also is her target."
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Avnet’s previous films include "Fried Green Tomatoes" (1991), "The War" (1994), and "Up Close and Personal" (1996). More recently he produced "Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow."
Actresses Liv Tyler, Saffron Burrows, and Jada Pinkett-Smith will be joining Adam Sandler and Don Cheadle in "Reign O’er Me," a post-9/11 drama from "Upside of Anger" director Mike Binder.
Says The Hollywood Reporter: "Saffron Burrows, Jada Pinkett Smith and Liv Tyler are in final negotiations to join the cast of the drama "Reign O’er Me" for Columbia Pictures. Adam Sandler and Don Cheadle are toplining. Helmed by Mike Binder, the film centers on a man (Sandler) who lost his family in the Sept. 11 attacks and has not recovered from his grief. He runs into his college roommate (Cheadle), who is now a psychiatrist and is determined to help him cope with the loss. Burrows would play Donna, a patient of Cheadle’s character who has entanglements with both men. Smith is set to play Janeane, the wife of Cheadle’s character, while Tyler would play Angela, a psychiatrist."
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Mike Binder’s other films include "Blankman," "Crossing the Bridge," and the well-admired (by those who’ve seen it) "Indian Summer."
In Other News is back, with marital highs and lows alike to keep you gossip-mongers happy…starting with "Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow" star Jude Law, whose secret affair behind fiancée Sienna Miller‘s back was exposed by the British Press Monday. In response, Law issued a public apology to Miller, whom he has been dating since the pair worked together — appropriately enough — on the set of "Alfie." In his letter, Law says he is ‘deeply ashamed and upset’ for the illicit relationship he had with Daisy Wright, a former nanny for the children he shares with ex-wife Sadie Frost, and whom he met while in New Orleans — aka, the Big Easy — to film this winter’s "All the King’s Men." Law’s marriage to Frost ended in 2003 in a quickie divorce granted due to his ‘unreasonable behavior;’ there is no word yet on the status of his engagement to Miller.
Hopefully, a more blissful fate awaits newlyweds Sandra Bullock and Jesse James, who were married last weekend in a secret ceremony in Solvang, California. The "Miss Congeniality" star and her new husband, host of the Discovery Channel’s "Monster Garage," spirited 300 guests to a private ranch for the nups, where Bullock walked down the aisle to the sounds of her late opera singer mother, Helga Bullock, and guests chowed down on a wedding cake baked by sister Gesine Prado. Bullock got into the crafty action, too — she metal-worked James’ wedding ring herself.
And finally, more wishful thinking for the marriage-inclined — "Malcolm in the Middle" star Frankie Muniz has proposed to his girlfriend of months, a non-Hollywood civilian whose last name has not been publicized. The nineteen-year old "Racing Stripes" vocalist met his fiancée, ‘Jamie,’ in that hotbed of romantic pairings, New Orleans (see above Jude Law story), where he was filming the upcoming virtual-horror flick, "Stay Alive." The couple has not yet set a date, giving Muniz a chance to break out of his ‘it’s that guy from Malcolm in the Middle/Agent Cody Banks‘ mold and show audiences that he’s all grown up — maybe.
"Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban" leads the 2005 Saturn Awards with nine nominations, including those for Best Picture, Best Director, and Best Writer. "Kill Bill Vol. 2" and "Spider-Man 2" follow closely with seven nominations each. "Collateral" and "House of Flying Daggers" each received four noms, while "Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind," "Sky Captain and The World Of Tomorrow," and "Van Helsing" received one each. The Saturn Awards is an annual event that recognizes achievements in genre filmmaking. Winners will be announced May 3rd at the Universal City Hilton Hotel.
"The Incredibles" and "The Polar Express," two of this year’s effects-heavy films, are out of contention for 2004’s Oscar for visual effects, The Hollywood Reporter reports. Instead, the contest will be between seven films: "The Aviator," "Spider-Man 2," "Lemony Snicket’s A Series of Unfortunate Events," "Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban," "The Day After Tomorrow," "I, Robot," and "Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow." Out of these seven, three finalists will be chosen and announced on Jan. 25, 2005 when the rest of the nominees for the other categories are also announced.
