By Christopher Wallenberg
Martin Scorsese's first 3D film, "Hugo," an enchanting epic adventure revolving around an orphan boy living a secret life inside the walls of a Paris train station, is a far cry from the director's usual blood-soaked films about gangsters and urban decay. Opening Nov. 23, "Hugo" features a script by Red playwright John Logan (who penned screenplays for "Sweeney Todd," "The Gladiator" and "The Aviator") and stars a slew of stage veterans, including "The Queen" actress Helen McCrory (she was Cherie Blair), History Boys Tony winners Richard Griffiths and Frances de la Tour, and New York theatre veteran Michael Stuhlbarg (The Pillowman). Based on the award-winning New York Times bestseller "The Invention of Hugo Cabret," the film centers on the plucky young hero as he searches, with the help of an eccentric girl, for the answer to a mystery linking his father who recently died, the irascible toy shop owner living below him and a heart-shaped lock without a key.
"Juno" teammates Jason Reitman (director) and Diablo Cody (screenwriter) reunite for "Young Adult," which stars Oscar winner Charlize Theron as Mavis Gary, a writer of teen lit who returns to her small hometown to relive her glory days. Her first order of business? Wooing back her happily married high school sweetheart, played by Tony Award nominee Patrick Wilson (now starring in the CBS drama "A Gifted Man"). When her cockamamie plans prove more challenging than she imagined, she forms an unusual bond with a former classmate who hasn't quite put high school behind him, either. The film opens Dec. 9.
In recent years, Meryl Streep has played real-life figures ranging from Anna Wintour and Ethel Rosenberg to Susan Orlean and Julia Child. Now she's tackling one of the most famous — and controversial — political figures of the past four decades, former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher. In "The Iron Lady" (opening Dec. 16), Streep brings to life one of the 20th century's most influential women, who came from nowhere to smash through barriers of gender and class to be heard in a male-dominated world. The biopic spans seven decades in Thatcher's life, but zeroes in on the peak of Thatcher's power in the 1980s, when she (along with Ronald Reagan) helped usher in an unprecedented era of conservatism in the Western world. The film is directed by veteran British stage director Phyllida Lloyd (Mamma Mia!, the 2009 Broadway production of Mary Stuart). Streep, the most nominated actor in the history of the Oscars, famously got her start in the theatre. She was last seen on stage in New York in the Public Theater's Central Park production of Mother Courage and Her Children in 2006.
09 Oct 2011
Asa Butterfield and Chloë Grace Moretz in "Hugo."
Paramount Pictures
Meryl Streep in "The Iron Lady."
photo by Alex Bailey
Like "Carnage," this year's Tony Award-winner for Best Play, War Horse, also faces thorny questions about the financial and critical prospects for its stage-to-screen transfer. Fortunately, "War Horse" (opening Dec. 28) has Hollywood powerhouse Steven Spielberg as its director and a beloved colt-turned-stallion as its central figure. The allure of the spectacular stage production (still ensconced at Lincoln Center and in London's West End) was its magical and magnificent use of large-scale puppetry to bring the horses to life (manipulated by multiple puppeteers). But for the movie (based on the book, not the stage script), Spielberg employs live horses and the sweeping canvas of cinema to tell the epic story of an unbreakable friendship between a horse named Joey and a young farm boy, Albert. Set in rural England and Europe during the First World War, the film follows Albert as he nurtures and tames Joey from a wild pet colt into a strong and steady workhorse that saves the family farm. But Albert and Joey are forcefully torn apart when Albert's father, in dire financial straits, secretly sells the steed to the British army. Nothing, though, can keep Albert from his beloved horse, and he soon signs up to fight in the war, in a desperate attempt to reunite with Joey. From there, we watch as the horse endures the brutality of the front lines (where thousands of horses perished), while changing and inspiring the lives of the people he encounters.
Hollywood's obsession with all things '80s seemed to peak the past few years with big screen remakes of "The Dukes of Hazzard," "The A Team" and "The Karate Kid." But that nostalgic yearning for addictive but empty-headed '80s cheese appears to be continuing unabated. And '80s lovers will no doubt be kickin' off their Sunday shoes and getting loose at the multiplex when a reboot of the 1984 teen classic "Footloose," which made Kevin Bacon a star, opens in theatres on Oct. 14. The film centers on a fleet-footed city-slicker, Ren McCormack, whose parents move him to a conservative town where dancing has been banned by local religious zealots. But Ren quickly kicks up a sweaty hot mess of trouble with his rampant hoofing, then raises the ire of the local zealot preacher after he starts making eyes at his teenage daughter. "Footloose" spawned not only the "Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon" game but a blockbuster soundtrack with a slew of candy-coated pop hits (including the title track, "Let's Hear It For the Boy," "Almost Paradise" and "Holding Out for a Hero"). It also gave birth to a 1998 Broadway musical version that ran for almost two years and scored four Tony nominations. After being turned down by both Zac Efron and Chace Crawford, the producers of "Footloose" were holding out for a hero and found Kenny Wormald, a professional dancer best known for his music video work, MTV's "Dancelife," and a starring role in the little-seen "Center Stage: Turn It Up." The new "Footloose" is co-produced by the prolific Broadway, film, and TV producing powerhouse team of Craig Zadan and Neil Meron (the film versions of "Chicago" and "Hairspray," the upcoming TV drama "Smash," and the current Broadway revival of How to Succeed in Business). Let's hear it for these boys!
