Viola Davis

BEAUTIFUL CREATURES Casts Emma Thompson; Jenna Fischer and Rita Wilson Join KISS ME

by Dave Trumbore    Posted: February 9th, 2012 at 9:06 pm

Two-time Oscar-winner Emma Thompson (Sense and Sensibility) is the latest to join Beautiful Creatures, a supernatural love story based on the first novel in a best-selling series. Thompson will join Academy Award-nominee Viola Davis (The Help), as well as Jack O’Connell (Eden Lake) and newcomer Alice Englert. Richard LaGravenese (P.S. I Love You) will direct the adaptation from the stories written by Kami Garcia and Margaret Stohl.

In other casting news, Jenna Fischer (The Office) and Rita Wilson (Sleepless in Seattle) have joined the indie drama, Kiss Me, directed by Jeff Probst (“Survivor”). The coming-of-age tale follows a teen with scoliosis as she navigates adolescent relationships. Hit the jump for more on both projects.

Viola Davis to Star in BEAUTIFUL CREATURES and ENDER’S GAME

by Adam Chitwood    Posted: February 2nd, 2012 at 2:37 pm

It’s a good day to be a cast member of The Help. We’ve already reported a couple of high-profile casting stories regarding Octavia Spencer and Jessica Chastain, and now the third Oscar-nominated actress from The Help has booked not one, but two new gigs. Best Actress nominee Viola Davis is set as the lead in Beautiful Creatures, and will take a supporting role in Ender’s Game. Directed by Richard LaGravenese (P.S. I Love You), the film is an adaptation of the novel by Margaret Stohl and Kami Garcia and centers on two star-crossed teens who uncover dark secrets about their families, their history and their town. Davis will play a seer who looks after the boy and his father after the boy’s death. Beautiful Creatures is the first in a series of novels, and Warner Bros. is hoping that the film will kick off a franchise.

Hit the jump for more, including the addition of Davis to the increasingly impressive ensemble for Ender’s Game.

SAG Award Winners Announced; THE HELP Wins Best Ensemble, Best Actress, and Best Supporting Actress

by Matt Goldberg    Posted: January 29th, 2012 at 7:13 pm

The 2012 Screen Actors Guild Award winners were announced tonight, and The Help took home the top film prize, “Outstanding Performance By A Cast In A Motion Picture”.  The drama also took home awards for Best Actress (Viola Davis) and Best Supporting Actress (Octavia Spencer).  If you think that’s no big deal in terms of affecting the Oscar race, I have one word for you: Crash.  Granted, The Help didn’t even pick up an Oscar nomination for Best Director, but actors make up the largest block of Academy voters (25 percent).  And as we’ve seen, actors really like movies that make us think we’ve defeated racism, which we totally have.  That’s why all African-American actors pull in huge salaries.  Actors like Will Smith and…Will Smith.  I wouldn’t put The Help ahead of The Artist just yet, but Davis and Spencer should now be considered serious contenders in their respective catagories (Spencer is almost at a lock at this point).

2012 Oscar Nominations Announced; HUGO and THE ARTIST Lead the Pack

by Adam Chitwood    Posted: January 24th, 2012 at 6:05 am

The nominations for the 84th Annual Academy Awards have finally been unveiled. Many of the categories have fallen in line just as most have predicted (I fared alright with my predictions, but not great), with Hugo scoring 11 nods, followed closely by The Artist with 10. The biggest surprises are War Horse and Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close getting in for Best Picture, the exclusion of The Adventures of Tintin from Best Animated Feature, and The Tree of Life nabbing Best Picture and Best Director nods (hooray!). On the snub side of things, despite landing the most precursor critics awards of any other actor in the race thus far, Albert Brooks was denied a Best Supporting Actor nod for his stellar work in Drive (boo). Additionally, Tilda Swinton was overlooked for giving the best performance of the year in We Need to Talk About Kevin, and AMPAS has no love for Michael Fassbender‘s haunting work in Shame.

There’s still plenty to be happy about, as Gary Oldman has his first ever Oscar Nomination (yes, that’s right) and Melissa McCarthy is a Best Supporting Actress nominee. Hit the jump to check out the full list of nominees. The 84th Academy Awards will be presented by Billy Crystal on February 26th.

Oscars 2012: Adam Predicts the Nominees

by Adam Chitwood    Posted: January 21st, 2012 at 2:38 pm

As I’ve been covering awards season pretty extensively here on the site over the past few months, I figured it would be appropriate to (foolishly) try to predict the upcoming Oscar nominations. It’s been a fairly tame year, as a few frontrunners were singled out early in the race and have held their ground throughout the grueling awards season. We haven’t been without a few surprises, as Steven Spielberg’s War Horse took a massive tumble following snubs from most of the major guilds, and David Fincher has surged back into the race bringing his adaptation of The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo with him.

Though there are plenty of safe bets when it comes to the 2012 Oscar nominations, there are still a few wildcards and tricky categories. I’ve put on my prognosticating cap (those interested can purchase one of these nifty hats at your local Target) and compiled a list of who and what I think will make the cut. Hit the jump to see how I think the nods will stack up when they’re announced on January 24th.

THE ARTIST Wins Top Prize at Critics Choice Awards; George Clooney Named Best Actor

by Adam Chitwood    Posted: January 12th, 2012 at 7:52 pm

With each passing awards ceremony, it’s looking more and more likely that we’re in for a fairly boring/predictable Oscars this year. The Artist continues to dominate the precursor ceremonies as it took home the Best Picture and Best Director prize at the Critics Choice Awards. On the acting side of things, George Clooney was named Best Actor for his work in The Descendants, and Viola Davis won Best Actress for The Help. The Artist is our clear frontrunner headed towards Oscar night, and I don’t really think anything else will be able to take it down. I can’t really complain about any of the acting wins, though for what it’s worth I think Brad Pitt gave the best performance of the year in Moneyball.

Elsewhere, Drive won Best Action Movie (though it’s really a drama) Bridesmaids won Best Comedy, and Rango was named Best Animated Feature. Hit the jump to see the full list of winners.

Over 40 New Images from EXTREMELY LOUD AND INCREDIBLY CLOSE

by Adam Chitwood    Posted: December 11th, 2011 at 9:30 am

A large batch of new images from the upcoming drama Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close has been released. The film is based on the novel by Jonathan Safran Foer and tells the story of a nine-year-old boy who sets out to find the lock that fits a key left to him by his father, who perished in the 9/11 attacks. I’m a big fan of the book so I’ve been looking forward to this one for quite a while. The cast is great and director Stephen Daldry has a pretty nifty track record, so I’m hoping everything comes together well. The pic has already started screening, but it’s under a strict embargo after the whole Girl with the Dragon Tattoo fiasco (plus Scott Rudin is also the producer of Extremely Loud).

Hit the jump to check out the images. The film stars Thomas Horn, Sandra Bullock, Tom Hanks, Max von Sydow, Viola Davis, Jeffrey Wright, and John Goodman. Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close opens in limited release on December 25th, then expands nationwide on January 20th.

TOP 5: THE DARK KNIGHT RISES, Movie Stars Portray Famous Movie Villains, TRANSFORMERS 4, QUANTUM OF SOLACE Script Problems, Kathleen Kennedy Talks JURASSIC PARK 4, TINTIN, More

by Jason Barr    Posted: December 10th, 2011 at 12:40 pm

I think there’s something to be said for coming to your own conclusions. Case in point: I may currently be at odds with 77% of the Rotten Tomatoes critic community when I say this, but I found The Sitter to be worthy of my box office dollars. Was it the best comedy I’ve ever seen? Not even close. Was it the best comedy I’ve seen in the past six months? Nope. That said, I had been looking forward to the pic over the course of covering it for this site. When the critical negativity began pouring in, I could have easily passed on the film as a result (something I’ve been guilty of in the past). Instead, I decided to check it out and I laughed (quite a bit, actually). So, what’s the moral of my story? If you want to see a movie, go see it. Don’t let poor reviews detour you from something you think you may enjoy. Use reviews as a foundation for healthy debate rather than as an excuse to not give something a chance because someone else didn’t like it.

All ranting aside, in this week’s “Top 5″ installment, you’ll be able to read all about The Dark Knight Rises and its IMAX prologue, viral campaign, and potential IMAX footage runtime. You can also see George Clooney, Brad Pitt, Rooney Mara and more portraying classic movie “villains” of their choice, get up to date on Michael Bay potentially returning to direct Transformers 4, Daniel Craig discussing the script problems that plagued Quantum of Solace, and producer Kathleen Kennedy talking Jurassic Park 4, Tintin, Lincoln, and Robopocalypse. Check out a brief recap and link to each after the jump.

Brad Pitt, George Clooney, Rooney Mara and More Portray Famous Movie Villains

by Adam Chitwood    Posted: December 7th, 2011 at 12:06 pm

Well here’s one of the coolest stories you’ll see all week. A number of fantastic actors have gotten together to recreate some of the greatest villains in movie history. Brad Pitt, George Clooney, Rooney Mara, Ryan Gosling, Gary Oldman, Michael Shannon, Jessica Chastain, and many more are all part of director Alex Prager’s “Touch of Evil” project. The video gallery features each performer uniquely taking on the persona of an iconic villain.

Some of the characters are deep cuts, with Pitt as Henry Spencer from Eraserhead, Clooney as Captain Bligh in Mutiny on the Bounty, Mara as Alex from A Clockwork Orange, and Oldman genuinely unrecognizable as the ventriloquist dummy from Magic. Other highlights include Viola Davis channeling Nurse Ratched from One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest and Michael Shannon as Wall Street’s Gordon Gecko. It appears that the actors chose the characters themselves, which makes this all the more impressive. Hit the jump to check out the images.

2012 Oscar Preview: Best Actor and Best Actress

by Adam Chitwood    Posted: November 25th, 2011 at 7:19 am

Yesterday we unveiled our picks for the top contenders in the Best Supporting Actor and Best Supporting Actress categories for the upcoming 84th Academy Awards. Today, we’re taking on Best Actor and Best Actress. Though it’s still relatively early in the race, we’ve got some surefire contenders and a couple of clear frontrunners for the top acting categories. In addition to Academy darlings like George Clooney and Meryl Streep, we’ve seen some extraordinary performances from relative newcomers likes Elizabeth Olsen and Michael Fassbender. As I stressed yesterday, it’s still pretty early so things can definitely change between now and February, but there are certainly some clear frontrunners in these two races already. Hit the jump to see find out how everyone stacks up.

THE HELP Review

by Matt Goldberg    Posted: August 10th, 2011 at 7:09 am

Movies that take place during the Civil Rights era have become their own genre and one that sometimes diminishes the characters and their stories by making everyone into a hero, a villain, or a martyr.  The Help tries to expand those roles by showing that not all southern white people in 1960s Jackson, Mississippi are vile racists, not all black people are born courageous activists, and that while the battle lines were clearly defined as right and wrong, some people had to do some soul-searching to find where they stood.  The movie stumbles when it forgets to shade its characters and by being too faithful to the book at the expense of effectively translating the story to the screen.  But despite these missteps, The Help manages to deliver some powerful emotional moments due in large part to yet another tremendous performance from Viola Davis.

Viola Davis Exclusive Interview THE HELP

by Christina Radish    Posted: August 9th, 2011 at 5:59 pm

In The Help, adapted from the best-selling novel of the same name, actress Viola Davis gives an acclaim-worthy performance as Aibileen Clark, a life-long housekeeper in Jackson, Mississippi during the 1960s, who forms an unlikely friendship with Eugenia “Skeeter” Phelan (Emma Stone). Bonding over a secret writing project that breaks societal rules in a way that was unheard of at that time, Aibileen finds herself opening up and telling her stories about raising 17 children for her white employers, often at the neglect of her own son, who was tragically and unnecessarily killed in an accident. While a sisterhood emerges from the alliance between Skeeter and Aibileen, it gives many other maids the courage to share their own experiences, at a time when speaking out put them all at risk.

At the press day for the film, Viola Davis spoke to Collider for this exclusive interview, in which she talked about what a dream it was to play such a multi-faceted character, how difficult it was to live up to not only the expectations of the fans of this book but also herself, how she wanted to make sure every detail of her character was real and authentic, the challenges of making sure audiences could relate to someone who is a quiet and internal character, how she hasn’t taken a break since her Academy Award nomination for Doubt because she wants to keep riding the wave while the work is available, and that she would love to be able to do a grand, sweeping period piece. Check out what she had to say after the jump:

8 Movie Clips from THE HELP

by Steve 'Frosty' Weintraub    Posted: July 30th, 2011 at 11:14 am

Disney has sent over eight clips from writer/director Tate Taylor’s The Help, based on the bestselling book by Kathryn Stockett.  Set in Mississippi during the civil rights movement of the early 1960s, The Help is about “a southern society girl who returns from college determined to become a writer, but turns her friends’ lives—and a small Mississippi town—upside down when she decides to interview the black women who have spent their lives taking care of prominent southern families.” The film stars Emma Stone, Viola Davis, Ocatvia Spencer, Bryce Dallas Howard, Chris Lowell, Anna Camp, Ahna O Reilly, and Allison Janney.

I’ve spoken to a few people that have seen it and everyone has been raving.  Almost all say it’ll be a contender during Award season.  Hit the jump for the clips, and look for interviews with the cast week of release.

International Trailer and Two New Images from THE HELP

by Jason Barr    Posted: June 8th, 2011 at 2:51 pm

The international trailer for writer/director Tate Taylor’s The Help is now available online. While the first half of the cut is very similar to the trailer released back in April, the last minute devotes more time to highlighting the interview process that Emma Stone’s character takes on while writing about the lives of African-American maids in Jackson, Mississippi during the civil rights movement. While I consider Stone a great young talent, I’m mostly looking forward to checking out The Help because it looks to be genuinely interested in showcasing a segment of the African-American plight during a tumultuous time in American history as opposed to simply pointing out how helpful white people can be to those poor, helpless black folk (I’m looking at you, The Blind Side). Here’s to hoping that turns out to be the case.

In addition to Stone, The Help also stars Viola Davis, Bryce Dallas Howard, Jessica Chastain, Sissy Spacek, and Octavia Spencer. The film hits theaters later this summer on August 12th. Hit the jump to check out both the trailer and a couple of new images from the pic .

Maggie Gyllenhaal and Viola Davis to Star in Education Drama STILL I RISE

by Matt Goldberg    Posted: May 10th, 2011 at 10:07 am

Maggie Gyllenhaal and Viola Davis will star in the topical drama Still I Rise.  Directed by Daniel Barnz (Beastly), the actresses will play a pair of mothers who join forces to reform an inner-city public school.  According to Deadline, “the film takes aim at the crisis of public education in America.”  So is it going to attack the evils of standardized testing?  That there aren’t enough teachers and class sizes are swelling to where no student can get the attention they deserve?  Or will it be an attack on the abysmal pay for teachers?  I’m guessing “None of the Above”.  I’m betting that it will be an attempt to root out the “bad” teachers and a nice update to the school’s facilities.

Gyllenhaal and Davis are both great actresses and I hope they’ve signed onto a project that examines the complexity of our education problem rather than trying to uphold some quick, ineffective fixes.  And if not, perhaps they can do a film where the military’s budget accidentally goes to education.

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