Interviews for 'The Help'

This highly anticipated film will have wider release in theatres this week! Rope of Silicon has even suggested 5 Reasons that 'The Help' is an early contender for this year's Oscars!



Here's an interview from Comingsoon.net which features a cast that includes Viola Davis, Emma Stone, Bryce Dallas Howard, Octavia Spencer, Jessica Chastain, Allison Janney and Sissy Spacek, as well as director Tate Taylor and the author Kathryn Stockett.



Synopsis: Set in Mississipi during the 1960's, The Help focuses on an oft-unsung side of the civil rights movement and the bond between African American maids and the children that they help raise. When an aspiring reporter (Stone) returns to her childhood home and doesn't like what she sees, she convinces a neighbor's maid, Aibileen (Davis), to help her put together a memoir that threatens to put the truth up against some societal boundaries - potentially at a significant cost.

More information on THE HELP

View more movie stills here

Anyone else like the song used on the trailer? Although I love the song written for the film written by Mary J. Blige, I'm so disappointed that Change the World is not on the soundtrack. You can listen to the songs here.





Like this quote by Minnie (played by Octavio Spencer):

“She’s got so many azalea bushes, her yard’s going to look like ‘Gone With the Wind’ come spring. I don’t like azaleas and I sure didn’t like that movie, the way they made slavery look like a big happy tea party. If I’d played Mammy, I’d of told Scarlett to stick those green draperies up her white little pooper. Make her own damn man-catching dress.”

The Tree of Life - interview with Jessica Chastain

Winner of the Palmes D'or at Cannes this year, The Tree of Life is due for release in the United States beginning May 27, 2011.

Here's an interview with Jessica Chastain discussing her role as Mrs. O'Brien, (wife to Brad Pitt's character). I posted about Jessica in an earlier post due to the many period dramas in which she's been cast. She's been mentioned as one of the up and coming actresses to keep an eye on!

From what I've read, the film sounds like it has something different to offer than the usual fare found at the cinema these days.

Review of film

Watch video interview

Photo: Ian Gavan / Getty Images

The Tree of Life (2011) - new images

I loved the trailer for this film, looks intriguing! Sean Penn, Brad Pitt and Jessica Chastain head up the cast.

Limited release: May 27, 2011

Director Terence Malick describes film:
We trace the evolution of an eleven-year-old boy in the Midwest, Jack, one of three brothers. At first all seems marvelous to the child. He sees as his mother does with the eyes of his soul. She represents the way of love and mercy, where the father tries to teach his son the world’s way of putting oneself first. Each parent contends for his allegiance, and Jack must reconcile their claims. The picture darkens as he has his first glimpses of sickness, suffering and death. The world, once a thing of glory, becomes a labyrinth.

From this story is that of adult Jack, a lost soul in a modern world, seeking to discover amid the changing scenes of time that which does not change: the eternal scheme of which we are a part. When he sees all that has gone into our world’s preparation, each thing appears a miracle—precious, incomparable. Jack, with his new understanding, is able to forgive his father and take his first steps on the path of life.

The story ends in hope, acknowledging the beauty and joy in all things, in the everyday and above all in the family—our first school—the only place that most of us learn the truth about the world and ourselves, or discover life’s single most important lesson, of unselfish love.

Early reviews at Cannes film festival

Coriolanus (2011)

A contemporary staging of Shakespeare's classic play about the titular Roman warrior, CORIOLANUS stars Ralph Fiennes, Gerard Butler, Vanessa Redgrave, Brian Cox, Jessica Chastain and James Nesbitt.

Source: "For his debut as a director, Ralph Fiennes has pulled the Shakespearean tragedy "Coriolanus" into the present-day world of 24-hour news coverage of riots and politics.

Fiennes takes the lead as a great but proud and flawed Roman general in the movie, which had its premiere Monday at the Berlin film festival. He stars alongside Vanessa Redgrave, who plays his iron-willed mother, Volumnia, Jessica Chastain as his wife Virgilia and Gerard Butler, cast as Coriolanus' sworn enemy, Tullus Aufidius.

Fiennes said he had thought about making a film of "Coriolanus" -- a tale of heroism, political manipulation, unrest and revenge -- since appearing in the play on stage a decade ago. He gave some thought to setting the movie in ancient Rome or in the 19th century.

"(But) I kept on seeing images in the newspaper or television which seemed to come from this story," Fiennes told reporters -- citing Russia's wars in Chechnya, riots in Athens and the latest global economic crisis. The film starts with a food shortages riot in a city in crisis. "I felt more and more convinced that the world around us was the right setting for the piece," he said."

IMDb

Video includes movie clips and press coverage from B.I.F.F.

> More video clips

Jessica Chastain

Her name has been popping up in more than one period drama that I've noticed lately! Jessica Chastain seems to be an actress with a growing repertoire and I'm looking forward to seeing her in The Help and The Tree of Life for starters, just 2 of the movies that she has coming out in the next year. Here are some of her period films:

The Wettest Country in the World (2012) with Tom Hardy and Shia LeBoeuf in tale of 3 brothers during Prohibition based on novel by Matt Bondurant

The Help (2011) based on bestseller by Kathrynn Stockett

Coriolanus (2010) a modern take on Shakespeare by Ralph Fiennes, with Gerard Butler and Vanessa Redgrave

Wilde Salome (2010) Al Pacino directing Oscar Wilde's adaptation of Salome

The Tree of Life (2011)
with Brad Pitt and Sean Penn, watch trailer!

The Debt (2011) with Helen Mirren, Tom Wilkinson, Ciaran Hinds, Sam Worthington

Agatha Christie's Poirot :Murder on the Orient Express (2010)
David Suchet and cast of many familiar faces!

Pirates: The True Story of Blackbeard (2006)
Hallmark Channel tv movie with Angus Macfadyen (Blackbeard) and other familiar faces: Richard Chamberlain, Mark Umbers, Rachel Ward, Stacy Keach

When I learned of the casting of The Help this past year, I couldn't help but notice that Jessica Chastain is a look-alike for her costar Bryce Dallas Howard. What do you think?

See more look-alikes

The Debt (2010)

[Sept 2011- Just saw film and thoroughly enjoyed it. Loved seeing the familiar faces of the 6 lead characters - some of my favourite actors!]

In John Madden's spy thriller The Debt, British actress Helen Mirren stars as a former Israeli secret agent who, 30 years earlier, participated in a famed mission to track down and assassinate a Nazi war criminal in East Berlin. This remake of an Israeli film goes back and forth from the 1990's to 1965.

Synopsis:
Rachel Singer (Helen Mirren) is a former Mossad agent who endeavored to capture and bring to trial a notorious Nazi war criminal - the Surgeon of Birkenau - in a secret Israeli mission that ended with his death on the streets of East Berlin. Now, 30 years later, a man claiming to be the doctor has surfaced, and Rachel must go back to Eastern Europe to uncover the truth. Overwhelmed by haunting memories of her younger self and her two fellow agents, the still-celebrated heroine must relive the trauma of those events and confront the debt she has incurred.

Cast:
[younger/older roles of characters]
Sam Worthington /Ciarán Hinds
Jessica Chastain/ Helen Mirren
Marton Csokas/Tom Wilkinson

Director: John Madden

Video: Helen Mirren talks about the film at Toronto film festival
Video: movie clip with Helen Mirren and Tom Wilkinson
Wikipedia
IMDb

Release date: Aug 31, 2011

Thanks to Sabrinalde for mentioning!