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Dev, Freida, and Emily, Weekend Movie Reviews of Precious, Carol, The Box, and Men Who Stare at Goats!

Molly — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 15:34:28 -0800

It's the weekend which mean it's time for our PopSugar Rush Watch, Pass, or Rent Movie Reviews! We're looking at Precious, The Men Who Stare at Goats, Precious, and The Box. Plus, we were on the red carpet at last night's BAFTA awards, so check out Emily Blunt, Dev Patel, and Freida Pinto! There's Miley Cyrus, Rihanna, and more. Watch the PopSugar Rush Weekend Edition now!

Movie Preview: Benicio Del Toro, Emily Blunt in The Wolf Man

BuzzSugar — Thu, 20 Aug 2009 15:45:48 -0700

I learned way more about The Wolf Man movie than I needed to know back in July of '08 when I saw a Comic-Con panel with actors Benicio Del Toro and Emily Blunt. At the time I thought the footage looked really cool, and I figured we'd get a real trailer for the movie soon because the release date was April 3, 2009. That Comic-Con panel was, you know, over a year ago, and obviously April came and went. But now we do have a trailer for The Wolf Man along with some interesting images, and I think it was all worth the wait.

Now set to hit theaters Feb. 12, 2010, The Wolf Man tells the story of Lawrence Talbot (Del Toro), "a haunted nobleman," who returns to his ancestral homeland and is bitten (and cursed) by a werewolf. I wish the movie were coming out around Halloween! To see the new trailer and a gallery of spooky images, read more.

View 17 Photos ›

Photos courtesy of Universal Studios

Emily Blunt Joins Matt Damon For The Adjustment Bureau

BuzzSugar — Tue, 14 Jul 2009 14:30:59 -0700

Aww! I love this onscreen pairing: Emily Blunt will star opposite Matt Damon in the "sci-fi love story," The Adjustment Bureau. Based on a short story by Philip K. Dick, the movie will follow "a congressman (Damon), on the rise in politics, who meets a beautiful ballet dancer only to discover strange circumstances keep them apart." Emily Blunt will be the ballet dancer to Damon's congressman.

How sweet is this? Sometimes I see news of onscreen duos and it seems to be an imbalanced combination - one person more talented or more likable than the other. But here we've got two actors who are both beautiful and endearing onscreen. Loves it!

Buzz News Roundup, 5/29

BuzzSugar — Fri, 29 May 2009 13:30:08 -0700

The British Academy of Film and Television/Los Angeles will honor Emily Blunt as British artist of the year on Nov. 5. - Variety
Big Brother will be watching again starting July 9. - TV.com
Chevy Chase is joining the cast of the time-travel comedy Hot Tub Time Machine. - ComingSoon
How to watch the Britain's Got Talent finale if you're not in the UK. - AP
Naval captain Richard Phillips' life rights have been acquired by Columbia Pictures. - Variety
TLC has ordered a new reality show about lavish weddings. - The Hollywood Reporter
Seann William Scott and Adam Brody are joining Bruce Willis and Tracy Morgan in Kevin Smith's buddy action comedy A Couple of Dicks. - ComingSoon
Kristin Chenoweth will star in a Christmas movie for Lifetime. - Broadcasting and Cable

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The Great Buck Howard: A Funny Tale of Fading Greatness

BuzzSugar — Wed, 08 Apr 2009 15:30:13 -0700

The Great Buck Howard is a cute little movie that managed to further endear Colin Hanks, John Malkovich and Emily Blunt to me. It's probably not going to change lives, but it more than suffices as a good distraction. Plus, it's a new and interesting portrayal of that 20-something distress of not knowing the answer to questions like "What do I do with my life? How do I figure out what's next?" Perhaps because I’m not much older than Colin Hanks’s character in the film, I appreciate stories that explore this particular struggle.

It's a common conundrum in this day and age: Average kid Troy (Colin Hanks) graduates college and goes to law school for a while before realizing he doesn't actually want to be a lawyer - so, now what? There's blessed little time devoted to the whole clichéd argument about changing careers (i.e. "Becoming a lawyer wasn't my dream, Dad - it was yours!") and swift movement onto the meatiest part of the narrative: Troy's in-the-meantime job as personal assistant to a famous "mentalist" (not magician, mind you), the Great Buck Howard (John Malkovich). Troy accompanies Buck to all his shows, where Buck mostly plays to small crowds of older folks. Buck's delusions of grandeur make us cringe as it becomes clear that he's not exactly in the big leagues as a performer, and yet with Troy (and everyone else, for that matter) he behaves like a diva. Troy takes the abuse without complaint and he seems to feel pity toward the aging performer. When he meets a pretty publicist named Valerie (Emily Blunt), Troy starts to think more seriously about what's coming next in his life. To see what comes next in my train of thoughts, read more.

With his signature intensity and precision of speech, John Malkovich easily slips into the role of Buck Howard - and what fun for Malkovich to play such a wonderfully larger-than-life character. While certain parts of the story might drag, Malkovich's Buck Howard consistently draws us back in with his outrageously dramatic, egotistical, and unpredictable personality. Malkovich also nicely balances making Buck Howard obnoxious without allowing us to ever hate him.

The story moves into some ordinary territory with the washed-up performer treating his poor, young assistant badly. But Troy, with his even temperament, doesn't seem to mind too much, and the truth is that Buck Howard is a fading trace of an already faded star. Not only is he drifting into obscurity as a performer, but his art itself is not particularly popular nowadays. It also becomes painfully clear that Buck doesn't have anyone in the world that he can rely on. We'd pity this aggravating, lonely man, but we can't because he doesn't seem particularly daunted by his own diminishing fame. Why would he be? He's the Great Buck Howard. In his eyes, he's the greatest.

Furthermore, he still has his fans and he even has the respect of his assistant - largely because Buck has an especially puzzling and impressive trick and Troy can't figure out how Buck pulls it off. In many ways the movie is a coming-of-age story for Troy and as he transitions from his younger self to an adult, he still has this childlike desire to believe in magical things, and not being able to figure out Buck's trick delights and satisfies this part of him. He wants to still believe in the omniscience of someone magical, and the sweetest part about this whole story is that Buck lets him.

Photos courtesy of Magnolia Pictures

Link Time! 3/24

BuzzSugar — Tue, 24 Mar 2009 13:30:34 -0700

Help choose the ultimate '90s movie. - Best Week Ever
Some highs and lows from SXSW. - Pop Candy
Tina Fey and Megan Mullally love them some Conan. - Popwatch
Hooray! New pictures from Where the Wild Things Are. - Cinematical
Do you Hulu? - geeksugar
Emily Blunt talks about ditching Iron Man 2 for Gulliver's Travels. - MTV Splash Page
What are the best short-lived shows of all time? - TV Squad
Zac Efron out of Footloose remake: yay or boo? - PopSugar

Sunshine Cleaning: A Cloudy Comedy

BuzzSugar — Mon, 23 Mar 2009 07:30:45 -0700

Critics may draw comparisons between this year's Sunshine Cleaning and 2007 Best Picture nominee Little Miss Sunshine. Both were Sundance darlings, both star the wonderful Alan Arkin, and both have optimistic-sounding titles. And despite each film's light-bright disposition, both skew closer to comedy of the darker sort. This intriguing juxtaposition worked quite well for Little Miss Sunshine, and, to a slightly lesser extent, it works for Sunshine Cleaning, too.

The off-kilter premise is what first drew me to the movie when I previewed it for last year's Sundance Film Festival. I loved that the film focuses on the dirty and demeaning task of cleaning up crime scenes, yet didn't seem as gloomy as the description suggested. By the time I saw the trailer, it was clear: No CSI confusion here. Luckily the film delighted me as much as I had hoped, mostly because the two lead actresses, Amy Adams and Emily Blunt, are so compelling to watch.

To hear a little bit more about the plot and what else I liked, read more

In the lead, Amy Adams is Rose Lorkowski, a former hot-shot high school cheerleader who has settled into a low-paying career of cleaning houses. Emily Blunt plays her sister Norah, who, as a failed waitress, is even more down on her luck than Rose. It seems that the strapped-for-cash sisters may have inherited a touch of fiscal bad luck from their father Joe (Alan Arkin) who is constantly searching for ways to get rich quick. And while Rose disapproves of her father's shenanigans, she, too, finds herself scheming to pay for her son's pricey private school.

Enter Sunshine Cleaning, a biohazard removal service that Rose starts with her sister when she discovers that the field is rather lucrative. What follows are oddly hilarious scenes of Rose and Norah learning the ropes of the business and navigating the truly messy world of crime scene clean-up. Picking up chunks of brain matter and bleaching out blood stains sounds like your typical horror fare, but in the hands of these two ladies, there is a sense of down-iness that comes from their "we're in this together" camaraderie.

Despite the more comical moments, there are touches of genuine grief, especially when we hear about the suicide of Rose and Norah's mother, and view some of the sisters' failed relationships (Steve Zahn and Mary Lynn Rajskub are lovely in their respective supporting roles). These parts add a melody to a movie that could otherwise be somewhat one-note.

Bottom Line: The film doesn't reach the fever-pitch fun that Little Miss has at the end, but it's still a worthwhile journey, especially if you're a fan of Blunt or Adams.

Photo courtesy of Big Beach Films

Buzz News Roundup, 1/30

BuzzSugar — Fri, 30 Jan 2009 13:30:33 -0800

ABC has ordered Lauren Graham's comedy pilot, while CBS wants pilots from three dramas. - The Hollywood Reporter
Over a month after Disney passed on The Chronicles of Narnia: Voyage of the Dawn Treader, 20th Century Fox has picked it up. - E! Online
Leonardo DiCaprio's production company will produce a biopic about James Bond creator Ian Fleming. - The Hollywood Reporter
There's a prequel to John Carpenter's 1982 horror-thriller The Thing in the works. - Variety
Emily Blunt and Jason Segel are joining Jack Black in Gulliver's Travels. - ComingSoon
Ellen Barkin will star in a half-hour comedy pilot for HBO. - Variety
Oscar-nominee Viola Davis will join Jamie Foxx and Gerard Butler in the psychological thriller Law Abiding Citizen. - ComingSoon
Channing Tatum has been tapped to star in an adaptation of the David Morrell novel The Brotherhood of the Rose. - Variety
Madonna will crank up her Sticky & Sweet tour again this Summer with about 25 more shows, which will add to the total of what's already the top-grossing tour ever by a female or solo artist. - Billboard

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Movie Preview: Emily Blunt in Young Victoria

BuzzSugar — Mon, 12 Jan 2009 10:30:20 -0800

Emily Blunt playing a young Queen Victoria in a sumptuous period drama? Yes, please! The trailer for The Young Victoria is slow to build but visually beautiful and features the ever-capable Emily Blunt in the title role. The movie is a "dramatization of the turbulent first years of Queen Victoria's rule, and her enduring romance with Prince Albert." Rupert Friend plays Albert and the sweetness of his relationship with Victoria here looks so refreshing.

The Young Victoria opens in the UK on March 6. To watch the trailer, read more.

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Movie Preview: The Great Buck Howard

BuzzSugar — Mon, 08 Dec 2008 15:34:06 -0800

Filed under "Movies I Missed at Sundance, Sadly" is The Great Buck Howard, a quirky comedy with a stellar cast that includes John Malkovich, Emily Blunt, Tom Hanks and Colin Hanks. The story follows law school dropout Troy (Colin Hanks), who answers a job listing to be a personal assistant and "unknowingly signs on to work for a belligerent has-been magician [the "Great Buck Howard," played by John Malkovich] struggling to resurrect his career. This leads to a journey across the country staging the comeback of a lifetime."

John Malkovich is fascinating to watch in pretty much every role he takes on, though I really love it when he gets to play wackier characters . There's no release date for The Great Buck Howard just yet, but for now you can check out the teaser trailer and a couple of clips if you read more.

The teaser trailer:

Colin Hanks clip:

Movie Trailers - Movies Blog

Emily Blunt clip:

Movie Trailers - Movies Blog

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