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Link Time!

BuzzSugar — Mon, 21 Sep 2009 13:45:07 -0700

It's Jim and Pam's wedding website! - Halpert Beesly
Get a load of new Edward, Bella, and Jacob stills from New Moon - PopSugar
Glee has been picked up for a full season! - Fox
Sacha Baron Cohen will lend his voice to an episode of The Simpsons - Entertainment Weekly
The NPH Effect: Emmy ratings were way up this year, improving on 2008's low viewership - The Wrap
Listen to new tracks from Built to Spill's upcoming album, There Is No Enemy - Stereogum
Can Michael Cera break out of his hipster-nerd pigeonhole? - PopWatch
The dreamy Nathan Fillion talks Castle, Dr. Horrible, and Joss Whedon - Pop Candy
Johnny Depp may be losing interest in doing Pirates of the Caribbean 4 - Vulture
There might be a Big Lebowski spinoff about John Turturro's the Jesus character - MTV Movies Blog
Patrick Swayze was supposed to have a cameo in upcoming horror comedy Zombieland - Coming Soon

Of Course Sacha Baron Cohen May Head to Eurovision Next!

BuzzSugar — Tue, 04 Aug 2009 06:30:58 -0700

This is one of those palm-to-forehead "of course!" moments: for his next trick, Sacha Baron Cohen will allegedly star in Eurovision: The Movie in which he will play a singer who enters the Eurovision Song Competition TV show.

Over two years ago, Borat screenwriter Dan Mazer and producer Damian Jones thought up Eurovision: The Movie, and Cohen will apparently dream up a new character who will compete on the show. Eurovision is described as an "annual TV songfest [that] brings together pop acts from 42 countries to compete for its grand prize, with the winner decided by votes from national juries. Cheesy, kitsch and often inadvertently hilarious, it's one of Europe's most-watched TV events."

Eurovision: The Movie will be another fake documentary, like Borat and Bruno. It's just a perfect combo. Cohen and Eurovision go together like peanut butter and jelly. If you have no idea what I'm talking about, just check out a couple of videos from the show

Bruno: Makes You Squirm More Than Think

BuzzSugar — Fri, 10 Jul 2009 06:30:44 -0700

There are cringe-inducing comedies, and there are grossout shockfests, and then there is Bruno. Sacha Baron Cohen's latest movie brazenly mates both genres while thrusting in a touch of documentary and hardcore porn.

Bruno made me squirm, but not in the way that Borat did. Whereas Borat succeeded in smartly skewering the stupidity of some Americans by putting them in uncomfortable situations, Bruno doesn't live up to its working subtitle: Delicious Journeys Through America for the Purpose of Making Heterosexual Males Visibly Uncomfortable in the Presence of a Gay Foreigner in a Mesh T-Shirt. I wanted this movie to be a nervous-laughter-inducing lampoon of homophobia and Hollywood, to tip my cringe-to-pleasure scale by putting bigoted people in embarrassing situations. Unfortunately, it let me down.

Where Does Bruno Fall on Your Cringe-to-Pleasure Scale?

BuzzSugar — Tue, 07 Jul 2009 05:47:04 -0700

Over the weekend I got to talking with some friends about Sacha Baron Cohen's upcoming movie, Bruno, and I learned that a couple of them probably won't see the movie because they find it too uncomfortable. The cringe-worthy situations that Cohen puts himself in, as Bruno and previously as Borat, are what many folks find hysterically funny, but at the same time, they can make some people squirm in a most unpleasant way.

Where does Bruno fall for you? Is it more cringe-worthy in a bad way than it is funny? Or is all the cringing just part of the fun? Or maybe you don't cringe at all!

Photo courtesy of Universal Studios

Get Ready to Cringe: Bruno Trailer Now Online

BuzzSugar — Thu, 02 Apr 2009 14:00:44 -0700

As the new trailer for Sacha Baron Cohen's next mockumentary Bruno points out, Borat is "so 2006," and we haven't had Cohen's particular brand of outrageous discomfort-inducing shenanigans since then. Well, Bruno looks like it more than makes up for lost time.

Cohen's flamboyant Austrian character Bruno travels around doing and saying crazy things to provoke people - and getting it all on film. The trailer for Bruno (which recently got an NC-17 rating) is by turns silly, uncomfortable, ridiculous and downright horrifying - you gotta see it (as long as you don't get offended easily and have headphones if watching near other people as this trailer is NSFW). For better or worse, Bruno hits theaters July 10. To check out the trailer, read more.

This is a red-band, restricted trailer, so you're required to enter in your birthday.

Witherspoon, Giamatti, and Cohen Looking to Downsize

BuzzSugar — Tue, 03 Mar 2009 15:30:26 -0800

I've been mulling over this movie news all day because it's this bizarre mix of intriguing and "whaaaaaaa?" I'm not sure I've figured it all out entirely, but I'll relay the stuff we know so far.

The good news is that this project, titled Downsizing, will be directed by Alexander Payne, the man behind Election and Sideways. And awesomely enough, he's gotten stars from both of those movies, Reese Witherspoon and Paul Giamatti, to sign on for this latest endeavor.

The plot is what loses me, however. Giamatti will play "a man low on money who decides he can have a much nicer life if he undergoes a process to shrink himself." What? Why will his life be nicer? And though the original article that posted yesterday stated that Giamatti and Witherspoon were married and that they both decide to become little people, now Variety is reporting that Witherspoon "would play a woman Giamatti meets on his journey as a miniature person." Variety also claims that Sacha Baron Cohen "would play a pint-sized foreigner." (in the earlier report, Baron Cohen was playing two different men, twins, one of whom is a "pint-sized Spaniard").

The way the article was originally written made me believe the "shrinking" meant that Giamatti would become a little person. But now I'm thinking this is more in the Honey, I Shrunk the Kids realm. Apparently "Downsizing would require considerable special effects."

I'm not sold on this project just yet. Then again, maybe the details will completely change all over again and it'll seem like a fantastic movie. It is a great cast and a director I like very much. Hmm . . . Thoughts?

Source

Which Sherlock Holmes Movie Would You Rather See?

BuzzSugar — Wed, 02 Jul 2008 11:32:48 -0700

There was Sherlock Holmes movie news recently (Guy Ritchie looking to re-invent the old sleuth story) and now there's more Sherlock Holmes movie news (Sacha Baron Cohen playing Holmes, Will Ferrell to play Watson in, of course, a comedic version). Can we call it a Sherlock Holmes "surge" or "trend" yet?

Regardless, there are two Holmes projects in the works and both sound intriguing. Especially now that I've seen the (freaking amazing) trailer for Ritchie's upcoming RocknRolla, I can't wait to see what kind of Sherlock Holmes movie Ritchie can create.

At the same time, Sacha Baron Cohen and Will Ferrell? Um, yes, please. They're funny together in Talladega Nights, and this movie has the potential to be hilarious, especially with Judd Apatow producing (though we know that's not always the sure sign of a great flick).

Which of these sounds more interesting to you?

Source, source and source

Oscar Nominee: Sweeney Todd for Costumes

BuzzSugar — Wed, 20 Feb 2008 12:29:17 -0800

In the days leading up until the Oscars, I'll be featuring the nominees in the various visual categories. This week, I'll be looking at the nominees for Best Costume Design. We've already taken a look at the costumes in Across the Universe, Atonement and La Vie en Rose. Today I'm highlighting the costumes in Sweeney Todd.

Veteran costume designer Colleen Atwood has already won a Costume Designers Guild award for her work outfitting the stars of Sweeney Todd, so things are looking good for this Oscar nominee. The drab woolen fabrics of many of the clothes contrast starkly with the dashes of bright color, especially, of course, the garish red blood. The palette of mostly muted grays, mustard yellows and browns helps to paint this grim world, with splotches of brilliant blues appearing with the showy character of competing barber Signor Adolfo Pirelli (Sacha Baron Cohen) and the sweet Johanna (Jayne Wisener) draped in pale, innocent hues. Overall, the costumes do well to transport us back to this dark old London where treacherous things happen in barber shops and beneath pie stores.

To see the rest of the gallery of costume images from Sweeney Todd, read more.

View 13 Photos ›

Photos courtesy of Paramount

Buzz News Roundup, 1/2

BuzzSugar — Wed, 02 Jan 2008 12:30:40 -0800

According to NME, MC Hammer is starting a Web site dedicated to dance videos.
Sacha Baron Cohen may play Abbie Hoffman in Stephen Spielberg's next movie, The Trial of the Chicago Seven, according to Variety.
ComingSoon reports that Tyler Perry will play a role in JJ Abrams Star Trek movie.
The New York Daily News reports on a contest where the winner is named the Ultimate Couch Potato.
Tila Tequila will date again on MTV, TV Week reports.
Madonna's directorial debut, Filth and Wisdom, will premiere at the Berlin International Film Festival, writes Billboard.
Saturday's NFL game between the New England Patriots and the New York Giants is now the season's most-watched TV broadcast with 34.5 million viewers, according to MediaWeek.
The St. Petersburg Times reports on the death of the TV theme song.

Source

Sweeney Todd: Sumptuous and Tragic

BuzzSugar — Fri, 21 Dec 2007 12:29:19 -0800

As I was leaving the screening of Sweeney Todd, my mind was swirling with those silly, cliche comments often seen accompanying ads for critically acclaimed movies: "Sweeney Todd is . . . a visual masterpiece!" "Another Burton beauty!" "A tale of blood and woe - woah!" I'll spare you the rest. The bottom line is that I was impressed. And nauseated. But mostly impressed.

The Stephen Sondheim musical and Tim Burton are a match made in heaven. Burton's dark, sinister-looking scenery and the bloody, musical horrorfest of a story gel together seamlessly to create something so lushly gory - but heartfelt - you may need to dry heave a little bit.

The story follows Benjamin Barker (Johnny Depp), a young man wrongfully imprisoned because the evil Judge Turpin (Alan Rickman) was obsessed with Barker's wife Lucy (Laura Michelle Kelly) and wanted her for himself. Years later when Barker returns to London, he renames himself Sweeney Todd and opens up a barber shop above Mrs. Lovett's (Helena Bonham Carter) meat pie shop, hoping to exact revenge on the judge by luring him in for a shave and then slitting his throat. For his part, Judge Turpin has been keeping Todd's daughter Joanna as his ward. Yet when a young friend of Todd's falls in love with Joanna by spotting her at her window, he determines to break her free from the Judge's grasp. Meanwhile, Mrs. Lovett and Sweeney Todd figure out a gruesome way to boost her meat pie sales. Those are basic plot points, but there's much more to say about Sweeney Todd, so read more.

Burton does some gorgeous tricks with light, color and reflection. Cracked mirrors and the reflections glinting off of Sweeney Todd's shaving blades are heavily used to distort or duplicate images, and to not-so-subtly symbolize Benjamin Barker/Sweeney Todd's fractured identity and his tortured soul. Burton's London is swathed in shadows and muted by a dark gray sky. His color palette consists of shades of gray with tinges of gold, blue and raspberry. The jarring exception, of course, is the brilliantly red blood that gushes freely, sometimes spurting onto the camera lens itself, causing the audience to instinctively jump back. The one time he interrupts this dismal color scheme is when depicting Mrs. Lovett's wistful dream of marrying "Mr. T" and spending the rest of her days "by the sea." The quintessentially Burtonesque costumes and candy-bright colors in this sequence are outrageous and delightful enough to garner giggles of surprise.

Johnny Depp is magnificent, as always, and the rest of the actors are wonderfully cast. Alan Rickman is genuinely disturbing as the perverted old judge. His right-hand man played by Timothy Spall is convincingly sick and twisted. Sacha Baron Cohen is funny as the competing barber Signor Adolfo Pirelli, which is to be expected, but the surprise is that his performance is also quite chilling. My favorite aspect of this film, however, is the classic Depp-Bonham Carter combination. They're simply the most perfect duo, as always - each strange and broken-down in their own way, yet both powerful in their own way, too.

This movie has been hyped to the gills, and it's hard to live up to such high expectations. Having said all this great stuff about the movie, the fact remains that it is still a musical, and people who think musicals are silly will most assuredly still think this movie is silly - Johnny Depp or no Johnny Depp. The movie is also not for the squeamish, as there is more blood - and, well, ground up human meat - than a B-grade slasher flick. I have an average-strength stomach and I felt the gag reflex kick in more than once. If you like this sort of thing, however, it's all worth it. Go see Sweeney Todd. Just eat a light meal beforehand.

To see the trailer and more clips from Sweeney Todd check out movies.ivillage.com.

Photos courtesy of Paramount Pictures