We’re assuming you already know all about “Smart People,” considering we ran a fancy video interview with some of its cast, including Sarah Jessica Parker, Dennis Quaid and Thomas Hayden Church. The film — about a series of folks who think they’re smarter than they really are — was a Sundance fave, and now we have a clip of it featuring “Juno” sensation Ellen Page. Watch it below, and then check out “Smart People” when it hits theaters April 11.

Share This

Everything Movies | Comments Off

Everything Movies | Comments Off

The Ruins was a best-selling book by Scott Smith. Now, it’s a horror movie coming out this Friday.

Here’s a look at a few photos from the film, which looks to be a smarter thriller than most cliched scary films out there:

We’ve also added a few quotes from The Ruins. We’ll add more as they come across our desks.

Everything Movies | Comments Off

George Clooney is more than a handsome face. He’s both a director and an actor.

The charitable hunk put both skills to the test for the upcoming movie Leatherheads. And he recently spoke to MovieWeb about the project:

How does George Clooney the director work with George Clooney the A list actor?
George Clooney: It’s funny. With the three films I’ve directed, the other two I only had bit parts in them. I wasn’t the lead. It becomes tricky, because there is an enormous amount of narcissism that comes into play. You are breaking the trust between two actors when you are in the lead. If you and I are doing a scene together and we’re talking, I’m not supposed to be judging you as an actor.

Some actors do that, and they’ll tell you what to do. In general you’re not supposed to break that trust. The director is. If we are doing a scene and we finish, then I go, “Okay, cut. Now try it like this.” It really requires an amount of trust. You have to go to each of the actors before you start and say, “Listen, this is going to be awkward.” You just get it out in the open and lay it out early. You say, “It’s gonna be strange all the way around.”

As an actor, it’s easy because I know precisely what I need to do in that scene. I’ve cut out that step where the director has to explain it.

Why did you choose to take the starring role in your own film this time out?
George Clooney: The truth is, I did it because I wanted to play this part for a long, long time. I always thought I was the right guy to play it. I also thought, “I’m 46. If I don’t do it now, I’m done. This is it. This is my last shot at it.” Soderbergh was going to direct it in 1998, when we were going to do it and I was very excited about that sort of prospect. Things kind of moved on. The script wasn’t in shape.

We had an outline. We had two or three scenes that we loved and characters that we loved, but we didn’t have a plot. Some years passed. I thought, “I want to do something that is completely away from what I have been doing.” I like screwing with different genres. This was a world I knew a little bit about. The style of film I knew. So, I spent a summer stealing from Philadelphia Story, homaging the hell out of those types of films.

And Hail the Conquering Hero sort of helped too. I was stuck in this world where I was going to direct it, and I was going to play the lead. What I hadn’t really paid attention to was that I was also going to be playing football. And it hurt. The first day I got hit by some 21-year-old that knocked me on my ass. I was like, “Okay, I’m in trouble because I’ve got four more months of this.”

I would never, by design, do a film that I would play the lead in ever again. It was really one of those things where all of it came together very quickly. It was a dumb move in some ways because it was a little too much to take on.

Leatherheads opens on April 4.

Everything Movies | Comments Off

After a long script-writing process for “Indiana Jones 4” that he told MTV News last spring was “a waste of a year,” celebrated director Frank Darabont wondered in November whether there would be any arbitration over credit, given how many of his own ideas seemed to find a way into David Koepp’s “Crystal Skulls.”

So we wondered: Now that the movie has been finished, will Darabont at last get to see his name on the big screen for an Indiana Jones adventure?

“Nope. Not on this one,” Darabont said when we caught up with him last week. “I know there are some common elements to what I gave Steven [Spielberg] and what was eventually shot, but I guess not enough to warrant credit. It’s clearly a disappointment, especially after Steven loved my script.”

In the Indy universe it’s the penitent man who passes, and for his part, Darabont bows down before Spielberg, saying he “wouldn’t hesitate to work with Steven again.”

The same can’t be said of George Lucas, however, who has probably seen the last of the “Shawshank” scripter. Would Darabont ever consider, for instance, working on the “Star Wars” television series?

“Honestly our storytelling sensibilities have diverged to the point where that would be a pointless exercise,” he said of Mr. Lucas.

Share This

Everything Movies | Comments Off

AJ Michalka, who appears in the Peter Jackson remake of The Lovely Bones, says viewers ought to brace themselves for a beautiful slice of heaven.

“I think it’s going to be stunning,” Michalka said of Jackson’s vision for heaven, a major set-piece in a film whose narrator resides there. “There’s going to be this beautiful gazebo involved, I know that. He’s doing a lot of stuff with blue screen, which if going to be insane, unbelievable. It’s going to be her own little world in heaven.”

And the character occupying it will be Susie Salmon (portrayed by Oscar nominee Saoirse Ronan), a 14-year-old who watches her family and friends from the afterlife, observing them as they struggle to cope with her brutal rape and murder.

AJ plays Clarissa in the film, Susie’s best friend. She had nothing but praise for another costar, too: Mark Whalberg.

“He’s incredible,” Michalka said.“We all did our own and after every take he was like, ‘Are you okay? Are you okay?’ He was super cool, super nice. It was great.”

Everything Movies | Comments Off

Variety reports that Fox Atomic is acquiring the novel “Naomi and Ely’s No Kiss List.” It will be developed as a vehicle for Hayden Panettiere, as she continued to expand her movie resume.

Panettiere is currently playing the title role in the Chris Columbus-directed comedy I Love You, Beth Cooper; and she is also planning to star in Daydream Nation.

Published last year by Knopf, “Naomi and Ely’s No Kiss List” takes place in Manhattan, where Naomi and her gay best friend Ely protect their soulmate friendship by creating a list of people deemed off limits for smooching. Their friendship is imperiled when Ely kisses Naomi’s boyfriend.

Everything Movies | Comments Off

Bill and Ted have been to Heaven, Hell, and the far reaches of time.

However, as Keanu Reeves told MTV recently, Bill S. Preston Esq. and Ted “Theodore” Logan may be making their most non-heinous journey yet: back to the big screen!

“I hear they’re doing a remake,” Reeves said of the movie that launched his carer. “[Alex Winter and I spoke] on the phone the other day [about it]. We’re great friends.”

Would Reeves be up for another sequel?

“The most serious we ever got was a few years ago,” the actor confessed of a hitherto unknown third film. “I had once mentioned about doing it when we were 40. Now maybe the only shot we have is to do it when we’re 50.”

Would you see Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure 3?

Everything Movies | Comments Off

MoviesOnline recently spoke to Christa Campbell about her role in Day of the Dead, coming to DVD on April 8.

In this modern update of the George Romero classic, a group of scientists, military personnel and civilians find themselves banding together in a military bunker to battle against the relentless undead. Campbell stars as Mrs. Leitner, a woman hiding from zombies at the local radio station with four other civilians.

How did your role in Day of the Dead come about?
Christa Campbell: I met Jeffrey at Lions Gate. He told me he was involved with the film, and I wanted to be involved with it. So I tracked down Steve Miner since I knew I had to be in this movie. When I met Steve it was great, he loved me, so they actually rewrote the part to suit me better.

How comfortable are you with gore?
Christa Campbell: I’m very comfortable with it. That’s the exciting part of making a horror movie; to actually be able to do things, like turn into a zombie or fight someone. It’s boring when you just come on screen and say a couple of lines, or have to sit around and cry.

What would you say has been your most challenging role to date?
Christa Campbell: Most challenging role – I don’t know. I had to do a lot of fighting in Day of the Dead. The make-up, and getting over the ego of not looking hot in this movie was a bit of a challenge, but it was also a big part of why I wanted to do it.

I had to realize that as a zombie I am not looking hot and I just have to embrace it now. I wanted to reach out and show that I could play a character that isn’t hot, and someone who wasn’t afraid to show some edge. So I’d say that the zombie part was the hardest.

Anything outside of Day of the Dead?
Christa Campbell: I just finished a movie called Finding Bliss. It’s a comedy about the porn industry. We all have nude scenes in the movie including Leelee (Sobieski). It was completely necessary for the story. But sometimes we’d all sit around and be like, did we just film that? Are we going to regret this in a week?

We were joking around about it a lot. But when you trust the director and know they have a vision and have a comfort in the dynamic and why you’re doing it, then you’re willing to take that risk.

Everything Movies | Comments Off