Whip up a batch of Cory Monteith-approved five layer dip; it's almost time for the Super Bowl! Which can mean only one thing if you're sports-averse but still forced to watch alongside a screaming Packers or Steelers fan: Commercials. This year's crop is set to include a wide variety of car and beer commercials, plus some highly anticipated trailer debuts. Or, in some cases, a combination of both.
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Of all the memorable elements of Lee Tamahori's unflinching drama The Devil's Double -- which roused Sundance with its portrait of brutal, debauched Uday Hussein and the Iraqi lieutenant enlisted to serve as his near-identical security detail -- few stirred more interest than Dominic Cooper's revelatory dual performance as both Hussein and title character Latif Yahia. While Movieline's Jen Yamato offered a bruising breakdown in a review last week, Elvis Mitchell sat down with Cooper to discuss playing multiple characters, laughing at lunacy and what happens to an actor when sympathy is not an option.
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As with every year at Sundance, the festival hangover descends quickly and lingers for days, weeks, even months afterward. (Don't believe me? Ask Jennifer Lawrence.) For the team at Movieline, meanwhile, this means an embarrassment of interview riches and other chatter in which we'll be rolling for a while to come. I mean, Miranda July stopped by! Let's hear from her.
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If the winter blahs have got you down, check out the just-released opening of Rio, the new animated feature from 20th Century Fox, which tells the story of a macaw that leaves behind the icy steppes of Minnesota for the warm climes of Rio. Plus, the studio announced that it would be releasing a special movie tie-in edition of America's favorite time waster, Angry Birds, in conjunction with the movie. Angry Birds Rio will be released in March and Rio, starring Jesse Eisenberg, Anne Hathaway and George Lopez, hits theaters April 15th. Check 'em both out after the jump.
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Now that Comcast (or Kabletown) has officially taken over NBC from General Electric, they have a big problem on their hands in the form of returning NBC to its past glory. The Movieline solution: Fun NBC-themed promos! Seriously, where have these been? Specifically, just recreate this "The Stars are Back on NBC" promo featuring Michael Richards sliding down an animated staircase into the waiting arms of a signing Crystal Bernard from Wings. Also, Joey Lawrence says, "Whoa," Tom Brokaw and Katie Couric make out, and John Larroquette picks a star out of his eyeball. Problem solved! And if it doesn't work, just bring back Seinfeld.
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There's been a lot of buzz about Glee's upcoming mid-season premiere, and with good reason: It's being heralded as the most expensive episode of television ever produced for the golden time slot following the Super Bowl. Finally, Fox has released a preview of the expected insanity that will ensue when Schue, Sue and the gang return on Feb. 6 for what appears to be the most random installment yet, "The Sue Sylvester Bowl Shuffle." Take a look for yourselves after the jump.
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It started innocently enough, with TNT NBA analyst Kenny Smith asking guest Tracy Morgan whether he preferred Tina Fey or Sarah Palin before tip-off of the Knicks/Heat game on Thursday night, but it ended with TNT having to issue the following statement: "It's unfortunate Mr. Morgan showed a lack of judgment on our air with his inappropriate comments." Uh-oh. How was Morgan able to turn a question about which bespectacled lady he found more sexually appealing into something inappropriate? Click ahead to find out.
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If your primary complaint about The Fighter was that there was not nearly enough nose-picking onscreen, you're in luck. AOL has exploited not one but two parties -- children and Academy Award-nominated motion pictures -- in its new Kids Act Out series, which lets adorable squirts loosely reenact scenes from The Fighter, Black Swan, 127 Hours, The King's Speech and The Social Network. Amusing or insulting, David O. Russell? Watch the videos yourself and decide below.
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If we could switch out real events for the hilariously animated translation produced by Taiwanese news service NMA, life would be so much more entertaining. Ricky Gervais would have been Tool Time'd by Tim Allen after the Golden Globes, Jeff Zucker would breathe fire, Charlie Sheen would have coked up hotel meltdowns -- oh, wait -- and the Jersey Shore cast would be greeted violently in Italy by riotous locals, a pickle cannon, and a gladiator showdown in which Snooki is forced to out-pace a tiger for survival. Taiwanese justice awaits you after the jump.
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Ask the Internet, and ye shall receive. Just yesterday, I was bemoaning the fact that the truly funny James Franco/Anne Hathaway Oscar promo that ABC ran before the nominations on Tuesday wasn't online, and voila! Now it is! If the co-hosts can expand this kind of charm beyond the 16 seconds of this commercial, we're all going to be in good hands on Feb. 27. Click ahead to watch Franco save Hathaway from a wardrobe malfunction.
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The 2011 Sundance Film Festival might be winding down with a flurry of sales, but one guy got that part out of the way early: Morgan Spurlock, whose documentary about the omnipresence of product placement, cheekily titled POM Wonderful Presents: The Greatest Movie Ever Sold, landed a distribution deal with Sony Pictures Classics last week before the festival began. That freed up the Super Size Me filmmaker to chat with Movieline's Elvis Mitchell about his special brand of "cotton-candy flavored spinach," selling out with style, and that time he turned down remaking Revenge of the Nerds.
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Good news: Isaiah Mustafa is back with another Old Spice viral video! Bad news: The luster has completely worn off. Like, down to the nub. Alas. On the bright side, though, perhaps this latest bit of shirtless enunciation sheds some light on what to expect from Mustafa's co-starring role in Tyler Perry's Madea's Big Happy Family. Or, not. Click ahead to watch the man your man could smell like discuss his upcoming set of Old Spice advertisements. Super Bowl, anyone?
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Two new SNL videos have emerged from Studio 8H on this lazy Wednesday afternoon: The first highlights a pair of promos for this weekend's Jesse Eisenberg-hosted show, where Bill Hader congratulates The Social Network star for his Oscar nomination. Standard stuff. Not the second video, though, which features a rare look at the SNL dress rehearsal. Have you ever wanted to see Seth Meyers sarcastically berate the crowd for not responding correctly to his "Update" jokes -- a sin which means that joke will not air during the live broadcast? Here's your chance! Also, if you think that Hader has difficulty getting through his lines as Stefon on the live broadcasts, you really need to watch how hard it is for him at dress rehearsal.
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James Franco has been an Academy Award nominee for a little less than two hours now, but he's already fired his first shot across the bows of The Social Network and other "classically made" but utterly conventional Hollywood offerings -- Oscar front-runners or not. And he let it rip exclusively in conversation with Movieline.
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While Movieline's Sundance bureau had its cameras trained on ingénues, warbling auteurs and various other festival luminaries, another stirring scene was captured at the premiere of Lucky McKee's latest horror effort The Woman: An angry viewer removed from the screening argued the film had no artistic value and should be confiscated and burned. And he was just getting warmed up.
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