Sony Pictures Classics has just spent in “the mid-seven figures” on Stephen Frears’ adaptation of the graphic novel Tamara Drewe. WOOHOO! Bring on the ninja vampires and octopus f’ck parties! …right?
Up-and-coming Brit starlet Gemma Arterton will play Drewe [the extra 'E' is for 'English' -Ed.], a young newspaper columnist who returns to the country village of her youth and stirs up dark passions among the locals. Guardian cartoonist Posy Simmonds’ graphic novel, a collation of comicstrips published in U.K. newspaper the Guardian, is a modern reimagining of Thomas Hardy’s classic novel “Far From the Madding Crowd.” [Variety]
So… by “dark passions” you mean, like, werewolves and lesbians and sh’t, right?
The art captures British frumpiness so well it’s scary; middle-age spread hulks through this book like sad weight, but it’s less skilled with beauty; Tamara’s looks don’t sway the reader the way they sway the characters in the book. But the view on how feminism has failed in moneyed Britain is priceless. [Amazon/Publisher'sWeekly]
See da main characta, Moira, she’s a shoe shoyne lass she is. But den one day whoilst ‘avin a cup a tea, she ‘as an epiphany, she ‘as. An’ she finks to ‘erself, “Oi, oy weren’ meant ta be da shoe shoyn lass! Oy’s meant to be droivin’ a lorry!” An’ da next fing you know, pow, as Bob’s your uncle, Moira’s become a lorry droiva. So den da rest a da book’s mostly Moira droivin a propa lorry, which is well funny ‘cos she still looks loike a shoe shoyne lass she does. Can you imagine dat? A shoe shoyne lass droivin a propa lorry? Oi, an’ oy reckon da movie’ll be well funny ‘cos we’w get Eddie Izzard ta play Moira we wew. A bloke, dressed as a bird! Can yous imagine dat?
British Prime Minister Gordon Brown visited the White House recently, and he and President Obama exchanged gifts. Obama gave Brown a collection of 25 DVDs (list of titles after the jump), but the big story was that the British press is all bitter and pissed about it.
“In return for a pen holder carved from the timbers of the sister ship of the one the White House desk is made from and a first edition of a seven-volume biography of Winston Churchill, the Daily Mail is appalled that “Barack Obama, the leader of the world’s richest country” gave Brown a box set of 25 DVDs selected by the American Film Institute. These, it says, include Raging Bull, Casablanca, Psycho and The Graduate. It is, the Mail says, “a gift about as exciting as a pair of socks”. ” [Guardian]
Wow, a pen holder… thanks. That’s, uh, I mean, normally I have so much trouble with the pen, you know, just laying the f-ck down on my desk all horizontal like, but this should, uh, really nip that problem in the bud. And as for that seven-volume biography… that’s, uh, awesome. I mean, I read a four-volume biography last year, but after only 2000 pages… I feel like there’s so much more to know.
After the jump I’ve got the trailer for British film Boy A (not to be confused with Radiohead album "Kid A," or Jenna Haze classic Straight to the A).
Based on the award winning novel of the same name by Jonathan Trigell, Jack (Andrew Garfield) is released from prison at the age of 24, having been institutionalized for most of his life after he and another boy murdered a child, when they were themselves children. The film follows Jack’s difficult attempts to readjust to the world outside of confinement and restart a life which never really got going. [RT]
If they made a movie about me, it’d have to be called Boy X because I’m so extreme. You can tell by the way I play Wii with sunglasses on.
Also available in hi-def at Apple
In other Simon Pegg-related news, it looks like we dirty Americans are going have to wait until MARCH FREAKIN' 28TH for Run, Fatboy, Run (trailer here). I blame David Schwimmer. I know he's only the director, but somehow he's responsible. (Though I do applaud his use of proper punctuation, unlike those illiterate bastards behind Run Lola Run).
This movie has been out in England forever already, and we have to wait until 2008?! I'll be old then! Gah, I'm sick of this; Simon Pegg movies, pies with meat in them, beef-flavored potato chips, pale chicks with fucked up teeth; the British get all the fun stuff. Okay, maybe not that last one.
