Awards shows are compelling because they're occasions for the rich, famous, and beautiful to go above and beyond to the apogee of glamor. The Golden Globes, however—mostly due to the mass quantities of alcohol and other substances in close proximity—are often the occasion for the glamorous to become beastlike in the blink of an eye. (Except Kate Winslet. She is never not absolutely fabulous.)
The poor girl just can't get a break. People are harshing on her all the time. Ah well, she at least beat out the horse movie and some stupid horror thing. At least there's that.
Tim Gunn calls Taylor Momsen "sad" and "pathetic." Jodie Foster avoids assault charges. Leonardo DiCaprio buys a pet that will live for 70 years. Chris Brown doesn't tip. Has Wednesday gossip gone too far, yet?
It's true. He just might be. Also today: A Kurt Cobain biopic sounds seriously dreadful, HBO casts two good actresses in two good roles, a teen adventure begins, and some important news about Big Momma's House 3.
Diane Lane turns 45 today. Director Jim Jarmusch is 57. Actor Balthazar Getty is turning 35. Neil Bush, the brother of George and Jeb (and father of Lauren), turns 55. Actress Olivia d'Abo is 41. Steve Perry from Journey turns 61. Linda Blair of Exorcist fame is 51. And DJ Jazzy Jeff turns 45 today. A few people celebrating birthdays this weekend appear after the jump.
We get some exciting news about horses today, and some not so exciting news about a zombie movie. Being upset about a zombie movie is like crying on Christmas, I know. But sometimes it happens.
Director Jim Jarmusch turns 56 today. Balthazar Getty, actor, heir, and frequent paramour of Sienna Miller, is 34. Diane Lane is turning 44. Neil Bush, the brother of George and Jeb and father of Lauren Bush, is turning 54. Actress Linda Blair is 50. Steven Adler, drummer and Celebrity Rehab fave, is 44. Pop star Willa Ford is turning 28. And DJ Jazzy Jeff (remember him?) turns 44 years old today.
Welcome back to Defamer Attractions, your indispensable guide to what's new, noteworthy and/or totally doomed this week at the movies. Today we welcome Shia LaBeouf and his million-dollar pinkie back to theaters alongside Spike Lee, Richard Gere, Diane Lane, Charlize Theron and Kirk Cameron (!), while facing a robust litter of potential arthouse underdogs and DVD release for the agoraphobes among us. As always, our opinions are our own, but if Josh Groban can steadfastly see it our way, shouldn't you as well?WHAT'S NEW: Shia LaBeouf reunites with his Disturbia director DJ Caruso for the thriller Eagle Eye, featuring our young hero as a man trapped (alongside Michelle Monaghan) in a mysterious mire of surveillance, espionage and murder also featuring Billy Bob Thornton and Rosario Dawson. Hitchcock comes up in more discussions of the film than he doesn't, with the rap being that Eagle Eye represents North by Northwest to Disturbia's too-influential-for-comfort Rear Window, but that's just adults being adults. The kids will toss rose petals and dump around $30.6 million out their wallets, further anchoring LaBeouf as his generation's most bankable star without a driver's license. Congrats, Shia! Meanwhile, that generation's parents can shuffle into the auditorium next door for the Gere/Lane reteaming Nights in Rodanthe, adapted from a Hallmark card novel by Nicholas Sparks with enough inoffesnsively creaky cliche and Mom Jeans-wetting romance to attract around $13.1 million. Also opening in limited release: The Palahniuk adaptation Choke; the Charlize Theron-led propaganda ensemble Battle in Seattle; Tim Robbins' and Rachel McAdams' Iraq-themed The Lucky Ones; Wayne Wang's modest immigrant mish-mash A Thousand Years of Good Prayers; the misanthropic Easter bunny comedy Hank and Mike; the race-baiting terrorism saga Shoot on Sight (tagline: "Is it a crime to be a Muslim?"); the Filipina-tranny doc The Amazing Truth About Queen Raquela; and the lyrical, Indie Spirit Award-winning drama August Evening. THE BIG LOSER: It's not like we actively root against films around Defamer HQ (all right, maybe that one time; it had it coming), and we really would like to see Spike Lee pull off Miracle at St. Anna, his epic WWII semi-mystery focusing long-overdue attention on the Army's 92nd Infantry Division — the only all-black unit to see combat in Europe. He may yet do it with Disney's micro-marketing prowess, but let's be honest: The reviews are brutal, it's 160 minutes long, it's rated R, it rotates between English, German and Italian, and at least a quarter of its intended audience is likelier to defer to one of two sturdy holdovers — Burn After Reading or The Famliy That Preys. If this breaks $5.5 million, we'll be shocked. Sorry, Spike; there's always Inside Man 2.
Matthew Broderick holding hands with Sarah Jessica Parker while walking in Midtown and later riding on a scooter with little James ... Maggie Gyllenhaal crossing the street ... Calvin Klein eating outside with a friend ... Carla Bruni carrying a Post under her arm ... Marcia Gay Harden and her daughter crossing the street with smoothies in hand... Katie Holmes leaving her building solo ... Sarah Palin arriving at the Colombian Embassy on the Upper East Side ... Diane Lane posing with an autograph-seeker outside her hotel ... Julianne Moore hopping into a SUV outside her West Village townhouse ... Matt Dillon stepping off the sidewalk ... Billy Bob Thornton outside NBC before taping Conan O'Brien's show ... and John Mayer all dressed up en route to a benefit.
As we eagerly await this weekend's Nights in Rodanthe to see if Richard Gere and Diane Lane can continue to make old-people sex as hot as it was in Unfaithful, we got to thinking — Nicholas Sparks is a total baller. Sparks, who writes the standard romance novel fare that stocks airport bookstores, wrote Rodanthe and has successfully pandered his schlock to production companies who have turned a number of his books into best-selling films. The Notebook, arguably the biggest success of the adaptations, quickly became that movie girlfriends forced their boyfriends to watch in the hopes of emulating real-life lovebirds Ryan Gosling and Rachel McAdams. But now comes the recent news that Sparks is no longer satisfied with hipster newcomers and wants to hit the big time, so he's selling out and writing both a novel and a screenplay adaptation for a new film which are specifically designated for queen Miley Cyrus herself. Sparks is a smart cookie and he knows women love his shit. So is he the next Nora Ephron?Here are a few reasons why we think his films are so popular: 1.) They're completely unrealistic, and we love it. Clearly, the main reason women love romance movies is that they are ridiculously far-fetched. Sure, our boyfriends would jump on to a moving ferris wheel a la Ryan Gosling to ask us out on a first date! And pale, feeble, Cross-bearers like Mandy Moore could certainly tame popular cool cats like Shane West in A Walk to Remember in real life. We know it's all bullshit, but a girl can dream. 2.) He gets the right people to play the parts. Okay, when you were in high school, you totally thought pre-ER bad-boy Shane West was a fine piece. And clearly whoever is casting these things still has the knack for it: Channing Tatum is set to star in the upcoming adaptation of Dear John, and obviously Miley is in demand. Plus, James Franco cameo as Richard Gere's son this weekend? Do us. 3.) True love can survive anything. Gosling goes off to war. And then McAdams-turned-Gena Rowlands goes totally insane at the end of The Notebook and wanders all over the hospital post-midnight. It looks like the house in Rodanthe is about to rot into a piece of driftwood. Are these obstacles too grand to stop a Sparks plotline? Never! True love prevails over all. 4.) Speaking of houses - the ones in the movies are fucking sweet. Gosling builds McAdams a house. Like, are you serious? It has a ridic balcony so she can paint fields and rainbows and swans on the lake and shit. And though we haven't seen Rodanthe yet, it has blue shutters and is so close to the water the sand stains the windows. We want to live there. 5.) And finally, even old people can get it on in a Sparks flick. We weren't totally repulsed when Rowlands and James Garner made out at the end of The Notebook, and that's saying something.
PrivacyWatch celebrity sightings are submitted by our readers, and are posted several times a week, so send them in often! Submit yours to tips[AT]defamer.com (please put "sighting" or "PrivacyWatch" in the subject line so we don't lose them) and tell everyone about the time you spotted Alice Cooper buying a box of vitamin-fortified Hitler-O's at the Rose Bowl Flea Market.
