JAVIER BARDEM IS BOND 23′S VILLAIN

This is good news. Bardem is a larger-than-life presence on the screen and Bond could use some larger-than-lifeness — especially if all that larger-than-lifeness is filmed on a tripod.

GENE HACKMAN TO COME OUT OF RETIREMENT?

Somewhere around 1983, Gene Hackman became my favorite living actor and remained so until his 2004 retirement (Michael Caine now owns that spot). Last I heard, The Mighty Gene Hackman is loving life somewhere in Arizona, where at the age of 81 he paints and writes.

I’d like to– No, I want to always remember Hackman as the epitome of everyday masculinity that he portrayed so brilliantly in every film regardless of the role. I don’t want to see him old and frail. Today he might be as strong and vibrant as Robert Duvall is at the age of 80, but if he’s not I don’t want to know about it.

This is why I refuse to see “Ragtime.” I simply cannot bear the thought of The Mighty Jimmy Cagney as an old man and won’t put myself through it.

TARANTINO CASTS DON JOHNSON AS PLANTATION OWNER PIMP IN ‘DJANGO’

What a superb piece of casting. With better script choices I’m almost positive Johnson could’ve been the movie star he deserved to be. You want to see an underrated pulper that thanks to Johnson’s hangdog performance deserves a bigger audience…?

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Though neither won last night, when the Academy Awards nominations were announced, one of the biggest surprises was the inclusion of Javier Bardem in the Best Actor category. Bardem, who previously won an Oscar for “No Country for Old Men,” received the nomination for “Biutiful,” which was also nominated for the Best Foreign Language film. The movie tells the story of a man who stopped imagining how good his life could be and started settling into the depressing world that he helped create for himself.

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Near the beginning of the film, the camera focuses on a man’s wedding band. A man’s voice is heard talking to a young woman as the two talk about the band with their hands raised. The focus on their hands foreshadows the story’s focus on the lead character’s occupation and how his life is affected by his source of income.

Uxbal (Bardem), the story’s lead character, helps manage a local sweatshop in Barcelona. At work, he’s a professional trying to make money through unethical labor practices. At home, Uxbal is a different person. He’s a dedicated family man with two young children.

Soon after we meet Uxbal, he’s diagnosed with a deadly disease. He only has a few months to live so he starts cherishing the time he has left with his family. In working to better the lives of his children, he moves back in with his bipolar ex-wife. If he was in a different stage of his life, he probably wouldn’t reunite with her but he’s facing his own mortality and wants to do what’s best for his family.

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“Eat Pray Love” exists to please lovers of the best-selling book of the same name – and anyone who prefers pretty postcards to nuanced storytelling. It’s heavier than your standard chick-lit adaptation and miles away from any “Sex and the City” shopping montage. No Manolo Blahniks were harmed in the making of this motion picture. But “Love” still can’t find the soul of its main character despite all the hand-wringing and dutiful self examination on display.

Julia Roberts stars as Liz, a writer unsatisfied with her husband (Billy Crudup) and her life in toto. She ditches her man and embarks on a year-long journey to find herself. First, she channels her inner gourmand with a trek to Italy. She bonds with a fellow ex-pat, eats enough pasta to change her pants size and starts leaving the skin of her own life on her rented room’s floor.

Audiences the world over might wish they were emotionally adrift if this is the result.

Her real healing begins when she visits India, where she embarks on a rigorous lifestyle of yoga, meditation and kibitzing with colorful supporting players. Richard Jenkins pilfers an entire swath of the film as a fellow lost traveler, a long, tall Texan with his own emotional scars. The character actor broke through the mainstream with his Oscar-nominated turn in “The Visitor.” Here, he reminds us just how potent he can be with only a few scenes with which to work. (more…)

There was not a great deal of drama surrounding this year’s British Academy of Film & Television Arts Awards, commonly known as the BAFTA Awards. Slumdog Millionaire (Fox Searchlight) is a movie with deep roots in the UK. Director Danny Boyle was born in Manchester, England, lead actor Dev Patel is the star of the popular British television series Skins, and the movie is a gigantic hit in the British Isles with an impressive $20.6M (US dollars) in box office for Pathe, since its release there on January 6.

BAFTA Winner Mickey Rourke

The two major uncertainties entering Sunday’s ceremony were whether Kate Winslet, twice-nominated for Best Actress, would split her own vote and miss out on her second BAFTA Award and who would prevail in the Sean Penn-Mickey Rourke battle for Best Actor. Aside from that, it seemed like a Slumdog sweep, and that’s exactly how it played out.

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