JAKE WEIRD

Claire Trevor: Brass, Class, Queen of the Bs & Film Noire

noreply@blogger.com (Kendra) — Wed, 22 May 2013 02:42:00 +0000

Most “tough babes” in movies came to be seen as camp figures, even jokes, but that was never the perception with Claire. Claire Trevor never became a joke. Audiences and critics alike always regarded her with respect. But quiet respect rarely assures top stardom. Though often starred, she never became a true box office star. Her feelings about her career constantly veered back and forth from diffidence to despair, ambition to acceptance, envy to ennui. She utterly lacked the iron-willed determination of a Barbara Stanwyck or the temperament of a Joan Crawford. Perhaps that was a blessing. Her career saw a dazzling number of setbacks, disappointments and re-discoveries, but she continued to be active long after more illustrious contemporaries outlived their vogues.

She was born Claire Wemlinger in the Bensonhurst section of Brooklyn on March 9, 1910, the only child of Noel B. and Edith Morrison Wemlinger. (Her father was born in Paris, her mother in Belfast.) The family moved to New York City when Claire was two and there she attended George Washington High School. Mr. Wemlinger, a successful Fifth Avenue custom tailor, moved the family then to nearby Larchmont. Claire attended Mamaroneck High School, where she got her first taste of performing. It was originally intended that upon graduation she attend Smith College but she enrolled instead at Columbia University where she studied art, but she had to quit after only six months because the Depression had cost her father his business and Claire had to help out financially. Having appeared in plays in school, she’d become smitten with acting and entered the American Academy of Dramatic Arts, but after six months she left to try and obtain some paying jobs and launched her attack on the big-time Broadway boys.

She often made the rounds with her long-time friend Martha Sleeper, who was already an experienced actress. For a while she called herself Claire Sinclair, having been impressed with a Sinclair Oil sign, changed that to Claire St. Clair, but soon dropped both in favor of Trevor. Armed with youth, beauty and a list of credits as impressive as it was phony, she managed to land her first acting job. She spent the summer of ’31 as the leading ingenue with the Hampton Players, a little theater group in Southhampton, New York, for $5 a week plus room and board. While there she was spotted by producer Alexander McKaig, who offered Claire her first Broadway role, leading lady in Whistling in the Dark opposite Ernest Truex and Edward Arnold. In his review for the Herald-Tribune, Percy Hammond wrote: “Claire Trevor, a shiny debutante, plays the pretty heroine casually.”

While the company was in Los Angeles, a number of film studio executives offered her screen tests. “Irving Thalberg had wanted me to sign at MGM,” Claire later said, “But at the time I was all theater-conscious. I told him that I would wait until some studio brought me to Hollywood from a hit play and give me a starring role in a picture. I’ve often wondered if I was foolish not to sign with Mr. Thalberg then. My career might have been much more successful.” She went back to New York and got a part as a waitress in a Depression comedy called The Party’s Over, which opened at the Vanderbilt Theatre on March 27, 1933. The critics were casually kind but the play was not doing very well, so when the New York office of Fox Films (renamed 20th Century-Fox in 1935) tested her and offered her a contract she readily accepted. She left the show at the end of April and arrived in Hollywood on May 7, 1933, a contract player with a major studio at $350 a week, a fortune to her. Two days later Claire was sent out on location, a sandy waste, for her first movie, Life in the Raw, a run-of-the-mill Western in which she was George O’Brien’s leading lady.

Fox decided to bring her indoors to play opposite Spencer Tracy in The Mad Game, a newspaper drama. She got excellent notices for her work as a cigarette-rolling reporter. By the end of 1933 she had starred in half-a-dozen Fox quickies. Early in ’34 her personal rave notices began piling up, but in minor films earning little or no attention. The pattern was set; Claire Trevor became Hollywood’s (or at least Fox’s) Queen of the B’s. She said in the April, 1934 Picture Play: “The studios usually artificialize women. I vowed I wouldn’t be beautified, but it’s a routine you have to go through every morning out here…. Pictures seem to me like the stock market, a magnificent gamble. My wish is that I’ll go to the top and then have sense enough to get out before I crash.”

Claire Trevor had become a known name and she was learning, absorbing, becoming thoroughly accustomed to delivering high-level performances under all but impossible conditions. As her income grew, so did her impatience for bigger and certainly better things. Later, in a 1946 Motion Picture interview, she said, “Producers decided I was older than I claimed to be and gave me snappy, severe business women, gal reporter types of roles. I played them all. I didn’t know that to make a real career in Hollywood you have to become a ‘personality.’ You have to cultivate publicity departments and become known as ‘The Ear’ or ‘The Toe.’”

Her patience and persistence finally seemed to pay off. She fought for, and won, the part of Francey in Dead End, a major production for United Artists, released in 1937. She had only one scene, as gangster Humphrey Bogart’s innocent one-time girlfriend who had turned into a hardened, diseased prostitute. (Claire and Bogart became fast friends for life.) No one could understand why on earth she wanted to play such a part, until they saw the film. Her contribution lasted less than two minutes, but she made every second count. The press and public finally took notice and she was nominated for a a 1937 Best Supporting Actress Academy Award. She didn’t win, Alice Brady did for In Old Chicago, but Claire felt this was a definite step up.

Free of her Fox contract in 1937, she gave an unusually candid interview in the June 1938 Modern Screen: “At first I accepted anything I was handed. When the scripts turned out to be crummy and inconsistent I just did the best I could. I thought Dead End was going to mean everything —a beautiful script, good director [William Wyler], topflight cast— but I was disappointed in my performance when I saw the picture. I hadn’t given what I thought I had… But they’ve kept me buzzing in the B-hive for four years and no relief in sight.

So one of these days I’m going to surprise everybody and say, ‘No, this part is not for me, this picture is not for me, I won’t do another B!’” “Perhaps I’ve been amiable too long,” she said in the May, 1938 Motion Picture. “Perhaps it’s time for me to put on the temperamental act and scream for better parts in better pictures. Next year I hope some really good roles in important productions will come my way. Naturally I would prefer to make three or four pictures a year which are important, rather than twice that number of the run-of-the-mill variety.” The title of the interview said it all: The Star Who Isn’t a Star.

She married Big Town producer Clark Andrews in July 1938. By then the last of her Fox follies were in release, and she was seen in two top-line Warner Bros. efforts: The Amazing Dr. Clitterhouse, an excellent gangster comedy with Claire playing a gang leader with silken ease, and Valley of the Giants, her first Technicolor picture and the first of many films to exploit her as a lady with a past in Western surroundings.

She was offered a Warners contract but, still smarting from her bondage at Fox, she refused. She told William M. Drew in his 1999 book At the Center of the Frame, “Warner Bros. had a promotional thing going at the time and they wanted me to be ‘the Oomph Girl.’ They wanted to sign me for five years but I turned them down… That may have been foolish too, because I would have been ‘the Oomph Girl’ rather than Ann Sheridan and also Warners did more of the kind of thing that was suitable to me.”

Texas (1941) was a funny, bouncy western, this time with buddies Glenn Ford and William Holden vying for Claire’s favors. In The Adventures of Martin Eden (’41) Claire was star Ford’s colorless true love. Honky Tonk (194l) was an MGM Clark Gable-Lana Turner vehicle typical of her luck. Trevor was featured as Gable’s old flame, an easy going saloon hustler. She started out with a good, gutsy part, but, as she told writer Charles Samuels eight years later, “By that time I was playing second leads. I had great scenes in Honky Tonk. At least I thought I had them ’til I went to the press preview of the picture. My scenes had been scissored out. ‘Where am I?,’ I kept asking myself. ‘What happened to me?’ I cried all the way home and swore I’d never make another picture. There were a lot of nights when I felt like that. Other girls were flying past me becoming big stars. I was still just another actress, competent but not a top-notcher. Still, I didn’t care too much.” She married Navy Lt. Cylos William Dunsmoore in 1944, and the following year their son, Charles Cylos, was born.

Claire co-starred on radio in 1944 with her old Fox cohort Lloyd Nolan in Results, Incorporated. It was a light-hearted (and headed) mystery series on Mutual, lasting from October 7th to December 30th. She loved radio—no lines to learn, no hours wasted on wardrobe, makeup and hairdos—and appeared in dozens of dramas and variety shows.

After the birth of her son, Claire was a hyper-glam temptress with greed in her eyes and a gun in her upsweep in Murder, My Sweet (1945). It was a classic film noir mystery which did wonders for former boy crooner Dick Powell in his first hard-guy role as detective Philip Marlowe, and consequently all the attention was focused on his surprisingly gritty performance. Claire had a good bit of grit herself. “You shouldn’t kiss a girl when you’re wearing that gun,” she tells Powell. “It leaves a bruise.” Powell got the girl (Anne Shirley) and the publicity. Trevor got a bullet.

In 1947 she played one of the bitchiest of her screen witches, a totally amoral schemer who teams up with killer Lawrence Tierney in Born to Kill. Now considered a noir classic, it was then passed by as just another RKO melodrama. She was the very spirit of evil as she hatched one sleazy scheme after another with not a trace of conscience while wearing some of the funniest ’40s millenary ever constructed. As always, the high quality of her work was overlooked. By now this was exactly what people expected of Claire Trevor, and exactly the genre in which they expected to find her.

Rosalind Russell offered her a supporting role in The Velvet Touch, the first of five films she turned out in breakneck procession. All were released within a few months of each other and suddenly Claire Trevor was the surprise re-discovery of 1948.

That year she discussed her career ambivalence: “Certainly I’d like to be a star,” she told Jack Holland, “because the opportunity for a variety of roles is so very good. I didn’t feel that way once. I thought only of all the worries the stars had; the lack of privacy, the grief and strain of worrying if each succeeding picture would be a failure. But when I see the excellent roles that Barbara Stanwyck, Irene Dunne, Olivia de Havilland, Joan Fontaine, Ingrid Bergman and others have had, I find myself wanting the same chance…. At the beginning I accepted every part that was handed to me. I was too meek. I never acted as though I was eating my heart out for a certain part.

But 1948 turned out to be a very good year for Claire Trevor. It was John Huston’s Key Largo that cinched her umpteenth comeback, this time for keeps. It was a high-profile, star-filled drama (Bogart, Bacall, Robinson, Lionel Barrymore, all close friends), but Claire’s performance as a gangster’s broken-down floozie was so powerful she walked off not only with all the notices but an Oscar for Best Supporting Actress of 1948. She played Gaye Dawn, a former singer who was now Robinson’s alcoholic mistress. In the film’s best remembered sequence, Robinson forced her to sing her long-ago hit song, “Moanin’ Low,” before giving her the drink she’d been begging for, and then refused when she finished because “You were rotten.” It was a wrenching scene and one of her most impressive screen achievements.

She and Dunsmoore had divorced in 1947 and on November 14, 1948, she was married to producer Milton Bren. This one was for keeps. Bren had two teenaged sons, Peter and Donald, from a previous marriage, and Claire helped raise them along with her son Charles. “I didn’t begin my life until I married Milton Bren,” she said in 1999.

Claire starred with Fred MacMurray in Borderline, produced by husband Milton Bren and again showing her gift for comedy. It was a brisk, well-played adventure, though no world-beater. For the next three years she appeared in widely assorted roles, always to fine critical notice. The films may not have been top box -office, but her Oscar had extended her screen career and gave her professional reputation a permanent face lift. Her performances remained exceptional and her merit was fully and repeatedly acknowledged.

Speaking to Louis Reid in 1950 about her bad girl image, Claire said: “If I had my choice, I’d rather be a bad girl in a good picture than a good girl in a bad one. I don’t care how I look—brazen, blowzy, brassy—if the role is of the bad ‘un, it’s all to the good. I’ve been all kinds of menaces—young, middle-aged, intermediate-aged, modern, old-fashioned—in big city underworlds and frontier towns. Sometimes I’ve had a heart of gold but more often my heart is only tarnished gilt. The idea is to look tough, live hard, be dangerous… I never knew any women as bad as those I’ve played on the screen. Never have I had the slightest acquaintance with a female dipso such as I depicted in Key Largo.”

Between 1951 and ’53 she did a variety of starring and supporting roles in mostly programmers: Best of the lot was Hard, Fast and Beautiful, directed by Ida Lupino. Claire was the calculating, overly ambitious mother of tennis champ Sally Forrest, and she imbued the role with a stunning harsh reality.

She did a small part opposite Spencer Tracy in The Mountain (1956). It starred Tracy and Robert Wagner as exceedingly unlikely mountain-climbing brothers, with Tracy turning to Trevor for some brief affections. She won particularly impressive critical response for her incisive turn in Marjorie Morningstar (1958) as Marjorie’s shrewd Jewish mother, one of her finest performances.

In 1964 she was Eddie Mayehoff’s wisecracking take-charge wife in How to Murder Your Wife, a middling Jack Lemmon comedy, and in ’67 she was in the little-seen The Capetown Affair, made in South Africa. This was a remake of 1953’s Pickup on South Street, with Claire in the Thelma Ritter role as a weary, doomed bag-lady. She wasn’t seen on the big screen again for 15 years.

In 1968 Claire again took to the boards in a pair of regional tours. She starred with Rock Hudson and Leif Erickson in Charles Laughton’s adaptation of John Brown’s Body and startled everyone by playing the fierce, cigar-smoking title lesbian in The Killing of Sister George. For the next ten years she devoted herself to painting, charitable causes and enjoying the good life in happy unofficial retirement. Then, in 1978, Claire’s son Charles, 34, was killed in an airplane collision over San Diego, and a year later Milton Bren, her husband of 31 years, died of a brain tumor. Claire was devastated by these twin tragedies within one year. She later told the Los Angeles Times that Bren’s death “was the biggest loss except for our son, who was killed. That was something you never get over. But losing my husband left me without anybody. I mean, I felt completely alone.”

Anthony Quinn with Claire Trevor in 1984

By the 90s she had moved back home to Newport Beach and was keeping a low public profile. In 1999 she met the Dean of the University of California, Irvine, School of the Arts, who invited her to come by and visit their theater. Claire took an interest in the program and began doing some off-the-cuff, informal master classes for the students. Along with additional bequests from the Bren family, the amount totaled $10 million. In her honor it has been renamed the Claire Trevor School of the Arts. At the formal dedication, her stepson Donald Bren said, "Claire last appeared publicly on this very stage, on a blustery day in January almost three years ago."

That’s when a wonderful group of students brought tears to Claire’s eyes with their performance and then she came up on stage and answered their questions about her many years of acting opposite such stars as John Wayne, Humphrey Bogart, Clark Gable and Spencer Tracy. She stole the show and she stole their hearts. Then she opened her heart and gave a [$500,000] gift to the theater, and I’m thrilled to be able to help students achieve their goals.” He then added, “Claire was a remarkable person in every way.” Bren concluded his speech by presenting the school with Claire’s Oscar and her Emmy. Now that’s giving back. -"Claire Trevor - Brass with Class" from "Killer Tomatoes: Fifteen Tough Film Dames" (2004) by Ray Hagen and Laura Wagner

Claire Trevor was unparalleled throughout a Hollywood acting career that spanned seven decades. She found reward and critical acclaim hard to come by despite being unexpectedly Oscar nominated as Best Supporting Actress for just a few seconds of powerful dialogue in the movie Dead End (1937), and although she eventually won an Oscar for her portrayal of a down and out gangsters moll in Key Largo (1948), she never really made it to the stratospheric heights of stardom that others took for granted. Despite her magnificently sensitive portrayal of Dallas opposite John Wayne in Fords Stagecoach (1939), a cursory glance in her direction might suggest she was subsequently type-cast in Poverty Row Westerns even as she later transformed into the bad-girl of Film Noire.

Here, McGivern investigates Trevors many screen representations in detail, often focussing on contemporary dominant historically specific concepts of American society and culture that gave rise to the Western and Film Noire. She delves deep into the life and image of Claire Trevor, looking at how her starring roles often seemed to reflect the tensions, paradoxes and contradictions of a bleak and uncertain future for many Americans who existed in a period of unprecedented national power and prosperity. This new biography "Claire Trevor: Queen of the Bs & Hollywood Film Noire" by Carolyn McGivern will be released on 1st June 2013.

Jake Gyllenhaal heads to the gym with brunette

noreply@blogger.com (Kendra) — Sun, 19 May 2013 21:58:00 +0000

Jake Gyllenhaal with a female friend heading to the gym in New York City on May 18, 2013

Jake Gyllenhaal is one prized piece of eye candy, yet he clearly didn't want to cause a frenzy as he left a gym in New York City's Soho neighborhood on Saturday.Strolling through the parking lot alongside a mystery female friend, the 32-year-old actor kept a low profile by staying covered up in a hooded grey sweatshirt, baseball cap, and a pair of opaque sunglasses that his his baby blues.Under his zip-up, the End Of Watch star donned a casual grey T-shirt and loose-fitted black athletic pants that he teamed with cool Nike kicks.

Gyllenhaal is also rumoured to be dating model Emily DiDonato, but she isn't the same female gym buddy who was spotted on Saturday.
According to Us Weekly, the two have been dating for 'a month of two,' but neither have gone public with their romance yet. Source: www.dailymail.co.uk

Marilyn Monroe: My Little Secret & White Rose

noreply@blogger.com (Kendra) — Sat, 18 May 2013 01:36:00 +0000

Andy Warhol's 1962 pop-art multiple images of Marilyn Monroe sold for $38.2 million on Thursday. The original silk screen grid, titled Four Marilyns, had been expected to fetch about $30 million. Reports said that it was purchased by Victoria Gelfand, a director at the Gagosian Gallery, at the Park Avenue salesroom of Phillips. Just one day earlier paintings by Jackson Pollock, Roy Lichtenstein and Jean-Michel Basquiat smashed all previous auction records at Christies. To put the sale in some perspective, Marilyn Monroe's 12 feature films averaged $7 million in total worldwide ticket sales.

Her biggest hit, 1959's Some Like It Hot, earned $25 million. Her next biggest, 1953's Gentlemen Prefer Blondes, took in $12 million. The remaining films collected between $2.5 million and $8.4 million each. Even accounting for inflation, most of the Monroe films' earnings would not have matched the amount earned by the Warhol creation." Source: www.contactmusic.com

"Marilyn Monroe: My Little Secret" Ranked as one of the Top 20 Marilyn Books. 1 Year after its release, the controversial book Marilyn Monroe: My Little Secret by author Tony Jerris, has been ranked as one of the Top 20 Marilyn Monroe books on the market by Gutsy Books. The story began in 2001 when Jerris met Jane Lawrence, who knew Marilyn Monroe very well. They became close friends and she told him her story. At 12, she started Marilyn’s fan club at Fox. According to Jerris, “By the time Jane was 15, her relationship with Marilyn had become physically intimate. Marilyn referred to Jane as 'my little secret,' and I couldn’t have chosen a more fitting title.”

Marilyn Monroe: My Little Secret is a provocative, poignant, no-holds-barred account of the relationship between Jane and Marilyn, which Tony has written in Ms. Lawrence’s voice. It took Jerris over 10 years to reach and write the book, and was released 1 year ago on the 50th Anniversary of Marilyn’s death. It has been featured on a variety of media outlets such as ExtraTV and The Young Turks Show, and written up in numerous worldwide publications and online sites including The Globe, The Enquirer, The Daily Mirror, Radar Online, Perez Hilton & Hidden Hollywood News. It was also named one of 2012’s Top Scandals in The Globe, and continues to be written up in numerous magazines and websites. Source: www.pr.com

"Marilyn's eyes opened wide in surprise and she burst out laughing. She took a swig of Dom. "Now you're my agent?" Marilyn poured more champagne and winked at me. "Five hundred bucks a week. Not bad for a girl from Van Nuys, uh?" I sipped my Coke, satisfied that Marilyn was not being snookered. Grace McKee (Gladys's best friend and fellow film tech at Columbia Pictures, whom Norma Jeane would refer to as Aunt Grace) was one of the few who truly loved Norma Jeane. As Norma Jeane's legal guardian, Grace promised to take care of her until Gladys could recover and return to society. Grace was a huge fan of Jean Harlow, so Norma Jean also became a big fan." -"Marilyn Monroe: My Little Secret" (2012) by Tony Jerris

The giant Marilyn Monroe sculpture with the forever billowing skirt has stood at Palm Canyon Drive and Tahquitz Canyon Way in Palm Springs for a year, but it will be moving on in June. Before then, there's a film series and farewell party planned. So go, snap some pictures and see the movies that made her a film icon.

The deal: The Forever Marilyn Outdoor Movie Series on May 3 will screen the comedy "Monkey Business" (1952), in which Monroe stars with Cary Grant and Ginger Rogers, and the thriller "Niagara" with Joseph Cotten on May 17. There also are screenings of new short films from ShortFest on June 7. All events start at 8:30 p.m. Source: www.latimes.com

"Black Dahlia & White Rose" is one of the short stories from "L.A. Noire: The Collected Stories" (2011), a re-imagining of the last days of a tragic figure of Los Angeles lore, Elizabeth Short, who became immortalized posthumously as “The Black Dahlia”. Mixing fact with fiction and a bit of legend, the story tells of Elizabeth Short sharing an L.A. apartment with a young Marilyn Monroe in 1947.

For the old life was used-up & of no promise, in Medford, MA. And the golden California life beckoned—Los Angeles & Hollywood. It did not seem a far-fetched idea to Betty Short as to Cleo Short or anyone who knew them, that daughter Betty was pretty enough & “sexy” enough to be a movie star one day. That was a happy time, those months then. They did not last long but Norma Jeane said to me when we were new & shy to each other sharing a room in Mr. Hansen’s “mansion” on Buena Vista Avenue: Oh Betty you are so lucky! for Norma Jeane said she had not ever glimpsed her father even from a distance but now that she’d been on the covers of Swank & Stars & Stripes maybe he would see her & recognize her as his. Poor Norma Jeane had faith, if she worked hard & made the right connections among the Hollywood men, like all of us, she would become a star like Betty Grable, Lana Turner, & earlier Jean Harlow who was Norma Jeane’s model & idol. Norma Jeane said if she walked into some place eyes would flash on her and people would think—Ohh is that Jean Harlow?

Lots of guys would claim her—seeing she’d one day be “Marilyn Monroe”—but in 1945 at the Radioplane factory in Burbank, Norma Jeane was just a girl-worker in denim coveralls—eighteen—not even the prettiest girl at the factory but Norma had something—“photogenic”—nobody else had. I took her picture for Stars & Stripes—in those factory-girl coveralls seen from the front, the rear, the side—“to boost the morale of G.I.’s overseas. And the phone rang off the hook—Who’s the girl? She’s a humdinger.

Betty said: You can get money from men—if they’re the right men not these God-damn bloodsuckers. Betty seemed angry at most men. She’d been engaged to a major in the US Army Air Corps she had met at Camp Cooke—this was said of her by girls who’d known her longer than me—& her fiancé had died in a plane crash—

BETTY SHORT: "Dr. M. drove me back to the Buena Vista in the beautiful black Packard car & said very few words to me—asked where I lived & was I a “starlet” —& stared straight ahead through the windshield of the car— Where does it seem that I am from, then?—I asked him with a sidelong smile. He continued to drive the Packard slow along the street as other vehicles passed us & his forehead furrowed & he said finally—I could not guess. I would think that you are born of Hollywood—you have stepped out of a movie—or of the night. Out of the night—this struck me, it was a strange thing to say & flattering to me & so I thought He is attracted to me. He will fall in love with me—he will be in my power." -"Black Dahlia and White Rose: Stories" (2012) by Joyce Carol Oates's story

Scarlett Johansson posing as Anti-Marilyn Monroe for Vogue Paris magazine, 2009

DePalma turns the legend of The Black Dahlia into a portrait of the Hollywood institution as both nightmare and fantasia—not dishonest sociology, but a haunting realization of all that Hollywood represents. “Hollywood will fuck you when no one else will,” says a hard-boiled police captain. His cynicism is in response to Elizabeth Short’s murder, but he could also be describing the misfortunes of his two young detectives assigned to the case, Bucky (Josh Hartnett) and Lee (Aaron Eckhart). Commodified just like movie stars, their hot and cold temperaments reflect contrasting ways of dealing with social and inner pressure—the range of moral disgust. It’s DePalma’s vision of social chaos—citizens divided against themselves—that never ends. (Johansson is uncannily photographed like Tippi Hedren in The Birds.) Source: nypress.com

Scarlett Johansson in "Summer Crossing" directorial debut

noreply@blogger.com (Kendra) — Thu, 16 May 2013 22:12:00 +0000

Scarlett Johansson has signed up to direct her first feature, a film adaptation of the Truman Capote’s nearly-lost novel “Summer Crossing.” Aldamisa will produce and shop the pic at Cannes. Aldamisa is also shopping Jon Favreau’s “Chef” in which Johansson just signed up to co-star.

Adaptation is based on Capote’s novel by the same name, which follows a 17-year-old Debutant who decides to pursue romance with a Jewish valet parking attendant instead of traveling through Paris during a 1945 summer heat wave in New York. Capote never published “Summer Crossing.” In fact, he trashed the manuscript altogether, and it was only salvaged after a janitor in his building fished discovered it. The pages resurfaced in a 2004 auction and was later published. Source: variety.com

Marilyn Monroe & Truman Capote dance at El Morocco in New York (1955)

Scarlett Johansson: Buxom beauty Scarlett Johansson as Marilyn Monroe seems like an obvious choice. With her blond 'do, red lips and va-va-voom curves on display, the actress channeled the Hollywood icon in a series of ad campaigns for Dolce and Gabbana in 2010. Source: nydailynews.com

"There was something exceptional about Marilyn Monroe," muses Truman Capote. "Sometimes she could be ethereal and sometimes like a waitress in a coffee shop." The pair met in 1949 and quickly became close friends. Both devotees of the capricious moment, Capote recalls how they once danced nude in Cecil Beaton's New York hotel suite while the great photographer snapped away. Truman says that the photographic proof is somewhere in one of his five homes.

When Monroe died of a drug overdose in 1962, Capote was in Spain writing In Cold Blood. "I was walking in a little Spanish town. I saw these headlines saying: 'Marilyn Monroe, Morte,' " he remembers. "I was shocked, even though you knew she was the kind of person this might happen to." Source: www.people.com

Jake Gyllenhaal and Chris Pine to join "Into the Woods" musical

noreply@blogger.com (Kendra) — Wed, 15 May 2013 06:23:00 +0000

Jake Gyllenhaal leaving NYC on a Private Helicopter, on May 12, 2013

"At this year’s Cannes Film Market, Meyer’s team will be pitching foreign distributors on high-profile projects including Nightcrawler, starring Jake Gyllenhaal. On the eve of Cannes, Meyer, 44, who lives in Los Angeles with his wife and three children, sat down with THR to talk about what’s ahead for Sierra — think Ender’s Game, the adaptation of the Orson Scott Card novel starring Asa Butterfield and Harrison Ford — and why he likes working outside of the studio system." Source: www.hollywoodreporter.com

Jake Gyllenhaal and Chris Pine are in discussions to join Johnny Depp and Meryl Streep in Disney’s adaptation of the Broadway musical Into the Woods, The Hollywood Reporter has learned.

If deals close, Gyllenhaal and Pine would play their first on-screen singing roles. Sources say that Gyllenhaal and Pine would play the musical’s two princes, Cinderella’s Prince and Rapunzel’s Prince, brothers who are pompous and self-absorbed. A fall production start is being eyed. The project is expected to attract more big names. John DeLuca is producing. Source: www.hollywoodreporter.com

Chris Pine -On being a misfit in high school: "Just looking at a girl felt awkward. When you feel like an oddball, it never really leaves you. Even now, I'm better around people who are uncomfortable with themselves, the misfits."

Last time he cried: "I cry all the time--at work, at the shrink's, with my lady. The Notebook killed me. Up destroyed me. Up was like the animated Amour."

Motto: "Just get in there and get dirty."
Source: blogs.villagevoice.com

This idea sounds promising, two blue-eyed hotties together and singing gracefully in a musical film - which is a very valued if risky field (Les Miserables had a great reception last year) that needs very skillful performers- connected to a talented cast. Chris Pine is a great choice, because he looks like Jake's geek twin brother.

Noirish settings: David Lynch's Alphabet, De Palma's The Black Dahlia

noreply@blogger.com (Kendra) — Tue, 14 May 2013 03:11:00 +0000

Fox has officially greenlit its first event series, handing out the order to Wayward Pines and tapping Matt Dillon to star in the drama from M. Night Shyamalan and Chad Hodge.

The drama, based on the best-selling novel of the same name by Blake Crouch, Pines is described as a thriller in the vein of Twin Peaks.

The drama revolves around Ethan Burke (Dillon), a Secret Service agent who arrives in the bucolic town of Wayward Pines, Id., on a mission to find two missing federal agents. But instead of answers, Ethan's investigation only turns up more questions. Each step closer to the truth takes Ethan further from the life he knew, from the husband and father he was, until he must face the terrifying reality that he may never get out of Wayward Pines alive. Source: www.hollywoodreporter.com

Wayward Pines isn’t the first show attempting to navigate the same treacherous road of plot twists and turns – set against the backdrop of a Noir-ish setting with supernatural overtones – as Twin Peaks did in the 1990s. Source: screenrant.com

Twin Peaks Cooper Dream: The iconic dream sequence that launched a cult TV show.

This weekend, as part of BAM's Booed at Cannes film series, they'll be showing two of David Lynch's most sublime works: Wild at Heart and Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me. And although the former is a steamy and violent fairytale road movie about a couple on the outskirts of the law, and the latter, a psychologically terrifying mystery of sordid debauchery lurking beneath a placid facade, they both showcase different elements of Lynch's cinematic sensibility. His obsessions and auteurististic traits resound through both with the haunting tone he's known and loved for. Source: www.blackbookmag.com

Add one more film to the list – David Lynch’s Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me. Early in Fire Walk With Me, an FBI chief (Lynch) presents two FBI agents (Chris Isaak and Kiefer Sutherland) with a message in code. The message is, in fact, a woman dressed in red, with a matching red wig and a "sour" facial expression. She wears a blue rose on her lapel.

Blue flower imagery in Hollywood films goes at least as far back as 1946's The Blue Dahlia (directed by George Marshall from a screenplay by Raymond Chandler), the title of which was borrowed by the press to describe the most famous lust-crime of 1947, the murder of demi-prostitute Elisabeth Short, aka "The Black Dahlia."

The Black Dahlia, Brian De Palma’s fictionalized version of the Elizabeth Short murder investigation (adapted faithfully from James Ellroy’s book of the same name), is as dark a film noir as Hollywood has produced in recent years. Maybe not as dark as 1992's Fire Walk With Me, but dark and sexually perverse enough to make the recent Hollywoodland (the conspiracy film where there is no conspiracy) look like a kiddies story. Director Robert Wise once told Bright Lights that for a noir to be truly noir, it had to be shot in black and white.

The Black Dahlia is, of course, shot in color (by Obsession cinematographer, Vilmos Zsigmond), but black and white cinematography is skillfully woven into De Palma’s tapestry throughout. Elizabeth Short’s screen tests are black and white. So is a stag film containing clues to the victim’s murder. Source: brightlightsfilm.com

This being quintessential noir, “Black Dahlia” is sexually explicit in depicting a romantic triangle between Bucky, Kay, and Madeleine, who may or may not have known Betty Short and who may or may not be bisexual. The sexual attraction between Bucky and Madeleine is depicted in particularly steamy way in a number of scenes. As De Palma promised during production, Hilary Swank, known until now for her tough gender-bending Oscar roles (“Boys Don't Cry” and “Million Dollar Baby”) is utterly credible as a noirish femme fatale. Source: www.emanuellelevy.com

The spiritual deflowering is all Bucky's. As he watches Short's screen tests, he becomes entranced by her ghostly image, and pursues justice in hopes of reclaiming her goodness and strengthening his. Like the heroes of other obsessive necrophiliac love stories—including Laura, Vertigo and De Palma's own Body Double—Bucky works through, and also evades, his dawning sense of helplessness by falling in love with a murdered woman and figuratively trying to resurrect her. It's a doomed quest. As Bucky burrows deeper into the city's underbelly, Short's murder begins to seem a redundant postscript —the annihilation of a woman who was already dead in spirit— and a harbinger of Bucky's own journey.

Bucky will see that dead woman as long as he lives. Justice won't bring her back to life, and no matter how diligently he tries to submerge that dreadful image—to forget and heal and move on—it will remain in his memory and erupt when he least expects it. "Nothing stays buried forever," Bucky tells us early in the The Black Dahlia; by the end, he realizes just how right he was. Source: www.slantmagazine.com

Film Noir Classics IV DVD, L.A. Confidential into TV Sequel

noreply@blogger.com (Kendra) — Mon, 13 May 2013 03:23:00 +0000

"Sony Pictures Home Entertainment, The Film Foundation and Turner Classic Movies again partner to present the fourth collection in this series, Columbia Pictures Film Noir Classics IV. These five films, all fully restored and remastered and never before released on DVD, showcase the work of directors Joseph H. Lewis, Robert Rossen, Gordon Douglas and Alfred L. Werker—all of them masters at creating taut and atmospheric visions from morally-strained hard-boiled stories. The collection also highlights the genre-defining cinematography of Burnett Guffey and George E. Diskant, and iconic performances by film noir mainstays Dick Powell, Evelyn Keyes, Lee J. Cobb, Dennis O'Keefe and Edmond O'Brien, who excelled at revealing the raw heart that beat beneath noir's tough exteriors."

Evelyn Keyes and Dick Powell on the set of "Johnny O'Clock" (1947) directed by Robert Rossen

Johnny O'Clock (Dick Powell) is a junior partner in a posh casino with Guido Marchettis (Thomas Gomez), but is senior in the eyes of Nelle (Ellen Drew)—Guido's wife and Johnny's ex. This love triangle leads to a web of complications, leaving Police Inspector Koch (Lee J. Cobb) to unravel the threads of deceit and a murdered casino employee's sister (Evelyn Keyes) to tug on Johnny's heartstrings before it's too late.

Dick Powell as Johnny O'Clock and Evelyn Keyes as Nancy Hobson share some intensely erotic moments in "Johnny O'Clock"

Applying Raymond Chandler's dictum that a good plot is an excuse for a series of exciting scenes, rookie director Robert Rossen strings together tense vignettes—brought vividly to life by cinematographer Burnett Guffey. Source: shop.tcm.com

Ella Raines in "Phantom Lady" (1944) directed by Robert Siodmak

-SF360: Who are the directors you gravitate toward and why?

Deanna Durbin in "Christmas Holiday" (1944) directed by Robert Siodmak

-Eddie Muller: Robert Siodmak is my favorite director because he, more than anyone else, understands the noir style. He’s a very seductive, suspenseful, atmospheric filmmaker. It really bugs me when people talk about noir as tough, violent pot boilers and they think it’s all like Mickey Spillane. The best noir films are spellbinding. That’s the word that comes to mind. It’s a style of filmmaking that completely complements stories about a person drawn into a situation almost against their will; they really shouldn’t go there but they can’t help themselves. The next thing you know they’re caught up in a whirlpool of sin and there’s no way out. I love when a filmmaker directs a film in exactly this way and that’s what Siodmak always did. His films have an inexorable pull—they’re not fast paced, there’s no slam-bang editing. Lynch’s films also have that quality. They draw you in and you can’t help yourself, you have the feeling that something dreadful is going to happen but you can’t stop going down that path.

-SF360: So, here’s pop quiz. Name the steamiest noir moment or scene.

-Eddie Muller: The after-shower, tic-tac-toe scene from Thieves Highway is the one stands that out for me. It was an early film I saw and I always cite it as an example of why old Hollywood movies, even with the Production Code, were more erotic than movies made today. Take Gilda: It’s the most perverted movie ever made.

-SF360: Your favorite/most lethal femme fatale?

-Eddie Muller: The women I’d travel back in time to are: Gloria Grahame, Ella Raines and Linda Darnell. Ella Raines was never really a femme fatale but I just really like her.

-SF360: How did you find your way into this niche?

-Muller: I like the films and particularly like that period of American history because I think it’s the time—mid-20th century, the span from victory in WW2 to the Kennedy assassination—when America lost its innocence. We were kings of the world because we saved the world and then when Kennedy was assassinated, it was if we lost our way and there was something horrible and corrupt at the center of our society. How that happened and how it’s reflected in the popular art of the time has always been interesting to me. Source: www.sf360.org

"The truth about Elizabeth Short is that she was a lost individual. She involved herself with a number of men, using their generosity for free dinners and money. The murder unfortunately was also a precursor to the decline of Los Angeles itself. The Black Dahlia murder is a symbol of change from what was once a young and innocent Los Angeles to a dark and gloomy Hollywood. The crime rate since World War II has increased in Los Angeles, and areas that were once considered middle-class neighborhoods have turned into rundown areas over a period of 20 years."

"What I have learned in the end is that the murder is not only a loss of a young life, it is also a loss of old-fashioned Hollywood. In the following years, race riots, immigration and civil rights have changed Los Angeles to what it is today; leaving all what was of 'Hollywoodland' behind, and bringing with it the unsolved case from a time that is gone but not forgotten." Source: dailybruin.com

In this respect, "The Black Dahlia" is one of De Palma’s most unflattering mirrors, its entirely uncompromised mise en scène in every way the stylistic equal of James Ellroy’s source novel. I had as much trouble getting into Ellroy’s fictionalization of the Elizabeth Short murder mystery until I recognized that he is, in part, a parodist, using hard-boiled, floridly macho prose to get at deeper psychological truths about human nature. He wields a pen in much the same way De Palma does a camera—to create, for both men, is to bear witness with a fervor approaching, if not attaining, the religious.

Their shared vessel is the young warrants detective Dwight “Bucky” Bleichert, a model of first-person arrogance in the novel, cast as something of an androgynous specter in De Palma’s adaptation. Embodied by a never-better Josh Hartnett, Bleichert wanders through a falsified period landscape, recalling his loss of innocence (or acknowledging his always-present corruption) through a precisely employed voiceover that casts each and every event (save for the film’s brilliantly nonredemptive final sequence) within the deceptive realm of memory. Source: www.reverseshot.com

Within 90 seconds of taking the stage, the author of "L.A. Confidential" and "The Black Dahlia" had referenced sex, drugs and physical anatomy, a warm-up for the searing commentary on liberals and hipsters that was to follow. It was a refreshingly unabashed articulation of a unique worldview that has produced one of the most distinctive voices on the local literary scene. In other words, Ellroy was a perfect fit for the Los Angeles Writers Reading Series, some of the best programming currently taking place on the Glendale campus. Source: articles.glendalenewspress.com

James Ellroy’s 1990s novel L.A. Confidential was turned into an acclaimed feature starring Kevin Spacey, Russell Crowe and Kim Basinger and produced by Regency. Now Ellroy and New Regency are shopping an L.A. Confidential sequel targeted for the small screen, Deadline said. Ellroy wrote the project on spec as a TV drama series, which is being pitched to broadcast and cable networks as well as emerging distribution platforms, with multiple outlets interested. The project is reportedly eyeing a straight-to-series commitment.

The sequel continues the themes and stories from L.A. Confidential, a murder mystery which examined the intersection of organized crime, police corruption, celebrity and tabloid journalism in 1950s Los Angeles.

The 1997 film, co-written and directed by Curtis Hanson, earned nine Oscar nominations, winning two awards, for best screenplay and best supporting actress (Basinger). The L.A. Confidential sequel is one of the first major projects to come out of the TV division of New Regency, which was re-started last year with the hire of Syfy’s Andrew Plotkin. It combines the company’s strategy of mining its movie library for TV series adaptations and bringing in new material.

Meanwhile, Ellroy just sold another LA-set period drama. Based on Ellroy’s 2012 novella Shakedown, the project, which has been set up at FX as a pitch, is set in the tabloid world and underbelly of Los Angeles circa the late 1950s. Source: www.panarmenian.net

"Starstruck" (2013), "The Black Dahlia", Josh Hartnett's evolution

noreply@blogger.com (Kendra) — Thu, 09 May 2013 23:10:00 +0000

Who Is The Black Dahlia (1975): Dramatization of Elizabeth Short's story. Starring Brooke Adams & Lucie Arnaz. In 1947 Los Angeles, a police detective tries to solve the shocking and grisly murder of 22-year-old aspiring actress Elizabeth Short, whose nude body was dumped in a lot after being bisected with surgical precision. The detective interviews people who knew Short, who was called "The Black Dahlia" because of the black outfits she wore. "She's a ghost and a blank page to record our fears and desires," says James Ellroy. "A post-war Mona Lisa, an L.A. quintessential." It's a real-life mystery that's inspired countless moviemakers and writers from "Double Indemnity," "Chinatown" and "L.A. Confidential."

Elizabeth Short was herself starstruck with her childhood idol actress/singer Deanna Durbin who passed away ten days ago. "Dottie [Elizabeth's sister], Bette and I were going to be movie stars. We were all entranced with movie stars, star struck. Spent hours talking about movie stars, about going to Hollywood. We performed using the Short's front porch as a stage. Every Friday as soon as the song sheets came out, we'd pool our money, get the latest sheets, and spend hours singing."

"Bette imitated Deanna Durbin. Walked like her, talked like her, and in my eyes sang like her." -Eleanor Kurz, Elizabeth Short's Medford neighbor and friend.

She was Elizabeth Short from Medford, Mass. Friends called her Betty. But in the headlines of the day, and ever after, she would be the Black Dahlia, inspired, it would be said, by the way she wore her hair.

She became a tabloid sensation, hot copy in a five-newspaper town. Now she has been incarnated on screen in "The Black Dahlia," a ferociously imagined fictional take on the brief life and cruel death of Elizabeth Short.

"The Black Dahlia" (2006) stars Josh Harnett and Aaron Eckhart as cops on the case, Scarlett Johanssen as the siren they both love, and as the Black Dahlia herself, Mia Kirshner.

"The myth of Elizabeth Short is this is what happens to star-struck girls from... little towns back East... who come out to big bad Hollywood with ideas of getting into movies," Harnisch said. "Terrible things happen." "Don't, don't, don't come to L.A. to become a movie-star," Ellroy said. "Fatuous dreams die hard." Source: abcnews.go.com

Josh Hartnett plays detective Bucky Bleichert in "The Black Dahlia" (2006) directed by Brian De Palma

"She needed to be here. She needed to be where it had all begun. It was late, still the store was unusually empty for a Friday night. All the Hollywood hangers-on who made Schwab's their headquarters, the has-beens and never-weres and still-to-bes who set the air abuzz with their jabber and complaints , their gossip and gloats, were nowhere to be seen. Margo made her way down the quiet main aisle and sat down at the horseshoe-shaped lunch counter in the back, which was empty apart from a man in a trenchcoat reading the late edition of the newspaper over coffee and apple pie. He had on one of those soft felt hats that were worn only by undercover detectives or men who played them in the movies, and for once in her life Margo wasn't interested in guessing which one he was." -"Starstruck" (2013) by Rachel Shukert

"The Golden Age of Hollywood –and its gritty underside– is captured with real flair in this novel... this novel evokes late-1930s Hollywood with panache. Characters are well drawn, representing common archetypes but with a twist." -School Library Journal, May 2013.

In Starstruck, novelist Rachel Shukert paints an alluring portrait of Hollywood in the 1930s: Glamorous muses in designer gowns swan around on the arms of handsome men in tuxedos. It’s all very nice until you look a little closer to notice that no one is smiling. While the view might look beautiful from afar -- much like an Impressionist painting -- up close it’s just a big, incoherent mess. In no time at all, Margaret Frobisher becomes Margo Sterling, a promising, young ingénue who is destined for stardom. But, like clockwork, unsavory rumors begin to swirl, connecting her to the missing starlet, Diana Chesterfield. There's no denying that Margo bears an uncanny resemblance to Diana -- she was even cast as Diana's replacement in the upcoming film. Some begin to speculate that Margo is looking to replace Diana altogether.

Starstruck is a clear nod in homage to Jacqueline Susann’s pulp novel, Valley of the Dolls, a seminal work that depicts the horrors of Hollywood and drug abuse. But while Dolls ultimately ends in tragedy, Starstruck has Margo rising straight to the top. The only question remains: At what cost did she get there? Shukert’s Starstruck reads like a cross between a film noir mystery novel and celebrity tabloid fodder. The ambiguity of characters’ intentions, along with the mystery behind a starlet's disappearance, will keep audiences captivated until the very end. Source: www.everydayebook.com

Josh Hartnett: "I'm not going to say that I'm a saint, that I've never done anything wrong in my life, but if you're going to find something out about me personally, at least find something that's remotely true." Hollywood actor Josh Hartnett has won 20,000 pounds ($30,000) in libel damages from a British newspaper that claimed he engaged in "steamy shenanigans" in a public area of a London hotel. The tabloid Daily Mirror claimed in a September article that Hartnett and an unknown woman had a steamy encounter in the library of the Soho Hotel that was caught on CCTV. Hartnett's lawyer says the actor plans to donate the damages money to charity. Source: seattletimes.com

Josh Hartnett's Evolution (Forever Young) video from Kendra.
Josh Hartnett's Evolution (A Look at All of His Filmography).
Soundtrack: "Forever Young" by Bob Dylan, "Someday Soon" by Wilco, "I Forgot to Remember to Forget" by Elvis Presley, "Lady" by Eugene Kelly, "Ooh Wee Baby" by Darlene Love, "Just Like Honey" by The Jesus & Mary Chain, "Lady Midnight" by Leonard Cohen, "Breathless" by Jerry Lee Lewis and "Baby, Baby" by The Vibrators.

Short version: includes songs "That's the story of my life" by The Velvet Underground and "Wonderful World" by Sam Cooke.

Jake Gyllenhaal attends 'Words Of War' Benefit by The Headstrong Project

noreply@blogger.com (Kendra) — Thu, 09 May 2013 21:25:00 +0000

Jake Gyllenhaal attending 'Words Of War' Benefit Hosted By The Headstrong Project on May 8, 2013 in New York City

Jake Gyllenhaal attended The Headstrong Project's first Words of War event in NYC last night. Along with his support, he lent his voice to the cause by reading the poem "Dulce et Decorum Est" by Wilfred Owen. The Headstrong Project aims to improve mental health care for Iraq and Afghanistan war veterans, and Jake also made a monetary donation by bidding $5,000 in the auction. He was joined by pregnant Veep star Anna Chlumsky, as well as the chairman of the Headstrong Project, Zach Iscol, for the charitable night. Source: www.popsugar.com

The actor who star in 2005 war drama Jarhead, which is based on the real life experiences of US Marine Anthony Swofford, read the poem Dulce et Decorum Est by British soldier and leading World War I poet Wilfred Owen at the inaugural Words of War event for the Headstrong Project.

Gyllenhaal also presented the foundation, which provides mental healthcare and support for war veterans, with a donation of $5,000 for eye movement desensitization and reprocessing training, a psychotherapy to treat post-traumatic stress disorder. Source: www.starpulse.com

Punk Beauties in Met Gala 2013: Punk Chaos to Couture

noreply@blogger.com (Kendra) — Tue, 07 May 2013 22:02:00 +0000

Amber Heard in a red dress by Emilio Gucci attends The Metropolitan Museum of Art's Costume Institute benefit celebrating "PUNK: Chaos to Couture" in Manhattan.

Anne Hathaway made good after opting out of wearing her go-to designer at the Oscars. "It's vintage Valentino from 1992," she said of her edgy gown.

Kerry Washington wore Vera Wang. "I have purple (highlights) going in to match the dress," she said. "I've had lots of misguided (fashion) moments. Who hasn't? I had a big hip-hop phase, jerseys and that kind of stuff."

Kate Beckinsale, in Alberta Ferretti, said her most rebellious moment was getting her ears double- and triple-pierced as a teen without telling her mom. "I hope my daughter doesn't read this!" says the mom of Lily.

The last to arrive: Madonna. Her top rebellious fashion moment? "It depends on the week!" she retorted. Source: www.usatoday.com

Diane Kruger in a black dress by Chanel (Haute Couture) & Joshua Jackson

Sienna Miller wore gown and jacket by Burberry Prorsum

Kristen Stewart wore a burdeos outfit by Stella Mccartney

Kirsten Dunst in a green dress by Louis Vuitton

Jessica Biel in a black outfit by Giambattista Valli

Mosh pits and punk rock don't usually mix with Upper East Side galas, but Beyoncé, Rooney Mara, Anna Wintour, Tiger Woods, Alec Baldwin and Anne Hathaway all tried to rock it like the Sex Pistols (or some fashionable facsimile) at Monday night's Metropolitan Museum Costume Institute Gala.

Peter Sarsgaard and Maggie Gyllenhaal (she wore a red dress by Calvin Klein and and Bulgari jewels)

Nora Zehetner in a printed Marchesa dress accessorized with Edmundo Castillo heels

"I don't think I'm very punk," Mara admitted, wearing a white lace Givenchy gown that, in truth, seemed more "Little House on the Prairie" -- although it did have some heavy-duty zippers. The gala celebrates the Costume Institute's new exhibit, "Punk: Chaos to Couture," which opens Thursday, tracing punk rock's influence on high fashion, from its birth in the 1970s onward. Source: www.newsday.com

Josh Hartnett stops to smell the flowers in Soho with Tamsin Egerton

noreply@blogger.com (Kendra) — Mon, 06 May 2013 16:15:00 +0000

As Josh Harnett and his girlfriend Tamsin Egerton stepped out in New York's Soho neighbourhood on Saturday, their love wasn't the only thing in bloom. Marvelling at the white and yellow petals in the city's landscaping, the 34-year-old Wicker Park actor stopped to savour their beautiful surroundings.

Diane Kruger and Josh Hartnett in "Wicker Park" (2004) directed by Paul McGuigan

His 24-year-old girlfriend smiled in awe as she watched him pull one of the blossoming branches towards his face, breathing in the fresh floral scent. Appearing to be in sync with one another, the couple coordinated their ensembles for their afternoon outing.

Tamsin donned a striped tee beneath a red plaid shirt and grey collared jacket. She teamed the tops with a pair of skinny denim trousers that she cuffed above her black ballet flats.

The blonde beauty's eyes were concealed with plastic-rimmed sunglasses as her wavy locks were neatly tied back into a bun. But throughout their day date, the British actress decided to loosen up a bit, releasing her strands from the sleek style and letting them flow freely past her shoulders.

On her left, Josh sported a heather grey tee that he teamed with a lightweight navy jacket, fitted denim trousers and laced brown shoes. He kept his eye concealed as well, sporting jet black plastic-rimmed sunglasses. The two stars have been dating since August 2012, but the Hollywood actor hasn't appeared in a film since 2011. Source: www.dailymail.co.uk

“Walk in the rain, smell flowers, stop along the way, build sandcastles, go on field trips, find out how things work, tell stories, say the magic words, trust the universe.” ― Bruce Williamson

Jake Gyllenhaal attends the 28th Annual Lucille Lortel Awards

noreply@blogger.com (Kendra) — Mon, 06 May 2013 15:02:00 +0000

Scan of Jake Gyllenhaqal in Die Zeit Magazine (Germany), May 2013

Jake Gyllenhaal attending the 28th Annual Lucille Lortel Awards on May 5, 2013 in New York City

NOIR CITY - SPRING 2013 (magazine excerpts)

noreply@blogger.com (Kendra) — Sun, 05 May 2013 22:26:00 +0000

Claire Trevor and Dick Powell in a promotional portrait for Edward Dmytryk's film "Murder, My Sweet" (1944) based on Raymond Chandler's novel "Farewell, My Lovely" (1940)

Raymond Chandler would be the prime beneficiary of the noir renaissance of the 1970s, as two previously filmed Marlowe novels returned to the big screen. Chinatown’s success permitted director Dick Richards to mount a handsome period production of Farewell, My Lovely (1975) that even got to use Chandler’s original title. (The 1944 adaptation was called Murder, My Sweet so that audiences would not expect a musical, given that the star was song-and-dance man Dick Powell beginning his transition into harder-edged roles).

Richards’ Marlowe was Robert Mitchum, who had already delivered a piercing, valedictory performance as the low-level Boston hood working both sides of the law in 1973’s The Friends of Eddie Coyle. Once again, Marlowe is asked by newly-sprung pug Moose Malloy (ex-boxer Jack O’Halloran, taking the role played by Mike Mazurki in the first film) to find his “cute as lace pants” girlfriend Velma. Aside from changing “psychic consultant” Jules Amthor into a madam, screenwriter David Zelag Goodman largely sticks to Chandler’s novel. This fidelity isn’t a bonus as it saddles the film with Chandler’s plot, as easy to track as mercury on a tabletop. The production design smartly conveys the 1940s setting while the script overemphasizes it, with Marlowe offering commentary on Joe DiMaggio’s ongoing hitting streak and a newsie asking him at one point, “Whaddaya think of this guy Hitler?” Farewell offers its share of incidental pleasures.

Charlotte Rampling was born to play an icy femme fatale, and novelist Jim Thompson amusingly cameos as her power broker husband. In the film’s best scene, Mitchum duets with Sylvia Miles’ dipsomaniacal faded actress Jessie Florian and she bursts into tears over her lost youth. (Miles received an Oscar nomination largely for this scene alone). As good-looking and sincere as Farewell is, it leaves no lasting impression.

Robert Mitchum on the set of the movie 'Farewell, My Lovely', 1974.

It is infinitely better than Mitchum’s second turn as Marlowe. 1978’s The Big Sleep is set in then present-day England. The locale is addressed with a throwaway line about Marlowe coming to the U.K. during World War II and never going back. The time period seems to have been purely a financial decision, meant to save money on wardrobe and cars. In The Long Goodbye, Robert Altman restlessly probes the Marlowe-as-man-out-of-time conceit. Here, writer/director Michael Winner doubles down on the issue by moving the detective across the pond and never addresses the complications.

Mitchum was several decades too old for the role the first go-round. He played tired in Farewell. In Sleep he actually is tired. Understandably so, given how much of the film’s running time consists of shots of the actor striding across empty rooms. Marlowe is hired by fellow ex-pat General Sternwood to bail his hellion daughters out of trouble. The Sternwood clan is played by James Stewart, Candy Clark and Sarah Miles.

In 1950, Fleischer was continuing his upward trajectory with his fourth RKO noir, 'Armored Car Robbery.'

The film stars Charles McGraw, a man whom William Friedkin calls “the quintessential B picture film noir actor.” Friedkin sums up McGraw’s on-screen persona when he describes him as “the most hard boiled of the tough guys.” McGraw, who was a contract player for RKO and appeared in many “B” noirs during the late 1940s and early 1950s, had a face cut from granite, the leftover pieces of which were dumped down his throat and left to chafe against his vocal cords.

He was the perfect fit for the type of character he played in Armored Car Robbery: a hard-nosed cop out for blood after a gang of thugs botches—you guessed it—an armored car robbery, offing his partner in the process. The film boasts great performances, excellent nighttime cinematography, a stripped-down, fastmoving plot, and a fantastic final scene that preceded a similar ending in Stanley Kubrick’s noir classic The Killing (1956). But it wasn’t Armored Car Robbery that was destined to put Fleischer on the map. He reteamed with McGraw in 1950, and once he completed directing The Narrow Margin in just thirteen days, he knew he had something special.

The Narrow Margin (1952) publicity still of Peter Virgo, Jacqueline White, & Charles McGraw

As he put it, “everyone who saw it at the studio was convinced it was my breakthrough film.” And it would be. But not in 1950, and not in 1951. As Fleischer put it, in 1950, the film “came to the attention of Howard Hughes, who promptly put it in his projection booth, where it sat for more than a year.” His improbable run of autonomy had finally come to an end. He’d run up against the one-man wrecking crew who was unintentionally, but systematically, destroying RKO.

Check out lots of riveting articles you can find in the NOIR CITY magazine - Contribute to Film Noir Foundation ordering the Spring issue of NOIR CITY online.

'Key Largo' & noir classics at Bogart Film Festival, Contemporary Film Noir: The Canyons

noreply@blogger.com (Kendra) — Fri, 03 May 2013 16:39:00 +0000

Lauren Bacall and Humphrey Bogart in "Key Largo" (1948) directed by John Huston

"The Humphrey Bogart Estate and the Key Largo Chamber of Commerce have created an annual Humphrey Bogart Film Festival in Key Largo, Florida. The inaugural edition will be held today, May 2 through May 5, 2013. The festival will be hosted by Stephen Humphrey Bogart, the son of Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall, and will feature preeminent film historian and critic Leonard Maltin as a special guest. The festival opens with a cocktail reception and an outdoor screening of the Bogie-Bacall classic Key Largo.

The Humphrey Bogart Film Festival features a formal Bogart Ball, a display of Bogart memorabilia, and rides on the original, fully-restored African Queen. The theme of the inaugural festival is film noir, and Leonard Maltin will give a presentation at the Bogart Ball about Humphrey Bogart's contribution to the genre. The Bogart Ball is a formal event, and features a cocktail reception, dinner, and dancing. The Bogie memorabilia include personal letters, signed contracts, movie posters, trophies and awards, clothing, and other unique artifacts.

The festival will screen Bogart movies and other iconic films from the film noir genre. Tracing Bogart's career arc and the history of noir's golden age, the following Bogie classics will be screened: The Petrified Forest, High Sierra, The Maltese Falcon, The Big Sleep, Dark Passage, The Treasure of the Sierra Madre, Key Largo, and In a Lonely Place. Because the actual African Queen boat is in Key Largo, Bogie's Oscar-winning turn as Charlie Allnut in The African Queen will also be shown.

Lastly, since it's hard to imagine a Humphrey Bogart festival without Rick Blaine, Casablanca will be screened. In between the Bogie classics, in order to provide a fuller picture of the history of film noir, classics such as Double Indemnity and Sunset Boulevard will be screened. More recent noirs, such as Memento, Brick, and Drive will complete the journey through the world of film noir. Source: movies.broadwayworld.com

THE CANYONS is a contemporary L.A. noir from director Paul Schrader, writer Bret Easton Ellis, and producer Braxton Pope about the dangers of sexual obsession and ambition, both personally and professionally, among a group of young people in their 20's and how one chance meeting connected to the past unravels all of their lives, resulting in deceit, paranoia, cruel mind games and ultimately violence.

Filled with intrigue and suspense, the story follows a beautiful troubled former ingenue as she follows a path of possible self destruction … and that’s just the casting Lindsay Lohan.

The saga behind the making of Bret Easton Ellis’ modern-day film noir “The Canyons” is perhaps just as tawdry as the plot itself. Since the first day of shooting, “The Canyons” has been a dream come true for TMZ editors: naked scene shoots, screaming matches, porn stars and, of course, the media’s ever-present anticipation of Lohan’s next potential misstep.

Lindsay Lohan: 'Anger Management' Guest Spot Still

In November, the second trailer portraying Lohan as a femme fatale caught in a ’50s melodrama hit the Web. Borrowing heavily from noir period pics like “Man Bait” or “Blonde Ice,” the trailer comes closest to “The Canyons’” tone. “Film noir is a huge interest of mine, and when Bret wrote the script, he defined it as a contemporary noir, so that was the style that we shared an affinity for,” says Pope. Source: www.variety.com

Jake Gyllenhaal hanging out with Jonah Hill & America Ferrera

noreply@blogger.com (Kendra) — Wed, 01 May 2013 22:38:00 +0000

Jake Gyllenhaal out with Jonah Hill and America Ferrera in NYC, on April 30, 2013

Happy 31st Birthday, Kirsten Dunst!

noreply@blogger.com (Kendra) — Wed, 01 May 2013 00:16:00 +0000

Kirsten Dunst attending the "Upside Down" Los Angeles Premiere, on March 12, 2013

Kirsten Dunst and Garrett Hedlung in "On The Road" (2012) directed by Walter Salles.

Kirsten Dunst (Happy 31st Birthday!) Hey Kirsten video: A compilation of pictures and stills of Kirsten Dunst. Song "Hey Kirsten" by Morning Spy.

The Faculty: Jordana Brewster (Marie Claire), Josh Hartnett, Clea DuVall

noreply@blogger.com (Kendra) — Mon, 29 Apr 2013 21:32:00 +0000

Jordana Brewster in "The Faculty" (1998) directed by Robert Rodriguez

I always knew I wanted to be either on TV or in movies," the 33-year-old says from her home in Los Angeles. "I just didn't know how." At 10, she moved with her family from her mother's native Rio de Janeiro to Manhattan, and the track became clear.

"Everything's much more accessible in New York. I started taking classes to prove to myself that I could do it." By the time she was 15, she was a regular on As the World Turns.

From '90s teen thriller The Faculty to The Texas Chainsaw Massacre: The Beginning (where she met her producer husband, Andrew Form), she's been working steadily ever since. Not that it's been a totally smooth ride. Source: www.marieclaire.com

Josh Hartnett with Jordana Brewster as Zeke and Delilah in "The Faculty" (1998)

Josh Hartnett was tipped for great things at the beginning of his career as he appeared in teen movies such as "The Faculty" and "The Virgin Suicides" and there was even more excitement when he moved into more ‘grown up roles’.

Ben Affleck, Kate Beckinsale and Josh Hartnett in "Pearl Harbor" (2001) directed by Michael Bay

He starred in the likes of "Pearl Harbor" and "Black Hawk Down" and his dashing good looks meant he was the next Hollywood leading man in waiting. But the dizzy heights have never really followed for the actor as he turned down the role of Superman - a role that would no doubt have sent his star rocketing even further.
Josh Hartnett with rumored girlfriend, English actress Tamsin Egerton on 23rd April 2013, in Krakow (Polonia)

Josh Hartnett as Paddy in "Stuck between Stations" (2011) directed by Brady Kiernan

The last couple of years we have seen very little of him on the big screen as he has done producing work as well as theatre projects - the movie that has done have struggled to catch people’s attention. But at thirty four Hartnett still has time on his side to get his career back to where it was as he has completed work on "Parts Per Billion" and "Singularity." Source: www.femalefirst.co.uk

Chloe Sevigny and Hilary Swank in "Boys Don't Cry" (1999) directed by Kimberly Peirce

A cameo by Chloë Sevigny/Piper Perabo/Clea DuVall (top 10 lesbian movie cliches): After "Boys Don't Cry," Chloë Sevigny pulled on a white T-shirt and leather jacket and straddled a motorbike in If These Walls Could Talk 2;

and in the underrated 90s teen alien film The Faculty, Clea DuVall even plays a character pretending to be a lesbian. Willingness to explore your fauxmosexuality shows true actorly dedication. Source: www.guardian.co.uk

Jake Gyllenhaal and Jude Law in the East Village, N.Y.

noreply@blogger.com (Kendra) — Mon, 29 Apr 2013 15:59:00 +0000

Jake Gyllenhaal chatting with Jude Law while out in the East Village, New York City, on April 27 2013

Jake Gyllenhaal and René Russo to star in "Nightcrawler" thriller

noreply@blogger.com (Kendra) — Fri, 26 Apr 2013 15:23:00 +0000

Jake Gyllenhaal dabbled in the world of crime journalism when he starred as cartoonist Robert Graysmith in David Fincher's brilliant 2007 crime thriller Zodiac, and today we have learned that he is ready to make his way back. Variety is reporting that the Oscar-nominated actor and Rene Russo have both signed on to star in the new indie thriller Nightcrawler.

René Russo in "Get Shorty" (1995) directed by Barry Sonnenfeld

The film will be the directorial debut of Dan Gilroy, who will also be writing the script. The filmmaker is best known for his work as a screenwriter, previously penning movies like The Bourne Legacy, Tarsem Singh's The Fall and Two For The Money. His brother Tony Gilroy, with whom he wrote the last Bourne movie, will be serving as a producer on the new project.

Jake Gyllenhaal attending the 11th Annual Poetry & the Creative Mind Benefit - Rehearsals on April 17, 2013 in New York City

New still of Jake Gyllenhaal and Sarah Gadon in "An Enemy" (2013) directed by Denis Villeneuve

While details about the plot of Nightcrawler are slim, the trade says that it follows "a driven young man who discovers the nocturnal world of L.A. freelance crime journalism." It's not specified what roles either actor will play, though presumably Gyllenhaal will be starring in the lead role. Source: www.cinemablend.com

Straight Hairdos: Gwyneth Paltrow, Scarlett Johansson and Christine Taylor

noreply@blogger.com (Kendra) — Wed, 24 Apr 2013 19:50:00 +0000

Scarlett Johansson showed off her freshly dyed red hair on the Captain America: The Winter Soldier set in LA yesterday. She is sporting crimson tresses for her return to the role of Black Widow in the latest Captain America flick, which is due out next year. This is the first we have seen of Scarlett with her newly dyed 'do, and she is not the only actress to go red for a role recently.

Megan Fox dyed her hair red to film Michael Bay's upcoming live-action Ninja Turtles project.

Scarlett popped up on her LA set after switching gears from a recent stint in NYC, where she starred in the Broadway play Cat on a Hot Tin Roof. Aside from the stage and the big screen, she is also currently on newsstands.

Scarlett covers the May issue of Marie Claire, and in an interview with the magazine, she touches on personal topics such as her divorce and dating in general, although she is currently taken by French boy friend Romain Dauriac. Source: www.popsugar.com

Jake Gyllenhaal and Gwyneth Paltrow wearing Calvin Klein Collection attend ELLE's 17th Annual Women in Hollywood Tribute on October 18, 2010 in Beverly Hills, California

Gwyneth Paltrow may have been named the most-hated celeb in Hollywood by one magazine, but another is calling her the most-beautiful woman in the world.
People magazine awarded Paltrow, 40, the title for 2013 in their latest issue. The cover boasts that Paltrow has a “timeless look." Source: www.foxnews.com

People magazine has bestowed its Most Beautiful Woman title for 2013 on Gwyneth Paltrow. Which, according to our reckoning, also makes her the year's "Most Beautiful Woman Married to a Member of Coldplay*" and "Most Beautiful Woman to Have a Second Cookbook on the BestSeller List While Starring Opposite Robert Downey Jr. in a Movie." Source: www.latimes.com

Christine Taylor sporting blonde straight hair.

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Jake Gyllenhaal with Christine Taylor and Ben Stiller at the Boston Celtics vs New York Knicks - Game Two on April 23rd 2013

New stills of Jake Gyllenhaal in David O. Russell's "Nailed" & "An Enemy"

noreply@blogger.com (Kendra) — Tue, 23 Apr 2013 01:30:00 +0000

Jake Gyllenhaal attending the 11th Annual Poetry & the Creative Mind Benefit on April 17, 2013 in New York City

New promotional still and poster featuring Jake Gyllenhaal in "An Enemy" (2013) directed by Denis Villeneuve

New stills of Jake Gyllenhaal and Jessica Biel in "Nailed" (2013) directed by David O. Russell

Floored by Flooring Designs and Film Decor

noreply@blogger.com (Kendra) — Mon, 22 Apr 2013 17:31:00 +0000

"I went to brush something off my cheek and it was the floor." -Philip Marlowe

Philip Marlowe first lived at the Hobart Arms, on Franklin Avenue near North Kenmore Avenue (in The Big Sleep), but then moved to the Bristol Hotel, where he stayed for about ten years. By 1950 (in The Long Goodbye) he has rented a house on Yucca Avenue and continued at the same place in early 1952 in Playback, the last full-length Chandler Marlowe novel.

“He turned and walked across the floor and out. I watched the door close. I listened to his steps going away down the imitation marble corridor. After a while they got faint, then they got silent. I kept on listening anyway.” ―Raymond Chandler, The Long Goodbye

"On the dance floor half a dozen couples were throwing themselves around with the reckless abandon of a night watchman with arthritis." -Playback (Chapter 8)

"Bunker Hill is old town, lost town, shabby town, crook town. Once, very long ago, it was the choice residential district of the city, and there are still standing a few of the jigsaw Gothic mansions with wide porches and walls covered with round-end shingles and full corner bay windows with spindle turrets. They are all rooming houses now, their parquetry floors are scratched and worn through the once glossy finish and the wide sweeping staircases are dark with time and with cheap varnish laid on over generations of dirt. In the tall rooms haggard landladies bicker with shifty tenants. On the wide cool front porches, reaching their cracked shoes into the sun, and staring at nothing, sit the old men with faces like lost battles." -The High Window (Raymond Chandler)

Marlowe PI's office, originally on the 7th floor of an unnamed building in 1936, is at #615 on the sixth floor of the Cahuenga Building by March/April 1939 (the date of Farewell, My Lovely), which is on Hollywood Boulevard near Ivar. North Ivar Avenue is between North Cahuenga Boulevard to the west and Vine Street to the east. The office telephone number is GLenview 7537. Marlowe's office is modest and he doesn't have a secretary (unlike Sam Spade). He generally refuses to take divorce cases. A chess adept, he almost exclusively plays against himself, or plays games from books.

Rick's smoky cafe in Casablanca, Lincoln's office at the White House of the 1860s, or the Mos Eisley cantina on the desert planet of Tatooine: A production designer came up with the overall look of those movie sets. But the booze on Rick's bar or the pens on Lincoln's desk — it took a set decorator and a crew to make them look authentic and believable.

Set decorators have many ways to find the objects that make their movies feel real. In particular, they rely on rental facilities like the Warner Brothers Prop House in Burbank, Calif. It has four floors — each the size of a football field. It's like walking through the furniture department of the biggest department store you've ever seen. On the upper floors there's contemporary furniture, antiques, chandeliers, draperies, flags, artwork, statues, kitchen and bath stuff — you name it, they have it. "Everything you see on TV and film," says manager and former set decorator Robert Greenfield, "we have at least one of them."

Gaffin spies her favorite chair. "I've used this chair in every movie I've ever done," she says. She lists some of them — the first two Iron Man films, The Pursuit of Happyness. It's an easily recognizable Eames lounge chair with brown leather cushions and molded plywood. Source: www.npr.org

Do you want to renew your room's floor? Do you need help choosing the right flooring options for your home? If you are looking for a professional solution with a wide assortment of practical ideas or restoring your previous flooring, you will be able to transform any room of your home into a media room or home theater. In foulksflooring-america.com you will find materials that reflect light and sound and choose hardwood which combines with other furniture pieces for an affordable budget.

In the case of choosing carpeting for your floors, be sure to choose one that is also soft and comfortable to sit on, especially if you plan to play video games in the room or have children in the home. You can add a few beanbag chairs or floor pillows. There is carpeting that is specifically designed for media rooms and home theaters. Your choices of Color: Overall, the carpet color should be dark, which will absorb the light from the screen instead of reflecting it.

Josh Hartnett (Love Scenes) video

noreply@blogger.com (Kendra) — Thu, 18 Apr 2013 03:09:00 +0000

Watch Josh Hartnett (Love Scenes) video in Entretenimiento | View More Free Videos Online at Veoh.com Josh Hartnett (Love Scenes) video

Jake Gyllenhaal at the Edible Schoolyard NYC's Spring Benefit

noreply@blogger.com (Kendra) — Thu, 18 Apr 2013 00:00:00 +0000

Jake Gyllenhaal stepped out for the Edible Schoolyard's inaugural Spring benefit dinner, called "A Garden Grows in Harlem," in NYC last night. It may have been their first-ever benefit dinner, but Jake and the Edible Schoolyard have been working together for over three years. He was joined by other big names like J.Crew's Jenna Lyons, Martha Stewart, and NYC Mayor Michael Bloomberg for the event, which benefits the creation of a rooftop garden and kitchen classroom at Manhattan's P.S. 7 in East Harlem.

Jake Gyllenhaal attending the Edible Schoolyard NYC's Spring Benefit on April 15, 2013 in New York City

Jake, who was the honoree of the charitable evening out, also scored a recent accolade in the Big Apple. Jake made his New York stage debut last Fall in the play If There Is I Haven't Found It Yet, and he is nominated for a Lucille Lortel Award, which honors the best in Off-Broadway theater performances. Source: www.popsugar.com

Bogosse Fashion, Clothes for Hotties

noreply@blogger.com (Kendra) — Mon, 08 Apr 2013 18:34:00 +0000

Jake Gyllenhaal in GQ Style (last additions in the IHJ gallery)

Josh Hartnett in GQ Style magazine

Jake Gyllenhaal in Details magazine, 2012

Josh Hartnett in Details magazine, 2003

Jake Gyllenhaal and Anne Hathaway on the cover of Io Donna Magazine, 2010

Gemma Ward & Josh Hartnett in Vogue magazine, D&G campaign

Bogosse is a word used in the fashion world whose meaning comes from 'beau gosse' (handsome boy)

Frank Michel "Sheraton" Pink men's shirt with floral design contrast
inside the collar, placket and cuffs

Beatles Collection: Tee shirt inspired by The Beatles. Full lyrics from the song "Hard Days Night" printed on the back. Lightweight and comfortable. By English Laundry 100% Cotton

If you are looking for a reliable retailer of fine apparel online, check out TrendRepublic.com. You will be able to find in their site all of the best men's fashion brands including Bogosse, Jared Lang, Ted Baker, and English Laundry. They offer free shipping on their men's clothes fashion and a great selection, along with exceptional custome service.