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Friday, June 26
When we first saw that My Sister's Keeper was scheduled for a summer release, we couldn't help but wonder why? For anyone not familiar with the Jodi Picoult book that inspired the movie, the plot centers on a young girl conceived to help her older sister fight cancer, who then grows tired of the treatment regimen and sues her parents ... and it gets even more depressing from there.
All in all, not your standard summer blockbuster fare.
But it got us thinking, sometimes you just need to shed a few. However, if that's your motivation this weekend, you might want to stay at home with Terms of Endearment, Sophie's Choice, Life Is Beautiful, or another familial tear-jerker instead. Don't believe us? Check out these critics' reviews.
"There's crying and vomiting aplenty ... and audiences may be forgiven the urge to respond in kind."
— Justin Chang, Variety
"What an agonizing, misguided, maudlin mess!"
—Susan Granger, SSG Syndicate
"...offers a couple of twists, one of them crucial and the other cruelly unnecessary and melodramatic. Actually, the crucial twist is steeped in weepy melodrama, too, right down to the bone."
— Steven Rea, Philadelphia Inquirer
"My Sister's Keeper isn't worth the weeping."
— Claudia Puig, USA TODAY
Posted 6/26/2009 by reelz
Related: Abigail Breslin | Cameron Diaz | Sofia Vassilieva | My Sister's Keeper
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Saturday, June 20
There's Something About Mary star Cameron Diaz recently talked to Starpulse about her upcoming depressing-but-uplifting movie My Sister's Keeper.
On the subject of family, the 37-year-old actress said:
Family is so important. What drew all of us to this story was the family, and the stories of each of these characters. I think we all related to the fact that there isn't anything that you wouldn't give someone that you love that deeply. You do whatever it takes to keep that person alive.
Promoting family values and unconditional love, could My Sister's Keeper be just what Diaz's career needs? Or will it be another quickly forgotten tearjerker? Guess we'll find out when the movie hits theaters next week.
Posted 6/20/2009 by Jenny
Related: Cameron Diaz | My Sister's Keeper
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Wednesday, May 27
The first poster for My Sister's Keeper was released last week, and has somehow managed to look nothing like the movie shown in the trailers. Whereas the released footage looks somewhat bleak and depressing, the poster makes it seem lighthearted and significantly more rom-com than it actually is.
The first question that springs to mind is why are Cameron Diaz and Abigail Breslin smiling like their daughter/sister isn't dying of cancer? And why is there no heartwrenching, emotionally charged tagline? It looks like the studio behind Jodi Picoult's bestselling novel have realised it might not be the best movie to release in the summer, which is usually a time for fun, escapist flicks. Either that, or Cameron Diaz's 50-watt smile is more important to this film's success than we thought.
Posted 5/27/2009 by Jenny
Related: Abigail Breslin | Cameron Diaz | My Sister's Keeper
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Thursday, May 7
In this summer's My Sister's Keeper, Cameron Diaz's character Sara shaves her head to support her terminally ill daughter, Kate (Sofia Vassilieva). Talking to the LA Times, Diaz spoke of her respect for co-star Vassilieva's real-life head shaving, saying:
She owned it. I mean, she was scared at first. I won't say that she ... she pushed through that fear, and I was just so inspired by her. She was an inspiration to us all.
She may have been inspiring, but it still wasn't enough to make Diaz give up her own head of hair. The former Charlie's Angels star narrowly escaped the shears by only needing to be bald for one day of shooting. But she was more than happy to give up makeup. "It took so much time off of when you have to get up and be ready. No makeup. It was great."
Well, at least she's got her priorities in order. Oscar-worthy personal sacrifice or relief at wearing no makeup? And people wonder why she's never taken a golden statuette home.
Posted 5/7/2009 by Jenny
Related: Cameron Diaz | Sofia Vassilieva | My Sister's Keeper
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Thursday, October 25
It's a busy deal day in Hollywood, with lots of ink hitting paper in an effort to get projects off the ground before the WGA strike deadline hits next week.
First, Jim Caviezel (The Passion of the Christ) has signed to star in a remake of the 1978 Australian suspense thriller, Long Weekend, about a young couple whose camping trip gets turned upside down when the animals--not appreciating being shot at--decide to strike back. Sounds kind of like a low-budget slasher flick to us, but Caviezel seems to take his work seriously, so who knows?
Dakota AND Elle Fanning will be joining Cameron Diaz in My Sister's Keeper, about a girl (Elle) who tries to get emancipated from her parents when she finds out she was conceived as a genetic match to save her cancer-stricken sister (Dakota). It's the first time the sisters will play opposite each other in a movie.
Jamie Foxx has added yet another movie to his plate with The Zebra Murders: A Season of Killing, Racial Madness, and Civil Rights. He will play a police detective that cracked racially-motivated serial murders in 1970s San Francisco and fought racism in his own department. It is based on the 2006 book of the same, very long, name.
Michael Mann and Robert De Niro will try to recreate their fire from Heat with another book adapation for the screen. Mann will direct and De Niro will star in Frankie Machine, a drama based on Don Winslow's novel, The Winter of Frankie Machine. De Niro decided to break his mobster-role retirement to play Frank Machianno, aka 'Frankie Machine,' a retired mob hitman who gets sucked 
back in when he finds out there's a hit out on him.
And finally, Mann and De Niro aren't the only superstar movie reunion. Ron Howard and Tom Hanks will get the band back together to make Angels & Demons. Howard will direct and Hanks will reprise his role as Robert Langdon, the symbologist sleuth from The Da Vinci Code in this sequel--once again based on a Dan Brown novel.
Source: Variety.
Posted 10/25/2007 by reelz
Related: Dakota Fanning | Elle Fanning | Jamie Foxx | Michael Mann | Tom Hanks | Long Weekend | Frankie Machine | The Zebra Murders: A Season of Killing, Racial Madness, and Civil Rights | Jim Caviezel | Angels & Demons | My Sister's Keeper
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Monday, July 30
Variety is veritably teeming with casting announcements this post-Comic-con Monday.
Cameron Diaz will be starring in My Sister's Keeper, which was adapted from Jodi Picoult's 2005 novel by Jeremy Leven (The Notebook). The drama, about a lawyer who must defend herself and her husband from the emancipation petition by their 13-year-old daughter who was conceived as a genetic match to save her sister from cancer, will be directed by Nick Cassavetes (Alpha Dog, John Q).
Keira Knightley will be putting on the corset and hoop skirts again for The Duchess, an 18th century costume drama adapted from Amanda Foreman's best-selling 2001 biography, Georgiana: Duchess of Devonshire. Described as the "Princess Diana of her time," Georgiana lived a rather wild life. Sounds a little like the formula used to make Marie Antoinette to us.
And finally, Johnny Depp is going back to the Hunter S. Thompson well for The Rum Diary, an adaptation of the "gonzo" journalist's autobiograhical novel that he wrote in 1959, but wasn't published until 1998. In it, Depp will play Thompson's alter ego, Paul Kemp, a freelancer for a rundown Puerto Rican newspaper who finds himself surrounded by self-destructive ex-pats.
The Rum Diary will be written and directed by Bruce Robinson (Jennifer Eight, The Killing Fields).
Posted 7/30/2007 by reelz
Related: Cameron Diaz | Johnny Depp | Keira Knightley | The Rum Diary | The Duchess | My Sister's Keeper