There is nothing more iconic than a good looking leather jacket on a movie star. There are as many styles of jacket as there are stars, which makes looking good easy. From Marlon Brando to Keanu Reeves, leather jackets have been a part of some of the most incredible looking costumes ever. So, here is our list of some of the most iconic leather coats and jackets in Hollywood history.

Marlon Brando In The Wild One

This list wouldn't be complete without including the O.G. leather look on Marlon Brando in The Wild One. The 1953 film about a biker gang was not only a big hit in theaters, but it was a huge influence on society. From the outlaw biker gangs who took inspiration from the look to regular folks who saw the leather jackets as the coolest of cool.

Wesley Snipes In Blade

Wesley Snipes is the coolest-looking superhero in Blade with his iconic look in leather and sunglasses. Everything about the costume and the character oozes cool and defines Blade's renegade nature.

Arnold Schwarzenegger In The Terminator Movies

Leather jackets definitely provide a look for someone to say "Don't mess with me," and nowhere is this more true in Hollywood than when Arnold Schwarzenegger wears one in the Terminator movies. Starting with the first movie, he's usually seen in one and you definitely don't want to mess with him.

Rooney Mara In The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo

Leather jackets have always been a symbol of rebelliousness in Hollywood. In The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo, it's the perfect look for Lisbeth Salander (Rooney Mara) to portray both her anti-social nature and her tough exterior. You can't imagine wearing anything else.

John Travolta In Saturday Night Fever

In the 1970s, no one was cooler than John Travolta in Saturday Night Fever. The strut, the hair, the dancing, and the leather jacket all made that possible. The look is so iconic that people are still imitating it today, five decades later.

Carrie-Anne Moss In The Matrix Movies

It's safe to say that The Matrix movies would not be the same if the characters were dressed in anything but the coolest and toughest-looking leather jackets and coats. From Neo to Morpheus to, of course, Trinity (Carrie-Anne Moss) in her amazing looking long leather coat. It's just such an amazing bit of costume.

Brad Pitt In Fight Club

Not every leather jacket has to be black to look completely awesome. Tyler Durden's reddish-brown jacket in Fight Club has become one of the most famous looks in Hollywood. Of course, it's easy for Brad Pitt to pull off almost any look, but he might just look his coolest in Fight Club.

Hugh Jackman In The X-Men Films

Leather jackets have been used a lot over the years to depict both heroes and anti-heroes. Nowhere is this more clear than on Logan aka Wolverine, as depicted by Hugh Jackman in the X-Men and now in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Logan is anti-social to an extreme and his leather jacket definitely indicates that you don't want to pick a fight with him.

Olivia Newton-John In Grease

The costumes in Grease are amazing. Of course, the T-Birds' jackets are fantastic, but it's the leather jacket that Sandy (Olivia Newton-John) dons in the last act that looks the most amazing. She completely changes her look and the jacket is what inspires the whole thing.

Keanu Reaves In The John Wick Movies

Keanu Reaves loves to wear leather in his movies, but the brown leather jacket in the first John Wick movie is probably the coolest. It's great because it's cool as heck, but it's not too over the top for the retired assassin. It makes John Wick seem normal, yet completely cool and ready for anything.

Eddie Murphy In Raw

In his standup movie Raw, Eddie Murphy takes the cool leather look to the next level. Not only does he have an amazing purple leather jacket, he compliments it with matching leather pants. It wasn't the first time he wore a leather outfit on stage, he wore a similar red one in his first standup movie, Delirious, but the purple one in Raw tops the red one in every way.

Michelle Pfeiffer in Dangerous Minds

Dangerous Minds isn't the best movie in Michelle Pfeiffer's filmography, despite having an amazing soundtrack, but for an actress who had a whole bunch of iconic looks in the '80s and '90s, her jeans and leather jacket look in the movie is one of the most memorable. It's a costume that tells you so much about the character without saying a word.

Steve McQueen In The Great Escape

It's hard to argue that Steve McQueen isn't one of the coolest stars in Hollywood history. Of course, you can earn that kind of praise without at least one leather jacket. In The Great Escape, McQueen's brown leather bomber jacket is the epitome of cool. Even when he is covered in dirt, he looks great, but it's when he's wearing the jacket that he looks his best.

Tom Cruise In Top Gun

In the '80s, there was no movie cooler than Top Gun and there was no cooler character than Pete "Maverick" Mitchell, played by Tom Cruise. The leather bomber jacket Cruise wore in the movie became so iconic and such a key characteristic of the role that when Top Gun: Maverick released its first teaser, the jacket was a big part of it.

Harrison Ford In Raiders Of The Lost Ark

There is something about a distressed leather jacket that brings authenticity to a character that few other costume pieces can. Nowhere in film history is this more true than with Indiana Jones (Harrison Ford) in all of the Indiana Jones movies. The jacket, along with the hat and the whip, completely define the character in every way. Is there any other kind of jacket you could ever see Indy wearing? Of course not.

Uma Thurman In Kill Bill

There are a lot things that make Quentin Tarantino's Kill Bill cool, but Uma Thurman's yellow leather motorcycle jacket tops the list. It's become an iconic costume over the years, and while not everyone could pull off the look, Thurman certainly does and everyone loves it.

Mel Gibson In The Mad Max Movies

As distressed leather jackets go, Mel Gibson's in the Mad Max movies is among the best looking. Looking into a dystopian future, it makes complete sense that leather jackets would still be part of the fashion. They are almost indestructible and have that classic look that almost no other piece of clothing has.

Joey Lauren Adams In Chasing Amy

This one flies a little bit under the radar, but it's an amazing look and deserves to be on this list. Alyssa (Joey Lauren Adams) in Chasing Amy has a lot of "rock and roll" to her style and nothing says rock star like leather.

Samuel L. Jackson In The MCU

As Deadpool asks in the post-credits scene in the original Deadpool movie, "Did you expect Samuel L. Jackson in a saucy leather number?" Well, yes, frankly we might have, since Jackson, playing the cooler-than-cool Nick Fury often shows up in a fantastic-looking leather jacket in the MCU. It is something we expect (even if Deadpool wasn't in the MCU at the time).

Tom Hardy In The Dark Knight Rises

Great Villains are often in leather. In The Dark Knight Rises Bane wears one of the greatest leather coats ever. The fur-lined brown leather number is perfect for his character and it's a look that not every villain could pull off, but Bane (Tom Hardy) certainly does.

Halle Berry In Die Another Day

Halle Berry has a few iconic outfits in the Pierce Brosnan-led James Bond film Die Another Day and while her bikini may be the most famous, the red leather jacket she wears for a lot of the movie is one heck of a look too. Sure, the movie isn't the best Brosnan-era Bond film, but you can't deny how great Berry looks in her costumes.

James Dean In Rebel Without A Cause

Seven decades after his death in 1955, James Dean is still the epitome of cool. Though he only starred in three movies, his impact on pop culture is immense. His red leather jacket in Rebel Without A Cause is one reason why. Because Dean's career was so brief, we don't have a lot of "looks" from him, making the jacket that much more iconic.

Kurt Russell In Escape From New York

If you want to look cool and look like you just don't care about anything, a distressed leather jacket can tell a lot of people just how you feel without saying a word. Take the look of Snake Pilsson (Kurt Russell) in Escape From New York. Has anyone ever looked tougher, cooler, and more aloof in an action film? No, not really.

Sigourney Weaver In Aliens

Ellen Ripley (Sigourney Weaver) is one of the most amazing characters in action movie history. Of course, that means she must look cool as heck in leather, and she does in Aliens. It's not her most iconic look, but come on, you can't deny how awesome it is.

Tom Cruise In Mission: Impossible

Let's be honest, Tom Cruise always looks good in a nice leather jacket, but if you're ranking his costumes by how good looking they are, the jacket he wears in the first Mission: Impossible is at the top. When he is doing his sleight of hand with the disc with the NOC list on it while wearing the jacket is one of the best non-action scenes in the whole series.

Peter Fonda And Dennis Hopper In Easy Rider

If you wanted to be a rebellious hippie in the late 1960s, a leather jacket was a good place to start with your look. Especially if you were on a motorcycle like Dennis Hopper and Peter Fonda in Easy Rider. Fonda has a more traditional biker look with his black leather jacket, but Hopper's character goes for a sweet suede jacket with some awesome fringe. Both look amazing.

Anne Hathaway In Get Smart

Get Smart might not be the best movie that Anne Hathaway has ever been in, but her white leather coat looks fantastic in it. It's not the only time Hathaway has shown up in an iconic leather look, who could ever forget her look in The Dark Knight Rises, it is a unique look that you don't see in a lot of movies. Of course, she completely pulls it off.

Matt Dillon In The Outsiders

The greasers in The Outsiders are mostly known for their jean jackets, but one greaser, Dally (Matt Dillion) wears a leather jacket and he looks exactly the part in it. It's not the cleanest jacket in the world, we wouldn't expect it to be, but man it looks so cool!

Laurence Fishburne In The Matrix

Like many of the characters in The Matrix, Morpheus (Laurence Fishburne) looks totally iconic in his leather duster. Sure it's not a "jacket," but there was no way we could leave it off of this list!

Jon Voight In Midnight Cowboy

Midnight Cowboy is a little bit of a forgotten movie these days, but it was a massive hit when it was released. Those who know, know. Jon Voight's suede jacket with the long fringe isn't a look everyone can pull off, and even in the movie it's not always the best look, but looking back, it's safe to say it belongs on this list as one of the best in Hollywood history.

Jason Momoa In Fast X

It's not hard for Jason Momoa to look cool, I think we can all agree. Still, in Fast X, that black and white snakeskin-looking leather jacket is simply amazing. It's not a look that anyone can pull off, in fact, many would look ridiculous in it, but not Momoa, not by a longshot.

Emma Stone In La La Land

Red leather is a fantastic look, though not everyone looks good in it. Emma Stone in La La Land isn't just anyone though. Stone just looks fantastic in the jacket and it, along with all the others on this list, has become iconic.

Months after premiering at the 2022 Toronto International Film Festival, and weeks after opening in cities like New York and Los Angeles, Sarah Polley’s Golden Globe-nominated dramatic film, Women Talking, has finally made its way to theaters across the country with its long-awaited wide release. Set in 2010, the movie centers on a close-knit group of women in a small and strict Mennonite community as they come together and make a difficult decision after discovering the men in their lives have been drugging and raping them for years, with the core cast featuring one incredible actress after another.

If you have watched the new drama, or are planning to do so now that it’s playing across the country, there’s a good chance you’re wondering where you’ve seen the Women Talking cast before. Fear not, for we have put together a list of the major players in the 2022 book-to-movie adaptation of Miriam Toews novel of the same name.

Rooney Mara (Ona)

Leading off the cast is Rooney Mara, who takes on the role of Ona, a Mennonite woman pregnant with the child of one of her abusers. 

This is the latest in a series of tough and difficult roles taken on by the two-time Academy Award nominee (The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, Carol), which includes movies like A Ghost Story, Mary Magdalene, and Nightmare Alley. Since breaking out nearly a decade-and-a-half ago with roles in the likes of Youth in Revolt, the 2010 remake of A Nightmare on Elm Street, and a small yet powerful performance in The Social Network, Mara has gone on to show up in titles like Side Effects, Her, and Lion to name a few. She’s next set to appear alongside her fiancé, Joaquin Phoenix, in The Island. 

Claire Foy (Salome)

Claire Foy appears in Women Talking as Salome, one of the Mennonite women determined to leave their community behind, no matter what it takes.

Fans of the sprawling Netflix historical drama series The Crown will instantly recognize Foy from her award-winning portrayal of Queen Elizabeth II during the show’s first two seasons, though she did appear in flashbacks in later installments. Sticking with TV, Foy has also given notable performances on the likes of A Very British Scandal and Upstairs Downstairs. 

Just like co-star Rooney Mara years earlier, Foy took on the role of Lisbeth Salander in 2018’s The Girl in the Spider’s Web, the same year she appeared alongside Ryan Gosling in First Man. And, according to Variety, Foy will appear in the upcoming adaptation of Taichi Yamada’s Strangers. 

Jessie Buckley (Mariche)

Jessie Buckley shows up in the new drama as Mariche, one of the female members of the Mennonite colony who aren’t so keen on the idea of leaving everything and everyone they know behind.

Over the course of the past few years, Buckley has made quite a name for herself with attention-grabbing performances in movies like I’m Thinking of Ending Things, Men, and The Lost Daughter, the latter of which earned her an Academy Award nomination). She has also taken on roles in shows like The Woman in White, Chernobyl, and Fargo in recent years. 

Ben Whishaw (August)

Playing one of the few good men in Women Talking, Ben Whishaw takes on the role of August, one of the male members of the Mennonite community.

Fans of the Daniel Craig James Bond movies will instantly recognize Whishaw from his portrayal of gadget master Q, which started with his debut in 2012’s Skyfall. But the talented film, TV, and stage actor has much more to his filmography, including Perfume: The Story of a Murderer, The Lobster, The Hour, and Fargo. And, since 2014, Whishaw has been the voice of Paddington in two movies, and various TV shows and specials, including one for the late Queen Elizabeth II’s Platinum Jubilee in 2022. 

Frances McDormand (Scarface Janz)

Frances McDormand appears in the cast as Scarface Janz, one of the members of the community who would rather do nothing and let things die down.

McDormand, who has won three Oscars for acting (Fargo, Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri, Nomadland), and one as a producer (also Nomadland), has spent the better part of the past 40 years giving one outstanding performance after another, including in multiple films directed by her husband, Joel Coen, such as Blood Simple, Burn After Reading, and The Tragedy of Macbeth. She has also appeared in the likes of Moonrise Kingdom, Almost Famous, Wonder Boys, and Primal Fear, to name only a few. 

Judith Ivey (Agata)

Judith Ivey appears in Women Talking as Agata, the matriarch of one of the families tasked with deciding what should be done once the revelations of abuse are made public. 

Throughout her career, Ivey has appeared in movies like The Devil’s Advocate, Mystery, Alaska, Flags of Our Fathers, and A Life Less Ordinary, as well as dozens of TV appearances. These include everything from Designing Women to The Critic, and Law & Order: Special Victims Unit to New Amsterdam. Ivey has also won two Tony Awards over the years, one for Steaming in 1981 and then several years later for her role in the 1984 run of Hurlyburly. 

Liv McNeil (Neitje)

Liv McNeil shows up in the film as Neitje, one of the younger members of the Mennonite community who has suffered abuse at the hands of the men in the colony.

Women Talking is the first major role for the young actress, who got her start writing and directing the 2020 short film, Numb.

Sheila McCarthy (Greta)

Sheila McCarthy appears as Greta, the matriarch of another one of the families tasked with deciding the future of the Mennonite colony.

Over the years, McCarthy has landed roles on shows like Picket Fences, Star Trek: Discovery, The Umbrella Academy, and most recently, The Good Doctor, as well as a list of movies that includes The Day After Tomorrow, The Lotus Eaters, Die Hard 2, and The Middle Man. 

Michelle McLeod (Mejal)

Michelle McLeod takes on the role of Mejal, another one of the younger victims of abuse rampant throughout Women Talking.

Over the years, the young actress has appeared in movies like My Spy, Honey Bee, and Don’t Talk to Irene, as well as shows like Grand Army, Tin Star, and the latest season of the Netflix series Workin’ Moms. 

Kate Hallett (Autje) 

Kate Hallett makes her feature film debut with her portrayal of Autje, another young member of the Mennonite colony at the center of the film’s narrative. 

Women Talking is currently playing in theaters nationwide. If you want to know what else is coming out this week or in the near future, check out our 2023 movie schedule for all the latest.

Sarah Polley’s Women Talking will initiate conversations. The design of the film encourages debate, asking questions that might have answers, as well as those to which the answers aren’t so easy. And because Polley’s adaptation of Miriam Toews’ novel of the same name applies to many layers to its discussions, it’s possible to take the dialogue that’s handed to this fiery cast and apply it to problems that are not addressed directly in the movie. But that’s more of a thought experiment for after you have absorbed this deep and introspective period drama. Women Talking screened as part of the 2022 Toronto International Film Festival. 

Though it looks like it might take place during the Frontier Age on an American prairie, Women Talking in fact is set in 2010. After the women of a strict (but fictional) Mennonite community start to realize that they are being repeatedly drugged and raped by the male members of the religious sect, they meet in private in a remote hayloft to discuss their options. They believe they have three: Do nothing; stay and fight, or; leave the colony. Each choice comes with its own complications, and the women – all from different generations, with unique skin in the game – argue, analyze and hypothesize over the moral and practical steps that need to come following this horrifying realization. 

Women Talking is An Acting Showcase

Sarah Polley continues to draw spectacular, powerful, and richly human performances from her cast members (her 2006 directorial debut Away From Her made the absolute most of her leads, and counts as one of the best films released that decade). The three realistic options presented before the quorum of women are personified by specific actors. Claire Foy’s angry and resentful Salmone wants to stay in the colony and fight the men who have wronged them, even if she knows they likely will fail. Her daughter was raped by one (or more) of the men, prompting Salmoe to attack one suspect with a scythe, leading to an arrest… but little else. 

Mariche (Jessie Buckley) leans more toward leaving the colony, primarily because she’s in an abusive relationship with Klaas. And Ona (Rooney Mara) quite often plays Devil’s Advocate, provoking both Salome and Mariche with logical questions that need to be answered should the women come to a majority decision. 

These women lose themselves so deeply in their parts once Women Talking starts examining their wounds, especially when these religious women begin to argue the possibility of finding forgiveness for the men who have attacked them. These are deeply religious characters who possess legitimate fear that turning on their men, or refusing to forgive them, will mean that the women spend eternal life in Hell. Not forgiving someone of a crime sounds more serious than the crime itself. 

These are extremely complicated issues that Women Talking embraces, and you find yourself switching allegiances and swaying your own opinions based on how affective Mara, Buckley, or Foy might be in a given scene. The latter might be the picture’s MVP, because of the raw fire she injects into her performance. But honestly, the full ensemble is stellar (though in her latest movie the always dependable Frances McDormand doesn’t get as much to do, as she leaves the quorum early and only resurfaces late in the game). 

There Are No Easy Answers To Women Talking’s Questions

Sarah Polley’s adaptation is a ferocious analysis of the human condition. It’s overly analytical of the women’s state and status, twisting and bending legitimate moral questions to see if they stand up to scrutiny. One minute, you might be siding with a valid argument for the women to leave this colony. How can they stay when there’s no real protection for them from the fear of attack? But then the women take the conversation one step farther and ask, “What kind of community will we establish once we have left? And who can come? Children? What age? What about the kids we have to leave behind?” These problems need solutions, and they’re not easily unearthed. 

The women of Women Talking are fighting for nothing short of the right to exist, for the free will to live in a just society. But before they rush into anything, they are going to debate each possible bump in the road from every direction. Strange as this may seem, the structure and execution of Women Talking called to mind Sidney Lumet’s brilliant adaptation of Reginald Rose’s 12 Angry Men. Both movies take the necessary steps to prove how complicated it can be for various personalities to reach a fair consensus. But where Lumet’s protagonists argued on behalf of an accused murderer, Polley’s conflicted women are fighting for the right to, the need to, and the desire to evolve, to better their living situation, and to not fall victim to the status quo. Powerful stuff, indeed.

Every once in a while, celebrity siblings - such as Ben and Casey Affleck or Dakota and Elle Fanning - end up sharing the screen together. Well, apparently it happens a little more often than just every once in a while, given the amount of examples we compiled below.

Jake And Maggie Gyllenhaal (A Dangerous Woman, Homegrown, Donnie Darko)

Oscar nominee Jake Gyllenhaal and his twice-nominated older sister, Maggie, are in three movies together: 1993’s A Dangerous Woman, 1998’s Homegrown (both were directed by their father, Stephen), and the eventual sci-fi cult classic, Donnie Darko, in 2001.

Jeff And Beau Bridges (The Fabulous Baker Boys)

Oscar winner Jeff Bridges and his older brother, Beau, also played siblings in The Fabulous Baker Boys - a 1989 comedy in which the titular musicians become rivals after teaming up with a beautiful aspiring singer (Michelle Pfieffer).

Kate And Rooney Mara (Urban Legends: Bloody Mary)

Kate Mara of the House of Cards cast led the 2005 straight-to-video slasher, Urban Legends: Bloody Mary, in which her younger sister, Nightmare Alley’s Rooney Mara, made her acting debut.

Sean And Chris Penn (At Close Range)

Future two-time Oscar-winner Sean Penn and his late younger brother, Chris (best known from the Reservoir Dogs cast) played siblings in the 1986 crime thriller, At Close Range, starring Christopher Walken as their criminal father.

Andrew, Owen, And Luke Wilson (Bottle Rocket, The Royal Tenenbaums) 

Owen Wilson and his younger sibling, Luke have also acted alongside their eldest brother, Andrew, in 1996’s Bottle Rocket and The Royal Tenenbaums from 2001 - both of which Owen also co-wrote with director Wes Anderson.

Chris And Luke Hemsworth (Thor: Ragnarok)

Chris Hemsworth has yet to star in anything with his little bro, Liam, but the Australian Marvel movie star’s older bother, Westworld star Luke, did show up in Thor: Ragnarok as a dramatized version of the God of Thunder, whom he is set to reprise (along with Matt Damon as “Actor Loki”) in Thor: Love and Thunder.

Dylan And Cole Sprouse (Various)

Twin brothers Dylan and Cole Sprouse (the latter of which went on to join the Riverdale cast) have shared the same role in several TV shows (most notably Grace Under Fire) and movies (such as Big Daddy with Adam Sandler) and have played siblings just as often, most famously as the title characters of The Suite Life of Zack & Cody, its spin-off The Suite Life on Deck, and 2011’s The Suite Life Movie.

Tia, Tamera, And Tahj Mowry  (Sister, Sister, Smart Guy, Seventeen Again)

Twin sisters Tia and Tamera Mowry have shared the screen with their little brother, Tahj, several times - most notably as guest stars on each other’s respective sitcoms, Sister, Sister and Smart Guy, and in the 2000 Showtime original movie, Seventeen Again.

James And Dave Franco (The Disaster Artist)

After years finding success in the business in separate projects, James Franco and his younger brother, Dave, played Tommy Wiseau and Greg Sestero of the infamous cult favorite, The Room, in the 2017 biopic, The Disaster Artist.

Hilary And Haylie Duff (Various)

Haylie Duff would appear on three episodes of her younger sister, Hilary’s, Disney Channel show, Lizzie McGuire, and provided the singing voice of Isabella Parigi in the theatrical spin-off before they both played a singing group on an episode of American Dreams, sisters in the 2006 rags-to-riches story Material Girls, and both leant their voices to the infamous animated movie Foodfight!, which was released in 2012.

Aly And AJ Michalka (Various)

Singer-songwriter duo Aly and AJ Michalka first shared the screen in the 2006 Disney Channel original movie Cow Belles as sisters, again in the MTV original Super Sweet 16: The Movie the next year as rivals, followed by three episodes of Aly’s CW series Hellcats in 2011 as half-sisters. Most recently, they appeared in the 2015 drama, Weepah Way For Now, as what appear to be fictionalized versions of themselves.

Dakota And Elle Fanning (I Am Sam, Taken)

Elle Fanning has portrayed a younger version of her older sister, Dakota, on two separate occasions: first in the 2001 drama I Am Sam and secondly in the Steven Spielberg-produced, Syfy original miniseries, Taken, in 2002.

Spencer And Abigail Breslin (Various)

Academy Award nominee Abigail and her older brother, Spencer, played siblings in both Raising Helen and The Princess Diaries 2: A Royal Engagement in 2004, played elves in The Santa Clause 3: The Escape Clause in 2006, and later played cousins in the 2014 crime drama, Perfect Sisters.

Jason And Justine Bateman (Arrested Development)

Justine Bateman played her real-life brother, Jason's, sibling in the 1986 TV movie Can You Feel Me Dancing? and a sex worker whom Jason’s Michael Bluth mistakes for his long-lost sibling on Arrested Development.

John, Joan, Ann, And Bill Cusack (Grosse Pointe Blank)

While beloved star John Cusack and his Academy-nominated sister, Joan, have appeared in more films together than most celebrity siblings can claim (including Say Anything… and High Fidelity), the only screen credit that they also share with both their sister, Ann, and brother, Bill, is 1997’s Grosse Pointe Blank, which John also co-wrote and produced.

Bill And Brian Doyle Murray (Various) 

Bill Murray and his older brother, Brian, are both Saturday Night Live veterans (although at different times) and have several classic movies in common - including Caddyshack, Scrooged, Ghostbusters II, Groundhog Day, and The Razor's Edge.

Ben And Casey Affleck (Good Will Hunting, Chasing Amy)

Years before casting him in his amazing directorial debut, Gone Baby Gone, Ben Affleck shared the screen with his younger brother and fellow Oscar winner, Casey, in Good Will Hunting (which Ben co-wrote with Matt Damon) and Kevin Smith’s Chasing Amy in 1997.

Macaulay And Kieran Culkin (Home Alone, Home Alone 2: Lost in New York)

Kieran Culkin (now more famous than ever since starring on HBO’s Succession) made his acting debut alongside his older brother (child megastar Macaulay Culkin) in 1990’s Home Alone cast as his cousin, Fuller - a role he would also reprise in the 1992 sequel.

Rory And Kieran Culkin (Igby Goes Down)

In addition to playing Macaulay’s younger self in Richie Rich, the youngest Culkin brother, Rory, also played a younger version of Kieran as the title role in 2002's Igby Goes Down.

The Wayans Siblings (Various) 

Where do we start with the Wayans Siblings? Well, for instance, several of them (such as Damon and Kim Wayans) were a part of the In Living Color cast with star and creator Keenen Ivory Wayans, who later directed his younger brothers, Marlon and Shawn, in movies like White Chicks, the first two Scary Movie installments, and Little Man.

Zooey And Emily Deschanel (Bones)

In Season 5 of Bones, star Emily Deschanel’s sister (Zooey of the Elf cast fame and later the lead of the New Girl cast) guest starred as Temperance Brennan’s second cousin, Margaret Whitesell.

Fred And Ben Savage (Little Monsters, The Wonder Years, Boy Meets World)

After playing siblings in the family-friendly horror film, Little Monsters, in 1989, Ben Savage made a guest appearance on his older brother, Fred’s, hit dramedy, The Wonder Years, in 1990 and later returned the favor by inviting him to the Boy Meets World cast for an episode in 1998.

Charlie Sheen And Emilio Estevez (Various)

After making several movies together - including Young Guns, Men At Work, and Rated X (the latter two of which Emilio Estevez directed), Charlie Sheen (née Carlos Estevez) reunited with his brother on an episode of his hit sitcom, Two and a Half Men, in 2008.

Vanessa and Laura Marano (Saving Zoë)

Both of these talented ladies had guest appearances on Dexter at different times in the series’ run, but Vanessa Marano and her younger sister, Laura, did appear together in the 2019 mystery, Saving Zoë, as siblings torn apart by one’s unsolved murder.

Nat And Alex Wolff (The Naked Brothers Band, Mr. Troop Mom, Stella’s Last Weekend)

Hereditary’s Alex Wolff and his older brother, Peacock’s Joe vs. Carole cast member Nat Wolff, both debuted as fictionalized versions of themselves in Nickelodeon’s faux rockumentary, The Naked Brothers Band, its series continuation, and the 2009 TV movie Mr. Troop Mom before reuniting in 2018’s Stella’s Last Weekend, which was written and directed by their mother, Polly Draper.

Vera And Taissa Farmiga (Higher Ground, At Middleton, The Nun)

Scream Queens Vera and Taissa Farmiga, who are often mistaken for mother and daughter, played mother and daughter in 2013’s At Middleton after Taissa previously played her older sister’s younger self in Vera’s 2011 directorial debut, Higher Ground. However, interestingly, their characters in the 2018 Conjuring spin-off, The Nun, have no apparent familial ties.

Maude And Iris Apatow (Knocked Up, This Is 40, Funny People)

Euphoria’s Maude Apatow and her younger sister, Iris, have played siblings in 2007’s Knocked Up, its “sort-of sequel” This is 40 from 2012, and 2009’s Funny People - all three of which also starred their real mother, Leslie Mann, as their mother, and were written and directed by their father, Judd Apatow.

Dan And Sarah Levy (Schitt’s Creek)

While Annie Murphy plays co-creator Dan Levy’s on-screen sister in the Schitt’s Creek cast, Café Tropical owner, Twyla Sands, is played by his real-life sister, Sarah.

Mary-Kate, Ashley, And Elizabeth Olsen (How The West Was Fun)

After Full House made the Olsen Twins, Mary-Kate and Ashley, household names and  before the Marvel movies made their younger sister, Elizabeth, an A-lister, all three of them appeared together in the ABC original TV movie How the West Was Fun in 1994.

Bill And Alexander Skarsgård (White Water Fury)

Years before his terrifying performance as Pennywise in It, Bill Skarsgård made his acting debut alongside his older brother, True Blood cast member Alexander, in the 2000 Swedish thriller, White Water Fury.

Blake And Robyn Lively (Simon Says)

Robyn Lively, star of 1989’s Teen Witch, shared the screen with her then up-and-coming half-sister, former Gossip Girl cast member Blake Lively, in a 2006 slasher flick called Simon Says, which also stars fellow ‘80s icon Crispin Glover.

Brian And Domhnall Gleeson (Mother!, Frank Of Ireland)

Despite plenty of years of experience between the them, it was not until 2017 when Star Wars star Domnhall Gleeson and his younger brother, Brian, shared the screen in Mother! before reuniting as co-creators and co-stars of the Amazon Prime original comedy Frank of Ireland - also starring their father, Brendan Gleeson.

Eddie And Charlie Murphy (Harlem Nights, Norbit)

Comedy icon Eddie Murphy worked behind the scenes a lot with his older brother, Charlie, who passed away in 2017, but the two would also share a few acting credits, - namely Eddie’s 1989 directorial debut Harlem Nights (also Charlie’s first movie), and in 2006’s Norbit, in which Charlie voiced a dog named Floyd.

Phylicia Rashad And Debbie Allen (The Cosby Show, Grey’s Anatomy, The Old Settler)

Phylicia Rashad and her younger sister, Emmy-winning dance legend Debbie Allen, have made guest appearances on each other’s shows - The Cosby Show, on which Rashad played Claire Huxtable, and Grey’s Anatomy, on which Allen plays Dr. Catherine Fox (née Avery) - and both starred in a 2001 TV movie called The Old Settler, which Allen also directed.

Ron And Clint Howard (Various) 

You can find Clint Howard in just about every movie directed by his brother, Ron Howard - including his feature-length directorial debut from 1977, Grand Theft Auto, which was also the brothers’ third time acting alongside each other after the 1963 film The Courtship of Eddie’s Father and a handful of episodes of The Andy Griffith Show.

Angelina Jolie And James Haven (Gia, Hell’s Kitchen, Original Sin)

Audiences probably remember Angelina Jolie’s brother, James Haven, better for other reasons than all the times he shared the screen with his younger sister - namely Gia and Hell’s Kitchen from 1998, and 2001’s Original Sin.

Jared And Shannon Leto (Various)

In addition to being bandmates with his young brother, Oscar winner Jared Leto, in 30 Seconds to Mars, Shannon Leto also shared the screen with him on a couple of episodes of My So-Called Life (on which Jared played the iconic Jordan Catalano) and through brief appearances in the movies Prefontaine from 1997, 1998’s Highway, and Sol Goode in 2003.

Chris And Scott Evans (Before We Go, Playing It Cool)

Former Captain America actor Chris Evans has a brother named Scott who has also appeared in two romantic-comedies from 2014 with his older sibling, called Before We Go (which Chris also directed) and Playing It Cool.

Sarah And Laura Silverman (The Sarah Silverman Program, Bob’s Burgers, Masters Of Sex)

Comedian and actress Sarah Silverman and her sister, Laura, played heavily fictionalized versions of themselves as series regulars on The Sarah Silverman Program, made guest appearances on Showtime’s Masters of Sex together, and have recurred on Bob’s Burgers as Jimmy Pesto’s twin sons, Andy and Ollie.

Kevin, Nick, And Joe Jonas (Camp Rock Movies, Jonas)

Back when they were the biggest thing to come out of Disney Channel, Kevin, Nick, and Joe Jonas played three brothers in a band not named the Jonas Brothers in the Camp Rock movies, and later played themselves to more comedic effect in their own sitcom, aptly titled Jonas.

Looks like talent really does run in the family.

Having conquered the world of big screen comedy, biographical dramas, comic book movies, and even starred in a few horror flicks, the next venture for Bradley Cooper is film noir, with none other than Guillermo del Toro as his guide. The celebrated visionary filmmaker cast the Academy Award-nominated A Star is Born actor as the lead of his next big project, Nightmare Alley, in 2019.

The mystery thriller, set in the 1940s, tells the story of a man named Stanton "Stan" Carlisle - Bradley Cooper’s character - who makes a living at a traveling carnival with his manipulative skills in mentalism. His ambition for greater glory eventually leads him to cross paths with Lilith Ritter (Oscar winner Cate Blanchett), a psychiatrist for the upper class with her own penchant for deceit.

The upcoming film will be many audiences’ introduction to this classic story of suspense, but it will not be the first time it has been told on the big screen. That being said, what is the legacy of Nightmare Alley and what else is there to know about it before it finally hits theaters? The answers will be revealed in the following collection of confirmed facts surrounding this anticipated production, starting with when we can expect to see it.

Nightmare Alley Is Set For A December 3, 2021, Release

Principal photography on Nightmare Alley first began in January 2020, but just two months later, it would join the club of countless Hollywood projects put on pause in the wake of Covid-19’s global outbreak. Disney, which owns the film’s distribution company Searchlight Pictures, would continue to keep the production on hold until the following September.

After it had initially finishing shooting in November 2020, followed by reshoots, Nightmare Alley officially wrapped on production on December 12, 2020. By then, it was scheduled to hit theaters nearly a year later - specifically on Friday, December 3, 2021.

Bradley Cooper Is Joined By A Star-Studded Cast For Nightmare Alley

Before Bradley Cooper got the part of deceptive carny Stan Carlisle, Leonardo DiCaprio was in talks to lead the cast of Nightmare Alley in early 2019 before scheduling conflicts forced him to abandon the project. Cooper’s stepping in was confirmed the following September, along with Cate Blanchett as Lilith Ritter, and her Carol co-star Rooney Mara as Molly Cahill.

That same month, in another instance of casting replacements for the project, David Strathairn took over Michael Shannon’s original role of Pete Krumbein, while Toni Collette was announced as his carnival performer wife, Zeena, followed by Willem Dafoe’s inclusion that October and Mindhunter’s Holt McCallany the next month. Peaky Blinders star Paul Anderson, veteran Italian actress and singer Romina Power, and Oscar winner Mary Steenburgen all joined the cast of Nightmare Alley during the first few months of shooting, following the January 2020 additions of The Shape of Water’s Richard Jenkins and Ron Perlman, who has an extensive history with the director.

Guillermo Del Toro Makes A Long Awaited Directorial Return With Nightmare Alley

It was announced that Guillermo del Toro would be directing Nightmare Alley while he was still riding high on the widespread acclaim for The Shape of Water in December 2017. The romantic fantasy, which earned the 56-year-old, Mexican-born filmmaker Academy Awards for Best Picture and Best Director, was actually the last movie for which he was at the helm.

Of course, the man has still been keeping busy since, directing episodes of his trilogy of animated Tales of Arcadia series on Netflix or producing films like Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark, the 2018 sequel to Pacific Rim, or the completed but not-yet released horror film Antlers, for instance. He will follow-up Nightmare Alley as co-director of a dark, stop-motion take on Pinocchio (which has been in and out of development hell since 2008) and a documentary profiling the career of Michael Mann that is currently untitled.

Guillermo Del Toro Co-Wrote The Screenplay With Movie Critic Kim Morgan

While he is not sharing the director’s chair this time, for Guillermo del Toro, penning the script for Nightmare Alley was not a solo effort. The famously collaborative talent had a co-screenwriter in the form of Kim Morgan, who is better known for her journalism background.

The film aficionado and critic has written for many notable entertainment-based publications, such as Sight & Sound and Playboy, and has also contributed to The Criterion Collection, presented films airing on Turner Classic Movies, and sat in for Roger Ebert as a guest on Ebert & Roeper in 2007. Nightmare Alley is Kim Morgan’s third screenwriting effort, but neither she nor Guillermo del Toro are the first to tell the story.

Nightmare Alley Is The Second Film Adaptation Of A Novel

The inspiration for Guillermo del Toro’s Nightmare Alley is a book of the same, published in 1946. The bleak commentary on the seedy inhabitants of show business - complete with slimy schemers, femme fatales, and all the classic elements of noir - is the debut novel and best known work of American writer William Lindsay Gresham.

Just a year after its release, Nightmare Alley was adapted into a film by Twentieth Century Fox starring Tyrone Power (whose daughter, Romina, appears in the upcoming reinterpretation) in the role now held by Bradley Cooper. Guillermo del Toro has described his new version as not a remake of the 1947 picture, but a “re-adaptation,” which may likely be from his reputation for darkness.

Nightmare Alley Will Be Rated R, According to Guillermo Del Toro

If there was any question of just how dark Nightmare Alley could be, Guillermo del Toro has already made sure to set that record straight. While speaking to Collider in promotion of Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark, he mentioned how he had been a fan of the William Lindsay Gresham’s novel since the early ’90s. When asked if the film would be rated R, he assured that “double-R” would be a more fitting rating for the noir when he was a done.

While there likely should not have been any question of an R-rating for a traditional film noir from Guillermo del Toro, his promise does come with much reassurance, nonetheless. With the exception of Hellboy, I have always preferred his darker, more adult stories, such as Pan’s Labyrinth or The Devil’s Backbone, believing them to match up with his vision more smoothly than his lighter efforts. That being said, with its mega-talented cast and heavy source material, it appears that we may be in for yet another Del Toro masterpiece with Nightmare Alley.

The birth of a child is a joyous occasion, especially when a couple is welcoming their first baby, and this is the special moment actors Joaquin Phoenix and Rooney Mara are feeling right now. This past spring, it was reported that the two were expecting, and we’ve now learned that Mara has given birth to a baby boy. Once the initial news dropped, many probably wondered what the couple would name their child and, according to one of Phoenix’s collaborators, they’ve named him after the actor’s late brother, River Phoenix.

At the recent Zurich film festival, director Victor Kossakovsky screened his latest documentary, Gunda, which Joaquin Phoenix executive produced. While speaking at the festival (via The Guardian), Kossakovsky was asked about Phoenix’s involvement, he mentioned that the actor had just welcomed “a beautiful son named River.”

River Phoenix was a staple of cinema from the mid-‘80s to the early ‘90s, starring in notable films like Stand By Me, Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade and My Own Private Idaho. He also received an Academy Award nod for Best Supporting Actor for his role in Running on Empty. Phoenix died of a drug overdose at the age of 23 in October 1993. His final film, Dark Blood, went unfinished for nearly two decades before it was released in 2012.

It’s sweet to see that Joaquin Phoenix and Rooney Mara chose to pay tribute to the late talent in this way. Phoenix has occasionally spoken how close he was with his brother and has paid tribute to him a few times.

Joaquin Phoenix, a mostly private person, typically prefers not to speak too much about his brother’s death. Phoenix’s Gladiator co-star, Russell Crowe, recently recalled that while making the film, Phoenix would still get numerous questions regarding his late sibling. Crowe also mentioned that both he and Phoenix became quite close while making the movie, with Crowe feeling particularly touched when Phoenix once referred to him in a brotherly way during a press conference.

River Phoenix was known for taking on complex roles that greatly varied from one another, and Joaquin Phoenix opted to take a similar approach when it came to his career path. Phoenix’s body of work is a diverse one that includes stand-out performances in films like Signs, Walk the Line, We Own the Night and The Master. And of course, he recently dipped his toe into the world of commercial filmmaking with Todd Phillips’ Joker, which earned him critical praise and an Academy Award for Best Actor.

River Phoenix is certainly missed among cinephiles, and we’ll always ponder what other art he may have contributed to film and television. Though his legacy certainly lives on through his body of work and now, his new namesake.

Keep it here at CinemaBlend for more news from the world of film and TV.

It’s certainly an interesting time for actors to have big news to announce, as current events have everyone staying put in circumstances that are hard to keep secret. Much as celebrity couple Ana de Armas and Ben Affleck have been named as an official couple, actors Rooney Mara and Joaquin Phoenix might have their own beautiful announcement they’ll soon be making. While nothing’s been confirmed, it sounds like the pair might be expecting their first child.

Page Six reported the supposed news, provided by sources allegedly close to Rooney Mara and Joaquin Phoenix. The respective stars of the upcoming Guillermo del Toro/Bradley Cooper film Nightmare Alley and the Academy Award-winning film Joker have not only been quarantining as any good partners would, but supposedly Mara has been wearing baggier clothing than usual. This is supposedly to hide a baby bump, which, if sources are to be believed, is currently at the six month milestone.

While this potentially beautiful news between Mara and Joaquin Phoenix hasn’t been confirmed, the co-stars of Her and Mary Magdeline wouldn’t be faulted if they stayed mum on the situation. As they are intensely private people, the current state of the world works perfectly to help them conceal the news until they feel like making the big reveal.

It’s news so wonderful that if it’s confirmed, it might have Joaquin Phoenix busting out those dance moves again once this little bundle of joy is delivered. Which would probably look something like the below clip from Joker... minus the entire police chase that breaks out towards the end, of course.

Obviously we’re going to have to wait until Rooney Mara and Joaquin Phoenix either confirm or deny their blessed event. So don’t think this story’s over just yet. But should this all turn out to be accurate and verified, we’d like to be among the first to congratulate Mara and Phoenix, as well as send our wishes that their child be happy, healthy and, of course, born with a huge smile on its face.

Joker is currently available on HBO, and its digital platforms, with its eventual inclusion just announced on the HBO Max platform. If you’re looking for more information, you can head to our HBO Max rundown of films that will be rolling out once the service opens its doors on May 27.

You can also keep track of what movies are heading to theaters later this year with our 2020 release schedule. As far as Joaquin Phoenix and Rooney Mara are concerned, the former is next set to appear in C'mon C'mon, while the latter's Nightmare Alley also stars Cate Blanchett and Bradley Cooper, among many others. Neither movie have a set release date yet, but stay tuned to CinemaBlend for that information.

This may come as a surprise, but The Social Network will be ten years old this year. It feels like just yesterday that everyone was obsessed with the biographical drama about the founding of Facebook and the people behind the creation of the world's largest social media network. With David Fincher behind the camera, Aaron Sorkin writing the biting dialogue, the score from Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross, and the insane cast, it's no surprise. Speaking of The Social Network cast, it's insane to look back on a movie the included Jesse Eisenberg, Justin Timberlake, Andrew Garfield, Brenda Song, and a who's who of young Hollywood talent.

Most, if not all of the film's young and talented cast-members have been quite busy over the past decade, and continue to entertain and enthrall audiences on the big screen, television sets, and stage productions around the world. And since The Social Network will be returning to Netflix in April 2020, now is the perfect time to look back on the cast and see what they're doing now.

Justin Timberlake (Sean Parker)

Justin Timberlake gave one of the best performances of his career with his portrayal of Napster co-founder Sean Parker in The Social Network. Introduced as an investor with a "billion-dollar" vision for the social media platform, Timberlake's dramatized version of the infamous billionaire quickly becomes the de facto antagonist of the film as he pushes Facebook co-founder Eduardo Saverin out of the picture and plants ideas in the head of Mark Zuckerberg.

Timberlake was in the middle of a four-year hiatus from the music industry when he appeared in David Fincher's 2010 masterpiece, but has since turned his focus back to his pop career and movies that give him a chance to show off his vocal talents. The former NSYNC member was supposed to have another box office success with the Trolls World Tour in April 2020, but thanks to the coronavirus pandemic, the sequel to the 2016 Trolls will be released digitally the same month it was supposed to debut in theaters.

Jesse Eisenberg (Mark Zuckerberg)

Jesse Eisenberg had already made a name for himself in comedies like Adventureland and Zombieland by the time he took on the role of Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg in the Oscar-nominated drama. Though some critics and those who know the real-life Zuckerberg weren't the biggest fans of Eisenberg's portrayal of the young billionaire, the performance earned the actor an Oscar nomination for Best Actor.

In the years following the release of The Social Network, Eisenberg has been quite busy with roles like Lex Luthor in Batman V. Superman: Dawn Of Justice and Justice League, as well as the 2019 followup to Zombieland. Eisenberg's latest project is the biographical drama, Resistance, which is based on Marcel Marceau, an aspiring mime famous for fighting in the French Jewish Resistance during World War II.

Andrew Garfield (Eduardo Saverin)

Andrew Garfield plays Eduardo Saverin, one of the founders of the original version of Facebook, which is shown in great detail in the early goings of the film. Throughout the movie, Garfield's talents can be seen in a number of key scenes, most notably the confrontation with Mark Zuckerberg at Facebook's headquarters after Saverin is essentially forced out of the company thanks to the meddling of Sean Parker.

In the years following his portrayal of the Facebook co-founder, Garfield has gone on to take a number of interesting roles, including Peter Parker/Spider-Man in The Amazing Spider-Man and its sequel The Amazing Spider-Man 2. Garfield has three film projects in the works, including the Gia Coppola picture Mainstream, Michel Showalter's The Eyes Of Tammy Faye, and Hamilton creator Lin-Manuel Miranda's Tick, Tick… Boom!, all of which don't currently have a release date.

Brenda Song (Christy Lee)

Brenda Song, who's most known for her appearances in multiple Disney Channel original shows, took on a different type of role when she was cast as the fictionalized character, Christy Lee, in the retelling of Facebook's formative years. Portraying the love interest of Eduardo Saverin, Lee is credited in the movie with the phrase "Facebook me" as the platform begins to gain in popularity.

Following her appearance in The Social Network, Song went on to star in a number of movies and television series like Scandal, New Girl, and Dads, before signing on to join the cast of the Hulu original series Dollface with Kat Dennings. The comedy series was recently picked up for a second season.

Armie Hammer (Cameron And Tyler Winklevoss)

Armie Hammer was a relatively unknown actor when he was cast to portray Cameron and Tyler Winklevoss (with the help of Josh Pence as a body stand-in for Tyler) in The Social Network. Like in the movie, the Winklevoss twins sued Mark Zuckerberg for stealing their ConnectU idea, and settled for $65 million in 2008.

Since playing the identical twins, the great-grandson of oil tycoon Armand Hammer has gone on to star in major studio releases like The Lone Ranger and offbeat dark comedies like Sorry To Bother You. Hammer is currently slated to appear in Kenneth Branagh's Agatha Christie adaptation Death On The Nile, as well as the Nicholas Jarecki thriller Dreamland, Bean Wheatley romance Rebecca, and even a Taika Waititi picture Next Goal Wins.

Dakota Johnson (Amelia Ritter)

It's easy to forget that Dakota Johnson was briefly featured in The Social Network as Amelia Ritter, a Stanford student who sleeps with Sean Parker when his character is first introduced. Though it's a small role, the scene helped introduce the billionaire to Facebook. The rest is history.

Following her minor role in the movie, Dakota Johnson went on to achieve superstardom in the Fifty Shades Of Grey franchise. In addition to playing Anastasia Steele, Johnson has also popped up in films like the 2018 remake of Dario Argento's horror classic Suspiria and the surprisingly engaging Bad Times At The El Royale. The daughter of Melanie Griffinh and Don Johnson is next slated to appear in Nisha Ganatra's dramatic comedy The High Note.

Rooney Mara (Erica Albright)

It only took one scene to turn Rooney Mara into a relatively unknown actress to a star in the making after breaking Jesse Eisenberg's heart and ego in the opening shot of The Social Network. Mara's character, Erica Albright, fed up with Mark Zuckerberg's obsession with "final clubs" and wanting so desperately to be liked by his peers, breaks things off with her one-time boyfriend and helps usher in the Facebook we all know today.

Mara went on to work with director David Fincher again in the 2011 remake of The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo and since then has shared the screen with everyone from Jude Law in Side Effects to Cate Blanchett in Carol, who she will be appearing alongside again in Guillermo del Toro's Nightmare Alley, which does not yet have a release date.

Rashida Jones (Marylin Delpy)

Rashida Jones pops up several times throughout the Facebook drama as Marylin Delpy, a junior member of Zuckerberg's legal team during the Saverin lawsuit. Delpy comes off as the only character in the movie who sees past the persona of Mark Zuckerberg and sees him as a lonely and severely shattered founder of major platform.

Jones was already a star by the time she was cast as the young lawyer thanks to her role as Karen Filippelli on the hit comedy series The Office. The daughter of music icon Quincy Jones would go on to appear in dozens of movies and television shows over the next 10 years, including Parks And Recreation. She is also slated to appear in the upcoming Sofia Coppola drama On The Rocks and the new Netflix series #blackAF, which she also executive produced.

Max Minghella (Divya Narendra)

Featured mostly alongside the Winklevoss twins for much of his time in the movie, Max Minghella's portrayal of American businessman and ConnectU founder Divya Narendra is one of the main sources of conflict for Zuckerberg through the 2010 drama.

Minghella would go on to appear in films such as The Ides Of March, The Internship, and Teen Spirit following his performance as Narendra. He is currently a member of the main cast of the Hulu series The Handmaid's Tale, where he plays Nick Blaine.

Joseph Mazzello (Dustin Moskovitz)

Joseph Mazzello has a way of showing up in movies that are cultural milestones before seemingly disappearing off the face of the earth until his next big role. He did this with Jurassic Park in 1993 and then again in 2010 with his role as Dustin Moskovitz in The Social Network. Moskovitz is one of the founders of Facebook and can be seen throughout the early happenings of the movie helping Zuckerberg get the site off the ground.

Since showing up in David Fincher's 2010 biographical drama, Mazzello has gone on to make appearances in television series like Justified and Person Of Interest, as well as film roles like his portrayal of Queen bassist John Deacon in the 2018 Freddie Mercury biopic Bohemian Rhapsody.

Well, that's what the main cast of The Social Network has been up to in the years since the Oscar-winning film's initial release. If they ever make a followup to the David Fincher drama, let's hope they bring back some of this stellar cast.

After a seven-year absence from the silver screen, Lisbeth Salander will return in all of her punk glory next year in The Girl in the Spider's Web. However, the franchise is making a big jump -- moving away from The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo actress Rooney Mara's portrayal in the 2011 film and replacing her with The Crown's Claire Foy. As it turns out, the break wasn't entirely mutual, as Mara reportedly wanted to come back and take another shot at Ms. Salander. The actress opened up ahead of the release of her new film, Una, and said:

Though the film received a warm welcome from critics when it debuted back in 2011, David Fincher's The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo wasn't necessarily a commercial smash. As a result, Sony put the franchise on ice for several years, ultimately deciding to move forward with The Girl in the Spider's Web -- which is not a direct sequel to Dragon Tattoo. Don't Breathe's Fede Alvarez was brought in to replace the Zodiac director behind the camera, and now it very much feels like Sony is more or less starting from scratch, despite Rooney Mara telling Yahoo Movies she would have returned.

Of course, it's also worth mentioning that Rooney Mara doesn't hold ownership over the role (which earned her a Best Actress Oscar nod in 2012). She inherited the part of Lisbeth Salander from Prometheus star Noomi Rapace, who portrayed the character in three Swedish-language films inspired by the Millennium trilogy. With Claire Foy about to step in for Mara, there's a case one can make that the role of Salander is almost becoming James Bond-esque.

Despite her desire to return to the role of Lisbeth Salander, Rooney Mara also recognizes the fact working on The Girl in the Spider's Web wouldn't be the same experience as Dragon Tattoo. She also explained:

With David Fincher no longer attached to the franchise as its director, and the fact that the source material was not even written by the late Stieg Larsson, a palpable sense of distance has been created between Mara and the property. Though she apparently would love to return to play the tech-savvy heroine to round out the originally-planned trilogy, many of the original elements wouldn't fall into place.

Fede Alvarez's The Girl in the Spider's Web will debut in theaters next year on October 19, 2018. Looking beyond the next installment in the Millennium series, take a look at our 2018 movie premiere guide for more information on everything else that's going to debut next year, and check out Rooney Mara in Una, which opens on October 6.

There's a scene about half an hour into A Ghost Story that will reveal whether or not you'll be able to stomach the rest of the film. It revolves around Rooney Mara eating a pie. For 5 straight minutes. Maybe it isn't actually that long, but it sure does feel like it.

In this moment, you see Rooney Mara's character, M, insatiably trying to make herself feel whole again after the death of her boyfriend, C (Casey Affleck), by consuming a pie that her friend has baked for her. It's a scene that's way too long and on the nose. Yet, at the same time, because it's all one shot from the middle distance you know that Rooney Mara really had to eat that entire pie, and the way she carries the emotion, all with the ghost of C in the background, become more heart-breaking and soulful to watch. If you let it. If you don't, they you'll just be furious that you've wasted 5 minutes of your life watching someone eat a pie.

But (shock, horror) there's more to A Ghost Story than a copious amount of pie-eating. Directed by David Lowery (Pete's Dragon, Ain't Them Bodies Saints), the film opens on C (Casey Affleck) and M (Rooney Mara) living in their small suburban home, and them, one night, hearing a bang on their piano. They're unable to find the cause of this noise. Then, a while later, C is killed in a car crash right outside the home. Shortly after M identifies his body at the morgue, C arises as a white sheet with two black holes and then makes his way back to the house. Over the next few months and years, C stays in the home and watches as M mourns and tries to process his death, before then trying to move on.

A Ghost Story feels like a visceral, emotional, primal scream of a response from David Lowery to working on the hyper mainstream Disney outing Pete's Dragon. Not that Pete's Dragon is a film that he should feel ashamed of, as it was a hugely enjoyable flick the whole family can enjoy. But A Ghost Story is the complete opposite. Bewitching, romantic, lyrical, and unquestionably original, A Ghost Story is a convoluting watch that leaves you feeling satisfied, even if you don't understand why.

A Ghost Story finds David Lowery embracing his inner Terrence Malick. There are lavish, haunting, impactful visuals, which he then contemplatively allows to fester in a dreamlike yet resonant manner. It is a film that asks it viewers to experience and ponder rather than bouncing to beats that they're used to, while challenging and asking its audience to explore the space, the mood, and the story being told. A Ghost Story wants you to feel rather than expect to be entertained or enlightened. For some, that will be too big an ask, especially as the film's scant narrative ponders huge themes of fate, legacy, and relationships rather than actually answering them.

David Lowery's presence looms large, becoming more decisive as A Ghost Story reaches the hour mark. Before then he strikes up a particularly potent symmetry with Rooney Mara, using minimal movement or dialogue to create striking, resting images and allowing her the time to convey, something that she does in a patient but affecting manner. Then, with half an hour left, Lowery grabs a hold of the film and whiplashes it in a variety of directions that are, in the moment, perplexing. So much so that by A Ghost Story's conclusion you know that you've felt something. You won't actually be able to fully explain what you experienced, but it will still definitely stay with you.

Casey Affleck looks like he wants to become the personification of grief, at least that's what his recent career choices seem to entail. With an Oscar under his arm for Manchester By The Sea, you'd think maybe he'd have taken some time to put out a kinder, gentler picture that wouldn't work out your tear ducts. Well, if you're one of the fools who thinks just that, and granted we have some on our staff here, then you're totally wrong. See for yourself as you watch the first trailer to director David Lowery's A Ghost Story, starring Affleck and Rooney Mara.

Lowery's follow-up to his entry into the live-action Disney canon, Pete's Dragon, A Ghost Story tells the tale of a husband and wife separated by the greatest divide that could ever exist between two people: mortality. With Casey Affleck's character being the dead party in the equation, he dons a sheet and embarks on an emotional journey to keep an eye on his wife after his passing. Though from the looks of what seems like a bit of a spoiler-ish trailer, it looks like Casey Affleck's character, simply named "C," goes on a bit of a journey through time as well, as the trailer indicates his wife not only moves on, but starts a family of her own with a new man.

A Ghost Story certainly looks like a far cry from Pete's Dragon and more like David Lowery's previous film, Ain't Them Bodies Saints. Strangely enough, there are similar elements in that film, despite the fact that it reunites the trio of Lowery, Rooney Mara and Casey Affleck. Though rather than taking a trip through a past era of southern history, A Ghost Story looks it expands its story of sorrow through time and familial relations. Don't think of it as a remake, but instead as a director expanding their personal canvas to encompass something greater.

Though as far as remakes are concerned, A Ghost Story seems like the film is a loose remake of Steven Spielberg's Always, which in turn was a remake of the 1943 film A Guy Named Joe. Both films tread very similar story beats, particularly with the ghost of a lover keeping an eye on his lady love. However, David Lowery has distanced his project away from the more conventional duo of films, again hewing closer to Ain't Them Bodies Saints' sensibilities. Also, it looks like the aspect ratio of the film will show the film as if it's framed like a photo from the 1970s, amping up the angle of personal reflection and thinking about the way things were.

With buzz from its Sundance Film Festival showing, and a beautiful trailer to boot, A24's A Ghost Story could be a very refreshing alternative to the summer blockbusters that will occupy the theaters around the same time as its debut. The film will haunt theaters on July 7th, most likely in a limited release platform, just as Spider-Man: Homecoming takes the dance floor.

After about four years of waiting, the next Hollywood-made Girl With The Dragon Tattoo movie is finally getting its act together, but with some very notable changes from the David Fincher version. Specifically, it's been reported that the new film, The Girl In The Spider's Web, will not see the return of stars Rooney Mara and Daniel Craig. Given the popularity of these actors, this approach has been questioned - but now director Fede Alvarez has explained the choice, and it's all about his ownership of the material.

The filmmaker - whose credits include 2013's Evil Dead and last year's Don't Breathe - was recently asked on Twitter about the lack of Rooney Mara and Daniel Craig in The Girl In The Spider's Web, and he explained it succinctly: he believes in the importance of casting, and wouldn't be able to do his entire job unless he brought in his own stars to play hacker Lisbeth Salander and journalist Mikael Blomkvist. Alvarez wrote,

It's a stance that weirdly makes one look at Fede Alvarez's Evil Dead differently in retrospect. That was his first time taking on a franchise title, and that too involved bringing together an entirely new cast (excluding the crazy quick Bruce Campbell cameo at the end of the credits). Given that The Girl In The Spider's Web will see the return of notable characters, it is a bit of a different situation, but together the two projects do provide insight to the filmmaker's philosophy and interests. For example, we can probably guess that he won't be taking the helm of a Marvel or DC sequel any time soon.

This provides an answer why the production of The Girl In The Spider's Web is going with a new pair of stars, but still the much larger question looms: who will be the new actors to take on Lisbeth and Mikael? (roles not only previously taken on by Rooney Mara and Daniel Craig, but also Noomi Rapace and Michael Nyqvist) With a release date set for October 5, 2018, we may be getting that answer sooner rather than later.

Do you think Fede Alvarez is right to recast Lisbeth and Mikael, or would you have preferred to see the return of Rooney Mara and Daniel Craig? Who do you think should take on the parts next? Hit the comments section below with your thoughts!

On paper, Lion shouldn't work. The premise, when said aloud, seems so laughable that there should be no way that a dramatic feature can sustain the improbability of the situation, despite the fact that it's based on a true story -- one in which a grown man uses Google Maps to locate his remote home village after being away for decades. And yet, the movie hits its marks, thanks primarily to an open-hearted performance by Dev Patel, and an engrossing opening act that establishes the reality of one man's unusual predicament, so that we believe the story every step of the way.

But why is it called Lion? The answer comes at the very end of the film, and by that point, you will be sobbing into soaking wet tissues because Patel and director Garth Davis will have successfully navigated you through an emotional journey of familial support and discovery. And it's worth every step taken on that path, starting with the introduction of 5-year-old Indian boy Saroo (Sunny Pawar), who lives with his mother and older brother in the Ganesh Tilai neighborhood of Khandwa, India. One evening, while following his brother to a job site, Saroo is separated from his older sibling, and ends up on a train that takes him miles from home. It takes him 25 years to return.

Lion explains how Saroo gets back home, and man, is it an impossible journey. It's not all terrible. Working off of Saroo Brierley's autobiographical book A Long Way Home, Garth Davis spends the proper amount of time following a lost, confused and terrified Saroo as the child tries to make sense of his situation. He passes through the hands of several strangers over the course of weeks and months until, finally, he is adopted by John (David Wenham) and Sue Brierley (Nicole Kidman), Aussies who raise the young boy as their own.

At this point, Lion fast forwards two decades, and we're still in the basic mechanics of the plot. Saroo, now played by Patel, is a well-balanced college student with supportive parents, a mentally-disabled step-brother (Divian Ladwa), and a progressive girlfriend (Rooney Mara, the only actor in this cast who seems out of place). During a discussion with classmates, Saroo begins to question his heritage, and with the help of modern technologies -- specifically Google Earth -- he wonders if he could ever deduce which Indian village he once called home.

And do you know what? Even without me telling you how Saroo's adventure concludes, it's miraculous how his story -- and this movie -- makes the world feel smaller, and makes our global community feel more connected. Lion takes Saroo's quest and turns it into a technological mystery, with an emotional goal on the other side of the finish line. And instead of being hokey, the use of Google Maps to piece together the scraps of Saroo's childhood memories have a sense of urgency (credit to Davis for figuring out how to make the act of Patel perched in front of a computer screen compelling).

There isn't quite enough for Lion to sustain tension over the course of its complete run time. The conflicts Patel has with Rooney Mara are forced and empty, though Patel connects with Ladwa as "brothers" paired by parents they really can't call their own. But the underlying maternal disconnect felt between Kidman and Patel comes home to roost when Lion arrives at its overwhelmingly satisfying conclusion. In a season of cinematic tearjerkers, from the devastating (A Monster Calls) to the cynical (Collateral Beauty), Lion literally earns every heartstring tug with its impossible story of rediscovering ones childhood with the help of cutting-edge technology and good, old-fashioned resolve.

2011's The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo was certainly not a bomb by any stretch of the imagination. However, considering all of the hype that surrounded the American film adaptation of Stieg Larsson's red-hot literary phenomenon, its end result was more tepid than anything else. This has lead to the ever-dragging path to any possible chance of the second book, The Girl Who Played With Fire, being adapted, and that film's potential star, Rooney Mara, is eager to get back into the world of Lisbeth Salander. However, even she knows that it's probably not happening, and she's officially given up hope that it will.

ScreenDaily caught up with the Academy Award nominated actor, who currently has a couple of films buzzing after their Toronto International Film Festival debut. While Mara's career has only grown and flourished since her stint in David Fincher's care, she's still pretty down about the chances of re-teaming for Lisbeth's further adventures. In fact, Rooney Mara was pretty point blank with her feelings, as she said the following when asked if she'd return for The Girl Who Played With Fire:

In the years since The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo's somewhat underwhelming release, Rooney Mara certainly hasn't been hurting for awesome opportunities. With triumphs like Ain't Them Bodies Saints, Her and her most recent award nominated performance in Carol, as well as the occasional miss such as last year's flop Pan, Mara's resume is an extremely diverse animal. However, we're not surprised that her role as the vengeful hacker-turned-sleuth Lisbeth Salander still has some sort of hold on her. It only takes another look at the trailer that entranced the internet five years ago to see why.

Are we disappointed that The Girl Who Played With Fire isn't coming any time soon? To be perfectly honest, it's been so long since we've seen the first film that we're not entirely sure. What does disappoint us is the fact that Rooney Mara has lost hope in a project she actually looks forward to. Still, with the work she's turned in through the years between now and The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo, we're certainly not disappointed in what we've seen of her.

You'll be able to see quite a bit of Rooney Mara, as she has Una, The Secret Scripture and Lion all awaiting release in the coming months.

Is blood truly thicker than water? Can we feel whole without really knowing where we come from? These are the questions posed by the upcoming film Lion, and it looks like a drama set to deliver stellar performances from powerhouse actresses Rooney Mara and Nicole Kidman. Check out the trailer for the upcoming film below to see more.

Lion follows the incredible true story of a young Indian born man named Saroo (Dev Patel) living with an adopted family in Australia. While speaking to some friends at a get together, he reveals that he's originally from Kolkata, India, but he found himself lost on a train at a young age and was subsequently adopted by an Australian family after winding up thousands of miles away from home. As the memories of his past begin to surface, he takes it upon himself to try and find his birth parents using what little information he has and all of the modern technology at his disposal. It's a decision that he feels compelled to make for personal reasons, but it's also one that threatens to tear a hole right through his family.

It's this familial friction that really serves as the meat and potatoes of Lion's story. As Saroo becomes more and more immersed in the search for his family, we as an audience see the toll it takes on his adoptive Mother (Nicole Kidman) and his girlfriend (Rooney Mara) as they endeavor to understand why he seemingly wants to leave behind the only home he has ever really known. If you didn't tear up even a little bit at this trailer, then I am sorry to inform you that you are actually made of stone.

However, as good as Rooney Mara and Nicole Kidman's performances look in Lion, we would be remiss if we did not point out the absolutely stellar looking performance of Dev Patel. The Slumdog Millionaire star has grown up over the course of the last eight years, and Lion looks like it could really start generating some award buzz for him. It's too early to know for sure, but it genuinely looks like he will give one of the most compelling lead male performances of the coming year. In a time where so many have complained that people of color seldom get proper recognition for their acting work, Lion could offer a solid reason to fix that issue.

That notion seems further enforced by Lion's release date. Hitting theaters in late November -- aka Oscar season -- the family drama seems poised to place itself as a contender for all of the major 2017 awards ceremonies. There's worse things for a film to be than Oscar bait.

We will keep you up to date with any and all relevant details related to the upcoming release of Lion as they become available to us. The film will hit theaters later this year on November 25. Stay tuned for more details.

With so many studios building their business around franchises capable of producing perpetual sequels, it's a rare enough thing these days to find a truly original idea at the movies. However, a new film with Rooney Mara and Robert Redford sounds like it fits the bill. Unsurprisingly, Netflix just scooped it up. Next year the streaming service will release The Discovery, a love story in which the afterlife is proven to exist.

In a single sentence, the description makes it sound like a remake of Robin Williams' What Dreams May Come, however, upon closer examination the film sounds very different and truly unique. According to a press release sent by Netflix, The Discovery is about the actual scientific discovery that the afterlife is real. Robert Redford will play the scientist who makes the discovery in question. Jason Segel will play Redford's son, a man who begins to fall in love with a woman named Isla, played by Rooney Mara. Isla is described as having a tragic past, so we can assume that the existence of the afterlife will play into that in some way. The film was written and directed by Charlie McDowell, who previously worked with Mara -- his current girlfriend -- on The One I Love.

Netflix chief content officer Ted Sarandos says of the project:

The other interesting thing about the film is that it will be set one year after the discovery of the afterlife has been made. This means that the movie won't be about the upheaval that would surely be part of any such discovery, but rather, it will be set in a time where the world has begun to come to terms with the idea. This makes writer-director Charlie McDowell's idea sound even more intriguing. Most of us can probably imagine, to some degree, the drama that would be caused if tomorrow somebody said they had found evidence of the afterlife. Trying to imagine a world where that knowledge is normal feels even more bizarre. How would the way people live their lives change if everybody knew the afterlife was real? Would religion become stronger, or would it completely fall apart? We're going to guess, as this ultimately sounds like a science fiction movie, that whatever form the afterlife takes, it probably doesn't adhere to the ideas of any single religion.

As the idea of an afterlife is a fairly universal concept, it's clear that Netflix sees this as a potentially huge film for them, considering their global reach. The streaming service can drop The Discovery in living rooms all over the world in an instant and Netflix sees the subject matter as being globally accessible.

What do you think of The Discovery? Does this sound like something you'd like to see? Netflix will release the movie via their online service, and in a limited theatrical release, sometime in 2017.

Joe Wright’s whimsical Pan didn’t do well when it hit theaters last year. Critics savaged it, for the most part. It has a 26% on Rotten Tomatoes, and our own Greg Wakeman could only give it 2 stars out of 5. Audiences were curious, as the film did $35M in the U.S. and better overseas (to the tune of $93 million… very little of which came from China). But the film’s cast has issues with the movie, and the way that it has been perceived… and they are still wrestling with the truth of a difficult situation. Just ask Rooney Mara.  

Mara is busy making the publicity rounds for Carol, a searing drama that earned the actress her second Oscar nomination. And yet, in an interview with The Telegraph, the actress still must answer questions about Pan, and the "whitewashing" claims that follow her role as Tiger Lily in the fantasy. Rooney Mara has been ahead of this discussion ever since she was cast in the part, and she continues to say that she hates the fact that the role has included her name in a racial controversy that has plagued this year’s Oscar campaign. Mara tells the Telegraph:

What Rooney Mara is referring to is the controversy stemming from casting a white actress in a role that traditionally has gone to Native Americans. In a similar interview with Deadline, where Mara addressed the topic of "whitewashing," the actress added that the population in Joe Wright’s Neverland (as well as in J.M. Barrie’s book) were meant to be global citizens, not Native Americans, and so limiting the way that they could be portrayed on screen "curbs art and creativity." However, the actress did admit:

The reviews that picked Joe Wright’s Pan apart rarely focused on the whitewashing of particular roles as the reason why the movie didn’t work. And Rooney Mara has done nothing to shy away from this conversation. As she says, there were two stages of disagreement: the first being when she was cast; and the second arriving when the movie came out. It’s clear that she and her director believe they were making an artistic decision when they cast Mara as Tiger Lily in this Peter Pan story, but I’m surprised, and I’m sure Mara is surprised as well, that she’s still answering for the role as she promotes Carol and prepares for the Academy Awards.

What do you think? Should Rooney Mara really be "embarrassed" for her portrayal of Tiger Lily putting her on the wrong side of the #OscarsSoWhite discussion? Or was she an actor trying a role because she liked the director and wanted to be part of his vision? Let us know your thoughts.  

When the first spin-off of the Star Wars universe hits the screen in December, Felicity Jones will be at the head of the team tasked with stealing the plans for the Death Star. Star Wars: Rogue One will be the first film in the franchise not lead by a character named Skywalker. The part is a pretty big deal, and it could have very easily gone to Rooney Mara instead, but it seems the part just found the actress at the wrong time.

The Academy Award nominee was interviewed by Deadline and asked about the report that she was in contention for the role now known as Lyra Erso. It turns out she was never really considered for the role as all she did was take a meeting on the project.

Rooney Mara says that who the director is, is a big part of whether or not she takes a role, so the fact that she liked Gareth Edwards was a point in favor of Star Wars: Rogue One. Unfortunately, it appears that Mara was either overwhelmed with whatever project she was working on, or that scheduling just wasn't going to work out, so she decided to not even audition for the part, since she knew she wouldn’t be taking it.

In the end, that was probably the right move. While many movies are willing to shift their schedules around to meet the needs of actors that they want, it’s not likely that Star Wars: Rogue One would have been able to do that for Rooney Mara, even if they’d wanted to. While we know that Star Wars: Episode VIII has seen a major delay in production, that comes after the box office shattering success of Star Wars: The Force Awakens. Any changes to Rogue One would have been announced before the franchise got back on its feet and probably would have been very concerning for fans.

Rooney Mara doesn't seem particularly disappointed that she had to forgo the role. Many actors are either very interested in joining major franchises, while others want to be as far away from them as possible. Mara, for her part, doesn’t seem to take any of that into account. Would you have liked to see her join the Star Wars universe?

Todd Haynes’ period tale of a forbidden, at-the-time socially unacceptable relationship between two women, Carol, is a lot of things. It’s meticulous constructed, visually sumptuous, and achingly romantic. There is eroticism, sensuality, and nudity, but overall it’s in keeping the tone and themes of the film. Nominated for six Oscars, Carol is receiving a nice push and the box office, but ABC is refusing to air a new TV spot for the drama because it shows a bit of skin. Take a look at the rejected ad and judge for yourself.

The scene in question shows stars Rooney Mara and Cate Blanchett, who are both up for Academy Awards next month for their performances, in bed together. Yes, they are naked, though there’s nothing more to see than you get in your average beer commercial, and everything is strategically covered. However, according to Page Six, ABC will not air the spot until The Weinstein Company "provides more coverage" on the two actresses.

Sources at TWC tell the outlet that they are in the process of making the changes requested by the network. I wonder if they’ll simply recut the footage or if they’ll use digital wizardry to cover up Mara and Blanchett. Maybe it will wind up looking like when Showgirls airs on cable and they put an animated top on Elizabeth Berkley. They probably won’t do that, but it sure would be funny.

Carol is one of the most acclaimed movies of 2015, and in addition to nominated for Best Actress and Best Supporting Actress for Cate Blanchett and Rooney Mara, respectively, it also earned Oscar noms for Best Cinematography, Best Costume Design, Best Original Score, and Best Adapted Screenplay.

Based on Patricia Highsmith’s novel The Price of Salt, Carol tells the story of a young shopgirl and aspiring photographer, Therese (Mara), in 1950s New York. When she encounters the glamorous older Carol (Blanchett) in her store one day, the two embark on an intimate relationship that challenges everything Therese knows and throws their lives into upheaval.

The list of awards Carol won and top ten lists it appeared on is practically endless, and those accolades started right out of the gate. When it debuted at the Cannes Film Festival in France last year it was met with a standing ovation, and in the time since it’s met with near universal acclaim.

Now that you’ve had a chance to check out the questionable Carol TV spot, do you agree with ABC’s decision? Do they have a point, is this too racy to air on the Disney-owned network? Or do you think they’re overreacting? Do you think there are other factors in play? Sound off in the comments below.

Entertainment is a weird business. Performers want to enjoy the work they’re doing, and entertain lots of people while they do it. They also need movies to make money. Awards are great, but they don’t pay the bills. Cate Blanchett now admits that she was afraid that Carol wasn’t going to be a very successful film because she perceived it’s audience as very small. Luckily, however, she turned out to be wrong.

The two Oscar-nominated co-stars of Carol, Rooney Mara and Cate Blanchett, recently sat down for an interview to discuss the making of the film. Blanchett confessed to Variety that she was hesitant to make the film because she didn’t expect it would be of interest to a large part of the normal film audience.

It’s a perfectly reasonable fear to have. When we watch movies, we have a natural tendency to try and relate to the characters. In a film which is a love story between two women, there is, at least, the potential for men to have difficulty doing this. According to Blanchett, the film has been getting a strong reaction from men, so the fact that it’s a story solely about women, or solely about gay women, is not affecting the film’s reception.

Part of the reason for this, according to Rooney Mara, is that the film, while dealing with a controversial subject, does not focus on the politics behind it. She views the film simply as a love story, not that different from any other on film. In this case the gender of the two characters may be different than in most movies, but the story itself is the same. This may be part of why general audiences are enjoying the film. While not everybody can necessarily relate to the characters, pretty much everybody who’s ever been in love can still relate to the story. Check out their complete comments below.

Carol also appealed to Oscar voters as it’s been nominated for six Academy Awards in total, including a Best Actress nomination for Blanchett and Best Supporting Actress for Rooney Mara. At the end of February, we’ll see how many members of the Academy loved Carol as much as everybody else.

If you’ve been anywhere near any website that is even remotely connected to movies or entertainment, you know that the big story of the day is that the annual Oscar nominations came out this morning. There’s a near endless supply of analysis to be found, lists of surprises and snubs and WTF choices (I’m just glad I now live in a world where a Mad Max movie could potentially win the Best Picture Oscar), and much more.

But there’s a curious subset, too, those who are up for an Academy Award, and those who are simultaneously nominated for a Razzie, a kind of anti-Oscar. According to The Hollywood Reporter, this year there are three who fall into this category: Rooney Mara, Eddie Redmayne, and Simon Kinberg.

Rooney Mara

Oscar Nominated For: Carol, Best Supporting Actress

Despite there being some controversy that she should be nominated in the Lead Actress category, Rooney Mara delivers a truly stunning performance in Todd Haynes 1950s set tale of forbidden love, Carol, playing a shop girl who falls for an older socialite woman, played by Cate Blanchett.

Razzie Nominated For: Pan, Worst Supporting Actress

Critics everywhere panned Joe Wright’s Peter Pan origin tale Pan for a variety of reasons. For her part, Mara, who plays Tiger Lily, came under fire for having a white actress play the friend of Peter Pan, who also happens to be the daughter of a Native chief.

Eddie Redmayne

Oscar Nominated For: The Danish Girl, Best Actor

Playing the part of Lili Elbe, the early 20th Century painter who was one of the first to undergo gender reassignment surgery, Eddie Redmayne, who won an Oscar last year for The Theory of Everything, delivers a truly transformative performance in The Danish Girl.

Razzie Nominated For: Jupiter Ascending, Worst Supporting Actor

Playing a petulant, intergalactic business mogul and heir to a wealthy, powerful space family in the Wachowski’s Jupiter Ascending, Redmayne alternates between hushed, almost bored sounding whispers as bat-shit crazy, spittle-flying, forehead-vein-pulsating shrieks of rage, with almost nothing in between the two extremes.

Simon Kinberg

Oscar Nominated For: The Martian, Best Picture

Serving as a producer on Ridley Scott’s space survival epic, The Martian, Simon Kinberg helped usher in one of the most entertaining, thrilling, well received movies of 2015, as illustrated by seven Oscar nominations, including Best Picture.

Razzie Nominated For: - Fantastic Four, Worst Screenplay

As the writer of Fox’s ill-conceived Fantastic Four, which was a disaster on almost every level, and likely to go down as one of the worst, or at least most hated superhero movies of all time, Kinberg did none of those things. Though not entirely his fault, he may have had a hand in killing any chance Marvel’s First Family has of being a big screen player for the foreseeable future.

Those damn geniuses at Pixar just know how to get to us. Unless you’re made of stone or have no soul, watching a Pixar movie has probably caused you to deal with some pretty emotional moments. It turns out that nobody is immune to this power. Even movie stars who go through some of the most emotionally draining work in film can still find themselves touched by a beautiful moment.

Rooney Mara admits that she cries very easily at the movies. Having said that, the Carol actress found herself not just crying but "scream-crying" at the end of Toy Story 3, she was so moved by the experience. While the interview for W Magazine assumes she was crying in fear due to the scene where the toys nearly die in a fire, Mara is talking about the end of the film, where the toys, who have spent the whole movie wishing that their grown up owner would play with them, finally get their wish.

What makes this confession all the more touching, and more than a little chilling, are the circumstances under which she watched the movie. Rooney Mara says she watched the film on her computer during the filming of The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo. Not only that, but it was following the week in which all of the movie’s rape scenes were filmed. Fiction or not, that has to be an emotional experience, and a Pixar movie is either the perfect antidote for that, or possibly the worst idea ever. It’s honestly hard to guess. Do you need something unapologetically happy at that point, or do you need to be left alone in a soundproof room for several days where nobody can find you? It sounds like Toy Story 3 was the emotional catharsis that the actress needed. Check out the full clip below.

While the story of Andy’s ownership of the toys is over, the toys' story is not over yet. Pixar's Toy Story 4 is currently planned for a 2018 release. Someone get Rooney Mara a fresh box of tissues.

Earlier this month, a surprising report made the rounds regarding the Dragon Tattoo franchise. With David Fincher’s 2011 adaptation of the Stieg Larsson novel being considered a disappointment, the story suggested that the series is going in a different direction moving forward, with Alicia Vikander potentially replacing Rooney Mara in the lead role of Lisbeth Salander. But while that’s the narrative that’s spreading around, things don’t quite seem to be set in stone.

Yesterday morning, I attended a Los Angeles press event for the upcoming Todd Haynes drama Carol, and it was while talking with Rooney Mara that I took the opportunity to ask about her future as the aforementioned goth-styled introverted computer genius. Noting the news about The Girl In The Spider’s Web moving forward, I asked if she had been approached by the studio about reprising Lisbeth Salander. It turns out that she really doesn’t know much about it all, but fully expects to play the part again if a new film is made. She explained,

You can watch Rooney Mara's response in the video below:

Unlike the original "Millennium trilogy" of novels, The Girl In The Spider's Web is the only book in the series not to be written by Steig Larsson - as the author died back in 2004 (all three original stories were published posthumously). The story brings back both Lisbeth Salander as well as Mikael Blomkvist, who was played by Daniel Craig in David Fincher’s The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo adaptation. At this time, it doesn’t look like the actor best known as James Bond will be reprising the role.

Personally, I think that the idea of replacing Rooney Mara as Lisbeth Salander is ridiculous – especially considering she’s seems very willing to do it (and is under contract). She was absolutely the best part of the film, fully embodying the character and melting into the role, and the clear proof of that is the fact that she was rewarded with an Academy Award nomination. It’s understandable when a director doesn’t return for a sequel, but to replace the lead actress in this case would be a mistake (even if the replacement is someone as talented as Alicia Vikander).

What do you think about this? Would you like to see Rooney Mara return as Lisbeth Salander, or should the roll be passed along for The Girl In The Spider’s Web? Hit the comments below with your thoughts.

Never underestimate the power of China. For years, the country has served as something of a safety net for Hollywood blockbusters that don’t perform as well as expected domestically. Joe Wright’s Pan has already been deemed a domestic failure, which means Warner Bros. is pretty much banking on success at the Chinese box office to save the film – but don’t be so sure about that eventuality.

According to The Hollywood Reporter, Chinese audiences have responded to Pan in a similar fashion to those in America: lukewarm at best. The Peter Pan origin / retelling earned roughly $740,000 on its opening night in china, and went on to gross a paltry $3.4 million over its opening four days. In total, the film has grossed around $30 million domestic and $63.8 million overseas against a reported $150 million budget – which only factors in production costs. For WB to even begin to see a profit from the film, Pan will have to somehow achieve $400 million at the worldwide budget, which does not exactly seem likely at this stage of the game.

One of the primary reasons for this colossal failure stems from the fact that Pan opened against a fairly deep pool of competition – something that is not usually the case in the Chinese market. Negative critical response played an obvious factor, as would be the case in any major market, but that does not explain how other American failures often make their money back in the China.

The almost universally panned – no pun intended – Terminator: Genisys performed admirably in China because it opened against almost no other major motion pictures, allowing it to thrive at their box office. By contrast, Pan faced stiff competition from France’s The Little Prince, Japan’s Detective Conan: Sunflowers of Inferno, and America’s own Ant-Man (which has been putting on an absolute clinic overseas).

Pan’s failure has brought the film industry back to the drawing board on numerous other projects. For example, the film’s current flop status has all but eliminated Joe Wright’s chanced of directing the upcoming film Emperor. The film’s lack of success also raises the concern of whether or not Hugh Jackman has any real box office appeal unless he has muttonchops and adamantium claws. Cinema Blend will keep you posted on any and all Pan news, and just remember: if you haven’t seen Pan yet, don’t worry, you’re definitely part of the majority on this one.

Even though it’s only been in cinemas for a matter of hours, things aren’t looking too good for Pan. In fact, they’re looking downright disastrous, because the early box office estimates are that it is going to be a huge flop for Warner Bros., with the current prediction being that it’s only going to take in around $21 million.

Variety believes that Joe Wright’s attempt to bring Peter Pan and Neverland to a new and modern audience is going to dramatic fall short. And with Warner Bros. having spent the rather astronomical sum of $150 million on the new origin story for J.M. Barrie’s character it’s a failure that will undoubtedly hurt the studio.

What makes the loss even harder to take is that it’s coming on Columbus Day weekend, which means that families across the United States Of America have an extra day to consider taking their brood to see the adventure. But, even with a further 24 hours to fill-up, people are deciding to go elsewhere.

Pan has been released in 3,515 locations, and if the early projections prove to be correct then it would be a catastrophic loss for the studio. In order for Warner Bros. to pull even and make a profit, Pan is going to have to amass somewhere between $350 million and $400 million at the global box office.

And even though Pan is also opening in 52 other countries this weekend, with an opening slot in the sometimes lucrative China territory on October 22, hopes are quickly dwindling that it will come anywhere near to getting the sum of money needed to be labelled a success.

If Pan fails in as disastrous a fashion as has been predicted then the previous plan for the film to be the start of a brand new adventure franchise will almost certainly be shelved. Warner Bros. made it known when they decided to greenlit Pan that they had big plans for future installments, with its stars signing multi-picture deals, and even during recent press junkets the cast and crew have teased that they’d be willing to return.

But why has Pan failed? Well, it didn’t really get off to the best start as people were outraged that Rooney Mara had been cast in the role of Tiger Lily, who has previously been depicted as Native American. Even though Rooney Mara and director Joe Wright have competently explained why The Social Network actress was cast, it still meant that the film started off on the back foot.

Then, Pan was pushed back from its original release date of June 26, 2015, which is never a good sign. It also didn’t help then when it was finally screened it was met with poor to mixed reviews from critics, who praised its look and visuals, but panned its plot and story. And with family films like Hotel Transylvania 2 and Goosebumps already, or soon to be, in cinemas, there just wasn’t enough room for Pan to fly.

Currently, franchises are king. Yeah, Hollywood is sort-of interested in your story and film if it’s riveting, unique, and teaches audiences something about themselves in an entertaining and profound fashion. But more important than that is its sequel, and hopefully sequels potential. We’re still yet to see if Pan will thrive at the box office, but if it does, Rooney Mara thinks that a follow-up will probably happen.

Rooney Mara made this admission to me when we had a chat about Pan during the press junket for the film a couple of weeks ago. And while she admitted that the decision rests in the hands of the audience and studio, she made it clear that there’s still plenty of room for the story to expand. She explained:

But what are the chances that Pan is going to make a splash at the box office? At the moment, expectations are remarkably low. That’s because early word regarding the film has been relatively mixed. In fact, relatively mixed is putting it mildly, and while the film hasn't exactly savagely been attacked by critics, it’s hardly been soundly endorsed either.

Of course, mixed reviews don’t always result in a poor box office return. But, according to the experts, this is actually the case with Pan, and the predictions are that it’s going to be a painful flop for Warner Bros., who have put around $150 million into producing the adventure.

According to Variety, even though it is Columbus Day weekend and parents and kids will be looking for something to do with their extra day, Pan is currently only on track to make $21 million, even though it’s going to be on 3,515 screens. It’s believed that, in order to make a profit, Pan will actually have to gross between $350 million and $400 million worldwide. Unfortunately, if Pan ends up making the amount that has been predicted, then it will be an almighty struggle to reach that sum.

What Warner Bros. hopes for is that Pan is able to fare better overseas, as it is being released in 52 other countries this weekend. It’s also going to open in China later this month, which has proven to be a rather lucrative territory for studios in recent years.

In Pan, Rooney Mara stars as Tiger Lily, opposite Hugh Jackman as Blackbeard, Garrett Hedlund as James Hook, and Levi Miller as Peter Pan. It’s a reimagining of J.M Barrie’s character and a new origin story for both Pan and Captain Hook. Pan is going to be in cinemas starting tomorrow. And if you want to see a sequel you’re probably going to have to take everyone you know to watch it. Twice.

White washing has become a point of serious contention in Hollywood these days. Complaints regarding a lack of diversity have become increasingly common – especially in adaptations in which white actors take on the roles of traditionally ethnic characters. For the upcoming film Pan, director Joe Wright cast Caucasian actress Rooney Mara as native character Tiger Lily – and he stands by the decision.

According to New York Daily News, Wright made the decision to cast a white actress as Tiger Lily in order to prevent an even more offensive portrayal of the character from occurring:

So while the character of Tiger Lily may be white, the village she hails from is inhabited by a variety of characters from a variety of ethnicities. Wright reportedly auditioned numerous actresses for the role; only to end on Mara more for the way she inhabited the role than for the color of her skin. In doing this, Wright avoided a potentially offensive depiction of Native American culture by giving the film’s tribe an otherworldly aura to it. It’s a difficult assessment to make, because while Wright most certainly created a diverse group of natives for Pan, all of the members of the main cast are white – even the natives – and Mara herself has recently apologized for the outcry the decision has caused.

This issue may not have seemed quite so problematic if it wasn’t already a major issue among modern Hollywood films. This year’s Oscar ceremony drew backlash once people realized that every single nominated actor – both lead and supporting – was white. Even casting white actors in the roles of established ethnic characters has become a common practice – see: Ben Kingsley as The Mandarin in Iron Man 3, and Jake Gyllenhaal as Dastan in Prince of Persia.

What are your thoughts on the casting decision? Does Hollywood have a race problem? Whether or not Wright made the right call with regards to his casting of Tiger Lily remains to be seen. Rooney Mara is an undoubtedly talented actress and shares characteristics the director saw in the character, however, set against the monochromatic cast of Pan the casting choice is not only jarring – it highlights a serious issue that Hollywood needs to address. We will see if the decision pays off when Pan hits theaters on October 9.

It’s common knowledge that not only has Kate Mara not actually seen Fantastic Four yet, but neither has most of the cast. But what about Kate’s little sister, Rooney Mara? Did she shun the film like the rest of the world? Or did she ignore popular opinion and go and see it anyway? Well, it turns out it’s the latter, as Rooney has actually seen Fantastic Four.

With Kate Mara constantly reminding us that she hasn’t seen Fantastic Four yet, I decided to ask Rooney Mara if she’d watched the much maligned blockbuster during the press junket for her upcoming role in Pan. Not only did Mara see the film, but she only had good things to say about her sister’s work in it too:

Sure, it’s hardly a ringing endorsement, but it’s still one of the best reviews that Fantastic Four has received, with critics savaging the blockbuster immediately upon its release. Heck, even its director Josh Trank decided to get in on trashing the film. On the eve of its release he took to Twitter to write the following post, before almost immediately deleting it.

Because of all this negativity, Fantastic Four ultimately went on to gross the rather measly sum of just $165.5 million at the box office, which has immediately put any plans for a sequel on hold. The film had looked promising in some of the trailers released before the August release date, one of which you can enjoy below.

Despite the fact that Fantastic Four was a bona fide flop of the highest order, you’d have still thought that Kate Mara would’ve wanted to see how all of her hard work actually manifested itself onscreen? When I probed Rooney Mara as to why her older sister might not have watched Fantastic Four yet, she was rather pragmatic with her response, answering:

We’re still not really sure what Fox’s plans for any Fantastic Four sequels are at the moment. In the immediate aftermath of the poor reviews and its poor box office performance, it was assumed that 20th Century Fox wouldn’t move forward with the sequel.

But the fact is that if Fox doesn’t produce a sequel Fantastic Four’s rights revert back to Marvel complicate this matter, as Fox won’t want their rivals to get their hands on a franchise that could easily flourish within their cinematic universe. One things for certain though, if Fantastic Four does get a follow-up, Josh Trank won’t be involved. If that's the case, then neither Kate or Rooney Mara may have to worry about discussing another Fantastic Four film at the box office.

Meanwhile, Pan is due out this coming Friday. If Kate Mara is as good a sister as Rooney, she’ll be the first in line to see it.

There’s been a lot of talk recently about female led action movies. Just last month Emily Blunt insisted that only three or four actresses in the world are ever linked to these roles because Hollywood doesn’t create enough of them. But in the case of Pan, Rooney Mara proves that she could easily become a bona-fide action star herself. But does she actually want to become one?

During the recent promotional tour for Pan, I had the chance to sit down with Rooney Mara and talk about her antics working on the Joe Wright fantasy adventure, which is a brand new origin story for the iconic JM Barrie character. I decided to ask her if, after starring in Pan, we would now see her vying for further action roles, like Captain Marvel.

And sorry to disappoint, but while Rooney Mara wouldn’t completely rule out ever starring in an action film again, she was rather adamant that she won’t be rushing back to do so, as she explained:

This really is a shame, because Mara plays a truly strong, powerful, and inspiring female character in Pan. With Mara’s rather menacing, but still utterly beguiling features showing that she really does have the perfect presence for other action roles, young girls around the world will soon be able to look up to her as a cinematic role model.

Of course, it didn't happen overnight, as Rooney Mara did go on to reveal that she’d spent four months shooting Pan in England, where she had to go up against her co-stars Hugh Jackman and Garrett Hedlund to film some of its most exhilarating fight sequences. You can get a taste of such sequences in the film's trailer below.

Those amazing fights were one of the main reasons why Rooney Mara decided to sign up for Pan, as she admitted that she found it refreshing that the role of Tiger Lily was much more complex than the typical "damsel in distress" that usually populates fairy tale stories. Mara added:

It also helped that with Pan, unlike many of her other roles, which have included The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo, Ain’t Them Bodies Saints, and Side Effects, Mara could actually star in a film that her entire family could watch without having to see her in the nude or being attacked. Something that I’m sure they don’t really enjoy viewing, even if Rooney usually excels in those films on the whole.

The rest of the world will be able to watch Rooney Mara's antics as Tiger Lily from this coming Friday, when Pan is finally released into cinemas.

It’s hard to pull your eyes away from Cate Blanchett, who returns to the silver screen in Todd Haynes’ dazzling Carol. The film screened at this year's New York Film Festival and tells of two women who fall in love at a time when doing so was detrimental. As the awards season continues to take shape, Blanchett’s performance is deserving of all the recognition that's likely coming for her her and the film.

The subdued color palette paints the 1950s backdrop, and Blanchett sashays through its texture in luscious reds, greens, and pinks. Therese (Rooney Mara), a department store worker, is instantly enthralled by her presence when she walks in to her store looking for a present for her daughter. The significantly younger Therese realizes more and more that she does not prefer the company of her male suitor (Jake Lacy), while Carol fights for her child in a divorce. But what began with a look from afar progresses into a relationship as each finds it painful to part from the other.

Carol is adapted from the Patricia Highsmith novel The Price of Salt, which is very reflective of the film. Highsmith first published the book in 1952 under the pseudonym Claire Morgan in light of the lesbian content and subsequent happy ending, which defied the societal outlook on homosexuality. It was later republished and stands as a triumph of LGBT and feminist fiction. Carol, the film — from its grainy texture to the music to the fashions to its elegance — seems as if it were plucked directly out of the time period, but it’s thanks to the modern acceptance of the LGBT community that a film like this is able to exist. 

In a time when more people than ever are demanding more fully formed roles for women in Hollywood, Carol also lambasts the rampant misogyny of the age. The character doesn’t need her husband, Harge, incredibly played by Kyle Chandler. He is still in love with his wife, but more than that he feels entitled to her. He constantly remarks that she’s “the most beautiful woman in the room” and how they shouldn’t be in this situation. Carol isn’t afraid to remind him that he’s not the center of her world; their confrontations reach a climax when he drunkenly demands she spend her Christmas with him and their daughter. 

While Mara and Chandler deliver incredible performances, Blanchett is a vision to behold. It all comes back to that gaze, which is eloquently portrayed through the repeated use of mirrors and clouded glass; often times Therese and the camera view the object of affection through rain-stained car windows or in the blurred reflections of storefront displays. She doesn’t hold back, fearlessly tackling the intimate moments with Mara when their gaze is but a nose-length long. However, Blanchett truly comes alive in the subtle changes in expression. As we gaze into her eyes, she stares just as intently into Mara’s from across a table. She slowly, gracefully, expertly raises the corners of her lips into a soft smile, her eyes begin to pool with tears, and it becomes clear that this film about first love, about forbidden love, transcends sexuality and womanhood.

In terms of the Oscars, Blanchett is catnip for Academy voters. While Carol itself touts the theme of LGBT oppression, it’s also a period film, both of which are a part of the Oscars’ long history of standouts. It's also a film which impresses at every level, including cinematography, costumes, directing, supporting talent, and writing. Carol seems like a potential contender for Best Picture and Supporting Actress, but it all comes back to Blanchett. 

Carol will be released in theaters on November 20. 

It’s now been 4 years since David Fincher’s re-imagining of The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo. The film was met with generally favorable reviews, but its $232.6 million return from a $90 million budget meant that the intended sequels soon took a step backwards. However, Rooney Mara is still very much interested in playing the character of Lisbeth Salander again, though she admits that she’s had to quell her expectations that the films will actually happen.

I spoke to Rooney Mara today about her role as Tiger Lily in Pan. I was intrigued to find out about the future of The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo, especially since there had been speculation earlier this summer that the second and third books could be merged together to make a single film. Mara admitted that she hadn’t actually heard this particular rumor regarding the future of the films, though she insisted that she’d love the opportunity to play the computer hacker again. Mara said:

After the release of The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo, writer Steve Zallian originally had a whack at the follow-up, but then Se7en’s Andrew Kevin Walker was hired to re-write the script. Since then though there has pretty much just been silence.

That was until earlier this year, when it was teased that The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo’s sequels, The Girl Who Played With Fire and The Girl Who Kicked The Hornets’ Nest, might be merged together. But it was also suggested that legendary director David Fincher would be kicked to the curb in order to make way for a more populist, less expensive filmmaker.

Obviously, any film that loses David Fincher is immediately at a disadvantage. But the more you think about it, it would actually make sense for the studio to come to this decision, as his darker tone doesn’t usually chime with mainstream audiences. If Fincher does actually drop out of the potential Girl With The Dragon Tattoo films, it will be interesting to see if Rooney Mara continued.

Mara’s career hit a new level after she starred in The Social Network, and after leading The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo opposite Daniel Craig, she was propelled even higher up the Hollywood star system. David Fincher directed both of those films.

The relatively low box office return means that Columbia and MGM were always likely to make different creative decisions in order to try and appeal to as wide a demographic as possible. But since so much time has passed now, it’s looking more and more unlikely that the films are actually going to get made at all.

As hinted in the new Carol trailer, Cate Blanchett might have another Oscar nomination — and win — on her hands. After portraying the elegantly disturbed Jasmine in Woody Allen’s Blue Jasmine, which won her the Best Actress Oscar, Blanchett plays a married woman of the 1950s who risks everything to be with the woman she loves. Watch the trailer below.

Rooney Mara plays the other woman, named Therese Belivet. The Manhattan-based department store worker is dating a man whom she does not love nor does she want to have sex with, but on a dull day while working in the toy section, she becomes enthralled by a female customer named Carol. The two strike up a relationship that eventually leads to a love affair. Interesting to note is that the film’s director, Todd Haynes, helmed a similarly themed work; Far From Heaven starred Julianne Moore as a '50s-era Connecticut housewife who discovers her husband has been leading a closeted life as a gay man. That film earned Moore an Oscar nomination, so perhaps Carol will do the same for Blanchette and Mara, as well.

This Carol trailer may be brief, but it captures the elegance and grace of the ‘50s, though its footage is tinged with sadness. Accompanied by "My Foolish Heart," first performed by Martha Mears in the 1949 film of the same name, the trailer is able to capture the quiet struggle of those forced to live in the closet for fear of oppression, ostracism, and the threat of their lives ruined.

The film is based on the book The Price of Salt, which was published in 1952. Author Patricia Highsmith used the pseudonym Claire Morgan at the time, due to the book’s lesbian romance depiction. In the afterword of the 2004 reprint, Highsmith wrote how she came about the idea for the book in 1948. She was living in New York and had just finished writing Strangers on a Train, though it wouldn’t be published until 1949. She worked as a temporary sales clerk selling dolls at a department store before Christmas. The character of Carol was inspired by a blonde woman she saw shopping in a fur coat, and she completed the outline for the novel in two hours. Highsmith used her own romance with her former lover, a Philadelphia socialite who lost custody of her child in divorce proceedings, as inspiration for her characters’ affair.

Carol premiered earlier this year at the Cannes Film Festival. Variety’s Justin Chang called it "an exquisitely drawn, deeply felt love story," while Mashable’s Jordan Hoffman, Austin American-Statesman’s Charles Ealy and The Times’ Wendy Ide are among those who praised Blanchett’s "effortlessly chic" and "absolutely flooring" performance.

Carol hits theaters on November 20, perfectly positioned for awards attention.

Over the years, the story of Peter Pan has been imagined, reimagined, animated, prequeled, and rendered in damn near anyway you can think of. But that doesn’t mean that people are going to stop sharing their takes. Joe Wright’s upcoming film, Pan, purports to be an origin story for the boy who would never grow up, and it dropped this new trailer today.

This is the adventure-filled trailer that Pan showed off at San Diego Comic-Con over the weekend, and as you can see right away, this interpretation of J.M. Barrie’s beloved Lost Boy is going to be something quite different from what you’ve seen before.

As the voiceover says, sometimes "friends begin as enemies, and enemies as friends," and you witness something curious here: Peter Pan and the man who will become Captain Hook fighting on the same side. That’s going to be an interesting relationship to watch develop, and like that bit with Hook (Garrett Hedlund), Tiger Lily (Rooney Mara), and that big ass jumping crocodile, there are sure to be a number of moments teasing Hook’s eventual loss of one hand. And what appears to be a bunch of faux swearing, which makes sense given this is a family film, and one that will likely wind up with a PG rating.

Levi Miller plays this version of Peter, a 12-year-old orphan with a rebellious streak stuck in a grim, depressing London orphanage (is there any other kind?). Then one night he is whisked away to Neverland, a magical island of pirates and fairies and ferocious warriors where he searches for answers about the true identity of his mother, engages in epic duels and battles, and discovers that he’s part of a prophecy that could topple the reign of the ruthless pirate Blackbeard (a crazy looking Hugh Jackman), who rules Neverland with an iron fist.

Joe Wright is a director most known for intricate costume dramas and period pieces, like Anna Karenina, Pride and Prejudice, and Atonement. While he has a definite visual eye and feel for staging, his Tolstoy adaptation illustrates that perfectly, and he has a some action on his resume with the underrated Hanna, Pan looks to be something very different from anything else he’s ever attempted. From the footage we see here, this is epic and sweeping in scope and scale, and is full of elaborate visuals and tons of special effects. One of the things we’re most curious to see is how he handles the size of Pan and juggles all of these disparate elements.

Pan brings the wondrous world of Neverland to life when it sails into theaters on October 9.

In what is a pairing that I’m pretty sure the entire cinematic community can get behind, it’s been announced that Jason Segel and Hugh Jackman are currently in talks to share the same screen together. In fact, Collateral Beauty is shaping up rather nicely, because not only might it feature both Segel and Jackman, but Rooney Mara is on-board and it is being directed by one of the most in-demand filmmakers of the year.

Variety have reported that Jason Segel is currently negotiating to join Hugh Jackman and Rooney Mara for Collateral Beauty. The Australian actor and American actress have already signed on the dotted line to feature, and they will be hoping the Segel decides to continue his recent dramatic work by joining them too. Segel has been wowing the film festival circuit recently thanks to his portrayal of David Foster Wallace in The End Of The Tour.

The film revolves around a New York advertising executive who suffers a huge tragedy. Unable to comprehend or adjust to his life being flipped upside down in such a dramatic fashion he is plunged into a deep depression. Aware of his downward spiral, the man’s colleagues then devise a unique and unconventional plan to help break him out of his plight. The plan works, however not in the fashion that anyone actually imagined.

Sounds like interesting stuff. Especially since this brief outline isn’t giving too much anyway regarding the tragic incident that leads the main character into his depression, what his colleagues do to him to help him out of it, and what effect it has on him. Still, with Hugh Jackman, Rooney Mara, and now, hopefully, Jason Segel involved, it’s hard not to be intrigued by Collateral Beauty, while it’s safe to assume that it possesses some worthwhile trait to have attracted this impressive trifecta.

Alfonso Gomez-Rejon has already picked out Collateral Beauty as his follow-up to Me and Earl and the Dying Girl. Just like Segel with The End Of The Tour, Gomez-Rejon, who has honed his craft as a director in television and adverts, has been receiving rave reviews for his sophomore directorial effort.

There was a bit of a stir for Collateral Beauty at the Cannes Film Festival just a few short weeks ago. Allan Loeb’s script created quite a frenzy, and PalmStar Media were the studio who ultimately outbid the other suitors to land the coveted project. Soon after this purchase, Gomez-Rejon decided that Collateral Beauty would be his follow-up to Me And Early And The Dying Girl, which is the perfect antidote for those of you who have grown weary of the summer blockbuster season. It’s funny, heart-wrenching and downright poignant. And if Gomez-Rejon can get Collateral Beauty to be even an iota as touching as it then, especially with the cast involved, it will be one not to miss. Collateral Beauty is expected to star shooting in the fall.

Warner Bros. recently made a strategic decision to push Joe Wright’s Peter Pan origin story, Pan, out of this year’s summer season and back to October 9, where it would have room to breathe, and properly prepare audiences for the journey. Based on the new trailer, though, the move also suggests that Wright needed time to polish his visuals, because this trailer looks more stunning than the previous pass.

When you are creating Neverland from scratch, though, you are going to need every minute in post-production that the studio will allow, so I’m really hoping the Pan move leads to an improved movie-going experience. As we have mentioned in previous articles, Pan will be a new take on the early days of Peter (played by newcomer Levi Miller), starting in a London orphanage and following him on his journey to Neverland, where he’s hoping to reunite with his mother (Amanda Seyfried)… and fulfill a prophecy of a young savior with the ability to fly.

But before he can become Pan, Peter looks like he’s going to have to go through Blackbeard, portrayed here by a scenery-chomping Hugh Jackman. Because Joe Wright is using the original text of author J.M. Barrie as a guide – and NOT the Disney animated feature we all grew up on – we see completely different versions of the classic characters we know and love. While many may come to Pan expecting to see Captain Hook (Garrett Hedlund), the chief nemesis in Wright’s tale is Blackbeard, the pirate. And Hook’s around… but he’s a human adventurer who starts off as an ally of Peter’s. Will he stay that way for long?

This new trailer for Pan also turns up the action that Joe Wright promised us when we visited the film’s London set last year. The production has been keeping a lid on the impact that Rooney Mara’s Tiger Lily will have on this story. From a lot of what we have been told about Pan, Mara will be the breakout action star of the family-friendly fantasy, and this great shot of her battling Blackbeard on the masts of captured pirate ships hints at the large-scale set pieces Wright has cooked up for this feature.

The big question might be how open audiences are going to be to the tweaks and alterations Joe Wright brings to the traditional Peter Pan story. I have been told that there will be loose connections to Wendy, Nana and the Pan characters we’ve grown to love. But Pan looks like it wants to take everything that you know about the Peter Pan fairy tale, and filter it through Joe Wright’s imagination. And that’s more than enough to get me in a theater in October. How about you?

For the record, Rooney Mara didn’t initially believe she could play Tiger Lily in a Peter Pan movie, either. Shortly after it was announced that the star of The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo would play Tiger Lily for director Joe Wright in a Peter Pan prequel, internet outrage (whether real or imagined) erupted on the usual chats and forums. There was even a petition to get Mara replaced. The actress understood… until she met with Wright and learned about his vision.

"I feel like there really hasn’t been a proper interpretation of the character," Mara told us when we visited the set of Pan last year. We talked at length about her trepidation to play a character that she "always thought of as a Native American." But long conversations with her director – who she was anxious to collaborate with – and readings of Jason Fuchs’ screenplay showed Mara how her interpretation of Tiger Lily could help define the role for a new generation. She explained to us:

In fact, everything we learned about Tiger Lily, in Pan, focused on her abilities, rather than her race. Wright and producer Sarah Schechter expressed joy at having a strong female role-model character at play in this story of Peter Pan (Levi Miller), Hook (Garrett Hedlund) and the wicked Blackbeard (Hugh Jackman). According to Rooney Mara, her Tiger Lily is a tree-hugger, who is punk. She’s not dirty but a little bit of a hippie. And from everything we saw, she’s a full-blown action star who will fit in beautifully during the summer thrill season at the multiplex.

Audiences will be able to judge for themselves whether they buy Rooney Mara – and all of Joe Wright’s cast members – when Pan opens in theaters this summer:

Read our full set visit here. Pan reaches theaters on July 24.

Hugh Jackman is dangling from a wire, floating roughly 35 feet over a full-scale model of a majestic pirate ship. Down below, diabolical sea-dwellers engage in an animated fistfight, and Jackman – dressed to the teeth as the pirate Blackbeard – descends over and over again into the fray. Once, when the wire pulls the A-list actor back into the rafters, he spies us… a small group of film journalists invited to the set of Pan to watch the actor and his colleagues at work. For just a moment, he breaks character. The menacing pirate is gone, and Hugh Jackman, The Movie Star, is flashing his brilliant smile and waving happily, prop sword in hand. It’s a beautiful, bizarre and wonderful movie moment I’ll never forget.

Pan, in case you don’t yet know, is director Joe Wright’s foray into the imaginative world of Peter Pan, for a live-action blockbuster that will hit theaters on July 24. The 3D family adventure stars Jackman, Rooney Mara (Tiger Lily), Garret Hedlund (Hook), and 11-year-old newcomer Levi Miller (Peter) in a unique spin on the traditional Peter Pan narrative.

To help explain Wright’s vision for Pan, Warner Bros. invited us to a sprawling film set on the outskirts of London, where we ate with pirates, walked the planks of huge pirate ships, waved at Hugh Jackman (see above), and learned the following about this summer’s Pan:

This Is NOT A Remake Of The Disney Cartoon

Joe Wright and his creative team on Pan made it abundantly clear during our set visit that they weren’t setting out to do a live-action version of the classic Walt Disney cartoon that most of us grew up on. Their inspiration comes from J.M. Barrie’s works, Peter Pan, of The Boy Who Wouldn’t Grow Up. Most of the creators in the production offices admitted to not watching the Disney cartoon in preparation for working on this feature, because Joe Wright’s vision is so different from the world that exists in the animated take. That’s not to say Wright (Atonement, Hanna, Anna Karenina) doesn’t utilize familiar aspects from the Peter Pan cartoon. Quite the contrary. But it’s HOW he uses them in Pan that sets this movie apart. Let’s continue to explore.

Pan Is A Prequel To The Story We Know And Love

Peter isn’t Peter when Pan starts. This might be an easy analogy, but Pan feels like Batman Begins for the boy who refuses to grow up. The story gets underway with Peter (Miller) in an orphanage in the 1940s, during the war. The boy clutches a letter, which he’d received from his mother (Amanda Seyfried) many years ago. It’s Peter’s mission to reunite with his mom – a mission that’s interrupted when Blackbeard and his pirates descend on the orphanage and carry kidnapped children to Neverland. Wright’s team talked at length about the progression of color that will signify Peter’s journey through Neverland. What starts in a monochromatic London orphanage will transition, from scene to scene, into a vibrant, imaginative playground filled with wondrous creatures such as fairies, Lost Boys, mermaids, the Never Bird, an albino crocodile and, of course, pirates. But Pan sees Peter coming to terms with being Peter Pan, and it’s not as simple of a journey as you might assume.

They Literally Built Neverland

If you are familiar with Joe Wright’s brilliant films, you know he favors practical effects over CGI, and Pan is no different. On vast soundstages outside of London, we were able to walk on a full-scale replica of the Jolly Roger pirate ship. We traipsed through colorful villages, held weapons and props that belonged to the denizens of Neverland, and we watched the first meeting between Peter (Miller) and Hook (Hedlund). The best part? We walked through the sprawling, incredible recreation of Neverland, a set that stretched for multiple soundstages and included towering trees, massive mushroom stumps, pieces of shipwrecked boats, a tunnel (where an important fight will take place), and a trampoline circle surrounded by chairs where the "ruling counsel" of Neverland sits. It’s a wonderful set that promises to house some impressive action set pieces – from underwater battles to swordfights and martial arts-based trampoline wars – and Wright made sure that it physically existed in this world, in which his cast was encouraged to play.

Young Levi Miller IS Peter

There could be no more important casting for Pan than finding the ideal Peter, and Wright seems to have hit a home run with 11-year-old Levi Miller. The young Australian held court with this small team of reporters, convincing all of us at the end of the lengthy interview that he’s a real find for the casting department. According to Miller, his Peter is adventurous and charming, and he’s driven by his "singular mission" to locate his mother. "He’s kind of a normal 19th century boy," Miller told us. Can he fly yet? "Maybe he can, and maybe he can’t," the seasoned pro dodged with the media! Well, at least Miller revealed that Peter, in this film, has a complicated relationship with both Hook (Garret Hedlund) and Tiger Lily (Rooney Mara) – something we were fascinated by because these are characters who will remain part of Peter’s fabric if the story is to continue.

Garrett Hedlund Will Steal The Show

Everywhere we went on the set of Pan, everyone made it clear that Garrett Hedlund was operating at another level playing Hook, and we were told repeatedly that audiences will exit the theater raving about his winning performance. If we heard it once, we heard it 1,000 times. Hedlund, naturally, downplayed expectations but told us he was having a blast exploring the goofy, comedic tone Wright wants for James Hook. That’s right, Hook isn’t yet Captain Hook in this movie. He’s an American – from the Midwest – who has been in Neverland for quite some time and actually starts off helping Peter during the early stages of the film. In fact, when we watch Hedlund work, he had both hands intact. Pan is as much Hook’s origin story as it is Peter’s, and Hedlund opened up about how they’re dynamic will change over the course of the film, starting as allies and becoming… something different. When Hedlund revealed that Hugh Jackman’s Blackbeard had tremendous influence over the development of Hook as a character, that didn’t bode well for the fate of young Peter Pan.

Pan (Hopefully) Is The Start Of A Franchise

Producer Sarah Schechter opened up, during our visit, of the possibility of Pan kickstarting a new franchise of live-action Peter Pan movies. With a leading man not even in his teens, and a wealth of possible stories left to tell, the sky over Neverland truly could be the limit for this cast and this series. Garrett Hedlund, who plays Hook to Miller’s Pan, admitted, "We signed on for multiple films." So if Pan does well, expect more stories in this universe. But Schechter made it crystal clear that the decision to make more movies centered around Levi Miller’s Peter Pan would be "organic" and not calculated. They love the world. They love these characters. They would love to keep telling stories with them, but nothing is set in stone. That being said, it’s worth noting that Pan will connect – loosely – to the familiar story of Wendy, John, Nana and the characters we love. It does not directly lead into that tale, but we might see a few very interesting hints as Pan draws to a close.

Joe Wright Is Done With Long, Unbroken Takes… For A Reason

Joe Wright made a name for himself (in the film-geek community, at least) for choreographing impossibly long, stylistic, unbroken single-take shots in movies like Atonement and Hanna. But don’t look for one in Pan, as the director told us during a lively conversation that there’s no use in trying to outdo the incredible camera work Alfonso Cuaron recently did with the Oscar-winning sci-fi masterpiece Gravity. While on set, we were lucky enough to sit in a small theater and watch a rough-cut of one of the film’s opening scenes – when the pirates soar over London in flying pirate ships and Peter tries to escape… then to hold on for dear life. And in this moment, there’s an unmistakable Gravity homage that Wright said he had a lot of fun including. The director emphasized over and over that his inspiration for doing Pan was a desire to entertain his three-year-old son, saying he’s fascinated with finding new things that make his child laugh. And while Wright isn’t a franchise guy, when we asked if he’d keep telling stories in this world, he smiled and replied, "We’ll see."

And so will you when Joe Wright’s Pan opens in theaters on July 24.

Despite being based on a massively popular series of novels, David Fincher’s 2011 adaptation of Stieg Larsson’s The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo underperformed. It still made $232 million worldwide, but expectations were through the roof. Since then, there’s been a great deal of talk about whether or not we’ll see the rest of the novels on screen, but now it looks like Sony has a plan in place.

Hacker heroine Lisbeth Salander will be back on the page later this year, with author David Lagercrantz picking up the mantel of the Millennium series in the wake of Larsson’s death with The Girl in the Spider’s Web. According to The Hollywood Reporter, this new chapter figures into Sony’s strategy for the franchise. The current idea is to combine the second and third books—The Girl Who Played With Fire and The Girl Who Kicked The Hornets’ Nest—into a single film, with Spider’s Web rounding out the cinematic trilogy. As far as this goes, however, there is some dissention in the ranks.

Fincher’s film had a $90 million budget, and the current plan is to make the next two films, including the condensed middle chapter, both without him and for significantly less money. Amy Pascal, the former head of Sony who negotiated the rights to Larsson’s books, and who is a producer on the project, is not a fan of this approach. A big part of her reluctance is the fact that combining the two books nullifies the Steve Zaillian script they already have for Fire, which reportedly cost seven figures.

Another hurdle is whether or not Rooney Mara and Daniel Craig, the stars of the first film, will be back. Mara plays the tattooed, pierced, black-wearing computer savant Lisbeth, who helps Craig’s Mikael Blomkvist, a journalist searching for a woman who has been missing for 40 years. Craig is busy holding up another franchise with James Bond, among other projects (he also reportedly wants a raise), and Mara said, as recently as February, that she doesn’t expect to be back.

Even if the American versions never get off the ground again, there are the Swedish adaptations of Larsson’s three books for fans. There are a great many folks out there who prefer them to Fincher’s film (though this is one of the instances where I actually like the remake more), but they’re largely responsible for showing the world outside of Sweden what Noomi Rapace is capable of.

Whether or not The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo franchise continues is going to be interesting to watch. They can certainly make solid crime thriller for less than $90 million, but without Fincher, and combining two long novels (both hover around 800 pages) into one movie, it feels like there is going to be something missing. I’m not the biggest fan of the books (this is a case where I think the movies are better than the books), but Fincher brought such a slick cool and put his own stamp on the material, it’s hard to imagine anything else being more than a pale imitation. But maybe I’m being pessimistic.

When The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo hit back in 2011, it seemed a foregone conclusion that David Fincher’s adaptation of the Swedish novel and film trilogy would get right to work on a second chapter. That, however, has yet to happen due to a number of reasons; notably, its somewhat disappointing box-office performance. With a domestic return of $102 million on the studio’s $90 million budget and even the addition of its $130 million foreign gross, the film yielded far less than its initial stellar expectations. In fact, in a recent interview, star Rooney Mara expressed serious doubts about her character Lisbeth Salander’s return for a potential sequel.

In an interview with E! Online, Rooney Mara was asked about where her once inevitable franchise now stands. Her answer was blunt and less than optimistic. According to Mara,

Of course, Mara is referring to the fact that the sequel, The Girl Who Played with Fire, has been in an unfortunate cycle of false starts over the last 3 years, now leaving it mired in a seemingly irrecoverable standstill. It’s an unfortunate fate for a film franchise that started quite auspiciously with the headline-making rumblings caused by the dark, disturbed, but sexy images of Mara’s dramatic transformation into the investigator/hacker, Lisbeth Salander. With that said, her opinions seem to be her own, as she, much like anyone, has not likely heard any substantive updates on the project.

While the source material was already well-established with the late Sieg Larsson’s trilogy of novels and the original Swedish films in which Noomi Rapace played the titular role, the "Americanized" film by director, David Fincher brought a stylized take on the series’ brutal nature and a seemingly more vulnerable performance with Rooney Mara’s take on the Lisbeth character. As a result, it was generally well received by critics. Yet, something about the film did not quite resonate enough with broader audiences.

However, for director David Fincher, the series seems to be a labor of love and all the indications that he’s given over the past few years still point to his commitment to getting The Girl Who Played with Fire finally made. Late in 2013, screenwriter Andrew Kevin Walker was brought on board to rework the script. Thus far, nothing seems to indicate that these plans were ever changed and Walker’s reworked script may very well be waiting to get made. In fact, while Fincher was sidetracked last year by his directorial success with Gone Girl, the long-belated sequel, Fire remains on his docket with supposed plans to make significant alterations to the traditional story. As Fincher remarked late last year,

It will be interesting to see if The Girl Who Played with Fire actually ends up surfacing. While Fincher’s original Dragon Tattoo film may not have been a phenomenal performer at the box office, it certainly made its mark on the zeitgeist. It also laid the groundwork to continue the series with the possibility of original twists and turns that may even keep those acquainted with the source material on their toes. Stranger, more unlikely sequels have managed to get themselves made.

As of now, the potential sequel’s existence will likely depend on whether or not a committed Fincher can pull off what would certainly be a more budget-conscious take on the Fire story, seeing as there is no chance Sony puts up another $90 million. While it’s difficult to read into specifically what turned the broader movie-going public off the first film, perhaps adjustments would be made to not dwell as deeply into the dank, tortured bleakness on which the last film fixated. It may not be the purists’ choice, but it might finally get the film made.

The original Star Wars trilogy was pretty damn light when it came to female characters, with the most prominent being Princess Leia, Jabba's slave girl Oola, and the rebellion leader Mon Mothma. The new generation of films - starting with Daisy Ridley's key role in Star Wars: The Force Awakens - looks to completely change that record, however, and apparently that includes the upcoming spin-off movie that will be directed by Gareth Edwards. There's a key role for an actress to play in the movie and apparently three big candidates for the part are Rooney Mara, Felicity Jones and Tatiana Maslany.

This news has come our way from The Hollywood Reporter, though, as you might imagine, there aren't many other details about the project currently available. We've previously heard rumors that the movie could follow the adventures of a young Han Solo, or perhaps be about the theft of the original Death Star plans, but nothing has been confirmed, and we don't know exactly what kind of role the lead female character may have. But let's take a closer look at the candidates, shall we?

Most of us really first got to know Rooney Mara when she played the small role of Mark Zuckerberg's ex-girlfriend in David Fincher's The Social Network, but it was her follow-up work with the director that really got people's attention. Starring as Lisbeth Salander in Fincher's The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo remake earned her an Academy Award nomination and immediately got the message across that she is one of the most talented young actresses in Hollywood. According to THR, she'll be testing for the Star Wars role later this week.

Speaking of Oscar nominations, Felicity Jones is actually in this year's Academy Awards race thanks to her performance opposite the also-nominated Eddie Redmayne in The Theory of Everything. She does already have some blockbuster experience on her resume, playing the mysterious Felicia in Marc Webb's The Amazing Spider-Man 2 - but it's also worth noting that she may have a conflict that will prevent her from being in Gareth Edwards' Star Wars spin-off. She is already attached to star in Ron Howard's upcoming Dan Brown adaptation Inferno, and because that's scheduled to film in the spring and summer there may be a scheduling issue.

Finally we have Tatiana Maslany, who hasn't gotten the Academy's attention just yet, but has gotten a Golden Globe nomination for her work on Orphan Black. The Canadian actress has spent a great deal of her career on television, but does have a few noteworthy film credits, including David Cronenberg's Eastern Promises and Michael Sucsy's The Vow and George A. Romero's Diary of the Dead.

Apparently the search for a star for the first Star Wars spin-off movie actually began last month in the U.K., but the search has now come to the United States, and Rooney Mara, Felicity Jones and Tatiana Maslany are three of many actresses who are being looked at. We should be hearing a lot more about the project in the coming weeks and months, so be sure to stay tuned.

Terrence Malick is regarded as one of the most illuminating and thought-provoking filmmakers to have ever graced American cinema. There’s just one problem: he has made six feature films in the last four decades. Thankfully, over the last few years he has become more prolific, and his latest film sounds just as weird and wonderful as you’d have expected.

Terrence Malick’s newest film is currently titled Project V, but that is expected to change at some point in the future. Until now, available information about the film had still been at a minimum. But the fine people over at Ryan Gosling Addicted have put their addiction to good use by translating an article from the Italian website, Cinefiols, which has shed a little bit more light on the upcoming project. At the Le Giornate professional del Cinema 2014, which is currently being held in Sorrento, Italy, some footage from the film was aired. And it turns out that Project V will see Ryan Gosling portraying an aspiring rock star.

Project V also includes the prestigious acting talent of Michael Fassbender and Rooney Mara. According to the report, Fassbender’s character is the business partner of Ryan Gosling’s rocker, and the pair work tirelessly together to try and help him reach his musical peak. Meanwhile Rooney Mara is Ryan Gosling’s love interest in the film. The footage also suggests that she has a secret relationship with Michael Fassbender too. Does that mean that we are going to get to see Michael Fassbender and Ryan Gosling trade blows in an attempt to win the heart of Rooney Mara? Let’s hope so. I’d put my money on Fassbender to come out on top.

But that’s not all. Terrence Malick’s rather superb reputation as a filmmaker also saw him convince Natalie Portman and Cate Blanchett to join the ensemble too. I think we can all agree that this is a rather smashing quintet of actors for any director to have at their disposal. Natalie Portman’s character becomes entangled with Michael Fassbender while Cate Blanchett reportedly grows closer to Ryan Gosling. Whether any of these actors will actually make the final cut of the film is still very much up for debate though. In fact, Christian Bale has already predicted that he has already been edited out after only filming for three or four days.

The fact that the report states "from the short footage we can guess that Ryan Gosling will star as an aspiring rock star" suggests that what was shown was a bit enigmatic and strange - which is hardly a surprise. Terrence Malick loves to subtly hint at his themes, plot and characterization rather than being overt with them. The likes of The Tree of Life and To The Wonder are testament to how he has a perfect eye for cinematic images - but his divisive approach to plot can leave people cold. Project V has been described as a film that is slow and gradual, while its rhythms and themes allegedly evolve and change over the course of its running time too. But what does all that actually mean? Who knows. It’s Terrence Malick. You just need to sit down, watch it, and feel something. If you like it: great. If you hate it: everyone completely understands.

"Welcome to Neverand!" With the vocal boom of a carnival barker, Hugh Jackman helps kick off the first full trailer for Joe Wright’s Pan, a wondrous origin story for the legendary hero that will reinvent the fairy tale next summer.

You had me at "Joe Wright." The director of such lush and mesmerizing epics as Atonement, Anna Karenina and Hanna puts a unique spin on the classic work of J.M. Barrie to portray young Peter Pan (newcomer Levi Miller) as a stolen orphan snatched by the crew of Blackbeard (Jackman) and transported on a wild and colorful adventure to Neverland.

The tone of Pan appears to aim right at families – particularly parents, playing up Amada Seyfried’s character as having to give up her child (and Peter’s tender hopes that he will one day reunite with her in another life).

But on a recent visit to the London set of Pan, Joe Wright told me specifically that he wants to up the action in this story and appeal to children who are the same age as his young son. He's a father now, and that desire to entertain younger audiences will ensure that Pan goes for the humor and the heart as well as for the Yo Ho Ho of it all. Will you be brave enough, Peter?

Will it work, Blackbeard?

Don't be such a jerk! The trailer wraps with some hints at the pizzazz Joe Wright wants to bring to this Neverland tale. There are mermaids, and flying pirate ships, explosions of color that happen whenever someone dies in Neverland, and -- again -- mermaids.

What isn't conveyed -- yet, anyway -- is how important Rooney Mara's Tiger Lily will be to this production. She really ends up being the hero of this adventure, and information we picked up on the set proves that there will be a lot more with Mara in the marketing campaign as we get closer to the film's release. Right, Hugh?

OK, fine. Pan will be in theaters on July 17, 2015.

What’s a Peter Pan story without a few pirates? When you journey to Neverland with the sweetly innocent Peter in tow, though, you mainly expect to see Captain Hook. And you will. But first, as Joe Wright prepares to pull back the curtain on next summer’s Pan, we meet Blackbeard, the true villain of the piece as played by Hugh Jackman.

Entertainment Weekly gets the exclusive images of Jackman in character as Blackbeard, the ruthless pirate legend who’ll be the foil to young Peter Pan (newcomer Levi Miller). That doesn’t mean that Joe Wright’s spin on the J.M. Barrie classic will lack for tradition, even as the director tells the magazine, "This isn’t exactly the Neverland story you know." Garrett Hedlund will play Hook, though he still has both hands and is painted more as a rugged explorer trapped in Neverland and willing to help young Peter. Rooney Mara plays Tiger Lily, an action heroine who might be the focus of the movie. And the majority of the scenery will be devoured by Hugh Jackman, playing the orphan-stealing Blackbeard.

Joe Wright has been dabbling in period epics for some time now, having helmed such masterpieces as Atonement, Pride & Prejudice and Anna Karenina with Keira Knightley. On a recent set visit to the London shoot of Pan, he told us at length all the different ways that he wanted to reinterpret the fairy tale story of J.M. Barrie, and we get a hint of these changes in his approach to pirates and Peter.

But this is only the first shot fired in what’s sure to be a lengthy marketing campaign. I’m hoping this means a trailer will drop soon, because what we were able to see of Joe Wright’s Neverland will take your breath away. If you want to see more of Peter Pan, and the ship he takes from London to Neverland, click the following link. Pan opens in theaters on July 17, 2015. Here’s an up-close shot of Levi Miller, the young boy cast as Peter Pan with the intention of possibly launching a franchise.

And when Peter is snatched out of his orphanage by Blackbeard’s crew, here’s the boat that takes him on his amazing journey:

David Fincher is underrated. I understand that’s silly to say, given how technically proficient and stylistically brilliant Fincher is. He’s a critics' darling, and now – with Gone Girl -- he’s proving he can deliver commercial hits, as well. But when it comes to working with actors, few offer praise to Fincher, despite the number of career-defining performances he coaxes out of actor after actor, in film after film.

Ben Affleck’s impossibly comfortable turn as the self-centered Nick Dunne struck me as yet another combination of a perfect Fincher choice, followed by a seamless performance under the director’s watchful eye. And I realized it was the latest of many. Here, then, are the 10 A-list actors who gave career-defining performances in a Fincher film, starting with the most prestigious of them all:

10. Michael Douglas, The Game

Nicholas Van Orton is Michael Douglas, right? Wealthy, indifferent, consumed by his selfish personal interests and safely ensconced in an Ivory tower created by success. And yet, the "Game" (and his collaboration with Fincher), calls Douglas back to the impulsive projects and hasty decisions he made as an up-and-coming actor – from Romancing the Stone to Fatal Attraction or The Star Chamber. By the end of The Game, both Nicholas Van Orton AND Michael Douglas woke up to the possibilities. Do you think it’s a coincidence Douglas moved on to Wonder Boys and Traffic after collaborating with Fincher? A suddenly alive actor, chasing that high.

9. Justin Timberlake, The Social Network

Sometimes, it’s difficult to tell if David Fincher pulls the Alpha personality out of a given performer, or if he luckily finds the exact right performer for his feature’s need. Take Justin Timberlake, as an example. As a screen actor, Timberlake tends to be terrible. Rent Runner Runner, The Love Guru or Friends With Benefits if you need help proving that point. But he’s spectacular in Fincher’s The Social Network, probably because he’s asked to play egotistical, entrepreneurial jerk Sean Parker, who helps Facebook reach its fullest potential. Most of it’s coaching on the director’s part, I’m sure. But I also believe that sometimes, Fincher just finds the right person, then sits back and let’s them be themselves.

8. Ben Affleck, Gone Girl

Fincher’s "Let You Be You" practice applies to Ben Affleck in Gone Girl, as well, leading to a ferocious debate I recently had with a colleague about whether Affleck was actually acting in the movie… or just showing us the closest side of his "personality" we’ve ever seen on screen. A little too self-aware, a little too self-centered, Nick Dunne basically is the "idea" we all have of Ben Affleck. There’s a scene in Gone Girl that crystallizes what I believe about the media-battered Boston native, and it occurs when Nick sits in a crowded airport and watches a televised report about his wrongdoings. Hasn’t than been Affleck, countless times before? (Hello, Bennifer.) Getting Affleck to commit to a role like Nick Dunne is half of the battle. But credit Fincher with tearing down any pretense Affleck might have had in the part, and encouraging him to embrace the slime that coats Nick’s thin skin, to deliver what I think stands as the best pure performance on the actor’s resume.

7. Tilda Swinton, Benjamin Button

"A hotel in the middle of the night can be a magical place." And it is in these moments, near the onset of David Fincher’s romantic Benjamin Button, where Tilda Swinton weaves her own on-screen magic as she and Brad Pitt’s maturing character "lose track of the night." Benjamin Button is supposed to be about the time-testing love affair between Pitt and Cate Blanchett. And the movie gets there, in time. But Tilda Swinton, best known for losing herself in disturbing personas, breaks the proverbial ice around Benjamin’s heart by showing him what true love can mean… and in her brief screen time, she leaves a tender mark on the beating heart of this beautiful, underappreciated drama.

6. Helena Bonham Carter, Fight Club

Oh, right. This is what Helena Bonham Carter is capable of when she isn’t under the thumb… er, collaborating with her beloved husband, Tim Burton. Remove the gothic make-up and the doom-and-gloom chicanery and you’ll unearth Marla Singer, the fucked-up third leg of an empty love triangle. Seeing Carter unleash her bitter, derisive attitude in a modern, satirical effort is beyond refreshing – mainly because Hollywood only seems to see her in period dramas (The King’s Speech) or demented kid-lit adaptations (Harry Potter, Alice in Wonderland). When given a chance, Carter has the ability to burrow like a tick beneath the skin of a lunatic, and create an unforgettable scene-stealer in a flat-out fascinating case study like Fight Club.

5. Morgan Freeman, Se7en

Is there anything more cliché than a retiring detective working his final case? And yet, in Morgan Freeman’s hands, the inspiring, intelligent character of William Somerset transcends all the usual flat-foot tics to deliver a well-worn, weary but wonderfully informed mentor to Brad Pitt’s rough-around-the-edges Mills. Even better, Fincher helps Freeman avoid most of the "Morgan Freeman tics" that lazily define too many of his performances. "Anyone who spends a significant amount of time with me finds me disagreeable," Somerset shares in the revealing dinner scene. Not true. I’d watch a series of movies following this wise detective on multiple cases, so long as Freeman was game.

4. Rooney Mara, The Social Network

Five dizzying minutes. That’s how long it takes for Rooney Mara, as Erica Albright, to shatter the fragile heart of unstable genius Mark Zuckerberg (Jesse Eisenberg), setting him deep down a path that would lead to the creation of the world’s most powerful social-networking tool. And while Mara only receives a few additional minutes of screen time during the rest of Fincher’s The Social Network, her impact casts an incredible shadow over the entirety of the film… hammered home by Mark’s pitiful Facebook search for his ex in the movie's closing minutes. Mara would bare her soul for Fincher in the director’s stab at The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo. To me, though, she accomplishes so much more – emotionally and intellectually – in the passing frames of this instant classic.

3. Ed Norton, Fight Club

Yes, you can argue that Edward Norton’s best performance (or, possibly, better performance) was in American History X. Some might say Primal Fear. But the tightrope walk he pulls off in David Fincher’s anarchist cookbook Fight Club strikes me, still, as the quintessential "Norton" turn. It’s cold, but devilish. It’s aloof, and yet in your face. It’s hyper-intelligent, but completely accessible. And there aren’t a lot of actors who can wear all of those skins… let alone wear them for the benefit of one (admittedly complicated) part. The "reveal" in Fight Club sputters if Norton isn’t brilliant. Thankfully, the movie lands every single-serving punch it throws, and he’s largely to blame.

2. The Entire Cast of Zodiac

Tried to single out one actor. Couldn’t. The entire ensemble from David Fincher’s true-crime masterpiece excels, from Jake Gyllenhall’s introverted puzzle-solving cartoonist to Robert Downey Jr.’s brash, alcoholic reporter and Mark Ruffalo’s overwhelmed San Francisco detective. Every small piece of the Zodiac puzzle is crucial to solving the twisty whodunit (that, sadly, has no definitive answer). The actual crime in Zodiac lies in the fact that this movie isn’t worshipped by the masses, studied by film students, and appreciated properly.

1. Brad Pitt, Se7en / Fight Club / The Curious Case of Benjamin Button

Forget the talk of Martin Scorsese and Robert De Niro (or Scorsese and Leonardo DiCaprio, for that matter). The pairing of David Fincher with the fearless Brad Pitt has been blistering over the years. Pitt’s an outstanding actor, one who probably gets half the credit he deserves because he’s dismissed as handsome and movie-star-ish. So when he works with Fincher, he pushes the envelope, adopting the intensity of a puppy as wet-behind-the-ears Detective Mills, or coating his Redford-esque looks in age-makeup for Benjamin Button. Pitt challenges himself regularly, and often looks for partnerships with uncompromising directors who’ll bring out the best (or the worst) in him. His work with Fincher, however, has yielded masterpieces, and I can only hope – after this six-year hiatus – that the two find a project on which to collaborate once again. And soon.

The intriguing indie The One I Love is earning plenty of buzz for its central secret. Even after its rousing world premiere at the Sundance Film Festival, critics raved about this inventive take on romantic comedies, yet wouldn't expose the clever cut-up's sly secrets. However, without spoiling anything, we can tell you one of the secrets even those who've seen the film have missed.

Just yesterday, I had a chance to sit down with The One I Love's director, Charlie McDowell, to talk about his feature directorial debut. We'll give you a fuller picture of that conversation closer to The One I Love's theatrical release, but in the meantime we'd like to share the secret of Rooney Mara's involvement in this Sundance darling. Though she's not one of its stars, The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo stunner took on a pivotal role.

The cast is reported as being made up solely of Mark Duplass, Elisabeth Moss and Ted Danson. They play an unhappy married couple, and their marriage counselor. But watching the film, I was struck how the costumes of these characters felt like characters in their own right. So, I asked McDowell about them, expecting just that--details about the costume choices. Then he surprised me by telling me Rooney Mara was the film's costume designer, though she's credited under the pseudonym Bree Daniel. Below, you can see how this led to an unexpectedly awkward moment.

Charlie McDowell began by speaking about his "girlfriend," an unnamed actress who wanted to help out in the film in a way she felt she'd be well suited. (Spoiler: she is!)

At this point, I asked for his girlfriend's name, in case the costume designer's credit wasn't readily available. McDowell grew bashful instantaneously, I soon realized why.

"Well, she goes by a pseudonym on the movie, but..." He hesitated. "So, my girlfriend is Rooney Mara, who is an actress. We didn’t want to credit Rooney Mara, costume designer. So she’s Bree Daniel on the credits."

Right. He's dating Rooney Mara. Some corner of my brain knew that at some point.

McDowell clarified he's proud of Mara's work on The One I Love, but wasn't sure how to answer the question about her name at first, because if he gave the pseudonym, it might start a gossip cycle that he's running around on Rooney Mara…with her own pseudonym. Celebrity can be complicated.

The One I Love is now on iTunes, and opens theatrically on August 22nd.

Let me say at the top: Rooney Mara is remarkable. She is a talented actress, gorgeous and mesmerizing onscreen. That doesn't mean she can't be miscast. And according to an online petition that's gaining momentum, she has been in Joe Wright's upcoming live-action Peter Pan origin story, Pan.

This isn't the case of fanboys gone rabid like that whole Batfleck debacle. It's political to its core. Essentially, the petition presented by Kristi Arnold begs Warner Bros. outright "Stop Casting White Actors to Play People of Color!" If you'd asked me last month about Wright's track record on making impeccable film adaptations of beloved books, I'd tell you he could do no wrong. Atonement, Pride & Prejudice and Anna Karenina are each breathtaking, tonally faithful to their inspirations, poignant and totally gorgeous. So when word hit that he'd be helming Warner Bros' Pan, by the J.M. Barrie novel, I was positively thrilled. Then he went and cast Rooney Mara as Tiger Lily, and it was hard not to cringe at another case of Hollywood whitewashing.

In her petition, Arnold requests:

Simply put, it's a matter of representation. Hollywood films are overwhelmingly about white men (and to a lesser degree white women). So when a role comes along that is literally written for a person of color to play, but is cast as a white person anyway, it is a slap to the face to many people of color. Now, you might argue that Mara is far more famous than any Native American actress you can think of. But can you think of any? That's the vicious circle of it all. If Hollywood doesn't cast people of color, how can people of color become household names that make them hot casting properties?

On the other hand, sometimes people of color are cast in roles that may have been originally conceived as a white character. The most notably example of this is Johnny Storm in the upcoming Fantastic Four. When Michael B. Jordan was cast for the role of a character who is traditionally white, it caused a shit storm of online reactions, many of which began with "I'm not a racist but…" Some said their outrage was over the character looking different, an admittedly common complaint in any live-action adaptation of a comic. Others insisted that it makes no sense that Johnny Storm and Sue Storm can still be siblings if they have different skin colors. Well, to that I'd argue that the film exists in a world where people can stretch like elastic, become living flame, turn invisible or into rock monsters. Your suspension of disbelief should be able to extend to interracial families.

But the difference here lies in that making Johnny Storm or James Bond a black guy still leaves millions of other white movie heroes for white kids to identify with onscreen. Take away a hero of color, and the void is felt. With so few movie heroes in the US being people of color, non-white children receive a very different message from Hollywood, one that too often relegates them to sidekicks, villains, or background players. Can children of color identify with a white hero? Of course they can, but it's hard to imagine that seeing mostly white people as the heroes in movies doesn't have some sort of effect on a child's sense of identity and racial awareness. Mara's casting in Pan is just the latest to bring this matter to light.

However, EW does point out that this petition misidentifies Warner Bros comments. They were not made in defense of Mara's casting or in reference to it, but rather to the project as a whole. Warner Bros has not yet responded to this controversy. Perhaps the statement is meant to refer to the reports that Lupita Nyong’o and Adèle Exarchopoulos were considered for the role of Tiger Lily. Perhaps some of the Lost Boys will be people of color. But if Warner Bros goal is to present a multi-racial world in Pan, it'd be better done if people of color weren't relegated to tertiary characters while all the leads are doled out to white actors.

At the time of posting, the petition was requesting 6,000 signatures, and had received 5,871. You can add your name here.

Director Joe Wright's upcoming Peter Pan origin story Pan has not yet found the 10-12 year old actor who will play the titular role, but it has been busy putting together a fantastic supporting cast. We've already learned that Hugh Jackman and Garrett Hedlund will be playing the pirates Blackbeard and Hook, respectively, but now The Hollywood Reporter is saying that Rooney Mara is in negotiations to play a character fans of the classic story will certainly recognize.

Should all go according to plan and the dotted line get signed, Mara will take on the role of Tiger Lily, the Native American princess who lives in Neverland. It's not entirely clear how she will fit into the plot, which follows a young Peter - living as an orphan in London - who is taken away to the aforementioned magical world and does battle with Blackbeard. The casting search is on for the young Pan, and it's possible that the supporting cast could add a few more recognizable names and faces. The plot is expected to be very different take on the classic Peter Pan story and will change up the stories behind the characters.

The film is actually a nice change of pace for Mara, who has been very selective about her project choices in recent years and has leaned towards dark dramas and more adult-oriented material:

Coming up soon for Mara is the release of the Stephen Daldry-directed thriller Trash - which will be in theaters in the UK this May - but she has also completed work on Terrence Malick's next project. She is currently filming the Todd Haynes-directed lesbian drama Carol, which pairs her up with Cate Blanchett.

Pan will be Wright's first film since his 2012 adaptation of Anna Karenina, and has been set by Warner Bros. to be released on July 17, 2015. Jason Fuchs, one of the screenwriters on Ice Age: Continental Drift, is penning the screenplay.

Mia Wasikowska and Rooney Mara rank as two of our most talented young actresses working today, choosing interesting projects with fascinating directors like David Fincher (The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, The Social Network), Steven Soderbergh (Side Effects), Cary Fukunaga (Jane Eyre) and Chan-Wook Park (Stoker). At some point in the near future, we’d love to see them collaborate on a film together, but for the time being, one will simply replace the other in a movie we’re eagerly anticipating.

ScreenDaily reports that Mara has replaced Wasikowska in Todd Haynes’ Carol, which he plans to start filming in Spring 2014. The movie is based on Patricia Highsmith’s lesbian love story. It was published in 1952 (under Highsmith’s pseudonym, Claire Morgan), and often goes by the rival title, The Price of Salt.

Says Haynes on the casting switch:

The “Cate” he’s referencing is Cate Blanchett, who was cast in the film earlier this year. Blanchett will play a frustrated wife trapped in a loveless marriage who enters a dangerous, intimate relationship with a twentysomething department store clerk (Mara). The story will be set in the 1950s, an era that Haynes previously explored in the outstanding Far From Heaven:

And Blanchett has a connection with Highsmith, having acted in Anthony Minghella’s brilliant, subversive The Talented Mr. Ripley … also set in the ‘50s. Are you sensing a theme here? Perhaps those two films give us an idea of the tone and style we might expect from Carol.

Haynes hasn’t done a feature film since 2007’s experimental Bob Dylan biopic I’m Not There, though he did stay very busy with Kate Winslet working on the HBO mini-series Mildred Pierce. Pairing him with Blanchett and Wasikowska would have been a thrill, but Mara has been proving herself extremely worthy with stellar performances in Dragon Tattoo and the recent Ain’t Them Bodies Saints. (Our own Eric Eisenberg raved about her turn in his review.) I might not have been excited about this news after Mara’s Nightmare On Elm Street reboot, but after a string of great performances, we now know she can hold her own opposite Blanchett, and I’m excited to see what Haynes can do with this material.

By now you probably know Rooney Mara's face… but if she had her way, you wouldn't know her at all. The actress who broke out big time as Lisbeth Salander in The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo clearly had no problem transforming herself into a punked-out Swedish hacker, in a performance that earned her an Oscar nomination and offers of roles anyone would dream of. But Mara, who has gone on to work with huge names like Steven Soderbergh, Terrence Malick and Spike Jonze, says that all that work became too much, and when I spoke to her in Manhattan last week she was gearing up for her first screen role-- in Stephen Daldry's Trash-- in nearly a year.

Many of the roles that Mara filmed in that time, including in Spike Jonze's Her and Terrence Malick's still-untitled film, have yet to see theaters, but you can catch her now in theaters and on VOD in Ain't Them Bodies Saints from a director who isn't yet a big name but seems destined to become one, David Lowery. Mara saw Lowery's previous short film and says she immediately fell for the script, in which she plays Ruth, one half of a criminal couple (opposite Casey Affleck) who are separated when he goes to jail, and she retreats home to raise their child. Five years later he's escaped and makes his way back to her, and though Ruth is a tough outlaw at heart and a devoted mom, she's not nearly the simple "tough female character" that Mara admits can be too limiting (when it's not Lisbeth, that is).

Check out my conversation with Mara-- and her confession about which movie classics she's catching up on this summer-- and see Ain't Them Bodies Saints in theaters or on VOD now.

This is a really general question, but you were talking about how when you got the script it some to you. But the movie is so visual and the music is such an important part of it, and its so hard for me to imagine seeing a script and seeing that in there. What was it that you saw?

Well, the music was, I couldn’t have imagined the music, but certainly, the look of it. I mean, I knew what David wanted it to look like because he sent such good reference photos. You know, he sent me a picture of a little girl sitting on, you know, the floor, in her house, with like a cat, playing with toys and he was like. “This is what I want Ruth’s house to feel like,” and it’s exactly what the house felt like.

Not looks like, but feels like?

Yeah. And he sent tons of photos like that of, you know, of what he wanted the movie to feel like, and so I know what it would look like and feel like.

And you had seen his short?

I’d seen his short, yes, but also, you know, the script, it is written in a way that it, you could-- it does have a very special, unique voice to it, and you could kind of tell the look the movie was going to be.

Yeah, the letters are really poetic.

And a lot of that was written later. It wasn’t in the first script that I read, but there was enough of that that I knew that it was special.

He says that you were the only person he wanted for this and you’ve said that you don’t know why. I don’t know if now you do know why, if he’s told you…

Well, I don’t know why, but then I found out later that he used to be, David used to be goth. So, I feel like he only wanted me because I was Lisbeth and I was like... From his goth days, he was like I need Lisbeth Salander. [Laughs]

That’s funny.

I know, right, but no, that’s not why.

In naturalistic parts like this, there’s not a lot of bigness to it, like with Lisbeth Salander, where you’re changing your entire appearance…

It’s very quiet.

And you’re not Southern and you’re not from a rural area. Your background isn’t really anything like that. It doesn’t seem like you put a lot of stock in that, but is that something that you have to convince other people to get over or have to talk to yourself about?

No, I don’t have to convince other people to get over it. I mean, I would choose to play a part, you know, that has an accent and that’s from a place that I’m not from any day of the week over something that doesn’t.

So, you’d rather do that.

Oh my God, yeah. I would rather never do a movie in my own voice, ever, but I mean, I have and I will, but I would much rather do anything in an accent or, you know, someone who is from a place that’s not my own.

So, is something like Side Effects more like naked, almost, because it’s more similar to you.

Yeah. So, you like the part of acting that’s like the hiding of yourself a little bit.

100%

How hard is that as you go forward though. When you become more famous, people know your face more, it is harder to disappear in stuff.

Yeah, it’s horrible. I haven’t worked since Thanksgiving.

Yeah, at Cannes, I was reading the interview you did on Grantland and you’re like, “I’m sick of myself. I’m still trying to figure out what to do.” Do you still feel that way?

Well, I did four movies in a row. I did Side Effects. Then I did Spike’s movie [Her]. Then I did this. Then I did Terrence Malick’s movie [still untitled]. Then I was like, “Oh my God. I’m never working again,” and that’s a long, that was a long time to take off for me. Now, I’m working in September, but I only just now feel ready to work.

What was it about yourself that you felt like you were trying to get away from? Do you feel like you did get away from that thing?

Well, like you said, I just don’t want to work too much. I don’t want to get too comfortable. I don’t want to like, I don’t know. I don’t want to have too many habits or like, things that I fall back on. I want to be, you know, I want to continue to be challenged and four in a row is too many.

Do you take time to look back at what you’ve done and kind of pick it apart?

I do a little bit, but I mean, I cant do that too much or I would drive myself crazy, because it’s not just me, it’s everyone. And it’s not just acting, it’s anything you do. You look back and you, of course could do it better. It’s like life, you get out of, you come out of something and you’re like, now I know how to get through that situation with that friend, or I would do it differently, you know. It’s like anything in life.

I mean, I know the Dragon Tattoo sequels are so up in the air, and not really up to you, but is the idea of playing the same character again… does the idea of like going back and fixing it appeal to you?

Well, someone asked me that, I would love to go back and play that character, but I wouldn’t think of it as I could go back and fix it, because the second one is so different than the first one and I’m sure by the time we finish it, I’d be like, “Oh, now I know how to do it.” You know, it would be the same thing. I would feel the same way after.

You've kind of rejected the idea of comparisons between David Lowery and Terrence Malick in other movies, but do you see the similarities in the way their work turns out and does it make sense to you that they work so different?

Maybe in Malick’s earlier work, a little bit. think they’re both very poetic and they’re both romantics and they have a similar aesthetic, but, you know, Malick’s work has changed and evolved so much from his earlier stuff. I don’t think the Malick of today has very many similarities to David’s work.

When you’re working with someone like David Lowery, who’s completely taking influences of Terrence Malick or whatever else, do you see the way he’s filtering those influences, compared to someone like David Fincher who doesn’t seen like he’s been making movies that are inspired by anybody else, necessarily.

Oh, yes he is. David is like, he knows everything about every movie and he’s seen everything and he I mean, I don’t think there’s a filmmaker out there that isn’t taking something from someone else.

That’s totally true.

I think the difference is that David is so--David Fincher is so knowledgeable that, you know, he's not copying, but he sees something and he knows how he wants to make it his own or make it better. He just is so smart about everything, about storytelling, but also about like the camera and like electronics and like, I can’t even talk about it, because I have no idea.

Yeah, he’s got that crazy brain, like he and James Cameron seem to be ones who are like, I know every single thing that happens on this set and I will do all of it.

Yeah, he does, but certainly, I think he totally takes things from other movies.

Between him and Steven Soderbergh who both seem to know absolutely everything in the world, are they handing you down things and being like, “Learn this.” Are you getting a film education from directors like that?

I mean, I am. Unfortunately, I’m so bad. I won’t even tell you the movies that I haven’t seen.

Oh God. I don’t shame anybody for that. There’s too many. You can’t see everything.

I saw The Godfather for the first time, a week ago.

That’s really exciting. Did you like it?

I loved it and it was so exciting. It also just made me really depressed though. I also watched Annie Hall for the first time last weekend and it was like, why don’t people make movies anymore, like actual movies. And so it was really depressing, but it is so exciting, I have so many amazing movies like that to watch.

So, is that what you’re using your time off from acting, to kind of do the research?

Yeah, I’ve been watching a lot of movie and also, you know, catching up with life and spending time with family and I’ve had a lot of work stuff to do, just not acting.

Are you playing Joaquin Phoenix’s ex-wife in Her?

Yes.

I feel like you’ve done a couple of roles, this too, playing older than you are, or someone who feels older than you are.

Well, I guess maybe, I look younger than I am, but I feel older than my age, which is kind of a weird place to be. But, the Spike Jonze film takes place kind of in the future, so I don’t know. It didn’t seem, playing his ex, they were worried about my age. They thought I was too young for it, but because I kind of play this genius scientist and it takes place in the future, so being younger than him, I don’t know, just didn’t feel weird. Kind of how in a period piece, it wouldn’t feel weird for me to be married to someone that age, you know.

The idea of strong women in movies is something that gets talked about , but a lot of films will claim they have a strong female character who is also really limited in what she can actually do. Then I was thinking about your sister on “House of Cards”, which is such an interesting female role in the way that it plays with sexuality and strength and the way that those two things can exist at the same time, and they’re very rarely shown that way. Do you feel like there is like a strong female trap, like here are the two different ways that we can be strong in movies and that’s all that you get out there?

Yeah, it’s really frustrating the way that females are depicted in film and what’s available. You just think about the roles that are out there for men. They’re so interesting and I’m sorry, but females are the more complicated, interesting sex. We are. And we’re just not depicted that way and that’s one of the things I loved about this is that she’s a mom. But I’ve read so many scripts where it’s like, the protective mom and she just will do anything to protect her child and it’s so, it’s just not real life. No one is that, most people are not that, you know, good. And here was a mother and it was just, to me, so much more interesting the way she was a mother and how complicated it was and it wasn’t, I don’t know. It’s definitely frustrating that females are, they’re not portrayed as complicated or as interesting as they really are.

This weekend marks the limited theatrical release of writer-director David Lowery’s Sundance hit drama Ain’t Them Bodies Saints, and while this of course means premieres, critical reviews and the like, Lowery is already offering the masses an additional story about the film’s main characters, Bob Muldoon (Casey Affleck) and Ruth Guthrie (Rooney Mara). Following in the footsteps of bigger budget films, Ain’t Them Bodies Saints received the graphic novel treatment, albeit in a limited format, which Entertainment Weekly is awesomely hosting in its entirety. Isn’t it nice when filmmakers and production companies don’t feel the need to relieve us of our money for extra material? (Pacific Rim graphic novel, we’re talking about you.) And from an indie movie, no less.

Adapted by comic artist and musician Matthew Southworth, with art by Criterion Collection designer Eric Skillman, this prequel story is titled New Tattoo, and gives us a look into the Bonnie and Clyde-lite lifestyle the two young loves are living before the events of the film pull them apart.

Initially, Lowery penned the story hoping to film it as a short to follow-up the feature, based purely on how much fun the director had with scenes where Affleck and Mara actually appeared together. “Casey and Rooney and I talked about it on set,” Lowery explains, “that we wanted to prolong that experience. But it never worked out because everyone’s schedules are so complex.” One suggestion from IFC Films later, and the short comic came together. You can take a look at the cover page and first two pages below.

It’s a nice, subdued story embedded with dread that thankfully doesn’t end in gallons of bloodshed. Southern lovers with guns are almost never a good thing when it comes to fiction, and the relationship between Bob and Ruth is captured subtlely but assuredly. The titular tattoo’s presence adds the extra emotional tug to a story that has admittedly been seen time and time again. I guess that’s why they chose that title. Not that the trailer doesn’t do a good job of hinting at this couple’s relationship, but this was a great touch, and it’s pretty fitting, given one of Lowery’s upcoming projects will be an adaptation of Brian Michael Bendis’ gruesomely fantastic graphic novel Torso.

If you haven’t gone out to see this one yet, maybe the trailer below will get you in the mood.