Friday Fun: Dora the Explorer Movie Trailer

It’s Friday, people!  It’s time for the week-end.  Time for some sleeping in, perhaps.  Time for some rest and relaxation.  And, maybe even time for some doo-duh-doo-duh-doo-Dora! Coming to the big screen.  But not really.  Ariel Winter, who plays Alex Dunphy on ABC’s “Modern Family” teams with College Humor for this spoof-a-licious trailer…

Trailer: Alex Cross with Tyler Perry

Medea just got real, people!  Tyler Perry is channeling some Denzel Washington acting chops in this James Patterson book-to-Film against Matthew Fox (“Lost”) who is channeling some Edward Norton.  I mean, I watched the trailer and Perry doesn’t once turn toward camera closeup and say, “Awwww, heeeeyyuulllll no!”

But don’t take my word for it, check it yourself…

Director: Rob Cohen (“Fast and Furious”, “Dragonheart”)

Writers: Marc Moss, Kerry Williamson (Screenplay)
James Patterson (novel)

ProdCo:  Summit Entertainment

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Kathleen Turner On New Movie “The Perfect Family”

From THE HUFFINGTON POST, comes this article about a new film from Certainty Films starring Kathleen Turner, Emily Deschanel and Jason Ritter.  HuffPost Senior Religion Editor Paul Brandeis Raushenbush spoke with Turner on the phone about the film and the Catholic character she plays.

Kathleen Turner is getting rave reviews for her staring role in the new comedy “The Perfect Family.” The film tells the tale of a Catholic housewife nominated for her parish’s coveted Catholic Woman of the Year award, yet to clinch the prize she must show off her ‘perfect family,’ which includes a lesbian daughter and a son whose marriage is falling apart.

While the film follows her trying to resolve this conflicting love of her church and her family, the film’s Catholic setting has drawn the predictable outrage from The Catholic League’s Bill Donahue who says it ‘smacks Catholicism.’

HuffPost Senior Religion Editor Paul Brandeis Raushenbush spoke with Turner on the phone about the film and the Catholic character she plays.

Tell me about your character Eileen in “The Perfect Family.” Was this Catholic woman someone whom you liked?

When I first got this script I asked myself, like I always do, why do I want to do this movie? And when I looked at the character Eileen I could see that this is a goodwoman, not judgmental, not intolerant, trying to live by this code of rules. But she has this conflict in her faith and her family.

The church was the only refuge she found before her husband got sober and her life found balance again. Then her daughter comes out at a lesbian and decides marrying her long-time partner and have a child. All of this is incomprehensible and what you see in the film is Eileen’s bewilderment. She is trying to make sense of how this person who is flesh of her flesh and blood of her blood is so different.We learn in the film that she got pregnant in high school. She explains to her daughter, “I didn’t even know how to drive a car.” And then shortly after that, she had another child. And then her husband was drinking heavily and was unfaithful to her. During this time the church gave her comfort and affirmation that she was doing the right thing, that whatever happened, God was on her side.

Head over to the HuffPost for the FULL ARTICLE:

Kathleen Turner On New Movie “The Perfect Family,” Catholic Faith And Family Values.

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Trailer: Blue Like Jazz

ProdCo: Ruckus Films
Title: Blue Like Jazz

Will ‘The Dawn Treader’ Float?

This ChristianityToday article by Mark Moring reports that Christian leaders and some Narnia fan sites got a sneak peek of the next Narnia movie and liked what they saw; filmmakers admit “mistakes” on Prince Caspian, vowed to get it right this time…

(EXCERPT) The filmmakers behind the Narnia movies, admitting they “made some mistakes” with 2008′s Prince Caspian, believe they have righted the ship for The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, coming to theaters in December.

After the first Narnia film, The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe, earned almost $750 million worldwide in 2005, Prince Caspian—a big disappointment to many fans of the beloved books by C. S. Lewis—earned about half as much. Domestically,Caspian made just $141 million, far short of its reported $225 million production budget.

"Voyage of the Dawn Treader"

But since then, Walden Media (which produced the first two films) and Disney (which distributed them) have parted ways; Walden is now partnering with 20th Century Fox for distribution. A new director, Michael Apted, replaces Andrew Adamson, who helmed the first two Narnia films (and is a producer for Dawn Treader). Those changes, and a renewed commitment to the message of the books, have filmmakers optimistic.

“We made some mistakes with Prince Caspian, and I don’t want to make them again,” said Mark Johnson, a producer on all of the Narnia films. He said Caspianlacked some of the “wonder and magic of Narnia,” was “a little bit too rough” for families, and too much of a “boys’ action movie.” He said it’s “very important” that filmmakers regain that magic for Dawn Treader, now in the editing stages—and he’s convinced they’ve found it: “I want to climb on the rooftops and say we have a wonderful Narnia movie.”

Johnson and execs from Fox and Walden did the next best thing, inviting 100 Christian leaders to a “Narnia Summit” held Feb. 16-18 in Los Angeles, where they showed clips from Dawn Treader and went through the entire script. Apted was flown in from London to join producers Johnson, Micheal Flaherty, and Douglas Gresham for the presentation to an audience of Narnia fans—potentially their biggest critics.

Invitees included representatives from big churches (including Tim Keller of New York’s Redeemer Presbyterian and Mark Brewer of Bel Air Presbyterian), parachurch organizations (like Young Life, Focus on the Family, and Youth for Christ), publishing companies (Relevant and Group among them), Lewis experts (like Stan Mattson of the C. S. Lewis Foundation), and online fan sites (NarniaWeb, Narnia Fans).

“You could call it the world’s largest accountability group, so we were definitely nervous,” said Flaherty, president of Walden Media. “We had folks with an encyclopedic knowledge of C. S. Lewis and the Narnia books. But we went through every line of dialogue and every scene with them to make sure it was a really faithful adaptation.”

The verdict? Decidedly thumbs up, according to those attendees we spoke with.

“What we saw on film, and some of the behind-the-scenes stuff, was pretty exciting,” said Steve Bell, executive vice president of the Willow Creek Association, who attended with wife Valerie. “It looks very compelling, a nice treatment.

“There seems to be a high level of respect for the material. My sense was that they really want to go to the authenticity of C. S. Lewis, maybe more so than ever. They’re very aware that they have to turn the corner from Prince Caspian. They know that the ball got dropped, and they’re trying to recapture that momentum.”

The Chronicles of Narnia: Voyage of the Dawn Treader will hit theaters December 10, 2010.  Read the FULL ARTICLE HERE at ChristianityToday.com and visit the official website on Facebook

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