Showing posts with label Saoirse Ronan. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Saoirse Ronan. Show all posts

Friday, January 13, 2012

Movie Casting News: Tom Hollander joins Johnny Lee Miller, Gemma Arterton, and Saoirse Ronan in ''Byzantium' film

According to ColliderTom Hollander (Hanna), Jonny Lee Miller (Dexter), and Sam Riley (Control) have joined Saoirse Ronan (Hanna) and Gemma Arterton (Prince of Persia) in Neil Jordan (Interview with the Vampire)‘s vampire movie Byzantium.
Ronanand Arterton play a daughter and mother who are vampires who arrive ina small 18th century British town.  Ronan’s character begins arelationship with a young man (Caleb Landry Jones) who’s dying of leukemia, which in turn forces him to struggle with his mortality and her to question her immortality.
Daily Mail (who first reported this with the Gemma Arterton interview/article) doesn’t have any details on which character Tom will play, but has mentioned him in the cast:

The film — set in both the 18th centuryand the modern day — is not all glossy surface nonsense like theTwilight pictures. For starters, it has a compelling storyline and muchbetter actors, including Sam Riley, Daniel Mays, Jonny Lee Miller andTom Hollander.
Read more: Gemma's coming out biting... as she gets her teeth into new vampire film role

Great to know that TH has a new film (other than his current TV series, Rev.) coming soon. Also, he's co-starring here with two other Austen Actors, Gemma Arterton (Lost in Austen; St. Trinians I and II films with Talulah Riley and Colin Firth, and The Little Dog Laughed stage play with Rupert Friend), and Johnny Lee Miller (Mansfield Park '99, Emma '09) and one of the fequent co-stars of P&P 05 Actors, Saoirse Ronan (Atonement, Hanna).

Tuesday, September 6, 2011

On DVD and Blu-ray Today: Hanna

On DVD and Blu-ray (with Digital Copy) today (September 6th), P&P/Atonement director 's recent theatrical released, action/suspense thriller film, Hanna starring an outstanding and talented cast in  (leading the cast in the title role) with Eric Bana, Cate Blanchett, Tom Hollander, and Olivia Williams. Read my Film Review: Hanna and see my Hanna signed poster!

Go get your DVD/Blu-ray copy or get your Hanna Blu-ray + Digital Copy Blu-ray (See Blu-ray and digital copy cover to your left via NBCUniversal Store)   

DVD Active has the following DVD and Blu-ray details and loaded with extras features as well as DVD cover artwork below...



Title: Hanna (IMDb)
Starring: Saoirse Ronan
Released: 6th September 2011
SRP: TBC

Further Details:
On September 6th, Universal Studios Home Entertainment will release Hanna on DVD and Blu-ray Disc. Directed by Joe Wright and starring: Saoirse Ronan, Eric Bana and Cate Blanchett, this film follows "Hanna, a 16-year-old girl raised in the desolate, icy wilds of Finland by her ex-CIA agent father Erik and trained to become the perfect assassin."

Extra features on both releases include: an alternate ending, deleted scenes, 'Anatomy of a Scene: The Escape From Camp G' and a feature-length commentary with the director. For Blu-ray purchases there are the following exclusives: 'Adapt or Die' featurette covering training, a 'Central Intelligence Allegory' making-of, 'Chemical Reaction' featurette about music - specifically the Chemical Brothers' involvement in creating the score, 'The Wide World of Hanna' featurette about location shots and a Hanna promo.

Hanna DVD cover artwork
(source: DVD Active)

Tuesday, July 19, 2011

DVD News: Joe Wright's 'Hanna' film coming to DVD and Blu-ray September 6th!

Universal Studios Home Entertainment has just announced the DVD and Blu-ray disc release date of September 6th for 's recent theatrical released, action/suspense thriller film, Hanna starring an outstanding and talented cast in  (leading the cast in the title role) with Eric Bana, Cate Blanchett, Tom Hollander, and Olivia Williams. The film, according to Box office Mojo, did very well and debuted at #2 in the U.S. domestic's box office grossing $12 million (JW's biggest opening weekend!) during the Easter weekend (with an estimated $30 million budget) and now a total domestic gross of $40+ million (over 2 million more than P&P movie's total domestic gross, which was $38.4 million, but that's because it started off as a limited release while Hanna was already in wide release) with an additional $18.2+ million foreign box office gross and a worldwide total gross of $58.7+ million in its 13 weeks theaters run.

DVD Active has the following DVD and Blu-ray details and loaded with extras features as well as DVD cover artwork below...


Title: Hanna (IMDb)
Starring: Saoirse Ronan
Released: 6th September 2011
SRP: TBC

Further Details:
On September 6th, Universal Studios Home Entertainment will release Hanna on DVD and Blu-ray Disc. Directed by Joe Wright and starring: Saoirse Ronan, Eric Bana and Cate Blanchett, this film follows "Hanna, a 16-year-old girl raised in the desolate, icy wilds of Finland by her ex-CIA agent father Erik and trained to become the perfect assassin."

Extra features on both releases include: an alternate ending, deleted scenes, 'Anatomy of a Scene: The Escape From Camp G' and a feature-length commentary with the director. For Blu-ray purchases there are the following exclusives: 'Adapt or Die' featurette covering training, a 'Central Intelligence Allegory' making-of, 'Chemical Reaction' featurette about music - specifically the Chemical Brothers' involvement in creating the score, 'The Wide World of Hanna' featurette about location shots and a Hanna promo.

Hanna DVD cover artwork
(source: DVD Active)

Thursday, June 2, 2011

Movie News: Is Matthew Macfadyen joining Keira Knightley on Joe Wright's 'Anna Karenina' film?


UPDATE 6/3/11: It's official Matthew Macfadyen confirmed for Anna Karenina!!! According to Matthew Macfadyen News (over at Topix. Thanks ladies!!!) Matthew's agency Hamilton Hodell has just confirmed Matthew will indeed be playing Oblonsky in Anna Karenina.

--------------------------------------------------------------------

Is our favorite Mr. Darcy, Matthew Macfadyen reuniting and re-teaming with his Pride & Prejudice co-star Keira Knightley and director Joe Wright in their upcoming film, Anna Karenina? If so, I think this will be the BEST casting news EVERRRRR!!! (well, at least here on this blog, lol)...Thanks to my friend and fellow P&P/MM fan, Sylvie Valente for the heads up on this wonderful casting news. Hopefully, this is true. It's not officially confirmed yet, but will find out soon enough.

For now, this will do as UK's Daily Mail reports in their newest article has more Anna Karenina casting info and said that Matthew is part of the cast and is playing the character: Oblonsky and get this he and Keira will be playing not lovers, but siblings! Wowza, this will be interesting to see and I don't know if I'll get used to seeing them play as siblings after playing our favorite P&P couple: Elizabeth & Darcy. I will always picture them as Lizzie & Darcy, lol...


Here's the article from the Daily Mail:

Oh boy! Jude and Keira are looking for an (on-screen) son

Keira Knightley and Jude Law are seeking a son, while Matthew Macfadyen and Kelly Macdonald would like an instant brood of five.

These are the screen relationships that will make up one big happy (or rather not-so happy) family in the film version of Anna Karenina that will shoot in Britain and Russia from September.


I told you back in November that Keira would play Tolstoy’s great literary heroine in a new movie version written by Tom Stoppard. The film reunites Keira with Joe Wright, who directed her in Atonement and Pride & Prejudice. That’s where Matthew comes in.

He and Keira played the will-they-won’t-they lovers Elizabeth Bennet and Mr Darcy in the Jane Austen classic. However, in Anna Karenina, Keira and Matthew play siblings.

Matthew has the part of Oblonsky, while Kelly — star of HBO’s compelling Boardwalk Empire — plays his wife Dolly.

The film’s casting executives are looking for brothers and sisters (cousins could be in the mix, too) to play the Oblonskys’ five children, who range in age from two to eight. The groupings must include a girl of around eight to play Tanya, the Oblonskys’ eldest daughter.

‘We want to capture that messy charm that comes with big families,’ Dixie Chassay, one of the executives, explained.

‘Dolly’s always pregnant. It’s always about family, and we want to capture that with brothers and sisters and cousins who play and are noisy and who laugh together.

‘Then there’s the son Keira has with Jude,’ Dixie continued, meaning their fictional child Seryozha.

The boy should be aged between seven and ten. ‘We are in the world of Tolstoy, so we need someone poetic,’ Dixie noted.

Ideally, for all of the kids’ roles, the casting people want to meet European (particularly French and Russian) siblings or cousins, although all must be able to speak English. They’d also look at children from large English families (the traditional kind you might see in the Bystander section of Tatler).
Aaron Johnson will play Anna’s lover Vronsky.

Jude joked to me recently that once upon a time he would have played such a part, but is ‘too old’ to be the dashing lothario. ‘I’m the cuckolded husband now,’ he told me.

Olivia Williams, who was so good in Wright’s thriller Hanna, will play Countess Vronskaya, Vronsky’s mother. Saoirse Ronan, who appeared with Keira in Atonement and had the lead in Hanna, will play Kitty, Dolly’s sister.

The fast-rising Andrea Riseborough has been cast as Princess Betsy, who always knew how to have too good a time. Andrea has two upcoming movies: Resistance and W.E.

Domhnall Gleeson — Bill Weasley in the Harry Potter movies — has been cast as Levin.

Tim Bevan of Working Title, who is producing the film with Eric Fellner and Paul Webster, believes the story — about a woman who has an affair with a younger man but remains trapped in her stale marriage to a dull husband — has ‘incredible relevance today’.

He added: ‘That’s why it has remained a classic through all this time — because people relate to it.
Read full article here!

Here's the Anna Karenina cast list thus far (*confirmed) with new additions...
*Keira Knightley - Anna Karenina
*Aaron Johnson - Count Vronsky
(Anna's lover)
*Judd Law - Karenin
(Anna's husband)

*Matthew Macfadyen - Prince Stepan "Stiva" Oblonsky (Anna's brother)

*Kelly Macdonald - Princess Darya "Dolly" Oblonskaya (Stepan's wife) 
Olivia Williams - Countess Vyronskaya (Vyronsky's mother)
Saoirse Ronan - Kitty (Dolly's younger sister)

Domhnall Gleeson - Contantine Dmitrich Levin
Andrea Riseborough - Princess Betsy

Note:  Benedict Cumberbatch, who was previously mentioned in the AK cast is now out due to scheduling conflicts. So, looks like Matthew stepped in, in his place!

Saturday, April 23, 2011

Film Review: Hanna

I just saw Hanna recently and thought it was AWESOME! This was one of the few films I've been following and anticipating to see (obviously, I've been blogging about it and promoting it here: ) since I heard one of my favorite directors was directing it with an outstanding and talented cast in  (leading the cast in the title role) with Eric Bana, Cate Blanchett, Tom Hollander, and Olivia Williams. This film was all that and more! It was much more than I expected and far surpasses my expectations. It definitely delivered, both the film and its actors' strong and solid performances.

Check out and read part of my review of this film below!



Hanna (2011)
starring Saoirse Ronan, Eric Bana, Cate Blanchett, Tom Hollander
     
 Watch the trailer for Hanna

(source:

Hanna (Ronan) is a teenage girl. Uniquely, she has the strength, the stamina, and the smarts of a soldier; these come from being raised by her father (Bana), an ex-CIA man, in the wilds of Finland. Living a life unlike any other teenager, her upbringing and training have been one and the same, all geared to making her the perfect assassin. (brief Hanna synopsis by Focus Features via IMDB)
Now, this was a brilliant, clever, entertaining, full of action, adventure, mystery, that has you on the edge-of-your-seat, suspense thriller, with humor film all in one, that I've seen in a long time. It was like a mixture of Leon: The Professional (featuring the young Natalie Portman) and the Bourne movies (starring Matt Damon) with a fairytale theme (ie. Little Red Riding Hood, but more like Hansel and Gretel, which I think if I remember right, was one of the bedtime stories by the Grimm Brothers that young Hanna was read to by her father Erik) to it. This is one of the films I loved and enjoyed watching this year...thus far. The story was great, brilliant, and cleverly written. Director Joe Wright did a fantastic job directing this film. The original score throughout the film composed by The Chemical Brothers were quite interesting, haunting, hypnotic, and addictive to listen to. It's very catchy and stays in your head even after the movie ended. Read my full Film Review: Hanna. (via my Movies Blog)

Speaking of Hanna movie, I've just won a Hanna signed poster!!!! Yes, I did and unexpectedly too!

Here are some photos I took (and thought I'd share here with you all) for the Hanna poster I've just won (one of the 5 signed posters by Saoirse Ronan) from Focus Features (via its official twitter page), which I had enjoyed and randomly participated in their signed poster contest prior to seeing the movie. I just received my prize over the mail Thursday and it was huge! It's a double-sided (or rather the back is like a mirror-image of the front) poster and was nicely packaged, so it was in good condition when I got it. The interesting thing was that not only it was signed by Saoirse Ronan, but by her co-star Eric Bana (which was a nice surprise as it was only Ronan that was said to have signed the posters in the contest) too! Wow, what a double treat!!

My Hanna signed poster
(signed by Hanna stars: Saoirse Ronan and Eric Bana!!
Thanks to @FocusFeatures!)


Plus, here are two cool Hanna web promo posters I've downloaded from the official Hanna website that was part of the Hanna signed poster contest I've won above especially when I got the clue and the right answer to the trivia games, I got the following...

Hanna web posters
 (source: the official Hanna website)

Friday, April 8, 2011

In Theaters Today: Hanna

Now showing in wide release and in theaters near you is Tom Hollander
Fantastic acting and crisply choreographed action sequences propel this unique, cool take on the revenge thriller.
Peter Travers of Rolling Stone calls Hanna “A knockout! Like nothing you’ve ever seen! A fairy tale of lightning speed and gritty action!” Read full review here!

Photo by Alex Bailey/Jasin Boland/Universal Pictures

 
Joe Wright/Hanna Related Articles...

Thursday, April 7, 2011

Photos: Joe Wright and Saoirse Ronan at the 'Hanna' New York Premiere and after party

Director Joe Wright attended with his Hanna stars and Eric Bana at the New York screening of "Hanna" at Regal Union Square on April 6, 2011 in New York City.
  
Tomorrow Hanna opens in theatres across the US! Be sure to see it! It's been getting early rave reviews thus far...

Also, tune in TONIGHT to see Hanna director Joe Wright on Last Call with Carson Daly on NBC at 1:35amEST/PST.


Check out new photos of JW, Saoirse Ronan, and Eric Bana below!


  
(Photos by Dave Alloca/Starpix | Jason Kempin/Getty Images North America
| zimbio.com) 

Actress Saoirse Ronan and director Joe Wright attend the
after party for the New York screening of "Hanna" at Casa La Femme
on April 6, 2011 in New York City. 
(Photos by Jason Kempin/Getty Images North America | zimbio.com)

Monday, April 4, 2011

Photos: Joe Wright and Saoirse Ronan at WonderCon's 'Hanna' Panel


Director Joe Wright and star of the new teen assassin/action film, Hanna were in attendance during 2011 WonderCon at Moscone Convention Center this past Saturday, April 2, 2011 in San Francisco, California. JW and SR did a Hanna Q&A panel to promote the film.

Hanna opens in wide theatrical release this week (Friday, April 8th)!

Check out photos of JW and SR below as well as videos from their Q&A at WonderCon, early film reviews, and Hanna related articles...


Hanna Panel at WonderCon 2011 - Day 2

(photos by Max Morse/Getty Images North America | Saoirse Ronan Web | zimbio.com)


 Watch the Hanna Q&A videos
with JW and SR @ WonderCon 2011

(source: )

 (source: )
  
Hanna 2011 - WonderCon Highlights 
with Joe Wright and Saorsi Ronan

  
- The first question of the panel went to Wright: why do a film like this after movies like Atonement and Pride & Prejudice? But the director said that Ronan was actually the one who suggested that he take it on. One of the things that attracted him to it was the fact that “it’s not a franchise, not based on a comic, not even based on fairytale specifically,” which allowed the director creative license to dream up his own world.
- Wright joked that two of the bad guys in the film were actually inspired by his own bullies from when he was growing up. “It was my way of getting back at them, by having them slain by a girl,” he quipped.
- Ronan beats up guys twice her size in the flick, and the actress endured plenty of training to get the fight scenes, particularly in martial arts. “I suddenly had muscle in my arms, and I was strong,” she said. “I had never experienced that before!”
- As for why Ronan loved the script, she explained: “It’s important that we have strong female characters in movies now.” And unlike other “sexy or cool” leading women in film, Ronan likes that Hanna is a misfit. “She is weird, and I think Hanna as an action heroine — if that’s what you want to call her — is quite elegant in her temperament and behavior except when she’s kicking ass. I think we haven’t seen an action heroine like this yet.”
- Wright also touched on the importance of heroines in movies, and got up on his soapbox to address female empowerment. “The place of young women in society, and the continued sexual objectification of women — I find that whole culture terrifying and kind of disgusting really,” he said. “I wanted to address that with this film. I remember when the Spice Girls came out in the ’90s and they called it ‘girl power.’ I think that’s bullsh*t. I probably shouldn’t say this, but I look at posters for recent films with girls kicking ass; there’s one out at the moment, in bikinis and crop tops, and this is supposedly female empowerment, and that’s bullsh*t. Female empowerment is not about sex; that’s the point of female empowerment. It’s about brains. So I was very keen to look at those issues with this movie, and Hanna exists outside of that.” Obviously Wright was getting in a dig at Sucker Punch, but his little speech received huge cheers from the audience. (Source)   
Hanna articles  
Plus Hanna Review