(Left) Amy Adams stars in ‘Nightbitch’. (Right) Aaron Pierre star in ‘Rebel Ridge’.
Preview:
Amy Adams and Aaron Pierre are among the new cast additions to ‘Star Wars: Starfighter’.
Ryan Gosling, Matt Smith and Mia Goth star.
Director Shawn Levy has the cameras rolling in the UK.
Director Shawn Levy is ready to set his S-Foils to “direct” position.
Okay, so we don’t know whether there will be actual X-Wings in ‘Star Wars: Starfighter’, but the cameras have started to roll on the new ‘Star Wars’ movie, and a fresh batch of actors have boarded.
The movie, which stars Ryan Gosling, Matt Smith and Mia Goth, is in production now in the UK, and the first behind-the-scenes image (see below) of Gosling and Gray is online to prove it.
(L to R) Ryan Gosling and Flynn Gray on set for ‘Star Wars: Starfighter’. Photo: Ed Miller/Lucasfilm.
With the official news out there, we now have a proper, if basic bit of detail for the movie. It’s described as “a standalone adventure taking place approximately five years after the events of 2019’s ‘Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker’. It is an entirely new adventure featuring all-new characters set in a period of time that has not been explored on screen yet.”
Gosling is playing a character that must protect a young charge (Gray) against evil pursuers. Adams will be the boy’s mother.
Smith will be hunting Gosling down and Goth will be on the villain’s scheming side. The other roles are unknown for now.
Jonathan Tropper, who collaborated with Levy on films such as ‘This is Where I Leave You’ and ‘The Adam Project,’ has been working on a script for over a year. Levy is also producing the feature via his 21 Laps banner, joining ‘Star Wars’ steward Kathleen Kennedy.
Shawn Levy talks ‘Star Wars: Starfighter’
‘Star Wars: Starfighter’s director Shawn Levy at Star Wars Celebration 2025. Photo: Lucasfilm.
Levy offered the following statement to mark the start of production work on the movie:
“I feel a profound sense of excitement and honor as we begin production on ‘Star Wars: Starfighter’. From the day Kathy Kennedy called me up, inviting me to develop an original adventure in this incredible ‘Star Wars’ galaxy, this experience has been a dream come true, creatively and personally. ‘Star Wars’ shaped my sense of what story can do, how characters and cinematic moments can live with us forever. To join this storytelling galaxy with such brilliant collaborators onscreen and off, is the thrill of a lifetime.”
When will ‘Star Wars: Starfighter’ be in theaters?
‘Star Wars: Starfighter’ is now due to arrive on May 28th, 2027. May the force be with it…
(L to R) ‘Star Wars: Starfighter’s director Shawn Levy, Ryan Gosling, Dave Filoni and Kathleen Kennedy at Star Wars Celebration 2025. Photo: Lucasfilm.
Movies where characters have no names, and only referred to as “Mother” or other archetypes, always make us suspicious. While it can work in book form, film is a much more visual medium and therefore a more specific one, and while that lack of specificity may make a story on the page more universal or metaphorical, the more concrete language of film may demand a little more out of its characters.
That’s especially true when you set them in a realistic – if also unnamed – time and place, as Marielle Heller’s film ‘Nightbitch’ does. An adaptation of Rachel Yoder’s 2021 novel, the movie stars Amy Adams as a stay-at-home mom (named ‘Mother’) who has given up a career as an artist and pretty much all of her self-identity to take care of her toddler (‘Son’). But Mother’s frustration with her choices manifests itself in some seemingly peculiar ways, leaving ‘Nightbitch’ in an uneasy and not super-successful limbo between satire, allegory, and body horror exercise.
Mother (Amy Adams) has given up her career as an artist to stay at home and take of, as she puts it, “a person who will pee in your face without blinking.” Her daily routine with her son – walks in the neighborhood, trips to the supermarket, crafts and games in the house, the same thing every day for lunch – becomes soul-crushingly numbing; she showed her work “at the Modern” once, but is “just dumb now.”
She attends mommy groups at the library but confesses in voiceover that she hates the other moms, all of whom seem to be having a much blissful experience than she is. Meanwhile, the barely present Husband (Scoot McNairy) is off traveling most days for his anonymous job, leaving Mother to take care of Son, run the house, and listen to Husband’s whining about how their relationship isn’t what it was before Son came along. “What happened to my wife?” he asks at one point. “She died in childbirth,” says Mother bitterly.
It is those punishing early days of motherhood that ‘Nightbitch’ (the film) gets right, with director Heller saying that Rachel Yoder’s book impacted her just as she stayed home for several years with her own young children. But while Heller has a great eye for emotional and physical detail in the everyday lives of dysfunctional people (just watch her marvelous ‘Diary of a Teenage Girl’ or the brilliant ‘Can You Ever Forgive Me?’), she is less sure-footed when ‘Nightbitch’ takes a turn into surrealism with a touch of body horror.
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Mother begins to notice fuzz growing on her back and face, while her teeth seem to sharpen; a bump on the end of her spine soon elongates into what appears to be a tail. Wild dogs begin congregating around her house at night, sometimes leaving her their kills. She herself craves raw meat. And finally one night, Mother changes into a canine form, running on all fours through her nameless suburban neighborhood as if she’s just been released from solitary confinement. She’s free, she’s an animal, she’s a primal force of nature – she’s herself.
Or is she? While such a transformation may work on the page, putting it on film makes it more literal and clunky. We’re never quite sure whether it’s all in Mother’s mind or not, and the earlier, emotionally truthful parts of the story simply don’t sit well with its flights of fancy. At one point, an enigmatic librarian named Norma (the great Jessica Harper) gives Mother a book called “A Field Guide to Magical Women,” suggesting that Mother is part of a long line of women who have “delayed their own greatness” (including Mother’s own mom). But just as things seem to come to a head – both in Mother’s own interior life and in her increasingly strained relationship with Husband – the story comes to a pat conclusion that seems to tie things up in simplistic fashion.
‘Nightbitch’ offers up some rich material for both Heller and Adams to mine, and hits upon some stark truths about motherhood – truths that often get buried in society’s rush to make it seem like it must be the ultimate achievement and defining moment in every woman’s life. But the film’s fantastical extension of those ideas doesn’t go very far, and the movie retreats from them almost as soon as it begins to explore them.
We can watch Amy Adams in just about anything, and ‘Nightbitch’ is really a showcase for her. Although Mother is more an idea than a full character in many ways, Adams brings a complexity to this woman that provides the main drive for the film. Mother’s exhaustion, boredom, and inner tension is palpable, as is her barely suppressed – and fully earned – rage when confronted with Husband’s neediness. And when her animalistic tendencies take over, her sexuality comes out unexpectedly as well, simmering, raw, and long-buried but still powerful. Although Adams is hampered by the script’s queasy sort of twilight existence, she still delivers a well-rounded and poignant performance.
Scoot McNairy, playing his second insecure male this year after his turn in the American remake of ‘Speak No Evil,’ does not fare nearly as well as Husband, a one-dimensional punching bag who pretty much deserves every (symbolic) blow he takes. Husband is clueless, unsympathetic, and emotionally absent, which makes his abrupt character turn toward the end of the film feel hollow. McNairy is a good actor who’s not served well by this role, and while Husband certainly represents a certain kind of husband and father (not all, but a lot) who see their role as merely bringing home the bacon while leaving the parenting to their partners, the film’s portrayal comes up short.
Although they’re all pretty thinly-drawn in a way, the women from the mommy group that Mother reluctantly hangs out with are at least fun to watch in a comic sense, and it’s always nice to see our beloved Jessica Harper (‘Suspiria,’ ‘Phantom of the Paradise’) onscreen even if her narrative thread ultimately doesn’t lead much of anywhere.
With award season upon us, there’s a good chance that Amy Adams might land her seventh Oscar nomination for ‘Nightbitch,’ and it would certainly be well-deserved. Whether she can win or not in a field that’s already looking fiercely competitive – with ‘Anora’ star Mikey Madison, ‘Babygirl’ lead Nicole Kidman, and Angelina Jolie from ‘Maria’ all in the running, among others – remains to be seen.
We just wish the movie around her was better. While the more realistic parts of ‘Nightbitch’ are on target much of the time, the film’s more allegorical or fantastical elements just don’t mesh as well, at least on film, and the director is never able to solve that problem. And instead of committing all the way to one direction or the other, ‘Nightbitch’ just kind of quickly wraps things up. Amy Adams’ provocative performance deserves better, but in the end this ‘Nightbitch’ lacks bite.
‘Nightbitch’ receives 6.5 out of 10 stars.
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What is the plot of ‘Nightbitch’?
An overwhelmed and frustrated stay-at-home mother (Amy Adams) begins to seemingly transform into a dog as she yearns to rediscover her own identity.
Moviefone recently had the pleasure of speaking with Amy Adams about her work on ‘Nightbitch’, developing the project as a producer, her approach to playing her character and the difficulties in her marriage, and the challenges of working with children and dogs.
You can read the full interview below or click on the video player above to watch our interviews with Adams and director Marielle Heller.
MF: To begin with, can you talk about developing this project as a producer and the themes you wanted to explore on screen as an actress?
Amy Adams: Well, I read the novel before there was a screenplay, so I was brought early on to produce it with Sue Naegle and Annapurna Pictures. Then, we immediately got Mari (director Marielle Heller) on board and Mari’s unique perspective and how she brought that unique tone from the novel into the screenplay. I thought the tone was unique. I thought it dealt with so many important issues. It brings up not only motherhood, parenthood, relationships, community, generational trauma, all these things, of course, that I love to dive into. I really wanted to tell this story.
MF: Can you talk about the frustrations that your character is having with her husband and motherhood in general?
AA: I think as we find her in the film, she’s at this place where she and father (Scoot McNairy) haven’t really communicated effectively how there would be an equitable division inside of the home. She’s taken on the bulk of responsibility of parenthood. What I love about what Mari’s done with the film and how Scoot McNairy plays the father is that he really isn’t the antagonist of the film and nor is motherhood the antagonist. There’s always a conflict of, and I think that feels so human and so true, between feeling lost and feeling like you’ve lost yourself and yet loving the new life that you could create, but not knowing how important communication and community is through that. Again, I think Scoot does such a wonderful job of playing this husband because he is so loving and invested. He just doesn’t know what’s going on and she hasn’t been able to communicate the truth and the depth of her frustration and her loss of self.
MF: Finally, there is an old saying that you should “never work with children or animals,” and you do both in this film. What was that like for you?
AA: I said that making this movie was a lot like having a baby. Now that I’m done, I’m like, “It was not hard at all.” But I think in the moment, if I’m really being honest, there were some challenges, but it was such a wonderful experience. These boys, Emmett and Arleigh (Snowden), they’re these twins that we worked with, were so open and kind of reminded me of the natural give and take of acting that sometimes can get away from me in bigger themes. It kind of brought me back to the play of acting, and it was a lot of fun to work with them. They were so beautiful and the whole set rallied around the experience. We had the prop master constantly bringing new things for them to play with, and Mari down here talking to them. It was a full community working with these kids.
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What is the plot of ‘Nightbitch’?
The film concerns a magical realism-style story of a stay-at-home mom (Amy Adams) who sometimes transforms into a dog.
Amy Adams in ‘American Hustle.’ Photo: Sony Pictures.
Preview:
Amy Adams is in negotiations for Taika Waititi’s new movie.
Jenna Ortega is already aboard.
The movie adapts Kazuo Ishiguro’s novel of the same name.
Taika Waititi last brought us the based-on-truth story ‘Next Goal Wins’, but for his next film, he’s going in an altogether more fantastical direction.
The director, who has worked on the likes of ‘Thor: Love and Thunder’ and ‘Jojo Rabbit’ is preparing to direct science fiction story ‘Klara and the Sun’.
‘Klara and the Sun’ charts the story of Klara (Ortega), an Artificial Friend designed to prevent loneliness. Klara is purchased by a mother (Adams) and a bright teen named Josie who adores her new robot companion but suffers from a mysterious illness.
Klara’s quest is to save Josie and those who love her from heartbreak and how in the process Klara learns the power of human love.
The original novel was published in 2021, written by ‘Living’ writer Kazuo Ishiguro, debuting on the New York Times’ Best Sellers Hardcover Fiction List at No. 3 and the Indie Best Sellers Hardcover Fiction List at No. 1.
Dahvi Waller, who has written on TV shows such as ‘Desperate Housewives’ and ‘Halt and Catch Fire’, crafted the adaptation, and Sony 3000 Pictures secured Waititi to direct last year, though the writers and actors’ strikes curtailed any chance to get it filmed in 2023.
But with Adams now closing in on a deal, the aim is to have the cameras rolling in the coming weeks.
And if that wasn’t enough positivity for you, the movie is produced by ‘Harry Potter’ veteran David Heyman, who also worked on both ‘Paddington’ movies and ‘Wonka’.
What’s next for Amy Adams and Jenna Ortega?
Jenna Ortega attends the world premiere of Netflix’s ‘Wednesday’ on November 16, 2022 in Los Angeles, California. Photo by Presley Ann/Getty Images for Netflix.
Adams’ next film is the intriguingly titled ‘Nightbitch’, which was directed by Marielle Heller and is a horror comedy about an artist whose maternal instincts start to manifest as a dog.
As for Ortega, she recently finished work on Tim Burton’s ‘Beetlejuice’ sequel (which now has a title: ‘Beetlejuice Beetlejuice’ and will be out on September 6th this year). The actor will next film the second season of hit Netflix series ‘Wednesday’, which also has Burton involved.
The show is gearing up to shoot the new series in the spring.
Arriving after other studios – DreamWorks in particular with its ‘Shrek’ movies – had been poking fun at fairy tale tropes, 2007’s ‘Enchanted’ felt like Disney throwing a loving nudge in the ribs to its own storied history of candy-coated Grimm adaptations and fantasy films.
A fish-out-of-water story of Giselle (Amy Adams), a young, wish-upon-a-starry-eyed woman in the animated realm of Andalasia who finds herself pushed – literally – into our own world by Susan Sarandon’s Evil Queen Narissa, ‘Enchanted’ generated a lot of fun from slyly deconstructing the idea of true love’s kiss, singing to animals as you do chores and handsome princes setting forth on quests.
It ended, as Disney’s fairy stories tend to, happily, with the magical menace vanquished and Giselle preparing for life with divorce lawyer Robert (Patrick Dempsey) and his six-year-old daughter Morgan (Rachel Covey) in New York. Her actual Andalasian prince, meanwhile (James Marsden’s heroically daffy Edward) landed snarky Nancy Tremaine (Idina Menzel) and returned to the world of hand-drawn dragons, ogres and such.
The songs were catchy, the jokes landed and Adams and Marsden in particular made the whole thing work.
‘Disenchanted’ premiering on Disney+, picks up roughly a decade after the first film, and discovers what happens after the Happy Ever After. “After ever after?” asks a cartoon chipmunk in the animated prologue. “You get married, and nothing else happens.” Which is not true by any means. And in the case of this movie, “Ever After” means the stark reality of married and child-rearing life.
Having welcomed a new baby into their family, Giselle and Robert are ready to uproot the brood and move to an apparently suburban paradise called Monroeville. It’ll mean big changes – Robert will face a daily commute into the Big Apple and Giselle is beginning to wonder if the magic has gone… or at least diminished. While she and Robert are happy, there’s just something missing.
Morgan, meanwhile – now played in suitably sulky teen form by Gabriella Baldacchino – is far from pleased at being torn from all she knows to live in what looks to be a fixer-up of a castle-style home.
The mood is lifted, at least for Giselle and Robert, by the surprise arrival (via magic wishing well portal, of course) by Edward and Nancy, who stop in to gift the couple’s new baby Sofia an Andalasian wishing wand. Which makes Morgan feel all the more left out, since only “a true daughter” of Andalasia can wield it.
Naturally, Giselle ends up using it to wish that her life were more of, well, a fairy tale, but soon regrets it when the world around her starts to feature fantastical elements again… and not in a good way.
She ends up slowly transforming into a wicked stepmother and clashes on the villainous front with Malvina Monroe (Maya Rudolph), the self-proclaimed head of the community, who covets the power for herself.
Robert, meanwhile, becomes the sort of heroic prince that Edward would want to hang out with, looking to slay dragons, while Morgan is reduced to a Cinderella-style figured, loaded down with chores and falling for Malvina’s son Tyson (Kolton Stewart).
As directed this time by Adam Shankman, ‘Disenchanted’ seeks to capture the same charm as the original, and in its favor, entertainingly moves the themes and characters forward in believable ways.
Adams, of course, still has the required blend of comic and dramatic chops to carry off Giselle, who could potentially be (and occasionally is) utterly twee and annoying at every turn. There’s a genuine joy to her performance, especially later when she’s embracing her darker side.
Dempsey feels less well served this time, largely reduced to his own subplot, but that’s not much of an issue, since he was always a little bland to begin with. Rudolph, too, is not given the space she really needs to make Malvina work as well as she might, having done more with smaller comic characters in other movies and shows. Yet when she and Adams face off, there’s enough smack-talk (and smack-sing) to keep you laughing.
Perhaps the most disappointing aspect, cast-wise, is a further reduction of screen time for Marsden, who steals every scene he wanders into as the declarative, comically overblown Edward. While he’s a character who probably does work better as a garnish rather than a main ingredient, he chews that role (and any surrounding scenery) with gusto, and the movie is better whenever he’s on screen.
This time around, the magic level of the whole enterprise is somewhat reduced, the sequel just missing the mark when it comes to capturing the same lightning in a bottle. The biggest offender on that front here is the songs, which is all the more dispiriting considering that the musical team sees the return of ‘Enchanted’s Alan Menken and Stephen Schwartz. None of the tunes are anywhere near as memorable or well-staged as ‘Happy Working Song’, and when you have Idina Menzel (no slouch on the Broadway front thanks to ‘Wicked’ and the pipes behind ‘Frozen’s ultimate earworm ‘Let it Go’) belting out what should be a showstopper of a third act offering called ‘Love Power’ and even that can’t move the needle? You know you’re in trouble.
Which is not to say that the movie is totally a wasted quest. There is still plenty to enjoy, even if gently deconstructing fairy tale conventions is never as fresh the second time around. It has been a long wait for a sequel to ‘Enchanted’ and though this isn’t quite the exact follow-up we’d have wished for, it’s still good to see these characters and their story back on our screens.
Walt Disney Studios kicked off the first day of D23 Expo 2022 in style today with tons of advance looks at what the House of Mouse has in store for fans in the coming days, months, and years. You can watch Moviefone‘s exclusive backstage interviews by clicking on the video player above.
The first D23 Expo in three years began with the president of Walt Disney Studios Motion Picture Production, Sean Bailey, revealing the first-ever footage from ‘Hocus Pocus 2’.
Bailey was joined by the wacky Sanderson Sisters themselves – stars Bette Midler, Sarah Jessica Parker, and Kathy Najimy – who appeared via video to show how their characters are back for the first time since 1993 for more soul-stealing Halloween action.
Battling them this time around are aspiring witch Becca (Whitney Peak) and magic shop owner Gilbert (Sam Richardson).
But the audience’s biggest applause went to the original film’s Billy Butcherson (‘The Shape of Water’s Doug Jones) upon his return from the grave. ‘Hocus Pocus 2’ hits Disney+ on September 30th. The trailer is in the video player above.
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Next up on the panel was another eagerly anticipated sequel, ‘Disenchanted’. Returning stars Amy Adams, Patrick Dempsey, Idina Menzel, and James Marsden took the stage, alongside Maya Rudolph, the film’s new villain. ‘Disenchanted’ finds Adams’ Giselle and hubby Dempsey moving to the suburbs with their infant and teenage children.
“I was a huge fan of the original,” said Rudolph. “I can’t believe I got to be part of this… It’s not easy being mean to Amy Adams.” The new teaser trailer for the sequel is in the video player above.
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As far as live-action remakes of Disney animated classics go, ‘Peter Pan & Wendy’ was the first on deck today: with star Jude Law (Captain Hook) flanked by newcomers Alexander Molony (Peter Pan), Ever Gabo Anderson (Wendy), and Alyssa Wapanatâhk (Tiger Lily).
Expect more empowered female characters this time around, including at least one Lost Girl among Peter’s Lost Boys.
“Disney has worked very hard to give her more depth and a lot more character,” said Anderson of Wendy. “She and Peter are equals in this film.”
Law added that Hook and Pan’s prior relationship is also fleshed out. “We got to mine their back story a little bit more. You get to understand their past,” he said, hinting that the two were once friends.
“I got to make sure all the little details, all the Easter eggs are there. Because I’m a nerd,” confessed Simien. He then joined another of the film’s stars – scream queen Jamie Lee Curtis – in a Doom Buggy rolling across the D23 Expo stage.
Few Disney films are so beloved as 1994’s ‘The Lion King’. And fans will get more of the film’s animal kingdom in the 2024 prequel ‘Mufasa: The Lion King’.
Director Barry Jenkins appeared to explain how “Mufasa is the origin story of one of the greatest kings of the Pride Land… It’s the real story of how Mufasa found his place in the circle of life. What you learn is that Mufasa is great because of the family and the friends he has with him.”
Of course Disney Studios wouldn’t exist without its very first animated classic, 1937’s ‘Snow White’.
Director Marc Webb is tackling the live-action 2024 remake, featuring Gal Gadot as the Wicked Queen and Rachel Zegler as its eponymous heroine. The two were touched by the warm response they received as they presented a first look at their characters.
“Just your reaction means the world to us,” said Gadot.
A visibly moved Zegler explained that, “Snow White is the girl you remember, but she’s definitely made for the modern age,” stating the film redefines what it means to be the fairest of them all.
Rachel Zegler and Gal Gadot at Disney D23 Expo 2022 Getty Images
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While ‘Snow White’ is Disney’s first animated feature, 1989’s ‘The Little Mermaid’ is responsible for the studio’s renaissance. As well as its renewed dedication to musicals, as Rob Marshall, director of May 2023’s live-action adaptation, reminded fans today.
“It was very important for us to honor the original. We went to Alan Menken, who was divine to work with, and also our dear friend Lin-Manuel Miranda. They had never worked together before… There are four new songs. We still retain the beauty of the original score, written by the late great Howard Ashman as well.”
Fans were treated to the film’s entire “Part of Your World” number, featuring a note-perfect Halle Bailey, who appeared on stage with Marshall.
“Three days of filming ‘Part of Your World,’” said Bailey, “that was the most beautiful experience of my life. Just getting to sing a song I’ve loved since I was a child was so exciting.”
“The camera loves you,” Marshall told Bailey. “But it’s more than that. [It] loves what’s inside. [It] loves what you bring.”
The two then unveiled a teaser that recalled ‘Finding Nemo’ in the color and detail of its underwater world. You can find a teaser version of the clip in the video player at the top of the page.
It was then time for Pixar Animation Studios’ turn in the spotlight, with chief creative officer Pete Docter introducing next summer’s ‘Elemental’.
Director Peter Sohn spoke of how the film’s Element City was inspired by the culturally mixed New York of his childhood. Footage shown depicted the star-crossed romance of its fire-based heroine Ember (Leah Lewis) and her watery boyfriend Wade (Mamoudou Athie).
Pixar also unveiled its first original long-form series in the form of ‘Win or Lose’, each episode of which follows the perspective of a different character connected to a co-ed softball team, the Pickles.
With this year’s ‘Lightyear’, Pixar returned to the science fiction of ‘Wall-E’. Expect more in this vein soon, starting with ‘Elio’.
Announced today at D23 with star America Ferrera on stage, the film’s title character is an 11-year-old boy who doesn’t feel like he fits in his world. His mom (Ferrera) runs a top-secret military project, which inadvertently results in Elio making first contact with alien life and becoming our planet’s ambassador to the rest of the universe. It’s due out in spring 2024.
Last but by no means least on the Pixar slate – ‘Inside Out’ star Amy Poehler made a surprise appearance alongside Docter to announce ‘Inside Out 2’.
“Joy and the emotions are back for an all new adventure inside Riley’s head,” said a fittingly ebullient Poehler. “Only this time she’s a teenager!”
New emotions will also appear in the film, as Kelsey Mann takes over the directing chores from Docter, with Meg LeFauve returning to write the summer 2024 release.
To cap off the panel, Disney Animation’s chief creative officer (and Oscar-winning ‘Frozen’ director) Jennifer Lee greeted the D23 Expo audience to show what’s in store for the studio’s 100th anniversary next year.
But first, Disney’s fan-favorite 2016 ‘Zootopia’ will get a spin-off series this November on Disney+. And attendees got an advance look at the aptly titled ‘Zootopia+’, consisting of six short ‘Zootopia’-style spoofs of everything from ‘The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills’ to ‘The Godfather Part II’.
Perhaps Disney’s most unique offering at the Expo was ‘Iwaju’. Coming this year to Disney+, it finds the animation studio partnering for the first time in its long history with an overseas animation studio – Africa’s Kugali. Its three founders appeared today, describing their Afrofuturism fable and its characters as a love letter to their hometown of Lagos, Nigeria.
More sci-fi arrived with a new look at ‘Strange World’, described by Lee as “a film about family, legacy, and what we leave behind for the generations that follow.” Director Don Hall explained how the film chronicles three generations coming together on an alien planet in order to save their world.
Stars Jake Gyllenhaal, Dennis Quaid, and Lucy Liu introduced a rip-snorting clip of an exciting chase through ‘Strange World’s creature-packed planet.
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The Disney Animation segment, and indeed entire panel, concluded with the revelation of the studio’s 100th anniversary feature film – ‘Wish’. The tale of the star upon which so many Disney characters have wished throughout the past century, ‘Wish’ is co-directed by the attending team of Chris Buck and Fawn Veerasunthorn.
Buck, who co-wrote the film with Lee, explained how ‘Wish’ explores a kingdom of wishes, in which wishes can literally come true. Offering a lush, animated watercolor style coupled with CG animation, it stars newly minted Oscar winner Ariana DeBose as 17-year-old Asha, who pleas to the heavens for help, and gets an actual star from the sky, named Star, who communicates through pantomime.
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Disney “good luck charm,” actor Alan Tudyk appeared with footage of his character, a goat named Valentino who wishes to communicate with people. Finally, DeBose saw fans off with a sizzling live performance of “More for Us,” one of the film’s songs by Grammy winner Julia Michaels.
‘Disenchanted’ will arrive on Disney+ around Thanksgiving.
What exactly does happen once fairytale characters get their “Happily Ever After”? If the new sequel ‘Disenchanted’ is to be believed, it’s not always completely happy.
The follow-up to 2007’s fairytale tweak ‘Enchanted’ reunites us with Amy Adams’ cartoon kingdom resident Giselle 10 years after finding love with Patrick Dempsey’s real-world lawyer Robert. They’re living in fantasy kingdom Andalasia with his daughter Morgan (Gabriella Baldacchino) and move to a new house in the suburb of Monroeville.
The community is overseen by Malvina Monroe (Maya Rudolph), who has nefarious intentions for the family. When problems arise, Giselle wishes that their lives were the perfect fairy tale. The spell backfires, with Giselle rushing to save her family and her homeland of the Kingdom of Andalasia before the clock strikes midnight…
Yes, definitely plenty of comical potential there. James Marsden and Idina Menzel are also back as Prince Edward and Nancy Tremaine, while the cast now includes Jayma Mays, Kolton Stewart and Oscar Nuñez. The tunes – since a big part of ‘Enchanted’s appeal was its Disney fairytale-spoofing music – are once again courtesy of composing legend Alan Menken.
(L to R) Amy Adams and Maya Rudolph in Disney+’s ‘Disenchanted.’ Photo courtesy of Disney.
This movie has faced some real challenges on its trip to screens, a veritable magical thorn forest that has seen filmmakers come and go. Which is a little surprising, since the original film was a hit for Disney.
First announced in 2010 with Jessie Nelson writing the screenplay and ‘The Proposal’s Anne Fletcher directing, it lingered in development until 2014, when J. David Stem and David N. Weiss took over scripting, while Fletcher remained in the director’s chair.
In 2016, along came ‘A Walk to Remember’ and ‘Hairspray’ director Adam Shankman, but thanks to continuing script wrangling, it wasn’t officially announced until December 2020 and thanks to the less-than-fairytale pandemic, was delayed further until production kicked off in May last year, with sets built in Ireland.
‘Disenchanted’ will arrive on Disney+ around Thanksgiving.
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And in related Disney+ – and Adam Shankman – news, the company also announced that another sequel project he’s involved with (as executive producer this time), ‘Hocus Pocus 2’ will arrive on the streaming service later this year.
This one, directed by Anne Fletcher (did they just swap directing gigs?) sees the return of the cackling Sanderson sisters, played once more by Bette Midler, Sarah Jessica Parker, and Kathy Najimy.
(L to R) Kathy Najimy, Bette Midler, and Sarah Jessica Parker in ‘Hocus Pocus 2,’ which will cast a spell on Disney+ on September 30th.
After seemingly being vanquished way back in the 1993 original, the sisters are brought back when a trio of girls unwittingly light the Black Flame candle, resulting in fresh chaos for the residents of Salem.
Doug Jones is back as the zombified Billy Butcherson, while the cast also includes Tony Hale, ‘The Afterparty’s Sam Richardson and RuPaul’s Drag Race’ queens Ginger Minj, Kornbread “The Snack” Jeté, and Kahmora Hall, who play drag versions of the sisters in a show within the film where the real witches show up. Can’t wait to see what they make of that…
‘Hocus Pocus 2’ will cast a spell on Disney+ on September 30th.
Julia Child in archival footage featured in ‘Julia’
Julie Cohen attended Colgate University for undergrad before receiving a Master’s degree from Yale Law School, where she was a Knight Journalism Fellow. Currently, she is an adjunct professor in the documentary program at Columbia University. Betsy West attended Brown University for undergrad before receiving a Master’s in Communications from Syracuse University. After working for three decades in network news, she joined the faculty at Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism. Cohen had directed seven documentaries and West had produced countless documentaries for film and television before the two joined forced on the Oscar-nominated doc ‘RBG’ about the life and career of U.S. Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg. ‘Julia’ is their third collaboration together; their second documentary ‘My Name Is Pauli Murray’ was released on Prime Video earlier this year.
Combining archival research with new interviews with those who knew her best, and exquisitely shot food, ‘Julia’ is a crowd-pleasing documentary that brings the life and passion of Julia Child sizzling into focus. The documentary swiftly traces Child’s life from her upbringing in Pasadena, California to her time serving in WII to her passionate love affair with her husband in France, and how all of this culminated in her becoming the first celebrity chef. You will laugh, you will cry, and you will definitely leave the theater hungry.
Directors Julie Cohen and Betsy West spoke to Moviefone about bringing her extraordinary life to the big screen.
Moviefone: How do you choose a topic for your documentaries, and how did you land on Julia Child for this one?
Julie Cohen: You know, we’re always looking to tell amazing stories about groundbreaking Americans. And the font, the question of how we choose very much has to do with the individual. When we’re looking at someone’s story, we’re thinking: is this person someone who really changed America in one way or other? Are they fascinating? Do they have a life trajectory that will work well, in a film? And the big question: is there the right material, you know, audio and video to tell this story with? Julia Child’s story fits the bill perfectly in many ways.
MF: How long were you working on sort of the research side of this particular film?
Betsy West: We worked for about a year getting everything in place, talking to the Julia Child Foundation, figuring out where all the materials were, reading the number of biographies and other materials, and then securing the funding for the film. So that was about a year in development. In terms of making the film, it was a little under two years to film and to edit it.
MF: How do you decide what the trajectory and arc of the story is?
Cohen: It’s a process. In our mind, the shooting process and the editing process and the research are all kind of melded together. It’s not like you do one then the next time the next. As we’re researching the story, we’re trying to think about what things we want to focus on. As we’re picking out who to interview, we’re figuring out what makes each interview subject and an amazing character, who doesn’t just feel like an expert, but really feels connected to the story. By the time we get into an edit process, we already have some ideas in mind about what the story should be. That’s when Carla Gutierrez, who was the editor of this film, and also had been our editor ‘RBG’ comes into the process, and then it becomes the three of us together figuring out of all of the material that we’re gathering and seeing what’s the stuff that sings the loudest?
West: I remember after Carla screened every a lot of interviews that we have done, and screened highlights of all of the archive that our archive producers had organized, we had a meeting, and we went over the story points, and we made little cards of what are the main scenes and the main points that we want to highlight here. Now, of course, that keeps changing as you go along. But you’ve got to start somewhere. Carla will start doing a scene, and then we work on that and one scene leads to another step by step.
MF: How does your collaborative process work as co-directors?
West: I’m sure it’s different with different people. But you know, for us, we make all of the major decisions together, we have a certain amount of trust now because we’ve been working together since ‘RBG’. I think once we’ve set a path, then we will often divide and conquer. So Julie will do one interview, and she’ll write the questions, and she’ll be doing the interview, but I’ll look at the questions. And I’ll often be there for the interview and kind of backstop her. And in terms of putting together scenes, we often will split that up and each of us will work on a section and then when we feel like we’ve gotten into a pretty good place, show it to the other person to get the feedback. It’s very much back and forth.
MF: What is sort of the most surprising thing you learned about Julia Child that you didn’t know before starting?
Cohen: We should say we did not come into this film as great Julia Child experts, so there were many parts of her story that felt like revelations, like understanding how she had involved herself in various political movements. We were fascinating by the story of how her view towards gay rights had changed, basically going from being homophobic to being a vocal, active supporter of AIDS research in a completely unapologetic way. That was very unusual at the time that Julia was speaking out for research to help people with AIDS in 1988. No one was doing that, let alone someone like Julia Child, whose fan base was middle America. So that really felt like an interesting part of her character and just an amazing, fascinating story to us.
West: I’ll say also, the love story kind of blew us away. We knew that she had a great, supportive husband. But I think we were a little surprised to find a nude photo in the archive and other evidence of just how much Paul child adored his wife.
MF: How did you decide what recipes to cook and frame the film that way? They really made you feel the way she felt about the food.
West: We worked with food stylist Susan Spungen, and talked to her about which of the classic Julia Child recipes would help us illustrate the various aspects of the story. Like how to show making a mistake and trying over and over and over again. Anyone who has ever made hollandaise sauce knows that it can curdle. That’s one example. It was Susan’s idea to do the pear tart to illustrate the love story, because it has so many cool parts, massaging the dough and the pears bubbling around. I like that you use the word feeling because that’s what we were trying to get at: what’s the emotion involved in preparing and consuming food together with the people that you love?
MF: Do you think there’s a direct correlation between Julia Child’s show and today’s internet food culture?
Cohen: Absolutely, I don’t think there would be the internet obsessed food culture that exists today if it hadn’t been for Julia Child. Before Julia, there was something embarrassing almost for Americans about loving food. They didn’t have that very French sense of like you should stop everything in the middle of the day and just savor and enjoy your lunch and some wine. It’s a fantastic experience. Americans were like food was just like something to get through. The whole idea that your food is beautiful, and something to not only share, but kind of talk about and show off. That’s part of what Julia brought to our country. At the same time, we do feel it necessary to say that Julia, according to really everyone who was a friend, would not approve of the notion of taking a photo of your food before you eat it. As we say in the film, when the food is placed in front of you, and it’s hot, you should dig right.
MF: When the film is over, what you’re hoping people feel coming away from the film?
West: We hope that we’ve conveyed Julia’s joie de vivre. We hope people come out of the film feeling happy, and perhaps have a little more appreciation for Julia Child and what she did for all Americans. And maybe they’ll be a little hungry too, and go out and cook themselves a great meal or go out to a restaurant.
Julie & Julia – written and directed by Nora Ephron
Meryl Streep as Julia Child in ‘Julie & Julia’
Born in New York City, Nora Ephron was the eldest of four children. After her parents relocated to the west coast to work as screenwriters in Hollywood, Ephron grew up in Beverly Hills. Graduating from Wellesley College in 1962, Ephron briefly worked in JFK’s White House before applying to work at Newsweek, where she was famously rejected as a writer because they “did not hire women” in that department. She took a job in the mail room, but also took part in a class action lawsuit against the magazine for sexual descrimination. After many years working as a writer, Ephron began writing screenplays, starting with 1983’s ‘Silkwood’. She received an Oscar nomination for her work on ‘When Harry Met Sally…” Altogether, Ephron wrote or co-wrote 14 screenplays and directed eight feature films.
Based on Julia Child’s book ‘My Life in France’ and Julie Powell’s memoir ‘Julie & Julia,’ Ephron’s final film is a portrait of Child’s time in France learning to cook and eventually co-writing her cookbook masterpiece ‘Mastering the Art of French Cooking.’ This is contrasted with Julie Powell (Amy Adams), who is going through a rough time in her life and decides to start a blog project documenting her attempt to cook every recipe in Julia’s book over the course of a year. Meryl Streep received an Oscar nomination for her performance as Julia Child, and has off-the-charts chemistry with Stanley Tucci as her husband, Paul Child. Another film in which you better have some really great food at home, or make time to go out and something scrumptious to eat when it’s over. Trust me.
Thriller “The Woman in the Window,” starring Amy Adams as an agoraphobic child psychologist who witnesses a crime, was just bumped from its awards-friendly October 4, 2019 release date to sometime next year.
Based on the best-selling 2018 novel by A.J. Finn, the twisty thriller did not test well with audiences, who found it too confusing.
The film from “Atonement” director Joe Wright is now getting “retooled” with additional reshoots. But since Adams is busy filming “Hillbilly Elegy” for Ron Howard, those reshoots will have to wait.
“The Woman in the Window” was the final movie from Fox 2000, the division that turned out award-winning hits including “Hidden Figures” and “Life of Pi.” It was shut down earlier this year after Fox’s merger with Disney.
Wright plans to shoot five days of pickup shots next month.
“We’re dealing with a complex novel,” says Fox 2000 president Elizabeth Gabler, who is staying on as a consultant on the film until its release. “We tested the movie really early for that very reason. We wanted to make it better, and we’ve had Disney’s full support in doing that.”
Adams is a six-time Oscar nominee who has yet to win. Looks like “The Woman in the Window” might not be the film to get her one.
Netflix’s upcoming film “Hillbilly Elegy” has an Academy Award-winning director and now a headliner who has been nominated for an Oscar half a dozen times.
The story follows three generations of Vance’s family. It looks at their’s rise from poverty, starting with his grandparents’ move out of Appalachia and through his years at Yale Law School. Along the way, it explores struggles they can’t escape, including alcoholism, abuse, and trauma.
Adams has picked a number of good roles over the years. She has starred in films like “Vice,” “Arrival,” “The Fighter,” and more. Not only has she received six Oscar nods, she is a two-time Golden Globe awardee, winning for “Big Eyes” and “American Hustle.” Her next film is 2019’s “The Woman in the Window.”
Vance is executive producing the adaptation of his book alongside Julie Oh. Imagine Entertainment’s Howard, Brian Glazer, and Karen Lunder are producing.
