Amy Adams Bags Lois Lane Role In 'Superman: Man Of Steel'

Amy Adams has become the latest addition to Zack Snyder's 'Superman' revival as she bagged the role of leading lady Lois Lane. This comes amidst news that Viggo Mortensen may be up for the part of evil villain General Zod and that Kevin Costner will play the part of Jonathan Kent. Adams will star opposite Henry Cavill as Clark Kent himself and it will be interesting to see the on screen romance blossom. This marks another step in the right direction for Adams, who is coming off the back of an Oscar nomination for 'The Fighter'.

It seems many young actors and actresses are simply coming up out of nowhere these days. Even Superman will be played by a fairly unknown actor in the form of Henry Cavill and we have seen similar situations with 'Thor', which is set for release in April this year, in which the relatively unknown Chris Hemsworth was cast as the leading man. Another similarly swift rise to fame was evident with Andrew Garfield who now seems to be cast in everything. We'll see if this will happen to Amy Adams but it's beginning to look likely that the 36 year old will be gracing our screens much more often.

Andrew Garfield and Robert Pattinson in line for Akira

A whole host of young British actors are competing for a chance to star in the new adaptation of Manga 'Akira'. Stars such as the talented Andrew Garfield ('The Social Network'), James McAvoy, star of 'The Last King of Scotland', and Robert Pattinson have been revealed by Deadline to be among this list. The film, written by 'Harry Potter' screenwriter Steve Kloves, follows Kaneda as he fights in Tokyo where a government project has created superhuman beings.

When I read this story I found it hard to believe that actors such as those listed above would have anything to do with a Manga film. However, the news has now been widely reported and it seems as if Warner Bros are making a big push with this film. I'm shocked by these announcements and I'm sure others will be too, so I must say well done to Warner Bros for whetting our appetite so.

The Imaginarium Of Doctor Parnassus (2009)

A Good Homage - 3.5/5

So I saw this film yesterday called 'The Imaginarium Of Doctor Parnassus'. With this film I found I couldn't help but focus my entire attention to the great Heath Ledger's performance, due to it being his final ever film. With this in mind, I found the film got off to a slow and slightly confusing start. To me, it was only when Ledger's character Tony was revealed to us that the film began to take off. Ledger's performance was definitely a truly memorable one. It shows how far he progressed from the days of '10 Things I Hate About You'. He performs in a very modest way in this film and his little facial expressions were absolutely captivating. The only one out the the three other stars in the film (Jude Law, Johnny Depp and Colin Farrell) was Farrell, who incidentally would be my favourite actor out of the three. He was the only one to really capture anywhere near the magic that Ledger brought to the film. In saying this however, his small role was dwarfed by Ledger.

In terms of storyline I must admit that I get a bit lost at times. I couldn't follow Terry Gilliam's train of thought as well as I had hoped. The film brought back images of 'Pan's Labyrinth', a film that is, at times, equally confusing. I don't think Gilliam took enough time to fully explain the story to the audience. Of course this has to be put down to the extremely unfortunate death of its main man part way through filming. The film was a great homage to Heath Ledger's legacy despite its flaws.

Another stand out role for me was Andrew Garfield as Tommy. I saw 'The Social Network' before I saw this film and I just didn't realise he had this sort of performance in him. He was truly stunning. His cockney accent and cheeky personality was convincing and whereas I found him a tad one-dimensional in 'The Social Network', here he showed us his full range of talents.

This is certainly one to watch mainly due to it being Heath Ledger's final role. He will be sorely missed and he was a treasure to the film industry.

The Social Network (2010)

Pretty Good - 4/5

So I saw this film a few days ago called 'The Social Network'. Billed as one of the top movies of 2010 the film certainly had huge prestige at the time of my watching it. I had extremely high hopes for the film, yet by the end I found myself a tad dissapointed. I found myself questioning what so many people seemed to agree on, that 'The Social Network' was indeed one to watch from 2010.
From the outset I found myself bombarded with the hyperactivity we have come to expect in speech by screenplay writer Aaron Sorkin. I am sure that if he was to read this, he would find it complementary, because I am sure it was his aim to manifest a character that affected the audience in this way, and I applaud him for this. However, at times the dialogue went on a journey of its own, losing me as a viewer. I'm sure this was not what was aimed for.

Jesse Eisenberg's character Mark Zuckerberg was cast beautifully. He epitomised the type of person that we have come to label as a computer geek. Quite rightly too I might add. But the character was not one that an audience could warm to, he had very little likeability. Again, we were always meant to feel this way towards Zuckerberg, and although we would not take sides against him in the flash forward scenes that showed the two law suits taken up against him, by the end of the film we saw a dark side to Zuckerberg's nature after he effectively cut Eduardo Saverin, played ably by Andrew Garfield, out of the Facebook enterprise. Furthermore, as a viewer from England, I found myself in possession of an intense jealousy towards Eisenberg's character; I was jealous of how intellectual he was and at the same time I was jealous about the purveyed life an American scholar in a school such a Harvard leads. I'm sure you will know what I mean when I mention other characters that gave me the same feelings. I'm thinking of Denzel Washington's portayal of Rubin Carter in 'The Hurricane' (1999) who astounded us with his intelligence in a stunning film, the witty Paul Finch, played by Eddie Thomas, in the orginal 'American Pie' (1999) and 'National Lampoon's Animal House' (1978) which was one of the first to reveal to us here in sunny England the out of control, party lifestyle that is led by many US students. Whether these depictions are based on truth or wildly overestimated, it doesn't really matter. They still make us jealous.
Would I recommend 'The Social Network'? Yes, but with caution.