News: Angelina Jolie

Everyone’s favourite fantasy figure Angelina Jolie may be wasted in this week’s The Good Shepherd, and may have been seen in the tabloids more often than on screen in the last couple of years, but that’s hopefully set to change.

She’s next up doing full-on “proper” acting in A Mighty Heart, following the efforts of the wife of murdered Wall Street Journal journalist Daniel Pearl to find out precisely how her husband ended up being beheaded on camera by Islamist fanatics back in 2002. then she’s on voice duties as the voice of the mother of the monster Grendel in the much-anticipated adaptation of the Dark Age poem Beowulf, starring Ray Winstone, Anthony Hopkins and a host of other top-notch actors, with more voice duties following in the animated comedy Kung-Fu Panda, alongside Jack Black, Jackie Chan, Dustin Hoffman and Lucy Liu, before switching back to drama for the Ayn Rand adaptation Atlas Shrugged, possibly alongside her real-world lover and father of her ultra-famous baby, Brad Pitt.

News: Sigourney Weaver

After this week’s outing in Infamous, Weaver will barely be off the big screen this year, with another four due out over the next 12 months, from the (apparently rather poor) attempt to do a Shrek by taking the piss out of fairy tales in the animated Happily N’Ever After to the rather more promising Vantage Point, a rashomon-style tale of an assassination attempt on the US President told from five different perspectives.

Along the way she’ll team up with Kate Bosworth for The Girl in the Park, with Weaver a woman whose daughter went missing while a toddler, who thinks Bosworth could well be her little girl – it could sound a bit like a remake of Vertigo from that, but other details are as yet unclear. There’s also The TV Set, a comedy based around the creation of a TV show pilot (which makes the title a truly unforgivable pun), co-starring David Duchovny and Ioan Gruffudd, before she tries her luck at another fairy tale-based animation next year, The Tale of Despereaux, alongside the voices of Robbie Coltrane, Dustin Hoffman, Kevin Kline, Christopher Lloyd, William H Macy, Justin Long and Tracey Ullmann.

Review: Stranger Than Fiction

UK release date: 1st December

Following in the footsteps of such movies as Being John Malkovich and I Heart Huckabees, which treat their outrageous scenarios as more drama than comedy, comes Stranger than Fiction.

The loopy premise here is that mild-mannered tax inspector Will Ferrell begins to hear voices — well, actually just one voice, which seems to be narrating his life. A visit to a literature professor (Dustin Hoffman, as enjoyably tick-riddled as ever) reveals that the author of his story is Kay Eiffel (Emma Thompson) and she is indeed in control of his destiny. The trouble is that all her novels end in the death of the lead character.

In less talented hands, this kind of forced intellectual whimsy can be deeply irritating, but with the understated direction of Finding Neverland‘s Marc Forster, the decidedly odd is perfectly believable. And Ferrell, like Bill Murray and Robin Williams, proves that comic actors reined in can give surprisingly affecting dramatic performances.

Radio Times rating:

***

UK cinema certificate 12A
Running time 112mins

Review by Adam Smith

News: Dustin Hoffman

The veteran star may well have been taking smaller roles in recent years, as in this week’s supporting turn in Stranger Than Fiction, but looks all set to return to the leading parts which should be his by right – he’s even talked about his desire to do sequels to his early hits The Graduate and Tootsie – though to what extent he was joking remains somewhat unclear, as he’s also recently said that he’d like to be the next James Bond…

Next up is Perfume: The Story of a Murderer, based on the novel by Patrick Süskind. Set in 18th century France, the film follows a young man with an extraordinary sense of smell who, having apprenticed himself to Hoffman’s master perfume-maker, embarks on a killing-spree in pursuit of the ultimate scent. It is set for release on Boxing Day.

Due in July 2007, Hoffman will take the title role in the entertainingly-named Mr Magorium’s Wonder Emporium. As the 243-year-old owner of the world’s most wonderful toy store hands over his business to his nervous manager, played by Natalie Portman, there may well be a fair few Charlie and the Chocolate Factory parallels. But, directed as it is by the writer of the distinctly unusual Stranger Than Fiction, there’s bound to be more to it than that…

Then, in 2008, Hoffman will try his hand at animated comedy, providing voice duties on two big-budget, all-star cast extravaganzas featuring – as seems to be the rule with CGI films these days – a bunch of oddball talking animals. First will come Kung-Fu Panda, alongside Angelina Jolie, Jack Black, Jackie Chan, Lucy Liu and Ian McShane, and then The Tale of Despereaux, from Corpse Bride co-director Mike Johnson, alongside Robbie Coltrane, Kevin Kline, Christopher Lloyd, William H Macy, Tracey Ullman, Sigourney Weaver and Justin Long.

Hardly much that could land him another Oscar for the shelf, but still – not bad.

News: Jack Black

The tubby star of this week’s Tenacious D: The Pick of Destiny has gone from second-fiddle sidekick in 2000’s High Fidelity to global superstardom in less than half a decade, so little wonder he’s making the most of it, with a whole slew of projects in the offing. Next up he’ll be seen (perhaps somewhat implausibly) as Kate Winslet’s love interest in romantic comedy The Holiday, due out on 8th December in the UK, with loads more due in the next few years.

Potentially promising is the as-yet untitled project from Noah Baumbach, writer of the superb The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou and writer/director of Oscar-nominated The Squid and the Whale, which will follow a family reunion over the course of a weekend. With Baumbach in charge, it’s impossible to predict what the outcome might be.

Then will come the much-anticipated Be Kind Rewind from Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind director Michel Gondry, with Black desperately trying to re-make movies from Back to the Future to The Lion King for a friend’s video store after accidentally wiping his entire stock. And talking of talking animals flicks, Black will aslo voice the lead character in the upcoming Dreamworks flick Kung Fu Panda, alongside the vocal talents of the likes of Angelina Jolie, Dustin Hoffman, Lucy Liu, Ian McShane and Jackie Chan. He is also attached to Shaun of the Dead director Edgar Wright’s Them, and adaptation of the non-fiction book by journalist Jon Ronson, exploring the wacky (and sometimes downright worrying) world of conspiracy theorists. With Wright and Black on board, it’s unlikely this is going to be a straight piece of reportage, however…

Meanwhile, his semi-spoof band Tenacious D seems to be continuing with its tours and occasional gigs – so keep an eye out, and you could catch a sight of Black in the flesh…

News: Jackie Chan

Despite now being comfortably into his fifties and having broken pretty much every bone in his body at some point or another, Hong Kong’s biggest star continues to churn out action flick after action flick, and still insists on doing all his own stunts. He has already completed work on two more Hong Kong movies since this week’s New Police Story wrapped, and is currently filming two more – this time English language – flicks.

The first of the Cantonese films was period-piece The Myth (yet to be scheduled for release in the UK), an unusual choice for Chan as he normally prefers present-day locations for his kung-fu antics, then Rob-B-Hood, again for New Police Story director Benny Chan, with Chan on more familiar action/comedy ground as a thief forced to cope with looking after a baby. It too has yet to be scheduled for a UK release.

Of his English-language movies in the works, the third installment of his popular Rush Hour series, due next summer, will doubtless be more of the same silly banter as he does all the fighting as he and the wisecracking Chris Tucker get mixed up with a bunch of Chinese Triads in – of all places – Paris. Giving himself a bit of a break, Chan is also voicing “Master Monkey” in the promising-sounding Kung Fu Panda, alongside Jack Black, Dustin Hoffman, Lucy Liu, Ian McShane and Angelina Jolie, due July 2008.

News: Justin Long

Accepted‘s Justin Long – probably best known to date as Britney Spears’ boyfriend in the dire Crossroads or Linsay Lohan’s bloke in the not quite as awful Herbie: Fully Loaded – is a bit of a workaholic. Already completed is Idiocracy, for director Mike Judge (the creator of Beavis and Butthead and King of the Hill), with Long in a relatively small role alongside Luke Wilson, who plays a bog-standard American frozen for 500 years, awaking to find himself the most intelligent person in the country, and Long is currently filming alongside Bruce Willis in Die Hard 4.

Long will also be taking the lead in Patriotville, as a lone guy fighting against his small town’s plan to build a casino on their historic battlefield, and voice the title character alongside in animated comedy The Tale of Despereaux forMike Johnson, co-director of Tim Burton’s Corpse Bride. Considering Long will be the lead alongside a voice cast that includes Robbie Coltrane, Dustin Hoffman, Kevin Kline, Sigourney Weaver and William H Macy, it could yet prove to be the film that puts him firmly on the map. Shame we won’t see his face, really…