The Star Online: Entertainment: Movies
The Star Online: Entertainment: Movies |
| 'Hangover' star Cooper to star in 'Paradise Lost' Posted: 19 Jul 2011 11:19 PM PDT SYDNEY (AP): "The Hangover" star Bradley Cooper will appear as Lucifer in a movie version of the classic poem "Paradise Lost" to be filmed in Sydney. An Australian official says the movie will be directed by Australian Alex Proyas, who also directed "I, Robot" starring Will Smith and "Knowing" with Nicholas Cage. New South Wales state Acting Premier Andrew Stoner says the movie will be shot predominantly at Fox Studios in Sydney. It is targeted for release in 2013. "Paradise Lost" is an epic poem by 17th century English poet John Milton. It tells the story of Satan tempting Adam and Eve, and their expulsion from the Garden of Eden. Stoner said Wednesday that had the movie not been lured to Sydney with financial incentives, "it would have been opportunity lost, not Paradise Lost." Full Feed Generated by Get Full RSS, sponsored by USA Best Price. |
| Posted: 19 Jul 2011 04:46 PM PDT It seems we never get tired of watching a seemingly fragile woman playing the heroine. THE idea of a black-op agency taking a young girl off the streets, accuse her of a crime she didn't commit only to force her to become an efficient operative is rather appealing. It must be because this premise – which originated in the 1990 Luc Besson's French film titled La Femme Nikita – has been revisited in a Hollywood film starring Bridget Fonda, a five-season Canadian TV series featuring Peta Wilson and now, another TV series headlined by Maggie Q called Nikita. Another piece of evidence of why this idea is popular enough to be recycled is that every version has its own legion of fans. While the movie is a distant memory for me, the 1997 Canadian show was pretty enjoyable with its extremely serious tone and intense leads. Hence, I was all ready to not like the latest show – Maggie Q is just way too skinny to carry off the killer look, right? The pilot didn't do much to convince me otherwise either – it didn't help I was purposely looking for any reason to dismiss it. Nonetheless, I was happily proven wrong when in the last 15 minutes of the pilot, I got the hint of what the show is capable of – action, humour, explosions, twisted conspiracies, beautiful people, cliched baddies, one-liners and technological advanced tools – pretty much all the stuff that any action-packed thriller should have. This version veers off from its predecessors in that our heroine has escaped the clutches of the secret government unit known as Division after serving it faithfully for many years. Now, she is intent on bringing it down as she realises that Percy (Xander Berkeley), who heads Division, is giving his loyalty (and by fault, the Division's) to whoever would pay him the highest price for an assassination. Nikita's mission is also fuelled by the fact that the Division has ordered the termination of a man she has fallen in love with while working undercover. Each week, an episode goes to great lengths to show exactly how Nikita foils a Division mission, using every trick she had learned from the organisation when she was serving it. It's a typical move of any action-based series – with loads of fights with our heroine executing cool kicks and punches, taking down burly men and still coming off looking so good. Now, the twist is, Nikita has a mole inside Division – one of the newest recruits, Alex (Lyndsy Fonseca) – who has been trained by Nikita on all things Division. Through Alex we get to see the workings of Division, which is located deep underground somewhere in the United States, revealing the kind of physcological and physical training Nikita must've gone through when she was first recruited. Meanwhile, Nikita has stationed herself in a bare room with large windows, which is furnished with one bed, a clothes rack (yes, one), a computer, a box filled with guns and sometimes-there-sometimes-not-there furniture. But not everything is dandy about this show. While the two female leads are watchable – one particular supporting character, a fellow new recruit by the name of Jaden (Tiffany Hines), is just so irritating. She's obviously there as a roadblock for Alex, but her character really does not need to do anything but just stand there and glower at Alex, and we can hate her. Now, no La Femme Nikita series is complete without the presence of the super serious Michael (Shane West), Nikita's handler, or the geeky Birkoff (Aaron Standford), who is in charge of all things technical in Division. Fortunately, both these characters survived the transition from the Canadian show in one piece. I am happy to report the chemistry between Maggie Q and West is there. In the 1997 series, one of the driving subplots of the show was the forbidden relationship between Nikita and Michael. So it should be interesting to see how that relationship is going to be explored here since Nikita is on the outside and they are enemies (he is assigned by Percy to bring down Nikita). But at the end of the day, what is most important is the story of the protagonist. Here, Nikita is constructed so well that we are okay with suspending disbelief and taking the leap along with the show. So welcome back Nikita, it's always nice to see you. ■ Nikita is aired on WarnerTV (HyppTV Ch 162) every Monday at 10pm. Full Feed Generated by Get Full RSS, sponsored by USA Best Price. |
| You are subscribed to email updates from The Star Online: Entertainment: Movies To stop receiving these emails, you may unsubscribe now. | Email delivery powered by Google |
| Google Inc., 20 West Kinzie, Chicago IL USA 60610 | |
0 ulasan:
Catat Ulasan