When it comes to movies based on a line of dolls, Kit Kittredge: An American Girl is light-years away from the ultra-commercialized vapidity of Bratz: The Movie.
This sweetly enjoyable family film stars the endearing Abigail Breslin as Kit. And, refreshingly, it’s actually about something — the Great Depression — and tackles such serious issues as prejudice, poverty and homelessness.
But even as serious topics are interspersed throughout the story, the film manages to be light and charming but never didactic. Much of the credit goes to the casting. Breslin is a bona-fide talent, whether warming our hearts as a bespectacled pageant participant in Little Miss Sunshine or winning our admiration as the plucky Kit, a wannabe reporter. Stanley Tucci, Joan Cusack and Jane Krakowski bring dramatic heft to a tale that could have been paper-thin. Read the rest of this entry »
Stan Winston, the Oscar-winning special effects, creature and makeup artist whose innovative creations include the full-scale animatronic dinosaurs in “Jurassic Park” and the futuristic Terminators, has died. He was 62.
Winston died Sunday at his home in Malibu after a seven-year battle with myeloma, a Stan Winston Studio spokeswoman said.
During a film and TV career that spanned four decades, Winston collaborated with such filmmakers as Steven Spielberg and James Cameron and worked on some of his generation’s most memorable films. Read the rest of this entry »
Reese Witherspoon channels her inner super soccer mom outside of her Brentwood, Calif., home with daughter Ava, 8, on Saturday.
Earlier this weekend, Reese, 32, was seen with boyfriend Jake Gyllenhaal taking private yoga sessions in Santa Monica.
Ms. Witherspoon also recently landed in the Forbes‘ Celebrity 100 List, ranking at #60. The mag said, “Witherspoon will star in the big-budget comedy Four Christmases this winter. She also landed an estimated $30 million, three-year contract to pitch Avon cosmetics.” Read the rest of this entry »
Tim Russert, who became a household name in American political discourse as host of NBC’s “Meet the Press” Sunday talk show, died on the job of a heart attack on Friday, the television network said. He was 58.
Russert, known for his tough interviews of many of the leading U.S. political figures of the past two decades, was the NBC News Washington bureau chief.
“He was an institution in both news and politics for more than two decades,” U.S. President George W. Bush said in a statement issued in Paris, where the president was travelling. Read the rest of this entry »
Movie star Angelina Jolie says being pregnant is “great for the sex life”.
The actress, who is expecting twins with partner Brad Pitt, says the couple have become “a lot more creative” in bed since she gained her baby bump.
“As a woman you’re just so round and full,” she told Entertainment Weekly magazine in the US, “so you have fun”. The couple already have four children, three of whom were adopted. Jolie, 33, says that she and Pitt “really don’t know” how they will cope with six. Read the rest of this entry »
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