2012 Movie Preview: Romances, From 'The Vow' to 'Breaking Beginning Part 2'

With 2011 within the dying cycle, selection time to anticipate 2012. All this week, Moviefone is previewing the apparently endless method to obtain large-time films striking theaters through the following 12 several days -- from from 'The Demon Inside' to 'Django Unchained' and all things in between. Next: the 12 romances to check out for next season. 2012 Movie Preview: Romances 'Declaration of War''The Vow''Perfect Sense''Wanderlust''Good Deeds''Salmon Fishing inside the Yemen''Playing the region''Mirror, Mirror''The Lucky One''Breaking Beginning Part 2''Les Miserables'Bonus: 'The Wedding' See All Moviefone Galleries » EARLIER: 2012 Movie Preview: Blockbusters 2012 Movie Preview: Comedies 2012 movie Preview: Family Films [Photo: Summit] Follow Moviefone on Twitter Like Moviefone on Facebook

First Look: Smallville's Erica Durance Suits Up as Wonder Woman on Harry's Law

Erica Durance It's the moment Smallville fans have been waiting for: Erica Durance is wearing the real Wonder Woman costume. She just didn't do it until her guest appearance on Harry's Law. Durance, who earlier this year said goodbye to the role of Lois Lane after Smallville ended its 10-year run, will play a somewhat mentally unstable woman who believes she truly is Wonder Woman in the Wednesday, Jan. 11 episode of Harry's Law. TVGuide.com hit the set to find out what it's like to put on the costume, which is of the same design worn by Adrianne Palicki in David E. Kelley's defunct Wonder Woman pilot. Also, Durance tackles the Lois Lane vs. Wonder Woman question. Smallville's Erica Durance seeks justice as Wonder Woman on Harry's Law How does it feel actually getting to play Wonder Woman... of sorts? Erica Durance: "Of sorts" is the best way to put it and it's probably the best way to play it because you get to have a little bit of freedom and you're not judged quite so harshly. The way that I was able to work with the character Wonder Woman in this is through the eyes of a woman who desperately needed a strong female archetype to look up to, and she had gone through such terrible things and this was her alter ego. I would challenge anybody who said that she didn't think she was Wonder Woman. This is how she found her way out. So, as an actress, getting to put on the suit and play Wonder Woman was fantastic and then I got this whole other layer because of the way David E. Kelley had written it, to ground it in this kind of humanistic viewpoint, which was lovely. What sparks your character's alter ego, "Wonder Woman," to go public? Durance: Well, she's been out for a while. What ends up happening is that my character, Annie Billson, has gone one step too far, or some would say many steps too far, and taken this psychosis, this vigilantism a little far in the opinion of society and she's hurt one too many people, and so she's actually been charged with a crime. She goes to see Adam (Nate Corddry), whom she has a history with and has gone to high school with. He knows her, so she seeks his representation. Annie is really passionate that she is actually Wonder Woman. Is it a fair comparison to say that she's as passionate as Lois Lane? Durance: I would think so because it's the same person doing it, and passion is passion. I'm the vessel and it'll end up having that same color to it, but I try to be as truthful as possible in it and she does have those same convictions. The only difference, of course, is this character's coming from a completely different type of world, and the reason she's become this is for a totally different reason. But I will say that people will probably definitely recognize it because it's still Erica playing it, right? [Laughs] So I couldn't transform that, but passion is definitely a good word for it. You had put on the "Amazon Princess" costume on Smallville. How does it feel getting to put on the real thing? Durance: A little daunting, and partially because having been in the comic world for a while now, I'm really very respectful of the people that love this character. I do take it very seriously. As a side note, just to be light about it, any woman wearing tight pants is not super excited the first time she puts them on. [Laughs] I wasn't exactly, you know, tight pants- or underwear-ready. Have you ever wanted to play Wonder Woman? If you didn't have the end of Smallville last season, would you have considered joining David E. Kelley's project? Durance: I will say that I would jump at the opportunity to work with David E. Kelley again and [Harry's Law and Wonder Woman executive producer] Bill D'Elia. Bill D'Elia cast me on my first big job ever so that was very tantalizing. I would face it with a bit of trepidation, but I probably would have wanted to dive into the deep end of something like that. I think it's a great character and you can have so much fun with it. I love comics. I love that sci-fi stuff. I grew up on that so it's something that, in a way, I really relate to and I would've loved that, but that wasn't my journey. Then I ended up getting this really great specific role on here and got to work on a show that's got the lead, which is Kathy Bates. To me, that's pretty great. Are you the type of actress who says, "I've spent all these years on Smallville and now I have to get away from that genre!"? Durance: No. I just believe things come your way that are meant to come your way and you'll know when you see it whether you want to do it or not. I think that most of us actors are put in a box of sorts. We're labeled. You can do your best to step outside of that a little bit here and there and have some fun with it, but you also have to understand that and embrace it and enjoy it. Personally, I'm just grateful to work again. Do you have any Smallville withdrawal? Durance: There's a certain grieving process to leaving a show and a group of people that were a family to you. It's important to learn that's all that life is, is just a set of transitions for you and so you move through it. But yeah, there were times when I was like, "Aww." Not so much sad at times, but I'll go on another set and it'll just be slightly different. I'm transitioning. I've been saying that for months. I'm in transition. Lasso of truth time: Best part of wearing the costume and the worst part of wearing the costume. Durance: The best part is the corset, believe it or not, because it gives you a tiny little waist, making you sit up really straight. I would say the most uncomfortable part is tight, stretchy pants because, well, you know what you feel like when you're wearing tight, stretchy pants. You just have to be careful everything is appropriate. But would you have wanted the underwear version of the costume though? Durance: [Laughs] I'm very grateful for the pants. I know that people were very excited about the underwear and seeing them. To be quite frank, I don't know if I could've done the underwear justice at this point in time and it might have been more upsetting for people to see me in them than to not, so I think the pants are a safe bet for me. Durance's episode of Harry's Law airs Wednesday, Jan. 11 at 9/8c on NBC. Are you excited to see Durance in the Wonder Woman costume?

Kaira Pitt Remembers Birthday At Michael Jackson Cirque Show

First Released: December 19, 2011 9:42 AM EST Credit: Getty Premium Vegas, Nev. -- Caption Kaira Pitt is smiles in the press conference for Moneyball in Tokyo, japan on November 9, 2011 Vegas was filled with stars over the past weekend using the Kardashian clan, Britney Warrior spears and Brangelina & their brood all turning up in Las Vegas. The acting giant couple as well as their six children celebrated Brads 48th birthday over the past weekend at Cirque Du Soleils Michael Jackson: The Immortal World Tour at Mandalay Bay, based on multiple reviews. They'd great seats, sitting right near the stage, a resource told People. They appeared to savor the show. The entertainers didnt know these were there along with a couple of of these recognized them when they were on stage, therefore it was pretty exciting. Another source told The Vegas Sun the family, who had been remaining in the Four Seasons, missed on the limousine ride between their hotel and also the show making 5-minute walk between your two hotels flanked by multiple body pads. They loved the performance and remained before the very finish instead of coming out in the curtain close. They became a member of everyone else throughout the ultimate standing ovation. It didnt look as though the cast understood the Hollywood couple was there until they heard the excitement within the audience, another source told the paper. Adding, It hadnt been introduced for them in advance, so that they gave just a little jerk along with a bow within their direction in the finish. Kaira and Angelina were applauding and smiling ear to ear using their children, who loved the show. They silently left just to walk to the 4 Seasons. The Moneyball star switched 48 on Sunday. Copyright 2011 by NBC Universal, Corporation. All privileges reserved. These components might not be released, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

Etta James Crictally Ill with Chronic Leukemia

Etta James Legendary blues singer Etta James is crictally ill with chronic leukemia, based on Riverside Press Enterprise. Browse the relaxation of present day news The "FinallyInch singer's live-in physician, that has been dealing with James since March 2010, has requested hopes following the sultry-voiced songstress' disease was considered incurable two days ago. Based on records in James' probate situation, she's also struggling with dementia and kidney failure. James, 73, was put in the hospital captured to treat the bloodstream infection sepsis along with a uti.

Chinese box office hits new levels

BEIJING -- China's film biz is constantly break records despite signs and signs and symptoms of the slowing down lower economy, with B.O. gathering 12 billion yuan ($1.89 billion) up to now this year. The whole gross for your year looks on course to clean past the $2 billion level because you will find still some large movies set to start through the progressively important Christmas season. Many senior players inside the biz have mentioned they expect the figure to top $2.05 billion this year, however it might be a lot more. Total B.O. a year ago was $1.62 billion.Theaters ongoing to start within an astounding rate this year, with eight new screens added every day. You'll find now greater than 9,000 screens in China, up from 6,200 screens a year ago.There has been greater than 500 films created in China, although senior biz figures within the u . s . states regularly express fears that local movies aren't succeeding enough to have their own against fierce competish from Hollywood, despite quotas on overseas photos along with other hurdles facing foreign movies.Nevertheless the Condition Administration of Radio, Film and tv is satisfied using the general picture. "These results demonstrate that china film business is stuffed with vigor and vitality," it mentioned in the statement. Contact the number newsroom at news@variety.com

Time Warner Refines $1.4B Bid For Endemol

The amount is the same as Time Warner’s previous offer for the reality TV producer. But the entertainment giant now tells Endemol that it’s willing to pay allcash — not a combination of cash and debt — if the company wants.Endemol execs had made no secret of their disdain forTime Warner’s previousbid, which one insider referred to as rock bottom. The revised offer comes as Endemol approaches its December 13 deadline for a debt-for-equity swap designed to reduce the companys debt to $670M from $3.7B. Once that happens, the company could be put up for auction. But the situation is complicated: One of Endemol’s biggest shareholders — Italy’s Mediaset, controlled by former prime minister Silvio Berlusconi — is also interested in buying the producer of shows including Big Brother, and Deal Or No Deal.It has said that it would not participate in an auction. Apollo Management, Centerbridge, and Providence Equity Partners and banks including Barclays and RBS are among Endemols biggest creditors.

'X Factor's' Rachel Crow on Her Elimination, Breakdown: 'It Definitely Hurt Bad'

Director Steven Spielberg had a hand in Oscar winner Christian Bale's starring role in Zhang Yimou's The Flowers of War, which premiered Sunday afternoon in Beijing.our editor recommendsZhang Yimou To Be Honored at Asia Pacific Screen AwardsChina Chooses Zhang Yimou's Christian Bale starrer 'Flowers of War' for Oscar Foreign Language Submission TheHollywood Reporter previously reported Spielberg's role in acover story with Bale and Zhang, However, Spielberg's director friend went into more detail on how the recommendation came about. "I asked Steven Spielberg, who is a friend, to read the English script and recommend actors," Zhang said at a press conference following the premiere. One of those suggestions was Bale, who had starred as a child actor in Spielberg's own turn directing in China, 1987's Empire of the Sun,also based on a novel set during Japan's World War II occupation of eastern China. STORY: The Flowers of War: Film Review Spielberg then encouraged Bale to work with Zhang. "He passed [Zhang] Yimou a letter to give to me, and it said, 'do it.'" With a budget of $100 million, the film is the most expensive ever made in China, as much as last year's top domestic box office performer, Feng Xiaogang's Aftershock, grossed. Despite that, Zhang brushed off any suggestion that it put greater commercial pressure on him for the film to perform. "Directors shouldn't think about these things. It prevents you from making a good movie," Zhang said. STORY: An Auteur + This Actor = Game Changer The two-time Oscar-nominated director similarly dodged a question about whether Flowers was an attempt to finally win that trophy. "Winning an Oscar was not the goal. We only wanted to create good art and make a good film," he said. "I don't really understand the Oscar process much, so it's up to luck." Zhang, who also directed the opening ceremonies of the 2008 Olympic Games, is representing China again with Flowers as the country's official entry for the Best Foreign Language Film award. Bale plays John Miller, an American drifter who finds himself in the then-Chinese capital in 1937, just as the Nanjing Massacre -- which saw invading Japanese troops rape and murder thousands of Chinese civilians -- is getting underway. A group of young prostitutes take refuge in a church near the brothel where they work, and Miller, donning clerical robes, offers them protection from the invaders. Flowers' female lead, newcomer Ni Ni, put herself out on a limb when asked if she felt a steamy scene between her character and Bale's was necessary, as in Ang Lee's Lust, Caution -- which had its sex scenes removed and earned a two-year industry ban for actress Tang Wei. "I really like Tang Wei and I think she's a wonderful actress, very beautiful, and I have learned a lot from her," Ni said. The film is set to open wide in China on Dec. 16, followed by a limited U.S. release on Dec. 23. Related Topics International Asia Christian Bale Zhang Yimou

'Glee's' Lea Michele Reveals Secret Behind Her 'New Year's Eve' Chemistry with Ashton Kutcher (Video)

When Rick Nicita joined Morgan Creek Productions in August 2008 as co-chairman, CEO James Robinson said the former CAA managing partner would have "a big palette" as his creative head. But the picture hasn't been pretty for the company behind such early 1990s hits as Robin Hood and Ace Ventura: Pet Detective.our editor recommendsCANNES: Morgan Creek Cancels Festival Party'Dream House' Loses Appeal for Rating ChangeDream House: Film Review During Nicita's tenure, Morgan Creek has released only one film -- the disappointing supernatural thriller Dream House, which opened Sept. 30 -- and has had other projects delayed while the company deals with the ongoing bankruptcy of its international distribution arm. Now Nicita could be leaving. His contract expires at the end of December, and the company tells The Hollywood Reporter in a statement that "Rick and Jim have not discussed Rick's contract." Typically, such a deal is inked well in advance of expiration. A source with knowledge of the situation said that Nicita is considering his options, including production opportunities and a return to the representation business. During his time at CAA, Nicita ran the careers of Tom Cruise, Al Pacino and Nicole Kidman, among others. Nicita and Robinson declined to comment. The future of the once high-flying film company is unclear. Morgan Creek still has a distribution deal with Universal, though the pact is set to expire at the end of 2012. And the company, co-founded in 1988 by Robinson and Joe Roth, had been slated to produce Major League 3, but Robinson said in February that he wouldn't risk working with star Charlie Sheen in the aftermath of Sheen's erratic behavior. A planned Tupac Shakur biopic remains without a director after talks with John Singleton ended. Singleton would have replaced departed director Antoine Fuqua on the long gestating biopic, titled Tupac. And in November, Morgan Creek pulled out of co-financing Warren Beatty's Howard Hughes biopic. Dream House, the thriller that starred Daniel Craig, Rachel Weisz and Naomi Watts, was the first film released by Morgan Creek since Sydney White, which came out in 2007 and underperformed. Dream House grossed $21.3 million domestically, but cost $55 million and required reshoots. (Morgan Creek pre-sold the film internationally, which would have mitigated losses; Dream House made about $4 million overseas.) But its director, six-time Oscar nominee Jim Sheridan, unsuccessfully petitioned the Directors Guild of America to have his name removed from the project because he was displeased with the finished product, according to an OctoberLos Angeles Times story. Meanwhile, the company's international distribution arm, Bermuda-based Inverness Distribution Ltd., filed for bankruptcy protection in federal court in May, citing debts of up to $100 million. The company filed for bankruptcy after a sharp drop in royalty payments from the licensing of its films. Inverness holds the rights to such movies as The Last of the Mohicans and Young Guns. In court filings, Inverness said it was roughly $74 million in debt on a $150 million loan issued by Societe Generale, ING Bank NV and Bank of Ireland, among others. A company spokesman told THR in May that the bankruptcy could result in Morgan Creek losing certain distribution rights in some foreign territories on some of its older films. Kim Masters contributed to this report. Email: Daniel.Miller@THR.com Twitter: @DanielNMiller Related Topics Morgan Creek Productions

Former 'Gossip Girl' Star Jessica Szohr's Werewolf Sex-Comedy-Horror 'Love Bite' Will get U.K. Deal

NY - The National football league is near to signing an eight-year extension of TV privileges deals to 2021 with broadcast partners CBS, Fox and NBC that will earn it about $3.2 billion annually, a 60 % increase within the current contract, the Wall Street Journal reported.our editor recommendsFox Sports Chief Talks Dodgers TV Deal, National football league Coverage (Q&A) Handled Dallas Cowboys Cheerleader Forced Off Twitter by National football league Franchise (Report) Plus, previous handles Wally Disney's ESPN and satellite television giant DirecTV are required to seal average media costs around $6 billion for that league. The National football league rejected comment, the Journal stated. "Nobody around the broadcast finish really wants to do without the National football league," Lee Berke, owner and analyst at LHB Sports, Entertainment & Media, told the Journal. "They're going without them at their very own peril, and every one of that will get considered in when determining to bid excessive.Inch "The National football league can also be expected to have to wait some additional games to produce another eight-week package earlier within the season on Thursday nights to become offered to cable systems," Nomura Investments analyst Michael Nathanson stated inside a report Tuesday morning. "We expect Time Warner's Turner Systems, Comcast/NBCUniversal's recently top quality NBC Sports Network (formerly Versus) and News Corp.'s cable systems to any or all bid strongly with this package." Nathanson computes a 6 %-7 percent compound annual rate of growth in costs for that broadcast systems within the existence from the expected new deals "as well as an starting point-up in 2014 of 20 %-25 %, or between $150 million and $175 million." The very first-year step-ups in costs "associate to an adverse mid-single-digit earnings per share headwind for CBS and low-single-digit headwinds for News Corp. and Comcast," the analyst outlined. Younger crowd informed: "In the end think the road has lengthy patterned the advantages of retransmission [consent costs], we feel that many designs include overlooked the pending step-as much as 2014 programming costs." The brand new National football league deal seems to permit TV Everywhere privileges for systems, that could help boost retransmission costs later within the deal, based on Nathanson. His earnings model for News Corp. already includes $190 million as a whole retrans revenue in fiscal year 2012, $400 million in fiscal 2013 and $600 million in the year after. For CBS, he projects $300 million in 2012 and $345 million in 2013, which Nathanson stated can be conservative. Email: Georg.Szalai@thr.com Twitter: @georgszalai Related Subjects NBC CBS National football league

Voir, Niko, Oceano link for 'Escafandra'

BUENOS AIRES -- Edgard Tenembaum, Paris-based producer of Walter Salles' "The Motorcycle Journals," is making his latest incursion into Latin American filmmaking with "Escafandra." Directed and put together by Pablo Reyero, whose multi-valued 1997 shanty existence portrait "South Pier" established him just like a seminal estimate the completely new Argentine cinema, "Escafandra" is structured becoming an worldwide co-production between Tenembaum's shingle Tu Vas Voir, Reyero's Oceano Films and Germany's Niko Film. It is simply tied lower a higher-notch Argentine cast: Leonardo Sbaraglia ("Red-colored-colored Lights"), Carlos Belloso ("The Holy Girl") and Mariana Anghileri ("Aballay"). Within it, Sbaraglia plays Pedro, who returns to his childhood town to be ready for that violent suicide of his father (Belloso), while his mother (Cecilia Rossetto) and sister wage a basic war along with his father's concubine (Anghileri). One of the Argentina's most artistically ambitious films set to shoot in 2012, "Escafandra" mixes past, present and future, Greek myths, magicians, monsters together with an aspiration-like narrative, Reyero mentioned. "An intimist story with facets of sci-fi, eroticism and horror," in Reyero's words, "Escafandra" might be the director's try to exorcize their very own father's violent suicide and also the own painful and surrealistic encounters dealing with it, he added. "Escafandra" will roll September in HD in Apartment Gesell, Buenos Aires province. Film uses "realistic" effects within the kind of "Let the most appropriate one In," Tenembaum mentioned. Reyero's "The Southern Mix," a hard drug heist fall-out drama, carried out Cannes 2003 Not Sure Regard. Contact the number newsroom at news@variety.com

REVIEW: Ralph Fiennes Takes a Dud of a Play and Turns It into a Not-Bad Coriolanus

It’s dangerous to underestimate modern-day reinterpretations of Shakespeare, a la Baz Luhrmann’s William Shakespeare’s Romeo + Juliet and Michael Almereyda’s Hamlet, not because Shakespeare necessarily needs to be modernized, but because it’s astonishing how much retooling, rejiggering and restuffing he can withstand: His work is like a magic carpet bag that never gets filled up or worn out. So I was curious about Ralph Fiennes’s directorial debut, Coriolanus, in which Fiennes himself stars as Caius Martius Coriolanus, the uppity Roman general who finds himself in a pickle when the hungry people of Rome, suffering from a food shortage, decree that their plight is his fault. Proud of his military service and disdainful of those who haven’t similarly fought for their country, he denounces the poor, hungry masses, accusing them of, among other things, having bad breath. That plunges Coriolanus into a public-relations nightmare from which he can’t recover, the beginning of the end. When I saw Coriolanus at the Berlin Film Festival last February, no one I talked to — not even the random sampling of the British critics I know — had actually read the play. That doesn’t mean we shouldn’t have read it. But now that I’ve seen Fiennes’s version, I have some idea why the material doesn’t always find its way into the basic curriculum: It’s kind of a dud. No wonder it was the butt of an old Saturday Night Live joke, in which Robin Williams plays a Shakespearean stand-up who, after Coriolanus flops at the Globe, is cast in the lead of the theater’s next production, Hamlet, prompting the line, “Is that a dagger I see, or are you just glad to see me?” Then again, Fiennes isn’t exactly laughing boy, so Coriolanus isn’t such an odd choice for his debut film — and he doesn’t do half badly with it, either. Fiennes played the title role in the play 11 years ago on the London stage, and apparently, he’s been turning it over in his mind ever since. The resulting picture drags in places, but Fiennes works hard to keep the rhythm going: He stages hand-to-hand combat sequences and knife fights as if he were making a smart action movie, not adapting Shakespeare, which is precisely the point. He told The Guardian, “If Shakespeare was alive today, I think he would write very easily for the cinema,” and he’s probably right. Nothing perks an audience up like a good rumble, and Shakespeare knew just how and when to drop ‘em in. The cutting in Fiennes’s action sequences is clean and clear, not choppy. And Coriolanus’s tussles with his sometime-rival, sometime-cohort Tullus Aufidius (played by an amazingly not-horrible, if not exactly good, Gerard Butler) are worked out with the right mix of outright male aggression and twisted mutual admiration. It’s only when the two find themselves in the clinch, their musclebound arms wrapped firmly around each other’s necks, that they realize they’re just two sides of the same coin. This Coriolanus is set in, as a title card wittily tells us, “A place calling itself Rome,” and if it isn’t exactly the real Rome (Fiennes shot the picture in Belgrade), it still has the feel of a modern, besieged big city. (The screenplay is by John Logan, who also adapted Hugo for Martin Scorsese.) The angry mob Coriolanus faces is a grass-roots terrorist group; in their rage and hunger they storm Rome’s “Central Grain Depot,” a bit of made-up silliness that’s perfectly believable in the movie’s context. (At times, Coriolanus somewhat resembles Alfonso Cuarn’s dystopian fantasy Children of Men.) And if there are slack patches in the narrative, Fiennes and his fellow actors get us through them efficiently enough. Fiennes’s Coriolanus is a noble hard-ass with a scarred face and a shaved pate. He’s charismatic in a chilly way, and sympathetic only in the sense that, given his taciturn, rigid character, we can usually tell where he’s coming from. He’s hard to care for, but not easy to turn away from. But the sleekest weapon in Fiennes’s arsenal is Vanessa Redgrave, who plays Coriolanus’s tough-love mom, Volumnia. If Coriolanus is cool as steel, we can see where he gets it: Volumnia is his female counterpart, his true partner in his life’s work, as the story’s incestuous undertones suggest. (The young actress Jessica Chastain plays Coriolanus’s retreating, suffering wife, Virgilia.) Redgrave’s Volumnia has the carriage of a warrior queen, her voice the smoothness and the bite of honey still in the comb — she makes even the play’s densest language seem as if it were written yesterday, not 500 years ago. In choosing Redgrave, Fiennes went out and hired the best. She’s modernity and timelessness in one magnificent package. Editor’s note: This review appeared earlier, in a slightly different form, in Stephanie Zacharek’s Berlin Film Festival coverage. Follow Stephanie Zacharek on Twitter. Follow Movieline on Twitter.