Friday, 3 December 2010

What Are Your Favourite Films Of The Year? Awesome Unpublished Posters, Oscar Hosts Announced, Leslie Nielsen's Last Empire Interview

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This Week...
Snow, eh? Love it (everyone with any sense) or hate it (everyone who commutes), it's everywhere right now and we've been having a ball pelting Chris with snowballs innocently making snowmen. In keeping with the weather, you can revisit our great movie snow scenes feature, or if you're trying to forget the cold, warm the cockles of your heart with our new Tron covers. And you can also catch up on our Sharlto Copley webchat, wherein the star of District 9 and The A-Team revealed himself to be a huge Goonies fan, a cat person and a demon typist. As if that weren't exciting enough, voting has just opened for the Jameson Empire Awards 2011, which means YOU get to determine which beautiful, talented people making movies right now will get to turn up and receive the ultimate accolade: hanging with the Empire staff. Er. Receiving an Empire award, I mean. Either way, vote now, and decide whether fame or ignominy will reward the filmmakers of the last year...

Helen O'Hara
Deputy Online Editor, Empire


Inside The Issue
Tron Legacy: The Ultimate Guide It's almost upon us, but there's still lots to tell about Tron Legacy, and we have the full story. There are three rather spiffing covers to choose from (pick Jeff Bridges' Flynn, Garret Hedlund's Sam Flynn or Olivia Wilde's Quorra) and then everything that you might want to know about the film inside.

Oscars Special! True Grit, Johnny Depp, Black Swan, Annetee Bening, The King's Speech, Angelina Jolie...

Plus: Review Of The year, The Green Hornet, Drive Angry, Scream 4, The Muppets and much, much more.

Click here for details



Hathaway And Franco To Host Oscars
The Academy is hip and with it, man


Leslie Nielsen RIP
Acting and comedy legend dead at 84


Irvin Kershner Has Died
Empire Strikes Back director was 87

Exclusive: Somewhere Clip
While Sofia Coppola's latest slice of elegantly careworn drama Somewhere began its life as "Chateau Marmont" - a reference to the B&B of choice for Hollywood stars since the silver screen era* - its title captures perfectly the ennui and listlessly that infects actor Johnny Marco (Stephen Dorff). He lives in the aforementioned hotel, with room service, parties and flunkeys on tap, but has a life without meaning, a prisoner to his surrounds and his celebrity. Apparently that's all much harder than it sounds.

More New Videos:

  • Exclusive: Chatroom Featurette Aaron Johnson is our moderator.
  • Exclusive Dawn Treader Clip A sneak peek at the third Narnia film.
  • Frankie And Alice Trailer Online Halle Berry's got a split personality...
  • New Game Of Thrones Trailer & Stills Sure, it's TV, but it looks awesome.
  • Grave Encounters Trailer Online Paranormal insane asylum activity.
  • Exclusive: New Catfish Trailer Arrives It's love in the time of Facebook...
  • I would so hit my head on the boom.
    Phil discussing the perils of having sex during a TV interview.


    Irvin Kershner: Sometimes You Only Need One Film
    It's fair to say that the thousand of movie fans paying tribute to Irvin Kershner today are, for the most part, doing it because of Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back. Generally accepted to be the best of the series, Empire Strikes Back is a near-perfect film, setting a high bar for sequels that most of them fail to reach, let alone jump. And while many of Kershner's other films as director look set for obscurity (or already well down that road) this one alone will ensure him some sort of enduring fame. Sometimes all you need is one film. The catch is that you need one bloody brilliant film.


    Peter Weir Webchat
    One of Australia's finest exports, Peter Weir is one of the most consistently good directors out there, working in different genres, countries and decades but never making a bad film: check out Master and Commander, Dead Poet's Society, Picnic At Hanging Rock, Gallipoli and The Truman Show. As his latest film, epic prison break movie The Way Back, approaches its Boxing Day release date, we've got the Wizard of Oz coming in to face the questions of Empire readers and give us the scoop on his career to date. Come along on Tuesday December 7 at 1pm (GMT) and join us! It's like Christmas come early.

    Vote Now For The Jameson Empire Awards 2011
    Empire needs YOU. Yes, it's that time of year again, when we start girding our loins for the film event of the year. Well, next year. For the Jameson Empire Awards 2011 are coming - right around the corner, in fact, on March 27th - and we need you to pick the winners. After all, it's your involvement that makes the Jameson Empire Awards so goshdarned unique.

    Undeniably Awesome Unpublished Posters
    Poster campaigns are increasingly gargantuan these days - just ask Warner Bros. Harry Potter team - but still, some slip through the net: a few because they're just not good enough; some because they don't fit with the rest of the series; others, well, who knows? It's a collection of the amazing-but-not-suitable one-sheets that we've got here for you today, to judge, inspect, and decide whether they're better than the ones that made it. And yes, expect some Drew Struzan numbers - just because he really is that good.

    The Genius Of Leslie Nielsen
    Leslie Nielsen died last night at the age of 84, and the world just lost an essential bit of comedy. In tribute to the man who inspired a devoted following and launched a million quote-offs, we present a guide to some of his funniest and greatest moments. We're not going to write too much about his early career and serious roles (you can read more about that in our obituary here), but we have instead assembled his very funniest lines from his very best films. Read, imagine or remember Nielsen delivering these lines in his best deadpan, laugh, and remember a heck of a comedy talent.

    Ten Real-life Murderers More Terrifying Than Norman Bates
    Psycho is the daddy of all monster movies - a horror film-slash-thriller in which 'slash' is very much the operative word. That we know. What's less well known is that the inspiration for Norman Bates - as well as The Texas Chain Saw Massacre's Leather Face and Buffalo Bill in Silence Of The Lambs - was real-life killer Ed Gein. But how close did Psycho come to capturing his horrific crimes? And how close did David Fincher get to the truth of the Zodiac murders? We've taken our Taggart-like eye to analyse Hollywood's take on real serial killers. Step over our metaphorical yellow police tape to find out the real stories behind the screen killers...

    Diane Lane: Her Best Roles
    Horse-racing biopic Secretariat gallops into cinemas this week. While it might have the nag's name in the title, the real story is about the swift-hoofed horse's owner, Penny Chenery. Lane's enjoyed an eclectic career through the years, and we know she has plenty of fans among you out there, so we thought we'd list what we think are her best work...

    Mistakes Animated Villains Make
    With their dastardly, if complicated, schemes and endless resources, animated villains really should be running the world by now. Instead they occupy a hall of shame built from bricks made of crushed hopes and broken dreams. From Captain Hook to the lion-shaped fail that is Scar, they get an A for effort and a big fat F for execution. This week, though, Will Ferrell's space-fiend Megamind shows us that, if you do your prep and work really hard, you really can destroy all goodness and kindness in the world. Sadly, as Megamind discovers, you need an end game too. But with the help of our easy guide to the do's-and-don'ts of on-screen villainy (and a team of highly-paid Hollywood animators), you too can become an ultimate animated badass. Mwahahahahaha!

    Pint Of Milk: Leslie Nielsen
    Actor, comedian, deadpan genius: Leslie Nielsen will be much missed. He gave us belly laughs, magical moments, and, in Frank Drebin, the most brilliantly hapless cop in screen history. In January this year he sat down with Empire to run the interrogation gauntlet that is Pint of Milk. It was one of his last interviews. Here, in tribute to the great man, is that Q&A in full.

    The Ultimate Blue Picture Quiz
    Megamind is out this week, and as you might have noticed, he's a bit blue. To make him feel better (d'ya see what we did there?) we've gathered together a 30 strong collection of similarly azure characters from which we're asking you to identify their films of origin. Some of them are easy, some of them are crazy hard, all of them are blue -- in one way or another. And no, none of them are from "blue movies". Get your mind out of the gutter; this is a respectable website!

    16 Movie Stars You Didn't Know Appeared In Games
    If you've recently played Fallout: New Vegas, you'll no doubt have been surprised to meet a character called Benny Gecko, played by Matthew Perry, and another, a decrepit, rotting, zombie-like mutant by the name of Raul - voiced by Danny Trejo. That's right, Danny Trejo, as in Machete Danny Trejo, otherwise known as the world's greatest bad guy. So in honour of his gaming voiceover work, and his first leading role as Robert Rodriguez's Mexpoitation knife obsessive, here's some of Hollywood's finest who've appeared in non movie tie-in video games.

    Sharlto Copley Webchat
    In his brief feature film career, Sharlto Copley has already placed a prawn-like space alien and brought one of the most beloved and iconic TV characters to the big screen. Not bad for just two short years, no? Anyway, as he was in town, we thought we'd ask him to drop by for a chat. A webchat, in fact. Here's what's he said, all typed up by the man himself. Seriously, he put us to shame.

    Empire's Christmas Gift Guide 2010
    Did you know that there are less than 6 weeks worth of shopping days till Christmas? Did you know that horrendously well-organised people are already scooping up the best stuff out there? And of course you're probably still recovering from last year and wishing it was still June. But fear not! Empire is here to help, bringing you the coolest kit this Christmas for the discerning present buyer. After all, if you get good stuff for the people around you, they might get you good stuff in return. It's a double-whammy!


    Empire Movie Club
    2 months FREE DVD Rental with Empire Movie Club
    Empire Movie Club have teamed up with Quality Street Matchmakers to bring you 2 months' free DVD or Blu-ray rental. Getting your free trial is simple... All you need to do is pick up a promotional box of Matchmakers in store today. Then visit www.qualitystreet.co.uk and enter your unique code printed under the cardboard tray. Follow the instructions and you'll immediately be entitled to your free 2 month subscription to the Empire Movie Club worth over £25!.

    18+ only. Offer closes 30.06.11. Credit Debit card required to register. See promotional packs for details.


    Empire iPhone App
    Every movie review from the world's biggest movie magazine
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    Some rather nifty Fivepoint Gloves - allowing to use your iPhone without having to take them off! Quite handy for this cold weather.

    Sharlto Copley is a faster typer than I am.


    He has some VERY famous fans, who he was too modest to actually mention in the webchat but told us about off the record.


    "Therein" is the word that contains more other words within it than any other word in the English language.


    Nicole Richie's book Precious actually does NOT contain 50p's worth of laughs, so that was a bad investment.


    Alex Pettyfer is a big Empire fan.

    Daniel Radcliffe remains awesome. Sloths: your new most coveted pet. A cat being wrapped in Christmas paper. Happy Advent! Astoundingly purdy nature photos.

    If you have any timewasters to share, then e-mail them in to me.


    Monsters

    An amazing achievement for a 'first-time' filmmaker, which measures up to the finest indies for performance and character-work, and the biggest blockbusters for jaw-dropping effects. And it has the year's best sex scene, too.

    Also Out
    Secretariat Plenty of horse but not much power.
    Of Gods And Men Monk-y magic.
    Rare Exports: A Christmas Tale Better watch out, you better not cry.
    Easier With Practice The loneliness of the long-distance writer.
    Miral Uneven Palestinian drama.
    Megamind Triumph Of The Will (Ferrell).
    The Be All And End All Heartstring-tugging comedy.

    Watch Video
    This Week's Video Trailers And Clips
    Every week, our video player will update to show trailers and clips from the week's movie releases listed above.


    The Secret Of Kells

    Unlike anything else you've seen, and very much worth seeking out, this is a unique and beautiful creation.

    Also Out
    Joan Rivers: A Piece Of Work Biodoc of the TV legend.
    Lymelife The American dream turns nightmare.
    The Holiday Life-swap rom-com with Cameron Diaz and Kate Winslet.
    A Christmas Carol The spirit of Christmas via the medium of mo-cap.
    Peeping Tom Prototype stalk 'n' slash chiller.
    The A-Team If you need a loud action flick...
    Win a copy of Adobe Creative Suite 5 Production Premium with Monsters
    To Celebrate The Film's Release On December 3rd
    Click here to enter

    Win An Annual Cineworld Cinema Pass With The Warrior's Way
    In Cinemas December 3
    Click here to enter

    Win Heartbreaker On DVD
    Plus Dirty Dancing Keepsake Edition
    Click here to enter

    Win Les Miserables In Concert The 25th Anniversary Live At The O2 On DVD
    Out Now!
    Click here to enter

    Win Restrepo On DVD
    'The real Hurt Locker', out to own on December 6
    Click here to enter

    Win Step Up 3 On Blu-ray
    Out Now!
    Click here to enter

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