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Angelina Jolie Snags Jennifer Aniston's Oscar Role James Hirsen, NewsMax.com
THE LEFT COAST REPORT
Headlines (Scroll down for complete stories): 1. Angelina Jolie Snags Jennifer Aniston's Oscar Role Hollywood insiders expected Jennifer Aniston to play the widow of slain Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl in an upcoming biopic. Aniston apparently thought she would too.
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But now the former "Friends" star is reportedly fuming over ex-hubby Brad Pitt's latest casting decision. Pitt has chosen to give the movie role to his present squeeze Angelina Jolie. It was Aniston who had convinced Pearl's wife to grant the film rights to Pitt and Aniston's production company, Plan B, in the first place. Ironically, Aniston had agreed to give Brad the ownership of the company as part of their divorce settlement. A source told the UK Sun, "She's horrified that Brad has handed the role meant for her to Angelina. It appears as though Jolie not only appropriated Aniston's spouse, she managed to obtain a role that had previously been viewed as a potential Oscar shot for Aniston. 2. KISS' Gene Simmons Gives Parenting Advice When he performs with the band KISS, Gene Simmons may paint his face, breathe fire, and spit blood, but he's not your run-of-the-mill hard rocker. "I've never been high, drunk, never smoked in my life," Simmons recently told The Associated Press. In my musician days, I had the good fortune of opening shows for KISS in the 1970s. Simmons was always a class act and approached his performance duties in a professional manner. Although he currently lives sans matrimony with partner Shannon Tweed, the parenting advice he gives sounds more like Dr. Dobson than Dr. Phil. Simmons has a new reality show on A&E called "Gene Simmons Family Jewels." The show features Simmons's kids, 17-year-old Nick Tweed-Simmons and 14-year-old Sophie Tweed-Simmons. "Our responsibility is to protect our kids, supply the money, and the structure and the love," Simmons said at a Television Critics Association meeting. "Their job is to do well in school and behave, period. This notion of parents having to go negotiate with their children who just learned to wipe their butts is out of the question." The Left Coast Report believes Simmons's advice could come in handy when negotiating with Kim Jong-Il.
3. ‘Pirates' Box Office Up, Disney Stock Down?
In the new Hollywood economy, the old formulas just don't seem to apply. While Disney's "Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest" was busy racking up huge box office numbers, the company's stock fell 4.1 percent. The entertainment giant confirms it is going to slash expenses, which will include laying off hundreds of people and reducing the number of films it releases. CEO Bob Iger has been focusing on the company's main brands Disney, ABC and ESPN, and the word is that releases from the less family friendly Touchstone Pictures division may be curtailed. Animated films, however, will not be cut back. Disney's situation serves to illustrate the waning influence of A-list actors on the industry. With the public having more entertainment choices, and with production and marketing costs going through the roof, some of the more high profile actors are in line for pay cuts. For example, Tom Cruise reportedly had to accept reduced compensation for the over-budgeted "Mission Impossible 3." And Cameron Diaz was allegedly strong-armed into taking a pay cut for the yet unreleased comedy "The Holiday." Concept hits like "The Chronicles of Narnia" or "Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire" are not dependent on big names or huge salaries. The Left Coast Report expects the Democrats to come to the aid of affected celebrities by proposing a federal Botox subsidy.
4. The Old Media Exploits the Troops The Old Media are invested in negative outcomes, and it shows. In their hyper-tabloid coverage of the soldiers who have been accused of wrongdoing in Iraq, the mainstream print and television media have tossed away the principle of presumption of innocence. Remember the media obsession with the now debunked story of missing museum artifacts? Or the ridiculous tale of the Quran that had been flushed down the toilet, which turned out to be fabricated? Accomplishments of the troops have been ignored as reporters busy themselves with counting up the casualties and pinning guilty tags on members of our military. Meanwhile, for weeks now in a political video advertisement, Democrats have been using flag-draped coffins of U.S. troops who died in Iraq. The ad, produced by the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC), features appearances by House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, ex-President Bill Clinton and Illinois Congressman Rahm Emanuel. (Emanuel also chairs the DCCC, which produced the spot.) The Left Coast Report is happy to report that the ad has now been pulled off the Web after more than a dozen Republicans and Democrat Reps. John Spratt of South Carolina and Chet Edwards of Texas, asked Emanuel to get rid of the military exploiting ads.
5. Oliver Stone Heralds ‘World Trade Center' Heroes
Ready for a shocker? Oliver Stone has made a movie that is sure to please cops, fire fighters, red-staters, the military, and even the GOP. Yes, you read the name correctly. It's that Oliver Stone. I recently had the chance to screen Stone's latest film "World Trade Center."
The movie I saw was not a final cut; it was a high-definition video version with a temporary score. Stone had prepared a written statement, which was read to the audience prior to the screening and explained the unfinished state of the preview cut. Notwithstanding, what came through on the screen was a tender rendering of a story that is rich with timeless themes. From the opening sequence to the end of the film, one can discern that Stone used painstaking care to tell the WTC story without embellishing it with a political agenda. Some on the left will be disappointed to find that Stone eschews the customary Hollywood conservative-bashing ritual. Instead, through his main characters, he elevates and celebrates the time-honored traditions of faith, love of family, and uninhibited masculine valor. "World Trade Center" tells the true story of Sgt. John McLoughlin (played by Nicolas Cage, "National Treasure") and William J. Jimeno (played by Michael Pena, "Crash"), two New York Port Authority police officers who were part of the first responders to place their lives on the line when the WTC was attacked on 9/11. McLoughlin and Jimeno were among those who attempted to evacuate tower 2. They were subsequently trapped beneath the rubble when the towers collapsed. Only 20 people were rescued from the wreckage in the disaster. Miraculously, McLoughlin and Jimeno were numbers 18 and 19. The two trapped officers survived the ordeal by talking to each other about their wives, kids, and life in law enforcement. Meanwhile McLoughlin's spouse Donna (played by Maria Bello, "Payback," "The Cooler") and Jimeno's pregnant wife Allison (played by Maggie Gyllenhaal, "Adaptation") attempt to hold their families and personal sanity together while they anxiously await news of whether their husbands survived the devastation. The overall casting of the film is outstanding with Bello and Pena stealing many a scene. Andrea Berloff's script provides a powerful subplot with the tale of Dave Karnes (played by Michael Shannon, "8 Mile"), a deeply religious retired Marine who in a spiritual calling feels compelled to put on his uniform once again, head out to Ground Zero and assist in finding survivors. You won't find the cynicism of "Wall Street" or political content of "Born on the Fourth of July" in this film, but you will see some of the grit of "Platoon. While "World Trade Center" recounts one of the many occurrences that took place on that mournful 9/11 day, it moves beyond the infamous and calamitous and explores the supernal courage and virtue displayed by ordinary Americans who when circumstances required were able to soar to extraordinary heights. Stone handles his task of cinematically relaying this true story with the kind of integrity one expects from a great journalist and the kind of artistry one appreciates from a veteran filmmaker.
Stone explained to film scholar Emanuel Levy the political restraint he exercised in making the movie: "These men were not concerned with politics. Although my politics and their politics are different, that didn't matter. We all got along. I can make a movie about them and their experiences, because they went through something that I can understand. Politics does not enter into it. The movie is about courage and survival." "World Trade Center" is set for release on Aug. 9. More than a mere chronicle of the nation's attack, the film is a homage to the courage and selflessness that were displayed amidst tragedy. Summer is the season for blockbusters that feature superheroes; the flights of fancy that include characters who are able to perform extraordinary feats. "World Trade Center" is about real-life superheroes. The Left Coast Report thinks Stone may have just performed the super-cinematic feat of his career.
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