Cannes hands out its top prize Sunday after a marathon battle between heavyweights like Quentin Tarantino and Jane Campion, with the critics’ money on lesser-known names from France and Austria.
The notoriously extravagant festival toned down the glitz for this year’s crisis-era bash and was lighter than usual in star power, but it still saw celebs like Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie sashay up the fabled red carpet.
Billed as a battle of auteur titans, it mostly lived up to expectations, with Britain’s Independent on Sunday calling it “a superior vintage” and France’s Journal du Dimanche declaring “the return of great cinema”.
Sure, single papa Jason Mesnick’s Bachelor finale showdown — and subsequent After The Final Rose specials part 1 and part 2 — brought record ratings, but will the fan backlash end up hurting ABC’s hit reality series? Pick up a copy of Entertainment Weekly this Friday for our full report, including what advice season 2 Bachelor Aaron Buerge — who knows a thing or two about, you know, being despised for making a girl cry on TV — has for the ever-fickle Mesnick. Meanwhile, we checked in with the man who’s really behind the roses, exec producer Mike Fleiss, to find out what the hell went down over the course of what will now be known as The Best Season Of Reality TV Ever (well, at least to me it will)!
Taraji Penda Henson (born September 11, 1970) is an Academy Award-nominated American actress. She is best known for her roles as Yvette in Baby Boy (2001), Shug in Hustle and Flow (2005) and Queenie in The Curious Case of Benjamin Button (2008).
Ms. Henson has appeared in the films Four Brothers (2005), Talk To Me (2007), Smokin’ Aces (2007), Tyler Perry’s The Family That Preys (2008), and Not Easily Broken (2009). In late 2008, she starred opposite Brad Pitt in The Curious Case of Benjamin Button. Henson plays the role of Queenie, Benjamin’s mother, in a performance which has garnered critical acclaim and an Oscar nomination for Best Supporting Actress. She noted in an interview that, “Queenie is the embodiment of unconditional love.”
Henson has also been a cast member on several television shows, including Lifetime Television’s The Division and ABC’s Boston Legal for one season. Her recurring appearances in television include the character Angela Scott on the ABC television show “Eli Stone” in December 2008. She has guest-starred on several television shows, such as The WB show Smart Guy playing the role of Monique (1997–1998), the Fox Television show House in 2005 and the CBS Television show CSI in 2006.
Angelina Jolie (born Angelina Jolie Voight on June 4, 1975) is an American film actor and a Goodwill Ambassador for the UN Refugee Agency. She has been cited as one of the world’s most beautiful women and her off-screen life is widely reported. Jolie has received three Golden Globe Awards, two Screen Actors Guild Awards, and an Academy Award.
Though she made her screen debut as a child alongside her father Jon Voight in the 1982 film Lookin’ to Get Out, Jolie’s acting career began in earnest a decade later with the low-budget production Cyborg 2 (1993). Her first leading role in a major film was in Hackers (1995). She starred in the critically acclaimed biographical films George Wallace (1997) and Gia (1998), and won an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress for her performance in the drama Girl, Interrupted (1999). Jolie achieved international fame as a result of her portrayal of video game heroine Lara Croft in Lara Croft: Tomb Raider (2001), and since then has established herself as one of the best-known and highest-paid actresses in Hollywood. She has had her biggest commercial successes with the action-comedy Mr. & Mrs. Smith (2005) and the animated film Kung Fu Panda (2008).
Divorced from actors Jonny Lee Miller and Billy Bob Thornton, Jolie currently lives with actor Brad Pitt, in a relationship that has attracted worldwide media attention. Jolie and Pitt have three adopted children, Maddox, Pax, and Zahara, as well as three biological children, Shiloh, Knox, and Vivienne. Jolie has promoted humanitarian causes throughout the world, and is noted for her work with refugees through UNHCR. Read more
William Bradley “Brad” Pitt (born December 18, 1963) is an American actor and film producer, who first achieved stardom in several successful films in the mid-1990s. He has been cited as one of the world’s most attractive men and his off-screen life is widely reported. Pitt has received two Academy Award nominations and won one Golden Globe Award out of four nominations.
Pitt began his career in television guest spots, including a recurring role on the CBS soap opera Dallas in 1987. He gained recognition as the cowboy hitchhiker who seduces Geena Davis’ character in 1991′s Thelma & Louise. Pitt’s first leading role in a major film was in Interview with the Vampire (1994). He was cast opposite Anthony Hopkins in the 1994 drama Legends of the Fall, which earned him a Golden Globe nomination.
Ingrid Martz (born September 17, 1979 in Mexico City, Distrito Federal) is a Mexican actress.
She studied acting in El Centro de Capacitación Artística de Televisa (CEA).
Some of credited works include Luz Clarita (1996),María Isabel (1997), Preciosa (1998), Salud, Dinero y Amor (1997), Mujeres Engañadas (1999), Carita de Ángel (2000), El Derecho de Nacer (2001), El Juego de la Vida (2001), Amor Real (2003) and Amarte es mi Pecado (2004).
Just days before the Academy Awards, Best Actor nominee Brad Pitt enjoyed a boys’ getaway to Las Vegas – with his sons Maddox and Pax.
The guys of the Jolie-Pitt clan (minus 7-month old Knox), were spotted at the Hard Rock Hotel & Casino Wednesday evening.
Pitt took Pax, 5, and Maddox, 7, to see the Cirque du Soleil’s show, KA, at the MGM Grand Hotel & Casino. Wearing his signature newsboy cap, the star had a Heineken, while the boys munched on popcorn and enjoyed the festivities of KA’s 2000th show celebration. In the end, the group was able to slip out of the theater unnoticed by most patrons – even as Pitt carried a sleeping Pax in his arms.
Salma Valgarma Hayek Jiménez (born September 2, 1966) is a Mexican/Lebanese/French and American actress, director, and television and film producer. Hayek has appeared in more than 30 films and performed as an actress outside of Hollywood in Mexico and Spain. Hayek’s charitable work includes increasing awareness on violence against women and discrimination against immigrants.
Hayek is the first Mexican national to be nominated for an Academy Award for Best Actress. She is one of the most prominent Mexican figures in Hollywood since the legendary Dolores del Rio. She is also, after Fernanda Montenegro, the second of three Latin American actresses to achieve a Best Actress Oscar nomination.
The 66th Golden Globe Awards Ceremony was broadcast on January 11, 2009, from the Beverly Hilton Hotel in Beverly Hills, California, United States on the NBC TV network. The broadcast was watched by approximately 14.6 million viewers with a rating of 4.9/12.
The Curious Case of Benjamin Button is a 2008 American drama film, inspired by the 1921 short story of the same name written by F. Scott Fitzgerald. The film was directed by David Fincher, written by Eric Roth and Robin Swicord, and stars Brad Pitt and Cate Blanchett. The film was released on December 25, 2008, by both Paramount Pictures and Warner Bros. Pictures. The film received 13 Academy Award nominations, including Best Picture, Best Director for Fincher, Best Actor for Pitt and Best Supporting Actress for Taraji P. Henson.
Plot
The elderly Daisy (Blanchett) is on her deathbed with her daughter Caroline (Ormond) in a New Orleans hospital as Hurricane Katrina approaches in August 2005. Daisy tells the story of a blind clockmaker named Gateau (Koteas), who was commissioned to create a clock to hang in the New Orleans train station. After receiving news of his son’s death in World War I, he continued work on his clock, but intentionally designed it to run backward, in the hope that it would bring back those who died in the war.
She then asks Caroline to read aloud from a diary containing photographs and postcards written by Benjamin Button (Pitt). Caroline begins to read as the story transitions to Benjamin’s point of view.
On November 11, 1918, just as the people of New Orleans are celebrating the end of World War I, a baby boy is born with the appearance and physical limitations of a man who is 86 years old. The mother of the baby dies shortly after giving birth, and the father, Thomas Button, takes the baby and abandons him on the porch of a nursing home. Queenie (Henson) and Tizzy (Ali), a couple who work at the nursing home, find the baby. Queenie, who is unable to conceive, decides to take the baby in as her own, against Tizzy’s wishes. She names the baby Benjamin.
