Rachel Weisz is set to co-star with Colin Firth in The Railway Man. The Deep Blue Sea star is in final negotiations to take on the role of Patricia ‘Patti’ Wallace, the second wife of Colin’s character Eric Lomax, a second lieutenant in the Royal Corp of Signals who is captured by the Japanese army in Singapore during World War II. Eric is sent to a POW camp in Kanchanaburi, Thailand, where he joins thousands of other prisoners and forced to work on the infamous Burma to Siam ‘death railway’ and the bridge over the river Kwai. The real life story is based on former army officer Eric’s book which details his experiences as a prisoner of war, and how he set out decades later to track down his tormentors and exact some revenge. Patti was responsible for helping him to confront his fears and she also wrote to the man Eric held responsible for his torture. War Horse star Jeremy Irvine will play a younger version of Colin’s character during his time in captivity. Jeremy told the Daily Mail newspaper: “Lomax suffered cruel and horrible treatment. I’ve been studying what happened to him and it was grim.” Jonathan Teplitzky is directing the film, with Frank Cottrell Bryce and Andy Paterson writing the script. Teplitzky previously said in a statement: “The Railway Man is an amazing story and to have the chance to make it with Colin Firth as Eric is really the best gift any director could hope for.”

Source: Contactmusic

Rachel Weisz is always worried she will be unemployed. The Oscar-winning actress admits she is constantly concerned she will not have any work even though she has been working constantly for the last few years. She said: “I know I’m doing more than when I started. I don’t really know if it ever gets easier. “We all love to get jobs, but every actress is worried that they’re gonna be unemployed even at times when you’re doing very well.
The British actress will soon be seen in the role of Evanora, the sister of the Wicked Witch of the West in Sam Raimi’s Wizard of Oz prequel Oz, The Great and Powerful, and she reveals she is trying not to judge her while playing her. She told Total Film magazine: “I don’t really think of her as evil. The Wicked Witch of the East knows how to get what she wants, I guess. “I mean she’s bad, she’s very, very bad, but you know I try not to judge her while I’m playing her.”

Source: Contactmusic

Nicole Kidman’s new film The Danish Girl has been shelved following the departure of actress Rachel Weisz, according to a U.K. report. The movie was due to star Kidman as Lili Elbe, the first person in the world to undergo a sex change, and Gwyneth Paltrow was initially signed up as the lead character’s wife. Paltrow pulled out, as did her replacement Charlize Theron, and the project, backed by Kidman’s Blossom Films company, was due to move forward with Weisz in the role. Filming was due to begin in Germany in September 2011, but the movie has now reportedly been put on hold following the departure of Weisz and director Lasse Hallstrom. A source tells the Mail on Sunday, “Nicole initially approached Gwyneth Paltrow to play the artist’s wife and fellow artist Gerda Gottlieb, but she was too busy. Charlize Theron then took the role but had to pull out because of scheduling conflicts. “Rachel Weisz signed up last year but now she’s pulled out and the whole production has been thrown into disarray. Nicole is still determined to make this film, so she’s gone back to the drawing board.”

Source: Contactmusic

The Whistleblower
Drama
Director: Larysa Kondracki
Cast: Rachel Weisz, Monica Bellucci, Vanessa Redgrave, David Strathairn, Roxana Condurache
Rating: 3 (out of 5)
Rachel Weisz possesses this rare quality — she is beautiful without being distractingly gorgeous, the latter being a liability that sometimes prevents actresses from comfortably slipping into the skin of plain-Jane characters. In The Whistleblower, Weisz plays Kathryn Bolkovac, a police officer so dedicated to her job that she loses a husband as well as custody of her teenaged daughter over it. Apart from delivering a powerhouse performance, she also does a credible job of never letting us think of her as a gorgeous movie star.
Not only is she the best thing about Kondracki’s debut feature, but Weisz is also pretty much the only reason The Whistleblower doesn’t turn into a morbid docu-feature. The story, based on actual events involving human trafficking in war-torn Bosnia circa 1999, is extremely compelling. However, the film is emotionally distant, possessing a stubborn reluctance to delve into the emotions and motivations of all its characters. Weisz’s Kathryn, who takes it upon herself to be the eponymous whistleblower, adds a much-needed touch of humanism to this film.
In terms of subject matter, this film reminded me of the underrated Fair Game, starring Naomi Watts and Sean Penn, which released earlier this year. Watts played a role very similar to what Weisz has done here, and the two performances are comparable in their intensities and overall effectiveness. An Oscar nomination would be well deserved.
There is also a powerful ensemble cast of veteran actresses lending wonderful support here, from Vanessa Redgrave’s dignified portrayal of Madeleine Rees, a hapless UN official, to Roxana Condurache’s heartbreakingly good performance as Raya, a Ukranian teenage girl who becomes Kathryn’s reason to stay in Bosnia. Uprooted from her family, Kathryn’s motivations are clear — she sees in Raya her own daughter, and will do anything in her power to protect her.
Unfortunately, the script, written by Eilis Kirwan and Kondracki herself, doesn’t try and explain the motivations of the perpetrators of the crime (which apparently involves everyone from UN peacekeeping forces to high-ranking diplomats) apart from a throwaway line (“They’re whores of war”). This is just my opinion, but it’s always better when there is at least an attempt to deconstruct evil rather than just painting it all with the same shade of black.
This is not a film that entertains and allows you to slip back into your comfortable reclining multiplex chair while you dig into a large tub of popcorn. The Whistleblower is well paced, but frequently difficult to watch because of the graphic violence that is depicted. It packs a visceral wallop, but ultimately, one is left wishing Kondracki could’ve gone the distance and bundled an emotional wallop along with that as well.

Source: MiD-DAY.com

Actress Rachel Weisz talks about her time spent on the set of Dream House, a new horror film also starring husband Daniel Craig, reports the Inquisitr. “It’s very romantic and just unusual. I’ve never read anything that quite had the same tone of romance and the supernatural and horror and it’s a love story as well,” said the 41-year-old actress. Dream House tells the story of a family whose new home becomes their worst nightmare. Writer Will Atenton (Craig) and his wife Libby (Weisz) move their family to New England so that Will can focus on writing a new novel. Shortly after moving into their new home, the family discovers that a woman and her two daughters were murdered in the house and everyone believes the father was the killer. Now the killer is after Atenton’s family and he must solve the mystery surrounding the murder in order to protect those he loves.“I play Libby, Will Atenton’s wife,” said Weisz, “I’m in the suburbs, which is not somewhere I fit into comfortably, but my husband’s bought us a big house so I’m happy to be raising the girls there. I think I’m a bit of a fish out of water but actually, my character never has a scene outside of the house — I’m in my ‘dream house’ the whole time.” Craig and Weisz became involved in a relationship while working on the film together and were married earlier this year. The film debuted in theaters on Sept. 30 and was directed by six-time Oscar nominated director Jim Sheridan.

Source: ThirdAge.com

It’s always a bad sign when a studio fails to screen a movie for critics in advance of its release. But how bad could a film starring the likes of Daniel Craig, Rachel Weisz and Naomi Watts, and directed by Jim Sheridan (My Left Foot, In the Name of the Father, In America, Brothers) really be? Well, when critics finally had a chance to view the horror movie Dream House in theaters over the weekend, they agreed almost unanimously — it’s pretty horrible. Who’s responsible? Numerous reports prior to the movie’s release indicated that Sheridan and the producers clashed over the final cut after test audiences panned it — and that Sheridan lost. Nevertheless, it’s his name in the credits and many critics direct much of their scathing assessment of the movie at him. “Sheridan’s pacing is turgid and mournful, which lends the story … an air of ponderousness,” comments Joe Neumaier in the New York Daily News . “What on earth was he thinking?” asks Jeannette Catsoulis in the New York Times , who describes Dream House as “a haunted-house tale of gobsmacking foolishness.” “Sheridan can’t ever quite get hold of the tone,” remarks Mark Olsen in the Los Angeles Times . And Stephen Whitty comments in the Newark Star Ledger , “There is something sad buried deep in Dream House , something puzzling and scary and maybe even dead. Unfortunately, it might be Jim Sheridan’s career.”

Source: Contactmusic