Meryl Streep has already tied Betty Davis’ 10 Oscar nominations and two wins and will likely edge closer to Katharine Hepburn’s 12 nominations and four wins with her role in The Iron Lady.
Already nominated for a Golden Globe and winner of the New York Film Critics Circle Award, Streep is a shoe-in for another Oscar nomination.
The Iron Lady is based upon the life of Margaret Thatcher, Britain’s first and only female Prime Minister from 1979 to 1990 who earned that nickname for her strict conservative policies, hard line against trade unions and tough rhetoric in opposition to the Soviet Union to become one of the 20th century’s most influential women.
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Canadian director David Cronenberg is not a marquee name like fellow Canuck James Cameron or Steven Spielberg, but his name appears with them on various lists of Greatest Directors. His resume includes Videodrome, The Dead Zone, The Fly, Dead Ringers, Crash, and many others and his latest is A Dangerous Method, based upon the play The Talking Cure.
Set on the eve of the First World War, it is based upon the true story of the turbulent relation ship between Carl Jung, his mentor Sigmund Freud, and Sabina Spielrein, the troubled beautiful woman who comes between the two of them.
Starring Viggo Mortensen, Michael Fassbender and Keira Knightly, it marks the third collaboration between Mortensen and Cronenberg, the first two being A History of Violence and Eastern Promises.
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How often do you hear of a Hollywood remake of an Icelandic film? Starring Mark Wahlberg, Contraband is a remake of Reykjavík-Rotterdam, which became one of the most successful films ever from that country.
Even more interesting is that the star of the Icelandic version, Baltasar Kormákur, is the director of the American version.
Wahlberg plays reformed criminal Chris Farraday who is forced back into running contraband when his bother-in-law, Andy, botches a drug deal. Chris only has hours to get the cash to settle Andy’s debt and must navigate a treacherous criminal network of drug lords, cops and hit men before his wife and two sons become targets as well.
Contraband also stars Kate Beckinsale, Ben Foster, Giovanni Ribisi and Robert Wahlberg, who is the older brother of both Mark and Donnie.
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Starring Queen Latifah and Dolly Parton, Joyful Noise is a musical-comedy-drama set in a small town in Georgia which has fallen on hard times and it is up to the local choir to lift their spirits by winning the National Joyful Noise Competition.
However, the normally harmonious choir is split when two of its leaders differ on how they can get there. Enter their respective daughter and grandson whose romantic sparks cause even more tension between them but those sparks may also hold the key to the choir’s success.
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And Beauty and the Beast re-released this weekend with a 3D makeover. It marks the first of at least four movies doing the same this year, the others being Star Wars Episode 1 in February, Titanic in April and Finding Nemo in September.
Rick Davis is the manager of the Capitol Theatre in West Kelowna.
capitol_wes@landmarkcinemas.ca
