Star Turns--What You Should Know About The Current And Upcoming Projects Of Your Favorite Players

By Guy Flatley

K

DIANE KEATON

MORNING GLORY

Rachel McAdams, Harrison Ford, Diane Keaton, Patrick Wilson, Jeff Goldblum, 50 Cent (Directed by Roger Michell; Written by Aline Brosh McKenna; Paramount)

Imagine this: Still half asleep, you click your remote to “Daybreak” one morning, expecting the predictably bland patter of the news show’s co-anchors to usher you calmly into the stress and turbulence of another day in urban America. Instead you are subjected to the shattering sight and sound of the normally polite Mike Pomeroy and Colleen Peck (Harrison Ford and Diane Keaton) as the veteran tube stars engage in a shockingly venomous, intensely personal war of words.

Riveting as the total loss of cool might be for thrill-starved viewers, it is not a scene destined to warm the hearts of the “Daybreak” people who gambled on the possibility that macho, hard-news Mike and girly-soft former beauty queen Colleen could combine forces and help raise the show’s sagging ratings. Who knew that they’d turn out to hate one another? Certainly not Becky Fuller (Rachel McAdams), the panic-prone wannabe producer who pitched the idea of this dream team in the first place. Oh, well, if Becky is fired, it won't be the first time. Maybe she's lucky in love? Nope. Her dashing beau, played by Patrick Wilson, seems ready to dash off in a whole new direction. Now Playing

NICOLE KIDMAN

RABBIT HOLE

Nicole Kidman, Aaron Eckhart, Dianne Wiest, Sandra Oh, Jon Tenney, Giancarlo Esposito, Tammy Blanchard (Directed by John Cameron Mitchell; Written by David Lindsay-Abaire; Fox Searchlight Pictures)

The serenity of a suburban family is shattered when a four-year-old boy is killed by the driver of a speeding car. Will a visit from the teenager who was behind the wheel bring solace to the boy’s mother, or will it fill her with rage?

David Lindsay-Abaire's play won the 2007 Pulitzer Prize for Drama, and Cynthia Nixon was awarded a Tony for her performance as the grief-ravaged woman. Does that mean Nicole Kidman, who received an Oscar for "The Hours," will be nabbing another statuette? Now Playing

THE DANISH GIRL

Nicole Kidman, Gwyneth Paltrow (Directed by Thomas Alfredson; Written by Lucinda Coxon; Pretty Pictures, Harrison Productions, Blossom Films)

Who was the first man in history to volunteer for the intricate, experimental surgery that would, with luck, turn him into a woman? He was a Danish artist by the name of Einar Wegener, and he embarked on his/her new life as the ultra feminine Lili Elbe immediately after being wheeled out of a Dresden operating room one earthshattering day in 1931.

In “The Danish Girl,” David Ebershoff’s well reviewed, vigorously fictionalized version of the facts, published in 2000, Wegener-Elbe was still legally married to Greta Waud, a wealthy painter from Pasadena, California, at the time of the surgery. And, according to novelist Ebershoff, Greta did not easily give up on her man, even after he’d became a woman—something Einar might never have dreamed of doing had his wife not persuaded him to slip into a lovely silk frock and sexy stockings and pose for a portrait she was working on.

The instant physical and emotional transformation astonished both Einar and Greta, and one can only imagine the depth and delicacy Nicole Kidman and Gwyneth Paltrow will bring to the roles of husband and wife, respectively, as they explore a brave, if baffling, new world.

The question is: Will Nicole, in the early, pre-op, scenes of the film, be half the man that Gwyneth was in “Shakespeare in Love”? Opening date to be announced

BEN KINGSLEY

PRINCE OF PERSIA: THE SANDS OF TIME

Jake Gyllenhaal, Gemma Arterton, Ben Kingsley, Alfred Molina, Steve Toussaint, Toby Kebbell, Richard Coyle, Ronald Pickup, Will Foster, Gisli Orn Gardarsson (Directed by Mike Newell; Written by Boaz Yakin, Doug Miro and Carlo Bernard; Walt Disney Pictures)

It’s beginning to look a lot like 1952. That was the year of “Son of Ali Baba,” in which Tony Curtis brashly threw himself into the role of Kashma Baba, a passionate young Persian who made it his business to rescue Princess Azura of Fez (Piper Laurie) from the clutches of an evil medieval Caliph (Victory Jory).

Today, we are still in the ancient land now known as Iran, but the new Prince of Persia is a conspicuously beefed-up Jake Gyllenhaal, and his pouty damsel in distress is the much-hyped Gemma Arterton. As for the totally hissable villain, just wait till you see Ben Kingsley turn on his sneer.

See this if you must, but you might be better advised to dig up Jordan Mechner’s “Prince of Persia,” the videogame series that entertained thrill-hungry civilians during the Gulf War. Or check out Netflix for “Son of Ali Baba.” Now Playing

GREG KINNEAR

GREEN ZONE

Matt Damon, Jason Isaacs, Greg Kinnear, Brendan Gleeson, Amy Ryan, Antoni Corone (Directed by Paul Greengrass; Written by Paul Helgeland; Universal)

The army officer played by Matt Damon is assigned to work with a CIA official on a mission to track down Saddam Hussein’s vanished weapons of mass destruction. One of the problems is that the duo spend most of their time in the Green Zone, the turf that is as safe as it gets in Iraq but also so sheltered that it is difficult to get a of view of what’s truly going on in the rest of the country. The thriller, based on Rajiv Chandrasekaran’s “Imperial Life in the Emerald City,” also stars Amy Ryan (“Gone Baby Gone”) as a New York Times reporter investigating the mystery of the missing weapons. Now Playing

SHAME ON YOU

Dennis Quaid, Greg Kinnear (Written and directed by Dennis Quaid)

Good old boy Spade Cooley was sometimes a bad old boy, most notably on the day in 1961 when he stomped, strangled and burned his wife Ella Mae to death in the presence of their daughter Melody. What madness drove the famed Western Swing fiddler to murder? You’ll find out a while after Quaid starts his cameras rolling on what he hopes will be a New Orleans location. Katie Holmes was set to play Ella Mae, but somebody must have talked her out of it. Greg Kinnear will be on hand, however, as warbling cowboy Roy Rogers. Opening date to be announced

KEVIN KLINE

AS YOU LIKE IT

Kevin Kline, Bryce Dallas Howard, David Oyelowo, Adrian Lester, Brian Blessed, Janet McTeer, Alfred Molina, Romola Garai, Justin Hoong-Fai Chan, Sacha Bennett, Yee Tsou, Paul Chan (Directed by Kenneth Branagh; Picturehouse)

Kenneth Branagh, who brushed up his Shakespeare impressively in filmed adaptations of “Henry V,” “Much Ado About Nothing,” “Hamlet” and “Love’s Labour’s Lost,” is at it again. But this time, with the complexly comic, gender-bending romance of “As You Like It,” he’s decided to stay behind the camera, and he’s taken the liberty of moving the magical Forest of Arden to 18th-century Japan. Bryce Dallas Howard and David Oyelowo play the love-struck Rosalind and Orlando. And if Kevin Kline, as mercurial courier Jacques, is even remotely as funny as he was playing Guy Noir in Robert Altman’s “A Prairie Home Companion,” we’re in for a rollicking time. Oooops! This one went directly to HBO/Cable.

KEIRA KNIGHTLEY

A DANGEROUS METHOD

Viggo Mortensen, Keira Knightley, Michael Fassbender, Vincent Cassel, Sarah Gadon, Andre Hennicke, Arndt Schwerinng-Sohnrey (Directed by David Cronenberg; Written by Christopher Hampton)

Keira Knightley, a visual knockout blessed with genuine talent, has yet to be hailed as a cinematic heavyweight. Maybe her failure to get the respect she deserves can be blamed on her frivolous participation in the slapstick drivel whipped up by the “Pirates of the Caribbean” mercenaries.

But advance reports suggest Keira may finally make the leap to celluloid aristocracy in director David Cronenberg and screenwriter Christopher Hampton’s adaptation of John Kerr’s “A Most Dangerous Method,” the solemn but provocative 1993 non-fiction book about Sabina Spielrein, a mentally disturbed 18-year-old Russian beauty who journeyed to Vienna in search of healing from Carl Jung, a popular disciple of trailblazing shrink Sigmund Freud.

Chief among Sabina’s problems in need of tending by Jung was her seemingly unbreakable habit of mentally coupling her food—be it breakfast, lunch, dinner or merely a snack—with repulsive images of her own feces and her own shamelessly hankering, hands-on father. Jung, played by swiftly rising star Michael Fassbender (“Inglourious Basterds,” "Fish Tank,” "Jane Eyre"), works some manly psychological miracles on Sabina and before long her sexual hang-ups have (mostly) flown away, as evidenced by the fact that she responds favorably to the notion of a full-throttle relationship with the romantic rogue—an arrangement that doesn’t sit too well with Carl’s wife and three kids.

Perhaps the biggest roadblock to a full carnal breakthrough for Sabina is erected by Dr. Freud (played by Viggo Mortensen, who triumphed as a walking, talking, slashing, shooting lethal weapon in helmer Cronenberg’s “A History of Violence” and “Eastern Promises”). Spoilsport Sigmund, having soured on his former protégé for a variety of reasons, engaged in an obsessive campaign to destroy his reputation as an honorable man of science. And, yes, Freud even enlisted the support of poor jilted Sabina—a woman he himself fancied—in his crazed scheming.

So, was Sig a prig or was Sig a pig? See “A Dangerous Method” and decide for yourself. Opening date to be announced

BEYONCE KNOWLES

CADILLAC RECORDS

Adrien Brody, Jeffrey Wright, Beyonce Knowles, Cedric the Entertainer, Mos Def, Eamonn Walker, Gabrielle Union, Norman Reedus, Emmanuelle Chriqui, Tammy Blanchard, Jay O. Sanders, Eric Bogosian (Written and directed by Darnell Martin; TriStar Pictures)

Chess Records, the Chicago label that first gave voice to some of the world’s top rhythm and blues greats, is paid tribute in this big-screen biopic written and directed by Darnell Martin, the woman behind various episodes of Law & Order, Grey’s Anatomy, ER and The L Word. Adrien Brody plays Leonard Chess, the company’s co-founder and the man who helped the legendary Etta James (Beyonce Knowles) kick a harrowing drug habit. Jeffrey Wright takes on the role of Muddy Waters, Moss Def is Chuck Berry and Cedric the Entertainer plays Willie Dixon.

In a New York Times article by Alan Light, Beyonce Knowles described meeting Etta James shortly after completing “Cadillac Records.” “She’s honest and no-nonsense,” said Knowles. “I know that in some interviews she was like, ‘I don’t know if she can play me.’ But when I met her, she said, ‘You are a bad girl,’ and I know that’s the ultimate compliment from her.” Now Playing

KRIS KRISTOFFERSON

HE’S JUST NOT THAT INTO YOU

Ben Affleck, Jennifer Aniston, Drew Barrymore, Jennifer Connelly, Kevin Connolly, Bradley Cooper, Ginnifer Goodwin, Scarlett Johansson, Kris Kristofferson, Justin Long (Directed by Ken Kwapis; Written by Marc Silverstein and Abby Kohn; New Line Cinema)

Smart, attractive and variously driven men and women meet, mix, meld and sometimes split in exotic, erotic Baltimore. The star-studded story is based on the self-help book by “Sex and the City” writers Greg Behrendt and Liz Tucillo and is being directed by Ken Kwapis, who deserves credit for his contributions to television’s “The Office,” “The Larry Sanders Show,” “The Bernie Mac Show” and “Malcolm in the Middle.” Mention should be made, too, of Kwapis’ big-screen, big-flop “License to Wed,” starring a spectacularly unfunny Robin Williams as a man of the cloth who's determined to put Mandy Moore and John Krasinski through holy hell before stooping to marry them. Now Playing

ASHTON KUTCHER

KILLERS

Katherine Heigl, Ashton Kutcher, Tom Selleck, Catherine O’Hara, Katheryn Winnick, Kevin Sussman (Directed by Robert Luketic; Written by Bob DeRosa and T. M. Griffin; Lionsgate)

You thought Katherine Heigl got a raw deal as the trusting airhead who is impregnated by slothful slob Seth Rogen in “Knocked Up”? Then you may be happy to find her in the intimate company of a former CIA superspy, a smooth, sexy hero—played by Ashton Kutcher--who decides he wants to marry her the minute he meets her on the French Rivera. And before long, the newlyweds are cuddling  in the serenity of suburbia. But they do not live happily ever after. That’s because assassins from out of hubby’s past want to play a part in what is beginning to look a lot like a very short future.
 
Did we forget to tell you that this is a comedy? Well, apparently somebody forgot to tell the audience on the day the movie opened, because the tragic truth is that nobody laughed. So now “Killers” is giving “Sex and the City 2” heavy competition for the title of The Unfunniest Movie of the Year. Now Playing