Miley Cyrus

Miley Ray Cyrus (born Destiny Hope Cyrus; November 23, 1992) is an American actress and pop singer. She achieved wide fame for her role as Miley Stewart/Hannah Montana on the Disney Channel sitcom Hannah Montana. Cyrus recorded music for the soundtracks, Hannah Montana (2006) and Hannah Montana 2/Meet Miley Cyrus (2007), released by Walt Disney Records. With the success of the Hannah Montana franchise she established herself as a teen idol. In 2007, Cyrus signed to Hollywood Records to pursue a solo career. She embarked upon the Best of Both Worlds Tour the same year, in which she performed as both herself and in character as Hannah Montana. The tour was eventually turned into a high-grossing concert film entitled Hannah Montana & Miley Cyrus: Best of Both Worlds Concert (2008). In July 2008, Cyrus released her first solo album, Breakout (2008), which was commercially successful.

She began her foray into film by providing the voice of "Penny" in the animated film Bolt (2008). Cyrus earned a nomination for the Golden Globe Award for Best Original Song for her performance of Bolt's theme song, "I Thought I Lost You". She also reprised her role as Miley Stewart/Hannah Montana in Hannah Montana: The Movie (2009). The Hannah Montana: The Movie' soundtrack introduced her to new audiences within country and adult contemporary markets.

She began to cultivate an adult image in 2009 with the release of The Time of Our Lives (2009), an extended play which presented a more mainstream pop sound, and by filming The Last Song (2010), a coming-of-age drama film. The former included Cyrus's best-selling single, "Party in the U.S.A." (2009). A studio album titled Can't Be Tamed was released in 2010 and presents a new dance-pop sound. The music video and lyrics of the album's lead single, "Can't Be Tamed", portrays a more sexualized image for the entertainer. Cyrus ranked number thirteen on Forbes' 2010 Celebrity 100.

Halle Berry Suka Jalan-jalan Tanpa Busana

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Aktris peraih Oscar, Halle Berry, secara terbuka mengakui bahwa dirinya menyukai ketelanjangan. Makanya, jangan heran bila ia kadang-kadang melepas pakaian bila sedang berada di kediamannya.

Saat menjadi bintang tamu di acara The Ellen DeGeneres Show, perempuan berusia 44 tahun itu membocorkan hal tersebut. Kata dia, bila dia sedang ingin tampil polos, ia suka jalan-jalan di sekitar rumahnya dalam keadaan bugil.

Nah, jika Anda menemukan dirinya dalam keadaan tersebut, kata Berry, bisa berarti itu hari keberuntungannya. "Tapi ya kadang-kadang," ujar Berry menggoda.

Sumber: Kompas

Film Angelina Jolie Dapat Izin dari Pemerintah Bosnia

Angelina Jolie bisa tersenyum bahagia. Izin untuk menggarap filmnya akhirnya diberikan juga oleh pemerintah Bosnia.

Mengutip laporan dari laman Reuters, Rabu (20/10), Menteri Kebudayaan Bosnia, Gavrilo Grahovac, telah membaca naskah film yang hendak digarap oleh Jolie tersebut. Usai membaca, izin pun ia teken.

Izin ini dikeluarkan setelah sang menteri bertemu dengan Bakira Hasecic. Hasecic adalah kepala Asosiasi Perempuan Korban Perang di Sarajevo yang tidak setuju dengan cerita film Angelina yang akan diangkat ke layar lebar. Namun semua persoalan itu kini sudah tidak lagi mengganggu.

Seperti disampaikan produser film tersebut, Edin Sarkic, Jolie dan krunya kini telah siap untuk memulai proses pembuatan filmnya di Sarajevo pada bulan depan.

''Sekarang ini saya sudah bisa memulai persiapan untuk proses shooting, di mana proses itu sempat terhenti pada pekan yang lalu,'' kata Sarkic. ''Ini menjadi sebuah hal yang sangat penting buat Bosnia di mana akan ada seorang bintang besar yang akan datang ke Sarajevo.''

Sementara, Jolie dalam sebuah pernyataan tertulis yang disampaikan pada pekan lalu menyebutkan akan menjadi sungguh memalukan dan sangat tak adil jika penolakan itu datang dari informasi yang keliru. ''Harapan saya, orang-orang itu harusnya bisa memberikan penilaiannya sampai mereka telah menyaksikan filmnya,'' ungkap Jolie.

Minka Kelly

Minka Dumont Kelly (born June 24, 1980) is an American actress. She starred in the NBC series Friday Night Lights as Lyla Garrity from 2006 to 2009.

Kelly was born in Los Angeles, California. She is the only child of former Aerosmith guitarist Rick Dufay and Maureen Kelly, an exotic dancer and single mother who often moved with her daughter to different communities before settling in Albuquerque, New Mexico, by the time Minka was in junior high school. Kelly has recalled her childhood as "pretty rough". She resented Dufay, as he had abandoned her and her mother. However, at seventeen, she attempted to reconcile with him by inviting him to New Mexico. She is of Irish and French descent.

At 19, after graduating from high school, Kelly returned to Los Angeles. While on a test shoot for a modeling agency, she was approached by a former Playboy Playmate interested in managing her, and who placed Kelly as a receptionist at a surgeon's office who would provide Kelly breast augmentation in exchange for hours worked. She then attended school for a year to become a surgeon's assistant, afterwards working as a scrub tech. She spent four years in that vocation while also auditioning as an actress before landing the new NBC television drama Friday Night Lights, based on the high school football movie of that name. In the interim, she had small roles in movies and shows, including the film State's Evidence, and a recurring-guest role on the TV sitcom What I Like About You.

In preparation for her role as cheerleader Lyla Garrity on Friday Night Lights, she trained with the Pflugerville High School cheerleading squad. Kelly received praise for her acting on the series, with the The New York Times calling her performance "heartbreaking".

She shot a cameo for The Kingdom, alongside Jamie Foxx. Peter Berg, the creator and pilot director of Friday Night Lights, directed the film. Kelly was the lead actor on the The CW's 2009 pilot Body Politic which did not go to series.

Minka joined forces with Alyson Hannigan, Jaime King, Emily Deschanel, and Katharine McPhee in a video slumber party featured on FunnyorDie.com to promote regular breast cancer screenings for the organization Stand Up 2 Cancer.

Minka Kelly landed a role in the CBS comedy pilot True Love as Kate, a Midwestern girl who falls in love with Henry — part of the quartet in the ensemble show — at the top of the Empire State Building, but was replaced by Sarah Chalke.

The actress currently guest stars in the NBC primetime series Parenthood.

Minka was named 'Sexiest Woman Alive' by Esquire magazine for 2010.

Angelina Jolie Didapuk Jadi Cleopatra

James Cameron dan Sony Pictures dikabarkan akan bekerjasama untuk menggarap film Cleopatra. Dilansir oleh Wartakotalive.com, Sutradara film Avatar tersebut, rencananya akan melibatkan Angelina Jolie untuk menjadi Cleopatra.

Meskipun keterlibatan wanita berusia 35 tahun itu belum resmi diumumkan, namun dalam berita yang dikutip Aceshowbiz mengatakan bahwa Jolie sangat khawatir untuk ikut terlibat dalam film tersebut.

Selain itu pejabat Sony Pictures, Amy Pascal dikabarkan ingin memiliki franchise Angelina Jolie seperti ia memiliki franchise Adam Sandler dan Will Smith.

“Dia adalah bintang yang sesungguhnya, dan seharusnya dia tahu bahwa ia dilahirkan untuk memainkan bagian ini, karena ini adalah pahlawan perempuan terbesar yang pernah hidup,” ujar Pascal.

Cleopatra akan diproduseri oleh Scott Rudin dengan mengadaptasi dari buku Stacy Schiff yang berjudul Cleopatra: A Life.

Buku tersebut menceritakan perjuangan politik Cleopatra dalam mengatasi kudeta yang dirancang oleh pendukung saudara laki-lakinya, kisah cintanya dengan Julius Caesar, 9 tahun hubungan perselingkuhannya dengan Mark Anthony, dan kematiannya.

Angelina Jolie saat ini sedang menggarap debut filmnya yang mengisahkan kisah cinta saat perang Bosnia. Sementara itu, James Cameron sedang disibukkan dengan film terbarunya, Fantastic Voyage, sebelum kembali ke bangku sutradara untuk menyutradarai sekuel Avatar.

Kristen Bell

Kristen Anne Bell (born July 18, 1980) is an American actress. Although her first film role was an uncredited appearance in Polish Wedding, Bell previously acted in stage and musical productions. In 2001, she made her Broadway debut as Becky Thatcher in The Adventures of Tom Sawyer. After re-locating to Los Angeles, Bell landed various television guest appearances and small film parts, before she gained fame as the title role on the critically acclaimed television series, Veronica Mars from September 2004 to May 2007.

During her time on Veronica Mars, Bell reprised her role as Mary Lane in the film version of Reefer Madness: The Movie Musical, a stage production she had taken part in. She also portrayed the lead role in Pulse, a remake of a J-Horror film. In 2007, she joined the cast of Heroes playing the character Elle Bishop, and Gossip Girl as the offscreen titular narrator. Additionally, she played the title character in the comedy movie Forgetting Sarah Marshall. Bell has received a Satellite Award and Saturn Award, and has been nominated several times for Television Critics Association Awards and Teen Choice Awards.

Bell was born and raised in Huntington Woods, Michigan, a suburb of Detroit. She is the daughter of Tom Bell, a television news director, and Lorelei "Lori" Bell, a registered nurse. Bell is of Polish and Scottish descent. Her parents divorced when she was two years old, and she has two half sisters, Sara and Jody, from her father's second marriage. Bell has a lazy eye which affects her right eye. She inherited it from her mother, who had it corrected as a child. Bell claims that if she does not get enough sleep, it furthers the ailment. She nicknames her right eye "Wonky".

At the age of four, Bell claimed she did not like her first name and opted to change it to "Smurfette" after the character in the The Smurfs. However, her mother convinced Bell to go by her middle name of Anne instead; she used the name Annie until high school. She attended Burton Elementary school in Huntington Woods where she studied singing and tap dancing.

Just before her freshman year of high school, Bell's parents decided to pull her from the public school system. She then attended Shrine Catholic High School in nearby Royal Oak, where she took part in the drama and music club. During her time at the school, she won the starring role in the school's 1997 production of The Wizard of Oz as Dorothy Gale and also appeared in productions of Fiddler on the Roof (1995), Lady Be Good (1996), and Li'l Abner (1998). In 1998, the year she graduated, Bell was named the yearbook's "Best Looking Girl" by senior class vote.

When Bell was 17, her best friend Jenny DeRita, whom she met at age 11 during a Detroit community theater production, was killed in an automobile accident. Bell said that it was "both the best and worst thing that has ever happened to me. [...] Once you learn not to take people for granted, you live a lot happier life."

Shortly after her high school graduation, Bell moved to New York and attended the Tisch School of the Arts at New York University, majoring in musical theater. In 2001, during her senior year at New York University, Bell left a few credits shy of graduating to take a role in the Broadway musical version of The Adventures of Tom Sawyer.

Career

In 1992, Bell went to her first audition and won a dual role as a banana and a tree in a suburban Detroit theater's production of Raggedy Ann and Andy. Her mother had established her with an agent before Bell was 13, which allowed her to appear in newspaper advertisements for several Detroit retailers and television commercials. She also began private acting lessons. In 1998, she appeared with an uncredited role in the locally filmed movie Polish Wedding.

Kristen Bell also portrays Sally Wister in The History Channel’s Choosing Sides: Young Voices on the Revolution currently showing at Independence Hall visitors center in Philadelphia.

In 2001, Bell left New York University to take a key role as Becky Thatcher in the short-lived Broadway musical of The Adventures of Tom Sawyer. That same year she made her credited film debut in Pootie Tang. However, her one line in the film was cut and her appearance exists only as a scene shown during the credit sequence. Additionally, she auditioned for the television series Smallville for the role of Chloe Sullivan, a part eventually won by Allison Mack. In 2002, she appeared in the Broadway revival of The Crucible with Liam Neeson, Angela Bettis and Laura Linney. Bell then moved to Los Angeles, California in 2002 because of her friendship with writers Kevin Murphy and Dan Studney, and appeared in a handful of television shows as a special guest, finding trouble gaining a recurring role in a television series. Bell had "tested like eight times and booked nothing and every show [she] tested for got picked up," including auditions for Skin and a Norm Macdonald series. In 2003, she landed a role in the Hallmark Channel movie The King and Queen of Moonlight Bay.

In 2004, Bell appeared in the Lifetime television movie Gracie's Choice, which received one of the network's highest ratings. She made her debut in a theatrically released film, with David Mamet's Spartan, as Laura Newton, the kidnapped daughter of the U.S. President, acting alongside Val Kilmer. Bell also guest-starred on the HBO's drama Deadwood in a two-episode story arc ("Bullock Returns to the Camp" and "Suffer the Little Children").

She then won the role of the title character in UPN's drama Veronica Mars, which was launched in the fall of 2004. Created by Rob Thomas, Bell starred as the seventeen year old detective Veronica, which put her alongside actors Enrico Colantoni who played her father, Jason Dohring, Percy Daggs III and Ryan Hansen. Bell noted the parallels between the character of Veronica and her own life - Bell's parents had divorced and her best friend had also died, like that of Veronica. The series earned positive reviews from television critics, as did Bell's performance. Some critics felt that she was overlooked, however, and deserved an Emmy Award nomination. As a writer at the tvaddict.com commented, "[Bell's] complete lack of Emmy recognition proves that voters don’t actually watch the tapes before they vote."

In 2005, Bell starred in Reefer Madness: The Movie Musical, reprising the role she played in the short-lived 2001 off-broadway musical. The musical was a spoof of the 1936 exploitation film of the same name. Reefer Madness: The Movie Musical debuted on the Showtime network on April 16, 2005. On September 18, 2005, Bell performed the theme song from Fame on the "Emmy Idol" portion of the 57th Annual Primetime Emmy Awards. She and the cast of Veronica Mars were nominated for two Teen Choice Awards in 2005: "Choice Breakout Actress" and "Choice Breakout TV Show".

Still in 2005, Bell was named by Jane magazine as "one of the 11 people you'd most like to see naked", and in 2006, Bell was selected "World's Sexiest Vegetarian" on PETA's yearly poll. She was placed #68 on Maxim's 2005 "Hot 100" list, #11 in Maxim's 2006 "Hot 100" list, and #46 in Maxim's 2007 "Hot 100" list in which she was stated to have "single-handedly saved the CW from becoming the worst network ever." In 2006, Maxim also placed Bell at the top of the "Fall TV's Criminally Sexy Investigators" List. In 2008, she was featured at #59 on Ask Men's Top 99 Women of 2008 List. Reflecting on her admitted popularity with "geeks", Bell was voted the fourth sexiest woman on TV by the staff at Wizard magazine.

She claims to have never thought of herself as womanly because she "always play[ed roles] and look[ed] and act[ed] 10 years younger than [she is]", however as she explains, "Something magical happened when I turned 25 — I looked in the mirror and was like, You might not get carded for an R-rated movie anymore. Like I didn’t have a little stick figure anymore." Bell has said that many of the characters she has played are tomboys because she was "not homely enough to play the nerdy girl and not nearly pretty enough to play the pretty girl".

Bell has been associated with the idea that "nerdy is the new cool", and she explains, "what was previously perceived as nerdy is now viewed as original. What I like about nerdiness, geekiness, is it doesn’t really matter what you’re into — it just means you’re not a follower." She has also said, "I love nerds. Comic-Con junkies are the tastemakers of tomorrow. Isn't that funny? The tables have turned." Vanessa Juarez of Entertainment Weekly commented that Bell's role on Veronica Mars, Heroes and as a Star Wars fanatic in the upcoming Fanboys has "solidif[ied] her placement at the center of the geek universe", while Rodney Rothman stated, "I guess she's cornered the market on losers." Bell's work is often compared to Sarah Michelle Gellar's portrayal of the titular character on the cult television series Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Frank Scheck of The Hollywood Reporter stated that Bell was "arguably the television successor [to Gellar's portrayal of Buffy] when it comes to fighting bad guys."

Despite "new celebrity" status, Bell claims that she is not concerned because "no one ever recognizes [her] anyway". As Bell explains, "I hang out with Hayden quite a bit — they never take pictures of me. I just step to the side, and I push myself in front of her when she wants to get out of it, or put her in the car."

In 2006, Bell won the Saturn Award for "Best Actress on Television" for her acting on Veronica Mars, while the series was nominated for "Best Network Television Show". Aside from working on Veronica Mars, in April, Bell starred as Gracie in Fifty Pills, an entry for the Tribeca Film Festival. She appeared in a short independent film called The Receipt and the horror film Roman, which was directed by her The Crucible co-star Angela Bettis. Released on August 11, 2006, Pulse starred Bell as the lead Mattie. A remake of the Japanese horror film Kairo, the film grossed $27.9 million worldwide, however it garnered negative response from critics. Frank Scheck of The Hollywood Reporter commented, "despite the starring presence of Kristen Bell, [the] young actress has far less interesting material to work with here than she does as [the character] "Veronica Mars.""

Veronica Mars continued on UPN until the third season, in which the show was renewed and returned on the newly created The CW. On January 19, 2007 CW Entertainment President Dawn Ostroff announced that, while she was pleased with the gradual improvement of Veronica Mars's ratings, the series would be put on hiatus after February sweeps to air a new reality series, Pussycat Dolls Present. On May 17, 2007 Ostroff announced the cancellation of the series. The two-hour series finale aired in the United States on May 22, 2007, and on June 11, 2007 Thomas officially announced in an email to TV Guide's Michael Ausiello that Veronica Mars had been canceled by the CW. A Veronica Mars feature film and comic book series continuation had been discussed, and for a short time there was talk of another collaboration between Bell and creator Thomas that would be unrelated to the Veronica Mars series.

Following the cancellation of Veronica Mars, Bell had voiced interest in appearing on Heroes because she was a fan previous to being cast. On July 29, 2007, during a train ride back to Los Angeles from the San Diego Comic-Con with Heroes actors Zachary Quinto and Masi Oka, and writers from the series, the writers had mentioned that if she "ever want[ed] to come on Heroes, give us [writers] a call," to which Bell said she would love to. She was also spoken to about a role on Lost, but was not offered one despite speculation that she was to portray Charlotte Staples Lewis. Announced in August 2007, Bell was to portray Elle Bishop, a "mysterious young lady" with an "awesome power". She did not have to audition for the role of Elle, who made her first appearance in an October 2007 episode, and will appear in at least thirteen episodes during the run of the series. The casting of Bell, as Heroes creator Tim Kring explains, "was not easy to pull off", but because of the large ensemble cast of the series and multiple story arcs, "we found a way to jump into a small window in [Bell’s] schedule." Concurrently with filming on Heroes, she narrates as title character in the CW series Gossip Girl.

Shortly after the cancellation of Veronica Mars in early 2007, Bell filmed on location in Hawaii for her starring role as the title character in the Judd Apatow comedy Forgetting Sarah Marshall. She noted that the improvisational comedy in the film was "a lovely experience". The film, written by and also starring Jason Segel was released theatrically on April 18, 2008. Bell lent her voice and likeness to the video game Assassin's Creed which was released on November 13, 2007 for the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 and April 8, 2008 for the PC. Bell reprises her role of Lucy in the upcoming Assassin's Creed II set for release on November 17, 2009. In the spring of 2006, she finished filming the Star Wars-themed comedy Fanboys, which had its release date pushed to January 14, 2008. This was due to additional funding given to director Kyle Newman to shoot new scenes, however, the busy schedules of the actors only allowed for filming in September 2007, thus moving the release date to accommodate that. Bell will voice the character of Marybelle in the animated feature Sheepish, which also has a 2008 release date. She will also star in the comedy Serious Moonlight, alongside Meg Ryan. The film is in post-production and has an estimated 2009 release date. On March 31, 2008 Bell began shooting for the Mark Steven Johnson-written Disney film When in Rome in locations in Rome and New York. Bell co-starred in the 2009 film Couples Retreat, a comedy chronicling four couples who partake in therapy sessions at a tropical island resort. Jason Bateman played her husband.

Bell has also said that when she is free from film and television roles, she would like to perform on stage again. She will co-star with singers Christina Aguilera and Cher in the musical, Burlesque currently (2009) in production.

Paranormal Activity

Paranormal Activity is a 2007 "mockumentary" horror film written and directed by Oren Peli. The movie premiered at the Screamfest Film Festival in US on October 14, 2007, and at the Slamdance Film Festival on January 18, 2008. The movie is currently in limited release in several cities in the United States as of October of 2009. The movie centers on a young couple, Katie and Micah, who are haunted by a supernatural presence in their home. The movie is presented through the camera set up by the couple to capture the paranormal activity.

Plot


The movie begins with Micah testing out and playing with his camera. He talks about what they're going to do and how weird things have been happening in the house. A psychic is called in and learns from Katie that she has been haunted by a ghostly entity since her youth. The psychic informs the couple that they are being plagued, not by a ghost, but by a demon. The psychic explains that the demon feeds off negative energy so the couple must do their best not to antagonize it or give it reason to grow by way of being at each other's throats.

Micah continues his project. A camera is set up in the bedroom and, every night, it captures what happens as they sleep. There are some nights when nothing happens but, soon, minor things begin to occur. The bedroom door moves by itself and the lights turn on in the hallway on their own. Micah even finds strange tracks in baby powder that he smears on the floor prior to sleeping.

Things escalate as the couple hears a loud bang and then a door slams. Going to investigate this, Micah finds the attic door open inside the house. He goes up to the attic and finds a photo of Katie from when she was young. Katie is shocked to see the photo and says it's impossible for that photo to be in the house because it was burned to ash in a fire that consumed a home she lived in prior to this.

Strange things continue to happen to Katie at night. Sometimes, Katie will get out of bed and stand right next to the bed for hours, doing nothing but staring but never remembers herself doing this. She does this one night and ends up outside on a swing where Micah finds her but she doesn't remember it the next morning.

The nights begin to get more chilling as the sheets on their bed begin moving by themselves. One night, Katie is yanked and dragged screaming out of bed by an invisible force and down the hall. Micah has to give chase and forceably take her back. The next day, Micah notice bruises on her skin and a large mark that resembles a bite from an unknown source. The activity soon begins to occur during the day, indicating the presence in the home is getting stronger. During one afternoon, a photo of Micah and Katie is smashed, with most of the damage done to Micah's side of the portrait. They make plans to go to a hotel that night, hoping that the being won't follow immediately. But later on that day, Micah finds Katie sitting on the floor in a daze with her back against the wall, gripping a crucifix tightly in her hand. Micah helps her up and notices blood on her hands and leg from the crucifix. Micah soon tells Katie to get their things together so they can leave the house. But Katie now refuses, saying that she wants to stay. She tells Micah to trust her and that "everything will be fine from now on." Afterwards, she gives a disturbing smile to the camera.

Things come to a head a few nights later when Katie, for no reason whatsoever, gets out of bed and stands there again. But this time, she stares at Micah for two full hours. She then walks downstairs and begins screaming at the top of her lungs. Micah jumps out of bed as the camera remains fixed in the room.

From here, nothing is seen, the audience can only hear the activity downstairs. Katie continues to scream, some struggling is heard, and then dead silence. Moments later, footsteps are heard but are heavier sounding as if something heavy is going to appear. Suddenly, Micah's body is hurled towards the camera. He falls and doesn't move.

Katie is seen standing in the doorway with her shirt a bloody mess. She gets on the ground and crawls to Micah's body and, like an animal, sniffs at him. She sees the camera and smiles at it eerily, her face contorted and evil, appearing as though she has been possessed by whatever haunts the house. Katie lunges toward the camera with a loud scream and nothing more is seen.

An epilogue title card reveals that Micah's body was discovered by authorities a few days later but that Katie's whereabouts are unknown.

Alternate endings

Several blogs and news outlets are reporting that the ending currently being seen in theaters for the limited screenings does not match endings previously seen in earlier screenings at Screamfest and the Burbank screening. However, outside of the blogosphere (which go off independent viewer reports), neither of the two alternate endings can be confirmed. Fangoria's review of the film does, however, feature a frame from one of the alternate endings wherein a catatonic Katie is seen sitting, alone, next to the bed in the bedroom after the apparent murder of Micah downstairs. Most of the reviewers express some discontent and disappointment with the ending but say that, while it is contradictory to the build-up and more conventional, it does work within the framework of the film.

Cast

• Katie Featherston as Katie
• Micah Sloat as Micah
• Michael Bayouth as the Demonologist
• Amber Armstrong as Amber
• Mark Fredrichs as the Psychic
• Ashley Palmer as Girl on Internet
• Randy McDowell as Lt.Randy Hudson
• Tim Piper as Richard

Whiteout

Whiteout is a 2009 feature film, based on the 1998 comic book of the same name by Greg Rucka and Steve Lieber, and released on September 11, 2009.[1] The film was produced under the banner of Dark Castle Entertainment by Joel Silver and Susan Downey, is directed by Dominic Sena, is distributed by Warner Bros., and stars Kate Beckinsale, Gabriel Macht and Alex O'Loughlin in the lead roles.

Synopsis

A U.S. marshal (Kate Beckinsale), the only one assigned to Antarctica, must investigate a murder there within three days before the Antarctic winter begins. She crosses paths with a U.N. operative (Gabriel Macht), also investigating the murder.She must chase down suspects and find more murders. Early in the story, Steko is attacked by the killer and left for dead in a storm. She saves herself but loses two fingers due to severe cold-related injuries.

For U.S. Marshal Carrie Stetko, things are about to get even more dangerous. The only law enforcement in this unforgiving territory, she has just been sent to investigate a body on the ice. Antarctica's first homicide. A shocking discovery in itself, it will plunge her into an even more bizarre mystery and the revelation of secrets long-buried under the endless ice--secrets that someone believes are still worth killing for. As Stetko races to find the killer before he finds her, winter is already closing in. In the deadly Antarctic whiteout, she won't see him till he's a breath away.

Tom Skerritt

Thomas Roy "Tom" Skerritt (born August 25, 1933) is an American actor who has appeared in over 40 films and more than 200 television episodes since 1962.

Skerritt made his television debut in the series Gunsmoke around 1959 and his film debut in War Hunt, produced by Terry Sanders and released the same year. Skerritt's notable film appearances include M*A*S*H (1970; his role was pared down considerably by director Robert Altman), Harold and Maude (credited as "M. Borman") (1971), Big Bad Mama, Cheech & Chong's Up In Smoke (1978), Ice Castles (1978), as Captain A.J. Dallas of the commercial towing vessel 'Nostromo' in Alien (1979), as a would-be astronaut in Contact (1997) and SpaceCamp (1986), and in Top Gun (1986), where he "flew with (Tom Cruise's) old man" as CDR Mike "Viper" Metcalf aka The Man.

Skerrit starred in the television series Picket Fences (1992–1996) in the role of Sheriff Jimmy Brock, for which he won an Emmy. More recently, he has starred in Homeland Security and The Grid.

He also portrays the deceased William Walker on Brothers & Sisters, having appeared in the pilot as well as in several flashbacks since. This is his second time playing the husband of Sally Field, the first being his role in the film Steel Magnolias. Recently, he has played the role of Ezekiel on ABC Family's Fallen miniseries. He appears as the guide on the showcase website for Microsoft's new operating system called Windows Vista.

He is now featured in advertising and promotion for The University of Kansas Hospital and Medical Center.

Skerritt was born in Detroit, Michigan, the son of Helen, a homemaker, and Roy Skerritt, who worked in business. A 1951 graduate of Detroit's Mackenzie High School, Skerritt attended Wayne State University and the University of California at Los Angeles. Since 1988, he has divided his domestic life between his Lake Washington home in suburban Seattle, Washington and a home on Lopez Island in the San Juan Islands. Skerritt has four grown children (three sons and one daughter).

Gabriel Macht

Gabriel S. Macht (born January 22, 1972) is an American actor. Macht is best known for playing The Spirit in the film of the same name.

Macht was born in The Bronx, New York, the son of Suzanne Victoria Pulier, a museum curator and archivist, and actor Stephen Macht. He has three siblings, Jesse (who appeared on The Next Great American Band), Julie, and Ari Serbin. The family moved to California when Gabriel was five years old. After graduating from high school, he attended Carnegie Mellon College of Fine Arts.

Macht married actress Jacinda Barrett in 2004. The couple had their first child, a girl, Satine Anais Geraldine Macht, born August 20, 2007 in Los Angeles.

Macht was nominated for the Best Young Motion Picture Actor Award after playing his first role at age eight in the film Why Would I Lie? under the stage name Gabriel Swann. He has appeared in many film and television roles including A Love Song for Bobby Long, Because I Said So, The Recruit, and Archangel. Macht played the title role in Frank Miller's 2008 adaptation of Will Eisner's comic creation The Spirit.

Jennifer Aniston

Jennifer Joanna Aniston (born February 11, 1969) is an American actress. She became famous in the 1990s for her role as Rachel Green in the US sitcom Friends, a role for which she won an Emmy Award, a Golden Globe Award, and a Screen Actors Guild Award.

She has starred in many Hollywood films. While most of her film roles have been in comedies such as Bruce Almighty, Office Space, Rumor Has It, and the romantic comedies Along Came Polly and The Break-Up, she has also appeared in films from other genres, such as the comedy-horror Leprechaun and the crime thriller Derailed.

Jennifer Aniston was born in Sherman Oaks, California, and grew up in New York City. She is the daughter of actor John Aniston and actress Nancy Dow. Aniston's father is a Greek American, born Yannis Anastassakis on the island of Crete, Greece, while her mother is of Italian-Scottish descent and was born in New York City. Aniston has two half-brothers, John Melick (older) and Alex Aniston (younger). Aniston's godfather was the actor Telly Savalas†, her father's best friend. She lived in Greece for one year as a child with her family, and they later relocated to New York City. Her father has appeared in the soap operas Days of our Lives, Love of Life and Search for Tomorrow. Aniston attended the New York Rudolf Steiner School and graduated from Manhattan's Fiorello H. LaGuardia High School of Music & Art and Performing Arts. She worked in Off Broadway productions such as For Dear Life and Dancing on Checker's Grave. She supported herself with several part-time jobs, including working as a telemarketer and bike messenger. In 1989, she moved to Los Angeles, California.

Aniston moved to Hollywood and was cast in her first television role in 1990, starring as a regular on the short-lived series Molloy and in the TV movie Camp Cucamonga. She also co-starred in Ferris Bueller, a television adaptation of the 1986 hit movie Ferris Bueller's Day Off. The series, however, was quickly canceled. Aniston then appeared in two more failed television comedy shows, The Edge and Muddling Through, and guest-starred on Quantum Leap, Herman's Head, and Burke's Law. After the string of canceled shows, along with her appearance in the critically derided 1992 horror film, Leprechaun, Aniston considered giving up acting. Aniston's plans changed, however, after auditioning for Friends, a sitcom that was set to debut on NBC's 1994–1995 fall line-up. The producers of the show originally wanted Aniston to audition for the role of Monica Geller, but Courteney Cox was considered to be better suited to the role. Thus, Aniston was cast as Rachel Green. She played the character of Rachel from 1994 until the show ended in 2004.

The program was successful and Aniston, along with her co-stars, gained wide renown among television viewers. Her hairstyle at the time, which became known as the "Rachel", was widely copied. Aniston received a salary of one million dollars per episode for the last two seasons of Friends, as well as five Emmy nominations (two for Supporting Actress, three for Lead Actress), including a win for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Comedy Series. According to the Guinness World Book of Records (2005), Aniston (along with her female costars) became the highest paid TV actress of all time with her $1 million-per-episode paycheck for the tenth season of Friends.

Jennifer Aniston has appeared in various commercials and music videos. In 1996, she was in Tom Petty and The Heartbreakers music video, "Walls." Aniston was in Melissa Etheridge's 2001 music video, "I Want To Be In Love." Jennifer Aniston was cast in a Heineken commercial which was later banned due to branding issues. Aniston has been in commercials for L'Oreal Hair Products. In 1994, Microsoft invited Aniston, along with Friends co-star Matthew Perry, to shoot a 30-minute promotional advertisement for their new operating system, Windows 95. She gained critical acclaim for her performances in The Object of My Affection (1998), a comedy drama about a girl who falls for a gay man, and in the low-budget 2002 film, The Good Girl, directed by Miguel Arteta, playing an unglamorous cashier in a small town. The latter film opened in relatively few theaters—under 700 in total—taking $14M in the U.S. box office. In late 2005, Aniston appeared in two major studio films, Derailed and Rumor Has It.

In addition to her career as a television actress, Aniston has enjoyed a successful film career. Her biggest box office success to date was her appearance in 2003's Bruce Almighty, in which she played the girlfriend of title character Jim Carrey. Aniston then starred in the 2004 film, Along Came Polly opposite Ben Stiller. In 2006, Aniston appeared in the low-budget drama, Friends with Money, which was first shown at the Sundance Film Festival, received a limited release. Aniston's next film, The Break-Up, which was released on June 2, grossed approximately $39.17 million during its opening weekend, despite lukewarm reviews.

In 2007, Aniston guest starred in an episode of Courteney Cox Arquette's series Dirt. Aniston played Arquette's snobby rival Tina Harrod. In addition to acting, Aniston has also directed a hospital emergency room-set short film named Room 10, starring Robin Wright Penn and Kris Kristofferson; Aniston has noted that she was inspired to direct by actress Gwyneth Paltrow, who directed a short film in 2006.

Forbes listed Aniston as the 10th richest woman in the entertainment industry for the year 2007. She is behind such powerhouses as Oprah Winfrey, J. K. Rowling, Madonna, Mariah Carey, Celine Dion and Jennifer Lopez and is ahead of Britney Spears, Christina Aguilera and the Olsen twins. Aniston's net worth is approximately $110 million. Aniston was also included in the annual Star Salary Top 10 of trade magazine The Hollywood Reporter for 2006. According to Forbes in October 2007, Aniston was the top-selling celebrity face of the entertainment industry. In 2008, Aniston landed the seventeenth spot on Forbes Celebrity 100 list based on "earnings and fame." Forbes listed Aniston's earnings as $27 million.

Aniston appeared in the third episode of Season 3 of NBC's 30 Rock playing Liz Lemon's old college roommate who stalks Jack Donaghy.

Aniston appears nude in a series of photographs that are published on the cover and inside pages of the January 2009 issue of GQ. She tells the magazine that she feels more comfortable today than she did in her twenties or early thirties. "I'm healthier. I'm more at peace in my mind and with my body," Aniston says.

On December 25, 2008, Marley & Me, in which Aniston starred alongside Owen Wilson, was released. It set a record for the largest Christmas Day box office ever with $14.75 million in ticket sales.It earned a total of $51.7 million over the four-day weekend and placed #1 at the box office, a position it maintained for two weeks. As of February 15, 2009 its total worldwide gross was $161,608,269.

Her next film in wide release, He's Just Not That into You, opened in February 2009. The movie made $27.5 million, ranking #1 at the box office in its opening weekend. While the film received mixed reviews, Aniston along with Jennifer Connelly, and Ben Affleck are often praised by critics as being the stand-outs in the film.

As of 2009, Aniston's movies have grossed $900,618,847 in the United States and over $1,508,048,564 worldwide.

On July 16, 2009, Aniston received an Emmy nomination in the category of Outstanding Guest Actress in a Comedy Series for her role on 30 Rock.

Kirsten Dunst

Kirsten Caroline Dunst (born April 30, 1982) is an American actress, model, and singer. She made her film debut in Oedipus Wrecks, a short film directed by Woody Allen for the anthology New York Stories (1989). At the age of 12, Dunst gained widespread recognition playing the role of vampire Claudia in Interview with the Vampire (1994). She was nominated for a Golden Globe Award for Best Supporting Actress for this performance. That same year she appeared in Little Women, to further acclaim.

Dunst achieved international fame as a result of her portrayal of Mary Jane Watson in the Spider-Man trilogy. Since then her films have included the romantic comedy Wimbledon (2004), the science fiction drama Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004) and Cameron Crowe's tragicomedy Elizabethtown (2005). She played the title role in Sofia Coppola's Marie Antoinette (2006), and she starred in the comedy How to Lose Friends & Alienate People (2008).

In 2001, Dunst made her singing debut in the film Get Over It, in which she performed two songs. She also sang the jazz song "After You've Gone" for the end credits of the film The Cat's Meow (2001). In early 2008 Dunst confirmed she was suffering from depression, checking into a treatment center before discharging herself in March and resuming her career.

Charlize Theron

Charlize Theron (pronounced /ʃɑrˈliːz ˈθɛrən/; born August 7, 1975) is a South African actress, film producer, and former fashion model. She became an American citizen in 2007.

She rose to fame in the late 1990s following her roles in 2 Days in the Valley, Mighty Joe Young, The Devil's Advocate, and The Cider House Rules. She received critical acclaim and an Academy Award for her portrayal of serial killer Aileen Wuornos in the film Monster, for which she became the first African to win an Academy Award in a major acting category. She received another Academy Award nomination for her performance in North Country.

Theron was born in Benoni, South Africa, the only child of Charles and Gerda Theron, and is of German and French descent. Theron's first language is Afrikaans; she is fluent in English and speaks some Zulu. "Theron" is an Occitan surname (originally spelled Théron) pronounced in Afrikaans as "Tronn", although she has said that she prefers the pronunciation "Thrown".

Theron grew up on her parents' farm near Johannesburg (Benoni). She attended Putfontein Primary School (Laerskool Putfontein). At the age of 13, Theron was sent to boarding school and began her studies at the National School Of The Arts in Johannesburg. At 15, Theron witnessed the death of her father, an abusive alcoholic; Gerda shot him in self-defence when he attacked her. The police pressed no charges against her.

At the age of 16, Theron traveled to Milan, Italy, on a one-year modeling contract, after winning a local competition. She went to New York with Pauline's Model Management. She decided to remain after her contract ended, attending the Joffrey Ballet School, where she trained as a ballet dancer. A knee injury closed this career path when Theron was 19.

Unable to dance, Theron flew to Los Angeles on a one-way ticket her mother bought her. During her early months there, she went to a bank to cash a check her mother had sent her to help with the rent. When the teller refused to cash it, Theron immediately started into a shouting match with her. Afterwards, a talent agent in line behind her handed her his business card and subsequently introduced her to some casting agents and also an acting school. She later fired him as her manager after he allegedly kept sending her scripts for films similar to Showgirls and Species. After eight months in the city, she was cast in her first film part, a non-speaking role in the direct-to-video film Children of the Corn III (1995). Larger roles in widely released Hollywood films followed, and her career skyrocketed in the late 1990s with box office successes like The Devil's Advocate (1997), Mighty Joe Young (1998), and The Cider House Rules (1999). She glossed the cover of the January 1999 issue of Vanity Fair as the "White Hot Venus". Theron appeared on the cover of the May 1999 edition of Playboy Magazine with an accompanying nude pictorial by photographer Guido Argentini taken at a time when she was but an aspiring model. Theron later claimed that the photographs had not been intended for publication and had appeared in the magazine against her wishes. She sued the photographer and won the case.

After appearing in a few notable films, Theron starred as the serial killer Aileen Wuornos in Monster (2003). Film critic Roger Ebert called it "one of the greatest performances in the history of the cinema". For this role, Theron won the Academy Award for Best Actress at the 76th Academy Awards in February 2004, as well as the SAG Award and the Golden Globe Award. She is the first African to win an Oscar for Best Actress. The Oscar win pushed her to The Hollywood Reporter's 2006 list of highest-paid actresses in Hollywood; earning $10,000,000 for both her subsequent films, North Country and Æon Flux, she ranked seventh, behind Halle Berry, Cameron Diaz, Drew Barrymore, Renée Zellweger, Reese Witherspoon, and Nicole Kidman

On September 30, 2005, Theron received her own star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. In the same year, she starred in the financially unsuccessful science fiction thriller Æon Flux. Additionally, Theron received Best Actress Academy Award and Golden Globe nominations for her lead performance in the drama North Country. Ms. magazine also honored her for this performance with a feature article in its Fall 2005 issue.

In 2005, Theron portrayed Rita, Michael Bluth's (Jason Bateman) love interest, on the third season of FOX's critically-acclaimed television series Arrested Development. She also received Golden Globe and Emmy nominations for her role of Britt Ekland in the 2004 HBO movie The Life and Death of Peter Sellers.

In 2007, Esquire named her the Sexiest Woman Alive.

In 2008, Theron was named the Hasty Pudding Theatricals Woman of the Year. That year she also starred with Will Smith in Hancock, a movie that grossed $227.9M in the U.S.A. and $396.4M internationally, and in late 2008 she was asked to be a UN Messenger of Peace by the UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon.

On November 10, 2008, TV Guide reported that Theron will star in the film adaptation of The Danish Girl alongside Nicole Kidman. Theron will play Gerda Wegener, wife of Einar Wegener/Lili Elbe (Kidman), the world's first known person to undergo sex reassignment surgery.

Renee Zellweger

Renée Kathleen Zellweger (born April 25, 1969) is an American actress and producer. She has won an Academy Award, three Golden Globe Awards and three Screen Actors Guild Awards, was named Hasty Pudding's Woman of the Year in 2009, and has established herself as one of the highest-paid Hollywood actresses in recent years. Zellweger first gained widespread attention for her role in the film Jerry Maguire (1996), and subsequently received two nominations for the Academy Award for Best Actress for her roles as Bridget Jones in the comedy Bridget Jones's Diary (2001) and as Roxie Hart in the musical Chicago (2002), and won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress for her performance in the drama Cold Mountain (2003). Her other films include Me, Myself and Irene (2000), Shark Tale (2004), Cinderella Man (2005), and Bee Movie (2007).

Zellweger was born in Katy, Texas, a western suburb of Houston. Her father, Emil Erich Zellweger, is from Au, St. Gallen in Switzerland and is a mechanical and electrical engineer who worked in the oil refining business. Zellweger's mother, Kjellfried Irene (née Andreassen), is Norwegian-born and of Sami origin, and is a nurse and midwife who moved to the United States in order to work as a governess for a Norwegian family in Texas. Zellweger described herself as being raised in a family of "lazy Catholics and Episcopalians". She has an older brother, Andrew.

In junior high school, Zellweger actively took part in several sports, including soccer, basketball, baseball and football. She attended Katy High School, where she was a cheerleader, a gymnast, and a drama club member. Zellweger acted in several school plays and was voted the "Best Looking" of her class before graduating from high school in 1987. After high school, she went to the University of Texas at Austin to major in English language. Zellweger was a good student, and made the Dean's List several times. At the beginning she took a drama class only because she needed a fine arts credit to complete her degree, but the experience made her appreciate how much she loved acting. During this time, she supported herself by taking jobs as a waitress in Austin, Texas and worked maintenance at The Velvet Touch in Flint, Michigan. In 1991, Zellweger graduated from university with a BA degree in English. She considered moving to Hollywood but decided to stay in her home state, Texas, to seek more experience. Her first job after graduation was working in a beef commercial, at the same time she started to audition for roles around Houston.

Film career

While still in Texas, Zellweger appeared in several films. One was A Taste for Killing (1992) as Mary Lou, followed by a minor role in ABC TV mini series named Murder in the Heartland (1993). The following year, she appeared in Reality Bites (1994), the directorial debut of Ben Stiller, and in the biopic film 8 Seconds, directed by John G. Avildsen.

Zellweger's first main part in a movie came with the 1994 horror story Texas Chainsaw Massacre: The Next Generation, alongside Matthew McConaughey. She played Jenny, a teenager who leaves a prom early with three friends and ended up getting into a car accident, which leads to their meeting a murderous family. Her next movie was Love and a .45 (1994), in which she played the role of Starlene Cheatham, a woman who plans a robbery with her boyfriend. The performance earned her an Independent Spirit Award for Best Debut Performance.

She subsequently moved to Los Angeles, winning roles in the films Empire Records (1995) and The Whole Wide World (1996). Zellweger first became widely known to audiences around the world with Jerry Maguire (1996), in which she played the romantic interest of Tom Cruise's character. She won the role over Mira Sorvino and Marisa Tomei.

Zellweger later won acclaim in One True Thing (1998) opposite William Hurt and Meryl Streep, and in Neil LaBute's Nurse Betty opposite Morgan Freeman. The role garnered the actress her first of three Golden Globe Awards, but she was in the bathroom when future co-star Hugh Grant announced her name. Zellweger later protested: "I had lipstick on my teeth!"

In 2001, Zellweger gained the prized lead role as Bridget Jones, playing alongside Hugh Grant and Colin Firth, in the British romantic comedy film Bridget Jones's Diary, based on the 1996 novel Bridget Jones's Diary by Helen Fielding. The choice came amid much controversy since she was neither British nor overweight. During casting Zellweger was told she was too skinny to play the chubby Bridget, so she quickly embarked on gaining the required weight and learning an English accent. She gained 20 pounds in order to complete her transformation to Bridget Jones. Her dramatic weight fluctuations became the subject of much media interest. Her performance as Bridget received praise from critics, with Stephen Holden of The New York Times commenting, "Ms. Zellweger accomplishes the small miracle of making Bridget both entirely endearing and utterly real." Along with receiving voice coaching to fine-tune her English accent, part of Zellweger's preparations involved spending three weeks working undercover in a "work experience placement" for British publishing firm Picador in Victoria, London. As a result of her considerable efforts to effect author Helen Fielding's character, Zellweger caught the attention of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, and received her first Best Actress Academy Award nomination.

In 2002, she starred with Michelle Pfeiffer in White Oleander. She played an actress in the film, and a clip from her role in Texas Chainsaw Massacre: The Next Generation was shown as she discussed her career with the main character, Astrid Magnussen. The same year, she appeared as "Roxie Hart" in the critically acclaimed musical film Chicago, directed by Rob Marshall, co-starring Catherine Zeta Jones, Richard Gere, Queen Latifah, and John C. Reilly. The movie received an Academy Award for Best Picture, and Zellweger received positive reviews. The San Francisco Chronicle's web site SFGate commented, "Zellweger is a joy to watch, with marvelous comic timing and, in her stage numbers, a commanding presence." The Washington Post noted that even though Zellweger couldn't dance well in real life, the audience "wouldn't know it from this movie, in which she dances up a storm." As a result, she earned her second Academy Award nomination as Best Actress, as well as the Screen Actors Guild and Golden Globe Award.

In 2004, Zellweger received an Academy Award, this time as Best Supporting Actress in Anthony Minghella's Cold Mountain opposite Jude Law and Nicole Kidman. Zellweger has since starred in the sequel to Bridget Jones's Diary in Bridget Jones: The Edge of Reason, lent her voice to the DreamWorks animated features Shark Tale and Bee Movie, and starred in the 2005 Ron Howard film Cinderella Man opposite Russell Crowe and Paul Giamatti. On May 24, 2005, Zellweger received her star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. She produced and appeared in Miss Potter, based on the life story of acclaimed author Beatrix Potter, with Emily Watson and Ewan McGregor, released in December 2006. In 2008, she starred in the western Appaloosa with Ed Harris and Viggo Mortensen and the period comedy Leatherheads with fellow Oscar-winner George Clooney and John Krasinski (from The Office).

In 2008 she produced a film starring Harry Connick, Jr., about the true story of Dr. Denny Slamon. The film, called Living Proof, premiered in October 2008 on Lifetime Television. Craig Zadan and Neil Meron is also producing.

She stars alongside Chris Noth and Kevin Bacon in the feature film My One and Only, due for release August 21, 2009. The film is a 1950s-set comedy in which the glamorous "Anne Deveraux" (played by Zellweger) embarks on an eventually cross-country drive din a quixotic search for a wealthy man to fund a new life for her and her sons.

As of 2009, StudioCanal and Alain Goldman's Legende are developing director Olivier Dahan's My Own Love Song with Zellweger and Forest Whitaker.

In 2009, she starred in New in Town, a comedy about a corporate executive from Miami who is sent to New Ulm, Minnesota, to oversee a small manufacturing company making minimal profits producing and selling pudding.

She also had a cameo role in the animated film Monsters vs. Aliens in which she voiced the character of "Katie."

Personal life

Zellweger dated director Joshua Pate, whom she began seeing in November 1997 after working on his film Deceiver. She also was rumored to have dated George Clooney. Her first high-profile romance was with actor/comedian Jim Carrey. The relationship ended in December 2000. The two were rumored to have been engaged, but Zellweger frequently denied this claim. Zellweger poked fun at the prior relationship when she ended her opening monologue on Saturday Night Live by reading an entry from her own "diary", marked "Dear Diary, I can't believe I am dating Jim Carrey."

For two years, Zellweger dated The White Stripes singer Jack White. The pair met while filming Cold Mountain, and later began dating after the film wrapped. They broke up two years later, after schedule demands kept them apart. Friends said the split was amicable.

On May 9, 2005, Zellweger married singer Kenny Chesney in a ceremony at the island of St. John. They had met in January at a tsunami relief benefit concert. Zellweger missed out on the engagement ring since the wedding was planned over a short span of time. On September 15, 2005, after only four months of marriage, they announced their plans for an annulment. Zellweger cited "fraud" as the reason in the related papers. After media scrutiny of her use of the word "fraud", she qualified the use of the term, stating it was "simply legal language and not a reflection of Kenny's character. I would personally be very grateful for your support in refraining from drawing derogatory, hurtful, sensationalized or untrue conclusions. We hope to experience this transition as privately as possible." The annulment was finalized in late December 2005.

In 2002, Zellweger bought a US$6.8-million home in Bel Air, then sold her previous home in the Hollywood Hills, bought for US$1.9M in 2000. Due to the constant attention from the paparazzi, she purchased a home in Connecticut and moved there in 2005. In January 2007, she admitted that she gets scared at home alone due to security problems and fans who send or leave mail at her homes; she said that she considered buying a gun for reasons of personal security. She claims she rarely spends time there, and keeps a small apartment in New York where she "stops over" to do laundry before moving on to her next film.

Zellweger, and Marc Forster, took part in the 2005 HIV prevention campaign of the Swiss federal health department. Zellweger maintains a residence in the Roland Park area of Baltimore, Maryland.

Reese Witherspoon

Laura Jeanne Reese Witherspoon (born March 22, 1976), better known as Reese Witherspoon, is an American actress and film producer. In 1998 she appeared in three major movies: Overnight Delivery, Pleasantville, and Twilight. The following year, Witherspoon appeared in the critically acclaimed Election, which earned her a Golden Globe nomination. 2001 marked her career's turning point with the breakout role as "Elle Woods" in the box office hit Legally Blonde, and in 2002 she starred in Sweet Home Alabama, which became her biggest commercial film success to date. 2003 saw her return as lead actress and executive producer of Legally Blonde 2: Red, White & Blonde. In 2005, Witherspoon received worldwide attention and praise for her portrayal of June Carter Cash in Walk the Line, which earned her an Academy Award, Golden Globe, BAFTA, and Screen Actors Guild Award for Best Actress in a Leading Role.

Witherspoon married actor and Cruel Intentions co-star Ryan Phillippe in 1999; they have two children, Ava and Deacon. The couple separated at the end of 2006 and divorced in October 2007. Witherspoon owns a production company, Type A Films, and she is actively involved in children's and women's advocacy organizations. She serves on the board of the Children's Defense Fund (CDF), and was named Global Ambassador of Avon Products in 2007, serving as honorary chair of the charitable Avon Foundation.

Nicole Kidman

Nicole Mary Kidman, AC (born 20 June 1967) is an American-born Australian actress, fashion model, singer and humanitarian. In 2006, Kidman was made a Companion of the Order of Australia, Australia's highest civilian honour. In 2006, she was also the highest-paid actress in the motion picture industry.

Kidman's breakthrough was in the 1989 thriller Dead Calm. Her performances in films such as Days Of Thunder (1990), To Die For (1995) and Moulin Rouge! (2001) won her critical acclaim, and her performance in The Hours (2002) was acknowledged with several notable film awards including the Academy Award for Best Actress, a BAFTA Award and a Golden Globe Award. In 2003, Kidman received her star on the Walk of Fame in Hollywood, California.

She is also known for her marriage to Tom Cruise and her current marriage to country musician Keith Urban.

As a result of being born to Australian parents in Hawaii, Kidman has dual citizenship of Australia and the United States.

2012

2012 is an upcoming disaster film directed by Roland Emmerich. The film has an ensemble cast, including John Cusack, Amanda Peet, Danny Glover, Thandie Newton, Oliver Platt, Chiwetel Ejiofor, and Woody Harrelson. The film will be distributed by Columbia Pictures. Filming began in August 2008 in Vancouver; the films release date is expected to be November 13, 2009 worldwide.

Plot

A global cataclysm occurs which leads to the end of the world and has survivors struggling for their lives, while a US government agency called the "Institute for Human Continuity" attempts to use ships to ensure the survival of the human race.

The film is inspired by several hypotheses that state that the ancient Mayan predicted a doomsday event would occur sometime around the 2012 northern hemisphere winter solstice.

Disaster movie maven Roland Emmerich (Independence Day, The Day After Tomorrow) crafts this apocalyptic sci-fi thriller following an academic researcher who opens a portal into a parallel universe, making contact with his double in an effort to prevent the catastrophic prophecies of the ancient Mayan calendar from coming to pass. According to the Mayan calendar, the world will come to an end on December 21, 2012. When a global cataclysm thrusts the world into chaos, divorced writer and father Jackson Curtis (John Cusack) uses his knowledge of the ancient prophecies to ensure that the human race is not completely wiped out. Chiwetel Ejiofor, Danny Glover, Amanda Peet, Thandie Newton, and Oliver Platt round out the cast of this end-of-the-world thriller co-scripted by the director and his 10,000 B.C.

Cast

• John Cusack as Jackson Curtis, a science fiction book writer who occasionally works as a limousine driver.
• Chiwetel Ejiofor as Adrian Helmsley, scientific advisor to the President.
• Amanda Peet as Kate, Jackson's ex-wife.
• Thandie Newton as Laura Wilson, the First Daughter.
• Oliver Platt as Carl Anheuser, the President's Chief of Staff.
• Danny Glover as President Wilson, the President of the United States.
• Woody Harrelson as Charlie Frost, a man who prophesies the end of the world and is considered crazy by others. Alex Jones claimed in an interview with Eric "Mancow" Muller that Harrelson told him that Frost's character was based on him. Harrelson compared his character to the mythological Greek figure Cassandra, whose predictions were dismissed.
• Ng Chin Han as Lin Pang, a worker in Tibet.
• Thomas McCarthy as Gordon, Kate's current boyfriend and a plastic surgeon.
• Liam James as Noah Curtis, Jackson and Kate's son.
• Morgan Lily as Lilly Curtis, Jackson and Kate's daughter.

Oliver Platt

Oliver Platt (born January 12, 1960) is an American Emmy, Golden Globe and Screen Actors Guild Award nominated stage, film, and television actor.

Platt was born in Windsor, Ontario, Canada to American parents Sheila Maynard, a clinical social worker who worked in Islamabad, and Nicholas Platt, a career diplomat who served as U.S. ambassador to Pakistan, Zambia and the Philippines. His family moved back to the United States when Platt was three months old. He is a distant cousin of Diana, Princess of Wales through his great-great-grandmother, Frances Work. When asked about Diana, his second-cousin once removed, Platt said, "I never met her. It's a non-story. I'd love to tell you we were confidantes. The truth is I don't know much more about it than you do."

Much of Platt's childhood was spent in Asia, where he played soccer. His family made frequent trips back to Washington, D.C., where they held Redskins season tickets. Platt is also a fan of the Boston Red Sox. When he was nine years old, Platt and his family visited Kennedy Center in Washington, where he watched a performance that helped inspire his acting career. "One of the performances that really made me want to be an actor started out with this probably 20-minute rambling, drunken monologue by this bum. And it was a young Morgan Freeman. I'll never forget it. This guy was just so riveting. He stood there on stage alone before the curtain went up, and he held this audience utterly rapt. Including myself, obviously."

Because of his father's career as an ambassador, Oliver Platt grew up in Asia, the Middle East and Washington, D.C. Platt attended twelve different schools, and has said "Even now I find myself envying people who have neighborhoods and roots". According to Platt, drama departments gave his childhood some stability, "It was something of a survival mechanism, in that it gave me a little subculture to plug into wherever I ended up. Kids need that. I certainly did." He attended a progressive boarding school in Colorado.

Platt majored in drama at Tufts University, then spent three years working in theater in Boston, which he said had a " wealth of serious amateur theatre at that time…I played many roles, and it was the best training I could have had." Platt travelled with Shakespeare and Company, based in Lenox, Massachusetts, touring schools to earn his Equity card, before moving to New York. Platt's early career involved off-Broadway and regional theater, and he appeared onstage with the New York Shakespeare Festival, Lincoln Center Theater, Manhattan Theater Club, and other companies across many genres. He obtained an agent while working at Manhattan Punch Line Theater, and met actor Bill Murray at his cousin's Christmas party. Murray attended Platt's show and recommended Platt to director Jonathan Demme, who cast him in Married to the Mob in 1988. Platt attributes his breakthrough to appearing at the Punch Line Theater.

Platt makes his decisions about accepting acting roles based on the role being "different from what I just did...I do have to be interested in the role". After Married to the Mob, he appeared in Working Girl (1988), Flatliners (1990), The Three Musketeers (1993), A Time to Kill (1996) and Bulworth (1998). In 1998, Platt and Stanley Tucci played two deadbeat actors who improvise with unsuspecting strangers in The Impostors. Tucci and Platt developed the characters while working on a play at Yale University in 1988, Tucci later completing the screenplay and directing the film.

In 1999, Platt played the wealthy and eccentric crocodile enthusiast Hector in David E. Kelley's Lake Placid, alongside Bill Pullman and Bridget Fonda. Platt described Hector as "pretty abrasive and obnoxious at times, but, I hope, he has a way of growing on you. I think David originally thought of him as a great white hunter sort of guy, but when I signed on for the role he sort of wrote him in a different direction."

The short-lived drama Deadline provided Platt's first lead role on television. Created by Dick Wolf, who also created Law & Order, Deadline focused on the lives of newspaper journalists in New York City. Platt starred as Pulitzer Prize-winning columnist Wallace Benton, an "unlikely hero". The strong cast, which also included Bebe Neuwirth and Hope Davis, could not compensate for sub-standard writing and the series was soon canceled. After Deadline's failure, Platt avoided work on television until he read a script for The West Wing and signed on for a guest role. He received an Emmy nomination for his portrayal of no-nonsense White House Counsel Oliver Babish, brought in during season two to compile a defense for President Bartlet and others who covered up his non-disclosure of multiple sclerosis.

His role in the television series Huff as Russell Tupper from 2004 to 2006 was well-received, especially by creator Robert Lowry, who said, "Oliver plays an alcoholic, drug-addicted, sexaholic, workaholic, womanizing misogynist who is adorable. I don't know any actor who could do that. I originally saw Russell as a blond stud, but when I saw what Oliver could do, I realized how much better, richer, and less predictable he was than my idea of the character...Oliver is very committed to the idea that story and dialogue be character-driven and unique". Platt's work was nominated for two Emmy awards and a Golden Globe.

In 2005, Platt acted in Harold Ramis's film The Ice Harvest as an unhappy businessman with a trophy wife and two stepchildren who becomes involved with a friend who has stolen $2 million from a Mafia boss. He also played a lard merchant named Papprizzio in Lasse Hallstrom's Casanova, who competes with Casanova (Heath Ledger) for marriage to Francesca (Sienna Miller). Platt won the New York Film Critics Online Award for best supporting actor for his role in Casanova.

A Broadway production named Shining City was Platt's Broadway debut in 2006. The play was set in Dublin, and Platt's role was the tortured protagonist, John. Shining City's director said, "There is one word to describe Oliver. It's 'humanity.' He's got that everyman quality. He's a contradictory human being with flaws and strengths. And he's loveable. He can simultaneously make you laugh and break your heart. Oliver has brought to the role of John what I expected and more: tremendous inventiveness and sensitivity." Platt visited Dublin to prepare for the role and ensure his performance was authentic. He was nominated for a Tony award for "Best Performance by a Leading Actor in a Play".

In 2007, Platt played the part of Yankees owner George Steinbrenner in the ESPN mini-series The Bronx is Burning. Platt signed onto the project after John Turturro was confirmed as Billy Martin, because, "This thing lives or dies by that portrayal… I think it's great casting. God knows he has the intensity." Platt starred in the pilot episode of The Thick of It, a remake of the British show of the same name in 2007. The series was not picked up by ABC.

Platt recently starred as Nathan Detroit, alongside Lauren Graham as Miss Adelaide, in the Broadway revival of Guys and Dolls which began performances at the Nederlander Theatre on February 3, 2009 and officially opened on March 1, 2009. The production closed on June 14, 2009 after 113 performances.

Platt is set to star as the White House Chief of Staff Carl Anheuser in Roland Emmerich's 2012, a disaster film set to be released November 13, 2009.

John Cusack

John Paul Cusack (born June 28, 1966) is an American film actor and screenwriter. He won the 1990 Most Promising Actor CFCA Award for Say Anything..., the 1998 Favorite Supporting Actor Blockbuster Entertainment Award for Con Air, and the 2000 Commitment to Chicago Award.

Cusack was born in Evanston, Illinois, to an Irish American Catholic family. His father, Dick Cusack (1925—2003), and siblings Ann, Joan, Bill, and Susie have also been actors; his father was also a documentary filmmaker, owned a film production company, and was a friend of activist Philip Berrigan. Cusack's mother, Nancy, is a former mathematics teacher and political activist. Cusack spent a year at New York University before dropping out, saying that he had "too much fire in his belly".

Career

Cusack gained fame in the mid-1980s after appearing in teen movies such as Better Off Dead, The Sure Thing, One Crazy Summer, and Sixteen Candles. Cusack made a cameo in the 1988 music video for "Trip At The Brain" by Suicidal Tendencies. His biggest success in that genre is arguably his starring role as Lloyd Dobler in Cameron Crowe's Say Anything. His roles broadened in the late 1980s and early 1990s with more serious-minded fare such as the political satire True Colors and the film noir thriller The Grifters.

Cusack became a proven box office success with his roles in the dark comedy Grosse Pointe Blank and the Jerry Bruckheimer blockbuster Con Air. In the years hence, his range of films has diversified, appearing in roles such as an obsessive puppeteer in Being John Malkovich, a lovelorn record store owner in High Fidelity, and a Jewish art dealer mentoring a young Adolf Hitler in Max. He starred in the horror film 1408, based on Stephen King's short story of the same name. He next appeared as a widowed father in the Iraq War-themed drama Grace is Gone and as assassin Brand Hauser in the dark political satire, War, Inc., along with Hilary Duff and Marisa Tomei.

His sister Joan Cusack and close friend Jeremy Piven have appeared in many of his films. The siblings appeared as two geeks in Sixteen Candles: John as one of Farmer Ted's posse, and Joan as the geek with the neck brace. They also appeared together in High Fidelity, Grosse Pointe Blank, Cradle Will Rock, Martian Child, Say Anything, and War, Inc.. Piven and Cusack played opposite one another in One Crazy Summer, Serendipity, and Grosse Pointe Blank. Cusack also had a brief cameo, seen from behind but speaking a line of dialogue, in Broadcast News, in which Joan also appeared. Piven also had roles in Say Anything, The Grifters, Runaway Jury and Grosse Pointe Blank.

Cusack will next be seen in Roland Emmerich's disaster film, 2012, which is scheduled to be released in theaters November 13, 2009, as Jackson Curtis, a book writer and limo driver.

Personal and political life

Since May 2005, Cusack has been an occasional contributing blogger at The Huffington Post, including an interview with Naomi Klein. He has written extensively on his opposition to the war in Iraq and his disdain for the Bush administration, calling its worldview "depressing, corrupt, unlawful, and tragically absurd". He also appeared in a June 2008 MoveOn.org ad, where he makes the claim that George W. Bush and John McCain have the same governing priorities.

Cusack has an allegiance to both the Chicago Cubs and the Chicago White Sox, for which, he says, he's "in trouble there for that." He has led the crowd in a performance of "Take Me Out to the Ball Game" at Wrigley Field.

In 2008, police arrested a woman suspected of stalking Cusack. On October 10, 2008, the woman pleaded no contest and received five years probation and mandatory psychiatric counseling, and was ordered to avoid Cusack, his home and business for the next 10 years.

Amanda Peet

Amanda Peet (born January 11, 1972) is an American actress.

After studying with Uta Hagen, Peet began her career in television commercials, and progressed to small roles in television and indie movies. Featured roles in films such as The Whole Nine Yards (2000) brought her recognition and she was named one of People's "50 Most Beautiful People in the World". Her subsequent film roles were more prominent, and included Something's Gotta Give (2003) and Syriana (2005).
Peet was born in New York City, the daughter of Penny (née Levy), a social worker, and Charles Peet, a corporate lawyer. The two are now divorced. Her father is a Quaker and her mother is Jewish. She has one older sister, Alisa Peet, who is a doctor of internal medicine at Temple University Hospital in Philadelphia. Peet attended Friends Seminary, then studied history at and graduated from Columbia University, where she auditioned for acting teacher Uta Hagen and decided to become an actress after taking Hagen's class. During her four-year period of study with Hagen, Peet appeared in the off-Broadway revival of Clifford Odets's Awake and Sing.

Career

Peet's first screen performance was a television commercial for Skittles. Her early roles included a guest role on the television series Law & Order. She made her film debut in Animal Room (1995). Peet maintained a steady acting career in relatively obscure indie movies.

Her first major role was as "Jack" in the 1999 WB network series Jack & Jill (which aired for two seasons). She also appeared in the eighth-season finale of Seinfeld ("The Summer of George") as a waitress whom Jerry Seinfeld meets. Peet's first role in a widely-released feature film came in 2000, with The Whole Nine Yards, starring with Bruce Willis. That same year, she was voted one of the 50 Most Beautiful People in the World by People magazine. Peet was also in the movie Saving Silverman with Jason Biggs, Jack Black and Steve Zahn, where she portrayed psychologist Judith. She also starred in Something's Gotta Give in 2003, playing Diane Keaton's daughter, and, at one point, Jack Nicholson's girlfriend.

In 2005, Peet appeared in the play This Is How It Goes, filling in for Marisa Tomei at the last minute after six days of rehearsal. In the same year, she also co-starred in the films Syriana alongside Matt Damon and George Clooney, and A Lot Like Love, with Ashton Kutcher. In February 2006, she was performing in Neil Simon's Broadway production of Barefoot in the Park.

Peet was a member of the cast of the television series Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip, which premiered on NBC on September 18, 2006. She starred with Matthew Perry, with whom she worked in The Whole Nine Yards and The Whole Ten Yards, and Sarah Paulson, with whom she co-starred in Jack & Jill. In Studio 60, Peet's character Jordan McDeere was the newly-appointed president of the National Broadcasting System (NBS). In 2006, she also starred along with Dermot Mulroney in Griffin and Phoenix, where she played a terminally-ill woman living life to the fullest.

In 2007's The Ex, a comedy co-starring Zach Braff, Peet played an attorney who stays home to raise a new baby. In 2008, Peet went on to play an FBI agent in The X-Files: I Want to Believe.

In 2009, Peet will star as Kate in 2012, a disaster film directed by Roland Emmerich set for release on November 13.

Personal life

Peet married screenwriter David Benioff on September 30, 2006, in New York City and gave birth to a daughter, Frances Pen, on February 20, 2007. The three live in Manhattan and Los Angeles. She was also maid of honor at Lauren Holly's marriage in 2001 with Francis Greco.

In 2008 Peet volunteered to be a spokeswoman for Every Child By Two (ECBT), a non-profit organization which advocates childhood vaccination. Peet began working with the group after becoming concerned by the "amount of misinformation floating around [about vaccines], particularly in Hollywood." In an interview with Cookie, Peet stated: "Frankly, I feel that parents who don't vaccinate their children are parasites," referring to the benefit unvaccinated children derive from herd immunity and the concern that dropping vaccination rates may put all children at increased risk of preventable disease. Peet's comments stirred controversy; in response, she apologized for using the term "parasites", but affirmed her position on the importance and safety of vaccination.