Archive for the ‘Mother & Child’ Category
Naomi Watts says Samuel L Jackson is surprisingly “tender”.
The actress stars alongside the famed actor in new movie Mother and Child, about three women whose lives centre around adoption. Naomi was amazed by Samuel’s acting ability, and hopes to team up with him as much as possible in the future.
“I was blown away. I only knew him from his movies. He’s just a total gentleman, a really tender person. He really took care of me,” she told People magazine.
Mother and Child debuted at the recent Sundance Film Festival in Utah, with Naomi admitting being at the event brought back some memories for her. She recalled the first time she attended, and laughed about the lengths she had to go to to get people to pay attention to her movie.
“The first time I came, I handed out flyers, trying to get people to come and see our short film. Actually, I was accosting people and trying to drag them in,” she laughed.
This is an old-ish video from last September of Mother & Child director Rodrigo Garcia talking about the film. I don’t think we’ve posted this before.
Rodrigo Garcia tells THR.com how he directs stars Samuel L. Jackson and Naomi Watts and why his film — “Mother and Child” — is “a movie for grown-ups.”
Just a tiny update today – I’ve added 2 new HQ stills from Mother & Child. The movie now has a distributor and is set for release in May, so hopefully we’ll be hearing a lot more about it in the next few months!
• Mother & Child (2010) > Stills x2 more
The best films at Sundance are those that speak to an audience with themes that are universal, featuring flawed, complex and deeply human characters. Rodrigo Garcia’s “Mother and Child” is such a film, with some of the most exquisite performances captured on film in ages.
Destiny plays a part in the lives of three disparate women from a 50-year-old physical therapist [Annette Bening], the daughter she gave up for adoption 35 years earlier [Naomi Watts], and a woman looking to adopt her first child [Kerry Washington]. Here we have what appears to be three distinct stories that inevitably intertwine and come together. However, this is not a film so much about narrative but the relationships and the foibles of humanity.
With profound insight, the film ventures deep into the hearts and souls of three women whose commonality often stems from our inability to communicate in different ways. Each of the three women are brought to life by three truly great actresses who manage to tell us all we need to know by what we can see on their expressive faces.
Mother & Child premiered at the Sundance Film Festival yesterday, and Naomi was there to promote it! She attended the premiere of the film last night with her co-stars Kerry Washington and Samuel L. Jackson and followed that with the After Party. Earlier in the day she was seen out and about at the festival in Park City. She also did a portrait photoshoot with her co-stars. Naomi looks cute with her trademark short tousled blonde hair!
Over 100 photos of Naomi at Sundance have been added to our Gallery, most of which are in HQ!
• 2010 – Session #001 x3
• Sundance Film Festival – Day 5 Sighting x31
• Sundance Film Festival – Mother And Child Premiere x61
• Sundance Film Festival – Mother And Child Premiere After Party x6
2010 Sundance Film Festival: Naomi Watts & Samuel L. Jackson Talk ‘Mother & Child’
Naomi Watts and Samuel L. Jackson discuss their new movie about adoption, “Mother & Child,” which is premiering at Sundance. Because Naomi recently became a mother, did she feel a stronger connection to the role she played?
Reviewed at the 2010 Sundance Film Festival.
Friggin’ Paul Haggis.
Love or hate Haggis’ 2004 Best Picture winner “Crash,” we can all agree on one thing: in the wake of its success, we all endured far too many knockoff humanist ensemble issue films. Just when it seemed like the end of that trend was finally in sight, here comes Sundance 2010 selection “Mother and Child,” yet another movie about a bunch of people with interconnected lives and a really important topic on their minds, in this case, adoption and single motherhood. These movies in the “Crash” mold are about two things: big ethical points and big acting, to the exclusion of just about everything else. The real shame here is that one of the stories by writer/director Rodrigo Garcia is actually pretty strong, far stronger than the others. But its impact is dulled by the film’s format, which repeatedly pushes it aside to pick up other, lesser plotlines and characters. It’s like trying to watch a really good television show with someone who insists on flipping to another channel during every commercial break.
The winner in the bunch is Naomi Watts who, in a terrific performance, plays Elizabeth, a ferociously competitive careerist starting a new job at a law firm run by Paul (Samuel L. Jackson). For Watts, Elizabeth offers an opportunity to showcase an intensity she hasn’t tapped into onscreen in a while. It’s nice to see it back. When she tells Paul in her job interview that many women find her threatening, we can see why; she is an intimidating, formidable presence. Elizabeth reveals in the same interview that she was given up for adoption by her mother when she was a newborn. She never met the woman and doesn’t care to; she isn’t close with her adopted parents and she doesn’t intend to marry. “I’m not in the sisterhood,” she says. “I’m my own person.”
TVA Films has picked up the Canadian rights to Rodrigo Garcia’s ensemble drama “Mother and Child” from executive producer Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu.
The Annette Bening-starrer, which bowed at the 2009 Toronto International Film Festival in a high-profile gala slot and closed San Sebastian, was produced by Lisa Maria Falcone’s Everest Entertainment and Julie Lynn at Mockingbird Pictures.
Montreal-based TVA Films plans a May 7 release for “Mother and Child,” which was written and directed by Garcia and co-stars Naomi Watts, Samuel L. Jackson, Jimmy Smits, and Kerry Washington.
Sony Pictures Classics acquired the U.S. rights to the indie pic in November from international sales agent WestEnd Films
PLOT: The story of three women; one is a middle aged nurse (Annette Bening), who, as a teenager, got pregnant and had to give her child up for adoption. The child grows up to be a high priced, emotionally unstable lawyer (Naomi Watts), who’s having an affair with her much older boss (Samuel L. Jackson). Their lives intersect with a young woman (Kerry Washington), who discovers that she’s unable to have children, and begins to look at the possibility of adoption.
REVIEW: MOTHER & CHILD is yet another film I caught at TIFF this year, that’s now making its way to Sundance. For me, one of the big shocks of TIFF was that this was not able to land a big distributor, as it features several high-power, potentially award-worthy performances from the high calibre cast, and three strong roles for women, in a year that was somewhat weak in that regard.
For Annette Bening especially, this is a tour de force. She plays a woman who’s spent her whole life punishing herself for a brief lapse in judgement she had as a teenager, carrying on imaginary conversations with the daughter she gave up years ago. After her cruel mother dies, Bening finally begins to come out of her shell somewhat, with the help of a kindly physiotherapist (Jimmy Smits), with whom she starts a tentative romance. I’d wager that if this film had come out this year, Bening would have generated a lot of buzz, as she probably hasn’t been this good since AMERICAN BEAUTY. I particularly liked the way her icy exterior starts to melt away once she falls in love with the likable Smits- who, in between this, and his turn in season three of DEXTER, is also really starting to impress me as a character actor.
Sony Pictures Classics has picked up U.S. rights to Rodrigo Garcia’s “Mother and Child,” starring Annette Bening, Naomi Watts, Kerry Washington and Samuel L. Jackson.
Film bowed as a gala preem at the Toronto fest in September.
Garcia wrote and directed the pic, which is centered around three women and the choices they’ve made concerning children. Filmmaker previously helmed “Things You Can Tell Just by Looking at Her” and “Nine Lives.”
Garcia’s producing partner, Julie Lynn, produced along with Lisa Maria Falcone. Helmer Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu exec produced.
“Mother” is the first pic financed via Falcone’s shingle Everest Entertainment, which will donate a share of its profits from the film to charities providing services and support for women and children.
Lynn previously produced “The Jane Austen Book Club,” which also was released by Sony Classics.
WestEnd Films is handling foreign sales on the film at AFM this week.
Sony Classics will release the film in 2010.
Mother And Child (2010) 
Fair Game (2010) 
You Will Meet a Tall Dark Stranger (2010) 
Dream House (2011) 
