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Just when you thought endless travel, chock-full closets, international adoration and more money than you know what to do with sounds like a good gig, the very same people enjoying all those perks remind the public that it’s not all bells and whistles.
Being famous is a trade. It has a cost. There is sacrifice involved when you gain an ounce of fame and find your picture pasted next to Jessica Simpson’s in US Weekly.
“You don’t know who is here for the glamour, for the gossip factor. You really just want to know that somebody loves you for you. It’s a difficult thing when you really like an ATM machine with a wig on it.” - Mariah Carey
“It can make you feel very lonely. You’re constantly wondering if people are using you.” - Kirsten Dunst
“The biggest detriment of my life is tabloid fame. It removes me from people. When I first meet someone, it is so hard for me to overcome everything they’ve read about me. It’s not fair.” - Reese Witherspoon
“I never imagined that worrying about what other people think of me would be a big part of my day. But when you get that much negativity thrown at you, you go, “Whew! I’ve got to cope with that.” Nothing I heard in the press resembled the truth. What an insight for me.” - Meg Ryan
So apparently it’s not all glitz and glamour. It would be fantastic to fly on private jets and attend lavish premieres, but I’m not sure I could take the crazy social bubble and tight emotional strain
Do you ever wish you could be famous, despite all the pit-falls? Why would you want to be famous?
image credit: lobstar28
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My city just hosted a four-day documentary film festival. The festival showcased stories from 25 countries and exposed audiences to a different sense of humanity; a humanity often ignored at the giant Cineplex Odeon.
Dinner With The President: A Nation’s Journey, directed by Sabiha Sumar, proceeds with questions in hand about democracy in the Islamic culture of Pakistan straight to the dinner table of President Pervez Musharraf.
Recycled Life chronicles the past 60 years in the lives of generations of families who have lived and worked, not in family-owned restaurants or Wal-Mart or at the local diner, but in the Guatemala City Garbage Dump, a humongous Central American landfill.
And did you know that at 18 years old girls in Israel are forced into military service? To See If I’m Smiling gives voice to these girl soldiers and immerses the audience into the emotions and experiences of their tours of duty.
The whole attraction and need for sidewalk-type festivals like these is that they get into the underbelly of a country or expose aches within cultures that so often get misinterpreted or ignored. For an audience, it fills a need to witness something true and organic and to learn something real.
Do you ever check out these kinds of film festivals? If you have, have they changed your ideas about humanity or the world?
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The December issue of Vogue will hit grocery store checkouts today, and gracing the cover in a red, cleavage-baring dress is none other than Jennifer Aniston.
Her appearance is part of the publicity for “Marley & Me”, co-starring Owen Wilson and opening Christmas Day. But as celebrity magazine interviews go, the film is quickly overlooked and interest instantly huddles around her dislike of Sex and the City and her comments about Angelina Jolie.
I have a mild love for her so I sought out the article and found an edited version online. My good opinion of her only grew. She’s a hippie chick characterized in the tabloids as being love’s greatest loser, but couldn’t give half a hoot.
“I actually feel I’ve been unbelievably lucky in love. Just because at this stage my life doesn’t have the traditional framework to it—the husband and the two kids and the house in Connecticut—it’s mine. It’s my experience. And if you don’t like the way it looks, then stop looking at it! Because I feel good. I don’t feel like I’m supposed to be any further along or somewhere that I’m not. I’m right where I’m supposed to be.”
It was a relief to hear such a grounded and healthy opinion from one of Hollywood’s most influential stars. I wonder how much discontentment could be averted if only more people adapted this attitude.
What do you think of Aniston’s opinion of life and love? Are you going to snatch up the December issue of Vogue?
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Bond is back.
Daniel Craig is returning as 007 in the newest Bond installment, “Quantum of Solace”, debuting this weekend. Sitting in as the 22nd film in the Bond chronicles, Quantum is the first to carry on a plot-line from it’s predecessor, starting off where “Casino Royale” left off. This time, Bond is out for blood against the organization he holds responsible for his love, Vesper Lynd’s, death. Surprise, surprise, the organization is much more complicated than first perceived and while discovering that fact, fiery shenanigans ensue.
Since James Bond is this rugged and indestructible character that pulls off insane stunts, MoviesOnline sat down with Craig and asked him if anything scared him while filming.
“No, no, not scared, I mean, trepidation but genuinely it’s about getting it right because I only want to do it once. And so if you’re standing on a roof and you’re going to jump over, I’m like, “I don’t want to do this more than once if I can help it.” So, that’s all you’ve got going through your head.”
I love that even Daniel Craig, the toughest guy kicking around Hollywood, isn’t interested in risking his neck more than he has to. James Bond has his limits.
Are you going to see the newest Bond flick?
Quantum of Solace opens November 14.
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Apparantly, Joaquin Pheonix is quiting acting.
Best known for his role in films like “Gladiator”, “The Village” and his Oscar-nominated turn as Johnny Cash in “Walk The Line”, the younger brother of the late River Pheonix is retiring at 34.
His last performance will be in “Two Lovers, opposite Gwyneth Paltrow. At a premiere of the film Sunday night, the words “Good Bye!” were scrawled across his knuckles, and while he hid behind a scruffy beard and Ray-Ban sunglasses, he proudly forced his fists forward for the flashbulbs.
At first, i thought, “Why make the announcement at all? Just quit and everyone will figure it out.” Then i saw the picture of him with awry facial hair and his permanent marker farewell and i thought, “He’s acting out just like a 17-year-old would do. All he’s doing is loudly announcing his retirement to draw attention to what he will be doing, music. It’s a publicity stunt.”
But when i read a simple sentence from an interview he did before the American Film Institute festival this past weekend, it swayed my opinion a bit.
“I think it’s just moving on. It’s rediscovering something else.”
Pop culture’s remarkably good at putting an artist, an actor, a performer into a box and confining them in that space. We want them to be this one certain thing. But what if they don’t want to be that? I guess Pheonix doesn’t, and he has every right to be something different, to discover something else.
What do you think about Pheonix putting down the Oscar hopes and movie scripts for the musicians life? Do you think he’s really moving on or just acting?
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Celebrities backing politians – it’s the thing to do every four years. If you’re Halle Berry or Beyonce, you don an Obama t-shirt. If you’re Rosario Dawson, you work the floor of the Republican convention. If you’re Elizabeth Hasselbeck, you make your own homemade t-shirt hoisting McCain up as a hero. And if you’re Heidi Montag, well, you endorse Republican by hanging out with McCain’s daughter.
Then there are celebrities who blog about it. In a blog posted last week on The Huffington Post, John Mayer writes,
“What Barack Obama says to me is these days are good for something. Just when I’d thought my only role as an adult was to help shoulder the nation through its darkest days (known to us as “the rest of them”), Obama gives me the feeling that I could be alive to witness one of the most brilliant upturns in a country’s history.”
His post is intelligent and says a whole lot more than a t-shirt. It lends credibility to the celebrity voice hawking politics. And maybe it would influence my vote (if I were an American). Maybe not. At least it adds something to the conversation.
What is your opinion on the mixing of celebrities and politics? Do celebrities influence who you vote for at all?
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There are more slaves in our world today than at any other time in human history.
Over 1/3 of all prostitutes in South and East Asia are children.
More than 17,500 people are trafficked into the US each year.
Huge statistics like these exist on paper, but musician Justin Dillon is trying to give them a face for anybody willing to open their eyes. In his documentary released this month titled “Call + Response”, Dillon, along with a group of fellow musicians, actors and activists, set out to expose the world’s 27 million dirtiest secrets.
With interviews, undercover footage, and musical performances, the film spotlights human trafficking, child soldiers, and sex slavery around the world. But not only do they want to profile the lucrative business, but give viewers the opportunity to respond, to become participants in open source activism. Interactive field projects are being funded as people support the film and keys to awareness and education can be found through their website, music and the film itself.
Have you heard about “Call + Response”? How aware are you about this human rights issue?
For more information and to watch the preview, go to: www.callandresponse.com
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I read a recent article on the New York Daily News called, “Films on porn & sex addiction are now in pop culture’s mainstream”. Reading the title there’s no guessing what it was about, and from reading it there seems to be some definite emergence of sexual taboos in the media. It’s not just about basic sexual content anymore. The edgier the media tries to be, the racier the content gets.
The articles author, Lewis Beale, connects the dots between the sexual status quo and the growing hunger for more explicit entertainment. With movies like “Zack and Miri Make A Porno” and the debut of two new reality shows “Secret Lives of Women: Sex Addicts” and “Sex Change Hospital” this fall, programming is pushing the conventional envelope.
But it begs the question that has been beaten like a dead horse since sex and entertainment co-existed: Is it really just about sex?
Psychologist and author of “Men – The Gods of Love”, Dr. David Eigen makes an interesting comment about our sexual pursuit, saying:
“We lose the very thing we’re striving for - we’re trying to find fulfillment. Intimacy is what we’re really dying for.”
As our culture pushes and pushes for more taboo entertainment, the question goes one step further: What craving are we really trying to satisfy? The answer always seems to point to something deeper, to something below the skin’s surface.
What do you think?
Is the craving for more R-rated sexual substance really about sex or is Dr. Eigen right, what we’re really trying to find is intimacy and fulfillment? Have you thought about what you crave?
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That infamous name never fails to make waves, and usually their tragically large waves. Now the pop starlet behind it is creating some positive waves with a new 90-minute documentary chronicling her comeback set to air November 30th on MTV. In it, filmmaker Phil Griffin plucks three months out of Spears’ life to tack to the movie reel, with backstage shots and candid interviews.
Nobody has missed the ugly downfall of Spears, complete with a buzz-cut, an ugly divorce and several rehab stints. So with the media and tabloid world having furiously documented her floundering career and out-of-control shenanigans, this is finally an opportunity to tell her side of the story.
“I wanted to make this film because I started to feel like I wasn’t being seen in the light that I wanted to be seen in. This is an opportunity to set the record straight and talk about what I’ve been through and where I’m headed,” Spears told MTV.
With recent MTV Movie Award wins, a more svelte look and a new album coming out December 2nd, it looks like she might just get it all back on track.
What do you think, is Spears’ comeback for good? Will you watch the documentary?
Read the entire article
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Free speech is one of the fundamental rights that is highly valued in our society. But people also know that when you drop religion, politics or family trees into a conversation like an anvil, the dirt can fly.
This particular anvil is a documentary called Religulous, dropped from none other than Bill Maher, an American fellow who frequents the television with his political commentary and critical stance against organized religion.
In the film, Maher traverses the globe with his movie title in one hand and a cynical reputation in the other. I can’t imagine he’s hopping continents in honest pursuit of truth. He’s looking to paint religion with an extreme and wide brush, all the while waiting for on-camera moments to capture and mock any slips in reason and logic.
Religion is favorite fodder for comedians worldwide. Why wouldn’t it be? The more sensitive and touchy the subject, the more people are going to react. And comedians are in the business of reaction.
What do you think of Bill Maher’s “religious mockumentary”?
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