Kate Winslet has not been seen on screen since The Reader was booked into theaters early last year. After winning the Oscar for that performance, she surprised everyone when she chose as her next project a TV remake of the 1945 film Mildred Pierce, which won Joan Crawford her only Academy Award.

The meaty title role in Mildred Pierce is a single mother who struggles to provide for her two daughters during the Depression. Taking on a job as a waitress, she infuriates her older daughter, Veda, who has grandiose social ambitions. After younger daughter Kay dies of pneumonia, Mildred pours all her love into the ungrateful Veda. The mother is even willing to take a murder rap for the daughter, who offs her stepfather in a dramatic shootout.

Todd Haynes (I’m Not There) adapted James M. Cain’s bestselling 1941 novel and directed the HBO miniseries, which will air over five nights next spring. Haynes was a 2002 Oscar nominee for his script of Far From Heaven, an homage to the lush 1950s movie romances of director Douglas Sirk; he lost to Pedro Almodóvar for Talk to Her.

The 1945 Mildred Pierce contended for six Oscars, including best picture, which went to The Lost Weekend. Crawford earned the first of her eventual three Oscar nominations; Possessed (1947) and Sudden Fear (1952) were the others. The actress feigned illness on Oscar night and, after skipping the ceremony, she received the press at home, where she accepted the award in bed, capping off one of the great screen comebacks.

In 1945, it looked like Crawford’s career was all washed up. She had left MGM after 18 years and was desperately hustling up roles at Warner Bros. when she discovered Mildred Pierce, a role rejected by Bette Davis. Director Michael Curtiz didn’t want Crawford on board, dismissing her as a has-been, but he finally bowed to studio pressure after she agreed to take a screen test. In December, award watchers were stunned when Crawford was voted best actress by the National Board of Review. Variety called it an “eye-opening selection,” which certainly opened Crawford’s eyes. Promptly, she hired a veteran PR man to manage her Oscar campaign and was off to win her overdue chunk of academy gold, beating the three previous champs in the race — Greer Garson, Jennifer Jones and Ingrid Bergman — as well as Gene Tierney.

From the looks of the trailer, Winslet delivers another of her knockout performances. HBO has so dominated the Emmy movie and miniseries races as of late that the broadcast networks want to bounce it from the kudocast. Regardless of where it ends up next year, look for Winslet to be as strong a contender as Crawford.

Source: Gold Derby | Los Angeles Times

Kate Winslet has confessed she is blissfully happy with her family life — just six months after her split from husband Sam Mendes.

The Titanic actress and American Beauty director Mendes ended their seven-year marriage in March, insisting the break-up was amicable.

Winslet has since been linked with male model Louis Dowler, and despite remaining tight-lipped about any possible new romance, she is adamant her home life with her two kids — daughter Mia Honey, nine, and six-year-old son Joe — could not be better.

She tells Hello! magazine, “I look at these gigantic children and I think, wow, you’re mine! I couldn’t be more grateful. And so this time now is really about focusing on them and working when I can and when the opportunity presents itself, and I’m just very, very fortunate to have two such glorious kids.”

Asked if she is currently “fulfilled and happy,” she replies, “Yes… absolutely, at the moment, regarding my family life with my children, without question. Yes, very much so, a very happy time.”

Source: seattlepi

Natascha Kampusch has revealed she imaged herself dead while being locked up by pervert Wolfgang Priklopil.

The 21-year-old writes in her autobiography “3,096 Tage” (3,096 Days), out this Wednesday (8 September), she saw her own body buried in a forest in front of her eyes.

“I thought to myself whether it hurt when one dies. But then I told myself that this doesn’t matter. What matters are the injuries,” she told Austrian daily Kurier today (Mon).

Kampusch also revealed Priklopil — who committed suicide hours after she escaped in August 2006 — beat her and threw a knife at her.

She said the pedophile abductor wanted to give her a name “to weaken me”. She explained: “He wanted to take power from me because my first name is rather strong and intense. He wanted to name me Maria, but I chose Bibiana — not because I liked it so much but because it comes after my own name day.”

Speaking about Priklopil, Kampusch stressed he was “paranoid, sick and poor.”

“He would not have kidnapped a child had he not been like that,” she said.

Asked how she felt right after being snatched off the road on her way to school, she said: “I couldn’t believe it. It was as if war breaks out and everything you ever possessed is suddenly lost — as if all bad omens, presumptions and fears become reality.”

Kampusch also writes about humiliation and slaps in the face during her childhood.

Continue reading Kampusch on death fantasies and pre-kidnap humiliation

Steven Soderbergh is bringing his fear-of-disease thriller Contagion to shoot in Hong Kong in a move that is likely to stir up painful memories of the deadly SARS epidemic in 2003 that spread around the world from China, shaking its one-party government.

Josie Ho, the singer-actress who last appeared in the slasher film Dream Home, told The Hollywood Reporter that Soderbergh has hired her to join the Hollywood ensemble cast in her native Hong Kong at the end of Sept.

In Soderbergh’s first visit to Greater China as a director, Ho, a daughter of Macau’s wealthiest gaming tycoon, is set to play the sister of “Patient Zero”, a casino worker who spreads a deadly virus to passengers on an airplane leaving for the United States.

Ho, who met Soderbergh in Hong Kong in July, said she would draw on her own memories of the Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome outbreak to play her role in Contagion.

Continue reading “Contagion” spreads to Hong Kong

Kate Winslet’s new boyfriend Louis Dowler has spoken about his romance with the actress, saying he is very ”happy” with her.

Model Louis Dowler — who began dating the Oscar-winning actress in June following her split from estranged husband Sam Mendes earlier this year — has spoken for the first time about their romance and couldn’t contain his excitement.

Speaking at the Virgin Media V Festival, in Chelmsford, Essex, earlier this month, Louis told Grazia magazine: “I feel really happy at the moment, although Kate’s not coming today, unfortunately. So I’m here with friends having a relaxing day out. Kate’s in Reading visiting family this weekend but I’m going to meet up with her on Sunday or Monday, which will be great.”

The Reader star is thought to have invited Louis to meet her parents in her hometown but the hunk had already made plans with friends to go to the festival.

Sources close to Kate — who has nine-year-old daughter Mia with first husband Jim Threapleton and seven-year-old Joe with Sam — say the pair are smitten with each other.

A friend said: “We all thought it was just going to be a fling, but it’s been going on a couple of months now and they seem to be getting closer and closer. Louis is making Kate really happy, he is just the kind of guy you want around if you’ve been going through a tough time, as he really looks out for the people he cares for.”

Source: Contactmusic News