Dear Juliet:

Here’s the pitch. You will know by now that 5000 people a year, often young American teenage girls, send letters seeking advice or support about love, lust and broken hearts to your good, dead, fictitious self. They feel your Shakespearean pain and think you can feel theirs, on account of the whole suicide gone wrong thing with Romeo.

The Plot

So we set this film in Verona, send in eye candy and journalist Amanda Seyfried, the bubbly, beautiful blonde from Mama Mia!, where she played a girl called Sophie and call her Sophie in this one as well with the view of making an unsubtle connection between the roaring box office success of that film and this one. She is on a romantic break with her foodie fiancé Victor (played by Gael Garcia Bernal) and as he goes off to eat his way through the city, she decides on a less calorific tour and finds your supposed grave, which is festooned with notes and letters from the loveless and love sick aforementioned teenage girls.

Because we want to create a slightly surreal fairytale feel for Verona, as Amélie did for Paris, we throw in an Amélie touch as Sophie finds an old letter stuck in a crevasse in this Italian Wailing Wall, much as Amélie discovered a little box of little boy memorabilia in a crack in her bathroom wall. Keen, as Amélie was to track down the now grown up boy, Sophie goes on a mission to find the writer of the letter, now a 70-ish year old Englishwoman called Claire, played by Vanessa Redgrave. The letter was to the love of her younger life, Lorenzo, whom she had to leave. Sophie aims to get Claire and Lorenzo together, because true love never dies and absence (if you forget to factor in that people don’t always age as well as the fine wines and cheeses Victor seeks out) makes the lovesick heart grow even fonder.

Claire comes to Verona with her snotty grandson Charlie, played to good comic effect by Christopher Egan, who doesn’t go in for all this romantic tosh. Cue sparks flying between Sophie and Charlie, a less foppish Hugh Grant (well, that’s not too difficult) and love, of a sort, blossoms for the young couple, as her fiancé feasts himself into oblivion.

Now let’s throw in an art imitating life imitating art factor and have Vanessa Redgrave’s love interest played by her real life husband Franco Nero, because they, too, reunited after a very long real life separation.

The Thoughts

Sounds like brilliant, box office busting, frothy rom com chick flick heaven? Well, it is and it isn’t. The tangled web they attempt to weave unravels rather quickly and I can’t help thinking the fault, dear readers, lies not in the stars, but in the clunky, somewhat predictable script (Shakespeare it isn’t) they have to deliver. Pretty much everything that happens in this film can be seen a mile away, particularly by the seasoned rom com film goer. But what the characters lack in credibility (both love interests of the fair Sophie are just not interesting enough to love), the film makes up for in it’s lovingly shot backdrop of scenic Verona. The real chemistry is between Redgrave and Seyfried, so the viewer (let’s face it, it will largely be one for the ladies) can say, “Hurrah women, ya boo sucks, men.”

I can see this lining the DVD supermarket bins in six months time and if it generates any movie memorabilia, it will be posters of the still lovely Vanessa Redgrave, the highest brow in this low brow, but engaging enough, love story lite.

The Film Buzz Rating: ******~~~~ (6/10)

UK Release Date: 9th June 2010

Director: Gary Winick

Writer’s: Jose Riveria, Tim Sullivan

Links: IMDB, Official Site

Sherlock Holmes 2 will have a mid December 2011 release, we can’t wait to see Downey and Law back together again.

Red Riding Hood starring Amanda Seyfried will be released in April 2011, Catherine Hardwicke (who directed the first Twilight movie) will direct.

The Hangover 2 is set for May 26th 2011.

Ryan Reynold’s portrayal of The Green Lantern is due for June 17th 2011.

The second part of the final instalment of the Harry Potter series comes to an end in Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2 on July 15th 2011.

Journey to the centre of the Earth 2 (does anyone really care?) is for September 23rd 2011.

Happy Feet 2 is for November 18th 2011 and New Year’s Eve opens Dec 9th 2011.

And if that wasn’t enough to get you excited Christopher Nolan’s incredibly successful Batman franchise will continue with the third movie released in the July 2oth 2012. Plus the next Superman movie in 2012 as well (be very interesting to see where they go with this after the disappointing Superman Returns).

That’s a lot of movies to keep us busy in 2011, but looks as though 2011-12 will be the super hero movie years – with the Flash Movie, Wonder Woman and Aquaman in the early stages of development. That’s a heck of a lot of lyrca and leather – let’s just say we at The Film Buzz are more than just excited!

What are you looking forward to seeing over the next few years?

Is Duty enough reason to live a lie?

While John, a soldier, is on leave in his hometown, he falls for a conservative college girl Savannah. They unexpectedly fall deeply in love but then John reenlists to duty due to the attacks on September 11th, 2001. Time and distance begin to take a toll on the young lovers – troubles invade and they put their love on hold. One cannot bear it anymore; can the other?

Starring Channing Tatum, Amanda Seyfried, Richard Jenkins and Henry Thomas and directed by Lasse Hallström who also directed Hachi: A Dog’s Tale (2009).

See it if you liked: The Notebook (2004), The Lake House (2006), The Time Traveller’s Wife (2009)

Certificate: 12A

Genre: Drama/Romance/War

Release Date: 14 April 2010

Cemetery Junction

Be Young. Be Free. Be Somebody.

A 1970s-set comedy centered on three young guys growing up in the small town of Reading, Berkshire. One of them is dreaming big – escaping the blue-collar life. He aspires to something else – and he meets Mr Kendrick who works for a big white-collar company and he decides that’s his way out.

Written and directed by Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant, Cemetery Junction is a British coming-of-age comedy set in the glam rock era of 1970s England, showcasing some bright new Brit-talent by the names of Christian Cooke, Tom Hughes, Jack Doolan and Felicity Jones.

See it if you liked: Starter For 10 (2006), Driving Lessons (2006), Adventureland (2009)

Certificate: 15

Genre: Comedy

Release Date: 14 April 2010

Repo Men

For a price, any organ in your body can be replaced. But it can also be repossessed.

The up-coming science-fiction action thriller directed by Miguel Sapochnik starring Jude Law (Alfie) and Forest Whitaker (Vantage Point).

Set in the near future where artificial organs are bought on credit – a man who has purchased an artificial heart is struggling to make payments for it. A very slick system is in place to chase down those who do not pay in full for their artificial organs, so he must go on the run before his heart gets repossessed.

Repo-men is a heavy and gritty action flick, with the action whipping by you can scarcely catch up. Filled with plenty of nail-biting sequences, and bloody scenes with bodily parts being re-possessed, this isn’t for the faint-hearted. Enjoy excellent performances by all the cast and is that isn’t enough – they’ve thrown in a small treat: a little feast for the eyes a.k.a. an extremely well-buffed Jude Law getting his muscles out for this action hero role.

See it if you liked: Babylon A.D. (2008), Jumper (2008), Push (2009)

Certificate: 18

Genre: Action/Sci-Fi

Release Date: 16 April 2010

The Ghost Writer

When a successful British ghost writer THE GHOST agrees to complete the memoirs to complete the memoirs of former British Prime Minister Adam Lang, his agent assures him it’s the opportunity of a lifetime. But the project seems doomed from the start — not least because his predecessor on the project, Lang’s long-term aide, died in an unfortunate accident.

The Ghost flies out to work on the project, in the middle of winter, to an oceanfront house on an island off the U.S. Eastern seaboard. But the day after he arrives, a former British cabinet minister accuses Lang of authorizing the illegal seizure of suspected terrorists and handing them over for torture by the CIA — a war crime. The controversy brings reporters and protesters swarming to the island mansion where Lang is staying with his wife, RUTH, and his personal assistant (and mistress), AMELIA. As The Ghost works, he begins to uncover clues suggesting his predecessor may have stumbled on a dark secret linking Lang to the CIA — and that somehow this information is hidden in the manuscript he left behind. Was Lang in the service of the American intelligence agency while he was prime minister? And was The Ghost’s predecessor murdered because of the appalling truth he uncovered?

Resonating with topical themes, this atmospheric and suspenseful political thriller is a story of deceit and betrayal on every level — sexual, political, and literary. In a world in which nothing, and no one, is as it seems, The Ghost quickly discovers that the past can be deadly — and that history is decided by whoever stays alive to write it.

Starring Ewan McGregor as the Ghost and Jon Bernthal, Kim Cattrall, Pierce Brosnan and Tim Preece.

See it if you liked: Michael Clayton (2007), State of Play (2009), Edge of Darkness (2010)

Certificate: 15

Genre: Mystery/Thriller

Release Date: 16 April 2010

Julianne Moore stars as Catherine alongisde Liam Neeson who plays David as the “perfectly married couple” with a teenage son but when David misses a flight and his surprise birthday party – Catherine starts to suspect that there is more than meets the eye. Her imagination runs wild with thoughts of David cheating on her and she decides to hire an escort to test his loyalty. Catherine employs attractive young Chloe and directs her encounters with David and Chloe reports back exactly what goes down in those encounters. However, as the meetings multiply, descriptions get more graphic and things start to get very out of control…

Directed by Atom Egoyan who previously brought us Where the Truth Lies (2005), you are fore-warned that the sexual scenes are going to be of graphic nature, however fear not, it’s not trashy porn material – we are reassured that the eroticism is tastefully done.

If that doesn’t persuade you to see this erotic thriller – Julianne Moore gives a truly excellent performance whilst Amanda Seyfried is absolutely stunning as the steamy “seductress” – 100 times better than her performance in Jennifer’s Body.

The Film Buzz Anticipation Rating: 7/10

UK Release Date: March 26th 2010

Director: Atom Egoyan

Writer: Erin Cressida Wilson (screenplay), Anne Fontaine

Links: IMDB, Rotten Tomatoes

John meets Savannah while on leave from the army, in a nutshell he helps her out and the two quickly fall in love, but alas John decides to go back to the army and the two keep in touch over time  by letters.

Based on the book of the same name written by Nicholas Sparks the author of The Notebook, you just know this is going to be a mushy, weepy, romantic but touching story. I thought the same thing about The Notebook and now it’s probably in my list of the top 300 films I’ve seen that didn’t suck even though I thought it would.

We can expect to see this in theatres in February 2010 – better stock up on those tissues.

The Buzz Anticipation Rating: 6/10

Release Date: February 2010

Director: Lasse Hallström

Writer’s: Jamie Linden & Nicholas Sparks

Links: IMDB