Naomi Watts and Robin Wright Penn Filming on the Beach – Feb 7, 2012
Naomi Watts Gets a Family Visit – Feb 8, 2012
Naomi Watts And Robin Wright Filming In Sydney – Feb 9, 2012
Stars On The Set Of “The Grandmothers” In Sydney – Feb 9, 2012
Naomi Watts and Robin Wright Film on the Beach – Feb 10, 2012

[Thu 02/02/2012 09:36:14]

By Brendan Swift

Australian actors Ben Mendelsohn, Sophie Lowe and Gary Sweet have joined the cast of Australian-French co-production The Grandmothers.

They join the principal cast of Naomi Watts, Robin Wright, Xavier Samuel and James Frecheville in a tale about two lifelong friends who fall in love with each other’s teenaged sons. Jessica Tovey (Underbelly, Paper Giants: The Birth of Cleo) will also make her feature debut in the.

The Grandmothers has been adapted for the screen by Academy Award-winning writer Christopher Hampton (Dangerous Liaisons, Atonement) from a story written by Nobel Prize for Literature winner Doris Lessing.

The eight-week shoot marks the English-language debut for director Anne Fontaine (Coco avant Chanel) and is due to begin on Monday (February 6) in Sydney.

The film is being produced by Hopscotch Productions’ Andrew Mason; Fontaine’s long-time collaborator Philippe Carcassonne; as well as French producers’ Mon Voisin’s Michel Feller and Dominique Besnehard. Hopscotch’s Troy Lum and Gaumont’s Francis Boespflug will act as executive producers.

The film is expected to be released in 2013 in Australia and New Zealand by Hopscotch Films/eOne while international sales will be managed by Gaumont.

Source: Inside Film

The Grandmothers, starring Naomi Watts, starts shoot next month

[Tue 10/01/2012 05:11:20]

By Sam Dallas

Erotic tale The Grandmothers, boasting an all-star cast, will start filming next month.

The somewhat-risqué drama, based on a short story of the same name by British author Doris Lessing, will star Naomi Watts (King Kong) and Robin Wright (Beowulf) who are two lifelong friends who fall in love with each other’s teenage sons.

The two sons will be played by The Twilight Saga‘s Xavier Samuel and Animal Kingdom’s James Frecheville.

The film, which received Screen Australia funding, is being described as an erotic tale of misguided love and a celebration of the enduring nature of female friendship.

Penned for the screen by Oscar-winning British writer Christopher Hampton (Dangerous Liaisons), the flick is expected to be filmed in NSW however an announcement has not yet been made.

It will be directed by France-based and former actress Anne Fontaine, who is best known for writing and directing Coco Before Chanel which was nominated for a string of awards (including Oscars and BAFTAs) after it was released in 2009.

The Grandmothers will be produced by Andrew Mason (on behalf of Hopscotch Features), as well as Philippe Carcassonne, Michel Feller, Dominique Besnehard and Francis Boespflug. Gaumont will handle international sales while Hopscotch/Entertainment One will distribute the film locally.

Hopscotch Films’ managing director Troy Lum told IF the film would be shot late-next month, while another on their slate – gothic thriller I, Frankenstein had been pushed back a month to March.

I, Frankenstein, based on a DarkStorm Studios graphic novel by Kevin Grevioux, will be directed by Tomorrow, When The War Began’s Stuart Beattie.

Sydney’s Make-Up Effects Group is currently working on the special make-up effects for the film, including the Frankenstein “look” for lead actor Aaron Eckhart (The Dark Knight).

Robert Luketic’s Brilliant, which Lum announced during last year’s Australian International Movie Convention, has been pushed back and is still in development after it was expected to shoot at around the same time as I, Frankenstein.

“No word on that yet…but it’s still in the works,” Lum said of the director’s first ever major Australian feature. Sydney-born Luketic is best known for Legally Blonde, 21 and Killers, and Brilliant is being touted as a cross between James Bond and My Fair Lady.

Source: Inside Film

The DVD of The Slap has been out in England. You can now order it here.

Kiss, written and directed by Alex Murawski and produced by Annmaree J Bell will screen as part of the Generation 14plus program at the 2012 Berlin International Film Festival in February. This is the second year running that an AFTRS film has been accepted, with Pig, directed by Tom McKeith representing the school in 2011.

[Fri 18/11/2011 03:30:56]
By Sam Dallas

Controversial ABC series The Slap will soon be heard around the world.

Produced by Matchbox Pictures, the popular series – through international distributor DCD Rights – has now sold to DirecTV and TVOntario (TVO) for US and Canada distribution rights, respectively.

It follows the news last month of the acquisition by the Sundance Channel, which will screen the show in Eastern Europe, Greece, Turkey, Spain, Portugal and Asia. The BBC picked up the rights to the show in August and it went to air on BBC4 late-last month, netting an average audience of 830,500 (4 per cent share), according to Variety.

Californian-based DirecTV, which in the past acquired Underbelly, will screen the series on the Audience Network channel later this year.

“Selling The Slap to North America is something that we really hoped for,” producer Helen Bowden told IF today. “DirecTV is the home of the US dramas Damages and Friday Night Lights, so we are thrilled to be in that company.”

While in Canada, The Slap will be seen on public broadcaster TVO in the near future.

“TVOntario goes under the banner ‘Makes you think’, which seems like the right home in Canada for our show.”

It’s been a big week for Melbourne-based Matchbox Pictures, which on Monday was awarded the Independent Producer of the Year trophy at the SPAA Conference dinner and Awards night.

The Slap’s a series that has sparked controversy since airing in Australia in early-October. Based on Christos Tsiolkas’ book of the same name, it follows the repercussions of a single ‘slap’ from a man to a child at a summer barbecue. It brings up such debates as parenting, race, class, sexuality and the rights of children. Each episode covers a different character’s point of view.

Stars appearing in the series include Melissa George, Jonathan LaPaglia, Sophie Lowe, Alex Dimitriades, Essie Davis, Blake Davis, Sophie Okonedo, Anthony Hayes, Diana Glenn and Kingswood Country’s Lex Marinos.

Source: Inside Film

Gallery Links
Photoshoots > 2011: Session 12 – Yen Magazine Issue #48
Public Appearances > 12.02.11: Louis Vuitton’s Sydney Flagship Store Opening
Public Appearances 12.20.11: “Sherlock Holmes 2″ Sydney Premiere
Autumn Blood > Productional Stills
Photoshoots > 2011: Session 11 – Flavor City

Gallery Links
The Slap > Productional Stills
Public Appearances > 11.15.11: Moet + Chandon Women In Film Celebration
Public Appearances > 12.07.11: Bulgari Christmas Celebration
Public Appearances > 11.16.11: 2011 Inside Film Awards
Blame > Promotional Shoots

  

Gallery Links
Magazine Scans > 2011 – Yen Magazine Issue #48
Magazine Scans > Cleo October 2011
Behind the scenes of photoshoots > 2011: Yen Magazine Issue 48
Candids >09.01.11: Lunches at Kawa Cafe in Sydney

The Slap, Episode 4, “Connie”
November 2, 2011
Source; Pedestrian 

I need to take an acting class to learn to say someone is a good actor/bad actor with more authority. It’s from the ‘you have such a great group of friends’ school of of saying you had an only OK time at someone’s party. An elegant deflection – allowing you nothing whatsoever about the thing itself but still present as a supreme judge of the bigger picture, the craft, the human spirit and all that.

I just get nervous about getting sprung saying Sophie Lowe is really good at playing uninhibited and unselfconscious teen, if she’s really just an uninhibited and unselfconscious Sophie Lowe. Or does it not matter whether she’s comprehensively transforming in to something she’s not, as long as she’s able to capture realistic emotion? Watching Sophie Lowe’s performance in this week’s episode of The Slap made one thing very clear. Her presence is so commanding that I can already tell I will spend the rest of my health-professional waiting-room reading life enduring sycophantic profiles that talk about her skin. For Australian acting accolades are not measured in Oscars but in how many profile pieces reference a flawless make-up free complexion.

Sophie Lowe plays Connie Lang, a character who is herself a good little actress. She shifts effortlessly between her roles as high school girl, veterinary assistant and babysitter. She is sexually direct around Hector (the father of the kids she babysits and the husband of the vet she works for); supporting and agreeable around Rosie (the mother of the boy she babysits and the boy who was slapped), and she is perceptive and playful around her best friend Richie. She contains all these competing qualities, and we watch her improvise reactions to other people’s more established personalities, tenderly testing the boundaries of others by drawing eyeliner on their faces after school or propositioning them in the car ride home after babysitting. She doesn’t really draw us in to her decision making process – she talks in blank teen fragments. All we know is that she is seeking self-definition through the adults we have already spent some time around, Connie’s company helps us to know them better than her.

v/o: ‘Connie knew that Episode 4 was going to be about her, for Connie had read the book and seen the preview at the end of last weeks episode. So Connie did very many teen things, all the teen things she could think of’.

Much like the over-explanatory voice-overs peppered arrhythmically throughout each episode, this episode was a little too thorough in traversing every aspect of her sexual awakening. It is like a complete compendium of Dolly Doctor columns. By the way, Sophie Lowe deserves a million Oscars/column inches about having nice skin for her willingness to do lots of very embarrassing stuff on tv. See: bath scene.

I felt like she accessed a slightly different register of teen angst – she has many feelings but she is not incapacitated by them, instead, they give her agency to do lots of humiliating stuff. Connie isn’t pre-occupied by the usual parental tensions of the teen experience, as both her parents are dead, and she’s being raised by an aunt. I think it’s fair to assume her folks were Lily and James Potter because her loss manifests as uniqueness and an ability to take risks, not as moroseness. Also, when Richie asks her if he dad was a punk she’s all ‘sort of…’ and trails off suspiciously.

Several scenes in this episode are shot in filtered Sofia Coppola-esque light – but it’s cool how it’s not as aesthetically unified or uptight as those films – it captures an adorably confused teen wardrobe (slouchy tees and strapless shiny blue dresses) instead of frame upon frame of gauzy white cotton. Australian teens aren’t as archetypal as American teens, but we are no less charming!

Of course it wouldn’t be an episode of The Slap without every single character saying heaps of stuff about the slap. Every time we walk in on secondary characters mid-conversation they happen to be talking about the implications of the slap, or its administrative back-end-arrest, witness testimony, court dates, etc. Look, The Slap, High Distincton for breadth of argument. But having the slap as the only thing the characters seem to be able to talk about erodes the believability of the world around them- they are merely mouthpieces plucked to enact Important Social Discussion. These are not characters affected by an incident – they’re defined by it and invented for it.

That said, there’s a smart parallel in this episode. Connie’s secret relationship with Hector acts as an interesting stand-in for the slap – another good case study for the differences in people’s views. She, like Hugo in episode 1, provoked the man who took action, arguably involving him beyond his actual culpability (Harry gets charged with child assault, Hector gets accused of rape.)

The treatment of their relationship leaves me feeling more conflicted and engaged than the slap. I am heartbroken for Aisha and her false sense of ease in her marriage with Hector, and I am happy when Hector unequivocally rejects Connie by the end of the episode. But then she starts sobbing, pulls her hair out of it’s high ponytail in sadness and I’m like- oh gurl, you look much better with your hair out! You should’ve had it out when you propositioned him just before! You would’ve totally gotten what you wanted! Try again!’

Words By Sophie Braham

BellaSugar Australia / NOVEMBER 17, 2011 9:32 AM

After rising to fame in Beautiful Kate, the gorgeous Sophie Lowe has always been on our radar — both for her acting roles and her effortless, sometimes eclectic style. She’s earned critical acclaim for her role as Connie in The Slap, the must-see mini-series which is in its penultimate episode — don’t miss it: ABC1, 8.30pm tonight. We caught up with her on the green carpet at the Jameson IF Awards last night and asked her to talk us through her stunning complexion so she opened up her clutch and revealed what’s inside . . .

Clé de Peau Concealer: “You can’t get it in Australia but whenever I’m in LA I get it.”
MAC Mineralize Skinfinish Powder ($47)
BECCA: “I really like anything BECCA.” Try the brand’s Beach Tint ($33.60) or Bird of Paradise Gloss ($46)

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