Vincents Movie Facts

Wes Anderson Says He's Drawn to Failure

Wes Anderson said his quirky undersea adventure "The Life Aquatic With Steve Zissou," which screened Wednesday at the Berlin film festival, allowed him to continue exploring a long-standing interest in failure.

"It's not like I ever had any intention to write about failure or focus on failure but I feel like I have utterly," Anderson, whose previous movies include "The Royal Tenenbaums" and "Rushmore," told reporters. "Every movie I make is about someone who can't fit in or can't make things work or is dealing with failure."

The takeoff of undersea adventure movies stars Bill Murray as the Jacques Cousteau-like explorer of the film's title. The crew, assembled by Zissou to hunt for a rare shark that killed his partner, has to cope with mutiny, pirate raids and other problems.

Anderson said Cousteau provided the inspiration for the film.

"He was my hero as a kid," he said. "Not only was he an oceanographer, but he was an adventurer and a filmmaker and a kind of movie star and I've always been fascinated with him."

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'Miss Daisy' Writer Sued by Son-In-Law

"Driving Miss Daisy" playwright Alfred Uhry is accused in a $1.4 million lawsuit of defaming his former son-in-law, who claims he was wrongly accused of child abuse and attempted poisoning by nicotine patch.

The lawsuit, filed Feb. 1, says the Pulitzer Prize winner waged a smear campaign against Russell B. Rhea by telling friends and business associates that Rhea engaged in "various types of criminal conduct."

"It's ludicrous. It's preposterous," Uhry said in Tuesday's The Hartford Courant. "He has a credibility problem."

Around the time Rhea, 43, divorced Emily Ann Uhry in 2003, she sought a restraining order accusing him of spiking her drink with blood pressure medicine. She also said Rhea "attached nicotine patches to various parts of my body when I was asleep" after watching a TV crime show in which someone had been murdered that way.

Rhea denied the allegations and no charges were filed.

"If I really wanted to kill her, I had rat poison and weed killer in the garage," he said.

In a second lawsuit, Rhea accused another of Uhry's daughters, Katherine Fox-Uhry, of slandering him by telling people he sexually abused one of his daughters and beat another, and sexually abused a friend of one of the girls.

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• All of the clocks in the movie are stuck on 4:20.
• Quentin Tarantino hesitated over the choice between the character he was going to play: Jimmie or Lance. He ended up choosing Jimmie's role because he wanted to be behind the camera in Mia's overdose scene.
• Jules's character was originally written to have a gigantic afro, but a crewmember obtained a variety of afro wigs and one jerry curl wig. Quentin Tarantino had never thought about a jerry curl wig, but Samuel L. Jackson tried it on, Tarantino liked it, and it was kept.
  
• Quentin Tarantino originally wrote the role of Jules specifically for Samuel L. Jackson, however it was almost given to Paul Calderon after a great audition. When Jackson heard this, he flew to LA and re-auditioned, getting back the part he was supposed to play. Calderon ended up with a cameo as Paul, the bartender.
• The shot of Vincent plunging the syringe into Mia's chest was filmed by having John Travolta pull the needle out, then running the film backwards.

The original captain of Star Trek's starship 'Enterprise' was Jeffrey Hunter, and not William Shatner, as Christopher Pike, in the pilot episode 'The cage' (1964). The cast was quite different from that of the classic series except for Leonard Nimoy as Spock.

Bill Murray's choice of swimwear in his new movie leaves little to the imagination. But the star of "The Life Aquatic With Steve Zissou" says he wasn't embarrassed to be seen in a tiny bathing suit."Being in a Speedo with other men in Speedos is, you know, is like you're on a swimming team," he told reporters recently, according to AP Radio. "It's the other men that are not in Speedos that are the problem because they're kind of going like, `Can you get a load of the guy in the Speedo?'"

Wes Anderson's gleeful takeoff on undersea adventure movies stars Murray as the Jacques-Yves Cousteau-like explorer of the film's title.

The 54-year-old actor said he didn't see his character as being physically vain.

Sixth Harry Potter Book Due Out in July

Get ready for publishing's ultimate blockbuster sequel: Harry Potter VI. Setting the stage for another round of midnight bookstore parties and marathon readings into the morning, the penultimate novel in J.K. Rowling's mega-selling series, "Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince," will go on sale 12:01 a.m. on July 16 in the United States, Britain and four other countries, publishers said Tuesday.

"I know you all expected this to happen on Christmas Day, but I was sure that those of you who celebrate Christmas have better things to do on the day itself than fight your way into my study," the British author wrote in a message posted on her Web site, "whereas those of you who DON'T celebrate Christmas would definitely prefer not to wait until the 25th."

Rowling, 39, noted that while she is pregnant with her third child, she has had the time "needed to tinker with the manuscript to my satisfaction and I am as happy as I have ever been with the end result. I only hope you feel it was worth the wait when you finally read it."

The book will also be published July 16 in Canada, Australia, New Zealand and South Africa. With the previous works available in 62 languages, many, many other countries are sure to follow.

Review: 'Aviator' Ultimately Superficial

Nearly three hours later, I still don't understand Howard Hughes any better than when I sat down to watch "The Aviator."

Oh, the film is visually astounding and all. Martin Scorsese's latest extravaganza is truly a sight to behold, constantly dazzling and frequently thrilling. Every detail is perfect as you'd imagine from a director who's as famous for perfectionism as the eccentric billionaire Hughes from the Art Deco accents on the stairway railings in Hughes' office to the red lipstick Gwen Stefani wears during a brief appearance as Jean Harlow.

Strong performances abound, from star Leonardo DiCaprio to Cate Blanchett as Hughes' legendary love, Katharine Hepburn, to Alan Alda as a scheming senator. (It's soothing just to hear his familiar voice again, even though every word that comes out of his mouth is duplicitous.)

See it for the plane crash alone a wondrously thunderous spectacle in which the stubborn Hughes refuses to land his newest aircraft during a test run, and plows it into the top of a Beverly Hills mansion.

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L.A. Critics Name 'Sideways' Best Film

"Sideways," a quirky comedy about two friends on a road trip through California's wine country, was picked as 2004's best film by the Los Angeles Film Critics Association, the group announced Saturday.

The movie won four other awards: best director for Alexander Payne; best supporting actor for Thomas Haden Church; best supporting actress for Virginia Madsen; and best screenplay, which was written by Alexander Payne and Jim Taylor.

Top acting honors went to Imelda Staunton of the abortion drama "Vera Drake" and Liam Neeson of the sex-researcher biopic "Kinsey."

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