Review: Thor: The Dark World

Anne Marie here with a look at Marvel's latest blockbuster.

And so the Great Marvel Experiment continues with the studio's latest film, Thor: The Dark World. Marvel can be credited with doing something virtually unprecedented in Hollywood: creating an extended cinematic universe with many different intersecting films, characters, and plotlines. Unlike a universe built by sequels and trilogies (like Star Wars) or subtle Easter eggs (like Quentin Tarantino's films), the universe created by Marvel built on a decade-long-ish Three Phase plan. The Avengers ended Phase One rather spectacularly.

Phase Two got off to a rocky-if-enjoyable start with Iron Man 3. However, as a Marvel character licensed to a different studio once said, "With great power comes great responsibility." Marvel doesn't get a free pass to make an inferior movie just because they're breaking new ground. Unfortunately, Thor: The Dark World, the second installment in Phase Two, might be just that inferior movie. [more...]

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Top Ten Biggest Money-Making Actresses Right Now

For today's Tuesday's Top Ten we're using Forbes numbers for discussion lift-off We recently discussed their list of the top paid actors from the past twelve months and came to the conclusion that they don't challenge themselves much at all. The women are a slightly different story. While it's true that no one would mistake this for a list of 'The Best Actresses Working' or 'The Actresses Who Are Currently Testing The Limits of Their Range,' this list does have slightly more variety in filmography though far less in terms of beauty and age as is always the case with the men and the women of Hollywood

01 Angelina Jolie $33 
Tops the list by way of signing on to Maleficent for Disney. The Sleeping Beauty prequel is a surefire hit, both because it's presold -- branding being everything -- and because it's Jolie who rarely falters at the box office. 

nine more ladies and an actress poll after the jump

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Something Portman This Way Comes

JA from MNPP here - by now I think most of you have probably heard the news that Michael Fassbender is going to play Macbeth for the director of Snowtown. (Any fans of Snowtown up in here? I found it monstrously, emphasis on monstrously, effective.) Speculation immediately turned to what actress would play the scheming Lady to his doomed King - I saw everybody from Tilda Swinton to Emma Watson mentioned (and no doubt somewhere Sally Kellerman whispered her own name into the wind, too).

Well today we find out his former Jane Got a Gun co-star to be that never was Natalie Portman will be the one whispering deadly somethings in his ear, and... people don't seem happy, from what I can gather? I have to admit I'm kinda skeptical myself. I like Natalie, I thought she deserved her Oscar for Black Swan, but Vincent Cassel wasn't wrong when he told her she can nail the White Swan but she has some trouble with the darker side. Can she summon the wicked gravitas you need for this role?

I mean, we need somebody in this part that can convincingly tell Michael Fassbender that he doesn't have, you know, the sufficient manhood, ahem. So yeah... now that I think about it pretty much anybody's doomed, having to sell that whopper. "The Scottish Play" is a curse after all!

Link-Link

Chris Sanders unused storyboards from the new animated film The Croods 
In Contention which Sundance films have Oscar potential?
CHUD What's next for David Fincher? Gone Girl or 20,000 Leagues or...
John August ooh listen here. A whole podcast on the wonderful Raiders of the Lost Ark
Empire Rosario Dawson nabs another female lead role. This time it's Queen of the Night from Atom Egoyan. To what do we owe this sudden upswing in her career? We want to thank whoever/whatever is responsible.

Awards Daily a trippy poster for Danny Boyle's Trance starring James McAvoy and Rosario Dawson
Studio Briefing 39 minutes of Cloud Atlas cut for its Chinese release. Maybe if it were 39 minutes shorter I might not have... no, never mind. Let's not go there again!
Coming Soon The Marvel Studios tv series "S.H.I.E.L.D." has begun filming
Gothamist wonders if TV's "The Carrie Diaries" (i.e. Sex & The City: the Prequel) is getting 1980s NYC all wrong
Bleeding Cool posters for 47 Ronin with Keanu Reeves getting the whitewashed leading Japanese samurai role (fwiw: Keanu has some Asian ancestry so this is kind of like the Johnny Depp as Tonto thing)
MNPP Everyone's favorite moment in Skyfall 

... or maybe you have a different one?

Finally... Have you seen this amazement? 

A dress made up of pictures of Natalie Portman crying twitter.com/milesmaker/sta…

— Miles Maker(@milesmaker) January 22, 2013

Link to the Rescue

First Showing Django Unchained banner on the Croisette in Cannes
Inlander Don Draper isn't Mad Men's main character any more
Filmofilia a full slate for Amy Adams through 2014 at least. Add thriller Dark Places (based on the novel of the same name) to the long list
Cinema Blend Rise of the Planet of the Apes sequel gets the Contagion screenwriter Scott Z Burns 

 MZ Yikes. Actor Nick Stahl of Bully, Terminator 3 and Carnivàle fame has been reporting missing since May 9th
Heat Vision Robert Downey Jr's The Avengers payday could reach $50 million. The other actors aren't so lucky
Gold Derby Downton Abbey will be competing in Best Series (where it belongs) for Emmy nods... finally giving up on considering itself a miniseries, bless.
Pajiba "Identifying the Moment in Natalie Portman's Career Timeline In Which It Was OK To Admit a Crush"
Screen Daily Keira Knightley replacing ScarJo in Can a Song Save Your Life 

Indiewire Awesome news for fans of the gay romantic drama Weekend (2011). Criterion will handle the DVD.
Michael Musto interviews Andy Dick, now sober but just as candid.
Coming Soon Orphan star and now Hunger Games victim Isabelle Fuhrman will star in the remake of Suspiria
The Film Stage Terrence Malick's latest, a romantic drama starring Ben Affleck, Olga Kurylenko, and Rachel McAdams (at least according to which characters feature in the synopsis) finally gets a title... To the Wonder.  

Not Your Usual Superhero Articles
Filmwell "thou shalt have no other god but Captain America's" on references to the divine in The Avengers
GeekWatch adorable story of a five year old boy meeting Captain America and Loki on the set of The Avengers