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'Insurgent' Spends More Time On Shailene Woodley And Characterisation


Shailene Woodley Kate Winslet Naomi Watts Octavia Spencer Ashley Judd

Unless you had read the book, last year's hit 'Divergent' probably left you scratching your head about the story set in post-war Chicago, where people are segmented into factions according to their personalities (Dauntless, Candor, Amity, Erudite and Abnegation), plus the factionless rebels and multi-factioned divergents. Basically it all felt rather contrived, and director Neil Burger's movie had to spend too much time trying to explain how it worked.

Maggie Q and Shailene Woodley in 'Divergent'
Maggie Q and Shailene Woodley in 'Divergent'

Now we move into the second chapter, 'Insurgent', and director Robert Schwentke can just get on with the story, playing down the odd structure of this closed-off city. So it's a much more involving movie that centres on the characters themselves, weaving the action into their personal situations while building a much more urgent sense of suspense up to another cliff-hanger ending. This also lets the female-dominated cast members shine, including Shailene Woodley, Kate Winslet and Naomi Watts, plus Octavia Spencer in a key cameo, and Ashley Judd in recurring flashbacks.

Continue reading: 'Insurgent' Spends More Time On Shailene Woodley And Characterisation

Impressive 'Dolphin Tale 2' Continues Warner Bros' Unlikely Franchise


Morgan Freeman Ashley Judd Harry Connick Jr.

Dolphin Tale (2011) was huge success for Warner Bros. Not in a massively commercial sense - it took $97 million - but critically, this was considered one of the finest, fun-filled movies in recent years and featured a lovely looking family cast including Harry Connick Jr, Ashley Judd and Morgan Freeman.

Dolphin Tale'Dolphin Tale 2' continues where the original left off

It told the true story of brave dolphin Winter and a band of compassionate group of strangers who banded together to save her life after she is caught in a crab trap.  

Continue reading: Impressive 'Dolphin Tale 2' Continues Warner Bros' Unlikely Franchise

Divergent Review


Good

Teens tackle yet another dystopian future in this well-made but derivative franchise-launcher. Filmmaker Neil Burger is more interested in whizzy visuals and a thorny plot to pay much attention to the characters or larger underlying themes, which leaves the film feeling eerily superficial. So while the film is relatively entertaining, it ultimately feels rather pointless.

The story's set after a war has reduced Chicago to a walled-in enclave of people divided into five stabilising factions: charitable Abnegation, peaceful Amity, honest Candor, defending Dauntless and brainy Erudite. Tris (Shailene Woodley) was born to parents (Ashley Judd and Tony Goldwyn) who are leaders in Abnegation, but when time comes for her to select her own path she discovers that she's Divergent, a cross-faction state that threatens those in power. So she chooses to join Dauntless, entering intense physical training under the tutelage of sexy hunk Four (Theo James) and harsh hunk Eric (Jai Courtney). then Dauntless' soldiers get caught up in a power struggle as Erudite leader Jeanine (Kate Winslet) plots to take governmental responsibilities from Abnegation.

All of this scene-setting takes about half of the film's running time, and it's frankly not very exciting. Burger makes sure it looks fantastic, with seamless visual effects, impressive stunt work and flashy action sequences, but the character drama takes longer to kick off. And there's also the problem that it essentially feels like a cross between The Hunger Games and Harry Potter as an unusually gifted teen takes on a controlling society.

Continue reading: Divergent Review

Ashley Judd Openly Discusses Estranged Husband Dario Franchitti


Ashley Judd

American actress Ashley Judd is a single women, but she still holds strong feelings for her estranged husband Dario Franchitti.

The pair became engaged in December 1999 while Franchitti was racing in the Champ Car World Series, and married two years later in 2001.

They decided to mutually separate 11 years later in January 2013, but Judd still hasn't fallen out of love yet.

Continue reading: Ashley Judd Openly Discusses Estranged Husband Dario Franchitti

Kate Winslet Or Shailene Woodley? Who Was Best Dressed At 'Divergent' Premiere?


Shailene Woodley Kate Winslet Ashley Judd Ellie Goulding Theo James Kiernan Shipka

With a cast like that of new blockbuster Divergent it’s not a surprise that the movie’s premiere was packed with stylish stars. The red carpet was swarming with a wealth of designer ensembles, and that’s just from the men! We’ve have a root through all of the fabulous outfits from the evening and picked out the looks that we love the most. 

kate winslet divergent premiere We're in love with Kate's Safiyaa London gown

Kate Winslet may have given birth to her baby boy just three months ago, but you’d never have been able to tell, so fabulous did she look in her floor length red Safiyaa London gown. Bear Blaze has got one yummy mummy, that’s for sure! Kate completed her look with two totally on trend accessories, a metallic gold clutch bag and gold cuff bracelet.  This girl knows how to red carpet (she does have a fair bit of experience at it!).

Continue reading: Kate Winslet Or Shailene Woodley? Who Was Best Dressed At 'Divergent' Premiere?

Divergent - Featurette


Author Veronica Roth and the cast of her book's film adaptation 'Divergent' talk about the upcoming dystopian movie in a short featurette. Among the cast are Shailene Woodley, Theo James, Kate Winslet and Jai Courtney.

Continue: Divergent - Featurette

Ashley Judd Accuses Sister Wynonna Of GPS Tracking In Police Report


Ashley Judd Wynonna Judd

Ashley Judd has filed a police report against her sister claiming that Wynonna has been using a GPS device planted on her car to secretly track her movement. The actress filed the report in Tennessee alleging that her country singer sibling placed a GPS tracking device on her silver Mini Cooper in order to obtain information related to an "ongoing custody dispute" within the family, according to Fox News.

Ashley Judd
Ashley Judd Has Filed A Police Report Against Her Sister, Wynonna.

The cellular tracking gadget was found by a mechanic after an unnamed driver of Ashley's car became suspicious and took the vehicle to be checked. Upon the discovery, the 45 year-old actress went to the authorities who discovered that the device was registered to a local Nashville private investigator, Janice Diane Swafford-Holt.

Continue reading: Ashley Judd Accuses Sister Wynonna Of GPS Tracking In Police Report

Olympus Has Fallen Trailer


President of the United States Benjamin Asher has had enough trauma while being in office, and things are about to get a whole lot worse. What with the current conflicts between the States and North Korea, there is a known danger that a war could erupt between the two countries; however, Asher had little to suspect when he welcomed a South Korean ministerial aide into the White House. In a terrifying turn of events, he is kidnapped by the aide who reveals himself to be Kang, a North Korean terrorist with little interest in negotiations. Trapped in the building as it becomes under siege by Kang's cohorts is Mike Banning; a former Secret Service agent who was discredited after making a mistake at the expense of a life while acting as a Presidential guard. Despite his being shunned from the government for his errors, with his insider knowledge he becomes the only hope they have of rescuing the President from a grisly fate.

Continue: Olympus Has Fallen Trailer

Ashley Judd Splits From Dario Franchitti After 11 Years Together


Ashley Judd Dario Franchitti

Ashley Judd has split from her Scottish race car driver husband Dario Franchitti after an 11 year marriage. The actress, 44, married the Indianapolis 500 driver, 39, in 2001 though the couple never had children.

"We have mutually decided to end our marriage. We'll always be family and continue to cherish our relationship based on the special love, integrity and respect we have always enjoyed," a representative for the couple told People magazine in a statement on Tuesday. So far, no reason for the split has been given. 

Judd is the daughter of country music star Naomi Judd, though carved out her own career in Hollywood with high profile movies such as Double Jeopardy, Heat, Kiss The Girls and High Crimes. In recent years she has turned her attention to humanitarian causes and worked with AIDS sufferers and young people. She is even considering a possible Democratic candidate run for the U.S. Senate in 2014, though had made no formal announcement on the matter. Media reports suggested she might vie for one of Kentucky's seats.

Continue reading: Ashley Judd Splits From Dario Franchitti After 11 Years Together

Dolphin Tale Review


Good
Relentlessly heartwarming, this film can't help but move us to tears. Honestly, it stars a disabled dolphin, an injured war veteran, a couple of cute kids and Morgan Freeman! It's also a great story, nicely told.

Shy 11-year-old Sawyer (Gamble) struggles to relate to other kids, and now his revered swim-champ cousin (Stowell) is heading off to war just as summer begins. One day Sawyer helps rescue Winter, a dolphin entangled in a crab trap, and gets involved in her rehabilitation with Dr Clay (Connick) and his daughter Hazel (Zuehlsdorff). Sawyer's mother (Judd) reluctantly lets him skip summer-school to work at the aquarium, which is under threat from mounting bills. And Sawyer convinces a prosthetic expert (Freeman) to help the now tailless Winter regain her ability to swim.

Continue reading: Dolphin Tale Review

Crossing Over Review


Good
Crash meets Babel in this multi-strand Los Angeles immigration drama. The film is well-made and benefits from a very strong cast, but it's both overly worthy and rather pushy about its perspective.

Immigration cop Max (Ford) clearly has compassion for the illegals he rounds up with partner Hamid (Curtis), a naturalised citizen from Iran. But visa official Cole (Liotta) is exploiting the desperation of a wannabe Aussie actress (Eve), while her British friend (Sturgess) finds a loophole in the law. Meanwhile, Cole's wife (Judd) is an immigration lawyer trying to help a 15-year-old Bangladeshi girl (Bishil) picked up by the FBI on suspicion of terrorism due to a school project. And Yong (Chon) is a Korean teen caught up with an Asian gang.

There are several other storylines, and each touches on a specific aspect of immigration, with a range of ethnicities, visa situations and personal issues, all of which come up against the rigid rule of law. Even harsher are FBI tactics that throw out rights such as privacy, free speech and the presumption of innocence, not to mention simple human decency. But then, their paranoia is echoed by people on the streets and in the classrooms.

In other words, the film is packed with thought-provoking material; it's vitally important simply because filmmaker Kramer is airing such complex issues. The Bangladeshi family is the most involving story, with a lovely, understated performance by Bishil as a girl whose whole life comes undone because she dares to think deeply. This story could have supported the whole film, and sometimes sits at odds with Sturgess' more comical tale, Eve and Liotta's sordid encounters, or Curtis' increasingly disturbing journey.

The entire cast gives offhanded, natural performances that hold our interest.

Ford is good as the everyman, brushing against the various plots. Despite the insipid Mark Isham score, there are some seriously powerful emotional scenes along the way, although a couple of strands get lost in the shuffle, disappearing for long stretches and only coming back to fit into the final tidy mosaic. Ultimately, Kramer strains to make it gel together, but we still hear his cry for understanding and compassion in a world filled with bigotry and ignorance.

Bug (2007) Review


Terrible
On my way out of William Friedkin's latest Bug, I overheard a gentleman in the lobby say to his companion that he hopes everyone involved in the picture fires their agents. The movie could mean at least a long stint in the doghouse for its two leads, Ashley Judd and Michael Shannon. It's regrettable, because the actors are clearly giving all they've got and then some to a project that, ultimately, amounts to a staggering miscalculation. As for Friedkin, I'm guessing he'll stay put for a few years before returning with another questionable clunker.

Working from Tracy Letts' adaptation of his own play, Friedkin gives us a five-character chamber piece, set in a downtrodden motel room out in the sticks. Bi-curious basket case Agnes (Judd) works as a waitress in a redneck bar by night, and shacks up in a motel room, in a pot-, coke-, and booze-induced stupor by day. It's her meager defense against the onslaught of just-paroled ex-husband Jerry (a beefed-up and amusing Harry Connick Jr.), who drops by to inflict verbal and physical abuse, not to mention dredging up memories of her long-lost son. The woman's only respite is her girlfriend, R.C. (Lynn Collins), a fellow waitress who's a tad too freewheeling for the reserved Agnes. Twitched-out and fragile, she meets her perfect match in the taciturn Peter (Shannon), a war veteran who harbors traumas of his own. Soon after they hook up, Peter becomes increasingly convinced that his body's been colonized by bugs -- bugs laying eggs and traveling up and down his bloodstream. Peter claims to be an escapee from a government medical lab where he was the subject of nefarious tests. He suspects the bugs were bio-engineered by the government to be tools for mind control. Before you know it, Bug has become a full-blown freak show, fueled by military-industrial conspiracies, and styled after Macbeth as the paranoid Peter and the needy Agnes become obsessive partners in mutual destruction.

Continue reading: Bug (2007) Review

Twisted Review


Terrible
Few cities on earth make for a better backdrop for murder mysteries than San Francisco. Its naturally spooky features - the fog-shrouded skyline, the damp city streets, and the massive bay - are all instant mood setters. It's the ultimate studio backlot. And yet, it amazes me that the thriller Twisted wastes all of the suspense and atmosphere that is so intrinsic in the San Francisco surroundings.

Ashley Judd plays newbie homicide detective Jessica Shepard, a former street beat cop whose quick rise in the department is due to her connections with the police commissioner John Mills (Samuel L. Jackson). When Shepard's parents were killed in a murder-suicide decades before, Mills (who was Shepard's father's former partner) became Shepard's surrogate father and mentor. She still struggles with the death of her family today and attends mandated counseling sessions with Dr. Melvin Frank (David Strathairn). Yet, despite the professional help, she drinks heavy doses of alcohol, sleeps with any man she finds at a bar, and fights with fellow detectives.

Continue reading: Twisted Review

De-Lovely Review


Very Good
In a darkened room an elderly man sits at a piano. He's barely outlined by light from a window, his face obscured in shadow. Then, a light fades up, spotlighting him, followed by light everywhere. Thus starts De-Lovely and its style of self-aware artificiality. It purports to be the life of composer Cole Porter (Kevin Kline) but there's little more here than a grand retrospective of his ingenious touch with a pop song and an attempt at scandalizing his personal, bisexual life.

Like a symphony that's incomplete because all the notes aren't available, what I didn't get out of this is a three-dimensional portrait of the subject. The show, structured as a dead or dying man's vision of his life played out like a movie and stage production, is loaded with talent and a detailed recreation of his period. The portrayal of the swank, rich life is as festive to behold as it is off-putting. The world in which Porter whirls and commands with assured, inevitable success is an alien one. Rather than feel a part of it, we are there to revel in the entertainment.

Continue reading: De-Lovely Review

Frida Review


Very Good
After withstanding a decade of development, a race between two competing projects, and the mural-sized egos of Jennifer Lopez and Madonna, a film biography of Frida Kahlo has finally made it to the screen. Who would have guessed that a film about a mustachioed, Mexican woman with a peg leg and an overweight, Communist husband would generate so much interest? Nevertheless Frida's producers, including star Salma Hayek, somehow prevented this unique story from becoming a disastrous vanity project and ended up with an unlikely Hollywood film.

Frida Kahlo's (Salma Hayek) first meeting with Diego Rivera (Alfred Molina) and her injury in a horrible bus accident set in motion the two major forces behind Frida. Bedridden for months in a full-body cast, the young Frida keeps herself busy--and learns to express her internal passions and pain--through drawing and painting. Falling in with the womanizing Rivera and his bohemian cadre of artists and revolutionaries deepens Frida's commitment to her painting and life with the loyal but philandering muralist. Their art carries them from Mexico to New York and back in the company of such impressive historical figures as David Alfaro Siqueiros (Antonio Banderas), Nelson Rockefeller (Ed Norton), and Leon Trotsky (Geoffery Rush).

Continue reading: Frida Review

A Time To Kill Review


OK
Remember the hoopla over the novel A Time To Kill? It was celebrated author John Grisham's second book -- actually his first book -- the book he published after The Firm became a hit. The book that no one wanted before he was famous. The book, apparently, that, if it hadn't had his name on it, would never have been published.

Now it's the fourth Grisham movie to be made, continuing in grand fashion that franchise of increasingly average film versions of his increasingly average writing.

Continue reading: A Time To Kill Review

Frida Review


Good

Most movies about the lives of famous artists never provide a true sense of what drove the person's creativity. Even in a strongly acted, strongly directed biopic like 2000's "Pollock," for example, the closest it came to explaining why heavily splattered canvases were a breakthrough in modern art was when the painter's wife cryptically proclaimed, "You've done it, Pollock! You've cracked it wide open!"

But in "Frida," a transporting cinematic experience about the life and work of Mexican surrealist Frida Kahlo, director Julie Taymor captures the very essence of Kahlo's creative process through a wondrously rich, freeform visual language that fuses the events of her life with the imagery in her paintings so vividly that the artist's work may take on a striking new significance for anyone who sees the film.

Passionately played by Salma Hayek, who has been personally shepherding this project for seven years, Kahlo comes to life in this picture as a complicated, dynamic, proud and intelligent woman whose frequent hardships informed her art. Opening when she was a plucky high school girl (36-year-old Hayek passes for 16 with remarkable ease), Frida is established as a young woman with a spicy individuality even before the 1925 bus wreck that irreversibly altered her life.

Continue reading: Frida Review

Double Jeopardy Review


Unbearable

Getting knocked up might just be the best thing to ever happen to Jodie Foster's career. Without a pregnancy to get her off the hook, it would have been Foster running from rampant, rabid loopholes in the laughable, pathetic, incoherent thriller "Double Jeopardy."

Poor Ashley Judd got the call to replace Foster in this picture -- about the fantasy revenge of a woman whose shady businessman hubby fakes his own murder and frames her for it -- and the actress barely survives it with her dignity intact.

Built upon the wildly inaccurate legal postulate that if you're convicted of murder and the victim turns up alive, you can kill them for real and the law can't touch you, this movie couldn't be more riddled with holes if the script spent an afternoon at the business end of a artillery range.

Continue reading: Double Jeopardy Review

Eye Of The Beholder Review


Bad

"Eye of the Beholder" isn't a title, it's a warning label. What's going on in this movie is anybody's guess.

An erotic thriller/mystery/failed cerebral art film, starring Ashley Judd as an esoteric serial killer and Ewan McGregor as her high-tech stalker/guardian, this flick is steeped in spiraling twists and volatile psyches which seemingly build toward a shock finale that never arrives.

Based on a novel by Marc Behm, it raises dozens of questions that go unanswered. It provides only snippets of backstory, leaving its characters half-revealed. And all the while, it's readily apparent that writer-director Stephen Elliott ("Welcome to Woop Woop," "Priscilla, Queen of the Desert") considers himself terribly cagey.

Continue reading: Eye Of The Beholder Review

De-Lovely Review


Good

"This is one of those avant-garde things, is it?" says a droll, dubious and dying Cole Porter (Kevin Kline) as he sits in an empty theater at the beginning of "De-Lovely," watching his life pass before his eyes on the stage, in a production conducted by an enigmatic, ironic, ethereal director named Gabe (Jonathan Pryce).

The answer to his question is a delighted "yes." This film is an imaginative, deconstructionist, celebratory musical biography woven together from elements of theater, meta-cinema, chamber drama and Porter's own MGM musicals with gratifying -- if deliberately glossy -- results.

Kline opens the picture as a frail but feisty old man (the age makeup is remarkable) who, as he watches his own story unfold, is alternatively tickled ("Oh, look, it's an opening number!"), critical ("He'd never wear that! Change it."), fondly reminiscent and pained by regret. And the actor also plays the younger Porter in the bulk of the picture, which has a merry, dreamlike quality to its stop-and-start interactions with the elderly Porter and his theatrical spirit guide.

Continue reading: De-Lovely Review

Ashley Judd

Ashley Judd Quick Links

News Pictures Video Film Quotes RSS

Ashley Judd

Date of birth

19th April, 1968

Occupation

Actor

Sex

Female

Height

1.70






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Ashley Judd Movies

Big Stone Gap Trailer

Big Stone Gap Trailer

In the Appalachian Mountains of Virginia lies a blue-collar coal-mining town called Big Stone Gap,...

Insurgent Movie Review

Insurgent Movie Review

A sharp improvement on the original, this second entry in The Divergent Series has a...

Dolphin Tale 2 Trailer

Dolphin Tale 2 Trailer

'Dolphin Tale' saw Sawyer Nelson and Dr. Clay Haskett save the life of a beached...

Divergent Movie Review

Divergent Movie Review

Teens tackle yet another dystopian future in this well-made but derivative franchise-launcher. Filmmaker Neil Burger...

Divergent Trailer

Divergent Trailer

Author Veronica Roth and the cast of her book's film adaptation 'Divergent' talk about the...

Divergent Trailer

Divergent Trailer

Tris Prior is a 'divergent' in a world where everyone is split up in accordance...

Olympus Has Fallen Movie Review

Olympus Has Fallen Movie Review

As this massive blockbuster thriller progresses, it's impossible not to become amused by how ridiculous...

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Olympus Has Fallen Trailer

Olympus Has Fallen Trailer

President of the United States Benjamin Asher has had enough trauma while being in office,...

Dolphin Tale Movie Review

Dolphin Tale Movie Review

Relentlessly heartwarming, this film can't help but move us to tears. Honestly, it stars a...

Dolphin Tale Trailer

Dolphin Tale Trailer

A young boy named Sawyer is walking along the beach in Clearwater, Florida, when he...

Tooth Fairy Trailer

Tooth Fairy Trailer

Derek Thompson is a minor league ice hockey player with the nickname 'The Tooth Fairy',...

Bug (2007) Movie Review

Bug (2007) Movie Review

On my way out of William Friedkin's latest Bug, I overheard a gentleman in the...

Twisted Movie Review

Twisted Movie Review

Few cities on earth make for a better backdrop for murder mysteries than San Francisco....

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