Brad Pitt says space epic 'Ad Astra' his 'most challenging film'

VENICE, Italy (Reuters) - Brad Pitt has fought in wars, pulled off robbery heists and confronted rivals in the boxing ring during his career, but the Hollywood star says his most challenging film yet is playing an astronaut on a life-saving mission in the space epic “Ad Astra.”

The 55-year-old actor takes audiences to the far reaches of the solar system in his role as Roy McBride after a new threat causing disastrous power surges threatens Earth.

McBride sets off to find his pioneering astronaut father, played by Tommy Lee Jones, who went missing more than a decade earlier while on a mission to Neptune.

Set in the near future when mankind has set up living stations and research centres on the moon and Mars, the film follows McBride as he makes his way into the vast abyss through spectacular landscapes and empty space.

The trip soon becomes a journey of self-discovery.

“This has been the most challenging film I have ever worked on,” Pitt, also a producer of the movie, told a news conference at the Venice Film Festival, where “Ad Astra” premiered on Thursday.

“The story ... is so delicate and any clip of a frame too early or music cue or voiceover could easily tip the thing over or be too much or be too obvious. It was a constant effort just to try to maintain this balance and try to keep this story unfolding in a very subtle and delicate way.”

In an interview with Reuters, Pitt called the film “a very intimate ... journey of the soul,” which at the same time mulls the possibility of extraterrestrial life.

“I like to believe there is (life) somewhere. To what degree, more advanced than us, less? Who knows ... Would we find that in our lifetime, don’t know. Not too concerned,” he said of his own beliefs.

McBride narrates his history and relationship with his father throughout the odyssey, where he faces challenges as well as enemies in an inhospitable and lonely environment.

“We decided to try and tell the smallest possible story in the biggest possible tapestry ... The tiny becomes the universal,” director James Gray said.

“Ad Astra” is one of 21 movies competing for the top Golden Lion prize at the festival, which runs until Sept. 7.

Discomfort

Venice is no stranger to screening space movies, having previously premiered the Oscar-winning “Gravity,” starring Pitt’s frequent co-star and friend George Clooney, as well as “First Man,” about the 1969 moon landing.

Asked if he had exchanged any space movie tips with Clooney, Pitt referenced the process of hanging from wires during such shoots, saying: “George and I exchanged some discomfort stories.”

“Ad Astra,” which also stars Liv Tyler, Ruth Negga and Donald Sutherland, is considered one of the must-sees during the festival, an important launch pad for the awards season.

Asked whether the role could perhaps win him his first best actor Oscar, Pitt said: “Man, I just want to get this film out ... it’s a challenging film, it’s subtle.

“It’s operating on many cylinders, it has something to say about who we are, a soul if you believe in that, what’s our purpose, why do we hang on, keep doing. So I am really curious to see how it lands.”

Critics praised the film’s stunning cinematography but some lamented the long voiceovers and plotline.

“Despite a dip in pace towards the end, it’s also a fantastically well-staged adventure,” Empire said, calling the movie “beautiful.”

Screen Daily said Pitt’s performance was “full of pained melancholy” while Variety said the story was “held together by Pitt’s stalwart presence.”

“Ad Astra” hits movie theatres worldwide next month.

Reporting by Marie-Louise Gumuchian in Venice; Additional reporting by Hanna Rantala in Venice; Editing by Gareth Jones and Matthew Lewis

source: news.abs-cbn.com

Angelina Jolie wants divorce finalized by end of 2018

LOS ANGELES - Angelina Jolie on Tuesday sought to move forward with her long and sometimes bitter divorce from Brad Pitt, which has yet to be finalized after almost two years.

Jolie's attorney filed papers in Los Angeles Superior Court saying the actress wanted a judgment "returning the parties to single status during calendar year 2018."

The document also said that Pitt has "paid no meaningful child support since separation" and said that although informal arrangements had been made with him, payments "had not been regularly sustained."

Jolie filed for divorce in September 2016, ending two years or marriage and a 10-year romance that had made the pair one of Hollywood's most glamorous and powerful couples. They have six children for whom she is seeking primary custody.

Mindy Nyby, a spokeswoman for the actress, said on Tuesday that the court filing was intended "to provide closure to the marriage in a way that clears a path towards the next stage of their lives and allows her and Brad to recommit as devoted co-parents to their children."

Pitt's representatives declined to comment. A source familiar with the matter, who was not authorized to speak publicly, said that "Brad is someone who fulfills his commitments."

The divorce filing, citing irreconcilable differences, triggered a bitter custody dispute during which Pitt was investigated and cleared of child abuse. Final custody arrangements have yet to be agreed.

The "Moneyball" actor said in an interview last year that he had quit drinking, was undergoing therapy and that he and Jolie had decided to abandon "vitriolic hatred" and work together to sort out their issues.

Pitt has kept a low profile in the past two years, while Jolie has recently been filming a sequel to fairytale drama "Maleficent" in London and directed a 2017 film about the 1970s Khmer Rouge regime in Cambodia in which more than one million people died. Their eldest son Maddox was adopted from Cambodia in 2002.

source: news.abs-cbn.com

DiCaprio, Pitt team up for new Quentin Tarantino movie

LOS ANGELES -- Leonardo DiCaprio and Brad Pitt -- two of Hollywood's biggest stars -- are teaming up for Quentin Tarantino's next project, a movie set in the 1969 Hollywood hippy era around the Charles Manson murders.

Movie studio Sony Pictures said on Wednesday that the film was called "Once Upon a Time in Hollywood" and will feature DiCaprio as the former star of a Western TV series, and Pitt as his longtime stunt double.

It's the first time the two actors have starred in a feature film together.

"Both are struggling to make it in a Hollywood they don't recognize anymore. But Rick (DiCaprio) has a very famous next-door neighbor ... Sharon Tate," Sony Pictures said in a statement.

Tate, the pregnant actress wife of director Roman Polanski, was murdered in 1969 by followers of Manson, one of America's most notorious criminals. Manson died in November 2017 at the age of 83 while serving a life sentence.

The movie is to be released on August 9, 2019, exactly 50 years after Tate and four friends were stabbed or shot dead.

Tarantino said he had been working on the script for five years and had lived in the Los Angeles area for most of his life, "including in 1969, when I was seven years old."

"I'm very excited to tell this story of an LA and a Hollywood that don't exist anymore. And I couldn't be happier about the dynamic teaming of DiCaprio and Pitt," he said in a statement.

DiCaprio won an Oscar in 2016 for his role in "The Revenant" while Pitt was Oscar-nominated for performances in "Moneyball" and "The Curious Case of Benjamin Button."

Tarantino has two Oscars for the screenplays of "Django Unchained" and "Pulp Fiction," both of which he also directed.

source: news.abs-cbn.com

Brad Pitt skips LA premiere to 'focus on family'

LOS ANGELES - Brad Pitt canceled a red-carpet appearance on Wednesday for filmmaker Terrence Malick's new film "Voyage of Time" to focus on his "family situation" amid a messy divorce from Angelina Jolie.

Pitt, 52, was scheduled to attend the premiere at the California Science Center in Los Angeles for the 40-minute feature examining the origins of the universe, which he narrates.

"Terrence's 'Voyage of Time' is an incredibly beautiful and unique experiential IMAX film for children and families chronicling the birth of time," Pitt said in a statement.

"I'm very grateful to be part of such a fascinating and educational project, but I'm currently focused on my family situation and don't want to distract attention away from this extraordinary film, which I encourage everyone to see," he added.

Pitt's management did not respond immediately to a request for comment.

Jolie, 41, filed for divorce on September 19 citing irreconcilable differences and seeking custody of their six children, with visiting rights only for Pitt.

The A-listers wed in France in August two years ago, but had been a couple since 2004.

French actress Marion Cotillard was forced last week to deny suggestions that she played a role in the "Brangelina" breakup by having a fling with Pitt.

Meanwhile the FBI has said it is gathering information before deciding whether to launch a federal probe into an alleged incident on a plane carrying Pitt and his children back from vacation in France.

It has not offered any details of the allegations but several US media outlets reported that Pitt had been involved in an angry outburst with at least one of his children.

source: www.abs-cbnnews.com

2016: The year love died in Hollywood

The imminent divorce of "Brangelina" is the latest in a series of celebrity splits giving the impression that the average Hollywood marriage has about as much chance of success as a non-white actor at the Oscars.

Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie-Pitt have both been through divorces before, he with "Friends" star Jennifer Aniston and she with actors Jonny Lee Miller and Billy Bob Thornton.

This year has also seen Gwyneth Paltrow and Chris Martin finalize their famous "conscious uncoupling" around the same time that Johnny Depp and Amber Heard were squabbling over the terms of their split.

Drew Barrymore, Lisa Marie Presley, Dennis Quaid and James McAvoy have announced divorces from their respective partners too, sparking some gossip websites to refer to 2016 as the year of the Hollywood divorce.

In 2012 statistics website PolitiFact estimated that the lifelong probability of an American marriage ending in divorce was 40–50 percent, citing academics and the National Survey of Family Growth.

Kelly Frawley, a partner at New York law firm Kasowitz, Benson, Torres and Friedman, believes that while there is no reason to think the rich and famous split more often than the rest of us, the pressures which put strain on relationships are amplified in the rarified air of Tinseltown.

"There are standard things that cause marriages to disintegrate -- concerns about money, fights about how to raise the children, issues of fidelity," she told AFP.

"Those are much bigger scale when you are dealing with a celebrity couple because there's so much accessibility to all the things that make it easy to step out of a marriage.

"You can spend money with ease, you can leave with ease, you can have affairs with ease."

- 'Unique microscope' -
It's not all doom and gloom. Denzel and Pauletta Washington have been going strong since 1983 while Billy Crystal, Christopher Walken and their respective sweethearts expect to celebrate golden wedding anniversaries before the end of the decade.

But unlike skin peels, kale and the 5:2 diet, divorce is one celebrity fad that has endured through the ages and the Hollywood hills are littered with the carcasses of euthanized showbiz marriages.

Among the high profile casualties are Ben Affleck and Jennifer Garner, who announced on June 30 2015, one day after their ten-year anniversary, that they were calling it a day.

Tom Cruise was on his third marriage by the time he and Katie Holmes split in 2012 and there were divorces in 2010 for Ryan Reynolds and Scarlett Johansson, and Elizabeth Hurley and Arun Nayar.

"Celebrities are under a unique microscope, where every nuance is dissected over and over again the slightest misunderstanding is reported like you're splitting up right away," said Judi Bloom, a licensed marriage and family therapist based in Southern California.

"That can really wear down a couple in the end."

One big problem for Hollywood couples, she told AFP, is that they spend so much time apart on their separate projects, which can "pull at the fabric of a relationship."

Some avoid growing apart by continuing to work together after getting hitched.

Warren Beatty and Annette Bening began dating during the filming of "Bugsy" in 1991, married a year later and filmed "Love Affair" together in 1994.

- Breathing space -

Will Smith and Jada Pinkett are still together a quarter century after meeting on the set of his sitcom "The Fresh Prince of Bel Air" when she auditioned to play his girlfriend.

She didn't get the part but she got Smith -- marrying the actor in 1997 and appearing alongside him in 2001 biopic "Ali."

It doesn't always work, of course.

Helena Bonham Carter and Tim Burton have joined forces for no fewer than seven films but called it a day after 13 years, an unlucky number which was also the length of the marriage of Woody Allen and Mia Farrow, and the number of his films in which she appeared.

Rob Shuter, a former Hollywood publicist for Jennifer Lopez, Jessica Simpson and others who now runs NaughtyGossip.com, told AFP celebrities and their representatives plan divorce announcements down to the most minute detail.

"The announcement about Brad and Angie came out one day after the weekly magazines went to print, which means that they get a week of breathing space," he said.

Shuter says that while print is less important in the digital age than it used to be, the timing was still "a disaster" for People, which has the largest audience of any American magazine, and its rival Us Weekly.

He believes Pitt would have been the more passive partner in planning their divorce announcement because of Jolie-Pitt's track record with carefully stage-managing the news cycle.

"When she was pregnant with Shiloh she didn't make the announcement with an official statement, she walked around the corner and let her bump show for 'People' magazine," he said.

source: www.abs-cbnnews.com

Review: 'The Big Short' explains 2007 financial crisis

The cast of "The Big Short" is so star-studded, you will certainly get drawn in by its smart poster, even if you had no idea what that puzzling title was all about. This film is now very high-profile because of the awards buzz surrounding it. In fact, just last week, "The Big Short" had just been named one of the nine nominees for the Oscar for Best Picture. It has also picked up nominations for Best Director (Adam McKay), Supporting Actor (Christian Bale), Adapted Screenplay and Film Editing.

"The Big Short" followed the interconnecting individual stories of a few maverick financial gamblers as they made unusual, high risk yet critical investments in the housing sector which would eventually lead to the US financial crisis of 2007.

Asperger's Syndrome and fake left eye notwithstanding, quirky hedge fund manager Dr. Michael Burry (Christian Bale), unearthed faults in the mortgage derivatives market and put multimillion dollar bets against it via a credit default swap market. (I still do not really understand what this huge deal was all about. I do not even know what a hedge fund manager is.)

Jared Vennett (Ryan Gosling), an enterprising employee at Deutsche Bank, got wind of Burry's investment and discovered a goldmine in collateralized debt obligations (CDOs). He began selling this idea behind his bank's back. (His presentation using Jenga bars was illustrative, but I did not completely get what those AAAs and BBBs meant.)

Because of a wrong number, Vennett got to pitch for and convince Mark Baum (Steve Carell) and his company to invest in his CDOs. Baum got interested with the big payback potentials, but later his moral conscience realized its far-reaching tragic implications. (I liked the Baum character but frankly I did not fully grasp why he was delaying the "swaps" that was he was delaying or what he hoped to achieve or prevent by delaying it.)

Greenhorn investors Jamie Shipley (Finn Wittrock) and Charlie Geller (John Magaro) also get wind of Vennett's deal from a proposal they incidentally picked up at a bank lobby. They sought the help of retired Wall Street veteran Ben Rickert (Brad Pitt) to help them get into the action. (They brought up another concept called an ISDA, which totally eluded me.)

I have to give credit to screenwriter/director Adam McKay for trying his best to explain all the financial gobbledygook involved in this technically complex story. He had some actors break the fourth wall and talk directly to the audience. He had some pop icons like top celebrity chef Anthony Bourdain and teen idol Selena Gomez to take part in explanatory side videos to discuss about concepts like CDOs, or even more abstract concepts like synthetic CDOs.

Frankly it was difficult for me to get through a huge part of the film precisely because those finance jargon was too alien to me. The bank for me is just for my savings and checking accounts and probably time deposits. But I am totally lost when the discussion goes deeper into loans, stock market, mortgages and the like. I literally tune out when my bank's manager talks to me about these things (but don't tell her about it). I had to look up what the "short" in the title meant, yet I still cannot explain it in my own words and comprehension. I guess there are just those topics that fail to connect with me, and Finance is one of them.

I guess this upbeat chipper tone in the first two acts of this film gave the Hollywood Foreign Press Association the idea to nominate "The Big Short" under the category of Best Comedy or Musical. Sure, Gosling gets to deliver some witty zingers, but this film is really hardly a comedy at all.

My favorite character was Carell's who seemed to see himself as some advocate for morality. For me, it was his Mark Baum who gave this cold and calculating film warmth and accessibility. Carell was this film's heart. Too bad he was not recognized for his performance on the Oscar list. In fact, for me it was these dramatic moments of moral dilemma with Mark Baum that turned my initial opinion around and made me actually like this film by the final act. 7/10

This review was originally published in the author's blog, "Fred Said."

source: www.abs-cbnnews.com

Angelina Jolie says ready to give up acting: report

AUSTRALIA - Hollywood A-lister Angelina Jolie says she plans to give up acting after a "few more" films and switch her focus to directing.

Jolie walked the red carpet in Sydney with husband Brad Pitt this week at the premiere of her new movie, World War II epic "Unbroken", which was filmed in Australia.



It was her second foray behind the camera after the critically-acclaimed 2011 "In the Land of Blood and Honey" and she said directing was now her passion and where she saw the future.

"I'll do a few more, but I'll be happy to let that all go at some point," she told the Sydney Morning Herald of acting, in comments published online Thursday.

"I love directing, I'm much happier directing," added the 39-year-old.

"I like following a project all the way through. I like spending two years on something and learning about it... I like being pushed mentally to have to learn so much and be a part of every single aspect of a production."

She separately told The Australian newspaper that "unless I'm sure there's a role or something I should do or (that) really means something to me, I'd rather be spending my time telling stories from behind the camera".

Jolie's new movie is based on the true story of a US Olympic athlete turned Japanese prisoner of war, Louis Zamperini, who competed in the 5,000m at the 1936 Games in Berlin before becoming a bombardier in World War II.

When his plane crashed over the South Pacific, he spent 47 days adrift on a raft with a crewmate before being captured by Japanese soldiers in the Marshall Islands.

He was held in a prisoner of war camp for more than two years, enduring beatings and torture, before his return home.

Jolie, who has been acting since she was a child, said her preference for being behind the camera did not mean she thought any less of acting or actors.

"I love actors, I love watching actors work, and I like to shine a light on them. I actually prefer it when it's not me," she told the Herald.

Since wrapping up "Unbroken", Jolie has directed both herself and Pitt in the yet to be released "By the Sea", of which little is known.

"To direct myself was hard, to direct him (Pitt) was a challenge and to be in the scenes with him doing very heavy, heavy drama was difficult," she told The Australian.

"But it was also a great pleasure for us both to bust out of our comfort zones and just get back to being actors who work and fight through scenes and figure it out, and not be safe and not be sure and try and push."

The last time they appeared on screen together was in "Mr and Mrs Smith" in 2005, during which they fell in love.

source: www.abs-cbnnews.com

Brad Pitt hit in the face at 'Maleficent' premiere

An infamous red carpet prankster struck actor Brad Pitt in the face as he signed autographs at the Hollywood premiere of a film starring his partner Angelina Jolie on Wednesday, police said.

Pitt, a Golden Globe-winning actor, was at the premiere of "Maleficent", at the El Capitan Theater in Hollywood, California, when Vitalii Sediuk leaped over a fence and hit him, said Los Angeles Police Department spokesman Gus Villanueva.

Pitt was not seriously hurt and authorities quickly subdued Sediuk, who was arrested for misdemeanor battery and remained in police custody on Wednesday night, Villanueva said. Sediuk is now being held pending payment of $20,000 bail.

"The officers who were handling him said it looked like it was intentional, but at this point, it remains to be determined," said Sergeant Leonard Calderon for LAPD Hollywood.

Sediuk, 25, is a Ukrainian television reporter who has often pranked celebrities at red carpet events.

In previous exploits, Sediuk has hugged actor Leonardo DiCaprio's crotch at a Santa Barbara Film Festival event, stormed the stage during singer Adele's Grammy acceptance speech, and been slapped by Will Smith after kissing the actor at a Moscow premiere.

Sediuk did not appear to be armed at the time of the attack on Pitt, and investigators have not yet determined a motive, said Villanueva, adding that he was likely to be arraigned on Thursday.

"Maleficent" is Disney's modern reimagining of the "Sleeping Beauty" fairytale, and Jolie stars as its villain.

source: www.abs-cbnnews.com

Brad Pitt's Brother Doug Goes Viral

He's watched his older brother Brad live in the unblinking glare of fame for 25 years. Now, Doug Pitt is getting his 15 minutes – and using them to make a difference.

Doug, who runs a family computer business in southwest Missouri, is featured in a new Virgin Mobile ad campaign in Australia that has since gone viral around the world. And he's using the attention to indulge another passion – for philanthropy.

"It's a little surreal, but it's fun," Doug tells NBC's Today show of his newfound celebrity. "This whole campaign was to be tongue in cheek and to have fun. And luckily, it's hit its mark."

Doug, who usually keeps a low profile, told hardly anyone that he would be in the campaign. But then the ad's view count climbed over 1 million. "All of a sudden I started getting calls. I panicked!" he says. "But I'm thrilled with the response."

One person he did tell before agreeing to the Virgin job was Brad. "I did call him and said, 'Hey, what do you think?' And he was like, 'Do it. It sounds great!' "

And Brad was amused by the finished commercial, Doug says. "I was out riding my bike and stopped and got a text and it just said, 'Hey, just saw it. Hilarious.' So, I was pleased."

Doug is now using the spotlight to spread the word about the charity he founded – Care to Learn, which provides funding and action to meet health, hunger and hygiene issues for lower-income children.

source: people.com

Brangelina engaged

LOS ANGELES - Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt, one of the world's best known couples, are engaged to marry, ending a fevered, seven-year celebrity media dance over whether they will ever say "I do."

A spokeswoman for Pitt on Friday confirmed the pair had agreed to wed after Jolie was photographed in Los Angeles wearing a large diamond ring, designed by Pitt, on her engagement finger.

"Yes, it's confirmed. It is a promise for the future and their kids are very happy. There's no date set at this time," said Pitt's spokeswoman Cynthia Pett-Dante.

Pitt, 48 and Jolie, 36 - dubbed Brangelina by celebrity media - are raising six children together, including three adopted kids, all under the age of 11.

Rumors of an impending marriage have made the front pages of celebrity magazines for years, and sent the world's media scurrying to venues as far afield as Italy, India, southern Africa and France to stake out imminent "secret" ceremonies.

The "Moneyball" star said earlier this year that pressure from their kids finally was forcing them to consider tying the knot after previously dismissing marriage as unnecessary or saying they were waiting until gays and lesbians could legally wed.

"It (marriage) seems to mean more and more to our kids. We made this declaration some time ago that we weren't going to do it 'til everyone can. But I don't think we'll be able to hold out," Pitt told The Hollywood Reporter in a January interview.

Jewelry maker Robert Procop said on Friday he had fashioned Jolie's engagement ring in collaboration with Pitt and had been working on it for a year.

"The full creative journey - from conception to completion - took a year, with Brad Pitt waiting until the perfect moment to unveil this special jewel to Angelina Jolie," Procop's spokeswoman said.

Hollywood power couple

Procop said the ring featured an elongated tablet-shaped diamond that was cut to suit Jolie's long, slender fingers, and is mounted with a galaxy of smaller stones.

The ring made its official debut on Wednesday night, when Jolie wore it to a small, private viewing of Chinese art at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art with Pitt and son Pax.

Pitt divorced his popular "Friends" actress wife Jennifer Aniston in 2005 to be with Jolie, after the pair became close on the set of action spy movie "Mr. & Mrs. Smith."

Jolie, who won a best supporting actress Oscar for her work on "Girl, Interrupted" in 1999, had two previous short-lived marriages to actors Billy Bob Thornton and Jonny Lee Miller.

Jolie and Pitt quickly became Hollywood's biggest power couple, traveling around the world as Jolie took on high-profile humanitarian roles and adopting children from Ethiopia and Vietnam to add to their brood.

Marriage speculation again reached fever pitch after Jolie gave birth to their first biological child - daughter Shiloh in Namibia in 2006 - and twins Knox and Vivienne in France two years later.

Pitt insisted they would not wed until gay marriage was legalized in the United States. Same-sex marriage is now legal in New York and seven other US states. In January, the actor made clear pressure was mounting, and it wasn't just the children who wanted a wedding.

"It means so much to my kids, and they ask a lot. And it means something to me, too, to make that kind of commitment ... But to be in love with someone and be raising a family with someone and want to make that commitment and not be able to it is ludicrous, just ludicrous," he said.

source: interaksyon.com

Brad Pitt stages ''mini-Grammys'' show to help New Orleans

NEW ORLEANS -- Every time he crosses the Claiborne Avenue bridge heading east across the New Orleans Industrial Canal, actor Brad Pitt gets a lump in his throat.



From that vantage point, he can look down on a section of the city's Lower Ninth Ward that is ground zero for "Make It Right," a home rebuilding initiative Pitt launched to help people whose homes were destroyed by Hurricane Katrina in 2005, which killed 1,500 people and devastated the historic Southern city.

"Each time I come back to New Orleans and drive over that bridge, I get this swell of joy," Pitt told Reuters, his eyes going watery. "It's means a lot to me to watch that neighborhood take shape."

Pitt and his movie star partner, Angelina Jolie, own a house in the city's French Quarter, and they visit the city regularly with their six children.

The actor shares his feelings about the city and its recovery with a few thousand people on Saturday evening, as he and comedian Ellen DeGeneres, a New Orleans native, host the Make It Right Foundation's biggest fundraiser at a New Orleans hotel.

Billed as "A Night to Make It Right," the star-studded, sold-out gala is expected to draw 1,200 guests who paid between $1,000 and $2,500 to attend a dinner prepared by New Orleans celebrity chefs John Besh and Emeril Lagasse, and a concert featuring musical stars Rihanna, Sheryl Crow, Seal and Dr. John.

The lineup includes Hollywood luminaries and honorary hosts Sean Penn, Spike Lee, Josh Brolin and Kevin Spacey.

In addition, some 2,000 people have anted up $150 for an "after party" hosted by actor-comedian Aziz Ansari, with musical performances by Kanye West, Snoop Dogg and the Soul Rebels.

Asked if it was difficult to get the big names to journey to New Orleans for the event, Pitt joked, "Even though these people don't like me that much, it really was simple."

Noting that the celebrities traveled from as far away as Paris for the event, Pitt said the turnout was a mark of their regard for New Orleans.

"They carved this time out of their schedule strictly for this event, and came on their own dime," he said. "We have so much incredible talent that wanted to come and support the city - it's going to be like a mini-Grammys show."

Pitt estimated the events and sponsorships would raise $4 million for Make it Right, which aims to build 150 homes in the Lower Ninth Ward and has pulled in about $30 million since its founding four years ago.

NEW AND IMPROVED

Since 2007, 75 homes have sprouted in a 16-block area that was at the epicenter of the Hurricane Katrina tragedy. Built to the specifications of architects selected through an international design competition held by Make It Right, all of the homes stand 5 to 8 feet off the ground, on pilings designed to keep the homes dry in the event of another flood.

Multi-angled steel roofs, windows of ultra-strong glass and tough siding materials are designed to withstand hurricane-force winds. Solar panels, rainwater collection systems and maximum air-circulation designs created homes with low utility bills.

The new houses are a sharp contrast to the modest, mostly one-story homes that characterized the neighborhood before Katrina. Many of them stand just yards (meters) away from the spot where an Industrial Canal floodwall ruptured after the storm, putting the neighborhood under several feet of water.

Gloria Mae Guy still talks about how she and her neighbor climbed to a rooftop as the rising water forced them from their homes. "We held on all night until a boat came and they helped us get out," she said.

Guy, 72, is back in the spot where she and her husband raised their five children, but now she lives in a modern, energy-efficient, two-story home, designed and built by Make It Right contractors. "I'm happy to be home, and I wouldn't be here if it weren't for Brad Pitt," she said.

Tom Darden, executive director of the Make It Right Foundation, said Pitt made the goal of rebuilding according to standards of sustainable construction clear from the beginning, but equally important was finding ways to reduce construction costs.

"Brad said, 'We're going to build the best house we possibly can build and figure out how to make it affordable,'" Darden said.

It was a tall order, but through several years of studying sustainable building techniques and amassing contractors familiar with the methods, the foundation is gradually bringing its costs down, Darden said.

Darden emphasized that while Make It Right was formed to help low-income residents remain in the neighborhood where generations of their families have lived, the initiative was not about handouts.

Applicants for the Make It Right homes must pass an approvals process that requires showing proof of income and the ability to make payments on a mortgage, along with insurance and maintenance costs.

Another goal is to apply the techniques learned in New Orleans to other areas in need, Darden said, noting that Make It Right had recently begun projects in Newark, New Jersey, and Kansas City, Missouri.

"Brad is our visionary," he said. "I think for him it's largely a social justice issue and he wants to help as many people as he can."

source: interaksyon.com

Brad Pitt defies the odds in 'Moneyball'

MANILA, Philippines — Brad Pitt earns his second Oscar Best Actor nomination for playing the true-to-life character Billy Beane in Columbia Pictures' acclaimed sports-oriented drama, “Moneyball.” Beane is once a would-be baseball superstar who, stung by the failure to live up to expectations on the field, turned his fiercely competitive nature to managing a pro baseball team.

Pitt had an instant attraction to the Oakland A’s general manager, to his shrewd, outsized personality, to his mix of obsessive focus and gritty resourcefulness and to his intimate personal relationship with the fine line between failure and success.

The real Billy Beane himself admits that having Pitt play him felt a little strange, but he liked the actor’s down-to-business approach. “When I found out that Brad Pitt wanted to play me, at first I didn’t believe it. I work in a place where a lot of rumors fly around, and I thought when all was said and done, it was a bit of a joke,” he confesses. “But when we started to interact, I was impressed with how serious, bright and incredibly perceptive he is and how he had a vision of what he wanted to do.”

He goes on: “He’d read the book from which the movie was based and really loved it. I think that’s a testament to the character that Michael Lewis wrote, as opposed to myself, but it would be hard for Brad Pitt to play anybody and not do a great job. There are certainly a lot of mannerisms that I think he picked up in our short time together. And he couldn’t have been more of an absolutely class guy, not only with the people who work with me but with my family as well.”

Beane continues, “Seeing this story come to life in the form of a movie is a once-in-a-lifetime, surreal experience. And yet despite Brad Pitt being a megastar, he could not have been more down to earth or more genuine – a regular guy from Missouri. While it’s flattering to see him play this character, at times I forget that his character is actually supposed to represent my life in baseball. I was drawn into his acting like any other moviegoer will be.”

Pitt explored Beane’s origins, which began as a naval officer’s kid who excelled at an early age on two different fields: baseball and football. Dubbed a true athletic “natural,” he was always told he would be destined for the elite echelons of pro sports. But after Beane declined a Stanford scholarship for the chance to join the New York Mets, he faltered, then struggled mightily to revive a career that never truly got out of the starting gate. After playing six seasons as a reserve outfielder for several major league teams – all the time wanting to make good on the promise he’d always been told he had – he did something bold. Beane turned in his glove and walked from the field to the front office to try his hand at management, a decision that would prove visionary.

Miller explains, “Imagine being fifteen years old and having grown men – experts – telling you that you have a destiny, you are meant to be a superstar of the next generation, and you have to make a decision based on that information – and you go down that road, only to discover ten years later that it wasn’t going to work out. The dream was just a dream, and he would have to start again.”

“Billy really did something crazy by today’s standards,” says Pitt. “He quit. I think in a way he felt that he was caught up in other people’s views of what he was supposed to be. I think he felt somewhat trapped. He explains it that he wanted to do something with his mind. Even though he was ‘in the show,’ the thing every boy dreams of, it wasn’t working for him.”

Pitt continues: “So he embarked on this new career, but he came in knowing there was a need to tear down that bias that he felt he himself was entrapped by at an early age.”

Miller says that the personality characteristics that make Beane a good GM also make him a compelling movie character. “Billy is charismatic and charming, but underneath that is an intense ambition to win a championship,” says Miller. “In the story we’re telling, in his drive for a championship, he comes to reevaluate what really matters in life, and it goes beyond baseball. He wants to challenge his own beliefs, to think differently. He’s dealt a similar choice to the one he faced when he was a kid, and having lived through that, he has the insight, perspective, and wisdom to decide differently.”

Pitt became fascinated by how the need to succeed on his own terms became the mother of invention for Beane in his second incarnation as the A’s general manager – and how it all came to a head in 2002, when the A’s lost their most notable players and, to many, their only hope.

“He realized that the A’s simply couldn’t fight the way the other guys might fight,” he explains. “They had to look for new knowledge, they had to question all the norms and find the inefficiencies in the way things were being done. They began with this seemingly naïve question: what if we were starting this game from scratch today, how would we do it? Where would we place value on the players? Then they went out and actually found these guys who were being overlooked and put together, in a patchwork, a formidable team.”

(Opening soon across the Philippines, “Moneyball” is distributed by Columbia Pictures, local office of Sony Pictures Releasing International. Visit http://www.columbiapictures.com.ph for trailers, exclusive content and free downloads. Like us at www.Facebook.com/ColumbiaPicturesPH and join our fan contests.)

article source: mb.com.ph