Tag Archives: Cate Blanchett

Cate Blanchett is an Academy Award-winning actress known for roles in several esteemed films, including Elizabeth, The Talented Mr. Ripley, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, The Aviator and Blue Jasmine.

10 Bad-Ass Actresses Who Should Take the Lead in James Bond

So rumour has we’re getting a new James Bond lead, and while other news outlets rush to tell which guy will get the job, we decided to look at the potential female contenders…

Historically the Bond franchise has always implied that a women’s place is in the bedroom. James is a serial shagger and comes across as either a cheeseball or an oaf when it comes to seduction. A significant amount of his sexual partners end up dead. On the one occasion he marries (On Her Majesty’s Secret Service) his wife also dies. Those who live are rarely seen again, unless they’re evil double agents. They also have demeaning names like Honey Rider, Pussy Galore or Octopussy.

So it about time they switched up. Here are the 10 Bad-Ass actresses we think should take the lead in James Bond.

1. Jaimie Alexander

She’d treat dudes the way Bond traditionally treats women, or maybe she’d be a badass lesbian, either way it’s something I could get down with, and Jaimie Alexander has proven in all her movies she’s a sexy lady who would totally take her martini shaken, not stirred.

James Bond Jaimie Alexander

2. Angelina Jolie

James Bond Angelina Jolie

Angelina Jolie is very sexy, and has time and time again proven that she can successfully pull off action roles, while also bringing depth to hercharacters. She can be subtle, she can be intense, so she should played Bond.

3. Emily Blunt
james bond emily-blunt

Well… I mean… come on. She’s pretty much the most obvious choice for the next James Bond. Give me a break.

4. Anne Hathaway

james bond anne hathaway

It might seem weird, and I know Bond is traditionally from the UK, but if they were to completely re-invent the series, couldn’t you just see Hathaway as an American Bond with a soft side she hides under her jaded bad girl facade? Yeah, I could dig that.

5. Emma Watson

Emma Watson

I know with Craig’s Bond they explored the origins of James Bond, but what if they did his earlier years? Like early-late 20’s Bond? What made him choose this career path? We could always do with more backstory and Emma Watson would be a great young Bond.

6. Cate Blanchett

James bond Cate-Blanchett

Are you looking at the above picture? The argument makes itself.

7. Lena Headey

Lena Headey

If Lena Headey played Bond the character would be rowdier, a bigger womanizer (if possible), a heavier drinker, and a dirtier fighter. Yeah, I think I’d enjoy that.

8. Rachel Weisz

james bond Rachel Weisz

She’s dark, she’s classy, she’s sexy, she’s British, and she looks good in a suit. I mean, what more do you need?

9. Kate Beckinsale

Kate Beckinsale

Well, if we’re going to suggest a woman to play Bond I obviously can’t leave out the ultimate British bad girl: Kate Beckinsale. If anyone could play a female bond, it’s this broad.

10. Michelle Rodriguez

michell rod

Michelle Rodriguez is a sexy, badass, mature woman. If she can play action, I think she can handle Bond.

Could ‘Lesbian Themed’ Movies Rule Next Years Oscars?

Indiewire have updated their 2016 Oscar predictions, and they predict a very real possibility that over half of this year’s female acting nominations could go to portrayals of gay women.

Lesbians have represented at the Oscars before. Charlize Theron won for playing serial killer Aileen Wuornos, Nicole Kidman played Virginia Woolf, and Annette Bening almost won for her rule in the The Kids Are All Right. 

Also read: When It Pays To Be A Lesbian At The Oscars

So who has been tipped?

There is a possibility that openly gay actress Lily Tomlin could get a nomination for playing someone openly gay in Grandma. Which is actually a first – a lesbian actress being nominated for playing a lesbian character – shock horror!

Tomlin would also become the only second gay person to be nominated for playing a gay person. Ian McKellen is currently the only other example.

In Paul Weitz’s Grandma, Tomlin plays a lesbian poet who goes on a road trip with her granddaughter after she breaks up with her long-term partner.

grandma-01

This is her first lead role in a film in over 27 years, and she’s incredible in it. Sony Pictures Classics is surely going to rev up a campaign for her come fall, in hopes of giving 75 year old Tomlin her first Oscar nomination since 1975, when she was nominated for Nashville. Our fingers are firmly crossed.

Also read: Watch | New Clip Released from Lily Tomlin’s New movie ‘Grandma’

If Tomlin does get nominated, she would almost certainly be competing against Cate Blanchett, who got insanely good reviews out of Cannes for Todd Haynes’ Carol. Blanchett plays half of a 1950s lesbian romance in the film, the other half being played by Rooney Mara, who beat out Blanchett for Cannes’ Best Actress award.

Carol-01

Mara is a very likely nominee too, though The Weinstein Company could very well campaign her in supporting.

Also read: Watch | First Teaser of Cate Blanchett’s new Lesbian / Bi-Feature Film ‘Carol’

Either way, this is three possible lesbian nominees.

And then there’s Freeheld, which we’ll likely be released at the Toronto Film Festival.

Freeheld-poster-01

The movie stars last year’s best actress winner Julianne Moore, who is paired with Ellen Page. The film is a classic Oscar bait story of real life lesbian Laurel Hester (Moore), a police officer in Ocean County, New Jersey. Following her diagnosis with terminal lung cancer in 2005, Hester repeatedly appealed to the county’s board of chosen freeholders in an attempt to ensure her pension benefits could be passed on to her domestic partner, Stacie Andree (Page).

Also read: Will Ellen Page’s “Freeheld” Be A Surprise Box Office Hit?

The film is actually based on a documentary short that won an Oscar, and is written by the same man who got a nomination for his screenplay for Philadelphia.

We obviously won’t know until we see it, but both Moore and Page sure seem like contenders for best actress and best support. That would also make Moore the only person to receive two nominations for playing queer characters.

Cate Blanchett: I never said I have had sexual relationships with women

In an interview published earlier this week with Variety, the magazine said it asked Cate Blanchett if this was her first turn as a lesbian to which they quote the two-time Oscar winner as “coyly” responding, “On film — or in real life?”  The outlet then noted “Pressed for details about whether she’s had past relationships with women, she responds: ‘Yes. Many times,’ but doesn’t elaborate.”

Cate Blanchett 02

This confession created worldwide headlines proclaiming Blanchett had experienced numerous lesbian affairs during her life.

However, during a press conference in Cannes while discussing her new lesbian / bi themed film Carol, Blanchett explained her quote had been judiciously edited for effect, and alas she is has not had sexual relationships with women.

From memory, the conversation ran: ‘Have you had relationships with women?’ And I said: ‘Yes, many times. Do you mean have I had sexual relationships with women? Then the answer is no.’ But that obviously didn’t make it.”

She also said she hoped for a time when it would no longer necessary for people to have to come out, saying:

In 2015, the point should be, ‘Who cares?’ Call me old fashioned, but I thought one’s job as an actor was not to present one’s boring, small, microscopic universe, but to raise and expand your sense of the world and make a psychological and empathetic connection to another character’s experience so you could present something other than your own world to an audience.

My own life is of no interest to anyone else. It is, I know, but I’m certainly not interested in putting my own thoughts and opinions up there. Why I love being an actor and working is what you refer to before, the research.  It’s finding other people’s experiences and making those beautiful, intangible [connections] that will communicate something.”

Variety has not responded as yet to Blanchett’s assertion, but it’s hard to believe an actress of her sterling reputation would make this clear clarification if she did not believe their assertion was inaccurate.

Blanchett went on to say she admired the restraint exhibited by the characters in the film, who speak about the sex lives only sparingly.

Carol’s sexuality is a private affair. What often happens these days is if your are homosexual you have to talk about it constantly, the only thing, before your work. We’re living in a deeply conservative time.”

The actor confirmed that her research had involved consuming countless lesbian novels written in the middle of the last century, of which Carol appeared to be “the only one with a happy ending”.

Carol-01

 

They were outsider novels. Carol was not a card-carrying member of any sexual persuasion. That’s also important to remember: those labels, those groups, the comfort of them, didn’t exist then. The resultant isolation was very important.”

The film is being regarded as the most mainstream American depiction of a lesbian relationship made to date.

Cate-Blanchett-Carol-01

Screenwriter, Phyllis Nagy, spent 14 years attempting to make this movie; now that she has, she said, it amounted to “a huge political statement.”

nothing has changed and everything has changed. Because we can have this movie now. It starts the kinds of discussion we need to have about this issue. We do not we politicise the material by just allowing people to live their lives honestly. [Gay people] are expected to make it an issue front and centre in our lives. But actually when you live your life, your identity is front and centre – but it’s something we’re not often treated to seeing in films.”

The cast and crew expressed the hope that the film might help change policy in the “70 countries round the world in which homosexuality is still illegal”. “It’s important to talk about,” continued Blanchett, while her co-star Rooney Mara, agreed “there’s a long way to go before we’re not talking about it”.

cate-carol

Watch | First Teaser of Cate Blanchett’s new Lesbian / Bi-Feature Film ‘Carol’

This week Cate Blanchett’s film Carol premieres at Cannes, and we’re all very excited. We’re even more excited to finally see so clips from the film.

Carol-02

The big-screen adaptation of Patricia Highsmith’s 1952 lesbian cult classic The Price of Salt stars Blanchett as a socialite Carol who falls for a younger shop girl (Rooney Mara). While lesbian pulp novels usually ended in tragedy (it would have been blasphemous to end them in blissful romance) Highsmith broke barriers by doing the opposite. In The Price of Salt the lead falls for a young woman – a department store clerk and artist – and spoiler alert (!) it ends in a way that lets us imagine that the two women end up happy together.

Also read: Cate Blanchett Confirms Her Past Relationships With Women

The original 1952 romance novel (which Highsmith originally published under a pseudonym, having predicted public outrage over the queer storyline) was very popular among lesbians of the time period — not all that surprising, due to the unconventional characters that defied stereotypes.

The clips don’t give much a way in terms of plot, but the two stars coy glances say so much more.

Carol-01Carol-04

On the film, director Todd Haynes says

In some ways, the event of a gay love story is less surprising every day. But I think love stories are hard to pull off, period. They require external forces that keep the lovers apart.”

Cate is now one of several public women who have spoken about having relationships with women, while also not labelling themselves, much like Miley Cyrus.

 

Why are so Many Female Celebrities Opting to Not Label Themselves Bisexual?

Last week, when launching her Happy Hippie Foundation campaign to help homeless LGBT youth, Miley Cyrus told the Associated Press that not all her relationships have been “straight or heterosexual”, but no B word in play.

Raven-Symoné is also another women who does not want to be labelled. When asked by Oprah if was gay, Raven gave a very careful answer. “I don’t want to be labelled ‘gay,'” Raven says. “I want to be labelled ‘a human who loves humans.'”

Then there is also Gillian Anderson who also came out as having had a relationship with another woman after the death of an ex-lover. She told the Times newspaper she that she is “aware of the need for being open about fluid sexuality” but has not yet called herself bisexual.

Gillian-Anderson-11

The Oscar-nominated Maria Bello came out in a New York Times op-ed she titled Coming Out as a Modern Family. She openly wrote about falling in love and beginning a relationship with her best female friend, but refrained from using the ‘B’ word and instead called herself a, “whatever.”

Later she told the Huffington Post,

Things shift and change and it’s fluid, and I think the younger generation is knowing that more and [is] excited about it. It’s not static — life just isn’t — and we have to create better labels to embrace the beauty of who we are.”

Maria Bello 05

Also read: Cate Blanchett Confirms Her Past Relationships With Women

In 2014 the ex-Spice Girl, Mel B, told the Guardian newspaper:

People call me lesbian, bisexual or heterosexual, but I know who’s in my bed and that’s it. I have a huge libido and a great sex life… Well, I did have a four-year relationship with a woman. But I’ve been very happily married for seven years to a penis. Ha ha! An amazing guy.”

So why are so many women opting to call themselves Bisexual? Is it that they are simply pansexual, and not limiting their sexual choice to biological sex, gender, or gender identity? Or is it that labels are simply too oppressive?

I am from a generation where stating who I am and who I am dating was about pride. I am proud to call myself a gay woman – a lesbian. And my friends will equally address themselves as such – be it bisexual, queer or gay.

So why the uncomfortable shift to not label? We have seen many celebrities be burnt with announcing they’re bisexual, but ending up with a man – Jessie J managed to cause so much offence when she stated she was no longer bisexual.

The Sex and the City star, Cynthia Nixon, once told the Daily Beast…

I don’t pull out the ‘bisexual’ word because nobody likes the bisexuals. Everybody likes to dump on the bisexuals.”

cynthia-nixon-21

Then there are others who champion their bisexuality. Anna Paquin went to town on Larry King when questioned her about her sexuality during an interview.

“Are you a non-practicing bisexual,” King asked her.

“Well, I am married to my husband [Stephen Moyer], and we are happily monogamously married,” she replied.

“But you were bisexual?” King asked.

“Well, I don’t think it’s a past tense thing,” she continued. “Are you still straight if you are with somebody?

“If you were to break up with them or if they were to die, it doesn’t prevent your sexuality from existing. It doesn’t really work like that.”

Anna Paquin

Also read: Raven Symoné Supports Miley Cyrus on Not Wanting to be Labeled Bisexual

So does refusing to adopt the bisexual label contributed further to bi invisibility?

No stranger to the label debate is Australian actress and founder of feminist website herself.com, Caitlin Stasey. When interviewed last year, she stated she recently decided to steer clear of labelling her sexuality.

Because if I say I’m bisexual, people say it doesn’t exist, and if I say I’m gay, people say I’m belittling the plight of all other women who consider themselves gay. I found a word that I identified with, I was told I couldn’t have it, and now I just think fuck it. I’m attracted to whom I’m attracted to.”

Caitlin-Stasey-02

Some of us live in a countries where same-sex relationships are still not legally recognised – where being a part of the LGBT community is still considered “other”.

So in one sense the coverage is good – it sparks conversations that hopefully help people realise sexuality lies on a spectrum, and where you fall is your place to label if you feel the need to do so.

Maybe one day bisexuality will be the norm. Or perhaps we’re slowly but surely entering an age, led by the politically correct Tumblr generation, in which we recognise, accept, and are no longer fearful of sexuality.

And beyond the labelling? Maybe one day we’ll wake to the news of a famous actress admitting she’s had relationships with many people, no mention of gender.

Cate Blanchett Confirms Her Past Relationships With Women

Blink and you’ll miss it – but Cate Blanchett just confirmed she has enjoyed past relationships with women.

In new piece with Variety, the six-time Oscar nominee talks about playing the lead in Carol, a new lesbian romance based on Patricia Highsmith‘s novel The Price of Salt. In the article, Blanchett also mentions that she has had relationships with women “many times” before – wow!

Cate Blanchett 02

From the article…

When asked if this is her first turn as a lesbian, Blanchett curls her lips into a smile. “On film — or in real life?” she asks coyly. Pressed for details about whether she’s had past relationships with women, she responds: “Yes. Many times,” but doesn’t elaborate. Like Carol, who never “comes out” as a lesbian, Blanchett doesn’t necessarily rely on labels for sexual orientation. “I never thought about it,” she says of how she envisioned the character. “I don’t think Carol thought about it.” The actress studied the era by picking up banned erotic novels. “I read a lot of girl-on-girl books from the period,” she says.

This is the first time she’s spoken about having been with women. However, the actress is currently is married to Australian writer/director Andrew Upton, so any further outings with women will be pretty limited.

Cate Blanchett 03

Carol is an adaptation of Patricia Highsmith’s 50s lesbian pulp novel The Price of Salt. While lesbian pulp novels usually ended in tragedy (it would have been blasphemous to end them in blissful romance) Highsmith broke barriers by doing the opposite. In The Price of Salt the lead falls for a young woman – a department store clerk and artist – and spoiler alert (!) it ends in a way that lets us imagine that the two women end up happy together.

Cate-Blanchett-Carol-01

On the film, director Todd Haynes says

In some ways, the event of a gay love story is less surprising every day. But I think love stories are hard to pull off, period. They require external forces that keep the lovers apart.”

 

Cate is now one of several public women who have spoken about having relationships with women, while also not labelling themselves, much like Miley Cyrus.

Cate Blanchett’s Lesbian Love Story ‘Carol’ Set For 2015 Cannes Film Festival Début

There are a number of films that will vie for the Palme d’Or at the 2015 Cannes Film Festival, but in contention is Todd Haynes’ Carol –  a 1950s lesbian love story starring Cate Blanchett.

Carol is an adaptation of Patricia Highsmith’s 50s lesbian pulp novel The Price of Salt. While lesbian pulp novels usually ended in tragedy (it would have been blasphemous to end them in blissful romance) Highsmith broke barriers by doing the opposite. In The Price of Salt the lead falls for a young woman – a department store clerk and artist – and spoiler alert (!) it ends in a way that lets us imagine that the two women end up happy together.

Cate-Blanchett-Carol-01

Playing the two leads are Cate Blanchett as Carol and Rooney Mara as the younger woman, whilst Sarah Paulson and Carrie Brownstein (Paulson and Brownstein are both openly queer) play two other women in Carol’s life.

Todd Haynes’ recent films (Far From Heaven, I’m Not There) have played the fall festival circuit, and this latest drama, which the Weinstein Co. is releasing Stateside this fall, will mark his first appearance at Cannes since 1998’s “Velvet Goldmine,” which received a prize for artistic contribution from the jury.

With no trailer and just a fan-made video of on set photos to go on it’s unclear if Carol will simply hint at a happy ending or explicitly say it, but we’ll have to wait and see.

Women Filmmakers Set To Shine At The Berlin International Film Festival

Berlin International Film Festival is Europe’s first major film festival of the year, and starts on Thursday.

Founded in 1951, The Berlin International Film Festival is one of the world’s leading film festivals and most reputable media events. Every year, the festival showcases up to more than 400 films across several genres, representing a comprehensive sampling of the cinematic world. Around 20 films compete for the top awards, called the Golden and Silver Bears. It’s also one of Europe’s three major film festivals, which also include the Venice International Film Festival and the Cannes International Film Festival.

Now in its 65th year, the festival will be showcasing a number of new movies, which will put women in the spotlight. A number of leading female actress, directors and producer are expected to be in attendance, premiering their latest films.

Dieter Kosslick, who has run the festival since 2001, told reporters that many of the more than 400 films that will screen focused on “strong women in extreme situations”.

Who to look out for…

The festival will begin with Oscar winner Juliette Binoche playing Josephine Peary, a woman who accompanied her explorer husband, Robert, on treacherous Arctic expeditions, in Nobody Wants the Night. The film is directed by Spain’s Isabel Coixet, only the second woman in the history of the Berlinale, as the event is known, to hold the coveted opening-night slot.

Nicole Kidman plays British adventurer and spy Gertrude Bell opposite former Twilight heartthrob Robert Pattinson as TE Lawrence, better known as Lawrence of Arabia, in German veteran Werner Herzog’s Queen of the Desert.

Two-time Oscar winner Cate Blanchett has two Berlin entries. She closes the festival as the wicked stepmother in Disney’s live action Cinderella and is featured alongside Christian Bale and Natalie Portman in Terence Malick’s long-awaited Knight of Cups.

Portman, now Paris-based with her choreographer husband Benjamin Millepied heading the Paris Opera Ballet, will visit Berlin for Knight and as executive producer of The Seventh Fire documentary about Native American gangs.

Lea Seydoux, the latest Bond girl in the British spy franchise, returns to Berlin with French director Benoit Jacquot in Diary of a Chambermaid, based on a novel already adapted by cinema greats Jean Renoir and Luis Bunuel.

British actress Helen Mirren stars in Woman in Gold, the true story of Holocaust survivor Maria Altmann who fought the Austrian government for nearly a decade for restitution of valuable Klimt paintings that the Nazis stole from her family.

Although the proportion of female directors has not yet taken a 50-percent stake, women are heavily featured in the 2015 festival, and the red carpet appearances of these female stars have been long anticipated by the public.

50s Lesbian Epic ‘Carol’ ft Cate Blanchett, Rooney Mara, Sarah Paulson and Portlandia star Carrie Brownstein, Will Be Out Next Year

While films like 2005’s ‘Imagine Me and You’ and more recent foreign language hit ‘Blue is the Warmest Colour’ have hit a chord as good queer lady led media. There is generally a stark lack of queer, female representation on our movie screens.

For the sake of both fixing what’s lacking and having the same chances at media representation that heterosexual people do (where boring, trope-y love triangles feature three people of the same gender rather than two), this needs to change. With Hollywood’s ever-changing mind-set and the calls and money of queer media fans making loud noises, things are slowly starting to improve.

One such example is Carol. An upcoming film from filmmaker Todd Haynes, Carol is an adaptation of Patricia Highsmith’s 50s lesbian pulp novel The Price of Salt.

While lesbian pulp novels usually ended in tragedy (it would have been blasphemous to end them in blissful romance) Highsmith broke barriers by doing the opposite. In The Price of Salt the lead falls for a young woman – a department store clerk and artist – and spoiler alert (!) it ends in a way that lets us imagine that the two women end up happy together.

Playing the two leads are Cate Blanchett as Carol and Rooney Mara as the younger woman, whilst Sarah Paulson and Carrie Brownstein (Paulson and Brownstein are both openly queer) play two other women in Carol’s life.

With no trailer and just a fan-made video of on set photos to go on it’s unclear if Carol will simply hint at a happy ending or explicitly say it, but we’ll have to wait and see.

As for what else we know about Carol, there’s reason to believe that it’s in very good hands indeed. Backing the project are Killer Films who are responsible for the Oscar winning film Boys Don’t Cry which was based on the real life story of a trans man, their mini-series Mildred Pierce won Emmys, a Golden Globe and a Screen Actors Guild award and both of the founders of Killer Films (along with filmmaker Haynes) are all out and proud.

It’s making all the right sounds then and we can expect Carol to be released sometime next year, although we could see sneak previews as soon as January, 2015 at the next Sundance Film Festival.