New Year’s Eve‘s director, Garry Marshall admits to Love Actually being his inspiration for the film and on paper it sounds like a good idea. Rope-in a large ensemble of stars and use multiple sub-plots to tell their individual tales. It’s a clever ploy. When it works.

The technical name for this type of movie, one with multiple stories woven together into one feature, is the portmanteau or anthology film. They are often based around a significant theme or event. For example, Christmas, love and New Year, or in the case of The Player, a murder.

A-listers seem to love attaching their names to portmanteau movies because a) it is a credit for their filmography, and b) as a small role they can wrap it up quickly. That said, the amount of talent who sign on the dotted line is still astonishing. In the last two years Marshall’s two portmanteau’s (the other being Valentine’s Day) have starred the likes of Julia Roberts, Hilary Swank and Robert De Niro. All actors with credible careers.

The risk with throwing so many of dominant personalities together is, two things can happen: the film is outstandingly brilliant, or utterly abysmal. The actors will either gel or clash. 1932′s Grand Hotel, for example is brilliant and Oscar acknowledged.

In terms of Love Actually and New Year’s Eve, the former has a credible execution (and was nominated for a Golden Globe), whereas the latter sadly doesn’t. The thing is, an actor is only as good as the material they are working with, and the script for New Year’s Eve was rushed and clunky, the dialogue was cheesy and written to aid the transitions necessary for the many narrative strands rather than a believable plot. On the other hand it felt like a little more care had been taken to weave the stories in Love Actually together without it appearing contrived.

The Audience

We have to bear in mind that these two films were made in two different countries with very different audiences in mind.

Love Actually‘s predominantly British cast is less distracting, because Hollywood stars are just that – stars with a reputation that precedes them, rather than actors. Therefore when we go and see New Year’s Eve, we don’t see Kim, the mum with a rebellious 15-year-old, we see Sarah Jessica Parker, and laugh openly when it’s revealed she is the ‘sister’ of Zac Efron, because … did they seriously expect the audience to go with that?

In fact, the only actors I wasn’t distracted by in New Year’s Eve were Lea Michele, who basically plays her Glee role a few years into the future, and Michelle Pfeiffer. She gives such a convincing portrayal of a mousy middle aged woman, that you forget who she is. Everyone else? Nope. That is definitely Hilary Swank in charge of the Times Square ball dropping at midnight. It is certainly Jon Bon Jovi performing. It’s a game of ‘Spot the A-Lister’.

At the time of Love Actually‘s release in 2003, many non-British viewers may not have known who half the actors were. Although Alan Rickman, Colin Firth, Hugh Grant and Emma Thompson were well known, they are lower key than their Hollywood peers. This is one of the main reasons why I think the film works. The less you know about the actor, the more you believe in their portrayal.

Parallels and Character

The parallels between the two films are quite striking. Both open with a heart-felt narration from a figure within the film. Hugh Grant speaks about his belief in love over hate, while Hilary Swank talks about the magic of a New Year and the hope it brings. Cue montage of scenes of preparation for Christmas and celebrations in Times Square.

Love Actually has two more sub-plots than New Year’s Eve‘s eight. I was genuinely surprised when I counted them up, because Love Actually feels like it has fewer. The sub-plots vary in length in Love Actually, unlike it’s US love child. The amusing sexual tension between John (Martin Freeman) and Judy (Joanna Page) as they work as naked stand-ins on a film set is justifiably given limited screen time compared to Colin Firth’s pursuit of his Portuguese love, Aurelia.

Problematically, New Year’s Eve tried to give equal screen time to everyone. There wasn’t time to concentrate on any one story. The film makers were so keen to make sure Katherine Heigl had as much to do as Sarah Jessica Parker, that plots were either drawn out too far or cut too short.

Both films share a lot of similar characters, like the unexpected brother and sister combination I mentioned earlier. In Love Actually the siblings are Hugh Grant and Emma Thompson.

A rock star is added into the UK and US mixes too. The difference is New Year’s Eve brought in a real singer (Bon Jovi), whereas Love Actually hired Bill Nighy to pretend. Bon Jovi may as well have played himself because I didn’t believe his name was Jenson at any point. You go along with Bill Nighy as ageing rocker Billy Mack though, and the character is much more interesting for it.

The obligatory adolescent couples are also present to appeal to kids. Sadly, Abigail Breslins’ Hailey in New Year’s Eve comes across as a brat when she runs away from her mother to kiss a boy at midnight, whereas Thomas Sangster’s Sam in Love Actually was endearing in his pursuit of his crush, Joanna.

In Conclusion

Love Actually is by no means a perfect film. It is too long, drags in places and lack realism in parts, like when ten-year-old Joanna is about to board a plane to America and she follows after Sam to give him a kiss goodbye, clearly  holding up the plane, before she runs back through security. Even in fiction, that is just not believable.

New Year’s Eve does have its moments of hope too. Sofia Vergara’s performance is pretty funny. The moments were too few and far between though. It seems like both films made a check list of classic romance plots and presented them to the audience with very different results. It’s a shame – Garry Marshall made Pretty Woman! So, when he’s good, he’s good.

Let us hope that, should he decide to make yet another holiday portmanteau, he rectifies the mistakes in his first two attempts. Or perhaps hires Richard Curtis to write it. Otherwise it will be yet another embarrassing mark on more A-List résumés.

Johnny Depp, George Clooney and Tom Hanks, have been voted the top three Hollywood stars who the nation would most happily invite over for Christmas, according to a poll carried out by the Sky Movies HD Christmas Channel.

The Pirates of the Caribbean star scooped the top spot with an impressive 7.6% of the votes. Depp was closely followed by George Clooney, who received 5.2%, and hot on his heels came Tom Hanks who reached third place with a respectable 4.9%.

Just behind Tom Hanks was British actress Emma Thompson – who scored 4.8% – followed by Friends actress, Jennifer Anniston and a very Pretty Woman, Julia Roberts.

The zombie fighting comedian, Simon Pegg, was ranked seventh, followed by heart-throb Hugh Grant who came in at eighth place. Cameron Diaz and Jim Carey, who starred together in the 90s family film The Mask, filled in the last two spots in the nation’s fantasy Christmas celebrity guest list.

The Christmas Channel asked 1,000 UK people to vote as part of Sky’s upcoming festive broadcasts, where film fanatics will be sharing their living rooms with the stars.

The Christmas Channel will be broadcasting some modern releases, such as Fred Claus and The Dark Knight, as well as Christmas favourites including Home Alone and The Grinch.

According to Ian Lewis, Director of Sky Movies, festive films have become as much a tradition as turkey and tinsel:

“The launch of our festive season of daily box sets was the perfect reason to find out who audiences really want to share their Christmas with this year. Depp was the clear winner for UK film fans. He is this year’s ultimate Christmas cracker!”

Why not take our poll and vote for your favourite Christmas guest!

Second Act is still in the very early stages of its life, with a writer and director not yet having been recruited, but it is said to feature Roberts, star of Pretty Woman and Notting Hill, as a woman who is suddenly forced to take a job, after never having worked a day in her life. She will star in the film, as well as producing this comedy that will be set in the workplace.

The character that Roberts will play is rather different to the actress, who has been busy recently, starring alongside Tom Hanks in Larry Crowne and playing the evil queen in the upcoming Snow White film, Mirror, Mirror. However, Larry Crowne did not meet with rave reviews and the pressure will be on Mirror, Mirror as it’s being released just three months ahead of the highly anticipated Snow White and the Huntsman starring Twilight’s Kristen Stewart. The latter Snow White adaptation looks as though it has been produced on an epic scale and Mirror, Mirror may be in danger of being ‘dwarfed’ by it.

Let’s hope that Second Act is just what Roberts needs to get her va-va-voom back, and we will bring you more news as we get it.

Based on the traditional Brothers Grimm story of Snow White, Mirror Mirror stars Julia Roberts as Queen Clementianna, whose competition in winning the heart of the handsome prince is none other than Snow White, played by The Blind Side‘s Lily Collins.

Despite the fact that Singh has previously been quoted as saying that Roberts was first to be cast, as he thought her perfect for the role, there has been a certain amount of debate surrounding her suitability, especially since the release of the trailer. Twitter debates have raged around whether or not she is ‘evil’ enough to do the role justice, and despite the fact that her performance seems to steal the show (in the trailer, at least), will her character come across as one which is simply jealous and bitchy, rather than truly wicked?

The proof is likely to be in just how far the Queen is willing to go in order to win the affections of Prince Andrew Alcott, played by The Social Network‘s Armie Hammer. Hammer beat both James McAvoy and Alex Pettyfer in being given this role, and both he and Collins seems to be getting off likely in terms of the public reaction to this trailer. Despite the dramatic visuals and and impressive costumes, this sneak peak at Mirror Mirror has also been criticized for being overly camp, and featuring some particularly terrible attempts as humour. It certainly looks like this film will be a huge step away from the style of action-fantasy that we saw with Singh’s latest release, Immortals, which starred Henry Cavill, Freida Pinto, and Mickey Rourke.

Of course, Mirror Mirror is also being inevitably compared to ‘the other Snow White film’ – Snow White & the Huntsman. How will Roberts fare against Charlize Theron in the battle of the evil queens? We can’t wait to find out!

Both Mirror Mirror and Snow White & the Huntsman are due to reach cinemas next year. Check out the brand new trailer for Mirror Mirror below, and let us know what you make of it!

Booth, who you might recognise from the Burberry ads or playing Boy George in the TV movie Worried About The Boy, will play Romeo to True Grit star Hailee Steinfeld’s Juliet.

Director Carlo Carlei reportedly chose him from 300 hopefuls, all desperate to play the star-crossed lover in the remake of Shakespeare’s classic romantic tragedy.

The cast, which also includes Holly Hunter as the nurse, Ed Westwick as Tybalt and Kodi Smit-McPhee as Benvolio, will be working with a script adapted by Julian Fellowes. Fellowes is known for creating the popular TV show Downton Abbey and winning an Oscar for his Gosford Park screenplay, as well as being known as an actor, novelist and a Conservative peer.

It sounds like a pretty exciting project so far. We’re thinking this role could propel Booth to super-stardom. You may remember the Baz Luhrmann film Romeo + Juliet in 1996 starring Leonardo DiCaprio and Claire Danes. DiCaprio became quite the heart throb after the film and went on to star in numerous films and be nominated for countless awards.

We’ll next see Booth starring in LOL with Miley Cyrus, but who knows next year it could be the Oscars for the dashing chap? What do you think, is it good casting?

The latest news from the Hanks camp is that his production company is working on a 3D film based on the action figure toy Major Matt Mason. Hanks has written the script himself and may also take the lead. It is rumoured that Back to the Future director Robert Zemeckis might be directing.

For those of you who are too young to have heard of Major Matt Mason, he was a Mattel action figure introduced in 1966. The major was an astronaut who lived and worked on the moon. Tom Hanks, who previously voiced a toy in Toy Story, has said on a number of occasions that Major Matt Mason was one of his favourite childhood toys. Awwww.

In the meantime you may remember we reported a couple of month ago that Hanks’ production company was working on bring the Broadway musical American Idiot to the big screen. Hanks is also currently promoting Larry Crowne, which he wrote, directed and starred in alongside Julia Roberts. See we told you he was busy at the moment.

Larry Crowne is released in UK cinemas on July 1.

Following her big screen début playing Mattie Ross in the Coen Brothers’ film, True Grit, the fourteen-year-old was nominated for a BAFTA and an Academy Award, amongst numerous others awards.

Now it seems the sought-after actress has attached herself to play the lead role in an upcoming amped-up version of Sleeping Beauty. This alternative take on the traditional fairytale has been penned by screenwriter Lindsay Devlin, and will reportedly be told from the point of the sleeping beaut herself (in case anyone was worried that Steinfeld would be left snoozing throughout the whole thing…).

Although Sleeping Beauty is currently awaiting financing, it it is taken up by buyers the film will join a long list of fairytale adaptations – but it is more than likely now that Steinfeld’s involvement has been confirmed.

Already in production on the fairytale-front is Snow White and the Hunstman, which stars Kristen Stewart and Charlize Theron, The Brothers Grimm: Snow White with Julia Roberts and Armie Hammer, and Peter Pan starring Channing Tatum. Meanwhile Gemma Arterton will also also appear in Hansel & Gretel: Witch Hunters, and James Franco will star in Oz: The Great and Powerful.

That’s not to mention the fact that there is already a reworking of the Sleeping Beauty story in the pipeline at Disney, which is currently titled Maleficent.

Will Steinfeld be able to deliver another stand-out performance against such stiff competition? It’s hard to say, but her performance in the upcoming Memento-esque film, Forgotten, should give some indication of what she’s capable.

We’ll keep you posted!

But they have reunited once again, and this time for a romcom called Larry Crowne, written and directed by Hanks himself.

The film tells the story of Larry Crowne (Hanks), a middle aged man who looses his job as a team leader in a discount warehouse store. One of the reasons is due to his lack of education, so he enrols at a college.

Crowne finds himself becoming friends with the others in his class, who are a pretty random group of people but all have the same wish – to better themselves.

He ends up falling for his teacher Mercedes Tainot (the lovely Julia Roberts). She is unhappy in her job and her marriage, but maybe he can change all that for her? You get the gist.

Anyway the film has a pretty good cast, other than the Hollywood heavyweights, Bryan Cranston, Pam Grier, George Takei, Rob Riggle, Taraji P Henson, Cedric the Entertainer, Gugu Mbatha Raw, Wilmer Valderrama, Rami Malik and Rita Wilson. Yes, it’s a random collection of actors but you have to admit they are all good-uns (apart from Wilmer Valderrama).

This is the first time that Hanks has been behind the camera in over ten years. He last directed That Thing You Do! in 1996, which was actually well received at the time but just didn’t set the box office alight.

How will Larry Crowne do in comparison, we wonder? Judging by the trailer it looks like a value for money feel-good romcom and when Julia Roberts flashes that smile, all is forgiven. Take a look at the trailer for yourself and let us know what you think.

Both parties are thought to be very keen for it to happen. Universal have been pestering her for a while, knowing her fans will flock to see it just because it’s Bella.

It will be her first role after finishing filming Twilight, so she understands the importance of picking the right film. Others have already been cast in the film, Viggo Mortensen will be playing the hunter and queen Ravenna will be played by Charlize Theron. What we want to know though, is who will be playing her Prince Charming?

Rumours had been circulating that Stewart would be taking on the role of Lois Lane in the upcoming Superman, but this has been quashed by a member of her team who said:

“There are a number of fabricated stories circulating. The fact is that she has not met on this film nor has she been approached for this film.”

Meanwhile there’s more news on the other version of Snow White which is being made, Tarsem Singh’s The Brothers Grimm: Snow White.

Julia Roberts has been linked to the role of The Evil Queen. The production company and Singh both want to sign her up as soon as possible, but what are the chances of her taking on an evil role?