Bill Condon Talks About Characters and Franchise Films

Bill Condon did a phone in interview with Moviefone this weekend.  Time and again Condon has proven in interview how seriously he has taken this material and how driven he has been to get everything right for the fans.  This interview follows right along those lines.  Here are a few tid bits as a sample:

You mention the performers experimenting in the dailies. I think it would be fair to call you an actor’s director — the films you’ve directed have gotten stars Oscar nominations five times, and Jennifer Hudson won — but Kristen Stewart, Robert Pattinson and Taylor Lautner grew up on these movies; they’re maybe set in their ways and what they think the characters are. How do you come in and direct them for this last run?

I did not find any of them set in their ways. It felt like they were eager to explore. Part of the advantage I had was that after a lot of anticipation in three movies, now a huge number of things happen. These characters change so dramatically. When you think of where Bella stars, which is where she’s been for all three movies, and by the end she’s this fierce warrior-hunter-maternal-goddess. All the steps that get her there — it’s a huge amount of change. The same for Jacob and Edward. They grow up more than anything.

Catherine Hardwicke [who directed ‘Twilight’] has a genius for getting inside the brain and is so in touch with what it’s like to be a teenage girl. I couldn’t imagine doing that first ‘Twilight.’ But I can imagine doing this one because it’s more adult concerns happening in this story.

Bella has that big transformation, of course, but Jacob has to go through a lot of heady emotional stuff as well. Taylor is the least experienced and youngest actor of the main trio — did you have to do any additional work with him to get him to where Jacob needed to go?

He is as serious an actor as anybody I’ve ever worked with. He worked really, really hard and wanted to get deeper inside the emotions of this character. Because, again, this character goes through things way beyond mooning over the girl he can’t have. He was up to it, and really, really serious. He didn’t walk through anything. Like any good actor it was a lot of talk, questions and trying things.

Read the whole interview on Moviefone.

Moviefone Unscripted With Robert Pattinson and Reese Witherspoon

Moviefone: Behind the Scenes With Robert Pattinson and Kristen Stewart

This is one of the outtakes on the Eclipse DVDs

Moviefone Announces Biggest Twilight Fan Results

Earlier this month we told you how Moviefone was looking for the biggest Twilight and Harry Potter fans. Well, they have just posted the winners and Tigra won on the Twilight side.

“Tigra220 had no shortage of confidence when submitting her entry, adding simply, “I am THE.BIGGEST.TWIHARD.EVERRRR!!!” And that, it would appear, is the truth …. at least according to our voters.”

CONGRATS TO TIGRA!

Check out full coverage on Moviefone.

Moviefone:The Great Movie Franchise Debate: Twilight and Harry Potter

On Tuesday, Laura debated Andrew from Mugglenet on which movie franchise did a better job: Harry Potter or Twilight. Several very specific categories were debated as picked by Moviefone, and we squared-off on roughly a half-dozen questions. We are happy to announce that Twilight as represented by Laura (as decided by two impartial Moviefone judges, who were guys) won!

It was all in good fun. We are still Harry Potter fans, and will be seeing the movie tonight! (Although there is a distinct possibility that the moderators of the Harry Potter site that Lori and Laura used to help run are plotting Laura’s demise.) We are definitely Team Switzerland on what book was better, but we had a ton of fun talking about movie adaptions and their ups and downs.

Don’t worry, Laura and Andrew are  still friends. Laura bought him lunch after the debate was over. There were rumblings of a possible rematch for this summer when the final Potter movie comes out. As we said last week, “Personally we still think that the two coolest werewolves of all time are Jacob Black and Remus Lupin. On their downtime they discuss their problems with vampires and Death Eaters while sharing a butter beer and watching the sunset at La Push.”

After you watch the debate tell us what you think in our comments and over on Moviefone.

Vote for Eclipse at Moviefone End of Summer Movies Poll

With the end of summer fast approaching, Moviefone is asking movie goers what their best and wost pics of the summer were. The Twilight Saga: Eclipse and its stars are listed in several categories including favorite on screen couple, best chick flick, and the movie that was most worth your cash.  But it wouldn’t be a poll if there wasn’t the all important, never ending question of Jacob vrs Edward.  The guys have some competition this time around in the category of hottest leading man with Javier Bardem from ‘Eat Pray Love’, Robert Downey Jr. from ‘Iron Man 2′,  Zac Efron in “Charlie St. Cloud,’ and Joseph Gordon-Levitt, ‘Inception.’  Be sure to vote for all your favorites as well as which film you are most looking forward to next summer!

The Lexicon and Moviefone’s Movieclub

Yesterday Laura (Pel) had the opportunity to discuss the Eclipse movie on Moviefone’s Movie Club with two panelists from Moviefone and Myriam (the Twilight Superfan) who Skyped in.

Watch the Movifone Livestream on the Lexicon

Livestreaming from around the nation.

Twilight Fan Tattoos and Twilight Night Madness!

Remember when Moviefone asked for your Twilight Tatoos?

Well, they just let us know that:

We got TONS of submissions. Check out the final, fabulous gallery here — they are amazing: Twilight Fan Tatoos

Next, we have ANOTHER giveaway! We’ve got some great prize packs just in time for our Twilight Night going on tomorrow — including a grand prize of a SIGNED script and passes to Twilight Night. If you haven’t heard about Moviefone’s Twilight Night (how could you?!) all the info is here: Moviefone’s Twilight Night

And the info on the giveaway (including other prize listings) go here: Giveaway Info

Finally, Moviefone’s Jenna Busch (who does our daily Moviefone Minute news video) was on the black carpet last night for the L.A. Eclipse premiere — and she got some great interviews with cast members…and the best part about this video? It’s short and sweet. Check it out:

See the entire article here

Moviefone: Twilight Trivia by Twilight Fansites

moviefone-logo-195x68We’ve all played those trivia games that ask questions that they think are hard like “What kind of car does Edward drive?” and we all secretly groan. Well Moviefone decided it wanted some truly tough Twilight trivia and they asked a variety of fansites including ours for questions.

Go check it out and see how you do. Thank you to Moviefone for asking us to do something like this for the fans!