Future screen goddess: Amber Heard
With the predictable glut of teen-flicks and slasher movies under her belt, Amber Heard could easily have ended up one of cinema’s perennial lightweights, a new Drew Barrymore – plenty of work, yet none of it particularly demanding.
But after landing a role opposite Johnny Depp in this year’s The Rum Diary (based on Hunter S Thompson’s early novel set in a Puerto Rican newspaper office in the 1950s), the 24-year-old Texan, is finally treading more mature ground. First up for 2011 though is the 3D action thriller Drive Angry in which Heard plays a waitress who teams up with Milton, an escapee from Hell played by Nicholas Cage whose murdered daughter’s child is to be sacrificed by a satanic cult. (Anything that sounds like a cross between Rosemary’s Baby and Sin City has got to be good, right?)
With her retro Hollywood looks and a repertoire that can deliver everything from ditzy blonde to sultry femme fatale, we’re sure that the pleasingly versatile Heard will be on our radar for many years to come.
Least likely to star in a rom-com: Jennifer Lawrence
Jennifer Lawrence is a canny chooser of movie roles, appearing in the kind of miserabilist, rough-hewn dramas (such as Winter’s Bone and The Poker House) that never fail to pique the interest of Academy Award judges.
Her appearance in this year’s X-Men may be her first Hollywood blockbuster but it certainly won’t be her last. Still only twenty years old and with sunkissed Californian beach-babe looks that belie her Kentucky roots, Lawrence has shown a willingness to scrape off the make-up and get down and dirty.
In Winter’s Bone her skin is the colour of blanched almonds, her blonde locks concealed by a scruffy beanie hat. Watch how she plays Ree Dolly, a wise-beyond-her-years teen in a town full of redneck junkies afraid that her relentless attempts to find her missing father will bring them all down. It’s a great script with convincing performances across the board, but it is Lawrence, utterly mesmerising as the quick-witted Ree, that nails this film down as a small-town, low-budget masterpiece.
Football’s most wanted: Gareth Bale
It’s not often that a defender’s worst nightmare is another defender. Gareth Bale’s surging runs from his own half and ability to rip apart the opposition’s defence has made him one of the most sought-after talents in football. If Welshman Bale can maintain the kind of form that saw him torment Inter Milan in the Champions League last year, he could help his club Tottenham to some long-awaited silverware this season.
One thing’s for sure: if Bale can’t win any medals with Spurs he’s going to want to do it elsewhere. Come the end of the season his manager Harry Redknapp could be swatting away blank cheques like flies as Europe’s big guns come sniffing.
Best way to dodge traffic: The Green Line
Due to open later this year, Dubai’s second Metro line is set to make the city even more accessible, encouraging us to visit areas some of us have forgotten existed (remember Oud Metha and Wafi City?).
Running mostly alongside the Creek, it will mean that reaching some of the city’s mostly atmospheric spots won’t involve getting hopelessly stuck in traffic. With the Green line expected to be less crowded than the Red line, you might even get to sit down once in a while, instead of swaying around the carriage like a punch-drunk boxer.
Wildest weekend: Al Sahel Lodge
Situated a couple of hours drive south-west of Abu Dhabi, Al Sahel Lodge on Sir Bani Yas Island will offer guests a unique, safari-flavoured vacation within a 4200-hectare environment that is home to more than 5000 free-roaming animals, including gazelles, cheetahs and hyenas. There’s also a tented library for avid bookworms, a swimming pool, and a swanky cigar lounge. Ernest Hemingway would approve.
Summer soundtrack: Jamie Woon
Previously a support act for Amy Winehouse, 27-year-old Londoner Jamie Woon combines soulful vocals with the speaker-busting bass and shrill bleeps of dubstep. His debut single Wayfaring Stranger received the music press equivalent of a standing ovation and his album (working title: In The Middle), due in spring, is destined to be one of the hits of the summer.
Band you’ll whistle to: Fleet Foxes
Bearded Seattle folk maestros Fleet Foxes describe their music as ‘baroque harmonic pop jams’ so what’s not to like? Their eponymous debut album in 2008 sent reviewers into a back-slapping frenzy and even though frontman Robin Pecknold says their second album – due anytime soon – will be “less poppy”, you wouldn’t bet against them topping more charts in 2011.
Vacation page-turner: The new James Bond novel
Ever since original Bond scribe Ian Fleming died in 1964, several authors, including Kingsley Amis and Sebastian Faulks, have continued to write 007 novels in an act of blatant literary puppetry (‘continuation’ in publishing parlance).
The latest to be handed the Bond baton is prolific American crime writer, Jeffrey Deaver, who is in Dubai this month to give a talk about his work and love of all things Bond. Currently titled Project X, the book is due for release in May this year. As for when we might see a new Bond movie, that’s anyone’s guess.
Worth buying a new sofa for: Boardwalk Empire
The latest US drama series to be given a universal thumbs-up by the critics, Boardwalk Empire, like Mad Men before it, is yet another unmissable drama from one of the main writers of The Sopranos. Terence Winter, who wrote 25 episodes of the mob hit, has shifted his imagination to prohibition-era Atlantic City for his latest creation, and in doing so has given Steve Buscemi arguably his most fascinating role to date.
As Enoch ‘Nucky’ Thompson, Buscemi is part-politician, part mobster and must navigate the treacherous underbelly of the city, a hive of corruption, racketeering and illegal bootlegging. With Martin Scorcese setting the tone by directing the first ever episode, Boardwalk Empire was always going to be a hit. Its few detractors bemoan its similarity to the Sopranos. As if that’s a bad thing!
Best use of a mallet: Thor
Hammer-wielding warrior-god Thor will do well to come out tops in a year crowded with superhero movies (Green Lantern, X-Men and Captain America to name but three) as Hollywood’s seemingly unquenchable thirst for comic-book adaptions continues unabated. Burgeoning Aussie actor Chris Hemsworth, whose biggest movie to date is Star Trek, will don the famous winged helmet, with Kenneth Branagh in the director’s chair.
Natalie Portman will play Jane Foster, a humble nurse in the original comics but now upgraded to a lofty astrophysicist (lest we think Hollywood is remotely chauvinistic). With thespian Branagh at the helm and a cast that includes such heavyweights as Anthony Hopkins and Rene Russo, Thor could well turn out to be this year’s Dark Knight Returns, the thinking man’s superhero movie.
What we’ll wear: High-ankled trousers
We’ve seen them on the catwalks, in the magazines, and even along the more fashionable boulevards of Mediterranean coastal towns, but now Dubai is bracing itself for the ankle-flashers, slim-fitting trousers short enough to reveal three inches of flesh or sock. If you can pull it off (in other words, if you can take the inevitable jokes about stealing your son’s school uniform and have thin, preferably tanned ankles) then it’s undoubtedly an elegant look. Just make sure you get the shoes right - nothing too chunky.
The new Daniel Craig: Alex Pettyfer
Perhaps staking a claim for the role of James Bond in a decade or two, Alex Pettyfer’s star turn in Stormbreaker as a teenage MI6 spy brought him to the attention of casting agents everywhere. Four years on, sporting grown-up facial furniture and with the taut physique of a protein-guzzling Olympian, 20-year-old Pettyfer is putting in some serious hours in front of the camera.
In the upcoming Beastly, a modern re-working of Beauty and the Beast set in New York, he stars opposite Vanessa Hudgens as a man who finds himself hideously disfigured after getting cursed by a witch. It’s tasteful teen romance that could elevate the former male model to Robert Pattinson levels of idolatry. After that, watch out for him in the sci-fi movies, I Am Number Four and Now.
Poshest meal: The Ivy
The Ivy is possibly the one restaurant in London where you are guaranteed to spot somebody famous tucking into its famously unpretentious food. It’s a culinary institution, with stained glass windows to stop voyeurs peering in and the paparazzi permanently camped outside its entrance. And now it’s coming to Dubai. Located in the Boulevard in Emirates Towers, this will be the restaurant du jour for the city’s diners - and maybe the occasional A-list visitor.
www.theivy.ae
Plus three things that won’t be big in 2011
Massive shoes
With soles thicker than a slab of fillet steak, these abominable brogues by Prada could be this year’s worst sartorial trend. Unless you’re severely vertically challenged or plan to enroll in clown school, you’ll do well to give them a wide berth.
Real Madrid
Jose Mourinho may have assembled a new line-up of Galacticos in Ronaldo, Kaka et al, but Real Madrid may be the club where so-called The Special One finally crashes to earth. After getting annihilated 5-0 by Barcelona last year, Mourinho might find the Spanish La Liga his toughest task to date. Then again, this is a man who has serious cojones.
The Royal Wedding
Surely we’ve all got better things to do on Friday April 29th than watch Prince William and Kate Middleton tie the knot. Alfred Hitchcock fans can commemorate the director’s death. Uma Thurman fans can celebrate her birthday. Failing that you might want to Celebrate International Dance Day. Anything – anything! - but the preposterous pomp and ceremony of a British royal wedding.
Gulf News reader Norberto L. Lingcaso Jr. took this shot while travelling on the Dubai Metro. He said: “I was going to Jebel Ali and I thought of capturing the colourful buildings along Shaikh Zayed Road.” Image Credit: Norberto L. Lingcaso Jr/Gulf News Reader
