Jake Gyllenhaal spotted all over NYC, including at Sting's birthday bash, and a WDW Interlude

Jake Gyllenhaal is a busy bee. He might be evading the cameras - with the exception of this photo taken by the MOMA cafe in New York, and another one here - but he's certainly getting about in the Big Apple. And so before we try and keep  track of him, pinning those proverbial tacks in the proverbial NYC Gyllenmap, pull up a chair and relax...

First off, we have sightings of Jake yesterday at what is becoming a favourite, Angelica Kitchen. Jake's enthusiasm for this vegan watering hole is so great that he was seen cycling to it in the rain. He was joined by his mum (and a bevy of women checking their hair in the window).

Later in the day Jake put on his glad rags and headed out to join the biggest bash in the city last night - Sting's 60th birthday party at NYC's Beacon Theatre, a night that raised £2.5 million. Jake was one of many there, including Robert Downey Jr (who took to the stage to sing to the birthday boy), Bruce Springsteen and pretty much everyone else who's ever picked up a mic. Nothing like Sting turning 60 to make me feel old. I remember seeing him and Police on stage so many years ago... Hopefully, some pictures may turn up of Jake. With apologies for linking to the Daily Fail, there are pictures of many of the other guests there.

I have a very pleasant image to put into your heads. Jake has also been spotted at a steam baths... Keep that thought...

Having an encounter with Jake, as we've seen, moves people to blog. This encounter with Jake on Thursday was no different. You can read all about it here.

So, the message is clear. There are two possibilities if you live in NYC. 1) keep your eyes peeled at all times, particularly near Vegan or arty cafes, or 2) be an ageing rocker and throw a big bash.

Many thanks to IHJ for the new old pics from backstage at the SAG Awards back in 2004 and to BBMISwear and Mermon for links.

WDW Hot Autumnal Interlude

Taking full advantage of a stonkingly hot day, I spent a lovely Sunday exploring some of Oxford's beauty spots. Oxford's medieval stones love the golden shine of the sun.

The day included a visit to Hogwarts.

My review of Shark Night 3D at MovieBrit.

Jake Gyllenhaal and Peter Sarsgaard visit Robert Downey Jr and a WDW Woman Vs Wild Interlude

I'm back, having spent two days camping in the wilds on a rugged Welsh mountainside, enduring the elements, eating whatever food I was able to scramble together, surrounded by wild beasts. A case of Woman Vs Wild. The similarities between my camping trip with Jake Gyllenhaal and Bear Grylls' foray into an Icelandic glacier is obvious. Although, to be fair, camping over Hay on Wye on a green hillside, popping in to bookshops, eating pub grub, looking at the sheep and wild horses, staring at the ice in a drink, while being bombarded with heatwave temperatures, is a tad different from what awaited Jake.

Bear has revealed today 'We had a jumbo jet blown sideways across the airport, whilst I was 5,000-feet up a mountain.' Pah! What's that compared to having your hand licked by a tubby spaniel when you're minding your own business and putting up your tent?

The picture here is courtesy of IHJ and shows Jake and Peter Sarsgaard outside the house of our much loved Robert Downey Jr on 12 June.

Interlude - Woman Vs Wild

Over the last couple of days I've been roughing it* (*actually, not really roughing it), on a motorbike camping tour of the sunsoaked Welsh Marches. This being the Welsh borders it did of course rain at one point but it stayed hot while it did it. Yesterday was the hottest day of the year and it brought the grockels out to the Cotswolds - first stop Bibury.

Nest was Berkeley Castle in Gloucestershire, a lived in castle full of Tudor and Stuart furnishings (some belonging to Sir Francis Drake). But most famously this is the castle where Edward II came a cropper in the 1320s.

Tintern Abbey not only had a beautiful abbey against a breathtaking backdrop of cliffs and trees and a river, it had cricket.

The famous Hay on Wye from the campsite.

Other places we visited included the beautiful and remote Black Mountains, White Castle, the most hidden and unfindable castle in Britain and Llanthony Priory.

The pictures in this section are by WDW.

[Updated] Nailed to be test screened tomorrow! Gwyneth Paltrow gets a grip on Jake Gyllenhaal and details of Source Code's OST

Updated to add this exciting piece of news about Nailed!

The Film Stage has posted this piece of hopeful news abut Nailed: 'I now have a reliable source with information that there will be a test screening tomorrow in Los Angeles, billed as “a new comedy from David O. Russell, the Oscar-nominated director of The Fighter, Three Kings and Flirting with Disaster.” While this is no confirmation that it will see theatrical distribution, it is certainly a strong hint there is renewed interest in the project. If Russell is interested in completing that final scene, I’m sure he has the clout to make it happen.'

On with the post...

We have some new pictures today from the Oscars including one of Gwyneth Paltrow holding Jake Gyllenhaal's head in some kind of fearsome Vulcan mindmeld grip.


Gwynnie isn't the only one of Jake's leading ladies to have a go...


We have some video of Jake at the Oscars although it rather unfortunately stops at the very moment when Jake draws breath to speak. Nevertheless, until we have further footage, you can at least enjoy looking at Jake while Amy speaks.



Source Code Soundtrack

I am delighted to say that, unlike Love and Other Drugs, the soundtrack of Source Code will be released. It will be out on 29 March and is available to preorder in the US and in the UK. You can read a full list of the tracks by Chris Bacon here as well as find the image below.


The tracks are:

1. Source Code Main Titles
2. You Don’t Know Me
3. Eight Minutes
4. Racial Profiling
5. Coffee Will Have To Wait
6. Source Code Explained
7. Piecing It Together
8. Am I Dead?
9. One Death Is Enough
10. Colter Follows Derek
11. A Real Validation
12. I’m Gonna Save Her
13. No More Rubble Today
14. Regret And Reconciliation
15. Frozen Moment
16. Everything’s Gonna Be Okay

Things must get serious, judging by the title of No. 5.

Thanks to Eureka for the heads up! A note to say that I don't know if the image above is the final image for the soundtrack or not. We shall soon see (and hear).

And finally...

There are also some new pictures of Jake with Robert Downey Jr. Many thanks to IHJ for these and all the Oscar pictures!

The morning after - The Oscar recap featuring Jake Gyllenhaal, Amy Adams, Gwyneth Paltrow, Michelle Williams, Anne Hathway and a cast of thousands...

What a night. While I wait for the coffee to have some affect and contemplate where in the office might be the most suitable place for a discreet nap, there's time for a look at what was for me the highlight in a ceremony that went on for an extraordinary amount of time: the Jake Gyllenhaal Bit.


Jake and Amy Adams (a nominee herself and wearing an extremely long dress)presented the awards for Best Documentary Short Subject and Best Live Action Short Film. The latter went to Luke Matheny for 'God of Love'. He also got one of the biggest laughs of the night. "I should have gotten a haircut."


As for the important stuff - what Jake was wearing - we hear from JJ that 'Jake wore a black made-to-measure Salvatore Ferragamo tuxedo, with double breasted jacket and gros grain details, paired with a pair of black leather Tramezza lace-up shoes.'


As mentioned in last night's update, Jake was able to share a moment with nominee Michelle Williams as well as her partner for the evening Busy Philipps.




Jake was also photographed with another of his co-stars, Gwyneth Paltrow, who had some rather unsettling news for Jake... 'Gwyneth Paltrow, apparently a bit nervous about performing the Oscar-nominated song from "Country Strong," crossed paths with Jake Gyllenhaal, about 30 minutes before Sunday's show started. "Hey, I'm sitting right behind you," he said. "Oh good, I'll throw up on you then," she replied.'


At 5:07pm (still a long, long way to go): 'There's major mingling inside the theatre now. On one side, Colin Firth kisses Amy Adams on the cheek. In the centre, Hugh Jackman is shown to his front-row seat before bouncing away. On the other side, Jake Gyllenhaal greets Marisa Tomei and Hilary Swank. "We're sitting next to each other," Swank excitedly tell Gyllenhaal.' Lucky Hilary! There were some other familiar faces too.







As for the Oscars themselves, take a look here at the opening skit by James Franco an Anne Hathaway. It's a rusty version but well worth a look if you haven't seen it.



Many thanks to IHJ for these wonderful pictures - there are lots more there.

Zodiac - a film and performance to remember and Brothers released in Germany at last!

As the preparations get under way for the Oscars (see below), there are some reminders about of many of the other 'best of' films that never quite got the Academy Award vote of approval for reasons that are beyond fathoming. And probably aren't worth the effort of fathoming.


David Fincher has an Oscar nomination for his astonishing work on Social Network. While this is enormously well-deserved, it has caused some to wonder why an earlier movie of his, Zodiac, was completely ignored by those award-giving committees. While it isn't productive to dwell on such things, what is extremely rewarding is to think back on a film, which, for me, puts crosses in all of the right boxes. And it's good to think that Fincher's Oscar success this year may attract new audiences to another film - Zodiac.



Zodiac isn't just the perfect police procedural movie, for me it succeeds (so much so it's in my top three films that I have ever seen, maybe even the top one) because it excels and surprises in so many ways. Zodiac is a thriller with many scenes of superb dialogue and minute observation; it is a horror movie that terrifies through a distortion of a recognisable reality; it is an elegant evocation of 1960s' and 1970s' San Francisco. Through detail and song, Zodiac reproduces a past time in a memorable way, reminding one of the past through its accuracy and mood.



And then there's the acting. Jake Gyllenhaal's portrayal of obsessive Robert Graysmith is a landmark performance in his career. In the promotion for Zodiac, Jake spoke of the passions that affected his life - family, food, acting, films - and demonstrated once again why he is such a great actor of his generation - he understands fully the roles he plays.


But it's not just Jake here, of course. Robert Downey Jr, in one of the first of his come back performances, and Mark Ruffalo and the actor whose skills Fincher may have appreciated the most, Anthony Edwards. Plus Chloe Sevigny and John Carroll Lynch who had appeared with Jake in two earlier movies, The Good Girl and Bubble Boy.


Aside from the film, which hooked me from its very first scene, there is also a soundtrack to listen to over and over again and a commentary featuring Jake and Robert Downey Jr together - a joy to listen to. Jake - and not just Jake either, RDJ said much the same thing - has spoken of what he had to endure to make this film. Tens of takes for each scene and, as the movie was filmed digitally, anything extra was instantly deleted.


This was a new experience for Jake but, judging by his body language with David Fincher in Cannes in May 2007, all of this was forgiven and a new relationship born. Jake has spoken recently of his pride in working for David Fincher. Without doubt, this will be an experience to look back on and we have been left with an astonishing film.



Brothers

Rather surprisingly, Brothers was finally released in Germany this week (27 January). Can there be any sense at all in releasing a film this far removed from its original debut? At least it ties nicely with Natalie Portman's huge Black Swan success.



And finally...



Includes pictures from IHJ and here.

My review of the wonderful Tangled now up on MovieBrit.

Prince of Persia lego revealed! We have camels...

While Jake Gyllenhaal watches the Dodgers win in LA (and I sigh about the lack of operational cameras in that fine city), the Prince of Persia action is heating up at Comic-Con in San Diego. Feast your eyes on Little Jake! I love the detail in the armour and on the face (note how I'm ignoring the drunk one at the back). Little did I think that one day I would be able to fill my home with Jake Gyllenhaal lego. Click on him and he shall be embiggened.




As if a Mini Jake isn't enough, we also get camels and ostriches. Apparently, they're prototype camels and ostriches... We can also expect Persian sets and a whole range of accessories.



What next from Comic-Con?


With thanks to Lego's Flickr, Pixelated Geek and ComingSoon.

Orphan's premiere

Edited to add photographs from Orphan's premiere which took place in Westwood on Tuesday. Peter Sarsgaard was there, as was Robert Downey Jr, whose wife Susan was a producer of the scary movie. You can see a video (with interviews) from the red carpet here.





Orphan pictures from the Daily Mail and Celebuzz.