Angelina Jolie jokes with crew while finishing up on her documentary in Cambodia
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- Published on Thursday, 03 March 2016 04:39
- Written by Daily mail
Ready to wrap! Angelina Jolie is in her element as she jokes with crew while finishing up work on her documentary in Cambodia .She may be a serious artist, but that doesn't mean the work environment has to be.And while wrapping up the filming of her latest movie in Cambodia the 40-year-old could be seen looking to be in good spirits as she joked with her cast and crew.The director seems to have formed a tight-knit bond with her crew after three months of filming her Khmer Rouge epic First They Killed My Father.The documentary - adapted from Cambodian author and human rights activist Loung Ung’s 2000 memoir - is moving into its final stages. Angelina, who sported a fitted, white, spaghetti strap dress with a flowing skirt, proudly displayed her extensive new back tattoos as she shared jokes and issued orders for filming a refugee camp scene at the foot of the Kulen Mountain in the Siem Reap province.The Oscar winner also shielded herself from the sun with a tan, wide-brimmed hat, as she could be seen gesturing while giving orders to the crew.And the star was later spotted donning a flowing, strapless white sundress as she enjoyed a day poolside as the movie came closer to wrapping.The movie features a largely Cambodian cast and crew, but Angelina has also hired a team of trusted British and American movie-makers as producers, camera operators, and in other high up positions, to ensure the movie is completed to the highest standard.'Angelina takes her movie-making very seriously,' an on-set insider said, adding: 'Some of it has been tough, make no mistake.' 'Cambodia is a third world country, and Angelina's been dealing with a largely Khmer cast and crew - things don't run as smoothly as on a huge Hollywood production.' 'There was a hiccup around December where some of the crew weren't working out and were subsequently sent home, but they were replaced and the team have been getting on incredibly well since,' the source added.
Angelina has also been getting some extra help on set in the form of her sons Maddox, 14, and Pax, 12, who have been on-hand during the shoot to help out with various production tasks, while Pax has also been taking photos to document the movie-making process. Angelina has also been immersing herself in the local Buddhist culture while in Cambodia, visiting temples and accompanying her six children – who also include Zahara, 11, Shiloh, nine, and seven-year-old twins Knox and Vivienne – as they learn about the culture and customs of their new country.In another show of her belief in the mysticism of South East Asia, Angelina's latest artworks, by her regular tattoo artist Ajarn Noo Kampai, whom she flew in from Bangkok to tattoo her, were on display at the set.Angelina has had a number of ancient Buddhist symbols and mantras on her back in a five-row form and a pyramid, symbols to give her power and help protect her family, according to experts able to decipher their meaning. First They Killed My Father: A Daughter of Cambodia Remembers is set to debut on streaming service Netflix later in 2016.
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Angelina Jolie returns to Cambodia as director
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- Published on Thursday, 18 February 2016 05:06
- Written by TDN
Between bites of spicy Cambodian curry and fried fish with rice, Angelina Jolie Pitt explains how this tiny country with a tumultuous past changed the course of her life.She first visited Cambodia 16 years ago to portray "Lara Croft: Tomb Raider" — the gun-toting, bungee-jumping, supremely toned action hero that made her a star. Soon after, she adopted her first child from a Cambodian orphanage and returned again and again on humanitarian missions. Now, she's back for another movie but this time as a director, and the subject matter is a far cry from Lara Croft."First They Killed My Father," is based on a Khmer Rouge memoir written by survivor Loung Ung that recounts the 1970s Cambodian genocide from a child's perspective. The film, which she is directing and co-wrote with Ung for Netflix, is in Khmer, with an all-Cambodian cast and according to Jolie Pitt "the most important" movie of her career. During a break from filming, she talked to The Associated Press about how, more than ever, she feels a satisfying symbiosis between her life and work.In person, Jolie Pitt is engaging and down-to-earth, dressed in a T-shirt and long black skirt, her hair pulled into a casual bun. She goes out of her way to play down her celebrity, hopping into the back of an SUV and squeezing into the middle seat beside a reporter for a short drive from the set to the crew's outdoor lunch tents. She is relaxed and articulate as the conversation veers from acting and directing, to history, humanitarian work, motherhood and her special relationship to Cambodia."When I first came to Cambodia, it changed me. It changed my perspective. I realized there was so much about history that I had not been taught in school, and so much about life that I needed to understand, and I was very humbled by it," said the 40-year-old Jolie Pitt, who grew up in Los Angeles where she felt "a real emptiness." She was struck by the graciousness and warmth of Cambodian people, despite the tragedy that left an estimated 2 million people dead. While shooting Lara Croft in 2000, some scenes required sidestepping land mines, she said, which made her aware of the dangers refugees face in countries ravaged by war. "That trip triggered my realization of how little I knew and the beginning of my search for that knowledge."
It prompted her to contact the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees to learn about the agency's work before joining as a goodwill ambassador in 2001. She was then given an expanded role as Special Envoy in 2012.It was during an early trip back to Cambodia with the U.N. that Jolie had another epiphany — this time about motherhood."It's strange, I never wanted to have a baby. I never wanted to be pregnant. I never babysat. I never thought of myself as a mother," Jolie, now famously a mother of six, says with a laugh. But while playing with children at a Cambodian school, "it was suddenly very clear to me that my son was in the country, somewhere."She adopted Maddox in 2002, and a year later opened a foundation in his name in northwestern Battambang province, which helps fund health care, education and conservation projects in rural Cambodia.Maddox is now 14 and sporting what his mom calls "a blonde stripe" — a shaggy mohawk with the top dyed blonde. He joined her in Cambodia to help behind the scenes for the project that she sees as a unique merger of her film work and family with humanitarian interests."For me, this is the moment, where finally my life is kind of in line, and I feel I'm finally where I should be," Jolie Pitt said.Her fondness for Cambodia is mutual, according to the country's most celebrated filmmaker Rithy Panh, who says "First They Killed My Father" will be the first Hollywood epic filmed in Cambodia about the country's genocide — a sign that the government trusts her to respectfully revisit the horrors of the past."I don't think they authorized Hollywood to come here. They authorized Angelina Jolie. It's not the same. She is special. She has a special relationship with the Cambodian people. There is a mutual respect," said Panh, her co-producer."I wonder if she's not a reincarnated Cambodian," he laughed, then thought about it. "Maybe. Maybe in a previous life she was Cambodian."She expects to return to hold the film's premiere in Cambodia at the end of the year, before its release on Netflix.
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Khmer Rouge's takeover of Phnom Penh recreated for Angelina Jolie-directed film
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- Published on Wednesday, 17 February 2016 05:33
- Written by SMH
The moment sends a chill down the spine of many Cambodians.Early on the morning of April 17, 1975, battle-hardened young fighters of the Khmer Rouge guerrilla army began silently filtering into the capital Phnom Penh, which had been besieged for five months.Many city dwellers cheered, hoping it would be the end of a civil war that had cost half a million lives.But it was to be the beginning of a four-year nightmare that left an estimated 1.7 million people dead from starvation, disease or execution as the Khmer Rouge emptied cities and tore up money in a disastrous attempt to create an agrarian utopia.Now almost 41 years later, photos have emerged on the internet of a dramatic recreation of that day – stirring memories of the genocide – despite that the producers of the Angelina Jolie-directed movie First They Killed My Father kept paparazzi away from the set."Seeing these scenes, remembering the true story during that regime … the pain and will never be forgotten," posted one Facebook user."It still haunts my memory, non-stop," posted another.Beyond blockades manned by today's soldiers, the photographs taken by onlookers show black-clad and heavily armed actors arriving on trucks in Battambang, the country's second-largest north-western city.The streets were lined with 1960s vintage cars, a computer shop had been transformed into a camera repair shop and a brick building had become a cinema.Hundreds of extras hired to appear in the movie were paid $US25 a day in the impoverished country were the average income is $US940 a year.The movie, produced for Netflix and shot in the Cambodian language and English, is an adaptation of a non-fiction book by Loung Ung, a childhood survivor of the Khmer Rouge era who was trained as a soldier in a camp for orphans.Angelina Jolie is greeted by Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen.
Jolie says she was deeply affected by Loung's book and the movie will be "hard to watch but important to see".She told Associated Press the intent of the movie is not to revisit the horrors of war but to bring to the screen characters that people worldwide will empathise with, and to help other people learn about Cambodia."What is special about this particular story is that it is told from the perspective of a five-year-old child, and is based on a child's emotional experience of war," she said."It sheds light not only on the experience of children during the genocide in Cambodia but of all children who endure war."Jolie said the movie will also draw her closer to the people of Cambodia, the homeland of her adopted 14-year-old son Maddox, who is involved in the production.Despite being deprived access to the set, the paparazzi have been busy revealing the 40-year-old Oscar-winning Jolie's new tattoos, supposedly inked by Thai master tattooist Ajarn Noo.And the gossip writers have claimed divorce was nearing with 52-year-old Brad Pitt (subsequently denied), and she was adopting another Cambodian child to join her six other children (also denied).Jolie, a United Nations special envoy on refugees, has had a decade-long association with Cambodia, whose 15 million people remain deeply scarred by the Khmer Rouge period.In 2001 she starred in Lara Croft:Tomb Raider, a movie shot at a temple in the Angkor Wat complex in the country's north-west.In 2003 she founded the Maddox Jolie Pitt Foundation, a non-government-organisation that focuses on environmental conservation, rural poverty and female empowerment.The foundation bought 60,000 hectares of Cambodian land that was infiltrated by poachers, and turned it into a wildlife reserve.Cambodia's King Norodom Sihamoni has signed a special decree giving Jolie Cambodian citizenship, in recognition of her environmental work in the country.
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Ready for a TV series based on Angelina Jolie action thriller Salt
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- Published on Monday, 15 February 2016 19:50
- Written by Empire online
Salt made a splash back in 2010 with Angelina Jolie kicking ass across the screen as a secret agent. Though there has been talk of a sequel since then, nothing has emerged. But now Sony is looking to go a different route, putting a TV remake of the film into development.It's just the latest in an increasing list of movies getting the telly treatment, with the likes of The Exorcist and Training Day among the current crop trying to fight their way into a packed small screen market. Quite what form the Salt show would take isn't known at this very early stage (beyond an obvious likely lack of Jolie, but Sony's Diego Suarez tells Screen International, "We want to bring it to Europe in a completely different way." The original plot (spoiler alert in case you haven't seen a six-year-old film) found Jolie has a CIA spy released from a North Korean prison who is eventually revealed to be a Russian agent tasked with assassinating the US President. She ultimately turns against her sleeper agent masters and goes on the run. This new series is being touted at the European Film Market, and we'll have to wait to see if a broadcaster bites.
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Angelina Jolie Says Shooting 'By The Sea' Movie With Brad Pitt Was 'Dangerous'
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- Published on Sunday, 14 February 2016 13:03
- Written by Designn Trend
Angelina Jolie knew that shooting "By the Sea" with Brad Pitt could potentially drown their marriage."It was our way of testing ourselves. We knew that if we could get through this, we'd come out even stronger and happier. And we did," Jolie, who wrote and directed the film, in which she and Pitt play a miserable husband and wife, told Britain's OK! magazine (via the Franchise Herald).She added, "We've always liked putting ourselves through challenges, even though it was maybe a little more dangerous for us as a couple. I don't think we want to go through it again though." But sources say Jolie and Pitt's marriage set sail long ago. According to a Hollywood Life insider, "Angie has some serious dark demons that have never entirely let go and it is still affecting her life and marriage. Her wild lifestyle when she was younger and her intense surgeries to avoid getting breast and ovarian cancer have taken a toll on her as a person and a life partner. Some of her issues force her to retreat into isolation and pull away from Brad and the kids. It is impossible to be entirely free from who she once was." Added the insider, "Angie tries to be a good mom and wife but it is difficult with her personal problems and she struggles. Brad was initially attracted to her dark side, but when she goes to this dark place she definitely pushes Brad away. It can be really hard on him. He feels he has been more than patient with Angie, but his confidence in their happiness is wearing thin." The pair's troubles apparently came to a head during their New Year's vacation in Thailand."Brad was hoping the whole family could bond, but that didn't work out either," a source recently told RadarOnline. "Despite a luxurious holiday that cost $1 million, Brad and Angie are worse off than ever. The vacation solidified the belief that their marriage is beyond repair. A divorce is definitely coming this year."
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