Nicole Kidman: A Kind of Life (33 page)

Meryl Streep

Eileen Atkins

Toni Collette

Claire Danes

Stephen Dillane

Producers: Robert Fox, Scott Rudin

Director: Stephen Daldry

Writers: Michael Cunningham (novel), David Hare

Nicole Kidman plays lesbian writer Virginia Woolf in this film based on the Pulitizer Prize-winning novel,
The Hours
. It is about women living in different eras who are affected by the feminist’s writing. Julianne Moore plays a housewife who is influenced by Woolf’s novel
Mrs. Dalloway
. Mery Streep plays a contemporary woman who throws a party for a friend who is dying of AIDS.  Nicole changed her appearance drastically to play the role and preview audiences did not recognize her.

CAST

Nicole Kidman

Stellan Skarsgard

Siobhan fallon

Chloe Sevigny

Patrica Clarkson

Jeremy Davies

Philip Baker Hall

Paul Bettany

Lauren Bacall

Producer: Gillian Berrie, Peter Aalbaek Jensen, Lars Jonsson, Vibeke Windelov

Director: Lars von Trier

Writers: Lars von Trier

Grace (Nicole Kidman) is a woman who movies to a small town in the Rocky Mountains in the 1930s and finds herself treated as an outsider. Based on the song “Pirate Jenny” from
The Threepenny Opera
, in which a town is attacked by its enemies and leaves an unwanted woman as the only survivor, it deals with themes of violence and vengeance. It was filmed in Sweden entirely on sets. 

CAST

Anthony Hopkins

Nicole Kidman

Ed Harris

Producers: Ronald M. Bozman, Andre Lamal, Gary Lucchesi, Michael Ohoven, Tom Rosenberg, Scott Steindorff

Director: Robert Benton

Writer: Philip Roth (novel, Nicholas Meyer

Based on Philip Roth’s novel,
The Human Stain
is about a college professor, Coleman Silk (Anthony Hopkins), whose life is shattered when it is disclosed that he had an affair with a young, female janitor, Faunia Farley (Nicole Kidman). The film contains Nicole Kidman’s most explicit sex scenes since
Eyes Wide Shut.

CAST

Jude Law

Nicole Kidman

Renee Zellweger

Natalie Portman

Philip Seymour Hoffman

Giovanni Ribisi

Brendan Gleeson

Charlie Hunnam

Ray Winstone

Donald Sutherland

Jena Malone

Producers: Steve Andrews, Albert Berger, Tim Bricknell, William Horberg, Sydney Pollack, Iain Smith, Ron Yerxa

Director: Anthony Minghella

Writer: Charles Frazier (novel, Anthony Minghella)

Jule Law plays the role of Inman, a wounded Confederate soldier who makes a journey back to his mountain community to reunite with his pre-Civil War sweetheart, Ada (Nicole Kidman). It was filmed in Romania.

CAST

Nicole Kidman

Matthew Broderick

Bette Midler

Glenn Close

Faith Hill

Producers: Ronald Bozman, Leslie Converse, Donald De Line, Scott Rudin

Director: Frank Oz

Writer: Ira Levin (book), Paul Rudnick (screenplay)

A remake of the 1975 film starring Katherine Ross, The Stepford Wives is a satirical thriller about a group of married men in a small town named Stepford, Connecticut. What the men have in common are beautiful wives who cater to their every need. When the character played by Nicole Kidman arrives in time she is horrified by the women and concludes that they have been brainwashed by their husbands, perhaps with the help of environmental toxins.

Birth (2004)

CAST

Nicole Kidman

Cameron Bright

Danny Huston

Lauren Bacall

Alison Elliott

Director: Jonathan Glazer

Writers: Jean-Claude Carriere, Milo Addica

A young widow played by Nicole Kidman gets on with her life after the death of her husband. She falls in love with someone new and not long after she is engaged to be married she meets a ten-year-old boy who informs her that he is the incarnation of her late husband.

Bewitched (2004)

CAST

Nicole Kidman

Will Ferrell

Shirley MacLaine

Michael Cain

Jason Schwartzman

Kristin Chenoweth

Heather Burns

Jim Turner

Stephen Colbert

David Allan Grier

Director: Nora Ephron

Writers: Nora Ephron, Delia Ephron, Sol Saks (television series)

A big-screen remake of the popular television series. With an impressive cast such as this and the legendary Nora Ephron calling the shots, you would think something magical would happen. Instead, moviegoers were offered the oddest leading man and leading woman pairing in movie history and a plot that did a good impression of a 1960s television script.

The Interpreter
(2005)

CAST

Nicole Kidman

Sean Penn

Catherine Keener

Jesper Christensen

Yvan Attal

Director: Sydney Pollack

Writers: Martin Stellman (story), Brian Ward (story)

When a U.N. interpreter played by Nicole Kidman overhears a conversation in a rare dialect that indicates that an African head of state may be killed, her life is thrown into chaos as she becomes a target of the killers. She is put under the protection of a federal agent who concludes that she may be one of the conspirators.

CAST

Nicole Kidman

Robert Downey Jr.

Ty Burrell

Harris Yulin

Jane Alexander

Emmy Clarke

Genevieve McCartkhy

Boris McGiver

Director: Steven Shainberg

Writers: Patricia Bosworth (book), Erin Cressida Wilson (screenplay)

Based on a book about photographer Diane Arbus, played in this film by Nicole Kidman, the plot focuses on Arbus’s obsession with photographing everything freakish. She falls in love with the character played by Robert Downey Jr., a man with werewolf syndrome, a disease that has caused his entire body to be covered with human fur.

CAST

Nicole Kidman

Daniel Craig

Jeremy Northam

Director: Oliver Hirschbiegel,

Writers: David Kajganich (screenplay), Jack Finney (novel)

Nicole Kidman’s character, a Washington psychiatrist, uncovers evidence of an alien epidemic and learns that her son might be key to stopping it.

CAST

Zane Pais

Susan Blackwell

Nicole Kidman

Jack Black

Flora Cross

Jennifer Jason Leigh

Seth Barrish

Matthew Arkin

Brian Kelley

Director: Noah Baumbach

Writer: Noah Baumbach

Margot, played by Nicole Kidman, and her teenage son travel from Manhattan to her family’s Long Island home to engage in sibling dysfunction. Not much plot. Lots of family jealousies and backbiting.

Nicole Kidman

Daniel Craig

Dakota Blue Richards

Ben Walker

Freddie Highmore

Ian McKellen

Eva Green

Director: Chris Weitz

Writer: Philip Pullman (novel), Chris Weitz (screenplay)

This is a fantasy in which an orphan, played by Dakota Blue Richards, overhears a conversation about a research project in the Arctic and a powerful dust with mystical powers, and then goes to the Arctic with the help of a golden compass. All about witches and goblins.