I've always said that Focus Features was my favorite studio. If I ever had the choice of places to work, that'd be where I'd go. For awhile there I swear every single film they made was golden. Then Jim Jarmusch's Broken Flowers
came along and ever since they've been 50/50. However I still look forward to everything they release. Their slate for next year seems a little thin, but I'm sure a couple of gems will come out of it.The film I'm most anticipating is The Eagle of the Ninth, starring Channing Tatum and Jamie Bell. Directed by Kevin MacDonald(The Last King of Scotland
), it stars Tatum as a Roman centurion on a quest to find out what happened to his father's legion, known as The Ninth, in Britain years earlier. Focus has settled on a February 25, 2011 release date.If there's one thing Focus does well, it's period pieces. March 11th sees the release of Cary Fukunaga's adaptation of Jane Eyre, starring Mia Wasikowska(Alice in Wonderland
). Fukunaga's last film, Sin Nombre
, was one of my favorites of 2009. Director Joe Wright reteams with his Atonement
star Saoirse Ronan, for the teen mercenary flick, Hanna. Due out on April 8th, Hanna is the story of a young girl raised with the skills to be a lethal killing machine. She's sent off on a mysterious mission by her father(played by Eric Bana), and finds herself pursued by a CIA operative(Cate Blanchett) with a murky past. Sometime in the fall/winter sees the release of One Day, by An Education
director Lone Scherfig. The film is a romantic comedy starring Anne Hathaway and Jim Sturgess as a pair who first met 20 years earlier during their high school graduation, and have proceeded to meet up once a year ever since.
