‘Origin Of the Species’: Ana De Armas, Jude Law, Alicia Vikander & Daniel Brühl Assemble For Ron Howard’s Survival Thriller

Nick Vivarelli International Correspondent Italy’s RAI Cinema, which has four titles in this year’s Cannes selection, has closed a deal on Ron Howard’s next movie “Origin of Species,” a hot project at the Cannes market starring Daisy Edgar-Jones, Ana de Armas, Jude Law and Alicia Vikander. RAI Cinema chief Paolo Del Brocco said the company – which is the film arm of Italian state broadcaster RAI – has teamed up with Rome-based Lucisano Media Group to acquire Italian rights from CAA Media Finance on Howard’s survival thriller penned by Noah Pink (“Tetris”) about a a group of eclectics who turn their backs on civilization and head to the Galapagos. In Cannes, RAI Cinema also picked up Italian rights from Gaumont on family movie “Moon The Panda,” by French humans and animals adventures specialist Gilles de Maistre, known for “Mia and the White Lion”and “The Wolf and the Lion.” De Maistre’s latest, about the friendship between a boy and a panda, is set to shoot later this month in China’s Sichuan mountains.

It’s widely know that Henry VIII, the Tudor king, had a particularly grim batting average when it came to matrimony.

Everything did not come up smelling like roses for Jude Law‘s latest role.

 like roses for Jude Law's latest role. The two-time Oscar nominee is set to star as King Henry VIII in Karim Aïnouz's opposite Alicia Vikander, who will portray Catherine Parr, the last of Henry's six wives. To physically portray Henry in his final years, Law sought the help of a perfumer to give himself a realistic — and seemingly awful — scent as the ailing king. «I read several interesting accounts that — at this period — you could smell Henry three rooms away because his leg was rotting so badly and he hid it with rose oil,” Law said during a press conference at the Cannes Film Festival on MondayI just thought it would have a great impact if I smelt awful.»As a result, a perfumer created a custom concoction to fit the bill.

Jude Law and Alicia Vikander step out for the photo call in support of their new movie Firebrand during the 2023 Cannes Film Festival.

Jude Law and Alicia Vikander step out for the photo call in support of their new movie Firebrand during the 2023 Cannes Film Festival.

Firebrand,” a historical drama that follows the marriage of the king and Queen Catherine Parr, his sixth and final wife — played by Alicia Vikander.In order to get into the role, the actor had a repulsive perfume blended from “blood, fecal matter and sweat” specially made to wear while shooting the movie.“I read several interesting accounts that you could smell Henry three rooms away. His leg was rotting so badly.

CANNES – Henry VIII was a bad, bad, bad man. The 16th Century King of England notoriously beheaded two of his six wives, divorced another two, and saw another die during childbirth.

So, Jude Law, when do you really think of the British monarchy after playing one of the worst kings in history, the wife slaying, Henry VIII, in Firebrand?

Alicia Vikander and Michael Fassbender looked all loved up on the red carpet for the premiere of her new movie, Firebrand.

Jude Law and Alicia Vikander led stars on the red carpet at the Cannes Film Festival ahead of the premiere of their new film Firebrand. The historical drama, based on Elizabeth Fremantle’s 2013 novel Queen’s Gambit, explores the life of Catherine Parr – the sixth and final wife of Henry VIII. Law stars as the notorious King of England while Oscar-winning actress Vikander plays Parr in the film which is the English-language debut for its director, Brazilian filmmaker Karim Ainouz.

Most movies about England’s King Henry VIII like to focus on the mercurial monarch’s failed marriages. His six wives have been collectively described as divorced, died, beheaded, divorced, beheaded, survived. That last one, the little talked-about Katherine Parr, had the distinction of outlasting Henry — their marriage was about four years as he started to succumb to the result of hard living. She was there during that time, but also a wife who if she weren’t so connected to the King easily could have qualified as a feminist. She not only was the first English woman to have a book published, was privately a radical Protestant in an England that had been staunchly Catholic, but also a sharply intelligent woman who had a head on her shoulders and was determined to keep it there.

Alicia Vikander was greeted with an eight-minute standing ovation at the May 21 Cannes premiere of Brazilian director Karim Aïnouz’s “Firebrand,” from a crowd that included best actress Oscar winners Michelle Yeoh and Marion Cotillard.With her husband Michael Fassbender beaming on from the row behind, Vikander motioned for the cheering audience to stop or she would cry. But then she gave into the adulation and blew kisses to the upper balconies Vikander’s co-star Jude Law and Aïnouz also got huge applause. Vikander joins a group of Cannes leading ladies including Lily Gladstone, Natalie Portman and Julianne Moore who have turned in show-stopping performances.

Sunday night at the 76th Cannes Film Festival was all about the world premiere of the Jude Law and Alicia Vikander Henry VIII period pic Firebrand, which received a royal response from the crowd in the Grand Theatre Lumiere with an eight and a half minute standing ovation.

Cannes Film Festival, Henry (Jude Law) is away in France with his army and Catherine takes the opportunity to ride off to a mossy forest for secret meetings with Anne Askew (Erin Doherty), a childhood friend who is now preaching revolt against a new law that has banned English-language Bibles and returned authority to Latin-reading priests. Compared to her radical friend, Catherine appears to be a cowed, abused wife.

Peter Debruge Chief Film Critic Tudor, or not Tudor. That is the question in “Firebrand,” a revisionist royal portrait of Henry VIII’s last wife, Katherine Parr (played here by Alicia Vikander), that features all the pageantry you’d expect from a lavish costume drama, while showing the ahistorical audacity to call “Time’s Up” on the gluttonous king (Jude Law). Never mind that Henry VIII died — of very different causes than the movie depicts — all of 476 years ago. When it comes to art, there’s no statute of limitations on taking toxic masculinity to task, which can be both encouraging (since history has excused no shortage of monsters) and frustrating. There’s a big difference between exposing the truth and rewriting what came before to suit a contemporary political agenda, the way this movie does. Liberally adapted from Elizabeth Fremantle’s fast-and-loose historical fiction “The Queen’s Gambit,” director Karim Aïnouz’s tony British production needn’t try hard to demonstrate that Henry was a notoriously bad husband.

EXCLUSIVE: The rain in Cannes managed to stop for a few hours on Saturday when Ashok Amritraj’s Hyde Park International hosted an exclusive event for buyers on the Croisette for its upcoming project Night Boat to Tangier, with Michael Fassbender, Alicia Vikander, director James Marsh and producers Andrew Eaton and Conor McCaughan all in attendance for the intimate event.

It’s a solemn command from Firebrand’s first assistant director Lydia Currie: “When you bow to the king, bow straight down,” she announces. “Don’t look at him; you’ll get your head cut off.” The fearsome monarch Currie is referring to is Henry VIII, and on this particular day, Jude Law’s king is in an ax-swinging mood. The background artists on Karim Aïnouz’s set comply to orders and stare down at their toes. Before them, seated on thrones arranged on a raised plinth, is the potentate in question, and Katherine Parr, his queen.

Manori Ravindran Executive Editor of International In Britain, schoolchildren learning about Tudor history are taught a handy rhyme to remember the order of King Henry VIII’s six wives: “Divorced, beheaded, died. Divorced, beheaded, survived.” Hollywood has for decades been transfixed by the “beheaded” and “died” bits — essentially, the stories about women suffering — but what moviegoers are rarely reminded of is the wife who outlived Henry. In Karim Aïnouz’s hotly anticipated “Firebrand,” it’s the notorious Tudor king’s final companion, Katherine Parr, who finally takes center stage. “What’s mostly been dramatized are the wives who didn’t make it,” says Swedish star Alicia Vikander, who plays the surviving queen opposite Jude Law’s ailing monarch. “[When I read the script] I immediately thought, ‘Huh, isn’t it interesting that most people know more about the other wives.’ It’s almost like people are drawn to quite grim stories.”

Daniel Bruhl is nearly unrecognizable on set of his new show!