Online movies rent: Most popular directors and actors
Richard Attenborough
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About: Born Aug. 29, 1923, in Cambridge, England, son of a college administrator, Richard Attenborough got his start as a popular juvenile actor of stage and screen. Beginning with 1942's In Which We Serve, he was often typecast as a nervous or cowardly youth; he was especially memorable as a young hoodlum in Brighton Rock.Attenborough tackled character roles in such U.S. productions as The Great Escape and The Sand Pebbles before making his directorial debut with 1969's Oh! What a Lovely War. He fulfi... Link: Richard Attenborough |
Helena Bonham Carter
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About: Descended from British nobility, Helena Bonham Carter was born in London May 26, 1966. With her porcelain complexion and doe eyes, she was ideally cast as the archetypal English heroine in a string of period films that brought her critical adulation and international fame.Bonham Carter first gained notoriety as the protagonist in A Room with a View (1985); on the heels of that success, she landed a steady stream of film work, including a turn opposite Mel Gibson in Hamlet (1990). In 1992, Bonham... Link: Helena Bonham Carter |
Daniel Day-Lewis
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About: Daniel Day-Lewis was born April 29, 1957, in London. His father, Cecil Day-Lewis, was the Poet Laureate of England. Daniel studied acting at the Bristol Old Vic, making his film debut as a teenager in Sunday Bloody Sunday (1971).A decade later, a small role in Gandhi led to highly visible work in The Bounty, My Beautiful Laundrette and A Room with a View, along with a successful starring debut in 1988's The Unbearable Lightness of Being. Day-Lewis followed up with a stunning Oscar-winning perfor... Link: Daniel Day-Lewis |
Maggie Smith
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About: A stage and screen actress of enormous range, Maggie Smith was born Dec. 28, 1934, in Essex, England. The daughter of an Oxford pathologist, Smith made her professional debut at the Oxford Playhouse in a 1952 production of "Twelfth Night."Smith hasn't looked back since, appearing constantly in movies and plays and in 2003, becoming one of only 17 performers to have won the "Triple Crown" of acting, with coveted Oscar (The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie, California Suite), Tony ("Lettice and Lovage") ... Link: Maggie Smith |
Ziyi Zhang
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About: Born Feb. 9, 1979, in Beijing, Ziyi Zhang studied dance from an early age -- a talent she put to use brilliantly in the choreographed fight scenes of movies such as Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon (2000) and House of Flying Daggers (2004).While attending Beijing's Central Drama Academy, Zhang landed a role on a shampoo commercial, and before she knew it, the ad's director -- acclaimed filmmaker Yimou Zhang -- cast her as the young lead in The Road Home (2000). After the huge success of Crouching ... Link: Ziyi Zhang |
Ken Watanabe
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About: Born October 21, 1959, in Niigata Prefecture, Japan, Ken Watanabe began a life in the theatre while he was still an acting student.His first television appearance came in 1982 and was followed in 1985 by a small role in the hit crossover film Tampopo. But it was Watanabe's role as samurai leader Date Masamune in the TV series "Dokugan-ryu Masamune" (1987) that earned him a huge following in Japan.After surviving a bout of leukemia, Watanabe slowly worked his way back into acting, an endeavor tha... Link: Ken Watanabe |
Li Gong
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About: Born in Shenyang, China, on Dec. 31, 1965, Li Gong met influential Fifth Generation filmmaker Yimou Zhang when she was still a drama student and quickly became one of his favorite actresses. She collaborated with Zhang for the first of many times on Red Sorghum (1987), her film debut and his first full-length feature.A decade later, she made her English-language debut opposite Jeremy Irons in Chinese Box (1997) and went on to star in the Oscar-nominated Breaking the Silence (1999) before appeari... Link: Li Gong |
Angelina Jolie
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About: Angelina Jolie was born June 4, 1975, in Los Angeles, Calif. As the daughter of Academy Award-winning actor Jon Voight, Jolie was quickly immersed in showbiz and made her screen debut at age 5 in the comedy Lookin' to Get Out.She began studying acting at age 11 at the Lee Strasberg Theater Institute in New York City, after which she worked as a professional model, appeared in music videos, student films (directed by her brother) and even onstage at Los Angeles's Met Theater. Jolie returned to th... Link: Angelina Jolie |
Cate Blanchett
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About: Best known for her portrayal of an iconic British royal (Elizabeth, for which she won numerous awards and nominations, including one for the Oscar), Cate Blanchett was born in Melbourne, Australia, on May 14, 1969.After a short stint traveling in Europe and North Africa, she enrolled at the National Institute of Dramatic Art and proved herself in theater productions and on Australian TV. After landing a lead role in Oscar and Lucinda, Blanchett starred in The Talented Mr. Ripley, Pushing Tin and... Link: Cate Blanchett |
Bill Nighy
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About: British actor Bill Nighy is a bit of a late bloomer, at least in the United States, where audiences have only gotten to know him through his later films such as Love Actually (2003), Underworld (2003) and The Constant Gardener (2005).Born Dec. 12, 1949, in Caterham, England, Nighy wasn't exactly a household name in his native country, either, until in 2002 he began playing a controversial politico in the TV series "Auf Wiedersehen, Pet." Despite his relative anonymity, Nighy has enjoyed a career... Link: Bill Nighy |