From JAM! Showbiz: Free to Rome McConaughey's a big star here -- but he's a big nobody in Italy By LOUIS B. HOBSON -- Calgary Sun HOLLYWOOD -- Matthew McConaughey loves Italy. "It's one of the first places I've been in the last couple of years where nobody knows or cares who I am," explains the lanky Texan, who's in Rome filming the Second World War submarine movie U-571. His co-stars include Bill Paxton, Harvey Keitel and rocker Jon Bon Jovi. "All the Italian paparazzi are running after Harvey and Bon Jovi. It's so refreshing to be left alone." McConaughey inherited U-571 from Michael Douglas, who was attached to the project for almost a year. "I think Michael realized he was a bit too old for the character. Heck, at 29, I'm a bit too old to be playing the captain of a Second World War sub." McConaughey promises that U-571 won't be "one of those kick-ass summer action movies. It's going to be much more like a Das Boot." McConaughey is still developing a film on the life of daredevil Evel Knievel. "I'm determined to do the safer stunts, but I'll leave all his fantastic stuff up to professional stuntmen." Next up for McConaughey is EDTV, which opens March 26.
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From the World Entertainment News Network: BON JOVI WAR MOVIE SET TO BOOST TOURISM (JAN. 25) WENN - SIXTH - HOLLYWOOD, SHOWBIZ & PEOPLE NEWS - IN MALTA From WENN news editor KEVIN LEWIN in London JON BON JOVI and HARVEY KEITEL are set to boost tourism in Malta thanks to the Mediterranean holiday island's offshore water tanks. Sea-faring movies such as RAISE THE TITANIC and pirate flop CUTTHROAT ISLAND have already made use of Malta's famous deep-water tanks - which allow movie makers to shoot from dry land with an open-sea backdrop. And now Bon Jovi, Keitel and MATTHEW McCONAUGHEY's latest movie project - war film U-571 is set to make use of a new underwater facility in Kalkara. A Maltese Embassy spokesman says, "The tanks have become big tourist spots because people love to see where and how the big films are shot. We hope U-571 has the same impact."
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From the Reuters newswire: Jon Movie News FEATURE - WWII U-boat movie gets true-grit treatment 09:13 p.m Feb 11, 1999 Eastern By Jude Webber ROME, Feb 12 (Reuters) - ``Saving Private Ryan'' did it for the Normandy landings. ``U-571,'' a new World War Two epic adventure, aims to do it for the battle of the Atlantic. The film tells of a bold bid by U.S. sailors to steal the German coding device, Enigma, from a stranded U-boat in 1942 and so to turn the tide of the war. ``The texture of the movie is completely authentic,'' director Jonathan Mostow told Reuters Television at Rome's legendary Cinecitta studios where filming started last month. ``The guys who were on the submarine were young, like our cast. All the details of the submarines, all the technical aspects, the commands issued, the type of things that happen are all based on reality. This is the way it was,'' he said. Mostow's movie, starring Hollywood tough guy Harvey Keitel, Matthew McConaughey and singer-turned-actor Jon Bon Jovi, is veteran Italian producer Dino De Laurentiiis' 600th film. Set as the Allies were reeling from British prime minister Winston Churchill's warning that they were about to lose the war in the sea, the film takes its inspiration from two operations in which German U-boats were captured by U.S. and British ships. ``Like in 'Saving Private Ryan', the story is a story that weaves together a lot of incidents that are based in fact into a fictional story,'' Mostow said, stressing the qualities he wanted to bring to the fore were ``realism and authenticity.''