Source: Deadline

The Sucker Punch star will be joining former Bond girl Olga Kurylenko in the male-dominated cast, which already includes Colin Farrell, Christopher Walken, Tom Waits, Sam Rockwell and Woody Harrelson, reported the New York Daily News.

The 29-year-old Australian actress is said to be playing Kaya, the girlfriend of Colin’s character.

The twisty tale focuses on unemployed actor and part-time dog thief Billy (Sam), who wants to help his best friend, struggling screenwriter Marty – played by Colin – by any means necessary.

He then teams up with Hans (Christopher) and together they steal the beloved Shih Tzu of Charlie (Woody), who then goes on the hunt to find out who took his pet.

Abbie – whose previous movies include Jane Campion’s Bright Star, Limitless and Madonna’s upcoming period drama WE – is currently shooting The Film Stage in Los Angeles.

Source: The Press Association

Visit BellaSugar.com for a nice little photo slideshow of Abbie through the years in celebration of the birthday girl!

“I would love to play here in LA too. And record an album,” she said in an interview with Esquire. “I think it’s just a timing thing. I’m so focused on movies right now.”

Abbie is no stranger to music and has been a fan of hip-hop for many years. She often finds herself penning song lyrics at all times of the day and finds the process therapeutic. However, Abbie writes so many lyrics she sometimes struggles to find enough paper to record her thoughts on.

“I’m always writing lyrics. I have so many lyrics on so many stray pieces of paper. Everywhere. I just write about, you know. Whatever’s on my mind. Whatever’s going on,” she explained.

“I got into DJing and making beats when I was about 17. I was always fascinated by the four elements of hip-hop: you know, writing, rhyming, breakdancing and graffiti. I’m in a crew now. Yeah, I love it! It’s a huge part of my life.”

Source: Music Rooms

GALLERY LINKS:
- Photoshoots: GQ

“One night I was having dinner with Bradley Cooper and he was like, ‘If [the cast of the A-Team] had played paintball with [the cast of Sucker Punch] you would have kicked our butts.” It’s like, “Yeah, we know.” – Abbie Cornish

GALLERY LINKS:
- Photoshoots: Nylon
- Magazine Scans: Nylon (US) – April 2011

GALLERY LINKS:
- Public Events: Sucker Punch Press Conference

“I think it’s really important to live in the moment,” she says. “Something I’ve noticed as I get older is that I do think about the future more. It’s all positive thinking.” For example, she says, “I can see (having) a child one day, and so I start to take more care of myself.”

GALLERY LINKS:
- Photoshoots: USA Today

Q: Was the nature of intelligence something you addressed in preparing for Limitless?

A: Particularly, there were discussions of what it would feel like to use 100 percent of your brain. It’s hard to imagine, you know? They say we only use, like, 10 percent of our brains. So it’s not like we use 50 and you just have to times it by two; we have to times it by 10.

Q: Did you have to confront that in a practical way, because your character takes the drug?

A: I imagined if you could have all your senses working at optimum form, how would that feel? Everything just heightened. I guess it’s almost animalistic in a way, the way certain animals can use their senses as we can’t – a dog’s sense of smell, for instance. Also the idea of instinct, the sixth sense, being able to predict an outcome. I tapped into that.

Q: What is your Sucker Punch character like, and what is the film about?

A: Sweet Pea is the older sister of Rocket (played by Jena Malone) … she’s in there as her protector, her mother, her nurturer. She’s very strong, but in the beginning of the film she’s playing by the book, and that book is not one you can trust. Of course, the film is entertaining; it’s girls kicking butt and all that sort of stuff, but there are a lot of existential ideas explored. What is fate? Do we have a hand in our own destiny? Who is it that sets us free? All these things are explored in the film. What it is to be a girl, to be a woman.

Q: Your combat was particularly convincing.

A: I’ve always loved it. My mum was Australian national karate champion. She won the full-contact championship when I was about 9. When she went into the final, she was up against a younger black belt; she was a brown belt. I remember being incredibly scared – this is my mother! It was the most amazing thing ever. I’ll never, ever forget it. My mum fought so hard, round after round, and she won. She was so fierce and amazing and strong. So I would go with her and train a little bit. I’ve dabbled in mixed martial arts; a little bit of ninjutsu and taekwondo and karate and kickboxing and that sort of thing, so I was ready to go, day one.

Q: When this is published, your fan base is going to expand alarmingly in a new direction.

A: (laughs) I loved training with these guys. There was a moment where I actually felt like this could be my life. I bounced out of bed every single morning. I would do anything to do it again. Even with all the swords and guns and stuff, and being a vegetarian – I love people and animals so much, I never thought I’d be excited or interested in guns, but when you’re using them and not harming anyone, it’s amazing. So yeah, I loved making that movie.

Limitless (PG-13) opened this weekend at Bay Area theaters.

To see a trailer, go to www.iamrogue. com/limitless.

Sucker Punch (PG-13) opens March 25 at Bay Area theaters.

Source: SF Gate

To see a trailer, go to suckerpunch movie.warnerbros.com.

Cooper is Eddie Morra, a guy who gets hooked on a new illegal drug called NZT. The little clear pill gives the user the ability to use their brain’s full potential ultimately making them smarter and stronger. Cornish’s character, Lindy, is Eddie’s former flame. She ditches Eddie after he hits an all-time low, but the two reunite when Eddie becomes super Eddie courtesy of NZT. However, Eddie’s new life isn’t entirely noble and he gets mixed up with some shady characters and, of course, Lindy gets a little too involved for her liking.

With Limitless hitting theaters on March 18th and Sucker Punch arriving on the 25th, Cornish is in full press mode and came ready to spill on anything and everything from her awe of Robert De Niro to her tactics when choosing roles. Check out all of that and much more in the interview below and be sure to keep an eye out for Cornish’s big moment in the film. You won’t believe the lengths she goes to!

Can you tell us about the character of Lindy and how you came to this project?
Abbie Cornish: Neil Burger sent me the script a while back and he really wanted me to do it and I thought it was a really interesting film and I felt like the character had room to grow and evolve within the scenes that were already written because it is a small part. So, as an actor, you always want to have a journey to go on, you want to have something where you can sink your teeth in and get your hands dirty. And so I felt like that was possible with this role and I was a fan of Bradley Cooper’s. We had never met and through the process of making the film, we became really good friends and I just thought Neil, as a director, would be a very present and caring and collaborative director. The genre of the film was something I hadn’t explored before and also the idea of this drug and what it could do and the possibility that it could really exist in our everyday lives. Even though it’s far-fetched, at the same time it kind of felt possible and real.

How does it feel to have your name above Robert De Niro’s name on the poster?
It’s interesting, I remember when we did the script read-through, the seats were very much like this, but close together so if you imagine the seats being like this (pulls the chairs closer together) and there’s a little card that says “Abbie Cornish,” there’s one here that says “Robert De Niro” and one here that says “Bradley Cooper,” and Bradley sits down and I sit down and we were talking over Bob De Niro’s chair to each other like this and then all of a sudden I look and I saw his placard and I said to Bradley, “Look, in a moment this chair will be filled by Robert De Niro.” I said, “How surreal is that?” He goes, “I know, I can’t believe it,” and it was just that moment of realizing that. We were leaning over his chair and that moment of realizing and all of a sudden we were making sure his chair was ready for him. [Laughs] It was just the most amazing thing for me because, as an actor, his performances are incredible. He’s such a talented and amazing actor and has had such a wonderful career. I think when you meet him, for me, it was like this fog for a moment, or more so, it sounds silly [laughs], but when people talk about near-death experiences, their life flashes before their eyes; when I saw Robert De Niro’s face, all his characters and his performances flashed before my eyes and then that and I saw this man who is Robert De Niro. It is, of course, surreal and wonderful and amazing and awesome.

Would you ever take NZT yourself?
I think if you could have the ability to take a drug like that without any side effects, without any consequences, without having to face addiction and all that sort of stuff; if you can just go on an adventure with it and feel what that is like. If you could open your mind and utilize 100% of your brain for a moment and feel that. I feel like so many of us have these infinite lists of things to do. I want to learn a language, I want to learn how to play the piano, I want to evolve as a painter, I want to run faster. Whatever it is, I feel like we always have these aims and aspirations and so the idea of taking a drug where within half an hour you could read a novel or within two hours learn a language or learn how to play the piano overnight and read classical music, it’s kind of fascinating. Imagine that. I don’t know why I would ever say no to the concept of that.

There’s also a very serious side to this concept because we’ve got kids today taking drugs to perform better in school. Can you weigh in on that topic?
Yeah, that was something I was talking about today actually. The closest things to it that I can think of are things like Ritalin and Adderall are these drugs that make you focus that are meant to accelerate the process of study and learning and all that. It’s interesting. For me, I very much feel that each is to their own. I feel like you can have a debate about it and you can express your own personal opinion on whether you yourself would want to do it or not do it or whether you’re against it or for it, but at the end of the day, how much can you really judge someone else’s existence and their life and what it is that they choose to do? I think as long as it’s not harming anyone else, I don’t know how much judgment can be placed upon it. I kind of feel like that with a lot of things in life. You know, I’m a vegetarian and very much active in regards to how I feel about animal rights and protecting animals and giving animals a voice, but at the same time, I appreciate and respect other people’s decisions to eat meat. The only thing that I hope is that people are educated, that they’re aware, that they’re living a conscious lifestyle. The only time where my hair stands up on its ends is when someone is very ill-informed, when they’re arrogant, when they haven’t educated themselves and they feel like they know what is right, but at the same time, they haven’t explored the truth of the situation.

How do you choose what roles you do and does it affect you personally if a movie does or does not do well commercially?
I’ll answer the second question first; I feel like I’ve been really blessed with the career that I’ve had and the work that I’ve been able to do as an actor because it originated from a place of films like Somersault where it’s a smaller budget film, great director, very hard working crew and you make that film with your heart and your soul. You don’t even think about what’s going to happen with it. I remember making Somersault and I didn’t even think about what was going to happen with the film when it was actually a film. I just thought about the film we were making.

Was that the first movie you made?
That was the first lead role in a feature film. I’d done a couple small roles in films and I’d done a bit of television, so it felt like the first time. And I remember when that film finally came out and then I got this phone call that said we were going to Cannes, I couldn’t believe it. It’s the most amazing, awesome thing that we went to Cannes, then we went to Tokyo and we went somewhere else. It was so beautiful and so amazing. And so I think that is always alive within me where, for me, the process of making a film is where all the energy goes and what’s really important and I feel that if you’re passionate, if you pour yourself into it and you’re surrounded by people doing the same thing that it doesn’t matter. And not a lot of people have seen Somersault, but I’m so proud of that film. That, for me, I don’t really think of things in those terms. Even with Sucker Punch, it’s a $100 million dollar film, it’s Warner Bros., I’ve never done a film like that, I’ve never been in a movie of that budget and you see big billboards everywhere and it’s on the internet, it’s on the television; it still feels the same to me. The process of making it was the same and I really care about the people I made it with.

Then the first question, choices that I make, yeah, it’s kind of the same thing. I make choices based on my instinct, I make choices based on the story, the character, the people that I’ll be working with. The more I work actually, the more I realize how important it is the people you make the film with.

So the decision-making process doesn’t correlate with the work you’ve just done?
No, not at all. And you know what? In the last couple of years, I’ve worked with some really, really awesome people and developed friendships and relationships that I will take with me for the rest of my life. For example, on Sucker Punch, the five of us girls bonded like you wouldn’t even believe and Zack Snyder and Deb Snyder, just the way they make films. I don’t know if you guys have done conferences with them, but you just get a sense very fast that they’re like a team and so when you work with them, it feels like you’re part of their family. We were all so sad when we wrapped on that film, because we felt like the family was sort of breaking up and I still stay in contact with everyone. For example, Jena Malone, she’s one of my best friends. It’s wonderful that feeling to me. Sometimes I call it play, sometimes I call it work, because it’s not defined just as work because it’s so enriched.

Source: Cinema Blend

A substantial portion of Cornish’s life is her dedication to being a vegetarian and supporting animal rights. “But at the same time, I appreciate and respect other peoples’ decisions to eat meat,” said the Australian actress, who received accolades for her work in Bright Star. “The only thing that I hope is that people are educated, that they are aware, that they are living a conscious lifestyle. The only time when my hair stands up is when someone is very ill informed, when they are arrogant, when they haven’t educated themselves and they feel like they know what is right but at the same time they haven’t explored the truth of the situation.”

Cornish grew up in a hobby farm (in Lochinvar) where the nearest corner store was 5 kilometers away, and the store was a “a post office, news agency, a fish and chips shop.” The nearest theater for the Australian actress was a 15-20 minute drive. “You’re driving in the country, 80 kilometers an hour sometimes with no traffic, so it’s a fair way,” she adds.

Source: Hollywood Outbreak

“I’m a vegetarian – I’m not the type to want to go shoot a gun – then I actually got to the range and totally fell in love with an M4. It was kind of amazing.”

On top of the Marie Claire cover story, which we’ve reported about previously, Abbie is also featured in another American magazine in April; she has a gorgeous pin-up snap and a short article inside the pages of GQ. Photoshoots from both magazines are now available in the gallery and the articles may be read in the press section.

The Limitless film page has also been updated with some critics’ quotes regarding Abbie’s performance. Pretty much all reviews that I’ve come across so far agree that Abbie is heavily underused in the movie but that she does well with the given material. Sad to hear that she doesn’t have all that much to do in the movie, really. She is so talented and truly deserves to be front and center in films. You’d think this would have happened especially following her spectacular turn in Bright Star.

GALLERY LINKS:
- Photoshoots: GQ
- Photoshoots: Marie Claire

With Robert De Niro and Bradley Cooper on board, the rest of the cast fell quickly into place, starting with Abbie Cornish as Lindy, Eddie’s girlfriend.”

Lindy, a magazine editor, has given Eddie her complete support. But even she has reached the end of her patience with him and ends their relationship as the film opens. When he discovers NZT and becomes wildly successful, they get back together again. “Abbie has a luminosity that makes it especially sad to think that Eddie could have blown it with her,” says Dixon. “And indeed, one of the things the drug does is help him get her back.”

Along with the opportunity to work with two actors whose work she admires, Cornish was drawn to the overall quality of the script. “It’s extremely well-written,” says the Australian-born actress. “This is a story you can lose yourself in because it feels like it could actually be happening. It’s totally believable and very contemporary.”

Lindy reconciles with Eddie after his amazing transformation, but she remains the voice of reason in the story. “Neil always saw the role as being pivotal, even though it’s a smaller one,” says Cornish. “She’s the only one who takes the drug and is able to understand the consequences. It changes what it is to be fallible, which is essential to being human.” Working with Burger was an intensely collaborative experience for Cornish. “He’s a very sensitive person who listens to the actors,” she says. “It makes the process of filmmaking feel collective and that’s very refreshing.”

Cornish brought the right mixture of smarts and beauty to the role, says Burger. “Abbie is fantastic,” says Burger. “She’s so lovely and so talented. Abbie has this mischievous energy, but she’s also incredibly bright. And the chemistry between Abbie and Bradley was immediate. They are pretty amazing together. You could feel the connection and get a sense of the history of their characters.”

Cornish, almost all of whose scenes are all with Cooper, says his enthusiasm for the work was infectious. “Bradley took on the role wholeheartedly,” she says. “It was awesome to watch. He has a great sense of humor as well as great depth to him, so he has that enormous range as an actor. He’s perfect as Eddie, because he can go from the guy in a downhill spiral to someone who has completely got it together. He’s also generous, and very engaging, which makes it a lot of fun to work with him.”

Her next picture will be a small, small indie film by relatively forgotten filmmaker David Riker who was hailed in 1998 for his debut picture, La Ciudad, which was nominated for several awards that year including the Independent Spirit Awards, The Gotham Awards and the SXSW Film Festival . While it’s been almost 13 years since La Ciudad, Riker, who penned Sleepdealer in the interim, is finally set to shoot his next picture, The Girl, starring Cornish, who replaced Emily Blunt earlier this year.

“It’s the story of a 25-year-old Texan girl who lives quite close to the Mexican border,” Cornish explained about her character Ashley. “She has a five-year-old son that she’s lost to the welfare system, she sees an opportunity to make money bringing illegal immigrants across the border. So she does it as a one-off and during this incident in a river, she’s left with the responsibility of a 9-year-old girl. So it’s her journey with a 9-year-old Mexican girl through Mexico to get her home.”

With a nine-week shoot planned in Mexico later this Spring, it occurred to the actress that it’s the most challenging film she’s ever done so far and she’s actually learning Spanish for the role as well. “I’m prepping more on this film than I have on any other film before. The only one that would come close in regards to preparation is Sucker Punch but that was very much physical preparation, because we trained for three months before we started filming. 70 percent of my dialogue is in Spanish. I don’t know how to speak Spanish, if only the NZT drug was real!” she said, referring to the smart drug in Limitless that allows its users to unlock the other 90 percent of their brain and therefore unleash an intelligence that makes learning new languages an afternoon task.

“I wish I had a year up my sleeve before I made the movie,” she said of her prep time. “I’ve only got a couple of months, but I can only do what I can do. I go to Mexico really soon. I’m going to spend a lot of time with the little girl, her name is Maritza, she’s a non-actor and doesn’t speak a word of English, so it’s pretty awesome.”

Cornish also spoke about her role in Madonna’s upcoming sophomore feature-length effort, the two-tiered romantic drama W.E.. And while the actress said making the film was enjoyable, it was also one of the hardest shoots she’s ever had to work on because of the surplus of material they had to get through in a limited amount of time. “There was so much in the script. I was amazed, we shot it all,” she said. “I know Madonna had to work hard in the editing room because it could be like a four hour film—you have two stories that run parallel. So you have two whole lives that you are trying to express and tell, and get [the film] under two hours.” [ed. W.E. is bifurcated and focuses on the affair between King Edward VIII and American divorcée Wallis Simpson plus a contemporary romance between a married woman and a Russian security guard.]

The actress had nothing but praise for the musical icon-turned-filmmaker, though noted her approach to visuals was atypical. “Working with Madonna was great,” she said. “It was different because she comes from a music background, but she’s a natural director that’s for sure and it’s in her blood, because throughout her life she’s dealt with choreography, dance and orchestrating things in that way, it was definitely a forte for her during the process of filmmaking.”

Cornish, who first broke out in the 2004 Aussie film, Sommersault, extolled the virtues of working with first-time feature-length filmmaker Cate Shortland as a near-magical experience and said she would certainly be game to work with the director again, who is busy tending to her family. “Who knows when she’ll make her next film. She seems to be taking her time, but if I get the opportunity, I would love to work with her again.”

Source: Indie Wire

The film’s co-star, Abbie Cornish, not only confirmed the possibility of a Venice debut to MTV News, but also revealed the mysterious role Madonna’s daughter, Lourdes, will be playing.

“I heard yesterday,” Cornish told us about Venice, while promoting her upcoming thriller, Limitless. “That’d be amazing.”

W.E follows a Julie & Julia-esque dual story line, one featuring Cornish as a contemporary woman obsessed with the Duke and Duchess of Windsor and another focusing on the royal couple itself. News that Lourdes would appear in a small role surfaced last fall, when photos of the teen in a schoolgirl’s uniform popped up online, but until now the nature of her part was unclear. Cornish’s character, it turns out, has a deep connection to that of Lourdes.

“She actually plays a younger version of my character,” Cornish said, adding that because they portray the same person, they never got to share actual screen time. “She’s a super-cute, younger version of my character.”

W.E. marks Madonna’s second feature following Filth and Wisdom, which hit only a handful of theaters in 2008. The new project, the pop star turned filmmaker said last year, has been an obsession of hers even before Filth and Wisdom and took her two-and-a-half years to write. “I made Filth and Wisdom because I realized that I didn’t really have a right to make a bigger film until I made a smaller film — and learned how to make a film,” she said.

According to Cornish, though, the Queen of Pop is a born filmmaker. “Madonna is a natural director,” the actress told us. “It’s in her nature. She’s a Leo and she really represents the Leos very well. She’s a very smart woman, very well read. She really absorbs a lot about whatever she’s involved in. I think she really loves learning. It was interesting to see her evolve throughout the filmmaking process. She’s such a cool woman.”

Source: MTV

Of the film’s many strengths, the five actresses at the core of Sucker Punch are at the forefront. Emily Browning leads the pack as Baby Doll, but she’s supported by an excellent cast that includes Jena Malone as field medic Rocket and Abbie Cornish as the fierce Sweet Pea, Rocket’s sister.

When we spoke with those two actresses on the set of Sucker Punch in late 2009, it was a particularly good day to talk to Malone. You see, while a healthy chunk of Sucker Punch dwells on action and adventure, there are also numerous dance sequences. The day we were on set just so happened to be Malone’s turn on stage, delivering a provocative dance routine that’s about as personal as it gets.

Malone: “Today’s dance scene was crazy. Each of us girls, except for Emily – because her dance becomes the tipping off of the fantasy worlds – we each have our own burlesque dance. It’s our persona coming out, all of the different icons that we represent. Mine’s sort of the nurse, because the first time that Baby Doll sees me, I’m done up as a nurse. It’s a crazy-dead-zombie-robot-nurse dance. It’s going to be so crazy and going to be so awesome.”

She added that even considering the grueling training process to become an appropriately skilled action star, that day’s dancing sequence was far scarier for her than any of the film’s battle scenes.

Malone: “This was the most terrifying thing of the entire film. I could shoot orcs until my fingers fall off. I could be in the gym doing deadlifts until my body gives out. But this dance is totally terrifying me. You have to get out of your mind, which is what they’ve been training us for – the physical discipline, the mental discipline – and get back into the body – the rhythm, the sex, the breath. We were doing the fighting sequence in the morning and you’re there and pumped up with your guns, then you have to let it all go and remember the languid curves and the softness of the body, too.”

Switching between sultry dancer and capable fighter isn’t an easy task, especially considering the preparation that each actress went through during pre-production.

Malone: “The first three months that the three of us girls were training together didn’t come until August – that was the rehearsal. All three of us girls were sweating, crying, figuring out what our pain threshold was. In a weird way, it was like an asylum. We had to eat at a specific time. We had to push ourselves to the limits. We were wearing these sweat uniforms and being instructed. Everything was a regiment. It was a far more interesting style of rehearsing. Getting to know the physical body of the character, the character’s pain threshold, how you can work together as a team. Horrible moments, like when I’m doing my twentieth farmer’s carry and I’m freaking sobbing and you want to do it for the other girls. You all become strong together. I think that any form of round-the-table, reading-the-scenes, we never would have gotten to that point of closeness and how connected we were in those first three months.”

Cornish: “And it was such an unspoken thing. We did talk about it, but there were so many moments when we were all just going hard and doing this thing. For me in particular, during those three months, there was this feeling inside me that was almost zen-like. It was so peaceful, because coming in and doing martial arts and working out and learning how to use a gun, you have to be so careful with a gun — it’s a deadly weapon. There was something very focused about that process, very disciplined. Just to be able to exert that much energy and let it out every single day was really fun.”

Although Sucker Punch boasts a heavy action component, both Malone and Cornish insisted that the film’s character work is just as strong.

Malone: “I think that’s a tribute to Zack and the script. He was really adamant about finding these characters amongst absolutely crazy feats of strength and confidence and out of this world of action. But in the midst of it being like, ‘Okay, yeah, I messed up. I’m sorry,’ there are still the women that we know in the other worlds. It’s not all just action: it’s humanistic, realistic. Also, he allows us to develop things on our feet. If there’s a little look that we can give, he allows those moments to happen. It’s about adding the characters to the fantasy.”

Cornish cited one of the film’s major action set pieces — a scene that sees our heroes battling against an army of mechanical gas-filled German soldier drones in the trenches of World War I — as especially demonstrative of the marriage between violence and drama.

Cornish: “Story-wise, for me in World War I, it was very much about Sweet Pea worrying about Rocket. She’s only here for her. Throughout that whole WWI sequence, everything they did, that was my intention. Where’s my sister? What’s she doing? It’s kind of fun, too, because even though you’re in this kill-crazy martial arts world, the story still exists.”

In his previous films, Snyder has proven time and time again that he’s a masterful action director. But Sucker Punch could prove his weight as a dramatic director, as Malone and Cornish had nothing but glowing things to say about Snyder’s skills in that department, particularly his ability to write for women.

Cornish: “I think Zack himself is very much in touch with his femininity as much as he is his masculinity. He’s very sensitive and caring.”

Malone: “Also, the script speaks for itself. If I’d read the script and felt that he didn’t know what he was talking about, I don’t think any of us would be here. He’s exploring so many different levels of female archetypes and allowing them to break and bend and expose themselves, amazing different forms of strength and insecurity, and allowing these women to really be fully-fleshed characters. I was thinking that they could really be men or women. In an action movie, we’re so used to seeing these men, but literally we could almost be sexless were it not for the specificity of the world that we’re in.”

Cornish: “The thing about Zack that I’ve found really fun is that he knows what he’s doing. He’s a great filmmaker. He’s super technical. He’s had this film in his head from start to finish. It’s all there, all storyboarded. But at the same time, he’s constantly exploring it. He’s very instinctual. You don’t feel confined or restricted. Every day is that day. He’s so in the moment. He’s a lot of fun to work with. I’ve had the most fun on this film than I have on any film.”

Zack Snyder’s Sucker Punch arrives in theaters on March 25.

Source: SpinOff

Abbie was presented the Excellence in Film award by Sucker Punch director Zac Snyder. It was the third anniversary of late great Australian actor Heath Ledger‘s passing and Cornish dedicated her G’day USA Award to him. She made an emotional speech about her Candy co-star and his pivotal influence on her career.

She told a story about shooting Bright Star in London and requiring a new trailer because hers was too small. Four trailers arrived and she randomly picked one. It turned out to be Ledger’s former trailer and they found a hotel room key he had used and a stash of vitamin pills. Before closing she accepted the accolade in “Heath’s memory”.

GALLERY LINKS:
- Public Events: G’Day USA 2011 Black Tie Gala

AFI AWARD FOR BEST LEAD ACTRESS

• Abbie Cornish. Bright Star.
• Morgana Davies. The Tree.
• Charlotte Gainsbourg. The Tree.
• Jacki Weaver. Animal Kingdom.

Bright Star earned an impressive total of 11 nominations, including for Feature Film, Best Direction and Cinematography. Congratulations to the whole crew for the wonderful honor!

The AFI Awards will be handed out in Melbourne on December 10 and 11. The ceremony will be broadcast on Saturday December 11 on the Nine Network at 9.30pm.

GALLERY LINKS:
- W.E.: On the Set – September 2010
- W.E.: On the Set – September 13, 2010
- W.E.: On the Set – September 15, 2010
- W.E.: On the Set – September 17, 2010

For a list of other celebrities who made the list, check out PEP.