REEL DEAL: Sandra Bullock Improvs in "The Heat"

Academy Award winner Sandra Bullock stars in “The Heat” and tries on improv comedy for the first time under director Paul Feig.

Bullock stars as Sarah Ashburn, an FBI agent hoping for a promotion and high-tails it from her home base in New York City to Boston, to help solve the mystery behind several murders. Standing in Ashburn’s way is a hard-hitting Boston police officer, Shannon Mullins played by Melissa McCarthy, who’s not happy that the FBI – especially the stuck-up Ashburn -- is treading on her turf. Ashburn is determined to wrestle the case away from Mullins, but the disheveled, foul-mouthed, in-your-face cop is a formidable adversary. They’ll soon discover they have more in common than they ever thought possible, including their misfit status and complementary skillsets.

“Ashburn’s effectiveness as an FBI agent comes from her meticulousness, stubbornness and thoroughness,” says Bullock. “But she’s completely inept when it comes to any kind of social interaction. She’s trying so hard to make up for that particular weakness that she becomes insufferably arrogant on the job. Ashburn is respected but not liked because she isn’t a team player. Every time she opens her mouth, people cringe.”

REEL DEAL: Breakout Actress Melissa McCarthy in "The Heat"

FBI Special Agent Sarah Ashburn (Sandra Bullock) – the Fed – and Boston cop Shannon Mullins (Melissa McCarthy) – the Fuzz – couldn’t be more incompatible. But when they join forces to bring down a ruthless drug lord, they become the last thing anyone expected: buddies. 

At the helm of “The Heat” is Paul Feig, the movie takes a look at the odd couple pairing of two law enforcement officials who, to their everlasting shock, slowly find themselves on the same page.  The Ashburn-Mullins dynamic is akin to that eternal physics problem about an irresistible force meeting an immovable object.  Only, here, it’s hard to tell who is which.   Ashburn is ambitious, talented, brainy, and possesses Sherlock Holmes-like powers of deduction and intuition.  She’s always the smartest person in the room, and isn’t shy about letting everyone know it.  Mullins grew up on the streets of Boston, and has a shoot-from-the-hip (and mouth) style of dealing with crime and its perpetrators.  She’s the “yang” to Ashburn’s “yin.”

REEL DEAL: The Heat SPOTLIGHT

Director Paul Feig reinvigorates the buddy cop genre by pairing Oscar-winner Sandra Bullock and breakout star Melissa McCarthy as law enforcers with wildly different styles in “The Heat.” 
Set in Boston, the movie follows Sarah Ashburn (Bullock), a rigid FBI agent forced to team up with Shannon Mullins (McCarthy), a brash undercover Boston street cop to track a ruthless drug lord.   Ashburn is a straight-laced, patient, methodical investigator known for her excellence, while Mullins is very short fused and none has ever had a partner or a long time friend.  This wildly dysfunctional duo must try to catch this high-powered criminal without killing one another in the process.

REEL DEAL: 20th Century Fox's Action, Thrilling Features For 2013

20th Century Fox brings in the brawny and the brainy, the dudes and the gals, the offbeat and the uptight in a series of explosive action and thriling features set to heat up the big screen this 2013 starting with Bruce Willis’ high-octane “A Good Day To Die Hard,” the Dracula-inspired “Stoker” starring Nicole Kidman, Sandra Bullock’s buddy cop movie “The Heat” and Hugh Jackman’s most anticipated return on the screen as “The Wolverine.”

Considered as one of the most enduring movie stars in the world, Bruce Willis is back the 5th time in the “Die Hard” blockbuster franchise the world over dies to line up for in “A Good Day To Die Hard” along with up and coming actor Jai Courtney.    Willis not only reprises his iconic John McClane but gives the hard-talking detective a higher ante when the stage of blazing, intense action is set internationally in Moscow where he finds himself reunited with his estranged son Jack (Courtney).  Having always had a frictional relationship with his son for years, the older McClane decides to finally look him up with help from friends at Washington DC.  The search showed that Jack is involved in some nefarious business in Europe somewhere and John takes flight from DC to Russia with the intention of helping his son out of trouble.  Unaware that his son is a highly-trained CIA operative out to stop a ring of terrorist planning a nuclear weapons heist, the two McClanes shed as much strength, wit and humor making them unstoppable heroes despite their opposing methods.