THESPIAN OF THE WEEK: Leonardo DiCaprio

Name:  Leonardo Wilhelm DiCaprio

AKA:  Leonardo DiCaprio

Date of birth:  November 11, 1974

From:  Los Angeles, California

Specialty:  Actor

Movie star bio on Leonardo Dicaprio, includes interviews with DiCaprio & Martin Scorsese:

DiCaprio Films You Shouldn't Miss:

Gangs Of New York

The Basketball Diaries

What's Eating Gilbert Grape

TOTAL ECLIPSE

GENRE:  Biographical/ Drama/ Romance
MADE:  1995
CAST:  Leonardo DiCaprio, David Thewlis, Romane Bohringer
DIRECTOR:  Agnieszka Holland
WRITER:  Christopher Hampton

PLOT:  A biographical film set in the 19th century of the life and relationship of French teenage poet Arthur Rimbaud and his mentor Paul Verlaine.

PARALLEL UNIVERSE:  Girl with A Pearl Earring, What's Eating Gilbert Grape, Happy Together

SCORE:

THE DEPARTED

GENRE:  Crime/ Drama/ Mystery
MADE:  2006
CAST:  Leonardo DiCaprio, Matt Damon, Jack Nicholson
DIRECTOR:  Martin Scorsese
WRITER:  William Monahan, Alan Mak, Felix Chong

PLOT:  Two men from opposites sides of the law go under cover, their targets: the police and the Irish mafia.  Things go down badly when they are made.

PARALLEL UNIVERSE:  Blood Diamond, Munich, Training Day

SCORE:

INCEPTION

GENRE:  Action/ Mystery/ Sci-fi
MADE:  2010
CAST:  Leonardo DiCaprio, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Ellen Page, Cillian Murphy
DIRECTOR:  Christopher Nolan
WRITER:  Christopher Nolan

PLOT:  Set in the future where entering a person's dream to get to the sub-conscious is possible.  Cobb must not fail his last job if he wishes to go back home, his job is to sow the beginning of an idea into the sub-conscious of a heir of an energy empire that will ultimately lead to the dissolution of the business.

PARALLEL UNIVERSE:  Shutter Island, Dark City, Memento

SCORE:

THE BASKETBALL DIARIES

GENRE:  Biographical/ Drama/ Crime
MADE:  1995
CAST:  Leonardo DiCaprio, Lorraine Bracco, Marilyn Sokol, Mark Wahlberg, Ernie Hudson
DIRECTOR:  Scott Kalvert
WRITER:  Jim Carroll, Bryan Goluboff

PLOT:  Based on the true story of Jim Caroroll.  A young teenager in New York with talent on the basketball court is faced with the harsh reality of his life spiraling out of control as he succumbs to drugs to escape the world he really lives in.

PARALLEL UNIVERSE:  Traffic, Trainspotting, Requiem For A Dream

SCORE:

THE QUICK AND THE DEAD

GENRE:  Action/ Western
MADE:  1995
CAST:  Sharon Stone, Gene Hackman, Russell Crowe, Leonardo DiCaprio
DIRECTOR:  Sam Raimi
WRITER:  Simon Moore

PLOT:  A lady gunslinger seeking revenge for her father's death comes into a small town called "Redemption" where dying is a way of life.

PARALLEL UNIVERSE:  3:10 To Yuma,  Tombstone, True Grit

SCORE:

\

WHAT'S EATING GILBERT GRAPE

GENRE:  Drama
MADE:  1993
CAST:  Johnny Depp, Leonardo DiCaprio, Juliette Lewis
DIRECTOR:  Lasse Hallstrom
WRITER:  Peter Hedges

PLOT:  The story of a young man's life caring for his fatherless family out in the middle of nowhere in a small town called Endora where his family is ridiculed for having an obese mother and life is hard trying to keep up with his younger brother Arnie.

PARALLEL UNIVERSE:  The Other Sister, Running With Scissors, Benny & Joon

SCORE:

ROMEO + JULIET

GENRE:  Remake/ Drama/ Romance
MADE:  1996
CAST:  Leonardo DiCaprio, Claire Danes, John Leguizamo, Pete Postlethwaite, Paul Sorvino
DIRECTOR:  Baz Luhrmann
WRITER:  William Shakespeare, Craig Pearce, Baz Luhrmann

PLOT:  A modern day version of "Romeo And Juliet" with original script.

PARALLEL UNIVERSE:  Shakespeare In Love, Titus, Gladiator

ACTING:

NOTES:  Remember how in high-school they would make you read Shakespeare's "Romeo And Juliet" and you were, quite frankly, a little bored?  Baz Lurhmann's modern day take on this play jazzes things up with gun fights instead of sword fights, he opts to keep the original script word for word but an urban setting with hot young actors and a bangin' soundtrack makes a big difference.

BLOOD DIAMOND

GENRE:  Drama/Thriller/Adventure
MADE:  2006
CAST:  Leonardo DiCaprio, Djimon Hounsou, Jennifer Connelly
DIRECTOR:  Edward Zwick
WRITER:  Charles Leavitt, C. Gaby Mitchell

PLOT:  The story about a blood diamond.  A journalist writing an article on Blood Diamonds travels to the source and makes a deal with an Australian native for the details of the story.  Both get tangled up with a man native to the land from a small fishing village seeking his taken family who happens to know where a very rare Blood Diamond is hidden.

PARALLEL UNIVERSE:  Children Of Men, Shawshank Redemption, Inception

SCORE:

SHUTTER ISLAND

GENRE:  Mystery/ Psychological Thriller
MADE:  2010
CAST:  Leonardo Dicaprio, Mark Ruffalo, Ben Kingsley
DIRECTOR:  Martin Scorsese
WRITER:  Laeta Kalogridis, Dennis Lehane

PLOT:  An ex-miliatry U.S. Marshall is hired to find a missing patient in a mental institute on Shutter Island.

PARALLEL UNIVERSE:  Identity, The Others, The Machinist

SCORE: