Lucy Liu Movies

A clumsy panda bear becomes an unlikely kung fu hero when a treacherous enemy spreads chaos throughout the countryside in this animated martial arts adventure featuring the voices of Jack Black, Dustin Hoffman, Angelina Jolie, and Jackie Chan. On the surface, Po (voice of Black) may look like just another portly panda bear, but beneath his fur he bears the mark of the chosen one. By day, Po works faithfully in his family's noodle shop, but by night he dreams of becoming a true master of the martial arts. Now an ancient prophecy has come to pass, and Po realizes that he is the only one who can save his people from certain destruction. With time running short and malevolent snow leopard Tai Lung (Ian McShane ) closing in, Furious Five legends Tigress (Jolie), Crane (David Cross ), Mantis (Seth Rogen), Viper (Lucy Liu), Monkey (Chan), and their wise sensei, Master Shifu (Hoffman), all draw on their vast knowledge of fighting skills in order to transform a lumbering panda bear into a lethal fighting machine. Now, if the noble Po can master the martial arts and somehow transform his greatest weaknesses into his greatest strengths, he will fulfill his destiny as the hero who saved his people during their darkest hour. ~ Jason Buchanan, All Movie Guide

Originally slated to premiere on November 27, 2007, then held back until December 4, the hour-long dramedy Cashmere Mafia finally made its ABC debut on January 6, 2008. The series focused on a quartet of highly successful female executives, friends since their days in business college, who continued to meet, compare notes, and advise and console one another in various expensive Manhattan restaurants and watering holes. Miranda Otto played the "anchor" of the group, Juliet Draper, the powerful COO of the Stanton Hall hotel chain, who wryly observed the passing scene, dispensed sage wisdom, and merrily dissed most of the males who crossed her path--with the occasional exception of her husband Davis (Peter Hermann). Lucy Liu costarred as Mia Mason, high-powered functionary at Barnstead Media, a publishing firm run by a Murdoch clone; Mia was so ambitious that she was even willing to sacrifice her love life for her career, maneuvering her own fiancee out of the job she finally grabbed for herself. Frances O'Connor played Zoe Burden, senior marketing VP for Lily Parish cosmetics, who after several dead-end heterosexual romances suddenly found herself attracted to another woman, Alicia Lawson (Lourdes Benedicto). And Bonnie Somerville appeared as Zoe Burden, managing director of mergers and acquisitions at the investment firm of Gorham Sutter, who encountered considerable difficulty juggling her career and her private life with her stay-at-home husband Eric (Julian Ovenden) and twin children Luke (Nicholas Reese Art) and Sasha (Peyton List). Also in the cast was Addison Timlin as Juliet and Davis' mildly rebellious 14-year-old daughter Emily. If Cashmere Mafia seemed to be an upscale variation of HBO's Sex and the City, it may have been because it was executive-produced by former Sex and the City producer Darren Star. The ABC series also bore a marked resemblance to Lipstick Jungle, a novel written by Starr's onetime Sex and the City partner Candace Bushnell; ironically, the TV-series version of Lipstick Jungle made its NBC bow some four weeks after Cashmere Mafia's inaugural episode. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

A woman who joins the undead against her will seeks vengeance against the ghouls who transformed her in this thriller. Sadie Blake (Lucy Liu) is a journalist who becomes acquainted with a group of beautiful but doomstruck partiers while following a story, led by the charismatic Bishop (James D'Arcy). While Sadie is taken with Bishop's good looks and sinister charm, she senses there's something dangerous about him, but it's not until she wakes up in the city morgue that she learns his secret -- Bishop is a vampire, and Sadie has joined his underlings as one of the undead. Angry and betrayed, Sadie is determined to stop Bishop and his compatriots, and she prowls the city with bow and arrow, ready to stake them from a distance when she spies them. Sadie finds an unlikely ally in her crusade in Detective Rawlins (Michael Chiklis), a police investigator whose daughter was transformed into a night creature by Bishop. However, Sadie is finding it increasingly difficult to resist her growing thirst for the blood of the living, becoming the sort of being she has grown to hate. Also featuring Carla Gugino, Robert Forster, and Nick Lachey, Rise: Blood Hunter received its world premiere with a special midnight screening at the 2007 Tribeca Film Festival. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide

A film freak has his life turned upside down when he starts dating a real-life femme fatale in this comedy. Neil (Cillian Murphy) is a dyed-in-the-wool movie fan who runs a video store, "Gumshoe Video," specializing in classic film noir and offbeat cult items. Neil spends nearly every evening on the couch, soaking up classic movies from the blue glow of his television; Neil's lack of a social life has not been good for his relationships with women, and his latest girlfriend walked out on him after he declared he wanted her to be more like Katharine Ross in Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. But then Neil meets Violet (Lucy Liu), a sexy and adventurous woman who is immediately taken with him. However, Neil soon decides Violet may be a bit too adventurous -- while he's content to get his excitement from watching movies, she would rather throw herself into thrilling situations rather than observe them from a distance, and her appetite for danger proves to be far more than he bargained for. Watching the Detectives was the first directorial effort from Paul Soter, who as a member of the Broken Lizard comedy troupe helped write the films Super Troopers and Beerfest. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide

Seven years after seeing his original vision butchered under studio interference as well as his star's, director Brian Helgeland finally was given the chance to piece together his director's cut under the name Payback: Straight Up. Along with reinstating the original third act, this version represents a return to the gritty world of '70s filmmaking that was the groundwork of the production up until Paramount got cold feet and ordered extensive reshoots. The story centers on Porter (Mel Gibson), a thief that is pulled into a heist by his old friend, Val (Brian De Palma regular Gregg Henry), who plans a double cross with Porter's wife, Lynn (Deborah Kara Unger) after showing her a photo of her husband in the arms of another girl (Maria Bello). As they're stealing $130,000 in laundered drug money from Chinese Triads, Lynn shoots Porter in the back and speeds away with Val and money in tow. What they didn't know is that Porter would come back looking for his cut, which has been used to pay off Val's mob debts so he could return to "The Syndicate." Helgeland, the screenwriter for L.A. Confidential and Mystic River, made his directing debut with this adaptation of the novel The Hunter by Donald E. Westlake writing under the pseudonym, Richard Stark. The same novel served as the basis for John Boorman's Point Blank starring Lee Marvin. This version excises Kris Kristofferson's performance entirely and features a new score by Scott Stambler. ~ Jeremy Wheeler, All Movie Guide

The (mostly) true story of a Hollywood princess turned bounty hunter is told in this witty action-drama from director Tony Scott. Domino Harvey (Keira Knightley) was the daughter of famed actor Laurence Harvey (played by Jesse Pate) who passed on when Domino was only eight years old. Domino's mother, former fashion model Paulene Stone (played by Jacqueline Bisset and renamed (%Sophie Wynn) in the film), strove to give her daughter a comfortable life, but Domino was naturally rebellious, and after a contentious stint in boarding school, a brief career as a runway model, and a fling with the fashion business, Domino was looking for something more exciting. She found it when he met Ed Mosbey (Mickey Rourke), an ex-con who had gone on to a successful career as a "bail recovery agent" -- in short, a bounty hunter. Ed also taught others how to join his profession, and Domino took his course and joined his team, along with Choco (Edgar Ramirez), a headstrong bail agent who took an immediate fancy to Domino. Domino, Ed, and Choco became a successful team -- successful enough that television producer Mark Heiss (Christopher Walken) asked them to become the subject of a television reality series. However, it was after the cameras were turned on Domino that her life got truly crazy. Bail bondsman Claremont Williams III (Delroy Lindo) had hired Domino and her friends for a risky case, and soon Domino, Ed, and Choco were chasing missing men and money while landing in hot water with both the FBI and the Mafia. Domino was loosely based on Domino Harvey's real life story; sadly her personal life was as reckless as her career, and Domino died as a result of drug abuse on June 27, 2005, after this film was completed. The film also features Lucy Liu, Mena Suvari, Macy Gray, and Dabney Coleman. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide

A presentation of the daily PBS Kids programming block, Maya & Miguel was a Latino-flavored educational cartoon series geared for children aged 5 through 11. Maya Santos was a lively 10-year-old Hispanic girl who was insatiably curious about the world around her, and who also came up with a million and one ideas to help those around her--in short, a well-meaning busybody, who invariably learned an important Life Lesson, or a new aspect of Latino culture and history, the end of each half-hour episode. Maya was accompanied in her exploits by her twin brother Miguel, her 7-year-old Mexican cousion Tito, and her ethnically diverse friends, among them Chrissy, Maggie, Theo and Andy. The adult characters included Maya and Miguel's incredibly supportive parents Miguel and Rosa, the kids' warm-hearted grandmother Abuela Elena, and friendly neighborhood mailman Senor Felipe. The Hispanic characters all spoke bilingually, switching from English to Spanish and back again with exhilarating abandon. Produced by Scholastic Productions and funded in part by a cooperative agreement between PBS, the Corporation for Public Broadcasting and the US Department of Education, Maya & Miguel debuted October 1, 2004. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Perhaps the most highly anticipated film of 2003, Kill Bill Vol. 1 marked the return of renowned filmmaker Quentin Tarantino after a six-year hiatus. Re-teaming the director with Uma Thurman for the first time since 1994's Pulp Fiction, the film was originally the first half of what was to be a three-hour-plus movie before being split into two films. Thurman stars as The Bride, one-fifth of a team of assassins called DiVAS. When The Bride opts to leave the outfit for a life of marital bliss, it doesn't sit well with her boss, Bill (David Carradine), so he has her former cohorts, played by Lucy Liu, Vivica A. Fox, Daryl Hannah, and Michael Madsen, show up at the nuptials, leaving behind a blood bath. Miraculously, The Bride survives a bullet to the head and, four years later, she sets out for revenge against her four assassins and their employer. The story is concluded in Kill Bill Vol. 2, released six months later. ~ Matthew Tobey, All Movie Guide

The three most glamorous and butt-kicking private detectives in the business are back and ready to take on bad guys in this sequel to the 2000 blockbuster screen adaptation of the once-popular television series. Dylan (Drew Barrymore), Natalie (Cameron Diaz), and Alex (Lucy Liu) are once again summoned to the office of their boss Charlie (voice of John Forsythe), where they're introduced to his new right-hand man Jimmy Bosley (Bernie Mac) and given their latest assignment. It seems a pair of rings have gone missing and need to be recovered, but this was no ordinary jewel heist -- the rings have been coded with special information that can be used to access a list of every person in the FBI's Witness Protection Program, and when a handful of protected informants are murdered, the Angels are brought in to help crack the case. As the women search for the culprits, they encounter Madison Lee (Demi Moore), one of Charlie's former agents who decided that the wrong side of the law pays better, and Seamus (Justin Theroux), who once dated Dylan and wants revenge for her decision to turn him over to the police. Luke Wilson and Matt LeBlanc return as (respectively) Natalie and Alex's love interests, as does Crispin Glover as the Thin Man; John Cleese, Robert Forster, and Eric Bogosian also appear in supporting roles. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide

A starry-eyed would-be star discovers just how far the notion that "there's no such thing as bad publicity" can go in this screen adaptation of the hit Broadway musical Chicago, originally directed and choreographed by Bob Fosse. In the mid-'20s, Roxie Hart (Renee Zellweger) is a small-time chorus dancer married to a well-meaning dunderhead named Amos (John C. Reilly). Roxie is having an affair on the side with Fred Casley (Dominic West), a smooth talker who insists he can make her a star. However, Fred strings Roxie along a bit too far for his own good, and when she realizes that his promises are empty, she becomes enraged and murders Fred in cold blood. Roxie soon finds herself behind bars alongside Velma Kelly (Catherine Zeta-Jones), a sexy vaudeville star who used to perform with her sister until Velma discovered that her sister had been sleeping with her husband. Velma shot them both dead, and, after scheming prison matron "Mama" Morton hooks Velma up with hotshot lawyer Billy Flynn (Richard Gere), Velma becomes the new Queen of the scandal sheets. Roxie is just shrewd enough to realize that her poor fortune could also bring her fame, so she convinces Amos to also hire Flynn. Soon Flynn is splashing Roxie's story -- or, more accurately, a highly melodramatic revision of Roxie's story -- all over the gutter press, and Roxy and Velma are soon battling neck-to-neck over who can win greater fame through the headlines. A project that had been moving from studio to studio since the musical opened on Broadway in 1973, Chicago also features guest appearances by Lucy Liu and Christine Baranski. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide