Mary Elizabeth Winstead (Bobby, Grindhouse) presented the Best Supporting Actor and Actress in a TV Series awards to two of the stars of Heroes – Masi Oka and Hayden Panettiere - at The Academy of Science Fiction, Fantasy & Horror films’ 2007 Saturn Awards. This was Winstead’s first time attending the annual event but she’s a longtime fan of horror and sci-fi. “Absolutely. I've always been a huge fan. I love being scared and kind of being put in a dangerous situation but being in the safety of a theater or your own couch has always appealed to me.”
Besides presenting at the Saturn Awards, Winstead’s been keeping busy in a variety of films including the fourth installment of the Die Hard film franchise: Live Free or Die Hard. Winstead claims she’s just as excited about seeing the finished film as are diehard Die Hard fans. She hasn’t seen any of it yet but says, “I'm really excited to. I've seen portions and it looks amazing so I'm really excited.”
There’s a lot of buzz about a PG-13 rating for Live Free or Die Hard and Winstead confessed she’s heard a lot about it. “I think it's going to be a great film no matter what it's rated. I think that there's a lot of action in it, it's awesome. So I think that hopefully people embrace it no matter what.”
But no matter what the final rating is, it’s highly doubtful kids will stay away. There are a lot of young fans of the action-filled films. “That's true,” agreed Winstead. “I know I did. I don't know. I feel like it's up to the studio and whoever's making the ratings. It's not my choice. I can't make the decision so I kind of have to accept it no matter what.”
Live Free or Die Hard is expected to be one of 2007’s bigger summer films, but we all know hype doesn’t always add up to box office dollars. Winstead knows that first hand having been a part of the Quentin Tarantino/Robert Rodriguez collaboration, Grindhouse, which posted disappointing numbers. Winstead’s not sure what went wrong and is actually surprised it wasn’t better received by audiences. “Just to be part of the movie myself, I really thought everybody would want to see two movies for the price of one. And the fact that people were kind of more like annoyed about the length of it kind of surprises me. I think the length had something to do with it. I think the fact that it was so marketed towards a certain genre maybe didn't appeal to some other people, middle America possibly. But I don't know. Who knows? I was a little surprised.”
Saturn coverage contributed by Fred Topel.
