WHAT'S NEW: The first genuine Oscar-chasing release of the fall, The Duchess will likely split its viewership between pro- and anti-Keira Knightley factions before anyone bothers to acknowledge its broader, bodice-ripping appeal. So yes, Team Knightley: She deftly portrays Georgiana, Duchess of Devonshire, the late-18th-century heroine with the bitterly controlling husband (Ralph Fiennes), the rabble-rousing side dish (Dominic Cooper) and a surfeit of corsted, pre-feminist longing. The star and the film are beautiful, the direction assured and the awards-season creds affirmed — particularly Fiennes', whose customary wretchedness as the Duke acquires a kind of fascinating tenderness with age. If anyone should be on the Oscar bubble (besides the art and costume crew, which are locks), it's him.

Still, in limited release, Duchess isn't competing for any box-office glory; that distinction belongs to Lakeview Terrace, the not-entirely-miserable Neil LaBute thriller featuring Samuel L. Jackson as a sociopathic cop out to get the hot interracial couple next door (Patrick Wilson and Kerry Washington). Against sturdy holdovers (Burn After Reading, The Family That Preys) and middling newbies (the Dane Cook slog My Best Friend's Girl, Ricky Gervais's leading-man debut Ghost Town), Lakeview will top out at $15.6 million. Cook will follow with $13.2 million; with half the screens and even less promotion, Ghost Town should still manage an even $6 million.

Also opening: Ed Harris's old-old-school Western Appaloosa; Chris Smith's tiny, acclaimed Indian excursion The Pool; the gay-conversion melodrama Save Me; the wrenching immigrant day-in-the-life tale Take Out; and the Duchess-correcting, misogynist fantasia The Pink Conspiracy.

THE BIG LOSER: You know, after we just predicted the Weinsteins would once again find their step in the multiplex, trust in Harvey to not only dump another subpar animated fairy tale on an unsuspecting public, but to essentially disown it. Such is Igor's lot, with its backers AWOL, its reviews tepid, and its voice talent (John Cusack, Molly Shannon, Steve Buscemi) trapped in a Straight-to-Flopz™ patchwork about a hunchback pursuing his dream of becoming a mad scientist. MGM is left to collect the grosses for this one, which won't break $5 million on 2,300 screens. Or, as they call it at Weinstein HQ, business as usual.

THE UNDERDOG: As members of the privileged few to have seen Hounddog in its spectacularly atrocious Sundance '07 cut ("It was unfinished!", the director screams), we long doubted not only the film's release potential, but also the redeemability of those souls who actually made it. But fair is fair, and while the reedited Hounddog remains the infamous Dakota Fanning Rape Movie — full of overripe Southern hokum comprising snakes, magical Negroes, Elvis worship and borderline inbreds — it has since obtained a sort of culty, gunpowder gloss embracing all of its wrecked potential. It's finally refined its badness enough to be good, even serviceable for at least an hour, with Fanning's vulnerability dynamically intact opposite the predatory, 'shine-swilling archetypes around her. Bonus points, however, to David Morse, whose full-retard debasement here must be seen to be believed.

FOR SHUT-INS: It's Celebrity Bomb Week among new DVD releases, including Mike Myers's stroppy folly The Love Guru; the Wachowski abortion Speed Racer; the Pacino pratfall 88 Minutes; Patrick Dempsey's rom-com Made of Honor; and at not-so-long last, the complete first season of Chuck. Aw, NBC — you shouldn't have! No, really. You shouldn't have.

So what's your Top 3? Is it a Keira weekend, or is Officer Sam pulling your ass over? And how's our math, anyway? Clear your calendars and call your shots — you're among friends here. Even you, Harvey!

'The Duchess' actress - who is often criticised for her slim figure - believes she would get a break from her detractors if she had a baby.

She said: 'That's a good reason to have a kid. They won't say I'm anorexic any more. S**t, I've got to have a child.'

F**k yeah you do! Having a baby (who we imagine, for some reason, would come out of the womb already furiously chain-smoking) could be the answer to all of Knightley's Hollywood prayers! Flush with pregnancy curves, no longer would the actress have to suffer the indignity of digitally-enhanced breasts and four-Skittle dinners. Or, alternately, Knightley could simply eat a sandwich every now and then. You know, whichevs!

[Photo Credit: Getty Images]

• Keira Knightley's baby wish [MSN]

Boomp3.com

The tension at the Toronto Film Festival press conference for the film The Duchess was so thick and juicy that it could be cut with a bread knife. When asked what it was like to work with her co-star Ralph Fiennes, Keira Knightley mistakenly called him "Ralph", instead of the preferred pronunciation "Rafe". Fiennes instantly began to sulk and slumped extremely low into his seat, at which point Knightley released an exasperated sigh. "If it bothers you so much, why don't you just change your name to Ocho Cinco?", she asked.

[Photo Credit: Bauer-Griffin]

*A Call To The Bullpen is a work of fiction. Although the pictures we use are most certainly real, Defamer does not purport that any of the incidents or quotations you see in this piece actually happened. Lighten up, people ... it's a joke.

It's not like there's not precedent here, however. Follow the jump for more, including a glimpse at Knightley's previous brush with the 'brush.

A little research at Vantage would likely have revealed Touchstone's own means of dealing with rack challenged starlets, as recalled over the weekend in published reports: Photoshop first, and ask questions later:

The actress drew negative attention in 2004 with her larger-than-usual breasts in publicity stills for King Arthur.

"Those things certainly weren't mine," Fox News quoted her as saying in 2006. According to Knightley, the studio marketing team was behind her suddenly C-cup breasts, but gave her final approval on the photos.

"I was like, 'OK, fine. I honestly don't give a s—-,'" she recalled.

Alas, after laying off the top-secret crew whose muscular augmentation of Daniel Day-Lewis's moustache put There Will Be Blood over the top in 2007, Vantage brass have lost their secret weapons in the even more subtle art of bosom heaving — a craft having long since fallen out of favor with critics from Scarlett Johansson to Liz Smith. But it could be worse — like that time Into the Wild attempted to pass off Emile Hirsch as a leading man? There are some miracles not even Photoshop can approximate.

• Keira Knightley refuses breast enhancement for 'The Duchess' [NYDN]