Q&A with director Carl Bessai, Andrew Airlie, Tygh Runyan and Camille Sullivan after a screening of Bessai’s most recent film Normal (our review).
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On my list of man-crushes I’ll admit to, Guy Pearce has ranked pretty high ever since I saw him in L.A. Confidential back in ’97. He followed that up with three more promising roles in Ravenous, Rules of Engagement, and the one that really put him in the spotlight, Memento. In my eyes, he was already one of the greats working and it really seemed like he was on the verge of breaking out and becoming a huge name in the business. His next five years were pretty unimpressive though, starring in a few mediocre Australian movies and some Hollywood dreck like The Time Machine and The Count of Monte Cristo (all of which he was good in – the movies themselves were just poorly written). Then, of course, he got his career back on track with the gritty Australian western, The Proposition, a true masterpiece (not to mention my favorite film of 2006). He followed that up with the decent First Snow and an exceptional performance as eccentric artist Andy Warhol in Factory Girl.
He’s been pretty busy lately too and has a few movies already in the can looking all to be released in 2008! First up, he’ll be portraying Harry Houdini alongside Catherine Zeta-Jones in Death Defying Acts. Then he stars in How to Change in 9 Weeks with Sam Neill and Miranda Otto that follows the story of a fifteen year old girl who went missing and how the family deals with it. He’ll follow that up with The Hurt Locker with Ralph Fiennes and David Morse, an Iraq war drama about an elite Army bomb squad that is in a dangerous game of cat-and-mouse. Then there will be the ensemble drama Winged Creatures about a random shooting at a Los Angeles diner and how the group of strangers deal with it, which will co-star Jackie Earle Haley, Forest Whitaker, Kate Beckinsale, and Dakota Fanning. 
And lastly for the year (and the one I think I may be looking forward to the most) is Traitor, a drama-thriller co-starring Don Cheadle and Jeff Daniels, that follows a straight-arrow FBI agent who goes all over the globe trying to crack a dangerous international conspiracy dodging bullets and betrayal along the way.
This was a long way of getting to my point, which is that I really like Guy Pearce and that I really like to hear what the man has to say, so I was pretty pumped to read a recent interview he had with the Australian website Executive Style. In it, he talks about movies throughout his career from L.A. Confidential to Memento to the train-wreck that was The Time Machine to The Proposition. It’s a pretty fun and interesting read and you can either click the link above or check out the full interview after the jump!
He said so himself on his recent blog entry!
Apparently he’s been busy on set of his upcoming film, a wrestling flick, a film called The Wrestler starring Mickey Rourke as Randy ‘The Ram’ Robinson, a retired professional wrestler making his way through the independent circuit, trying to get back in the game for one final showdown with his former rival.
Looks like they’re almost finished with filming and Aronofsky is looking for help in filling the stands for the last bout. Filming of the final match will take place on March 14th and 15th in Dover, New Jersey so if you’re in the area, you should add yourself to the mailing list to get more information.
I’m not quite sure if they’re looking for extras or selling tickets to the match since there is also a link to Ring of Honor where you can apparently buy tickets to the event (though I can’t seem to maneuver through their website to find them). Either way, it might be fun for some of our readers.
The Wrestler is scheduled for release next year.
Director: Anthony Hopkins (August, Dylan Thomas: Return Journey)
Writer: Anthony Hopkins
Producers: Stella Arroyave, Robert Katz
Starring: Anthony Hopkins, Stella Arroyave, Christian Slater, John Turturro, Michael Clark Duncan, Camryn Manheim, Jeffrey Tambor, S. Epatha Merkerson, Fionnula Flanagan, Michael Lerner, Christopher Lawford, Lisa Pepper, Gavin Grazer, Aaron Tucker, Lana Antonva, Kevin McCarthy
MPAA Rating: R
Running time: 96 min
Few will disagree that over the last few years, Sir Anthony Hopkins’ performances have left a lot to be desired. The multi-award winning actor whose name, at one time, equaled box office and critical recognition has been on a downhill slide for the last few years and outside of the heartwarming The World’s Fastest Indian, Hopkins hasn’t exactly been burning up the screen. Perhaps it’s age or lack of interesting roles but the truth is he has been playing the same old, worn out parts for the later part of his career and the lack of enthusiasm from movie goers is starting to show.
Perhaps it’s the this lack of interest or maybe an attempt to reboot his career but Hopkins has moved behind the camera to bring us his third film as a director, the un-sequential and hard to follow mess he’s titled Slipstream. It’s the story of an ailing writer suffering from bi-polar disorder trying to write his last script. That would be a simple enough story to tell but Hopkins opts to go the mind-bending route constantly repeating and confusing his audience more than he entertains them.
To say that Slipstream is a challenging film is an understatement. Frames are inter-spliced with quick photos, dialog is constantly repeated or rewound and replayed, characters change and play different roles throughout and the story within a story changes just as soon as you think you’ve figured out what going on. I love a film that forces me to pay extra close attention to the details and heck, I even like a film that toys with my expectations but Hopkins’ film feels too contrived, like it was edited together to challenge and confuse the viewer and not allow for the satisfaction of “figuring it out” even after multiple viewings. This feels like it should be a cult film, with all the trappings for an intense and engulfed audience to watch each frame in slow motion in an effort to pick up the hidden secrets and nuances. Unfortunately, it lacks what other films of this type (I’m thinking along the lines of Donnie Darko and other films of this sort) have in abundance: characters that we care about.
Director: Catherine Owens, Mark Pellington
Producers: John Modell, Catherine Owens, Jon Shapiro, Peter Shapiro
Starring: Bono, Adam Clayton, Larry Mullen Jr., The Edge
MPAA Rating: G
Running time: 85 min
Just as laser light shows are a breed of event onto themselves, so is U2 3D. Part concert film, part music video, all 3D experience, Catherine Owens and Mark Pellington’s film finds a niche for itself somewhere between the regular 3D film and the concert experience. Unlike some of the other concert films that I’ve seen, U2 3D doesn’t settle for capturing U2 in concert instead, it reaches to bring the U2 live experience to the theater and does so with great success.
The film is cut together from a number of performances during the band’s 2006 Vertigo tour. Featuring 11 tracks and 3 “encores” (one during the excellent closing credits), this is all U2 for 85 minutes and if you’re a fan, it’s heavenly. The music isn’t the only great thing on display here. Pellington and Owens have made excellent use of the 3D technology, incorporating text and hand drawn visuals into the concert footage and giving you more than just cool angles and “close enough to smell Bono’s breath” shots.
Concert films are only as good as the performances and U2 are great live performers. The surround sound is sharp and clear and sounds fantastic pumped through IMAX’s digital sound system. Even in an older IMAX theater, the sound quality is phenomenal and I can only image how much better this would sound at one of the newer, state of the art theaters.
Beyond the performance, there are also some interesting and innovative artistic things going on here. From the brilliant opening scene which follows a girl from the opening of the gate to the opening moments of the concert and even some of the juxtaposing of images to create more than just the audience member experience, though the “in the audience” experience definitely there as well, as much as it can be.
Director: Cristian Mungiu (Occident)
Writer: Cristian Mungiu
Producers: Cristian Mungiu , Oleg Mutu
Starring: Anamaria Marinca, Vlad Ivanov, Laura Vasiliu, Alexandru Potoceanu
MPAA Rating: NR
Running time: 113 min
You may feel the need to have a good, hot shower (or two) at the conclusion of 4 Months, 3 Weeks, 2 Days. The movie is gritty, dark, cold and depressing. But sitting above all that is the fact that it’s undeniably compelling; despite its repugnant subject matter.
Taking place in communist Romania in 1987, we start our story in a student dormitory where we follow a young lady named Otilia as she goes about morning business. Looking for friends to talk to, buying some cigarettes and other essentials. We can tell something is going on between her and her flat mate, Gabita, as if they are planning something important; though we’re not quite sure what. We follow Otilia throughout the morning: meeting her boyfriend, gathering some money, stopping at a hotel, etc; still obviously preparing for something important and secretive. Eventually she meets up with a stranger in a public place, whom she brings back to Gabita at the hotel. Here is where we finally learn that an illegal abortion is about to be performed. As little problems that have arisen throughout the day grow more and more important and more and more impactful, we can see that this entire situation is a time bomb waiting to go off. Things quickly begin to spiral downward and out of control and Otilia must make decisions that will change the way she views the world, her friends and most importantly herself, forever.
While I try not to draw too many comparisons with other films in my written reviews, I couldn’t help but be reminded of Gus Van Sant’s high school drama, Elephant. While not as literally explosive as Elephant ends up being, 4 Months, 3 Weeks, 2 Days appears to draw some inspiration from Mr. Van Sant as it spends quite a bit of its running time with seemingly mundane details and lengthy shots of characters going about normal, everyday activities; or lengthy, nearly silent shots of characters while in not such a mundane circumstance. The difference between the two films however, would be that while Elephant slowly builds nothing into cataclysm by the end, 4, 3, 2 has several moments interspersed throughout that are cringingly gripping and even interesting and sometimes sickening and degrading.
The director really does a fantastic job of getting us to sympathize with Otilia after the choices and sacrifices she makes for herself and her friend. We may not be so sympathetic at the time; but it’s later, when we’re forced to sit and think about what has happened that we really feel the sting of emotion. Whether it be a lengthy (10 minutes) happy birthday dinner party in which we get a long unbroken shot of Otilia as she sits at a dinner table full of joyous conversationalists or Otilia just sitting on a chair loooking at the floor as she contemplates and questions her friend on what has happened, we have no choice but to look into Otilia’s eyes and in this way, we’re very forcefully thrust into her shoes and we want nothing more than to be somewhere else.
Technically, Eyes of Laura Mars is not a John Carpenter film (it was directed by Irvin Kershner), but one based on a screenplay he had written titled “Eyes”. Producer Jack H. Harris, who was involved with Carpenter’s first film, Dark Star, handed a treatment of “Eyes” to Jon Peters at Columbia Pictures, who liked the concept of a woman who psychopathically witnesses murders through the eyes of the killer. Unfortunately, the script would go through a number of transformations over time, leaving little resemblance between Carpenter’s original vision and the finished film.
Laura Mars (Faye Dunaway) is New York City’s hottest, and most controversial, fashion photographer. Her photos, consisting of scantily-clad women and set against ultra-violent backdrops, have simultaneously stirred the admiration and incited the fury of the New York elite. But the violence in Laura Mars’ creations runs much deeper than mere sensationalism. Laura possesses a unique psychic power, one that allows her to witness, in her mind’s eye, actual murders as they are occurring, seeing every terrifying detail through the eyes of the murderer himself. Recently, the killings that Laura has ‘seen’ are of people close to her, and police detective John Neville (Tommy Lee Jones) wants to know the connection. As the bodies pile up, Laura begins to suspect that the killer is someone very close to her, and that she may be the ultimate target of his murderous spree.
I do not normally post Star Wars bits – there are enough folks writing for this website already who still get their Original Trilogy on. [on a personal note, the whole thing began to lose its luster around 1999 when the not-so-swell prequels were farted out at a hype-drowned public concurrently to Mr. Lucas endlessly tinkering with his original baby - often by a cutting a toe off here and painting a new tattoo on there.] However, this is the type of geek-chic creation that puts a smile from ear to ear (says the self-confessed opening credits junkie).
Is there anyone more influential in the ‘opening credits’ department than Saul Bass? Just take any opening credits sequence you’ve seen prior to 1980 –and still remember– and it was probably Bass. From It’s A Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad, World to Seconds to that crazy animated bit in the middle of Vertigo, it’s all S.B. (and this is to say nothing of all the fab One Sheets the man is responsible for).
Some enterprising fellow (a graphic arts student no doubt) has a “what if” version of the opening credits of Star Wars, a great idea and brilliant execution, considering that there were never any opening credits in front of these films. From the miracle of YouTube straight to your undernourished cerebellum.
In the parlance of our site, “It’s under the seat.”
I‘ve always had the utmost respect of the balancing act Alex Proyas and team pulled off with 1998′s Dark City. It is a triumph of production design and maximizing effectiveness of special effects (in the scheme of things, Dark City was a relatively cheaply made film). The film razzle-dazzles at the same time as it scares and challenges it audience. The true brilliance of the film is how it slides genre elements along side one another; like the puzzle-box of the films central conceit. When the lead characters suspicions of the men behind the curtain leads to a sublime tumbling of all of the films careful machinations, it is a sight to behold (“C-beams glittering in the dark near the Tannhauser gate” or “sick ridiculous puppets we are, and what gross little stage we dance on.”)
The pair of scenes below illustrate this quite nicely. First you have a lounge singer (Jennifer Connolley at her most radiant) singing a vintage piece of crooning in front of a retro microphone, her shimmering green dress a light in the dark, smoky club. This is followed by a trip to highly a mannered psychiatrist (Kiefer Sutherland about as far from Jack Bauer as one can get). Inside she learns that her husband has had a mental collapse after an act of infidelity and is a criminal on the run. But this is told by Dr. Shcreber against the backdrop of something in between Pavlov’s laboratory and Dr. Frankenstein’s castle. Gothic and Art Deco are smashed into one another against narrative signposts of crude psychology, infidelity, crime and science fantasy (retro-horror?). Of course there are other elements in the film, I’d have loved if William Hurt‘s hardboiled detective or Ian Richardson‘s alien-ghoul would have been included in that 2 minute clip, just to give the breath and scope of what is accomplished here. The film has rightly achieved a full cult following that isn’t quite at the level of 2001, Metropolis or Blade Runner (other films that blended their ideas with their production design and simply are baffling from a categorization standpoint), it is slowly getting there.
Not a list of every DVD that is being released this month. Just a list of DVDs I found noteworthy or might be of interest to someone. If you have more, by all means post ‘em in the comments section. No Country, Enchanted, a few back-catalog titles in special edition format and Kurt will finally get to see the mess that is Southland Tales. But we start with March 4th…
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see the rest of the month…
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Director: Eran Kolirin
Writer: Eran Kolirin
Producers: Ehud Bleiberg, Koby Gal-Raday, Guy Jacoel, Eilon Rachkowsky, Yossi Uzrad
Starring: Sasson Gabai, Saleh Bakri, Ronit Elkabetz
MPAA Rating: PG-13
Running time: 87 min
Along the same lines as Juno in one respect, The Band’s Visit grated on my nerves for about half of the picture; though through no fault of its own. Seeing this film with a Minnesota audience of an average age of about 65, it took a harsh toll on my patience as audience members cackled throughout the nearly 90 minute running time of the entire film, thinking everything they saw on screen was hilarious – even though there wasn’t anything particularly funny about any of the given scenes.
The Band’s Visit opens with a group of Egyptian, military band members standing in the middle of nowhere (a small town in Israel), waiting for a bus that will never show up. All wearing the same, powder-blue uniforms, the group stands out like a sore thumb and Israeli hospitality is lacking to say the least. Becoming more and more lost, eventually the group finds themselves at a small cafe run by a strong, independent woman who offers food and a place to sleep. She splits the men up to three different locations around the town; taking two herself, three at a friend’s small flat and the other two on the cafe floor. From here, the band members appear embarrassingly greatful and accept quiet conversation, a night out on the town or a quiet evening at home singing songs or playing their instruments. There really isn’t much more plot than that. The story finds its path with conversation and layers of humanity peeled away slowly but surely.
The movie definitely has some slow pacing and could get a bit tedious for some as the quirk and charm wears off and the character development starts to reveal itself. Fortunately for me, this is when the audience started to quiet down and I began to really enjoy the picture and find that these characters actually mean more to me than just a series of cute moments.
In the early 1920’s, director F.W. Murnau set out to make a movie based on Bram Stoker’s classic novel, Dracula. The resulting film, titled Nosferatu and starring Max Schreck as the vampire, remains to this day a masterwork of horror.
Shadow of the Vampire, released in 2000, is a fictional account of the making of Nosferatu, with one small modification. This time around, the roles of vampire and actor have been reversed. Nosferatu’s Max Schreck, so effectively frightening as the undead bloodsucker in the original, is no longer merely an actor portraying a vampire. In a twist that could be among the most ingenious in recent memory, a real-life vampire (Willem Dafoe) has been hired by director Murnau (John Malkovich) to play the role of an actor named Schreck who is, in turn, playing a vampire in his new film. And exactly how did Murnau convince a real vampire to star in his movie? By promising him the throat of the leading lady (Catherine McCormack) once filming was completed. For Murnau, it’s the perfect arrangement, the ultimate truth for his artistic endeavor. But can he control the beast he has so callously unleashed on his unsuspecting film crew?
