Archive for August, 2004
Monday, August 30th, 2004
Renowned puppeteer Basil Twist’s aquatic extravaganza Symphonie Fantastique became an overnight sensation when it debuted in a 500-gallon water tank at the 78-seat HERE Arts Center in Soho in 1998.
One-of-a-kind entertainment, the show combines the magic of puppetry with the powerful suggestions of dance, film and art, set to the five movements of Hector Berlioz’s hour-long 19th-century classic composition. Out of view of the audience, five puppeteers swirl fabrics and feathers, glitter and vinyl, plastic, dyes, bubbles, fishing lures and flashlights through the water tank to create an utterly original work that is alternately funny, romantic, joyful, haunting and whimsical.
Beginning September 17, Symphonie Fantastique returns to New York as the inaugural production of the new Dodger Stages on West 50th St. The revival will feature a 1,000-gallon water tank.
… Read the rest
Monday, August 30th, 2004
Following in the footsteps of Richard Linklater, whose sequel to Before Sunrise was a hit with critics and audiences this summer, the Associated Press reports that Kevin Smith “has begun work on a sequel to Clerks, his homemade indie classic from 1994.
“That $27,000 movie, shot at night in a store where Smith worked, chronicled the adventures of Dante and Randal, two guys who talk about life, death, sex and movies while working at neighboring stores.
“The sequel, [to be called The Passion of the Clerks], picks up 10 years later.
” ‘It’s about what happens when that lazy, 20-something malaise lasts into your 30s. Those dudes are kind of still mired, not in that same exact situation, but in a place where it’s time to actually grow up and do something more than just sit around and dissect pop culture and talk about sex,’ Smith said during an interview at his Hollywood office.”
“A new 10th anniversary DVD of Clerks debuts September 7, and Smith said working on that three-disc set inspired him to write about what became of those characters.” The three-disc 10th-anniversary DVD release of Clerks, titled Clerks X, will be released by the Miramax Collectors Series. It will include the original theatrical version of the film, an extended Sundance Film Festival (news – Web sites) cut and a new documentary.
… Read the rest
Monday, August 30th, 2004
Director Larry Fessenden (Wendigo), visual/FX/storyboard artist Brahm Revel (Wendigo, “Californication”) and producer/director James Felix McKenney (The Off Season, Cannabalistic!), have released “What Are You Voting For?“, a free informational 32-page comic book “profiling the life and crimes of the Bush administration.”
“While we want to share this work with friends and like-minded folks,” Fessenden said, “we didn’t do it to get a pat on the back, we really want to make a difference by presenting the issues in a digestible format like a comic book. Our goal is to get it to the swing states this fall. So we’re looking into ways to distribute it. Any ideas would welcome.”
Contact Fessenden at larry@glasseyepix.com
… Read the rest
Monday, August 30th, 2004
Beginning September 23, The Museum of Modern Art presents three evenings of dialogue with leading music and media innovators.
Laurie Anderson, Michel Gondry and Brian Eno will discuss how the fields of music and moving image production overlap. According to the MoMA press release: “The common element uniting these artists is their musical backgrounds — Anderson as a solo performer, Gondry as a drummer and director of music videos, Eno as a pioneer of electronic music — allied with their subsequent careers in the visual and moving-image arts. While cross-pollination between other artistic media, such as painting, sculpture, drawing, and printmaking, has long been acknowledged and examined, Anderson, Gondry and Eno’s careers have utilized elements from their musical backgrounds and works to create hybrid projects — installations, feature films, performance pieces — that have developed the frontiers of media art.”
Anderson will be interviewed by writer/actor Wallace Shawn on September 23 at 7:00 p.m.; Gondry by journalist and film programmer Ed Halter, on September 30 at 7:00 p.m.; and Eno by director Todd Haynes on October 7 at 7:00 p.m.
The series will take place at CUNY Graduate Center, Proshansky Auditorium, 365 Fifth Ave. at 34th St. Tickets are $15, $10 for MoMA members; $8 for students with ID. Tickets can purchased at the MoMAVistor Center at the MoMA Design Store, 44 W. 53rd St. and at the CUNY Graduate Center box office.
Commemorating its 75th anniversary, The Museum of Modern Art will re-open its newly renovated building on West 53rd Street on November 20, 2004.
… Read the rest
Saturday, August 28th, 2004
In a promising sign for indies, the Sundance ’04 feature Evergreen will premiere theatrically September 10 on 115 AMC theater screens via a satellite link and digital projection. Via Movie City News comes this press release in which AMC Film Group Chairman Dick Walsh says, “This engagement also showcases the capability of AMC’s DTDS system to bring quality programming directly to our theatres on a national basis.”
Says the release, “Written and directed by promising newcomer Enid Zentelis and screened at the 2004 Sundance Film Festival, Evergreen tells the story of Henri, a teenage girl who lives in poverty with her mother, who goes to great lengths to become part of her boyfriend’s affluent family. Shot on location in Everett, Washington, the cast features Mary Kay Place, Cara Seymour, Bruce Davison and Addie Land as Henri…
“AMC will present the film digitally, using AMC’s proprietary Digital Theatre Distribution System (DTDS). The DTDS system eliminates the need for the production and distribution of 35mm film prints, a costly process which the producers of independent films often cannot afford. The digital file of the movie will be distributed to each AMC theatre via satellite.”
According to director Zentelis, she spoke with Walsh at Sundance where the theater exec saw the film, loved it, and spoke of his interest in getting the film in front of audiences. UTA agent Jeremy Barber worked out the deal between the filmmakers and AMC. For more info on the film visit the website.
… Read the rest
Friday, August 27th, 2004
“Genesis P-Orridge is talking about the day he was asked to rescue a series of radical movies made by William [S.] Burroughs, artist Brion Gysin and filmmaker Antony Balch from a skip. It was 1980 and P-Orridge was living on the dole in Hackney, east London, fronting art-punk band Throbbing Gristle. ‘Brion called me from Paris,’ recalls P-Orridge. ‘Antony had died, and all the films they had made in the 1950s and 1960s were about to be destroyed. ‘Here’s the address,’ he said. ‘Do what you can to save them. Go and get them, and they’re yours. You’ll know what to do with them.’ ”
No, this isn’t the sequel to The Da Vinci Code.
According to The Guardian, the episode really did take place, and Genesis P-Orridge rescued the films on which Burroughs, Gysin and Balch collaborated — including Towers Open Fire and The Cut Ups — from imminent destruction.
… Read the rest
Thursday, August 26th, 2004
Via the dishy Weblog A Fly on the Wall comes the following link to Jennifer Shiman’s hilarious animated 30-second “re-enactments” of popular movies, including Alien, The Shining, Titanic and The Exorcist.
As in her previous films, Shiman’s latest masterpiece, Jaws in 30 Seconds, is re-enacted entirely by bunnies.
.… Read the rest
Wednesday, August 25th, 2004
With Tuesday’s announcement of 10 more titles, the Gala Presentations program of the 2004 Toronto International Film Festival is now complete. Among the additional titles announced are:
Mike Barker’s A Good Woman, a world premiere and a charmingly comedic tale of high-society Americans in Italy starring Helen Hunt and Scarlett Johansson;
Kevin Spacey’s Beyond the Sea, a world premiere starring Kevin Spacey as Bobby Darin;
Oliver Hirschbiegel’s Downfall, an intense thriller that dramatizes the fall of Berlin at the end of the Second World War starring Bruno Ganz and Juliane Kohler;
John Stephenson’s Five Children and It, a dazzling combination of live action and animation starring Kenneth Branagh and Freddie Highmore;
the world premiere of Jean-Paul Salome’s Arsene Lupin, the thrilling and passionate story of the whirlwind adventures of a legendary hero starring Romain Duris and Kristin Scott Thomas;
the international premiere of Carlo Mazzacurati’s An Italian Romance, which follows two estranged lovers and the passionate love affair that ensues when they reunite;
Mick Davis’s Modigliani, a world premiere starring Andy Garcia that recounts the untold story of the bitter rivalry between Modigliani and Picasso;
Bille August’s Return to Sender, a world premiere starring Kelly Preston and Aidan Quinn in the rivetting story of a cynical lawyer who fights to exonerate a woman on death row;
Walter Salles’s The Motorcycle Diaries, which traces the youthful origins of revolutionary Che Guevara;
and a fascinating look at the theater during the height of the English Restoration, Sir Richard Eyre’s Stage Beauty.
The complete Masters lineup boasts 21 films from 19 countries, including Buddhadeb Dasgupta’s Chased by Dreams;
Brides from Pantelis Voulgaris;
Goran Paskaljevic’s Midwinter Night’s Dream;
Wong Kar Wai, Steven Soderbergh and Michelangelo Antonioni’s portmanteau film, Eros;
Low Life from Im Kwon-Taek;
Hou Hsiao-Hsien’s Cafe Lumiere;
Bad Education from Pedro Almodovar;
Land of Plenty from Wim Wenders;
The Ninth Day from Volker Schlondorff;
Human Touch from Paul Cox;
and Theo Angelopoulos’s Trilogy: The Weeping Meadow.
As Planet Africa celebrates its 10th anniversary, the Festival presents Ousmane … Read the rest
Tuesday, August 24th, 2004
As reported in The Guardian, “At first glance the text of the advert running in national newspapers [in th UK] today reads like an attack on the burger and fries giant McDonald’s.
“The advert says it supports the core argument of a film where a man who eats burgers for 30 days piles on weight to such a health damaging extent that his doctors order him to stop eating them.
“But it is not placed by campaigners savaging the firm’s nutritional record — it is placed by McDonald’s.
“So concerned is the multinational about the U.S. independent film Super Size Me, which [screened this past weekend] at the Edinburgh film festival and goes on general release in Britain in three weeks’ time, that it decided to mount the unconventional campaign.”
The ads are reportedly not unlike those the fast food corporation had previously run in Australia. Unlike the Austrailan ads, however, which challenged the conclusions of the documentary, the UK ads reportedly “support” the conclusions of Super Size Me film but challenge the film’s methodology: “The ad claims the film is flawed because an average customer would take six years to eat the same amount of burgers as the filmmaker ate. It also claims the weight gain was exaggerated because the filmmaker cut his physical activity to a bare minimum.”
As cited on the JKL Blog: [McDonald's rival] “Subway Restaurants, a U.S. sandwich chain, recently withdrew a highly controversial German ad campaign [promoting Super Size Me] due to mounting pressure from employees, consumers, think tanks, members of congress and bloggers” [which attacked the ad as anti-American]. The headline of the ad, which features a cartoon of an obese Statue of Liberty reads, in German, “Why are Americans so fat?”
“Earlier this year, Larry Light, McDonald Corp.’s chief marketing officer, said McDonald’s has adopted a new marketing technique that he dubbed ‘brand journalism’, reports the Free Enterprise Blog… His insight? Offering a free DVD of Super Size Me for every ice tea sold.”
… Read the rest
Sunday, August 22nd, 2004
Vincent Gallo in Sunday’s New York Times:
Q: “Why aren’t you married?”
A: “Intimacy always creates an urge in me that I am missing out on something.”
Speaking of Gallo, via his Drowning in Brown Web site comes news that he will be performing live on August 25th at Rothko in New York.
Gallo will be performing with Sean Lennon in a rare live performance that will include music from Gallo’s album “When.” Tickets are $18 advance, and $22 day of the show. Tickets include a ticket to a screening of his latest film, The Brown Bunny.
… Read the rest
