Archive for November, 2006
Wednesday, November 22nd, 2006
Over at Movie City Indie, Ray Pride runs excerpts from an interview he did with Robert Altman for a special Gotham Award issue of Filmmaker.
An excerpt:
An attempt to be original counts as some kind of success, doesn’t it? “Now, if you see anything original, you won’t see it [out there for] very long. It’s time turtling on. These kids… they don’t understand anything else. There’s so much saturation. There’s not a policeman today who didn’t learn his behavior from watching films or television. We all imitate each other.” Does Altman ever think he’s imitating himself? “It now occurs to me they’re all chapters of the same book. My fingerprints are all over them. Whatever I do, I can’t not do it.”
I shift the conversation to a few elements of production, asking if he ever felt any kind of fear on the way to the set in the morning anymore? “Fear? No. Concern, to some degree. It’s difficult, there are so many elements. One element goes wrong, you have to constantly readjust. I have to say it’s anxiety, not fear.”
Have your budgets always been adequate? “I’ve never been short. On any of those films, if I had an extra week, I don’t know what I would have done with it. I set my own schedules. I don’t always have all the actors, I don’t have the access to the money to pay certain actors who won’t work at a certain special effect, things like that. But that just means I have to be a little more creative. I like that.”
Ringing off, I mention I like the similarities between Cookie’s Fortune and the work of the cinema’s great humanist, Jean Renoir (whose Rules of the Game was the acknowledged template for his later Gosford Park. “All these tags are beyond me,” he says. Well, I joke, I guess it’s your job to do the work, and the job of the journalists is to put your art in a shoe box, I joke to the man who said Hollywood made sneakers and he made gloves.
… Read the rest
Tuesday, November 21st, 2006
As various news sites, including Reuters, are reporting, Robert Altman died last night in a Los Angeles hospital. He was 81.
There are many ways to eulogize this remarkable director, a true maverick who never relinquished his own very personal idea of independence over many decades of work. For now, I’m just going to point you to Matthew Ross’s cover story on Altman in our Spring, 2006 issue. At the time he had just finished A Prarie Home Companion which Ross called “a triumphant new chapter in Altman’s body of work.” In the article, Altman noted that since receiving the heart transplant he talked about on stage after winning an honorary Academy Award this Spring he completed five features. And while many younger directors complain about the inequities of Hollyood and their inability to get their movies movie, Altman remained both philosophical and wiley, committed to testing the boundaries of both the system and society with his sly, fast-footed dramas.
We’ll have more on Altman in the days ahead.… Read the rest
Tuesday, November 21st, 2006
The Emmanuelle franchise has just turned 31, and is alive & well, in case you were wondering about the fate of France’s #1 erotic superheroine. Originally introduced in the semi-autobiographical novel Emmanuelle by Emmanuelle Arsan, the character went on to infamy in the soft-focus feature film adaptation in 1974 that took most of the world by storm. A series of lush sequels followed, theatrical features that featured a rotating roster of directors (including cult figures Jean Rollins and Walerian Borowczyk) and the occasional presence of original star Sylvia Kristel.
After 7 films however, the 90s saw the classy Emmanuelle brand go to cable, spawning a rather different brand of bump and grind, soft-core tawdriness, sadly probably more familiar to latenight TV viewers at this point than the original films.
That may be about to change: Alain Siritzky Prods., the Paris-based production outfit behind the series since the first film, has announced a new feature film, Emmanuelle Tango, which finished principal photography in Buenos Aires, Argentina earlier this year. Newbie director Milos Twilight brings us a tale in which aliens (from outer space, not Latin-America) threaten world safety; managing to find time to hit the nearest tango bar while they’re at it. Only Emmanuelle can stop them, apparently.
The first worldwide theatrical Emmanuelle release in a decade, will this mean a return to the fun, witty entries of days gone by, and a resuscitation of the sullied Emmanuelle name? One time will tell….… Read the rest
Friday, November 17th, 2006
If you’re in New York City this week check three free screenings at the Brooklyn Academy of Music: Jim McKay’s features Our Song, Everyday People and the most recent, Angel Rodriguez.
Since Our Song in 2000 McKay has been making lovingly crafted dramas that quite movingly dig into the lives of characters often overlooked by both mainstream Hollywood and independent film. All three films are set in Brooklyn, and the latest stars newcomer Jonan Everett (pictured) and Rachel Griffiths in the story of a troubled inner-city teenager and the guidance counselor who is trying to help while confronting problems of her own.
Angel Rodriguez screens at 6:50 tomorrow, November 18; Everyday People screens at 6:50 on November 20; and Our Song screens at 6:50 on September 21. Again, the screenings are free, and BAM is located at 30 Lafayette Avenue in Brooklyn.… Read the rest
Friday, November 17th, 2006
Apparently Tickle Me Elmo isn’t the only electronic gadget capable of making otherwise sane, normal people stand in pouring rain and commit random acts of violence: meet PlayStation 3. Electronic gaming giant Sony Computer Entertainment unveiled the latest version of their popular console this week in the States, setting off an unprecedented wave of hysteria, violence and heartbreak.
In Connecticut, two armed thugs tried to rob a line of people waiting for the new game system to go on sale and shot a man who resisted. In Kentucky, four people were hit by BBs fired from a passing vehicle as they waited for a Best Buy store to open. In Palmdale, California, authorities shut down a Super Wal-Mart after shoppers began to riot. In Wisconsin, a 19-year-old was injured when he ran into a pole during a stampede for a much coveted spot outside another Wal-Mart.
The biggest question remains. Is PS3 worth all the trouble? Not if it will only play a fraction of PS 1 and 2 games, as widely reported.
PlayStation 3 hit Japan on November 10, and sold out within hours. A release in Europe is slated for March.… Read the rest
Thursday, November 16th, 2006
I was walking down St. Mark’s Place the other day and saw that a CBBG fashion store is going in at the site of the old Fillmore East. And, Hilly’s been talking about moving the legendary but now shuttered rock club to Las Vegas. So, I guess now is a good time to link to Braden King’s new Sonic Youth video, “Do You Believe in Rapture.” It’s his loving elegy to the club in all of its grimy, decaying, sticker-over-stickered, disgusting bathroom-ed glory, and it contains Super 8 footage from Jem Cohen.
Also: Claire Denis’s sensuously jittery video for another song off the same Rather Ripped album, “Incinerate.”… Read the rest
Thursday, November 16th, 2006
Currently out on DVD through First Run Features, Michael Apted‘s 49 UP continues the examination of the lives of 14 people that began when they were children in Paul Almond‘s Seven Up!
Via GreenCine here’s a Q&A with Apted on the UP series.… Read the rest
Thursday, November 16th, 2006
Online video network Revver teams up with IFP to bring filmmakers an unusual, highly original concept: the IFP – Revver Video Short Film Contest.
To compete, all you need to do is create a 60 second video (choosing from the list of themes offered), upload it using the handy UPLOAD tab found on the IFP site, and then log in to Revver to learn how to get your future films on their site! Contestants are encouraged to be as irreverent and experimental as they like, competing for a chance to win a ticket to the legendary Gotham Awards in early December, and have the film screened before a live industry audience. The winner will also have his/her film distributed on DVD to all Gotham attendees.
The competion promises to be fierce, at the same time unearthing a cornucopia of talented, budding filmmakers. Why not join in the fun and let your creative voice be heard?… Read the rest
Thursday, November 16th, 2006
IFP Gotham Awards are around the corner and this year you have a chance to see the nominees for Best Film Not Playing at a Theater Near You. From Nov. 24-27 they’ll be screening at MoMA leading up to the announcement of the winner, selected by Filmmaker, at the Gotham Awards Nov. 29th.
The five nominees — So Yong Kim‘s In Between Days, Richard Wong‘s Colma: The Musical, Steve Barron‘s Choking Man, Goran Dukic‘s Wristcutters—A Love Story, and Jake Clennell’s The Great Happiness Space: Tale of an Osaka Love Thief — were selected by a panel of advisors from numerous film festivals and then with the help of MoMA and the editors of Filmmaker narrowed the field down to these five worthy films.
To learn more about this year’s Gotham Awards click here.… Read the rest
Thursday, November 16th, 2006
Over at his blog, Doug Block responds to a comment I made about his interview (linked below) with Sujewa Ekanayake about the Truly Indie release of his 51 Birch Street.
Scott Macaulay at Filmmaker was a tad disappointed that I didn’t do more hardcore number crunching, but there’s a reason for that. When we signed the deal, Truly Indie asked me not to (largely because they’re considering raising their fees at some point). Personally, I think that’s a bit silly, since if filmmakers knew how relatively low the cost is, they’d be flocking to Truly Indie’s door. But TI’s Kelly Sanders is on the record as saying (at our Toronto Film Festival panel) that you could do a 5-city release for as little as $35,000. And in the same post (hint: see #7), I cunningly hinted at what our fees are for our initial 5 cities, which included NY, LA, SF, Chicago and Minneapolis.
And, he links back to this earlier blog posting listing his Top Ten Reasons for Going the Truly Indie Route.… Read the rest
