October 7, 2004

Shorts, 10/7.

Twilight of the Ice Nymphs Max Goldberg previews "Fiercely Primitive: The Films of Guy Maddin," a series at the Pacific Film Archive (October 8 through 31): "Maddin isn't the first filmmaker obsessed with film history, but where others deify past achievements from afar, he actually inhabits the abandoned film languages of yesteryear."

Also in the San Francisco Bay Guardian:

Canfield has seen The Incredibles and offers his first impressions at Twitch: "The movie that will rock the holiday box office."

Stuart Klawans's piece on "iCinema" is inaccessible at the Nation's site, but you can read his interpretation of the mixed messages about the future of filmmaking sent by Tarnation and Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow at Alternet. For more on the making of Tarnation, see Andy Bailey's freshly posted piece at Filmmaker, where Steve Gallagher rounds up news of and reactions to the animated feature Muhammad: The Last Prophet.

"[David Lynch] wrote this amazing screenplay called 'Ronnie Rocket' that's been shelved for about 20 years now, and it's kind of a sequel to Eraserhead. It's about this detective who goes into a place called "the inner city" to figure out why the electricity has gone in reverse. I'd love to do it, but I know he'll do it someday." Peter L'Official interviews Jonathan Caouette. Also in Salon: Stephanie Zacharek on House of Flying Daggers ("an epic of the heart"; Filmbrain's verdict: Not great but still "a highly enjoyable, entertaining, richly cinematic two hours") and Charles Taylor on Vera Drake: "It's as if Leigh the dramatist is replaced in the movie's second half by a Marxist theorist who is more interested in demonstrating a thesis about class, even if it destroys all the virtues of the movie he's been making."

Vince Keenan is getting a kick out of Henry Kissinger's chats with celebs.

CNET's Alorie Gilbert reports on Overstock.com's unusual promotion for the Fahrenheit 9/11 DVD, pitting it directly against Fahrenhype 9/11.

Different networks made different directorial choices on the night of the first debate between John Kerry and George W Bush. In a New York Times op-ed, David Thomson accepts the power of the close-up and the split screen but, in the case of these debates, prefers the two-shot or group shot:

Bazin (and others) believed that the cinema (and why not television?) had (or has?) a natural affinity for showing people together and people in places so that we understand both better. The close-up (vital as it may be to storytelling) tends to emphasize the glamour, drama (or melodrama?) of lone people; it has the seed of dictatorship in it. The cinema was based for decades on the notion that all people are equal, alike but different, and it found glory in the group shot that allowed us to look from one person to another, and feel the kinship and the difference.

More first debate analysis on the eve of the second one: Frank Rich and Maureen Dowd.

Also: Nick Madigan on how friends and family are seeking to correct the tabloid image of Marlon Brando's last years; he was not, they say, reclusive and impoverished. And NYFF reviews:

  • Manohla Dargis on Kings and Queen: "[Arnaud] Desplechin has no interest in polishing narrative like a gemstone; he would rather take a chisel to it." And Or: "Well-meaning but irritatingly naïve."
  • AO Scott on Macunaíma ("a gloriously demented artifact of its time") and Tarnation ("suggests that the confessional, autobiographical impulse that emerged in American poetry in the late 1950's and that has more recently produced a flood of prose memoirs has now found an outlet on screen").
  • Eric Asimov on Sideways: "The movie's novelty is a measure of the awkward and singular relationship that Americans have with wine."

Anthony Kaufman weighs the prospects for the ten or so films showing at NYFF that have yet to sew up a North American distribution deal. Also at indieWIRE: Jonathan Caouette tells Brandon Judell he's asking "really good questions."

"A good blog can be a powerful cult accelerator." Adam Baer compares but mostly contrasts Zach Braff's blog and Gawker Media's for A Dirty Shame.

Robert Faires talks to Gabe Kaplan (yes, that one) about his one-man show, Groucho: A Life in Review. Also in the Austin Chronicle: Anne S Lewis asks filmmakers Louis Alvarez and Andy Kolker about their latest doc, Small Ball: A Little League Story.

Land of Plenty Wim Wenders's Land of Plenty opens in Germany today, so briefly, a few pointers to interviews with the director in German:

In the City Pages, Matthew Wilder ponders Bergman's place in the here and now.

"He was such a mischievous imp." The Guardian excerpts Janet Leigh's forward to Ken Mogg's The Alfred Hitchcock Story.

Also:

  • Adrian Searle: "Tate Modern's exhibition Time Zones is long overdue, the first survey of time in recent film and video that the Tate has ever mounted."
  • Possible Jane Austen adaptations from Xan Brooks.
  • Richard Dreyfuss confines his career to the stage: "I'm not seeking to do any more movies, and they're not seeking me. I'm quite happy with that situation."

How to Lose Friends and Alienate People Miramax is investing big-time in an adaptation of Toby Young's How to Lose Friends and Alienate People, reports Ben Dowell in the Sunday Times. The Cinecultist is baffled by the choice of Jake Gyllenhaal to play "the bald, portly 40-year-old writer."

James Rampton interviews Kevin Kline for the Independent.

Recent entries from Cinema Minima's far-flung correspondents: Amit Tyagi in Nairobi, Wilfred Lobo in Mumbai and Mike Atherton in London.

Team America finally has its R rating, giggles Nicole Sperling in the Hollywood Reporter: "The production team submitted the scene [to the MPAA] with various alterations to the board 10 times before it agreed."

Online viewing tip. A few whimsical stop motion shorts. Via Wiley Wiggins.



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Posted by dwhudson at October 7, 2004 8:49 AM