The first film completed by Merchant Ivory Productions since the death of producer Ismail Merchant in 2005, The City of Your Final Destination is the latest work from director James Ivory. Based on the Peter Cameron novel, with a screenplay by Ruth Prawer Jhabvala, the motion picture, which opens today, stars Norma Aleandro, Charlotte Gainsbourg, Anthony Hopkins and Laura Linney.
Jeremy Sheldon reveals “Cinema’s Invisible Art” in Granta.
The debut film from director Duncan Ward, Boogie Woogie boasts a massive ensemble cast — Gillian Anderson, Alan Cumming, Heather Graham, Danny Huston, Christopher Lee, Joanna Lumley, Charlotte Rampling, Amanda Seyfried, and Stellan Skarsgård, et al. Based on the novel by Danny Moynihan, who also wrote the script, Boogie Woogie will be released in North America beginning April 23.
Steven Zeitchik at the L.A. Times blog, 24 Frames, muses “If you thought ‘Bad Lieutenant’ was nutty…”
One Film Wonder: An acclaimed soprano of the first half of the twentieth century, Jarmila Novotná appeared in only one film which was a not a musical, based on a musical theme or cast her in a singing role. Born in Prague in 1907, Novotná debuted at the city’s opera house in 1925, before embarking on a singing career throughout Europe. During the 1930s, while based in Berlin and Vienna, she starred in a succession of music-based films. Novotná began a 16-year reign in 1940 at New York City’s Metropolitan Opera.
In 1948, following a 12-year gap since her last film, Novotná starred in her only non-singing, non-musical role in Fred Zinnemann’s The Search. She portrayed Hannah Malik, a Czech concentration camp survivor, who seeks the son she been separated from in post-World War II Germany. Starring Montgomery Clift as a G.I. helping the young Czech boy (Ivan Jandl) locate Malik, The Search, which was filmed on-location in war-ravaged German cites, was a critical and audience favorite. Following The Search, she appeared in 1951’s The Great Caruso and made a number of television appearances during the decade. Novotná retired from her singing career in 1956 and died in New York City in 1994.
