October 30th, 2009
The tireless Clint Eastwood returns in December with “Invictus,” which chronicles the five years from Nelson Mandela’s release from prison to his prominent role as President of South Africa to unify South Africa through the hosting of the 1995 Rugby World Cup. Morgan Freeman portrays Mandela and Matt Damon plays Francois Piennar, the victorious South African team captain.
Mark Macaskill of The Times discovers that “Robert Carlyle fans can buy a role in his new film.”
Viggo Mortensen, Charlize Theron, and Kodi Smit-McPhee appear in November in the film adaptation of Cormac McCarthy’s “The Road,” directed by John Hillcoat, who helmed 2005’s vastly impressive “The Proposition.”
“Antichrist” star Charlotte Gainsbourg reveals to Mick LaSalle of the San Francisco Chronicle that “on the balance, all the naked things and the sex scenes were nothing compared to the grieving scenes.”
One Film Wonder: In 1980, South African director Jamie Uys made “The Gods Must Be Crazy,” which centered on Xi, a Saho bushman in the Kalahari Desert, who discovers a soft drink bottle and embarks on a journey to discard it. As “The Gods Must Be Crazy” was financed with South African government funds at a time of an international embargo, the film was marketed as a Botswanan film. Describing the work as a “highly popular and distorted film,” Canadian anthropologist Richard Lee noted in his book “The Dobe, Ju/hoansi” that “The Gods Must Be Crazy” inaccurately “tried to portray the Ju/’hoansi as pristine hunter-gatherers ‘untouched’ by civilization.” The film became a world-wide sensation. In North America, interest began in midnight movie houses, with the movie earning expanding distribution in 1984 and grossing more than $30 million.
Xi was portrayed by N!xau, a San, one of the indigenous peoples living in the region classified presently as South Africa and Namibia. Born circa 1944, he was paid a reported few hundred dollars for his performance in the film. For the 1989 sequel, “The Gods Must Be Crazy II,” he negotiated a purported salary in the hundreds of thousands. N!xau appeared in only 4 other films, each one of them a sequel in the “The Gods Must Be Crazy” franchise; the last three, which were not directed by Uys, were set in Hong Kong and filmed in Cantonese. A herdsman, he returned to Tsumkwe in the Otjozondjua region of Namibia to live on his farm with his family. N!xau died in 2003.
Posted in Beyond the Reel |
Tagged Antichrist, Charlize Theron, Charlotte Gainsbourg, Clint Eastwood, Cormac McCarthy, Invictus, Jamie Uys, John Hillcoat, Kodi Smit-McPhee, Mark Macaskill, Matt Damon, Mick LaSalle, Morgan Freeman, N!xau, One Film Wonder, Robert Carlyle, San Francisco Chronicle, The Gods Must Be Crazy, The Gods Must Be Crazy II, The Proposition, The Road, The Times, Viggo Mortensen |
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October 2nd, 2009
Penelope Cruz returns in November to North American screens in Pedro Almodovar’s “Broken Embraces.”
Tim Murphy of New York Magazine finds “Precious” star Gabby Sidibe “living the life.”
Lars von Trier — the vuvuzela of world cinema — arrives stateside later this month with the graphic and divisive “Antichrist.”
The Vancouver Sun’s Randy Shore asks, “Did you hear the one about the first nations’ comedy?”
One Film Wonder: Barbara Loden was a celebrated stage actress who only appeared in three films, most notably as Ginny Stamper, the older, promiscuous sister of Warren Beatty’s Bud in 1961’s “Splendor in the Grass, directed by her future husband, Elia Kazan, whom she married in 1968. She won the Tony for Best Performance by a Featured Actress in 1964 for her portrayal of Maggie in Arthur Miller’s “After the Fall.”
In 1970, Loden wrote and directed “Wanda,” her only feature-film work behind the camera, and starred in the title role. In his March 1971 review, The New York Times’ Roger Greenspun remarked that “Loden’s film, by the time you are through with it, has, rather surprisingly, some of the look of classical moviemaking.” Thirty-five years later, Dave Kehr in the same paper lauded the film a “masterpiece” which
“had the bad luck to be doubly ahead of its time. Politically, it was guilty of premature post-feminism. The story about a youngish housewife (played by Ms. Loden) from Pennsylvania coal mining country who walks away from her husband and two children to take up with a mean-spirited petty thief (Michael Higgins) is hardly a parade of positive role models. And formally, the film — shot in 16-millimeter by Nicholas Proferes, using the lightweight equipment that was then driving the cinéma vérité documentary movement — goes far beyond the jittery, performance-centered style associated with that era’s independent films, like John Cassavetes’s 1968 “Faces.”
Barbara Loden died of breast cancer in 1980 at the age of 48.
Posted in Beyond the Reel |
Tagged Antichrist, Arthur Miller, Barbara Loden, Broken Embraces, Dave Kehr, Discussing Mr. Darcy, Elia Kazan, Faces, Gabby Sidibe, John Cassavetes, Lars von Trier, Michael Higgins, New York Magazine, Nicholas Proferes, One Film Wonder, Pedro Almodovar, Penelope Cruz, Precious, Randy Shore, Roger Greenspun, Splendor in the Grass, The New York Times, The Vancouver Sun, Tim Murphy, Wanda, Warren Beatty |
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May 22nd, 2009
Coming in August. Quentin Tarantino’s Summer Blockbuster for the Indie World.
The divisive Lars von Trier returns with his latest contentious work, “Antichrist,” and Roger Ebert of the Chicago Sun-Times plays devil’s advocate as he pens a thoughtful essay on the film and the divergent reaction to the Danish enigma, which can be summed up by an enthralled First Showing’s Alex Billington exclaiming I had a blast watching this while Todd McCarthy of Variety says the auteur cuts a big fat art-film fart.
Opening on July 17, the postmodern, bittersweet love story “(500) Days of Summer” stars the adorable pair of “The Lookout”’s Joseph Gordon-Levitt and “Tin Man”’s Zooey Deschanel.
Kenneth Turan of the LA Times revels in Jane Campion’s “Bright Star” poetry while the New Zealand Herald’s Helen Barlow lauds the film as “Campion’s poetic comeback.”
One Film Wonder: “This is Spinal Tap” — the greatest mockumentary ever made — boasts not one but two one film wonders. David Kaff played the band’s loopy keyboardist, Viv Savage, and in the subsequent quarter century he has landed a half-dozen roles, mostly on Aussie telly. As the band’s latest ill-fated drummer, R.J. Parnell portrayed Mick Shrimpton with ciggy-dangling-from-the-lip rock and roll insouciance. Parnell was summarily typecast in his only other role; he was “Drummer” in 2004’s “The Devil’s Due at Midnight.” In Spinal Tap’s uproarious final credit sequence, both Savage and Shrimpton impart their succinct philosophies.
Posted in Beyond the Reel |
Tagged Alex Billington, Antichrist, Bright Star, David Kaff, Helen Barlow, Inglourious Basterds, Jane Campion, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Kenneth Turan, Lars von Trier, One Film Wonder, Quentin Tarantino, R.J. Parnell, Roger Ebert, The Devil's Due at Midnight, The Lookout, This is Spinal Tap, Todd McCarthy, Zooey Deschanel |
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