Of all the whining I heard over the past few days from Comic-Con, the complaints about missing the Iron Man 2panel and footage seemed to be the loudest and most drawn out. Perhaps people were just that eager to see Scarlett Johansson as she talked about playing Black Widow? It’s likely considering the whole SDCC event has apparently turned into something more to do with sex appeal than comic books (though one could argue that comics have always been about sex appeal anyway).
The big topic of the day seems to regard ScarJo’s character in the movie, specifically her weight loss and fitness training for the role, which makes her somewhat the female equivalent to New Moon’s Taylor Lautner, who helped promote his movie at the Con by showing off his amazing abs. But because this isn’t a gossip blog, I’m going to spin the discussion toward the more important things learned from the actress and the rest of those involved with IM2.
Check out the last of my collection of favorite Comic-Con coverage, as it focuses on the man of iron, after the jump: …Read more
This review was originally published in slightly different form during the Sundance Film Festival. Moon opens in New York and LA on Friday.
A small, personal story wrapped in the trappings of classic sci-fi epic, Moon manages to be both derivative (most notably, of Stanley Kubrick’s2001) and deliberately rebellious in its treatment of sci-fi tropes. Moving through familiar territory and yet sparked with a spirit all its own, like any great work of genre cinema Moon’s future-world scenario and super-slick techno-artistry are put to the service of a story that ultimately downplays the traumas wrought by technological possibility in order to dig deep into the trauma of being a person. …Read more
Thanks to David Hudson of IFC.com’s The Daily and just about everybody else for so clearly letting me know what “everyone’s talking about” today: the new trailer for the sci-fi Sundance sensation Moon. I find the excitement interesting for two reasons. First, I think it’s odd when people who’ve already seen a movie go ga-ga for its trailer. Such subjective write-ups also tend to hint that spoilers abound, which can be quite obnoxious. Second, I think it’s strange that we still go completely insane for films like this, even as we immediately address their influences in Kubrick and Tarkovsky. I’m not complaining, of course; I love all derivatives of 2001: A Space Odyssey, Solyaris, Alien, Metropolis, Blade Runner, The Matrix, Close Encounters of the Third Kind, etc. There’s just something about sci-fi that overcomes the usual complaints against lack of originality.
Anyway, because I haven’t yet seen Moon (Karina has, though, read her review from Sundance here), I’m going to attempt to ignore the commentary from people who already love the film (sorry Billington, Goss, etc.). Objective reactions only, after the jump: …Read more
Duncan Jones‘ Moon divided critics at Sundance, which is maybe not much of a surprise. A slow, introspective homage to classic sci-fi with one actor (Sam Rockwell in a perfectly modulated dual role), two locations (inside a moon space station, and just outside it), and minimalist special effects, Moon challeneges the viewer to confront what they think they know about space movies and lonely-man-in-existential-crisis movies equally. Audiences that get it seem to really get it, and hopefully Sony Classics, who are scheduled to release the film in June, won’t push the genre elements over the intellectual elements –– or vice versa –– when the victory of the film is the merging of the two. As I put it in my review, Moon “feels more casual and accessible than any cinematic exploration of the Lacanian mirror stage has a right to be.”
Whilst at Sundance, I got a few minutes alone with Rockwell and Jones, and we chatted about their mutual love of early-80s sci-fi, the technology and technique behind the dual performance, and the real life potential of Moon’s alternative energy fantasy. Beware: there’s a possible spoiler immediately after the jump.
Critics had every reason to object when Billy Bob Thornton remade The Bad News Bears a few years back. After all, Walter Matthau had already defined the role of foul-mouthed Coach Buttermaker, a cranky alcoholic who oversees a team of misfit little leaguers, in the perfectly serviceable 1976 original. Now we get yet another variation on the formula, this time starring Sam Rockwell as the last man you’d want coaching a varsity girls basketball team, in The Winning Season.
Strange that this second film from Grace Is Gone writer-director James C. Strouse could be so different from his debut (in which John Cusack played an emasculated widower who refuses to cope with the death of his wife in Iraq), and yet so similar to an entire subcategory of the underdog sports comedy. Some would argue that the girls basketball angle sets The Winning Season apart, but what little originality the film has going for it is the element it shares with the largely unseen (and widely unloved) Grace Is Gone –– namely, its observant yet underplayed attention to a fragile father figure.
50 Centannounced a new production company, Cheetah Vision, which currently has eight scripts in development, including the company’s inaugural movie, The Dance,starring Nicolas Cage. 50 Cent will also see his directorial debut, Before I Self Destruct, released this year for free as a supplement to his latest album.
Despite the fact that the presidential inauguration typically occurs during Sundance, this year the festival took a more noticeable pause to watch Barack Obama sworn in yesterday. Sundance Institute’s Michelle Satterberg on the event: “I think we just didn’t care about it [before]. But this is different.”
Steven Soderbergh hosted a “secret screening” of his latest, The Girlfriend Experience. Check out Karina’s review here.
As Sony Classics and Lionsgate make their first festival buys, Summit is reportedly interested inI Love You Phillip Morris. Meanwhile, at Slamdance, North American rights to The Ante have gone to Panorama Entertainment. Other Sundance titles likely to sell soon, according to Anne Thompson: Shana Feste’sThe Greatest; Bobcat Goldthwait’s World’s Greatest Dad; the Ashton Kutcher-produced Spread; and the Anna Wintour doc The September Issue.
According to E!,the whole “subdued” thing hasn’t actually affected the swag.
Regarding the minor trend in Sci-Fi films this year, Moon star Sam Rockwell says, “I think in-camera effects are coming back full-throttle. I think people are getting a little sick of the glossiness of CGI and want to see old-school effects like they used to.” Hallelujah to that.
Another trend this year: romantic comedy. Or, is it more like romantic “dramedy”?
For those of you who don’t like the cold weather in Park City, Sundance is in negotiations to launch a version of its film festival in Abu Dhabi (pictured). Original idea was to hold the new fest in April, but it’s likely to happen later due to the current economy.
Also an effect of the recession: a leaner Sundance, with lowered attendance, smaller crowds (particularly for lack of a lot of the people who go to Park City just to hang out), and fewer parties. The Salt Lake Tribune examines all the cutbacks, including economic effects on documentary filmmaking, distribution and Sundance deal-making, and ends with a nice quote from Robert Redford: “What might be a positive is that if there is less hoo-ha, less of a circus atmosphere, there will be more tendency to focus on what it is that we’re really about, which is the independent filmmakers and the quality of the work.”
The Hollywood Reporter also spoke to Redford, who admits there are currently too many film festivals, and Sundance may eventually become obsolete as a result: “My feeling is when the day comes when we’re no longer providing the mission we started with — not creating something new for audiences, not creating opportunities for new artists to have a place to come and develop — then we shouldn’t be here, and we won’t. As long as we continue to create new advantages, we will continue, but not just to be continuing.”
The New York Times profiles The Informers and its ill-fit premiere at this year’s fest. Says author/co-screenwriter Bret Easton Ellis: “When people tell you something’s ‘a real Sundance movie,’ that’s more negative than a compliment.”
One of the many things Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich did this week — instead of resigning from his position, as many people desired — was sign into law an increase on tax credits for films produced in his state. So, it should be only appropriate, and somewhat bittersweet, for the inevitable movie about his life and corruption hearings to be shot there.
Now that we’ve got a location for the film, it’s time to cast the players in Blogojevich’s scandalous tale. The Washington Post has already published a list of possible actors to portray the lead (John Travolta, Sean Astin, Gary Cole, Stephen Baldwin, Tom Cruise, Ray Liotta, Charlie Sheen, Mike Myers and Steve Carrell), but more difficult than casting Blogojevich (see our pick below) is determining what other significant figures should be prominently featured.
A straight biopic calls for way too many characters, so we’ve narrowed the film down to focus on just Blagojevich’s arrest and subsequent (forthcoming) trial. As always, if there’s another character to be included or another thespian suited to a role we’ve cast, chime in with a comment. Also, due to the fact that we’ve previously done posts about Barack Obama casting, let’s just assume that he’ll only be portrayed by a voice on the phone, a la Al Gore in Recount. …Read more
Chuck Palahniuk, the author behind David Fincher’s Fight Club and Clark Gregg’s Choke, opening in theaters this Friday 9/26, pens intelligent, well-written junk food. I enjoy reading all his books, and even have a friend I nicknamed Brandy Alexander after the transgender lead character in Invisible Monsters, yet whenever someone asks me the plot of a particular novel that isn’t Invisible Monsters, I draw a blank. I mean, I’m certain I’ve read his books, just like I’m certain I ate dinner last Thursday, I just can’t tell you exactly what it was.
So when I learned I had an email interview with the author himself scheduled I had to dig out my old copy of Choke and check the jacket. Ah, sex addicts who work at a fake Colonial village – how could I have forgotten? No matter. The writing is terrific. Palahniuk might be able to shed some light on the grander themes he seems to be addressing, from numb consumer culture to transgender issues to the difference between nonfiction “truth” versus “truth” in fiction, I reasoned.
You see, I just couldn’t accept Choke on the same terms as a piece of well-made but empty entertainment like The Scorpion King, which worked because it didn’t overreach beyond what was necessary, tailored the script specifically to The Rock’s charming, self-deprecating personality and nothing more. I wanted to know why I always felt an important statement about society was being made in Palahniuk’s books.
But after finally interviewing the author I got a strong sense that his working method is more akin to that of the car mechanic he was for years. As a writer he seems to take the same sort of Meyerhold biomechanics approach (“I saw a bear, I ran, I was afraid”) that I learned in acting school. In other words, through the physical, mechanical act of writing – and not reflection – he gets at a deeper truth. Which is deep in itself. Now if only I could remember what Rant was about…
I knew the whole red-band fad would come to this: Fox Searchlight is promoting the latest trailer for its Sundance-pickup Choke as “the raunchiest red-band trailer EVER.” Well, I don’t know if I agree with the statement — maybe if Fox hadn’t censored the sex scenes with “Big Screen Only” banners — but something about this latest spot makes me more interested in the film. Could it be the nudity? Or the swearing? Or maybe it’s simply the greater exposure to the coarseness we’ve come to expect from Sam Rockwell. And here he appears more depraved than usual.
On the film’s adults-only website (also available to kids who know how to pick the age-restriction locks), there are also four new promotional videos featuring strippers reading passages from Chuck Palahniuk’s novel, on which the movie is based. They’re pretty funny if you’re still into the dumb stripper stereotype (I prefer the smart MENSA strippers/porn stars like Asia Carrera, of course). Also on the site, you can kinda learn how to do the Heimlich Maneuver.
Choke won a Special Jury Prize for its ensemble cast (including my current celebrity crush, Kelly Macdonald) at Sundance this past January. It opens in theaters nationwide September 26.
We’ve had a bit of trouble getting this episode to go through the iTunes feed, so we hope this re-post will fix the problem. The original post, with episode description and embedded player, is here.
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50 Cent 
