I don’t smoke weed, but if I did, I’d spend today getting high and watching a marathon of movies that are (supposedly) better when you’re stoned. Why? Because it’s 4/20, the high holy day for marijuana fans. You’ve probably seen a billion of these lists, which recommend the same bunch of psychedelic classics beloved by stoners everywhere. So, instead of including such obvious choices as 2001: A Space Odyssey, Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory, and other familiar titles, I’ve picked some alternatives to the usual 4/20 favorites, because after awhile, the same old visuals just don’t do it for me — I mean, those sick, degenerate reefer addicts — anymore. …Read more
We’re less than two weeks away from receiving this year’s Oscar nominations, and though none of the major categories are completely predictable just yet, each has at least three or four certain favorites. Meanwhile, the final slots for Best Picture, Best Director and the acting and screenwriting categories may be simply a random grab from small handfuls of rotating contenders. As of now, it doesn’t appear we’ll be seeing any huge surprises come the morning of January 22nd, when the Academy announces the nominees. The Dark Knight is sure to become the first comic book film up for Best Picture, and it won’t even be a shocker if animated feature Wall-E is listed alongside it in the same category.
But the ballots don’t need to be mailed out until Monday, so I’m taking one last chance to reach out to the procrastinators within the Academy membership. If you still don’t know who and what to write in, and you’re unwilling to go the safe route and nominate the expected bunch of films and talent, then consider some of these underdogs, under-appreciated and pretty much unlikely possibilities: …Read more
After making a big splash at Sundance several years ago with his hysterical short Windowbreaker, the incredibly prolific and versatile Tze Chun, who in the five years since graduating from Columbia’s undergrad Film Studies program in 02′ has made a whopping 12 low budget short films, will be back in Park City this year with his debut feature, Children of Invention. A feature length version of Windowbreaker, it follows two young Asian children living illegally in a model apartment who are left to fend for themselves when their hardworking mother disappears. We caught up with Tze (pronounced “Z”) to discuss his adoration for inappropriately long Charlie Kaufman interviews, his desire to adapt portions of Virginia Woolf and in what capacity Richard Kern and Britney Spear might become friends. …Read more
Why did Kurt Anderson conduct a radio interview with Synecdoche, New York director/writer Charlie Kaufman in the middle of the dog run at Washington Square Park? Presumably, so we could have the pleasure of watching the above video, in which Kaufman tries to explain is desire “to give the world something that isn’t crap,” but is distracted when pounced on by adorable puppies. Cue Jon Brion’ “Little Person,” and watch grown men reach for the Kleenex. The full Studio 360 segment with Kaufman can be listened to here.
Trying to make an independent film about a gay man and a terrorist bonding in a Brazilian prison cell was not an easy thing to do in the early 1980’s. Nevertheless, producer David Weisman did exactly that, making Kiss of the Spider Woman not only a reality, but an Oscar-winning hit. We talk with Weisman about his beginnings, and the struggle of making an independent film without a road map.
While independent filmmakers certainly have more options in 2008, one hurdle that remains is distribution. We talk to documentarian Anne Sundberg about her latest film, The End of America. Five months ago it was an idea, today it can be viewed for free online at SnagFilms.com.
There’s a bit in The Anatomy of Melancholy about the “madness” common to critics, artists, and philosophers, and by extension anyone who remains so lost in thought or creative action that they’re rarely actually fully present in life. “Is not he mad that draws lines with Archimedes, whilst his house is ransacked and his city besieged, when the whole world is in combustion, or we whilst our souls are in danger … to spend our time in toys, idle questions, and things of no worth?” And then author Robert Burton jumps straight into describing a similar sort of madness: “That lovers are mad, I think no man will deny. To love and be wise, Jupiter himself cannot intend both at once.”
Synecdoche, New York, Charlie Kaufman’s directorial debut, is impeccably acted, inventively designed, sometimes laugh-out-loud funny, and often devastatingly sad. It was also still such a mystery to me after two viewings that I found it hard to trust my own vocabulary to describe what the experience of watching it is actually like. But Burton, rambling on 400 years before the fact, seems to nail it, or at least part of it: a life where the madness of creativity and the madness of love/lust are constantly exchanged for one another, to the point where pleasure from either is unattainable. But it’s also about the fear of death, the impossibility of romance in the absence of longing, the instinct to project our desires on to others and to seek answers about ourselves in mirror images. In other words, as theater director Caden Cotard (Philip Seymour Hoffman) says of his own life’s work, “It’s about everything.”
A sampling of the many special film events happening around the city this week:
Tonight Anthology Film Archives will host the premiere of Flaherty NYC, a new monthly series of works taken from the lineup of the Flaherty Film Seminar held earlier this summer. Tonight’s program focuses on a number of shorts by Oliver Husain, including Q, which is described as “a fantasy of globalization set in a multicultural consumer space that fulfills its shoppers’ and viewers’ every desire and need.”More info here.
Jody Lambert’s Of All the Things, a documentary about his songwriter/performer father Dennis Lambert and his unlikely “comeback” concert in the Philippines, screens at Stranger Than Fiction at the IFC Center tomorrow night. Father and son will be at the screening for a Q & A; the following night, Dennis Lambert will perform a showcase at Joe’s Pub. More info at the Stranger Than Fiction Facebook page.
The Hamptons Film Festival begins on Wednesday, and it’s opening and closing with two gems that I first saw in Toronto. The opening night film is Valentino: The Last Emperor, Matt Tynauer’sseverely underrated doc on the the designer, his long-time business partner/boyfriend, and The End of Couture As We Know It. The closing night film is Charlie Kaufman’s Synecdoche, New York, which I’ve now seen twice and still can’t quite figure out how to write about. I might try for round three this weekend. It’s depressing as hell, but I think it might be my favorite American film of the year. See the trailer above.
Why doesn’t anyone care about M. Night Shyamalan’s The Happening? iO9’s Graeme McMillan has a theory: “The trailer gives you absolutely no idea what the movie is about, apart from people dying and Mark Wahlberg looking confused. People probably thought that it’s some kind of big-budget sequel to A&E’s turgid Andromeda Strain remake.”
Paul Scheer’s first paid job as an actor was in The Onion: The Movie. “I shot it about 6 years ago, I’ve never seen it, nor did I ever see a script for the entire film (just my scene) but after reading this quote from the Washington Post, I’m intrigued…” We assume he was as “intrigued” as us by the part about the film co-starring “Kevin Federline, who — oh irony of ironies! — appears as a dancer in a music video that satirizes soon-to-be-wife Spears.”
Jeff Wells takes a look at a piece by Gregg Goldstein on Charlie Kaufmann’s Synecdoche, New York. “The title of Goldstein’s piece is ‘Synecdoche could improve with edit’; the subhead is ‘Hypnotic film may undergo further cuts.’ The Hollywood Elsewhere response: ‘No shit?’”
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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Why doesn’t anyone care about M. Night Shyamalan’s 
