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March 2009
Noteworthy DVDs released 3/31/09
PICK OF THE WEEK
‘Slumdog Millionaire’ (Fox). It wasn’t the best movie of the year, no matter what the Academy says, but Danny Boyle’s often delightful, oddly old-fashioned romance has charm to burn.
OTHER TOP PICKS
‘Fallen Angels’ & ‘Happy Together’ (Kino). Two of the more accessible outings by style-obsessed Wong Kar-Wai, just out in editions with worthwhile bonus features.
‘Pride and Prejudice’ (1995) (A&E). Colin Firth as Mister Darcy, finally able to agitate Jane Austen fans on Blu-ray.
‘Tell No One’ (MPI). It drops the ball just a tiny bit at the end, when a character stands around and explains secrets that should unveil themselves more cinematically, but this French thriller about a widower who believes his wife isn’t dead gets the job done.
‘Timecrimes’ (Magnolia). The Fantastic Fest fave from Spain, in which a man hops back in time an hour, largely so the filmmakers can include many shots of the same naked woman.
NEW ON BLU-RAY
‘John Carpenter’s Ghosts of Mars,’ ‘The One’ (Sony); ‘National Geographic: Kingdom of the Blue Whale’ (Warner Bros.); ‘The Robe,’ ‘South Pacific’ (Fox); ‘Two Evil Eyes’ (Blue Underground)
FRESH FROM THE MULTIPLEX
‘Marley and Me’ (Fox); ‘Seven Pounds’ (Sony)
ARTHOUSE/FOREIGN
‘Danton,’ ‘Il Generale Della Rovere’ (Criterion); ‘Same Old Song’ (New Yorker); ‘Tehilim’ (Kino)
BEST OF TV
‘Dennis Miller: The HBO Comedy Specials’ (Kultur); ‘The IT Crowd’ Season 1 (MPI); ‘Ricky Gervais: Out of England’ (HBO)
KIDS’ STUFF
‘Baby Einstein: Baby World Music,’ ‘Hannah Montana: Keeping It Real,’ ‘Schoolhouse Rock: Earth’ (Walt Disney); ‘Goosebumps’: ‘Return of the Mummy’ and ‘The Scarecrow Walks At Midnight’ (Fox); ‘Thomas & Friends: High Speed Adventures’ (Lions Gate)
CULT CORNER
‘The Cremator’ (Dark Sky); ‘Erotic Horror Triple Feature’ (Seduction Cinema); ‘Exposed’ (Synapse)
STRAIGHT(ISH) TO VIDEO
‘The Butterfly Effect 3: Revelations’ (Lions Gate)
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Bad boy ‘Bruno’ slapped with NC-17
At least for now. We report this because 20 minutes of raucous clips of the new Sacha Baron Cohen comedy screened during SXSW and our own Charles Ealy watched and blogged about it HERE.
Sharon Waxman at The Wrap reports:
Universal’s ”Bruno,” the widely anticipated Sacha Baron Cohen docu-comedy opening in July, has been slapped with an NC-17 rating on its first submission to the Motion Picture Association of America because of numerous sexual scenes that the ratings board considers over the line, according to the studio releasing the film.
Among the objectionable scenes is one in which Bruno — a gay Austrian fashionista played by Baron Cohen — appears to have anal sex with a man on camera. In another, the actor goes on a hunting trip and sneaks naked into the tent of one of the fellow hunters, an unsuspecting non-actor.
A Universal spokesman confirmed the rating on Sunday, saying: “On its first submission the film did not receive an R but it is far too early to say that there is any struggle to get there as the process is only at its inception.”
Baron Cohen is accustomed to pushing boundaries. In his last hit film, “Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan,” the writer and actor orchestrated outrageous real-life situations that challenged anti-Semitic and other stereotypes.
With “Bruno,” Baron Cohen apparently goes even further, drawing a cutting comic edge that challenges homophobia and racism by embracing both. His method is a kind of cinema verite, drawing unsuspecting bystanders into outrageous situations, or provoking them to say outrageous things, and orchestrating NC-17 rated situations.
Individuals close to the film say that Baron Cohen, Bruno’s writer and star, is “experimenting” and still “finding the film,” and tested two different versions with audiences in the past week. Both screenings, they said, were very successful.
But Cohen needs to deliver an R-rated film to Universal, which will not consider releasing an NC-17 “Bruno,” according to an executive there.
Text and graphic: Sharon Waxman’s The Wrap.
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Varying views of Texas in film series
So many movies have been made in Texas that it’s hard to pick just a few for a film series. But the Austin Film Festival and Bullock Museum have selected an interesting array of titles for their Made in Texas Film Series, six movies made by Texans or in Texas, or both.
Look:
April 8: “Songwriter,” with writer Bud Shrake and musician Ray Benson in attendance
May 13: “Fandango,” with writer-director Kevin Reynolds there
June 10: “Blood Simple”
July 8: (tba)
Aug. 12: “Chalk,” with writer-director Mike Akel and writer-actor Chris Mass there
Sept. 9: “A Perfect World,” with writer-director John Lee Hancock
All shows at 7:30 p.m. in the Texas Spirit Theater. Free for festival and Bullock Museum members. $5 general.
More HERE.
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Arkansas considering tax incentives
Smack on the heels of the Texas House passing a bill approving film incentives Tuesday comes this report about Arkansas mulling the idea, via today’s New York Times:
“As states line up to lure filmmakers with higher tax incentives and other perks, Arkansas legislators are trying to catch up. After almost a decade of some of the least impressive rebates in the country, the state may gain on its movie-friendly neighbors with a 15 percent tax break for movie productions in the state. Legislation for the tax credit moves to the state senate floor Thursday, said State Rep. Rick Saunders, a Democrat from Hot Springs and the bill’s sponsor.”
Read the whole piece HERE.
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Cine Las Americas honors Chilean cinema
It’s coming fast: Cine Las Americas International Film Festival happens April 22 — 30. For the first time in its 12 years, the fest has invited a guest country and Chile has accepted the honor.
What’s it mean? That the fest has made “space for the screening of films that represent the best and most successful of contemporary Chilean cinema, focusing on films produced in the post-dictatorship period from 1994 to 2004.” New and classic Chilean films are also part of the program.
More about the guest and the fest HERE.
Perfect for the kids: Dave England, naughty/nasty/numbskull from the “Jackass” franchise, teaches a digital filmmaking workshop April 5 at the Austin School of Film. Info and sign-up HERE.
England follows the class with a live show at the Alamo Ritz. More HERE.
Sidney and Shelby Brammer screen their short film “The Flea Circus” — an adaptation of part of their late father Billy Lee Brammer’s legendary Texas political novel “The Gay Place” — at 5 p.m. April 3 at Austin Community College’s Rio Grande campus.
A panel, “Austin in the 50s: The Political and Literary Landscapes of Billy Lee Brammer,” with Jan Reid, Don Graham, Jap Cartwright, Kaye Northcott, Nadine Eckhardt and Babe Schwartz, follows.
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Film incentives fly through House
Good news for Texas film tax incentives, as reported by the American-Statesman’s Corrie MacLaggan HERE.
We got a response from Jeannette Scott, the Central Texas representative of the Texas Motion Picture Alliance, which has been lobbying to get incentives passed:
“The next step is for the House bill to go before the Senate to be heard and voted on. If we have no amendments proposed and the Senate passes the bill we will have our enabling legislation. At this point, we are cautiously optimistic about passage. The bigger challenge will be the next step — appropriations, aka ‘show me the money.’ ”
What do you think about giving financial breaks to draw more film production to the state? Leave a comment.
For more background on the incentives, including interviews with proponents such as Robert Rodriguez, click HERE.
More about the legislative push at the Texas Motion Picture Alliance site HERE.
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Alamo Village goes super-high-tech
Here’s how Tim League, co-owner of the Alamo Drafthouse Ritz, Village and South, concludes a blog he’s writing right now:
“Starting this Friday, all first run features at the Alamo Village will be presented digitally. And not just digitally, my friends, the best dang digital that money can buy!” (Italics ours.)
Talk about burying the lede. Here’s the long version, with some bold-face highlights from us:
The day before Christmas, Alamo technical guru Andrew McEathron and I got on a plane to Los Angeles for a side-by-side comparison of digital technologies. We’ve been toying around with the idea of a digital conversion for years, but frankly, we weren’t thrilled by what we had seen to date with the standard digital cinema projectors. Word in the nerd circles, however, was that Sony’s new system had been blowing the doors off the competition in side by side tests, and that’s what we were flying to LA on Christmas Eve to see.I’m going to get a bit technical here on the details … In 2005, the Digital Cinema Initiatives (DCI), a joint venture of the six major studios published a system specification for digital cinema. Among other things, they established a minimum standard of “2K” resolution at 2048â—Š1536 pixels, a little bit less than twice the horizontal pixel count of home HD televisions. Until this Friday, that is as crisp as you could see in Austin. Furthermore, the 3D process for 2K resolution left a little to be desired. Constrained by the native resolution of the projector, 2k digital 3D flashes a left eye image and then a right eye image to give the illusion that the images are being projected simultaneously. Some viewers have complained of a flickering quality to the light, a lack of brightness and eye strain.
Intent on being the industry technology leader, Sony developed a 4K digital cinema system with a native resolution of 4096â—Š3072 pixels. That’s four times as many pixels as the DCI digital standard used by everyone in Austin (until this Friday!). Also, at the end of last month, Sony announced it’s partnership with RealD, the industry leader in 3D technology. This is the first digital cinema system that uses two dedicated lenses to simultaneously project the right eye and left eye images. It’s the first truly 3D digital experience and the brightness and clarity improvement are striking.
That’s it for the technical bit. Now back to Los Angeles. Within 45 minutes of landing in LA, Andrew and I were whisked into a screening room which had two projectors running simultaneously, one a top of the line 2K projector, professionally tuned by a third party installer, and the other a Sony 4K digital machine. We watched still images, movie trailers, action sequences, 2K content interpolated up to 4K, and also the “Lawrence of Arabia” 4K digital restoration.
The magic number for this test was “2 screen heights from the screen.” If we sat closer to the screen than that, we could see in the 2k image: pixelation, weird digital patterns in areas of complex detail and jagged edges in the quick action/motion scenes. The difference in quality with the 4k projector was stunning. All of the 2k issues disappeared. I could only see pixels if my face was immediately in front of the screen, step back 2 feet and the pixels disappeared. At several of our screens at the Alamo, “2 screen heights from the screen” comprises half of the auditorium.
After the test, our minds were made up. Sony had finally delivered a system that we could accept and could bring to our audiences with pride. We are extremely excited to be bringing to Austin the new standard in digital presentation. The new Sony 4K digital experience rolls out on all four screens this Friday at the Alamo Drafthouse Village, and one one screen, you will get to see the new standard in Digital 3D with “Monsters vs. Aliens.” This is the first installation of it’s kind in Austin and only the second in Texas. We are also in the first wave of national rollout for the RealD 4K 3D system.
We will still be keeping a 35mm film projector at Village for special repertory events, but starting this Friday, all first run features at the Village will be presented digitally. And not just digitally, my friends, the best dang digital that money can buy!
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Noteworthy DVDs released 3/24/09
PICK OF THE WEEK
“The Last Metro” (Criterion): Okay, so it’s not François Truffaut’s most groundbreaking film. But the auteur sure pleased a lot of viewers (and voters for the French César awards, who gave it a slew of statues) with this tale of a theater company trying to survive the Nazi occupation of France. Having Catherine Deneuve and Gerard Depardieu as the leads couldn’t have hurt. (“Metro” is new to DVD; both it and Truffaut’s “The 400 Blows” are being released on Blu-ray.)
OTHER TOP PICKS
“Forbidden Hollywood Collection” Vol. 3 (Warner Bros.): This time out, Warner’s series of box sets collecting daring early cinema focuses exclusively on the films of William Wellman, like the Barbara Stanwyck vehicle “The Purchase Price.”
James Bond: As usual, the home-vid release of a recent theatrical 007 adventure — the bloodthirsty outing “Quantum of Solace” — is joined by reissues from MGM. This time out, the new ones (including “Goldfinger, Moonraker,” and others) are on Blu-ray.
“Twilight” (Summit): Vampires in high school. Perhaps you’ve heard of it.
“Bolt” (Walt Disney): John Travolta and Miley Cyrus lend their voices to the CG animated tale of a dog who plays a super-mutt on TV.
Beyond the movie: Two theatrical releases have made-for-video addendums this week, with the “Kung-Fu Panda” mythology being expanded by “Secrets Of The Furious Five” (Paramount, now available as a stand- alone title) and “Watchmen: Tales of the Black Freighter” (Warner
Bros.) aimed at satisfying those who couldn’t get enough of the “Watchmen” film. (Do such viewers exist?)
NEW ON BLU-RAY
“The Fast and the Furious Trilogy” (Blu-Ray) (Universal); “The Kite Runner,” “A Mighty Heart,” “Things We Lost in the Fire,” (Paramount)
BEST OF TV
“Andy Richter Controls the Universe” Complete Series (Paramount); “Doctor Who” Mega Set Vol. 2 (BBC); “The Dog Whisperer” Very Best of (Universal); “In Treatment” (HBO); “The Riches” Season 2 (Fox); “Star Wars: The Clone Wars: A Galaxy Divided” (Warner Bros.); “Stephen Hawking and the Theory of Everything” (Acorn Media); “A Woman Called Golda” (Paramount)
REISSUE/REPACKAGE
Guy Maddin’s “Careful” (Zeitgeist); “Lilo & Stitch:
Big Wave Edition” (Walt Disney); “The Matrix,” 10th Anniversary Blu- Ray edition (Warner Bros.); “Centennial Collection” editions of “The Odd Couple,” “To Catch a Thief” (Paramount)
ARTHOUSE/FOREIGN
“Opera Jawa” (First Run Pictures)
STRAIGHT(ISH) TO VIDEO
Rob Schneider directs and stars in “Big Stan” (Warner Bros.)
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Inspiration at 24 frames per second
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It’s over. Here’s another.
Larry McMurtry is the guest of honor at the 2nd annual Marfa Film Festival, happening April 29 — May 3 in the boho desert landscape amid the dust and the stars.
On May 2, McMurtry will present an outdoor showing of quintessential small-town-TX movie “The Last Picture Show,” based on his novel. He will discuss it and his career.
More about the 50-film fest HERE.
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Stuff that isn’t SXSW
Chick flicks? Tag ‘em as you will, but the myriad fine films comprising the annual Lunafest handily defy simplistic stereotypes and hammer-down paltry presuppositions.
Presented by Austin’s mighty Reel Women, with assists from the Jewish Community Association of Austin and Women’s Division, the touring program of 10 juried short films unspools at 2 p.m. Sunday at the Dell Jewish Community Campus (7300 Hart Ln.).
The movies “range from animated shorts to fictional drama, and cover topics such as women’s health, body image, spirituality, relationships, cultural diversity and breaking barriers.” They’re about and/or by women, but they are also firmly universal. One, “Red Wednesday,” is by Austin filmmaker Nazanin Shirazi.
Tickets are $10. Proceeds go to several good causes. Tix, details and more Reel Women news HERE.
‘Big Girl,’ playing Sunday at Lunafest
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‘Goodbye Solo’ beautifully dramatizes the human dimensions
I saw another exquisite film during SXSW, Ramin Bahrani’s human-scale pearl “Goodbye Solo” on Thursday at the Alamo South.
I’m a vocal fan of Bahrani’s work — last year’s “Chop Shop” made my Top 10 list — and the new film confirms Bahrani’s ascendancy as a poet of the marginal, a bard of the striving, an empathetic, wise and objective observer of the little moments and so-called “little” people that make up the mad mosaic of life.
It’s too intimate, too finely wrought to reveal its character-shaped story, but it features an astonishing debut by Souleymane Sy Savane and a funny-tragic turn by crotchety character actor Red West, whose character is bent on accomplishing one final act in his long, troubled life.
More about “Goodbye Solo” and its trailer HERE. It opens in New York on March 27, so expect an Austin run a little later.
Today’s full film schedule HERE.
Saturday’s full SXSW schedule — including Jonathan Demme presenting his new rock doc “Neil Young Trunk Show” — HERE.
Jonathan Demme will present “Neil Young Trunk Show” at 4:30 p.m. Saturday at the Paramount.
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Iron Maiden rocks the Paramount. Really.
A guy stood up in the front row, peeled off his shirt and swung it above his head tonight at the Paramount. A movie was playing. On the giant screen was a thrashing metal concert. Iron Maiden was performing “Number of the Beast” in the loud and engrossing documentary “Iron Maiden: Flight 666.” The guy suddenly believed he was in Tokyo or Mumbai or Mexico City or wherever the film was at that point and simply had to rock.
The show drew a surprisingly big crowd of black-T-shirt-sporting (not a surprise) enthusiasts, including about 30 members of the official Iron Maiden fan club, who were, of course, the show’s special guests.
The gist, via SXSW’s description: In a “customized Boeing 757 with 12 tons of equipment and 70 crew, Maiden traveled over 40,000 miles in just 45 days playing sold-out concerts from India to Los Angeles to the tip of South America.”
The upshot is a classic backstage concert doc, with scads of live footage judiciously edited for maximum punch and minimal boredom. Bandmates, now in their 50s, prove funny and smart and human.
We witness the rigors of touring: the jet-lag, the excruciating logistics, the play, the fans and how they differ in manners and passion from nation to nation (Latin Americans are the most fiery and demanding and adoring).
We hear all the best older songs, watch fire-bombs billow and mushroom during “Number of the Beast” and follow perpetual motion machine Bruce Dickinson’s calisthenic theatrics during “The Trooper” and “Aces High.”
Also: We see Adrian Smith play tennis and Nico McBrain play golf. That kind of stuff.
And this: The pilot of the 757 is singer Dickinson himself.
Scot McFadyen and Sam Dunn directed the rock doc. You know you’re in able hands, because they also made the essential doc “Metal: A Headbanger’s Journey”, which world-premiered at SXSW in 2006.
“Flight 666” screens again at 2 p.m. Saturday at the Austin Convention Center.
Steve Harris: bassist, mensch, madman.
Right HERE for details about the film and its Saturday screening.
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Haynes screens banned ‘Superstar’
Sometimes we think we’re in the loop. Sometimes we are laughably deluded.
We missed this big special show during the festival, and we are sad.
Karen Carpenter, played by Academy Award-winner Barbie
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Downtown scene
As I was leaving the Hilton of Fourth Street around 10:30 a.m. after interviewing director Kathryn Bigelow for “The Hurt Locker,” I ran into a group of young German hipsters, who wanted to know whether I knew my way around town.
I said yeah. They were wearing SXSW music badges and were a bit scruffy, with poorly grown facial hair.
And they looked at me very seriously and asked, ‘Man, do you know a place where we can just sit down and have our morning beer?’
I pointed them two blocks north to Sixth Street, and they were most appreciative. I predict the bars will have a steady business for the rest of the week.
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SXSW Film Festival winners
The jury and audience award-winners of the South by Southwest (SXSW) Film Conference and Festival were announced Tuesday night at the fest’s closing awards ceremony.
Check them out here.
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Find out what’s ‘Pulling John’
How does one confront his hero?
How about with hand chalk and a curled bicep, because that’s what the world’s most promising arm wrestlers need in their battle to dethrone John Brzenk.
Brzenk serves as the centerpiece of the arm wrestling documentary “Pulling John,” which debuted at SXSW. His prowess in pulling (the term commonly used by competitors when referring to the actual arm wrestling) has made Brzenk a legend, the Jordan or Gretzky of his sport. He tussled with Sly Stallone in 1987’s “Over the Top,” he’s held off all challengers for 25 years, and pullers across the globe speak of Brzenk in almost worshipful tones.
But time has crept on Brzenk, and a pair of promising pullers (Russia’s Alexey Voevoda and West Virginia’s Travis Bagent) seeks to take advantage during the 2004 world championships. Filmmakers Vassiliki Khonsari and Sevan Matossian delve into the background of Voevoda and Bagent during their hunt for glory, but they never stray too far from Brzenk. He shows humility compared to Bagent’s bluster; his grounded persona contrasts with Voevoda’s vaguely spacey Slavic spirituality.
To their credit, Khonsari and Matossian avoid favoring Brzenk and villainizing his competitors, although Matossian admitted after the film that they had grown fond of Brzenk and were rooting hard in the shadows.
Brzenk’s toughest foe is a familiar one for any athlete. Times change, and age saps away the ability. Brzenk’s strength hasn’t slipped since he took over the sport, but his cat-quick reflexes have dulled in the film. He relies on his will and wiliness as much as his muscle, and that makes for some anxious times during the tournament.
The filmmakers culled “Pulling John” from more than 600 hours, but they do not delve into the circumstances that made Brzenk particularly vulnerable in 2004. Tendonitis had plagued the champ for several years and had triggered thoughts of retirement. Brzenk admits during the film that he was “seeking a second wind.”
That second wind has apparently blown in. After struggling for a few years, Brzenk currently again sits comfortably atop the world of arm wrestling. It’s a fitting postscript but not one revealed in “Pulling John.”
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Tension aplenty in ‘That Evening Sun’
The layers of tension that envelop the brilliant “That Evening Sun” could suffocate the hardiest of men.
And that’s what ultimately dooms Abner Meecham (portrayed by Hal Holbrook, an octogenarian experiencing a most impressive career Renaissance), a proud landowner of salty Southern stock who “escapes” a nursing home and returns to his acreage in East Tennessee. Problem is, that land has been sold by Meecham’s lawyer son to a redneck clan fronted by a lazy parochial type named Lonzo Choat (Raymond McKinnon) who perks up just enough to torment his family and animals with equal aplomb.
But such stereotypes exist only on the surface, and that’s why the adapted screenplay by director Scott Teems vibrates with nervous energy.
Sure, Meecham has whipped a piece of remote Tennessee land into a successful farm that produced enough bounty to send a son to law school. But his productivity doesn’t make him a saint; he takes great pleasure in demeaning Choat (“you even walk like white trash,” Meecham sneers) and admits to “meanness” to both his son and deceased wife.
Choat, too, ultimately suffers from Meecham’s darker instincts.
Choat’s no sympathetic character, certainly, but McKinnon and the sturdy script give him enough depth to draw some compassion, especially from those familiar with the traditional class divisions which tend to run deep in the South.
The chemistry between McKinnon and Holbrook helped “That Evening Sun” win the Special Jury Award for Best Ensemble Cast Tuesday, and it makes the film one of the festival’s most pleasant surprises.
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‘The 2 Bobs’ packs Paramount
Ashamed to say it, but I missed most of Tim McCanlies’ bodaciously Austin comedy “The 2 Bobs” on Monday at the Paramount. Theater employees and SXSW crew agreed that audience and cast-crew turnout was atypically crazy, and that’s a good thing for McCanlies (“Secondhand Lions”) and Austin film.
Broad comedy, gaming geekdom, R-worthy naughtiness and popping candy colors captured by cinematographer PJ Raval infuse the movie with charm, laughs (the house roared) and accessibility. Local bands, local scenery, local faces make this a thickly Austin affair.
McCanlies and cast during the Q&A
Read our recent interview with McCanlies about the making of “2 Bobs’ HERE.
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‘Observe and Report’s’ rowdy Monday premiere
The Paramount was stuffed with giddy fans. The cast and crew were there, sitting among we plebians.
Many people, including the cast, laughed their blanks off for what was finally a hit-and-miss hard-R comedy about an overzealous mall cop (Seth Rogen) and his sundry, raunchy misadventures. Sex, drugs, a full-frontal flasher, crunchy violence — a cocktail both fizzy and flat.
Writer-director Jody Hill introduced the movie by thanking Warner Bros. “for letting us make a weird-ass film.” He described it as “a comedy, I guess,” to which Rogen, sitting in front of us, hoisted a can of Shiner in the air.
The red carpet scene was Hollywood-fat:
Rogen
Co-star Anna Faris
Co-star Michael Pena
Recognize these guys? They’re brothers John and Matt Yuen, who have sizable roles in the movie. They used to work at the Arbor Cinema in Austin.
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Seth Rogen meets his twin
I’ve been spotting a writer from The Hollywood Reporter out and about at red carpet gatherings for the past few days during SXSW film. He resembles Seth Rogen enough that I kept falsely exciting other carpet-baggers by pointing and gasping, “There’s Seth Rogen!” They would turn, cameras ready, then deflate. A lame gag, but you get bored standing around like herded barn animals.
At Monday night’s teeming red carpet for Rogen’s comedy “Observe and Report,” Rogen and the reporter finally came face-to-face. The first words out of Rogen’s mouth: “Hi, me!”
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Interview: Seth Rogen, star of ‘Observe and Report’
I caught up with “Observe and Report” star Seth Rogen today, the morning after the world premiere of the new comedy written and directed by Jody Hill (“The Foot Fist Way”). The Canadian-born star who has risen to fame as part of Judd Apatow’s comedy clan discussed his new movie, improvising on the set and the upcoming movies “Funny People” and “The Green Hornet.”
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Noteworthy DVDs released 3/17/09
PICK OF THE WEEK
“Elegy” (Sony): Penélope Cruz won the Oscar this year for her movie with Woody Allen, but odds are good that voters were also thinking of her performance here, in a role (opposite the very fine Ben Kingsley) allowing her to draw herself in as much as she cut loose in “Vicky Cristina Barcelona.”
OTHER TOP PICKS
“Dodes’ka-Den” (Criterion): Akira Kurosawa’s first color film, from 1971, in an improved edition including documentary features on the director, cinematographer Takao Saito, and esteemed composer Toru Takemitsu.
“Murnau” (Box Set) (Kino): Though not nearly as showy as last fall’s huge set from Fox, this collection offers some of German auteur F.W. Murnau’s best known work (restored versions of “Faust” and “Nosferatu”) alongside material that hasn’t been available on disc before.
Eclipse Series 15: Travels with Hiroshi Shimizu (Criterion): The little-known Japanese filmmaker is represented by three films from the ’30s and one from 1941 in this no-frills box.
“The Cake Eaters” (Universal): In time for “Twilight“‘s DVD release and the upcoming “Adventureland,” this well reviewed but little seen Kristen Stewart film gets a video release.
NEW ON BLU-RAY
“The Princess Bride” (MGM); “Quo Vadis” (Warner Bros.); “The Robe” (Fox)
ARTHOUSE/FOREIGN
“Azur and Asmar” (Weinstein Co.); “Lost Souls” (1980) (Image); “Yella” (New Yorker)
FRESH FROM THE MULTIPLEX
“Punisher: War Zone” (Lions Gate)
BEST OF TV
“Barney Miller” Season 3, “Married…With Children” Season 10, “The Nanny” Season 3, “The Three Stooges” Collection #5 (1946-1948) (Sony); “Degrassi: The Next Generation” Season 7 (Echo Bridge); “J*A*G” Season 8 (Paramount)
KIDS’ STUFF
“Bob The Builder On Site: Skyscrapers” (Lions Gate); “The Velveteen Rabbit” (2007) (Anchor Bay)
DOCUMENTARIES
“The Beautiful Truth,” “Cafe Chavalos” (Cinema Libre); “Portrait of Petula Clark” (Infinity)
STRAIGHT(ISH) TO VIDEO
“My Zinc Bed” (HBO); “Walled In” (Anchor Bay)
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SXSW: We Live in Public
‘We Live in Public.’ Few people soared as high as Internet pioneer Josh Harris during the dot-com bubble of the late 1990s, and few fell so hard after the bust.
Early on, Harris understood the potential of the Web to replace television as a broadband entertainment medium, founding Pseudo.com, the first Internet ‘network.’
He boasted to ‘60 Minutes’ that he would soon be bigger than CBS. And he set up one of the most bizarre live broadcasts in history: the 24-hour recording of 100 people who were living in a New York City bunker.
When they showered, their images were broadcast. Same thing when they went to a bathroom, made love. Everything was fair game, and the private lives became public. After a police raid in early 2000, the project shut down. But Harris continued to ‘live in public’ for six months with his girlfriend on the Internet. When they fought, each one would run to his or her laptop to see what the public thought: Did he win the argument, or did she?
And throughout it all, Harris began to see some holes in his theory that people would be willing to trade their privacy for public recognition.
Director Ondi Timoner, who spent more than a decade tracking Harris, shows not only his prescience but also his startling cluelessness.
‘We Live in Public’ won the top documentary prize at the Sundance Film Festival.
4:30 p.m. today, Austin Convention Center; 11:30 a.m. Wednesday, Paramount Theatre, 713 Congress Ave.
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Infamous ‘Troll 2’ spawns ‘Best Worst Movie’
Talk about the redemptive power of filmmaking.
In 1990, Michael Stephenson endured a performance in “Troll 2” (which IMDB honored with its worst-movie-ever-made badge), in which he played a boy contacted by his dead grandfather — and chased by vegetarian goblins, no less.
Two decades later, Stephenson returns with his stunning documentary “Best Worst Movie” to reveal what happened to the cast and crew of “Troll 2.”
Thousands of cult film followers know what happened in Utah during the filming of “Troll 2.” An unusual concoction of amateurs and struggling actors, under the direction of Italian exploitation maestro Claudio Fragasso, produced a bizarre story of a goblin village, communing with the dead, photosynthesis and bologna sandwiches. And “Troll 2” is weirder than it sounds, trust me. Over the years, as Stephenson documents, “Troll 2” has garnered a devoted collection of followers that host showings and parties.
Truth trumps fiction when it comes to the peculiar, however. The cast of “Troll 2,” reunited in a way, includes artists who struggle with their part in the film (one actor says it’s never been on her resume) and others who embrace its history. The dynamics between the former crewmates gets strange, revealing long-dormant tension and more than a touch of sadness.
Showing impressive filmmaking instincts, Stephenson focuses on charismatic George Hardy, a dentist in his native Alabama whose lone acting gig came in “Troll 2.” Hardy is a gregarious and good-natured sort whose ego receives plenty of stroking from the “Troll 2” fanatics who holler his quotes. Hardy wants to share the attention — and, as he sees it, the fun. His response to the “Troll 2” phenomenon morphs into a fascinating portrayal of the appeal of fame, no matter how small.
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‘Made in China’s no pet rock
Did you know that the pet rock phenomenon in the 1970s lasted just six months?
But in those 180 days, inventor Gary Dahl made millions and encapsulated the potent earning power of a fad.
Dahl and his ilk (Richard James’ slinky and Milton Levine’s ant farm, for example) also inspire earnest young entrepreneur Johnson (Jackson Kuehn) on his quest to join that quirky tribe in “Made in China,” the debut film by Austin’s Judi Krant that premiered Sunday at the Alamo Ritz.
Johnson leaves behind a worried mom and an apathetic sister to visit Shanghai, a production epicenter of all things cheap and plastic. He endures a swindler, roundabouts through Shanghai’s back alleys and a most unfortunate faux-Chinese business suit before finding redemption with his own invention.
At its best, “Made in China” delivers a charming narrative against the backdrop of fads and their history. Kuehn (acting every bit a native of Woodville, Texas) offers a convincing portrayal of a budding salesman with lots of naivety and just enough backbone.
Sure, the debut film can drag at times. Jokes fall flat, the plot meanders. But “Made in China” never strays too far off its course. Krant cleverly creates a dichotomy of worlds. She filmed Johnson’s hometown in Woodville, using (in true independent filmmaking spirit) Kuehn’s mom not only as an actor but also the location manager. The shots in Shanghai resulted from “being a little crafty,” Krant said, in some older neighborhoods not trumpeted by Chinese tourist officials. They give the film an unusual air of authenticity.
Expect both Krant and Kuehn to have a shelf life more like the slinky than, say, that pet rock.
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More on ‘Bruno’
When members of the press were walking out the Alamo South Sunday night after a sneak peek at footage from the upcoming “Bruno,” Michael Hogan of Vanity Fair asked me whether I thought the footage was made up, or whether Sacha Baron Cohen was still able to fool people as he did in “Borat.”
Despite Cohen’s fame, the answer, apparently, is that he’s still able to fool people.
Longtime friend and reporter Michael Granberry of The Dallas Morning News wrote last year that Cohen and his associates paid $50 for people to show up for the taping of what was described as a new TV talk show.
Footage from that taping in the Dallas suburb of Carrollton was included Sunday night in “Bruno.” The scene was described earlier on this blog and involved Cohen, dressed as a gay fashionista, describing how he adopted a baby from Africa as a fashion accessory, much to the audience’s outrage.
The taping occurred at TWL Studios-Productions, Granberry reported.
And now, from The Associated Press, comes word that Cohen “tricked the Alabama National Guard into allowing him onto a post, giving him a military uniform and briefly letting him train — all, supposedly, for a German TV documentary.”
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Screening alert: ‘Sunshine’ — see this one
Karen Skloss’ profoundly affecting documentary on single motherhood screens at 9:15 tonight at the Austin Convention Center and again at 2 p.m. Friday at the Alamo Ritz, where it enjoyed its premiere last Saturday.
Skloss weaves something singular and powerful from several threads dealing with adoption, unexpected pregnancy, relationships and the impervious ties between parent and offspring. It’s Skloss’ own story, yet it’s completely universal. Even resistant guys will find themselves melting in this radiant “Sunshine.”
Skloss’ lyrical storytelling gets a nice assist from the expressive, sometimes dreamy camerawork by longtime RIchard Linklater collaborator Lee Daniel.
More on the film and screenings HERE.
Read Charles Ealy’s interview with Skloss HERE.
Karen Skloss during the Q&A for “Sunshine” on Saturday at the Alamo Ritz
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As a surprise, Linklater unveils his latest
Well, sort of a surprise. … Richard Linklater filled the “Special Screening” slot this morning at SXSW with his small gem “Me and Orson Welles,” which received a warm hometown welcome at the Paramount. The two-thirds-filled house laughed, clapped, loved it.
Linklater, sporting a killer Western shirt embroidered with characters from Howard Hawks’ “Rio Bravo,” admitted he wasn’t supposed to be showing the movie this early (even though it played Toronto last year), since it won’t be released until October. What the hell, he said. He couldn’t not play it at longtime friend Janet Pierson’s first SXSW as the fest’s producer and leader.
The movie — based on Robert Kaplow’s novel and adapted by Austin writers Holly Gent Palmo and Vincent Palmo, Jr. — is about “art, youthful ambition and the blessing and curse of those compelled to put on a show,” Linklater told the crowd.
It’s a lovely movie, a richly appointed ’30s period piece set inside Orson Welles’ famed Mercury Theater in New York. It follows Zac Efron’s ambitious teenage actor as he finagles his way into Welles’ stellar troupe, using wiles, charm and confidence. It’s about learning the showbiz ropes the hard way by the hardest teacher, the blustery and bumptious Welles.
In a searing star turn, Christian McKay plays Welles as a seductive but insufferable supernova of gaseous ego and barking entitlement. Though not the late rotund Welles, he nevertheless takes up all the space around him and steals its oxygen, leaving those nearby gasping.
McKay’s lusty and rollicking Welles is the wild-eyed ringleader of a constellation of stars, from producer John Houseman (Eddie Marsan) to Joseph Cotton (James Tupper). They are mounting an ambitious, career-making production of “Julius Caesar” and we are history’s bedazzled witnesses.
Elegant and smooth, “Me and Orson Welles” evinces Linklater’s knack for character-driven chamber pieces, fluttering with sharp dialogue while exploring the brambles of love and the dour realization that egos and great art are sometimes horribly, wonderfully indivisible.
More about the movie HERE.
Linklater’s towering SXSW success
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We see funny people
Outside the sold-out premiere of the big-star comedy “Adventureland” Sunday night at the Alamo South, its writer-director Greg Mottola (he also did “Superbad”) and one of its stars, Bill Hader, stopped for an artistic portrait. (Thanks!)
Their movie, “Adventureland,” opens April 3
Also there were actor Danny McBride (“Pineapple Express,” etc.) …
… and (below) his good pal Jody Hill, who directed McBride and himself in “Foot Fist Way” and is screening his new Seth Rogen comedy “Observe and Report” at 9:30 tonight at the Paramount. (Be there. Rogen will be.)
Later Sunday night, following the screening of the excellent if harrowing border drama “Sin Nombre” at the Paramount, a red carpet roll-out was held for the cast of the comedy “Women in Trouble, co-starring Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Marley Shelton, both below. (We heard — cough — the movie wasn’t so hot.)
Gordon-Levitt
Shelton
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Interview: ‘Over the Hills and Far Away’ director Michel Scott
Austin American-Statesman: So how do you shoot video from the back of a horse?
Michel Scott: I actually grew up riding horses. My father owns a ranch in Colorado, where I would spend summers. I started riding when I was three or four but I hadn’t ridden for five or six years. I started training and brought the camera with me to see how it worked out. Eventually I got more comfortable with it, but nothing could have prepared me for what was going to happen in Mongolia. There were a lot more hours in the saddle than I expected, and I pretty much wound up holding the camera the entire time.
AA-S: Once you got involved, how did the story change?
Scott: There were definitely some twists and turns in the story that I didn’t expect. When Rupert told me they were going to take their child and ride through Mongolia and visit shamen, it doesn’t get much wackier than that. From my perspective as a filmmaker I said, ‘This is going to be amazing. This is a fantastic story.’ I thought this was going to be a story about acceptance. And ultimately it is. But it ends up being something else.
AA-S: Isaacson is producer and also the lead character, and yet he and the family aren’t always shown at their best.
Scott: The great thing about Rupert is he’s very interested in being seen from all sides. He wants the story to be as real as possible. I wanted to be sure we weren’t showing something unreal, especially since the storyline is unreal. And luckily Rupert was OK with that. It can be quite a challenge to film subjects who are also involved in the production of the film. In fact, that’s one of the greatest no-nos of documentary film. That can get very complicated very quickly. But Rupert was very gracious and wanted to show all sides of him and the family.
AA-S: The backstory of their domestic life in Elgin is intercut into this incredible quest narrative. Why that approach?
Scott: “I have to give a lot of credit to our editor, Rita Sanders. She was very helpful putting the structure of the film together. I think the initial reason was that we have all of this backstory, but the audience is going to know Mongolia is coming. We didn’t want to spend 30 or 45 minutes before leaving for Mongolia. We know that’s what people were going to be anticipating, so we wanted to get to Mongolia as soon as possible. But the backstory was so important for the actual trip to Mongolia to make sense.
AA-S: Did you try the boiled lung?
Scott: Yes. Actually, I tried all of the organs that Rupert tried. I have to admit I didn’t think they were that bad, except for the heart — the heart was pretty gross. I was ready for the worst.”
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‘Drag Me To Hell’: Raimi’s horrific vision returns
It’s good to see that success hasn’t spoiled Sam Raimi’s bloodiest, goriest, most outrageous and downright fun instincts.
In an ode to his glorious horror past, Raimi presented his new film “Drag Me To Hell” at a raucous midnight screening Sunday at the Paramount Theatre.
The film, due for a May release, still has a few post-production issues to sort out. But tightened sound effects and a few tweaks will only add to one of the year’s most anticipated films.
Sure, Raimi can wield the studio’s tools enough to produce the “Spiderman” trilogy that makes him one of Hollywood’s most desired directors. Give the man a few buckets of blood-red corn syrup and a budget without restraint, however, to really watch the fun begin.
And Raimi delivers the fun in a story that could be straight from the scribbled notes on his script from 1981’s “Evil Dead,” which redefined the horror genre with its blend of slapstick and gore.
An innocent loan officer with good intentions named Christine (Alison Lohman) tries to prove her hard heart to a supervisor and turns down a glass-eyed Mrs. Ganush (Lorna Raver), who responds to the denial with a flurry of spittle and, yep, a Gypsy curse. Christine enlists the help of everyone from her earnest boyfriend to concerned fortune-tellers as she battles Mrs. Ganush and her demonic sidekicks.
The ensuing tussles will look familiar to longtime Raimi fans. Eyes pop, bodies ooze and shadows creep across the screen. “Drag Me To Hell” may not technically be the new “Evil Dead” film, but it’s close enough for the fans that have eagerly awaited the return of Raimi’s horrific vision.
Really, the only thing that seemed missing at the Paramount was an appearance by Bruce Campbell.
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Bruno special screening
Sacha Baron Cohen addressed an Austin audience at the Alamo Sunday night via videotape to introduce the first-ever selected clips from his new movie. Security was tight, the footage was rough and the crowd was howling. The movie opens July 10.
Here’s what we saw:
Bruno is a gay Austrian cable TV reporter on fashion, and he’s a bit out there. And when he gets fired from his job, he decides to head to Hollywood to become the “biggest Austrian celebrity since Hitler.”
As a fashion accessory, he adopts a baby from Africa, in hopes of getting that Madonna cachet. He also wants to use the baby to stage a crucifixion scene, but he has only one baby to put on the cross, so he begins to interview “stage parents” to see if their babies might be suitable to portray the two thieves on either side of his baby.
The interviews with eager parents are beyond belief. He asks them whether their babies are comfortable with dead or dying animals, and they all say yes. He also wants to know whether their babies are accepting of such things as Komodo dragons, and they all say their babies are fine with such things. One of the babies weighs 30 pounds and Bruno thinks she may be a bit chunky, so he suggests liposuction, and the parent seems to think that’s doable.
Before long, Bruno has dressed up his baby in a “gayby T-shirt” and taken him to a TV talk show in Texas, which is filled with African Americans. Let’s just say they don’t look kindly upon the adoption, and things turn ugly.
When the baby thing doesn’t turn out as Bruno had hoped, he morphs into another person, Straight Dave, the host of a TV wrestling show called Man-Slamming Maxout.
But it seems as though Straight Dave still has a few latent urges lingering below. Let’s just say that the Straight Dave fans are in for a disappointment.
It’s not clear whether Cohen has really continued to find clueless audiences who will fall for his antics. But it appears that he has. The movie is bound to stir up just as much controversy as Borat. And that’s the point.
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Panel wrap: Jan Harlan discusses Stanley Kubrick
He died 10 years ago this month, but legendary director Stanley Kubrick still draws a ton of interest from film geeks, as evidenced by the relatively-full conference room at the Convention Center Sunday afternoon.
Multi-platforming film critic Elvis Mitchell discussed Kubrick with Jan Harlan, Kubrick’s brother-in-law who also served as executive producer on some of the director’s biggest films (“Barry Lyndon,” “The Shining,” “Full Metal Jacket”). Harlan spoke of his enigmatic brother-in-law’s perfectionism and artistic vision and his role in helping some of the best of Kubrick’s best films come to life.
Some snippets from the talk:
- Although “Eyes Wide Shut” was initially panned by many critics, and audiences in small towns in America killed the film, the Japanese audiences loved it. A studio rep. actually told Harlan that Japanese couples actually left the theater holding hands, a show of affection that is generally unheard of.
- Not surprisingly, Kubrick did not enjoy the role of the critic in cinema. He was confounded by the fact that he could spend three years working on a film, only to have some critic see the movie in the morning and then write a review that afternoon. He seemingly had no use for critics, as is the case with many filmmakers and moviegoers.
- In discussing the casting process for “Full Metal Jacket” and Kubrick’s desire, borne from perfectionism, to cast 18 year-olds to play the roles of the young soldiers, Harlan said that they reviewed 2,500 casting tapes to try and find the right seven actors for the main parts before relenting and hiring actors in their twenties. “Like everything, he took it (the casting) incredibly seriously,” said Harlan.
- Kubrick, as has been well documented, hated to travel. So, when the production team needed American tanks to shoot scenes in London for “Full Metal Jacket,” they “rented” three old American tanks from the Belgian army. Apparently the Americans were reluctant to help out the team, holding a slight grudge from “Dr. Strangelove.”
- Kubrick had a brilliant memory and would concurrently play matches of chess against three different people. However, he was a much less skilled table tennis player.
- The director loved sports, and one time, after watching a semi-final between John McEnroe and Boris Becker, Kubrick turned to Harlan, exhilarated and exhausted, and proclaimed to Harlan, “No film could ever be so exciting.”
- Harlan’s biggest regret about “Eyes Wide Shut,” and the film’s biggest problem, was that the film needed two viewings to be fully understood.
- Kubrick turned over the “A.I.” project to Steven Spielberg because he believed the dark fantasy would be done better by Spielberg and be entirely too dark under his own direction.
- With regard to “A.I.,” while Harlan says Kubrick was an “optimist in his daily life,” the director believed that we were “digging our own grave” and that the human race had “no chance of survival.”
- Harlan briefly touched on a fact that I was alerted to by one of my film professors in college and a former colleague of Peter Sellers, ‘Dr. Strangelove” was initially to be made as a straight-ahead drama. The dark comedic elements were added later. My professor in Rome told me that the idea to shift the tone was one he had offered Kubrick at a dinner party … I did not get the chance at the panel to verify the veracity of that claim.
Co-star Jason Segel, who introduced his freaky real world of Dracula Muppet-style puppets and dreams of a Dracula musical in last year’s SXSW hit “Forgetting Sarah Marshall,” assured the crowd that a movie version is happening: “The script is done. I love it … I think you guys will like it. It’s like a late-’70s or early-’80s Muppet movie. … I’ve written stuff for all my (acting) friends. Everybody’s in it.” (He pointed at Rudd.)
After Segel told us we we’re a “great audience,” a very happy writer-director John Hamburg said, “I’m excited. I’m pumped up. I feel like Cate Blanchett!”
Asked if he’d be working with his “Swingers” pal Vince Vaughan again, co-star Jon Favreau said yes, that they’re doing a comedy he wrote called “Couples Retreat” with Jason Bateman. It should be out in October. (More on that movie HERE).
Rudd projectile vomits on Favreau in “I Love You, Man,” and says he insisted to Hamburg that he really vomit, with no FX. So he did. He used five cans of Italian wedding soup.
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A winning ‘Winnebago Man’
If someone didn’t like Austin filmmaker Ben Steinbauer’s hilarious and surprisingly poignant doc “Winnebago Man” we have yet to hear from him or her. A capacity house Saturday night at the Alamo South riotously greeted the movie and its improbable, endearingly cantankerous star and former Winnebago pitchman Jack Rebney, who is alternately known as the Winnebago Man and the Angriest Man in the World in the viral, YouTube and tape-trading universe. (Google that stuff. Now. Please.)
Steinbauer’s movie delves deep and sincerely into Rebney’s wounded soul, smartly veering from what so easily could have been a glib and selfish ha-ha look at this crusty coot who made an ass out of himself! piece of pandering pop poop. The filmmaker went the distance, locating Rebney, befriending him and gingerly discovering what makes him tick and tantrum.
Rebney’s appearance at the premiere proved what a good sport he is, how thoughtful and articulate and (seriously) kind he is. He quoted Andre Gide: “The man without anger is no man at all.” He seems to accept and embrace the strange cult adoration that’s enveloped him, and it makes you happy. From online ignominy to legitimate love — it’s a great story peeled back in a sensitively conceived film.
Actor Jeffrey Tambor was in the audience, as was Beastie Boy MCA (Adam Yauch), whose Oscilloscope Films, as well as IFC, are reportedly circling the movie for a deal.
We asked Tambor what he thought of the movie. He gushed, “I LOVED it. It’s more than the sum of its parts. It is all of us.”
More “Winnebago Man” screening times HERE.
Director Ben Steinbauer and his famous subject Jack Rebney meet adoring, autograph-seeking fans after the show. Yes, that’s a Winnebago behind them.
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Lack of laughs in ‘Splinterheads’
Writer/director Brant Sersen had a festival hit on his hands at SXSW in 2004 with the ridiculous “Blackballed,” a movie that featured the comedic talents of Rob Corddry, Rob Riggle, Jack McBrayer and others. Unfortunately, Sersen’s cinematic offering this year did not offer the laughs as his previous effort.
In “Splinterheads” (which screened at Alamo Ritz Saturday night), Justin Frost (newcomer Thomas Middleditch) is in a mild state of arrested development. Unable to get his life on track, the young 20-something is stuck in a rut in his sleepy New York town, fiddling with delusions of karate expert gradeur while toiling aimlessly as a yardboy with his friend Wayne Chung — a name that is a decent indicator as to the humor in the film, simple and expected.
Still living at home with his widowed mother, the apron-strings of whom he is afraid to detach himself, Justin is a bit of a manchild, full of whimsy and insecurity. His safe little world is shattered by the appearance of Galaxy (Rachel Taylor), a beautiful con artist and carnival worker who eventually introduces him to a world of mild adventure (in the form of geocaching) and risk-taking.
Middleditch, a pretty solid ringer for Seth Meyers, with a tinge of Jonathan Richman, is at his best when he is playing the more high-status comedic character — lampooning Chung and his mother’s ex-boyfriend, a local police sergeant played by the ubiquitous Christopher McDonald. It is the nervous bumbling would-be romancer of Galaxy and the target of her unsavory boyfriend’s wrath, a nice turn by Dean Winters (most recently Tina Fey’s “Beeper King” boyfriend on “30 Rock”), where the character is less believable.
Maybe Middleditch is too old, maybe he is too handsome, but he is just not believable, or very likeable, as the nervous mamma’s boy. Additionally, the entire conceit of a boy meeting a carnie (actually a “splinterhead,” the difference which is unneccesarry to quibble over here) who teaches him how to let go and get on with his life just seems a little too absurd to swallow. It feels like a teen movie stuck between goofy adolescence and 20-something self-discovery, not quite here and not quite there. It’s also hard to see a comedy in a festival setting and see so many intended laugh lines fall flat. The script just seems a little rushed, like jokes that didn’t work were left in instead of reworked or heightened.
The movie does have a certain charm — Middleditch gives a nice, if at times awkward performance and Taylor is serviceable, although far too beautiful to be a believable “splinterhead” — but it struggles too often, forcing the wrong comedic note and losing the audience’s interest with its fairly ridiculous storyline. If a plot line is going to be as cute and absurd as that of “Splinterheads,” it either needs more of an adolescent feel or needs to deliver more laughs.
“Splinterheads” screens again March 17 at The Paramount at 1:30 p.m. and at noon on March 19 at the Alamo South.
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‘Artois’ got our goat at SXSW
Yes, it’s called “Artois the Goat,” this pleasantly weird, ineffably odd bucolic farce that’s snazzily disguised as a profound reflection on love, the indomitable creative force, wild passion, dream-juiced vision and the pursuit of cultivating meaning in our flyspeck lives.
It’s also about dairy products. Dilate those holes and sniff in the deep, sybaritic ecstasy of luscious, creamy, fragrant … goat cheese. We are so totally lactose tolerant.
The Alamo serves a special goat cheese plate in honor of “Artois the Goat.” Background, the cast and crew bask in the ovation at Sunday’s premiere.
An accomplished, beautifully shot, directed and musically scored art comedy, “Artois the Goat” got its world premiere Sunday at the Alamo Ritz. It’s an Austin affair, written and directed by UT film alums Cliff Bogart and Kyle Bogart and filled with familiar local talent. (See the recent stage production of “An Ideal Husband”? Much of its sharp cast appears here.)
The Bogarts are young newbies, but they know how to make a movie. Unlike, say, Joe Swanberg, they understand that time and care and thought (and talent!) are required to create a full-bodied film that doesn’t reek of juvenile navel-gazing. They understand cinema, that it’s a visual medium. They can write, even if some of the jokes fall flat. They can direct actors. Art direction — they have that down. Music — completely.
“Artois” follows one man’s erupting passion to create a wonderful new goat cheese. He has a girlfriend, always a distraction in the aim of art. Much more bubbles and bounces about the movie. Some things don’t work — the comedy can be awfully broad — but a lot does work — genuine ideas exist here.
During the post-show Q&A, the brothers cited the Coen brothers, Douglas Sirk’s “All That Heaven Allows” and Indiana Jones as influences. That’s a party as richly complex as a tangy camembert.
More on “Artois” and its upcoming screenings HERE
The Bogart bros
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Allman and ‘Little Dizzle’
Marshall Allman, who graduated from Austin High School six years ago and headed to Hollywood just a couple of weeks later, has already made a name for himself on television, as LJ Burrows, the son of Lincoln Burrows (Dominic Purcell).
And it looks like the 24-year-old is well on the way to becoming a movie star, too. He has the lead role in director David Russo’s “The Immaculate Conception of Little Dizzle,” which screens Sunday night at the South by Southwest Film Festival and will show again on Thursday and Saturday.
As Dory in “Little Dizzle,” Allman cleans bathrooms and toilets at a Seattle office building where a company is experimenting with the ingredients of cookies. He and a motley crew of outcasts discover the cookies in the trash and start eating way too many of them each night.
The result?
Chemical changes begin to occur within their bodies, causing unusual developments. During a recent conversation at an Austin hotel before the local premiere, Allman discussed his life in L.A. and how he came to star in what is one of the most unusual movies of the year.
It must have been scary to move to Hollywood right after graduating from high school. Can you talk about that?
In hindsight, it was risky and scary, But at the time, I guess it’s the way I’m made up. I get a vision and then I go for it. I remember my mom (Austin resident Idanell Allman) helping me make the transition. She had to teach me how to do laundry once I got to Hollywood. She had taught me before, but I didn’t pay attention because she was always there to do it for me. She came out and helped me get settled. I already had a job and a manager for my acting career.
Before you moved?
I’d been to a talent search and met a manager there. And when I moved to Hollywood, I was working at the Gap. I had a job at a Gap store here in Austin, and you can just transfer a Gap job to L.A. So I had a job, and my manager helped me find a place. It was awesome. I lived in West Hollywood at the time, which was a total trip. I was right off the Sunset Strip near the Viper Room and Tower Records. It was the biggest culture shock. Have you ever heard of Angelyne, the Billboard Queen?
Yes.
Well, she lived in my building. So I’d come home and see this pink Corvette pull in with Angelyne on the license plate, and this woman looks completely like … what is going on? (Angelyne is quite busty and blonde.) I told friends about it, and they said, ‘You live by Angelyne!’ And I said whatever, you know. And they said, ‘She’s famous!’ And I said, ‘Famous for what?’ And they said, ‘She’s famous for being famous!’
There’s a lot of that going on in Hollywood. How long did it take to get an acting job once you were out there?
Not very long. I think it took about a year before I got a meeting with a commercial agent. I went in and said, ‘You’ve probably heard this before, but I’m going to book three national commercials in a year. Do you want to be my agent?’ And he said, ‘Sure.’ And I booked three national commercials in nine months. So I did it. I felt like Babe Ruth. And because of that and some other help, I got my first theatrical agent and I just started going out on auditions. I said to myself, ‘This is going to work.’ The theatrical agent led to my first guest spot on television and all that jazz. My very first job was on ‘Without a Trace,’ and then I moved on, eventually getting the role in ‘Hostage,’ my first feature film, with Bruce Willis. I was a hostage taker. I was very nervous. I hadn’t had as much acting training so I relied totally on my raw talent, with no way to know how to bring my talent out. It was this big lesson. I learned just ow much talent I have without any help. After that, I studied pretty aggressively so that I wouldn’t get into that situation again. Then I got ‘Prison Break’ and in between the seasons of that show I did ‘Immaculate Conception’ and ‘Winged Creatures’ (2008).
How did you get the role in “Little Dizzle”?
It was through an audition, and it was pretty crazy meeting (director) David Russo. He’s a trip. He’s the archetype of the mad artist and he plays it well. I left that audition and went ‘Wow!’ (Co-star) Vince Vieluf and I did a chemistry reading, acting out a couple of scenes while David was right in there with us, filming. And we ended up shooting one of the scenes in the bathroom when Vince’s character flushes his dizzle. David fell in love with me because I reached my arm down the toilet to get it. I think he knew it was meant to be after that.
What do you mean?
It’s that I had no fear in sticking my arm down the toilet because I was trying to save dizzle. That’s a lot of conviction right there, sticking your hand down a toilet.
How would you describe your relationship with the dizzles?
The director was a janitor for seven years, and one time he found an aborted fetus in a toilet. And that’s what inspired the film. That’s what dizzle represents. … He’s not really fit for this world, and that strikes a chord with Dory. And therein lies the comedy. It’s more like an experience than a movie. It’s palpable.
What kind of religious significance do you see in this film?
Dory is trying to do all the right things. It’s almost by rote. But really it’s about a movement inside, about what I think is a relationship with God, rather than rules and regulations, doing checklist A to get the results for checklist B. That’s what I love about Dory. He has no fear. He’s willing to take the risk.
Why does he lose it all at the beginning of the movie?
He’s trying to get a break. There’s a girl he has a crush on, he tries to become a Christian for a girl. He tries to do all the right things to get the Christian girl, but gets the wrong results, and then she’s talking about a guy she wants to date who isn’t even a Christian. But she thinks she can convert him. She calls the new guy a ‘convertible with a convertible.’ Dory recognizes that he gave up everything to believe what she believes. It’s a breaking point for him.
Did you have any awkwardness in the making the movie?
Well, the shower scene was crazy, because it took 17 hours to shoot it. It’s a very elaborate scene. And it’s animated by Rosto (a digital compositry artist). And we were very happy to have him. I had to hang upside down in front of green screens for hours. You’ll notice that I was split into two at one point, and when we shot that, I was actually hanging upside down. The rest of it was me standing on a platform in front a green screen, and I had to be all wet. It was wild. You get to a certain point where you’re so focused on what you’re doing that all the awkwardness goes away. This film was a trip, man. We shot it in Seattle, in June, and the sun doesn’t go down until 10 p.m. at that time, and we shot the entire movie in 19 days. The shower scene took a whole day. Oh yeah, and this is important. I got my motorcycle license for the movie. I don’t want to forget that, because I was terrified of motorcycles.
How do your parents react to all this?
They love it. They’re my biggest fans.
What’s next?
I doing a project called Blue Like Jazz, (a best-selling book of essays about spirituality). Steve Taylor is directing. He helped adapt it from the book with Donald Miller, the author.
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Wavy Gravy does Maggie Maes
Wavy Gravy brought his fish on a leash and his ragtag entourage to Sixth Street Saturday night for a party following the premiere of the new documentary about his wild life, ‘Saint Misbehavin’.’
Lots of longtime Austinites turned out to salute the hippie icon, who MC’ed the Woodstock proceedings and went on the found the Hog Farm commune in Berkeley, Calif. Free red rubber noses were distributed to guests, in honor of Wavy’s clownsmanship.
Wavy was very upbeat and pleased with the audience reception at the premiere. Michelle Esrick, the director of the documentary, said the response was so positive that it was ‘jaw-dropping.’
I didn’t get to stay for the entire party, but later in the evening, Wavy and his gang were planning to present the Wavy Grave Basic Human Needs Award to Austinite Mikail Davenport, who contracted polio at age 2 but has gone on to compete in marathon wheelchair racing events. In 2004, he founded Disabled, Not Unable, an education organization to assist people with disabilities. His life story was featured in the Oscar-nominated documentary short, ‘The Fnal Inch.’
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Random SXSW sightings
Roam around enough during SXSW film and you’ll spot some interesting faces and alarming characters …
Legendary psychedelic harlequin and philanthropist Wavy Gravy at the world premiere of his documentary “Saint Misbehavin’: The Wavy Gravy Movie” on Saturday at the Alamo South. More about the movie and its other screenings HERE.
Comic actor Danny McBride (“Pineapple Express,” “Tropic Thunder”) was bumming around with Jody Hill, friend and director of their cult comedy “The Fist Foot Way,” on Saturday night. Hill’s at SXSW for his new Seth Rogen flick “Observe and Report.” The scoop on its Monday screening HERE.
“Super Size Me” star-director Morgan Spurlock hangin’ with some Dutch clogs, which dangled (and made nice noise) at the art-exhibit and party for the artist Trimpin in the State Theater lobby. The documentary about him and his sui generis artwork, “TRIMPIN: the sound of invention,” world-premiered Saturday night. More about the film HERE.
Fabled documentarian and SXSW veteran Ron Mann was spotted Saturday afternoon on Sixth Street. His new doc “Know Your Mushrooms” screened Friday and shows two more times. Learn about it HERE.
Homemade goblins appear at the showing of the terrific documentary “Best Worst Movie,” which traces the unlikely fandom of the awful movie “Troll 2.” They were scaring SXSWers on Saturday in the lobby of the Alamo South. More showings and details for “Best Worst Movie” HERE.
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A ‘Love’ fest with stars Rudd and Segel
Paul Rudd and Jason Segel are the kind of co-stars who easily fall into a rhythm with each other on-screen and off. And they’re the kind of actors who offer you bacon on a Saturday morning.
They need to eat, of course. It’s the day after the premiere of their new bromance comedy, “I Love You, Man,”kicked off the South by Southwest Film Festival. They’ll be on a plane out of Austin in the afternoon, but not before rounds of interviews and a panel appearance.
“Are you sure you don’t want some?” asks an apologetic Rudd, pointing to his plate, and soon, he and Segel delve into a short back-and-forth over real versus turkey bacon. Real bacon wins.
It’s a golden time for these two actors. Witness the wildly approving audience reception to their new movie the previous night. And, on its April cover, Vanity Fair has declared them, along with fellow Judd Apatow collaborators Jonah Hill and Seth Rogen, “Comedy’s New Legends.”
So how are they and their comedic conspirators enjoying this wave of acceptance, praise and love that started five years ago with Apatow’s “Anchorman” and just kept building with “40-Year-Old Virgin,” “Knocked Up” and last year’s “Forgetting Sarah Marshall”?
“It’s a little scary,’ says Segel.
“Here comes the fall,” counters Rudd only slightly grimly.
Although it seems unlikely now, that pragmatic observation makes sense. Hollywood builds you up just to knock you down — isn’t the crash of such a huge wave inevitable?
Adding to this, says Segel, is that “what drove Judd and the rest of us was the sense of our always being the underdog,” he says, pointing back to “Freaks and Geeks”and “Undeclared.” (ABC dropped the ax on “Freaks,” the 1999 sitcom produced by Apatow and starring Segel and Rogen, halfway through its first season. Two years later, their next TV project, “Undeclared” met the same fate on Fox).
“It was us against the world,” says Segel, now a co-star in the CBS sitcom “How I Met Your Mother” and writer and star of last year’s well-received “Forgetting Sarah Marshall.” “It’s a scary feeling for sure to be where we are now.”
The ensemble approach that led to their success today also brings with it an intense responsibility to keep it going for the sake of everyone in their extended comedic clan.
“No one wants to be the iceberg that sinks the Titanic,” deadpans Rudd.
It’s hard to imagine a disaster in their near future, especially after the early reaction to “I Love You, Man,” a movie directed and co-written by John Hamburg (“Meet the Parents” and the underrated but brilliant “Safe Men”).
The comedy boldly examines the inner workings of those mysterious male friendships, complete with Rush-inspired jam sessions and all. The script deftly taps into stereotypes as well as surprises, all made even funnier by the cast’s improvisation, encouraged by Hamburg.
“It’s fulfilling creatively to improvise,” says Rudd. “You’re really collaborating, which makes the day so much fun.”
Being longtime friends was an obvious boon for two actors playing best buds, but it had its drawbacks. Hamburg wanted them to improvise their first “man date”— an evening of fish tacos and drinks — but Segal says an hour into their riffing, Hamburg had to reel them in.
“He had to remind us that this was the first time our characters had really talked,” Segel says.
Rudd and Segel’s affable chemistry is undeniable, but it was also there between Rudd and actress Rashida Jones, who plays his fiancee.
“We’ve been great friends for many years,” says Rudd of Jones (“The Office,” the upcoming NBC sitcom “Parks & Recreation” and daughter of SXSW Music keynote speaker Quincy Jones). “I love her. I was so excited that she was doing the movie.”
But Rudd and Segel were both somewhat nervous to work with other castmembers — namely, the gentlemen of the legendary prog-rock group Rush.
“They’re so mysterious,” says Rudd, who was worried Geddy Lee and company would get tired of playing “Limelight” 40 takes in a row.
If anyone knows what that was like, it was Rudd and Segel, who had to film their hysterical “Tom Sawyer’ cover over two 14-hour days.
“’Tom Sawyer’ still haunts me a tiny bit,” says Segel.
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They’ve got the funny. Now, where’s the money?
Some of the biggest names in online comedy videos (Ricky Van Veem of collegehumor.com, Keith Richman of Break Media), along with “Colbert Report” writer Meredith Scardino, actor B.J. Novak of “The Office” and BOXEE’s Avner Ronen gathered in the cavernous ballroom A at the Austin Convention Center to discuss comedy, and content in general, online.
As one might expect, there was not too terribly much new ground covered here. But such is the case with a nebulous, growing and unpredictable medium.
Richman admits that one of the biggest problems for online content and its producers is the fact that it is still too hard to monetize online content. He claimed that even though some of the videos on his site may get more views than 30-50 digital cable channels, he is still not able to find a way to make the money those channels do.
While people may be watching more and more online content, Van Veem said that a recent study found that Americans average 151 hours of tv watching, so it seems tv is not going away any time soon.
The boon for viewers and the trouble for tv, however, may come from the fact that with the Internet, people can watch what they want and won’t waste time watching shows they don’t like, as they might with TV. According to Novak, this should serve as a bit of a warning for bad content on TV. The good shows will stay on the air, he says, but maybe we will be lucky enough to see the bad stuff go away.
The biggest challenge for producers of online content will continue to come from the struggle to get money and distribution. The good news seems to be that online content is judged and promoted in a democratic way. If people like a video, they will pass it along, and eventually the process of passing along clips will be the new stamp of approval as opposed to the stamp of approval that comes from a late-night talk show host or television producer. Web 2.0 — you be the star, star-maker. As for the salary of said stars and star-makers, we’re still working on that part, it seems. The future holds the answers. As always.
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The art of acting, according to Jeffrey Tambor
Part acting coach, part Buddhist, part life coach, part stand-up comedian, Jeffrey Tambor wowed the participants at his acting workshop this afternoon.
The first half of the two-hour event had the actor and writing coach workshopping a scene with two actors, putting them through paces and exercises to find an emotional honesty and vulnerability. His cajoling and direction helped the two find the purpose of their scene, to, as Tambor put it, “break the glass” to find how who they were and what the scene was about.
His biggest direction was to get the actors to get outside of themselves and not worry about being “overmuch.” As an anecdote, he described Mickey Rourke’s now-famous acceptance speech at the IFC Awards as one of the greatest speeches he had ever seen. That kind of letting go was what Tambor was trying to evince from the actors.
“There’s no honor lost in being excited and emotional and passionate,” Tambor said.
His method was supportive, tender, humorous and fully honest. That honesty, humanity and candor carried over into the question-and-answer portion, as Tambor discussed the role of the artist and finding confidence in your life and work. Tambor touched on the relationship between actors and writers, and how there must be trust and respect from both sides. Creating a play or movie is a malleable process, not anarchy, but cerainly a give-and-take, he said. He also shared his personal battle with worrying and confessed that it was having children that got him outside of himself. In that same vain of generosity, he said that when you are trapped in your own head or being obsessive and neurotic, the best thing you can do is to do something for someone else. The artist must listen to himself, believe in himself, never think to please and always surround himself with people who give him confidence.
Tambor’s humor, grace and honesty undoubtedly left many in the audienced embued with that sense of confidence, fearlessness and self-reliance of which he spoke.
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Linklater’s new film to screen at SXSW
The “Super Special Screening,” we hear, slated for 11 a.m. Monday at the Paramount is Richard Linklater’s “Me and Orson Welles,” starring Zac Efron and Claire Danes. Look out for the official announcement.
The movie did well at the annual Toronto film fest last year and received upbeat reviews. It’s still looking for a distributor.
More on the film HERE.
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SXSW Film kick-off party pix
Shots from the SXSW film opening night party Friday at Buffalo Billiards.
But first, a snap of John Inwood, writer-director of the Austin-made “ExTerminators,” which premiered Friday at the Paramount after “I Love You, Man.” More on his movie and screenings HERE. He’s arriving on the red carpet.
OK. Back to the party …
Mike Judge (“Office Space”)
“I Love You, Man” promo silliness
Austin filmmaker David Zellner, who co-stars in “Beeswax” at SXSW
Austin filmmaker PJ Raval, who shot Tim McCanlies’ SXSW comedy “The 2 Bobs”
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‘I Love You, Man’ Q&A
Back to Friday night’s noisily successful opening night with the Paul Rudd comedy “I Love You, Man.” Just for a minute.
The post-screening Q&A was moderated by charming first-timer Janet Pierson, doing a wonderful job handling her virgin experience as SXSW Film Producer. “It’s my first Q&A. I’m kinda struggling here,” she said, though the audience rebuked her with a swell of cheers and applause. (You’re doing great, Janet!)
Tiny, quickie excerpts:
SXSW film producer Janet Pierson, commanding the crowd. Great job!
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Jeffrey Tambor will rock you today
One of the annual highlights at the SXSW Film Conference is actor/funnyman Jeffrey Tambor’s Acting Workshop, happening at 3 p.m. today in Room 16AB at the Convention Center.
He was in town Friday night for the film kick-off party at Buffalo Billiards on Sixth Street, and looked dapper. Proof:
During the panel, Tambor (“The Larry Sanders Show,” “Arrested Development”) “explores the practical and philosophical approaches that lead to a great performance. He will rehearse and refine a scene with actors to break down the performance process. It’s for those interested in bridging the gap between actor and director. Directors and filmmakers are encouraged to attend and bring questions.”
Those are SXSW’s words. Actress Jess Weixler (“Alexander the Last”) will join him.
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SXSW: Opening Night
SXSW Film kicked off Friday night at the Paramount with a cyclone of laughter and celeb-juiced buzz: What the hell, Paul Rudd and Jason Segel were there, doing the red carpet and sitting in the audience, watching with nearly 1,000 viewers their new “bromantic” comedy “I Love You, Man.”
They cracked up as much as swooning fans. We saw them. True.
Jon Favreau — actor in “Swingers,” of course, and the director of last summer’s “Iron Man” — joined the posse, along with co-star Rashida Jones (daughter of a certain Quincy) and the tart, fashionably brittle Jaime Pressly.
The full house went mad for the opener, a very funny Hollywood comedy in the mold of all the Apatow, Inc. hits preceding it, like “Knocked Up” and “Forgetting Sarah Marshall,” which also screened at prior SXSWs (meaning Rudd and Segel are happy SXSW vets).
Some shots:
Paul Rudd, arriving at the Paramount on a damp Friday night
Jon Favreau, shooting the marquee of his movie on his cell
Rashida Jones, who plays Rudd’s fiancee in the comedy
Pressly on the carpet
And here’s SXSW producer Janet Pierson (far left) and “I Love You, Man” writer-director John Hamburg, producer Donald De Line, Rudd, Segel, Jones, Favreau again with his unforgiving, all-seeing cell phone, as they introduce the preordained blockbuster:
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Mumblecore must die!
Discuss.
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The early buzz: ‘We Live in Public’
‘We Live in Public’
Few people soared as high as Internet pioneer Josh Harris during the dot.com bubble of the late 1990s, and few fell so hard after the bust.
Early on, Harris understood the potential of the Web to replace television as a broadband entertainment medium, founding Pseudo.com, the first Internet ‘network.’
He boasted to ‘60 Minutes’ that he would soon be bigger than CBS. And he set up one of the most bizarre live broadcasts in history: the 24-hour recording of 100 people who were living in a New York City bunker.
When they showered, their images were broadcast. Same thing when they went to the bathroom, made love. Everything was fair game, and the private lives became public.
After a police raid in early 2000, the bunker project shut down. But Harris continued to ‘live in public’ for six months with his girlfriend on the Internet. When they fought, each one would run to his or her laptop to see what the public thought: Did he win the argument, or did she?
And throughout it all, Harris began to see some holes in his theory that people would be willing to trade their privacy for public recognition.
Director Ondi Timoner, who spent more than a decade tracking Harris, shows the not only his prescience but also his startling cluelessness.
‘We Live in Public’ won the top documentary prize at the Sundance Film Festival.
4:30 p.m. Tuesday, Austin Convention Center; 11:30 a.m., Wednesday, Paramount
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SXSW capsule review: ‘For the Love of Movies: The Story of American Film Criticism’
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SXSW capsule review: ‘Beetle Queen Conquers Tokyo’
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SXSW capsule review: ‘Alexander the Last’
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SXSW capsule review: ‘Soul Power’
Maybe it’s my upbringing. Maybe it’s my taste in music. But in my humble opinion, this documentary rocks.
“Soul Power” focuses on a three-day music festival held in Zaire in 1974, when Muhammad Ali and George Foreman met for the famous “Rumble in the Jungle.” The festival included performances by James Brown, Celia Cruz, the Mighty JBs, Bill Withers, B.B. King, Miriam Makeba and the Spinners.
The footage, which includes plenty of scenes with the Champ, has long been held in limbo because of financial difficulties associated with a Liberian investment group that paid for the festival and the filming of it.
The early highlights include Cruz jamming with other musicians on the flight to Africa, as well as scenes of musical street life in Kinshasa, the Zairian capital. The movie also shows how close the whole concert came to falling apart.
Jeffrey Levy-Hinte, who edited the boxing documentary “When We Were Kings,” directs, culling from more than 12 hours of film.
The performances by Withers, King and Brown are nothing less than amazing.
Screening: 2:30 p.m., Thursday, at the Paramount.
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SXSW capsule review: ‘American Violet’
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SXSW capsule review: ‘The Big Squeeze’
Austin-based documentary veteran Hector Galan continues his career-long interest in Mexican American culture with “The Big Squeeze,” which centers on an accordion showdown sponsored by the nonprofit Texas Folklife center.
Part of the Accordion Kings & Queens celebration, the Big Squeeze gathers promising nonprofessional players in a search for tomorrow’s stars. The youngsters here have talent, and some, like John Ramirez (who took up the instrument at the age of four and rehearses on a stage built in the family kitchen) display real charisma in performance. But the half-hour television format required for this film doesn’t allow for much development of drama or character — especially when the filmmakers have footage of stars such as Mingo Saldivar and Step Rideau to, er, squeeze in as well.
Screening: 7 p.m. Wednesday, Austin Convention Center.
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SXSW capsule review: ‘The Way We Get By’
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SXSW capsule review: ‘Trust Us, This Is All Made Up’
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SXSW capsule review: ‘The Time of Their Lives’
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SXSW capsule review: ‘Monsters from the Id’
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SXSW capsule review: ‘Motherland’
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SXSW capsule review: ‘Trimpin’
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SXSW capsule review: ‘Over the Hills and Far Away’
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SXSW capsule review: ‘Beeswax’
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SXSW capsule review: ‘Saint Misbehavin’: The Wavy Gravy Movie’
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SXSW capsule review: ‘Anvil! The Story of Anvil’
Back in the hair-lashing, riff-crunching heyday of ’80s heavy metal, Anvil was a rising force of anthemic noise and comically lewd antics. The group’s snaggle-toothed frontman called himself Lips and played his V-shaped guitar like a perverse love object.
From its Toronto base, Anvil had plans for world domination and almost pulled it off. But, after pioneering the thrash-metal movement and influencing upcoming rock giants Metallica and Slayer, Anvil vanished into obscurity.
“Everybody ripped them off and left them for dead,” says former Guns N’ Roses guitarist Slash in this oddly touching and enormously entertaining documentary about Anvil’s current comeback attempt. Directed by Sacha Gervasi, an old friend of the bandmates (and now an accomplished Hollywood screenwriter), “The Story of Anvil” catches up with Lips and original drummer Robb Reiner, who formed Anvil as teenagers in 1973.
Almost 40 years later, now well into their jowly 50s, their hunger for hard-rock glory remains unquenched. Instead of sports stadiums, though, Anvil plays sports bars. Lips and Reiner’s impossible dream to reclaim the metal-god mantle is the drama throbbing through the film.
Passion, perseverance, rejection, humiliation, frustration — these are the age-old themes of the struggling artist, and the movie explores them with unflinching honesty. It shows how exhaustingly difficult it is to get noticed in a youth-oriented music industry whose entire business model has changed. And it shares the squabbles sparked when egos clash in a creative fever, recalling the fiery band in-fighting seen in the 2004 Metallica documentary “Some Kind of Monster.”
While this invites our empathy, the movie is also extremely funny, filled with inadvertent “Spinal Tap” moments that make you laugh and love the characters even more. Lips and Reiner endear because they operate in a bubble in which time and good sense have stopped. Their optimism veers on boyish naivete, and they almost infect us with their quixotic hopes. Says Lips: “It can only get better.”
Screening: 10 p.m. Sunday, Alamo South; 9 p.m. Wednesday, Alamo Ritz.
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Daniel Johnston biopic in the works
Some pertinent breaking news just knocked. We answered. On the doorstep: adored Austin musician/artist Daniel Johnston. The special delivery he carries goes like this:
The makers of the inventive, award-winning teen dramedy “My Suicide,” enjoying its U.S. premiere Sunday at SXSW film, have snagged the rights to what they call “one of the most sought-after stories of the new century: the life story of manic-depressive genius singer-songwriter-artist Daniel Johnston.”
We take this message and ponder it. A dramatic feature about Dan “Hi, how are you?” Johnston. Our response is bifurcated: Cool. Then: Crap.
(Who will play him? Jonah Hill? Philip Seymour Hoffman? Oprah? “My Suicide’s” teen lead will play the young Johnston.)
Regenerate Films producers David Lee Miller, Larry Janss and Gabriel Sunday are developing the script.
Johnston, by the by, is playing twice at SXSW Music: 2:45 p.m. March 19 at the Brooklyn Vegan/Paste Magazine party at Radio Room and 1 a.m. March 21 at Emo’s.
For “My Suicide” show times at SXSW Film, go HERE.
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The early buzz: IFC teaming up with SXSW
IFC Festival Direct and South by Southwest are teaming up to present five movies this year that will also be available, by pay per view, on television.
In Austin, the movies can be accessed through IFC in Theaters on Time Warner Cable’s Movies on Demand Channel 1000. Prices range from $5 to $7.
The highest-profile movie in the lineup is ‘Alexander the Last,’ directed by Joe Swanberg.
Swanberg has become a regular at the Austin festival and typically premieres his films here.
The low-budget ‘Alexander the Last’ focuses on the perils faced by a young couple, both of whom are creative professionals and being tempted by the attractive people with whom they work. Like other Swanberg movies, it poses questions about monogamy, both emotionally and sexually. Barlow Jacobs, Jess Weixler and Justin Rice star, and Swanberg and most of the cast will be on hand for the premiere at 10 p.m. Saturday at the Paramount. It will also screen at 11 a.m. March 19 at the Alamo South and at 11:30 a.m. March 21 at the Austin Convention Center.
The other movies in the program are:
‘Paper Covers Rock,’ which focuses on a young woman (Jeannine Kaspar) who tries to commit suicide and then has to fight to regain her daughter. Joe Maggio (‘Virgil Bliss’) directs. 7 p.m. Friday at the Hideout.
‘Medicine for Melancholy,’ returning from last year’s festival and dealing with the one-night stands of two African Americans in San Francisco. 9 p.m. Friday at the Hideout.
‘Three Blind Mice,’ an Australian tale about three Navy officers who go out on the town in Sydney before shipping off to war. 5 p.m. Sunday at the Alamo South, 10 p.m. Tuesday (March 17) at the Alamo South and 3 p.m. March 20 at the Alamo Ritz.
‘Zift,’ a Bulgarian story about a man who’s released from an unjust imprisonment to discover that he’s living in a totalitarian state in the 1960s. Javor Gardev directs, and cinematographer Emil Christov brings an atmospheric eeriness to the film. 11:59 p.m. Friday at the Alamo Ritz and 11:59 March 19 at the Alamo Ritz.
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Is ‘Tree of Life’ dino-sore?
Terry Malick’s much-awaited, long-gestating “Tree of Life” — partly shot in Smithville last year and starring Brad Pitt and Sean Penn — appears to be taking on even stranger dimensions. We’re talking dinosaurs, IMAX, Iceland and the like.
Actually, we’re not talking. Ain’t-It-Cool-News via Empire.com is talking.
Get the eye-brow-bending scoop HERE.
A scene from Malick’s latest effete, poetic, philosophical, art-house epic?
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Bruno coming!
Guess what, folks. Got in this morning and found out that SXSW and Fantastic Fest will present a “special sneak peek” at footage from ‘Bruno,’ the new Sacha Baron Cohen movie.
Cohen’s previous effort, as everyone knows, was ‘Borat.’ The screening will be held on Sunday at 11 p.m., at the Alamo on South Lamar. And no badge will be needed. It’s free. So it will probably be a zoo.
In the movie, Cohen dresses provocatively, in tacky see-through shirts, and proceeds to make straight males uncomfortable. Could be a hoot. No mention of Cohen actually being there. We’ll see.
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The maturation of Joe Swanberg
Young filmmaker Joe Swanberg, long the bane of my film festival-going career, has finally made a pretty good and recommendable movie. Still in his 20s, I believe, he began with puerile, poorly thought-out and semi-embarrassing micro-budget indie exercises like “Kissing on the Mouth,” “LOL” and “Hannah Takes the Stairs.” They were strictly indulgent, with itty-bitty sparks of promise.
Yet with the curiously titled “Alexander the Last,” world-premiering at SXSW this week, he demonstrates a real urge and ambition toward mature filmmaking. I won’t go on, because another reviewer is writing up this indie-that-can, but it’s a marked departure, a happy upgrading of his previous work, which, if we are fair, was noble and serious.
I have to chalk it up to the fact that Swanberg either attracted or enlisted two name producers, Noah Baumbach (writer-director of “The Squid and the Whale” and much more) and Anish Savjani (“Wendy & Lucy”), who likely kept him on his toes, and a professional cast that can actually act. Regardless, almost everything is nicely in place — performances, tempo, music, cuts, cues, camera work, emotional marks — and it’s worth a peek during SXSW.
SXSW screening dates HERE.
More about the movie HERE.
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The Early buzz: ‘Sweethearts of the Prison Rodeo’
Austin filmmaker Brad Beesley, who’s known for his bizarre Americana documentary ‘Okie Noodling,’ turns his camera on Oklahomans again, but this time, the subjects aren’t fishermen. They’re prisoners.
In ‘Sweethearts of the Prison Rodeo,’ Beesley explores the vibrant, near-extinct phenomenon of prison rodeos, specifically the one in McAlester, Okla.
Since 1940, Oklahoma convicts have participated in what some people see as a gladiatorial contest, with multiple injuries and maimings. And in 2006, Oklahoma allowed women to join the rodeo and compete against the men.
Beesley doesn’t just show the rodeo. Over a couple of years, he trains his camera on the men and women who are competing and tells their stories — how they ended up in prison, how long they’ve been there, why they’re competing.
And some of the facts he uncovers are startling. It turns out that the vast majority of the imprisoned women are there not for violent crimes, but for drug possession or distribution. And the few murderers who do compete in the rodeo seem truly repentant.
Among the women are Crystal Herrington and Rhonda Buffalo. We see them training, see them in their cells and eventually see them riding broncs against the men.
Although many people may question the wisdom of holding a rodeo, the annual event at least gives the imprisoned cowboys and cowgirls a goal. The danger of the final scenes, however, may surprise viewers.
11 a.m. Saturday at the Paramount; 1:30 p.m. March 17 at the Alamo Ritz downtown; 4:30 p.m. March 20 at the Austin Convention Center.
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Noteworthy DVDs released 3/10/09
OTHER TOP PICKS
“Milk” (Universal): If “Milk” sounds too much like a civics lesson, consider watching it back-to-back with “Pineapple Express” for a jaw-droppingly yin-yang James Franco experience.
“Rachel Getting Married” (Sony): Anne Hathaway stretches out as an addict trying to cope with family grief and joy in a single stress-filled weekend.
“Synecdoche, New York” (Sony): The movie of the year or the year’s biggest cinematic self-indulgence? Let the debate begin.
“Let The Right One In” (Magnolia): The vampire flick that plays like a Euro art film. Because it is.
“Cadillac Records” (Sony): Beyonc´ as Etta James and Jeffrey Wright playing Muddy Waters? Count us in.
NEW ON BLU-RAY
“Batman: The Motion Picture Anthology (1989-1997)” (Warner Bros.); “Brokeback Mountain” (Universal); “Rockers” (MVD)
FRESH FROM THE MULTIPLEX
“Battle in Seattle,” “Role Models” (Universal); “The Boy in the Striped Pajamas” (Miramax); “Transporter 3” (Lions Gate)
ARTHOUSE/FOREIGN
“L’Innocente” (Koch); “Shinobi No Mono 3: Resurrection” (AnimEigo)
FROM THE VAULTS
“20,000 Leagues Under the Sea” (1954), “Escape to Witch Mountain” (Walt Disney); “Max Fleischer’s Gulliver’s Travels (1939) (Koch)
DOCUMENTARIES
“The Singing Revolution” (New Video)
BEST OF TV
“Cracker” Complete Collection (Acorn Media); “Family Ties” Season 5, “South Park” Season 12 (Paramount); “Get Smart” (Season Two) (HBO); “Woody Woodpecker Favorites” (Universal)
REISSUE/REPACKAGE
“Howard the Duck” (Universal); Pinocchio (Walt Disney, also on Blu-ray); “Primal Fear” (Paramount, also on Blu-ray)
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Early buzz: ‘Four Boxes’
Few films will fit in better with the overall focus of the upcoming South by Southwest Film and Interactive festivals than ‘Four Boxes.’
The thriller, starring Justin Kirk of Showtime’s ‘Weeds,’ deals with a team of ambulance chasers who target the homes of people who have died and left estates that need liquidating.
A mystery develops when the team sets up shop in a house and starts watching real-life events being streamed onto a Web site called fourboxes.tv. And before long, the liquidators begin to think what’s happening on the Web site might have some connection to the home where they are working.
Even more troublesome: The Web site appears to be showing what might be a terrorist cell planning an attack on the United States.
Directed by Wyatt McDill, ‘Four Boxes’ explores the permeable boundaries between real life and events being shown on the Web.
What’s real and what’s not? You’ll have to decide when watching this world premiere. McDill describes the movie as ‘a game-changing film that hints at the artistic and infrastructural collapse’ between storytelling on the big screen and on the Internet. Terryn Westbrook and Sam Rosen co-star with Kirk.
‘Four Boxes’ screens at 9:30 p.m. March 15 at the Alamo South, and at 4 p.m. March 17 at the Paramount. It will screen again at 7 p.m. March 20 at the Alamo South. The cast and crew are expected at various screenings. A party follows the world premiere March 15 at the Tap Room.
This one’s interesting, folks.
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Early buzz: Donald De Line
Producer Donald De Line will be having a big South by Southwest moment this year. His movie ‘I Love You, Man’ will be the opening-night film on March 13, and his other new movie, ‘Observe and Report,’ will be the centerpiece screening on March 16.
Most people in Austin probably don’t know anything about De Line, but they should. He’s a former chairman of Paramount and a former president of Touchstone. And he now has his own production company, De Line Pictures.
‘I Love You, Man,’ which will have its premiere in Austin, stars Paul Rudd and Jason Segel. In need of a best man for his upcoming wedding, Rudd goes on a series on ‘man dates’ in an attempt to find a friend. John Hamburg directs, and most of the cast will be on hand for the premiere. It’s scheduled for wide release March 20, a week after playing SXSW.
‘Observe and Report,’ another comedy that will premiere here, stars Seth Rogen as a bipolar security guard who is trying to track down a mall flasher. It’s directed by Jody Hill and will go into wide release April 10. Ray Liotta and Austin’s Jesse Plemons co-star.
In addition to De Line’s two new movies, he’s also working on big-screen versions of ‘Green Lantern,’ directed by Martin Campbell; ‘The Jetsons,’ with Austin’s writer/director Robert Rodriguez; and ‘Yogi Bear.’
Screenings: ‘I Love You, Man,’ 7:30 p.m. March 13 at the Paramount
‘Observe and Report,’ 9:30 p.m., March 16 at the Paramount
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Early buzz: Soul Power
Of all the movies playing at the upcoming South by Southwest Film Festival, few have been getting more favorable buzz than ‘Soul Power.’
It screened at the Toronto International Film Festival and received positive notices from numerous critics. And the premise sounds intriguing.
The documentary focuses on a three-day music festival held in Zaire in 1974, when Muhammad Ali and George Foreman met for the famous ‘Rumble in the Jungle.’ The festival included performances by James Brown, the Mighty JBs, Bill Withers, B.B. King, Miriam Makeba and the Spinners.
The footage from those performances has long been held in limbo because of financial difficulties associated with a Liberian investment group that paid for the festival and the filming of it. But the rights to the footage have finally been settled. And Jeffrey Levy-Hinte, who edited the boxing documentary ‘When We Were Kings,’ has put together a new movie based on the original footage.
‘Soul Power’ includes scenes of American musicians arriving in Africa and follows them through their performances — more than 12 hours of film that’s been edited down to about 90 minutes.
‘Soul Power’ is the directing debut of Levy-Hinte, who previously produced ‘Thirteen,’ ‘Mysterious Skin’ and ‘Roman Polanski: Wanted and Desired.’
Screening: 2:30 p.m., March 19, at the Paramount
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Horton Foote dies
Horton Foote, the Texan who chronicled small-town Southern life in movies, books and plays and became one of the most noted storytellers of the state, has died in Hartford, Conn. He died Wednesday and was 92.
Foote wrote the screenplays for some of the most lauded movies ever made, including “Tender Mercies” with Robert Duvall, “To Kill a Mockingbird,” with Gregory Peck, and “Trip to Bountiful.”
Many of his stories dealt with everyday people facing hardships but maintaining their dignity. And those tales led to a Pulitzer Prize and two Oscars. He was also honored by the Texas Film Hall of Fame, the Texas Book Festival and nearly every other arts group in the state.
In short, he was a Texas legend.
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Rodriguez hops to the future
From Empireonline.com:
Robert Rodriguez, the multi-talented writer, director, composer, cameraman, editor and tea boy, is heading into the future with his new film, “Nerverackers.” … A futuristic sci-fi thriller that Rodriguez will write and direct for his old chums at Dimension, “Nerverackers” will take place in the year 2085, when society has become a blissful utopia. That is, until something, or someone, embarks on a crime wave, prompting the authorities to assemble a special unit, led by a guy named Joe Tezca, to fight back.
More HERE.
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Early buzz on ‘The Hurt Locker’
If you’re planning your film viewing during the South by Southwest Film Festival, you’ll want to know about the area premiere of ‘The Hurt Locker,’ from director Kathryn Bigelow and screenwriter Mark Boal.
Bigelow needs no introduction to Texas movie lovers, but if you need your memory jogged, she directed 1987’s classic ‘Near Dark,’ starring Adrian Pasdar as a young Texan who falls for a girl who happens to be a member of a vampire gang.
Since then, she has gained a reputation as one of the nation’s most visually exciting directors, as she showed in 1991’s ‘Point Break’ and in 1995’s ‘Strange Days.’
‘The Hurt Locker’ premiered last year at the Venice Film Festival to widespread acclaim and has been making the rounds on the festival circuit before its official release this summer. The war thriller was shot on location in Jordan and deals with a bomb squad working in Iraq. It’s based on recently declassified information as well as personal observations by screenwriter Boal, who was an embedded journalist during the U.S. invasion of Iraq.
Jeremy Renner stars as the leader of the bomb squad, and supporting actors include Guy Pearce and Ralph Fiennes.
After the Venice premiere, ‘The Hurt Locker’ received a 10-minute standing ovation. Variety described it as a high-adrenaline jolt.
Bigelow and Boal will be in attendance at the Austin premiere at 6:30 p.m. March 17 at the Paramount.
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Raimi and Demme coming to SXSW
Sam Raimi is best known to those not in the know as the director of the “Spider-Man” franchise (still waiting for the apology for part 3, mister). But before that he displayed wondrous chops as a horror mastermind with the giddily inventive “Evil Dead” trilogy. (And before that, he worked with the Coen brothers, and they cooked up all sorts of cinematic tricks.)
Anyway, Raimi will screen his work-in-progress horror movie — yes, he’s back to his rotten, bloody roots! — “Drag Me to Hell,” which is not only what my last girlfriend told me but also might be the fourth best title ever. The movie stars Alison Lohman and Justin Long and is described as a “young woman’s desperate quest to break an evil curse.”
Raimi will introduce the film at midnight March 15 at the Paramount Theatre.
‘Drag Me’ right here …
On a less gory and gutty note … Jonathan Demme is showing his new Neil Young concert movie “Neil Young Trunk Show” on March 21 at the Paramount. And Demme will be there to chat it up.
Full info on these and every SXSW movie HERE.
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Noteworthy DVDs released 3/3/09
PICK OF THE WEEK
“I’ve Loved You So Long” (Sony): A deeply wounded, quietly stunning performance by Kristin Scott Thomas anchors this French film, which holds out secrets for the end but doesn’t do it just to tease.
OTHER TOP PICKS
“Ashes of Time Redux” (Sony): Wong Kar-Wai’s breakthrough film — early masterwork, or impenetrable tone poem in which mood trumps substance?
“Treasures From American Film Archive: Vol. 4 (Avant-Garde)” (Image): The series of box sets devoted to obscure short films turns to experiments in cinema by Joseph Cornell, Shirley Clarke, Jonas Mekas and many others. New music by John Zorn.
“The Hunchback of Notre Dame” (1982) (Sony): Who knew Anthony Hopkins once played everyone’s favorite spinally-challenged icon? Co-stars Derek Jacobi, John Gielgud and Lesley-Anne Down, that’s who.
FRESH FROM THE MULTIPLEX
“Australia” (Fox); “Beverly Hills Chihuahua” (Walt Disney); “Lake City” (Universal)
NEW ON BLU-RAY
“The Silence of the Lambs” (MGM); “Watchmen: The Complete Motion Comic” (Warner Bros.); “In the Electric Mist” (Image); “Brokeback Mountain” (Universal)
ARTHOUSE/FOREIGN
“Back To Normandy,” “Wonderful Town” (Kino); “Moses and Aaron” (New Yorker); “Weapons” (Lions Gate)
BEST OF TV
“7th Heaven” Season 8, “The Hills” Season 4, “Nash Bridges” Season 2, “The Return of the Man from U.N.C.L.E.,” “Spongebob vs. The Big One” (Paramount); Six “Doctor Who” adventures, “Planet Earth” Vol. 3 & 4 (BBC); “East of Eden” (1981 Miniseries), “Ramsay’s Kitchen Nightmares” (Acorn Media); “ER” Season 10 (Warner Bros.); “My Two Dads” Season 1 (Shout! Factory); “The Tales of Beatrix Potter” (Lions Gate)
REISSUE/REPACKAGE
“Ace Ventura Jr.: Pet Detective” (Warner Bros.); “Air Bud” (Walt Disney); “The Scarlett Johansson Collection” (Lions Gate)
STRAIGHT(ISH) TO VIDEO
“Real Time” (Image); “Stiletto” (First Look); “The Village Barbershop” (Monterey)
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SXSW Watch: The early buzz
Like every other arts lover in Austin, you’re probably wondering how to plan your schedule during South by Southwest, which kicks off March 13 with the Film Conference and Festival.
The American-Statesman Life & Arts staff will be giving tips on upcoming events to help in your planning.
First up: Marshall Allman, 24, the star of the new movie, ‘The Immaculate Conception of Little Dizzle.’
The Austin native moved to Southern California shortly after graduating from Austin High School, and some of his first work was as a guest on various TV shows, including ‘Without a Trace,’ ‘Boston Public’ and ‘Malcolm in the Middle.’ His most high-profile TV role so far has been as LJ Burrows on ‘Prison Break.’
In director David Russo’s new film, ‘The Immaculate Conception of Little Dizzle,’ Allman plays Dory, a guy who loses his high-tech job and ends up working as a night janitor. Before long, he forms a bond with his fellow workers and discovers that he and they are the subjects of a bizarre experiment that is changing their minds and bodies.
Described as a hallucinatory tale that includes animated sequences, ‘Little Dizzle’ co-stars Tygh Runyan of ‘Normal,’ Tania Raymonde of ‘Lost’ and Vince Vieluf. Screenings: March 15, 9:15 p.m., Alamo Ritz; March 19, 4 p.m., Alamo Ritz; March 21, 11 a.m., Alamo South.
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