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November 4, 2009
Your A-List: Best Video Store
The A-List reader’s poll produces very few exact ties. Numerically, the more votes, the less chance for a tie. Yet we are faced with one in first place this week.
Austin’s other traditional video spot, I Luv Video, came in a respectable third with 14 percent. Blockbuster and the Austin Public Library tied at 6 percent. Hastings, an older Texas chain, managed 4 percent.
Three percent or less of the voters chose Tapelenders, Encore and the Movie Store.
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October 27, 2009
'Apollo 13' Red Carpet at the Paramount Theatre
[Sorry these party posts are coming in so late, even if for obvious reasons. Only 8 more of 25 total to go.]
Only at the Austin Film Festival do screenwriters stride the red carpet, facing a battery of cameras and microphones usually reserved for A-List onscreen stars.
Outside the Paramount Theatre on Saturday, for a headliner screening for the Austin Film Festival, press and paparazzi pushed forward to view the likes of Bill Broyles, Al Reinart, Ron Howard and Capt. Jim Lovell, all writers on “Apollo 13” and the book upon which it was based, “Lost Moon.” After the sidewalk gabfest, Howard and crew introduced the movie to a packed house.
Ron Howard, so charming on the red carpet
“Apollo 13” Director and writer Ron Howard: “I haven’t been to that many festivals. I go to a couple of big ones that serve as film markets around the world. This one is really about creativity, about trying to help people find their voice. You sense it. There’s a spirit of cameraderie that’s palpable. And it’s fun. (‘Apollo 13’) has always been a crowd pleaser. We tried to tell a compelling, dramatic story, but also tell what it was really like to go to the moon during the Apollo Era.”
Cyndy Powell and Glen Powell, Jr.
NASA astronaut Capt. Jim Lovell, who lives in Horseshoe Bay: “The movie actually rejuvenated the space program. Just last week, three people came up and said, ‘I saw “Apollo 13” on TV again. I said: ‘You gotta be kidding. They’re still showing it?’ But it’s a classic. Ron did a superb job. Everybody knew the ending when they walked in the theater. But he kept everybody on the edge of their seats until the end of the movie.”
Tom and Jamie Hinson
Ron Howard’s brother, Clint Howard, who played Sy Liebergot in “Apollo 13.”: “It’s the busiest I’ve been at a festival, with all the panels and luncheons. It’s really inspiring. I really really like the fact that they emphasize writing and writers. You’re opening a whole can of worms when you talk about writing. It’s not something you can do in two or three days. It’s great that writers are acknowledged and encouraged.”
Natalie Streit and Nikolai Burgevin
[For those of you counting, this was Party No. 17 out of 25 on this Big October Weekend. Eight more posts to go.]
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October 25, 2009
Texas Film BBQ at the French Legation
Even if the weather outside were frightful — it was not — the Texas Film BBQ would have been delightful …
Marc Mollere and Dolce Carbajal
All sorts of celebrities — major or minor — and just plain film folks show up. They feast on the saucy meat, sip polite drinks and wander across the Texas/Old World French Legation lawn …
Lori Madrid and Tommy Warren
Also to savor the respite from the Austin Film Festival. No matter how much the badge-holders benefit from the panels, discussions, luncheons, interviews, red carpets and movie premieres, the cherished annual BBQ is a required break …
Nita Lou Bryant and Bryanne Cooke (whose personal story is worth a long entry in itself, someday
I spent the most time with Turk Pipkin, who just returned from the Los Angeles premiere of his doc, “One Piece at a Time.” He shared juicy stories about the event, which I promised not to share here (ask Pipkin, though, he’s a much better storyteller anyway) …
Janet Pierson (SXSW) and Jill Oleson (former art critic for the Statesman)
I’ll repeat the weather report: Out of this world. Or rather, the best that this one produces.
Hannah Gallow with AFF founder Barbara Morgan
[For those of you counting, this was Party No. 12 out of 25 on this Big October Weekend. 13 more posts to go.]
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October 23, 2009
Austin Film Festival Opening Party at Mohawk
They used to call them “Chamber of Commerce Days” …
Claudia Blanchette and Amanda Garcia
When the weather was so unblemished, out-of-towners long to linger. Perhaps to spend money, I suppose …
Michael Torres and Stephanie Hunt
Instead, let’s call them “Open Austin Days,” when we extend our collective hands to participants in an event like the Austin Film Festival …
Leslie Carlisle, Terrence Michael and TS Morgan
That’s what happened at Mohawk on Thursday, as festival badge-holders, from home and abroad, left behind panel discussions and movie premieres to engage each other in free-wheeling conversation for an hour or so …
Laura Kinkaid and Andrew Lee
The food stayed upstairs on the terrace, nearer the azure sky. So did the guests. A curious few filtered down to hear the lively band even to dance. But industry talk and nibbles ruled the roost.
Walter Bell and Denise Pischinger
One vegetarian visitor asked for a recommendation on Congress Avenue near the Paramount Theatre. I scratched my head and pointed him toward Manuel’s, Annies and a few other spots on that main stem.
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October 22, 2009
Food & Film Party at the Driskill Hotel
Food & Film Party: One of the city’s finest chef showcases …
Amy Cadenhead and Carla Click with the Texas Film Commission
The sipping and sampling kicked off the Austin Film Festival on Wednesday …
Irfan Hydari and Karey Scheyd
Yet many of the celebrants don’t really attend the movies. Just this party …
Mark Schkud and Brian Hack
No matter. This year, the mezzanine level of the Driskill Hotel looked slim, sleek …
Rick and Melissa Delaney
Drinks centralized, chef’s tables scattered, guests, ultimately, sated.
Anna and Brian Maxin
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October 14, 2009
Your A-List: Best Movie Theater
Well, the four winners tell you something right away.
Three of those belong to the original Alamo theater group founded by Tim and Karrie League. Lake Creek was part of the first franchise wave. A second regional expansion is underway.
We don’t have to tell why all four Austin outlets are loved. Recite the formula: Movies, food, drink, fun and respect. (The final element reflects the founders’ devotion to the cinematic experience. When they say “no talking,” they mean it.)
Tying for fifth place at just over 4 percent were the Bullock Museum’s IMAX and Tinseltown Pflugerville.
Taking 3 percent or less were the Paramount Theatre, Regal Gateway, Regal Arbor, AMC Barton Creek Square, Cinemark Hill Country Galleria, Regal Westgate, Dobie, Galaxy Highland, Cinemark Southpark, City Lights, Cinemark Cedar Park, Cinemark Round Rock, Regal Metropolitan, Regal Lakeline Mall, Chestnut Square, Showpace, Millennium, Tinseltown South and Starplex.
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September 13, 2009
2009 Fortunate 500: Movies
2009 FORTUNATE 500
MOVIES
For a previous posted micro-profile of Janet and John Pierson, go here.
Paul Alvarado-Dykstra. Fantastic Fest, Texas Motion Picture Alliance
Connie Britton. ‘Friday Night Lights,’ ‘Women in Trouble,’ ‘A Nightmare on Elm Street’
Elizabeth Avellan. ‘Shorts,’ ‘Santos,’ Troublemaker Studios, Texas Motion Picture Alliance
Louis Black. Austin Chronicle, South by Southwest
Gary Bond. Austin Film Office, Austin Film Commission
Sandra Bullock and Jesse James. Bess Bistro, Walton’s Fancy and Staple, South Austin Speed Shop, ‘The Proposal,’ ‘All About Steve’
Kat Candler. Candler Productions, University of Texas
Kathryn and Kyle Chandler. ‘Friday Night Lights,’ ‘Morning,’ Beyond the Lights Celebrity Golf Tournament
Ashley Chiles. Ladyflash
Cole Dabney. Austin Film Critics, Coleandbobby.com
Marc English. Austin Film Society, Marc English Design
Caroline Frick. Texas Film Archives
Hector Galan. ‘The Music of America,’ ‘The Big Squeeze,’ ‘The War’
Dana Glover. Median Films, ‘Jollenbach’
Kyle Henry and Carlos Treviño. ‘Beeswax,’ Rude Mechs, ‘University, Inc.’
Tamara and Bob Hudgins. Texas Film Commission, Chisholm Trail Community Foundation
Mike Judge. ‘The Goode Family,’ Austin Film Society
Taylor Kitsch. ‘Friday Night Lights,’ ‘Wolverine’
Harry Knowles. Ain’t It Cool News, Fantastic Fest, Butt-numb-a-thon
Richard Linklater. Austin Film Society, ‘Inning by Inning,’ ‘Me and Orson Welles’
Suzanne and Tim McCanlies. ‘The Two Bobs’
Henri Mazza. Alamo Drafthouse
Barbara Morgan. Austin Film Festival
Mark Mueller. Voodoo Cowboy, Mueller Law
Chale Nafus. Austin Film Society
Masashi Niwano. Austin Asian American Film Festival
Karen Olsson and Andrew Bujalski. ‘Beeswax,’ Texas Monthly, ‘Waterloo’
Jesse Plemons. ‘Friday Night Lights,’ Greater Austin Walk for Autism, Beyond the Lights Charity Golf Tournament
PJ Raval. ‘Trouble the Water,’ ‘Trinidad,’ ‘The Two Bobs’
Robert Rodriguez. ‘Shorts,’ Austin Film Society, Troublemaker Studios
Tom Schatz. UT Film Institute
Paul Stekler. Austin Film Society, University of Texas
Agnes Varnum. Austin Film Society, Doc It Out
Janell Vela-Smith. Fighting Stunts Association, Spiderwood Studios
Anne Walker-McBay. ‘The Two Bobs’
Tommy G. Warren. Spiderwood Studios
Tara Wood. Wood Entertainment, ‘Waco’
David and Nathan Zellner. ‘Goliath’
COMPLETE 2009 FORTUNATE 500 LISTS:
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September 12, 2009
AGLIFF Centerpiece Movie at Alamo South
The Austin Gay and Lesbian Film Festival remains the city’s preeminent gay cultural and social event.
Calvin Williams and John Livingston
Sure, Last Splash reels in thousands of intense partiers from across the U.S. twice a year.
Jake H. Gonzales, Lisa Whitaker, Asif Hassan
Galas for Equality Texas and Human Rights Campaign, as well as other health and political-themed organizations turn out the “A Gays.”
Glenn Doonan, Chris Oakleaf and Kristina Hager
Not to mention arts or sporting events, which, cliche or not, appeal to gay and lesbian sensibilities in droves.
Melanie Tiemann and Collin Acock
Yet AGLIFF ties all these fields together through its incredibly varied film selections. And now it’s snugly camped at Alamo South. From the sound of its board members and staff, the nonprofit festival is thriving, even in tough economic times.
Lori Barrett and Chris Trickey
The Centerpiece Movie? “Antique,” a complicated comedy from Korea about four men and a pastry shop. Only one of the four is gay-identified. Yet the various romantic, commercial, gustatory, criminal and psychological entanglements reflect a healthy inclusion of gay themes. I actually saw it twice, once on an inferior DVD screener, then, gloriously, on the big screen.
It’s one of the best films of the year — of any stripe. Grade: A.
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September 7, 2009
Fortunate 500 Top Picks: Movies
The Top Picks for the 2009 Fortunate 500 list of socially active area citizens were published in Glossy on Friday. In Out & About, we’ll mete out those Top Picks over the next few days. Then, beginning Tuesday, we’ll release the full lists and galleries.
Top Picks: Janet and John Pierson
The movie industry is not kind to couples. Yet, together and apart, Janet and John Pierson have devoted three decades to pushing independent films and filmmakers. They’ve served as distributors, exhibitors, producer’s representatives, investors, workshop producers and executive producers. They co-created the Independent Film Channel’s series, “Split Screen,” and both serve on boards for the linchpin resource for local movies and fans, Austin Film Society. John wrote the seminal bestseller about the indie industry, “Spike, Mike, Slackers and Dykes,” and teaches at the University of Texas. Janet is the producer of the South by Southwest Conference and Festival. Yet it’s their relentlessly social — and sometimes contradictory — enthusiasms for movies that make them the city’s first film couple. Even their children, Georgia and Wyatt, caught the movie bug. All four appear in the documentary “Reel Paradise.”
For more 2009 Fortunate 500 updates, follow the category link below.
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September 1, 2009
The Jason Bateman Interview: Part 3
For more Jason Bateman, scroll down to previous posts, or link here to Part 1 and Part 2.
You’ve been in the business for quite some time.
I started when I was 10. I’m 40 now.
And you seem sane.
So you weren’t scarred when Sandy Duncan replaced Valerie Harper on “Valerie” (in 1987)?
No, I wasn’t scarred at all, though I was sorry to see Valerie go. We got along very well. But Sandy turned out to be — and remains — one of my favorite people. It went from good to great.
You were already directing at that age?
I was 18 on that show and I did an episode. I like it. Just like anybody in any profession you want to use what you’ve learned. The job of director allows you to exercise things you’ve soaked in, besides just the acting. I’d rather, frankly, to be doing that. I know it’s a cliche: “I’d rather be directing.” It would be nice, after all these years, to do a job that’s more challenging than just the one thing — acting.
Speaking of cliches: Is it a myth that child stars end up with crazy, wrecked lives?
It’s certainly not a myth. There are plenty of examples. I don’t know if you can fill a hand with those who are left from when I started. I’m not saying that as a braggart. These people either screwed their lives up or they were cast aside. Which is unfortunate, because, if you were talented then, why can’t you be talented later? Just because you grew out of the age that made you famous, you should be relegated to irrelevance.
I don’t know. First of all, the job itself demands that you learn how to be someone you are not. And if you are child, you are learning how to do that while you are trying to figure out who you are. You are allowed to misbehave at a time when you like to behave. It can be as challenging as you want it to be, or as you could ask for. I feel pretty lucky to make it through.
“Extract” opens on Friday.
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The Jason Bateman Interview: Part 2
For Part 1 of “The Jason Bateman Interview,” scroll down to previous post, or link here.
It’s an interesting question. It probably has a lot to do with just me — I have a tendency to want to be liked by everybody. So I tried to teach myself at an early age how to get along with most different kinds of people. And not alienate those I don’t like or understand. Maybe it’s that: Knowing how to get along. It’s this deep-seated, pathetic desire to be liked.
Were there any actors whom you connected with particularly, developed a particular rhythm with?
Each one of us seemed to find that black-and-white, yin-and-yang, twosome dynamic. That’s something out there you don’t establish until you are on the set with the other actors. Obviously the writer has in mind what one needs to do, and there’s a back-and-forth about who’s going to be the antagonist, who is going to be the protagonist, who is going to be the straight man, who is going to be the funny man, and so on. And that switches multiple times in the scene. It’s a matter of watching what the other actor is doing and hopefully being malleable, being the other side of coin when need be. That’s one of the reasons I don’t really learn my lines until I’m on the set. If I learn my lines (in advance), it usually means I’ve hammered myself into one way of doing it.
More to come …
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The Jason Bateman Interview: Part 1
Don’t expect shocking revelations. Jason Bateman didn’t crack under the pressure of serial interviews meted out in an enormous suite at the Four Seasons Hotel. He didn’t lash out at Austin director Mike Judge, or whine about his child stardom, starting in the early 1980s with “Little House on the Prairie.” He was as ingratiating in person as he appears on screen, playing a factory owner in Judge’s “Extract” — which opens Friday — or real-estate developer on the much-lauded — and thematically similar — TV series, “Arrested Development.”
Jason Bateman: Ninety-five percent of that is usually what’s there before I get there. Mike certainly is no stranger to writing interesting characters and his “middle men,” his “center men,” his protagonists, or whatever you want to call them, are no exceptions. I think he understands that somebody bullet-proof is not interesting and certainly not funny. He’s pretty good at putting flaws in there.
And then the degree of subtly by which you show those flaws correlates to whether it’s good writing or great writing. He doesn’t hammer you with things and doesn’t lean in too much. He never begs for a laugh. He trusts that the characters will suffice. He doesn’t write, really, any jokes. He creates these situations and makes sure he doesn’t write the characters too far from reality, so the absurd situation or the conflict can be relatable, tangible. If it’s too far from reality, it’s lost on the audience.
You were able to do a similar thing with a fictional situation that was very unreal, “Arrested Development.” How would you compare those two experiences? In both casese, your character is right in the middle of the flakes and the felons, and yet is able to preserve his decency.
It’s just a sense of wanting to be a good proxy for the audience. The
character is the audience. He’s supposed to be your tour guide and to
experience for the audience.
More to come …
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August 22, 2009
Films Fantastic at the Independent
Jolyn Janis and Jay Galvan had a notion …
Jolyn Janis and Jay Galvin
To stage a tiny — almost microscopic — movie festival …
Bears Fonte, Jon Alvord, Richard Ford
They called it Films Fantastic! …
Rocio Garza, Sophia Hoang
And it played out Friday at the Independent, Mike Henry’s cool, flexible, post-Electric Lounge performance space in the 501 Studios complex on East Fifth Street …
Kai Salim, Josh Robins
All the movies were short. Some were incomplete, or trailers, or music videos, or behind-the-scenes documentaries.
Sesar Sandoval, Stephanie Johnson
Here’s the shocker for such a one-off, grassroots Austin event: Despite the low-or-no-budget work, almost all of it was professional to a high degree. Keep an eye out for the filmmakers listed at Artist in Resonance.
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August 19, 2009
'Extract' Premiere at the Paramount Theatre
Mike Judge’s “Extract” is an exceedingly sweet and funny movie brushed by a darkish undercurrent.
Mike Judge
Austinite Judge was among the celebrities attending the movie’s premiere at the Paramount Theatre last night.
Patty Griffin
Jason Bateman, who stars as a decent, likable cooking-extract company owner gone adrift, also graced the Austin Film Society event.
Jason Bateman, Mike Judge
I interviewed Bateman earlier this morning at his hotel, and will share our conversation as soon as some transcription time pops up on my schedule.
Eloise DeJoria
Meanwhile, the film opens for a general run Sept. 4. Go for it.
Kelly West photos.
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August 18, 2009
My Austin Film Critics Awards list grows longer
Quickly catching up on the possible award nominees for the Austin Film Critics Association voting later this year. (Didn’t particularly care for “Inglourious Basterds.”) As you know, the real awards season starts in September, but I hate forgetting my early-year faves.
“The Hurt Locker”
“Moon”
“Funny People”
“Star Trek”
“Outrage”
“(500) Days of Summer”
“Best Worst Movie”
Added in just the past few days:
“Julie and Julia”
“Extract”
Need to see before the summer ends:
“Up”
“Public Enemies”
“The Proposal” (Austin connection)
“Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince”
“District 9”
“The Hangover”
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Tips: Lindsay Lohan, Robert De Niro, Jessica Alba. What to do? Part 2
For more on “Tips: Lindsay Lohan, Robert De Niro, Jessica Alba. What to do?” scroll down to previous post, or link here.
Testing the evidence on the basis of reputation is trickier. Given the saturation coverage of her recent behavior, the Lindsay Lohan tips sound pretty darn convincing. Similarly, the bland whispers about Jessica Alba and Robert De Niro skew to type. But isn’t that playing along with the alternate universe spun by the tabloid mongers? Gotta keep celebrity prejudice under control.
Then we ask: Who cares?
The alert reader might say: “That should be your first question. Quit wasting your time and mine.” This blinkered way of treating potential news is very popular, especially in mainstream print media. “It’s news when we decide it’s the news,” goes The New York Times view of the world. And that view often precludes what readers actually want to know.
I’ll admit to entering this profession with that attitude. “I’ll decide what’s substantive enough to deserve consideration, thank you.” Didn’t matter if thousands of Austinites thought something else — their tips, for instance — were newsworthy.
Then a colleague said something so obvious, yet so revolutionary, I’ve never really recovered from it: “Sometimes, we must meet the readers where they live.”
She’s right. If my readers, sorting through my Out & About blog posts, columns and other articles about personalities, nightlife, entertainment, socializing and city scenes want to know — or share something — about the famous people in our midst, I’m not going to shut that door.
Tip me. Go ahead. Trust me not to abuse the information through character assassination or invasion of privacy. And I’ll trust you. Up to a point.
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August 17, 2009
Tips: Lindsay Lohan, Robert De Niro, Jessica Alba. What to do?
Lindsay Lohan misbehaves in a downtown Austin hotel.
She’s spotted “texting furiously” while her friends buy wine at a Lakeway drugstore.
Another “Machete” star, Jessica Alba, is logged at the Starbucks at Fifth Street and Lamar Boulevard.
Robert De Niro, a third Rodriguez import to our town, is pegged at quiet corners all over downtown.
Which celebrity rumors and tips to believe? And what to do about them?
After we get past the inevitable and reasonable “Why should we care?” and “Why don’t you leave those poor people alone?” objections, a responsible social columnist must systematically and sympathetically evaluate each piece of evidence.
The first thing I do is consider the source. One tip came from an unimpeachable agent, but three times removed from the scene. Another from a reader who provided credible details, but whose word is unproven.
The “flesh-colored brassiere” incident was duly recorded and distributed online. The images look like Austin. It is Lohan, or an extremely convincing likeness. That’s about as far as that evidence takes us.
Another tip came from a Facebook friend with no record of misleading me. Unlike neighbor Beau Bahan, who offered up this delicious, mock scoop: “I saw (Lohan’s) image on a pancake at Maudie’s this morning, reaching toward what seemed to be the image of Doug Sahm, forming in the condensing moisture on the outside of a glass of orange juice.”
More to come …
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August 12, 2009
Movies headed for Austin Film Critics Awards voting
Preserving — if only just barely — my membership in the Austin Film Critics Association, I’m catching up on quality movies. Of course, the awards-worthy movies often come out after Sept. 1.
“The Hurt Locker”
“Moon”
“Funny People”
“Star Trek”
“Outrage”
“(500) Days of Summer”
“Best Worst Movie”
Need to see before the summer ends:
“Up”
“Public Enemies”
“Julie and Julia” (Austin connection)
“Extract” (Austin connection)
“Inglourious Basterds” (Austin connection)
“The Proposal” (Austin connection)
“Shorts” (Austin connection)
“Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince”
“District 9”
“The Hangover”
Your suggestions go here …
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August 11, 2009
Hollywood celebrities swamp Austin in August
August in Austin is hardly hospitable, weather-wise. Yet necks will rubberize — and not from the heat — as movie celebrities invade our town this month.
As usual, blame the Big 4 Filmmakers: Robert Rodriguez, Richard Linklater, Elizabeth Avellan and Mike Judge, and their projects, either on location or in the can. The shooting of producer Avellan’s and director Rodriguez’s “Machete” (co-directed by Ethan Maniquis) has lured tabloid queen Lindsay Lohan here to sample our alternative variety of heat.
We’ve already received tips on Lohan’s movements, but “Machete” co-star Robert DeNiro is likely to be more discreet. We hear that all sorts of celebrities — Jessica Alba, Steven Seagal, Don Johnson, Cheech Marin, et al — will make appearances in the movie, so who knows will show up at the Four Seasons, Uchi or the Belmont. Quentin Tarantino is expected to play a production role in “Machete,” which was previewed, fictionally, in his and Rodriguez’s “Grindhouse.” He’s also scheduled for the Alamo Ritz premiere of “Inglourious Basterds” on Saturday, although don’t expect a red-carpet parade on East Sixth Street.
Sunday, Rodriguez and Avellan’s Austin-shot “Shorts” premieres at the Paramount Theatre, with proceeds going to Thoughtful House Center for Children. Younger stars Jimmy Bennett, Trevor Gagnon, Devon Gearhart, Jake Short, Jolie Vanier and (son) Rebel Rodriguez will line the red carpet. Sadly, adult actors Leslie Mann, James Spader and William H. Macey are not on the evening’s roster.
Judge’s “Extract” premieres at the Paramount on Tuesday. Some of the artists, including the director and the underrated lead, Jason Bateman, are rolling into town for interviews and red carpet. Co-stars Mila Kunis or Ben Affleck will not likely to join them, but who can say …
What about Linklater, you say? We’ve been waiting with bated breath for his “Me and Orson Welles,” which wrapped last year with Ben Chaplin, Claire Danes and Zac Efron. It bowed at Toronto Film Festival and made a surprise appearance at South by Southwest. Should arrive for real during the Oscar rush in October.
Meanwhile, Linklater’s got “School of Rock 2” and other local projects in the works. Add them to the list of possible celebrity magnets for our long, hot August.
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July 29, 2009
'The Hurt Locker' bears the truth of war
The advance buzz on “The Hurt Locker” didn’t mislead. Published and verbal reports accurately telegraphed that it would break with the received notions about war movies.
The only previous war movie it recalled is “Jarhead,” this time without the distraction of Jake Gyllenhaal’s searing good looks. In fact, I didn’t really recognize the leads — Jeremy Renner, Anthony Mackie and Brian Geraghty — at all. Which made their performances more convincing, lacking the filter of celebrity personae.
Pegged as an action film — witness the virtually all-male audience at the Arbor Theatre — “The Hurt Locker” bears the truth of war. Especially the Iraqi war.
On a lighter note, for Oscar handicappers, this one’s got to be in that Top 10.
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July 25, 2009
'(500) Days of Summer' the next 'Annie Hall'? Part 3
For Parts 1 & 2 of our “(500) Days of Summer,” see posts below…
(The characters don’t even acknowledge they live in Los Angeles until two-thirds of the way through the movie, when Tom says, “We live in one of the most beautiful cities in the world.” Early in the writing process, the script was set in San Francisco.)
Popular music plays a motivational role in “(500) Days.” “I spent eight years attaching images to music, so it only seems natural to let that inform the momentum of the movie,” Webb says. “Clearly, Tom as a character is formed by music. So it became a matter of letting a musician — a singer-songwriter — narrate the movie for a moment. And then let the music take over. I mean, half the experience you have in the cinema is going in through your ears. And relationships are often defined by the music we listen to and associate with them.”
Before shooting, Webb screened two films for the whole cast and crew, “Annie Hall” (1977) and “High Fidelity” (2000) calling them “tonal focus points.” Yet early published comparisons to cult standards spooked the team.
“It almost feels blasphemous,” Joseph Gordon-Levitt says about linking his role to Dustin Hoffman’s in “The Graduate,” another character who romanticizes a woman irrationally.
Zooey Deschanel’s wide eyes grow wider when references to “Annie Hall” come up during her interview. “I’m so honored,” she says. “(Woody Allen) is one of my favorite filmmakers. I have an ‘Annie Hall’ poster in my house.”
“Any comparisons to Woody Allen, I’ll gladly take,” Webb says. “ ‘Annie Hall’ has become so iconic. It’s told out of order, too. It also arrives at an interesting conclusion about the nature of love: People often confuse permanence for success.”
Could “(500) Days” reach “Annie Hall” proportions of cultural impact?
“I’ve been doing this a long time, and you never know,” Deschanel says. “Sometimes you can do a movie and you think it’s going to be huge, and something happens, it doesn’t hit a chord with people. Other times you don’t expect it: This movie was fun and light, a very pleasant film to work on from the beginning. I love movies about relationships that are thoughtfully done. This one was.”
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'(500) Days of Summer' the next 'Annie Hall'? Part 2
For Part 1 of this series of interviews, see post below …
“It was funny, but it wasn’t making fun. It wasn’t goofy or jokey,” he says. “It was a heartfelt story about love and heartbreak. I feel strongly about these things. I don’t want to make light of them or reduce them to simplistic plot devices.”
He also was attracted to the complicated task of playing a role for whom the audience’s sympathies can wax and wane.
“In all his immaturity, he’s always coming from a genuinely well-meaning place,” Gordon-Levitt says. “Love: He really wants to understand it and feel it and know it. To not irritate the audience, you’ve got to not criticize your character. Any character I play, even a bad guy, I want to understand where he’s coming from and why. Make him a human being.”
Part of what distinguishes “(500) Days” from run-of-the-mill romantic comedies is the structure, rapidly switching among the 500 days of the romance, but not in chronological order, like reading entries in a 500-page diary out of order. During the planning and shoot, director Marc Webb and his team carried around a gigantic storyboard-style scroll that kept everyone on the same frame.
“When you are tracing through memories, you don’t often do it sequentially,” Webb says. “That was one of the bases for the movie. The hard parts were the design elements and continuity things. Film actors, for their parts, are completely used to doing something in the morning and assuming a completely different mind frame in the afternoon. It’s their job.”
Gordon-Levitt agrees the actors had it easiest in this puzzle of a movie.
“That’s part of an actor’s preparation for any scene, to know where am I now, what came before this, what comes after it, why am I this way,” he says. “The director helps you with that, and Marc is fantastic at that. His knowledge of the story and his profound empathy for the characters was a huge part of what makes the movie work.”
Both actors praised Webb’s talent-coaching skills, unusual for a director who comes from a music-video background.
“He’s a real storyteller. He gets character,” Gordon-Levitt says. “A lot of guys know how to make a movie pretty. That’s the cliche for somebody who has been directing music videos: It’s going to look good, but it’s going to be a vapid, pretty thing.”
“Marc is a great leader on a set,” Zooey Deschanel agrees. “He was always reminding us where we were (in the story). But you have to remind yourself, too. There’s always an arc to the script. The character changes. As an actor, your job is to be as open as possible. I take on the emotions and attentions of the moment. Then let them go, and move on to the next one.”
More to come …
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'(500) Days of Summer' the next 'Annie Hall'? Part 1
As early as March, the artists behind “(500) Days of Summer” sensed they had stumbled onto a potential generational phenomenon.
The plot is insidiously simple. In an office environment, a sensitive man, Tom, falls in love with a free-spirited woman, Summer, whom he idealizes. She reciprocates, but insists she’s not looking for a boyfriend. Their relationship tangles. That’s all. Almost. “We’ve all been Tom and we’ve all been Summer at least once in our lives,” Deschanel says. “Everybody can relate to both of them.”
Like characters in a Woody Allen comedy, naive Tom and independent Summer alternate irritation with allure for the audience.
“Tom is emotionally immature, but to me it’s very charming,” director Webb says. “Tom wants what we all want — happiness. Maybe he’s misguided. He’s still aiming for something beautiful and big. He’s contemplating destiny. That allows us to root for him. (Actor) Joe has a warmth and emotional center that could easily evaporate in this role, but doesn’t.
“As for Zooey, there are very few people you wouldn’t turn against, and she’s one,” Webb continues. “My goal for Summer was, even though she’s infuriating and frustrating, if you walked out of the movie angry at her, I would have failed. She’s always honest, always up front. That’s her defense.”
More to come …
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July 14, 2009
'Brüno': A Gay Man Responds
Harrowing.
That’s my one-word response to “Brüno,” Sacha Baron Cohen’s latest cinematic rampage.
Even more to the point: Too much bullying from Cohen. Many of his subjects put up with his schtick until he virtually rubbed his business in their faces. (Also: Too much business.)
As a consumer of pop culture, however, I know that Cohen’s ambush comedy tactics can be thrillingly audacious. (He actually interviews a Lebanese terrorist, and later taunts a redneck ultimate-fight audience into homophobic hysteria.) Any alert ticket buyer also makes a compact when they enter the theater: We are here to watch Cohen cross social boundaries in novel ways. And with jaundiced glee, I’m going to laugh at much of it.
As a gay man — friends, colleagues and readers have asked how I feel about “Brüno” in that context — I am not sure how to judge the effect. Brüno is obviously a caricature. He challenges tolerance for straight and gay audiences alike, not just through his extreme mannerisms and speech, but also through his bizarre, sometimes obscene behavior. It’s like Cohen is turning every homophobic nightmare about gay sex, substance and parenting into creepy flesh.
So, in a sense, Cohen’s task is unmasking homophobia. It must be said that he finds it in unsurprising places. (A gentler and perhaps more effective satire would look where homophobia is supposedly banished.) So Cohen makes it easy for the audience to laugh at the rubes — urban as well as rural, but mostly Americans — who fall into his tender-free traps.
I’m not sure if this tactic subverts or reinforces homophobia. Most people, like me, probably leave the theater too stunned to think clearly. The experience lingers in the memory like a bad dream. And maybe that in itself — a rare thing — is the movie’s gift. We are left to decide what “Brüno” means.
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June 24, 2009
Audience unmoved during 'Transformers 2' preview
Summer movies elicit screams, chortles and cheers. Not “Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen,” previewed Tuesday at the Bullock IMAX.
Bay even took a lame crack at the Obama Doctrine of considering all strategies in a crisis and civilian control of the military.
The audience didn’t bite. Except for a few snickers about the write-by-numbers script — was there a separate author for the taglines, which erupted every five minutes? — this mixed-age crowd bit their tongues.
It’s not painful, but it’s a mess. Believe every word of Chris Garcia’s review. Like me, he praised the first edition, dismissed the second.
OK, now for my pet peeve: Geographical inaccuracy. Petra, Jordan is a few clicks from the pyramids of Egypt, which you can see from the Red Sea? Please. Generic U.S. geography, play with that, but don’t confuse the masses about the Middle East. It’s already complicated enough.
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May 21, 2009
'Dance Flick' dumb, dizzy, fun
“High School Musical.” “Fame.” “Flashdance.”
“Singing in the Rain.” “Shampoo.” “West Side Story.” “Dreamgirls.” “Little Miss Sunshine.”
“Save the Last Dance.” “Step Up.” “Bring It On.” “Drumline.” “Stomp The Yard.” “Honey.”
The humor is based almost entirely on stereotype. Black vs. White. Straight vs. Gay. Classical vs. Hip-Hop. But this time, the stereotyping can catch one off-guard. Especially given the 3-jokes-per-minute rate imposed by a mess of Wayans, plus actors David Alan Grier, Amy Sedaris, Shoshana Bush and Austin native Christina Murphy.
What is not an outright Hollywood backwash or a broad appeal to racial and sexual differences is outright physical humor — a tongue passes from one ear to the other through the romanced woman’s head; a baby squirts out of a pregnant dancer; a mother is hit by multiple vehicles on her way to her daughter’s dance audition, then pops into a prepared grave.
Reading back on the previous paragraphs, I realize it sounds like I’m panning “Dance Flick.” I’m not. Yes, it’s like hundreds of “In Living Color” sketches strung together into a jumbled breakdance, but I laughed. And laughed. And laughed.
I attended the screening primarily to report on Austin’s Murphy — a potential local celebrity — but her role as a teacher’s pet singer/dance/actor at Musical High is so underdeveloped, I almost missed her performance. She isn’t even given a chance to redeem herself by joining, “Fame”-like, Musical High’s final dance-off team. But that’s only one of many plot lines left dangling.
Truth is, I responded, first and foremost, to the movie references. They clearly didn’t register with some of the younger members of the audience. Yet the genres that deal with performing arts academies, black dance competitions and high-school musicals deserve a big poke in the eye like “Dance Flick.”
It’s dumb. It’s dizzy. And it’s a lot of fun.
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May 10, 2009
Nerds at Play: 'Star Trek' for Austin Planetarium 2
For Part 1, see post below.
OK, nobody expects self-professed nerds to stage a perfect fundraiser. The adorable Austin Planetarium folks did not play against type at their Bullock Texas State History Museum “Star Trek” event. Until the smashing movie started, the event lacked social ease. After that, the audience mind-melded with the elephantine IMAX screen.
Connor Goeke, Kathy Goeke
Mounted in the echoing grandiosity of the museum’s great hall, the 3-hour presentation was impossible to hear beyond the first rows. A “Star Trek” spoof lasted so long it made Shakespeare’s tragedies seem time-warped. The food disappeared early, but not the booze — a dangerous combination.
Yet the vibe remained mellow throughout. Costumed guests — Darth Vader? Wrong franchise, baby — mingled with folks just off work. (It started at 6 p.m. The movie came at 9:30 p.m.)
Joy Scott, Monica Piñon, Wendy Worthy
A word or two about the movie, which has so far grossed $76 million. As reviews attest, it’s thrilling. Of course, watching it on the second row of the IMAX was rather like a super nova exploding in one’s face (two were featured in the film).
Ariana Delbar, Vincent Delbar
One neat thing for the social columnist to repeat: It will appeal to Trekkies and summer-movie fans alike. Nerds will lock arms with mall movie-goers to make this the summer’s highest grossing film.
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April 30, 2009
Comedy at the Capitol at Mother Egan's
The movie-makers had triumphed. And not just on screen.
Anne Wolfe-Andersen, Richard Dillard, Elena Weinberg
Supporters of Texas’ film industry scored recently with a bill that allows the governor’s office to tailor incentives to the project, rather than stick with strict, low percentages of the local budgets.
Chrystal Roberson, Cody Kirk, Lill Gentry
To celebrate, actors Marco Perella and CK McFarland gathered some players at Mother Egan’s to reenact the spoofs they had performed on lobbying days at the Capitol.
Felix Rivas, Leron Minor
You’d recognize either actor from their many stage and screen incarnations. Along with colleagues, they staged burlesques of “Miss Congeniality” and other Texas-made movies. Gentle ribbing was aimed at figures such as Sandra Bullock, for her rockers, bikers and houses.
Anne Schultz, Michelle Atkins
Another sketch, “The Last Picture Show,” threatened Texans with bad street theater if films moved elsewhere. (Actors and crews would be left with nothing else to do.) Many see-it-from-a-mile away cracks were made on the Larry McMurtry title.
John Hafner, Chris Sturgeon
The industry-thick audience, relaxing over beers and ales, got the inside jokes. Time to retire the Comedy at the Capitol players. Victory is here. I hear the mighty cheer. On the side of …
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April 21, 2009
Austin Nichols re-ups on 'One Tree Hill,' opens in 'The Informers'
He has signed on for two more seasons of “One Tree Hill,” the teen television drama on the CW network. He was introduced to the series as Hollywood producer Julian Baker who shakes up a small North Carolina town.
Additionally, Nichols’ movie, “The Informers,” opens Friday nationwide. On the big screen, he supports Kim Basinger, Mickey Rourke, Billy Bob Thornton and Winona Ryder in the drama about greed-riddled, decadent Hollywood during the 1980s.
Striking Amber Heard, also from Austin, earned a choice role in that mass-acted film as well.
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April 10, 2009
Translating 'Grey Gardens' 4
For Parts 1, 2 & 3, see posts below …
It also benefits from views of the estate at various stages of glory and decline. This includes the mountains of filth that, before the documentary was made, had been cleaned out by municipal authorities, and structural failings, which Jacqueline Onassis and Lee Radizwill paid to stabilize. In the movie, we see the sprawling foulness only through newspaper clippings.
The 2009 drama shows the jazzy Manhattan that Little Edie briefly conquers. We are introduced the married man (Daniel Baldwin, looking deceptively like his brother, Alec), who becomes another of her romantic disappointments. Ken Howard earned the thankless role of stuffy Phelan Beale, a one-note character that appears almost sexist in reverse.
As in the documentary, all eyes zero on the two women. Jessica Lange has played fragile, misunderstood eccentrics before, and has won major awards for those performance, but Drew Barrymore stretched her acting muscles to play Little Edie. The only thing missing from her complex portrayal was the real woman’s overtly sexual come-ons during the documentary’s making, especially toward “The Marble Faun,” a comely gardener, absent in the HBO drama.
Did we need this movie? Perhaps not. Maybe the ineradicable images from the 1975 documentary would have sufficed for all time.
Yet director and co-writer Michael Sucsy and his team have made a convincing case that the Beales’ story is the stuff of enduring drama, worth retelling in more than one medium.
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Translating 'Grey Gardens' 3
For Parts 1 & 2, see posts below …
Little Edie rebels and heads off to New York City at the end of the first act, but we know she’ll return. Her mother’s blocking actions are supposedly protective, yet the subterfuge foreshadows of the future invalid’s cruel frankness with her daughter. Confusing the audience’s sympathies further, 1941 Big Edie and later Little Edie were played by the same astonishing actor, Christine Ebersole.
For its part, the HBO movie absolves the mother of specific villainy for daughter’s breakdowns. Blame is shifted instead to Phelan Beale, Edith’s husband, for staunching both women’s artistic impulses, and for insisting that Edie marry into that odd American aristocracy that includes future global figures, Jacqueline and Lee Bouvier, Edie’s near-contemporaries and cousins. Phelan Beale and, later, his sons make what they think are perfectly sensible demands on the pair of nonconformist women, but they all the men, including Big Edie’s sexually ambiguous pianist and buddy, come off as beastly.
More to come …
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Translating 'Grey Gardens' 2
For Part 1, see post below …
Despite a score that wavered between opera and music hall, it ran ahealthy 308 performances and won multiple Tony Awards, including honors for actresses Christine Ebersole (pictured) and Mary Louise Wilson, who uncannily impersonated Little and Big Edie respectively.
Now, here comes an HBO drama, set to air 7 p.m. Saturday, that traces the entire Beale story through a seamless web of flashbacks and flashforwards. Two admired actors who have enjoyed their shares of offbeat roles, Jessica Lange and Drew Barrymore, portray Edith and Little Edie at various ages and degrees of detachment with the world around them.
And there’s every chance this version could be considered a minor masterpiece in its own right.
More to come …
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Translating 'Grey Gardens'
Some stories resist translation. They unspool effortlessly in one medium, then snarl fiendishly in another.
How else to treat aristocratic Edith (“Big Edie”) and Edith (“Little Edie”) Bouvier Beale — relatives of Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis — who had withdrawn to their weed-throttled, cat-infested East Hamptons estate, virtually penniless, but unwilling to leave their home?
After all, the invalid would-be singer and erratic would-be dancer (pictured) had lost touch with what most people would consider reality. The elder Beale rarely moved from her sickbed, controlling her adult daughter through alternating affection and verbal laceration; the younger pranced around in swaddled fabric, flirting with any available man and whispering to the camera as if she were starring in a Hollywood movie.
To portray these peculiar women with anything other than aesthetically distancing documentary dryness might appear disrespectful, like making a ballet out of photographer Diane Arbus’ equally sensitive, but unsettling portraits of mentally challenged children.
More to come …
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March 17, 2009
O&A SXSW 25: '500 Days' & 'Best Worst Movie'
Because the social whirl is my beat, I usually miss the movies, music and other delicacies that make SXSW so alluring to visitors and locals. So Monday, I skipped the parties and, instead, saw two movies back to back.
This deft romantic comedy — disguised as a chronological sleight of hand — had already conquered Sundance and several other festivals. And I can see why. The whole movie inhabits a Los Angeles that almost no outsider would recognize — the older, graceful sections of downtown, for instance. And the two stars bring such charm to the screen, it’s easy to endure their characters’ irritating qualities. A minefield as a date movie, “500 Days” at times matches Woody Allen at his darkest/sweetest.
“Best Worst Movie” is the funniest thing I’ve experienced in some time. This documentary reconstructs the making of “Troll 2,” a hilariously bad horror movie from 20 years ago, its evolution into cult status and the toll that process has taken on its creators. Lovingly made by Michael Stephenson, who played the boy lead in the original, “Best Worst” follows “Troll 2” on the cult circuit (including Austin’s Alamo Drafthouse and Rolling Roadshow), reenacts the atrocious dialogue, tracks down the clueless Italian writer/director team, and gently updates viewers on the lives of the cast members — some clearly in need of clinical aid.
Oh, did I laugh, as did everyone else at the Paramount. A must see. Now for “Troll 2,” which I’ve never seen.
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March 12, 2009
O&A SXSW 10: Texas Film Hall of Fame 5
Dennis Quaid gave out the last honor of the evening, the Tom Mix Honorary Texan Award, to Billy Bob Thornton who was born in “extreme Northeast Texas — Hot Springs, Ark.” Quaid listed Thornton’s blue-collar past and his breakthrough as a screenwriter at director Billy Wilder’s suggestion.
“Billy Bob is the definitive Davy Crockett,” rugged-looking Quaid said while quantifying and qualifying Thornton’s work in Texas. Apparently they really bonded during the “Alamo” shoot outside Austin.
“I’m going to be bitter and angry for a second,” he said about the press line, being asked what it felt like to be conferred honorary Texan status. “I lived Tomball outside Houston, my family’s from Richardson and Garland and lived in Texas a third of my life. This is where my heart it is It is an artistic place, creative place. If you want to get technical about where I’ve lived the longest, I’m a (expletive) Californian.”
Good way to end the evening. As we were leaving, Kyle Chandler asked why I didn’t stick around for more quotes. I told him about my leg condition. He listened and responded with such sympathy, I flashed to him as my coach.
Photos by Larry Kolvoord.
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O&A SXSW 9: Texas Film Hall of Fame 4
“Rushmore” won the Tiffany & Co. Star of Texas Award. Luke Wilson accepted. He praised Dennis Quaid, Billy Bob Thornton and other present actors for their essential quirkiness.
He sounded surprised he ever broke into the industry. “The studio hated it. It came and went in the theaters in a week,” he said of “Bottle Rocket,” Wes Anderson’s first film. “Then we had a chance to do ‘Rushmore.’ And we got to work with all these great Texans again.”
Ray Benson introduced himself “world’s tallest living Jew” and supported a “recession auction” for Texas film incentives, the Austin Film Society and its programs, especially the summer kids filmmaking and intern projects.
Here comes Brendan Fraser — first Church goes off the rails with a story about a shared passion for miniature donkeys — to honor production designer and director Catherine Hardwicke with the Ann Richards award.
She recalled receiving a mound of dirt for Christmas from her farmer father in McAllen and making a creative project out of it. Then she told stories about clawing her way to the top and being locked in Tom Cruise’s “Scientology stare” when she took over design for “Vanilla Sky.” She then told a story contrasting the expectation that she’d been in Rupert Murdoch’s residence and a horse that now lived in her childhood home. Good stuff.
Richard Linklater memorialized the late Horton Foote.”The films are with us forever and the plays will be performed into the future.” A deeply moving tribute film followed.
Photos: Larry Kolvoord.
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O&A SXSW 8: Texas Film Hall of Fame 3
Thomas Haden Church reminded everyone it was Linda Gray’s legs on the poster for “The Graduate,” while elaborating on his longtime interest in her looks. (Church’s dicey choice of words provoked much laughter during the evening.)
Gray talked about the origins of “Dallas” and her 30-year relationship with Larry Hagman, to whom she presented the Texas Film Hall of Fame honor. “Larry kept us all together, made us all laugh, as the only Texan in the group,” of the “Dallas” actors.
Hagman pointed out that while everyone in the world watched “Dallas” 30 years ago, teens today don’t even know who he is. He also joked about Ronald Reagan, Alcoholics Anonymous, Texas film incentives and passed out Larry Hagman $10,000 bills. “If you give some, you’re going to get some,” he said about the proposed incentives, threading his way through a Comanche chief Quanah Parker story in support.
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O&A SXSW 7: Texas Film Hall of Fame 2
Hilariously off-color Thomas Haden Church goofed on the Texas Film Hall of Fame honorees and presenters during his emcee duties at Austin Studios. But then he made a serious plea for production incentives in order to battle allurements from New Mexico and other states. That elicited a standing ovation from an industry-friendly crowd.
Introducing each presenter, Church made specific, personal connections with the artists, including the first, Keith Carradine, who appeared in mobster outfit, calling Powers Boothe as a “great actor of extraordinary powers.” Carradine recalled the “testoterone-fueled male bonding” in “Southern Comfort.”
“I want to thank you having me in my home,” the Snyder-raised Boothe said, ” which is Texas.”
He spoke about hard work and his education at Texas State University-San Marcos and SMU.
“I didn’t know Thomas Haden Church was funny,” Boothe deadpanned, praising the other honorees movingly. “I hope we bring more movies to Texas. There’s a hell of a lot of talent here.”
Photos: Larry Kolvoord.
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O&A SXSW 6: Texas Film Hall of Fame 1
Austin social nobility mingled with Hollywood film royalty at the Austin Studios on Thursday for the Texas Film Hall of Fame Awards.
The city’s longest and most elaborate red carpet welcomed luminaries such as Larry Hagman, Dennis Quaid, Linda Gray, Brendan Fraser, Thomas Haden Church, Billy Bob Thornton, Catherine Hardwicke, Keith Carradine and Powers Boothe.
They joined with filmic Austinites Kyle Chandler, Kinky Friedman, Connie Britton, Dana Wheeler-Nicholson, Brad Leland and Richard Linklater.
They rubbed chill-protected shoulders with locals like Kate Hersch, Mort and Bobbi Topfer, Evan Smith, Charles Duggan and Brewster McCracken as well billionaire couple Jean-Paul and Eloise DeJoria.
Right now, they are auctioning off an evening with Zac Efron for the premiere of “Orson Welles and Me” with Claire Danes, an Aspen, Co. vacation and a “Breakfast at Tiffany’s.” Steaks have just arrived. Crowd is happy. Credit the large margaritas. Chandler is wearing skiwear onstage.
Photos: Larry Kolvoord.
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O&A SXSW 5: Social Schedule for March 12
One event is so big that it blocks out all others. It traditionally kicks off the SXSW Film Conference and Festival. And it brings more Hollywood celebrities to Austin than the next 10 events.
6 p.m. Texas Film Hall of Fame at Austin Studios
Check here this blog later for live reports.
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O&A SXSW 4: Texas Film Hall of Fame Pre-Party
A year later, and people are still gabbling about the 2008 Texas Film Hall of Fame Pre-Party at Lance Armstrong’s mini-Minoan palace underneath Mount Bonnell. (Yes, you’re right, it was cold. People did huddle under the tent and the poolside fire attracted a crowd. Eternally handsome Morgan Fairchild dominated the main living room, while a rather vulnerable-looking Debra Winger hovered on the stairs. No telling what went on in Armstrong’s trophy room when we weren’t there. Hmmm.)
Deborah Green, Julie Thornton, Brendan Fraser
If anything, this year’s Pre-Party will produce even more gabble. (Did you see the glittering dome hanging above John and Julie Thornton’s Enfield-area manse, the dungeon-like dining room, the bathroom wallpaper, the winking, Koonsian art and the outdoor fireplace made of baroque shells? And was there a separate patron celebrity for each room? The food? Out of this world!)
Billy Bob Thornton, Richard Linklater
Still boyish Brendan Fraser was there, his hair festooned like one of chef Quincy Adams Erickson’s spoonful creations. So was “Dallas” immortal Larry Hagman, disappearing under a cowboy hat, with a daub-faced Linda Gray and Swedish-born wife Maj Axelsson running photo interference. (I lost out twice.)
Stephen Rice, Powers Boothe
Unassuming power couple John and Janet Pieson (University of Texas and South by Southwest Film Conference and Festival) held court in one room, a beaming Richard Linklater — director and Austin Film Society founder — in another.
The Misshapes
Billy Bob Thornton looked sly but acted gracious. (Charmer!) And posing DJs the Misshapes looked very much the part — having flown in at the last minute from Paris Fashion Week.
Andy Sarwal, Katy Hackerman
Of course Julie Thornton, wrapped in a smart, ribbony black outfit, played part of the effervescent hostess, and many of her exquisitely set off friends — Carla McDonald, Deborah Green, etc. — competed to look more glamorous than any of the Hollywood contingent.
Sharon Miller, Andy Dollerson
We talked to Linda Ball and Forrest Preece about walking the city, to Agnes Varnum and Rebecca Campbell about the outlook for Thursday’s Hall of Fame festivities (cold, rainy), to Stephen Moser, Stephen Fish, Richard Hartgrove and gang about the grounds (“Only Donna Stockton Hicks can match this!), to Powers Boothe about the the newspaper and entertainment industries, as well as his lingering imaginative association with messianic preacher Jim Jones, to writer Julia Smith about staying at Quality Quinn’s rustic perfection of a house in Marfa, with Katy Hackerman about her new life at the UT College of Natural Sciences.
Now here’s a stray question for you: People can’t believe I go to so many events each week, but how does Julia’s husband, Texas Monthly’s Evan, do it — while editing and publishing a major magazine and hosting a TV show? Watchman?
Lawyer and film producer Mark Mueller with Rep. Elliott Naishtat
My favorite conversation of the evening, though, was reserved for sassy Brits Sharon Miller and Andy Dollerson, who jabbed and counter-jabbed about art, surfing, coastal Britain vs. coastal Texas and a host of other subjects.
This party is going to be hard to beat.
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March 1, 2009
Jonas Brothers thrill Austin fans with surprise visit
When metal meets metal at a high speed, the collision produces a screech that could pierce a concrete bunker.
“I just touched Nick Jonas’ hand!” shrieked Ashley Volk, 15, into her cell phone.
Well, it wasn’t completely unexpected.
Early Sunday, reporters were bussed out to Austin Bergstrom Airport to meet the “Surprise Theater Invasion” entourage as they reclaimed earth from their Marquis Jet. The expertly managed press conference inside an airline hangar lasted only five minutes, then it was back to the theater as part of a police-escorted motorcade.
During those five minutes, though, the assiduously wholesome New Jersey siblings revealed a few details about the foibles of fame as Disney-fueled pop stars.
“In Spain, one crowd was so enthusiastic, we had to run through a mall to escape,” said Kevin, the eldest, side-burned brother. “And I read once that I was married to a Pakistani woman.”
“I read we were breaking up,” said Joe, the quieter, middle brother. “That didn’t happen. We did receive, as a gift, a dead shark in a glass tank.”
The Jonas clan has made several sneak attacks on fans during their movie’s opening week, including Los Angeles, New York, Atlanta and Dallas.
“We also are doing some smaller towns like Austin and Charlotte (N.C.),” said Nick, the youngest, most theatrical member of the band. Nice to be included.
They called their Grammy Awards ceremony appearance with legend Stevie Wonder “inspiring,” then spun off some musical influences — Elvis Costello, Prince, Kings of Leon.
Later, at the theater, social temperatures rose in anticipation of the Visitation.
“I love it!” said Meredith Warren, 11. “I love Joe!”
“I love Kevin!” countered Avery La Rue, 11. “I love them all! When I get to school tomorrow, I’ll rub their noses in it.”
Addie Bueide, 8, burst out with a series of responses: “Excited. Nervous. Shaky. I’m going to scream. Loud.”
Sabrina Arispe, 8, likes the team’s music, movies and inherent cuteness, but her brother takes a different tack: “They’re funny,” says Ricky Arispe, 12.
Oh, kind of like the Monkees? Reference lost.
When the act entered finally entered the room, three hours after the first fans lined up outside in 40-degree weather, they spoke for less than a minute, then waded into crowd, buffeted by heavy security.
“It’s for the love of fans,” Nick said. “We wanted to make sure they were a part of this.”
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February 23, 2009
Victoria's swell Oscar party
Remember last year, we told you about the best Oscar party we didn’t attend. That would be the one, pre-ceremony, Austin nonprofit consultant Victoria Corcoran attends with her close L.A. friends, including ex-Dallas pal Bonnie Curtis. It usually includes past Oscar winners and themed decor.
There were all sorts of insider Oscar-related pranks and pratfalls, but here’s a short report and a picture of La Corcoran with boyfriend, Austin landscape architect Jeff Neal, and two Nixons.
In addition to our usual dinner party, turned out that three of the group’s very dearest friends were nominated for Best Picture: Kathy Kennedy and Frank Marshall for “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button (Kathy’s now tied for the record for most nominations for Best Picture without a win: six, with Frank in second with five; combined, however, the couple have a record seven). Also Bruce Cohen, last year’s dinner party honoree, was up for “Milk.”
Attendees were: “Chumscrubber” director Arie Posin, his wife William Morris literary agent Sara Bottfield, Huffington Post blogger Sally Horchow, men’s accessories designer (now carried at Harrod’s) Eduardo Braniff (yes, that Braniff), Graham King productions developer Grey Rembert (she & Eduardo attended the Oscars last night and say right next to Kathy and Frank on the (expletive) floor!), Bonnie Curtis, her wife Kim Lincoln (film graphics artist), screenwriter Andrew Marlowe, whose new TV show “Castle” opens in early March, his wife Terri, producer Lee Clay (a Dallas native), and Jeff Neal (Gardens landscape architect), and little ole me.
I’m betting VC was the most glamorous.
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Delayed Oscar thoughts (feelings, really)
Thanks, Oscar. You did it for me.
I spent so many past ceremonies cursing voters for their sentimentality or social correctness. Also, groaning through endless ancillary presentations and speeches.
You can read more probing commentary by movie critic Chris Garcia, but for my four-hour investment, Oscar delivered. (I believe Chris would agree with me on several scores.)
As for the glacially-paced minor awards speeches and inevitable feel-good segments, I just caught up on Facebook, Twitter, Google Reader and austin360.com Oscar posts. No harm. And I’ll take one Ben Stiller/Joaquin Phoenix or Seth Rogan/James Franco routine every half hour to keep me honestly engaged.
Let’s talk awards. Like Chris, I think the biggest crime of the season was ignoring “The Dark Knight” for the major categories, but that train had long left the station by Sunday night.
Heath Ledger and Penelope Cruz were exactly my picks for supporting performances. “Wall-E” and “Man on Wire” were good enough to be considered — glancingly — for Best Picture, much less for Best Animation Film and Best Documentary Feature, which they did.
I was pleased with all the “Slumdog Millionaire” prizes and, like other viewers, choked up during Dustin Lance Black’s acceptance speech for his “Milk” screenplay. Sometimes, political statements are not just apt, they can spin into graceful turns of persuasion.
Though I haven’t seen “The Reader,” and probably won’t, I believe Kate Winslet is Oscar-worthy any season.
Still, I held my breath for one award. Best Actor. Would the Academy reward Mickey Rourke for his return from the real-life brink and his gutsy rejection of vanity in “The Wrestler.” Or would Sean Penn win for transcendent acting, something he does better than almost anyone else in Hollywood?
YES! Sean Penn. Presented by Robert DeNiro, even. My evening was complete. His speech veered toward indecorum, but, inevitably, he proved the consummate professional.
And you know, critics will excoriate the practice, but I was genuinely touched by the five-on-five tributes for the acting categories. Telling to watch legends from the past look into the eyes of the nominated to give them, for the most part, bona fide praise. (Well, not I’m-reading-this-for-the-first-time Sophia Loren.)
Thank you, Oscar.
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February 20, 2009
'Jollenbach' screening at the Arbor
Making a movie makes community. That was readily apparent at the Arbor Theater on Thursday as an enterprising community gathered for a screening of the Austin-filmed “Jollenbach.”
David Anderson, Michelle Carter, Dana Glover
Actors, crew, backers, followers embraced, shook hands, traded stories before the Midian Films thriller sparked up. Austin’s shortest red carpet pointed the way.
Bryant Clark, Alex Burback
Everybody played multiple roles on this ultra-low-budget film about ghost hunters, partly captured in the hand-held video model, à la “Blair Witch Project.” That included Dana Glover, Michelle Carter and David Anderson, who, among them worked just about every aspect of the movie.
Danyelle Carter, Donahill Dixon
Herds of radio folks were in the house, including crack storyteller Bob Cole and his on-air partner Bucky Godbolt, as well as veteran meteorologist and UT lecturer Troy Kimmel. (Sports commentator/movie partner Anderson is part of the KVET team, too.)
Troy Kimmel, Andrew Perrone
Midian is still trying to finalize “Jollenbach” to get it in the can, but with the community on hand at the Arbor, I’m confident that will come soon. And hey, a low-budget thriller is a recession-proof product.
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February 5, 2009
Glancing ahead to Texas Film Hall of Fame 3
For Parts 1 & 2, see posts below …
Thanks for clarifying, darlings. I’ll be there.
The Texas Hall of Fame stars align once more on Thursday, matching glittering inductees with gleaming presenters. Linda Gray will induct “Dallas” co-star Larry Hagman; multigifted Keith Carradine will honor vari-talented Powers Boothe; scampy Dennis Quaid will salute equally scampy Billy Bob Thornton (two speeches to record). John Cusack will present the Ann Richards Award to Cameron-born Catherine Hardwicke, whose “Twilight” came out in fall, and Thomas Haden Church will emcee the entire ceremony.So bring your shades. You’re going to need them. Maybe somebody will mistake you for a star.
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Glancing ahead to Texas Film Hall of Fame 2
For Part 1, see post below …
This is not an actual party but rather a composite devised from past luminaries who have brightened the Texas Film Hall of Fame and its private revelries.
While the star power is blinding, the conversations actually prick up one’s ears. That’s because many of the honorees are adept artists such as Horton Foote, Terrence Malick and Edwin “Bud” Shrake. (My weak-knees moment last year came interviewing brainy beauty Mariska Hargitay.) The guest lists also include captains of various Austin industries, handshake-happy politicos and just ordinary folks who happened to gain entrance to the event.
Tickets are, in general, sold by tables, which run from $5,000 to $25,000 for parties of 10. To purchase a bundle, contact Shannon Moody at 322-0145, ext. 222.
Bonus: If you purchase one of the higher-priced tables, you receive a coveted invitation to the primary preparty, which was the hit of last year’s social season. Held at Lance Armstrong’s Mount Bonnell palace, it put socialites and fans in conversational pods right next to Morgan Fairchild, Debra Winger and other celebs.
More to come…
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Glancing ahead to Texas Film Hall of Fame 1
Dennis Quaid, Owen Wilson and Matthew McConaughey loiter by the pool, threatening to liberate their shirts. Lyle Lovett, Willie Nelson and Kris Kristofferson strum ancient guitars by the fire, contrasting expressive voices against expressionless faces.
Inside, Sissy Spacek, Betty Buckley, JoBeth Williams and Marcia Gay Harden gather around the buffet table, whispering trade secrets about how to cry on cue. Farah Fawcett and Woody Harrelson pause on the landing, neither really sure why.
Forrest Whitaker and Robert Duval lean forward intensely in the study, arguing about whose Oscar was harder to earn. Directors Richard Linklater and Robert Rodriguez joke once again that everyone mixes them up, while producer Elizabeth Avellan maps out the future of Austin moviemaking while rallying an increasingly voluble following.
Back outside, a wistful Ethan Hawke contemplates life and love as he gazes at the moon.
More to come …
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January 31, 2009
Austin Film Studios Re-Opening Party
In a manner fitting for an organization that has put movie-making into the rough hands of the Central Texas masses, Austin Film Society’s bash for its re-opened Austin Film Studios was an egalitarian affair.
Cynthia Cano, Anna Cano
Tacos and beer. Industry information booths and green-screen demos. Families. Even the VIP area, cordoned off by a few large chairs, felt like any house party in the city.
Randy Strickland and his son Aaron
The crowd in the just-refinished Quanset hut was enormously varied. We recognized actors from their film and TV work. We ran into the industry regulars who haunt such events.
Ben Foster, Chris Sturgeon, Ashley Kaplan
But the vast majority of the attendees looked — and sounded — like young, aspiring film-makers, just the resource that gives Austin the competitive edge over Albuquerque and Shreveport.
Whit Warrell, Fawn
(We explained to a few of them the value of state incentives and society membership.)
Jared Gomez, Emily Robinson
Since the interior was set up like a rectangular doughnut, we simply circulated around the metaphorical hole.
Christopher Smith, Nicole Mendelly
We arrived a little late, after the ribbon-cutting and speeches, which was OK.
Karen Waldrum, Jim Dobsont,
And we left a little early, hoping at least to catch the Ghostland Observatory mini-set at Bass Concert Hall.
Christina del Castillo, Kim Ngo
About this time, cedar fever smacked me off my feet, so I headed home.
Ryan Bogenreif, Kristina Seeley
But not without admiring the unpretentious glamour of the occasion.
Sonny Clark, Jordan Haeger
Most people underdressed, as is the Austin custom. But the charm still worked on this sometimes skeptical recorder of the scene.
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January 22, 2009
Oscar wit and wisdom
Kip is not given to dry wit. Not early in the morning.
And he sometimes wrinkles his nose at the era of instant journalism.
Yet he was up all night, editing some loathsome book, so some internal switch must have flipped.
“Have you seen the Oscar nominations?” he asked, as I sat down for my first decaf.
“No,” I replied, rubbing my eyes. “Who’s up?
“Oh,” he uttered slowly, a smile spreading across his face. “The Oscars were so 45 minutes ago.”
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January 10, 2009
Hank Stuever on gay kissing (Sean Penn + James Franco) in the movies
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January 9, 2009
'Milk' vs. 'The Wrestler'
As movie awards season marches on, we add our two or three cents for the day.
But what about Mickey Rourke in “The Wrestler”? Amazing performance, no doubt, as the bloodied, late-life professional wrestler. Redemption for the character. Redemption for the actor. Nice gritty feel to the whole movie. Yet I couldn’t help feeling that I knew exactly what was coming in each scene. All we could do is wait for the next wrenching emotion from Rourke’s life-savaged features. (At times, Rourke is so unrecognizable from his early days, I’d swear it was a stand-in.) He’s be nominated for everything. Win? Dunno.
Still on my to-see list: “Slumdog Millionaire,” “Synecdoche, New York,” “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button” and two movies I’d seen as plays, but could watch just for the acting: “Doubt” and “Frost/Nixon.” Suggestions welcome.
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January 6, 2009
Belated farewell to Pat Hingle
Memorable among his screen performances were Ralph Follet in “All the Way Home,” Ace Stamper in “Slendor in the Grass” and Jim O’Connor in the TV version of “The Glass Menagerie” with Shirley Booth (my first exposure to the material). On Broadway, he shined in “1776,” “Child’s Play” and “That Championship Season” during my watch, many more before then.
He died Jan. 3 at age 84. Hingle entered the University of Texas in 1941. He returned after a stint in the Navy and got interested in drama because that where the pretty girls were. He earned a B.F.A. in Drama in 1949. He certainly performed in the Curtain Club, the extracurricular stage group, during the Walter Cronkite, Harvey Schmidt and Tom Jones days.
Does anyone recall his Austin days? Contact me if you do.
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December 29, 2008
Slamming out 2008 with 007
During 2006 and 2007, while serving as the newspaper’s movies editor, I saw every significant film distributed in this country. More than 100 each year. In 2008, as my assignment altered, I saw maybe — 20? — mostly at film fests.
So what do we catch for our first holiday movie? “Quantum of Solace.” Can’t beat it for completely escapist entertainment. Edited with such speed, I sometimes didn’t know who was shooting whom. Who cared? Tinseltown South was packed, even though the Bond movie came out months ago and the projection quality was terrible.
Two quick observations: Touch-screen technology never looked so futuristic as at M1 headquarters. Also, add chic architecture to the franchise’s built-in appeal, not just the (real) Austrian opera house, but also the (fake) Bolivian desert resort. What fun watching it blow up!
The Bond for our age, Daniel Craig, keeps up his end of the bargain, but I’d like to see him in seduction mode more often. (Revenge only goes so far.) And hurray for the 007 producers for giving Dame Judi Dench more to do. You’ve got her talents on retainer. Use them!
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December 16, 2008
Austin movie celebs helped hire those lobbyists
This lobbying effort would not be possible were it not for the leadership of Austin’s top film talent. Producer Elizabeth Avellan was front and center promoting awareness of the threats to Texas movie-making. Set decorator Jeanette Scott organized the Spaghetti Western event at Star Hill Ranch that raised $70,000 for the effort.
Others lent their shoulders: Richard Linklater, Robert Rodriguez, Michael Judge, Terrence Malick and more of the film industry’s Who’s Who. Emerging leaders, such as Spiderwood Studios’ Tommy G. Warren, also contributed, as did Alamo Drafthouse’s Tim and Karrie League. The Austin Film Society also pitched in its help.
When this community gets organized, watch out!
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November 17, 2008
The Ear Candy 3: Vintage Cinema
“Film Music by Bernard Herrmann” Austin Symphony Orchestra conductor Peter Bay is a big Herrmann fan. So am I. Expressive music of the highest quality from “Citizen Kane” to “Taxi Driver.” Soundtracks of my life. “Psycho” is the headliner here, but there’s so much more, including the weirdly whistled theme to “Twisted Nerve.”
“The Essential Michael Legrand: Film Music Collection” Tinkling pianos. Aching strings. Sentiment and melancholy. More soundtrack of my life, or perhaps of my romantic adolescence: “The Umbrellas of Cherbourg,” “Summer of 42,” “The Thomas Crown Affair” I had almost forgotten the once ubiquitous “Brian’s Song.”
“Vintage Cinema” (Cincinnati Pops) — The big symphonic scores of epic movies, mostly from Hollywood’s Golden Era. The kind of shows you’d hit during a rainy matinee — and dream all week of Taurus Bulba or the Sea Hawk. Swept away in the tempest of images and sound.
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November 13, 2008
From Prop 6 to Prop 8 and 'Milk'
By agreement with the movie’s promoters, we won’t say much about the powerful Harvey Milk biopic, “Milk,” starring astonishing chameleon Sean Penn. Look for local and national reviews Nov. 26 and an Austin opening Dec. 5.
Also, a good chunk of the movie is devoted to Milk’s fight against California’s Proposition 6, which would have excluded any gay person — or anyone who supported them — from teaching in the state’s schools. The campaigns, debates and protests strongly resemble the ongoing clash on marriage equality embodied in the recently passed Proposition 8.
For a taste of the movie’s milieu from the 1970s — and how the scene has changed — there’s a Prop 8 protest at City Hall 12:30 p.m. Saturday. Similar gatherings are planned for Houston and Dallas to coincide with a national event.
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November 8, 2008
Momentous night at Spaghetti Western
Something changed last night. The Central Texas movie industry grew up. After 20 years of making films that entertained the world, movie makers sat down to dinner, listened to speakers and mingled for a cause.
Richard Linklater, Robert Rodriquez
The cause? Promoting industry-friendly legislation in Texas. Directors like Richard Linklater, Mike Judge and Robert Rodriguez, producers like Elizabeth Avellan and hundreds of actors, designers and crew members have watched their livelihoods slip away to New Mexico and Louisiana because of heavy incentives on the other side of our borders.
Chris Mattsson, Jane Scheweppe, Deborah Green
On a crisp November night, these and hundreds more gathered at the Adam Wooley’s miraculous Star Hill Ranch for a Spaghetti Western fundraiser. The event’s primary organizer, Jeannette Scott, told me they raised almost $70,000 for the Texas Motion Picture Alliance’s lobbying efforts. That’s way more than the $20,000 the Dallas region raised at their first such event.
Alex Smith, Dana Wheeler-Nicholson
VIPs hung out in one of Star Hill’s fully functional historical buildings (unlike some other Old West towns, this one on Hamilton Pool Road is as devoted to interiors as to exteriors). Mayor Will Wynn led the political delegation and Rep. Dawnna Dukes. Luminaries included philanthropists Chris Mattsson and Jane Schweppe, social all-stars Deborah Green along with Carol and Chris Adams, Zilker Summer Musical backers Pati and Bruce McCandless, Asleep at the Wheel’s Ray Benson, newscaster Michelle Valles, Villa Muse honcho Paul Alvarado-Dykstra, Alamo Drafthouse’s Karrie League (the Alamo gang prepared the food and screenings).
Nancy Mims, Rodney Gibbs
More notables: game-maker Rodney Gibbs, Hollywood-to-Austin writer Paul Ehrmann, fabric designer Nancy Mims, Spiderwood Studios owner Tommy G. Warren, filmmaker Alex Smith (one half of the Smith brother team of writer/directors) and actress Dana Wheeler-Nicholson (“Fletch,” “Friday Night Lights,” “W.”)
Elizabeth Avellan, Karrie League, Paul Ehrmann
Seated out on the main street, which was just as dazzling, were actors Diane and Marco Perella, “Midlife Gals” Kelly and Sally Jackson, and many more. The were all there to ensure a future for film making in Central Texas.
Marco Perella, Diane Perella
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November 7, 2008
'In Search of a Midnight Kiss'
What you can do with just a few thousand dollars, if you possess natural film talent like former Austinite Alex Holdridge: Create a black-and-white romantic comedy that makes Los Angeles as retro-seductive as Woody Allen’s New York City in Manhattan; launch two protagonists that one could easily detest, then draw us deeply into their brief encounter; revisit a familiar tribe of scruffy, marginal wannabes and transform them into the most important people in the universe.
The cast is ideal, but well-seasoned Scoot McNairy really settles in one’s memory. He could become an indie sensation well beyond his current status as a reliable character actor. I hadn’t until this moment made the “Sideways” connection, or absorbed the observation of the classical unities, but nobody really cares what I think about these things. Alex, you did good.
(Yes, today I finally leave my sickbed and hit the social circuit again.)
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November 6, 2008
Finally saw 'The Unforeseen'
There’s no question that Dunn is an extraordinary documentarian. She’s patient. She’s empathetic. She’s got an eye for the right image at just the right moment. Her playfulness with maps, for instance, goes well beyond the mere documenting of the springs endangered by development.
Yet, as with so many talented documentarians, she doesn’t stop there. Her opening sequences and several subsequent ones visually damn downtown development meant to provide an environmentally suitable alternative to urban sprawl. Her views of unfinished freeways are of roads built specifically to avoid the environmentally sensitive Hill Country. And her right out of “Grapes of Wrath” farmer — cutting grass with a scythe! — is so romanticized as to further undercut her potent and sophisticated arguments about development.
I attended a press conference for “The Unforeseen” with Robert Redford. First, I was a bit taken aback by just how articulate he was. But then I was shocked by how jagged the feelings sounded from some of the people in attendance. Clearly, the development wars of the 1980s were not over for them. It’s to Dunn’s credit that the movie cleanly navigated so many of those divisions — to the displeasure of those present for that event.
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Guest blogger Victoria Estrada: 'Religulous'
Guest blogger Victoria Estrada reviews “Religulous,” which I still haven’t seen, on Kid in Austin.
Political commentator Bill Maher ruffles some feathers in Larry Charles’ documentary, “Religulous,” a film that systematically questions blind faith and pokes God-sized holes in the hearts of Americans.
But I must say, before the (expletive), Maher’s a comedian. And he did wonders with the topic at hand.
Take Maher from behind a desk yelling at other loudmouthed pundits on his HBO program, and put him at the front of a single-wide trailer in Raleigh, North Carolina, N.C.. He goes inside a roadside chapel, standing before six or seven rustic looking truckers in collapsible chairs. Suspicion is written across their tired faces.
His strategy is simple. Maher asks only for explanations of their belief. The whats, the hows and the whys. His straightforward approach could be mistaken for arrogance and condescension. But Maher’s reaction to their responses is often times met only with a reiteration, allowing the interviewees to hear the holes in their own reasoning.
Perhaps the most fascinating part of the documentary are the reactions caused by questions that merely scratch the surface of the religion debate. Early on Maher asks “And why is faith so good?” to which a trucker rises from his seat in a huff. “Look, I don’t know what your movie is about but I don’t like it and I’m leaving,” he says, a common reaction to Maher’s questions.
Interviews are conducted all over the world, from the desk of one square-jawed Republican senator to a Orthodox Jewish rabbi who denies the Holocaust — the only interview Maher walked out on shaking his head in defeat and disbelief. He interviews clergy, doctors, and, unfortunately, or maybe to his discredit, the kind of faceless Americans who populate places like The Holy Land, a biblical amusement park in Orlando, Fla. These scenes seem too easy, and Maher self-serving.
I wouldn’t recommend this film for people that aren’t already engaged in the debate on religion. But for those who can stomach Maher’s opinion, there are many belly laughs to be had at the expense of reverence.
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November 5, 2008
Your A-List, Best Video Store
Vulcan, which has been around Austin almost as long as video could be rented, has maintained its loyal customer base through these strategies, plus something indefinable — character. You know when you in a Vulcan video store. It won 46 percent of the A-List vote for best video store.
Netflix, which revolutionized the market with its delivery service and lack of late fees, came in second with 17 percent. I Luv Video, another ground-based Austin veteran, came in third at 15 percent. Blockbuster, the chastened chain that once dominated the industry, took fourth with 9 percent. Waterloo Records & Video, which, I believe is getting out of the video-renting game, earned 5 percent.
Pulling in less than 2 percent were The Movie Store, TapeLenders, Austin Public Library, Encore and Hastings.
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November 2, 2008
'Man on Wire' -- 4 stars
Director James Marsh splices interviews, archival footage and unusually adroit reenactments to tell Philippe Petit’s story. Well, his story and that of his friends, because it took a small army to accomplish that dangerous, illegal act. Their suspenseful, painstaking planning and execution, as well as the high-flying aesthetics, keep one glued to the screen.
The movie itself is a work of art. It won high praise at the Sundance Film Festival, played Austin theaters and earned a rare 100 percent rating from RottenTomatoes.com’s Tomatometer. It will be available on DVD on Dec. 9.
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October 29, 2008
Your A-List, Best Place for a First Date
The A-List winner for Best Place for a First Date is also a theater, but a movie house, to be more specific. In fact, it’s a small group of movie theaters that have won numerous A-List awards for combining food, drink, film and socializing. Alamo Drafthouse — no particular location — took 28 percent of the vote.
Hula Hut, the playfully themed restaurant on Lake Austin, come in second with 13 percent. Eternally youthful Peter Pan Putt-Putt was not far behind with 13 percent. Two restaurants — Hyde Park Bar & Grill and Vivo — virtually tied at 9 percent. The coffeehouse and roasters next to Hula Hut, Mozart’s warmed to 8 percent, while the Restaurant Row veteran, Romeo’s, earned 7 percent of the love. Coming in under 6 percent were Enoteca Vespaio, Chez Zee and Mars.
Write-ins: Carrabba’s, The Steeping Room
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October 21, 2008
AFF Barbecue at the French Legation
At the Austin Film Festival’s annual French Legation barbecue, pasty-faced moviemakers raved about Texas climate as they mingled with locals on the historic lawns. Yeah, guys, you should have been here a few weeks ago, when it was hotter than the sun’s core. Visitors should never make life-changing decisions based on festival weather in Austin.
Barbara Morgan, Gigi Bryant
We chatted with the always generous Gigi Bryant of of GMSA Management Services.
Nancy Smith, Matthew Dunn
Also with James Moody of Mohawk, who talked about traveling with White Denim as they made more noise nationally. (Is there anything more gratifying than an Austin breakout artist?) He’s one of those club owners, like Paul Oveisi at Momo’s, who understands the future of Austin live music from the ground level.
Bob Soderstrom, Maya Perez
Kids pummeled the grass. Those diners who sought the convenience of picnic tables under the required tent emerged quickly to absorb the last of the sun’s rays. It was a bucolic scene that would have tempted any fest-goer to skip the next movie or panel and just be. In Austin. For now.
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Jake Gonzales of AGLIFF
But it serves him well in his double role as an independent publicist and a staff member in charge of programming and outreach for the Austin Gay and Lesbian International Film Festival. That edge tells careful listeners that he’s serious about expanding the focus of the festival to include a full range of gender and sexuality issues. It also helps explain his drive, pushing the fest, once the premier cultural event in the Austin gay community, to year-round status.
Gonzales spoke with us at Jo’s Hot Coffee, representing AGLIFF executive director David Sweeney and development director Collin Acock. I liked his style: The San Antonio native who attended Converse High School clearly looks carefully at things, then chooses his words and his battles deliberately. I look forward to working with him.
He gave me a hot tip: Austin-to-Los Angeles filmmaker Jenn Garrison has been nominated by AGLIFF for the Iris Prize 2009. Garrison’s short “Greg” could win $25,000 for its portrayal of a “deviant savant” amid the women’s independent music scene.
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October 15, 2008
Your A-List, Best Movie Theater
Entertainment Weekly named Alamo Drafthouse the best movie theater. In the country. How can you argue with the smash-up of sensitively selected movies, filling pub grub and potent potables?
Its kin — still run by Tim and Kerry League’s gang — took three spots: Alamo South Lamar (25 percent); Alamo at the Ritz (11 percent) and Alamo Village (7 percent). The only other serious contender was Regal Gateway (9 percent). Its art house sibling, Regal Arbor, earned only 3 percent.
The list of theaters taking 2 percent or less is long: Bulluck Museum IMAX, Paramount, Regal Westgate, Tinseltown Pflugerville, Cinemark Southpark, Millennium, Dobie, Galaxy Highland, Regal Metropolitan, Cinemark Cedar Park, City Lights, Cinemark Round Rock, AMC Barton Creek Square, Cinemark Hill Country Gallleria, Showplace, Tinseltown South, Regal Lakeline Mall, Starplex and Chestnut Square.
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Andrew Shapter's 'Happiness Is,' Part 3
Interview continued from post below…
Out & About: Early screenings of your documentary have inspired a brigade of volunteer marketers (they’ve already descended on us!). How will the DIY method translate into distribution?
O&A: Social media seem to have made a huge difference in recent political and philanthropic campaigns. How will your volunteers use it?
AS: The volunteers are a strategic, “wired” group of individuals who really understand that peers are power. This is a generation that grew up having access to endless information and messaging, so they really rely on the dissemination of information from others to influence their thoughts, decisions and actions. Because the message is so simple, the foundation is built upon initial awareness generation through grass-roots media that you’ll see around town, and then capturing the power of word-of-mouth into a loyal, expressive movement. But, when the success spans beyond what our group can handle, that is where additional support from outside distributors could come into play.
“Happiness Is” plays at 9:15 p.m. Sunday at the Rollins Theater and 9:30 p.m. Wednesday at the Alamo Lake Creek.
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Andrew Shapter's 'Happiness Is,' Part 2
Interview continued from below…
Out & About: Asking people about the ideas behind “the pursuit of happiness” appealed to your personal passions. How did this passion catch fire with your team? Did anyone lose the spirit?
O&A: It seems to me that “Happiness Is” works best when you move from abstractions to concrete examples. And you give generous time to three or so excellent subjects. How did you settle on your ex post facto stars?
AS: Well, the film is basically the result of hundreds of spontaneous interviews from a 4,000-mile road trip. We purposely avoided the structures of traditional documentary filmmaking by making the crux of it about the question, “What is your pursuit of happiness.” The characters that we ultimately featured were the happiest people we met on the trip and had the most compelling things to say. They have completely different personalities, yet, they have a few distinct things in common that helped us reach some conclusions. One of these is that the typical definition of the “American dream” of wealth and success didn’t factor in. Our “happiest” characters lead a life of purpose by devoting their lives to helping those in need. I’m not talking about giving money. I’m talking about those who work with the most unfortunate of Americans every day. Their work enables them to appreciate their own lives in a more profound way.
“Happiness Is” plays at 9:15 p.m. Sunday at the Rollins Theater and 9:30 p.m. Wednesday at the Alamo Lake Creek.
More interview to come…
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September 23, 2008
Ben McKenzie, Rowan Joseph at Jo's, Part 3
For his part, Joseph had never seen the “O.C.” One thing that clinched McKenzie for the “Johnny Got His Gun” role was a candid Web image.
“I saw a picture of Ben walking down the street of LA — whistling. Nobody whistles. Not in LA,” Joseph says. “I said ‘That’s the one.’ He has to look like he stepped off the battlefield in World War I. He has to be an Everyman. He has to be a boy at the beginning and a man at the end.”
After just a few screenings, he’s been delighted by the reaction of McKenzie fans to the material, composed almost entirely of words and very little cinematic visualization.
“It’s been a long time since people listened in movies,” Joseph said. “Audiences, younger audiences, are having that experience for the first time. It’s a bench, a chair and Ben.”
Joseph received two calls after the first screening in Washington D.C., one from Mark Cuban’s group, asking what cities they’d like to play, the other from the Pentagon asking if he wanted a tour.
“Ninety-eight percent of films don’t get distribution,” Joseph says. “How did we get here? This is surreal. Thank god for Dalton Trumbo and Ben.”
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Ben McKenzie, Rowan Joseph at Jo's, Part 2
Continued from post below …
Poised beyond his years, McKenzie, 30, is a veteran of saturated media promotion, having survived 92 episodes of an evening soap opera with generational impact. Joseph, 51, runs Garry Marshall’s Falcon Theatre and has won awards as a director and producer in New York, Chicago and Los Angeles. Yet theater doesn’t produce the kind of 24-hour attention that a hit TV show generates.
“It lasted only four seasons,” he says of “The O.C.,” contrasting it with other pop watersheds like “90210.” Instead, he wants to follow in the footsteps of actors who outgrew their youthful vehicles. “There’s a guy you may have heard of — Johnny Depp — likeable guy, pretty good actor. He was on a show called ‘21 Jump Street.’”
McKenzie, who has been stumping for Barak Obama in his spare time, hadn’t read the Trumbo book, but was immediately entranced by it when the “scary” project was proposed.
“The writing is very rich; the character is incredible,” McKenzie says. “You get very few chances to play something like this on stage or in film in your life. And it’s so timely. The story is almost 100 years old, if you consider it takes place in World War I, but we’re still talking about generals sending 18-year-old boys — and now girls, too — off to war that they don’t understand while they were there.”
To be continued…
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Ben McKenzie, Rowan Joseph at Jo's, Part 1
Benjamin McKenzie, like his primary medium, is cool.
Rowan Joseph, like his, is warm. Very warm.
Seated side by side at Jo’s Hot Coffee promoting their movie, “Johnny Got His Gun,” the television actor and the theater director present a study in extreme contrasts.
His forehead tilts forward, not as a weapon in a charm offensive, but almost to hood his responses. McKenzie keeps something in reserve, an essential on the screen. (A budding Robert Redford then?)
He speaks in short, declarative sentences, factual without elaboration, while avoiding the impression of obfuscation. (“I live a quiet life in the hills above L.A. Way up. Above the perpetual chaos of Hollywood and West Hollywood. A little yard. A dog. I hang out at my house.”)
Pennsylvania-born Joseph is a rumpled eruption of emotions. Always in movement, always in thought, he’s making intellectual connections — theater, books, movies, actors, lighting — faster than anyone could absorb them.
If McKenzie recedes into reflection, Joseph can’t wait to rhapsodize about his first movie project, how he envisioned McKenzie as Dalton Trumbo’s injured World War I soldier after seeing his “Junebug” and a picture on the Internet; how the movie was made on an $83,000 budget with just a bench and a chair, how he relied on his theatrical background to simulate water with $53 worth of dry ice.
Most miraculous of all: How the 77-minute movie with a single actor was picked up for distribution on the first inquiry to Mark Cuban’s Truly Indie company.
More to come …
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September 18, 2008
Elizabeth Avellan on Austin's ravaged film industry, Part 2
“We’re losing more than jobs,” Avellan says. “We’re losing a community.”
Not to mention the effect on Austin’s vaunted creative culture. Avellan and other Austin-based producers have had trouble keeping movie production in Texas, to say nothing of the Hollywood financiers attracted to New Mexico’s or Louisiana’s incentives. Avellan says those incentives often benefit the financiers only, not the productions themselves.
“Decisions are not being made on a script’s merit,” she says. “It’s all about who has the best incentives.”
There’s also the little matter of location credibility. A film that was supposed to shoot in the Texas desert recently was lured to Puerto Rico (no desert), while the USANetwork’s “In Plain Sight” series does fine when scenes are set in Albuquerque, but New Mexico doesn’t sub as well as Texas, with its varied landscapes, for other locations. (Also, have you noticed the shallowness of the acting pool in Albuquerque?)
TXMPA’s Dallas group raised $20,000 for lobbying efforts recently; Scott wants to double that during the “Spaghetti Western,” here in the former heart of Texas film production.
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Elizabeth Avellan on Austin's ravaged film industry, Part 1
If you doubt that incentives from other states have diminished Texas movie production, share a late morning coffee with set decorator Jeanette Scott and producer Elizabeth Avellan.
That’s why Scott, who has never put together a benefit event, agreed to organize the Texas Motional Picture Alliance’s “Spaghetti Western” fundraiser at Star Hill Ranch in Bee Cave on Nov. 7. She’s drafted big guns such as Avellan, Mike Judge, Robert Rodriguez, Richard Linklater, Alexandra and Terrence Malick as well as Warren Spector to lead the charge.
But it was Avellan, who produced Rodriguez’s and others’ films from “El Mariachi” to “Spy Kids,” “Sin City” and “Grindhouse,” who rattled the Mueller Austin Starbucks with reports of the industry’s astonishing demise.
“We are facing a brain drain,” she says. “We’re training these film talents, and they move away because other states are stealing our films. Too much money is left on the table. Studios are not even scouting Texas.”
Texas Motional Picture Alliance is the lobbying arm of the regional industry. It’s hoping to increase the state’s cash-back grant on instate spending from 5 percent to something like 15 to 20 percent, not even close to Michigan’s 42 percent.
More to come …
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September 15, 2008
Watch out for 'Whip It,' Ellen Page on Austin streets
That state lures movie producers with a 42 percent tax incentive; Texas offers up to 5 percent. Now Barrymore will shoot exteriors here, days before the Austin City Limits Festival launches. During last year’s fest, the director scouted locations while dallying with ex-boyfriend Justin Long.
The interior/exterior split is now familiar to Texas’ decimated film industry. Establishing shots for Oscar winner “No Country for Old Men” were made in West Texas, for instance; the rest went to New Mexico, another incentive haven.
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'Kings of the Evening' Premiere Reception
Now that all the Hurricane Ike social reporting is done, it’s time to recap some pre-Ike events that never made it into Out & About posts. One such event was the premiere of “Kings of the Evening,” an Austin-shot movie that has earned honors at African American film festivals around the country.
Taisha Shaw, Angela Rawna
The following reception at the Monarch Event Center was meant as a thank-you to the cast and crew from the Austin Convention and Visitors Bureau, which is tasked with overseeing film production in the city.
Linara Washington, Jennifer Walker
With most of the news about Austin’s decimated movie industry — leeched away by incentives from New Mexico, Louisiana, Michigan and 37 other states — negative, it was a blessing to toast a small, feel-good film from Andrew P. Jones about honor dressing during the Depression.
Cara Briggs, Jonathan Clark
We ran into all sorts of favored folks, include two fantastic Austin stage actors — Angela Rawna and Cara Briggs — the second appearing in this particular movie, the first not. Like most independent films these days, “Kings of the Evening” will face tough distribution challenges, but the audience buzz was warm at the reception.
On a sad note, we heard at the reception that Max Horne, the cabaret singer whom we’d enjoyed at Ms. B’s not long ago, died quietly of cancer a few weeks ago.
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September 9, 2008
Sneak: 'Burn After Reading'
The formal reviews will come out later this week, but it’s definitely second-tier Coen — not nearly in the league of “No Country for Old Men,” “The Big Lebowski,” “Fargo” or “Miller’s Crossing.” Yet this quirky little spy thriller set on the fringes of official Washington D.C. kept me guessing and giggling to the end. Every few minutes, I whispered to my companions, “Where is this going?”
The loose threads are tied up neatly during an outrageous scene between a nervous CIA middleman played by David Rasche and his supercillious superior, brilliantly thrown away by J.K. Simmons. On a spectrum of playing with type to playing against type were Tilda Swinton (conventional cold B-word), John Malkovich (obscenity spewing brain), Frances McDormand (ditzy, sweet yet also fearless), George Clooney (a cad again, but at least clueless about it), Brad Pitt (playing a twink so twinky, he’s almost unrecognizable).
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September 8, 2008
Elaine Stritch & Matthew McConaughey, Part 3
See lower posts for first two parts…
Back on his old stomping grounds, Matthew McConaughey dived into Barton Springs, attended a lopsided Longhorn victory at the expanded Royal-Memorial Stadium, hung with Austin buddies and titillated admirers with his appearances at the Paramount premiere of “Surfer, Dude,” which he produced as well as starred in, and the after-party at the Belmont, where he kindly allowed his picture to be taken with fans, even though cameras were generally forbidden.
McConaughey has worked pretty steadily since Richard Linklater’s “Daze and Confused” broadcast his core persona to wider audiences in 1993. Many a brash young movie star has faded before the 15-year mark. Not McConaughey. His prolific mixture of light comedies and fairly substantive dramas begs comparison with another native Texan and sometime Austinite, Dennis Quaid, also compared to Marlon Brando in his youth, although for different reasons. (And to round out the coincidences, Elaine Stritch actually dated Brando, until the former convent girl fled that Lothario’s apartment when he emerged from a back room in pajamas.)
Here’s the point: McConaughey is no slacker. Yet is he milking his looks and charm while reaching no higher than the lowest rungs of his talent potential? Ask people which of his roles they remember most, and they’ll say David Wooderson from “Dazed and Confused,” way back at the beginning of his career. Since then, he’s confounded his critics in “Amistad,” “A Time to Kill,” “Lone Star” and other movies, plus he was memorable in “Reign of Fire” with Christian Bale.
Yet will anyone care about McConaughey when, like Stritch, he’s 83?
I hope so. He’s a genial guy. And like Quaid, he’s been generous to his partly adopted city of Austin. Perhaps he won’t have to suffer, as Stritch did, to discover that it’s really all about the work.
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Elaine Stritch & Matthew McConaughey, Part 1
Two major celebrities tarried in Austin last week.
One is 83, the other somewhat younger, 38, hauling around an even younger girlfriend, 24, and a newborn in tow.
One made her name on the stage, the other zoomed to stardom on the big screen.
One had never visited Austin before, the other once lived here, returned often after relocating to the West Coast, although his visits have been spaced fewer and farther between of late.
One performed a series of four 150-minute cabaret shows at the Mansion on Judge’s Hill while in town, the other made brief appearances before the press and public at the Paramount Theatre and the Belmont.
One was once known as a beauty, a wit and something of a lush, the other is known as a beauty, a charmer and something of a party dude.
One shrunk to mortal size once she left the stage, showing her age and disabilities, the other beamed with golden good health, clothed or half-clothed in public.
How Elaine Stritch and Matthew McConaughey responded to Austin and how Austin responded to these celebrities tells us something about all three.
More to come…
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September 4, 2008
Review: 'Surfer, Dude'
Matthew! Matt! Ma-te-o! Bro!
Or, as you’d slur it in “Surfer, Dude” with a sweet-potato-pie East Texas drawl, “braaaw!”
O mighty Bronze Idol of our New Bronze Age! We, your expanded posse, worship at your sandy, unshod feet. We adore your kouros-boy curls, Praxitelean torso and the “Discobolus” curve of your back.
Mr. Matthew McConaughey, you are not just the Sexiest Man Alive, but the Sexiest Man Alive Who Wants to Die During Sex.
Your blissed-out grin and Marlon Brando peepers blink out from the giant screen, from every “TMZ” episode and from every celebrity ’zine. (Congrats on your personal-best time in the Nike + Human Race! And on the mini-dude-in-waiting!)
Man, what a pal. You lent your stratospheric appeal to a formulaic beach movie directed by your Longview bud, S.R. Bindler, who previously made a mind-bending documentary — “Hands on a Hard Body.”
Now, Bindler’s cinematic clay is another hard body — the hard body of the post-“People” Era. And Bindler clearly knows what he’s doing: You are framed — in all your “California Dreamin’” glory — in virtually every shot, inviting the audience to drool over your bodacious six pack, your naked “bongo nights” backside and your surfing-suited crouch.
You may not have been a beach bum before making this movie, but it will be impossible to shake that image now. Think how long it took Sean Penn to escape Jeff Spicoli. Expect 21 more years of red carpets before winning that Oscar.
For “Surfer, Dude” you even brought along two of your Austin braaaws — Woody Harrelson and Willie Nelson — studiously blowing on the movie’s ubiquitous weed. (If they handed out Academy Awards for convincing consumption of cannabis …)
Perhaps unwittingly, “Surfer, Dude” is a big, wet kiss blown — with a sexy wink — in the general direction of the good, clean 1960s beach movies, those that sported such improbable plot devices as, oh, say, a reality-show mogul trying to force a pure-hearted surfer into a commercial enterprise he despises.
There’s not much actual surfing here, though we see some virtual-reality surfing sessions. Nobody embarrasses themselves, least of all you, who may now reclaim your shirt.
Yet there’s a reason this review runs to almost 400 words and is addressed to you, you, only you. The movie’s a monument to your transcendent humpiness — despite the smattering of topless women, a la “Girls Gone Wild,” in party scenes — and the unblemished, unfiltered, unaltered pleasure you take in life.
Awesome, Dude!
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September 3, 2008
Green Carpet: 'Surfer, Dude'
Enough Obamamania. On Wednesday, Austinites witnessed McConaugheysteria.
The Dude
Fans and press melted underneath the Paramount Theatre marquee for two hours before Matthew McConaughey finally waved goodbye to the crowd assembled for the Austin Film Society premiere of “Surfer, Dude.” When he did abandon the “green carpet” — a play on the movie’s frequent references to varieties of grass — screeches erupted in the lobby and uniformed officers were called in to part the sweaty masses.
Camila Alves
Dude No. 1 was gracious with his idolaters, as were his colleagues from the beach movie about a surfer who won’t bend his gifts to rank commercialism. Some, like Austin-era bud Woody Harrelson, spent the past week in town, hitting old haunts like Barton Springs (where McConaughey was whistled for diving in the wrong zone).
K.D. Aubert
His director and pal from Longview days, S.R. Bindler (“Hands on a Hard Body”), shared a suite with McConaughey for the Longhorns game on Saturday, as well as a trip to the field during halftime.
S.R. Bindler and wife, whose name I missed (help!)
“I’ve been to many games,” Bindler said. “But I had no idea the full spectacle.”
Zachary Knighton
Cast members such as K.D. Aubert (“Buffy the Vampire Slayer”), Jeffrey Nording (“Dirt”), Todd Stashwick (“The Riches”) and Zachary Knighton (“The Hitcher”) shared their favorite Austin barbecue stops (Stubb’s, Iron Works) and small Texas towns (Marfa was mentioned more than once).
Todd Stashwick
“I haven’t been here in 12 years,” said Nording, who plays another bemused villain in “Surfer, Dude.” “It’s tripled in height. I still recognize some things, but what happened?”
Jeffrey Nording
Hey, I skipped the after-party at the Belmont, which I’m sure floated above the Earth, but what with the movie — see my review in this space Thursday morning — and the green carpet, all I could visualize was Mangia pizza and the last bits of the RNC convention.
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September 2, 2008
AGLIFF Review 4: 'Ciao'
“Ciao”
1 star
The parallels just keep on rolling. The two movies are set in American regional centers without particularly distinct cultures (Dallas, Atlanta), and then introduce comparatively exotic elements (from Italy, Alabama). Both are paced exceedingly slow, which only exacerbates the Coke-flat talents of most of the actors.
Sustained somberness, irrational outbursts of emotion and unexpected intimacies are, of course, perfectly natural responses to death. Yet the makers of these movies are not budding Bergmans. One wants to respect their serious intentions, but the results just don’t merit our trust. Death does not become them.
“Ciao” plays the Austin Gay and Lesbian International Film Festival 2:30 p.m. Saturday tat the Alamo Ritz.
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AGLIFF Review 3: 'Like a Virgin'
“Like a Virgin”
3 stars
You read that right. All those trappings of the traditional sports movie lead to a low-key, quirky comedy set amid the grit of an industrial South Korean port. The sweetness of the boy’s self-discovery is tempered by a tear-stained family drama, but all is redeemed when he is able to employ his hidden wrestling skills to affect transformation into a Korean approximation of his idol, Madonna.
Screenwriters Lee Hae-yeong and Lee Hae-jun lay the tender trap sensitively and saucer-eyed young Ryu Deok-hwan sells every little unexpected twist in the protagonist’s personality. It’s a bit frightening to think how this project might have floundered with a less adept artistic team. One or two notes played too loud or too long, and the whole thing might have crumbled.
“Like a Virgin” plays the Austin Gay and Lesbian International Film Festival 8 p.m. Sept. 5 at Alamo Ritz.
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August 25, 2008
AGLIFF Review 2: 'The Edge of Heaven'
‘The Edge of Heaven’
Four stars.
An earthy Turkish laborer, retired in Germany, attempts to fill his declining years with a gusto for life’s pleasures. This brings him into contact with kind, worldly Turkish prostitute, who leaves the profession just ahead of Islamic religious bullies. His son is a scholar of German at a Bremen university; her daughter has disappeared in Turkey. The first act ends badly. When that prodigal daughter seeks refuge in Germany, she encounters a saucer-eyed young social activist, with whom she has a brief, but telling affair. The second act ends even more tragically. The activist’s mother, seemingly the least of the players in this story that loops back on itself, becomes the dramatic fulcrum by its ameliorating end.
The cast, which tends to let expressions tell more than verbosity, fits the material seamlessly, Hanna Schygulla, who plays the activist’s mother, is devastatingly effective, although those who have not seen her since the Fassbinder’s days may be startled by the effects of normal aging.
By the way, that the lesbian affair is treated almost as an afterthought, then as an unexpectedly crucial link in the mysterious story makes this an unusual pick for a gay film festival, but thank AGLIFF heartily for bringing this gem, which won best screenplay at the Cannes Film Festival, to Austin.
“The Edge of Heaven” screens 7:30 p.m. Sept. 3 at the Alamo Ritz.
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August 23, 2008
AGLIFF Review 1: 'Equality U.'
‘Equality U.’
Three stars
The set-up sounded a bit pat: A group of young Christians travel on a Soulforce Equality Ride to Christian colleges and universities to discuss with students and administrators their institutions’ rules against homosexuality.
And, for a while, those expectations are met in the documentary “Equality U.” Group co-leader Jacob Reitan finds his eloquent, uncompromising speech-making not always effective; equally adamant co-leader Haven Herrin looks more closely at individual situations and teases out more ambiguity. Disagreements about strategy cleave the Riders almost from the start. Yet train a camera on humans long enough — especially in such hothouse conditions — and they will surprise even a viewer who has seen scores of documentaries about gay culture.
One stumbles on the unflaggingly hopeful and spiritually adjusted Oklahoma Rider who discovers her father ready to disown her for appearing on TV; the Oklahoma Baptist University junior who comes out in great fear, only to find her status liberating; the weeping student who doesn’t want her university’s anti-gay stance to hurt actual people; other students who promise to help change their universities’ policies.
Director Dave O’Brien saves the most potent gesture for last: Brigham Young University students, knowing that they will almost certainly be expelled and excommunicated, stage a simple die-in on campus for those Mormons who committed suicide when rejected by their families and schools after coming out. It’s a heartbreaking subject the rest of the country, slowing altering its views on homosexuality, doesn’t want to face. The Equality Riders stare it down with courage, dignity and — dare we say? — grace.
“Equality U” screens at the Austin Gay and Lesbian International Film Festival 2 p.m. Sept. 3 at the Alamo Ritz.
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August 20, 2008
Catching up with SXSW's Janet Pierson at the Athenian Grill
Janet Pierson is not Matt Dentler. The new SXSW Film Fest director would never be mistaken for the former SXSW Film Fest director, who struck out for the far frontiers of online movie distribution in NYC earlier this year. Whereas Dentler was physically dynamic, verbally prolific and geographically ambitious, Pierson is quiet, thoughtful, a behind-the-scenes social connector who is best when helping others rather than tooting her own horn.
Of course we talked film and festivals, but also StumbleUpon.com, which helps locate Web sites based on the reader’s interests, and JazzyDanceCo.com, which showcases hot Austin salsa dancers Azucena and Carlos. (I like that in a conversationalist — curiosity across various fields.)
Although she says her first months as director have been stressful, Pierson has learned to relax into who she really is — somebody who knows everybody in the local film industry, as well as major figures in film all over the world, and who understands that the digital option holds out the future for many of those filmmakers.
She divulged some fizzy fest news, but we’ll sit on that until the timing is right. Stay tuned.
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August 19, 2008
Jacqueline Rush Rivera and Dan Cofer leave Austin movie posts
It with sadness that we report that Jacqueline Rush Rivera is leaving Cine Las Americas, while Dan Cofer is bidding farewell to the Dobie Theater.
I didn’t know Dan as well — I don’t even have a photograph of him to publish — but he was a gracious manager. His distant predecessor, Scott Dinger, was a prolific leader for the local movie tribe and helped launch the Austin Gay and Lesbian International Film Festival.
Ever since then, a revolving door has fanned past the managerial spot. Recently, the Landmark-owned Dobie has booked more popcorn movies along with its art-house fare. Whatever it takes to pay the bills — I worked for Landmark in the 1980s — but the Dobie was once an essential cultural asset for the city. Now …
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August 10, 2008
Voodoo Cowboy at The Belmont
If the Ice Ball at the Monarch Center represented a grassroots fundraising and socializing effort come of age, the Voodoo Cowboy party at The Belmont the same evening had the feel of a top shelf event that just gets more glamorous at each turn. Voodoo Cowboy Entertainment manages musicians, athletes and moviemakers, while its party-giving colleagues at Mueller Law Offices work in a myriad of specialties. Their annual shindig Saturday — overseen by Mark Mueller himself — lured the brightest and the most beautiful from a multitude of Austin professions into the spotlight.
Zach Hadley, Angela Torres
In our first sweep through the party, we encountered filmmaker and activist Turk Pipkin, U.S. Congressman Lloyd Doggett, Style Avatar Stephen Moser, SXSW Film’s Janet Pierson, Austin Film Society’s Agnes Varnum, UT Performing Arts Center’s Tim Neece (or was it?), lawyer and Fortunate 500 stand-out Becky Beaver, bountiful benefactor Melanie Barnes, open-hearted publicist Patricia Paredes, and writer and social connector Anne Elizabeth Wynn, among many others.
Amy Hillin, Paul Molanphy, LZ Love
The whole event, blessed by late-night winds, was filmed and, given the bands loosening the guests’ joints and the flowing liquids loosening them even more, there should be some interesting footage out there.
Haylee Faggard, Mark Faggard, Cassandra LeBlanc
We spent the most time with David Sullivan, the new head of First Night and one of the national proponents of art-sated New Years Eves. “He’ll be the Cliff Redd of First Night,” predicted Wynn, referring to the Long Center savior, who swept aside local bickerers to build the city’s first municipal performing arts center.
David Sullivan, Patricia Paredes, David Johnson
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August 7, 2008
Catching up with Cole Dabney
Just back from working Camp Longhorn up near Marble Falls, Cole Dabney is in Austin full-time.
Bobby’s on a naval vessel in the Caribbean — and a year from now he’ll be U.S. Navy full-time — right now, but Cole and I met for salads and pizza at Taverna on Second Street. (We agree that the free focaccia is the coolest thing about the small-group restaurant. Well, that and the awning-shaded sidewalk seating.) Cole, a UT junior, is bubbling with ideas, including one for introducing great films to kids through a book. (Any trade publication editors out there?)
And yes, ladies, the former TCU basketball player is single. I knew the question would pop up sooner or later. Better get it out of the way, right off the bat.
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August 1, 2008
2008 Fortunate 500: The Complete List
Remember, this is our annual list of Austin’s most social citizens. It honors those Central Texans who go Out & About for the good of the greater social fabric.
Almost all our picks were originally nominated by readers, then followed by our social spies during the subsequent year. (I chatted with most of them, too, at the 1,000 or so social events I attended in the past 12 months.) So now is a prime time to alert us to people who contribute above and beyond to the social scene, so they can be eligible for the 2009 list.
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July 25, 2008
2008 Fortunate 500: Movies
MOVIES
Top Pick Jacqueline Rush Rivera: A native of Puerto Rico, she trained in visual arts and discovered Austin while working at the immigrant center Casa Marianella. With Eugenio del Bosque, Rush Rivera has helped internationalize Cine las Americas, fast growing into an essential Austin social event. She’s also out supporting causes such as the Austin Asian Film Festival, Austin Film Society and the city’s other movie fandangos.
Paul Alvarado-Dykstra. Fantastic Fest, Villa Muse Studios
Elizabeth Avellan. ‘Shorts,’ Troublemaker Studios
Angela Bettis and Kevin Ford. ‘Inheridance,’ ‘When Is Tomorrow,’ ‘Scar’
Louis Black. Austin Chronicle, South by Southwest
Gary Bond. Austin Film Office, Austin Film Commission
Rebecca Campbell. Austin Film Society, Austin Studios
Kat Candler. Storie Productions, Austin Film School
Heather Courtney. ‘Critical Condition,’ ‘Trinidad’
Cole Dabney. Austin Film Critics, Coleandbobby.com
Eugenio del Bosque. Cine las Americas
Laura Dunn. ‘The Unforeseen’
Marc English. Austin Film Society, Marc English Design
Hector Galan. ‘The War,’ ‘Bronx Burning ’
Katy Hackerman and Robert Walker. Austin Film Society, Matinee Media, Marfa Public Radio
Tamara and Bob Hudgins. Texas Film Commission, Chisholm Trail Community Foundation
Lisa Kaselak. Austin Gay and Lesbian International Film Festival.
Harry Knowles. Ain’t It Cool News, Fantastic Fest, Butt-numb-a-thon
Tim and Karrie League. Alamo Drafthouse, Fantastic Fest, Rolling Roadshow
Richard Linklater. Austin Film Society, ‘Inning by Inning,’ ‘Me and Orson Welles,’ ‘Boyhood’
Suzanne and Tim McCanlies. ‘The Two Bobs’
David Modigliani. ‘Crawford’
Barbara Morgan. Austin Film Festival
Chale Nafus. Austin Film Society
Masashi Niwano. Austin Asian American Film Festival
Spencer Parsons. ‘I’ll Come Running,’ University of Texas, Austin Chronicle
Janet and John Pierson. University of Texas, Austin Film Society, South by Southwest Film Festival
PJ Raval. ‘Trouble the Water,’ ‘Trinidad,’ ‘The Two Bobs’
Bob Ray. ‘Hell on Wheels’
Robert Rodriguez. ‘Shorts,’ Austin Film Society, Troublemaker Studios
Ame Shillington. Austin Star Map
Tom Schatz. UT Film Institute
Alex Smith. UT Film Institute, ‘The Slaughter Rule’
Paul Stekler. Austin Film Society, University of Texas
Anne Walker-McBay. ‘The Two Bobs,’ ‘Boyhood’
Alisa Weldon and Lynn Yeldell. L Style G Style, Austin Gay and Lesbian International Film Festival
While I’m in hiking in Montana, we’ll reveal one Fortunate 500 list each day at noon. For a complete updated list, follow the brightly colored Fortunate 500 link below this post.
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July 17, 2008
Longhorns, Texas the bad guys in 'The Express'
Orangebloods might want to avert their eyes: Trailers for “The Express,” an inspirational sports movie about Ernie Davis, the first African American to win the Hiesman Trophy, show the halfback facing down racism in upstate New York and the Deep South. Sneers on campus. Cold shoulders from merchants. Stars and bars in the South.
Uh oh. It’s not just Texas. It’s the University of Texas.
Indeed Davis, played in “The Express” by Rob Brown, and his Orangemen beat Texas in the 1959 Cotton Bowl to take the national championship. Davis was told he’d allowed to accept his MVP award at the post-game banquet, but would be required to leave the hotel immediately afterward. His whole team boycotted the banquet.
Not Texas’ finest hour, especially since UT fielded all-white teams in those days, not raising the ban against black players until 1963. Extra cringe points: part-time Austinite Dennis Quaid looms large Davis’ Syracuse coach, who insists on playing his controversial halfback. The movie, which premieres in Syracuse on Sept. 12, is slated for an October release nationally.
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July 16, 2008
'Mamma Mia!' review preview Part 3
Addendum to “Mamma Mia!” review below
HOLLYWOOD TALENT SHOW
Vanessa Redgrave (“Camelot”)
Nicole Kidman (“Moulin Rouge”)
Renee Zellweger (“Chicago,” pictured with Catherine Zeta-Jones, who had already proved herself on Broadway)
Richard Gere (“Chicago”)
Meryl Streep (“Mamma Mia!”)
Johnny Depp (“Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street”)
Peter O’Toole (“Goodbye, Mr. Chips,” “Man of La Mancha”)
Lee Marvin (“Paint Your Wagon,” even though his recording of “Wanderin’ Star” went gold)
Helena Bonham Carter (“Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street” — OK, barely)
Pierce Brosnan (“Mamma Mia!”)
Deborah Kerr (“The King and I”)
Natalie Wood (“West Side Story”)
Audrey Hepburn (“My Fair Lady”)
Ava Gardner (“Show Boat”)
Franco Nero (“Camelot”)
Send in your own suggestions.
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'Mamma Mia!' review preview Part 2
Continued from below….
If Streep’s energy ever lags, in rushes Julie Walters and Christine Baransky, as old friends with their own twists on late-life libido. Accomplished, stylized musical performers, they need no prompting to steal the frame. The possible daddies — Stellan Skarsgard, Pierce Brosnan and Colin Firth — remain modestly in the background for the most part, singing when required. (By now, Brosnan’s undignified howl has been sufficiently ridiculed, so let’s not elaborate. He’s still emits more heat than all the studs who line Baransky’s beach number.)
A few words on the unity of time: Much has been made of a 59-year-old Streep, playing a member of a disco-era all-girl band, giving away a 20-year-old daughter whose boyfriend is Web-savvy, placing the fictional present fairly close to the chronological present. Actually, the math almost works, if you think of the late 1970s as the Age of ABBA, and the late 1990s as the Age of the Internet.
OK, that pushes it. But director Phyllida Lloyd, who knows something about operatic mythos, tries to keep time markers to a minimum, thus allowing us to breaststroke along with the contagious tide.
“Mamma Mia!” and its all-age, full-contact ecstasy — best embodied in “The Dancing Queen” — may do more for women (and men) of a certain age than the comparatively attenuated and over-dramatized “Sex and the City.”
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'Mamma Mia!' review preview Part 1
“Mamma Mia!” is a skinny dip in the fountain of youth.
Just watching flaxen-tressed, 59-year-old Meryl Streep skittering across the turquoise-tinted Maxfield Parish fantasyscape of a Greek island, singing (gloriously) and dancing (enthusiastically) to thumping ABBA songs is enough to give anyone permission, under the right circumstances, to believe the admittedly clunky lyrics: “You can dance, you can jive, having the time of your life.”
While transitions from dialogue to lyrics can be painful, Johnson clearly understands the ancient rites of comedy: Young lovers overcoming obstacles, plotters withholding secrets, old fools acting foolishly, women embracing Dionysian frenzies, chastising their men for shortcomings, balancing sexual power on Aphrodite’s sacred island. She even slips in an updated Greek chorus.
It’s all there. And we play along because we want to believe that all these nice, flawed people can still shake every bit of joy out of life. And because the harmonically ingenious ABBA songs, even when oddly placed, are ineradicable.
Streep doesn’t exactly carry the movie, but she lends it just enough depth and credibility, if not exactly intelligence, applying her usual complicated, misdirected emotional range to motherly instincts, feminist self-sufficiency and, ultimately, romantic rage and redemption. (Her diva turn in “The Winner Takes It All” puts her in the Barbra Streisand, Patti LuPone, Liza Minnelli league, even if the script doesn’t build up the necessary context.)
to be continued …
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July 12, 2008
'American Teen' cast socializes in Austin
A movie forced them together. The same movie has reunited them periodically over the past two years.
“We’re all best friends now,” say about the subjects of the documentary “American Teen,” which was filmed over the course of 10 months at an Indiana high school.
The five former classmates whose stories emerge as the spine of Nanette Burstein’s doc, due out in movie theaters soon, are touring America to promote it. Thursday and Friday, they stopped in Austin and our conversation wandered far off topic (for which they repeatedly apologized, forgetting that the interview fed into a social column, not a movie feature, so all was well).
Now graduating into adulthood, they resemble only remotely the posed and doctored images on the yellow version of the movie poster — which they disdain, preferring the “Breakfast Club” concept for an earlier marketing device. Instead of stock characters in a teen comedy, in life they embody a range of confidence, reticence and curiosity common to many Americans of college sophomore age.
Between Krizmanich and Hannah Bailey, the hip, witty yet clearly skeptical one in the urban cap, was Colin Clemens, pegged as “the jock,” good-natured but more guarded, perhaps less worldly than Reinholt, his head into basketball practice. He appeared to gain subtle strength by his association with Krizmanich and Bailey, but his body language most matched Tusing’s.
Responding to questions about their past, current and future friendships — they didn’t really know each other until the documentary settled their immediate fates — Krizmanich, Reinholt and, tardily, Baily, chimed in as a cheerful chorus, while Tusing and Clemons glanced into the middle distance. Did they suspect that, after this rush of celebrity-induced intimacy, they might drift apart? After all, what do they share in common other than the accident of appealing to Burstein’s documentary eye? (Granted, also, some personal history, since the movie reached full form.)
Only one has “escaped Indiana,” in their words. After a hiatus in San Francisco, Bailey now attends arts-oriented State University of New York-Purchase. The others scattered closer to home, to university towns instate.
Tusing, exhausted from travel, went back to his room instead to contact his friend Molly. “With IM you can take the time to think,” he said. This observation was followed by a discussion on the crucial value of “BRB” — “be right back” — in texting slang, which allows for composition time. (Apparently, texting plays a major role in the romantic storylines of the movie, too.)
Has the experience changed their lives? The group talked earnestly if glibly about helping other teens or serving as mentors, but Tusing provided the most personal response.
“It has given me a good confidence boost in real life,” he says. “I feel better. I didn’t think I was special, that I was important. Seeing reactions to the results, (audiences) like who I am. At least the part they can see. If strangers like who I am, I don’t need to be concerned.”
A lesson every performer — come to think of it, every human — learns, at least momentarily.
“We were more alike than we gave ourselves credit for,” Clemens says. “I’m glad we could put stereotypes aside.
As the interview disintegrated, in a natural way, they continued to tease and sweetly torment each other, testing boundaries. A good sign for future friendship.
You can visit them at their Facebook page.
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July 9, 2008
Wall-E and other Macs
As our family movie critic, Dale Roe, quickly pointed out, the title character in Pixar’s “Wall-E” is an Apple product. One can tell by the chord harmonizing when the robotic trash-compactor powers on. (Roe’s review was the subject of its own media hum on Mac fan sites.)
I agree with 99 percent of Roe’s five-star review. Stray thoughts on my first viewing (there will be others):
It’s still somewhat startling that Disney and Pixar would bet the ranch on a movie with virtually no dialog and two lead characters who are non-android robots. But even more shocking is its unambiguous shots at fast-food-driven obesity, WalMart-style quantity consumerism, television-and-leisure-addicted lassitude and a general lack of civic engagement from the American public. All this is done with animation, which may soften the sting, but I know its passive targets were sitting next to me at the Gateway Theater.
I still haven’t read any commentary on the miraculous use of an old-fashioned musical, “Hello, Dolly!” as Wall-E’s on-screen inspiration for ecstatic activity and romantic contact. The movie is full of cinematic allusions to “E.T.,” “Star Wars,” “2001: A Space Odyssey,” etc., but to so completely embrace the 1969 film that, to some historians, nailed the coffin shut on the big-budget movie musical era, is clever unto genius.
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July 8, 2008
It's a boy for Matthew McConaughey
Looks like Austin’s perennial surfer dude is now a surfer daddy. Matthew McConaughey’s girlfriend Camila Alves gave birth to a 7-pound, 4-once boy Monday evening.
“Camila and I were side by side the entire time,” McConaughey, 38, told OK magazine. “We are both tired and elated, and are so happy to have created the greatest miracle in the world — having a child and making a family. Now comes the greatest adventure — raising one, together.”
McConaughey was last seen hanging with his man pal Lance Armstrong in Southern California, where Austin’s best cyclist is summering with girlfriend Kate Hudson (also chumming with Hudson’s mom, Goldie Hawn). We’ll see if the fun-loving McConaughey can settle down with his 24-year-old Brazilian model and newborn.
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July 2, 2008
Robert Rodriguez and Rose McGowan parting?
AP Photo/Jeff Christensen
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June 30, 2008
Action figure Richard Norton at Master Yi's
A long stretch of Burnet Road north of Research Boulevard has not yet benefited from the advent of the nearby Domain shopping Babylon. Strip centers look like dowdy afterthoughts from the 1970s and one can’t help but express curiosity about what goes on behind the miniblinds of these businesses. Master Yi Academy, for instance, has taken advantage of the relatively affordable real estate by operating a spacious, well-tended martial arts headquarters, including two well-lit, popular studios.
Jason Montgomery, Richard Norton, Rick Galione
Friday, one gym-like space was given over to movie star Richard Norton, who shared insights from his fake fighting on shows such as “Ironheart,” “Rage and Honor” and his friend Chuck Norris’ “Walker, Texas Ranger.” He demonstrated the camera-frame-filling “John Wayne” swing pnch and gave advice on keeping other fighters in one’s peripheral vision or falling to the floor without “breaking” (using one’s arm or hand to cushion the fall).
Janell Vela-Smith, Christian Ramirez
Among the participants in all shapes and sizes were members of the Janell Vela-Smith’s Fighting Stunts Association, as well as representatives from her Innovative Renderworks, an independent film company that plans to shoot “Templar: Honor among Thieves” at Spiderwood Studios, still under construction near Bastrop.
Jason Montgomery, Rick Galione
So quite a bit of action behind those miniblinds.
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June 16, 2008
Austin connection: Holland Taylor, Ann Richards, Madison Davenport and Deanna Dunagan
Madison Davenport, who spent part of her youth in Austin, plays Ruthie Smithens, best friend to the title character in “Kit Kittredge: An American Girl,” which opens Friday nationwide. The 11-year-old launched her prodigious movie career in 2005 with Helena Bonham Carter in “Conversations with Other Women.”
Deanna Dunagan, who gave a touching speech after winning Best Actress in a Play on Sunday’s Tony Awards broadcast, graduated from the University of Texas, having studied music there. Her win for her role as the addicted mother in Tracy Letts’ Pulitzer and Tony-winning “August: Osage County” rewarded her long-delayed Broadway debut.
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June 5, 2008
Rethinking 'Sex and the City'
That thought passed through my mind at about Minute No. 120 during the “Sex and the City” film adaptation, as we witnessed the show’s fantastically frivolous characters undergo emotional challenges even more daunting than those introduced late in the TV series. It’s still a romantic comedy, no doubt, but “Sex” veers so persistently into romantic disappointment, we wonder how much empathy we can spare for Carrie, Samantha, Charlotte and Miranda.
You’ve read the reviews. There’s no question that “Sex” is worth seeing. It’s a cultural phenomenon that reveals a great deal more about our times than some of the most probing PBS documentary specials. Yet the movie stretches the TV premise to the limits. Were it not for the nuanced acting from the four leads and their some of their male counterparts, we’d dismiss their trials and tribulations among the designer labels, penthouses, bubbly, diamonds and beach pads long before the final — narratively satisfying — minute.
Photo courtesy Craig Blankenhorn/New Line Cinema
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June 4, 2008
Augie Garrido, Richard Linklater at 'Inning' premiere
Baseball coaching legend Augie Garrido looked sharp in a dark blazer, accompanied by companion Jeannie Grass, herself smartly turned out in a slim, black outfit for the premiere of “Inning by Inning” at the Paramount Theatre. Garrido appeared humbled by Richard Linklater’s biographical documentary, which showed the University of Texas baseball coach as a sort of philosopher/teacher whose passion is bringing out the best in each student/player.
Jeannie Grass, Augie Garrido
The doc is terrific and will show soon on ESPN. Garrido gave Linklater unprecedented access to the dugout and locker rooms, where the coach’s motivational diction includes strong language. An afternoon showing of “Inning by Inning” — dubbed a “director’s cut” — included the expletives in full, but the evening premiere was a double benefit for the Austin Film Society and the Boys and Girls Clubs of Austin, so we got family version. Of course, you could always read his lips, and the audience got a kick out of his spray of traditional sports wording.
Richard Linklater with Will Crouch, part of the 2005 College World Series championship team, now into commercial insurance after a career in pro ball
Linklater was in high spirits, given that he had just completed two films. He spoke about his own interest in sports, literature, theater and movies, then we caught up on our shared experiences at the River Oaks and Varsity theaters during the golden years of arthouses. Linklater graduated from Bellaire High School — down the road from where I grew up — and says he sometimes reminds Dennis Quaid of their shared alma mater. He’d like to work with Quaid. Do it, Dennis, do it!
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June 2, 2008
Weekend: 'Sex' Parties at Rain and Buzios
Alamo Drafthouse booked at least eight large-scale “Sex” parties for opening week, while fielding requests from hundreds of small groups of (mostly) women for tickets or reservations.
Shannon Hollsten, Katie Chabannes at Rain “Sex” Party
“I am shocked to say that ‘Sex and the City’ has generated more interest … than any movie before it,” says Samantha Cox, who has wrangled such events for the Ritz, South and Village iterations of the Alamo for five years.
Rob Faubion, Saffire at Rain “Sex” Party
“All shows of ‘Sex and the City’ are completely sold out all weekend and have been sold out for almost two weeks,” says the chain’s Mike Sherrill. “This is seriously bigger than ‘Star Wars’ in regard to advance ticket sales.”
It helps that the Alamo recently landed its full liquor license and is therefore capable of supplying those promised cosmos.
Nicholas Brown, Saul Ramirez, Danny Flores, Javier Anchondo, Ramon Olivas at Rain “Sex” Party
As of Thursday, the Belmont had arranged five “Sex” parties.
Gabon Donovan, David Sidney, James Waldrip, Chelsea Antoniono, Laura Hamilton at Buzios “Sex” Party
We attended a “Sex” happy hour at Rain that combined powerful cosmos with soothing treatments from Milk and Honey Day Spa.
Later, we witnessed post-premiere parties at the Copa and Buzios Room, which included the requisite wedding dresses and funny hats.
Carrie Clayton, Chad Stevens at at Buzios “Sex” Party
The Buzios Room is quickly becoming one of my preferred downtown lounges. Even with a party crowd, the dark, cool space radiates calm.
Anita Gonzales, Lacy Anderson
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May 30, 2008
Weekend: 'Sex' Party at Gateway
Forget gas prices. Look for a cranberry juice shortage this summer as “Sex and the City” parties proliferate and millions of cosmos are consumed for fun and charity. Almost every downtown club got into the act this weekend. The Belmont booked at least five “Sex” parties. Alamo Drafthouse picked up even more (still counting).
The dual event at Gateway for Breast Cancer Resource Centers was one of the first. Pertly dressed women — and three brave men — twirled their red drinks over at Baby Acapulco, then pointed their heels over to the Regal cineplex across the street for a viewing of the two-and-a-half-hour screen adaptation of the series about single women acting like gay men in a glamorized New York City.
Nina Seely, personal shopper to the fortunate, took a lead in this charity event, and she brought up the rear as curtain time approached. “I’m exhausted,” she moaned. Nobody said it was easy being fabulous.
Ellen Jatinen, Maria Carter, Yvonne Suttles, Kerry Van Dusen
Sharon Radovich, Bernie Tejeda
Michelle Rodriguez, Cho Smith
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May 29, 2008
'Shine a Light' vs. 'U23D'
Expands the visual universe (“U23D”) vs. explodes images through compaction (“Shine a Light”).
Perfects 3D tracking (“U23D”) vs. perfects the 4-story close-up (“Shine a Light”).
Apollonian art (“U23D”) vs. Dionysian art (“Shine a Light”).
Bono the big soul (“U23D”) vs. Mick the big (expletive) (“Shine a Light”). (Not saying which I prefer. Both small men generate more kinetic energy than the Hoover Dam.)
As much as I admired Martin Scorcese’s “Light,” it gave me a throbbing headache. Even from the last rows, it was just too much Rolling Stones. I’m glad to finally see and hear them up close (and I now get Keith Richards, after 40 years of missing the point), but my sensory overload was shared by Suzie Harriman, who heads back to her garden home in Mexico after she finishes easing Betty Dunkerley’s graceful exit from office.
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May 26, 2008
Austin stars: Lance Armstrong, Kate Hudson, Andy Roddick, Vince Young, Drew Barrymore, Dennis Quaid
While I was soaking up the cool in New England, Austin-linked celebrities went crazy.
Lance Armstrong: After cruising around Austin, our town’s superstar cuddled with new flame Kate Hudson at the Cannes Film Festival. You gotta admire his moxie, even as he insists he and Kate’s ex, Owen Wilson, were never close friends, and thus he’s not picking his pocket.
Drew Barrymore: The frequent Austin visitor, said to be engaged to Apple cutie Justin Long, was seen in Michigan. Maybe she’s decided to take advantage of those 40 percent film production incentives for “Whip It,” the roller derby movie once headed for Austin.
Dennis Quaid: A stranger to Austin lately, despite the presence of his wife Kimberly Buffington’s family — unless we’ve missed a recent visit, and that’s entirely possible — Quaid will be honored June 12 at the Maui Film Fest. Tough gig.
Andy Roddick: The recently engaged tennis star dropped out of the French Open because of an elbow injury. One of his fans has started a “Book Fairy Project” to recycle old children’s books. Last time we chatted with Andy he was reading the “Harry Potter” series. The 25-year-old also placed on OK’s Top 50 Man Candy of the Year list.
Photo: Courtesy of Blogxilla.com
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May 20, 2008
Harry Knowles to slim today
We’re sending thin, positive thoughts to Internet movies poobah Harry Knowles, who is undergoing lap-band surgery today, according to a notice at Ain’t It Cool.
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April 30, 2008
'Iron Man' + Plastic Man (from 'American Idol')
On to other entertainment: Can’t hold back — Jason Castro must go. I no longer care who wins this season of “American Idol,” but the dreaded one is so bland, shallow and irritating, even the contestants who stumble over lyrics or song choices should be forgiven before Castro is graduated to the next level. Yes, he’s pretty and sweet in a stoner way, but this is supposed to be a vocal contest. I’ll leave the Paula Abdul gawking to the YouTubers. What a wreck.
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April 24, 2008
Are we in Buenos Aires? No, Cine las Americas
I felt like the late, lamented world-spanner Pan Am had jetted Victoria Corcoran and I off to some cool, cosmopolitan capital like Buenos Aires, Sao Paulo or Mexico City. Instead, we were hanging around the lobby at the Metropolitan theater on South Interstate 35 for the second-to-last installments of the Cine las Americas festival. We chatted with fest leaders Jacqueline Rush Rivera and Eugenio del Bosque, who reported increased attendance at this year’s series of international films, then we mixed with the crowd. We’ll follow up with hard numbers later.
Jennifer Aguirre, Erick Fajardo
Lisa Torres, Steven Vargas
Rosa Madriz, Diego Michellie
Valentine Garcia, Monica Arango
The Stephen Moser Pie Social May 3-4 benefit has moved from Alamo Ritz to Alamo South due to the Pecan Street Festival, which will make parking downtown impossible.
I can live with sometimes predictable Carly Smithson leaving “American Idol,” but not when goofball slacker Jason Castro redeems the golden ticke. He wasn’t even in the bottom two. Somebody must counteract the Tiger Beat vote.
Did anyone notice that Barack Obama slipped “gay and straight” into his unification speech after losing in Pennsylvania. Classy. Or clever. Or both.
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April 23, 2008
Subversive humor in 'Harold & Kumar' (SXSW)
Precedents exist: “The Simpsons,” “South Park” and “Beavis and Butthead” were, to varying degrees, considered irredeemably juvenile before their impact on social consciousness was recognized. This week’s cultural test faces a franchise launching its first sequel, “Harold & Kumar Escape from Guantanamo Bay,” which wouldn’t even exist if word of mouth about the “White Castle” DVD hadn’t convinced a generation or so that two Asian-Americans could easily embody American stoner sensibilities.
During the South by Southwest Film Festival, we sat down with the three stars — Kal Penn, John Cho and Neil Patrick Harris — at the Intercontinental Stephen F. Austin Hotel to discuss Asian exploitation films, political rhetoric and the sequel’s goofy charms.
“It’s not something that we intentionally try to do,” Harris said. “It’s intentional content, but it’s not intentional on our parts (as actors). It’s something that just does. It’s nice that we are able to appreciate the joke and play into it and value it. But there’s been no concerted effort (on our parts) to make a statement.”
“I’m proud of the fact that the movies work that way,” Penn said.
“It’s odd. Do you think it has something to do with: We attack it in a juvenile fashion because that’s what (prejudice) is?” Cho said. “There’s a traditionalism about getting up on a pedestal and saying ‘racism is bad,’ but to make potty jokes laced with commentary, maybe that’s the way to unseat these kinds of thoughts.”
“That’s super true,” Harris said. “Because if it were trying to be a really smart, intellectual communication about stereotypes, everybody would be really guarded.”
The three performers would love to discuss a third “Harold & Kumar,” which depends on how this low-budget, Shreveport-shot sequel does at the box office. Despite the financial constraints, the second movie comes off as more Hollywood, less indie, which the actors partly attribute to production designer Tony Fanning.
“The spirit of the adventure of the second makes it more grand, too,” Cho said. “It has more of a plot.”
“A third (movie) would be great because Jon and Hayden are so green, their progression has been slow,” Harris said of the team who directed the sequel themselves in order to save money. “I expect that a third film would be on par on the first two, but would be different. They care about the script and it shows. They were inspired to make it look and sound as good as it is.”
Photos by Jay Janner.
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April 8, 2008
Sissy Spacek in Smithville with other Oscar winners, nominees
Fisk is working on Terrence Malick’s “Tree of Life” after previously contributing to Malick’s “Days of Heaven” and “The New World,” as well as Spacek’s “Carrie.” She also appeared in Malick’s “Badlands.” (The sometime Austinite was twice nominated for Oscars.)
Spacek, of course, is cousin to Taylor-raised, University of Texas-trained Rip Torn (nominated for an Oscar for “Cross Creek”), who was married to Oscar winner Geraldine Page (“The Trip to Bountiful”), herself nominated seven times before winning. Torn and Page helped Spacek in her early career after she left Quitman.
“Tree of Life” stars, as everyone in Central Texas knows by now, Oscar-nominated Brad Pitt (“Twelve Monkeys”), domestically allied to Oscar winner Angelina Jolie (“Girl Interrupted”), now a regular at the Bastrop Wal-Mart (she’s also daughter of four-time Oscar nominee Jon Voight, winner for “Coming Home”). Pitt acts with Oscar winner Sean Penn (“Mystic River”), although local sightings of Madonna’s ex are rarer. He was twice nominated before winning. No Oscars for Madonna, I fear.
But that’s closer than six degrees of separation from more than 25 Oscar bids in our little Smithville band.
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April 5, 2008
AGLIFF party at Vespa Austin
Don’t go to the Vespa Austin dealership on South Lamar Boulevard unless you want to be seriously tantalized by the classic urban vehicles in dozens of models and colors. The business moved from 500 N. Lamar Blvd. recently — somebody inform Google Maps, please — and the showrooms are lined with the waspish two- and three-wheelers.
Lynn Yeldell, Alisa Weldon on their battleship gray 60th anniversary model Vespa
We weren’t shopping, exactly (seriously, Kip), but instead attending a small party for the Austin Gay and Lesbian International Film Festival, the core cultural event for the Central Texas GLBT community every year. We caught up with old friends of the community, and met newcomers eager to help with this indispensable organization.
Mita Hernandez, Able Billheimer
We also tasted the signature cocktail of the event — now every event has one — a Bloomtini, which includes Sweet Leaf Ice Tea. That’s a trend: tea in cocktail, and though it doesn’t sound palatable at first, it adds a kick and balances out the various fruit and alcohol elements.
San Francisco transplants David Sweeney, Kevin Chappell
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April 3, 2008
Austin Super Celebs: Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie
Yet Austin also regularly attracts super celebrities, some temporary, some resident, whose comings and goings are minutely tracked by thousands of media outlets worldwide. For instance, Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie have graced our city and environs for almost a month. A few paps have snapped them shopping for their growing family, but locals have gratefully left them pretty much alone. (That could change if Jolie gives birth here, bringing down the world celebrity press.)
As I write this, Pitt’s “Tree of Life” appears to be shooting at various South Austin locations. Despite this hard work, the tabloids, instead, are all over Pitt’s reported split with publicist Cindy Guagenti, the couple’s backing of a school charity in Missouri and George Clooney’s faked wedding in Italy for the couple. (Clever, clever Clooney.) And those are just the most repeated stories today. Our publication hasn’t even photographed them, which is why we’re using this AP photo from the Independent Spirit Awards, rather than something a rogue pap took locally.
All this to introduce a possible semi-regular feature for Out & About — Update: Austin Super Celebs. Here’s what’s happening according to the latest media reports, in no particular order.
Owen Wilson: I never know whom to trust on this guy. Some have him re-kindling romance with Kate Hudson; others say Jennifer Aniston is healing his emotional wounds. His mid-level movie comedy “Drillbit Taylor” has grossed more than $20 million to date.
Matthew McConaughey: The latest buzz is that he’s been offered the title role in the movie of “Magnum P.I.” I loathed the original, but would see it for MM. Still no plans to wed his baby mama, Camila Alves, and he can be counted on for a big, goofy quote almost every day.
Dennis Quaid: Almost everything lately has been about the medical accident that threatened his and Kimberly Buffington’s twins — legal action, charity foundation, etc. He’s also quit smoking for the kids and can be seen soon in “Smart People” and, later, “G.I. Joe.”
Vince Young: I was proven wrong: Austin’s favorite quarterback has not been tearing up Sixth Street during his return engagement at UT, for classwork this time. He bopped back to Nashville to study up with the Titans during spring break and caught a few Longhorn basketball games. That’s all we know.
Lance Armstrong: No startling romantic news lately. Mostly, he’s done a great job on the health and charity circuit, and he’s quoted often as an inspirational figure. Good place to be.
Dixie Chicks: More anti-war and pro-environment appearances. Hardly buzz magnets since their Grammy coronations.
Andy Roddick We were more than 24 hours late reporting the tennis star’s engagement to SI model Brooklyn Decker. Tonight he faces off with nemesis Roger Federer in Miami. Our question: Will they wed in Austin? Update: Roddock wins!
If you think any others Super Celebs belong in this category, drop me a line.
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March 28, 2008
Robert Redford pumps 'Unforeseen' in Austin
You could hardly ask for two more articulate speakers on behalf of a movie, this one a poetic documentary about Barton Springs and urban development that has swept the world’s film festivals and won the hearts of critics.
“My hope is to inspire and reinvigorate those who have battled (for the Springs) while informing the newcomers,” Dunn said about her hope to capture “The essence of what’s going on in Austin.”
Then she invited Robert Redford up to the stage. Grounded, magnetic, a better expository speaker than most politicians, Redford talked about what attracted him to the project: Terrence Malick’s invitation to join the team as executive producer, his own childhood learning to swim at the springs, his activism in the 1980s and ’90s in favor of the aquifer’s preservation, his long support of documentaries as films, not just megaphones, as well as Dunn’s unusually fair-minded and aesthetically persuasive technique.
At one point, activist Brigid Shea pointed out, as she has at screenings, that “Unforeseen” does not document the SOS struggle minutely enough and Dunn didn’t show enough of Bradley’s dark side. Dunn and Redford need only have said that the rhetoric of changing minds not already converted to the environmental cause requires something other than the movie that Shea could make, but their respectful comments expanded on that.
“The environmental movement needs to accept there’s a new way to do things,” Redford said, emphasizing the broad coalitions now possible for protecting the environment.
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March 26, 2008
'Hell on Wheels' hitches onto roller derby leagues for film distribution
Austin is the acknowledged midwife for the renaissance of roller derbies, with two leagues, Lonestar Rollergirls and Texas Rollergirls, and legions of fans. The local phenomenon also generated the lackluster A&E reality series “Rollergirls” and the Shauna Cross’ novel, “Derby Girl,” soon to be an Austin-shot movie, “Whip It,” directed by Drew Barrymore and starring Oscar nominee Ellen Page.
“The screening was INSANE,” Ray says. “Each league was on opposites sides of the theater and the alternating cheers and hisses were crashing into one another in the middle of the room.”
Despite the audience intensity at SXSW and other film festivals, “Wheels” did not earn a traditional distribution deal.
“We had lots of interest but the deals just didn’t make sense,” Campbell says. “They offered no serious advance, which we needed to pay off our post-production costs. Some distributors told us that they were worried that the failure of the A&E ‘Rollergirls’ reality show would adversely affect other films related to roller derby.”
Although SXSW and other festivals created a general buzz, the next step was in doubt. “Fests are great and fun and can give your film credibility and raise its profile in both the general public as well as with press,” Ray says. “On the flip side, you don’t make any money, you eat into you potential paying audience and you are competing with dozens of other indie films screening that city the same week.”
Only problem: They still carry debts from the production. “Traditionally, you sell your film and get some money up front to help pay the bills, but the distributor, etc. gets a sizeable amount of your money,” Campbell says. “The distributor helps pay for a lot of the publicity and sets up the screenings for the filmmakers, etc. The filmmakers don’t have to worry as much. With special event programs, you’ve got to do it yourself, continue to pay for it yourself, when you’re still trying to pay off the debt you already have from making your film.”
“A traditional ‘theatrical booking’ also is a minimum of a week-long engagement,” Ray says. “Event screening can be as little as a single screening on one night or can continue on. Event screenings can also occur in a nontraditional setting, like a venue such as The Hideout, or even one night gigs at the American Cinematheque or the Brooklyn Academy of Music.”
Besides three upcoming shows at Alamo Ritz, “Hell on Wheels” is slated for events in St. Louis; Reno, Nev.; Buffalo, N.Y.; Norfolk, Va.; Knoxville, Tenn.; Kalamazoo, Mich.; Edmonton, Alberta; Tulsa, Okla.; and Birmingham, England.
For now, the marriage of roller derby leagues and an Austin documentary seem to have solved the problem of distribution resistance.
“I know many a filmmaker who have self-distributed and none have ever been in a situation like the one we’re in right now,” Ray says. “It’s pretty exciting.”
‘Hell on Wheels’ plays 10 p.m. Sunday and Wednesday and 7 p.m. April 8 at the Alamo Ritz.
Lonestar Rollergirls battle Sunday and Texas Rollergirls play April 6.
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March 22, 2008
'Camp' and 'Party Monster'
A formula teen movie aimed a the drama queen set, “Camp” gives away its intentions when the kids on the bus to summer camp sing a fairly obscure Stephen Sondheim song as if it were a campfire standard. Soon we learn that a central character is among those rare species of straight boys interested in theater. His character — and various rivalries and romantic entanglements — are delivered with smile-inducing lightness, twisting Hollywood teen stereotypes just slightly. Two subplots have Sondheim making a surprise appearance and composer Bert Hanley (“The Children’s Crusade”) redeemed from alcoholic anesthesia by a revue of his works.
“Party Monster” didn’t fully satisfy the requirements of its genre. Drugs, sex and house dance music litter this based-on-reality downer about the club kids in 1980s New York. The moviemakers get the glammed-up look right, as well as th the non-stop, ultimately self-destructive revelry, but a crucial casting error crippled the effect. I’m sure the producers salivated at the chance to make “Home Alone” graduate Macaulay Culkin a cross-dressing, drug-sated anti-hero, but either he lacked the acting chops, or he’s just too good playing an irritating character, whichever the case, he drove me nuts. Nimble Seth Green and multiple points of view in the storytelling could not blunt the negative impact from Culkin on this historically informed but flawed film.
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March 20, 2008
Austin Nichols' 'Lenexa' DVD out
Austin Nichols, the Austin actor best known as the enigmatic surfer dude on “John from Cincinnati,” stars this 2006 movie just out on DVD. The story of five young men coming off age, “Lenexa, One Mile” was shot in and around Kansas City. It was based on the life of the director, Jason Wiles, and his friends.
“I always felt that it was one of my best performances and I hope that a large number of people can get their hands on this DVD. It is a beautiful little movie that people will love.”
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Ryan Phillippe vs. Colin Farrell
If baby-faced Ryan Phillipe has enfeebled another movie (“Stop-Loss”), then baby-faced Colin Farrell has redeemed himself as a potent actor in “In Bruges.” Both have relied on their searching eyes, smooth features and erratic action to establish themselves as potential Hollywood leading men.
Farrell, on the other hand, has flubbed even bigger assignments, including “Alexander” (although I continue to hear good things about Terrence Malick’s “The New World”). “In Bruges” provides Farrell — looking a lot like Austin actor Joey Hood — with his best script and role yet, a guilty, goofy, hapless young Irishman who’s a wash-out as a paid killer. He’s supported by a tremendous cast that includes foul-mouthed monster Ralph Fiennes and humane veteran Brendan Gleeson.
It may be the only movie from early 2008 that we recall with fondness.
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March 18, 2008
Cameron Diaz on for Austin's 'Whip It'?
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March 14, 2008
SXSW 'Stop-Loss" review
‘Stop-Loss’
Two stars
Still green actor Ryan Phillippe has undermined yet another promising film. This time it’s the Austin shot “Stop-Loss,” which premiered at the Paramount Theatre on Thursday during the last days of the South by Southwest Film Festival. Phillippe plays an Iraq war veteran with post traumatic stress disorder who is pressed back into service after his expected discharge through a procedure known as “stop-loss.” In early combat scenes, Phillippe, focused by the action, plays a believable leader who helps his men through the mess of street fighting. His crucial scenes, however, transforming from a disciplined member of the armed forces into a rebellious fugitive from the law are unconvincing. His platoon mates fare no better: Joseph Gordon-Levitt, so hypnotizing last year in “The Lookout,” plays a generic depressive. Jar-headed Channing Tatum certainly looks the part of a soldier (actually built more like a U.S. Marine), but his range runs from threat of violence to confusion about the threat of violence. Although “The Deer Hunter” set a precedent, writer/director Kimberly Peirce does not convince us that these and other damaged vets all came from the tiny fictional Texas town of Brazos, and the 1978 film was helped by infinitely more talented actors.
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March 13, 2008
SXSW 'Lost Coast' review
‘The Lost Coast’
Three stars.
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March 12, 2008
SXSW 'All for Nots' party at Club De Ville
The disjunction hung in the late afternoon warmth. There was Michael Eisner, former Disney head, representative of Old Hollywood, with a car and driver in full ready nearby, lounging, however, at Club De Ville, the funky chic Austin bar, pushing “The All for Nots,” a Web-only series about an aspiring rock band. Web only.
A couple of things fit the old paradigm: Eisner wanted control of the event. A VIP room with nobody inside. (Now that’s exclusivity.) No posed photos of him, except by the company’s paid photographer. This candid, however, seems to tell the visual story just as well.
The New York-based band, including Austinite Michael Moravek, looked fresh and sweet. Later, I swooped by to hear their pleasingly rich, varied sound. It’s Thom Woodley, Moravek, Erica Harsch, Brian Cheng, Vanessa Reseland, Kevin Johnston
The party was open to Film and Interactive partisans, so the mix turned lively as the party progressed. Adam Schiff, Jane Hu (with Eisner’s office), Jared Klett, Justin Day (both of blip.tv)
Ran into adorable Judy Maggio and her daughter, Carly Brown, both primed to enjoy the music part of the fest.
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March 11, 2008
SXSW Film Bash party at La Zona Rosa
Finally, a party party. One where people let down their hair, socialize with abandon and forget the stress of festival week. The SXSW Film Bash at La Zona Rosa let off a lot of steam for participants, inside with a line-up of bands and outside with a frolicky pack of very tired movie buffs, biggies and backers. It was so much fun, we skipped competing events and lingered past midnight, mostly hanging out with local critics the likes of Chris Garcia, Cole Dabney and Marjorie Baumgarten, but also actor Chris Sykes and editorial genie Shannon McGarvey.
Masashi Niwano (Austin Asian Film Festival), Jacqueline Rush Rivera (Cine las Americas)
Loren Siegel, Shannon McGarvey, Amalia Ortiz
Wyatt Cenac, Meaghan Hermann, Kristen Mohon, Greg O’Bryant
Tina Rodriguez, Elvis Mitchell (former New York Times critic, now a producer), Jess Weixler
Sam Lisenco, Val Link, Deborah McIntosh, Dannah Shinder
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SXSW Florida Fish Fry at Wave
I’ll be honest: I chose the Florida Fish Fry for my second SXSW of Monday evening because food was promised right there in the invitation. And a little fresh fried conch can help you get through an evening of rushed socializing. The event was sponsored by the Florida film industry and we talked with representatives from Orlando and St. Petersburg, both with keen senses of their markets’ strengths and weaknesses. (Privately, one representative predicted the collapse of the Louisiana film subsidy because of corruption.)
Kevin Koym, Kyle Texas, Brian Massey
We also caught up with some inveterate social connectors, including Kevin Koym of Enterprise Teaming, Kyle Texas of Bumperactive and Brian Massey of BookLobby.com, a fascinating attempt to help ordinary citizens lobby public officials by sending them copies of influential books.
Anne Toole, Daniel Tittle, Todd Cormier, Nicole Huntley, Cheri Nightingale
There was Alan Chan and Jennifer Phang, producer and director of “Half-Life,” as well as Stachy Schoolfield, director of the beloved “Jumping Off Bridges.” The first generated some buzz at SXSW Film; the second is doing well on DVD.
Alan Chan, Stacy Schoolfield, Laura Sobel, Jennifer Phang
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March 10, 2008
SXSW ON Networks Party at Six
For the first time, SXSW Film and the ON Networks are giving out the Greenlight Awards for digital TV series. Several Austinites are finalists. The party at tri-level Six on Sunday remained lively (little, delicious Cuban sandwiches helped). We promise to update you when the winners are announced.
Chris Demarais, Joe Ruzicka, Aaron Marquis, nominated for “The Wingmen,” which grew out of their improvisational troupe at UT.
Kelly Jackson, Sally Jackson, who write the wild Midlife Gals blog.
Alex Petitt of www.mainstreamgreen.tv, a green building guide, and Rob Ray, who directed “Hell on Wheels,” the roller derby doc that’s doing well in special presentations across the country.
SXSW Technicolor party at 219 West
Couldn’t make out what Technicolor was pushing in Austin, land of digital moviemaking, but the company’s SXSW party at 219 West mixed artists with indie movie fans in one of the week’s most congenial events. Alex Castillo talked about two films he contributed to — “El Primo / The Cousin,” set in Laredo, and “The Stain on the Sidewalk,” a film by Adam Schlachter, also in attendance. Robbie Bourland and Byron Brown promoted their short, “a New Toy,” while Alex Rovinsky (Freshlips Films), Peter Price (“Up with Me”), Chrissy Stuart (“High Beam Events”), Ryan Carey (UXO) and Lindsey White (of Vancouver) shared their filmic thoughts.
Chrissy Stuart, Peter Price
Alex Rovinksy, Ryan Carey, Lindsay White
Robbie Bourland, Byron Brown
Adam Schlachter, Lyra Guerra, Alex Costello
Drew Barrymore to scout Austin sites
First we heard the project was on. Then film officials were not so sure. Now, in the first dollop of news from the South by Southwest Film Festival, we were told Sunday that Drew Barrymore will be scouting Austin locations in the coming days for her roller derby movie, “Whip It,” starring Oscar nominee Ellen Page. Barrymore, of course, is a not infrequent visitor to our fair city and already knows its prime draws.
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March 9, 2008
Kal Penn, John Cho, Neil Patrick Harris at the Stephen F.
Cultural heroes? Battlers of bigotry? Or just plain actors? Kal Penn, John Cho, Neil Patrick Harris, interviewed at the Stephen F. Austin Hotel, chose the third door, not because they would distance themselves from the prejudice extirpation in the “Harold & Kumar” movies, but because they want to give proper credit to Jon Hurwitz and Hayden Schlossberg, who created the characters.
We’ll publish a much more in depth version of our interview when the movie — sure to be a humongous hit — comes out on April 25. For now, we’ll share a few observations from this threesome of thoughtful artists. For instance, in the first movie, “Harold & Kumar Go to White Castle,” the titular adventurers made Asian jokes about each other, but never thought of themselves as anything other than Americans. In “Harold & Kumar Escape from Guantanamo Bay,” which premiered at SXSW on Saturday, their sometime outsider status is raked over the coals for hilarious insights.
Yes, the humor is juvenile, even potty — and potted — in places. Yet the pair’s road trip as fugitives across the South subverts expectations at every step. Still, the threesome shied away from owning their status as pop culture role models, in a sense, on and off the screen. Maybe when the cult original catapults them into big box office with the sequel — and you can bet money on it — they will understand the impact they are making and embrace it. (Again, much more later.)
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March 8, 2008
SXSW Film opening night party at Buffalo Billiards
One might wonder why so many black-clad, fuzzy-cheeked denizens streamed into Buffalo Billiards, usually a countrified post-frat hangout. But the Sixth Street entertainment emporium works each year for the SXSW Film/Interactive as an opening night venue, in part because it holds 1,200 customers, but also the attendees glom onto the old-fashioned, pre-digital games scattered over two floors.
Meredith Munn, Anish Savjani
Right away, we ran into festival producer Matt Dentler, who looked serene considering the stress incumbent on this week. (We chatted with this wife, Jarren Wenderlein, dressed to the nines, earlier at the Hall of Fame ceremony. Like many busy couples, they split their duties.) Among the filmmakers who made flinty conversation were the stars of “Dance of the Dead” and creators of various shorts.
Christopher Williams, Andrea Alverez
Upstairs, a pod of movie critics, including Christy Lemire of the Associated Press and Christopher Kelly of the Fort Worth Star-Telegram, caucused. A tiny flock from Montreal praised the festival, the comparatively mild weather and the strange American accents they had encountered.
Alison Willmore, Karina Longworth, Casey McKinnon, Rudy Jahchan
The spare nibbles — chips, celery sticks and the like — were late in arriving, not good news when the basic bar drinks were free. But everyone remained on their best professional behavior, even the hipper-than-thou.
Blair Redford, Mike Milligan, Josephine Decker, two of them from “Dance of the Dead”
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Hall of Fame after-party at Pangaea
No matter the revelry earlier in the night, it’s often wise to top off the madness at Pansexia, I mean Pangaea, where everyone feels free to undulate with whomever they please. The Texas Film Hall of Fame, the Austin Film Society event not officially connected to SXSW, staged its pre-party at Lance Armstrong’s classy palace on Thursday. They dolled up Stage 5 at Austin Studios on Friday for the main event, then danced the night away at the downtown club with the faunish name.
And, oh, did they dance, on couches, on ledges, on each other. We just missed Ethan Hawke, but ran into ex-Dell philanthropist Tom Green and others who had dined at the Studios. We heard there was a slight altercation earlier in the evening at the club, but no details. It’s amazing that so much pandemonium goes on there without some serious bumps, but Michael Ault’s crew is alert to trouble, sweeping the space with their pinlights for signs of trouble (mostly broken glass, I’d imagine).
Mahealani, Sweety Bird, Creamy Original: stage names for three dancers of the Supersonic Soul Squad.
Nearing 2 a.m., a group pegged as competitive swimmers — yet another event in Austin this weekend — got particularly rambunctious with their gals. A 7-footer actually tossed his petite girlfriend up and down. Don’t know what it is about this club that releases such (controlled) libido.
My favorite dancer of the evening, whose name I could not catch in the din
Mariska Hargitay, Morgan Fairchild, etc. at Film Hall of Fame
We insist paparazzi could not make a living in Austin, but the turnout at the Austin Film Hall of Fame ceremony last night could make made me a liar. The red carpet was banked with dozens of photographers and reporters, including those in town to cover South by Southwest and two major movies — “Will” and “Tree of Life” — shooting here.
Glowing star of the runway, Morgan Fairchild
The biggest flurries on the carpet were made by Morgan Fairchild, pale and glamorous in pale green satin, and Mariska Hargitay, stunning in revealing decolelage and escorted by her ruggedly handsome husband, Peter Hermann, who has appeared in several “Law & Order SVU” episodes, and, more recently, “The Velvet Mafia.”
Here’s Hargitay and Hermann with event co-chair Katie Hersch, a huge “Law & Order” fan.
The Hall of Fame is one of those events that brings out all sides of Austin. Some insist on dressing “Texan,” while others take the opportunity to be creative, or wear that gown that’s not seen the light of digital flashes. Although rain threatened, the conditions in the tent were ideal this year, at least early in the evening, before I had to race off to the next event.
I chatted with aspiring writer and accomplished bon vivant Kimberly Thompson and her Danish husband Lance Sallis.
Artist and incorrigible character Bob Wade kindly introduced me to actor Barry Tubb (from a million things, including “The Three Burials of Melquiades Estrada” and “Lonesome Dove,” also owner of land out by Marfa).
I’ve really grown fond of Eloise Dejoria, and I’ve just barely met instantly recognizable John Paul briefly. Of course they are well atop the Fortunate 500 for sociability and good works in Austin.
Accidental introductions are among the joys of this beat. I approached Zachary Walker (above) because of his bright red shirt, then found out he was Second Lt. Zachary Walker of the Texas National Guard, and he was attending as part of the Inman Foundation group that included Col. David Hill of the U.S. Army. So the always welcome Nancy Scanlan walks up and says “Of course I know Bobby Ray…” meaning Admiral Bobby Ra Inman, founder of the foundation, former CIA director and current LBJ School educator.
Before leaving, I caught up with several filmmakers and tasted the piquant salad, but then sailed off into the sunset before the likes of Mike Judge and Dan Rather made their appearances.
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Jim Sturgess + '21' at Four Seasons
Count on one hand the number of movie stars who are more charismatic in person than they are on screen. One claim would go to Jim Sturgess, the English actor who is shockingly convincing as the shy American MIT student who conquers Las Vegas by card counting in “21.” Meeting at the Four Seasons, Sturgess lights up his huge, limpid eyes with genuine connection — something he has done on screen in “Across the Universe” and “The Other Boleyn Girl” — and relates the challenges of playing someone quite different from himself.
Mesmerizing Jim Sturgess
Before the actual shoot in Vegas, Sturgess, an indie rock fan who you might have spotted on Red River Street last night, spent considerable time with the real life math natural, Jeff Ma, who had shared his story with writer Ben Mezrich. The subsequent article had sparked interest from Kevin Spacey, who optioned it for the screen and plays Sturgess’ teacher with unusual restraint and only a little menace, as well as director Robert Luketic, best known for the hit “Legally Blonde,” and an artist stuck with romantic comedies after his early successes in that genre.
Director Robert Luketic, who bet his career on Sturgess
Natty Australian turned Los Angelino Luketic told exacting stories about the process of transforming the original anecdotes into an entertaining Hollywood picture, especially through the use of sound and film editing during the blackjack sequences. Ma seemed to be having the time of his life, as his personal adventure is now a major motion pictured, premiered Friday at SXSW. We’ll publish a more substantial treatment of the interviews when “21” opens in theaters, but suffice it to say, we went through the rest of the day gushing, especially about Sturgess’ high-wattage charm.
Psyched movie subject Jeff Ma
March 7, 2008
Hall of Fame pre-party at Lance Armstrong's
This we can finally say: Lance Armstrong has good taste. His Mount Bonnell mansion at first impresses with its size, room spilling into room, indoor flowing into outdoor. Dark, heavy accents help define the spaces, never grand but always congenial for conversation and mixing. Armstrong’s admirable art collection, including large abstracts, are lovingly placed around the palace and fires roared in several fireplaces.
For the Austin Film Society’s pre-party for the Texas Film Hall of Fame, the chilled masses flocked to the largest of several living rooms. There was Morgan Fairchild, looking not a day over 30, in a vortex of fans, while Debra Winger held court in an alcove/landing on the stairs. In Armstrong’s trophy room, which includes all seven framed Tour de France winning jerseys and a curious conversation nook, there was Style Avatar Stephen Moser in all his splendor. Lots of folks from the film community, but also many from the Austin Ventures set.
Carol Adams, Debra Winger, Chris Adams (perfect Austin couple to guide Winger through the evening)
Robin Rather, Jean Rather, Dan Rather (anxious about following the late Ann Richards as emcee of the Hall of Fame ceremony)
Janet Pierson, Blaine Wesner, Alexa Wesner
Katy Walker, Robert Walker, heroes of Marfa Public Radio, among other causes (she’s also the daughter of recently deceased UT and Rice President Norman Hackerman)
Dede Church, Todd Church. He is helping Armstrong build his new store; she knows my sister Valerie Koehler and her Blue Willow Books in Houston