Yesterday Brian DePalma and Magnolia’s Eammon Bowles debated the issue of certain grisly photographs of Iraq casualties having been removed from the end of DePalma’s Redacted due to concerns about legal vulnerability. The discussion happened at a N.Y. Film Festival press conference held yesterday afternoon. Movie City Indie’s Ray Pride has posted good information about this, including a statement from Bowles.
“I had a few too many vodka and sodas, and I’m feeling it,” confides a friend who’s just gotten back from the Toronto Film Festival. “Perhaps it’s better in the end, but I didn’t see Battle for Haditha or Redacted. Oliver Stone recently said that the Iraq conflict was ‘another generation’s war‘ as he preps for Pinkville. I think he’s right to stay with what he knows, and for this reason Brian DePalma‘s Redacted scares me a little. Iraq may prove to be very complex to bring to the big screen and an even bigger marketing challenge. I wouldn’t want to be Mark Cuban right now, although it sounds like Haditha has some fans.”
Update: A Magnolia Pictures staffer told me yesterday there was a long-jead journo screening in Manhattan two days ago for Brian De Palma‘s Redacted. That was wrong, I’ve now been told — the screening was “for some festival committees.” I asked to speak directly to Magnolia Pictures chief Eammon Bowles about this but he never returned the call, so I accepted the word of an underling.
Redacted only wrapped about three months ago, but it will play in Toronto in September and open in the fall. A DePalma fan site has quoted a “source” who saw the HD-shot film, and the short verdict is that this “Rashomon-style series of video diaries based on a single incident between American soldiers and Iraqi citizenry” is “very good.”
The video diaries come from several sources, including an American soldier, an Iraqi, and a terrorist website, among others.” The source adds that the film is “intense” and “very affecting,” and that “it feels like the work of a young man.”
Women are often disrobed and filmed in a stylish, lip-smacking way in Brian DePalma’s films, and the trailer for The Black Dahlia (Universal, 9.15) seems to indicate he’s maintaining his signature. Nothing wrong with this — just predictable. The forthcoming booking at the Edinburgh Film Festival (8.14 to 8.27) is fine, but my reservations still hold.
Brian DePalma‘s The Black Dahlia debuting at the Venice Film Festival….great. I truly don’t believe anything good can come of this film except a spike in James Ellroy‘s book sales. The ’40s noir thing is over…done to death. DePalma — a truly exciting and out-there director from the late ’60s to early ’80s, and an occasionally successful commerical director from the mid ’80s to mid ’90s, has been over in the sense of failing to read or respond to the culture for years. I used to love the guy but then he made Femme Fatale and that was it. Two likely solves to the real Black Dahlia murder have been published — take your pick but they both sound pretty good to me. Alas, DePalma’s film, based on Ellroy’s “The Black Dahlia”, is fictional. DePalma’s chops are always first-rate — the guy has always been an audacious pro — so it might make for a good sit but I keep getting these vibrations and radio signals telling me it won’t be.
The great William Friedkin has passed at age 87.
I was going to begin my brief obit (other obligations are pressing as we speak) with a headline that shouted “drat!…zounds!…now Friedkin will never come clean on the French Connection censorship thing!”
Because it is entirely fair and logical to presume that no one in his inner circle will now come forth to sully the late director’s name by confirming the likely truth of the matter, which is that “Hurricane Billy” did, in fact, either ask for or approve the censoring of the Act One N-word scene in his 1971 Oscar-winning crime flick.
So yes, I’m a little bit angry and muttering “curses, foiled again!…he snuck out like a cat burglar!” But let’s put that story aside and show proper respect to a great, outspoken, occasionally turbulent director who ruled the ’70s with enormous drive and primal hunger and churning ambition.
Friedkin was one of those seriously ballsy grade-A hot shots who flourished when big-boy auterism was in flower…from the early to late ’70s he was one of the leaders of the “Easy Riders, Raging Bulls” motorcycle club, standing side by side with Steven Spielberg, Brian DePalma, Francis Ford Coppola, Robert Altman, George Lucas, Martin Scorsese, Woody Allen, Sidney Lumet, Stanley Kubrick, Bob Fosse, et. al.
And yet, truth be told, Friedkin’s serious golden god period lasted only eight years, or from ’70 through ’77…a chapter that encompassed the making and release of four grade-A films — The Boys in the Band (’70 — a delicious zeitgeist-capturing bitter comedy that I own on Bluray and watch every couple of years), The French Connection (’71 — his finest and most vigorous and super-adrenalized achievement — a truly great film…winner of four Academy Awards, including Best Picture), The Exorcist (’73 — an excellent, wholly believable horror classic….his commercial peak achievement) and Sorcerer (’77)…a first-rate, hugely ambitious action action thriller that not only disappointed commercially but killed Friedkin’s career momentum.
He recovered, of course, but Friedkin never reclaimed that special current of dynamic power and auteurist urgency…from the late ’71 opening of The French Connection through the collapse of Sorcerer six years later he was damn near king of the fucking world.
Hurricane Billy kept that major-auteur-fascination thing going for another seven years (’78 through ’85)…galloping along on his mighty egoistic steed with the making of four more films…The Brink’s Job (’78), Cruising (’80), Deal of the Century (’83) and To Live and Die in L.A. (’85), his second best urban crime flick and arguably his third best of all time.
A 35-year downshift period followed, during which time Friedkin directed The Guardian, Blue Chips, Jade, Rules of Engagement, The Hunted, Bug, Killer Joe and the forthcoming Venice Film Festival non-competitive selection, The Caine Mutiny Court-Martial.
If the keepers of Friedkin’s legacy want to do the right thing, they’ll push for the restoration of that censored French Connection scene and erase all copies of the edited bullshit 2021 version. If the Disney guys have any decency they’ll just forget about the whole matter…they’ll say “look, Friedkin was in his late 80s and censoring that scene was completely out of character for a guy known for his ballsiness and obstinacy, so let’s just forget it happened and restore the footage and be done with it.”
I’ve known a few lower-level drug dealers in my time, and apart from the idiots who got high on their own supply, my general impression was that most of them just wanted to do business with a minimum of drama. They were careful and at times a bit paranoid, but only because they feared dealing with immature fools who might rat them out to narcs.
I’m no expert on the drug-dealing world, but I’ve never once heard of anyone on the verge of a big buy trying to rip off the buyer, like this pool-room scene in Carlito’s Way or the famous chainsaw motel scene in Scarface.
The bottom line (and we all know this) is that director Brian DePalma always cared more about delivering his big, carefully choreographed set pieces with knockout camera moves than he did about capturing realistic situations and characters that you can recognize and believe in. But that’s the DePalma tradeoff. You’ll never buy a lot of the stuff that happens in his films, partly because they all seem to happen inside some kind of odd, unreal membrane, but when the big set pieces happen you’ll be wowed.
Congratulations to Quentin Tarantino and wife Daniella Pick on their announcement that a baby is on the way. Whatever the child’s gender, he/she will naturally be subjected to a relentless education about film. By the age of seven or eight he/she probably will have seen each and every Sam Fuller film ever made, and will be able to recite the release years of each, the principal cast members, the cinematographer and aspect ratio used, etc. Not to mention the films of Sergio Leone, Martin Scorsese, Howard Hawks, Richard Linklater, Brian DePalma, etc. By the time the kid is ten he/she will be blase about visiting the major film festivals. I could go on and on. His/her future is all mapped out.
About a week after Variety‘s Peter Debruge and Elsa Keslassy posted their 3.14 Cannes spitball piece, Deadline‘s Nancy Tartaglione and Andreas Wiseman shared some different projections.
Nothing is set in stone, but Tartaglione and Wiseman said we can probably forget about eight films that have been mentioned as possible Cannes ’18 titles — Karyn Kusama‘s Destroyer, Damien Chazelle’s First Man, Jacques Audiard’s The Sisters Brothers, Yorgos Lanthimos’ The Favorite, Richard Linklater’s Where’d You Go Bernadette, Steve McQueen’s Widows, Lenny Abrahamson’s The Little Stranger and even Paolo Sorrentino’s Loro.
But Asghar Farhadi’s Everybody Knows, a Spanish-language film costarring Javier Bardem, Penelope Cruz and Ricardo Darin, could be the opening-night attraction.
Xavier Dolan’s The Death And Life Of John F Donovan is a big maybe (“It could cut very close”).
Thierry Fremaux screening Ocean’s Eight at Cannes ’18 would be…I don’t know what to call it but “sick joke” is one of the terms that comes to mind. Ditto Solo: A Star Wars Story, but maybe.
Orson Welles’ The Other Side Of The Wind, a Netflix release, will probably screen under Cannes Classics. Two other Netflix films, Jeremy Saulnier‘s Hold The Dark and David Mackenzie’s Outlaw King, would have to screen outside competition, per a recent Cannes declaration.
Thomas Vinterberg’s Kursk and Brian De Palma’s Domino could be programmed.
David Robert Mitchell‘s Under The Silver Lake is “tipped to factor this year”, they say, and Harmony Korine’s Beach Bum is said to be a dark horse.
Other likelies include Luca Guadagnino’s Suspiria, Terry Gilliam’s The Man Who Killed Don Quixote and Lars Von Trier’s The House That Jack Built. Ditto Mike Leigh’s Peterloo, Laszlo Nemes‘ Sunset and Pawel Pawlikowski‘s Cold War.
Jennifer Kent’s The Nightingale may not be ready in time.
Regarding the possibility of A Rainy Day in New York, Tartaglione and Wiseman wrote the following: “In a somewhat surprising bit of speculation, it was suggested to us that Woody Allen might make a return with A Rainy Day In New York. However, given that some actors from the film have donated their wages to various movements, it would make for an awkward red carpet.”
Wells to Tartaglione & Wiseman: Why are you so skeptical and patronizing about the possibility of A Rainy Day in New York? You said in your piece that Fremaux “has historically maintained that he chooses films based on merit,” but you deride the possibility of Rainy Day because some of the cast won’t attend the red-carpet premiere? Where is the merit in that consideration?
You’re aware, obviously, that Fremaux has been inviting Woody to show his films at Cannes for many, many years, but he’s suddenly going to cut and run because Timothee Chalamet and other cast members might not attend the premiere at the Grand Lumiere? So what? Is this festival about artistic integrity or isn’t it?
I’ve been spitballing 2018 releases for several weeks, but now I’m attempting to focus on films that will probably stand out in terms of great reviews, Best Picture nominations and award campaigns.
It’s now March 6th — less than six months away from the start of the ’18/’19 award season. And right now (stop me if you’ve read this before) eight films are the leading Best Picture hotties — Martin Scorsese‘s The Irishman, Adam McKay‘s Back Seat, Damien Chazelle‘s First Man, Barry Jenkins‘ If Beale Street Could Talk, Bryan Singer‘s Bohemian Rhapsody, Bjorn Runge‘s The Wife, Mimi Leder‘s On The Basis of Sex, and Josie Rourke and Beau Willimon‘s Mary, Queen of Scots. (8)
Tell me which others should be included….please. Richard Linklater‘s Where’d You Go, Bernadatte? Terrence Malick‘s Radegund? Jason Reitman‘s The Front Runner? Felix von Groeningen‘s Beautiful Boy? Yorgos Lanthimos‘ The Favourite (reign of Queen Anne in early 17th Century)? Joel Edgerton‘s Boy Erased starring Lucas Hedges? (6)
Robert De Niro, Joe Pesci in Martin Scorsese’s The Irishman (Netflix).
Saoirse Ronan in Mary, Queen of Scots.
Director Barry Jenkins (l.) during filming of If Beale Street Could Talk.
Felicity Jones (l.), Armie Hammer (r.) during filming of Mimi Leder’s On The Basis of Sex.
Upmarket Genre: 1. Luca Guadagnino‘s Suspiria (Dakota Johnson, Chloë Grace Moretz, Tilda Swinton, Mia Goth); 2..Steve McQueen‘s Widows (Viola Davis, Cynthia Erivo, Andre Holland, Elizabeth Debicki, Michelle Rodriguez, Daniel Kaluuya, Liam Neeson, Colin Farrell); 3. Ron Howard‘s Solo — A Star Wars Story (Alden Ehrenreich, Woody Harrelson, Emilia Clarke, Donald Glover, Thandie Newton); 4. Lynne Ramsay‘s You Were Never Really Here; 5. 20. Stefania Solluima‘s Soldado (Benicio del Toro, Josh Brolin, Catherine Keener — Columbia, 6.29.18).; 6. Steven Spielberg‘s Ready Player One (Tye Sheridan, Olivia Cooke, Ben Mendelsohn, T. J. Miller, Simon Pegg, Mark Rylance); 7. Jennifer Kent‘s The Nightingale (19th Century Australian revenge saga) w/ Aisling Franciosi, Baykali Ganambarr, Sam Claflin, Damon Herriman, Ewen Leslie. (8)
Likeliest Best Foreign Language Feature Contenders: Alfonso Cuaron‘s Roma (Marina de Tavira, Marco Graf, Yalitza Aparicio, Daniela Demesa, Enoc Leaño, Daniel Valtierra); Asghar Farhadi‘s Todos lo saben (Spanish-language drama w/ Penelope Cruz, Javier Bardem, Barbara Lennie, Ricardo Darin, Inma Cuesta, Eduard Fernandez Javier Camara);Laszlo Nemes‘ Sunset (a young girl grows up to become a strong and fearless woman in Budapest before World War I), w/ Susanne Wuest, Vlad Ivanov, Björn Freiberg; Paolo Sorrentino‘s Loro (life of Silvio Berlusconi); Nuri Bilge Ceylan‘s The Wild Pear Tree, and Olivier Assayas‘ E-book. (6)
Possible Strongos: Jacques Audiard‘s The Sisters Brothers (Jake Gyllenhaal, Joaquin Phoenix, Rutger Hauer, Riz Ahmed, John C. Reilly); Felix von Groeningen‘s Beautiful Boy with Steve Carell and Timothy Chalamet; Xavier Dolan‘s The Death and Life of John F. Donovan (Kit Harington, Natalie Portman, Jessica Chastain, Susan Sarandon, Kathy Bates); Spike Lee‘s Black Klansman (John David Washington, Adam Driver, Laura Harrier, Topher Grace, Corey Hawkins — Focus Features). (4)
Michelangelo Antonioni‘s Red Desert (’64) will screen this Friday (7.28) at the Walter Reade. Oh, that red hair and pale skin, that black mud and those gloomy gray skies and general sense of sprawling ecological ruin…mother’s milk to me.
I saw Red Desert for the first time two years ago. I know the Antonioni milieu, of course, and had read a good deal about it over the years, so I was hardly surprised to discover that it has almost no plot. It has a basic situation, and Antonioni is wonderfully at peace with the idea of just settling into that without regard to story. And for that it seemed at least ten times more engrossing than 80% or 90% of conventional narrative films I see these days, and 87 times better than the majority of bullshit superhero films.
Monica Vitti plays a twitchy and obviously unstable wife and mother who’s been nudged into a kind of madness by the industrial toxicity around her, and Richard Harris is an even-mannered German businessman visiting smelly, stinky Ravenna, a port city on the Adriatic, to arrange for several Italian workers to perform a long work assignment in lower Argentina.
You suspect that sooner or later Harris, whose hair has been dyed an odd brownish blonde, will make a move on Vitti but other than that nothing really happens. It’s about industrial sprawl and poisoned landscapes and a lot of standing around and Vitti’s neurotic gibberish and a certain caught-in-the-mud mood that holds you like a drug, specifically like good opium.
Each and every shot in Red Desert (the dp is Carlo di Palma, whom Vitti later fell in love with) is quietly breathtaking. It’s one of the most immaculate and mesmerizing ugly-beautiful films I’ve ever seen. The fog, the toxins, the afflictions, the compositions.
Cheers and salutations to The Playlist‘s Jessica Kiang and Oliver Lyttleton for having posted the most comprehensive list of 2016 films that I’ve seen anywhere. I’ve been updating my own 2016 rundown (the most recent re-edit appeared on 12.30) so I’ve isolated 31 of Kiang and Lyttleton’s titles that I’ve previously ignored. Several are intriguing; about half seem minor-ish or less than fully wowser but let’s not pre-judge. I’ve listed them in order of highest HE interest. All synopses written by Kiang/Lyttleton. A reposting of most recent 2016 summary follows:
The Salesman (d: Asghar Farhadi) Cast: Sahahab Hosseini, Taraneh Alidoosti. Synopsis: Two actors perform in Arthur Miller‘s Death Of A Salesman.
The Discovery (d: Charlie McDowell) Cast: Rooney Mara, Nicholas Hoult. Synopsis: A love story set a year after the existence of the afterlife has been scientifically proven.
American Pastoral (d: Ewan MacGregor). Cast: Ewan MacGregor, Dakota Fanning, Jennifer Connelly, Uzo Aduba, Rupert Evans, Molly Parker, David Strathairn. Synopsis: Based on the Pulitzer Prize-winning novel by Philip Roth, this is the story of Seymour “The Swede” Lvov, a successful businessman, former high-school sports star and scion of a Jewish upper-middle New Jersey family, whose life gradually disintegrates in the politically turbulent 1960s.
Loving (d: Jeff Nichols) Cast: Joel Edgerton, Ruth Negga, Michael Shannon, Marton Csokas, Nick Kroll. Synopsis: The true story of Richard and Mildred Loving, an interracial couple sentenced to prison in Virginia in 1958, and then exiled from the state for the crime of getting married, and their nine-year fight to be able to return home as a family.
Salt And Fire (d: Werner Herzog) Cast: Michael Shannon, Gael García Bernal, Werner Herzog, Veronica Ferres. Synopsis: Two men on opposite sides of a clash over an ecological issue in South America must put aside their differences and work together to avoid disaster when a nearby volcano presents eruption signals.
Julieta (d: Pedro Almodóvar). Cast: Emma Suárez, Adriana Ugarte, Inma Cuesta, Rossy de Palma, Nathalie Poza. Synopsis: The life of the titular woman, told between two time periods, 2015 and 1985.
Jackie (d: Pablo Larraín) Cast: Natalie Portman, Greta Gerwig, Peter Sarsgaard, John Hurt, Max Casella. Synopsis: The story of Jackie Kennedy in the first days following the assassination of JFK.
Certain Women (d: Kelly Reichardt) Cast: Laura Dern, Kristen Stewart, Michelle Williams, Lily Gladstone, Jared Harris. Synopsis: The story of the intersecting lives of three women in present-day Montana.
The Neon Demon (d: Nicolas Winding Refn) Cast: Elle Fanning, Jena Malone, Bella Heathcoate, Keanu Reeves, Christina Hendricks. Synopsis: An up-and-coming model in Los Angeles becomes prey for a gang of beauty-obsessed peers who wish to drain her of her vitality and beauty.
20th Century Women (d: Mike Mills) Cast: Elle Fanning, Annette Bening, Greta Gerwig, Billy Crudup, Alia Shawkat. Synopsis: A story of three generations of very different women living in 1970’s Santa Barbara.
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