What you see here is a prime example of what happens to film that is neglected and improperly stored.
This is an original reel from It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World that is now untouchable. The film has turned acidic, sporting the strongest and most foul vinegar-like odor I have ever smelled. In fact,
Robert Harris told me a story of how his contact lenses were singed by the fumes the film produced, causing temporary retinal damage to his eye. [more inside]
posted by Trurl
on Apr 27, 2012 -
37 comments
The concept of Used Cars originated with writer-director-producer John Milius, who pitched the idea to scribes Zemeckis and Gale while they were still hard at work on what would become 1941.
... Zemeckis shot Cars
in a breakneck 28 days at a Chrysler-Plymouth dealership in Mesa, Ariz. ... Despite its low profile, the film received a great deal of critical acclaim, including the notoriously finicky Pauline Kael…who described Cars as “a classic screwball fantasy — a neglected modern comedy that’s like a more restless and visually high-spirited version of the W.C. Fields pictures.”* [more inside]
posted by Trurl
on Dec 21, 2011 -
36 comments
"You're going nowhere, son. Just you, me ad the walls. So wipe that bloody grin off before it's shot off, and don't slouch. You toe rag. You bin
. Pay attention when I break you. And break you I will, boy. You're in my manor, now." Buck up! It's Terry Finch's
THE REPRISALIZER! Follow
Bob Shuter, whose mission of reprisal against his brother's killers, their families, associates, progeny and property takes him across the desolate wasteland of 70s Britain, primarily Kent AKA
FINCHLAND. Finch, writer of The Reprisalizer and
DRAW!, the cowboy whose name means death, is soon to be the subject of
a major motion picture from Matthew Holness, creator of
Garth Marenghi's Darkplace.
posted by Artw
on Dec 13, 2011 -
15 comments
Two and a half years ago, we explored
the early history of Cartoon Network... but it wasn't the only player in the youth television game.
As a matter of fact,
Fred Seibert -- the man responsible for the most inventive projects discussed in that post -- first stretched his creative legs at the network's
truly venerable forerunner:
Nickelodeon.
Founded as Pinwheel, a six-hour block on Warner Cable's innovative
QUBE system, this humble channel struggled for years before Seibert's innovative branding work transformed it into a national icon and capstone of a media empire.
Much has changed since then, from the mascots and game shows to
the versatile orange "splat." But starting tonight in response to popular demand, the network is
looking back with
a summer programming block dedicated to the greatest hits of the 1990s, including
Hey Arnold!, Rocko's Modern Life, The Adventures of Pete & Pete, The Ren & Stimpy Show, Double Dare, Are You Afraid of the Dark?, Legends of the Hidden Temple, and
All That.
To celebrate, look inside for the complete story of the early days of the network that incensed the religious right, brought doo-wop to television, and slimed a million fans -- the golden age of Nickelodeon.
(warning: monster post inside) [more inside]
posted by Rhaomi
on Jul 25, 2011 -
116 comments
"Beat the Devil" went straight from box office flop to cult classic and has been called the first camp movie, although Bogart, who sank his own money into it, said, "Only phonies like it." It's a movie that was made up on the spot; Huston tore up the original screenplay on the first day of filming, flew the young Truman Capote to Ravallo, Italy, to crank out new scenes against a daily deadline and allowed his supporting stars, especially Robert Morley and Peter Lorre, to create dialogue for their own characters. (Capote spoke daily by telephone with his pet raven, and one day when the raven refused to answer he flew to Rome to console it, further delaying the production.) -
Roger Ebert's Great Movies
posted by Trurl
on May 22, 2011 -
21 comments
For quite some time, I’d wanted to make a screwball comedy. A fast-talking, wildly acclerating ensemble comedy that gets stupider and stupider. I never imagined it would be about a war, and inspired by a very recent war at that. But Simon, Jesse, Tony and I all felt that the more we found out about the dysfunction in Washington and the naivety in London leading up to the Iraq invasion, the more obvious it was that the only way to deal accurately and fairly with this topic was as a screwball comedy. - The Oscar nominated script for
In The Loop, with an introduction by writer Armando Iannucci.
posted by Artw
on Feb 13, 2010 -
33 comments
Super Powers, winner of the 2007 Tribeca Film Festival Special Jury Prize for Best Narrative Short (possibly NSFW - a couple of swear words and adult theme)
posted by fearfulsymmetry
on Nov 18, 2008 -
12 comments
The opening shots of 1920s New York City are wonderful, then you get a zany high-speed Harold Lloyd blazing down the avenues, and that's fun to watch, but the real killer is the horse-drawn trolley absolutely
tearing-ass through lower Manhattan, full gallop. Ends badly. Then it's over to San Francisco for one last bit of homicidal vehicular activity with a bus. Well, they sure don't drive
like they used to!
[more inside]
posted by flapjax at midnite
on May 25, 2008 -
37 comments
Director
Henry Bean has written and directed a new
movie,
Noise. It's about the bad kind of noise: car alarms that won't stop going off, garbage trucks that wake you up, endless horns honking. You know the pain.
[more inside]
posted by bassjump
on Oct 24, 2007 -
48 comments
Judd Apatow's Family Values A look inside the comedic mind that brought us "Freaks and Geeks", "Undeclared", and "The 40 Year Old Virgin".
Apatow’s childhood hero was Steve Martin. On a summer trip to L.A., Apatow persuaded his grandparents to drive by Martin’s home until Apatow spied his hero in the driveway. Martin wouldn’t give him an autograph, so Apatow wrote him an angry letter saying it was his patronage of Martin’s projects that allowed him to live the high life. A few weeks later, Martin sent Apatow a copy of his book “Cruel Shoes” with an apology: “I’m sorry. I didn’t realize I was speaking to the Judd Apatow.”
Also:
Judd and Seth Rogen at play.
posted by ColdChef
on May 27, 2007 -
33 comments
"I would like to do better, to be better than I am". He's the French New Wave
maverick and Academy Award winner (
at 26, for his first short) who, to commemorate the tenth anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz -- with considerable personal pain and the admission that "
no description, no picture can reveal the true dimension" of what happened in the camps -- made what François Truffaut called "
the greatest film ever made", duly
censored by French authorities. Four years later he baffled audiences with "
the first modern film of sound cinema",
shattering the rules of chronology to describe the “anguish of the future”: even if all he ever wanted was "
to stop death in its tracks"
(French language link),
only for one minute. But he is also the unabashed lover of
la bande dessinée who
learnt English by reading comic books and
in the Seventies dreamed (French language link) of making
"Spider-Man" into a movie (the Hollywood studios were not convinced), the
MGM old-school musical and
operetta nut so in love with design that "
half of the fashion photography of the past 40 years owes a debt" to him. Now,
Alain Resnais' new
work, just shown
at the Venice Film Festival where
his buddy David Lynch was awarded a lifetime achievement Golden Lion, is a French film
inspired by an
English play with 54 short scenes, music by the X-Files's Mark Snow. (more inside)
posted by matteo
on Sep 8, 2006 -
20 comments
The Room: The Movie. Triple-threat (actor/writer/director)
Tommy Wiseau made his cinematic debut in 2003 with the
The Room (see
trailer and
various scenes),
"a blend between a
softcore porn flick and a Tennessee Williams stageplay." Wiseau ("who's not just one of the most unusual
looking and
sounding-with
an unidentifiable Eastern European accent-leading men ever to
grace the screen, but a narcissist nonpareil whose movie makes
Vincent Gallo's "The Brown Bunny" seem
the apotheosis of cinematic self-restraint...may be something of a first: A movie that
prompts most of its viewers to ask for their money back-before even
30 minutes have passed." -
Variety),
allegedly raised $6 million outside Hollywood to cover production and marketing costs of the self-described "black comedy about love, passion, betrayal and lies" (see
various rough dress rehersals).
Audience members, including comedian
David Cross, have been
"marveling at the bizarre editing, bad bluescreen, uncomfortably explicit
sex scenes and, of course, the enigma of Wiseau himself" as the film
played monthly for years in Los Angeles. Available on
DVD, diehard "roomies"
swear by the
theatrical experience,
shout out their own commentary,
hurl spoons at the screen and singalong to the
soundtrack. Some call it
"The Rocky Horror of the New Millenium" and stage
"Room"
parties. If you look at the
marketing campaign or
survived a screening you might see The Room as
"a seminar on how
NOT to make a movie." [Inspired by
Boing Boing]
posted by boost ventilator
on Jun 1, 2006 -
28 comments
Never ever
borrow a friend's mobile, trust
hitch hikers or
strangers in furry costumes, never
get distracted, worry about
the first time or about
your young son not being manly enough, and most of all
never, ever forget stuff. Also, remember to always be nice to
your enemies, your
granny and
policemen, but don't be
too nice to your neighbours, and don't forget to
get the car washed. Lots more brilliant
short films viewable online from UK's Channel 4 Film (Real/WM streams).
posted by funambulist
on Mar 31, 2006 -
4 comments
Sometimes movies don't finish
the way we'd like. Short, off-beat, animated re-imaginings of selected movie endings, in torrent and .wmv format. The
archives are yet young, but might be worth keeping an eye on for future chuckles.
posted by Gator
on Jan 25, 2006 -
11 comments
.jpg){kind=link}
