James McBride talks about
The Help, Hattie McDaniel, why black women are still winning awards for playing maids, how black culture is appropriated and represented, and whether marginalized groups in America all serve the purpose of "cultural maids".
[more inside]
posted by nakedmolerats
on Jan 30, 2012 -
58 comments
In 1962, the
New York Times called it a masterpiece, and it won the Oscar for best foreign film that year. If you can't see it any other way,
one reviewer on IMDB will rent a theater and screen it for you - if you don't mind a trip to Melbourne. Sundays and Cybele (Les dimanches de Ville d'Avray) is worth tracking down, however you manage.
[more inside]
posted by not_that_epiphanius
on Jan 29, 2012 -
8 comments
The Formula for Complete and Utter
BAYHEM or, How Michael Bay has Made Billions in Box Offices Worldwide. SLInfographic (the last graph is particularly depressing)
posted by fearfulsymmetry
on Nov 2, 2011 -
110 comments
"The first and greatest American Surrealist,
Joseph Cornell is best known for his
boxes. The best of his mysterious assemblages of dime-store tchochkes and paper ephemera in little hand-made cabinets perfectly realize the elusive sublime at the heart of Surrealism, while avoiding the juvenile theatrics of his European colleagues.
However, Cornell was also one of the most original and accomplished filmmakers to emerge from the Surrealist movement, and one of the most peculiar. Just as the ascetic and introverted Cornell himself held Surrealism at arms length, borrowing only those elements that suited his interests and temperament, his films superficially resemble those made by other Surrealists, they are in truth sui generis. Only a handful of his contemporaries understood the genius of films like his
Rose Hobart — an unfortunate situation exacerbated by Cornell's own obstinate resistance to public screenings. No one made films even remotely similar to Cornell's for almost thirty years, and even now the perfect opacity of his montage remains unrivalled."
Jack's Dream ::
Cotillion / The Midnight Party ::
By Night with Torch and Spear ::
Centuries of June ::
more
posted by puny human
on Jul 2, 2011 -
16 comments
For Roger Ebert,
it's a prayer that made him "more alert to the awe of existence." For Rober Koehler,
it's a kitschy New Age con. For Richard Brody, it perfectly captures the essence of a generation by depicting a character thinking
"back to the musings and fantasies of childhood, which are the product of a wondrous and fantastic view of science formed by popular-science books for children and by the commercial artists whose illustrations adorned them." For Stephanie Zacharek, it's
"a gargantuan work of pretension." For Ignatiy Vishnevetsky, it's
"a creation myth in the guise of a crypto-autobiography" that invents a universe of its own only to destroy it. For J. Hoberman, it's lifeless and dull,
"essentially a religious work and, as such, may please the director's devotees, cultists, and apologists." It spent thirty years in development,
three in editing and, yes,
it contains dinosaurs.
The Tree of Life, written and directed by
famously reclusive Zoolander fan and
"JD Salinger of American movies" Terrence Malick , won the
Palme d'Or at this year's Cannes Film Festival. Tomorrow,
it comes out in the United States.
[more inside]
posted by alexoscar
on May 26, 2011 -
64 comments
For the past year, director Stephen Soderbergh
has been recording and sharing a list of the books that he has read, and films that he has watched. The writers at Flavorwire noted Soderbergh's decision to watch Raiders of the Lost Ark in black & white three times, and have
compiled a list of color films that work better in monochrome.
[more inside]
posted by schmod
on May 24, 2011 -
59 comments
The Edgewise Guide To Filmmaking. Screenwriter Lisa Morton kept a diary while making the very, very strange 1989 movie
Meet The Hollowheads (
trailer). The low-budget sci-fi/horror/social comment/sitcom takes place in a dystopian underground suburb whose entire infrastructure, operated by monopolist corporation United Umblicial, consists of flexible tubes which carry waste, energy, and slimy and sometimes still living comestibles. The movie, the one and only directorial effort of
horror FX and make-up man Tom Burman, inspires
confusion and
dismay in most viewers.
Hollowheads stars
John Glover and features a 14-year-old Juliette Lewis, her big brother Lightfield,
a musical instrument made out of a live chicken, an eyeball attached to a large intestine that lives in a glass tank, and an uncredited Bobcat Goldthwait as a lascivious cop, whose few lines include "When will children learn to just say no to butt polish?"
posted by escabeche
on May 1, 2011 -
52 comments
Finnish YouTube user
Ishexan has uploaded seven English subtitled movies in parts:
Broken Blossoms (
1919),
Aelita (
1924),
The Gipsy Charmer (
1929),
The Tragedy of Elina (
1938),
The Activists (
1939),
The Wooden Pauper's Bride (
1944), and
Sampo (
1959), which is based on the epic poem
The Kalevala. The films are mostly Finnish, though
Aelita is a silent Russian sci-fi film, and
Sampo was a joint Finnish and Soviet production. More film clips inside (mostly Finnish documentaries and "dorky musical numbers").
[more inside]
posted by filthy light thief
on Apr 30, 2011 -
12 comments
So here's what's on tap two summers from now: an adaptation of a comic book. A reboot of an adaptation of a comic book. A sequel to a sequel to an adaptation of a comic book. A sequel to a reboot of an adaptation of a TV show. A sequel to a sequel to a reboot of an adaptation of a comic book. A sequel to a cartoon. A sequel to a sequel to a cartoon. A sequel to a sequel to a sequel to a cartoon. A sequel to a sequel to a sequel to a sequel to a movie based on a young-adult novel. And soon after: Stretch Armstrong.
How did Hollywood get here? There's no overarching theory, no readily identifiable villain, no single moment to which the current combination of caution, despair, and underachievement that defines studio thinking can be traced. But let's pick one anyway: Top Gun.
The Day the Movies Died.
(via)
posted by Horace Rumpole
on Feb 20, 2011 -
146 comments
Robert Rodriguez's Machete (
Previously) started out as a joke, and went on to be a rather successful film. However, Texas Governor Rick Perry feels the movie doesn't portray Texas positively and has
revoked the productions tax breaks. possibly at the cost of Texas's film industry.
posted by djduckie
on Dec 9, 2010 -
79 comments
They Live, John Carpenter's 1988 cult classic, is a fairly subversive piece of work. The film, which combines sci-fi, horror and satire -- and includes one of the iconic fight scenes in movie history -- is an allegorical treatise on the evils of capitalism, set in a Los Angeles populated by evil, conspiratorial and wealthy aliens. The film, despite a mixed original reception, has developed a rabid fan-boy following over the last few decades, and now Jonathan Lethem, the author of "Motherless Brooklyn," "The Fortress of Solitude" and, more recently, "Chronic City" has written "They Live," a meticulous, scene-by-scene analysis of its many, many layers.
posted by Joe Beese
on Nov 8, 2010 -
128 comments
Every day, our world gets a little bit smaller and a lot more complex. So much so that even minor decisions can have major consequences. Not just for trees or frogs or polar bears, but for human lives, and livelihoods. At its core, sustainability is about people.
The Living Principles for Design aim to guide purposeful action. It is a place to co-create, share and showcase best practices, tools, stories and ideas for enabling sustainable action across all design disciplines.
[more inside]
posted by netbros
on Sep 20, 2010 -
9 comments
Lookout Mountain Laboratories (Hollywood, CA) was originally built in 1941 as an air defense station. But after WWII, the US Air Force repurposed it into a secret film studio which operated for 22 years during the Cold War. The studio produced classified movies for all branches of the US Armed Forces, as well as the Atomic Energy Commission, until it was deactivated in 1969. During this time, cameramen,
who referred to themselves as "atomic" cinematographers, were hired to shoot footage of atomic bomb tests in Nevada, Utah, New Mexico and the South Pacific. Some of their films have been declassified and can be seen
here. [more inside]
posted by zarq
on Sep 14, 2010 -
6 comments
It's a nice day for a KRULL WEDDING. Back in 1983, a dozen lucky couples were married as a promotion for the 1983 scifi swashbuckler Krull. This is weird enough, but what's even more baffling is that Columbia Pictures scheduled this wedding before Krull even came out.
posted by Strawman
on Aug 19, 2010 -
84 comments
