Tag Archives: Career

10 Reasons to Remember Robby Müller (1940-2018)

04 Wednesday Jul 2018

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Robby Müller (4 April 1940 – 4 July 2018)

Famous for working closely with Wim Wenders and Jim Jarmusch, Robby Müller was a multi-award winning cinematographer who was adept at using light and colour in often idiosyncratic yet beautiful ways. Watching a movie he’d lensed, there was always a sense of being invited to see the world in a different way, more heightened perhaps, but still recognisable and relevant to our own experiences. He was able to use colour as a way of “phrasing” a scene, of giving it a texture that other cinematographers could never achieve because of how he himself saw things. When he worked with Wenders or Jarmusch (or even Lars von Trier), the distinct worlds they created were enhanced by Müller’s own aesthetic style. The director Steve McQueen once referred to Müller as a “blues musician”, and it’s hard to disagree with that assessment; Müller was a virtuoso in much the same way. And he had an appropriate nickname too: the Master of Light.

1 – Alice in the Cities (1974)

2 – The American Friend (1977)

3 – Saint Jack (1979)

4 – Paris, Texas (1984)

5 – To Live and Die in L.A. (1985)

6 – Down by Law (1986)

7 – Dead Man (1995)

8 – Breaking the Waves (1996)

9 – The Tango Lesson (1997)

10 – Dancer in the Dark (2000)

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Poster(s) of the Week – A Tribute to Bill Gold

23 Wednesday May 2018

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If you had to identify a link between Casablanca (1942) and A Clockwork Orange (1971) – other than that they’re both classics – it’s unlikely that you’d opt for the graphic designer Bill Gold. But Gold designed the posters for both movies as part of a career that began in 1942 with Yankee Doodle Dandy and continued until 2011 with J. Edgar (for which he came out of retirement at the age of ninety).

He began his design career in 1941, working in the advertising department at Warner Bros., and eventually becoming head of poster design in 1947. When the New York offices of Warner Bros. advertising unit was disbanded in 1962, Gold created his own company, Bill Gold Advertising, and continued designing posters for movies as varied as Camelot (1967), Diamonds Are Forever (1971), Breathless (1983), and In the Line of Fire (1993). He designed the posters for pretty much every Clint Eastwood movie from Dirty Harry (1971) onwards, and when he was awarded a Lifetime Achievement Award from The Hollywood Reporter in 1994, it was Eastwood who presented him with the award. Involved in the design and creation of around two thousand movie posters during his near seventy year career, Gold passed away on 20 May 2018 aged ninety-seven. In tribute to Gold and his work, here are ten posters that sum up both his talent and the reason why he was held in such regard by the likes of Laurence Oliver, Elia Kazan, and Ridley Scott.

   

   

   

   

   

10 Reasons to Remember Miloš Forman (1932-2018)

15 Sunday Apr 2018

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Miloš Forman (18 February 1932 – 13 April 2018)

Miloš Forman once said, “It all begins in the script. If what’s happening is interesting, it doesn’t matter where you shoot from, people will be interested to watch. If you write something boring, you can film from mosquitoes’ underpants and it will still be boring.” Forman knew the value of a good script, and even a cursory look at the movies he made reveals a grasp of that essential provision. Though he was a master visualist, and an expert at creating the relevant mood for each of his projects, his affinity for the written word always made his movies stand out from the crowd. Through dialogue he could reach the emotional heart of a character and show that emotional heart to audiences around the world. From his beginnings in his native Czechoslovakia, through to the movies he made as a continual outsider within the Hollywood system, Forman was a director who pursued the projects that interested him, and through doing so, ensured that his body of work would remain fascinating and thought-provoking.

At a young age, he wanted to be a theatrical producer. He attended boarding school with the likes of future Czech president Václav Havel, and future movie makers Ivan Passer and Jerzy Skolimowski. He studied screenwriting at the Academy of Performing Arts in Prague, and later worked for Alfréd Radok, the creator of Laterna Magika. He began making movies in the early Sixties, creating a comedic style that brought him to the attention of festival programmers around the world, and soon to much wider audiences than could be found in Czechoslovakia. The Prague Spring of 1968 pushed Forman into leaving his home country, and he wound up in the US, where after a good but inauspicious start, he was hired to direct an adaptation of Ken Kesey’s novel, One Flew Over the Cuckkoo’s Nest – Forman always said that he was hired because he was within the producers’ price range. He won an Oscar for his efforts on the movie, and from there on, the future of his career was assured (he won a second Oscar for his work on Amadeus).

Forman continued to make intelligent, critically well received movies across a variety of genres. But though his movies didn’t always do well at the box office, his standing within the movie community increased with every project. Even a “lesser” Forman movie, such as Goya’s Ghosts (2006), had moments where his artistry and skill as a director helped transform the material into something better than originally envisaged. He worked particularly well with actors, and steered the likes of Jack Nicholson, Brad Dourif, Elizabeth McGovern, F. Murray Abraham, and Woody Harrelson to Oscar nominations (Nicholson and Abraham, of course, won). Forman was also a staunch advocate of individual freedoms, and was wise to the irony of fleeing one country (Czechoslovakia) where censorship was directly applied by the State, to another country (the US) where indirect censorship applied by the studios, often meant it was more difficult to make the kinds of movies he was interested in making. But what was most important to him was that he liked to have fun when making a movie, even if he was making a serious drama, and in that respect, his movies retain an engaging, sprightly quality to them, a liveliness that helps keep them feeling fresh even after repeated viewings.

1 – A Blonde in Love (1965)

2 – The Fireman’s Ball (1967)

3 – Taking Off (1971)

4 – One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest (1975)

5 – Hair (1979)

6 – Ragtime (1981)

7 – Amadeus (1984)

8 – Valmont (1989)

9 – The People vs. Larry Flynt (1996)

10 – Man on the Moon (1999)

Interview with Kristina Anapau

01 Sunday Apr 2018

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Kristina Anapau has been an actress since 1997, when she made her screen debut in Escape from Atlantis. Since then she’s appeared on stage, and continued to appear on screen in movies such as Black Swan (2010), and Cornered (2011). Kristina has worked steadily in television as well, bagging guest spots on shows such as CSI: NY and House, and a recurring role on True Blood. She is even more talented, having trained as a classical ballerina as a child, while also being a classically trained pianist. More recently, Kristina has had articles published in a variety of magazines including The Hollywood Film Journal. Her work on the Hawaii-based production, Kuleana (2017), prompted thedullwoodexperiment to interview her about the movie and filming it in the US state where she was born.

How did you come to be involved with Kuleana?

I met the director, Brian Kohne, back in 2011 at The Big Island Film Festival – his first feature won [the] Grand Jury Prize that year. He sent me an earlier version of the Kuleana script about a year later – every time he sent a new draft, I thought the script just couldn’t get any better, but it did. Every time. It was such a beautiful story, I knew I wanted to be a part of it right away.

How did you approach the character of Rose, and were there any particular challenges to playing the role?

I drew a lot from certain elements of myself in creating Rose – Brian and I spoke a lot about her before filming – [and] added layers upon layers. Rose was a pleasure to portray. I think the only challenge were the “fake” cigarettes I had to smoke all day in the scene at the police station. I swear there was something else in those cigarettes!

What was it like working with Brian Kohne?

Brian is so lovely to work with. He has a vision for exactly what he wants to see on screen and puts 200% into everything he does. His creative drive is infectious, and you can’t help but want to join in to help bring that vision to life.

The movie reflects on a turbulent time in Hawaiian history – how much were you aware  of before coming on board?

This film was definitely an education for me in that regard! I’m not a Hawaiian history buff to say the least, and wasn’t born until about ten years later, so I learned a lot about the cultural upheaval of that time period during the making of this film.

How important is your Hawaiian heritage to you both personally and professionally?

I actually don’t have any Hawaiian heritage other than having been born there. My parents both came from the mainland U.S. shortly before meeting there in the 70’s – Anapau is my middle name. My real last name is Roper – British heritage on my Dad’s side and Swedish and German on my Mother’s. Although I just sent my 23andMe kit in, so ask me again in 6 weeks! Maybe I’ll discover a surprise in there!

How was it filming on Maui?

It’s always lovely to go home to Hawaii and Maui is an island I had never explored. A beautiful place to film!

What’s the vibe like in Hawaii in terms of the film industry there?

I haven’t actually spent too much time around the Hawaii film industry other than while making Kuleana and attending a few film fests throughout the years, but everyone seems very driven – very creative – I’m really hoping that Brian’s success with Kuleana will open the door for local filmmakers in a big way.

You were an executive producer on Kuleana – do you see yourself supporting other Hawaiian movies in a similar way in the future?

If the right project came along. Absolutely.

You were awarded a special No Ka Ai award at the 2011 Big Island Film Festival – how important was that to you?

It was a wonderful honor – it was such a special event to be a part of.

Away from acting, you’re a writer and a musician, and you trained to be a classical ballerina – do you have any other ambitions within the arts?

Just to write more!

Who has influenced you the most in terms of your career?

Linda P. Brown. In terms of my career. My life. Everything.

And finally, what’s next for Kristina Anapau?

Last year I co-created and produced a kids show with award-winning host and comic John Kerwin. It’s essentially The Tonight Show for kids – we have all the young stars of Disney, Nickelodeon, and everywhere else – kids in the audience – it’s a lot of fun. It has been airing nationwide on DirecTV, but [is] about to launch across a variety of big streaming platforms, so keep an eye out, we will be everywhere. Follow us on insta@johnkerwinkidsshow for all the latest! So, very busy with that – I have a few more projects in development as well. Writing and producing are my main focuses now.

10 Reasons to Remember Stèphane Audran (1932-2018)

28 Wednesday Mar 2018

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Stèphane Audran (8 November 1932 – 27 March 2018)

The Sixties were a boom time for French actresses, and Stèphane Audran certainly made her mark on international cinema during that period. Success came quickly after she began acting in the mid-Fifties, appearing on stage and in an early short movie by Eric Rohmer. In 1957 she was introduced to the director who would do the most to shape her career, Claude Chabrol (and who she would marry in 1964). Early in her career, she often played the lively, vivacious friend of the female lead, but Chabrol saw another persona that could be used to greater effect: that of a glamourous yet detached sophisticate whose emotions ran deep. It was the role that Audran was seemingly born to play, and during her early collaborations with her future second husband (Jean-Louis Trintignant was her first), it was the kind of part that she returned to time and again, but she was always able to give each portrayal a different spin. By the end of the Sixties, Audran was an established star of French cinema and one of its finest ambassadors around the world.

It was the Seventies that really saw her career take off, with a string of impressive performances that garnered her a clutch of awards, and which cemented her reputation as one of the most intelligent actresses of her generation. Audran had never really had much confidence in her abilities when she started out, but the reception to performances such as the one she gave in Just Before Nightfall gave her the boost she needed. As the decade progressed she consolidated her position as one of France’s best actresses, and began appearing in English language movies, such as The Black Bird (1975) and Silver Bears (1978). Her marriage to Chabrol was beginning to suffer by then, and her portrayal of Isabelle Huppert’s working class mother in Violette Nozière aside (a role she thought she wasn’t right for, but which brought her a César Award for Best Supporting Actress), Audran began to suffer psychosomatic problems. Her career declined for a time, and though she continued working, and still on occasion with Chabrol himself, the Eighties weren’t as successful for her as the Seventies were.

But it was a movie made in 1987 and set in 19th century Denmark that cemented her reputation: Babette’s Feast. Beautifully crafted and with perhaps Audran’s finest performance at its centre, this was the movie that erased any doubts as to her skills as an actress. She continued to work steadily from then on, and even though she never again scaled the heights of the previous decades, she remained a consistently reliable actress whose performances were always carried off with honesty and sincerity. All of which was a far cry from her formative years when she was plagued by illness, and an over-protective mother who disapproved of her decision to become an actress. By her own admission her early roles weren’t very good, and she always attributed her success to Chabrol, but if she was his muse – and they did make twenty-four movies together – then we should all be grateful that he saw what a talented actress she could be, and made sure that we all found out.

1 – Good Time Girls (1960)

2 – Les biches (1968)

3 – The Unfaithful Wife (1969)

4 – Le Boucher (1970)

5 – Just Before Nightfall (1971)

6 – The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie (1972)

7 – Violette Nozière (1978)

8 – Coup de Torchon (1981)

9 – Thieves After Dark (1984)

10 – Babette’s Feast (1987)

Spielberg (2017)

18 Sunday Mar 2018

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D: Susan Lacy / 147m

With: Steven Spielberg, Leah Adler, Francis Ford Coppola, Daniel Day-Lewis, Brian De Palma, Leonardo DiCaprio, Richard Dreyfuss, Sally Field, Tom Hanks, Michael Kahn, Janusz Kaminski, Tony Kushner, George Lucas, Janet Maslin, Dennis Muren, Martin Scorsese, A.O. Scott, Anne Spielberg, Arnold Spielberg, Nancy Spielberg, Sue Spielberg, John Williams, Vilmos Zsigmond

Spielberg opens with a confession from the man himself: that when he saw Lawrence of Arabia (1962) for the first time, it made him realise he couldn’t be a director. The scope and the depth of David Lean’s extraordinary movie was so far beyond Spielberg’s own capabilities as a budding movie maker that it was overwhelming. But not even Lean’s masterpiece could deter him completely. The next week he saw it again, and again the week after that, and the week after that… Awake to the possibilities that cinema could offer and provide, Spielberg continued to make short movies of his own, including Amblin’ (1968). This brought him to the attention of Sid Sheinberg, then president of Universal, who took a chance on him. A short stint in television led to his first feature, Duel (1971), and just four years later, he changed the face of cinema forever by making the first summer blockbuster, Jaws (1975). The rest, as the saying goes, is history.

Susan Lacy’s celebratory documentary focuses on the various highs of Spielberg’s career, while studiously ignoring the lows. This is to be expected perhaps, but while the likes of Jaws, E.T. – The Extra-Terrestrial (1982), Schindler’s List (1993), Jurassic Park (1993), Saving Private Ryan (1998), Munich (2005), and Lincoln (2012) are studied in some detail, once 1941 (1979) is dealt with (“Why couldn’t I make a comedy?”), the focus settles on establishing Spielberg as a predominantly serious movie maker, and not the populist movie maker who, at his best, can still inspire the kinds of awe and wonder that other directors can only dream of. Lacy looks to how Spielberg has grown as a director, and how he’s used each new experience behind the camera as a way of augmenting and perfecting his craft. Even now, after more than fifty years as a director, Spielberg comes across as someone who’s still learning, and is eager to do so. It doesn’t hurt that he’s an engaging and often self-deprecating interviewee, and throughout he makes references to growing up and being a child of divorce, something that has infused much of his work since.

His recollections and reminiscences are supported by a range of collaborators and interested parties, but none are as interesting as those supplied by his family, from his mother Leah, father Arnold, and sisters Anne, Nancy and Sue. Their memories of his childhood, coupled with his feelings about being Jewish, help broaden our understanding of Spielberg the person, and what has driven him in his work over the years. But while he’s open and honest about his parents’ divorce and the effect it had on him, and the importance of his own family now, the absence of Kate Capshaw is curious (and unexplained). That aside, and though the movie overall is a fascinating endorsement of his career and achievements, it’s perhaps a little too safe in its approach. Though a plethora of behind the scenes footage, and photographs from his childhood and early career is welcome, and Spielberg is a worthy subject, there’s a sense that his observations about those movies which weren’t so successful – Hook (1991), The Lost World: Jurassic Park (1997), or The BFG (2016) – would have been equally welcome. Lacy correctly focuses on Spielberg’s strengths as a director and the high regard he has amongst his peers, but even that brings up another issue: with Spielberg having had a considerable influence on a range of movie makers over the last forty-plus years, why are their contributions as noticeably absent as Capshaw’s?

Rating: 7/10 – a documentary that isn’t as wide-ranging as it could have been (and despite its running time), Spielberg is still an entertaining journey through the director’s life and career that is informative and convivial; having Spielberg revisit many of his movies is illuminating, and there’s enough here that’s new or previously unrevealed to make this – for now – the place to go to find out how and why he makes the movies he does.

10 Reasons to Remember Lewis Gilbert (1920-2018)

27 Tuesday Feb 2018

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Lewis Gilbert (6 March 1920 – 23 February 2018)

With his family’s music hall background (Gilbert first appeared on stage with them aged five), and a handful of movie roles as a child in the Thirties (mostly uncredited), it would have seemed appropriate for Lewis Gilbert to seek a career in front of the camera, but though Alexander Korda offered to send him to RADA, Gilbert elected to study direction instead. The first movie he worked on as an assistant? Alfred Hitchcock’s Jamaica Inn (1939). Not a bad start, but with the onset of World War II, Gilbert joined the Royal Air Force’s film unit and worked on several wartime documentaries. Further experience came when he was seconded to the First Motion Picture Unit of the US Army Air Forces, where he was allowed to shoot much of the work assigned to American director William Keighley.

After the war, Gilbert continued to make documentaries, but it was in the Fifties that he began to make his mark as a director of features. Working for low-budget outfits such as Nettlefold Films, Gilbert honed his craft, and made a number of well received movies that brought him greater attention and the chance to work on a succession of true stories from the recent war. For a while, Gilbert was the go-to director for these kinds of movies, and between 1953 and 1962 he made half a dozen war-related movies, all of which increased his standing within the movie community, and allowed him to make a range of other movies during the same period that highlighted his versatility. But it was Alfie (1966) that really put him on the map, earning him his sole Academy Award nomination, and proving once and for all that his strongest suit was in relationship dramas.

Anyone following his career up until this point, would have been surprised when his next movie proved to be the fifth Bond movie, You Only Live Twice (1967). But Gilbert proved himself to be at home amidst all the over-sized sets and the absurdity of a Bond movie, and returned twice more to make The Spy Who Loved Me (1977 – terrific) and Moonraker (1979 – uh-oh). In between his first and second Bonds, Gilbert made a number of movies that didn’t fare so well with critics or audiences, and with some, like The Adventurers (1970), Gilbert would later claim that they shouldn’t have been made. But after his Roger Moore one-two at the end of the Seventies, the Eighties saw Gilbert make two bona fide British classics in Educating Rita (1983) and Shirley Valentine (1989). He made his last movie, the enjoyable but slight Before You Go in 2002, but at eighty-two, retirement wasn’t exactly a surprise.

If he had one regret, it was always that he was unable to direct Oliver! (1968), a movie he had developed with its composer, Lionel Bart, but which he was unable to make due to contractual obligations. Gilbert was a director who, Bond movies aside, always looked to the characters first, and it was this focus that allowed him to make so many wonderful movies over more than fifty years. He was honest about his work, and some of his collaborators, but always tried to do the best he could do with the material provided. He wasn’t an auteur in the accepted sense, but his ability to draw out excellent performances from his casts, and to move easily between comedy and drama – often in the same scene in a movie – was a constant throughout his career. And he was a realist. Of Alfie, he had this to say: “Paramount backed Alfie because it was going to be made for $500,000, normally the sort of money spent on executives’ cigar bills.”

1 – Time, Gentlemen, Please! (1952)

2 – Reach for the Sky (1956)

3 – The Admirable Crichton (1957)

4 – Carve Her Name With Pride (1958)

5 – Sink the Bismarck! (1960)

6 – Alfie (1966)

7 – You Only Live Twice (1967)

8 – The Spy Who Loved Me (1977)

9 – Educating Rita (1983)

10 – Shirley Valentine (1989)

10 Reasons to Remember Terence Marsh (1931-2018)

13 Saturday Jan 2018

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Terence Marsh (14 November 1931 – 9 January 2018)

It’s easy to forget when watching a movie that what you’re actually looking at, the physical environment that the cast is working within, has either been designed or adapted to look how it does by the production designer, or art director as they’re otherwise known. A production designer works closely with a movie’s director to ensure that the visual look and style of a movie suits the material and communicates, where necessary, a mood or tone. It’s a challenging job, and Terence Marsh was one of the best in his particular corner of the movie industry.

Marsh began his career as a draughtsman at Pinewood Studios, where he worked uncredited on a number of movies including A Town Like Alice (1956) and The League of Gentlemen (1960). In the early Sixties he began to work as an assistant art director, and he gained his first on-screen credit for Lawrence of Arabia (1962). Three years later he had become a fully-fledged art director and won the first of two Academy Awards for his work on Doctor Zhivago (1965) (Marsh must have really impressed David Lean with his work). His second Academy Award came three years later with Oliver! (1968). For this, he oversaw the building of a London street that was carried out by around three hundred and fifty men and which included the laying of around ten thousand cobblestone slabs.

Marsh worked continuously from the Sixties onwards, and in a variety of genres, bringing his attention to detail and visual acuity to a number of movies that were improved just by his work on them. During his career he collaborated with the likes of Richard Attenborough, Sydney Pollack, Frank Darabont, Carol Reed, Gene Wilder, John McTiernan, Paul Verhoeven and Mel Brooks, and always did his best to match his vision of a movie to theirs. He remained at the top of his game even in the Nineties, whether it was through riding out in a Trident-class nuclear submarine for The Hunt for Red October (1990), or designing “Old Sparky” the electric chair for The Green Mile (1999). For his expertise and his apparently infallible skill in picking the right environment to suit the tone or the mood of a movie, or even just an individual scene, Marsh will be sorely missed.

1 – Doctor Zhivago (1965)

2 – Oliver! (1968)

3 – Mary, Queen of Scots (1971)

4 – A Touch of Class (1973)

5 – The Adventure of Sherlock Holmes’ Smarter Brother (1975)

6 – To Be or Not to Be (1983)

7 – The Hunt for Red October (1990)

8 – Basic Instinct (1992)

9 – The Shawshank Redemption (1994)

10 – The Green Mile (1999)

10 Reasons to Remember Shashi Kapoor (1938-2017)

05 Tuesday Dec 2017

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Shashi Kapoor (18 March 1938 – 4 December 2017)

That Shashi Kapoor became an actor and producer should be no surprise given that he was born into Indian acting royalty. His father, Prithviraj, was a leading light in Hindi silent cinema, and went on to become a successful theatre producer and director. Shashi was soon inducted into his father’s touring theatre troupe, and it wasn’t long after that that he was appearing in movies. During the late Fifties he worked as an assistant director before making his debut as an adult actor in Dharmputra (1961). It was the start of a career that would span nearly forty years and see him appear in over a hundred and fifty movies (though he had a rocky start, with most of his early movies being box office flops).

Kapoor had an ebullient screen presence, and though he was often called upon to play the leading man, he wasn’t afraid to take a back seat when needed to some of his co-stars, such as Amitabh Bachchan or Sanjeev Kumar. For Kapoor his theatrical background ensured that the story was the main thing, and whether he was appearing in a Bollywood production, or an English language movie – he was the first Indian actor to move comfortably between the two arenas, and he worked particularly well with James Ivory – Kapoor’s commitment to the roles he played was unwavering. Even if a movie he appeared in wasn’t successful (and there were many), Kapoor retained his popularity, and his career maintained a momentum that, at its height, saw him appear in six or seven movies a year for a number of years. The Sixties and Seventies were perhaps his best period, but he continued to give good performances right up until his last movie, the unfortunately titled Dirty British Boys (1999).

In his home country he will always be remembered as the handsome leading man of so many Bollywood musical extravaganzas, while his appearances in the movies of James Ivory will keep his memory alive in the West. He had a much more substantial tie to the West, of course, through his marriage to the actress Jennifer Kendal, who he appeared with in Shakespeare-Wallah (1965). With her he continued the Kapoor family dynasty, and now he has children who work in the industry as well as various nieces and nephews. He made a couple of forays into directing, and could be called upon to provide the odd guest appearance in a movie from time to time, but it will be those traditional leading man roles from the Sixties and Seventies for which he will be best remembered, roles that showcased both his star quality and his commitment to acting.

1 – Shakespeare-Wallah (1965)

2 – Jab Jab Phool Kihle (1965)

3 – Pyar Ka Mausam (1969)

4 – Bombay Talkie (1970)

5 – Deewaar (1975)

6 – Kabhie Kabhie (1976)

7 – Junoon (1979)

8 – Shaan (1980)

9 – Heat and Dust (1983)

10 – New Delhi Times (1986)

10 Reasons to Remember Walter Lassally (1926-2017)

25 Wednesday Oct 2017

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Walter Lassally (18 December 1926 – 23 October 2017)

Walter Lassally’s family fled Nazi Germany in 1939 and came to England where his father made industrial and documentary movies. Following in his father’s footsteps, Lassally made his name as a cinematographer in the Fifties, working as part of the British Free Cinema movement, and alongside directors such as Karel Reisz, Tony Richardson, and Lindsay Anderson. These were short movies and documentaries that reflected the mood of Britain at the time, and Lassally’s involvement in them helped forge the partnership he made with Richardson in the early Sixties, and which led to a trilogy of movies about working class British lives (past and present) that brought both of them international acclaim. Following his collaboration with Richardson, Lassally reunited with Cypriot director Michael Cacoyannis, with whom he’d worked sporadically during the late Fifties, on perhaps his most famous work, Zorba the Greek (1964). Lassally won an Oscar for his work on the movie, and when he retired he donated it to a beach front taverna located near to where Anthony Quinn and Alan Bates famously danced together in the movie (alas, the statuette was lost in a fire there in 2012).

Lassally continued to work steadily after that, and was much in demand, but in 1972 he began another working relationship that would provide him with extra plaudits in the years ahead, with James Ivory. They worked together off and on over the next twenty years, and Lassally continued to provide the movies he worked on with a thoughtful and intelligent visual approach to the material, while also doing his best to come up with new innovative ways of presenting said material. And even though he officially “retired” in the early Nineties he continued working up until his last feature, Crescent Heart (2001). While not a household name in the same sense as some of his contemporaries, Lassally was nevertheless a signifier of quality if you saw his name in the credits of a movie. Thanks to his early background in shorts and documentaries, Lassally was always able to find the truth within an image, and provide a clarity of vision that always helped to elevate the material or the narrative he was working with. An unsung hero behind the lens then, but very capable of capturing sights that could provoke an emotional and an intellectual response in the viewer.

1 – A Girl in Black (1956)

2 – A Taste of Honey (1961)

3 – The Loneliness of the Long Distance Runner (1962)

4 – Tom Jones (1963)

5 – Zorba the Greek (1964)

6 – Oedipus the King (1968)

7 – Malachi’s Cove (1973)

8 – Heat and Dust (1983)

9 – The Bostonians (1984)

10 – The Deceivers (1988)

10 Reasons to Remember Harry Dean Stanton (1926-2017)

16 Saturday Sep 2017

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Harry Dean Stanton (14 July 1926 – 15 September 2017)

For a long time he was just plain old Dean Stanton, appearing here and there in supporting roles in a gamut of movies and TV shows from 1954 (where for once he was Harry Stanton) through to 1971. During that time he was an Hysterical Patient in Psychiatric Ward in Voice in the Mirror (1958), Poetry-reciting Beatnik in The Man from the Diner’s Club (1963), and even Blind Dick in Ride in the Whirlwind (1966). He was the character actor who popped up seemingly everywhere, appeared in a few scenes, got himself noticed in an “oh it’s him” kind of way, and then vanished again only to repeat the same scenario in his next movie or TV episode. In the Fifties and Sixties there were lots of actors like Stanton making minor impressions on audiences, but Stanton stuck to it, and even if audiences weren’t always aware of who he was (aside from in an “oh it’s him” kind of way), the industry certainly did.

Stanton was a versatile actor whose career never really took off in the way that some of his contemporaries’ – such as Jack Nicholson – did. He never seemed to mind though and often took roles just because he liked them (he was a great advocate of the saying, there are no small parts, only small actors). But his career did take a huge leap forward in 1984 when he made two movies that sealed his fame as an actor forever. Alex Cox tapped him for the role of Bud in Repo Man, and Sam Shepard wrote the part of Travis Henderson for him in Wim Wenders’ Paris, Texas. The role of Travis, a lost soul trying to reunite with his family after having vanished years before, required Stanton to be still and silent for long stretches of the movie, but he used his weather-worn features and skill and experience to ensure the character retained a whole host of recognisable emotions and feelings. It was a performance that perfectly encapsulated his abilities as an actor, and should have allowed him to take on more leading roles, but again, he was happy with his choices, and his career continued to keep him busy.

Away from acting, Stanton was also an accomplished musician, appearing internationally as part of The Harry Dean Stanton Band, and garnering rave reviews for the band’s unique spin on mariachi music. He’s also one of the few actors to have an annual movie festival created to honour him; The Harry Dean Stanton Fest has been running since 2011 in Lexington, Kentucky (this year’s event runs 28-30 September). But perhaps the highest praise Stanton ever received was from critic Roger Ebert. Ebert stated that “no movie featuring either Harry Dean Stanton or M. Emmet Walsh in a supporting role can be altogether bad.” And aside from Dream a Little Dream (1989), he was absolutely right.

1 – Straight Time (1978)

2 – Wise Blood (1979)

3 – Alien (1979)

4 – Escape from New York (1981)

5 – Repo Man (1984)

6 – Paris, Texas (1984)

7 – Wild at Heart (1990)

8 – The Mighty (1998)

9 – Sonny (2002)

10 – INLAND EMPIRE (2006)

10 Reasons to Remember Tobe Hooper (1943-2017)

27 Sunday Aug 2017

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Tobe Hooper (25 January 1943 – 26 August 2017)

Like many of his horror movie contemporaries, Tobe Hooper began his career with a bang, but then saw fewer and fewer of his movies gain a similar kind of recognition. And like so many of his contemporaries, he retreated to television, where he worked steadily for around fifteen years. His career was one he might not have been able to predict, though, as during the Sixties he worked as a college professor and documentary cameraman. It wasn’t until he assembled a small cast of college students and teachers and made a small, yet hugely influential feature based upon the infamous Ed Gein, that Hooper stepped into the limelight as a movie maker. The movie, the uncompromisingly titled The Texas Chain Saw Massacre (1974), broke new ground in the horror genre, and is still as uncomfortable to watch today as it was over forty years ago. It also introduced audiences to a new horror icon in the form of Leatherface.

The movie was such a success that Hooper’s future career seemed assured, but projects didn’t always come his way, and some that he took on, such as The Dark (1979) and Venom (1981), led to his being fired once filming had begun. Around this time, Hooper redeemed himself enough to land the job directing a script written by Steven Spielberg, called Poltergeist (1982). To this day, Hooper’s credit as the movie’s director has been continually challenged, with members of the production crew adamant that Spielberg directed the movie and not Hooper. Hooper himself always said that Spielberg did some second unit work “to help out”, but whichever way the truth lies, the movie bolstered Hooper’s reputation but still not enough for him to be working regularly. It wasn’t until he signed a three-picture deal with Cannon Films that it appeared he was fully back on track, but those pictures were heavily cut by Cannon during post-production, and Hooper’s intentions for all three movies were dealt a series of savage blows that helped critics afford Hooper some of the worst reviews of his career so far.

Following his terrible experiences with Goram and Globus, Hooper turned to television where his credits included work on series such as Freddy’s Nightmares, Tales from the Crypt, and Masters of Horror. He made the occasional movie during this period, but a couple of better than average shockers aside, he made the kind of horror movies that made audiences question how the same director could have made something as visceral and uncompromising as The Texas Chain Saw Massacre. However he felt about the way his career had turned out, Hooper never complained about his seeming lack of good fortune over the last thirty years, and appeared content to be regarded as the creator of a genuinely disturbing horror movie, and a handful of cult classics.

There was always more to Hooper than most people gave him credit for, and he was always aware that his career could have been so much better in terms of the quality of his movies. But he always persevered and did the best he could with often very limited resources (as he did back in 1974), but there were too many occasions where his skill as a director was at odds with the needs of his producers, and Hooper’s work was bowdlerised in the process. Nevertheless, he continued to work exclusively in horror and science fiction, and unlike, say, George A. Romero or Wes Craven, he never tried to work outside those two genres. Hooper knew where his talents lay; it was just a shame that few producers – including Spielberg – were ever prepared to let Hooper have free rein. If they had, perhaps there would be more classic movies on his resumé than just the one that launched his career.

1 – The Texas Chain Saw Massacre (1974)

2 – Death Trap (1976)

3 – Salem’s Lot (1979)

4 – The Funhouse (1981)

5 – Poltergeist (1982)

6 – Lifeforce (1985)

7 – Invaders from Mars (1986)

8 – The Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2 (1986)

9 – Crocodile (2000)

10 – Toolbox Murders (2004)

10 Reasons to Remember Jerry Lewis (1926-2017)

20 Sunday Aug 2017

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Jerry Lewis (16 March 1926 – 20 August 2017)

For many movie lovers, the quintessential Jerry Lewis performance involved a plethora of facial contortions, a unique range of vocal gymnastics, and a willingness to appear very, very, very silly. As a performer, Lewis was irrepressible, a mercurial performer who could delight and enthuse audiences in a way that nobody else could match or improve upon. In short, he was the very definition of unique.

He began his career at an early age, performing alongside his parents at venues in the Catskill Mountains in New York state. After World War II, Lewis met a singer named Dean Martin, and together they formed a double act that lasted until 1956. Their act began in night clubs, with Lewis’s clumsy busboy interrupting Martin’s singing. It was successful, and paved the way for radio shows, TV guest spots, and of course, movies. Lewis and Martin made sixteen pictures together, but as time went on, Lewis’s star waxed higher than Martin’s, and the movies began to focus more on Lewis’s comedy antics than they did on the pair as a team.

The duo’s break up worked for both of them, but for Lewis it brought him to a whole new level of stardom. He became a successful recording artist, appeared by himself on several TV shows, and began a second movie career as a leading actor, appearing in a variety of comedies that he often wrote or co-wrote himself, and which established even further his credentials as one of the best comic performers of the Fifties and Sixties. But his own particular brand of humour began to lose favour with audiences during the mid-Sixties, and the projects he initiated failed to reach the level of success he’d achieved over the previous twenty years. In the late Sixties, he taught movie directing at the University of Southern California; two of his pupils were Steven Spielberg and George Lucas. During the Seventies, Lewis was more active on the stage, and he didn’t return to making movies until the early Eighties.

His acting career over the last thirty-five years was sporadic, yet full of interesting choices, and he gained a further reputation as a dramatic supporting actor. One area in which he maintained a distinctive consistency was in his role as a humanitarian. Lewis hosted a series of fund-raising telethons for the Muscular Dystrophy Association during the Fifties, and again between 1966 and 2010. They were incredibly successful shows, and over the course of fifty years, Lewis helped raise over $2.6 billion in donations. And in France – still – he is regarded as a comic genius. Lewis was a versatile performer who did things his own way, and was frequently right for doing so. And besides, anyone who encouraged Christopher Walken to pursue a career in show business can’t be that bad.

1 – The Stooge (1951)

2 – Living It Up (1954)

3 – The Geisha Boy (1958)

4 – The Bellboy (1960)

5 – The Nutty Professor (1963)

6 – Who’s Minding the Store? (1963)

7 – The King of Comedy (1982)

8 – Arizona Dream (1993)

9 – Funny Bones (1995)

10 – Max Rose (2013)

10 Reasons to Remember Jeanne Moreau (1928-2017)

02 Wednesday Aug 2017

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Jeanne Moreau (23 January 1928 – 31 July 2017)

What to say about Jeanne Moreau? Quite simply, she was the most exquisitely gifted actress of her generation, another in a long line of French actresses for whom giving a bad performance seems an impossibility. She began her career in 1947 at the Comédie-Française, and worked steadily both in the theatre and in small roles on the big screen, making a name for herself and building a reputation for excellent work that she maintained all the way through to her final movie appearance in 2015 (and despite those early movie roles failing to bring her much success). It was the first of four collaborations with Louis Malle, Lift to the Scaffold (1958), that brought her to the attention of a wider, international audience. It proved to be the spark that lit the fuse on a tremendous run of movies throughout the Sixties, a period where her status as a forceful screen presence was cemented. She could be mysterious, sexy, aloof, fearless, carefree, and unassailably pragmatic – all these things and more. But above all she could always find the emotional core, and the honesty of a character, and use these to give a flawless, mesmerising performance.

She was in demand constantly throughout her career, and worked with some of the most accomplished directors the world over, including François Truffaut, Michelangelo Antonioni, Tony Richardson, Joseph Losey, Rainer Werner Fassbinder, Wim Wenders, François Ozon, Manoel de Oliveira, and Orson Welles, who considered her “the greatest actress in the world”. Throughout her career it was always the case that directors sought her out rather than the other way round. She was a fervent collaborator, giving of her best when encouraged and supported by directors such as Luis Buñuel, who she regarded as the father she never had (she also married William Friedkin in 1977, though their marriage only lasted for two years). Away from acting she was also a singer, and released several albums over the years. But her true love was acting, and at that she was simply inspirational, which makes the fact that she was never nominated for an Oscar all the more inexplicable. A true original, she leaves behind a body of work that will continue to reward viewers for decades more to come.

1 – Lift to the Scaffold (1958)

2 – The Lovers (1958)

3 – Seven Days… Seven Nights (1960)

4 – Jules et Jim (1962)

5 – Diary of a Chambermaid (1964)

6 – Viva Maria! (1965)

7 – The Bride Wore Black (1968)

8 – Querelle (1982)

9 – The Old Lady Who Walked in the Sea (1991)

10 – Time to Leave (2005)

10 Reasons to Remember Sam Shepard (1943-2017)

01 Tuesday Aug 2017

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Sam Shepard (5 November 1943 – 27 July 2017)

If Sam Shepard had never gone into acting, he still would have left a lasting legacy in so many other areas. He was a Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright, an author, a screenwriter, an occasional drummer during the late Sixties with The Holy Modal Rounders, and a two-time movie director. And he co-wrote the Bob Dylan song, Brownsville Girl. Shepard was a true virtuoso, comfortable in a variety of disciplines and able to excel in pretty much all of them.

He made a name for himself in the Sixties, writing a series of plays that won him award after award and a degree of brand-name recognition. He had a way of depicting the emotional and psychological lives of “normal” people in a way that was sincere and affecting, and several of his plays were adapted into movies, often to critical acclaim. He continued to write plays and work in the theatre even though he could have settled into acting as a single career, but Shepard always seemed to be a restless man who was always looking to be creative. As an actor, Shepard was often a calm, purposeful presence in his movies, portraying men of honour and sincerity, and his quiet, stoic demeanour was always a plus. He appeared in supporting roles for the most part, but showed when he was given a leading role that he could carry a movie and often with an ease that some of his more experienced peers couldn’t match. But even though he had tremendous skill as an actor, an innate quality that was unique to him, he didn’t quite see it that way. Let’s leave the last word to Shepard (he’d probably have appreciated it): “I didn’t go out of my way to get into this movie stuff. I think of myself as a writer.”

1 – Days of Heaven (1978)

2 – Resurrection (1980)

3 – The Right Stuff (1983)

4 – Fool for Love (1985)

5 – Crimes of the Heart (1986)

6 – Thunderheart (1992)

7 – Don’t Come Knocking (2005)

8 – The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford (2007)

9 – Brothers (2009)

10 – Blackthorn (2011)

10 Reasons to Remember John Heard (1946-2017)

22 Saturday Jul 2017

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John Heard (7 March 1946 – 21 July 2017)

John Heard was an actor who could have been a star – and briefly he was. Early on in his career, it looked as if A-list status was only a movie or two away. But it wasn’t to be, and though Heard continued to work steadily on both the big screen and on TV, he never achieved the level of fame or fortune that his skill as an actor warranted. He was sanguine about his lack of success, and in 2008 he had these very perceptive words to say about his career:

“I guess I went from being a young leading man to being just kind of a hack actor. When I came to Hollywood, I was pretty much a stage actor, and I expected everybody to be quiet. And they weren’t. They were doing their job, and you’re expected to do your job, and you’re sort of this ongoing co-existence. I was a little bit of an arrogant jerk. Now, it’s a little bit more like, ‘Okay, I realize you have to pat me down with powder every three seconds.’ And I stand there, and I’m a little more tolerant…. I think I had my time. I dropped the ball, as my father would say. I think I could have done more with my career than I did, and I sort of got sidetracked. But that’s OK, that’s all right, that’s the way it is. No sour grapes. I mean, I don’t have any regrets. Except that I could have played some bigger parts.”

Event though from the Eighties onwards he could be found quite low down on cast lists in often minor supporting roles, Heard could still infuse the characters he played with an honesty and a sincerity that often made them better roles than intended. Even in something as bad as Sharknado (2013), he was still worth watching, and he gave several other movies a boost just by being in them. Some careers don’t pan out in the way that actors expect or plan for, and even though Heard was capable of much better roles than he was given, and much better performances when given the chance, he was still an actor who could surprise an audience, as the Emmy nomination for his role as Detective Vin Makazian in The Sopranos (1999/2004) proved. However his career may be viewed now, one thing can be said with certainty: his was a talent that was never fully exploited, and that was, and continues to be, a detriment to us all.

1 – Head Over Heels (1979)

2 – Cutter’s Way (1981)

3 – Cat People (1982)

4 – The Trip to Bountiful (1985)

5 – Big (1988)

6 – Beaches (1988)

7 – Home Alone (1990)

8 – My Fellow Americans (1996)

9 – The Great Debaters (2007)

10 – Too Big to Fail (2011)

10 Reasons to Remember Martin Landau (1928-2017)

17 Monday Jul 2017

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Martin Landau (20 June 1928 – 15 July 2017)

Before he became an actor, Martin Landau was an editorial cartoonist for the New York Daily News, a job he held from the age of seventeen before the lure of the stage claimed his attention at the age of twenty-two. In 1955 he auditioned – along with five hundred others – for the Actors Studio. There were only two successful applicants, Landau, and a young actor named Steve McQueen. While there he was also best friends with another young actor, James Dean. Two years later he made his debut on Broadway, and two years after that he made an impact playing a ruthless villain in Hitchcock’s North by Northwest.

However, despite further roles on stage and the big screen, Landau’s career really took off thanks to the small screen. Guest spots on shows such as Bonanza, The Outer Limits, and The Man from U.N.C.L.E. led to a recurring, then permanent role on Mission: Impossible (1966-69). The role of Rollin Hand gave Landau the chance to employ a variety of accents and disguises, and it brought him international recognition. But he was never able to capitalise on the show’s success and transpose it into a better big screen career. TV continued to dominate, and during the Seventies he was best known for appearing in Space: 1999 (1975-77). It wasn’t until Francis Ford Coppola offered Landau a plum role in Tucker: The Man and His Dream that he began to experience the kind of career upsurge that he was long overdue for.

In the years that followed, Landau did some of his best work, and earned very high praise indeed from Woody Allen: “Of all the actors I’ve ever worked with, he gives expression to my dialogue exactly as I hear it. His colloquialisms, his idiom, his inflection is exactly correct. So of all the people who’ve ever read my lines, he makes them correct every time…” And in 1995 he won an Oscar for his role as an aging Bela Lugosi in Tim Burton’s excellent biopic Ed Wood. From then on, Landau continued to work as steadily as before, but often adding a much needed lustre to some of the movies and shows he appeared in. It could be argued that Landau had to wait until he was much older before he could give the performances that were tailor-made for him, but even if that were true, he still leaves behind a tremendous body of work – from the Fifties to the current decade – that we can enjoy for many more years to come.

1 – North by Northwest (1959)

2 – Cleopatra (1963)

3 – Decision at Midnight (1963)

4 – They Call Me Mister Tibbs! (1970)

5 – Tucker: The Man and His Dream (1988)

6 – Crimes and Misdemeanors (1989)

7 – Max and Helen (1990)

8 – By Dawn’s Early Light (1990)

9 – Ed Wood (1994)

10 – Harrison Montgomery (2008)

10 Reasons to Remember George A. Romero (1940-2017)

16 Sunday Jul 2017

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George A. Romero (4 February 1940 – 16 July 2017)

Although best known for his series of zombie movies, George A. Romero’s desire to make movies came about when he saw The Red Shoes (1948), a movie so far removed from the genre that made him famous that it’s intriguing to wonder just where his career would have taken him if he’d followed in the footsteps of Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger, and not fallen in with the low budget horror arena where he spent pretty much all his career. He was also a huge fan of The Tales of Hoffmann (1951), a movie he would rent on 16mm from the very same rental company that Martin Scorsese used.

But a career creating those kind of artistic endeavours wasn’t to be. Romero started out by making TV commercials and industrial training movies in and around his home town of Pittsburgh. In 1968, he and some friends all contributed $10,000 so he could make his first feature. The result was an unqualified success, and Night of the Living Dead became a movie that would influence an entire sub-genre of horror. From then on Romero was pigeon-holed as a horror director, and though he made a number of movies that didn’t involve zombies or extreme gore effects (usually courtesy of Tom Savini), Romero was always grateful that his first feature allowed him to have a movie making career.

Romero would return to zombies five more times in his career, and though the law of diminishing returns had set in by number five, Diary of the Dead (2007), there was still enough of Romero’s patented social commentary to make the last three in the series interesting to watch at the very least. But Romero’s work away from marauding members of the undead, often provided examples of the best that he could do. Martin (1978) is a creepy, unsettling modern vampire tale, with a great performance from John Amplas, and Knightriders (1981) is a counter-culture movie that features probably Romero’s best assembled cast, and a knowing, mordaunt sense of humour. He was capable of so much more but spent too much time developing projects that inevitably never got off the ground, such as a TV version of Stephen King’s The Stand, or movies such as Resident Evil (2002) where he was slated to direct. An affable, knowledgeable, and likeable figure within the industry, Romero will be missed for all the subtexts he put in his movies and for the way he made zombies “cool”.

1 – Night of the Living Dead (1968)

2 – Season of the Witch (1972)

3 – The Crazies (1973)

4 – Martin (1978)

5 – Dawn of the Dead (1978)

6 – Knightriders (1981)

7 – Creepshow (1982)

8 – Day of the Dead (1985)

9 – The Dark Half (1993)

10 – Bruiser (2000)

10 Reasons to Remember Michael Nyqvist (1960-2017)

28 Wednesday Jun 2017

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Michael Nyqvist (8 November 1960 – 27 June 2017)

Although he was born in Sweden, Michael Nyqvist’s interest in acting began when he was a teenager living as an exchange student in Omaha, Nebraska. He made several stage appearances while he was a senior in high school, but on his return to Sweden he was accepted into ballet school; he gave it up though after a year. When he was twenty-four he was accepted into the Malmö Theatre Academy, and his career as an actor began in earnest. But for a long while he appeared solely on the stage before he made his first appearance on screen in a TV movie called Kamraterna (1982) (as The Model). However, it wasn’t until the mid-Nineties that Nyqvist began to get regular work as an on-screen actor, and it wasn’t until he appeared in Lukas Moodysson’s Together (2000) that he really made an impression on audiences and critics.

From then on, Nyqvist made a number of Swedish movies that traded on his ability to portray fierce yet vulnerable male characters, and with a great deal of sincerity and intelligence. But it was his role as the journalist Mikael Blomkvist in the Millennium Trilogy – The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo (2009), The Girl Who Played With Fire (2009), and The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest (2009) – that brought him to the attention of international audiences, and in particular, Hollywood’s casting agents. Two years later and he was making his English language debut in the sadly less than enthralling Abduction (2011). From there he combined working in Hollywood with working in Sweden, and maintained an integrity in his work that guaranteed good performances, even if the material he was working with wasn’t quite up to the standard required. Regarded unfairly perhaps as a “serious” actor, Nyqvist was always able to find the light and shade in most of the characters he played, and he was always a magnetic presence when on screen. In short, he was one of that select band of actors who always improved a movie they appeared in, and you could count on him to deliver a thoughtful, considered performance whatever the genre. For that, he will be sorely missed, and even more so for dying at such a relatively young age.

1 – Together (2000)

2 – The Guy in the Grave Next Door (2002)

3 – As It Is in Heaven (2004)

4 – Suddenly (2006)

5 – The Black Pimpernel (2007)

6 – The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo (2009)

7 – Mission Impossible: Ghost Protocol (2011)

8 – My So-Called Father (2014)

9 – John Wick (2014)

10 – The Colony (2015)

A Brief Word About Daniel Day-Lewis

20 Tuesday Jun 2017

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The sudden, and unexpected, announcement that Daniel Day-Lewis is to retire from acting has definitely come as a shock, and though there will be many who will hope he changes his mind at some point in the future, it’s unlikely that will be the case. Day-Lewis has always maintained a strict control over his career, and it’s also unlikely that he will have made this decision lightly. Whatever his reasons (which at the moment remain personal), the loss of such a highly talented actor at such a relatively young age – he’s 60 – will no doubt be heavily discussed and analysed over the coming days and weeks. But what we can rely on, and indisputably so, is the body of work he’s left us with.

With Paul Thomas Anderson’s 50’s-set fashion drama, Phantom Thread, still to come at the end of 2017, the only person to win the Best Actor Oscar three times – for My Left Foot (1989), There Will Be Blood (2007), and Lincoln (2012) – will have made just twenty-one movie appearances, from his first, uncredited role as a child vandal in Sunday Bloody Sunday (1971), all the way to Anderson’s latest. It’s an incredibly impressive body of work, and one that highlights Day-Lewis’s versatility and commitment to his craft. Famed for staying in character for the duration of shooting a movie, his approach to inhabiting a character was to immerse himself as much as possible into the world that character was a part of, whether his role was that of an adopted Indian tracker called Hawkeye in The Last of the Mohicans (1992), the wrongly imprisoned Gerry Conlon in In the Name of the Father (1993), or the vicious gang leader Bill the Butcher in Gangs of New York (2002).

Arguably the finest actor of his generation, Day-Lewis’s absence from our screens – albeit something that we’ve become used to over the last thirty years as he’s pursued other interests between projects – may potentially rob us of even greater performances. But the movies and the appearances he does leave us with will remain exceptional examples of his skills as an actor, and his willingness to give everything of himself to a role.

A Brief Word About Peter Sallis (1921-2017)

05 Monday Jun 2017

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Peter Sallis (1 February 1921 – 2 June 2017)

While Peter Sallis will probably be best remembered for his portrayal of Clegg in the long-running British TV series Last of the Summer Wine (he was the only cast member to appear in all 295 episodes), for many he will always be known as the voice of the not-quite-so-brilliant inventor Wallace in Aardman’s wonderful series of shorts – A Grand Day Out (1989), The Wrong Trousers (1993), A Close Shave (1995), and A Matter of Loaf and Death (2008) – and the movie, Wallace & Gromit in the Curse of the Were-Rabbit (2005). His voice could be mellifluous, mournful, mischievous or gleeful, and he was a respected character actor who could always be relied upon to flesh out a role beyond sometimes obvious limitations. Like many actors of his generation, he acted with a commitment and a relish that is rarely seen today, and which add to the many reasons why his career was so rewarding. A true gentleman, he’ll be sorely missed… but thanks to his work on the small screen, never forgotten.

Becoming Bond (2017)

27 Saturday May 2017

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D: Josh Greenbaum / 92m

With: George Lazenby

Cast: Josh Lawson, Kassandra Clementi, Jane Seymour, Jeff Garlin, Jake Johnson, Dana Carvey, Adamo Palladino, Sofia Mattsson, Landon Ashworth, Jonathan Slavin

George Lazenby will be known forever as the man who played James Bond once, and then refused to play him again. It’s a story that’s been told over and over again, and which gets another airing in Becoming Bond, an affectionate documentary-cum-reenactment of Lazenby’s life up to, including, and just past his time as 007. But this time the story is told by Lazenby himself, and even though you still might consider him to be incredibly foolish for abandoning the role, at least here you get a better, more convincing set of reasons for his having done so.

Lazenby recounts his early life as a child, talking to camera and occasionally prompted by director Greenbaum. His early life in Australia isn’t short of drama. At the age of three he was left with half a kidney, and his doctors advised his mother that he’d probably only live until he was twelve (maybe thirteen). Growing up he got into all kinds of mischief, from “stealing” his uncle’s car to bringing a snake to school. He recounts his first sexual experience (“I thought I’d blown my penis apart”), his failure to graduate from school, and his first job as a mechanic. From there, Lazenby (Lawson) becomes a car salesman, and he meets Belinda (Clementi), his first true love. He pursues her (despite the antipathy of her parents), but their relationship is severed when she goes to England to study.

But Lazenby is nothing if not persistent. When he doesn’t hear from Belinda he travels to England and tracks her down. But there’s no reconciliation, and soon Lazenby finds himself broke and in need of a job. He returns to being a car salesman, and hears from  Belinda who wants their relationship to be platonic. However, this doesn’t hold for long, and the pair marry. Around this time, Lazenby is talent-spotted as a male model, and he begins to do photo-shoots and appear in adverts. As he becomes more and more in demand though, a photo-shoot in Spain leads to his making a huge mistake. A few years pass and Lazenby is introduced to an agent, Maggie Abbott (Seymour). A short while after that, and Maggie is calling him about a movie role she thinks he’ll be perfect for: James Bond.

What follows is largely well known, but Lazenby provides more than enough detail to keep fans of On Her Majesty’s Secret Service (1969) – and James Bond in general – happy in perpetuity. From Lazenby’s attempts to get to see casting director Dyson Lovell (Slavin) to his first meetings with director Peter Hunt (Palladino) and producer Harry Saltzman (Garlin), the making of the first Bond movie not to star Sean Connery is told with candour and charm by Lazenby, and the aftermath with sincerity and a certain amount of ruefulness. Lazenby is an avuncular screen presence, always ready to laugh at the antics of his younger self, but also willing to admit the mistakes he made and the harm they may have caused others.

The movie puts Lazenby front and centre, adopting a talking head approach that keeps the focus on the ex-model while his past is played out on screen in a lightweight, genial fashion that relies heavily on Josh Lawson’s amiable good looks and an overall tone that says, “hey, don’t take all this so seriously”. The recreations of Lazenby’s youth and early adulthood – he was twenty-nine when he played Bond, the youngest person to do so – are played out in a variety of styles and against a variety of poorly realised backgrounds, but it’s all so unremittingly charming that it doesn’t matter. It couldn’t look and feel more quaint if it was all shot in jerky black and white and everyone moved as if they were speed walking.

It’s clear from the start that Greenbaum and his crew are fans of Lazenby, and are relishing the opportunity to have their hero tell his life story, but if there’s a consequence to all that then it’s the lack of follow up comments or questioning when something happens that paints Lazenby in a negative light. Greenbaum seems content to let Lazenby tell his story unedited and unchallenged, and while there’s nothing to suggest that James Bond Version 2.0 isn’t telling the truth about his life and times, there are moments where it’s obvious that some degree of dramatic licence has been invoked. And while these moments are usually at the behest of the humour, there are other times when the more serious elements seem to get a free pass (particularly in relation to Belinda). It’s almost as if Greenbaum didn’t want to pry too closely in case Lazenby called to a halt to the whole thing.

But while a little more depth would have made the material resonate a little more, there’s no denying that Lazenby is an agreeable, pleasant companion to spend ninety minutes with, and that by focusing largely on his pre-Bond years, he has the chance to tell a variety of anecdotes which are both amusing and which are kept in context with the rest of his life. Whether he’s the face of Big Fry chocolate, or a stubbornly bearded star abandoning his image as a suave, globe-trotting spy, Lazenby is true to himself, and even if you think his decision to leave Bond behind was misguided, by the movie’s end you have a better understanding of his reasons for doing so. You still might disagree with his decision but it’s not as arbitrary or as ill considered as people thought at the time.

While Lazenby is an amusing, often self-deprecating “host”, and the re-enactments of his life are heavily stylised and redolent of a long-forgotten era (though the makers should have realised that in England a car’s steering wheel is on the right), there is still a sense that Becoming Bond is lacking in something vital. It’s amusing, it’s bright and attractively shot by John W. Rutland, it’s a nice blend of whimsy and historical faction, and it’s unrelentingly pleasant. And though it may seem churlish to criticise a movie for being pleasant – or even inoffensive, which it is – when Lazenby gets to the point where to say more might leave him wide open to complaints of narcissism (and there are many such moments), or insensitivity, then he’s allowed to stay quiet. But then this is as much an homage to the one-time James Bond as it is a chance for that same man to relive former glories. But even though Lazenby seems to have dealt with his past, there’s still the nagging sense that if he had it all to do again, then Lazenby himself would be in the record books for making the most Bond movies, and not Roger Moore.

Rating: 7/10 – neither a confession nor an exposé, Becoming Bond is instead a cheerful, engaging movie that – to paraphrase William Shakespeare – comes to praise Lazenby, not to bury him; he’s led an eventful life, certainly, and much of it is recounted here, but while it’s entertaining enough, Greenbaum seems too willing to let things pass for any objectivity to come into play.

10 Reasons to Remember Roger Moore (1927-2017)

23 Tuesday May 2017

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Roger Moore (14 October 1927 – 23 May 2017)

Looking back over Roger Moore’s career, it’s tempting to wonder just how it would have continued if the role of a certain British spy hadn’t come along in 1972. Up until then, Moore’s movie career had been occasional and not very successful, with early try-outs with MGM and Warner Bros. doing little to further his career. As he said himself, “At MGM, RGM (Roger George Moore) was NBG (no bloody good).” In the early Sixties he made a couple of movies in Italy, but by then he’d already made important in-roads in the format that would stand him in good stead throughout the rest of the decade. Television gave Moore true recognition with featured roles in series such as Ivanhoe (1958-9), The Alaskans (1959-60), and Maverick (1959-61). But it was the role he played between 1962 and 1969, that of Leslie Charteris’s suave, sophisticated anti-hero, Simon Templar, in The Saint, that brought him international attention.

The early Seventies saw Moore team up with Tony Curtis for The Persuaders! (1971-72), and then Cubby Broccoli came calling with the offer to play James Bond. At this point, Moore’s career went into overdrive, and he became a worldwide star. His interpretation of Bond has had its detractors over the years, but there has always been the sense that the producers of the series adapted the role to suit Moore’s abilities rather than the other way round. He remained in the role for twelve years and made seven appearances, and though each entry was successful there was a recognisable falling off of quality, and sometimes, Moore looked tired. In between saving the world, Moore made a number of action movies during the Seventies that cemented his position as an international star and celebrity, and if some of those movies attracted controversy (such as the trio he made in South Africa), Moore stayed clear of all the fuss and bother and he remained popular in the eyes of the public.

Post-Bond, Moore’s movie career never maintained the heights he’d achieved throughout the Seventies and early Eighties, but by then he was in his sixties and it was perhaps inevitable that he would take on less work. The early Nineties saw him appear in a number of less than remarkable comedies, but he also began his tenure as a UNICEF Goodwill Ambassador, work that was rewarded by his receiving a knighthood in 2003. In the last ten years his career had gravitated to voice roles, and he made increasingly fewer public appearances. Moore was a charming man with an awareness of his limitations as an actor, and he was always quick to agree when anyone brought this up. The British satirical show Spitting Image (1988-91) included Moore in their roster of recurring puppets. In it, the writers had Moore respond to a director’s call for “more emotion” by raising an eyebrow. Such was Moore’s lack of ego that he expanded on this, saying that as Bond he’d had three expressions: “right eyebrow raised, left eyebrow raised, and eyebrows crossed when grabbed by Jaws”. Just for his personality and his sense of fun alone he’ll be missed, but as an actor who never really took things too seriously but still managed to entertain millions of moviegoers, he’ll be missed even more.

1 – Gold of the Seven Saints (1961)

2 – The Man Who Haunted Himself (1970)

3 – Live and Let Die (1973)

4 – Shout at the Devil (1976)

5 – Sherlock Holmes in New York (1976)

6 – The Spy Who Loved Me (1977)

7 – The Wild Geese (1978)

8 – The Sea Wolves (1980)

9 – The Cannonball Run (1981)

10 – For Your Eyes Only (1981)

10 Reasons to Remember Powers Boothe (1948-2017)

15 Monday May 2017

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Powers Boothe (1 June 1948 – 14 May 2017)

For the first ten years of his acting career, Powers Boothe was on stage appearing in a range of Shaespearean productions that included Troilus and Cressida to Henry IV, Part II to Richard III. Quite a difference in terms of his background as the youngest of three boys growing up on a ranch in Texas (he was also the first person in his family to go to university). Those early years helped Boothe hone his acting skills, and though he began his movie career with a bit part in The Goodbye Girl (1977), it was only three short years before he was impressing television audiences with his performance as the doomed cult leader in Guyana Tragedy: The Story of Jim Jones (1980). Boothe won an Emmy, and that auspicious portrayal heralded the arrival of a real talent.

During the Eighties Boothe consolidated his success with a variety of movie, television (particularly as Philip Marlowe) and stage roles that reaffirmed his skill as a performer, but as the decade progressed he appeared more and more as both a supporting actor, and as a villain as well. With his stern features, penetrating stare and sonorous voice, Boothe was equally suited to the various law enforcement roles he began playing as he got older, before moving on to senior politician roles such as Alexander Haig in Oliver Stone’s Nixon (1995). He was able to inject a sense of gravitas to these roles that often helped tremendously when a movie was lacking in other areas, but a glance through his filmography shows that he didn’t make too many bad choices during his career, and he was able to work with directors of the calibre of John Boorman, Walter Hill and Robert Rodriguez.

From the late Nineties onwards, Boothe gravitated more and more towards television, and appeared in a number of well received shows including Attila the Hun, Deadwood, and 24. In recent years he also appeared in the likes of Nashville and Marvel’s Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. But whatever the format, Boothe was always an actor worth paying attention to, someone who could take a role and spin something unexpected out of it. And despite the often serious nature of the parts he played – he never did comedy – he could be relied on to appreciate the benefits of his profession: “Hell, I’ve played as many guys who get the girl as I have heavies. I’ve done love scenes with Jessica Lange and Jennifer Lopez, and I won’t kid you, they’re fun”.

1 – Guyana Tragedy: The Story of Jim Jones (1980)

2 – Southern Comfort (1981)

3 – The Emerald Forest (1985)

4 – Extreme Prejudice (1987)

5 – Into the Homeland (1987)

6 – By Dawn’s Early Light (1990)

7 – Tombstone (1993)

8 – Blue Sky (1994)

9 – U Turn (1997)

10 – Sin City (2005)

10 Reasons to Remember Jonathan Demme (1944-2017)

26 Wednesday Apr 2017

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Jonathan Demme (22 February 1944 – 26 April 2017)

Like many of his contemporaries, Jonathan Demme started his movie career working for Roger Corman. He wrote several screenplays, including The Hot Box (1972) and Caged Heat (1974 – which he also directed), and had several modest successes as a director in the mid-Seventies. He learned his craft well, and over the next decade Demme made a succession of well received movies as well as a string of music videos for bands such as Talking Heads and New Order (a group whose songs featured in pretty much all his movies from the Eighties onwards). Demme chose his projects carefully and as a result he wasn’t the most prolific of directors when it came to features, but he was a committed documentarian, making over a dozen during his career.

It was a certain Oscar-winning movie in 1991 that gave Demme his biggest exposure as a director, but though he could have used that success to helm any movie he wanted to, he continued to choose projects that most other directors would have passed on, from intimate documentary portrait Cousin Bobby (1992), to literary adaptation Beloved (1998), to the well intentioned but unsuccessful remake of Charade (1964), The Truth About Charlie (2002) (on the subject of remakes he never thought it was “sacrilegious to remake any movie”; for Demme it was “sacrilegious to make a bad movie”). He kept returning to music documentaries, and ventured into television, ensuring that he continued to have a varied, and sometimes eclectic career.

He was known primarily for his use of close-ups, for finding roles for his “stock company” (actors such as Charles Napier and Dean Stockwell), and for his work having had a profound influence on the writer/director Paul Thomas Anderson. If anything, Demme was a mercurial director who never quite received the acclaim that his body of work deserved, but for anyone who has followed his career since those heady days working for Roger Corman, he was an intelligent, perceptive director whose talent and skill behind the camera meant that whatever project he was working on, it would always be worth watching.

1 – Caged Heat (1974)

2 – Melvin and Howard (1980)

3 – Stop Making Sense (1984)

4 – Something Wild (1986)

5 – Swimming to Cambodia (1987)

6 – The Silence of the Lambs (1991)

7 – Philadelphia (1993)

8 – Neil Young: Heart of Gold (2006)

9 – Rachel Getting Married (2008)

10 – I’m Carolyn Parker (2011)

10 Reasons to Remember Bill Paxton (1955-2017)

26 Sunday Feb 2017

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Bill Paxton (17 May 1955 – 25 February 2017)

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Can you imagine what The Da Vinci Code (2006) would have been like if Bill Paxton had played Professor Robert Langdon, and not Tom Hanks? It should have happened, but Fate (in the form of TV show Big Love) dictated otherwise. If you’re having trouble imagining Paxton reeling off tons of symbolic exposition in an overly earnest manner, then that’s a disservice to an actor whose career included a wide variety of roles, and whose skill as an actor was often under-appreciated.

Starting out as a set dresser for Roger Corman’s New World Pictures, Paxton spent the early part of his career in bit parts, but eventually it was a part in Franc Roddam’s The Lords of Discipline (1983) that brought him to the public’s attention (and casting directors). A year later he began a fruitful relationship with James Cameron, playing one of the three punks unfortunate enough to meet Arnold Schwarzenegger’s T-800 at the beginning of The Terminator (1984). Two years later and it was the very opposite of “Game over, man!” as Paxton’s role as Private Hudson in Cameron’s sequel to Alien (1979) gave him all the exposure an up-and-coming actor could need. From then on, Paxton’s career was assured.

He hit his peak in the Nineties, appearing in a succession of well received roles in a succession of popular, well received movies that often found him being one of the best things in them. But in amongst a run of Hollywood blockbusters (including some movie about a sunken ship), Paxton made several movies that may not have been as successful, but still provided examples of his range and skill as an actor, from the misfire that was Boxing Helena (1993), to offbeat crime drama Traveller (1997), and even turning up in horror portmanteau Future Shock (1994). Paxton wasn’t afraid to dive into roles, and even in something as daft as Club Dread (2004), you could still see the effort he was making in bringing his character to life and making him as credible as possible given the nature of the movie.

As well as acting, Paxton was a director, producer and writer, and he worked equally well on television, particularly on the aforementioned Big Love, a show that demonstrated how good he was in leading roles, though it’s likely he’ll be remembered more for his supporting roles over the years. Paxton’s last movie is The Circle (2017), and it’s hard to believe that he won’t be making any more, that we won’t see that infectious, mischievous grin anymore, or hear that distinctive Texan drawl. He’ll be sorely missed. After all, who else could have taken a line like “I’m navel lint!” and made it funny, pathetic, heartrending, and despairing all at the same time?

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1 – Aliens (1986)

2 – Near Dark (1987)

3 – One False Move (1992)

4 – Tombstone (1993)

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5 – True Lies (1994)

6 – Apollo 13 (1995)

7 – Twister (1996)

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8 – A Simple Plan (1998)

9 – Frailty (2001)

10 – Hatfields & McCoys (2012)

"The Hatfields and the McCoys"

Nicolas Cage’s Top 10 Movies at the International Box Office

08 Wednesday Feb 2017

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The career of Nicholas Kim Coppola has had its fair share of ups and downs (though in recent years it’s consisted mostly of downs). Inhabiting the strange netherworld of DtV movies nowadays, Cage seems to be flitting from one career-killing project to another with no apparent concern for his legacy as an actor (something that could be attributed to a lot of other actors as well – eh, John Travolta?). But overall, Cage has had a great career, and appeared in several modern classics over the years, and this is reflected in the movies that make up the list below (though it doesn’t include his Oscar win for Leaving Las Vegas (1995). The most recent movie in the list is an unexpected success from 2013, but his recent cameo in Snowden (2016) and a well-received outing in Army of One (2016) are, hopefully, signs that the tide is turning. Cage has six movies due for release in 2017, but if none of them improve his standing, we’ll still have all these (mostly) great movies to remember him by.

10 – The Sorcerer’s Apprentice (2010) – $215,283,742

Surprisingly enjoyable on a “don’t-expect-too-much” level, Cage enters into the spirit of things (along with a wonderfully hissable Alfred Molina as the villain) in this barmy fantasy movie. As the ever-so-slightly po-faced Balthazar, Cage has to make one too many trips to Exposition Central, but acquits himself well in a role that could have been played oh-so-seriously. The movie has its fans, and if you haven’t seen it yet, it’s well worth seeking out as an undemanding treat.

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9 – Con Air (1997) – $224,012,234

After making the very downbeat Leaving Las Vegas, Cage surprised everyone by making a string of big-budget, high-concept action movies, including this riotous romp where he plays the one good guy on a prison transport plane full of murderers, rapists,  thieves, and Steve Buscemi. Cage goes for laconic, brooding and ironically mirthless (“Put… the bunny… back… in the box”), and cements the action credentials he established for himself in The Rock. He’s the calm at the centre of the storm, and all the more convincing for it.

8 – Ghost Rider (2007) – $228,738,393

The first of two outings as stunt motorcyclist turned demonic revenger Johnny Blaze, Ghost Rider sees Cage play the flame-headed title character against the backdrop of an increasingly silly script, and a lacklustre plot. But against the odds, Cage’s interpretation of the character works better than expected, and his understanding of the role lends some gravitas when it’s most needed, making this a definite guilty pleasure, and whether you’re a Marvel fan or not.

7 – Gone in Sixty Seconds (2000) – $237,202,299

Cage saw in the new century with this remake of H.B. Halicki’s 1974 counter-culture classic, but somewhere along the way it failed to replicate what made the original so memorable. Cage gives an unremarkable performance, and the movie’s surface sheen hides a superficial storyline that no amount of slickly produced car chases can hide. That it did so well at the box office is a testament to Cage’s popularity at the time, and a vigorous marketing campaign that promised more than the movie could actually deliver.

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6 – Face/Off (1997) – $245,676,146

John Woo given (nearly) free rein + Nicolas Cage + John Travolta + more mayhem and carnage than you can shake a church full of doves at = an even barmier and over the top movie than The Rock. Face/Off is one of the maddest, strangest, but totally enjoyable action movies of the Nineties. Woo directs as if he doesn’t care how looney it all is, and Cage – along with his future DtV compatriot Travolta – goes along for the ride, hamming it up as much as he can and having a whale of a time. He’s out there, and he wants you to come with him… and how can you refuse?

5 – G-Force (2009) – $292,817,841

Cage has contributed his vocal talents to a handful of other movies, but his role as Speckles the mole in G-Force may just be his goofiest performance yet. And it’s made all the more impressive by the fact that, for the most part, it doesn’t even sound like it’s Cage. A kids’ movie that doesn’t try too hard with its script, it’s nevertheless a minor pleasure, and has enough wit about it to offset the unnecessarily convoluted nature of the central plot.

4 – The Rock (1996) – $335,062,621

The first of Cage’s forays into the action movie genre, The Rock gave him a new lease of life on the big screen, and brought him to the attention of a whole new audience. Beginning as a nerd but inevitably transforming into a kick-ass action hero, it’s obvious that Cage is having fun with his role, and this transfers itself to the viewer. Rarely have the gung ho endeavours of an unprepared yet adaptable rookie been so coated in so many levels of ridiculousness, and rarely has an actor proved so effective in carrying it all off as if they were born to it.

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3 – National Treasure (2004) – $347,512,318

An action-adventure movie that came out of nowhere and proved unexpectedly successful, National Treasure takes the template that has made Dan Brown such a household name, and tweaks it so that it’s fun and not at all pompous in its self-important outlook. Cage revisits his action hero period but makes his character more like Indiana Jones than Cameron Poe, and in doing so gives one of his loosest, most enjoyably Cage-like performances in years. The plot is suitably daft, but who cares when the aim is to have as much fun as possible? Certainly not this movie, as it revels in its absurdity from start to finish, and continually winks at the audience to reassure them that, for once, it is all just an act.

2 – National Treasure: Book of Secrets (2007) – $457,364,600

A sequel to National Treasure was perhaps inevitable, but what wasn’t as predictable was said sequel out-grossing its predecessor. More convoluted than the original, but lacking the flair that made the first movie so enjoyable, the movie bounces from one absurdist set piece to another with galling regularity, but somehow still manages to keep the audience on board, a feat that is the one thing that makes this poorly constructed – and thought out – sequel as successful as it is.

1 – The Croods (2013) – $587,204,668

An animated movie about a family of Neanderthals with Cage as its male figurehead? A surefire box office success? Unlikely on the face of it, but that’s what happened as audiences took the Crood family to their hearts, and gave Cage his most unexpected hit to date. As in G-Force, Cage shows an aptitude for voice work that makes his role all the more enjoyable, and he finds various and varied ways to display the character’s frustration at continually being ignored by his family. Cage sounds relaxed in the role, and is clearly having fun, an experience his fans haven’t had for quite some time – since this movie, in fact.

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10 Reasons to Remember Emmanuelle Riva (1927-2017)

28 Saturday Jan 2017

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Emmanuelle Riva (24 February 1927 – 27 January 2017)

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For many, Emmanuelle Riva will be best known for her Oscar-nominated role as Anne in Michael Haneke’s profoundly moving and riveting exploration of love under pressure, Amour (2012). But Riva’s career began in 1957, and sixty years on, she remains a well-respected actress who made a lasting impression in a string of movies made in the Sixties, and who had an equally impressive career on the stage.

Like John Hurt, who also died on 27 January 2017, Riva wanted to act at a young age but was given little support by her family. She moved from her rural home to Paris in 1953, and was soon awarded a scholarship. Though too old to enter the French National Academy of Dramatic Arts, word of her abilities as an actress soon landed her roles, beginning with a production of George Bernard Shaw’s Arms and the Man. But it was her role as Elle in Alain Resnais’ haunting Hiroshima mon amour (1959) that brought her instant, worldwide recognition. From there she made a number of critically and commercially successful French films that cemented her reputation, and allowed her to continue working in the theatre and occasionally in television.

In the Seventies and Eighties, Riva’s movie career suffered through a mixture of poor choices and the perception that she was entirely a serious dramatic actress (she would have liked to have appeared in some comedies, but always blamed her performance in Hiroshima mon amour for establishing that perception). In the Nineties she made an appearance in Three Colours: Blue (1993), but although she was singled out for praise, and the performance served as a reminder of what she could do, Riva’s movie career remained largely unappreciated until Michael Haneke came along in 2010. She wrote poetry in her spare time (and was published), and enjoyed photography; photographs that she took while making Hiroshima mon amour were exhibited and turned into a book around fifty years after she took them. She was a creative force who didn’t always get the breaks she needed, but her career was, nevertheless, varied and intriguing in its choices. She was a confident, inspiring actress whose naturalistic style spoke to the heart of the characters she played, and she was incapable of giving a less than committed performance. She never wanted to be a star, and perhaps would have been horrified to have been regarded as one, but Riva had that star-like quality, and thanks to her body of work, that quality still lives on.

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1 – Hiroshima mon amour (1959)

2 – Kapò (1960)

3 – Léon Morin, Priest (1961)

4 – Thérèse Desqueyroux (1962)

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5 – Thomas the Impostor (1965)

6 – Bitter Fruit (1967)

7 – The Eyes, the Mouth (1982)

8 – Venus Beauty (1999)

9 – Le Skylab (2011)

10 – Amour (2012)

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10 Reasons to Remember John Hurt (1940-2017)

28 Saturday Jan 2017

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John Hurt (22 January 1940 – 27 January 2017)

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With his distinctive voice, and even more distinctive features, John Hurt was an actor who was rarely out of work, from his first appearance in 1962 in an episode of the British TV series Z Cars, to his final role as Neville Chamberlain in Darkest Hour (due in November 2017). But Hurt’s acting career might never have started; when he was a young boy he lived opposite a cinema but his parents forbade from seeing movies there. It wasn’t until he went to an Anglican Preparatory School that he developed a desire to act. However, his parents didn’t encourage him, and his headmaster told him he “wouldn’t stand a chance”.

Luckily, Hurt persevered, and he won a scholarship to RADA in 1960. Two years of studying later and he was finding work on TV and in movies, and making a name for himself. It was A Man for All Seasons (1966) that brought him to the attention of a wider audience, and from there he never looked back, and over the next fifty years he made over a hundred and twenty movie appearances as well as numerous TV and video appearances. Aside from the movies listed below he was notable for being the mad Emperor Caligula in I, Claudius (1976); the first victim – spectacularly so – of the Xenomorph in Ridley Scott’s Alien (1979); himself in Mel Brooks’ Spaceballs (1987); and the renowned wandmaker Garrick Ollivander in the Harry Potter movies. His commitment and passion to acting were rewarded twice: with a CBE in 2004, and a knighthood in 2015.

His career also encompassed various outings as a narrator or voice actor on a variety of animated projects, from Watership Down (1978) (and the 1999-2000 TV series) to Thumbelina (1994), and Ultramarines: A Warhammer 40,000 Movie (2010). But whatever the movie, Hurt was one of those actors you could always rely on to give a great performance however good or bad the material was. He had a natural integrity, and a straightforward approach to acting that focused on the character almost exclusively, which led to so many compelling performances over his fifty-year plus career. Despite his slight frame, he was a persuasive physical presence, unafraid to push himself in the search for the reality of the role he was playing, whether made up as Quentin Crisp, or suffering torture as Winston Smith. And he was a member of a rare group of actors, those who’ve played the Time Lord, Doctor Who. With his passing, Hurt leaves behind an incredibly varied and impressive body of work that will continue to provide endless hours of entertainment for fans and future generations alike.

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1 – 10 Rillington Place (1971)

2 – Little Malcolm and His Struggle Against the Eunuchs (1974)

3 – The Naked Civil Servant (1975)

4 – Midnight Express (1978)

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5 – The Elephant Man (1980)

6 – 1984 (1984)

7 – The Field (1990)

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8 – Love and Death on Long Island (1997)

9 – Hellboy (2004)

10 – Shooting Dogs (2005)

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10 Reasons to Remember Om Puri (1950-2017)

06 Friday Jan 2017

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Om Puri (18 October 1950 – 6 January 2017)

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The third actor to be taken from us so far in 2017 (after Argentinian actor Luis Mazzeo and Syrian actor, writer and director Rafiq Subaie), Om Puri will be best known to Western audiences as the immigrant fish and chip shop owner living in Bradford and trying to keep his Anglicized children from continually ignoring their heritage in East Is East (1999) and its predictably titled sequel West Is West (2010). He had a blunt physicality in later years that belied a sharp intelligence as an actor, and if Western movie makers didn’t quite know what to do with him other than cast him as an overbearing patriarch, then it was their loss, as he made many, many movies in India that showcased his varied talents as an actor. That many of them remain unseen outside of India is a shame, as Puri was a phenomenal talent who added lustre to each project he was involved with. For once, putting together a list of just ten movies to represent an actor’s career is really difficult, as with around three hundred roles and movies to choose from, and with Puri often in a category all his own in terms of performances, it’s entirely likely that some performances will be left out that perhaps shouldn’t be. That’s a testament to the man and his career, and his indelible contribution to Asian cinema.

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1 – Aakrosh (1980)

2 – Bhavni Bhavai (1980)

3 – Ardh Satya (1983)

4 – Mirch Masala (1987)

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5 – City of Joy (1992)

6 – Maachis (1996)

7 – East Is East (1999)

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8 – AK 47 (1999)

9 – Dhoop (2003)

10 – Road to Sangam (2010)

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John Travolta’s Top 10 Movies at the International Box Office

06 Friday Jan 2017

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The career of John Joseph Travolta has had its fair share of ups and downs (though in recent years it’s consisted mostly of downs). Inhabiting the strange netherworld of DtV movies nowadays, Travolta seems to be flitting from one career-killing project to another with no apparent concern for his legacy as an actor (something that could be attributed to a lot of other actors as well – eh, Nicolas Cage?). But overall, Travolta has had a great career, and appeared in several modern classics over the years, and this is reflected in the movies that make up the list below. The most recent movie in the list may be from 2008, but a recent return to form in The People v O.J. Simpson: American Crime Story (2016) hopefully will see the tide turn. But if it doesn’t, we’ll still have all these great movies to remember him by.

10 – Broken Arrow (1996) – $150,270,147

John Woo + John Travolta + Christian Slater + more exploding helicopters than you can shake an AK-47 at = a hundred and eight minutes of loud, dumb, spectacular fun. Not the greatest of movies on Travolta’s CV, nevertheless Broken Arrow is hugely enjoyable in a crass, leave-your-brain-at-the-door kind of way, and should best be looked on as a guilty pleasure. It features Travolta hamming it up like crazy (and smoking in the most affected way ever seen on screen), and delivering one of action cinema’s most memorable lines (courtesy of Speed scribe Graham Yost): “Would you mind not shooting at the thermonuclear weapons?”

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9 – Phenomenon (1996) – $152,036,382

In the year that also saw Travolta play an angel in Michael, Phenomenon gave us a chance to see him as, possibly, the recipient of a gift from God. Newly imbued with super-intelligence and telekinesis after seeing a bright light in the sky, Travolta’s ordinary Joe becomes an object of fascination, and notions of faith arise too. It’s an uneven movie, but Travolta is good in the central role of George, and if the whole thing falls apart by the end it’s not because of bad intentions, but purely because the script paints itself into a corner it can’t get out of.

8 – Hairspray (2007) – $202,548,575

John Waters + John Travolta in a female body suit + song and dance numbers = one of Travolta’s most enjoyable movies. He may not have been everyone’s first choice for Edna Turnblad, but Travolta gives one of his most relaxed and engaging performances alongside “hubbie” Christopher Walken. A movie bursting with energy and giddy vitality, Hairspray is still as vibrant today as it was ten years ago, and Travolta is a big part of why that’s the case, reminding us that he can still move it and groove it.

7 – Pulp Fiction (1994) – $213,928,762

Quentin Tarantino’s second movie has been pulled part, analysed from the first frame to the last, and generally obsessed over by critics and fans alike ever since its release. It’s simply an incredible breath of fresh cinematic air, and remains a true one of kind over twenty years later. It’s also the movie that brought Travolta back in out of the cold after a career slowdown that had left those same critics and fans wondering if he’d ever get his career back on track after a string of duds that included Two of a Kind (1983) and Chains of Gold (1991). In terms of his performance, it’s arguable that he’s never been better, and his scenes with Uma Thurman are as mesmerising now as they were back then.

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6 – Saturday Night Fever (1977) – $237,113,184

The movie that brought Travolta everlasting fame, Saturday Night Fever is a gritty wish-fulfilment tale that’s become overshadowed by its soundtrack, but forty years on it still has a power and a coarse energy that keeps it feeling fresh and not just a time capsule look at an era now long gone. Travolta is so convincing as Tony Manero that you can’t imagine anyone else playing the role, and though it spawned a million and one parodies – the best being in Airplane! (1980) – that white suit and Travolta’s defiant strutting, both on and off the dancefloor, are still as iconic as ever.

5 – Face/Off (1997) – $245,676,146

John Woo given (nearly) free rein + John Travolta + Nicolas Cage + more mayhem and carnage than you can shake a church full of doves at = an even barmier and over the top movie than Broken Arrow. Face/Off is one of the maddest, strangest, but totally enjoyable action movies of the Nineties. Woo directs as if he doesn’t care how looney it all is, and Travolta – along with his future DtV compatriot Cage – goes along for the ride, hamming it up as much as he can and having a whale of a time. He’s out there, and he wants you to come with him… and how can you refuse?

4 – Wild Hogs (2007) – $253,625,427

At this point, you might be saying to yourself, “Wow! Really? Wild Hogs? Over two hundred and fifty million? How did that happen?” And on the surface, you’d be right, but dig a little deeper and the movie has some (well) hidden depths, as well as a quartet of hugely enjoyable performances, including Travolta as the de facto leader of the Hogs. It’s an undemanding movie, but Travolta is easy-going (even when playing uptight) and immensely likeable, and when his character gets easily flustered, it’s a sight to see – purely because it’s a trait he rarely gets to display elsewhere. One to file under Don’t Knock It If You Haven’t Seen It, and a lot funnier and warm-hearted than you’d expect.

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3 – Look Who’s Talking (1989) – $296,999,813

The first of three – Travolta appears in all of them – Look Who’s Talking was a surprise box office success back in 1989, but though the basic premise is clever: baby expresses his thoughts and feelings as he would if he were an adult (and with Bruce Willis’s voice), the movie is genuinely funny, and has a lot of heart, making it easy to like. Travolta plays a more charming version of Tony Manero, and there’s a definite chemistry with Kirstie Alley that allows Travolta to show he can do a straightforward romantic role as well. Now if only they’d left things well alone and not made two more movies…

2 – Bolt (2008) – $309,979,994

To date, Bolt is Travolta’s second and last animated movie, after Our Friend, Martin (1999). Unfairly overlooked when it was first released, there’s a lot to be said for the first movie that John Lasseter oversaw upon jumping ship from Pixar to Disney, not the least of which is the unexpectedly inspired choice of Travolta as the title pooch. He’s clearly having fun with the role, and that comes across in his performance; which begs the question, why hasn’t he made more animated movies? Whatever the reason, Travolta is definitely one of the main reasons for the movie’s success, and his performance more than justifies the producers’ making him first choice for the role all along.

1 – Grease (1978) – $394,955,690

As the Kurgan (Clancy Brown) put it in Highlander (1986), “There can be only one”, and sure enough it had to be Grease. Even if you’re not a fan of musicals, you have to admire the sheer exuberance and exhilaration of the dance sequences that make up most of Grease‘s allure, along with its way-too-catchy songs and endlessly quotable dialogue (“Let’s hear it for the toilet paper!”). As the belligerent/charming Danny Zuko, Travolta makes a virtue (of sorts) of thrusting his hips as often as he can in Olivia Newton-John’s direction, as well as looking out of his depth, and all with a virile swagger that recalls any number of teenagers from those Sixties beach movies. A great performance in a classic musical, pure and simple.

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10 Reasons to Remember Debbie Reynolds (1932-2016)

29 Thursday Dec 2016

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Debbie Reynolds (1 April 1932 – 28 December 2016)

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As if 2016 already hasn’t been a terrible year in terms of the stars we’ve lost, it seems that none can have been so tragic as the death of Debbie Reynolds. Coming just twenty-four hours after the death of her daughter, Carrie Fisher, Reynolds’ passing is as much a jolt to the system as Fisher’s unexpected demise. There’s a saying that no parent should outlive their children, and it looks clear that the shock of losing her daughter contributed to Reynolds being added to the (too) long list of people the entertainment world has been robbed of this year. But like everyone else we’ve had to say goodbye to, Reynolds has left us with an impressive body of work to remember her by.

Her career began when she was just sixteen years old and she won a beauty contest where she impersonated Betty Hutton. Four years later, and with no practical experience, Reynolds was chosen to be Gene Kelly’s dance partner in Singin’ in the Rain (1952). It wasn’t her first movie, but it was certainly her biggest challenge to date, and she was so good it was like she was making her twentieth screen appearance, and not her sixth. Success after success followed throughout the Fifties, but in the Sixties her career began to slow down. She found other projects to occupy her time, such as buying a Californian hospital with plans to turn it into a profitable business venture. She also founded the Hollywood Motion Picture Collection, a museum dedicated to movie memorabilia that included over three thousand costumes, from Judy Garland’s ruby slippers in The Wizard of Oz (1939) to the white dress Marilyn Monroe wore in The Seven Year Itch (1955).

in the Seventies she made her Broadway debut, and though she appeared in only a handful of productions, her talent guaranteed her good reviews (it was also during this period that she picked up the nickname “Princess Leia’s mother”). Much later, she found her way into the consciousness of a younger generation through her recurring role as Grace’s mother in the TV show Will & Grace (1999-2006). She continued to work sporadically both in movies and on the small screen, but mostly she did voice work on animated productions such as Kim Possible (2003-2007), and even an episode of Family Guy.

She was a glamorous star who during her lifetime knew what it was to be down on her luck, even admitting at one point to living in her car. But throughout her career, whether she was up or down, Reynolds kept on smiling and proving herself to be a strong draw when a role came along. Her Fifties heyday was a remarkable period, and she was a remarkable performer during that period, and like many stars from that era, she became an instantly recognisable actress whose name equalled quality. Like everyone else we’ve had to say goodbye to this year, she’ll be sorely missed.

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1 – Singin’ in the Rain (1952)

2 – Susan Slept Here (1954)

3 – The Tender Trap (1955)

4 – Bundle of Joy (1956)

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5 – The Mating Game (1959)

6 – The Pleasure of His Company (1961)

7 – How the West Was Won (1962)

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8 – The Unsinkable Molly Brown (1964)

9 – Divorce American Style (1967)

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10 – Charlotte’s Web (1973)

10 Reasons to Remember Carrie Fisher (1956-2016)

27 Tuesday Dec 2016

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Carrie Fisher (21 October 1956 – 27 December 2016)

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Carrie Fisher was the daughter of Hollywood “royalty”: Eddie Fisher and Debbie Reynolds, so it was perhaps fitting that she will be best remembered as Princess Leia Organa in Star Wars (1977) and three of its sequels. But there was more to Fisher than just a role in a space opera, even one cherished by millions, and away from that galaxy far, far away she was also a writer and well-liked celebrity. She wrote the novel Postcards from the Edge, and scripted the movie version too (it was released in 1990), and had a successful “career” as a script doctor, polishing dialogue and scenes for movies as diverse as Hook (1991), Outbreak (1995), Coyote Ugly (2000), and all three Star Wars prequels. She also wrote her cameo scene in Scream 3 (2000). Though she had several battles in her private life – with alcohol and prescription drugs – and was diagnosed with bipolar disorder, Fisher remained a fighter throughout.

Away from the Star Wars movies, Fisher’s acting career wasn’t always as compelling as she may have liked, but when she was asked if playing Princess Leia was the dark side of the Force in her professional career, she had this to say: “Oh, no. It was fun! I was young. People want it to be a problem for me. No. Those are great movies. Why shouldn’t I be proud of being in that? The dark side? You ever see Hollywood Vice Squad (1986) or The Star Wars Holiday Special (1978)? How about Under the Rainbow (1981)? Was Star Wars the dark side? There’s so much competition for that one.” While it’s true that playing the Princess with the bagel-bun hairdo has proved to be her career high, let’s not forget that she made significant contributions to a lot more movies besides. And here are just ten of them.

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1 – Shampoo (1975)

2 – The Man With One Red Shoe (1985)

3 – Hannah and Her Sisters (1986)

4 – Appointment With Death (1988)

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5 – The ‘Burbs (1989)

6 – When Harry Met Sally… (1989)

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7 – Sibling Rivalry (1990)

8 – This Is My Life (1992)

9 – Wonderland (2003)

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10 – Stateside (2004)

Mini-Review: Ingrid Bergman in Her Own Words (2015)

30 Wednesday Nov 2016

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Original title: Jag är Ingrid

D: Stig Björkman / 114m

With: Ingrid Bergman (archive footage), Alicia Vikander, Pia Lindström, Roberto Rossellini Jr, Isabella Rossellini, Isotta Rossellini, Sigourney Weaver, Liv Ullmann

An accomplished, award-winning actress, Ingrid Bergman was also an inveterate diarist and she kept hours upon hours of home movie footage across all three of her marriages, along with thousands of photographs. She charted her life and career through these recorded memories, and would often find herself looking back at favourite moments whenever the mood took her. And thanks to all this “memory hoarding”, Bergman has provided the platform on which movie maker Stig Björkman has assembled a captivating, insightful documentary on the star herself.

Told in the style of a not-quite linear autobiography, Ingrid Bergman in Her Own Words offers a succession of affecting, candid scenes from Bergman’s life that are punctuated by talking heads recollections from her children and others, and Vikander reading the actress’s personal letters and diary entries. Bergman’s childhood and close, formative relationship with her father is covered, as are her first excursions in front of the camera in a series of Swedish movies. Her first marriage to brain surgeon Petter Lindström reveals a young woman on the brink of stardom and enjoying every aspect of the Hollywood experience that would ultimately see them split up.

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From this, it becomes clear that Bergman was committed more to her career than she was to her daughter, Pia, a circumstance that carried on when she had her children with Roberto Rossellini. Whether this was a conscious choice or not isn’t made clear but it does speak to Bergman’s desire to act above everything else. It also helps to explain how she was able to leave Hollywood for Italy and a period in her life when she was pilloried in the press for “abandoning” Petter and Pia. From there the movie covers the late Forties and her career resurgence thanks to Anastasia (1956), and her third marriage to theatrical producer Lars Schmidt. An inevitable collaboration with fellow Swede Ingmar Bergman on Autumn Sonata (1978) follows on, until her death from breast cancer in 1982.

The movie stresses Bergman’s dedication to her career (a little too much at times), but it also highlights just how much she enjoyed life and made as much of it as she could. Her children’s thoughts often provide an alternative viewpoint, but their love for her is evident throughout, even though she was largely an absent presence in their lives (all of them wish they could have had more time with her, but don’t begrudge her absence at all). The various archival elements are compiled with a great deal of care, and are fascinating for their candour and historical relevance. It all goes to prove that, despite some controversial (for the time) personal decisions, Bergman was admired and respected by pretty much everyone she came into contact with.

Rating: 7/10 – as a straightforward, no frills documentary, Ingrid Bergman in Her Own Words works incredibly well in spite of lacking any appreciable depth, but Björkman assembles the varied materials with skill; a knowing and affectionate tribute to an actress who David O. Selznick referred to as “the most completely conscientious actress” he had ever worked with, this is for fans and newcomers alike.

10 Reasons to Remember Raoul Coutard (1924-2016)

09 Wednesday Nov 2016

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Raoul Coutard (16 September 1924 – 8 November 2016)

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A key influence on the look and style of movies made during the Nouvelle Vague period (covering the late Fifties and the Sixties), Raoul Coutard was a cinematographer known primarily for his work with Jean-Luc Godard, but he also worked with the likes of Jacques Demy, François Truffaut, and Costa-Gravas.

Coutard served in the Indochina War (1946-1954), and ended up living and working in Vietnam for eleven years as a war photographer. In 1956 he was asked by Pierre Schoendoerffer to work on a documentary called The Devil’s Pass (1958); Coutard accepted due to a misunderstanding: he thought he was being hired to take stills shots. From there he shot two more movies for Schoendoerffer, and in 1959 was hired by Godard’s producer Georges de Beauregard to work on Godard’s first feature, Breathless (1960). Godard had had somebody else in mind for the job but the end result saw Coutard shoot all of Godard’s movies bar Masculin, féminin (1966) from then until 1967. Coutard was adept at using handheld cameras for Godard’s low-budget black and white movies, but he really impressed the director when it came to shooting his widescreen, colour movies: Coutard created a lighting rig that enabled shooting inside places without enough natural light.

Coutard’s career slowed down in the Seventies, though he did direct his first feature, Hoa Binh (1970); it was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film, and won the prize for Best First Work at the 1970 Cannes Film Festival. He reunited with Godard in 1982 on Passion, and from then on Coutard began to work more consistently. His work continued to be distinctive and an asset to the projects he worked on, right up until his last work on Philippe Garrel’s Wild Innocence (2001). But he will always be remembered for the movies he made in the early to mid-Sixties, a selection of classic French movies that have stood the test of time not just because of the passions and fearlessness of their writers and directors, but also because of the way that Coutard illuminated those passions and that fearlessness through the immediacy of his visual style.

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1 – À bout de souffle (Breathless) (1960)

2 – Une Femme est une femme (A Woman Is a Woman) (1961)

3 – Jules et Jim (1962)

4 – Le Mépris (Contempt) (1963)

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5 – Bande à part (Band of Outsiders) (1964)

6 – Alphaville, une étrange aventure de Lemmy Caution (Alphaville, a Strange Adventure of Lemmy Caution) (1965)

7 – Pierrot le Fou (1965)

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8 – Weekend (1967)

9 – Z (1969)

10 – Passion (1982)

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Happy Birthday – Winona Ryder

29 Saturday Oct 2016

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Winona Ryder (29 October 1971 -)

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In the late Eighties, Winona Ryder appeared in two iconic movies: Beetlejuice (1987) and Heathers (1988). She wouldn’t be twenty for another three/four years. Having that much success so early in her career could now be seen as a bad thing, as the Nineties increasingly showed that fame and fortune were having an adverse effect on her. Dogged by depression and anxiety, Ryder continued to make movies that were incredibly diverse, and which featured varied, challenging performances. But like many of her contemporaries, once the new century arrived she became less and less of a box office draw, and her choice of roles retained their variety but not the critical or commercial acclaim of her earlier work. Nowadays her appearances are more sporadic, though well-received. In particular, her role in Black Swan (2010) and her work on the TV series Stranger Things (2016) have reinforced the idea that she is still as talented as she was in her heyday. Here are five more reminders of just how good an actress Winona Ryder is.

The Crucible (1996) – Character: Abigail Williams

Nicholas Hytner’s adaptation of Arthur Miller’s acclaimed play (and with a script by Miller himself) features a stunning performance from Ryder as the lover of Daniel Day-Lewis’s character who, out of envy, sparks a witch hunt in the town of Salem. Ryder is mesmerising as the vindictive Abigail, and she more than holds her own against the likes of Day-Lewis, Joan Allen, and Paul Scofield, imbuing her character with an angry, yet damaged vulnerability that more than justifies her vengeful actions.

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A Scanner Darkly (2006) – Character: Donna Hawthorne

In Richard Linklater’s bold, inventive movie, which features the second fully integrated use of rotoscoping (basically tracing over original movie footage), Ryder is a dealer of Substance D, a drug that has gotten 20% of the American public hooked on it. Keanu Reeves’ undercover government agent becomes emotionally entangled with her, and it’s Ryder’s quietly subtle performance that helps guide the viewer through some of the more labyrinthine aspects of the narrative, and (hopefully) out the other side.

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The House of the Spirits (1993) – Character: Blanca Trueba

Based on the novel by Isabel Allende, this arresting look at love and politics during the turbulent years of the military dictatorship in Chile sees Ryder recalling her character’s memories as a child and then following that same character’s adult life, and all the difficulties experienced at both times. It’s a largely supporting role, but Ryder is more than capable of providing a fully rounded character who has an increasing impact on the story the movie is telling. It’s also a testament to Ryder that this was her third costume/historical drama in a row – after Bram Stoker’s Dracula (1992) and The Age of Innocence (1993) – and she retains the virtues that allowed her to give such great performances in those movies as well.

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The Iceman (2012) – Character: Deborah Kuklinski

As the unsuspecting wife of real life hitman Richard Kuklinski (Michael Shannon), Ryder gives an understated, yet compelling performance that acts as a credible counterpoint to Shannon’s more expressive role. This was another reminder that Ryder is a fine, intuitive actress when given the right role, and she matches her co-star for intensity when the part requires it, leaving the viewer in no doubt that whatever troubles have plagued her in the past, she’s still more than capable of bringing a somewhat stock character to life.

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Square Dance (1987) – Character: Gemma Dillard

In only her second appearance in a movie, Ryder plays a thirteen year old who, having lived in the country with her grandparents (Jason Robards and Jane Alexander) for most of her life, accepts an offer from her mother to go and live with her in the city. She gives a sweet, confident performance in a movie that deserves to be reassessed as it approaches its thirtieth anniversary, and she displays a maturity in the role that few other actresses at that age could muster.

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10 Reasons to Remember Andrzej Wajda (1926-2016)

11 Tuesday Oct 2016

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Andrzej Wajda (6 March 1926 – 9 October 2016)

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The most prominent movie maker to come out of Poland, Andrzej Wajda was also a director with a strong European sensibility, even as he was chronicling the turbulent political times he lived in. His father was killed in the Katyn Massacre in 1940 (an event Wajda would revisit in 2007), but he survived along with his mother and brother. After the war he went to Kraków’s Academy of Fine Arts, and then in the early Fifties the Łódź Film School, where he was an apprentice to the director Aleksander Ford. He made his first movie, A Generation in 1955; it was also the first in a trilogy of movies that would take an anti-war stance then unpopular in Poland itself, which was still under Soviet rule.

He worked in the theatre as well, but focused more and more on movie making. His work gained international recognition – Kanal (1956) shared the Special Jury Prize at Cannes in 1957 with Ingmar Bergman’s The Seventh Seal – and he was able to explore more of the topics that interested him, as in Lotna (1959), a tribute to the Polish Cavalry that his father had been a part of. Throughout the Sixties he made movies that were more and more allegorical and symbolic, and his reputation increased accordingly. He was most successful in the Seventies, making a string of films that cemented his position as the foremost Polish movie maker of his generation.

In the Eighties he continued to make movies but more and more of his time was taken up with supporting Lech Wałęsa’s Solidarity movement. This involvement angered the Polish government to such an extent that it forced the closure of Wajda’s production company. Undeterred, Wajda continued to make the movies he wanted to make, and his career continued to go from strength to strength. In 1990 he was honoured by the European Film Awards with a Lifetime Achievement award (only the third director to have the honour, after Fellini and Bergman). Wajda won numerous other awards during his lifetime, and he was a tireless innovator who held a light up to the social and political upheavals and troubles that were occuring in his beloved Poland. His movies had a rigid formalism to them that was always undermined (and deliberately so) by Wajda’s own innate sympathy for humanity. He was a passionate, discerning movie maker who could make audiences laugh, cry, be angry or sad, but never bored or uninvolved.

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1 – A Generation (1955)

2 – Kanal (1957)

3 – Ashes and Diamonds (1958)

4 – The Birch Wood (1970)

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5 – The Promised Land (1975)

6 – Man of Marble (1977)

7 – Man of Iron (1981)

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8 – Danton (1983)

9 – Korczak (1990)

10 – Katyn (2007)

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Robert Zemeckis’ 10 Most Successful Movies at the International Box Office

10 Monday Oct 2016

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Robert Zemeckis has been making movies for nearly forty years. He’s been at the forefront of a variety of technical firsts, from motion capture (on The Polar Express) to digital effects (Lieutenant Dan’s missing legs in Forrest Gump), but despite all this he’s still an actors’ director at heart, and he loves to tell a story. Even when his aim is to tell a serious story, such as in The Walk (2015), he still wants to entertain the audience, and to take them on a journey to a place they’ve never seen or experienced before. Along the way he’s made a handful of movies that are bona fide modern classics, and made a little town called Hill Valley into a place we’d all like to visit. For providing us with so many wonderful movie memories, here’s how we’ve repaid him at the international box office.

10 – Beowulf (2007) – $196,393,745

The middle picture in Zemeckis’ motion capture trilogy, Beowulf sees him trying to stretch the boundaries of both motion capture and 3D but with predictably mixed results. While his use of 3D is exemplary, the problems that prevented The Polar Express from being completely effective – the dullness of the eyes, the subtleties of lip movement – remain to make for some awkward moments. Nevertheless, the final showdown with the dragon is still one of the best fantasy sequences yet committed to screen (in any format), and Angelina Jolie is a great choice for Grendel’s mother.

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9 – Back to the Future Part III (1990) – $244,527,583

The last in the trilogy was always going to divide audiences. Some were always going to love it for its Western setting, others were going to hate it for exactly the same reason. Whatever your leaning, what is unassailable is the movie’s appreciation for the genre, and the very satisfactory way in which Zemeckis and co-writer Bob Gale have wound up the overall story. Few trilogy closers are this triumphal, and fewer still are as emotionally astute – only Toy Story 3 (2010) springs to mind – but when you’re having this much fun saying goodbye, it seems right and proper to such a degree that you never think about just how much you’re going to miss the characters when it’s done.

8 – What Lies Beneath (2000) – $291,420,351

Zemeckis tries his hand at a psycho-drama with supernatural overtones, ropes in Michelle Pfeiffer and Harrison Ford as the leads, and manages to pull off a number of effective sequences, but ultimately, What Lies Beneath is a movie that doesn’t quite work in the way that Zemeckis and screenwriter Clark Gregg want it to. The tone of the movie fluctuates too often, leaving viewers uncertain if they’re watching a bloodless horror, a taut thriller, or a domestic drama gone awry. There are elements of all three on display, but it’s when they’re all combined in the same scene that things go badly wrong. Still, the scene where Pfeiffer is paralysed in the bathtub is unbearably tense, and Zemeckis handles it with accomplished ease.

7 – The Polar Express (2004) – $307,514,317

Best seen in its IMAX 3D format, The Polar Express (now a Xmas staple) sees Zemeckis experimenting for the first time with motion capture and gives Tom Hanks the chance to emulate Alec Guinness’s eight role appearance in Kind Hearts and Coronets (1949). It’s a heartwarming tale, with a plethora of breathtaking visuals and sequences – the train racing across a frozen lake as the ice breaks up is simply stunning – and if it’s a little too smothered in saccharine at times, then it’s a small price to pay for a movie that in terms of its original look (and the problems that come with it) is endlessly fascinating to watch.

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6 – A Christmas Carol (2009) – $325,855,863

Zemeckis teams with Jim Carrey for a version of Dickens’ classic tale that dials back on The Polar Express‘s sometimes overbearing sentimentality, and offers all kinds of visual tricks and complexities as the director tries once more to convince audiences that motion capture is the way of the future. But even though many of the issues surrounding facial expressions and physical movement that hampered The Polar Express and Beowulf have been addressed, there’s still an inherent “unreality” to the characters that, in the end (and despite the movie’s success), audiences couldn’t ignore, or overlook.

5 – Who Framed Roger Rabbit (1988) – $329,803,958

When Who Framed Roger Rabbit was first released, there were plenty of people who were fooled by the opening Baby Herman cartoon into thinking the whole movie was going to be animated. That might have been a good move on Zemeckis’ part, but how less satisfying it would have been than this perennial crowd-pleaser, both an homage to the Golden Age of Animation, and the most expensive movie (animated or otherwise) made in the Eighties. It’s an almost perfect blend of comedy, drama, pathos and nostalgia that moves at a cracking pace, and has so many visual gags in it you can’t catch them all in a single viewing. Roger is adorable, his wife Jessica Rabbit “isn’t bad… [she’s] just drawn that way”, and when revealed, Judge Doom is one of the scariest villains in any movie, period.

4 – Back to the Future Part II (1989) – $331,950,002

Many people felt that Back to the Future Part II was too complex, too convoluted, and too much of a head-scratcher, especially when Marty travelled back to 1955 to ensure his parents got together – again. But it’s the movie’s complex understanding of time travel, and the consequences that can arise when time is tinkered with, that makes this first sequel such an unexpected joy to watch. It’s also darker and more cynical than the first and third movies, but Zemeckis handles the material with confidence and no small amount of flair. For some fans, this is the best movie in the trilogy.

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3 – Back to the Future (1985) – $381,109,762

The movie that made Zemeckis’ career, Back to the Future is a delight from start to finish, a beautifully rendered love poem to a bygone era, and one of the smartest sci-fi comedies ever made (if not the smartest). Michael J. Fox and Christopher Lloyd make for an inspired teaming, and the whole thing is both whimsical and irresistible, with some classic lines of dialogue (“Roads? Where we’re going, we don’t need roads.”), and a whole raft of smart, enagaging performances. A movie you can watch over and over again and never tire of it.

2 – Cast Away (2000) – $429,632,142

If all you take away from Cast Away is that Tom Hanks lost an awful lot of weight to convince viewers his character was living on a desert island, and that he talked (a lot) to a volleyball called Wilson, then you’re missing the point of a movie that paints a vivid, unsentimental portrait of a man believed missing at sea who learns the art of survival the hard way. Hanks gives one of his best-ever performances, but the script includes too many longeuers for comfort, and the final third fails to match the impetus of the opening scenes. Zemeckis shows a keen eye for the practicalities of surviving on a desert island, and along with a committed Hanks, ensures the audience is just as invested in Hanks’s character getting off the island as he is.

1 – Forrest Gump (1994) – $677,945,399

Unsurprisingly, it’s the Oscar-winning home run that is Forrest Gump which sits atop this list. A perfect combination of director, script and star, the movie blends so many disparate elements, both thematically and visually (and with such confidence), that it’s easy to forget just how much of a surprise this movie was when it appeared over twenty years ago. Hanks, arguably, has never been better, and the same can be said of Zemeckis, who displays a fearlessness in handling the material that he’s never quite managed to recapture in his work since then.

forrest-gump

Mini-Review: De Palma (2015)

25 Sunday Sep 2016

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de-palma

D: Noah Baumbach, Jake Paltrow / 110m

With: Brian De Palma

It’s a great idea: take a movie maker whose career spans over fifty years, put him in front of a camera, and let him talk about that career in as much detail as he can. It’s a great idea, and it’s a simple one, and Brian De Palma is a perfect choice. He’s had a career with its fair share of ups and downs, critical and commercial successes and failures, and he’s not hesitant about defending some of the “poor choices” he’s made over the years. From his early days making student shorts such as Woton’s Wake (1962), De Palma is captivating and incisive about his work. He talks about each movie he’s made – some in more depth than others – but always with a view to explaining what he feels went right and what went wrong with each movie, and why. He talks about his disagreements with the studios, with screenwriters (De Palma is possibly the only director who worked with Robert Towne and thought he wasn’t doing a good enough job), and occasionally with actors (his remarks about Cliff Robertson are hilarious).

In terms of actual movie making, De Palma is a knowledgeable, avuncular storyteller, able to recall the reasons he made certain movies, the battles he had to fight to get some of them made, and why some weren’t as successful as others. His reasoning at times is a little self-serving (he still thinks The Bonfire of the Vanities (1990) holds up as a movie), and he’s dismissive of the critics and their views (unless that critic is Pauline Kael, who championed his work when few others would). He has some great anecdotes to tell about the likes of Robert De Niro and Sean Connery, and he’s not afraid to talk about the accusations of exploitation and Hitchcockian mimicry that have dogged his career.

de-palma-scene

There are well-chosen clips from each of De Palma’s movies, and most serve as visual references for his opinions and recollections. Here and there are revelations that many people won’t be aware of, or have seen, such as the alternative ending to Snake Eyes (1998), and his use of Michael Caine’s double in Dressed to Kill (1980). There’s a whole mineful of useful, interesting information being relayed here, and De Palma is an engaging, smart, occasionally witty interviewee; listening to him talk about the perils involved in getting a movie off the ground is like a masterclass in itself (and it’s happened to him way too often for comfort). But you also get a good sense of how tenacious he’s been in the past, and how determined he’s been to make the movies he’s wanted to make.

If there’s one issue that De Palma the movie is unable to address, it’s that De Palma the man goes unchallenged throughout. By giving De Palma a free pass, he’s allowed to make several remarks that would normally require further exploration (see The Bonfire of the Vanities). This leads, on occasion, to a number of moments where the viewer may be tempted to ask their own questions in the hope that De Palma somehow picks up on them. Someone once observed that “all directors are egomaniacs”, and while De Palma seems a little less egocentric than most, eagle-eyed viewers will notice that he rarely accepts any blame for those of his movies that didn’t work out so well. But then, De Palma is telling his story, not someone else’s, and like any artist who creates alternate realities for a living, sometimes the line between truth and reality can get blurred by self-interest.

Rating: 8/10 – fans of Brian De Palma will find his reminiscences and opinions of great interest, and even casual admirers will be drawn in by his winning (and occasionally) belligerent approach; as mentioned already, De Palma is a great idea, and one that could (and should) be used to capture the views and experiences of his contemporaries – so, calling Mr Spielberg, and Mr Scorsese, and Mr Coppola…

10 Reasons to Remember Curtis Hanson (1945-2016)

21 Wednesday Sep 2016

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Curtis Hanson (24 March 1945 – 20 September 2016)

curtis-hanson

Like many of his contemporaries, Curtis Hanson grew up with an appreciation of movies made in the Golden Age of cinema (1930-1960), so much so that in his own movies he made references to the period, or had his characters watch movies made and released back then. Early on, after dropping out of high school, Hanson found work as a freelance photographer and editor for Cinema magazine. His first movie credit might come as a surprise: he co-wrote the screenplay for The Dunwich Horror (1970). Two years later he was able to get his first project made as writer and director and producer, the unsuccessful psycho horror thriller, Sweet Kill (1972). It was an experience that appears to have hampered Hanson’s career insofar as he didn’t direct again until 1979. The early Eighties saw him struggle to make any headway, with projects such as Losin’ It (1983) failing to gain the kind of response that would have boosted his career (and despite the presence of a young Tom Cruise).

But Hanson persevered, and in 1992 had a breakthrough hit with another psycho horror thriller, The Hand That Rocks the Cradle. It proved to be the fillip he needed, and from then on his career was assured. His choices became more varied, and he moved from genre to genre with an ease and a versatility that belied his previous work. His ability to work on projects that were outside of his own personal experience, in particular, and to find the core truth of them was always impressive. He was also able to extract some amazing performances from the actors he worked with, from Russell Crowe to Michael Douglas, Toni Collette and Paul Giamatti. Hanson was an intuitive director, intelligent and creative, visually astute and emotionally honest with his characters. Watching his movies will always be a joy – well, maybe not Evil Town (1987); no, really, don’t bother, there’s a reason he’s credited as Edward Collins – but now they’ll come with the bittersweet thought that Hanson’s particular approach to movie making won’t be repeated any more, and we’ll have to bear his loss along with all the other talented individuals 2016 seems intent on taking from us.

white-dog

1 – White Dog (1982) – co-screenwriter only

2 – The Bedroom Window (1987)

3 – The Hand That Rocks the Cradle (1992)

4 – The River Wild (1994)

the-river-wild

5 – L.A. Confidential (1997)

6 – Wonder Boys (2000)

7 – 8 Mile (2002)

8-mile

8 – In Her Shoes (2005)

9 – Too Big to Fail (2011)

10 – Chasing Mavericks (2012)

chasing-mavericks

Tim Burton’s 10 Most Successful Movies at the International Box Office

07 Wednesday Sep 2016

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A consistently quirky and visually inventive director, Tim Burton’s career has followed a steady path through some of the most iconic settings in recent cinema history, from the cod-Gothic streets of Gotham, to a future(past?)-Earth ruled by apes, to the haunted woods of 18th Century New England, and the outer limits of Lewis Carroll’s vivid imagination. For over thirty years, ever since the release of Pee-Wee’s Big Adventure (1985), the wild-haired director has taken us on startling journey after startling journey, and kept us entertained throughout. If his more recent output hasn’t exactly overwhelmed critics and audiences in the way that previous movies have, Burton still has the capacity to excite and stimulate his admirers in a way that few other directors can. This explains the level of anticipation surrounding his latest feature, Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children (due later this year), a movie that seems a perfect fit for Burton’s own “peculiar” sensibility. Whether or not it will be as successful as the movies listed below, no one knows – yet* – but if it is, then it will be interesting to see just how successful it is… and how far up the list it lands.

corpse-bride

10 – Corpse Bride (2005) – $117,195,061

A companion piece to Henry Selick’s The Nightmare Before Christmas (1993) with its songs, portrayal of a darker world beyond ours, and stylised animation, Corpse Bride has a lyrical quality to it that highlights the sweetness of the relationship that develops between the nervous Victor Van Dort (Johnny Depp) and the Corpse Bride herself, Emily (Helena Bonham Carter). Burton’s love of animation and its visual possibilities shines through here, as he depicts a world at once familiar and yet also removed from our own, and tugs at our heartstrings in often surprising, yet affecting ways.

9 – Big Fish (2003) – $122,919,055

A terrific cast – headed by Ewan McGregor and Albert Finney – and Burton’s use of fantasy to illustrate the differences (and similarities) between a father and son, helps Big Fish to branch out in unexpected dramatic directions for most of its running time. After the critical debacle of Planet of the Apes, Burton’s foray into what could be loosely termed the Great American Saga is a winning, immensely enjoyable fable that mixes drama, comedy and a delightful imagination to create a uniquely heartfelt story, and is one of Burton’s shamefully under-appreciated features.

8 – Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street (2007) – $152,523,164

Tim Burton and Johnny Depp – making a musical together? While the subject matter may well have been a good fit for Burton given his love of Hammer horror movies, an adaptation of the Stephen Sondheim/Hugh Wheeler Broadway success looked like it would fall as flat as Depp’s singing voice. But an arresting production design, plenty of gory throat cuttings, vivid presentations of the songs, and a well-chosen supporting cast all help to make Burton’s incursion into the world of the musical a triumphant success, and one of the best of its kind in recent years.

7 – Sleepy Hollow (1999) – $206,071,502

One of Burton’s more enjoyable romps, Sleepy Hollow is another movie that seems to have been tailor-made for him. The bleak New England setting, the palpable sense of fear amongst the townfolk, and a memorable villain in the Headless Horseman, all contrive to make the movie an ominous yet light-hearted escapade that has a great deal of energy and purpose about it. The period setting, and its science versus the supernatural angle, is deftly handled, and Johnny Depp gives one of his better performances as the in over his (potentially decapitated) head policeman, Ichabod Crane.

sleepy-hollow

6 – Dark Shadows (2012) – $245,527,149

A big fan of the original televison show that ran from 1966-1971, Burton’s take on the Collins’ clan of vampires and their home town of Collinsport, Maine proved to be a misfire that relied way too much on its comedic elements (which aren’t that funny to begin with), and never managed to find a consistent tone. Johnny Depp serves up a prime slice of ham, Eva Green tries to match him, and Burton’s direction feels like it was put together in the editing suite. Even the visuals have a flat, uninspired air about them, as if Burton and his team realised early on that their passion for the project wasn’t going to be enough.

5 – Batman Returns (1992) – $266,822,354

For some, Batman Returns will always be the best of the quartet of Caped Crusader movies made back in the late Eighties/Nineties, and in terms of the story and the plotting, they’d be right. It also sees Burton’s wild and wonderful imagination given even freer reign than on the first movie. Another triumph of production design, Burton’s Gotham is a heavily stylised, bleakly functional place that is the perfect backdrop for its tale of good versus evil. And any movie that features Michelle Pfeiffer in figure-hugging black leather…

4 – Planet of the Apes (2001) – $362,211,740

If there’s one movie in Burton’s oeuvre that really shouts “massive mistake!” it’s the often unbearable-to-watch Planet of the Apes. Remakes of beloved classics rarely turn out well, and this proved the rule. Whether it’s the miscasting of Wahlberg, the terrible script that couldn’t be its own thing and had to keep referencing the 1968 original, the recurring sense of déja vu that dogs the movie as a result, or the defiantly daft-as-a-box-of-frogs surprise ending, the problems are all topped by Burton’s almost complete lack of engagement with the material. There’s a sci-fi movie that Burton could direct out there somewhere, but this definitely isn’t it.

planet-of-the-apes

3 – Batman (1989) – $411,348,924

By the time Burton was earmarked to make Warner Bros.’ new take on Bruce Wayne’s alter ego, he’d achieved a modicum of success and respect thanks to his two previous features, Pee-Wee’s Big Adventure (1985) and Beetlejuice (1988). Batman, though, launched Burton’s career into the stratosphere. It was a brave move on the part of Warner Bros., but Burton rewarded them with a take on the Dark Knight that was at once visionary, bold, and inherently psychological. With strong performances from Michael Keaton and Kim Basinger (usually overlooked, and unfairly so), it’s biggest coup was Jack Nicholson as the Joker, a dazzling, out-there portrayal that in its own, surprisingly effective way, is a match for any other interpretation of the character that’s, well… out there.

2 – Charlie and the Chocolate Factory (2005) – $474,968,763

Roald Dahl and Tim Burton seem like an obvious combination, and it took a while for them to be “teamed up”, but the results were mixed to say the least. While financially successful, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory lacks a lot of the charm of the original, and some of the additions to the script shift the focus away from Charlie himself, and onto Willy Wonka (something Dahl probably wouldn’t have approved of). Along with the movie in the No. 1 spot, it’s also a movie that has been production designed to death, leaving each new “moment of wonder” much like all the rest, and blending into one. Burton reflects on notions of fatherhood and abandonment – a common theme in his movies – but here they feel tired, leaving only Freddie Highmore’s quietly impressive performance for audiences to respond to.

1 – Alice in Wonderland (2010) – $1,025,467,110

Burton’s most successful movie at the box office is not his best, and like Charlie and the Chocolate Factory features a riotous production design that helps paper over the cracks of a wayward script and equally wayward performances. Burton’s usual flair for the bizarre is firmly on display but in such a watered-down fashion that it’s difficult to work out if he was fully engaged with the material (he’s always seemed more at home working on a movie’s pre-production than on the actual shoot). Looking back at the movie, it’s hard to see why Alice in Wonderland has been so successful, as it’s colour-rich phantasmagoria lack the kind of emotional investment to make it all work as it should, and Johnny Depp provides yet another irritating performance. But ultimately it’s Burton’s distance from proceedings that hurts the movie most, and makes it a less than rewarding experience.

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*Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children has been as successful as everyone hoped. As of 21 October 2016 it’s made $200,165,118 at the international box office.

Steven Soderbergh’s 10 Most Successful Movies at the International Box Office

30 Tuesday Aug 2016

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An indie movie maker through and through, Steven Soderbergh has made some of the most compelling and thought-provoking movies of the last thirty years. From his breakout Sundance hit sex, lies and videotape (1989), Soderbergh has tackled projects in a wide variety of genres and with an appropriately wide variety of results at the box office. Some have failed to make back the money they cost to make – Gray’s Anatomy (1997), The Good German (2006) – while others have underperformed (see the Top 10 below). But he has had some successes, mostly thanks to a certain franchise, but even outside of those movies, and despite his decision to retire from making movies in 2013, Soderbergh has remained a director you can never quite pin down. If nothing else, this list reflects the diversity of his output, and is a reminder of the quality of his work over the years.

10 – The Informant! (2009) – $41,771,168

A movie that never quite achieved the recognition it deserves, The Informant! uses its real life story in a way that refutes the “zany” approach presented in its trailers, and by doing so makes it much more rewarding. This is due to the combination of Scott Z. Burns’ clever screenplay, Soderbergh’s relaxed direction, and Matt Damon’s beautifully judged performance as deluded whistleblower Mark Whitacre. Ripe for rediscovery, it’s a tragic farce that has far more going on under the surface than most casual viewers will be aware of.

The Informant!

9 – Side Effects (2013) – $63,372,757

Soderbergh brings his usual intelligence and cool approach to thriller-dom with this convoluted and surprisingly well-constructed story set around medical ethics and the nature of psychopathology. While that may sound too highbrow for some, Side Effects revels in its Hitchcockian twists and turns – Soderbergh wanted to recreate the look and feel of old suspense movies for a modern era – and manages to keep audiences guessing all the way to its final reveal.

8 – Out of Sight (1998) – $77,745,568

The oldest Soderbergh movie on the list is also possibly his best, a funny, dramatic, odd couple romance (based on the novel by Elmore Leonard) that features a career-best performance from Jennifer Lopez, and George Clooney in the role that cemented his reputation as an A-lister. Soderbergh is clearly having fun with the material, and it’s easily one of his most visually entertaining movies as well, thanks to his use of stylised colour palettes and freeze frames to highlight significant moments in the story.

7 – Contagion (2011) – $135,458,097

A timely warning about the nature of pandemics and the ease with which they can spread, along with the inability of governments to deal with them in a constructive way, Contagion may have too many storylines (some of which don’t add much to the narrative), but is still an intelligently mounted, urgently prescient movie that uses its multi-national cast to (mostly) good effect – sorry, Marion Cotillard – while maintaining a focus on the pandemic’s impact on regular, individual lives.

Contagion

6 – Magic Mike (2012) – $167,221,571

If you had any doubts about Soderbergh’s ability to tackle a variety of genres and stories, then this behind-the-scenes look at the lives of a group of male strippers should have dispelled any lasting uncertainty. Raucous, raunchy and down to earth, Magic Mike features a terrific performance from Matthew McConaughey, the kind of off-colour humour you’d expect given the characters, and a succession of stage routines that should have female viewers leaning forward in their seats – a lot.

5 – Traffic (2000) – $207,515,725

Another contender for Soderbergh’s best movie (and winner of four Oscars, including one for Soderbergh himself), Traffic is a jolt to the senses that grips from the beginning and never lets go. Examining the drug trade from both sides of the US/Mexico border, from the highest echelons of US law enforcement to the infrastructure of a Mexican cartel, Stephen Gaghan’s impressively detailed script is given more than due justice by Soderbergh, and features equally impressive performances from the likes of Michael Douglas, Don Cheadle, Dennis Quaid, Catherine Zeta-Jones, and Oscar-winning Benicio Del Toro.

4 – Erin Brockovich (2000) – $256,271,286

2000 was an amazing year for Soderbergh, what with this and Traffic being released to critical and commercial acclaim. Based on the true story of its titular character, an Oscar-winning Julia Roberts has probably never been better as the no-experience paralegal who brings down a polluting Californian power company through a landmark class action suit. Threaded through the obvious drama are several moments of beautifully judged humour, and Roberts’ teaming with Albert Finney is inspired. All in all, a strong contender for Soderbergh’s most enjoyable and rewarding movie.

Erin Brockovich

3 – Ocean’s Thirteen (2007) – $311,312,624

By the time this second sequel rolled around, Soderbergh and Clooney et al were determined not to make the same mistakes that made Ocean’s Twelve so underwhelming. While still not perfect, Ocean’s Thirteen is definitely more entertaining than its predecessor, even if it tries too hard to be as charming as the first outing, but audiences were willing to give the movie a chance. That it did as well as it did at the box office may well be due to brand recognition, and the popularity of its cast, but it’s also a movie that sees Soderbergh come as close to going through the motions as he’s ever done.

2 – Ocean’s Twelve (2004) – $362,744,280

A sequel to Ocean’s Eleven was always going to come along at some point, but when it did no one could have predicted it would be such a humourless, drama-free non-event. Easily the worst movie of Soderbergh’s entire career – yes, even worse than Underneath (1995) – Ocean’s Twelve is the very definition of a lacklustre movie. It’s almost as if Soderbergh and the returning cast decided to make a movie that was the very antithesis of Ocean’s Eleven, leaving it flat, unsatisfactory, unnecessarily confusing, and too reliant on “reveals” that are in no way foreshadowed anywhere else in the movie.

1 – Ocean’s Eleven (2001) – $450,717,150

Soderbergh’s most successful movie is probably his most well-known and well-regarded feature, a sharp, funny, engaging, clever, mischievous rascal of a movie that recreates the tone of the 1960 original and lends it a (then) modern sensibility that still holds up well fifteen years later. The scam is beautifully staged, the cast make it all look so easy, and the whole thing is handled with Soderbergh’s customary visual flair. It’s a movie that creates tension and expertly crafted edge-of-the-seat moments at every turn, and all of it while the movie is winking at the audience as if to say, “Well? Can you guess what’s happening?”

Ocean's Eleven

10 Reasons to Remember Gene Wilder (1933-2016)

29 Monday Aug 2016

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Gene Wilder (11 June 1933 – 29 August 2016)

Gene Wilder

Often wild of eye and generous of grin (and self-confessed Jewish-Buddhist-Atheist), Gene Wilder was an actor who was recruited into comedy by Mel Brooks – and thank Mel for that! It could all have been so different, though. Wilder’s career began in the late Fifties. He trained with Uta Hagen at the HB Studio before being accepted into the Actors’ Studio and taking private classes with Lee Strasberg. In the early to mid-Sixties, Wilder began to make a name for himself in various stage productions, until a production of Mother Courage and Her Children introduced him to Anne Bancroft, who in turn introduced him to her husband, Mel Brooks.

Having regarded himself as a serious, dramatic actor, Wilder acclimated quickly to comedy, and this despite making his feature debut in Bonnie and Clyde (1967). Aside from a handful of TV movies, Wilder didn’t stray from comedy for the rest of his career. But in doing so he provided us with so many wonderful, comic performances that if there had been any more diversions from comedy, it would have seemed like a betrayal.

He was well-known for his work with Brooks (five movies), and Richard Pryor (four movies). These collaborations cemented his fame and fortune, and brought him critical as well as commercial success. During the Seventies, Wilder made a string of movies that traded well on his ability to portray an unhinged loon with complete credibility. No matter what the scenario, Wilder’s high-pitched, hysterical expressions of incredulity were always funny to watch, even with repeated viewings.

Following his retirement from movies in 2003, Wilder decided to concentrate on writing, publishing a memoir as well as several novels and a collection of short stories. His philosophy was simple: “I’d rather be at home with my wife. I can write, take a break, come out, have a glass of tea, give my wife a kiss, and go back in and write some more. It’s not so bad. I am really lucky.” And so are we, to have such an enduring legacy of movies to enjoy for generations to come.

The Producers

1 – The Producers (1967)

2 – Quackser Fortune Has a Cousin in the Bronx (1970)

3 – Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory (1971)

4 – Blazing Saddles (1974)

Blazing Saddles

5 – Young Frankenstein (1974)

6 – The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes’ Smarter Brother (1975)

7 – Silver Streak (1976)

Silver Streak

8 – Stir Crazy (1980)

9 – The Woman in Red (1984)

10 – See No Evil, Hear No Evil (1989)

See No Evil, Hear No Evil

10 Reasons to Remember Arthur Hiller (1923-2016)

17 Wednesday Aug 2016

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Arthur Hiller (22 November 1923 – 17 August 2016)

Arthur Hiller

Born in Edmonton, Canada to Jewish parents who had immigrated from Poland in 1912, Arthur Hiller grew up in an environment where a love of music and theatre was instilled in him from a young age. He joined the Royal Canadian Air Force at the start of World War II, and became a navigator, flying numerous missions over Europe. In the early Fifties he began directing for Canadian television; this led to his being offered a job directing with NBC. Over the next ten years he worked steadily in television, contributing to shows such as Playhouse 90, Perry Mason, Gunsmoke, Alfred Hitchcock Presents, and Route 66.

During this period he made his feature debut, the coming-of-age romantic drama The Careless Years (1957), but it wasn’t until he worked for Disney on Miracle of the White Stallions (1963) that his movie career began to take off. By then, Hiller’s ability to work within different genres was standing him in good stead, enough for him to move away from television (almost) altogether. After 1965, his TV work consisted of three episodes of the series Insight, episodes that were made over an eleven-year period. Hiller soon allied himself with screenwriters of the calibre of Paddy Chayefsky and Neil Simon, and developed a reputation for making comedies that had a surprising depth to them.

1970 saw the release of Hiller’s most famous, and enduring movie of all, Love Story. The success of the movie cemented his success, and throughout the Seventies, Hiller had a run of hit movies that made him an A-list director. His was a brisk, authoritative style, but there was also a looseness, a sense of fun to his movies that made them more enjoyable than most comedies of the era. He was inspired by a post-War screening of Rome, Open City (1945), and he never lost sight of the emotional truth of his movies, even if some of his later works, such as Carpool (1996) weren’t as effective – or as amusing – as they could have been.

In 1989, he took on the role of President of the Directors Guild of America, a position he held until 1993, when he became President of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences for the next four years. He made one last movie, the less than pardonable National Lampoon’s Pucked (2006) (a career nadir for both Hiller and its star, Jon Bon Jovi), before retiring. Hiller will be fondly remembered for the way in which his movies resonated with audiences, their effortless likeability, and the almost timeless quality they carry, and the unassuming yet quietly confident way in which he directed them.

The Americanization of Emily

1 – The Americanization of Emily (1964)

2 – The Out of Towners (1970)

3 – Love Story (1970)

4 – Plaza Suite (1971)

PlazaSuite_Still_26.tif

5 – The Hospital (1971)

6 – The Man in the Glass Booth (1975)

7 – Silver Streak (1976)

Silver Streak

8 – The In-Laws (1979)

9 – The Lonely Guy (1984)

10 – Outrageous Fortune (1987)

Outrageous Fortune

Happy Birthday – Ben Affleck

15 Monday Aug 2016

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Ben Affleck (15 August 1972 -)

Ben Affleck

Few actors have had the career that Ben Affleck has (mostly) enjoyed. From his first appearance in the rarely seen drama The Dark End of the Street (1981) up until his more recent appearances as the Caped Crusader in both Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice and Suicide Squad (both 2016), the Berkeley-born multi-hyphenate has made a number of critically acclaimed movies, been one half of the critically derided Bennifer, and staged a comeback thanks to a series of critically acclaimed directorial outings. In front of the camera he’s better as a brooding, contemplative anti-hero than the comic actor he was asked to be so often in his early career, while behind the camera he’s proved he can deliver some of the finest dramatic movies of recent years. And of course, he’s a two-time Oscar winner, for co-writing Good Will Hunting (1997) with Matt Damon, and for being a producer on Argo (2012). It would seem that his future is now inextricably linked with the DC Extended Universe – though we shouldn’t hold that against him – so it may be that his profile won’t extend much beyond that particular arena in the coming years. But even so, Affleck has enough clout within the Hollywood industry now to ensure that whatever he does in the coming years, it will be warmly received and showered with awards (unless he dons a batsuit). Here though are five movies he’s made that are worth seeing because of his involvement.

Changing Lanes (2002) – Character: Gavin Banek

Changing Lanes

A simple traffic accident leads to outright hostilities between a young lawyer (Affleck) and an alcoholic insurance salesman (Samuel L. Jackson) in Roger Michell’s cautionary tale, a movie that cleverly shifts its sympathies between both men while also condemning their behaviour at every turn. Affleck subverts his natural charisma to good effect in a performance that is the epitomy of “sweaty desperation”.

Boiler Room (2000) – Character: Jim Young

Boiler Room

Affleck essays a supporting role here, playing the boss to Giovanni Ribisi’s aspiring investment broker in a movie that is unapologetically hard-boiled and rapacious. It may be Ribisi’s movie – and he’s very very good in it – but Affleck is unnervingly convincing as one of the co-founders of the firm he works for, and gives a scene-stealing performance early on that few actors of his generation could have provided.

State of Play (2009) – Character: Stephen Collins

State of Play

An uneven but still gripping adaptation of the original BBC series, this sees Affleck as the potentially corrupt congressman who may or may not be involved in a string of murders being investigated by his old friend, a newspaper journalist (played by Russell Crowe). Affleck takes a role that could have been strictly by-the-numbers, and imbues it with a complexity that matches the narrative and makes for a worthy adversary for Crowe’s dogged journalist.

Going All the Way (1997) – Character: Gunner Casselman

Going All the Way

As the extrovert buddy to Jeremy Davies’ introverted ex-serviceman in post-Korean War America, Affleck takes on a role that requires him to flaunt his obvious sexuality, and he rises to the challenge with gusto. Whenever he’s on screen he’s like a magnet for the eyes, a jock you can’t underestimate, and a character with much more depth than is usual for this type of role. Knowing this, Affleck gives an affecting performance, and steals the movie right from under Davies’s nose.

Hollywoodland (2006) – Character: George Reeves

Hollywoodland

For some, this is Affleck’s finest hour as an actor. As the increasingly haunted, yet charming Reeves (who played Superman on TV in the Fifties), Affleck gives a subtly shaded performance that reveals Reeves’ inability to deal with the pressures of fame, and highlights Affleck’s skills as an actor. Full of wonderful intuitive touches, it’s a supporting performance that feels like a lead role, and is mesmerising to watch, all a tribute to Affleck’s research, and commitment to the (real-life) character.

Ron Howard’s 10 Most Successful Movies at the International Box Office

04 Thursday Aug 2016

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Having successfully made the transition from actor to A-list director, Ron Howard has retained his populist focus ever since he made his first short movie, Old Paint, back in 1969. He’s also a director who moves from genre to genre, and while some of his detractors insist he doesn’t imprint his own particular stamp on any of them, he still has a recognisable style that’s all his own, whether it’s ramping up the tension as the Apollo 13 crew try to solve the problem of getting back home from the Moon, examining the life and times of one of Britain’s most iconic racing drivers, or indulging in some light-hearted fantasy romance involving a mermaid. In each of these there’s a subtle understanding that Howard takes it all very seriously but at the same time is having fun putting it all together, like a kid in a candy store who can pick anything he wants. He’s not the edgiest, or grittiest of directors, and sometimes the subject matter isn’t always a good match for his strengths (e.g. In the Heart of the Sea), but he isn’t afraid to take risks, and when he does connect with the right material, the effect can be breathtaking. Here then are his ten most successful movies at the international box office, and evidence (if it were needed), that you don’t have this much success unless you’re getting it right more times than not.

NOTE: As always, box office figures are all thanks to the good folks at boxofficemojo.com.

10 – Cinderella Man (2005) – $108,539,911

Howard’s biopic of the boxer James Braddock – apparently washed-up but with one last championship fight left in him – Cinderella Man reunites the director with Russell Crowe and makes the Depression-era Thirties as much of a character as any of the people depicted. It’s a powerful piece about pride and redemption, and of all the movies on this list is probably Howard’s most underrated project. A towering achievement, and in terms of recreating an age where people had to fight for so many things, including the right to a basic life, Braddock’s tale is a salutary lesson in self-belief and how not to give up.

Cinderella Man

9 – Parenthood (1989) – $126,297,830

Howard has always been able to assemble great casts for his movies, and Parenthood is no exception. A comic ramble through the ups and downs of, yes, parenthood, Howard deftly explores the stresses and strains, and quiet heroics, that make up being a parent, and along the way keeps things grounded yet heartfelt. It’s a small, unassuming masterpiece of a movie, with terrific performances from Steve Martin and Dianne Weist, and features early turns from Keanu Reeves and Joaquin Phoenix (back when he was known as Leaf Phoenix). And as Jason Robards’ character so aptly puts it, parenting is “like your Aunt Edna’s ass. It goes on forever and it’s just as frightening.”

8 – Far and Away (1992) – $137,783,840

Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman in a romantic drama set against the backdrop of the Irish famine – what could possibly go wrong? Critics were quick to answer, and while it’s true that Far and Away isn’t the best example of Howard’s work in this list (it lacks passion and sincerity, and never engages the audience as powerfully as it should), it still retains a certain flavour that helps overcome the movie’s soap opera narrative and the overly romanticized nature of much of the material. Howard plays up the central relationship but is hampered by (then married couple) Cruise and Kidman’s lack of chemistry, leaving him adrift in a way that wouldn’t happen again until In the Heart of the Sea.

7 – Backdraft (1991) – $152,368,585

In between Parenthood and Far and Away, Howard made this testosterone-fuelled homage to US firefighters, and in the process made a movie that easily fits the term “guilty pleasure”. A certain amount of romanticism is involved (witness Kurt Russell tackling raging infernos without a helmet or breathing apparatus), and it’s allied to a mystery concerning a string of arson attacks, but the movie scores highly when it puts its willing cast in amongst the flames, and when Howard dials back the heroics to examine just what it is that drives these men on in such dangerous circumstances. Nascent star William Baldwin has never been better, but he’s still overshadowed by the likes of Scott Glenn, Robert De Niro, J.T. Walsh, and Donald Sutherland as Backdraft‘s very own version of Hannibal Lecter (“Burn it all”).

Prince WIlliam County firefighters watch as visiting British firefighters Phil Driver (center/front) and Gary West (left/front) demonstrate British firefighting techniques in the county's flashover simulator, a chamber about the size of a cargo container which allows firefighters to experience the growth and progression of a fire under controlled conditions. Dylan Moore photo

6 – Ransom (1996) – $309,492,681

A cynical yet memorable thriller with stellar turns from Mel Gibson and Gary Sinise, Ransom sees Howard apply tension by the bucket load as he charts the response by Gibson’s mega-rich businessman to the kidnapping of his son. Howard pulls out all the stops, making the movie an often heart-stopping experience, and it’s a shame that he’s not found another project to bring out the same qualities he displays here. Helped immeasurably by his star’s commitment, the former Richie Cunningham dispels any idea that he can’t do “edgy” when the material requires it, making this one of the rare occasions in his career when Howard has actively refuted his critics.

5 – A Beautiful Mind (2001) – $313,542,341

The true story of asocial mathematician John Nash, A Brilliant Mind brought Howard and Russell Crowe together for the first time, and earned Oscars for both of them. A meticulous, solidly grounded exercise that explores with creativity and sensitivity the mind of a schizophrenic genius, the movie is far more audacious than perhaps even its supporters are aware, and its place in the list shows just how successfully Howard’s approach to the material scored a hit with, and resonated with, audiences around the world. A strong contender for the title of Howard’s best movie, and a testament to the notion that there are no stories – true or otherwise – that can’t be made if a director is confident enough to trust in the material (in this case, Akiva Goldsman’s succinct and sympathetic screenplay).

4 – How the Grinch Stole Christmas (2000) – $345,141,403

A rare foray into fantasy for Howard, and twelve years after the disappointment that was Willow. Adapting Dr Suess for a live action big screen outing may have seemed foolhardy at the time, but Howard enters into the spirit of things and makes the movie one giant confection to be enjoyed over and over again. With the inspired casting of Jim Carrey as the Grinch, and the good doctor’s off-kilter sensibility given free rein, Howard is free to indulge himself as much as the audience, and the result is a movie that sees him having fun with the garish environs of Whoville, the innate pomposity of the Whovian “intelligentsia”, and the waspish barbs uttered by the Grinch. A joy from start to finish.

How the Grinch Stole Christmas

3 – Apollo 13 (1995) – $355,237,933

Howard has always had a healthy attraction for true stories of courage, but he excelled himself with this gripping, incredibly well mounted account of the crew of Apollo 13’s attempt to get back home after their mission suffers from setback after setback after setback. Howard is aided by a string of impressive performances, from Tom Hanks, Kevin Bacon and Bill Paxton as the beleaguered astronauts, to Ed Harris’s no-nonsense mission controller, and all the way down the cast list to people such as Kathleen Quinlan, and good luck charm Clint Howard. But it’s the verisimilitude achieved by Howard and his design team that registers the most, making Apollo 13 entirely credible and helping to make the astronauts’ predicament as taut as possible. Even if you know the outcome, Howard’s ability as a director will still keep you guessing if they actually get home – and that’s no small feat.

2 – Angels & Demons (2009) – $485,930,816

This and Howard’s most successful movie probably won’t be any surprise but what can’t be denied is that having a built-in audience is half the battle won. Reteaming with Hanks for what is actually a prequel to The Da Vinci Code, Howard retains the faithful adaptation approach he took with Dan Jones’ first outing for symbologist Robert Langdon, but still can’t do anything to combat the problems inherent in Jones’ wayward tale of corruption and murder within the Vatican. As a result, this seems more like Howard taking a back seat to the material and getting on board solely as a director for hire, rather than as an instigator.

1 – The Da Vinci Code (2006) – $758,239,851

The fan base was there, and a big screen adaptation was always going to happen, but of all the directors to take up the challenge of making Dan Jones’ literary behemoth, Howard probably wasn’t anyone’s first choice. Nevertheless, he does the best he can to replicate the pace and urgency of the novel, and elicits another committed performance from Hanks, but is hampered at every turn by the absurdities of Jones’s story; so much so that the book’s big revelation is a tepid affair at best, and risible at worst. But this was always going to be a success, and if you’re going to be attached to the movie version of a global phenomenon, that’s still no bad thing for your reputation. With third adaptation Inferno due to hit screens later this year, it’ll be interesting to see where it will fit into this list in a year’s time, though it’s unlikely to topple this first outing.

The Da Vinci Code

Ridley Scott’s 10 Most Successful Movies at the International Box Office

17 Sunday Jul 2016

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In a career that spans nearly forty years, Ridley Scott has directed so many arresting and visually memorable movies, and in such a wide variety of genres, that it doesn’t seem to matter what projects he takes on, he’s pretty much guaranteed an audience when they’re released. He’s a meticulous, well-prepared director who likes to do as much as possible practically, though is more well-known for two movies whose use of CGI made them more successful than they perhaps would have been without it. The movies in this list have made over $3 billion at the international box office, so you can see why he’s a much sought after director, and never seems to take a break between movies. In his seventies now, he’s still preparing and making movies with the same energy and passion that he had nearly forty years ago. Let’s hope most, if not all, of his future projects are as successful as the ones listed below.

NOTE: Figures for Alien (1979) and Blade Runner (1982), two movies you would have thought would make the list, are sadly unavailable.

10 – Body of Lies (2008) – $115,097,286

Terrorism in the Middle East, and the murky involvement of the CIA, are the focus of Scott’s taut thriller which reunites Leonardo DiCaprio and Russell Crowe for the first time since Sam Raimi’s The Quick and the Dead (1995). It’s a complex piece of work with many subplots and layer upon layer of political expediency and moralising adding texture to the movie’s more overt thriller elements. If it doesn’t succeed entirely then it’s not for want of Scott trying, and there’s a standout performance from Mark Strong that overshadows the work of both DiCaprio and Crowe – and that’s saying something.

Body of Lies

9 – Black Hawk Down (2001) – $172,989,651

Scott has always had a penchant for true stories, and Black Hawk Down, the tale of one hundred and twenty-three elite US soldiers making an incursion into Somalia and then finding themselves battling against a much stronger Somali force than their intelligence was aware of, is no exception. Scott brings an impressive sense of realism to the movie, and the fighting sequences are as intense as you’d expect, but what makes this movie work is the way in which Scott and screenwriter Ken Nolan manage to make the audience care about each and every one of those one hundred and twenty-three soldiers as if we’d known them all our lives.

8 – Kingdom of Heaven (2005) – $211,652,051

Unfairly maligned when it was first released, Kingdom of Heaven is a sprawling epic set at the time of the Crusades that feels like it was made to (belatedly) cash in on Scott’s success with Gladiator (2000). Happily, this is its own movie, and while some of the politicking of the time is overlooked in favour of too many battle scenes, Scott keeps things relatively simple and coaxes a better-than-expected performance from Orlando Bloom. That said, if you want to see the movie, choose the three-hour Director’s Cut instead of the theatrical version.

7 – American Gangster (2007) – $266,465,037

Another true story, this time centred around the life of drugs kingpin Frank Lucas (played by Denzel Washington), and set in the Seventies, American Gangster sees Scott reunited again with Russell Crowe, and holding back on the visual flourishes in order to tell a dramatic story on its own terms. It’s not quite the sweeping historical epic that its run time would have you believe, but it does feature strong performances from its two leads, and the clever tricks of Lucas’s trade make for fascinating viewing.

6 – Exodus: Gods and Kings (2014) – $268,175,631

You can see the attraction for Scott in a movie based around the rivalry between Moses and his “brother” the Pharaoh Ramses, but thanks to a script that seems to have been patched together at short notice, Exodus: Gods and Kings is a dramatic mess that can’t even elicit good performances from Christian Bale and Joel Edgerton, and also features some of the least convincing (i.e. ropiest) CGI seen in recent years. A misfire then, but Scott still manages to invest the movie with his customary, and always worthwhile, attention to detail.

Exodus Gods and Kings

5 – Robin Hood (2010) – $321,669,741

Less of a swashbuckling approach to the Robin Hood myth than a retread (in part) of Robin and Marian (1976), Scott’s fifth collaboration with Russell Crowe aims for earthy realism, but in doing so, fails to include a lot of what makes the myth so popular and entertaining. Scott marshals the visual elements with his trademark flair but can’t seem to inject any energy into Brian Helgeland’s too-respectful script. This leaves the movie feeling uneven and less than engaging, and the relationship between Robin and Maid Marian (played by Cate Blanchett) seems more matter-of-fact than truly romantic.

4 – Hannibal (2001) – $351,692,268

Scott’s first sequel (and so far only one, until Alien: Covenant comes out next year) sees him inherit the services of Anthony Hopkins but not Jodie Foster as Hannibal details what the cannibal doctor did next. There’s an over-abundance of style that should seem out of place but somehow works, and though Julianne Moore struggles as Clarice Starling, nevertheless Scott imbues her scenes with Hopkins with a delicate mutual dependency that gives the storyline some much-needed depth. And then there’s that scene at the end…

3 – Prometheus (2012) – $403,354,469

When it was first announced that Scott was returning to the world of Alien, and with a prequel at that, fans of the series wept for joy. Alas, Prometheus left audiences with more questions than they had answers to, and in particular, what on earth happened that it turned out so badly? Scott may know the answer to that one, but his insistence on practical physical surroundings aside, this woeful exercise in late-bloom franchise expansion lacked subtlety, a coherent script, and featured a drab performance from Noomi Rapace – all things that Scott didn’t appear to have a solution for.

2 – Gladiator (2000) – $457,640,487

They said the days of sword-and-sandal epics was dead, that audiences didn’t want to see those kinds of movies anymore, where the hero had bigger breasts than the heroine, and the sets wobbled if anyone went near them. Thankfully, Scott and co-screenwriters David Franzoni, John Logan and William Nicholson had other ideas and the result is a triumphant reminder that when Scott is on top form there’s very few directors who can match him. Stirring, impressive (the scenes in the Coliseum really do buzz with excitement), with a handful of terrific performances and a sense of its own destiny (along with its lead character), this is high concept movie making at its best.

1 – The Martian (2015) – $630,161,890

Despite his being known as a director of science fiction movies, The Martian is only Scott’s fourth outing in the genre, but thanks to a near-perfect blend of drama, comedy and thrills, along with a standout performance from Matt Damon, this tale of an astronaut stranded on Mars and needing to stay alive until a rescue mission can reach him, is gripping, tightly structured, and a few narrative concerns aside, absolutely commanding. That it’s Scott’s most successful movie so far is perhaps not so surprising given the subject matter and Damon’s performance, but when you consider this was made very quickly indeed, it’s a tribute to Scott and his cast and crew that it turned out as well as it did.

The Martian

Happy Birthday – Chiwetel Ejiofor

10 Sunday Jul 2016

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Chiwetel Ejiofor (10 July 1977 -)

Chiwetel Ejiofor

A British actor who has found his mark in American movies, Chiwetel Ejiofor – pronounced Chew-eh-tell Edge-ee-oh-for if you’re not sure – has appeared in a number of high-profile features since he caught the attention of Steven Spielberg, and was cast in Amistad (1997). Since then he’s had the serious good fortune to appear in movies directed by the likes of Ridley Scott (twice), Woody Allen, Spike Lee (also twice), Roland Emmerich, and Joss Whedon. By his own admission he’s attracted to strong, dramatic stories, hence the reason Love Actually (2003) is one of the very few comedies to grace his CV, but it is that intensity and drive he can bring to a movie that makes his performances so memorable, even in something as disappointing as Secret in Their Eyes (2015). He’s best remembered for his award-winning portayal of Solomon Northup in 12 Years a Slave (2013), but fortunately it’s not a movie or a role that has pigeon-holed him since, and with his upcoming appearance as Baron Mordo in Marvel’s Doctor Strange (2016), it’s clear that he’ll continue to make a variety of dramatic movies, and in any genre. Here are five more movies that he’s appeared in over the years. Together, all of them confirm his range as an actor – as if this was needed – and all of them are well worth seeking out if you haven’t done already.

Talk to Me (2007) – Character: Dewey Hughes

Talk To Me

A movie about the life and times of ex-con and radio personality Ralph “Petey” Greene (played by Don Cheadle), sees Ejiofor playing his friend and manager. He gives an inspired (and award-winning) performance that perfectly complements Cheadle’s, and the movie’s examination of one of America’s most turbulent periods – the late Sixties, early Seventies – is faithfully depicted. Even if the episodic nature of the narrative stops the movie from being as powerful as it could have been, Ejiofor’s portrayal of Hughes is nothing short of outstanding.

Dirty Pretty Things (2002) – Character: Okwe

Dirty Pretty Things

A British movie that deals with issues of immigration and racism, Dirty Pretty Things is bolstered by yet another award-winning performance by Ejiofor. As a Nigerian doctor forced to leave his country and who finds front of house work at a hotel that hides a terrible secret, Ejiofor brings an honesty and sincerity to his portrayal that never once falters. He’s particularly good in his scenes with Audrey Tautou (as a Turkish Muslim seeking asylum), and does a superb job of maintaining Okwe’s fatalistic-yet-hopeful character, even when the odds that he’ll find happiness are stacked against him.

Endgame (2009) – Character: Thabo Mbeki

Endgame

The second true story in this list, Endgame concerns itself with the secret talks held between the African National Congress and the Afrikaner National Party as they tried to reach an agreement to end apartheid. As Mbeki, Ejiofor gives yet another excellent performance – this time alongside William Hurt’s professor of philosophy, Willie Esterhuyse. The relationship that evolves between the two men serves as an example of what life in South Africa without apartheid could be like, and as the passionate, demanding Mbeki, Ejiofor is on such good form he’s almost hypnotic.

Serenity (2005) – Character: The Operative

Serenity

Ejiofor’s first encounter with science fiction couldn’t have been more enjoyable – for him and for fans of the short-lived TV series Firefly. As the mysterious and determined Operative, Ejiofor elevates the character’s seemingly banal, villain-101 demeanour into something much more interesting and calculated. He also fits in well with the established cast, and proves more than capable of holding his own against the likes of Nathan Fillion and Alan Tudyk, while also creating a role that is memorable for being unexpectedly layered.

Kinky Boots (2005) – Character: Lola/Simon

Pictured: Lola (Chiwetel Ejiofor ) in Julian Jarrold's 'Kinky Boots'.

There’s much fun to be had in this, the tale of a Northampton shoe manufacturer whose livelihood is threatened by falling sales – until owner Charlie (played by Joel Edgerton) comes up with the idea for making bespoke boots for drag queens. As one of those drag queens, Ejiofor mixes comedy and drama with ease, and reveals a fine singing voice into the bargain. It’s effectively a supporting role, but when he’s on screen, Ejiofor holds the viewer’s attention like no one else – and that’s not just because of the outfits he’s called on to wear.

Steven Spielberg’s 10 Most Successful Movies at the International Box Office

06 Wednesday Jul 2016

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He’s been entertaining audiences for nearly fifty years now, ever since his first professional gig directing an episode of Marcus Welby, M.D. in 1970. Since then he’s become the world’s most successful director, his movies earning a combined total of over four billion dollars. But which of Steven Spielberg’s movies have attracted the biggest audiences and earned the most at the international box office? Read on to find out.

10 – Minority Report (2002) – $358,372,926

“Everybody runs…” stated the tagline, and audiences flocked to see Spielberg’s adaptation of a short story by Philip K. Dick, with its clever, cerebral murder mystery and crunching action sequences. It also marked the first of two collaborations with Tom Cruise, and showed that, once again, Spielberg was more than capable of creating a believable vision of the future.

Minority Report

9 – The Adventures of Tintin (2011) – $373,993,951

Spielberg takes on motion capture with mixed results, in a movie that translates Hergé’s tenacious young detective from page to screen in a way that provides some stunning visuals but which also forgets to make the story more involving than it is. The Bearded One has a ball, and this is perhaps Spielberg’s loosest, most carefree movie since 1941 (1979).

8 – Jaws (1975) – $470,653,000

The movie that made Spielberg a household name, Jaws still has the power to unnerve successive generations of audiences, and persuade viewers that staying out of the water is still a pretty good option. A rollercoaster ride that never lets up, Spielberg pulls out all the stops, makes Peter Benchley’s source novel seem better than it is, and elicits a trio of terrific performances from Robert Shaw, Roy Scheider and Richard Dreyfuss.

7 – Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade (1989) – $474,171,806

What should have been the last in the series sees Spielberg make up for the darker excesses of Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom (1984), and regain the sense of fun that made Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981) so appealing. The inclusion of Sean Connery is, of course, a stroke of genius, but the movie’s highlight is that tank chase, a marvellous exercise in thrills, perfectly timed stuntwork, and breezy humour that still impresses today.

6 – Saving Private Ryan (1998) – $481,840,909

After pulling no punches in his examination of the Holocaust in Schindler’s List (1993), Spielberg brought home the true horror of the D-Day landings by thrusting his audience into the thick of it all for twenty of the most gruelling, gut-wrenching minutes in cinema history. The search for Private Ryan and the events that follow lack that initial visceral intensity, but this is still Spielberg operating at a level that few other directors can match.

Saving Private Ryan

5 – War of the Worlds (2005) – $591,745,540

Spielberg’s second collaboration with Tom Cruise was a box office success but lost its way in the final third, leaving critics and audiences alike wondering how Spielberg and screenwriter David Koepp could have failed to maintain the movie’s pace and energy from its stunning opening, and gripping central section. Whatever your view, this is easily one of the best, most effective alien invasion movies ever made, and all because the characters and not the spectacle are the focus.

4 – The Lost World: Jurassic Park (1997) – $618,638,999

Not one of Spielberg’s best thanks to an erratic screenplay courtesy of the normally reliable David Koepp, this inevitable sequel sees Spielberg struggling to repeat the sense of wonder he brought to the original. It’s overlong as well, and there are only a few instances where Spielberg finds his groove, but this took as much as it did at the box office because nobody else was able to come close to making dinosaurs look this impressive.

3 – Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull (2008) – $786,636,033

A prime example of one too many trips to the well, what was until recently Indiana Jones’s swansong movie – a fifth entry is due in 2019 (when Harrison Ford will be seventy-seven) – this sees Spielberg aiming to restore the last-gasp, derring-do atmosphere of Ark and Crusade, while being undermined by a script that loses sight of what made those movies so enjoyable in the first place.

2 – E.T. – The Extra-Terrestrial (1982) – $792,910,554

Spielberg’s ode to childhood and miracles can still invoke a wide variety of emotions including wonder. It also provides all the evidence needed to remind audiences that Spielberg is a director who has such a deep connection to the child in all of us, that he can make us wish we were that young again. Forget the minor changes he made in the 20th anniversary re-release, this remains one of the most powerful, and emotional, fantasy movies ever made.

1 – Jurassic Park (1993) – $1,029,153,822

Dinosaurs. ‘Nuff said.

Jurassic Park

10 Reasons to Remember Abbas Kiarostami (1940-2016)

05 Tuesday Jul 2016

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Abbas Kiarostami (22 June 1940 – 4 July 2016)

Abbas Kiarostami

And so we say goodbye to yet another iconic figure from the world of movie making. As if 2016 hasn’t been bad enough so far, to lose Abbas Kiarostami as well is like being kicked in the stomach while you’re already on the floor. Kiarostami wasn’t just one of the most influential figures in Iranian film – if not the most – he was also one of the most influential figures in film worldwide, an artist who prompted Jean-Luc Godard to say, “Film begins with D.W. Griffith and ends with Abbas Kiarostami.”

He began his career at the age of thirty after having set up a film section at Tehran’s Centre for Intellectual Development of Children and Young Adults. He made his first movie, a short called Nan va Koutcheh (The Bread and Alley) in 1970, and continued his career during the Seventies by making an eclectic mix of short movies, features and documentaries. As he developed and refined his style, his movies became more and more minimal. Kiarostami kept stripping away everything he felt was extraneous or unnecessary, until he had the essence of the story he wanted to tell. Audiences across the globe began to connect with his movies with the release of Close-Up (1990), a mesmerising treatise on life and art and the blurring that often occurs at the boundaries of these two elements.

From there he went from strength to strength, his movies often appearing to great acclaim at film festivals around the world, while in Iran, they were largely ignored by the authorities, his way of reflecting Iranian social attitudes apparently providing little enticement for them to interfere or complain. Thus free of the constraints that have affected fellow movie makers such as Jafar Panahi and Mohammad Rousolof, Kiarostami was able to make the movies he wanted to make, and his continued success, along with critical approbation, made the release of his movies something to anticipate and cherish. He often worked without a script and was keen to improvise, and he also enjoyed crafting performances from non-actors, using their inexperience to capture a more realistic mise-en-scene. His last work, the documentary Venice 70: Future Reloaded, was released in 2013. He leaves behind an impressive body of work, and the grateful thanks of movie goers around the world who have been captivated by his simple yet telling way of movie making, and the wholly human worlds he’s invited us into over the years.

The Report

1 – The Report (1977)

2 – Where Is the Friend’s Home? (1987)

3 – Close-Up (1990)

4 – Through the Olive Trees (1994)

5 – Taste of Cherry (1997)

Taste of Cherry

6 – The Wind Will Carry Us (1999)

7 – Ten (2002)

8 – 10 on Ten (2004)

9 – Shirin (2008)

10 – Certified Copy (2010)

Certified Copy