Oscar-Nominated “The Power of the Dog” Editor Peter Sciberras on Building Unbearable Tension
Jane Campion’s tense, character-driven Western, The Power of the Dog, is a critical favorite and Oscar frontrunner. The film’s vast landscapes (shot in New Zealand, much to the chagrin of actors not involved with the movie) are a backdrop to a slow-moving family melodrama: sweet and earnest George (Jesse Plemons) marries widowed Rose (Kirsten Dunst), bringing out the worst in Phil (Benedict Cumberbatch), George’s volatile, curiously standoffish brother.
The brothers are also partners in a successful ranch,...
“Flee” Director Jonas Rasmussen on His Historic Triple Oscar-Nominated Doc
Director Jonas Rasmussen remembers being a kid in Denmark and watching television news in 1990 when the first McDonald’s opened in Moscow, supposedly signifying a brave new world of post-Soviet capitalism. Rasmussen never could have imagined that the Afghan refugee standing just outside of the camera range would one day star in his acclaimed documentary Flee. The only movie in Oscar history to be triple-nominated in Best Foreign Language, Best Documentary, and Best Animation categories, Flee blends animation with bits of archival video footage to illustrate Amin Nawabi’s harrowing journey to freedom...
Oscar-Nominated Re-Recording Sound Mixer Paul Massey on “No Time To Die”
“When I started out, I had no objective whatsoever to become a re-recording mixer,” says Paul Massey, who may well be the most accomplished accidental Oscar winner in history. Growing up in London, Massey played trumpet in wedding bands, worked at a recording studio and then, he says, “I made a slow, totally unintentional transition to film post-production.”
Like Ridley Scott, one of his most frequent collaborators, Massey, Academy Award winner for Bohemian Rhapsody, moves briskly from project to project...
Oscar-Nominated “Dune” Screenwriter Jon Spaihts on Decoding Frank Herbert’s Tome
For Dune‘s Oscar-nominated screenwriter Jon Spaihts, the opportunity to help Denis Villeneuve find a way to crack the elusive code to adapting Frank Herbert’s magisterial, meaty sci-fi tome came at a funny time. “I’d decided I wanted to focus on a personal project that I’d direct myself, so I told my reps, ‘No new jobs,'” Spaiths says. “Then my agent called and said Denis Villeneuve is doing Dune, and I said, ‘Get me in a room as fast as possible.'”...
Oscar-Nominated “Dune” DP Greig Fraser on Taming an Epic Sci-Fi Beast
Denis Villeneuve is the director to finally tame a film version of Dune, Frank Herbert’s 1965 sci-fi novel that, over the decades, accidentally spawned a cottage industry of unsuccessful visual projects (see: David Lynch’s 1984 Dune, the SyFy channel’s attempt in 2000, and Alejandro Jodorowsky’s Dune, which never saw the light of day). Casting Timothée Chalamet as young prince Paul Atreides and Zendaya as Chani of the Fremen, the original native inhabitants of Arrakis,...
How the Oscar-Nominated “tick, tick…BOOM!” Editors Evoked the Excitement of Live Theatre
The magic of live theatre is a precious element that is often elusive to the lens. Countless legendary Broadway performances have sparkled and faded in a night, rarely ever recorded. Even a long run of a popular musical will never see the exact same show cross the stage twice.
Many movie adaptations of musicals are enormous affairs with extravagant sets, costumes, and visual details that fill in the gaps that exist only in the imagination of a live audience...
Chris Hemsworth Teases Intense “Extraction 2” Action Scene
Chris Hemsworth knows his way around an action scene, but his work as Tyler Rake in the first Extraction was about as intense as it gets. Now, Hemsworth has teased a scene from Extraction 2, which will pick up sometime after the end of the first film, you know, after Rake was shot, fell off a bridge, and presumably died. Tyler Rake’s survival in director Sam Hargrave’s hit film seemed likely but was far from definite when the credits rolled—then Netflix made Hemsworth’s return to the role in the sequel official at their big Tudum event this past September...
“Dune” Oscar-Nominated Sound Team on Sandworms, Ornithopters & More
The experience of seeing writer/director Denis Villeneuve’s Oscar-nominated epic Dune was, for this viewer, as much an auditory experience as it was a visual one. The sounds of the alien world depicted in part one of Villeneuve’s two-part adaptation of Frank Herbert’s 1965 novel are mesmerizing, from the whispering sands shifting across the desert planet of Arrakis to the oddly soothing purr of the dragon fly-winged aircraft, the ornithopter. For supervising sound editor Mark Mangini and supervising sound editor and sound designer Theo Green,...
“The Adam Project” Screenwriter Jonathan Tropper on Teaming With Ryan Reynolds & Shawn Levy
The development of The Adam Project has its own time-traveling origin story, one that dates back roughly ten years. Screenwriter Jonathan Tropper says the production took flight, in part, because of Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle (2017) which stars Kevin Hart, Jack Black, Karen Gillan, and Dwayne Johnson in a reboot of the beloved Robin Williams’ film that sucks them into a video game in an adventurous fight for survival.
“Before Jumanji came out,...
New “Morbius” Video Promises the Official Opening of the Sony/Marvel Multiverse
“Morbius is and always has been a standout persona in the Marvel lore,” says Jared Leto at the top of a new Morbius vignette. Leto takes on the role of Dr. Michael Morbius, one of the strangest, most misunderstood characters in Marvel’s vast canon. In the film, from director Daniel Espinosa, Leto’s Dr. Morbius is a decent if monstrously ambitious man trying to cure the world of a rare blood disorder. The catch is the good doctor suffers from the disorder himself,...
Jordan Peele, Christopher Nolan & More Developing New IMAX Cameras
IMAX, the best large-format camera developer in the world, is working with some of the most tech-savvy, talented filmmakers on the planet to develop new film cameras. The Hollywood Reporter scoops that writer/directors Jordan Peele and Christopher Nolan are just two of the filmmakers giving the company feedback. They’re joined by some of the best cinematographers in the business, including Rachel Morrison (Black Panther), Bradford Young (Arrival),...
“The Outfit” Director Graham Moore on His Meticulous, Mobbed-Up Debut
Graham Moore, who won both an Oscar and a Writers Guild of America award for his adaptation of The Imitation Game, has joined a growing list of scribes going behind the camera to helm a production. The Outfit, his feature film directorial debut, has arrived, which the longtime scribe co-wrote with Jonathan McClain.
The movie follows a highly skilled English tailor, played by Academy Award winner Mark Rylance (Bridge of Spies),...
How “The Batman” Batsuit Designers Went Lean & Mean
Outside of The Batman writer/director Matt Reeves (who co-wrote the script with Peter Craig), Glyn Dillon and David Crossman probably have The Batman‘s coolest credits attached to their names. Both share the title of Batsuit costume designers, with Dillon serving as chief concept artist and Crossman the costume supervisor. In terms of superhero icons, it doesn’t get much better than designing the Caped Crusader, and the tandem created a unique silhouette for a younger Bruce Wayne,...
“The Batman” Cinematographer Greig Fraser on Finding Light in the Darkness
At a gripping three hours, The Batman isn’t so much an endurance test as it is a lengthy visual puzzle, one that takes place primarily after hours. Director Matt Reeves’s take on Batman (Robert Pattinson) may be the franchise’s most disaffected nocturnal not-so-superhero yet. Working, brooding, and convening with Alfred (Andy Serkis) from dusk ’til dawn, this Bruce Wayne is consumed by trying to undo a complex web of official corruption hidden by Gotham City’s entrenched crop of violent mafiosos...
Leading Lawmakers Celebrate the Motion Picture Association’s Centennial
“We are a nation of visionaries,” Vice President Kamala Harris says at the top of her remarks about the Motion Picture Association’s centennial. The Vice President was one of nine leading lawmakers to speak about the centennial and the importance of the MPA’s work advocating on behalf of the film and television industry. “Members of the Motion Picture Association, for a century you have written the lines we will never stop quoting. You have created the images we will never forget...
“After Yang” Cinematographer Benjamin Loeb on the Spare Sci-Fi Beauty of Kogonada’s Latest
After Yang cinematographer Benjamin Loeb knew the minute he met South Korean-born director Kogonada that theirs would not be a standard show biz collaboration. When Loeb called from his native Oslo to Zoom interview for the DP job, he and Kogonada barely mentioned the project at hand. Instead, they talked about ramen. “We spent hours talking about the complexion of broth and what makes the broth look good and feel good,” Loeb recalls. “We equated how all your ingredients need to push in the same direction...
“Turning Red” Co-Writer Julia Cho on Writing Pixar’s Tender New Film
Pixar’s new movie Turning Red follows straight-A student Meilin, whose perfect 13-year-old life implodes when she starts turning into a giant panda every time her emotions get out of control. Heir to a fierce ancestral spirit that’s affected women in her family for generations, Mei (voiced by Rosalie Chiang) defies her domineering mother Ming (Sandra Oh) and joins her friends to see Four Town, a boyband that sounds very much like NSYNC thanks to the period-perfect pop songs crafted by Billie Eilish and her brother Finneas O’Connell. ...
New “Morbius” Look Reveals the Marvel Antihero’s First-Ever Screen Appearance
“What excited me the most about playing Morbius was the fact that he’s never been on screen before,” Jared Leto says at the top of this new look at Morbius. Leto will give us our first-ever depiction of Marvel’s blood-sucking antihero, with director Daniel Espinosa’s film revealing the origin story of Dr. Michael Morbius. Morbius is a brilliant but doomed scientist trying desperately to not only to do good in the world but save himself in the process...
MPA Creator Award Recipient Writer/Director Nikyatu Jusu on her Stunning Debut Feature “Nanny”
Deploying West African folklore to interrogate the myth of the American dream, writer/director Nikyatu Jusu‘s debut feature Nanny is a remarkably assured genre-melding experience. Nanny also gives viewers something that’s sadly still quite rare—it evocatively places us inside the head, heart, and aching soul of Aisha (Anna Diop), an undocumented Senegalese immigrant trying to navigate the mystifying codes of the United States to create a stable place to bring her son, Lamine (Jahleel Kamara). Jusu’s nimbly executed deployment of supernatural characters to critique the myth of the American dream would be a difficult feat for a veteran writer/director,...
“Deadpool 3” Will See Shawn Levy Direct Ryan Reynolds in Marvel Movie
An all-star team will be bringing you Deadpool 3. The Hollywood Reporter confirms that Free Guy and The Adam Project director Shawn Levy is in negotiations to reunite with Ryan Reynolds to direct the long-awaited third Deadpool film. Deadpool and Deadpool 2 screenwriters Paul Wernick and Rhett Reese will return to write. This is major news and confirms that Marvel’s rowdiest, most irreverent superhero is that much closer to coming back...
