Ava DuVernay’s Selma set to Stun Audiences on Christmas Day
Three major films about three tumultuous periods of American history will hit select theaters on Christmas Day. That two of the three films are directed by women is something to be excited about, and that one of those women is a woman of color, and that her film is covers one of the most crucial three months in American history, marks this single day as one of the most significant of the entire year in film.
You've no doubt heard about Angelina Jolie’s Unbroken (covering the story of Olympian and American soldier Louis Zamperini’s imprisonment by the Japanese during World War II),
Director Michelle MacLaren’s a Wonder Woman
It’s time to get excited about a comic-book movie that’s not directed by Christopher Nolan or Joss Whedon, that doesn’t star or co-star or have a cameo by Robert Downey Jr., and that's not centered on a brooding dude, or a rich, conflicted dude, or a bunch of dudes with various powers. We're talking about a film that’s poised to make a household name of not one woman but two. Your excitement will be warranted,
At Long Last Filmgoers Will Head Into the Woods
Into the Woods began its life as a musical by Stephen Sondheim and James Lapine, debuting on Broadway on November 5, 1987 at the Martin Beck Theater. Former New York Times' theater critic Frank Rich (later an Op-Ed writer, now an editor-at-large at New York Magazine) wrote in his review, "The characters of ''Into the Woods" may be figures from children's literature, but their journey is the same painful,
Disney Animation Pushes the Boundaries of Technology With Big Hero 6
Fighting an evil villain and saving the day are probably not very high on an average teenager’s daily to-do list. But for robotics prodigy Hiro Hamada, star of Walt Disney Animation Studios’ animated feature Big Hero 6, those tasks just happen to pop up on a typical weekday. With the film opening in domestic theaters this past Friday, audiences are now joining the mini mastermind and his inflatable robot sidekick, Baymax, on an action-packed adventure as they get entangled in a dangerous plot unfolding in the bustling,
Beyond Interstellar: 12 Films to Put On Your Calendar
After months and months of speculation that Christopher Nolan alone seems able to create around his films, the general public will get a chance to weigh in on his most passionate project yet, Interstellar. You’ve already heard about Interstellar. Everyone has. What we thought we’d do is give you a quick cheat sheet on some upcoming films, leading you right to Christmas day.
November 14
It’ll be a very strong week for serious film,
Harsh Conditions Bring out the Best in The Homesman‘s Crew
When we interviewed Marco Beltrami, he was particularly jazzed up about the work he did for Tommy Lee Jones’ upcoming film The Homesman. Beltrami is the type of composer who seeks out directors (as he did with Joon-ho Bong for Snowpiercer) and he was excited about Jones’ second directorial effort. The film’s set in the punishing Nebraska frontier in the middle of the 19th century. This inspired Beltrami to record a lot of his score outdoors,
Interstellar’s Out of This World Crew
In a little over two weeks, on November 7, Christopher Nolan’s long awaited Interstellar will finally hit screens across the country. Jeff Jensen’s cover story for Entertainment Weekly uncovered a lot of juicy details which add up to what sounds like the director's most personal, and possibly ambitious, film yet. When Jensen was on set in October of 2013, the film's code name was Flora's Letter. As Jessica Chastain told Jensen at the time,
Stuntmen Turned Directors Light Up Screen With John Wick
So you’ve got a protagonist named John Wick who’s a widower with a puppy. The puppy's named Daisy. Daisy’s pretty much all this guy has and cares about in this world, a gift from his late wife. John Wick’s a retired freelance consultant living quietly and sadly, just he and Daisy all alone.
One day John goes to buy some gas. He’s got a sweet ride, a 1969 Boss Mustang. He’s minding his own business,
The Sundance of Horror: L.A.’s Screamfest is Freakish Fun
L.A.’s Screamfest is assured of two things this year: it will once again be the biggest horror film festival in the United States, and it won’t draw the ire of the Professional Clown Club. There appear to be no murderous clowns in this year’s festival lineup.
If you’ve been following entertainment news over the past few days, you might have noticed the kerfuffle between the Professional Clown Club and FX’s American Horror Story,
The Life of the Mind: Making The Theory of Everything
In an introduction to a first edition of Stephen Hawking’s groundbreaking popular science book A Brief History of Time, Carl Sagan tells a story about how he happened to wander into the ancient ceremony of the investiture of new fellows into the Royal Society. On that day, Sagan noticed in the front row a young man in a wheelchair very slowly signing his name in a book. “A book that bore on its earliest pages the signature of Isaac Newton.
Spirits & Passion Collide in The Book of Life
Animator, painter, writer and director Jorge R. Gutiérrez has won Annies and Emmys for his animated television series El Tigre: The Adventures of Manny Rivera for Nickelodeon. His work caught the eye of another Mexican polymath, writer, director, producer and novelist Guillermo del Toro (Hellboy, Pan’s Labyrinth, Pacific Rim), who’s producing Gutiérrez ‘s feature debut The Book of Life, which bows this Friday, October 17. The Book of Life is an enchanting story of friendship,
The Timely Kill the Messenger Looks at the Price of Truth
On August 18, 1996 Gary Webb, then a San Jose Mercury News Staff Writer, reported that, “For the better part of a decade, a San Francisco Bay Area drug ring sold tons of cocaine to the Crips and Bloods street gangs of Los Angeles and funneled millions in drug profits to a Latin American guerrilla army run by the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency.” That line opened Webb’s three-part series “Dark Alliance,” a report that would ultimately define the rest of his life and spark years of debate.
World War II Veterans Helped Fuel Fury‘s Realism
The most all encompassing war in history has been depicted on screen countless times. Filmmakers have been portraying the horrors, and heroes, of the "good" war, from D-Day to the Battle of the Bulge to Pearl Harbor, from every conceivable angle. In just six years, from 1939 to 1945, World War II took the lives of more than sixty million people, some 2.5% of the global population, and filmmakers have been grappling with the immensity of the war ever since.
Erik Parker & One9 Discuss Nas: Time Is Illmatic – Part II
Click here for Part I of our conversation with music journalist/producer Erik Parker and multimedia artist/director One9.
Erik Parker and One9’s Nas: Time is Illmatic clocks in at a brisk 75-minutes, as compact and filled with detail as a Nas song. The documentary manages to examine nearly every credible element in the making of Nas's groundbreaking album, and really, the making of an artist and a man in a little over an hour.
Erik Parker & One9 on Their Doc Nas: Time is Illmatic – Part I
“I’m an eighth grade dropout…I didn’t know what the future was going to hold,” says Nasir Jones at the outset of journalist Erik Parker and multimedia artist One9’s documentary, Nas: Time is Illmatic. For the uninitiated, the future held one of the most groundbreaking hip hop albums of all time (the titular “Illmatic”), a legendary career, and its creator becoming the namesake of a fellowship at Harvard University’s Hip Hop Archive.
Longtime Collaborators Helped David Fincher Find Gone Girl
The New York Film Festival kicked off with the world premiere of David Fincher’s Gone Girl last Friday, and boy, did it deliver. Fincher’s directing chops are never in question, and Gillian Flynn’s novel is perhaps perfectly suited for his particular skill set. Gone Girl combines his instinctual way around pitch-black thrillers (Se7en, Zodiac, The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo), and offbeat, grimy comedies (Fight Club) and delivers 148 compelling minutes without any evident lull.
Gone Girl at the New York Film Festival
The early reviews have already begun flooding in, and tonight, at 5pm, those of us in the press who haven’t attended a 20th Century Fox screening will be lining up outside Walter Reade Theater at the New York Film Festival for Gone Girl.
Director David Fincher has become one of the most reliably inventive filmmakers of his generation, and perhaps one of the best at adapting novels and short stories for the screen.
The Ambitious, Beguiling The Disappearance of Eleanor Rigby
Have you ever wondered what it would be like to see your life through someone else’s eyes? In his ambitious feature debut, writer/director Ned Benson gives his characters this unique chance in the emotionally charged tale of love, loss and rediscovery that is The Disappearance of Eleanor Rigby. The film follows the relationship of estranged couple Conor (James McAvoy) and Eleanor (Jessica Chastain) from first blush to final breath as they try to regain the connection they once had.
Creating The Boxtrolls by Hand
The Boxtrolls is a stop-animation fable directed by Anthony Stacchi and Graham Annable about the foul monsters who live beneath the cobblestone streets of Cheesebridge. The deal with this Victorian-era hamlet is that it’s obsessed by money and class, a posh place where the air is redolent with the stench of fine cheese. Chesebridgeians love their cheese, so this is exactly what the villainous Boxtrolls prey on—at night, they crawl out from their dank, fetid sewer homes and steal the residents of Cheesebridge’s precious cheese!
The 52nd New York Film Festival
Major film premieres from three of cinema’s most iconoclastic directors, a documentary about one of the most controversial figures in recent American history and some of the best of world cinema highlight the 52nd New York Film Festival, which runs from September 26 to October 12.
As the last major festival of the year, you might think NYFF’s main slate would be filled with films that have already played in any one of the fests that came before,
