Oscar Watch: Costume Designer Stacey Battat on Creating the Cloistered Couture of The Beguiled
Costume designer Stacey Battat last worked with Sofia Coppola on The Bling Ring, which featured a gang of fame-obsessed teenagers in Los Angeles who use social media to track celebrities whereabouts, then rob their homes when they’re gone. For her latest collaboration with Coppola, Battat had to travel back in time some 150 years to Civil War era Virginia, where she was tasked with dressing a largely female cast, set in a southern boarding school,
The Production Designer Who Recreated the Famous Kaczynski Evidence for Manhunt: Unabomber
Mentions of the Unabomber immediately call to mind the deadly postal packages containing explosives and that famous police sketch of the suspect in a hoodie. While working on Manhunt: Unabomber, production designer Erik Carlson realized, however, that the case actually hinged on hundreds of handwritten documents. The eight-episode Discovery Channel miniseries delved into the infamous FBI investigation that eventually resulted in Ted Kaczynski’s arrest. Carlson painstakingly recreated all 17 of the homemade bombs,
How a Scandal Director Pulled off the Most Explosive Episode of the Final Season
When Scandal first aired in 2012, it joined Grey’s Anatomy as must-see TV from prolific hit maker Shonda Rhimes, one of the most powerful and consistently excellent show creators in the business. Two years later, How to Get Away With Murder aired and ABC’s Thank God It’s Thursday lineup was born. Now in it’s final year, Scandal is going out with a bang. A crossover event with Murder was announced yesterday as stars Kerry Washington and Viola Davis swapped Instagram posts.
The Strange Ones Directors Play With Your Perceptions
Christopher Radcliff and Lauren Wolkstein’s feature-length debut The Strange Ones is a slow burning, twisted coming-of-age story co-starring Alex Pettyfer and 14 year old James Freedson-Jackson, who won SXSW’s Special Jury Prize for breakthrough performance. He’s immensely deserving of the accolade, delivering a performance of almost unnerving poise for a 14-year-old actor. The film had begun its life as a short six years ago, but patience is a virtue in the filmmaking game,
Oscar Watch: SFX Makeup Artist Arjen Tuiten on the Immense Responsibility of Working on Wonder
The last time we spoke to special effects makeup artist Arjen Tuiten, he was explaining the laborious but successful transformation of Woody Harrelson into our 36th president, Lyndon Baines Johnson, for Rob Reiner’s LBJ. Working alongside makeup designer Ve Neil, Tuiten crafted new teeth, ears, age spots, freckles, and jowls for Harrelson. Becoming LJB also required reshaping Harrelson’s head so it matched the 6’4″ Texan’s, and the entire transformation process is one that no actor likes.
Oscar Watch: Director Luca Guadagnino on his Lush, Lyrical Call Me By Your Name
Italian director Luca Guadagnino’s lush and luscious love story Call Me By Your Name is an homage to the director’s love for cinema.
“Every movie is personal. This one connects me with my love for certain films,” says Guadagnino, citing French director Maurice Pialat’s À Nos Amours and the films of Italian auteur Bernardo Bertolucci as particular influences. “I was drawn to the possibility of telling this story through the lens of directors I love: Bertolucci,
Writer Extraordinaire Aaron Sorkin on his Directorial Debut Molly’s Game
Screenwriter Aaron Sorkin is famed for writing the words uttered by The West Wing’s imaginary president and the semi-fictionalized tech magnates of Steve Jobs and The Social Network. For his first film as a director, Sorkin scripted the dialogue of a criminal: Molly Bloom, a skier who turned to running big-money poker games after an injury ended her Olympic aspirations. Hardly a desperado, the title character of Molly’s Game is a thoughtful young woman played by Jessica Chastain.
Composer Henry Jackman on Channeling Indiana Jones for his Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle Score
Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle is an action comedy set inside a computer game being played by four teenagers. We’ve already spoken with stunt performer Jahnel Curfman about how she helped star Karen Gillan, who plays the avatar Ruby Roundhouse, make the action feel as plausible and thrilling as possible. Now, we speak with composer Henry Jackman about how he to found a way to set the tone with music that matched the action,
Oscar Watch: The Disaster Artist Composer on Memorializing the Best Bad Movie Ever
Nearly everyone who loves a good story dreams of making their own movie at some point in their life. Very few actually ever try it, and even fewer succeed. In 2003, Tommy Wiseau and Greg Sestero set out to make The Room, a ‘real Hollywood movie’ that is often regarded as one of the worst movies ever made. Ironically, their story has inspired one of this year’s strongest Oscar contenders. The Disaster Artist tells the story of two people who have been mocked as failures,
Greta Gerwig On Moving Behind the Camera for her Solo Directorial Debut Lady Bird
*We’re sharing some of our favorite interviews of the year this week in our ‘Best of 2017’ roundup.
Fans of Greta Gerwig know her as the go-to muse of indie filmdom’s mumblecore movement and for her collaborations with such notable directors as Joe Swanberg (LOL,
Wonder Woman‘s Cinematographer on Capturing the Dynamic Essence of Diana Prince
*We’re sharing some of our favorite interviews of the year this week in our ‘Best of 2017’ roundup.
Wonder Woman was exactly who we needed, exactly when we needed her, and she reframed the landscape among a crowded superhero genre. Director Patty Jenkins and her team brought to life a leading character who could feel love, fury, compassion and power in equal parts. Diana Prince and Steve Trevor’s relationship was a romance of equals (well,
Writer/Director Edgar Wright Talks his Brilliant new Film Baby Driver
*We’re sharing some of our favorite interviews of the year this week in our ‘Best of 2017’ roundup.
It’s is odd that British auteur and fan-boy fave Edgar Wright, 43, known for spoofing horror flicks (2004’s Shaun of the Dead), buddy-cop procedurals (2007’s Hot Fuzz) and sci-fi thrillers (2013’s The World’s End) has produced his most mature and satisfying spin on a popular genre – this time,
Stunt Performer Annabel Wood is a Real Life Wonder Woman
*We’re sharing some of our favorite interviews of the year this week in our ‘Best of 2017’ roundup.
When she hears the word action, Annabel Wood’s job is to take the command literally. She very often makes her living dying. All in all, Wood has died more times than she can count – and she keeps coming back from more. She’s a stunt performer, and one of the best in the business.
The Dazzling Design of Ghost in the Shell
*We’re sharing some of our favorite interviews of the year this week in our ‘Best of 2017’ roundup.
Freakish cyborgs look right at home in Scarlett Johansson’s Ghost in the Shell sci-fi epic thanks in part to three years of ingenious design work from New Zealand-based Weta Workshop. Inspired by Masamune Shirow’s visionary Manga series and 1995 anime film, co-art director Ben Hawker, who previously channeled Middle Earth critters for the Lord of the Rings trilogy,
Writer/Director Martin McDonagh on his Dark, Brilliant Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri
*We’re sharing some of our favorite interviews of the year this week in our ‘Best of 2017’ roundup.
With his thrillingly raw new film Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri just released, writer/director Martin McDonagh is happy to chat about the movie,
Love & Other Illusions: How Blade Runner 2049‘s Sound Designer Played With our Heart Strings
*We’re sharing some of our favorite interviews of the year this week in our ‘Best of 2017’ roundup.
For part one of our interview with Blade Runner 2049 sound designer Theo Green, click here.
One of Blade Runner 2049’s most inspired characters is Joi (Ana de Armas), the holographic love interest of Officer K (Ryan Gosling). Joi is, in the strictest of senses,
Cinematographer Dan Laustsen on The Shape of Water‘s Fluid Fable
*We’re sharing some of our favorite interviews of the year this week in our ‘Best of 2017’ roundup.
Danish cinematographer Dan Laustsen worked alongside Guillermo del Toro on and off for two decades, so when it came time to shoot The Shape of Water, he shared the director’s penchant for precision. Lush, lyrical and rich in metaphor, the film pays homage to Universal Pictures’ 1940’s-era monster as it follows Sally Hawkins’
Get Out‘s Cinematographer Reveals the Methods Behind Jordan Peele’s Brilliant Madness
*We’re sharing some of our favorite interviews of the year this week in our ‘Best of 2017’ roundup.
From the moment the first trailer for Get Out dropped, we knew this was going to be something special. We were beyond excited to see comedy genius Jordan Peele (Key & Peele) take on a horror movie and the final product exceeded all our hopes. Get Out travels from poking fun at the insecurities of race relations in America to dramatizing the terror of racism in a way that has critics becoming philosophers as they try to unpack Peele’s genius for tackling sensitive subjects with humor,
Listen to how Coco’s Composer Conjures Mexico’s Musical Heart
*We’re sharing some of our favorite interviews of the year this week in our ‘Best of 2017’ roundup.
The Handmaid’s Tale DP on Using Old Lenses, Vermeer and Drones to Conjure Dystopia
*We’re sharing some of our favorite interviews of the year this week in our ‘Best of 2017’ roundup.
Liverpool-born cinematographer Colin Watkinson quit his job as a surveyor to work as an entry-level “runner” on a British soundstage, rose through the ranks to shoot Tarsem Singh’s The Fall in 2006, and on the strength of that film’s universally hailed visuals, became one of Los Angeles’ most prolific television commercial DPs.
