How to Train Your Dragon 2‘s Writer/Director Dean DeBlois
When Dean DeBlois and Chris Sanders film How to Train Your Dragon was released in 2010, it was a critical darling but had something of a sleepy opening. Adapted from Cressida Cowell’s book, How to Train Your Dragon contained everything that you expect from a stellar animated film—a great script, no small amount of wit, dramatic depth and fantastic effects. At its core it had a relationship that was hard to beat,
Damon Lindelof Returns to TV to for HBO’s The Leftovers
“Two percent doesn’t sound like much, but, two percent of the entire planet, of every person on it, that’s more than the world’s ten largest cities combined. That’s more than every death from every war in the 20th century. If every one of those people joined hands, they’d wrap around the world six times. It’s one hundred and forty million people. And like that…they were gone.”
The above quote comes from one of the clever,
Building Edge of Tomorrow’s Armored ExoSuits
How might a soldier be able to fight giant, sophisticated, and fantastically violent aliens with sundry razor-sharp tentacles and a taste for carnage? Simple: just create an articulated armored suit capable of protecting a soldier’s body while delivering a massive amount of firepower from weapons mounted to the carapace. This was the challenge the filmmakers behind Edge of Tomorrow created for themselves, and instead of relying on CGI to create these fantastic and fearsome combat “jackets,”
Comedy Central’s Growing Roster of Female Showstoppers
If you haven’t watched any of Inside Amy Schumer on Comedy Central, you should start doing so immediately. Far from coming out of nowhere (Schumer’s been on Comedy Central in several capacities over the years, and finished fourth on NBC's Last Comic Standing), there are still many people in the country who haven’t heard of her, so watching her show can feel like witnessing the sudden birth of the total comedy package—like a foul-mouthed,
Get Excited: Star Wars: Episode VII, the Coen Brothers as Writers for Hire & More
What do J.J. Abrams, the Coen Brothers, Patrick Stewart, Jonathan Ames and UNICEF have in common? Nothing, save for the fact that they're all apart of this round-up of things to be excited about. Let's have a look:
The Coen Brothers as the Best Possible Writers for Hire
Here’s the [true] story; one afternoon in May, in 1943, an Army Air Forces B-24 bomber crashes into the Pacific Ocean. Former Olympic track star Louis Zamperini,
It’s 2014: Do You Know Where Your Mutants Are?
Just to be clear, the new X-Men movie, Days of Futures Past, is both a sequel and a prequel. It’s a sequel to the original film trilogy, since the older set of characters (the Patrick Stewart and Ian McKellan crowd) have already lived through the events of X-Men: The Last Stand. It’s also a sequel to the prequel/reboot X-Men: First Class, with its new generation of James McAvoy,
Mutants, Maleficent & Tom Cruise: Summer Blockbuster Season is Upon us
Godzilla thrashes and trashes his way into theaters this weekend, marking the unofficial start of summer blockbuster season (you could argue The Amazing Spider-Man 2 kicked off the increasingly earlier start to tent pole season on May 2). In the coming weeks, some of the year’s biggest films are hitting theaters, including mutants, mutating robots, turtles who are also mutants, Maleficent, Tom Cruise, monkeys riding horses,
Godzilla Sound Designers Erik Aadahl & Ethan Van der Ryn on Creature Language
“Whenever I heard his roar, it’s a long roar, a screaming, and to me it almost feels like Godzilla is scolding us for humanity’s foolishness. It’s like Godzilla exists as a symbol of human consciousness. It’s a scream involved with sadness.”
So said Ken Watanabe, one of the stars of the latest incarnation of Godzilla, describing the iconic roar of the original Godzilla in the 1954 film that started it all.
Looking Back at the Original Godzilla
In August of 1954, Toho Studios began shooting a film unlike any that ever been made in Japanese cinematic history. Three photography teams were required: a special-effects photography team to cover the film's star, a principal photography team to capture dramatic scenes between the rest of the cast, and a composite photography team who would help mesh star and cast into a cohesive whole.
That film was, of course, the original Godzilla,
Director Gareth Edwards, Producer Thomas Tull & Star Ken Watanabe Talk Godzilla
We combed through a few Godzilla round table interviews Warner Bros. recently uploaded to their press site in anticipation of the iconic monster's May 16 landfall, and have provided some choice quotes from three major players involved in the film—director Gareth Edwards, producer and Legendary Pictures Chairman and CEO Thomas Tull, and star Ken Watanabe.
DIRECTOR GARETH EDWARDS
On creating the look of Godzilla
"We imagined that sixty years ago,
Celebrating the Unsung Maternal Heroes of the Silver Screen for Mother’s Day
Mothers’ Day is this Sunday, and it’s come to our attention that, strange as it may seem, celebrities have mothers too. Some of them even have celebrity mothers. Though really, if you consider all the time, industry knowledge and innate talent that it takes to succeed in Hollywood, it makes sense that we see so many famous kids with famous parents (see Liza Minelli and Judy Garland) or sprawling thespian dynasties (see the Barrymores or Redgraves).
Mr. Sunshine: David Lynch, Auteur of the Uncanny, Talks Inspiration
One of the first words out of David Lynch’s mouth nearly brought the house down at the Brooklyn Academy of Music on a drizzly night last week. The icon behind films as disparate and evocative as Eraserhead, The Elephant Man, Blue Velvet and Mulholland Drive, as well as the groundbreaking television series Twin Peaks, was patiently listening as Paul Holdengräber, the erudite director of public programs at the New York Public Library,
The Grand Seduction: A Look at Canada Behind the Camera
During preproduction of the Canadian film The Grand Seduction, the crew realized a major set piece had yet to be built— Joe’s Place, a local bar and restaurant that was vital to the film. Joe's Place was, in short order, built from scratch in Newfoundland’s fishing community Trinity Bright, where much of the film was shot. Emblematic of the relationship between Canadian and U.S. filmmakers, once production left town, the producers left Joe’s Place standing,
Sky High Murals With Colossal Media
If you've been to New York City, you've experienced the odd sensation of being the recipient of an endless stream of sales pitches. Whether you're waiting for the subway, walking down Houston street or sitting in a taxi, you're surrounded by advertising. Check out this upcoming show at Mercury Lounge! Buy this brand of flavored vodka! Do whatever is being asked of you on those taxi monitors before you can get the touch screen to respond to your desperate tapping off the 'Off''
Angus MacLachlan on the Art of Writing for and Directing Actors
Paul Schneider won Best Actor at the Tribeca Film Festival last week for his role as Otto Wall in Angus MacLachlan’s Goodbye to All That. The character was a tricky one—Schneider was playing someone affable and intelligent, but also unfocused and obliviously selfish. He spends most of the film in a state of confusion about why his life seems to be falling apart. His wife has left him, his daughter doesn’t feel safe in his new house,
Making The Amazing Spider-Man 2, the Largest Production in New York History
Spider-Man’s home has always been New York City, but The Amazing Spider-Man 2 is the first of the comic book adaptations to be filmed exclusively in New York State. It’s also the largest, with locations that included not only Manhattan, Brooklyn, and Queens, but Long Island and upstate New York.
Shepherding the production were producers Avi Arad and Matt Tolmach. The industry veterans work together so closely, they finish each other’s’
A Living, Dangerous Dorian Gray: For No Good Reason Celebrates England’s Wildest Cartoonist
Avey Tare gets Ralph Steadman.
The Animal Collective frontman has made no official statements regarding Steadman’s art, but regarding psychedelia he says, “it's always been about the combination of moods and how fast a mood can change. I think combining humor alongside something extremely dark is always appealing in the world of psychedelia.” He could just as easily be describing the gonzo cartoonist’s style, where exuberant satire blends with slapstick nightmare,
Tribeca 2014: David Simon, Beau Willimon, Nate Silver & Anne Thompson Talk Stories
We all know that our shopping habits are fodder for various entities looking to target their advertising and increase their profits, but the same kind of Big Data is being used by media and entertainment entities, from HBO and Netflix to the New York Times and Fox News, to figure out who we are, what we read and watch, and what, perhaps, we want next. "Does betting on the ‘wisdom of crowds’ bode well or ill for future innovation in film,
Tribeca 2014: Kelly Reichardt’s Tense, Thrilling Night Moves
A group of environmental activists watch a somber film about the slaughter of the planet. A woman’s voice narrates the horrors of mankind's insatiable greed—eroding beaches, melting ice caps, deforestation, and carbon emissions to name a few of our sins, with a call to action as well. "Let the revolution begin…for the future, for the people, and for the planet."
This film-within-the-film ends to a smattering of clapping. The filmmaker is present, and she's asked to answer questions from the group.
Tribeca 2014: Writer/Director Angus MacLachlan’s Goodbye to All That
Writer-director Angus MacLachlan’s Goodbye to All That includes one of the more frank and pathos-free sex scenes in recent memory. Otto Wall (Paul Schneider) and Mildred (Ashley Hinshaw), who recently met on the online dating service OkCupid, sit opposite one another on chairs, naked. They are describing, with exacting detail, what they’d like to do to each other. Otto’s wife has recently left him, and he’s experimenting for the first time in his life with online dating.
