Soundtrack Heaven: Inside Llewyn Davis, Her & More
Part of what we try to do on this site is introduce you to all the people who make movies. By that we mean all the people, as each film you see is a final product that was assembled by dozens, sometimes hundreds, of talented people.
Looked at a certain way, there's a Russian nesting doll quality to the medium—the director and the stars are the largest doll in the set, the one you see without having to do a thing...
Warner Bros. Recruits World’s Greatest Pickpocket, Apollo Robbins, for Will Smith Film
In 2001, the Gentlemen Thief, Apollo Robbins, was performing at a show at Caesar’s Palace, in Las Vegas. He was told former President Jimmy Carter was coming to the show, but, owing to Robbins profession, he wasn’t allowed to shake Carter’s hand. Instead, Robbins chatted up his Secret Service men. A few minutes later, he held up a copy of Carter’s itinerary, which an agent snatched from him and said, “You don’t have the authorization to see that!” Robbins also didn’t have the authorization to empty many of the agents’...
Star Wars: Episode VII’s Galaxy of Talent Behind J.J. Abrams
As useful as IMDBpro is, it’s recommendable to take the “projects in development” rubric with at least a grain or two of salt. Because really, how could one man have 28 projects in development, including the next Star Trek and Mission Impossible, while also working on a little film franchise called Star Wars?
If it were any one other than J.J. Abrams, you’d be right to assume that most of these would fall through,...
Ender’s Game and 8 Films That Touch on Bullying
Looked at in a certain way, Ender’s Game follows The Hunger Games into theaters (even though the story itself predates it) as a film about the pernicious reality of bullying, and, the myriad ways one can stand up to it.
In each film, some form of tyranny is meted out, both from up close and personal and from afar. There are antagonists who tease, torment and threaten our protagonists, and there are the governments that manipulate and menace the populace...
Breaking Down Rom-Com Master Richard Curtis’s About Time
Richard Curtis wrote three of the most beloved romantic comedies of the mid 90s and early 2000s—in a remarkable string, he penned Four Weddings and a Funeral, Notting Hill, and Bridget Jones Diary (which he co-wrote with Helen Fielding and Andrew Davies). His directorial debut in 2003, Love Actually, which he also wrote, was an international success and helped create cross-pond love for fantastic actors like Bill Nighy, Chiwetel Ejiofor (now poised for an Oscar nomination for his starring role in 12 Years a Slave),...
USC’s Paul Debevec‘s Role in The Matrix, Avatar, Gravity & More
Paul Debevec can rightfully claim that he has helped, in small ways and large, create some of the most technologically groundbreaking films of the last two decades. Debevec leads the graphics laboratory at the University of Southern California's Institute for Creative Technologies, and is a research professor in their computer science department. He is one of the most influential academics in the film world today.
Debevec’s research and technology have been used in The Matrix sequels,...
Directing Diana: Oliver Hirschbigel On His Princess Di Film
German director Oliver Hirschbiegel is no stranger to controversy. His 2004 Oscar-nominated film Downfall triggered rancor in the German press for its complex, humanistic depiction of Adolph Hitler, played by Bruno Ganz. Now Hirschbiegel faces another firestorm in Great Britain for Diana, a portrait of another larger- than-life figure: Diana, Princess of Wales, played by Naomi Watts. The British press has been vitriolic towards the film, which is based on the book “Diana: Her Last Love”...
Daredevil King Johnny Knoxville & Six Other Fearless Actors
Blunt force trauma—this is both a medical term and a description of Johnny Knoxville’s Jackass-related career. He’s been concussed multiple times (once via a bull), torn his urethra (attempting to backflip a motorcycle, the less you read about the particulars the better), had bone chips removed from his elbow (and probably needs further surgery on it), thrown out his back (he told he Dave Kitzkoff of The New York Times he’s not even sure how),...
Janty Yates on Dressing Brad Pitt, Michael Fassbender & the Cast of The Counselor
Academy Award winning costume designer Janty Yates is a fashion time traveler. In her last 12 films (eight of which were with director Ridley Scott), Yates has designed clothes (and armor, and flight suits, and period piece suits, and…) for characters in ancient Rome (Gladiator, which earned her an Oscar), World War II era Europe (Charlotte Gray), 12th century Jerusalem (Kingdom of Heaven), 1970s New York (American Gangster),...
A Bloody Good Job: Carrie’s Makeup Maestro Jordan Samuel
Makeup department head Jordan Samuel had quite a task in front of him when he joined director Kimberly Peirce and the filmmaking team behind Carrie. "Truthfully, blood itself is one of the most difficult things for a makeup artist," Samuel says, "and the more there is the more difficult it is."
Now, add to the amount of blood Samuel would be working with in Carrie to the fact that he was a major part of making sure they could pull of recreating one of the most iconic scenes in horror film history,...
Gravity Shines Light on Future of 3D Filmmaking
How do you create a 3D film that’s truly worth the price of admission? If one lesson can be taken from James Cameron’s Avatar, Martin Scorsese’s Hugo, and Alfonso Cuarón’s Gravity, it’s that the extra dimension has to be crucial to the narrative itself. It’s not enough to wow people—you need a good story reason for the technology, which all of the above directors had in spades.
3D Serving the Story
Cuarón’s masterpiece took place in space,...
Celebrating the 30th Anniversary of The Right Stuff With Writer/Director Philip Kaufman
“There’s a demon that lives in the air. They say that whoever challenged him would die.” –Levon Helm’s narration at the beginning of The Right Stuff.
Test pilots attempting to break the sound barrier at Muroc Army Air Field in California, where that demon lived, often died. It’s at Muroc where Philip Kaufman’s seminal film begins. Chuck Yeager (Sam Shepard) has been given the opportunity to try and break the sound barrier in the X-1,...
The Carrie Phenomenon: A Brief History of Telekinesis
“Extraordinary claims require extraordinary proof.” – Marcello Truzzi, the founding co-chairman of the Committee for the Scientific Investigation of Claims of the Paranormal and the director of the Center for Scientific Anomalies Research.
Covered in pig’s blood, Carrie surveys the most terrifying scene imaginable—a room full of cackling high schoolers. And they’re all laughing at her. It’s one of the most famous scenes in horror film history, to be relived anew in theaters around the country tonight,...
Diablo Cody Discusses Paradise, her Directorial Debut
Diablo Cody is still probably best known for her freshman outing as a screenwriter with Juno, back in 2007. After all, the smart, offbeat comedy-drama about a pregnant teenager earned the Illinois-born-and-bred scribe a flurry of ovations for her original screenplay, including an Oscar, a BAFTA and honors from the Writers Guild of America. But come October 18, Cody, who has since penned and produced Jennifer’s Body, Young Adult and Showtime’s United States of Tara,...
Spike Jonze’s Soulful, Searching Sci-Fi Romance Her
A Spike Jonze film is always an event. He’s made four features in fourteen years—starting with Being John Malkovich (1999), a film so singularly peculiar and original (a puppeteer finds a portal that leads into the actual mind of John Malkovich), that the long-time music video director found himself nominated for an Academy Award at the ripe old age of 30.
Malkovich was written by Charlie Kaufman, as was Jonze’s next feature,...
Chatting with Jerry Ferrara About Last Vegas, Being Punched by De Niro, & More
In Last Vegas, which boasts the tagline, “It’s going to be legendary,” legendary actors Michael Douglas, Robert De Niro, Morgan Freeman and Kevin Kline play four old friends (literally) who throw a Las Vegas bachelor party for the only one of them who has remained single all these years. Call them The Wolf pack, 40 years later.
The movie, which hits theaters November 1, was directed by Jon Turteltaub (National Treasure, While You Were Sleeping) and also stars Mary Steenburgen and Jerry Ferrara...
Everlasting Love: Jim Jarmusch’s Beautiful Only Lovers Left Alive
How often do you walk away from a vampire film and think, ‘Well, that was really lovely’? I’d wager never. Yet that is exactly the feeling I left with after the screening of Only Lovers Left Alive at the New York Film Festival.
True to its title, Only Lovers Left Alive is a love story, even a comedy. It’s a film about Adam (Tom Hiddleston) and Eve (Tilda Swinton), two ancient lovers separated by an ocean who come together in Detroit as the world seems to be coming apart...
Fighting Cancer With Music & Film: The Incredible Documentary No Evidence of Disease
How do you spread awareness about a disease killing 30,000 women a year that barely anybody talks about? Naturally, you start a band.
That’s what six gynecologic oncology surgeons from all over the country did when they created N.E.D., an acronym for ‘No Evidence of Disease.’ Initially created as a cover band to entertain their fellow doctors at a medical conference, the members of N.E.D. saw the potential to reach women using a medium that had been transmitting stories for centuries...
Alexander Payne’s Nebraska Delights at the New York Film Festival
Alexander Payne first got Bob Nelson's script for Nebraska back in 2003 or 2004 (he isn’t quite sure). He liked it, and he immediately thought of Bruce Dern for the lead role, so he sent it to him. Dern liked it, and was surprised Payne had thought of him for the lead. Dern was so excited, in fact, he went to Toys R Us and bought a toy truck (a new truck has a lot of significance in the plot) and sent it to Payne,...
The U.S. Premiere of 12 Years a Slave at the New York Film Festival
Screening in the United States for the first time, Steve McQueen’s powerful, heart rending 12 Years a Slave once again left a festival audience in silence and many viewers weeping in their seats. The story of Solomon Northup’s betrayal, his years of horror while a slave in Georgia, and his desperation to return home to his family in New York requires the viewer to face an unflinching portrayal of humanity at its worst trying to break a man taken at his best...
