A tribute to the great George Segal.
A tribute to the late, great Hal Holbrook.
The 10th anniversary of the Chicago edition of the traveling Noir City festival runs from August 17 to 23 at the Music Box Theatre.
Matt writes: The 2018 SXSW Film Festival just wrapped this past weekend and featured a wide array of enticing titles headed for theaters and streaming platforms this year. Check out our table of contents providing reviews penned by Brian Tallerico and Nick Allen of festival selections such as Andrew Haigh's "Lean on Pete," John Krasinski's "A Quiet Place" and Steven Spielberg's "Ready Player One"
A look at the entire career of Daniel Day-Lewis and how his work in "Phantom Thread" feels like the perfect finale.
An interview with Oscar-winning actress Vanessa Redgrave about her directorial effort "Sea Sorrow" and her work in "Blow-Up."
A look back at this past weekend's Telluride Film Festival, which included 9 in the main program directed by women.
Premieres at this weekend's Telluride Film Festival include the latest from Alexander Payne, Errol Morris, Greta Gerwig, Angelina Jolie, Guillermo del Toro and more.
A dispatch from CIFF on new films by Pablo Larrain and Asghar Farhadi.
Reviews from the Cannes Film Festival of Sean Penn's "The Last Face," "The Long Night of Francisco Sanctis" and Asghar Farhadi's "The Salesman."
Kevin Spacey discusses the timelessness of William Shakespeare, impact of Hill Street Blues, and the moment he knew he was an actor.
"Norman Mailer: The American" is available on Amazon Instant video. It is also available on DVD. Criterion has announced a two-disc Eclipse Series DVD set of Norman Mailer-directed features for release August 28, 2012: "Maidstone" (1970), "Wild 90" (1967) and "Beyond the Law" (1968).
Watching "Norman Mailer: The American," I was struck by the similarities between Mailer and Charles Foster Kane. And it's not just that director Joseph Mantegna (not the actor) at one point employs the title card for "Citizen Kane's" faux newsreel "News on the March" to setup some archival footage. Or the fact that "American" was originally the proposed title for Orson Welles' masterpiece.
Both films grapple with taking the full measure of a man who had significant influences on his times (Kane is fictional, but he was legendarily based in part on newspaper publisher William Randolph Hearst). As Mailer's life unfolds in all its glory, controversy and infamy, dialogue from "Kane" ran like a crawl through my brain. "Few private lives were more public... and he himself was always news." And: "Here's a man who was as loved and hated and talked about as any man in our time." But finally: "It's not enough to tell us what the man did, you've got to tell us who he was."
Marie writes: Okay, this is just plain cool. This is clearly someone using their brain, in combination with "what the hell, let's just go ahead and try it..."
Dr Julius Neubronner's Miniature Pigeon CameraIn 1903, Dr Julius Neubronner patented a miniature pigeon camera activated by a timing mechanism. The invention brought him international notability after he presented it at international expositions in Dresden, Frankfurt and Paris in 1909-1911. Spectators in Dresden could watch the arrival of the camera-equipped carrier pigeons, whereupon the photos were immediately developed and turned into postcards which could be purchased. (click images to enlarge.) - from The Public Domain Review. Visit the site to see even more photos.
Elia Kazan's "On the Waterfront" has been discussed endlessly by film fans, critics and film historians. It's easy to see why, for "On the Waterfront" can be studied from various perspectives. On the one hand the film reflects a time in history when some Americans named names before the House of Un-American Activities Committee much like Terry Malloy does in court. It has also been argued to be Kazan's answer to Arthur Miller's play "The Crucible" or his redemption and justification for falling victim of Joseph McCarthy's witch-hunt of the 1950's.
He had these smiling eyes. And a self-deprecating manner which seemed to belie his very good looks ("He's so cute," my 19-year-old assistant exclaimed), about which he was fairly oblivious. Most of all, he was simply a very good guy.
Gary Winick, a many-hats-wearing filmmaker and digital pioneer, died of complications following a 2 year battle with brain cancer on February 27th, the day of the Academy Awards --- an especially sad irony for a vital man, weeks shy of 50, whose passion for film and storytelling had filled the decades of his adult life.
The private memorial service was held at the Time-Warner Center in Winick's beloved New York. Overlooking Central Park as the sun set, an invited group of 400 (some going back to childhood, some famous, many with whom he'd worked, even some he'd made sure got a decent meal when they were struggling) assembled to watch film clips, to hear and tell stories - to cry, yes, but also to laugh at so many experiences they certainly cherish now.
I can't see Sarah Palin as vice president, but I have no trouble imagining her as an Emmy winner. I'm not being satirical. She and John McCain kicked butt on Saturday Night Live. They were terrific. How good were they? They were better than Tina Fey and Darrell Hammond.
Elia Kazan, who presided over a revolution in American acting and directed films that won 20 Academy Awards, died Saturday at 94. His films included such towering achievements as "A Streetcar Named Desire," "On the Waterfront" (1954), "A Face in the Crowd" and "East of Eden," but when the Academy gave him its Lifetime Achievement Award in 1999, as many as half the audience members refused to applaud--because he "named names" during the Congressional witchhunt of the early 1950s.
The questions about Elia Kazan's honorary Oscar have no simple