Why showrunners matter on TV much less than you think; BBC’s Sherlock by the numbers; Vulture’s Summer TV issue; in praise of Don’t Trust the B—– in Apartment 23; M. Night Shyamalan wrote what?; DNA can’t be patented; robots can fight.
What are we to make of Owen Wilson, he with the tow-colored mop of hair, the crooked nose, and
the smile that seems to need so much in return? In certain contexts,
Owen Wilson’s smile is heartbreaking. Not just in more serious roles,
but in everything. One does not often think of grown men as being “wistful” or full of
“pathos”; only little plucky orphans in pig-tails and pinafores should
be “wistful.”
Troll the NSA; clashes continue in Turkey; the “familiar profile” of the Santa Monica killer; wash your hands!; actresses in Hollywood are having a worse/better time of it; Lego faces getting angrier; great tracking shots.
Lateral tracking shots can get to the heart of a film more quickly and succinctly than any other technique. What are your favorites?
Cybill Shepherd recalls working on Peter Bogdanovich’s “At Long Last Love” and the critical drubbing she in particular took in the press.
As a companion piece to our reassessment of “At Long Last Love,” Peter Bogdanovich recalls the film’s orgins, its forgotten pleasures, and the studio-mandated tinkering that turned it into a box office bomb. He also recalls turning down an offer of help from Gene Kelly, casting Burt Reynolds, and a remarkable encounter with Roger Ebert.
Peter Bogdanovich’s movie musical “At Long Last Love” developed one of those reputations as a career-killing stinker, but in hindsight, it’s a pretty darn good mix of 1930s tunes with the slightly more realist sensibility of later musicals. And it’s a project with a crazy history. Now that it is out on Blu-Ray, it deserves another look.
HBO’s Pussy Riot: A Punk Prayer lets us look closely at young women who have been the subject of so much conversation that their personhood has almost been obscured.
As we mourn Abrams’ macho Star Trek obliteration, it’s a good time to revisit that most Star Trek-ian of accomplishments, Voyager, the most despised object of fanboy loathing in the franchise’s history.
At a beautiful and moving event Wednesday evening, the Sundance Institute honored Roger Ebert’s memory and also honored young filmmaker Ryan Coogler. It was an evening for remembering, but also for making sure that Roger’s legacy goes on; the Sundance Institute announced the Roger Ebert Scholarship for Film Criticism to nurture young critics at the Sundance Film Festival.
Alan Sepinwall breathes fire on people who spoil Game of Thrones plot developments for newcomers; why the new Doctor Who should be a man, again; the late Iain Banks in his own words; John Malkovich saves a man’s life; why you won’t read to the end of anything; like air guitar, but with sex.
Motion picture film lives after all, er, maybe; what makes a person fall in love with film festivals; breaking down the great direction on Breaking Bad; Alain Resnais’ You Ain’t Seen Nothin’ Yet; Night of the Hunter & childhood fear; great dads in pop culture not named Atticus Finch; Girls, Season 38.
The evolution of Superman’s cape; the de-evolution of women’s roles in film and TV; joke plagiarist sort-of apologizes for stealing from Patton Oswalt & other pros; David Cronenberg does race cars; Vince Vaughn, salesman; fans bring their Game of Thrones grief into therapy; astounding animated short made entirely from 3-D paper models.
From the Sundance Institute:
Los Angeles, CA
— Last night, Wednesday, June 5, the third annual ‘Celebrate Sundance
Institute’ benefit in Los Angeles honored the life and work of beloved
journalist and film critic Roger Ebert with the Vanguard Leadership Award in Memoriam. The event also honored filmmaker Ryan Coogler – whose debut feature film, Fruitvale Station, was
selected for Sundance Institute’s Screenwriters Lab and went on to win
both the Grand Jury Prize and the Audience Award at the 2013 Sundance
Film Festival – with the Vanguard Award, Presented by Tiffany & Co.
Slut shaming in geek culture; Rock Hudson’s wife tape-recorded herself confronting her husband about his sexual orientation; how Michael Douglas used his own experience to flesh out Liberace; Carey Mulligan might play Hillary Clinton in a biopic; New Yorker cartoonists talk about the delicate art of collaboration; Upstream Color comes to Netflix instant.
With its partly improvised dialogue and eruptions of argument, Mike Leigh’s “Life is Sweet,” now on Criterion DVD, gave viewers was insight into where the director had been, artistically. It also hinted at where he was going: into territory with far more visual and verbal polish.
Robert K. Elder made a splash a few years ago with his book “The Film That Changed My Life,” a collection of interviews with directors about a single film that influenced their career. Now he’s back with “The Best Film You’ve Never Seen,” (published by the Independent Publishers Group) in which directors advocate for under-appreciated and critically maligned movies. Roger said of the book, “How necessary this book is! And how well judged and written! Some of the best films ever made, as Robert K. Elder proves, are lamentably all but unknown.” Here’s Elder’s interview with Guillermo Del Toro, who sings the praises of “Arcane Sorceror,” which Edgar Wright memorably described as “the ‘Barry Lyndon’ of horror films.”
