In Contention

Category: Featured

  • ‘Batman Unmasked’ on The History Channel

    Christian Bale in The Dark KnightThis is exactly the kind of thing “The Dark Knight” needs to tap into a genuine conversation about the film’s — and Batman’s — relevance in the zeitgeist.  I’ve been watching The History Channel’s “Batman Unmasked: The Psychology of the Dark Knight” this afternoon, and for a Bat-nut like me, it’s the ultimate geek-out opportunity.

    The entire 60-minute program is available over at YouTube.  It’s aired on television twice today and I don’t know when it will run again, but it’s all kinds of fascinating.  It takes a look at the character’s progression from 70-year-old roots through expansion on the psychological nature of the character in the 1980s and how that history is commented upon in Christopher Nolan’s “Batman Begins” and “The Dark Knight.”

    The most intriguing part for me comes around the 08:15 mark of the clip below.  I didn’t know this, but apparently much of Nolan’s vision for Bruce Wayne stemmed from a comparison to Theodore Roosevelt.  Check it out:

    There are, of course, interviews with filmmakers, actors and DC higher-ups, but there are plenty of doctors, professors and psychologists thrown in for good measure.  Talk about a treat.  I just wish more footage from “The Dark Knight” was used in the program, though they do get around to discussing the Joker in great detail amid a summation of the Bat’s rogues gallery of villainy.

    Anyway, I’d love to see more stuff like this hit the tube.  Or more features digging for this kind of thing in print rather than soliciting general soundbytes about Ledger’s performance or the box office intake of the film.  “The Dark Knight” is an important movie event on many levels this year, and it goes pretty deep.

  • INTERVIEW: ‘Appaloosa’ composer Jeff Beal

    Jeff BealLike a number of film music composers, Jeff Beal makes his home north of Los Angeles in the rocky, canyoned city of Agoura Hills.  One feels a sense of the old west before even seeing the ranch-style houses in his neighborhood and the tail-flipping horses tied out back.  Questions about his work on “Appaloosa,” Ed Harris’s latest entry in the western genre, seem to manifest out of thin, dusty air by the time we make it downstairs to his efficient but Spartan studio.

    At the beginning of the process, Harris told Beal he was not interested in anything overly romantic or mythic.  The mandate was the relationships, the conflict they bring about and the intimate world the characters inhabit.  It was a unique vision for Beal, but one he was more than willing to explore.  He had his share of wells to draw upon, but his work in high-end television projects really stuck out.

    “The only thing I can think of that was sort of similar was [HBO’s] ‘Rome,’” Beal said.  “It was a similar approach creatively because you were dealing with a historical genre, a genre that’s been done a lot, sometimes with a lot more overt flare.  And this was more like the ground view of these people.”

    To that end, Beal set about constructing a theme with little harmonic movement, something that would carry the feeling of the audience being visitors in the world of Virgil Cole and Everett Hitch.  Spring-boarding off a life-long interest in folk music (American or otherwise), Beal wanted to make the music reflect the story-telling nature of the narrative.

    “There was actually a second half that became more of a traditional piece of music because at the end of the day we decided we don’t need that because it’s better to have just a clean, simple statement,” he said.  “These guys are men of action.  It’s all about a process, one step in front of the other.  It’s a journey.  One of the phrases Ed gave me when we were starting was ‘rough elegance,’ which I loved.  A lot of the music sprang from that inspiration.”

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  • EXCLUSIVE: New ‘Defiance’ poster

    We just acquired the sweet new one-sheet for Edward Zwick’s “Defiance.”  Maybe cashing in on a little of that Bond love for Daniel Craig this season, this poster is certainly more appealing than the previous art work:

    Paramount Vantage's Defiance

  • Scott Rudin takes his name off ‘The Reader,’ walks away

    Scott RudinUPDATE (9:58 p.m.): Thanks to one of our readers for pointing out that “The Reader” has been removed from The Weinstein Company’s official site.  Could it mean that Weinstein will fold after all?  Could the pain of getting a publicity team in place, dealing with Rudin’s all-in public play and general bad buzz make TWC see the light and move the film to 2009?  We’ll see…

    EARLIER: I love Scott Rudin.  All along, throughout this whole nasty affair, I have hoped he would prove his balls are bigger than Harvey’s and I think he’s done that now.

    Patrick Goldstein is reporting that the producer has taken his name off of Stephen Daldry’s “The Reader,” which was suddenly jerked into the 2008 Oscar season by Weinstein Company honcho Harvey Weinstein, a move read by most in the industry as a gluttonous attempt at securing some Oscar glory this year.  With “Revolutionary Road” and “Doubt” already at the center of the season’s buzz cycle, the last thing Rudin needed, or wanted, was to have to split his attention a third way — let alone a way that would have been abandoned by its own star as well.

    Yes, it’s true.  Kate Winslet would not have hawked “The Reader” against her husband, Sam Mendes’s “Revolutionary Road” (in which she also stars).  Director Stephen Daldry himself had to respond diplomatically to the entire charade of Rudin and Weinstein kissing and making up in public, only to have before-the-fact private emails spread across the net by an industrious blogger.

    I’ve made my opinion of this fiasco known, and I definitely don’t think I was alone.  In fact, I know I wasn’t.  Weinstein scrambled to put together a publicity team but likely found a lot of road blocks, and to Rudin, it had to have been a painful march toward the inevitable:

    “The Reader,” produced by Alan Smithee.

    Goldstein reports:

    In recent days, negotiations had apparently taken a turn for the worse. Upset with Weinstein and worried that many of his long-standing talent relationships would be harmed, Rudin decided to separate himself from the project. Daldry remains contractually obligated to complete the film, though it’s uncertain of how he will complete the film without Rudin, a longtime collaborator with both Daldry and David Hare, who were the creative team on “The Hours.”

    And the closer, which says it all:

    Whatever the root cause, this is another body blow to “The Reader,” which loses a strong producer who is always a major force during awards season. Rudin will continue as producer of two other year-end pictures, “Revolutionary Road” and “Doubt.”

    Personally, I’m just glad Goldstein got this scoop and not Nikki Finke.

  • Josh Brolin and Jonah Hex

    Jonah HexJeffrey Wells conveys the sentiments of a single source, /Film marks it as reportage and suddenly it’s considered a done deal that Josh Brolin has signed on to star in “Jonah Hex.”  It all may well be true, mind you  It probably is.  But this is the kind of thing that web masters don’t understand when high profile institutions like Variety hold off on linking to them until people are actually on the record.

    ANYWAY, I’m a step removed from Mark Neveldine and Brian Taylor.  Friends of a friend, so to speak.  Watched a few UFC fights with the chaps.  Good guys.  But I’ve heard zip.  If it’s true, it’s definitely a better choice than Thomas Jane would have been (gossip passed along in June).  It would also be a ballsy play for Brolin to make a hard left turn out of prestige and into the realm of genre once more with the directors of “Crank” at the helm.  But I like him for Hex.

    It’s no secret that I’m game for just about any western at this stage.  But “Jonah Hex” represents, along with “The Lone Ranger,” a branching out into typicality for the genre.  Rather than the prestige pet project here or there, we’re starting to see pop culture reflexivity, and that means a lot for the future of spurs and saddles on the big screen.  When (and if) these films start making money, studios will more and more loosen their resistance against making these films.

    But back to “Hex,” if you don’t read the DC Comics book, I certainly recommend it.  It was resurrected a few years back into a new series that is up to about #36 right now (I’ve got the full set), and rather than arcing major stories, it’s generally a one-story-per-issue kind of thing, self-contained, very pulpy, pure awesomeness.  Give it a look.

    Here is what Wells heard:

    I’m told that the deal is sealed for Josh Brolin to star in Jonah Hex, based on the graphic novel and directed by Mark Neveldine and Brian Taylor (Crank, Game) and to be funded and released by Warner Bros. Brolin’s rep is not only denying this but claiming Brolin is “not attached,” but a voice is telling me to consider the word of a friend who tells me the deal was locked down last night.

  • TECH SUPPORT: Best Costume Design — Volume One

    Tech Support at In ContentionThe Academy Award for Best Costume Design recognizes, shock of shocks, the clothes and accessories worn by actors in a film.  Clothing can add to the story and express the nature and situation of the characters who wear them.

    If a single word could be used to describe this category, it would be “period.”  31 of the 40 nominees here this decade were period pieces.  This is not altogether surprising.  Period clothes automatically draw attention by not being the sort of fashion we see every day on the street and require the costume designer to accurately portray the time in which the film takes place.

    The nominations two years ago “The Queen” and “The Devil Wears Prada” were refreshing in my opinion but extremely rare, being the first contemporary nominees in a dozen years.  Admittedly, fantasy films occasionally find a home here as well.  Seven nominees this decade fit that mold.  But even so, there is usually only one –- and never more than two –- spots available for non-period films in this category.

    This is also an arena that tends to reward many familiar faces.  In a typical year, only one or two of the nominees are first-timers, while many designers are (usually deservedly) seen year after year.  This trend has occasionally resulted in some films one would never expect to find in the awards race landing the label “Oscar nominee.”

    Catherine Martin might be leading the way this year.  She won this category seven years ago, the last time both she –- and her husband/director Baz Lurhmann -– worked.  That film was “Moulin Rouge!” and its design elements were fantastic.  Again doubling as a production designer on “Australia” this year, Martin will fashion the world of a Briton coming to a strange historical land, filled, as always, with Lurhmann’s bordering-on-fantastical elements.  The design opportunities should once again be amazing and I’d be quite surprised if Martin failed to make the cut.

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  • Forget Timberline Lodge — try the Stanley

    Inside the Stanley Hotel/Film points us today to a Fantastic Fest tie-in at Timberline Lodge, the hotel where Stanley Kubrick filmed his Stephen King adaptation “The Shining.”  There will be a party, some dinner, and of course, an overnight stay at the creepy establishment.

    That’s all well and good, but forget the Timberline.  I say try your hand at a night in the Stanley Hotel out in Estes Park, Colorado.  That’s the place that gave King his inspiration for the book, a supposedly haunted hotel founded by Freelan O. Stanley (of Stanley Steamer fame).  The guy built this place way out west when his wife began to come down with health issues.  Doctors said the air and altitude of the setting would be good for her.

    King stayed there back in the 1970s in — you guessed it — room 237.  That room is said to be frequented by the spirit of an old maid who will set your clothes aside nice and neat while you’re out hiking or skiing or what have you.  You’ll come back to the room and your shoes will be put in the closet, your shirts stowed in dresser drawers, etc.

    Stars tend to frequent room 237.  Back in 1994, Jim Carrey stayed in the unit while filming “Dumb and Dumber” (Estes Park was used for the Aspen scenes).  He supposedly came down in the middle of the night and told the desk person, “I don’t care where you put me but you have to get me out of that room.”  I’ve heard he won’t really talk about what happened in there.

    Hey — this is what the tour guides tell you.  Don’t shoot the messenger.

    But seriously, the Stanley is a creepy place.  They even did a Ghost Hunters episode there.  Apparently the fourth floor has the most paranormal activity, and there are lots of kids’ spirits hanging around the place, tugging at shirt tales, playing jacks, etc.  The location is surreal as well, looking out over the Rockies with a vast open space out in front of the hotel.  The Rocky Mountain National Park entrance is maybe four miles away, so it’s a choice spot.

    If you can handle it.  Mwahahahahahaha.

  • Adapting Philip Roth

    Cover of The Dying Animal by Philip RothPhilip Roth is author of 25 novels and other works of non-fiction.  Revered in America, he has won every major American literature prize, including the National Book Foundation’s Award for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters in 2002.  Despite his literary success, his films have had a difficult journey to the silver screen.

    I joined the long line of Roth fans that were disappointed with Robert Benton’s adaptation of “The Human Stain,” the 2000 novel that received the National Book Award for the best work of American fiction. It was an extraordinary book and perhaps Roth’s finest. And I believed that it would translate nicely onto the silver screen. While the novel weaved in and out of the past and present, the transitions weren’t so frequent that it would create a problem for the screenwriter, Nicholas Meyer (Oscar-nominated for “The Seven-Per-Cent Solution.”

    Benton was able to attach an exceptional cast that included Anthony Hopkins, Nicole Kidman, Ed Harris and Gary Sinise. But when the film bombed with critics and audiences alike, it was quickly pulled from mainstream movie houses and relegated to small boutique theaters, and for short periods of time. It made only $5.3 million against a production budget of $30 million.

    Mr. Roth’s work has been adapted again by Mr. Meyer this year. Taking the pages of “The Dying Animal” and turning them into the film “Elegy,” Mr. Meyer and the film’s director, Isabelle Coixet have managed to create a finer adaptation of the text, and a far better film.

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  • Memo: Uh, the Best Actress race is VERY heated

    Kate Beckinsale in Nothing But the TruthAs a few commenters have been discussing elsewhere, it seems that some supposedly attentive Oscar bloggers figure 2008 to be a weak year for the lead actress race.  We’ve been calling it the most competitive derby in years around these parts for quite a while now, so the notion that anyone would find it to be thin is perplexing to say the least.

    Well, I’m happy today to see that Pete Hammond is on our bandwagon, writing the following at his Notes on a Season blog:

    This year, however, it is already clear that the race, for all intents and purposes, is backloaded with the most imposing and competitive list of genuine best actress possibilities in many years.

    A tsunami is coming, and [Melissa] Leo and [Penélope] Cruz are getting out of the way by taking their best shot now, hoping it’s enough to stay alive when the big storm of contenders hits shore.

    He then launches into a laundry list of contenders, all of them thoroughly covered before.

    We’re currently banking on Kristin Scott Thomas, Angelina Jolie, Kate Winslet and Meryl Streep around these parts.  Those are four slots that seem secure.  After that, it’s a toss-up between Anne Hathaway, Melissa Leo, Penélope Cruz, Michelle Williams and Sally Hawkins in the indie sector.  If it’s not an indie performance the AMPAS wants to recognize, they’ll have high-budget fare to choose from in Cate Blanchett and Nicole Kidman.

    I’m sticking with Kidman for now.  Makes as much sense as any other contender.

    Have your say. Who are you predicting for Best Actress right now?

  • EW’s Oscar revote

    Entertainment Weekly Oscar revoteFrom Thompson on Hollywood:

    Entertainment Weekly wants Hollywood to rewrite Oscar history by giving the film industry a chance to revise the Oscar history books. It’s called “Recall the Gold.”

    On October 6, EW is inviting more than 7,000 Hollywood insiders to participate in an extensive survey to re-vote on past Oscar races. EW wants to test which movies truly stand the test of time. With the benefit of hindsight, did the right films and performances win over the past 25 years? To look at 2003, will Robert Begnini still beat Tom Hanks? Will Shakespeare in Love still beat Saving Private Ryan? Will Gwenyth Paltrow still beat Cate Blanchett?

    Alright, let me stop it right here and get this out of the way: a nice diversion, nothing else.  Not to poo-poo the experiment, because it’s a fun idea, but the buzz and manipulation of a given Oscar season is in the same league as the manipulation that comes from loud fans and film-goers who think this film deserved to win over that and scream about it for years after the fact.  Nothing like this can happen in a vacuum, so let’s not consider an “Oscar revote” anything more than it actually is.

    And when you see that EW editor Sean Smith’s idea was inspired by the “Brokeback Mountain” loss to “Crash,” it becomes a little more irritating, in my book.  Let it go, folks.

    More:

    Monday EW is mailing out their official “Recall The Gold” ballot inviting the industry to vote in six major categories for five given years spaced five years apart–2003, 1998, 1993, 1988, and 1983–five, ten, fifteen, twenty and twenty-five years ago…

    “We built it from scratch,” says Smith. EW reporters and editors scrolled through their rollidexes. They added everyone who had ever been nominated or won an Oscar, and crew members of films that grossed over $100 million. They looked at the news reports of Hollywood people who had been added to the Oscar ranks in recent years. They culled creative directories for execs, producers, publicists, editors, costume designers, art directors, directors, cinematographers, writers, animators, sound mixers, composers–all the categories covered by the Academy.

    EW made one HUGE change. They invited top film (not TV) agents, who are not permitted to belong to the Academy, to join the list of Oscar revoters. And Smith thinks his list may skew slightly younger than the Academy’s. “We’re not trying to duplicate the Academy,” he says. “What do people working in the film industry think about these Oscar-winning movies now?”

    So, they added more people with agendas to the voting pool.  Nice.  Click the ballot image above for a larger image.  And read the rest of Thompson’s story here.

  • OFF THE CARPET: Who we are, who we want to be

    (from left) Josh Brolin and Toby Jones in W.In the last few weeks, drama has persisted in the yet-to-be-heated Oscar season.  Producers are debating exhibitors in public and mid-summer opinions of awards-caliber product are being revisited — in some cases disavowed — as more and more viewers get their peeks.

    On the positive side, two studios have launched the screener circuit with indie films they hope can muster some remembrance, while the foreign film news bite barrage has come to a close with the qualification deadline.  But there isn’t much to go on in terms of assessing the season, not a lot in the way of tangible grist for the mill.

    Lots of smoke, very little fire.

    In part, that should explain a lack of predictions updates here at In Contention, shifting and sliding for no reason.  And indeed, this week’s update isn’t a massive overhaul — or even an overhaul — beyond putting a few things into context here, trimming the fat there.  But as I set out to update our projections this week, I became more and more aware of 2008’s striking theme of self-reflection this Oscar season.  And hey, it seemed as good an idea for a column as any.

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  • Is Alfred Hitchcock — gasp! — over-appreciated?

    Alfred HitchcockRandom thoughts…and writing this I risk having my head taken off by angry fans and film buffs, but I have always had some issues believing Alfred Hitchcock to be the great filmmaker artists and historians have claimed him to be. In many ways, despite having personally lectured the man and his work to film school classes, I feel he may be the most overrated filmmaker of all time.

    Aim your weapons and open fire on me, as I have placed a target on my back and surely know it, but there must be some folks out there who share my opinion?

    Admittedly, “Psycho” is a powerful film.  It was responsible for ushering in a new form of horror movie, and “Vertigo” is beautifully made, but is there anyone else out there (again) who finds the characters in his films a little…cool, remote, ah, hell…cold? Never have I felt anything for a Hitchcock character.  Never have I invested myself emotionally with a single one of them, not even when portrayed by the great James Stewart or Cary Grant.

    It bothers me that “Hitch” had the film finished in his head by the time he started shooting, leaving nothing for chance and removing any sense of creativity from the actors. He  spoke, they listened and moved and that was that. No where can I find any reference to any collaboration between the director and his actors, which to me is essential in filmmaking and strengthens the characters, giving the actors something to attach themselves to. If an actor is shown how to do it all, how to move, how to speak, how to play the role, when and where are they permitted to be creative?? Look at the dreadful acting in “The Birds” and you get an idea of what I mean.

    “Frenzy” turned out to be a very powerful film, truly frightening, and his last good picture.  However, if you ask me, his best film was “Lifeboat.”

    OK, have a go…my secret is out.  I’m not a Hitchcock fan. My God the shame, the shame…the horror.  Tell me why I should think otherwise.

  • The top 10 shots of 2007: part two

    Today we round out the top 10 shots of the year with the final five.  Check out part one if you missed it.

    Let’s dive in:

    #5

    Michael Clayton

    “MICHAEL CLAYTON”
    Director of Photography: Robert Elswit

    We were completely ripping off New York filmmaking from the 1970s, things like “Klute” and pretty much everything Owen Roizman has ever shot.  But Tony’s sense of these things was not lots of little pieces; he loves making kind of graphic frames that play as long as possible.

    –Robert Elswit

    Robert Elswit had a hell of a year in 2007, finally getting his due from the American Society of Cinematographers who awarded his work in Paul Thomas Anderson’s “There Will Be Blood.”  There was another film featuring Elswit’s unique signature, however, that flew under the radar for its considerable attention to composition and camera movement: Tony Gilroy’s “Michael Clayton.”

    Much is made of the film’s final sequence, a long shot focused on Clayton as he rides away from the hysteria in his life, desperate for his cab driver to “just drive.”  But a companion shot from earlier in the film was just as arresting, if not more so, as a purposeful point of transition to the second half of the endeavor.  A long tracking shot that never misses a beat, both behind and in front of the camera, the scene detailed is the expert, painfully clinical execution of Arthur Edens, played to an award-worthy T by Oscar nominee Tom Wilkinson.

    The final image is steeped in theme, and an initial tracking sequence under Edens’ opening monologue pulls the viewer into the film’s interior world, but this particular shot is so cold as to be frozen in its depiction of something at once gruesome and strangely beautiful, fluid.  I’m not privy to whether it may have been a directorial decision, though I suspect it may have been, but it is the crown jewel in a film packed with precision from Elswit.
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  • The top 10 shots of 2007: part one

    Daniel Day-Lewis in There Will Be Blood2007 was, to my mind, the greatest year for cinematography in a long, long time.  I can’t recall the last time I was so thoroughly impressed with the visual artistry of film after film like I was last year, and I attribute that to the intriguing spark of creativity underway in the film medium as of late.  Newcomers and veterans alike were putting awe-inspiring images on film, some of the seasoned pros besting their already exceptional portfolios.

    I wanted to do something special in the way of commemorating the efforts of these individuals, and so I set out to interview a number of them as the year drew to a close.  Sadly, I was never able to piece those interviews together in a proper story like I would have wanted, but in recent weeks it has occurred to me that it may be just as beneficial to offer up something you don’t regularly see: a personal compilation of the greatest single images from the cinematic year.

    And so it goes that I offer the Top 10 Shots of 2007, a two part piece that will run down what I felt were the best of the best in a year full of exceptional cinematographic work.  Today, I’m running down shots 10 through 6, and tomorrow, we’ll wrap it up with the top 5.  Mixed in you’ll find sporadic comments from the lensers in question, as I feel it only appropriate that I give that small gateway into their process for readers and viewers alike.

    I hope you enjoy reading this as much as I did compiling it.

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