In Contention

Tag: Michael Jackson

  • AFI’s moments of significance in 2009

    James Cameron on the set of AvatarThey should add an “L” between the “F” and the “I.”  American Film List Institute.  Anyway, this just arrived via press release.  The criteria is apparently “accomplishments of considerable merit; influences with either a positive or negative impression; trends, either new or re-emerging; anniversaries or memorials of special note; and/or movements in new technologies, education, preservation, government or other areas that impact the art film, television and digital media.”

    It leads off with the obvious choice.  More after the jump:

    AVATAR – JAMES CAMERON’S MILEPOST IN THE EVOLUTION OF THE ART FORM

    James Cameron’s pioneering effort to unleash the human imagination was fully realized in 2009 with the release of AVATAR, a film that firmly established itself as a landmark in the way stories are told.

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  • Corliss declares Firth and Mo’Nique performances of the year

    Colin Firth in A Single ManWe’re currently in that month where precursors do their utmost to reduce a year’s worth of cinematic achievement to a small handful of oft-repeated names and titles. It’s understandable (if disappointing) when groups or committees compile these identikit lists — but when individuals (and serious critics at that) stick rigidly to the formula, it becomes a little depressing.

    This is my way of saying I read Richard Corliss’s Time list of the year’s Top 10 movie performances and could only say, “Really?” He watched an entire year’s worth of films and could only come up with nine heavily-publicized Oscar contenders and one token wacky/stupid/throwaway pick? (That’d be Michael Jackson, if you’re interested.)

    Make no mistake, there are a number of fine performances here. Colin Firth, Mo’Nique, Jeremy Renner, Christoph Waltz, Carey Mulligan … noteworthy work, make no mistake. I just find it hard to believe that a critic has no personal favorites that deviate slightly from the buzz-determined consensus. I’m not saying he has to pick Tilda Swinton or Tom Hardy or John Malkovich — but he must have noticed some performers that weren’t already clocked by everyone else. Why not highlight one of them?

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  • 10/30 Oscarweb Round-up

    Sotigui Kouyate and Brenda Blethyn in London River• Brian Lowry on how The Ten is an Oscarcast producer’s nightmare. [Variety]

    • With Hugh Jackman out, Jeff Wells thinks the Oscars need to skew younger with their host. [Hollywood Elsewhere]

    • The producers of “London River” launch a deserved Oscar campaign for Brenda Blethyn, despite still lacking US distribution. [Notes on a Season]

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  • Thoughts on ‘Michael Jackson’s This Is It’

    Michael Jackson in Michael Jackson's This Is ItI was going to sit down and write a proper review of “Michael Jackson’s This Is It,” but I hit a wall pretty fast.  I don’t know how to review something that was never meant to be a cinematic work of art.  It succeeds on so many levels but it also doesn’t aspire to a whole lot.

    It is, at the end of the day, a serendipitously candid look at an entertainer creating, and as a Michael Jackson fan, I was thoroughly satisfied.  As a filmgoer, I found myself mentally assembling my grocery list.

    No, the film isn’t boring.  And though it is a bit repetitive, it never fails to be at least modestly fascinating.  This is, after all, one of the most intimate looks we’ve had at one of the more elusive artists in popular culture.  And the surge of excitement you get from seeing a strong, limber, on-it-as-ever Jackson stick the moves and ratchet up the spectacle is affecting to say the least.

    Gone is the frail, shrinking, ghostly image plastered across the tabloids or snapped swiftly by craven paparazzi.  Here is a man in command of a machine built to entertain.

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  • 8/21 Web Round-up

    Bill Murray in Groundhog Day• How many days did Bill Murray re-live in “Groundhog Day?” [Chicago Tribune]

    • Screenwriter Roberto Orci to receive Imagen Awards’ Norman Lear Writer’s Award. [Variety]

    • David Poland sits down with three more Super Movie Friends to talk “Inglourious Basterds.” [The Hot Blog]

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  • 40 years later…

    Voyage to the MoonToday marks the 40th anniversary of the Apollo 11 moon walk.  But I’m having trouble drumming up any real feeling about that since it really hasn’t meant a damn thing since.  We never went back with any real initiative, the space program has stalled for the most part and never seems to break any new barriers and, yeah, I actually put some level of stock into the idea that we never went there in the first place.

    Don’t get pissy with me.  I guess we could look at the tapes again.  Oh, wait.  NASA “lost” them and “probably taped over” them.  That ought to get the conspiracy theorists’ hearts racing.

    But seriously, I can’t say the occasion is particularly moving.  It doesn’t feel like it has meant anything in the grander scheme.  The “ours is bigger than yours” mentality that drove us to seek out a moon-landing in the first place doesn’t really register these days.  Maybe I’d feel different if I were there, in the moment, feeling the vibe, etc.  But from this perch, it’s not moving the needle.  Just me.

    Don’t tell Buzz Aldrin, though:

    The occasion is marked by outlet after outlet this week.  In the pages of The New York Times, John Strausbaugh writes up the centuries-old fascination with a moon landing in fiction, fables and film that preceded the Apollo 11 mission, while Jeffrey Kluger has the Time Magazine cover story (with some peripheral discussion on the conspiracy theory stuff).

    (More fun after the jump.)

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  • 7/14 Web Round-up

    Steven Soderbergh• Who dropped the “Moneyball?” [CNN]

    • Steven Soderbergh can see the end of his career. [The Guardian]

    • Michael Adams talks to filmmaker Mick Garris about the all-but-forgotten 1997 short film “Ghosts,” starring Michael Jackson. [Movieline]

    • Need a “Green Lantern” primer?  Here’s a good one. [Empire]

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  • Jennifer Hudson sings for Michael Jackson

    I’m sure many of you have been watching the Michael Jackson memorials proceedings just as I have, so there’s no need to remind you of what went down. A largely tasteful, moving affair, I’m pleased to say.

    In the interests of keeping things movie-related (I mean, how many other Oscar winners can claim to have performed for the King of Pop?), I thought I’d put up this clip of Jennifer Hudson belting “Will You Be There” with immense spirit. Not the man’s greatest song, but it hardly matters. Say what you like about Hudson as a thespian, but by God, that voice can move mountains.

  • 7/2 Web round-up

    Michael Bay• Michael Bay is a drug. [First Showing]

    • Three years after stirring trouble regaring the on-set particulars of “Miami Vice,” Kim Masters decides to take aim at Michael Mann once again with speculation and anonymous quotes. [The Daily Beast]

    • Meanwhile, Harvey Weinstein seems to be making a transition to film critic, calls “Public Enemies” the start of the 2009 Oscar race. [The Daily Beast]

    • Elliot J. Gorn questions the historical accuracy of the film, fails to understand compositing, artistic license. [Slate]

    • Headline of the month: “Tippi Hedren tells Michael Jackson’s former pet tigers of his death.” [The Guardian]

    • Attempting to steer coverage slightly away from commerce, Eugene Hernandez introduces a new, David Hudson-inspired column aggregation column.  Not exactly novel to the net but certainly to the outlet. [indieWIRE]

    • Geoff Boucher sits down with Guillermo Del Toro. [Hero Complex]

    • The 10 most clever bank robberies in movies. [Spout Blog]

  • 7/1 Web Round-up

    Michelle Pfeiffer• Drew McWeeny catches up to “In the Realm of the Senses” 23 years later on Criterion Blu. [HitFix]

    • Anna Pickard breaks down the “Funny People” trailer. [The Guardian]

    • Steve Weintraub chats with “Big Bang Theory” star Jim Parsons at the Saturn Awards.  (It’s one of my favorite sit-coms, so I thought I’d share.) [Collider]

    • So you’ve been asking yourself, “What does a producer do, anyway?”  Here’s a primer. [indieWIRE]

    • So if you live in Glascow, you can finally watch Monty Python’s “Life of Brian” in a cinema. [The Independent]

    • Deborah Landis, designer of the red jacket Michael Jackson wore in “Thriller.” [Speakeasy]

    • Dan Zak catches up with “Chéri” star Michelle Pfeiffer at 51. [Washington Post]

    • The 25 sexiest movies ever.  Eh. [Entertainment Weekly]

  • Steve Lopez’s would-be Jackson column

    Steve Lopez as Vromans in PasadenaSpeaking of David Carr, he points us (via his must-follow Twitter page) to a Ventura County Star story today concerning Los Angeles Times columnist Steve Lopez’s recent keynote address for the National Society of Newspaper Columnists.  The part that caught my eye was a segment dedicated to Lopez’s description of his Michael Jackson column, had he decided to write one.

    I heard Lopez speak a little more than a year ago, when he was promoting his then-forthcoming book “The Soloist” (the story of his relationship with Nathaniel Anthony Ayers that was translated to the screen earlier this year with Robert Downey Jr. and Jamie Foxx in starring roles).  He spins a good yarn with the best of them.

    Anyway, Lopez’s piece would have begun in Iraq, when he was covering the Gulf War in 1991 and attempted to gain access to Saddam Hussein’s nearby summer palace.  He took two photographers with him and went as far as they could go, Lopez says.  When soldiers approached them with machine guns and began grilling the three journalists about their thoughts on George Bush and Saddam Hussein, however, one of the photographers started to make too many waves.

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  • Michael Jackson’s filmmaker collaborations

    Michael Jackson in the music video for Billie JeanTomorrow’s installment of The Lists is going to be Michael Mann-centric, but I was all set to write up something brief in the way of qualifying Michael Jackson’s contributions to the movie world until I came across this Christopher Campbell posting at Spout Blog.  It’d be pretty difficult to go much deeper than he has.

    Campbell ranks Jackson’s “filmmaker collaborations,” including music videos directed by the likes of John Singleton, David Fincher, Bob Giraldi and, of course, John Landis and Martin Scorsese.  As expected, the Francis Ford Coppola-directed, George Lucas-produced “Captain EO” is in the mix, as well as Sidney Lumet’s “The Wiz.”  I had totally forgotten about the Spike Lee production “They Don’t Really Care About Us” until I caught it on MTV or the like yesterday.  Campbell places that at #1.

    It’s a shame room couldn’t be made for the “Billie Jean” production, from visionary music video (and eventual so-so film) director Steve Barron (A-Ha’s “Take On Me”).  Promo News recently caught up with Barron for a brief remembrance of the shoot.

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  • 6/29 Web Round-up

    Stephen Frears• Rachel Abramowitz catches up with Johnny Depp on the “Public Enemies” publicity trail. [Los Angeles Times]

    • Helen O’Hara remembers Michael Jackson’s movie moments. [Empire]

    • Jenni Miller talks to “Cheri” director Stephen Frears. [Cinematical]

    • Guillermo DelToro’s credo. [The Independent]

    • “Do the Right Thing” still asks burning questions. [Washingotn Post]

    • Hey, remember Julia Ormond? [New York Daily News]

    • David Cairns talks to “Pontypool” director Bruce Macdonald. [The Autuers’ Notebook]

  • Has anyone seen this bizarre CNN interview with Joe Jackson???

    I don’t think “WTF” says it, but…WTF???

  • Deepak Chopra on his friend, Michael Jackson

    This Keith Olbermann interview with doctor and author Deepak Chopra, one of Michael Jackson’s closest friends and confidants, is required viewing for anyone wanting to get past the knee-jerk “a pedophile is dead” stupidity flooding the net, the air waves, etc., in the wake of the entertainer’s untimely demise Thursday.  The interview comes on the heels of a Huffington Post op-ed Chopra penned early Friday morning, worth more than any cheap dime-store speculation from misanthropes and uneducated buffoons.

    Thankfully the interview briefly gets into the issue of Jackson’s lupus condition, which obviously speaks to the plastic surgery that eventually became an obsession with health that so many are quick to forget or ignore, choosing instead the line that he was attempting to transform himself into a child or some other such nonsense.  There is a Wolf Blitzer interview with Chopra that was even longer, which kick-started his many media appearances this weekend.  If you can find that, give it a look, too.

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  • WEEKLY WRAP: Bombshell upon bombshell

    Michael JacksonWeird, unsettling week, this. Here’s how it went down:

    • In the week’s biggest movie news, the Academy threw us all for a loop by announcing a 10-nominee slate for the Best Picture category.

    • But even that shock was dwarfed in scale by the stunning news of Michael Jackson’s passing.

    • And in a rather bleak week for losing talent, we also said goodbye to Farrah Fawcett and Ed McMahon.

    • On a happier note, we laid eyes on two of our most eagerly awaited films of the year — “Public Enemies” and “Antichrist” — and liked what we saw.

    • AMPAS continues its tinkering, this time in the Best Original Song category.

    • The “Transformers” sequel opened to critical scorn even accusations of racism, but is the film totally indefensible?

    • With “The Hurt Locker” finally going public today, we caught up with the film’s breakout star Jeremy Renner.

    • We revealed our age by celebrating the 20th anniversary of Tim Burton’s “Batman.”

    • Continuing the reflective mood, this week’s list considered the greatest directorial debuts of the decade.

    • Speaking of debuts, “The Proposal” gave Sandra Bullock the biggest of her career.

  • ‘Bruno’ cut out of respect to Jackson

    LaToya JacksonWell, that was quick. The Guardian reports that, following the coinciding events of last night’s “Bruno” premiere and Michael Jackson’s tragic passing, a hasty — and possibly permanent — cut has been to the film. The scene in question pits Sacha Baron Cohen against Jackson’s sister LaToya:

    The offending scene features Cohen, in the guise of Brüno, attempting to find Michael Jackson’s phone number on LaToya’s BlackBerry. After Brüno reads aloud what he claims to be the singer’s number, an apparently enraged LaToya terminates the interview and storms off the set. Reports suggest that the scene will not be restored for its official release on 10 July.

    It would appear that the scene isn’t particularly derogatory about the late superstar, but the powers that be at Universal decided to remove it “out of respect to Jackson’s family.” Fair enough.

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  • Still hurting, still remembering

    Captain EO