Big Screen Little Screen

Trailers for the 15 2008 documentaries on Oscar’s short list, to be cut down to the final five nominations (via Anne Thompson)

At the Death House Door
The Betrayal (Nerakhoon)
Blessed Is the Match: The Life and Death of Hannah Senesh
Encounters at the End of the World
Fuel
The Garden
Glass: A Portrait of Philip in Twelve Parts
I.O.U.S.A.
In a Dream
Made in America
Man on Wire
Pray the Devil Back to Hell
Standard Operating Procedure
They Killed Sister Dorothy
Trouble the Water

Not the best, not the smartest, not the most entertaining - the U.K.’s Times Online compiled 50 picks for next year’s blockbusters and highest grosses. Pink Panther 2 leans up against the final spot (only 50 pictures to be released in 09?), with Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince up top.

The 50 Biggest Movies of 2009 - Times Online (via Screengrab)

Excerpts from Vulture’s interview with culture critic Ken Burns on his new book, and the indelible effect on pop culture and flea-market entrepreneurship of Scarface, in Scarface Nation: The Ultimate Gangster Movie and How It Changed America

Why was the Scarface cast and crew so reluctant to discuss its influence?
I think their interpretation of its acceptance in pop culture is that it somehow tarnishes the movie and they can’t understand that it’s what keeps it alive. I think they really ought to loosen up and embrace it. They should own their Scarface.

You wrote that De Palma has been repeatedly pitched by rappers looking to re-score Scarface with hip-hop. Sounds like a good idea, given Georgio Moroder’s awful disco-synth soundtrack.
He hates the idea and has refused to allow that to happen. He thinks [the old score] captures the period, and while he’s very glad that hip-hop musicians love this movie, he thinks it would ruin his great creation.

You’re also a music critic. It seems hip-hop has moved away a bit from the Scarface paradigm, what with 50 Cent selling water and all that.
I think that the business rules of Scarface provided a business model ten years ago for a lot of hip-hop artists, but now those kinds of showy exhibitionist displays of wealth are considered both bad form and bad business, and we’re entering the post-Scarface era of music economics.

Received an email this afternoon noting that The Criterion Collection is having a 40 percent off sale on all their currently in-stock items - DVD’s, clothing, posters, and knick knacks - until Monday, November 24th, at midnight. Free shipping on orders over 50 dollars.

Note: I received no compensation for passing this on, though I wouldn’t kick an early Ozu box set out of bed if it were to mysteriously appear either.

Ingredients: 200 Toshiba Gigashot cameras (highest number of moving image cameras ever used in a film sequence), custom rig weighing half a metric ton, 20 terrabytes of data.  Add Crystal Castles.  Add Flashdance reference.  Add sporty spices.  Add target demo participants.  Shoot.  Edit.  Broadcast.

Details (via Engadget)

Bjork clears up any confusion you may have had (via Gizmodo)

– HBO has acquired rights for a Ed Norton produced documentary following Barack Obama from the early days of his presidential campaign all the way through Election Day - Hollywood Reporter

– Turning the tables on the usual remake story - Fox Japan takes a shot at Alexander Payne’s Sideways. Same old remake story - Steven Spielberg eyes an Oldboy remake utilizing Will Smith which, rest assured, will capture none of the spirit of the original.

– Kevin Smith, Michael Moore, M.Night Shyamalan, Cameron Crowe, and Uwe Boll - 5 Directors, 5 Achilles Heels - Spout

– Christopher Mintz-Plasse (McLovin) is everywhere - L.A. Times

– In defense of a defunct format: The Guardian’s Darragh McManus hearts the VCR

– David Lynch to launch a new web series based on his latest book, Catching the Big Fish: Meditation, Consciousness and Creativity - Wired

– The Red Balloon, Rumble Fish, Le Petit Amour, Billy the Kid - Miranda July on films that shaped her childhood and career - The Guardian

– Interviews: Salon and 30 Rock’s Jack McBrayer, A.V. Club and Paul Rudd, and Vulture with Jean-Claude Van Damme on the critically acclaimed(!?) JCVD.

– Video: Seth Rogen and Kevin Smith on Clerks, Superbad, Zack and Miri, and fat guys on film. (via Hollywood Elsewhere)

Seems appropriate. Change - cosmetic and otherwise - is coming.

Apologies for the non-posting.  The latest on Don Draper and Zack and Miri and the lot seems so small while history is in the making. I mean, CNN just dropped a hologram on our unsuspecting heads for Pete’s sake.  Elect today, blog tomorrow.

Written by Jonathan Raymond and Kelly Reichardt (both behind 2006’s Old Joy) and directed by Reichardt. Michelle Williams stars as drifter Wendy, en route to a cannery job in Alaska with her dog Lucy in tow. As her car breaks down in a small Oregon town, her tight-money problems create a ripple of bad decisions and piled-on crises. Scheduled release: December 10, 2008 (limited).

Related: indieWIRE Profile - Williams on Wendy and Lucy (via GreenCine)

“I like the way she’s handing out the Pops. The kids are excited.
But, the mom reminds me of something.”

“No, this is original.”

Having directed one of the best dramas of the year in Snow Angels and a top comedy in the Judd Apatow produced Pineapple Express, David Gordon Green will continue to show off his range by taking on the adaptation of the Steve Niles graphic novel, Freaks of the Heartland (Hollywood Reporter). Add Freaks to Green’s growing list of projects, including writing and exec producer credits for the recently announced Fox TV animated comedy Good Vibes, about California surfer teens. (Variety)

I’m cold on Diablo Cody until moved otherwise, but any mention of Toni Collete is an immediate ear-perker and amounts to a major coup for Showtime. Collete stars as a mom suffering from multiple personality disorder (or dissociative identity disorder for the stickers among us). Backed by Stephen Spielberg. United States of Tara is slated for a January debut. (via Pop Candy)

Written and directed by Sharon Maguire (Bridget Jones). Based on the Chris Cleave novel. Starring Michelle Williams, Ewan McGregor, and Matthew Macfadyen. Williams portrays a young mother who learns that her husband and son were killed in a London soccer stadium bombing while she was involved in an extramarital affair with a local journalist (McGregor). U.K. trailer.  Scheduled U.S. release: TBD.

“A thriller-romance-survivor movie-cum-psychiatric free-for-all, ‘Incendiary’ aspires to so much it ends up being less than the sum of its parts — one of which is a terrific performance by Michelle Williams.” - Variety

(Hat tip to Row Three)

20th Century Fox is hoping that Michael Douglas is ready to sign on for a reemergence of Me Decade icon Gordon Gekko, as they prime a Wall Street sequel to be written by Allan Loeb (21). Part 2 would rejoin Gekko just as he finished up a long prison bid, only to find the torn-up financial landscape of present day. No indication yet on if Oliver Stone will be back to helm the project, thought it appears that Charlie Sheen won’t return to reprise his Bud Fox role. (Variety)

“I’ve always had a bit of a walk—this girl’s got hips—but on the show it’s exaggerated. The first day, I put on those [retro] undergarments, and I was walking around the office like, boom, boom, boom! They called ‘Cut,’ and I turned to [creator] Matt Weiner and said, ‘That was Joan.’ And he said, ‘That was Joan.’ It all just dropped into place.” — Mad Men’s Christina Hendricks (Page Six)

– “Not only do I not know how I’m going to sell this, but I also don’t know if I want to sell it. I don’t want to figure out a way to trick people into seeing this movie. If it’s not your thing, you shouldn’t see it. It’s not going to be for all people—that’s what I’m learning. There are people who are not going to respond to it. And that’s fine. I don’t want to trick them… Synecdoche is not going to give you anything like, ‘Oh, it’s a dream or it’s a portal into John Malkovich or it’s a secret memory-erasing drug or whatever the hell it is.’ It’s not going to happen. This guy’s life is going to play out and you’re going to watch him age and you’re going to watch him not succeed at what he wants to do and have lousy relationships and you’re going to watch him die. — Charlie Kaufman mopes around with Vice (via The Michael Ryan)

– “I didn’t know what Junebug would be like… They were making it for under $1 million—you just don’t know when you’re involved in smaller projects if they’re going to be seen.” — Amy Adams, once one Oscar nominated gig away from leaving the business altogether (Vanity Fair)

– “I don’t mind being nude onscreen. Or anywhere, really. But having someone touch you on camera is really … [long pause] It’s really kind of an awful experience. Because half of your brain is like, ‘Okay, I wanna make this look real, because I want it to feel real for the audience,’but then you’re also fighting to say, ‘But it’s not real.’ But it is actually real, because somebody is actually touching you. That kind of work that you have to do to disassociate from your body is kind of traumatic. I don’t enjoy that at all. It’s … gross. — Mumblecore muse Greta Gerwig on Nights and Weekends (Vulture)

Written by Megan Holley and directed by Christine Jeffs, Sunshine Cleaning stars Amy Adams as a housekeeper that enlists her sister, played by Emily Blunt, to join her in transitioning to a more profitable crime scene cleaning startup. Also stars Alan Arkin and Steve Zahn. Scheduled release: TBA. (via Row Three | Trailer Addict)

Directed by Josh Safdie, The Pleasure of Being Robbed stars Eléonore Hendricks as a fearless New York petty thief with Amelie-like, whimsical curiosity. Hendricks co-wrote the screenplay with Safdie. Open now in NY - more screens to follow, including IFC’s On Demand service.

Trailer

A la American Teen, Caroline Suh’s timely rookie documentary outing follows four student council president candidates at New York’s Stuyvesant High School. Scheduled release: October 15, 2008.

Trailer