Doc Corner: IMAX in the Age of VOD

Glenn here. Each Tuesday we bring you reviews and features on documentaries from theatres, festivals, and on demand. This week we take a look at IMAX and question why such a documentary-friendly medium hasn't taken advantage of the marketplace.

A funny thing happened in the arthouse cinemas across my home country of Australia this weekend: Aleksandr Sokurov’s Russian Ark was re-released into theatres. It had been a hit in 2002, but it’s still odd to see a 14-year-old Russian art film pop up around the nation for no other reason than, I suspect, to throw some (very elegant and aristocratic) shade at the recently-released Victoria.

I bring this up because I recently visited my local IMAX. The proper IMAX with screens that stands as tall as multi-storey buildings, and not whatever fauxMAX imitations have popped up across American multiplexes. [more...]

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Happy 100th: Why Doesn't Movita Have a Biopic?

Today is the Centennial of the Mexican American actress Movita, who was born as Maria Luisa Castaneda but renamed Movita by MGM because the name sounded Polynesian to them. Well maybe it's her centennial. She claims the studio fudged with her age to make her older for legal reasons. She's surely best remembered today as "Tehani" one of two young island beauties (the other being "Maimiti" played by Mamo Clark) that got entangled in all that Mutinous Best Picture business on the Bounty back in 1935 (if you know what I mean).

Movita went on to international fame and married two famous masculine hunks, first the boxer Jack Doyle and then superstar Marlon Brando (quite atypically she was an "older woman" marrying a young superstar) so we're guessing she had a type...

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Ask Nathaniel

Time for another Q&A. Ask away in the comments and I'll choose 10 to answer tomorrow evening. Let's have a loose animal theme this week. Between my ongoing sick cat drama at home and the movies (jungle book coming soon) we're feeling zoological.

Programming note: Requested Crimes and Misdemeanors (1989) revisit will happen April 20th. Sorry for delay.

Previously on: If you're like "what's this Q&A business?" catch up on recent Q&As 

April Showers: Antonio Banderas in "Law of Desire"

In April Showers, Team TFE looks at our favorite waterlogged moments in the movies. Here's Manuel on Law of Desire (1987).

Almodóvar is the air again due to Chus Lampreave's passing and his latest, Julieta getting solid reviews (his best since Volver). And since April is “Actor Month” here at TFE let's kill two birds with one stone by looking at a small scene featuring Antonio Banderas and Eusebio Poncela from the 1987 classic Law of Desire.

The film centers on Antonio (Banderas) and his obsessive fixation with a gay film director (Poncela). After stalking him and eventually roping his way into his life, Antonio settles on trying to shape Pablo after his own image. First, he fixes some things around Pablo’s messy apartment, including some tiles in his shower, and then, the next day he takes it upon himself to set some sort of routine for them.

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The Family Fang Welcomes You

Manuel here. Nat got a look at The Family Fang in Toronto and ahead of its screening at Tribeca (and its limited release later this month), we finally got a poster and a trailer for Jason Bateman's sophomore effort. The film features the Arrested Development star and TFE fave Nicole Kidman as the Fang siblings (Buster and Annie) who are brought together after their parents mysteriously disappear. In true indie drama mode, though, this is an excuse to unearth all sorts of dysfunctions, mostly stemming from the fact that the senior Fangs are kooky performance artists who scarred their children by incorporating them into their live art pieces (and, you know, by referring to them as child A and child B).

In a feat of perfect casting, the Fang patriarch is played in his later years by Christopher Walken who shares top billing with Kidman and Bateman in the poster below:

So many things to love about this poster but at the top of my list is the inclusion of Kathryn Hahn on the side who is just perfect as the young matriarch, Camille Fang. That said, you could easily mistake this for a Wes Anderson poster, don't you think? The line reminding you that the film was written by "Pulitzer Prize Winner David Lindsay-Abaire" (for, coincidentally, Rabbit Hole which Nicole brought to the screen in 2010) is straight out of Moonrise Kingdom.

I can't really do a Yes/No/Maybe So given I already got to see the finished film last week, but I'm curious to see whether the poster and trailer are making you eager to get to meet the Fang family.