April Showers: Rachel Getting Married

April Showers - some nights at 11. Here's new contributor Sebastian on a TFE favorite...

a shower scene from one of my favorite films

Jonatham Demme's Rachel Getting Married (2008) takes place over the weekend of Rachel's (Rosemarie DeWitt) wedding, and follows her sister, Kym (Anne Hathaway, earning her first Oscar nomination), on leave from rehab and struggling to navigate the highly stressful family reunion. Though the film is a celebration, it's about loss, too. As a teenager, Kym, intoxicated, caused an accident that led to the tragic death of her little brother, Ethan. His absence is felt throughout the film, through words and images, through an empty room or, most painfully, on his father's (Bill Irwin) face after happening upon a plate with Ethan's name on it.

Ethan is part of the sisters' closest moment together, too, which comes right on the heels of their biggest clash, when Kym returns to the house after wrecking her car in the woods the night before. Physically and emotionally bruised, she goes straight to Rachel, who immediately knows what to do...

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Posterized: Alex Garland of "Ex Machina" Fame

My schedule has been in complete disarray so I haven't yet seen Ex-Machina, opening today in limited release, but I've heard many thumbs up from the critical community. 

 As an early adopter of this year's "it" girl, Alicia Vikander, I'm excited to see her as a cyborg or whatever she plays in the movie. But we'll get around to Alicia and her men (Domnhall Gleeson & Oscar Isaac) after we see the picture.

Ex Machina (2015) marks Alex Garland's directorial debut but his name is already a familiar one at the movies from adaptations of two of his novels, and as a screenwriter himself. He has also served as an executive producer on a few movies, not pictured here like 28 Weeks Later (2007) which of course spun off from the film he wrote, and this summer's Big Game (2015) an action film starring Samuel L Jackson as the President of the USA. 

HOW MANY GARLAND-RELATED FILMS HAVE YOU SEEN?

THE BEACH (2000) based on his novel
28 DAYS LATER (2002) original screenplay
THE TESSERACT (2003) based on his novel
SUNSHINE (2007) original screenplay
NEVER LET ME GO (2009) his screenplay adaptation of Kazuo Ishiguro's novel
DREDD  (2012) his screenplay adaptation based of the comic strip character Judge Dredd

If you've read any of his novels -- the only one that hasn't been adapted for the screen is "The Coma" -- you win bonus points, and must share your feelings. It's the law.

Crawford Week Finale: To Those Who Can't Blend In!

This week's Joan Crawford mania, sparked by back-to-back best shot eppys (Mommie Dearest and Johnny Guitar) and a coincidental shout out to Mildred Pierce on Mad Men / reader question about Golden Age actresses, made this week something of an accidental theme week. For those who weren't feeling it, too bad! [Glenn Close voice]

Joan's not going to be ignored, Dan."

Joan cannot be denied. Nor can she blend in. Which is the topic of this final Joan post, my very late pick for that Best Shot party (I wasn't the only latecomer!). Let this one serve as a toast not only to the two time Oscar-winning cinematographer Harry Stradling Sr, but the costume designer Sheila O'Brien.

Best Shot. Joan, glowing like the sun in the center of the frame where she belongs.

There are many things to love about this western oddity but the single most amusing detail is that Joan has three costume changes during the extended climax. There's no time for a costume change like that time when you're running for your life! In the scene which really caught the Best Shot club's attention she is playing piano calmy in the center of her saloon (and the frame, naturally) in an enormous fluffy girly white gown. This change comes late enough in a picture in which she's only ever otherwise worn pants, that you know it's an in-your-face move meant to make a statement. (With the added benefit of pissing off her equally butch rival, Mercedes McCambridge). It's also the first time in the picture in which things go really wrong for her. Her lover Johnny Guitar momentarily rescues her from certain murder and they flee into the darkness. He's worried that she's like a great big lantern with that white dress on in the nighttime. So Crawford switches it out for an outfit that's.... wait for it... Bright red. Way to be inconspicuous Joan. A very brief time later, while still trying to avoid taking several bullets she switches that one out for... BRIGHT YELLOW. 

You will never catch Joan Crawford in camouflage. She will only spend time in the shadows if she can be beautifully lit emerging from them (see the whole of Mildred Pierce). A true star will not / can not blend in. Go ahead and put her in the center of the frame in shockingly bold colors, with nothing else to distract us. All eyes will stay on her regardless.

P.S. Curiously, though the costume designer Sheila O'Brien lived to be 80 years old, dying only a few years after Joan herself, she only served as lead Costume Designer on six Hollywood pictures, after a promotion from the wardrobe department. Five of the six were Joan Crawford vehicles so the Star obviously liked her, or Miss O'Brien worked very hard to appease the Star. Either/Or.  In fact, her first non "wardrobe credit" was "gown executer: Miss Crawford" (such a violent title!) on 1949's Flamingo Road, after which she became a lead designer. She was Oscar nominated for the popular Crawford picture Sudden Fear (1952). Her last Crawford picture Female on the Beach (1955) carries the immortal tag line:

She was TOO HUNGRY for love... to care where she found it!"

Weirdly O'Brien only has two credits after her time with Crawford and they're both years later. Did she upset the tempestuous diva? What happened to her? I'm suddenly desperate for a biopic on her. I bet there are skeletons in that wardrobe closet. 

Exit Music. Play us off, Joan!

Ask Nathaniel

I'll pick ten questions to answer on Monday night. But remember to keep it tight because book length questions get ignored. Two (unrelated) themes to inspire your questions this week: "Stage" and "Science Fiction" because Tony season is coming and we have a special sci-fi theme week coming up in April that we need you in the mood for.

Interview: "Dior and I" Director. Film and Fashion Are More Connected Than You'd Think

Jose here to bring you and interview as the new documentary Dior and I opens in select theaters.

In April 2012, Raf Simons was announced as the new creative director at Christian Dior, fashion experts all over the world were surprised that they’d chosen a minimalist Belgian designer who up to then had mostly been known for his menswear, and when his first couture collection debuted, the house of Dior was once again giving people something to talk about, as Simons sought to pay tribute to the man whose “New Look” revolutionized fashion in the twentieth century. What few people knew was the behind-the-scenes drama that had the introverted Simons become the hero at the center of a thriller which had him try to deliver a couture collection in two months, as opposed to the six most designers are given to work with.

In his provocative documentary Dior and I, director Frédéric Tcheng gives us access to this exclusive world in which art and commerce are at constant odds with each other. Tcheng has amassed an admirable nonfiction filmography comprised of some of the greatest fashion films in recent years, he co-produced and edited the Oscar short-listed Valentino: The Last Emperor and co-directed the delicious Diana Vreeland: The Eye Has to Travel, but as he explained during our chat in New York City, he’s not interested in being “a fashion filmmaker”, but instead wants to tell compelling stories that transcend into the universal.

THE INTERVIEW

JOSE: Something that never becomes clear in the film is why he would agree to do the collection in eight weeks? Did you ask him about this?

FRÉDÉRIC TCHENG: (Laughs) I think the timing just happened to be that way, I’m not sure what was actually said at the meetings when they were negotiating his arrival, so I can’t speak for that. What I gather is that Dior wanted him to start with couture as a statement, not ready to wear, but couture, which happens only twice a year. Everyone was waiting for Dior to announce a new designer, and it took them almost a year to do it, so I don’t know what happened in those meeting rooms.

This time element gave you the tools to make a thriller! [More...]

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