'It'

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Destry Links Again

Film Misery offers up "51 Movies to See Before Oscar Night". Get screening, people.
/Film details on Nicolas Winding Refn's Drive follow-up Only God Forgives starring Ryan Gosling and a "merciless and terrifying".... KRISTIN SCOTT THOMAS. Yes, please. Holy Goddess, yes!
Know Your Meme "first world problems." hee. I wonder how James Van Der Beek feels about that dramatic acting moment always being used in these comical ways?
Guardian funny dismissal of Roland Emmerich's Anonymous

MUBI tells us what's on tap for this year' AFI fest including the classics that guest director Pedro Almodóvar programmed himself. So sad I can't be there for the 25th anniversary screening of Law of Desire; it's only my favorite Pedro! 
Cinema Blend Andy Serkis reaps seven figures for Rise of the Planet of the Apes sequel. Deserved.
Liz Smith lists Hollywood's shortest marriages. Oh Rudolph Valentino... (sigh)
Towleroad a few more links and a note about this weekend's new releases 

Finally...
I must send you off to read Michael's review of Weekend at Serious Film. Michael contributes here from time to time (mostly via Unsung Heroes) but I told him last time I saw him that I was super impatient to hear his reaction as it took him way too long to see it. I love this warning to other straight dudes, commanding them to buy a ticket...

If you don't then you forfeit any right to complain when the multiplexes are filled with nothing but Garry Marshall movies named after holidays.

LOL!

Live-Blogging the Bond 23 "Skyfall" Press Conference

I couldn't begin to tell you why I do the things I do but rather than make you watch all 28 minutes of the Bond 23 conference, I'm watching it for you; I'm a giver.

007 by way of 11/03

50th Anniversaries on their way!

0:01 As the press conference begins we're reminded that it's exactly 50 years ago today Sean Connery was officially announced to play James Bond in Dr. No (1962). Fun, trivia right?

1:15 The confirmation of the worst kept secret in London: the title is "Skyfall"... They don't mention this but that make Skyfall the second shortest Bond title ever (after Dr. No). The longest title is On Her Majesty's Secret Service. #uselesstrivia

2:02 EDITED TO REMOVE COMPLETELY GARBLED NONSENSICAL SENTENCE WHICH IS WHAT YOU GET WHEN YOU LIVE BLOG. The film will take place in London, Shanghai, Istanbul, and has a heavy Scottish component. 

3:21 Not present at the conference but in the film Sam Mendes tells us are wispy wonderful Ben Whishaw and Ralph Fiennes who are described in virtually the same way as playing...

a part I can't tell you about in scenes I can tell you nothing about"

4:25 The stars come out Berenice Marlowe, Naomie Harris, Dame Judi Dench (Mendes makes a funny "you won't have heard of her but i think she has a very promising career ahead of her"), Javier Bardem will play the villain and of course Daniel Craig as Bond, James Bond 007.

5:53 Sam Mendes says he was a huge fan of Bond films (English schoolboys grow up with him) and he says the first one he saw was Live and Let Die (1973) which is, incidentally, one of the Roger Moore titles.

press conference attendees: Bardem, Marlowe, Mendes, Dench, Craig, Harris, Broccoli and Wilson

6:30 Lots of mutual back patting. Mendes loves Craig (he doesn't mention it but he gave Craig one of his first big American movie roles in Road to Perdition), the Broccoli estate loves Mendes, etcetera. Everyone loves everyone. 

7:35 Producer Michael G Wilson "No one really thought we'd get 50 years of Bond, let alone 23 pictures." They mention 23 a lot but it depends on how you count the films.

8:30 They will start shooting today... BOND GIRLS & SHIRTLESS BOND AFTER THE JUMP

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Distant Relatives: 8½ and Synecdoche, New York

Robert here w/ Distant Relatives, exploring the connections between one classic and one contemporary film.

Portrait of the Artist as a Confused Man

Perhaps the idea of a filmmaker making a film about himself, his fears, his hopes, his life, is inherently self-indulgent. It's hard to argue otherwise though self-portraits have always been a staple of art. Perhaps Da Vinci and Rembrandt were self-indulgent too. Still, something about the self portraits is so necessary. Someone has to explore the life of the artist. Biopics, whether celebratory or critical, are often too structured and viewed from outside looking in. Only autobiographies allow the filmmaker the ability to really explore their internal rot. The cinema this creates may not always be compelling but it always feels essential. Federico Fellini's career is saturated in self-exploration, from the continual casting of his wife Giulietta Masina (La Strada, Nights of Cabiria, Juliet of the Spirits), to his reminiscence on his childhood (Amarcord) to his contemplation on the de-evolution of social ascencion (La Dolce Vita). Fellini's career is a tribute to himself, and never more than in 8½, a film so self-referential that its title is devised from the number of films Fellini had made to that point. It is his eighth and a half. Charlie Kaufman's career too is filled with expressions of his own desires and anxieties. He sees his life as that of the impotent artist, and they appear throughout his films in one form or another. The fact that Kaufman had already written a film, Adaptation that featured himself as the lead character (writing a film that featured himself as the lead character) shouldn't detract from the fact that Synecdoche, New York's Caden Cotard is very much a Kaufman stand-in. In fact, Adaptation's use of Kaufman as character may have even freed up the real Charlie Kaufman into a more subtle (if that's possible) cypher for the later film. Adaptation feels a bit like a warm up for Synecdoche, New York with its musings on love and death and the meta-realities of art. Both titles refer to the artistic process as well (self-referentially like Fellini's). Adaptation is obvious. As many of us learned only upon the relase of the film, a "synecdoche" is a part of speech where a part of something is used to represent a whole, such as saying "threads" to mean "clothes" or "set of wheels" to mean "car." And so it is with art, the attempt to use one small story to represent some truth about the whole of existence.
 
In both films, 8 1/2 and Synecdoche, New York we begin with a misanthrope, unwell in health and heart, about to embark on the ultimate boondogle of his career, whether he knows it or not. Continue...

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Nicole's Perpetual Elephant Love Medley

As if Nicole Kidman hadn't done enough for the mystique of elephants! Ten years ago in Moulin Rouge! (see previous posts) she famously lived, loved, and playfully sang on top of a giant bejewelled 'phant. Now she'll be interacting with the real thing on the silver screen. In early 2012 she'll be heading to Africa to film My Wild Life, a drama about the work of elephants advocate and conservationist Dame Daphne Sheldrick. Phillip Noyce (Salt, The Quiet American) will direct. Sheldrick's autobiography will be published in the spring and by this time next year (or thereabouts), if all goes according to plan, we'll see Nicole Kidman reenacting her adventures just in time for next year's Oscar race.

We assume that the bulk of the film will take place between 1955 and 1976 when Sheldrick (who was in her 20s and 30s at the time) and her husband were the co-wardens of Kenya's Tsavo National Park. Sheldrick became an expert on rearing wild animals particularly elephants and rhinos. According to The Hollywood Reporter the film has been gestating for longer than elephants themselves do (22 months if you need to know) and in previous incarnations Julia Roberts and Kate Winslet were both interested in playing Sheldrick. 

David and Daphe Sheldrick. No word yet on who will play David.I believe Sigourney Weaver was the last actress to get an animal husbandry biopic / Oscar nomination (Gorillas in the Mist, 1988)? It can't be too frequent an occurrence given that we don't see too many of those on the big screen. Even animal husbandry with super powers (Aquaman) never makes it to the big screen.

It occurs to me: the family Elephantidae must have secured good representation in Hollywood ten years back. Ever since Nicole & Ewan's "Elephant Love Medley" they've been getting bigger and bigger roles starting with key supporting parts in action movies (The Lord of the Rings and Ong Bank franchises). Lately they've taken to starring in documentaries (One Lucky Elephant - see previous post) and ampliying and romanticizing the charms of their leading ladies (Julia Roberts in Eat Pray Love, Reese Witherspoon in Water For Elephants). 

P.S. Here's a fun take on Moulin Rouge's "Elephant Love Medley" with the original songs dubbed in.

P.P.S. There really ought to have been a special Oscar for the song scoring / arranging / adaptation of Moulin Rouge!