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Entries in Heavenly Creatures (12)

Sunday
Aug282011

DiLinkrio

© Phil NotoKeyframe a look back at the multiple Tilda Swintons of Teknolust
The Siren and Sunset Gun on Gene Tierney in Leave Her To Heaven 
World of Wonder gossiping about Will Smith and Jada Pinkett's breakup which they're denying (for now)
IndieWire has a chart of the top ten lesbian-centric box office hits: The Hours and Heavenly Creatures -- two films we like to talk about! -- bookend the chart. It's a remarkably high quality top ten all told. 

⬅ Your Nice New Outfit This is wonderful. The artist Phil Noto imagines society page coverage of superhero parties involving The Avengers and X-Men and the like allegedly shot by Ant-Man himself, Hank Pym. [P.S. If you're wondering why I always try to mention names of artists and such it's because I hate it when people don't get credit for their work. I wish the internet would respect province more... I just found out that my "Dead Wives Club" poster mockup which was satirizing Leonardo DiCaprio's career has finally taken off on tumblr and yet I wasn't credited for creating the joke or for making the poster. Sad face me.]

Zimbio Thelma & Louise has a 20th anniversary Academy screening in LA. Sadly Susan Sarandon didn't show. So it was basically Thelma & Nope, Just Thelma. This is even worse than last week when Pfeiffer wasn't at the Scarface thing.
Just Jared Tobey Maguire and Leonardo DiCaprio in training on the set of The Great Gatsby.


Frankly My Dear... Speaking of Leo. He's lined up his 5th collaboration with Martin Scorsese. They'll remake The Gambler (1974) together. If you're keeping track DeNiro and Scorsese made 8 films together. DiCaprio seems determined to overthrow him in the Scorsese History. 

Wednesday
Apr272011

Melanie's Mini Memoir: Winslet, Jackson and "Heavenly Creatures"

Our Wednesday night series Hit Me With Your Best Shot resumes on May 4th with David Lynch's Eraserhead (see the May & June schedule here), but tonight we bring you A Very Special Episode.

We knew from Twitter that the actress Melanie Lynskey (Win Win) enjoyed this particular series. After our group gaze at Heavenly Creatures (1994), which happened to be her film debut, she sent us the following note with permission to publish it. How great! Melanie is currently in movie theaters as the troubled mom in Win Win but she's got two more films on the way. She's completed work on Eye of the Hurricane co-starring with Campbell Scott (another underrated actor) and Touchback, a sports fantasy starring Kurt Russell. 

Melanie takes it from here...

"So excited you did a Hit Me With Your Best Shot on "Heavenly Creatures". I loved reading what everyone had to say. I don't know if I can do a *best* shot, but the one that came to mind instantly as being the most symbolic of my experience on the movie as a whole is a small scene which is part of the montage in the early scenes of the friendship (you talked a bit about that montage). There's a shot where Diana Kent dabs her lips with a napkin at a dinner table and the camera swoops around the table and settles on me imitating the way she does that.

It's kind of a weird shot for me to choose; there are so many beautiful shots in the movie (the amazing Alun Bollinger, AlBol!) and so many moments I so clearly remember filming because I was so connected to Kate in that moment, or I was going through some crazy emotional turmoil for a scene and there it is, captured forever.

Filming that little dining room scene, to witness Peter's energy and how badly he wanted this tiny little moment to work out was about the most inspiring thing my little 15 year old self could see. He had this idea, and he wanted to make it work, and every take we did felt exciting, because we were all so invested in making that shot happen. I remember looking around the room and really feeling so grateful to be exactly where I was at that moment, with a group of frustrated people in a little room doing the same thing over and over.

I cant remember how many takes we did. We did it many times and I remember Peter just being so committed, even though it was proving very difficult to capture. The timing was very tricky.  The feeling of being part of a group of collaborators working together to create something was so powerful to me. I felt so fortunate to be part of the group.


The scene in the bathtub where it's all kind of blue - i remember that one like it was yesterday, it was so intense, the feeling in the room. And the shot of Kate is insane, about as beautiful as it gets. And any scene with Sarah Peirse feels extraordinary to me because she gave such a beautiful, honest performance. She just amazes me.

When I think about that shoot, the thing that I think about is how completely excited I was to be doing my first professional acting job, and how the most exciting times for me were those where I was sitting there thinking...

This is a movie. This is what it's like when people make a movie. This is amazing.

When Peter would get all excited about something, he would get like a little boy and it was adorable. Every camera move he and AlBol came up with was just mesmerising. The pieces would all click together and the chemistry of the scene would start to be created, and to me, it felt like magic.

They always wanted movement, and we as actors were always timing what we were doing to the camera move. Kate and I needed to have so much energy at all times, and Peter and AlBol and the way they were shooting really contributed to this sort of breathless, intense, excited headspace that we pretty much lived in for 3 months. Kate and I would go home at the end of a long day and hang out for hours just jabbering away to each other."

We sincerely thank Melanie Lynskey for this mini-window back to the making of one of the best films of the 1990s. [Here's the original post which prompted it.]

Next Wednesday on "HMWYBS" we're discussing David Lynch's Eraserhead (1977). Join us with your own choice or just be here for the discussion. Eraserhead is currently available on Netflix Instant Watch.

 

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