Scene Work: 'JBJ' in "Win Win"

We kicked off this new informal mini-series about key scenes we love in this year's movies chatting with Demián Bichir from A Better Life. Let's move on to another early release that is fighting for year end "remember us?" honors as precursor season begins. If Thomas McCarthy's well liked Win Win will compete anywhere it's likely to be in Original Screenplay category which still appears to be a free-for-all. Precursor prizes will undoubtedly narrow Oscar's focus but right now several combinations of the year's well received originals seem possible there.  

I was stunned to hear directly from Amy Ryan at a party that my favorite scene in the movie, wasn't even in the first version of the script. McCarthy added it later knowing something was missing and his instincts were spot on. So when I received the screenplay in the mail this weekend (swag pictured to your left) I opened immediately  to see that it was there in the "official" screenplay.

Up until this point in the movie Jackie, the plain spoken wife of Mike (Paul Giamatti as a lawyer/high school wrestling coach) has been trying and failing to make a connection to the young wrestler (Alex Shaffer) who is staying in her basement. They finally bond over tattoos after she sees several of his at the wrestling match. The dialogue in the scene (which I'd already transcribed) is mostly the same as in the official screenplay though the actors were obviously encouraged to play it as naturally as they could so there are a couple of different beats on screen.

Jackie: Okay so I gotta ask. Those tattoos must have hurt, right?
Kyle: Not really.
Jackie: Don't lie to me. Look.

Jackie lifts her pant leg. She has a small tattoo on her ankle.

Jackie: I got it on Spring Break. Hurt like hell.
Kyle: What does it say?
Jackie: "JBJ". Jon Bon Jovi. I'm a fan.
Kyle: Really?
Jackie: Yes, really. I'm a Jersey girl. You got a problem with that?
Kyle: No. I do not.

Jackie: That was fun today. You're good. I'm glad you started wrestling, again.
Kyle: Yeah, me too.
Jackie: No quitting this time, got that?

(The actors must have added the endearingly sarcastic "Really. Yes, really" exchange since it's not in the screenplay.)

At this point in the scene Kyle explains that he didn't quit his old wrestling team but was kicked off after stealing a teacher's car.  After telling him how stupid that was Jackie registers that Kyle already knows this. She softens and you can see in Amy Ryan's terrific performance (ordinary people portrayed with this much verve is all too rare at the movies) that she knows that he's basically a decent kid and feels pride in finally connecting with him.  

Jackie: Hey, we all do stupid things. The good news is you got another chance. And you're kicking butt. That's the way to do it.
Kyle: Yeah, I guess.
Jackie: Oh it totally is. You know who would agree with me? 
Kyle: Mike?
Jackie: No. JBJ. 

That scene sure is a winner. The next cut is to a wrestling meet, and we see Jackie newly enthused about the team and cheering Kyle on (to the tune of Jon Bon Jovi's "Have a Nice Day"). It's a perfect coda that plays way less sappy than it sounds; you want to pump your fist right along with her and JBJ.

Interview: "Rampart"'s Ben Foster. He's Dying for a Musical Comedy

Ben Foster photographed at Sundance in January.Ben Foster doesn't like to talk about himself.  This becomes clear immediately after we've begun talking about Ben Foster, though he won't admit it until we're wrapping up.

"Press is very difficult for me," He explains fifteen into our conversation. Some actors do like talking about themselves, I remind him, amiably. "That must be nice for them," Foster quips back sarcastically. On the subject of Rampart and its leading man Woody Harrelson, though, he is much more effusive. "It's so easy to talk about him." the actor says with relief, combining his roles as co-star, friend and first time producer.

"I'm absolutely amazed by the work he did," he offers when the subject of Woody's acclaimed and Oscar buzzing performance as a corrupt cop pops up. "He dropped 30 lbs, he was living the cop lifestyle, he disappeared on set - it was disturbing quite often to see your friend coming unglued. We all know that it's for a movie but there are those moments where you get a bit concerned... that's just a tribute to what a brilliant actor Woody is." 

The two actors co-starred previously in Oren Moverman's The Messenger (2008) which netted both Moverman and Harrelson Oscar nominations. They've since formed a production company with more projects currently in development. 

Foster as "General Terry" informs for corrupt cop "David Brown" (Woody Harrelson) in Rampart

What's it like to wear a new hat suddenly as a producer? Foster likens it to "going into the boiler room" to understand the whole mechanism operates.  "I've been doing this for 18 years so to be let in on all the almost disasters that come up every single day was actually thrilling. Actors are so insulated and spoiled on set. It's amazing how much they're protected... and need to be to some degree."

Foster was on set nearly every day but for the week preparing for his small role in the film. He praises Moverman's sets for being collaborative, creative and safe for the actors. The Rampart screenplay was initially much broader, closer to co-writer James Ellroy's traditional pulp noir before Moverman's rewrites. And there's no rehearsal -- some actors don't even meet before the first take.

'No rehearsal?' I ask in disbelief considering the nuanced work Moverman pulls from actors in both Rampart and The Messenger. How else do you get a scene like my favorite in The Messenger, one long continuous shot were Foster and the newly widowed army wife played by Samantha Morton (Foster calls her "an exquisite actor and beautiful human being")  become emotionally intimate in her kitchen; Moverman used their first take.

"Well, rehearsal is a big word," Foster clarifies, explaining that they don't do much in the way of the traditional theatrical approach of hitting your marks hard. On Moverman's set there are handheld cameras and  actors are encouraged to drop lines if they feel they should or move around as they wish, even free to leave the room. All of this adds to an environment that demands that the actors really listen to each other while performing. The rehearsal, such as it is, is not the traditional kind. "Oren does extensive work with each actor building the characters, their past where they're going, who they are, what they do and then sitting them up with a specialist -- someone who has a job similar to that and who has lived a life similar to the character -- and then you [as an actor] do your homework. That's kind of the miracle of good casting that these people know how to listen and know how to play."

Woody & Ben at the Academy's Governor's Ball earlier this month.On the subject of casting, he sounds a bit like a producer already. So one has to wonder what he thinks of his own typecasting these days. If filmmakers are looking for a dark, twisted, maybe violent character, Foster's name always seems to crop up. Why is that? His succinct answer: 

I don't know. I don't know. I'm dying for a musical comedy right about now!"

Musical comedy is actually where it began for Foster, though that seems radically against type for the actor as we know him now. He was doing middle school musicals in Iowa when his father taped him just "just being a goof" Disney got a hold off the tape and the next thing he knew he was in California auditioning and moving to Toronto to star in a television series. "I didn't even know what a mark was." Foster recalls, confessing that he learned everything on the job.

Despite his urge to mix things up with something lighter, Foster admits that he "takes great pleasure in the intense and disturbed". Even his fall back term of endearment fits with his dark persona; the word "beast" keeps peppering his conversation. He uses it to describe talented actors and director's he'd like to work with: David Lynch, Paul Thomas Anderson, Gaspar Noe... "Lars von Trier for sure. There's some real beasts out there." He'd just seen Melancholia before our conversation. Did he always know that his Get Over It (2001) co-star Kirsten Dunst had this kind of work in her?

Ben Foster and Kirsten Dunst in "Get Over It" (2001)

"Oh she is a beast of an actor, always has been." he says, suddenly animated, always happier to praise other actors and avoid the Ben Foster topic. "It's just about the stars aligning for her to really show what she's got. There's so much more to come with her. I'm absolutely a silly fan of Kirsten's."

Before our conversation wraps up he describes Melancholia as a knockout. "Few films have made me happier than Melancholia" he adds with endearing absurd sincerity. It's a beast of a movie, we heartily agree, but apocalypse-induced euphoria might not be the best thing to admit while searching for a good musical comedy.

Related Posts
Interview Kirsten Dunst | TIFF Rampart Review | Rampart After Party | Best Actor Oscar Race | Take Three: Ben Foster

Golden Horse Awards: Two Oscar Submissions Win Big

I'm so itching for a big American awards show to hit us. Soon, soon. But until then, let's look to Taipei where The Golden Horse Awards were just handed out.

As expected the hit Taiwanese film Warriors of The Rainbow: Seediq Bale took home Best Picture. There's the jubilant cast doing an aboroginal dance on the red carpet. Fun!

Andy Lau and Deanie YipThe big winners of the night are both Oscar submissions this year in the Best Foreign Language Film category. Taiwan's Seediq Bale which is a action drama about aboroginal tribes battling occupying Japanese forces won the top prize and four other statues including "Audience Choice". Hong Kong's caretaking drama A Simple Life must have been close to a surprise sweep since it managed three of the top four statues: Director, Actor and Actress.

Superstar Andy Lau won Best Actor for the second time. He'd previously won for an Infernal Affairs sequel (the original Infernal Affairs was remade into the Oscar winning The Departed where Matt Damon took on Lau's role). Lau then presented Best Actress a category wherein he'd worked with 3 of the 4 nominees. You can see Shu Qi, he calls her "the most huggable woman ever", grinning throughout the presentation. Best Actress went to Lau's costar and actual godmother Deanie Yip. She also won the Volpi Cup at Venice this year for this role as a grown man's lifelong help who he must then care for when she has a stroke.

Video, complete list of winners, and fashion after the jump.

Click to read more ...

Happy Turkey (and Muppets) Day

Marilyn Monroe and TurkeyWe've been watching the Macy's Parade while cleaning / cooking and there has literally yet to be a musical number from Broadway that's NOT movie-based as I type this. Should've live-blogged and talked Sister Act, Spider-Man, Priscilla, How To Succeed, Newsies and more... Broadway is basically movies on stage now, with a special emphasis on 1990s comedies.

Meanwhile at the multiplex, it won't just be turkeys slaughtered for today's festivities. In Hollywood's infinite wisdom, three showbiz-centric movies for adults must open simultaneously (The Artist, My Week With Marilyn, Hugo) and three movies children might like (Hugo, The Muppets, Arthur Christmas ...two of which are obviously for adults) must open in direct competition as well. There probably won't be enough dollars to go around which is sad because the same ticket buyer might well like all of those movies. On balance, this is an absurdly high quality crop, not one, well, turkey in the batch [Disclaimer: Arthur Christmas is the only one I haven't seen but I hear good things.] 

If all five of those newly released options weren't enough, Oscar maniacs can also sample The Descendants (expanding) and, in NY & LA, A Dangerous Method and Rampart. In case you haven't been keeping up and since we're hosting a big dinner, here are past thoughts...

THE ARTIST ~ review | all posts | best pic race | interviews soon
MY WEEK WITH MARILYN review | more Marilyn on the way
HUGO  ~ the filmmakers speak | work in progress thoughts |  all 
A DANGEROUS METHOD ~ several reviews from our team
RAMPART - all posts | best actor race 

As for THE MUPPETS... I didn't have time to review the new film before guests started arriving but I'd love to hear your thoughts. I found it quite uneven even within both of the narratives. The Muppet reunion brand relaunch is what I came to see and the nostalgia factor there worked like a charm. But individual scenes didn't always sparkle and I wanted more funny performances and less story beats. Meanwhile the musical comedy factor seemed to fall mostly to the Jason Segel / Amy Adams / "Walter" coming-of-age storyline which I liked much more than I was expecting to -- great sight gags in the beginning and Amy Adams could not be a better fit for the Muppet world -- until I didn't. By the time the three of them met The Muppets I was over it because... THE MUPPETS; stop distracting me from them! So my reaction was all over the place and far more colored by my own childhood fixations rather than the movie itself. But if you grew up loving The Muppets it's a total must-see. I recently rented the DVDs of the original series and it is crazy enjoyable -- like giddy-smile making -- just as we all remember. In fact, after watching three episodes back to back I think TV needs a relaunch of The Muppet Show more than the movies need the muppets. Variety shows are sort of back given the plethora of performance competitions but the variety has gone out of them as they are the same thing over and over again, whether that's contemporary pop karaoke or dancing.

One of the new songs "Life's a Happy Song" (Bret McKenzie --yay!) is a total charmer and should give the felt fuzzy group their fourth music-related Oscar nomination (the first three films all won one nomination in Song or Score categories.)

Do your Thanksgiving plans include movies? Have you seen The Muppets yet?

Super 8 and Makeup: A Love Story for the Oscars

Could you close your eyes, please?"

Super 8's leading character Joe Lamb is a movie makeup and effects fan. He taught himself how to do all the major Hollywood techniques with the Dick Smith mail-away instructions course. He can do beauty makeup, zombies, and bloody injuries. He's just a big budget and two years away from Oscar glory in 1979 when the film takes place.

The first Academy Award for Best Makeup was presented at the 54th ceremony, honoring films released in 1981. Since then, it has been a category that has confounded and confused Oscar prognosticators. What seems like a guaranteed nominee to a non-voting member of the Academy is ignored, while less well-received films with one good character go down as nominees. It feels like the standards and interests of the voters change from year to year almost on a whim. Will they go for full-body human transformations or bizarre alien creations? Cartoonish monsters in a kids film or grizzly beasts in an R-rated horror? Those tend to be the mainstays, except for the years where they go for elaborate period epics or subtle character-defining facial alterations.

Super 8 feels like the kind of film that could sneak in for a nomination because it forces the watcher to pay attention to the quality of the makeup. The protagonist lovingly talks about the same books that many modern makeup artists claim they used to learn the fundamentals of the craft. The Dick Smith books are still considered the gold standard and are constantly updated to reflect new industry techniques. Small details like this permeate the first hour of the film as a siren's song to makeup professionals and enthusiasts. If you talk enough about a film's makeup, people are going to notice the makeup.

What Joe Lamb the character accomplishes with a tackle box of grease-paint and some fake blood is at the calibre of professional work from the late 1970s. For every scene that pays tribute to 30+ year old techniques, there is another scene that acts as a stylish and gritty display of what modern practical makeup looks like in 2011. From the dirt and scratches covering the kids after the train derailment to the festering wounds on a character's head, there are very few scenes in Super 8 that just rely on everyday natural film makeup. It's a film that screams for attention for Deborah La Mia Denavar's makeup team.

Will horror nostalgia and blunt realism be enough to grab the attention of the voters? According to the rules for the 84th Annual Academy Awards, each film submitted for Best Makeup needs to get at least 15 votes to even be considered for a nomination. The top 7 vote getters (if more than 7 meet the 15 vote threshold) are then required to provide up to 10 minutes of edited footage to showcase the makeup techniques. All nominations are made based off of preferential ballots for the top 3 screened excerpts from films. That means a whole lot of films could be left out just because their written application of makeup techniques didn't grab the voters.

What films do you think will even make it past the 15 vote minimum to be eligible for a nomination?