Directors: Joel and Ethan Coen
Notable Films: Fargo, No Country for Old Men, Miller’s Crossing, The Big Lebowski, Raising Arizona, O Brother! Where Art Thou?, and A Serious Man
Famous For: Dark humor with a lot of irony, incorporating elements of film noir into everything, and messing with people’s expectations of certain genres.
Thanks to the digitalization of the film industry, one no longer has to live in Los Angeles or New York to become a filmmaker. Now the auteurs are able to plan, produce and cut their films in just about any city in the world without needing the Hollywood studio lots and financing to back up. With many cities and states seeking to cut away from LA’s business, they’ve been implementing tax breaks and resources which make things a little easier for the independent filmmaker.
For the past ten years Movie Maker magazine has been posting a list of the ten best cities to live, work and make movies for independent filmmakers. Recently, they have published their list of cities for 2010, which can be seen in their latest article here. CyniCritics looks at what these cities have put out recently and what their locations can be ideal for.
What’s been filmed there: The Book of Eli, Terminator Salvation, Crazy Heart, The Men Who Stare at Goats, Transformers 2, Sunshine Cleaning, No Country for Old Men, Little Miss Sunshine and 21 Grams
Who used it best: The Cohen Brothers in No Country for Old Men
Ideal for: Desert settings, possible Iraqi war films, post-apocalyptic films Continue reading
In honor of April Fools Day, I decided to list five famous and not so famous movies that can confound, twist, and trick you while still being well made and entertaining. Don’t worry, I won’t give anything away.
Image courtesy of The Pioneer Woman
1. The Sixth Sense– How could you not include this one? The most famous thing about this movie is its ending, but the rest was still a great revitalization of the scary thriller when it was released. Haley Joel Osment, Bruce Willis, and Toni Collette all give outstanding performances, but it’s the ending of this movie that earns its place in cinema history.
Image courtesy of Oregon Live
2. Tell No One– This excellent French thriller has twists at every turn, leading to one of the most satisfying conclusions in a movie. This tale of a man who’s thought to be dead wife starts emailing him is a first-class thriller of the highest order. Writer/director Guillaume Canet knows how to structure a film around an already great screenplay.
Image courtesy of Fused Film
When I heard that the venerable Martin Scorsese would be the executive producer and director of the new HBO show Boardwalk Empire this fall, it got me thinking. What would other directors do with the expanded storytelling capability of television? So I’ve decided to start a new segment dedicated to analyzing what an acclaimed film maker would do with a whole season (12-13 one hour episodes) on HBO or Showtime. I pick those networks because they are the only ones where you can be uncensored like the directors in their films.
Director: Quentin Tarantino
Notable Films: Pulp Fiction, Death Proof, Kill Bill Vol. 1 & 2, Reservoir Dogs, Jackie Brown, and Inglourious Basterds.
Famous For: Poetically vulgar dialogue, messing with structure, fetishized violence, sympathetic criminal characters, melding genres the average person doesn’t know exist.
St. Patrick’s Day is one of the biggest drinking days of the year, whether it be the Irish invading the pubs in numbers larger than usual or other people dressing in green and dousing themselves in beer. If you’re looking to avoid the St. Patrick’s Day alcohol binge, here are some movies that pay homage to Irish heritage without focusing on beer.
Image courtesy of Hollywood Jesus
1. Gangs of New York– Martin Scorsese’s 2002 epic lands us right in New York City in the mid-19th century. Irish-Americans face discrimination from the loyalist party, who are also facilitating a takeover of the city while everyone else is fighting the Civil War. Leonardo DiCaprio stars as Amsterdam Vallon, an Irishman who tries to take revenge on Bill the Butcher (the ever-superb Daniel Day-Lewis) for murdering his father. Not only will you get a dose of Irish-American history, you’ll also get one of the great film epics of the 2000’s.
Image courtesy of Cinematic Intelligence Agency
2. Once– This beautifully made musical follows two people in Dublin as they write and record music. Glen Hansard and Markéta Irglovás star as the two, and the chemistry they share is revelatory. The film surprisingly won the Oscar for Best Original Song the year it was released. That song, “Falling Slowly,” is one of the most gorgeous songs ever recorded in a musical, let alone a movie. Don’t miss your chance to experience this film.
OSCAR PREDICTIONS
BEST PICTURE NOMINEES REVIEWED
Avatar
Verdict: The film is titanic in every way, from its dazzling images and special effects to its messages and attention to detail. But with big budget comes big demand, meaning Cameron must make a crowd-pleaser. Dumbing down the dialogue, character depth and dynamics, he creates a universal story the whole world can understand and enjoy. Avatar is whatever movie you want it to be, a love story, a message movie, or an visually imaginative heyday, but to sophisticated moviegoers it’s only meh. Grade: B- Full Review Here
The Blind Side
Verdict: John Lee Hancock’s bombastic, preachy and watered down The Blind Side is the one movie nominated for Best Picture this year that didn’t deserve its slot. This is the crowd-pleasing, melodramatic sports movie that moved both the Monday Night Football crowd and Sarah Palin wannabes to tears. Hancock directs this film with a style right out of the sports film playbook, taking no chances and milking every crowd-pleasing scenario for maximum fluff. Grade: D Full Review Here
District 9
Verdict: District 9 is the greatest display of gritty sci-fi, with its scathing political undertones and pulse pounding action. Blomkamp is able to mesh aliens seamlessly into a very real human world that echoes our own. While the obvious political undertones make this an allegory for apartheid, more conceptual parallels can be made with our current human rights, terrorism, and corporate moral dilemma. It’s expert movie making from top to bottom. Grade: A Full Review Here Continue reading
CyniCritcs reviewer Matt Erspamer posted his Oscar predictions and hopefuls a while ago here. For a second opinion on the main categories and a look at some of the technical awards, Luke Miller posts his picks and favorites here.
Best Picture
Avatar
The Blind Side
District 9
An Education
The Hurt Locker
Inglourious Basterds
Precious
A Serious Man
Up
Up In the Air
Will Win: The Hurt Locker. Avatar may have audiences at home swooned away with its big glitzy effects, but with the new preferential voting system in place, The Hurt Locker has a lot less haters than Avatar which makes me believe it will be found on more number two and three place ballots of those who get cut in the early rounds. Avatar winning at this point would be one big upset after losing at the PGA, WGA, DGA and BAFTA which are all huge precursors to the Oscars.
Should Win: Up In the Air. I can’t really summarize how great this film is without ranting into a whole essay. You can read about it here in my review however.
Left Out: The following films that are better than The Blind Side: Star Trek, Away We Go, Moon, (500) Days of Summer, Public Enemies, State of Play, The Road, or Where the Wild Things Are. Personally, I would have chosen a comedy to put in this bunch and Away We Go had the best blend of funny and heart to rank it up with Juno or Little Miss Sunshine. Continue reading
Image courtesy of Screen Rant
The biggest crime perpetuated by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (Peter Travers of Rolling Stone prefers “Farts and Biases” and I tend to agree) this year is ignoring Spike Jonze’s Where the Wild Things Are. Today, you have the opportunity to partially correct that mistake by going out and renting or buying the film yourself and seeing what great work he has done.
Jonze had the audacity to adapt a 12-page, mostly illustrated children’s novel to the silver screen. Guess what? He succeeded admirably.
Wild Things is a beautifully told vision of childhood. The fears, anxieties, tribulations and joys told through the eyes of a young boy named Max (portrayed by terrific child actor Max Records) are all brought to vivid, beautiful light in this film.
Image courtesy of Alt. Film Guide
As it stands now, it looks like the four winners for for acting Oscars this weekend will be Jeff Bridges, Sandra Bullock, Christoph Waltz, and Mo’Nique. One washed-up country singer, one modern country belle, one Jew Hunter, and one mom from Hell- see any similarities?
The acting categories usually go to four very distinct roles from very different styles of acting. Not so this year.
If you were to look at the supporting categories this year, you’d see that. Waltz gives his tour de force in four languages layered with charm and menace, while Mo’Nique gives hers in one language, amps up the menace, takes away charm, and adds insanity. Different styles of acting? Yes. But, both of these roles are antagonists.
Many people suggest that the 3D revolution didn’t start until Avatar came along. Though the concept had been executed as far back as the early 20’s, never had the experience been so seamless and engaging as it was in Avatar. However, with the recent announcements of 3D movies, I’m beginning to think that Avatar may be the peak, and that it’s all downhill from here.
During the commercials of Avatar, audiences were treated/tortured with a commercial for Piranha 3D. The plot outline on the IMDB page reads as follows:
A tremor under the surface of Lake Victoria unleashes scores of prehistoric piranhas, an event which rallies the local sheriff who will risk everything to save her townsfolk.
It was then, seeing that this new technology would return to its roots: the endless concept films with ‘3D’ tacked onto the end of the titles or the latest Dreamworks release put into 3D just to jack up the ticket price.
Continue reading
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