A behind the scenes look at the movie featuring interviews with the cast and crew. This film was extremely well-received in Telluride and set to be a surefire Oscar contender throughout the fall.
TRAILER: "Under the Skin"
The appropriately creepy and weird teaser trailer for Under the Skin, which received comparisons to David Lynch's Eraserhead after its debut in Venice.
More From Venice: Reaction to 'Philomena,' 'Under the Skin' and 'The Wind Rises'
More reactions have come in from the Venice Film Festival, and starting with Philomena, the consensus seems to be that director Stephen Frears (of countless good movies over the years, including Dangerous Liaisons, Dirty Pretty Things and The Queen) is back in form with the heartwarming story of an old woman who teams up with a journalist to find her long lost son. Judi Dench delivers a knockout performance (of course) and is likely to get her seventh Oscar nomination, while Steve Coogan charms with a script he co-wrote. The crowdpleaser is slated for limited release by the Weinstein Co. on Christmas Day, but set to expand nationwide in early January. I'd watch out for this one, because the Oscars have a long history of embracing feelgood, funny, yet emotional movies that will make you laugh and cry, and this seems to fit that slot this year.
"Coogan and Pope's script tenderizes you with keenly judged comic asides before landing its big, emotional body-blows...This is a heartbreaking story- how could it not be? But Frears' film breaks your heart and then repairs it." (Daily Telegraph)
"Frears gives the story a slick makeover, blending melodrama and comedy with brisk professionalism and a hearty helping of schmaltz. But Dench and Coogan sell it well." (The Atlantic)
"Its main focus is the sparky, shifting relationship between its two protagonists and its trump card the startling chemistry between its two main stars. 'Philomena' is an ongoing, confounding delight of a film." (The Guardian)
Meanwhile, Under the Skin debuted to very divisive reaction (half the audience booed) but early reviews indicate rapturous reception from some critics at least. Jonathan Glazer has been polarizing before (his last film was 2004's creepy Birth), but this one is drawing comparisons to the surreal images of artists like David Lynch. Starring Scarlett Johansson, it's based on the novel by Michael Faber, where an alien in the body of a woman comes to Scotland to hunt men for dark purposes. Oscar seems unlikely to go for this, given the weirdness of it, but I'm sure curious.
"Glazer's astonishing film takes you to a place where the every day becomes suddenly strange, and fear and seduction become one and the same. You stare at the screen, at once entranced and terrified, and step forward into the slick." (Telegraph)
"It's an intoxicating marvel, strange and sublime: it combines sci-fi ideas, unusual special effects, and a sharp atmosphere of horror with the everyday mundanity of a woman driving about rainy Scotland in a battered transit van." (Time Out)
Finally, the arrival of The Wind Rises came with some sad news for fans of the great Hayao Miyazaki, who announced his retirement practically concurrent with the film's premiere. His last feature seems to have received respectful but fairly muted reaction so far, so we'll have to wait until further screenings have occurred to get a handle on the response. Still, there are some admirable notices of this first Miyazaki film set in the real world (in this case, pre-WWII Japan) which dramatizes, in partly fictionalized fashion, the life of Jiro Horikoshi, the engineer who designed the A6M Zero, one of the deadly fighter planes used in the second World War. Unfortunately, the film's subtitled release will only be seen in NY and LA this December, while Disney re-dubs the film for wider release some time next year.
"There are visual flights of fancy here as glorious as anything Miyazaki's studio has created, but the story is rooted in a country trudging towards its own destruction...the real love story here is between a creator and his creations, which Ghibli's team of animators render in head-spinning detail." (Telegraph)
"The ambitious 'The Wind Rises' is something of a special case that will divide audiences into two camps, those who find it an unforgettably beautiful and poetic ode to life, and those who tune out to its slow moving second act, which can wear down the patience of even the well-disposed." (Hollywood Reporter)
Blu-Ray Pick of the Week: "Mystery Science Theater 3000: The Movie" (1996)
A guilty pleasure maybe, but still funny. Pick this one up if you can and check out what made this cult series so beloved. Featuring human Mike and his robot cohorts Tom Servo, Gypsy, and Crow T. Robot, they mercilessly skewer 1955's This Island Earth to hilarious results (I always preferred the heckling alone over the bookend "plot" stuff outside the theater). Extras include the making of, deleted scenes, and behind the scenes footage and interviews with the cast and crew.
Original trailer from 1996:
TRAILER: "Rush"
Ron Howard's latest film about Formula 1 racers premiered at Toronto to surprisingly good reviews so far, with many calling it a thrilling and unconventional race car movie, the best one ever made. Is this just one of those years where everything's going to be good? Starring Thor's Chris Hemsworth and Inglorious Basterds' Daniel Bruhl as the real life rivals James Hunt and Niki Lauda, the movie is set to be shown at the Toronto International Film Festival and released wide on September 27th.
BOX OFFICE 8/30- 9/2: 'The Butler' Tops 'One Direction' Over Labor Day
Over the long Labor Day weekend, The Butler rallied to a first place finish for the third week in a row, amassing $20 million over 4 days for a $79 million total. It's holding up very strong and will cross $100 million over the next two weeks, boosting its Oscar hopes as the fall season arrives. Over the 3 day weekend, the concert documentary One Direction: This is Us had topped, with $15.8 million, although the film was extremely frontloaded, meaning most of that money came from Thursday shows alone. It'll probably finish with about $30-33 million, more than the recent Katy Perry and Jonas Brothers documentaries, but not nearly as high as say, Michael Jackson's This is It ($72 million) or Justin Bieber: Never Say Never ($73 million). The biggest concert documentary ever remains Woodstock, from 1970, with $50 million, which of course, adjusted for inflation would be about $290 million today.
In other new releases, Getaway, one of the worst reviewed films of all time, crashed and burned, with just $5 million over the weekend, and the limited release Spanish comedy Instructions Not Included earned an amazing $10 million on just 347 screens, showing that there is a significant Hispanic audience out there for films targeting them.
Top 5:
- Lee Daniels' The Butler- $20 million
- One Direction: This is Us- $18 million
- We're the Millers- $15.9 million
- Planes- $10.7 million
- Instructions Not Included- $10 million
In holdovers, We're the Millers has now made $112 million and is one of the major hits of the summer, and Pacific Rim finally crossed $100 million in the U.S. while reaching $400 million worldwide, so the movie can definitively be labeled a success thanks to overseas grosses. Woody Allen's Blue Jasmine has $21 million total and still going strong, while Disney's Planes has $70 million domestic, which is now considered a hit for the made-for-DVD film, as it's holding on well due to a lack of family audience competition. Next week, we're officially out of summer blockbuster season, as the only major releases are Riddick, with Vin Diesel and the much anticipated documentary Salinger, from Shane Salerno, that will reveal several soon to be published new works from the famed author.
Jennifer Lawrence in Vogue
The rise of Jennifer Lawrence has been really huge, really fast. The girl came out with an Oscar nomination at 20 for the little seen (but really good) WInter's Bone and then used that as a boost to jump into franchise movies in a hurry with The Hunger Games and X-Men: First Class. Silver Linings Playbook came out in the same year as Hunger Games and bam, she's got her first Best Actress Oscar at 22 years old. It's been a pretty dramatic rise for her, and I think she's going to be around for a long time because she's a good screen presence (unlike say, Kristen Stewart), and there's 3 more Hunger Games movies coming out in the next few years alone. So I like her a lot and she gets a great photo spread in Vogue, but already she's committing my biggest pet peeve about famous people- and that's complaining about being famous. Come on, are you kidding? Already?
"All of a sudden the entire world feels entitled to know everything about me, including what I'm doing on my weekends when I'm spending time with my nephew.'"
Then there's this:
"What really gets to her is when people say, 'You have to make peace with it.' 'I am just not OK with it,' she says. 'It's as simple as that. I am just a normal girl and a human being, and I haven't been in this long enough to feel like this is my new normal. I'm not going to find peace with it.'"
The only thing that bugs me about that is how much I don't buy it. It was incredibly obvious that this girl wanted to be famous. You don't go aggressively chasing after franchise movies after making a well-reviewed indie film if that's not what you want (especially The Hunger Games, which everyone knew was going to be huge no matter who was cast in that role). You don't make sure you're the first person on the red carpet at the Oscars for Winter's Bone in a dress that guarantees you're unrecognizable from that film if you're not trying to get attention (see below). And you don't, in the very same interview where you moan about the plight of being famous, also say this:
"'But I always knew,'- here she lowers her voice- 'that I was going to be famous. I honest to God don't know how else to describe it. I used to lie in bed and wonder, Am I going to be a local TV person? Am I going to be a motivational speaker? It wasn't a vision. But as it's kind of happening, you have this buried understanding: Of course.'"
Right. So, given that she's 23, this longing to be famous took place in the last decade, where not a single person in their twenties grew up not knowing what it is to be famous, in this era of reality TV and TMZ and the internet and all the rest of it. She knew. And now she's one of the youngest Oscar winners ever and has probably got herself and her entire family set for the the rest of their lives, so take it easy on the whining, ok Jennifer? You're a good actress who got famous from movies, as opposed to scandals and reality TV, with a long career ahead of you- I'd say you've pretty much got it made.
TRAILER: "Prisoners"
It was surprising after seeing the trailer, but this movie opened to very good reviews in Telluride yesterday, with many comparing it to dark thrillers like Seven and Mystic River, and calling it the best performance of Hugh Jackman's career. From French Canadian director Denis Villenueve, whose Incendies was nominated for Best Foreign Film two years ago, this comes out Sep 20th.
More From Telluride: Premieres of 'Labor Day' and '12 Years a Slave'
A couple of films have touched down in Telluride over the last two days, including Jason Reitman's Labor Day, starring Kate Winslet and Josh Brolin, based on the novel by Joyce Maynard. Early reactions are mixed-positive, describing the film as a tearjerker melodrama with good performances, and a departure in tone for Reitman, usually known for snarky comedies like Juno and Thank You For Smoking. Oscar chances are unclear on this one, so we'll have to wait for the official release and reviews to know more, but its best bet seems to be Kate Winslet at the moment. The movie comes out Dec 25th (oddly, there's no trailer for this yet).
"To the extent that Adele's hunger for affection resonates with audiences, what emerges is a powerful- if implausible- romance." (Variety)
"A full-immersion exercise in the old-fashioned women's weepie that skews far closer to Nicholas Sparks' brand of contrivance than Diablo Cody territory." (The Playlist)
"As consistently assured a piece of film-making as any we've seen from Reitman." (HitFix)
Faring better was Steve McQueen's 12 Years a Slave, which premiered to stunning reviews and a standing ovation. Claims are that it portrays slavery as never before, with unrelenting brutality and emotion from the performances by Chiwetel Ejiofor and Michael Fassbender. Some compare it to a horror film that refuses to let you turn away from its sights. Oscar nominations seem assured, but I'm wary about the violence, which sounds pretty harsh. This is not brutality leavened with comedy ala Django Unchained, or a feelgood movie in any sense (If you've seen Shame you know this guy can be bleak). I have a feeling that will limit its box office and Oscar potential, but the movie will be a surefire contender with nominations in Picture, Director, and below-the-line categories, with Ejiofor sounding like a lock for Best Actor.
"Had Steve McQueen not already christened his previous picture thus, 'Shame' would have been the perfect one-word title to capture the gut-wrenching impact of his third and most essential feature, '12 Years a Slave.'" (Variety)
"More than a powerful elegy, '12 Years a Slave' is a mesmerizing triumph of art and polemics: McQueen turns a topic rendered distant by history into an experience that, short of living through the terrible era it depicts, makes you feel as if you've been there...Ejiofor is a lock for Best Performance in the Oscar race, as is McQueen and his movie." (Indiewire)
"McQueen has no fear of depicting the true savagery thrust upon American slaves by their owners. He won't flinch in holding on the image, even if it's graphically disturbing. Slavery was an inhumane evil that McQueen refuses to turn away from." (HitFix)
Here's the trailer for the movie once again. It comes out Oct 18th:
Movie of the Day: "The Butler" (2013)
Ok, so I know I just reviewed the movie recently and of course it's still in theaters, but it is an entirely appropriate film to be the last entry in our civil rights series this week. As most know by now, the story spans the decades of the Civil Rights Movement from the 1950's through the 1980's, and then all the way to present day and what it means for Forest Whitaker's butler character to see a black man elected President of the United States. You'd really have to be made of stone not to be moved by that moment after watching this man's entire life go by on screen, so convincingly portrayed by Whitaker. It's a historical tearjerker, and a look at the civil rights struggle from the black perspective, and that makes it a very unique and important movie to cap off our week long commemoration of the March on Washington.
Trailer:
"Getaway" is a Trainwreck with Critics
Aha- it looks like we have a candidate for the worst movie of the year in Getaway, the Ethan Hawke/Selena Gomez car chase movie. It's sitting at a dismal 2% Fresh on Rotten Tomatoes (that's one, count it, ONE positive review) and boy the knives are out for this one, with some absolute gems being hurled at it by the critics:
"You've probably seen this movie before, watching a child play with his toy Hot Wheels cars after eating multiple bowls of sugary breakfast cereal." (San Francisco Chronicle)
"'Getaway' could have been an excellent two-minute film." (Washington Post)
"'Getaway is so bad that what's most surprising about it is that Nicolas Cage didn't manage to star in it." (New York Post)
"It doesn't have a plot, really. It's more of an outline of a first draft of a notion." (Minneapolis Star Tribune)
"Maybe the title isn't a title, but an instruction: 'Getaway,' away from this movie, and fast." (Arizona Republic)
"The only participant to emerge with its reputation intact- though not its paint job- is the Shelby Mustang muscle car, which also delivers the film's most nuanced and psychologically complex performance." (The Atlantic)
Movie of the Day: "Mississippi Burning" (1988)
Today's civil rights movie is the multiple Oscar nominee from 1988, starring Gene Hackman and Willem Dafoe as two FBI agents who are investigating the murders of three civil rights workers in Mississippi in 1964. It was loosely based on the real life event that took place in the 60's, and was controversial upon the time of its release for some fictionalization of those events, and the fact that most of the black characters in the film were portrayed as passive victims- it was one of those civil rights movies purely from the white person's perspective. But despite the valid criticisms, the movie is an effective thriller with some really good acting from Gene Hackman and Frances McDormand as a woman who's beaten by her Klan member husband. There's nothing like Gene Hackman going Dirty Harry on the KKK.
Original Trailer from 1988:
