Tag Archives: Films

Interview: James Bond 007 Series Producers Barbara Broccoli, 59 And Michael G. Wilson, 77 (Variety UK)

From a Variety.com online interview (January 17, 2020):

Variety The U.K. Issue Family Bond 007 magazine cover January 2020“He brought flesh and blood to the character,” she says. “Bond in the novel is a silhouette. Daniel has given him depth and an inner life. We were looking for a 21st-century hero, and that’s what he delivered. He bleeds; he cries; he’s very contemporary.”

(On Daniel Craig)

“For better or worse, we are the custodians of this character,” says Barbara Broccoli, who oversees the franchise with her half-brother Michael G. Wilson. “We take that responsibility seriously.”

Eon Productions James Bond 007 Producers Michael G. Wilson and Barbara Broccoli

It’s an arrangement that was first hammered out by Broccoli’s father, the producer Albert “Cubby” Broccoli, when John F. Kennedy was president and the Twist was all the rage. Miraculously, that pact has prevailed through the decades and generations, enduring everything from corporate mergers and bankruptcies to shifting consumer tastes and geopolitical upheavals. The elder Broccoli died in 1996. but not before ceding control to his two children with the 1995 release of “GoldenEye,” a film that proved a sexist superspy, conceived by novelist Ian Fleming in the 1950s, still had a role to play in post-Cold War cinema.

Read full article

“David Attenborough – A Life On Our Planet” Recounts 93-Year Old’s Life In Nature (Trailer)

Sir David Attenborough has warned that “human beings have overrun the world” in a trailer for his new film.

The feature-length documentary, titled David Attenborough: A Life On Our Planet, looks back on the defining moments of his life and the environmental devastation that has taken place during that time. As well as highlighting some of the issues that climate change poses, he also explores some of the potential solutions.

In the trailer, the veteran broadcaster, 93, said: “I’ve had the most extraordinary life. It is only now that I appreciate how extraordinary.”

For the full story click here: https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2020…

2020: Major Books, Films And Music From 1924 Enter U.S. Public Domain

From Duke Law “Center For The Study of the Public Domain”:

Center for the Study of the Public Domain Duke LawOn January 1, 2020, works from 1924 will enter the US public domain, where they will be free for all to use and build upon, without permission or fee. These works include George Gershwin’s Rhapsody in Blue, silent films by Buster Keaton and Harold Lloyd, and books such as Thomas Mann’s The Magic Mountain, E. M. Forster’s A Passage to India, and A. A. Milne’s When We Were Very Young. These works were supposed to go into the public domain in 2000, after being copyrighted for 75 years. But before this could happen, Congress hit a 20-year pause button and extended their copyright term to 95 years.

Films

  • Buster Keaton’s Sherlock, Jr. and The Navigator
  • Harold Lloyd’s Girl Shy and Hot Water
  • The first film adaptation of Peter Pan
  • The Sea Hawk
  • Secrets
  • He Who Gets Slapped
  • Dante’s Inferno

Books

  • A Passage To India E.M. Forster 1924Thomas Mann, The Magic Mountain
  • E.M. Forster, A Passage to India
  • Ford Madox Ford, Some Do Not… (the first volume of his “Parade’s End” tetralogy)
  • Eugene O’Neill, Desire Under the Elms
  • Edith Wharton, Old New York (four novellas)
  • Yevgeny Zamyatin, We (the English translation by Gregory Zilboorg)
  • A.A. Milne, When We Were Very Young
  • Hugh Lofting, Doctor Dolittle’s Circus
  • Edgar Rice Burroughs, Tarzan and the Ant Men
  • Agatha Christie, The Man in the Brown Suit
  • Lord Dunsany (Edward Plunkett), The King of Elfland’s Daughter

Music

  • Rhapsody in Blue, George Gershwin
  • Fascinating Rhythm and Oh, Lady Be Good, music George Gershwin, lyrics Ira Gershwin
  • Lazy, Irving Berlin
  • Jealous Hearted Blues, Cora “Lovie” Austin (composer, pianist, bandleader) (recorded by Ma Rainey)
  • Santa Claus Blues, Charley Straight and Gus Kahn (recorded by Louis Armstrong)
  • Nobody’s Sweetheart, music Billy Meyers and Elmer Schoebel, lyrics Gus Kahn and Ernie Erdman

(Only the musical compositions referred to above are entering the public domain. Subsequent arrangements, orchestrations, or recordings of those compositions, such as Yuja Wang’s performance of Rhapsody in Blue, might still be copyrighted. You are free to copy, perform, record, or adapt Gershwin’s composition, but may need permission to use a specific recording of it.)

Interviews: Director Martin Scorsese On Filmmaking & Death (NYT)

From a New York Times online article (01/02/20):

Martin Scorsese Photo by Philip Montgomery for The New York Times
Scorsese would like to take a year to read and spend time with loved ones. “Because we’re all going. Friends are dying. Family’s going.”Credit…Philip Montgomery for The New York Times

In ways both subtle and substantial, Scorsese sees the world changing and becoming less familiar to him. He gratefully accepted a deal with Netflix, which covered the reported $160 million budget for “The Irishman.” But the bargain meant that, after the movie received a limited theatrical release, it would be shown on the company’s streaming platform.

Scorsese has other aspirations but they have nothing to do with moviemaking. “I would love to just take a year and read,” he said. “Listen to music when it’s needed. Be with some friends. Because we’re all going. Friends are dying. Family’s going.”

Martin Scorsese is the most alive he’s been in his work in a long time, brimming with renewed passion for filmmaking and invigorated by the reception that has greeted his latest gangland magnum opus, “The Irishman.”

And what he wants to talk about is death.

Just to be clear, he’s not talking about the deaths in his movies or anyone else’s. “You just have to let go, especially at this vantage point of age,” he said one Saturday afternoon last month.

Read entire article

Movie Insider: “Every Starfighter In Star Wars Explained By Lucasfilm” (WIRED Video)

Wired Magzine logoLucasfilms’ Doug Chiang and Amy Beth Christenson explain each and every type of starfighter from the Star Wars movie franchise. These small, combat-focused spacecrafts have become a canvas for some of the most iconic designs in all of cinema.

Tie Fighter The Galactic Empire Star Wars A New Hope

Ever wondered why the “snout” of the X-Wing is so pronounced, or why the Y-Wing’s paneling is so bare? Amy Beth and Doug offer all these insights and much more!

Top New Films: “A Hidden Life” Written & Directed By Terrence Malick (Dec 2019)

NY Times Film Review LogoThe arresting visual beauty of “A Hidden Life,” which was shot by Joerg Widmer, is essential to its own argument, and to Franz’s ethical and spiritual rebuttal to the concerns of his persecutors and would-be allies. The topography of the valley is spectacular, but so are the churches and cathedrals. Even the cells and offices are infused with an aesthetic intensity at once sensual and picturesque.

The hallmarks of Malick’s later style are here: the upward tilt of the camera to capture new vistas of sky and landscape; the brisk gliding along rivers and roads; the elegant cutting between the human and natural worlds; the reverence for music and the mistrust of speech. (The score is by James Newton Howard.)

To read more: https://www.nytimes.com/2019/12/12/movies/a-hidden-life-review.html

Film Actor Profiles: “An Essay On (64-Year Old) Willem Dafoe’s Face…” (Gentleman’s Journal)

From a Gentleman’s Journal online article:

Willem Dafoe Gentleman's Journal photo Dec 2019Thankfully, Willem Dafoe and Willem Dafoe’s face have used this innate recognisability to their joint advantage. To date, the actor has appeared in well over 100 films, and his prolific career can be charted through the cracks and comments — some nice, some not so nice — that those in the industry have made about his looks.

In fact, in the intervening decades, Hollywood has called many, many times — as have independent filmmakers, foreign studios, animation houses, video game developers and scores of theatres. On the big screen, Dafoe has taken roles in PlatoonMississippi BurningBorn on the Fourth of JulyThe English PatientAmerican Psycho and Shadow of the Vampire. He flew into The Aviator for a cameo, swung into the Spider-Man trilogy as the villainous Green Goblin and dipped his toe in voiceover work with Finding Nemo. He’s taken on John CarterJohn Wick and narrated films from Vox Lux to The Great Wall. He’s been Oscar-nominated several times, for playing characters as wild and disparate as hammy vampires, Floridian motel managers and Vincent van Gogh. The man is a chameleon — and has managed to become one despite having Willem Dafoe’s face.

To read entire article: https://www.thegentlemansjournal.com/article/willem-dafoe-interview-face-hollywood-cover/

Interviews: Director Martin Scorsese On “The Irishman” (Netflix Video)

Robert De Niro, Al Pacino and Joe Pesci star in Martin Scorsese’s THE IRISHMAN, a saga of organized crime in post-war America told through the eyes of World War II veteran Frank Sheeran, a hustler and hitman who worked alongside some of the most notorious figures of the 20th century. Academy Award winning Director Martin Scorsese on his vision and the making-of THE IRISHMAN. Now playing in theaters and on Netflix.

Artist Profiles: Film Director Mike Nichols (1931-2014) Profiled In New Book (NY Times Podcast)

Mike Nichols Life Isn't Everything Ash Carter and Sam KashnerMike Nichols, who died in 2014, was a film and stage director of genius, and he wasted no time in showing it. The first two films he directed were “Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?” and “The Graduate.” In the new oral history “Life Isn’t Everything,” Ash Carter and Sam Kashner draw on 150 respondents to tell the story of his incredible career.

The New York Times Book Review

Website: https://www.nytimes.com/2019/12/06/books/review/podcast-life-isnt-everything-mike-nichols-still-here-elaine-stritch-alexandra-jacobs.html

Top Interview Podcasts: Actress Jamie Lee Curtis Talks About Her Films And Career (New Yorker)

Jamie Lee Curtis comes from Hollywood royalty as the daughter of Janet Leigh and Tony Curtis. She credits her mother’s role in “Psycho” for helping her land her first feature role, as the lead in “Halloween,” in 1978. “I’m never going to pretend I got that all on my own,” she tells The New Yorker’s Rachel Syme. But Curtis says she never intended to act, and never saw herself as a star: “I was not pretty,” she explains; “I was ‘cute.’ ”

Eventually, the pressure she felt to conform in order to keep working led to a surgical procedure, which led to an opiate addiction. Curtis talks with Syme about recovery, second chances, and more than forty years of films between “Halloween” and Rian Johnson’s “Knives Out.” Plus, the chef at one of Los Angeles’s best restaurants on how to build a woman-friendly kitchen.

To read more: https://www.wnycstudios.org/podcasts/tnyradiohour/articles/jamie-lee-curtis-original-scream-queen-podcast