solace in cinema : A vast wasteland of movies

I mentioned in some older posts that I got a chance to go see ‘3:10 to Yuma’ recently, and while it is a good western, there was elements in it that disapointed me. Yuma will almost certainly have a big marketing push before it hits the cinemas, but studios choices of what to push and what to bury has always confused me. Case in point is a great western ‘Seraphim Falls’, i’d go as far to say it’s better than ‘3:10′ more gutsy, more violent and generally more hard boiled than 3:10.. and yet nobody hears about it.. and nobody goes to see it.

It’s bsically a chase film disguised as a really minimal western, Pierce Brosnan getting tracked across the country by Liam Neeson, through snowy tundra and blistering dessert. It’s a bit like the second half of apocalypto.

A new rule I like to live buy is you can tell how good a film is from it’s imdb keywords (the best invention ever):

* Told In Flashback
* Knife Through Head
* Survival Tactics
* Burning House
* Forest
* Revenge
* Shot In The Arm
* Spit In The Face
* Knife In The Throat
* Knife Throwing
* Knife

hahaha.. sorry ‘Knife in the Throat’… really, who searches for films via throat wounds? incidentally the keyword tells me that ‘Prizzi’s Honour’, and ‘The Hunting Party’ also have ‘Knife in the throat’ scenes… so now you know. good times.

‘Seraphim Falls’ was released into UK cinemas last week with little fanfare, so if you’re in the UK don’t be like “wow.. Rush Hour 3 looks hilarious.. lets go see that!” you’d be wrong… and also an idiot. Check out the trailer here, then go see Seraphim Falls.

Oh and if you’re anywhere else you can pick the dvd up on R1 (how I saw it)

I was browsing impawards this morning, and came across a set of new posters (mostly for british films) but all were just beautiful, clean text, no massive actor headshots, great use of type and colour. I want them all.

The company responsible is a London based graphic design company called Allcitymedia, I talked about them before as they’re the dudes that put out the great ‘Old Joy’ poster. They’ve obviously got some good designers on staff and do the UK quad market proud. I can pick their designs out of a crowd now, and am glad that such great graphic design still exists in the movie marketing industry.

Really digging this one for ‘Control’, great use of colour…

couple more at impawards here: ‘Someone else‘ and ‘Hands of the Gods‘ and check some of the allcity back catalogue here

So last Wednesday night I went to a screening of the new political thriller Breach, I’d already seen it on R1 dvd, but I like to see things on the big screen and there was a Q&A afterwards with the director of the film Billy Ray, and stars Chris Cooper and Ryan Phillipe which was worth it alone.

I recorded the Q&A so you can take a listen using the player below. It’s interesting to hear the guys talk about the film and the real life character that Chris Cooper portrays on film, and at the end they even briefly mention what films they have coming up.. Chris Cooper has ‘The Kingdom’ and Ryan Phillipe mentions a Viking film he’s going to be working on.

The film tells the real life story of Eric O’neil (Ryan Phillipe) an FBI trainee who is apointed to work in the office of Robert Hanssen (Chris Cooper) a senior FBI agent. O’neil is forced to track Hanssens movements, gain his trust, and as it turned out discover proof that Hanssen was selling U.S secrets to Russia. The biggest security breach in FBI history.

Billy Ray’s last film ‘Shatttered Glass’ was a really interesting film, ultimately made better by good casting decisions in Hayden Christensen (actually acting for a change) and Peter Sarsgaard. The same is true in Breach. Ryan Phillipe i’ve always been slightly indifferent too, and this film didn’t make me change my mind, but Chris Cooper as always pulls the film up to another level. Cooper has a way of adding weight, believability and depth to a character like few other actors can. There’s a scene near the end with Cooper in the lift, uttering the line to Phillipe “pray for me” that for a 6 second shot, almost makes the film.

Billy Ray is obviously a competant director and deals well with characters and actors, but has trouble really making the story as exciting as it could be. Tension is handled deftly but tends to peeter off. The film obviously draws inspiration from 70’s thrillers like ‘All the Presidents Men’, ‘Three Days of the Condor’ and even ‘The Conversation’ to a degree but failed to draw me in like those stories did. I think films like ‘All the Presidents Men’ take a story that is almost ridiculously complicated distills it down and finds a focus to hang events around. Breach tries to do this with the Cooper/Phillipe relationship but it’s never quite enough.

Last night I attended Frightfest, which was awesome and I want to get on to talking about that…. but there’s a bunch of new trailers and other good stuff that has been released overnight so lets try and cover it all off in one foul post. BRAP!

The First image from ‘Daybreakers’ has been released (shown left), the new vampire flick from the Spierig Brothers (who did the zombie film ‘Undead’ i’m quite partial to)… the film stars Ethan Hawke, Willem Dafoe, and Sam Neil and WETA are rocking the sfx. Here’s the synopsis:

In the year 2017, a plague has transformed most every human into vampires. Faced with a dwindling blood supply, the fractured dominant race plots their survival; meanwhile, a researcher works with a covert band of vamps on a way to save humankind. a researcher (Hawke) works with a covert group of vamps to a band of humans fight back.

check out a bigger version of the image here

There’s a full Length trailer for *deep breath* ‘The assassination of Robert Ford by the Coward Jesse James’, god i’m not looking forward to saying that over the automatic ticket booking line when it comes out. I seem to recall not being that impressed by the teaser, but the full trailer looks like it kicks it up a gear stylisticly speaking and like it good be a decent western/cowboy drama. Brad Pitt’s doing his thing but I’m more interested to see ‘The Good Affleck’ aka Casey in a bigger role like this…

Check it out here: medium Large Small HD Medium HD Big HD

A new image from ‘Alien vs Predator 2 - Requiem’ goes up on IGN, still looks garbage. here. I have literally no hope for this film being good.

A full length trailer for ‘Hitman’ drops. I don’t even remember if I ever talked about the teaser trailer arriving. I just don’t care enough. I like Olyphant, I’m not sure he’s right for agent 47, and I love the games.. I think really i’m just pupously not getting excited to prepare myself for the worst. Check it: Medium QT Large QT

While i’m on the subject though Xavier Gens (Hitman director) appears to have directed another smaller french film this year called ‘Frontières’ about… neo-nazi backwood cannibals.. HELL YESSSS! youtube trailer here

I don’t know what it is, but these kind of low budget indie love stories hit me in my sappy spot. I think I might have some kind of deep emotional scarring. happy daysssss. Check out the trailer here

Reminds me a lot of the Mike Mills video for ‘All I need‘.

Basically if you combine some off-key indie kids, with captured moments of intimacy, and lots of shots of said-kids starring into the sun as it’s low in the sky. I … am… sold.

I remember seeing some stills from this a while back, but seeing things moving actually makes me a little more excited to see the film. Sort of strikes me as a remake of Ils

So they’re making the Lost Boys 2, It’s official. It’s being directed by P.J Pesce who appears to have done some horrendous shit, It’s going to be direct-to-video, but after reading some of the reports saying that ‘Wrong Turn 2′ doesn’t suck, maybe DTV sequels can cut the mustard afterall. hmmm.. we’ll see. I’m checking out WT2 on saturday at Frightfest, so i’ll let you know how it is.

So the casting for the ‘Lost Boys 2: The Tribe’ so far they’ve confirmed Corey Feldman, and Corey Haim, (i’m guessin greprising there original roles) Tom Savini, and Jamison Newlander (the non-corey frog brother) and now… Autumn Reeser is also attatched, who was in the O.C or someshit.

Anyway i’m pretty certain that nobody actually gives a fuck about this sequel except for Feldman and Haim… speaking of which, if you haven’t seen the truly horrible car crash tv that is ‘The Two Corey’s’ check out the moment they found out they weren’t in the sequel (something that has obviously changed now)

I’m gonna go and buy some of Corey Feldman’s Teeth off ebay

If you haven’t entered your name for a chance to win tickets to the opening night of frightfest: Maybe you should. Find all the details here

I’ll draw the winners at random at 5pm today.

Todd Haynes is an interesting yet sporadic director, he made a little film I really liked back in 1995 called ‘Safe‘ with Julian Moore, then ‘The Velvet Goldmine’ which was ok (what can I tell you .. the glam era doesn’t interest me) and the film ‘How to make your girlfriend cry’ AKA ‘Far from Heaven‘. Haynes also writes the scripts for his films so his lack of output is understandable.

His latest film ‘I’m Not There’ is a sort of ‘life and times of Bob Dylan’, using several different actors (and actresses) to play the man himself; Christian Bale, Ben Whishaw, Richard Gere, Heath Ledger, Marcus Carl Franklin and Cate Blanchett.

Here’s how the wanky plot synopsis describes it:

Formerly going by the title of “I’m Not There: Suppositions on a Film Concerning Dylan”, this is a film about the life of Bob Dylan. The film follows seven characters, each embodying a different aspect of Dylan’s life story and music. It’s the first biographical feature project to secure the approval of the pop culture icon. The film is about the life of Bob Dylan’s early days as a struggling folksinger, the rise to the forefront of the early-’60s folk scene, the controversial switch to rock, the motorcycle accident and the subsequent retreat from public view, and the latter-day de-emphasis of recording and concentration on the concert series known as the Never Ending Tour.

You can download the trailer In hi-res quicktime here. Or check it out in youtube format below:

I hadn’t heard about this film until I read about it over at ioncinema, it looks interesting enough and the director Craig Zobel was a second unit on David Gordon Greens ‘Snow Angels’, and Green susbsequently produced his film; ‘The Great World of Sound’. The film seems to strike me in the ‘humourous not funny’ vein, but seems to have a dash of ‘The Grifters’ thrown in:

Great World of Sound follows Martin(Pat Healy), as he applies for a job at a company training prospective music producers. During training, he teams up with another new employee, Clarence(Kene Holliday), a middle-aged man trying to change his career path. As they travel from town to town, the two “Record Producers” audition new talent found by ads placed in local newspapers by their employers, The Great World of Sound Recording Company. They’re seeking new talent for their record label, giving artists a chance to let their music be heard… for a small fee. It’s going great at first, but soon Martin and Clarence begin to question whether the company is as virtuous as it seemed to be in its’ promise to deliver people their dreams.

I can’t quite tell if some of the people auditioning are real or not. It doesn’t mention anything on the films website about it using documentary style footage, but then it could have just been real acts in improvised situations with the actors. Who knows. It looks interesting though.

Check out the films official website here

I highly doubt it’ll get a theatrical release over here in the UK though so i’ll have to wait for a R1 dvd, meanwhile i’m just hoping that ‘Snow Angels’ will play at the London Film Festival this year.