|
Post by Lauryn on Sept 19, 2007 12:19:13 GMT -5
New York Post: SPC Sparks To 'Married Life' (9-18-07)Those classy guys who run Sony Pictures Classics, Michael Barker and Tom Bernard, went into the Toronto Film Festival with a record nine titles and have gone home with ten. The Hollywood Reporter says SPC, for an undisclosed sum, has picked up the rights to Ira Sachs "Married Life,'' one of surprisingly few titles at the upcoming New York Film Festival that was without U.S. distribution. The flick stars Oscar-winner Chris Cooper as a middle-aged milquetoast who falls for beautiful Rachel McAdams (welcome back!). Two obstacles: he's married to Patricia Clarkson and McAdams is more interested in his best friend, Pierce Brosnan. It's unclear when product-loaded SPC will release "Married Life,'' which boasts 11 producers. Posted by Lou Lumenick on September 18, 2007 09:10 AM We might be more over the moon if Focus had actually nabbed it, but at least with SPC you still get big studio backing behind the movie. From this article, and looking at their website, they do seem to have a lot of acquisitions on their plate, though. I wonder when we'll hear of a ML release date? SPC's metier has more often been foreign films but in 2005 they also handled "Capote" and realized Oscar hopes for Philip Seymour Hoffman, so they can step up and make a film be counted. If I remember, Hoffman and Bennett Miller did an enormous amount of press for "Capote." And well, sure, they were highly motivated by the knowledge that the lead performance was prime Oscar bait, but still, I think a somewhat similar lesson applies with "Married Life." The actors and SPC will need to be out there on the hustings doing press for this movie to break away from the pack, IMO. Speaking of Oscar, I hope that Chris Cooper gets a nod for "Breach." He was brilliant in a difficult role that would have eluded the skills of many actors. Ryan Phillippe was very effective in the film, too, which surprised me.
|
|
|
Post by Ace on Sept 19, 2007 15:15:01 GMT -5
SPC seems to be also distributing a couple of larger more mainstream films like The Jane Austen Book Club and Sleuth, so they're becoming more and more diversified. Another small mention Cord Weekly: Hollywood takes it to Toronto www.cordweekly.com/cordweekly/myweb.php?hls=10034&news_id=891Carie McNabb Sep 19, 2007 Carrie McNabb offers a run down of the celebrity-adored festival in our province’s capita [Excerpt] If you weren’t able to make it out to TIFF this year, don’t worry. A lot of films from TIFF will be hitting theatres before December. Some top films from the festival that are worth checking out include: David Cronenberg’s follow-up to 2005’s History of Violence titled Eastern Promises; Jason Reitman of Thank You For Smoking fame’s new film Juno; Atonement, which stars Keira Knightley and premiered at the Venice Film Festival a few short weeks ago; and the lovely Married Life, starring Rachel McAdams and Pierce Brosnan in a spectacular performance.
|
|
|
Post by Ace on Sept 20, 2007 13:25:30 GMT -5
Vindy: A survival guide to the festivalThursday, September 20, 2007 By MILAN PAURICH VINDICATOR CORRESPONDENT [Excerpt] Compared with glorious, out-of-left-field surprises from relatively new or previously unknown directors such as Christian Mungiu ("Four Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days"), Anton Corbijn ("Control"), Ira Sachs (the terrifically entertaining "Married Life" with pitch-perfect comic performances from Pierce Brosnan, Chris Cooper, Rachel McAdams and Patricia Clarkson), Craig Gillespie ("Lars and the Real Girl" starring Ryan Gosling as a small-town sadsack in love with a life-sized doll named Bianca), Marjane Satrapi and Vincent Paronnaud (the one-of-a-kind French-Iranian animated dazzler "Persepilos"), Juan Antonio Bayona ("The Orphanage"), Tom McCarthy ("The Visitor"), Eran Kolirin ("The Band's Visit"), Christophe Honore ("Love Songs"), Garth Jennings ("Son of Rambow") and perennial wild card and wild child, Harmony Korine ("Mr. Lonely"), the festival's "big" star-studded vehicles (including "Elizabeth: The Golden Years," "Michael Clayton" with George Clooney, chick-lit fave "The Jane Austen Book Club" and Helen Hunt's all-over-the-map directing debut "Then She Found Me") seemed a tad underwhelming.
|
|
|
Post by Yuliya on Sept 20, 2007 13:54:54 GMT -5
I don't think this has been posted yet; it's an interview with David Wenham (Faramir in Lord of the Rings) for Moving Pictures - David "Daisy" Wenham: Lord of the AdaptationsHere's the pertinent part: ---------- MPM: Is the film Marriage something that's already in the can, or...? David Wenham: Yeah, I shot that some months ago in Vancouver. MPM: And you've got a fairly cool set of castmates on that as well. What was it like working with Pierce Brosnan and Patricia Clarkson? David Wenham: Pierce has a reputation as one of the most generous people in show business, and I've got to say it's true. He's a true gentleman. He's a funny, funny man; a very smart, witty man; and talented to boot. MPM: And Patty Clarkson? David Wenham: [Laughter] Patty is a gem, an absolute gem! Patricia and Chris Cooper would have to be my favorite actors, male and female actors. To actually be in a film with them and work with them was a total treat. Both of those guys have talent in abundance, and Patty just cracks me up. She is an absolute hoot. MPM: Was there a specific incident you can recall? David Wenham: There is, but it's probably not suitable for publication. ---------- Can one say "tease"? Grrr!
|
|
|
Post by Ace on Sept 20, 2007 14:05:37 GMT -5
Great find. Thanks. Most of the best stories always seem not to be fit for publication. Darn.
|
|
|
Post by Ace on Sept 21, 2007 13:27:53 GMT -5
Entertainment Weekly: Toronto 2007 Roundup - Joyful Imperfections (9-21-07)Lisa Schwarzbaum EW's critic was impressed by the wealth of smart, original, character-driven movies she saw at this year's Toronto Film Festival, bolstered by the star power of Nicole Kidman, Philip Seymour Hoffman, and George ClooneyAt first I didn't recognize Nicole Kidman in Margot at the Wedding, and not just because of what appear to be alterations in the planes of her chiseled face. No, the Kidman who plays the title role in Noah Baumbach's follow-up to The Squid and the Whale — another pleasurable/painful thumb-press on the bruises of family dynamics, in what's fast becoming identifiable as the Baumbach Maneuver — gives herself fully to playing a woman of weirdly thrilling neuroses. This Kidman doesn't flutter or erect a protective screen between herself and her role as an admired, high-maintenance writer who reenacts ancient battles with Jennifer Jason Leigh as her estranged sister. Rather, this Kidman locates the monster that resides, with special privileges, in successful, cultured, ''upscale'' people. Hers is a great performance in an astute movie that searches for psychological truth at the expense of comfort. Which, come to think of it, is a good definition for the best of what I saw this year at the Toronto Film Festival: original, accomplished, adult movies about very imperfect people behaving very imperfectly. Take The Counterfeiters, a bracingly unsweetened drama by Austrian filmmaker Stefan Ruzowitzky pulled from the inexhaustible Holocaust archives — a survival tale that turns Schindler's List on its head. The ''hero'' is a genius Jewish con artist who, thrown into Mauthausen concentration camp, is put to work by the Nazis counterfeiting British and American money for the benefit of the Third Reich. Except he's not a hero, just a compromised guy with quick wits, an urge to live, and a bit of luck. Atonement, a respectful literary adaptation of Ian McEwan's acclaimed 2002 novel, features a young girl who tells a lie and ruins many people's lives for years to come — not least her own. The story's cinematic grip is likely to be strongest on those who don't compare the movie's blandly pretty scenery (and Keira Knightley's distractingly hollow cheekbones, her clotheshorse postures) with the precision of the author's commanding language. The moral quandary, at least, has not been softened a whit, and the last section, with Vanessa Redgrave pitching in, is still a satisfying shocker. Men behave exceedingly badly, to a moviegoer's great delight, in Before the Devil Knows You're Dead. Sidney Lumet's sly demonstration of the cesspool effect of accumulating misdeeds features Philip Seymour Hoffman and Ethan Hawke as two weasel brothers (Hoffman's characteristically generous embrace of weaselability inspires Hawke to do his best work since Training Day). And the uglier and more desperate the consequences, the more invigorating and juiced up the storytelling. That same inversion of personal goodness and movie payoff goes for Michael Clayton, with George Clooney biting into the title role of a disheartened, dead-eyed legal fixer in Tony Gilroy's superior, cynical thriller. And, sheesh, although I know my colleague Owen Gleiberman disagrees, nothing at Toronto matched the oomph and excitement of David Cronenberg's Eastern Promises, with its head-butting collision of genre pic and moral study. (See for yourself; it's now in a theater near you.) To be sure, not every movie built on moral dilemma hit the mark. Rendition employs Jake Gyllenhaal, Reese Witherspoon, and Meryl Streep, among pedigreed others, to explore justice, injustice, and the slippery boundary between each in the name of American national security, but loses its energy before an audience can muster the desired outrage and concern. Disengagement, Amos Gitai's provocative drama set during the Israeli withdrawal from Gaza, almost cancels out the power of its disengagement scenes with a whole lot of piffling craziness from an unlikely eyewitness played by Juliette Binoche. Lust, Caution, Ang Lee's inert period piece set during pre-Revolution Shanghai, manages to make betrayal, deception, and violent graphic sex barely more exciting than the exertions of society ladies snapping mah-jongg tiles. But then, at Toronto, the unpublicized side streets of programming are often more rewarding than the big stuff. I was seduced by Ira Sachs' Married Life, a little beauty set in well-mannered 1949, which has fun with bad behavior among attractive cheaters. (Starring Pierce Brosnan, Chris Cooper, Patricia Clarkson, and Rachel McAdams, the road to mischief is deliciously acted.) And in Baltasar Kormákur's singularly eccentric Icelandic thriller Jar City, questions of murder and rape vie for attention with the ethics of genetic testing. Against such moral weightiness and in a festival destined by the calendar to be linked forever in memory with the fall of innocence that took place six years ago on September 11, a global charmer like The Band's Visit arrives light and welcome as a bouquet of balloons. The musicians in question are an Egyptian police band, spiffy in their formal blue uniforms and ready to perform at a booking — but completely lost at the wrong address in an Israeli desert town. Writer-director Eran Kolirin pairs a marvelous Sasson Gabai as the group's dignified, sad-faced conductor with the indispensable Ronit Elkabetz (Late Marriage) as the sexy, no-nonsense Israeli café owner who becomes his tour guide. The filmmaker maneuvers a path of surprising freshness — sweet but never syrupy, funny but never condescending, hopeful but never unrealistic, even in a world where truth also can feel lost at the wrong address.
|
|
|
Post by Ace on Sept 21, 2007 13:49:01 GMT -5
Thought I posted this here before for the Uk Telegraph: The Telegraph: Toronto Film Festival: A festival of provocations14/09/2007 Byline: Tim Robey This year's Toronto Film Festival line-up was a lucky dip of prostitution, paedophilia, the Iraq war and Ryan Gosling falling in love with a sex doll. Almost every film has felt like a provocation - some startling, some just numbing. [Excerpt] There's been lots more here besides: Married Life is an elegantly gloomy, Woody Allen-esque period tragicomedy from Ira Sachs, in which 1940s salesman Chris Cooper can't bear to leave his wife (Patricia Clarkson) so decides to poison her instead. Unlike Gosling and his plastic girlfriend in the somewhat rent-a-quirk Lars and the Real Girl, it keeps growing on me the more I think about it.
|
|
|
Post by Ace on Sept 22, 2007 14:45:09 GMT -5
Time Out: Northern lights
Politics and pregnancy dominate this year’s Toronto Film Festival. Ben Kenigsberg Each critic sees 30-plus films in an order of his or her own devising, but for me, the 32nd Toronto International Film Festival (which ended September 15) announced its theme between Saturday’s Midnight Madness revelry and Sunday morning’s conversation starter: George A. Romero’s Diary of the Dead versus Brian De Palma’s Redacted—twin experiments in first-person filmmaking, screened 12 hours apart. In between, I watched Werner Herzog journey to Antarctica in Encounters at the End of the World. In a festival with 275 features, you can’t ask for all the transitions to be smooth. The fifth movie in Romero’s zombie series, Diary of the Dead doubles back to Night of the Living Dead by starting from the first day the zombies appear. The allegorical tropes are familiar, but the Blair Witch shooting style is new: The no-name actors take turns filming each other, providing a handmade contrast to the propagandistic newscasts the characters see on TV. (Michael Moore would probably agree with Romero’s DIY message, though the Sicko director’s unspeakably lazy Captain Mike Across America—reconstituted footage from his 2004 get-out-the-vote tour—accomplishes nothing beyond self-aggrandizement.) De Palma takes a similar antimedia stance in Redacted, a veritable Iraq War remake of his Vietnam film Casualties of War (1989), inspired by a real-life murder-rape case in Samarra. De Palma wanted to use footage from the incident, but his lawyers wouldn’t allow it. Instead—calling attention to his artifice—he builds a narrative out of the fictionalized soldiers’ footage, a fake French documentary and YouTube-style videos. His glibness in quoting from Casualties borders on appalling; indeed, notwithstanding Captain Mike Across America, Redacted sparked some of the festival’s most scathing reviews. But the movie’s use of the Casualties template can be read as De Palma’s statement that Iraq and Vietnam should be treated with equal crudeness. Redacted may be hard to like, but it was also Toronto’s most provocative film. It’s not as if there weren’t respectful alternatives. Nick Broomfield’s effective Battle for Haditha reenacts an incident in which marines retaliated for a roadside explosion by slaughtering two dozen civilians. And both films were preferable to Rendition, a glossy Reese Witherspoon vehicle about secret government torture that seems overplotted to avoid clarity. Arriving late at a fest with loads to admire but little that sparked true passion, Todd Haynes’s I’m Not There became a predesignated flash point, promising the spectacle of six actors playing characters modeled on Bob Dylan. Cate Blanchett fares best, wandering around in an 8½-inspired landscape and sparring with a journalist played by Bruce Greenwood. Richard Gere fares worst in the Pat Garrett & Billy the Kid thread, which is too clever by half. I’m Not There’s collage of visual styles (from Fellini to Godard to Pennebaker to Peckinpah, all brilliantly aped by cinematographer Ed Lachman) keeps it hypnotic from start to finish. But the moment when Haynes brings it together is itself not quite there. For all the movie’s fascination with the Dylan mystique (and Julie Taymor’s bizarrely conceived Beatles numbers in Across the Universe), the festival’s best use of music involved a crucial moment in Gus Van Sant’s Paranoid Park, as the protagonist burned a letter to the strains of Elliott Smith’s “Angeles.” Toronto came billed as reviving the gritty urban thrillers of the ’70s, whether it was with Neil Jordan’s The Brave One, a gloss on Death Wish, or Sidney Lumet’s unhurried heist movie Before the Devil Knows You’re Dead, which has shades of both Dog Day Afternoon and Reservoir Dogs. A more enjoyable throwback, Ira Sachs’s superb, 1949-set comedy Married Life takes the Preston Sturges–style premise of a philandering husband (Chris Cooper) who’d rather murder his wife (Patricia Clarkson) than see her unhappy and turns it into a parable about the compromises of marriage.Turning back the clock in a different sense, Toronto contributed to this year’s crop of preemptive post–Roe v. Wade movies. The nuptials in Noah Baumbach’s sharply written (if contrived) Margot at the Wedding hinge in part on an unplanned pregnancy. The Romanian Palme d’Or winner 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days chronicles a girl’s struggle to obtain an abortion under the Ceausescu regime. But the best-loved film involving a pregnancy was Juno, directed by Jason Reitman (Thank You for Smoking) and written by Diablo Cody (yes, a former stripper). Like Knocked Up, it’s a disarmingly hilarious treatment of a politically incorrect premise: teen decides to keep her baby and give it up for adoption. The movie’s success is due almost entirely to lead actor Ellen Page, who even redeems the final slide into sentimentality. If Toronto offered no masterpieces, it did, at least, announce that a star was born.
|
|
|
Post by Ace on Sept 22, 2007 15:53:29 GMT -5
=San Francisco Chronicle: The Toronto Film Festival's hits and missesRuthe Stein Thursday, September 20, 2007 Pleasant Surprises: "Married Life": This small film from Ira Sachs, director of the underappreciated "Forty Shades of Blue," is about successful friends in love with the same woman in prosperous postwar America. The settings look right out of "Mad Men." Chris Cooper plays a married man who falls for a young femme fatale (a very blond Rachel McAdams). Pierce Brosnan, as jaunty as Cary Grant, is his single pal who keeps her company while his friend is home with the wife. ======================= James Mason, Fred MacMurray, Cary Grant -- you know these really aren't all the same "type" at all. Interesting that in Seraphim Falls he was compared to James Coburn and Clint Eastwood. In The Matador it was Christopher Walken, Billy Bob Thorton, Cary Grant (!) and Walter Matthau. And yet how can that be when we've all been told that Pierce Brosnan has no range.
|
|
|
Post by Ace on Sept 22, 2007 15:55:18 GMT -5
|
|
|
Post by Ace on Sept 22, 2007 16:24:47 GMT -5
Time Out: New York: Walk on the wild sideAuthor: Joshua Rothkopf Rock rebellion and youthful swagger pump up Toronto’s volume. Screams, gales of laughter, Canadians gone wild: Anything is possible when a beach ball comes into play. Toronto’s cavernous Ryerson Theatre became an impromptu volleyball court last Saturday as the clock ticked past midnight and zealous viewers aimed for the balcony. One hoodie-clad pummeler became an instant celebrity. When France’s Julien Maury, codirector of the riotously gory Inside (imagine an evil twin of Knocked Up), finally hit the stage in baggy jeans and a baseball cap, he jumped right in: “Where is zee beach ball? I want to play with you guys!” The Toronto International Film Festival was coming to an end. Only nine days earlier, the vulpine Asia Argento stalked the stage and thanked her father, horror maestro Dario, for making her “a freak.” Between those two bookends unspooled one of the more exuberant fests in recent memory, a showcase of youthfulness in which the best new work gave off sparks of punk attitude and irreverence. Go ahead and put the Argentos’ The Mother of Tears in that category—unless, of course, you find roving packs of leather-clad succubi old hat. Stodgier horror purists bolted for the exits, while the beaming director himself celebrated his 67th birthday at the world premiere of his lovably ridiculous future cult classic. Toronto has always worked best as a one-stop shop, skimming the cream from Cannes, Sundance and other festivals. But if you tuned out those preapproved highlights, the prevailing spirit was one of revolution, of youth supplanting elders. In short, it was not a good week to be Ben Affleck. Judging from brother Casey’s star-making turn in The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford (playing the latter with equal parts squirmy insecurity and desperate lunging), the family’s true talent has arrived. Here, too, was plucky Ellen Page, barely out of her teens, stepping up mightily as a pregnant high-schooler in the terrific Juno, which boasts some of the most viciously sarcastic dialogue since Heathers. (Expect more carping about a young woman’s choice come the film’s December release.) Even hippie relic George Romero attuned himself to the panic of terrified film-school students in Diary of the Dead, a YouTube-era nightmare that outdid Brian De Palma’s clumsy, Iraq-themed Redacted for political urgency. Those still unconvinced of Toronto’s newfound vigor could bask in the deafening power chords of Pete Townshend, reverberating in the same theater where the Who performed Tommy nearly 40 years prior. Amazing Journey: The Story of the Who is a near-definitive tribute to the group’s abandon, loaded with euphoric footage of guitar destruction and Keith Moon’s exploding drum kit. No film proved as majestically loud as Julian Schnabel’s revelatory concert document Lou Reed’s Berlin, both a reclamation of the singer’s most challenging album (a bracing cocktail of cabaret decadence and lyrical nihilism) and an improvement on it. These two films—along with the moody Cannes holdover Control, the Ian Curtis biopic—made up an impressively rebellious listening library. Asia Argento, Casey Affleck, the Who: The kids were all right. At the apex of Toronto’s rock & roll riot perched Todd Haynes’s brilliant I’m Not There, positioned as an oblique biography of Bob Dylan—embodied by six actors, including a wonderfully cryptic Cate Blanchett—but played more as a cousin to Velvet Goldmine’s glam poseurs than anything out of this world. (The true subject may be the director himself.) A gaping void yawns at the center of the movie, crystallized in the moment when a white-faced ghost wails Dylan’s lesser-known “Going to Acapulco” on a stage that might be Missouri, the Wild West or Sam Peckinpah’s Pat Garrett & Billy Kid—or a purgatorial combo of all three. This non–Dylan fan was shaken for days. After such open-throated boldness, was there room for (yawn) respectable dramas about emotional containment? Sure, although Joe Wright’s Atonement definitely seemed to lose steam after its dazzling first act, set at a sexed-up British mansion at the onset of WWII. It’s not that Wright’s adaptation of Ian McEwan’s best-selling novel wants for polish, only that its subsequent wrinkles feel a touched too smoothed out. Meanwhile, Ira Sachs’s Married Life, a demystification of late-1940s upper-class infidelity, was perhaps the find of the festival and the sole notable exception to the week’s assemblage of younger-feeling drama. Chris Cooper, Pierce Brosnan and a robustly liberated Patricia Clarkson all excelled at cheating. In a festival of succubi and guitar windmilling, it was the least they could do.
|
|
|
Post by Ace on Sept 25, 2007 5:09:30 GMT -5
Well this is interesting and more than a tad rude considering the short notice and that it was given the honor of being a Centerpiece Film. Though I'm sure Woodstock is happy with Kimmel giving them Lars. Poughkeepsie Journal: Distributor buys film, pulls it from festivalFriday, September 21, 2007 Sony Pictures Classics has purchased "Married Life" and pulled it from this year's Woodstock Film Festival, a festival spokeswoman said today. The festival has replaced "Married Life," starring Patricia Clarkson, with "Lars and the Real Girl," which also stars Clarkson and Ryan Gosling. Directed by Craig Gillespie and written by "Six Feet Under" scribe Nancy Oliver, "Lars" is described as a "heartfelt comedy" about a loveable introvert whose emotional baggage has kept him from fully embracing life. It will be screened Oct. 13 at 6:45 p.m. at Tinker Street Cinema in Woodstock and Oct. 14 at 6 p.m. at the Rosendale Theater in Rosendale. "Married Life" ticket holders will be contacted about their options. Academy Award-nominated Clarkson is scheduled to speak at the Actors Dialogue panel Oct. 14 at 10 a.m. at Utopia Studios in Bearsville. For view an updated schedule and purchase tickets to this year's screenings, panels and concerts, visit www.woodstockfilmfestival.com.
|
|
|
Post by Ace on Sept 25, 2007 5:11:27 GMT -5
|
|
|
Post by Ace on Sept 25, 2007 22:40:57 GMT -5
Variety finally got to see it and maybe they shouldn't have. Though at least it's better written review than Hollywood Reporter and brings up some interesting points. Not enough about Pierce though so pfft. Variety: Married Life By TODD MCCARTHY A Sony Pictures Classics release (in U.S.) of a Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Pictures and Sidney Kimmel Entertainment presentation of an Anonymous Content/Firm Films production. (International sales: Kimmel Intl., Beverly Hills.) Produced by Kimmel, Jawal Nga, Steve Golin, Ira Sachs. Executive producers, William Horberg, David Nicksay, Geoff Stier, Adam Shulman, Matt Littin, Alix Madigan-Yorkin, Bruce Toll. Directed by Ira Sachs. Screenplay, Sachs, Oren Moverman, based on the book "Five Roundabouts to Heaven" by John Bingham. Richard Langley - Pierce Brosnan Harry Allen - Chris Cooper Pat Allen - Patricia Clarkson Kay Nesbitt - Rachel McAdams John O'Brien - David Wenham The tone, casting and material form a less-than-perfect match in "Married Life," a period domestic drama that never quite decides if it wants to be a credible marital study, a noirish meller or a sly comedy. The talented quartet of lead players feel oddly paired in this curious tale of jealousy, betrayal and murderous intent. Helmer Ira Sachs, whose last picture, "Forty Shades of Blue," won the top jury prize at Sundance two years ago, appears to be working a bit out of his zone here. Combo of likely restrained critical response and mature-leaning cast and content points to restrained theatrical B.O. prospects. The snappy animated credits suggest a fizzy mood immediately contradicted by the opening scene. It's Nov. 5, 1949, and in a stylish and smoky eatery in what is presumably New York City, aging gent Harry (Chris Cooper) confides to his best friend Richard (Pierce Brosnan) that he's leaving his wife for someone new, who's given him a shot at true happiness. Harry seems almost childishly sincere about his emotional reawakening, but is downright naive about the consequences of introducing his roguish bachelor buddy to his sweetheart Kay (Rachel McAdams), a demure bottle-blonde beauty who, one surmises, fell for the three-decades-older Harry due to a need for a reliable male authority figure after the deaths of her father and soldier husband; one look at her and it's clear Richard is going to have a very hard time keeping his hands off his pal's girl. Based on an obscure pulp novel, John Bingham's "Five Roundabouts to Heaven," the yarn heads directly into noir territory when Harry plots to murder his devoted longtime wife Pat (Patricia Clarkson) to spare her the pain of divorce. As Harry is unaccustomed to such wayward undertakings, this takes a while, by which time Richard and Kay have found a way to heat up the cold winter. Pat also has some private business going on that no one, least of all her husband, knows about, creating layers of duplicity all around. Most of "Married Life" consists of lengthy dialogue scenes. Possibly because many of these conversations involve confidential information, the thesps have been directed to speak in a muted, hushed manner, as well as with a pause-ridden cadence that invests the delivery with a stilted, artificial character. Add to this the characters wearing heavy woolen clothes in overly warm rooms, and feverish emotions cloaked by societal reticence, and it's easy to see the hothouse atmosphere Sachs is shooting for. Unfortunately, the result is not so much overheated as suffocatingly claustrophobic, with a set of characters who follow their desires but try to disguise the fact from others. Pic is dramatic but lacks a dynamic; one can sense the director's intent and affection for the form, but also see that working in this stylized vein does not necessarily come easily for a filmmaker of his hitherto more naturalistic tendencies. Additional unease stems from the vast age difference between McAdams' Kay and both of her suitors. Even if plausible psychological reasons can be offered for her choices, the physical matchups don't feel right, suggesting either that Kay should have been played by someone a bit older or Harry, especially, by a younger actor (strangely, Cooper comes off as at least a decade younger in the imminent "The Kingdom" than he does here). Regrettably absent from the bigscreen since "The Family Stone" nearly two years ago, McAdams endows her readings with tender feeling, but her natural vivaciousness and spontaneity are straightjacketed by the format. Not only that, but she looks much better with her natural hair color than as a phony blonde. Cooper counterbalances Harry's misguided foolishness with the strong suggestion of a dignified man's awareness that this likely represents his final hope for a rejuvenating romance. Although Richard's professional life and background could have used a line or two of definition, Brosnan has little trouble convincing as a selfish cad, and Clarkson has fun withholding, then revealing the true nature of her would-be victim. Shot in Canada, the pic makes do from a period p.o.v. with a very limited number of sets and costumes.
|
|
|
Post by Ace on Sept 27, 2007 9:08:16 GMT -5
Back Stage ManifestoTom Hall (programmer for the Sarasota Film Festival) The 2007 New York Film Festival | I Do It has been a long week and a half at the 2007 New York Film Festival; With social obligations, deadlines and a general sense of exhaustion settling over me this past week, I haven't been able to make the time to write about the films I've been seeing. As usual, my passions run toward talking about films I really admire and less toward those of which I am not fond, but in fairness, this year's New York Film Festival has been a decidedly mixed affair. As I have said before, I always think that is a good thing; If every movie in the festival aligned with my own tastes, desires and sensibilities, I don't think the programming committee would be doing their job of finding a broad array of films for a diverse audience. Although my own tastes are very broad, it's always a good exercise in thinking about films to unfold the reasons why I do not respond to this or that movie, but ultimately, I find far more pleasure in taking apart the things that I like and trying to discover why they move me. Which is why, as a newlywed, I was so surprised to find myself enjoying three very different films that approach the subject of marriage as a painful, sexy and confusing platform for cinematic exploration. First up, Ira Sachs' Married Life, a polished black comedy about a man so afraid of hurting his wife with the revelation of his infidelity that he sets his mind to killing her to spare her the torment of losing him. Sachs gets great performances from Chris Cooper as the unfaithful husband, Patricia Clarkson as the doting wife with secrets of her own and Pierce Brosnan as the couple's dashing bachelor friend, but what is most surprising in this day and age of our country's non-stop hypocritical, sanctimonious ramblings about the 'sanctity of marriage' is how the film balances on the knife's edge between kitschy period pastiche and heartfelt melodrama. Looking at marriage as a series of near-homicidal self-delusions and unspoken lies, Sachs is able to expose the arrogance of idealism between lovers and to show that the suppression of individual desire in the name of keeping up appearances can lead down some very dark alleyways. That said, for all of the dark and brooding intentions, the film's cynicism about the ability of couples to act morally has a lovely, light touch that will appeal broadly to adult audiences everywhere. In other words, adults are going to recognize themselves in the cruel intentions on display in Sachs' film and laugh their asses off. Of course, the secret to laughing at a film like Married Life is to recognize our own desperation and doubt in the twists and turns of Sachs' plot; There is no finger wagging here. Instead, Sachs (much like he did in his breakout Forty Shades Of Blue) rolls the dice by humanizing everything; Our darkest impulses invest the story with enough regret, empathy and desire to bring the film into a harmonious balance. =============================== And a bit by Eugene Hernandez Editor-in-Chief of IndieWire in his blog One of the annual highlights of the New York Film Festival is actress Sylvia Miles, a fixture at festival screenings and parties. I snapped this quick, candid iPhone photo as she chatted up Ira Sachs after his press and industry screening of "Married Life." And that's Josh Marston in the background, leaving the Walter Reade theater. Ira's film was a minor revelation for me. After hearing some mixed reviews in Toronto, I decided to see it for myself and was thoroughly engaged and impressed. He's crafted a tight showcase for some excellent performances, including the always exciting Patricia Clarkson. Some are already comparing the movie to AMC's "Mad Men," but I never bought into that show, so I can't weigh in on that. The period detail and terrific twists and turns make for an entertaining ride. Perceptive viewers should get some fun out of finding little moments or lines that reference period films, which were a big influence on Sachs.
|
|
|
Post by Ace on Sept 27, 2007 12:57:14 GMT -5
Time Out new York: King of New York"TONY" finds much to crow about at the 45th New York Film Festival. Every year, it seems, New York hosts more and more film festivals, whether linked by borough, nationality, religion, sexual orientation, age or any other arbitrary rubric. But each September, both the most rabid cinephiles and the most casual filmgoers anticipate the announcement of the lineup of the New York Film Festival, still the premier movie event of our celluloid-saturated city. And unlike the overwhelming, nearly unmanageable festivals at Cannes and Toronto, the New York Film Festival is a beautifully curated boutique affair. The official selection consists of 28 films; below we spotlight our top dozen from one of the strongest lineups in recent memory (for a review of The Darjeeling Limited, the opening-night film, see page 100). All screenings, except where noted, take place at the Jazz at Lincoln Center’s Frederick P. Rose Hall. Although most films are nominally sold out, it’s often possible to get tickets right before showtime. Married Life We’re not exactly ruining Ira Sachs’s absorbing, late-1940s-set domestic drama by revealing that married life has its drawbacks. Sexual frustrations take their toll on a tight group of friends (Chris Cooper, Patricia Clarkson, cock-of-the-walk Pierce Brosnan) fortified with more martinis and lit cigarettes than an entire season of Mad Men. But the underlying grace of the film, adapted from a John Bingham novel, comes from its revision of stock scenarios into honest emotional material. There’s frank talk, a little poisonous revenge, even forgiveness. Maybe married life ain’t that bad.—JR (Sat 29 at 3:30pm; Sun 30 at 6:45pm)
|
|
|
Post by Ace on Sept 27, 2007 23:07:45 GMT -5
New York Times: Tickets to a Venturesome Film Festival (9-28-07)By MANOHLA DARGIS Published: September 28, 2007 A taste of sleaze, a blast of sex, some manufactured dissent and art, glorious art — the 45th New York Film Festival offers something tasty for every discriminating cinematic palate. Proudly, at times lazily, this is a festival that always demands discrimination from its audience, a sense of adventure, even as it also relies on no small amount of brand loyalty. You can call the festival elitist — really, go ahead, it’s a badge of honor — as well as maddening, inspiring, out of touch and in the know, but this year you certainly can’t call it dull. This year the programmers have rounded up fewer of the usual suspects and taken actual chances, particularly with Abel Ferrara (“Go Go Tales”), Catherine Breillat (“The Last Mistress”) and Brian De Palma (“Redacted”). The down-and-dirty Mr. Ferrara, one of the few real New Yorkers in the lineup, is guaranteed to outrage as much as entertain with his sentimental strip-club story, as is Ms. Breillat, a committed French philosopher of the boudoir. Both their films feature the Italian actress Asia Argento, a skinny vamp who has unexpectedly ripened into a terrific actress. A little messy and unpredictable, Ms. Argento has range and heat, which makes her a fitting emblem for the festival at its most vigorous. As it has in the past, the festival has drawn heavily from this year’s excellent Cannes Film Festival to help build a strong program. More than half the New York selections will open theatrically in the coming year (some will also play as videos on demand), including Ms. Breillat’s “Last Mistress,” Gus Van Sant’s “Paranoid Park,” Todd Haynes’s “I’m Not There,” Hou Hsiao-hsien’s “Flight of the Red Balloon” and Cristian Mungiu’s “Four Months, Three Weeks and Two Days,” which won the Palme d’Or at Cannes. (Lee Chang-dong’s heartbreaker “Secret Sunshine” does not yet have distribution, so catch it if you can.) These titles challenge, engage, thrill and sometimes appall. They are alive to the world, not just cinema’s own dusty glory. That history has at times seemed to weigh too heavily on the New York Film Festival, which got off to a heady start in the enchanted art-house year of 1963 with films by Yasujiro Ozu, Chris Marker and Jean-Pierre Melville. In the years that followed, the festival tapped more baby auteurs and grand masters (Rivette, Imamura, Fassbinder), bringing the best in world cinema to an appreciative, movie-hungry city. That was then, this is now. This country’s appetite for foreign-language cinema has so perilously diminished, even in New York, that these days some of the festival’s more obscure names — Jia Zhang-ke, Alexander Sokurov, Bela Tarr — would probably elicit more huhs than huzzahs. But to some of us, these are rock stars. After foolishly passing on his first two features, the festival has made room this year for another (rising) star, the Mexican filmmaker Carlos Reygadas. His “Silent Light,” a luminous drama set in a rural religious community, is precisely the kind of uncompromised work of art that needs a festival push and that this festival, in turn, needs to burnish its high-art reputation. Even so, there’s no question that a strain of pragmatism runs through most film programming, which probably explains why one of the festival’s 28 feature slots has been reserved for those crowd-pleasing headliners, the Coen brothers, on board with their relievedly straight adaptation of Cormac McCarthy’s novel “No Country for Old Men.” The festival may be elitist, but it also understands the value of marquee names. And indeed the festival opens tonight with Wes Anderson’s “Darjeeling Limited,” which will be released commercially tomorrow in New York, including at a theater a few blocks from Lincoln Center, its home. No matter: 4,000 festivalgoers have sold out the festival theaters where the film is playing this evening — and at upward of $40 a pop. The festival’s imprimatur affirms Mr. Anderson’s status as a director of note, and his film brings it red-carpet opportunities, as does the centerpiece (“No Country for Old Men”) and another selection showing this first week, Julian Schnabel’s “Diving Bell and the Butterfly,” which weds avant-garde gestures to glossy-magazine aesthetics. It may not be art, but it’s pretty and it’s in French, and it brings a tear to the eye. More venturesome choices from the first week include Mr. Sokurov’s startling and dreamy “Alexandra,” in which the octogenarian opera star Galina Vishnevskaya plays — eccentrically, mesmerizingly — a Russian babushka who pays a bizarre visit to her grandson at the Chechen front. And while it drove me bonkers at Cannes, Mr. Tarr’s film “The Man From London” (an adaptation of a Georges Simenon novel) is definitely worth a look — a patient look — for the way Mr. Tarr carves up space with light and camera movement, and for the unsettling sight (and sounds) of the British actress Tilda Swinton as a Hungarian-dubbed hausfrau. Mr. Sokurov and Mr. Tarr are among the most fascinating filmmakers working today, and these films are, as of press time, without American distribution. I wish I liked Eric Rohmer’s “Romance of Astrée and Céladon” or even found it interesting as a later-life artifact. (Mr. Rohmer turned 87 this year.) Based on Honoré d’Urfé’s 17th-century novel, the film follows two dippy fifth-century lovers through the agonies of love and betrayal, as well as one too many awkwardly composed shots. The film, which plays this weekend, has its fans, but despite some pertly attractive female nudity, I found it moribund and badly performed to the point of distraction. There’s something noble, if that’s the word, about the festival’s loyalty to auteurs like Mr. Rohmer, and perhaps the selection committee actually loves the film and didn’t just succumb to sentimentality. Even so, though not an admirer, I do understand why the Rohmer is in the festival. The same cannot be said for “The Orphanage,” a slick Spanish horror film directed by Juan Antonio Bayona. The cinematography looks moody and pristine, the actors hit their marks, the story amuses without being especially surprising or scary or innovative. I have similar reservations about Ira Sachs’s cynical excursion into 1940s unhappiness with “Married Life,” which features top-notch performances from Patricia Clarkson, Chris Cooper, Rachel McAdams and especially Pierce Brosnan. Few actors play cads as persuasively as Mr. Brosnan — more, more! — and it’s always nice to see Ms. McAdams, even if she doesn’t do much but flaunt her dimples. (Both films play this weekend and have distribution.) In recent years the festival, perhaps in response to the far larger Tribeca Film Festival, has expanded its offerings. Alongside “Views From the Avant-Garde,” the festival’s annual, ambitious showcase of experimental cinema and video, it is presenting a tribute to the Hong Kong-based Cathay Studios, featuring classic titles from the 1950s and 1960s. There’s also a handful of music documentaries (Bob Dylan, Tom Petty); a fund-raising shebang sponsored by New Line Cinema; and several retrospective screenings, including John M. Stahl’s feverish “Leave Her to Heaven” (1945), a film noir in lurid Technicolor, and John Ford’s “Drums Along the Mohawk” (1939). Also screening is the so-called definitive edition (HA!) of Ridley Scott’s “Blade Runner” (1982), which remains a masterpiece, even with fiddles and tweaks. This is an important year for the New York Film Festival, partly because it will not be showing films in its usual big house, Alice Tully Hall, which is closed (well, all but gutted) during Lincoln Center’s massive renovation. Much of its screenings will take place at the Frederick P. Rose Hall in the Time Warner Center a few long blocks south of Lincoln Center. Home to Jazz at Lincoln Center, Rose Hall is on the center’s fifth floor, which means that this year you can pick up an organic apple at the Whole Foods on your way to the movies. None of this appears to have affected sales, and as of yesterday afternoon more than half the screenings were sold out. Even more important is what the renovations mean for the Film Society of Lincoln Center, the festival’s parent organization. When the renovations are finished — optimistically in 2009 — the Film Society will have a new public home on the south side of 65th Street called the Elinor Bunin-Munroe Film Center. This large new space will include an education center, gallery, cafe, indoor amphitheater and two theaters (90 and 150 seats) to complement the recently refurbished 268-seat Walter Reade Theater across the street and up one flight of stairs. For the Film Society, which has had to make do with a theater hidden from pedestrian view, tucked in the equivalent of Lincoln Center’s backyard, this is exciting news. The question is how the Film Society will rise to the occasion of these new digs: notably, will it expand beyond its cozy core constituency? For those of us who have despaired at the Walter Reade’s inability to fill its seats consistently, and for those of us who have also long thought of the New York Film Festival as an uptown event, these are no small matters. The Film Society does get out of the neighborhood, most recently with outdoor screenings in Stuyvesant Town, but its distance from many of the city’s most vibrant communities can make it seem as remote as the far side of the Moon. The Film Society has often seemed as if it expected the city to come to it, never the reverse. Its willingness to go beyond its comfort and perhaps even its geographic zone feels especially urgent now because it won’t be long before the old art-house faithful start slipping away like Antonioni and Bergman. Cinemania is alive and well on the Internet, notably in blogs, where young movie nuts rant and rave and help cultivate one another’s cinematic interests. This is heartening, but film — especially the kind that distinguishes this year’s edition of the New York Film Festival — needs more than passion. It needs an audience, a paying public. If we don’t cultivate a new generation of movie lovers who get excited at the very idea of a Hou Hsiao-hsien film, we may as well hold a memorial service for foreign-language-film theatrical distribution right now. You bring the flowers; I’ll bring the Scotch.
|
|
|
Post by Ace on Sept 28, 2007 10:49:41 GMT -5
Washington Blade: Toronto’s high-profile festival yields long-awaited gay fare (9-28-07)Queer films – Canadian style [excerpt] HARRIETTE YAHR Friday, September 28, 2007 A gay jock, an intersexed teen, Cate Blanchett in drag: Queer films buzzed around this year’s Toronto International Film Festival, held Sept. 6-15. Toronto, which falls after Venice on the festival circuit, is known for its A-list presence — this year Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie were on hand. But there’s another side of the fest, showcasing independent and niche films, including gay options. Watch for a couple of these to play Sundance in January before hitting theaters; others you can catch at a queer film festival near you, or down the line on DVD. Standouts — like the Todd Haynes festival hit — are scheduled for theatrical release in the coming months. A slew of films by queer directors (not necessarily with queer content) and films that featured or centered on queer characters played the fest. The hottest was “I’m Not There,” Todd Haynes’ Bob Dylan-inspired visual feast about the multiple psyches of the artist. Look for Cate Banchett to get an Academy Award nomination for her turn as one of the Dylans — in perfect cross-dressing form. Toronto opened with “Fugitive Pieces” by Jerome Podeswa, based on the bestselling novel by Anne Michaels. Podeswa is also known for directing episodes of “Queer as Folk,” “The L Word,” and “Six Feet Under.” Gregg Araki screened “Smiley Face,” a film whose tone is far from the director’s dark-themed and well-received “Mysterious Skin.” Anna Faris carries this entertaining and colorfully shot tale about Jane F and the wacky adventures that ensue after she mistakenly eats her roommate’s pot cupcakes. Queer indie master Gus Van Zant was on hand for the North American premiere of “Paranoid Park,” which uses a stunning visual mix of 8mm and 35mm film to tell the slow, meditative story of a skateboarding kid caught up in one heck of a messy situation. Although it claims no queer content, “Paranoid’s” homoerotic feel — heralded by long tracking shots of the newbie Gabe Nevins — is hard to deny. Of note is Van Zant casting the teens off of MySpace. Look for “Paranoid Park” in theaters in March 2008. Ira Sachs (“Forty Shades of Blue”) premiered “Married Life,” a sublime, well-executed dark comedy about the complications of love, which gets my vote alongside “I’m Not There” for the film with best performance of the festival: Pierce Brosnan playing a mistress-stealing best friend.
|
|
|
Post by Ace on Oct 2, 2007 17:49:18 GMT -5
Variety: AFM touts 106 world premieres; Santa Monica film confab to unveil 500 moviesBy TATIANA SIEGEL More than 500 films will unspool at the 28th American Film Market, with 106 receiving their world premieres at the annual Santa Monica confab. AFM, which runs from Oct. 31-Nov. 7 this year, has sold out all exhibition space at the Loews Santa Monica Beach Hotel and Le Merigot Hotel. Preems include Nu Image's "Mad Money," starring Katie Holmes, Diane Keaton and Queen Latifah; QED Intl.'s "Smart People," with Thomas Haden Church, Sarah Jessica Parker and Dennis Quaid; "Tales of the Riverbank," starring Jim Broadbent and Stephen Fry, from Handmade Films Intl.; and Toho's "Sanjuro," written by the late Akira Kurosawa. Epic Pictures Group's "Carnera," starring F. Murray Abraham and Paul Sorvino; Faye Dunaway starrer "Flick," from AV Pictures; and Matthew Modine starrer "The Neighbor," from Curb Entertainment, will also see their world preems at AFM. This marks the fourth consecutive year in which the market has reached capacity. The lineup of 522 feature films in 34 languages boasts stars including Jessica Alba, Charlize Theron, Catherine Zeta-Jones, Aaron Eckhart, Ryan Gosling and Pierce Brosnan.Among the pics: Kimmel Intl.'s "Lars and the Real Girl," starring Gosling and Patricia Clarkson; GreeneStreet Films' "Bill," with Alba, Eckhart and Timothy Olyphant; Yari Film Group's "Resurrecting the Champ," with Alan Alda, Josh Hartnett and Samuel L. Jackson; and "Blood Brothers," produced by John Woo, from Fortissimo Films. Lineup also includes StudioCanal's "Disengagement," with Juliette Binoche; and Kimmel's "Married Life," starring Brosnan, Clarkson, Chris Cooper and Rachel McAdams.
|
|
|
Post by Lauryn on Oct 4, 2007 13:44:32 GMT -5
Ace, just reading through your round-up of reviews on "Married Life." I'm slightly worried about what the "Variety" critic had to say about the oddly hushed and paused delivery of the lines just because I know Todd McCarthy generally has a good ear for the right rhythms of dialogue in a film. From the tenor of this review and others I expect there will be some directorial experimentation we might quarrel with, but nothing so overly eccentric as to derail our enjoyment of the performances -- and I think that's about where two-thirds of my anticipation for ML lies. And when the SMA plays a rake (apparently with his usual zest) you can put an exclamation point on that, LOL!
I see that Manohla Dargis, as well as some of the rest, is getting a charge out of the caddish Pierce, too. Not unusual, I have that weakness myself, though Dargis doesn't seem to like him in any other guise. Yet another that thinks his classic good looks make him boring by default unless he's playing against type. I'm reminded of what she said of him in "Laws of Attraction" and "TOP":
For his part, Brosnan often seems vacuum-sealed onscreen, but he can come marvelously alive when playing the roué, as he did in "The Tailor of Panama." Quincy Jones once said that Sean Connery, another James Bond, reminded him of a panther. Brosnan generally brings to mind a show dog — very well groomed, very well behaved — but every so often he flashes a look that suggests under all the good breeding waits an awfully hungry wolf.
|
|