Editor | Peter Bowen

Of course, you read it in high school—ok, college. And maybe you saw the classic 1994 version with Joan Fontaine and Orson Welles on TCM. But Cary Fukunaga (fresh from his award-winning Sin Nombre) is sure to bring a fresh spin to Charlotte Brontë’s sturdy classic Jane Eyre. Mia Wasikowska (currently Alice in Alice in Wonderland) is set to play Jane and Michael Fassbender (Inglourious Basterds) will be Rochester in the production that starts shooting next week in England. This new version is penned by Moira Buffini with a cast that includes Judi Dench, Sally Hawkins, and Jamie Bell. James Schamus, CEO of Focus Features, comments, “Cary is the ideal choice to realize this unforgettable story in its traditional setting, yet with contemporary vitality and spirit. With two of today’s most promising new stars in Mia and Michael, plus an outstanding supporting cast, this will be a Jane Eyre for the ages.” To read the full press release, go here.

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Let’s say you are a big fan of Coen brothers cult favorite The Big Lebowski, but you have to travel to Germany and stay a night in Berlin, what should you do? Obviously, dude, you should stay at the Michelberger Hotel, which Travel + Lesiure reports is “friendly and funny: hallway TV’s play a permanent loop of The Big Lebowski in German.”

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In the Guardian.com, film critic Philip French considers how he (and other film lovers) cherish particular scenes from film history. French loves the shower scene from Psycho––but then who doesn't? A panel of contemporary filmmakers singled out different, but no less memorable scenes from other films. Among the filmmakers, Ken Loach loves the bicycle scene from Jules et Jim, Shaun of the Dead Edgar Wright zeroed in on Carrie’s “Blood at the Prom” scene, Clair Denis loves the the opening scene from Hitchcock’s Rear Window. Also quoted is Ryan Fleck who (along with Anna Boden) is currently making It’s Kind of a Funny Story for Focus. He picked the "Subway Chase" scene from The French Connection. Remembering fondly action films before the advent of computer-generated effects, Fleck jokes about making films today (and in the process considers how his work on It's Kind of a Funny Story might have been different:

It was the kind of thing that you just would never get away with these days. I'm editing a movie right now that has a teenager walking on the Brooklyn Bridge, considering suicide. He steps out on to a ledge, over traffic… It never even occurred to put the actual kid out on the ledge, on a bridge, over traffic because we knew there was no way authorities would let us do that. So there's camera trickery. Back in the 70s we'd have just thrown a child out over the ledge, seen what happened, and shot it.

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As Greenberg gets set to hit theaters in the next few weeks, critics and writers are looking at the new side of Ben Stiller shown in this touching character study by Noah Baumbach. Dennis Lim in a recent piece in the New York Times called  "Mortification Man" considers the various elements that, not only connects this new character to Stiller’s previous comedy triumphs, but also threads a bond between Baumbach’s and Stiller’s comedic styles. Lim writes:

Mr. Baumbach’s brand of humor is more analytical than Mr. Stiller’s, but both men specialize in a comedy of discomfort and mortification. You can imagine the short-fused Roger carrying the psychic burden of Mr. Stiller’s other roles as a perennial punching bag. Somewhere between good sports and masochists, his characters always get the girl but must first endure a series of indignities: zipper and hair-gel debacles in There’s Something About Mary, polygraph testing in Meet the Parents, gastrointestinal flare-ups in Along Came Polly.

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The 25th Film Independent Spirit Awards took place Friday night (March 5) in Los Angeles. Among the winners were cinematographer Roger Deakins who won a Spirit Award for his work on the Coen brothers comedy A Serious Man. In addition,the Robert Altman Award went to A Serious Man, with the award being given to the film's directors (Joel and Ethan Coen), casting directors (Ellen Chenoweth and Rachel Tenner) and the ensemble cast (Richard Kind, Sari Lennick, Jessica McManus, Fred Melamed, Michael Stuhlbarg, and Aaron Wolff). After receiving his statuette, Michael Stuhlbarg got much sympathy when he commented that he would keep his awards at his mother and father's house. A complete list (and coverage) of the Spirit Awards can be found at indieWIRE.

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Tahar Rahim, the star of Jacques Audiar's prison/crime saga A Prophet has been getting lots of attention of late. Not only did he win two Cesars last week (one for best actor and one for most promising actor), he's been popping up in article after article by people who've just discovered him. Chris Lee's recent post "Is A Prophet's Tahar Rahim the next Al Pacino?" on the Los Angeles Times movie blog "24 Frames" discussed where the star came from and more importanly where he is going:

For his next project, The Eagle of the Ninth, directed by The Last King of Scotland helmer Kevin Macdonald, Rahim changed gears to appear opposite Channing Tatum and Jamie Bell. “I’m the baddie,” Rahim said between drags of on a Camel Light, seated in the Beverly Hills back yard of the French consul general. “He’s the prince of an ancient Gallic tribe. I’m talking in ancient Gallic -- it was hard.”

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Among the treasures to be bid on at St. Olaf's recent Black and Gold Winter Gala auction was part of the chalk board used in the Coen brothers' Oscar-nominated A Serious Man. According to the St. Olaf's Press, the gala raised "$109,000 for St. Olaf, including $2,600 for the blackboard" It only made sense since the scene was shot at St. Olaf anyway. And the Coen brothers not only allowed the college do what they wanted with the blackboard, but also wrote a letter of authenticity for the board. 

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On April 29, Focus Features CEO James Schamus is set to be honored for his artistic side when the San Francisco Film Society awards him their Kanbar Award for excellence in screenwriting. According to ScreenDaily, “The Kanbar Award acknowledges “the crucial importance of a script in the production of an exceptional film.” Schamus will take part in an onstage interview on May 1 with critic and cultural theorist B Ruby Rich, followed by the West Coast premiere of the newly completed director’s cut of Ride With The Devil.”The Kanbar award is named after Maurice Kanbar, a longtime member of the San Francisco Film Society board. Rachel Rosen, SFFS director of programming, explains “We’re pleased to be able to honor James Schamus, who appreciates, as does Maurice Kanbar, the essential role that screenwriting plays in the genesis of a great film.” John Waters will present Schamus with the award on April 29 at the Westin St. Francis Hotel as part of the Film Society Awards Night. Well done!

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The current issue of Los Angeles Magazine has a first-person account by Noah Baumbah (as told to Amy Wallace) about the making of Greenberg. The piece, entitled "Los Angles I Love You But You're Bringing Me Down"––which you may recognize as a title of a LCD Soundsystem song, whose songwriter James Murphy not coincidentally wrote Greenberg's score––recounts Baumbach process in making a film about Los Angeles. As Baumabch says in the first line, "I don’t know which came first—wanting to set a movie in L.A. or wanting to do a movie about a fortysomething guy who can’t get out of his own way." In the article, he talks, among other things, about the complexity of picking LA locations that would have emotional resonance but not seem cliche.

Sometimes a location is true to you, but it’s been overshot. I went back and forth on Musso & Frank because I thought, Is it too classic? But because it’s Greenberg’s birthday in that scene, I liked the majesty of Musso’s working in contrast to his anxious mood. And then of course it all ends with him storming out after the waiters sing him “Happy Birthday.” We used all the real waiters there. And real regulars. We tried to do that everywhere. At Musso’s, Lucy’s, the Sake House, we used real people.

 

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On Friday, at 24th annual Teddy Awards at the Berlin International Film Festival, Lisa Cholodenko’s marriage comedy The Kids are All Right took home the feature film Teddy Award. Started in 1987, the Teddy Awards recognized LGBT work shown in all parts of the Berlin Film Festival. The Kids are All Right, which will be released by Focus Features this summer, features Julianne Moore and Annette Bening as a happily settled lesbian couple whose world is turned upside down when their teenage kids seek out and find their sperm-donor dad (Mark Ruffalo).

The Teddy for best documentary went to Pietro Marcello’s poetic La bocca del lupo (The Mouth of the Wolf) that remembers the love affair between a Sicilian ex-con and his transsexual lover named Mary. The Teddy for short went to actor-now-filmmaker James Franco’s The Feast of Stephen, based on the same-titled poem by Anthony Hecht.

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Ebay bidders, start your computers. Focus Features and Variety––The Children’s Charity of Southern California have teamed up to auction off the 1966 Dodge Coronet used in A Serious Man. The auction kicks off on Monday, February 22, 2010 and ends Thursday, March 4, 2010––so bid early and bid often. To get in on the action, go to www.eBay.com/varietyskids. Or if you happen to be in Minnesota, you can stop by the Mall of America where the lovely car will be on display during the auction.

This mean blue machine is the car owned and driven by Larry Gopnik (Michael Stuhlbarg) in the Coen Brothers’ Academy Award-nominated comedy A Serious Man. (A Serious Man is up for Best Picture and Original Screenplay.) Weeks before production started on the film, the Coens and their production team scoured antique car shops to find the perfect car for their lead character, a Jewish physics professor living in the suburbs of Minneapolis in 1967. Then It appeared––a 1966 Dodge Coronet, a midsized car that Chrysler introduced in the ‘50s and then again in the mid-‘60s. To get a sense of the scrutiny the production team went through with vintage autos, click here and then go to “Recreating 1967 - Part 4.”

While there’ll be a final cost on the car, the good karma will be priceless in this auction. “We’re delighted that a serious collector will have the opportunity to buy one of the film’s classic cars and that children in need will benefit from the excitement of the Oscars and the online auction,” Focus Features CEO James Schamus commented. Proceeds will benefit Variety––The Children’s Charity of Southern California, which helps “inspire hope, enrich lives and build a better future for the children in need in Southern California.” This is not the first time that Focus has worked with Variety––The Children’s Charity of Southern California. In previous years, Focus has contributed for auction the iconic shirts worn by the stars (Heath Ledger and Jake Gyllenhaal) of Brokeback Mountain, the famed green dress worn by Keira Knightley in Atonement; and the suit worn by Sean Penn in Milk.

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The International Cinephile Society recently announced their awards for both American and International films of 2009. And A Serious Man was in top form. It won the ICS award for Best Flm, as well as Joel and Ethan Coen taking home Best Director and Best Original Screenplay for, as the ICS explains, “perhaps their most personal and certainly their most brilliant exploration of the relationship between God and Man.” In addition, A Serious Man received commendable runner up notices. Michael Stuhlbarg received a runner up nod for Best Actor (with Colin Firth’s excellent performance in A Single Man edging him out). And Jess Gonchor received a runner-up recognition for his production design work on A Serious Man (with Nelson Lowry’s fantasy world in The Fantastic Mr. Fox winning). While perhaps not as well known as other groups, International Cinephile Society is “an online group made up of 60 accredited journalists, film scholars, historians and other industry professionals who cover film festivals and events on five continents.”

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Noah Baumbach's Greenberg hit the red carpet this weekend, premiering at the Berlin Film Festival on February 14––yes, that would be Valentine's Day. Rhys Ifans, Greta Gerwig, Ben Stiller and Noah Baumbach all took to the Red Carpet and then later showed up for a Press Conference to to talk about the film. Eugene Hernandez of indieWIRE reported on the Greenberg splash, and the comic repartee from the press table:

“Somebody would say you’re a total idiot to hire Ben Stiller and not let him improvise,” Baumbach confessed at the press conference. “You idiot,” shot back Stiller, relating that he once tried to get Baumbach to consider a change in the script, but when it was time to shoot, the screenplay hadn’t been changed. Pulling back, Stiller praised Baumbach for writing so specifically and working so precisely.

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The 37 annual Annie Award were presented by the International Animated Film Society on Saturday February 6 at UCLA's Royce Hall. While the Pixar megahit Up took away Best Picture, Coraline was congratulated with three major awards: Shane Prigmore won for Best Character Design; Bruno Coulais for Best Music in a Feature, and Tadahiro Uesugi took home the award for Production Design in a Feature. Congratulations to all.

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Susan Wloszczyna of USA Today got to profile four upcoming movie stars: Ponijao, Bayarjargal, Mari, and Hattie––the underage stars of upcoming film Babies. The article looks at the lives, famies and locations of the four babies with commentary from both the director and Focus CEO James Schamus. In talking about Ponijao, who is one of the new members of the Himba tribe in Namibia, Schamus quipped: "In the village, a breast is lunch for anyone who gets there first."

USA Today has several other pieces on the subject of Babies. “Parents, movie fans are cooing over 'Babies' documentary” and “The world is 'Babies' filmmaker's playpen”

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Mark Ruffalo, who stars in the recently acquired Focus film The Kids are Alright, directed by Lisa Cholodenko, has had a quite a year. In addition to staring in Kids, Ruffalo made his directorial debut with Sympathy for Delicious (which appeared in Sundance along with The Kids are Alright). Ruffalo speaks with the Hollywood Reporter's Gregg Goldstein about his career, directing, and appearing in Lisa Cholodenko’s comedy. He relates that originally he turned down the part:

THR: Why did you did choose to get involved with The Kids Are All Right?

Ruffalo: That was in July. I read that script and I really liked it but I turned it down -- I thought, I don't know, I don't want to be acting right now -- but it never really left me. It was funny and smart and a nice little break from editing the movie at the time that I shot it -- a quick job. I'm a big fan of Lisa Cholodenko, she's amazing, and Julianne and Annette -- I've always wanted to work with them.

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In the recent post in Los Angeles Times blog “The Big Picture” entitled “Jews in Oscar films: Are they vile throwbacks to Jewish stereotypes?”, Patrick Goldstein takes up the issues that is being hotly debated in the Jewish community––when does humor end and hate-mongering begin. Goldstein highlights a recent article in the Jewish Journal entitled “Realism or Anti-Semitism: Negative Depictions of Jews Raise the Age Old Question" whose author Tom Tugend looks at the cases of The Coen Brothers’ A Serious Man and Lone Scherfig’s An Education. It’s a fascinating debate, but Goldstein brings it back in the end to an obvious observation:

When I went to Hebrew school, I had to listen to long, hazy and often entirely unsatisfying religious discourses by rabbis who were eerily similar to the ones in the film. If you thought the Coens were offering a mean-spirited, self-hating portrayal of Jews, you missed the point of the movie. It's simply a comically barbed look at an insular community that simply happens to be Jewish, because the Coens did what all good writers do -- they wrote what they know.

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Ned Vizzini is the author of the novel It’s Kind of a Funny Story, which is being adapted into a film by Ryan Fleck and Anna Boden for Focus Features. Vizzini has been blogging about the production––and quite a witty blog it is––for FilmInFocus. The Playlist picked up his blog about the film’s rocking final days of production. But don’t believe me, check on Vizzini’s blog yourself.

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Beliefnet, an all-purpose, all-denomination site for all things spiritual, just announced their nominations for their 2010 Beliefnet Film Awards. We thrilled to see that two Focus films got noms, each in different categories. The Coen brothers’ A Serious Man was one of five films nominated in the category of Best Spiritual Film, and Sam Mendes’ Away We Go was picked to compete in the Best Inspirational Film.

As defined by Beliefnet, the category of spiritual Film transcends religion: “The five cinematic gems we selected this year are all overtly religious, yet they each illustrate a spiritual theme that is universal.” The category of Inspirational films, on the other hand, “depict characters embracing adventure, fighting corruption, struggling against adversity, uniting for a common cause, and searching for a place to call home. While they vary in scope and tone, they all offer encouragement that there is something we can do to improve life for ourselves and others.” Good luck to all the films. We believe in you.

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This morning the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences announced the list of major awards and we proud to announce that both Coraline and A Serious Man were given serious notice. A Serious Man was nominated both for Best Picture (Joel and Ethan Coen) and for Best Original Screenplay  (Joel and Ethan Coen) while Coraline was nominated for Best Animated Feature Film ((Henry Selick).  More to follow.

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