FilminFocus.com
Week in Film
Week in Film
Call Me.
24 April 2008
Norma Desmond's famous retort in Sunset Boulevard — "I am big. It's the pictures that got small." — is proving true in ways she could never have imagined. Last week, Spike Lee joined forces with Nokia Phones to make a short film based on videos created through people using their cell phone. There isn't a specific narrative, only a general theme — humanity. Individuals who want to submit work can go the Nokia website and get instructions on how to upload their latest videos for Lee to consider using. Lee told The New York Times, "I'm interested because it's a great collaborative effort… Within five years, new movies will be made with devices like these." But Lee is not alone in wanting to explore this new medium. Last year, Robert Redford's Sundance Institute worked with GSMA (the international organization for mobile phones) to create five films for the Global Short Film Project with directors from Jonathan Dayton & Valerie Faris (Little Miss Sunshine) to experimental director Cory McAbee (The American Astronaut). Although not every director is thrilled. Last January David Lynch produced a short film that popped up on YouTube in which he disparages the very idea of watching a movie on a cellphone (with the iPhone theme music playing in the background).
Finding Silence
23 April 2008
While some claim film immortalizes people, in truth, most silent films made during the first three decades of cinema have been lost. But while they may be missing in America, they may exist elsewhere in the world, like Australia. Federal Arts Minister of Australia Peter Garrett announced that 8 films discovered in their archives will be restored with the United States Film National Film Preservation Foundation through a project entitled Film Connection: Australia-America. "Newsreels, documentaries, trailers and Hollywood promotional films which filled out theatre programs and were widely seen by audiences in the United States and Australia are represented in the project," announced Garrett in a press statement. "The films range from 1912 to 1927 and are important missing links in early film history." Among the films is a trailer for a lost 1921 feature Sin Woman, which is considered to be one of the earliest existing film trailers.
The Way the Cookie Crumbles
23 April 2008
Details emerged last week about veteran actor James Caan's exit from David O. Russell's new film, Nailed, which is currently shooting. The film, a political satire about a woman who gets a nail stuck in her head and goes to Washington D.C. to fight for better healthcare, was to feature the Godfather star as the speaker of the house. Caan's character chokes to death on a cookie and Russell wanted Caan to cough, however the actor said it was not possible to cough while choking. Russell proposed that he would film it both ways, however Caan did not feel sufficiently confident that his more realistic take on the situation would be used and so left the set and quit the film. Russell became an unwitting YouTube star last year when video of his on-set battles with Lily Tomlin on his previous film, I Heart Huckabees was leaked online, and tensions between him and George Clooney on Three Kings have been well-documented. Nailed producer Douglas Wick, however, told Reuters that the cookie contretemps was "part of an ongoing creative conversation between the actor and director" and that Russell had acted professionally throughout.
Verhoeven's Holy Controversy
23 April 2008
Paul Verhoeven, director of Basic Instinct and Showgirls, is no stranger to stirring up a little controversy but his latest project could well be his most contentious yet. The Dutch helmer announced that he is to publish a biography of Jesus, Jesus of Nazareth: A Realistic Portrait, in September through the Amsterdam-based J.M. Meulenhoff publishing house, with an English translation following in 2009. The book, co-authored with Rob Van Scheers (who wrote the biography Paul Verhoeven a few years ago), is based on two decades of research and posits the idea that Jesus' was not born of a virgin birth but that he was conceived after Mary was raped by a Roman soldier during the Jewish uprising in Galilee. This theory, however, has been mocked by Catholic League President Bill Donohue: "He's been working 20 years trying to sell this argument and hasn't come up with anything," Donohue told Fox News. "It's a European version of Hollywood. He should go back to Sharon Stone's legs." Verhoeven was a regular attendee of the late biblical scholar Robert W. Funk's seminars on Jesus, which promoted "biblical literacy" and questions the veracity of Jesus' miracles. Verhoeven, who also claims that Judas did not in fact betray Jesus as is stated in the New Testament, hopes to make a film of his book in the near future.
Sit Down for Your Rights
24 April 2008
Keith Griffiths has written in detail on his guest blog on this site about the restrictive censorship in Thailand, where the highly acclaimed Apichatpong Weerasethakul film Syndromes and a Century (which Griffiths produced) had no less than six scenes cut from it after they were deemed unsuitable for Thai audiences. This week, however, there is another disturbing story about Thai political interference in the moviegoing process. The news broke that a political activist, Chotisak Onsoong, has been arrested after failing to stand for the national anthem which honors Thailand's King Bhumibol Adulyadej prior to a film screening last September. Chotisak, who is being charged with lèse majesté (insulting the monarch), claims that being obliged to stand for the anthem infringes on his freedom of choice. Chotisak was charged at a Thai police station, where supporters held banners reading 'Not standing, different thinking is no crime,' and faces a jail sentence of between three and 15 years. An online petition has been set up to support Chotisak which you can sign here.