The Other State: Film news and etcetera from New Zealand – June 2009

The Short Film

Six Dollar Fifty Man

Huge congratulations to the team (directors Mark Albiston and Louis Sutherland) behind the NZ short film Six Dollar Fifty Man which won a special distinction at Cannes in May. This is only two years after winning the special distinction for the filmmakers previous short Run. Please someone give these guys a real budget – I want to see a feature! link

The Competition

Each year New Zealand’s filmmaking talent is put to the test during the 48 Hours Furious Filmmaking contest. This year’s competition took place over the weekend 8-10 May, with the Grand Final held on the 20^th June. The concept is simple – make the best film possible in only 48 hours. All creative aspects of the film must be created in the 48 hours allotted; even genre and other random elements are provided just before the timer starts to prevent any cheating. Now in its 7^th year, 48 hours has attracted the attention of Wingnut Films (Peter Jackson’s company) who now sponsor it and often enter a team to keep their talent on its toes.

Here is this years winner, Charlotte, from Dunedin based Team Line Men:

Charlotte is the first animated supreme winner. Here is my pick of the past winners. It’s called Jesse McCleod: The Journey from 2004, and has been described as “a friendly tale of family euthanasia”:

You can read more about the competition, and watch all of the previous winners here.

The Woman

This barely makes it as New Zealand news, as it relates to a British film (Bright Star) that premiered in France (at Cannes) starring an Australian (Abbie Cornish) – but it was directed by New Zealander Jane Campion (who lives in Australia). Whew. As with most ex-pat does good products the buzz in NZ was that Bright Star was set to win the Palme D’Or. While the film is receiving rave reviews from some, it also failed to set others worlds alight. One Little White Lies reviewer lists it in the best and worst: “Biggest Disappointment: That Jane Campion’s Bright Star, a turgid, middle-brow exercise in Quality Filmmaking, so successfully hoodwinked the general public.”

Bright Star will open the 2009 Auckland International Film Festival. I may go. I may also skip it and see Brüno which also comes out that day.

The Peter Jackson Empire

Peter Jackson has a lot on his plate – Lovely Bones is still in post-production, his Dambusters remake is still going ahead, and he is producing The Hobbit. This hasn’t stopped him from taking on a new role: leading a ministerial review of the New Zealand Film Commission. Jackson has been a vocal critic of the commission’s funding decisions in years past, this coupled with the brand new CEO might lead to a few positive changes down at the NZFC… {link}

The Film

Taika Waititi’s follow up to Eagle vs. Shark has just wrapped. The Volcano promises to be full of 1980s coming-of-age awkwardness. The buzz? – it’s gonna be ‘mean’. {link}

The Volcano

– Morgan Stewart

Review: Heavens Gate (1980): Minute by Minute

Simon continues his celluloid odyssey through a Micheal Cimino’s maligned gem, Heaven’s Gate.

3 of 229

The final names appear, then pictures! But first it should be noted that Michael Cimino has given himself two credits – written by and directed by. Rather than having his name appear twice, Cimino could have combined the two and formed a “written and directed by” title. Cimino clearly knows nothing of word economy.

But considering this is a man who’s produced a three plus hour film, I don’t know why I should expect any different.

Despite all that, the moving pictures are the focus of this minute. An orange sky, a man running toward a gate and a superimposed caption beginning to fade in. Why is the man running? Did he set fire to a hedge? Did a hedge set fire to his aunt and he’s running to get help? Why are hedges lighting people on fire?

I look forward to answers.

AGE SHALL NOT WITHER THEM – FROM WOODY ALLEN TO ANDRZEJ WAJDA

One of the secrets to longevity in the world of film is to keep working! It might sound obvious, but I came to this realisation as I was exiting Melbourne’s Nova Cinema earlier this week (Monday afternoon to be precise, when tickets before 4pm are the princely sum of just $6), having just seen the charming comedy-drama ‘Sunshine Cleaning’, directed by New Zealander Christine Jeffs.

I was musing to myself about the clever casting of two of today’s brightest young actresses, Amy Adams and Emily Blunt as sisters, and filing away in my trivia drawer the fact that both their previous big screen successes had seen them starring opposite the indomitable Meryl Streep. Adams had received her second Oscar nomination (the first was for ‘Junebug’) earlier this year for her stellar work alongside Streep and Philip Seymour Hoffman in the convent-set ‘Doubt’, and the talented British actress Blunt more than held her own in the frantic fashion world of ‘The Devil Wears Prada’ alongside Streep and Anne Hathaway.

Andrzej Wajda

Anyway, checking what else was playing that day, maybe a double bill was on the cards as ‘Sunshine Cleaning’ comes in at a swift 91 minutes. Unfortunately, I was just too late to be able to easily pop into ‘Katyn’, directed by the exceptional Polish filmmaker Andrzej Wajda. With time on my hands I began to muse on Wajda’s remarkable career in film which began more than fifty years ago in his native Poland.

And thus was the idea born to look at how age is seemingly no barrier in the world of film direction.

Woody Allen

I began by thinking about one of my favourite directors Woody Allen, still making a movie a year at the tender age of 74, and in the process assisting in gaining Oscar glory for Penelope Cruz in this year’s ‘Vicky Cristina Barcelona’. Allen’s recent career renaissance, which began with ‘Match Point’ in 2005, shows no sign of slowing down and I’m excitedly looking forward to his latest ‘Whatever Works’ starring Seinfeld and Curb Your Enthusiasm creator Larry David.

Another legendary workaholic is Clint Eastwood, who constantly amazes me with his work ethic. At 79 years of age he’s still making hugely successful films. In the last year alone we’ve seen him direct himself in Gran Torino which is now his biggest grossing film ever in a (directing) career stretching back to his 1971 debut with the thriller ‘Play Misty For Me’. Eastwood’s second recent film was the period mystery ‘Changeling’ which scored an Oscar nomination for star Angelina Jolie, and he shows no signs of slowing down as he’s currently putting the finishing touches to the post-apartheid ‘Invictus’ with Morgan Freeman as South African president Nelson Mandela.

Just thinking about these guys is wearing me out, so I’m going to have a breather before taking a more in-depth look at the hardest working men and women in Hollywood and beyond, and how some of film’s best-loved directors don’t, and won’t, let age get in the way of their creative genius. Watch this space!

MIKE CHILDS

Film Review: Heaven’s Gate (1980): Minute by minute.

Simon Continues his celluloid odyssey through an Micheal Cimino’s maligned gem, Heaven’s gate.

2 of 229

Well, frankly the second minute of opening credits was not as dynamic or energetic as the first. It’s more of the same, and after a stellar opening minute of names fading in and out, you are left feeling a little disappointed.

It’s an old technique, but the second minute could have benefited from the filmmaker intercutting pictures of zebras and gnus between the credits.

However, it wasn’t all bad. There is a false ending to the credits just before the two-minute mark, proving Cimino still has a few tricks up his sleeve. Additionally, “Joseph Cotton as the Reverend Doctor” is a credit that should feature in all opening credit sequences.

Read Part 1 here

Weekend Reading #7: Ricky Gervais, Piracy top 10, Scientology and Murder

The first picture of Mickey Rourke as Whiplash in Iron Man 2. Looks a bit like Jeff Bridges. Ho Hum.

1. This is fantastically cheeky, and must be infuriating for the major film studios. While flaunting the immense amount of flagrant illegal downloading of their properties, it’s also useful information in terms of a films popularity. Torrentfreak publishes top 10 lists of the most downloaded (pirated) films each week. And the choices by users don’t necessarily mirror the similar box office charts. This weeks top 10 has He’s just not that into you and Friday the 13th beating Wolverine and Terminator Salvation. Romance wins the day?

1	(6)	He’s Just Not That Into You	6.5 / trailer
2	(…)	Friday the 13th	6.1 / trailer
3	(2)	Push	6.4 / trailer
4	(1)	Coraline	8.1 / trailer
5	(…)	The Pink Panther 2	5.0 / trailer
6	(…)	Confessions of a Shopaholic	5.7 / trailer
7	(3)	X-Men Origins: Wolverine (R5)	6.8 / trailer
8	(4)	Fired Up	5.3 / trailer
9	(…)	Terminator Salvation (Cam)	7.2 / trailer
10	(9)	Crank: High Voltage (R5)	7.6 / trailer

Full lists {here}.

2. Ricky Gervais is a busy man, Empire talked to him about his new 3D film

“I’m going to play the lead character, a Puddloflaj called Puddy. It’s great fun to work on and it’s really weird. Flanimals was a little thing I used to do when I was 15 to make my nephew laugh. And now this is happening…The good thing about owning everything is I can give myself the lead role. The Puddloflaj is a fat useless blob. He’s a sweaty, purple-faced, cowardly wobbler. And he’s got a Reading accent. Brilliant! And it’ll be 3-D. Posh! $80 million was the last count. Crazy, isn’t it?” {link}

3. Their is no signature style in the way murder is filmed these days according to David Thompson:

Are we weary of the great authors who signalled themselves with point of view? Has the era of personal passion gone out of film-making? Or are there yet other reasons? Fifty years ago, there were great critical battles fought over “authorship” in film. So style mattered then. Is it possible now that the innate impersonality of film (a mechanical means of reproduction) has become dominant? Think of it this way: a paragraph of Hemingway, Dickens, Dostoevsky, Joyce, Nabokov or Faulkner could likely be identified by any well-read person. So why are so many films nowadays so anonymous? Is that something film-makers have settled for, or is it our wish? {link}

4. Scientology and South Park, but mostly scientology (This isn’t entirely film related, i just like hearing about the insidious ways of this dubious fellowship):

Last year, Church of Scientology operatives received an alarming tip: During the upcoming 2000 MTV Movie Awards scheduled for June 8, a short South Park film parodying Battlefield Earth would feature the character Cartman wiping his ass with a copy of L. Ron Hubbard’s sacred text, Dianetics. The tip was erroneous. Cartman would actually be wiping his ass with a Scientology personality test.

But agents of the church’s shadowy Office of Special Affairs didn’t know that. They only knew they had a public relations nightmare on their hands.

Battlefield Earth had already turned out to be a colossal embarrassment for the church. Its star, celebrity Scientologist John Travolta, had denied there was any connection between the movie, which was based on a 1980 science fiction novel by Hubbard, and the controversial religion, which was based on Dianetics, Hubbard’s 1950 self-help book. Despite Travolta’s denials, however, ordinary Scientologists had anxiously awaited the film, hoping it would improve the image of their founder and his faith. Instead, it was panned as the worst film of 2000 and one of the worst science-fiction films of all time. The New York Times suggested that although it was a bit early to be making such judgments, Battlefield Earth could turn out to be the worst movie of the new century. {link}

5. Business of Cinema is news site from india which covers both Bolly and Holly. It’s an interesting time over there as Hollywood tries to crack the active and increasingly affluent, western looking market.  Well written and researched, with plenty of scoops. Check it out {here}.

6. Great article from David Cox in The Guardian on how to make Science fiction popular again, and why the recent Terminator Salvation failed so badly at the box office:

On the face of it, the hostility that Terminator Salvation has evoked seems a bit unfair. Its action outclasses that of better-received films, its devastated landscapes are striking and its plot is relatively cogent and comprehensible. Nonetheless, it clearly fails to excite. Something important is missing.

The film takes its franchise’s war between men and machines to a new level by infiltrating the people’s resistance forces with a human/cyborg hybrid. Unfortunately, the spectre thus paraded isn’t remotely scary. After all, these days, few of us are racked by fear that machines will try to kill us. {link}

7. Remember that brilliant show, Front up, where Urban Cinefile creator Andrew Urban would go up to random people and ask them to tell him about their lives? Junkies, business men, virgins and housewifes who were possibly all three would feature on the show, and Urban would slowly illicity confessional gold from them. Well he has done a bunch of brilliant interviews for the Australian Film Television and Radio School as part of a project called “The knowledge”. It feaures producers, writers, actors, distributors, media executives, composers, and publicists who all work in our local, reliably unprofitable cinema industry. Good on ’em. Listen to their wise words {here}

8. Sweden has abolished its censorship board. Oh and they have maximum age restriction of 15 (no R18+) Lets party. {link}

Film Review: Angels and Demons (2009)

It was an afternoon session of Angels and Demons that drew me in. I decided to go during the day as the cinemas are generally cleaner and I find there are fewer bees.

As the previews rolled, I was practically alone in the cinema. There was one gentleman, nine or so rows away in J17, who had brought in his own cactus and of course there were the millions of symbiotic microbes on and in my body that usually accompany me on trips to the cinema.

As the lights went down another patron entered the cinema. When there are only two or three people in attendance at a session, seat numbers are fairly pointless. I was sitting in my assigned seat, but was first in and had no way of knowing whether the cinema would fill up. Of the 200 plus seats this man could have sat in, he sat directly next to me.

He was a peculiar person; dressed in a full brown hooded robe and ate popcorn from an old hat. The hood completely shrouded his face in shadow and his hands were covered by the cloak’s wide baggy sleeves. I had specifically asked the human at the ticket counter not to be seated next to any druids or wizards, so I figured he must be a die hard fan.

As the opening credit sequence wound up, the cloaked man put his hand on my leg and whispered in my ear.

“Come with me if you want to live,” he said.

“Who are you?” I uneasily inquired.

“I am Roger.”

“Pleased to meet you. Do you think you could take your hand off my leg?”

“Oh, yes. Sorry,” said Roger apologetically.

“That’s alright,” I lied.

“Time is pressing,” Roger blurted out. “You must follow me.”

I figured this loon must have been just a little too heavily into Dan Brown, but I asked Roger why I should follow him. He huskily told me that we were both in grave danger. Apparently, word had reached the Vatican that I was watching Angels and Demons (2009).

Naturally, I queried why the Vatican would care, but Roger insisted that was not important right now.

“Listen, Roger.” I began. “I’m not going anywhere, I’ve come to watch a film and –“

Before I could finish my sentence the man in J17 stood, turned and fired 36,000 rounds from a Vatican issue Tommy Gun. Roger and I ducked. Thankfully the accumulated filth on the seats deflected most of the bullets. Roger leapt up and threw three ninja stars, a ceremonial dagger and a can opener at the would-be assassin. The can opener struck him square in the shoulder. He tumbled back over the seat directly behind him and was knocked out cold.

Before I could digest what had just happened, the cactus sprung from its pot and fired its spines directly at me. Roger threw his baggy sleeve in front of my cowering frame, blocking all of the spikes. He shook them from his cloak and flew toward the cactus. Roger and the cactus wrestled and duelled. The cactus knocked Roger right into the screen and he fell to the ground. The cactus tried to body slam Roger, but the cloaked warrior managed to roll out of the way at the last moment and leap on the cactus as it hit the floor.

“Run!” cried Roger. “Save yourself!”

As Roger laid several blows into the cactus, (most cushioned by his oversized sleeves), I fled the cinema. As I ran past the ticket counter, the human from whom I’d bought the ticket said apologetically, “Oh, hey, did you say you wanted to sit next to a wizard, or didn’t?” I ignored the question and escaped onto the street.

Huffing and puffing, I staggered into a bookstore figuring that if I couldn’t see the movie, I might as well attempt to read the book. I found a copy of Angels and Demons and opened it. A cloud of poisonous gas erupted from the novel, engulfing my face and I collapsed onto the bargain table.

I came to around ten minutes later thanks to the smelling salts the Borders staff keep handy at all times. The encircled staff members were happy to see I’d regained consciousness and for some bizarre reason applauded.

Fed-up and resigned to the fact I was never going to see or read Angels and Demons I asked the Borders employees if anyone had seen the movie. In unison, they replied, “Yes.”

“Was it good?” I asked dejectedly.

They all nodded and said, “Yeah, it was good.”

So there we have it – if the Vatican doesn’t thwart your every attempt, you should see Angels and Demons. If you don’t like it, blame Borders.

Film Review: My Year Without Sex (2009)

What’s all this about My Year Without Sex? Is that a new comedy starring Cameron Diaz and Matthew McConaughey? I was relieved to discover that this is a new Australian film and a possible contender for the best one of 2009 (not that there’s much competition, sadly).

Writer/Director Sarah Watt (Look Both Ways (2005)) has created a realistic portrayal of family life that shows a warmth and humour we have not seen in Australian film for a long time.

Couple Natalie (Sacha Horler) and Ross (Matt Day) and their two children’s lives are interrupted when Natalie suffers a brain aneurism. Their tribulations and the ways in which they cope are at times difficult but this is in no way a dysfunctional family. Instead the film is concerned with the poetry and drama of everyday life as it is impacted by crisis.

Watts cleverly transforms ordinary details into finely-nuanced observations of character. There are some glorious, superbly acted moments in this film that capture the absurdity of suburban rituals and the beauty in small moments. Although the film has a distinctively suburban setting, it differs from many Australian films in that it is not obsessed with the way characters come up against society due to reasons of ethnicity and class.

My Year Without Sex deals with big questions but I would say it is a poignant rather than a profound film. Natalie’s search for meaning leads her to the church but ultimately affirms the value we play in each others’ lives.

This is a delightful love story about hope, endurance and the importance of family. Once again life in the suburbs makes compelling story material even when it does have a happy ending.

—> Interview with actor Sacha Horler {Here}

—> Interview with Matt Day and director Sarah Watt {Here}

Weekend Review #6: Commies, Zombies, and Steve Mcqueen

Ah those Russians

“A movie made by a homeless Russian man who admits he hasn’t washed for 19 years has been admitted to the Cannes Festival first selection tour. Leonid Konovalov’s movie is called “I + People = ?” and is characterized by its creator as an “erotic and philosophical film. The homeless man’s film was sent to Cannes by Konovalov’s daughter, who the paper says lives abroad with her husband. The Festival responded with a letter saying that the film is up for selection, and inviting him to visit the participants’ press conference.” mmm erotic AND philosophical {Link} 

Colour blind Communists

Anti-colourisation movement gaining steam “Russian Communists have created a movement against colorization of old black and white films, saying the colorization is inexcusable ridicule of the Soviet legacy.” {link}

The other Steve Mcqueen

Steve Mcqueen (dir: hunger) has a new work in the venice biennale. “Adrian Searle takes a first look at Steve McQueen’s new film, Giardini, at the Venice Biennale and is stunned by its ethereal melancholy” If you can bare listening to Searle talking about the film, breathing heavily and sounding like a privileged, indulgent wanker t click here {link} or for the AFR review of Hunger click {here}

Phrase of the week: Arthouse Stud Monkey

 

Looking for nits

From Catherine Shoards article in the guardian:

“A new species was sighted at the Cannes film festival this year. At first, everyone was foxed: who was this lovely creature scampering up the Croisette? What was its genealogy? On the final weekend, critic Leslie Felperin of Variety nailed it: what we had witnessed, she wrote, was the arrival of the “arthouse stud monkey”. Male leads who were well-groomed, sensitive, cultured and endlessly selfless in bed starred in three of the 20 films in competition. Was it any coincidence that they also happened to be the only three films directed by women?…” {read more}

ZOMBIES!

Why does the public love zombie films so much at the moment, where is cultural resonance stemming from? Let us ponder this with Anne Billson who writes a feature piece in in the guardian this week.

“This fascination with zombies may seem perplexing to the uninitiated. If vampires are the aristocrats in the world of the walking dead, zombies are the lumpen proletariat…At their most basic level, zombies represent anarchy, threatening to upset the established order. Whereas a decade or so ago this might have seemed undesirable, now we’re not so sure, because the established order hasn’t been doing us any favours lately…

Take a look at the footage of the G20 demos in London, which shows crowds of people herded, clubbed and beaten back by heavily armoured police. The establishment is treating people like the zombies in Romero’s films – as a faceless mass, less than human, a tide of contagion to be stemmed at all cost. They are no longer just reminders of our mortality. They are us. We are all zombies now.” {link}

This one’s for you Tim:

 

Film Review: Heaven’s Gate (1980): Death by 229 cuts.

After the stunning success of the Deer Hunter, Michael Cimino’s next film was a catastrophe. Heaven’s Gate ran over budget, over time and was plagued by negative press, culminating in the eventual collapse of United Artists and forged Cimino’s reputation as an overbearing and out of control director.

The first cut Cimino handed in of Heaven’s Gate was well over five hours long. So he must have perceived the picture to be some sort of masterpiece. As Cimino believed the film was worthy of spending the modern equivalent of $120 million and bankrupting United Artists, I will review Heaven’s Gate with all the respect and reverence Cimino would have wanted.

I’m going to review each individual minute of Heaven’s Gate, so I can fully understand and convey the artistry that must have gone into this enormous film. The DVD running time of Heaven’s Gate is 229 minutes, (just under four hours). So I have my work cut out for me, but it’s still going to be easier than my original plan of reviewing it frame by frame.

So here it is – Michael Cimino’s Heaven’s Gate, minute by minute.

1 of 229

The opening credits (so far) are beautiful in their simplicity. Cimino has opted for classic and dramatic white letters on a black background. The font is reasonable and the director has resisted the temptation to use Sanskrit or the Cyrillic alphabet, (though the latter would have been acceptable for a Russian release). You are immediately filled with anticipation. Will Christopher Walken feature in scenes that make creative use of a tarp? Will John Hurt balance atop something cylindrical? One can only guess. But as soon as Kris Kristofferson’s name appears and is spelled accurately, you know you’re in good hands.

Event: Fan Boys Q & A: 5th of June

While we didn’t give this film the most favourable review here at AFR, this recent press release from ACMI caught our attention.

Attention Fanboys and Fangirls:

The first 20 individuals to come in Star Wars costume to the 9.00pm session on opening night, Friday 5 June, will get free admission for themselves into that session. 

The first 5 individuals to come in Star Wars costume to the 7.15pm session on opening night, Friday 5 June, will receive a limited edition Fanboys poster.

Opening night will also feature some of your favourite Star Wars characters ready to pose for photos with you. Arrive 30 minutes before the 7.15pm or 9pm sessions on Friday 5 June to have your photo taken with Darth Vader or a Storm Trooper, courtesy of Melbourne’s The 501^st Collective. BYO camera

Sounds fun Non?