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Film and the Arts
George Clooney Has Had A Very Good Year
- Details
- Parent Category: Film and the Arts
- Category: Interviews
- Published on Sunday, 18 December 2011 08:19
- Written by Brad Balfour
Despite the media attention George Timothy Clooney gets for his love life, this dapper male star deserves the spotlight for a lot of the right things -- his acting talents, social concerns, creative work, self-effacing humor, and general good-guy demeanor.
This year he released The Ides of March, a film he directed and stars in that is winning his co-star, Ryan Gosling, award noms. And now that he has starred in award-winning director Alexander Payne's latest, The Descendants, Clooney's revelatory performance is again garnering him numerous award nominations, some of which will undoubtedly result in various wins.
Clooney plays Matt King, scion of an old Hawaiian land-owning family, who re-connects with his two daughters, 17 year old Alexandra (Shailene Woodley) and 10 year old Scotti (newcomer Amara Miller), after his wife Elizabeth ends up in a coma through a boating accident. While coping with this tragedy, he grapples with new and old responsibilities.
Michel Hazanavicius Makes The Artist
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- Parent Category: Film and the Arts
- Category: Interviews
- Published on Friday, 09 December 2011 16:43
- Written by Brad Balfour
In making The Artist a black & white, silent movie, French director Michel Hazanavicius defied expectations. For anyone, this was not only strange concept but it seemed like a retrogressive idea, something of throwback. But this veteran French filmmaker employed a sufficent sense of irony to take the idea beyond preciousness and imbue it with a wit and charm.
Silent movie star George Valentin finds the arrival of talking pictures causes him to fade into oblivion. Though he sparks with Peppy Miller, a young dancer set for a big break, he see a reversal of fortunes as she shifts to stardom while he slips into near-poverty. From 1927 Hollywood, George and his dog stay true to each other but learn to evolve to the changing times and personalities.
Beatles Deconstructed: An Interview with Scott Freiman
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- Parent Category: Film and the Arts
- Category: Interviews
- Published on Friday, 02 December 2011 10:00
- Written by Kevin Filipski
A 
Trip Through Strawberry Fields
IFC Center, 323 Sixth Ave, New York, NY
More than 40 years after the band’s breakup, The Beatles are as popular as ever: CDs keep selling like hotcakes, tribute bands are a cottage industry, and 69-year-old Paul McCartney is still one of the hottest stage acts on the planet, with fans from 4 to 84 at Sir Paul’s shows. There’s also a plethora of books that keeps on coming, from bios to musical analysis.
The latter is also what Scott Freiman does: for the past few years, his Deconstructing the Beatles lectures have been an entertaining showcase of the intense creativity that makes up the Beatles’ music. His multimedia presentations comprise video and audio samples, including snippets of rarely-heard demos and other stripped-down segments of the songs.
Freiman’s already done the White Album and Sgt. Pepper: his next lecture, at the IFC Center in Manhattan on December 5, is A Trip Through Strawberry Fields, a dissection of that classic track along with “Penny Lane” and “A Day in the Life.” For a complete list of his upcoming schedule, visit beatleslectures.com.
Mighty Movie Podcast: Christopher Hampton on A Dangerous Method
- Details
- Parent Category: Film and the Arts
- Category: Interviews
- Published on Tuesday, 22 November 2011 14:40
- Written by Daniel Persons
David Cronenberg is no stranger to exploring how people undo themselves by venturing into the boundaries of human sexuality. In A Dangerous Method, though, he delves into the historical figures who helped set those boundaries, and creates a drama where intellect and science are pitted against human passion and sexual politics.
The story -- as adapted by screenwriter Christopher Hampton from his stage play, The Talking Cure, which in turn was based on John Kerr's book, A Most Dangerous Method: The Story of Jung, Freud, and Sabina Spielrein -- spins off the actual relationship between Carl Jung (Michael Fassbender), one of the founders of modern psychoanalysis, and Spielrein (Keira Knightley), a young woman who starts out as the doctor's patient and eventually becomes his colleague and, as rumor has it, mistress. As Sigmund Freud (Viggo Mortenson) is drawn into their orbits, the film becomes an intelligent and moving tale of people striving for the betterment of humanity, frequently against the pull of their own frailties.
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