"Highly Questionable Content": The Sarah Stillion Story
If you care about kids and what they're learning in school,
and if you care about great art,
then let me warn you,
when you read what my friend Martin posted on his blog about something that happened to his wife Sarah, well, you might just lose all restraint and start spouting inappropriate language at the computer.
Special screening of "Expiration Date" in Seattle!
Here's an opportunity Seattle film buffs shouldn't miss:
Union Church presents this chance to see Rick Stevenson's wonderful new film "Expiration Date" before it hits theatres nationally this summer.
A highly original romantic fable laced with black comedy (rated PG), Expiration Date has won numerous awards at film festivals (including the Spiritual Cinema Festival-at-Sea) and just screened to acclaim at the Seattle International Film Festival. It is one of those rare films that make you feel good about being human.
Stevenson will be there to talk about the film and shooting in Seattle, and there will be other special appearances as well.
Join us at University Presbyterian Church's Geneva Hall on Friday June 16th at 7:30 p.m. Part of the proceeds go to help in the launch of Union Church.
Tickets are $10 at the door. ($5 for youth/seniors)
Questions? Email Jennie at jennies@upc.org.
For more about the film visit: http://www.expirationdatethemovie.com/
Grammatical Error on New "Apocalypto" Poster
The new Apocalypto poster boasts this slogan: No one can outrun their destiny.
To which Steven Greydanus responds,
Shouldn't that be "No one can outrun HIS destiny"?
Other grammatical alternatives:
"No one can outrun destiny."
"You can't outrun your destiny."
"People can't outrun their destiny."
"Outrunning destiny? Fuggetabbatit."
Specials: "Apocalypto" Poster. "Pan's Labyrinth" rave, and more.
With all of the hubbub over a certain controversial film in recent months,
I'd almost forgotten about this...
Nice poster. Dumb slogan.
NO PANS FOR PAN
Salon's Andrew O'Heihr returns from Cannes and raves and raves about Guillermo Del Toro's new fantasy film Pan's Labyrinth.
"Hands down the most exciting and original film I've seen here, and the one that had me in tears during its final scenes."
He also liked A Scanner Darkly.
On one hand, "Scanner Darkly" is a paranoid futuristic thriller, but on the other it's a pitch-perfect portrait of life in deadbeat slackerdom and Linklater's funniest, loosest movie in years.
And this is very interesting to me... a new film from the director of Lantana, which has become one of my favorites...
"Jindabyne" -- Ray Lawrence, the Australian director whose last film was the 2001 international hit "Lantana," was back at Cannes (after 21 years) with this tale of four Aussie locals on a fishing trip who find a dead body. As with a similar discovery in "Lantana," this event sets in motion an unexpected chain of circumstances. The setting here is rural rather than urban, and one could argue that Lawrence has restaged the basic subject matter of his earlier film in new surroundings. Still, it's a powerful, compelling blend of thriller and character drama that should have long legs and a broad reach.
Specials: New Yorke in June? Irons and Malkovich. The future of X-men.
I'D LIKE NEW YORKE IN JUNE (but it's coming to stores in July)
The new Thom Yorke solo album The Eraser is coming, and today I heard a few tracks from it. I enjoyed them. They sounded like songs from Amnesiac, with fewer guitars. The twitchy electronic loops and beats are there, and familiar power-chords, along with Yorke's typically spooky vocals and lyrics. But I can't say it struck me as anything more than half-decent Radiohead b-sides. Maybe if I hear the whole album, it'll make more sense to me why Yorke went and did this.
BESTSELLING BOOK TO BECOME, WHAT? A MOVIE?
What would it look like if John Malkovich and Jeremy Irons decided to be in a fantasy epic? Something like this.
PRODUCER RALPH WINTER ON X-SEQUELS
Will there be more X-Men films? Yes and no, according to producer Ralph Winter. Yes, there will be films about these characters, but no, not as "X-Men movies." Looks like Wolverine will get his own movie, and perhaps Magneto as well.
I love these characters, and I do hope we see them again. I wish I had liked X-Men: The Last Stand. I visited the set several months ago, and sat right next to Brett Ratner. We watched as Magneto lifted Wolverine off the ground and threw him into some trees. Cool stuff. It's amazing how much work is involved in three seconds of footage. There were about a hundred people running around that set.
But alas, so many cool stunts and effects, such thin storytelling. Last Stand needed a stronger script that explored the characters' development in-depth, the way the first two films did. They were some of the most thoughtful comic book films yet made. This one looked great, and the cast were as engaging as always, but it wasn't very thoughtful storytelling. Joss Whedon's comics did a better job with the material. You can't develop complex characters and then just dump them from the franchise in forgettable death-or-departure scenes, unless you want fans to go away very disappointed.
X-Men 3: First-impressions
I gave in to the temptation tonight, took a break from writing, and decided to rest my weary head with two hours of good big screen adventure... X-Men the Last Stand.
Instead, I sat there and watched Ratner and Simon Kinberg and Zak Penn spoil the efforts of so many talented individuals, effectively spoiling the best adventure franchise running. I should have gone to M:I3 or Over the Hedge instead.
The film basically serves as a giant compliment to director Brian Singer's abilities, by showing what happens when he's not on board. Oh, Brian, if only you could have put Superman Returns on hold...
This matters to me because the X-franchise was an unusually good franchise. Both of the previous X-Men films surpassed my expectations. I had no history with the comics, but the films very quickly made me believe in the characters and care about them. And recently, I've become a fan of Joss Whedon's "Astonishing X-Men" series, which features his signature style of smart writing.
And then this one comes along and just starts spoiling the storylines of characters that the first two films worked so hard to build. There are scenes that change the makeup of the X-Men team dramatically, scenes that should be full of emotion and drama, that end up being little more than effects spectacles.
I was worried that Bret Ratner was the wrong guy for the job, and thus I wasn't surprised to find that his direction lacked inspiration. Some of the critics are praising Ratner's work, but there wasn't a single scene in this film that drew me in. Everything was far too rushed.
But the script... for crying out loud.
- Too many characters.
- One-liners that provoke groans rather than laughter.
- Characters who lose most of the humanity and dimension they had in the first two.
- Villains who, from the moment they appear onscreen, have ceased to be the slightest bit scary. (Ian McKellen didn't have an ounce of menace in this one. He just looked silly. It's all in how you film him.)
- And the war scenes are just noise and violence for the sake of spectacle.
I could start picking away at the things that don't make sense about the story, but why start?
This is the worst franchise collapse I've experienced since Alien 3. I enjoyed it more than Star Trek V (the one where God ends up chasing Kirk around a planet) and it's much better than Catwoman. (I never saw the Superman sequels, but I've heard that one fell pretty hard and fast too.)
It's really too bad. It's a rare thrill when somebody like Brian Singer or Joss Whedon can take a world as imaginative as the X-Men world and make it compelling, funny, scary, and full of characters with interesting storylines. And it's sad when someone comes along and lets all of the air out of the balloon.
Makes me wonder if I should stop hoping for the return of the Firefly/Serenity series. At least it came to a close without any disappontments. If the studio decided to bring it back with the wrong people at writing the script, as Universal did here, that would be far worse than abandoning the property and leaving us with the successes we've already enjoyed.
Worried about Wolverine: Is X3 any good?
I won't have time to return to moviegoing for another week or two, due to deadlines, but I'm sure looking forward to getting back into a theater.
But alas, it sounds like the summer blockbusters are a disappointing lot. I'd been looking forward to X-Men: The Last Stand, but I feared it would end up being a case of effects over story, action over character development. According to these reviews, it sounds like my fears have been realized.
Of course, I should be going to the amazing lineup at the Seattle International Film Festival. New stuff from Gondry, Ozon, Hou... but to tell you the truth, as anxious as I am to see these, the last few years have made me weary of those long, annoying lines and the overpriced tickets. The last few times I've attended the fest, I've regretted it, and wished I'd waited for the DVD.
Anybody here seen X3 yet? Were you impressed? Disappointed?
Gore-y
My friend Evi Sztajno, a student at SPU who has begun writing for the student newspaper, just published an interview with Al Gore concerning his documentary An Inconvenient Truth.
Congratulations, Evi! Nice work!
What a guy.
The Independent has fine profile on Bono.
There was another element to Bono's success in the Bush White House. Since they were teenagers he and Edge and Larry, U2's drummer, have been committed Christians, though they long ago abandoned membership of the hothouse Shalom church to which they belonged in the early days. "He doesn't lay it on you or try to convert you," says Geldof, "but it's at the core of his activism. On rare occasions he talks unashamedly and openly about it. It's what gets him up in the morning."