By Craig Kennedy - February 9th, 2010; 12:38 pm
Production rumors and announcements are the bread and butter of many movie websites, but after awhile you start to realize that none of it really means anything until cameras are rolling. Still, there are a handful of filmmakers I like to keep tabs on and Martin Scorsese and Steven Soderbergh are two of them.
The Playlist (which has a source wedged up Soderbergh’s ass who has been feeding them this or that scrap of info about Knockout) reported yesterday afternoon that Soderbergh was bumping work on Liberace into 2011 so he could instead get going on Contagion written by Scott Z. Burns (The Informant!) with plans for Kate Winslet, Matt Damon, Marion Cotillard and Jude Law to star. Burns and Soderbergh hatched the idea for Contagion while working on The Informant! and Burns described it in 2009 as “Traffic meets Outbreak.”
According to The Playlist’s source, Contagion is getting preference over Liberace because there are a couple of other similar projects in the works and the filmmakers would like to beat everyone to the punch. The trades and other sources picked up on the story later on yesterday so it appears to be truthy… for now.
No word on the status of Soderbergh’s Cleopatra/Guided by Voices musical.
Meanwhile, the internets were oddly shocked back in January that Martin Scorsese was back on the adaptation of Brian Selznick’s kid-lit fav The Invention of Hugo Cabret, a film he’d been attached to in 2007 only to eventually drop out. That’s still true and it’s currently his next project officially. Meanwhile, speaking to the French press for Shutter Island (again via Playlist), Scorsese says his long gestating 17th century Jesuit priest in Japan story Silence is “hopefully” ready to go and then maybe The Irishman, his Robert De Niro mobster flick based on the book I Heard You Paint Houses adapted by Steve Zaillian.
Again, I’ll be a believer when cameras are rolling on any of these projects, but for now it’s interesting to note that rumors of Soderbergh’s pending retirement were apparently premature and that Scorsese’s Sinatra bio that had everyone all excited last spring is still a long way off.
Got all that straight? Good because it’ll probably change in a week.
Filed under: Pre-Production, Rumors
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By Craig Kennedy - February 9th, 2010; 8:39 am
The Muriel for the Best Female Performance of the Decade goes to: Naomi Watts – Mulholland Dr.
How could it not?
Filed under: Awards
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By Craig Kennedy - February 8th, 2010; 10:55 am
The voting wasn’t even close. Daniel Day-Lewis by a milkshake landslide.
Filed under: Awards
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By Craig Kennedy - February 7th, 2010; 6:19 pm
The first Muriel Award was handed out today (for best film of the decade: David Lynch’s Mulholland Drive) along with the sad news that Muriel’s cage mate Charlotte passed away during the night. RIP Charlotte. This year’s awards are dedicated to you.
Filed under: Awards
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By Craig Kennedy - February 7th, 2010; 6:09 pm
I tentatively ventured out to the multiplex this weekend for the first time in a few weeks. I had big plans to catch a number of movies, but the scheduling monkey blew it and I could only swing From Paris With Love. All I wanted was an unassuming and uncomplicated bit of action with a fun, scenery chewing performance from John Travolta, but I had the same expectations with Tony Scott’s awful remake of The Taking of Pelham 1 2 3 last summer and they were hopelessly dashed. Luckily, Pierre Morel and Luc Besson came through. Paris isn’t ground breaking action, but it’s a solid 95 minutes that doesn’t try too hard to cover up its B picture roots.
Continued »
Filed under: Watercooler
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By Craig Kennedy - February 7th, 2010; 11:39 am
It’s funny that last year the International Animated Film Society snubbed one of the best Pixar films, WALL-E, in favor of the entertaining but middle-of-the-road Kung Fu Panda while this year they overlooked the superior Coraline and Fantastic Mr. Fox for Pixar’s second-string Up.
Up was fine, but if you take away the first 10 minutes (on its own a worthy animated short candidate), you have a very ordinary cartoon.
Up also won Best Director for Pete Docter. Meanwhile, Henry Selick’s Coraline and Disney’s The Princess and the Frog took three individual awards each: music, character design and production design for Coraline and voice acting, animated effects and character animation for Princess.
Wes Anderson’s Fantastic Mr. Fox took a well-deserved writing award.
Check out all the winners including television at the Annie Awards website.
Also last night, Up in the Air beat Crazy Heart, An Education, District 9 and Precious for the USC Libraries Scripter Award given to the best screenplay adaptation and its original source.
Source: THR and THR
Filed under: Awards
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By Craig Kennedy - February 6th, 2010; 8:16 am
The 4th Annual Muriel Awards: February 7 – 28, 2010
Filed under: Awards
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By Craig Kennedy - February 5th, 2010; 6:30 pm
New DVDs coming Tuesday, February 9
(Next Week: Hunger and Revanche on Criterion plus Audrey Tautou in Coco Before Chanel and Jamie Foxx and Gerard Butler in Law Abiding Citizen.)
(recommended movies underlined. All ratings out of 5 stars)
A Serious Man (**** 1/2). Joel and Ethan Coen return to their roots (a Jewish family living in a Minnesota suburb in the 1960s) for this jet black comedy about a professor and family man plunged into a theological crisis when his ordinary world inexplicably begins to crumble around him. The dialogue is as sharp, deliberate and as clearly rendered as any Coen film, though it’s more naturalistic and less exaggerated. As put-upon professor Larry Gopnik, Michael Stuhlbarg takes the Coen verbal stylization and makes it feel real. With line readings that are unforced, natural and full of pathos, he might be one of the most unambiguously sympathetic Coen characters to come along outside of Carla Jean Moss. And then there’s that unsettling ending… well you’ll just have to see it for yourself.
(Opened: 10/2/09) Trailer / Review
Buy: DVD Blu-ray
Rent
Continued »
Filed under: DVD
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By Craig Kennedy - February 5th, 2010; 3:05 pm
A friend of mine, the multi-talented Hilliard Guess, will be showing his new short film Troublesome in Hollywood on February 17, 2010.
Hilliard wrote, produced and directed the film which tells the story of a hip-hop superstar (Kareem Grimes) trapped on a subway car with his celebrity therapist (Dynasty’s Gordon Thomson). As the oxygen level drops, tensions increase…
Click here for location and RSVP details and click here to watch the trailer and get more info about the film.
Filed under: Screenings, Shorts
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By Craig Kennedy - February 5th, 2010; 12:24 pm
