The Screengrab : frank langella

DVD Digest for April 21, 2009

Paul Clark — Tue, 21 Apr 2009 14:00:00 GMT

As the summer movie season approaches, the studios unleash their first wave of DVDs that tie in with the upcoming blockbusters. However, this week also sees the release of one of the most intriguing DVDs so far this year.

Heading this week’s slate of recent releases is Darren Aronofsky’s working-class sports saga The Wrestler (Fox, also Blu-Ray), featuring the towering performance of Oscar-nominated comeback kid Mickey Rourke, as well as the Best Picture nominee Frost/Nixon (Universal, also Blu-Ray), with its televised tête-à-tête between Michael Sheen’s celebrity reporter and Frank Langella’s Tricky Dick. Also this week: the Biggie Smalls biopic Notorious (Fox, also Blu-Ray), and the acclaimed documentary A Jihad for Love (First Run).

As far as I can see there’s only one major classics release this week, but it’s a doozy- Criterion’s Science Is Fiction: 23 Films by Jean Painlevé. Featuring nearly two dozen works from the famed French scientist/filmmaker, this box set also features an original score by Yo La Tengo that accompanies eight of the films, as well as extensive interview footage with Painlevé from the French TV series Jean Painlevé Through His Films. Much has been made in the past of Criterion’s ongoing efforts to release the canonical classics of world cinema in worthy DVD editions, but no less noble is their commitment to honoring more esoteric fare like this, which might not otherwise have gotten released on DVD. I only hope that enough people will pick up this DVD that Criterion will be encouraged to release more like it in the future.

In TV on DVD news, this week sees the release of Caprica (Universal), the prequel to the acclaimed Sci-Fi Network series Battlestar Galactica, and the pilot episode for an upcoming series of the same name.

This week’s most in-demand Blu-Ray only release is the X-Men Trilogy (Fox), which is hitting shelves in advance of the big-screen spinoff entry X-Men Origins: Wolverine. Each of the films is also available separately, if you’d prefer. A comic book movie of a somewhat different stripe is also arriving on Blu-Ray today- Frank Miller and Robert Rodriguez’s Sin City (Disney), which includes both theatrical and “extended” versions, along with plenty of special features. Other Blu-Ray only releases include Charlie Sheen in The Arrival (Lionsgate), and, just in time for Earth Day, the nature doc Arctic Tale (Disney).

Finally, our Synopsis of the Week- a feature which, by rights, ought to be re-titled Anime Synopsis of the Week- is actually a twofer this week, coming as it does from the ADV Films two-pack of Puni Puni Poemi and Kekko Kamen. Here’s the synopsis:

”Aliens annihilate Poemi Watanabe's parents in PUNI PUNI POEMI, so she goes on a revenge program that includes S&M, humongous robots, and the mysterious properties of dead fish. Poemi becomes a superhero in the process, but all she wanted was to be a professional voice actress!”

OK, I guess I get the ways S&M and humongous robots must be related to a plot like this, but the whole “dead fish” plot point sounds so bizarre that it’s one of those things that can only seems to turn up in Japanese animation. Also, I sure do hope that Poemi becomes the superhero voice actress she’s always dreamed of being! Moving on:

”In KEKKO KAMEN, a busty supervixen puts up a losing battle against stripping down to her bare essentials as a parade of creeps-- ranging from a principal to a camera-wielding samurai-- successfully remove her wardrobe.”

Compared to its companion in the DVD set, it doesn’t sound like this one has much of a plot. In fact, if not for the synopsis revealing that the creeps “successfully remove” the heroine’s wardrobe, there would be almost no story to speak of. I do, however, like that the protagonist is a “busty supervixen”, since as any Russ Meyer fan can tell you, that’s the best kind of supervixen.

Better Late Than Never: Phil Nugent's Oscar Predictions

Phil Nugent — Fri, 20 Feb 2009 16:00:00 GMT

Here at the Screengrab, we happily embrace our responsibility, as movie bloggers, to approach the massive, steaming mountain of Oscar speculation coverage and, having considered it, to grab a shovel and do our part. I personally missed the recent group "Oscar predictions" feature, because I hadn't had the chance to see most of the movies nominated for the major awards. Now that time has passed, I still haven't seen them, but a wino who hangs out by the mall near Columbus Circle briefed me on what he'd heard people saying about them as they were filing out of the Loew's multiplex across from Lincoln Center and running their mouths while he was trying to sleep, and now I think I'm all up to speed. Let's do this thing.

BEST PICTURE: Last year, just as our country was collapsing into economic meltdown and post-imperial despair, one movie stood out for its ability to bring a smile to faces whose owners thought that they would never smile again, to fill the air with the laughter of children, to defy the iron laws of miserable reality and nature itself. That film was, of course, Beverly Hills Chihuahua. It's a lead pipe cinch to win Best Picture this year--or would be, if it were nominated. It isn't, due to a terrible blunder. Because most of the rich and powerful industry figures who select the nominees have very busy schedules, what with all the time they spend entertaining the troops overseas and home schooling their children, they entrust the actual selection process to their servants, asking them to fill out and submit their ballots for them. This year, most of them naturally advised the help to vote for the movie about the rich dogs who visit the slums, and something got lost in the translation, much to the benefit of Danny Boyle's movie, which is apparently about some folks in India. Once the voters recognize this slip-up, Slumdog's chances are sure to plummet.

The Weinstein Company has put a lot of muscle behind The Reader, but the film, which turns on the act of reading, and even announces as much in its title, will not be forgiven by the representatives of the movie business for so brazenly calling attention to, and perhaps seeming to encourage, an alternative method of entertainment. If the company wanted to antagonize the entire industry, why didn't they just make a movie called The Video Pirate Who Cost That Poor Studio Janitor in the Short Film You Just Saw His Daughter's College Fund? One film that might stand to profit from these movies' obvious missteps is Frost Nixon, Ron Howard's fact-based follow-up to Quentin Tarantino's Kill Bill. (The movie stars Michael Sheen, the most talented and British of the countless actor sons, some legitimate and officialy recognized, some not, of Apocalypse Now star Martin Sheen, as Skid Roper, an itinerant washboard musician who wreaks bloody revenge on his former parter, Mojo Nixon, after Nixon dissolves their partnership and abandons him for solo stardom just as poor Skid was beginning to enjoy the earthly pleasures known only to novelty artists making it big on the collegr radio circuit.) But I predict that the Best Picture award will go the The Dark Knight. Since it's not nominated, its win would constitute a shocking and unexpected twist at the end of the evening, and that's just how Batman rolls!

BEST ACTOR: Everyone agrees that this will be a pitched battle between the two leading candidates: Frank Langella, who plays Mojo Nixon in Frost Nixon, and Brad Pitt for his performance as an eighty-year-old baby in the twenty minutes of The Curious Case of Benjamin Button that some people saw before they fell asleep or went out for a smoke and forgot to return to the theater. In both cases, it will very likely come down to the two bravura musical numbers performed by the stars. Langella's pitched rendition of "Burn Down the Malls" has become a cult sensation, especially since the Gap built their holiday TV commercials around it, but Pitt set the screen on fire with the spectacular production number in which he dances around his New Orlean orphanage, performing Benjamin Button's Oscar-nominated theme song:

Alakazam and whoa, hot damn!

I'm an eighty-year-old baby!

The devil must have sent me here to freak y'all out,

And no, I don't mean maybe.

Oh, I go in my pants like a baby do

But that's what the old folks do too, woo!

Prayin' every night, God, kill me, please!

I'm an eighty-year-old baby!

The rule of thumb with actors nominated for their performances in singing parts is that their odds greatly improve if they did their own singing. When Jamie Foxx was nominated for Ray a few years ago, the general consensus was that he was badly miscast as Johnny Ray, but Foxx was assured of a win as soon as voters heard his own wrenching performance of "The Little White Cloud That Cried". And while Langella did his own singing, not only was Pitt's singing voice dubbed, but his face was CGI-generated, and his dancing was performed by that old guy who used to appear in the Six Flags commercials. Normally, this would give Langella an edge. But we're probably going to have to give Pitt one of these things eventually, and there may never be another time when a Brad Pitt performance has so little Brad Pitt in it. And since the less Pitt contributes to a Brad Pitt performance the better it's likely to be, I think the Academy will do the right thing and strike now while the iron is hot.

BEST ACTRESS: Anne Hathaway is nominated for her performance in Rachel Getting Married, but as I understand, she doesn't play Rachel. Getting nominated for a movie that has a character's name in the title when you didn't play that character is just confusing. It makes Academy voters' heads swim, and trust me, these people don't need that. Kate Winslet is nominated for The Reader, and we've already discussed what's the matter with that title, and I hear that Winslet actually plays the person who the reader reads to, which...well, see above. Sometimes I don't think people even take these things seriously. Melissa Leo is nominated for Frozen River, which is a peerless example of the kind of performance and movie that wins at the Independent Spirit Awards exactly one day before the same names are read aloud at the Oscars ceremony and a murmur passes through the crowd that goes something like, "I dunno, I think maybe she's from Canada." Meryl Streep is nominated for playing a nun in a film based on an acclaimed Broadway play, and that sure sounds like an Oscar sure shot, as I was saying just the other day to President Ronald Reagan and MTV VJ Martha Quinn as we were playing Ms. Pac-Man and eating Frusen Glädjé washed down with New Coke while wearing our "Frankie Say" T-shirts and waiting to go over and stand in line for the opening of Epcot Center...oh, really? That was all that long ago, huh? Okay, then I guess it'll have to go to Angelina Jolie for The Changeling. It should have hit me immediately that they'll need to do that to make it up to Clint for not nominating him for having had jack shit to do with Gran Torino, especially since watching that movie amounted to spending two hours seeing Eastwood screaming at the voters, "Look at these wrinkles! Listen to this raspy croak of a voice! Y'see this kisser? I'm not gonna be here forever, for God's sakes, don't you get it!?" The nice thing is that now Brad and Angelina will both carry one home, on the same night. It'll probably extend the life of the marriage by a good two years.

BEST DIRECTOR: Danny Boyle for Slumdog Millionaire. Just the voters' way of saying that they understand that the mix-up about nominating him instead of whoever directed Beverly Hills Chihuahua wasn't his fault and everybody feels bad about any possible embarrassment this whole mess has cost him

THE JEAN HERSHOLT HUMANITARIAN AWARD: This guy.

Screengrab Predicts The Oscars: Winners (Part Six)

Andrew Osborne — Thu, 05 Feb 2009 23:30:00 GMT

BEST ACTOR

And the nominees are...

Richard Jenkins – The Visitor
Frank Langella – Frost/Nixon
Sean Penn – Milk
Brad Pitt – The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
Mickey Rourke – The Wrestler

Paul Clark Predicts: Mickey Rourke

This might be more of a ballgame had Penn not won five years ago -- and if Milk had real Best Picture traction. As it stands, Rourke has the comeback story, the body transformation, the hype machine, and best of all, the awesome performance to carry him here.

Andrew Osborne Predicts: Sean Penn

Mickey Rouke got his Golden Globe, so his fairy tale comeback story had a nice happy ending, but Sean Penn won the SAG Award for Outstanding Performance in a Lead Role, so I think he’ll take the Oscar. Besides, for once, I actually want to hear Penn pontificate on a political subject...specifically, I want him to aim his famous humorless scowl at California’s clueless voters and ask them why they felt the need to make George Takei sad.

Leonard Pierce Predicts: Mickey Rourke

Frank Langella’s blowsy overacting is getting way too much attention, making him a risk to steal the thunder of much better performances. Brad Pitt’s Benjamin Button is showy but ultimately hollow, which should leave Sean Penn and Mickey Rourke to fight it out over Milk and The Wrestler. Given Penn’s history and AMPAS’ love of a comeback story, this one should by Rourke’s to lose.

Should Win: Mickey Rourke, The Wrestler
Will Win: Mickey Rourke, The Wrestler

Nick Schager Predicts: Mickey Rourke

Penn’s superb turn as the slain Harvey Milk is just as worthy, but the Academy loves underdog-comeback stories, and this year, that narrative belongs to The Wrestler’s Mickey Rourke.

Sarah Clyne Sundberg Predicts: Sean Penn

Scott Von Doviak Predicts: Mickey Rourke

SCREENGRAB CONSENSUS: MICKEY ROURKE

BEST DIRECTOR

And the nominees are...

Danny Boyle – Slumdog Millionaire
Stephen Daldry – The Reader
David Fincher – The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
Ron Howard – Frost/Nixon
Gus Van Sant – Milk

Paul Clark Predicts: Danny Boyle

There are years when Oscar voters decide to spread the wealth by giving this award to a celebrated filmmaker whose film they liked just a shade less than the Best Picture winner. But this isn’t one of those years -- among the nominees no one’s particularly “due”, so they’ll fall back on their Best Picture pick.

Andrew Osborne Predicts: David Fincher

Just hedging my bets on this one, in the same way Academy voters may split their love in the absence of a slam-dunk Best Picture frontrunner.

Leonard Pierce Predicts: Ron Howard

This could be a curious case, insofar as there doesn’t appear to be any single movie poised to sweep the Oscars. I had originally predicted that neither David Fincher nor Gus Van Sant would receive a nomination due to the atypical films they made, but my colleague Scott Von Doviak, probably correctly, felt that this increases rather than lessens their chances. Stephen Daldry winning would be a worst-case scenario.

Should Win: Gus Van Sant, Milk
Will Win: Ron Howard, Frost/Nixon

Nick Schager Predicts: Danny Boyle

Of all the nominees, Boyle’s work is the flashiest, and his film has populist-landslide-winner written all over it. Given that he was also honored by the Director’s Guild of America, count on him taking home the gold.

Sarah Clyne Sundberg Predicts: Danny Boyle/Ron Howard

It's a toss-up between everyone's favorite — Slumdog Millionaire — and Frost/Nixon because Ron Howard is exactly the kind of "Hollywood insider taking his art seriously" that the Academy likes.

Scott Von Doviak Predicts: Danny Boyle

SCREENGRAB CONSENSUS: DANNY BOYLE

Stay tuned for our Best Picture predictions and your very own souvenir Academy Awards ballot as the Screengrab 2009 Oscar Special continues way past your bedtime and pre-empts the evening news!

Contributors: Paul Clark, Andrew Osborne, Leonard Pierce, Nick Schager, Sarah Clyne Sundberg, Scott Von Doviak

Leave the '80s Alone: He-Man and the Masters of the Universe

Nick Schager — Fri, 30 Jan 2009 16:30:00 GMT

News out of Hollywood this morning is that John Stevenson, the director behind last summer's Kung Fu Panda, has been signed to helm a live-action film for Warner Bros. based on that Mattel-manufactured icon of '80s action-figure silliness, He-Man. Considering that John Woo previously flirted with the project a few years back, it's probably no surprise that the perpetually shirtless, Castle Grayskull-residing hero will be returning to the big screen. Yet it's hard to understand the necessity of another cinematic He-Man adventure, as Gary Goddard's 1987 Masters of the Universe definitively captured the essence of the show (which I confess to loving as a kid ): a blend of sub-Lord of the Rings fantasy, pro wrestling-level drama, unsubtle and goofy homoeroticsm, and a variety of cheesy characters spouting cornball one-liners. Plus, Goddard's opus had Oscar-nominee Frank Langella as Skeletor! As proven by the below [spoiler-ish] clip, for pure entertainment value, it's hard to top any film whose climax features an oiled-up, scantily clad Dolph Lundgren dodging lasers, swinging across chasms, being zapped with electricity, sword-fighting Langella, and then sharing a triumphant moment with an apparent reject from Troll.

Screengrab Predicts the Oscars: Nominations (Part Four)

Andrew Osborne — Thu, 08 Jan 2009 22:30:00 GMT

BEST ACTOR

Scott Von Doviak Predicts:

NOMINEES
Clint Eastwood (Gran Torino)
Frank Langella (Frost/Nixon)
Sean Penn (Milk)
Brad Pitt (The Curious Case of Benjamin Button)
Mickey Rourke (The Wrestler)

If Sean Penn can get nominated for I Am Sam, there's no reason to think his beautiful work in Milk will be overlooked. Everyone loves a comeback, so even if they're a little worried he'll take a drunken stumble into Jack Nicholson's lap, Mickey Rourke will be nominated for The Wrestler. Rounding out the leading men will be Frank Langella (Frost/Nixon), Brad Pitt (Benjamin Button), and this year's sentimental "Hey, you're almost friggin' 80!" nominee, Clint Eastwood (Gran Torino).

WINNER
Rourke. Watch out, ladies!

Sarah Clyne Sundberg Predicts:

NOMINEES
Christian Bale (The Dark Knight)
Philip Seymour Hoffman (Synecdoche, NY)
Sean Penn (Milk)
Brad Pitt (The Curious Case of Benjamin Button)
Mickey Rourke (The Wrestler)

Since Philip Seymour Hoffman appeared in two movies likely to figure in the Academy Awards this year, it follows that he must be nominated for at least one. Brad Pitt will be nominated for long and faithful service, Christian Bale for being in a blockbuster that didn't suck, and Mickey Rourke for appearing again out of nowhere. Sean Penn will win, because he is playing a gay man. But also because this is the best role he has done in a good while, if not ever. Madonna will be jealous.

WINNER
Sean Penn

Paul Clark Predicts:

NOMINEES
Clint Eastwood (Gran Torino)
Frank Langella (Frost/Nixon)
Sean Penn (Milk)
Brad Pitt (The Curious Case of Benjamin Button)
Mickey Rourke (The Wrestler)

Where’s Richard Jenkins, you ask? The Screengrab favorite won numerous early accolades for his work in The Visitor, but the risky plan to open the film early to build steam for Jenkins has led to the unassuming actor getting lost in the end-of-the-year shuffle, as most of the honors have been split between Penn and Rourke. With early predictions such as Leonardo DiCaprio (Revolutionary Road) and Benicio Del Toro (Che) having largely stalled out, Jenkins is the only potential spoiler here, but between Rourke’s comeback-kid status, the high-profile biopic turns of Penn and Langella, and two big stars in Eastwood and Pitt, I’m predicting that Jenkins pulls a Paul Giamatti and gets shut out of a nomination despite the early hosannas. As for the eventual winner, it seems too soon for Penn to win a second Oscar, and unless Rourke torpedoes his chances between now and February 22, I suspect that capping off his comeback with a statuette will prove too perfect an ending for voters to resist.

WINNER
Mickey Rourke

Andrew Osborne Predicts:

NOMINEES
Clint Eastwood (Gran Torino)
Richard Jenkins (The Visitor)
Frank Langella (Frost/Nixon)
Sean Penn (Milk)
Mickey Rourke (The Wrestler)

After all the endless hype about Mickey Rourke’s comeback in The Wrestler, it’d be heee-larious if he didn’t actually get nominated. And I’m guessing there’s more than a few Academy voters not exactly wishing Mickey well...but Hollywood and professional sports are all about storylines, so a Rourke nod seems inevitable. Unlike Rourke, Frank Langella and Sean Penn were playing other people in their movies rather than semi-autobiographical stunt-casting versions of themselves...and doing it well: Penn, in particular, seemed like an entirely different human being in Milk (which, y’know, is probably why the award is “Best Actor” instead of “Best Comeback”). Then again, there’s something to be said for a beloved screen icon just playing a stylized, hyper-real version of themselves, especially when they’re still kicking more ass in their seventies than alleged action star Shia LaBeouf will kick on the ass-kickingest day of his life, and especially when said role occurs in what may be said icon’s last screen role ever...in other words, I’ll be surprised if Clint Eastwood doesn’t grab a nomination for Gran Torino. And speaking of beloved movie stars, I’m supposed to pick Brad Pitt for the fifth spot, but what if the Academy decides his performance in Benjamin Button was more to do with CGI than acting chops? In that case, they might choose a dark horse, under-the-radar industry vet who’s paid his dues and (unlike Pitt) may never get another shot at the brass ring: the lovely and talented “that guy” Richard Jenkins for his role in The Visitor. (But Penn’s gonna actually win, partly thanks to Proposition 8...and I mentioned that whole crazy “acting” thing, yes?)

WINNER
Sean Penn

Leonard Pierce Predicts:

NOMINATIONS
Leonardo DiCaprio (Revolutionary Road)
Frank Langella (Frost/Nixon)
Sean Penn (Milk)
Brad Pitt (The Curious Case of Benjamin Button)
Mickey Rourke (The Wrestler)

Goodness knows why anyone continues to insist that Leonardo Di Caprio is a good actor, but I’d bet my next paycheck on him getting the nod. Frank Langella, likewise, plays Nixon like a broad majestic Shannon – that ain’t acting, that’s overacting – but the Academy loves an old pro. Pitt’s Button nom makes up for the Burn After Reading one he won’t get. In the end, though, it’ll be a battle between comeback kid Mickey Rourke in The Wrestler and Sean Penn’s well-deserved nomination for Milk; I’ll predict that Rourke gets it, though, since Penn has had (and will have) many more moments in the sun, while this is likely Mickey’s last dance. BIGGEST SCREWJOB: Benicio Del Toro’s incredibly tight performance in Che won’t get recognized because the public won’t sit through a 17-hour movie, and right-wing critics will yap endlessly that the movie glorifies a killer, which has never, ever happened before in a Hollywood movie.

WINNER
Mickey Rourke

SCREENGRAB CONSENSUS: NOMINEES
CLINT EASTWOOD, FRANK LANGELLA, SEAN PENN, BRAD PITT, MICKEY ROURKE

SCREENGRAB CONSENSUS: WINNER
MICKEY ROURKE

Click Here For Part One, Two, Three, Five & Six

Contributors: Paul Clark, Andrew Osborne, Leonard Pierce, Sarah Clyne Sundberg, Scott Von Doviak

Andrew Osborne's Top Ten Movies of 2008 (Part One)

Andrew Osborne — Sun, 28 Dec 2008 21:47:00 GMT

So, by the end of first quarter 2008, I’d seen exactly one memorably list-worthy movie (see #7) and figured it was just gonna be one of those low tide kinda years after a pretty strong 2007 (Knocked Up, Juno, The King of Kong, Gone Baby Gone, Hell On Wheels, Zodiac, 2 Days In Paris, etcetera). And yet, looking back over the past twelve months, I have to admit, to paraphrase Charlie Brown, it wasn’t such a bad little tree, with a lot of perfectly enjoyable (if not terribly memorable) films, as well as a number of...

WILDCARDS: (potentially list-worthy movies unseen by moi in 2008): Man On Wire, Encounters at the End of the World, Waltz with Bashir, Trouble the Water, Let the Right One In, Revolutionary Road, Gran Torino

And now, the Top 10 I did see...

1. YOUNG@HEART

Usually, the top of my Top Ten list is something I’d be happy to watch again at the drop of a hat, but I suspect I’ll never, ever sit through Young@Heart again: the first time was wrenching (and memorable) enough. My wife and I saw the film at the Harvard Square Loews with my Dad, who’s been in AARP territory for quite a while now, and a theater half full of strangers. For the first thirty minutes or so, Stephen Walker’s documentary about feisty senior citizens singing ironic hipster doofus perennials like “I Wanna Be Sedated” and “Staying Alive” was a hoot...and then the first lovable oldster died. And then another, and another, like some horror movie of age we’re all trapped in, and suddenly every single person in the theater was getting smacked right in the kisser with the harsh realities of mortality, and nearly all of us were openly sobbing. Yet for all that, the film is never mawkish: the chorus members are presented as a platoon of happy warriors, singing at the top of their lungs as they march into the shadow of the valley of death, fighting tooth and nail for every last drop of joy they can squeeze out of life, even as their comrades fall around them. As I said before in my 2008 half-time wrap-up, I try not to judge people based on their personal tastes when it comes to movies, but if you can sit through the Young@Heartster’s performance of Coldplay’s “Fix You” (punctuated by the rasp and click of the soloist’s respirator) without a lump in your throat, you may need to check your own pulse.

2. HAPPY-GO-LUCKY

While not as powerful or memorable as Young@Heart, Mike Leigh’s Happy-Go-Lucky was an equally heartfelt (and far less harrowing) film-going experience, with a similar theme (not to mention a timely one, given the world’s collective George W. Bush hangover): get busy living or get busy dying. Yes, life can be tough and full of injustice and, yes, it’s easy to be aloof and snarky and negative about it, but whether or not that makes anything better (for yourself or anyone else) is the question Leigh tackles here. Underpaid elementary school teacher Poppy (the infectiously great Sally Hawkins) is a relentlessly cheery optimist, the sort of person easily dismissed as a shallow, annoying bubblehead...in fact, one guy I know found the character so irritating he ditched the film after fifteen minutes. But then Poppy encounters her polar opposite, a seething mass of bitterness (embodied in a visceral performance by Eddie Marsan) whose dismal, head-full-of-spiders malevolence provides the necessary contrast to show the true strength and value of Hawkins’ irrepressible sunbeam, raising questions (and suspense) about which of the two worldviews will ultimately triumph.

3. RACHEL GETTING MARRIED

Like my fellow Screengrabber Scott Von Doviak, I didn’t expect this Jonathan Demme curiosity to wind up on my Best of 2008 list. Watching it the first time, it seemed unfocused and self-indulgent with its meandering Altman-wannabe pace, its self-consciously eccentric diversity and its melodramatic Lifetime-esque family drama. Yet because of its unusual construction, Rachel Getting Married feels now like a memory of an actual wedding I attended rather than just a movie I watched, adding extra punch to my recollections of the infrequent but correspondingly vivid moments of drama like the blistering showdown between Anne Hathaway’s loose cannon recovering addict Kym (a.k.a. Shiva the Destroyer) and her mother (Debra Winger...damn!) –- though even if Demme hadn’t gotten all artsy with the structure, Hathaway’s mesmerizing performance alone would have been worth the price of admission.

4. FROST/NIXON

Ron Howard’s cinematic adaptation of the acclaimed Peter Morgan play is what I call a “guys-in-suits” movie (one of my favorite genres) where formidable, top-level professionals like Howard, Morgan, Frank Langella (recreating his Tony-winning stage performance as Nixon) and the reliably great Michael Sheen (as Frost) focus their collective talents on a film about formidable, top-level professionals (like the real Frost and Nixon), sparring and strategizing and walking quickly down hallways and corridors rattling off witty bon mots and dense bits of jargon in the midst of high-stakes negotiations and race-against-time showdowns. Some critics have noted the actual historic impact of the Frost/Nixon interviews wasn’t really all that monumental, but the film charts high on my list as an entertaining poker tournament between two fascinating characters (with extra points for Toby Jones’ hilarious cameo as super-agent Swifty Lazar).

5. MILK

Sometimes timing is everything. In twenty years, critics will still be praising Sean Penn’s amazing transformation from scowling, self-important killjoy movie star into sweet, gawky force-of-nature gay activist Harvey Milk, but hopefully by 2028 this film will seem like just another well-made but otherwise run-of-the-mill “issue” film about an issue that’s no longer really an issue. But here in 2008, in the wake of the Proposition 8 disgrace, Milk is still, sadly, very much of the moment, and even for some progressives, the casual man-on-man kissing and romance between Penn’s character and his lovers (James Franco and Diego Luna) is a rare enough sight to give pause. From a historical standpoint, I was horrified to learn that Dan White (well captured by Josh Brolin in a chilling “mundanity of evil” performance) could murder Harvey Milk and the freakin’ mayor of a major American city in cold blood and get just seven years in prison on a manslaughter rap...that fact, combined with the anti-gay slanders of the McCain/Palin campaign (and, really, every Republican campaign in recent memory), the controversy over Obama’s selection of Rick Warren to give the invocation at his inaugural and the sense of communion at the packed house screenings of Milk during its opening weekend are just some of the reasons Gus Van Sant’s good movie feels like such a great and important one now.

Click Here For Part Two

Thursday Poll for December 18, 2008

Paul Clark — Thu, 18 Dec 2008 15:00:00 GMT

Last week, to coincide with the release of Ron Howard’s big-screen take on Frost/Nixon, we asked you to choose your favorite big-screen version of our 37th President. According to you, the Trickiest Dick of all was the future Lt. Bookman and Jimmy Gator himself, Philip Baker Hall, in Robert Altman’s Secret Honor. Hall brought in 45% of the vote, all the more impressive when you consider that his competition was somewhat stiffer than Nixon’s was in 1972. Coming in second place was Anthony Hopkins in Oliver Stone’s Nixon, followed by the ever-popular “Other” (although readers neglected to specify precisely which Other they meant) and Frank Langella in Frost/Nixon, whose poor showing might be attributable to the fact that his film hasn’t yet been widely released. Sadly, Dan Hedaya’s comedic take on the disgraced Commander in Chief couldn’t manage a single vote, although for my part I would’ve ranked him second behind Hall.

This week, we look at the career of perennial Oscar favorite (and eternal Screengrab crush) Kate Winslet. With two new films on the verge of release, Winslet once again finds herself in the awards hunt for one or possibly even both of these performances. But before she can add yet another nomination to her already impressive five (at the age of 33, no less), let’s compare the relative merits of her already-nominated performances. Which is your favorite?

Which of Kate Winslet's nominated performances is your favorite? | BuzzDash polls

I predict this will be a landslide, although lord knows I’ve been wrong before. As always, the comments section is open. See you next week!

Screengrab Review: "Frost/Nixon"

Scott Von Doviak — Fri, 05 Dec 2008 20:30:00 GMT

I’ve been spending the waning days of the George W. Bush era immersed in Nixonland. Rick Perlstein’s massive, compulsively readable tome makes a convincing case that Richard Nixon capitalized on the divisions in ‘60s America so successfully that he defined the political landscape for decades to come. I’m only halfway through the book – early 1969, to be specific – so please don’t ruin the ending for me. My guess is that Nixon is elected to three more terms and his face is carved on Mt. Rushmore.

But I kid. I’m actually aware that Mr. Nixon had something of an ignominious downfall, and that some years later he sat down to discuss the matter with British chat show host David Frost. I never would have guessed that the backstage finagling behind this momentous meeting would serve as the basis for a critically-acclaimed Broadway play, let alone a Ron Howard movie. Politics does indeed make strange bedfellows. But while I have my doubts that this is a story that needed to be told, Frost/Nixon tells it in such a brisk, engaging way, it’s easy to forgive a few notable missteps.

Don’t get me wrong; it’s not that I’m convinced what has ended up on the screen here bears much resemblance to the actual behind-the-scenes intrigue of the Frost/Nixon interviews. The play by Peter Morgan (who has adapted it for the screen) is probably at least 50% speculative nonsense, but you could say the same for Robert Altman’s 1984 foray into Nixonia, Secret Honor, and that film would be no less riveting for it. Howard isn’t on Altman’s level (please, don’t stop the presses), but for the most part he stays out of the way and lets the two lead actors do their thing.

They’ve been doing that thing for a while now. Michael Sheen and Frank Langella originated the roles of Frost and Nixon on London’s West End, and Langella won a Tony for his presidential portrayal when the production moved to Broadway. As the movie opens, Frost is hosting an Australian variety show, having lost his high-profile gig on American television, and he’s itching to get back to the big time. He sees his opening when President Nixon resigns in disgrace in 1974. Working on his memoirs, the ex-Prez wants a big payday for his first exclusive TV interview, and the U.S. networks are unwilling to pony up.

Enter the unlikely Frost, a man best known for chit-chatting with lightweights. (The real Frost disputes this, insisting he had interviewed many political giants before landing the big fish.) He gets Nixon to agree to four 90-minute specials, the last of which will focus exclusively on Watergate, then sets about cobbling together a syndicated network and sponsorship agreements with the likes of Weed-Wacker in order to meet Nixon’s seven-figure price. Frost brings aboard a team of Nixon experts to help him sharpen the knives for the grand inquisition, but as filming gets underway it is Nixon who has the upper hand, gassing on at length about his accomplishments and leaving Frost gasping for air.

Can Frost pull it together in time to nail Nixon to the wall once and for all in the climactic Watergate interview? As I recall, the general reaction to the actual Nixon/Frost interview has always been…eh, not really. (The real thing is now out on DVD, although I haven’t had a chance to check it out yet.) Still, Howard and Morgan do a capable job of milking the drama out of this question, only occasionally overreaching, as in an imagined late-night drunken phone call from Nixon to Frost.

The supporting cast, including Oliver Platt, Sam Rockwell, Kevin Bacon and Toby Jones, is excellent, but I need to single out Rebecca Hall, mainly because I didn’t recognize her at all from Vicky Cristina Barcelona and so every time she appeared on screen I made a mental note to check IMDb as soon as I got home to find out where this wondrous being had been all my life. The ’70s style definitely works for her.

More importantly, Sheen and Langella expertly tango their way through the steps of this adversarial alliance between interviewer and subject. Sheen is equal parts showman and con man, revealing just enough vulnerability to earn our affections. Like Philip Baker Hall and to some extent Anthony Hopkins before him, Langella is a mythic, larger-than-life Nixon, but he leaves you with at least a smidgen of sympathy for the devil.

Related:
Screengrab Review: "W."
That Guy! Philip Baker Hall

Trailer Review: Frost/Nixon

Paul Clark — Wed, 03 Sep 2008 16:00:00 GMT

Fans of Peter Morgan’s stage production of Frost/Nixon have extended this big-screen adaptation of the play a good amount of goodwill due to the Broadway stars (Frank Langella and Michael Sheen) being kept for the movie. But while I’m always in favor of character actors (especially talented veterans like Langella) getting their moments in the spotlight, judging by the trailer I’m not sure that retaining them for the movie was the right move. Part of the problem is Nixon himself, who was not merely one of the most recognizable political figures of the past half-century but also one of the most widely-imitated, making portraying the role on the big screen a challenge for any actor. And frankly, I’m not sure I like how Langella is approaching the role here- his vocal mannerisms and gestures might work onstage, but they become overbearing in the trailer, like a straight-up impersonation rather than an attempt to get under his skin. Of course, much of this no doubt has to do with the director, as “Academy Award Winning Director Ron Howard” (ugh) probably didn’t do much to discourage Langella from using the same approach to the character that he did onstage. But in a less-is-more medium like film, maybe Langella needed to ease up on the Tricky Dick stuff and just play the character, like Philip Baker Hall in Secret Honor.

America the Beautiful: 15 Movies That Show What's Right With U.S. (Part Two)

Andrew Osborne — Thu, 03 Jul 2008 20:30:00 GMT

THE RIGHT STUFF (1983)

The title of Tom Wolfe's book refers to the ineffable, super-American quality that Wolfe attributed to the anonymous test pilots who paved the way for the NASA space program -- whose stars, the Apollo astronauts, Wolfe depicted as media puppets by comparison. Phil Kaufman's movie version hangs onto the romantic mythology of the test pilots and treats the astronauts' public packaging as comedy, but it also honors the astronauts as real heroes who, by learning to play the media and sticking together to face down the bureaucrats and the scientists with the Dr. Strangelove accents, proved their mettle and created a new kind of savvy icon for the TV age. Amazingly, this satiric yet stirring popcorn epic wasn't much of a hit in theaters but has since achieved classic status as a home video perennial. It has so many high points that it's practically made for the rewind button.

SOMETHING WILD (1986)

Jonathan Demme's road movie/screwball romance crams every getaway fantasy destination you can think of into one wild weekend: shanghaied from his lunch hour by Lulu, the boho funk priestess (Melanie Griffith) in the thrift shop accouterments and Louise Brooks 'do, Charlie the office drone (Jeff Daniels) stops by the liquor store, gets screwed to within an inch of his life in the roadside motel, meets his new flame's mom, hits the dance floor during the high school reunion, and barely makes it home Monday morning with the small town sociopath (Ray Liotta) in hot pursuit. Demme keeps things fresh with the jumping soundtrack and the crowded supporting cast, which includes fellow directors (among them John Waters, perfectly cast as a used car salesman) and faces from other Demme movies (such as Steve Scales, from Stop Making Sense, as a tourist-shop cashier who offers Daniels the sage advice, "Charlie, attempt to be cool."). They don't just liven up the screen; the way Demme uses them, the many bit players passing through suggest the variety of life that you pass by and rub up against in just a couple of days spent on the American road. The movie seems to be hinting at a hundred other stories that are out there, ready to be told; the camera just happened to latch onto Charlie and Lulu first.

O BROTHER, WHERE ART THOU? (2000)

Just your typical Depression-era musical comedy based on Homer's Odyssey, O Brother Where Art Thou is often dismissed as one of the Coen Brothers' sillier efforts. Well, sure, it is pretty silly at times, but it's also the Coens' richest, most satisfying serving of pure Americana to date. While Blood Simple, Raising Arizona, Miller's Crossing and Fargo had drilled into very specific subcultures, regionalisms and genres, O Brother is as expansive as the American South itself – a melting pot of prison flicks, road movies, musicals, social issue pictures and screwball comedies. From the golden-hued landscapes beautifully photographed by Roger Deakins (and later computer-enhanced) to corny-but-right images like a pie cooling on a windowsill to the Ku Klux Klan/Wizard of Oz mash-up that might have been disastrously offensive in the hands of less skilled filmmakers, the movie is a technical marvel. But more than that, it's a love letter to the pure American music forms of folk, country and blues – the Harry Smith Anthology come to life. And in moments as when the casually integrated Soggy Bottom Boys take the stage to a raucous ovation from an audience that literally runs a racist politician out of town on a rail, it's a celebration of community, holding a cracked mirror up to the best aspects of our national character.

DAVE (1993)

Like all nations, the U.S. has its share of assholes, but even our critics generally concede that Americans, by and large, are basically decent people: optimistic, can-do types, generally willing to help out and do the right thing, especially when our leaders quit pandering to our fear and greed and inspire us to roll up our sleeves and achieve worthy goals. Of course, for all the talk of elites, political insiders, change and the American mainstream in the current election, no president, congressman or media pundit is ever really an average citizen, living as they do in a bubble of power and privilege the nation’s true average Joes (and Daves) can only dream about...which is part of what makes Ivan Reitman’s good-natured political comedy so appealing. Released during the honeymoon period of the Clinton administration, when Bubba was still viewed as a charming, sax-playing, fast-food noshing everyman, Dave tells the story of part-time presidential impersonator Dave Kovic (Kevin Kline) who winds up in the Oval Office after the real president (Kline again) suffers a stroke while cheating on his imperious wife (Sigourney Weaver). Oily, Cheney-esque chief-of-staff Bob Alexander (Frank Langella) arranges the charade, intending to use Kovic as a puppet mouthpiece for his own agenda, but the plan goes awry when the impersonator starts acting more presidential than the corrupt president he started off imitating, using his newfound power to actually, y’know, help and support the American people rather than fleecing them like a vast herd of sheep. After outsmarting Alexander, romancing the First Lady and ensuring that a conveniently upstanding deus ex machina of a vice president (Ben Kingsley) will take his place, Kovic leaves the White House behind and returns to his regular life, where he decides to run for his local city council, echoing the film’s underlying message that our government functions best when our best people are in government.

MR. SMITH GOES TO WASHINGTON (1939)

He's often cited as America's most patriotic filmmaker, and there's no doubt that to a certain degree, Frank Capra – born in Sicily, and the very image of an immigrant boy made good – deserves the title. But most of his films aren't simply pro-American jingoism: they're patriotic in the truest sense, in that they recognize the flaws of Capra's adopted country and seek to address them, never pretending that this isn't a nation with profound problems, but likewise never succumbing to cynicism and always holding out the hope that even one individual can make a difference. Nowhere is this more evident than in the wonderful Mr. Smith Goes to Washington. Although today, the film – buoyed by a tremendously charismatic performance by Jimmy Stewart as the naïve but determined junior senator Jefferson Smith – is considered a classic depiction of grass-roots democracy and the way the little guy can succeed in his struggle against entrenched forces, it wasn't quite so warmly received at the time. Since Capra didn't flinch from portraying Washington as a deeply corrupt place full of crooked politicians and smear merchants, both Democrats and Republicans denounced it as a vicious attack on our noble democracy; some even pegged Capra as a communist agitator determined to stir up trouble. But in the end, the image of Sen. Smith's desperate filibuster has stayed with us as a lasting reminder of Capra's philosophy that one man, no matter how many forces are arrayed against him, can triumph against evil – and what could be more American than that?

Click here for Part One & Part Three

Contributors: Phil Nugent, Scott Von Doviak, Andrew Osborne, Leonard Pierce

No, But I've Read the Movie: LOLITA

Leonard Pierce — Tue, 06 May 2008 21:00:00 GMT

Usually, Hollywood is a tad standoffish about tackling the great novels. If they do it right, they win the admiration of critics, but risk losing the mainstream audience, who will think of their project as snooty and highbrow. If they do it wrong, people still won't go see the movie, plus the critics will turn the whole thing into a laughingstock. Producers are generally willing to let someone take a crack at one of the classics once and only once, and then only if they're an established filmmaker and there's nothing too controversial about the book. How, then, did not one but two movie versions get made of one of the most inflammatory, misunderstood and potentially dangerous books of the 21st century — a book that not only quite openly asks us to identify, to a certain degree, with an effete intellectual pederast, but which was written by one of the pioneers of postmodernism? Some might suggest that certain producers and/or directors simply jump at the chance to cast a movie starring a hot nymphet, but we are not so cynical here at the Screengrab, oh goodness no. We will not speculate how it came to pass that two high-profile film adaptations of Vladimir Nabokov's brilliant, subtle, subversive and daring story came to pass — one of them, by a titan of the silver screen, made less than a decade after the novel's publication and the other, by a flaky British director whose movies have always been a heartbeat away from softcore porn — and instead focus on the respective qualities of the two films.

A lot of people didn't think Lolita would ever make it to the big screen once, let alone twice. For all the pretentious, self-deluding protagonist Humbert Humbert's talk of "nymphets", he is nakedly and, for the most part, blindly and unrepentently a pederast — a dirty old man who chases after young girls and compensates for his failings by passing intellectual judgment on everyone else around him. This was, and is, considered a pretty volatile subject, even considering Hollywood's history of sexualizing young women; indeed, the tagline for the 1962 Stanley Kubrick version of Lolita was "How did they ever make a movie of Lolita?" Part of the answer to that is by soft-pedaling Dolores Haze's age: in the Kubrick film, she's sixteen and in the Adrian Lyne version, she's a year younger — both a level of remove from the highly uncomfortable fact that in Nabokov's novel, she's twelve. Regardless of the controversy that raged (and will probably always continue to rage) around the book, especially from people who haven't read it, Lolita is rightly considered one of the greatest books of the post-war and post-modern era. The films, however, are a touch more difficult to critically assess. Kubrick's 1962 version was well-received at the time, snaring an Oscar nomination and a handful of Golden Globe noms, but has it stood up to the test of time? Adrian Lyne's 1997 edition wasn't expected to be very good, and after a successful run overseas had a hard time finding distribution in the U.S. from controversy-shy studios until it eventually had to debut on cable. Was it better than its reputation? Let's you and me find out.

WHAT THEY HAD: Aside from being directed by a genuine master of the medium, the best thing Kubrick's Lolita had going for it was the coup it scored in getting Nabokov himself to pen the screenplay. If this didn't exactly ensure that it would remain faithful to the book (see below), it would at least ensure that the script wasn't a total wash. It was a gorgeous-looking movie, and with a couple of notable exceptions (see, again, below), the cast was top-notch, even if Peter Sellers was so overblown and overused in his role that a number of commentators (including Nabokov himself) suggested that the movie should be called Quilty. Lyne's version wasn't as assured in terms of filmmaking, largely because Adrian Lyne is worth about one and a half feet of Stanley Kubrick, but it was very stylish, and the always-terrific Jeremy Irons as Humbert was ably matched with the phenomenal Dominique Swain as Lolita. If Swain's career never let her equal this performance, she could at least be proud that she took one of the most difficult roles in modern drama and absolutely nailed it to the wall. Additionally, and to their credit, both films managed to weather the storms of controversy they met with, and although both suffered from studio interference to make the story palatable to sex-shy American tastes, neither was entirely wrecked because of it.

WHAT THEY LACKED: Kubrick's Lolita may have suffered the most; it doesn't hold up well compared to most of his other films, and at times comes across as lifeless and flat on the screen. Sue Lyons is pretty much a disaster as Lolita, having the right look but not even remotely the necessary acting chops, and Shelley Winters sometimes seems completely lost as her mother, Charlotte Haze. Studio tinkering and his own lack of familiarity with the discipline of screenwriting blunted the impact of Nabokov's script, and the whole thing, overall, comes across as one of those noble experiments that you want to like a lot more than you really do — not that it's a bad film by any means, but to call it, as some critics do, a great one is to force yourself to overlook a lot of its flaws. If Lyne's movie succeeded more on its own terms, that's only because no one expected anything out of it in the first place. It's certainly not a great film either, and not even as good a film as Kubrick's, but it didn't have the same high expectations as did a movie with Kubrick and Nabokov's names attached. Lyne wasn't lucky enough to snare Vlad as his writer, the novelist having passed away some twenty years prior, so he mistakenly assumed that if you can't get the guy who wrote Pale Fire, get the guy who wrote The Deep End of the Ocean. He also cast the merely competent Frank Langella in the role previously occupied by the resplendent Peter Sellers, and made the mistake of asking Melanie Griffith to portray a human being, something she has always had trouble with.

DID THEY SUCCEED?: Probably no version of Lolita is ever going to fully succeed; if Vladimir Nabokov himself couldn't pull it off, what chance does Adrian Lyne have? The transcendent value of the novel lies first and foremost in its rich, beautiful use of language, and second in its detailed and subtle crafting of irony; the former comes across on the screen not at all, and the latter, often, quite poorly. Lolita is a book that everyone is always constantly rushing to misinterpret, and looking at the production history of both films, that was clearly the case here; it didn't help much that, in the case of the 1997 version, the foremost misinterpreter of the book was director Adrian Lyne. He not only brought his trashy erotic-thriller sensibilities to a story that didn't need them, but he also seemed to completely miss the point of how funny Lolita is. Whether brought on by his own self-seriousness or a misguided sense of respect for the source material, that's a fatal mistake, and whatever its other flaws, it's not one that Kubrick's 1962 version made. It seems impossible that some future director will gather the courage and resources to take another crack at Lolita and avoid the pitfalls of the previous two versions, but as unlikely as it might be to think that someone will film a third version of the book, who would have ever predicted someone would film it the first time?

DVD Digest for April 22, 2008

Paul Clark — Tue, 22 Apr 2008 14:00:00 GMT

This week, a cinematic master gets the Eclipse treatment, and a viral-marketing-phenom makes its DVD debut.

DVD of the Week: In the past few years, a number of Yasujiro Ozu films have made their way to DVD, but he was so prolific that there are still many films missing, especially from his earlier work. For this reason alone, the arrival Eclipse Series 10: Silent Ozu- Three Family Comedies is cause for celebration. Comprised of three films made between 1931 and 1933, the Silent Ozu box has no extras to speak of (Eclipse doesn't really do extras), but each film features a brand-new score by silent-film composer Donald Sosin, as well as the high-quality transfers we've come to expect from the Criterion family. To date, I've only seen the box's centerpiece film, I Was Born, But..., but that film and the other Ozus I've seen have been so delightful that I have no reservations about recommending the other films- 1933's Passing Fancy and 1931's Tokyo Chorus- as well. Here's hoping that Eclipse continues to do right by Ozu in the years to come. He's certainly worth it.

Releasing today from Criterion itself is Spanish filmmaker Juan Antonio Bardem's seminal, long-overlooked melodrama Death of a Cyclist. The class-oriented of a respected professor whose life goes into freefall when after a hit-and-run accident, the film is at times heavyhanded but always striking and beautifully shot. In addition, the film should provide a fitting introduction for many moviegoers to the charms of leading lady Lucia Bosé. An Italian stunner with screen presence to burn, Bosé was a mainstay of the early films of Michelangelo Antonioni, as well as appearing in work by Buñuel, Fellini, and Marguerite Duras. The DVD also includes a featurette on the life and work of Bardem, but the real story is the film which, like its female lead, is ripe for rediscovery.

Also of note on the classics front is the release of four comedies from Universal's Cinema Classics series. The four films are: the Mae West/Cary Grant vehicle She Done Him Wrong; Billy Wilder's early film The Major and the Minor starring Ginger Rogers and Ray Milland; and two films from director Mitchell Leisen, 1939's Midnight starring Claudette Colbert, and 1937's Easy Living with Jean Arthur. Each film is a gem, but of particular note is Easy Living, perhaps the greatest film written by Preston Sturges before he reigned over Hollywood comedy in the 1940s. And if it's sexy action you want, check out Image's new DVD of the Shaw Brothers cult classic Intimate Confessions of a chinese Courtesan, a movie I'm pretty sure I dreamed one night.

Compared to this week's selection of classics, the new titles can't help but look a little paltry. The big-ticket DVD this week is of course Cloverfield (Paramount), the Matthew Reeves/JJ Abrams rampaging-monster movie. For me, the film was never so much fun as when I first saw the trailer before Transformers, but the DVD should give people a chance to approach the film separated from all the hype. This week also brings a Philip Seymour Hoffman double feature, with Hoffman hitting DVD shelves with Tamara Jenkins' The Savages (Fox)- in which he appears opposite Laura Linney- and his caustic, Oscar-nominated performance in Mike Nichols' Charlie Wilson's War (Universal), which also features mediocre turns by Tom Hanks and Julia Roberts, and a pretty hot scene in which Emily Blunt slinks down the stairs wearing only a man's dress shirt.

In addition, there's a trifecta of indie releases hitting the market today: Andrew Wagner's Starting Out in the Evening (Lionsgate), which garnered awards buzz for the ever-dependable Frank Langella; Paul Schrader's The Walker (ThinkFilm), featuring Woody Harrelson as a too-helpful escort for society women; and Joe Swanberg's Hannah Takes the Stairs (Genius Productions), starring "mumblecore" darling Greta Gerwig. Also worth mentioning are the second season of Friday Night Lights (Universal), J.A. Bayona's supernatural chiller The Orphanage (New Line, also Blu-Ray), and the mostly-ignored Hollywood remake of One Missed Call (Warner, also Blu-Ray). Mind you, the latter is only worth mentioning for the sake of completism, but there you go.

Finally, David Huddleston would like the announce that there are no HD-DVDs hitting the market today. Frankly, he couldn't be happier.

The Rep Report (January 23 - 30)

Phil Nugent — Tue, 22 Jan 2008 17:00:00 GMT

SAN FRANCISCO: The 6th Annual Noir City Film Festival at the Castro is jam-packed with seamy rarities and not-available-on-DVD obscurities. It opens on January 25 with a tribute to actress Joan Leslie, who'll be interviewed onstage between screenings of the 1947 Repeat Performance and the striking 1943 backstage drama The Hard Way. There are also tributes to Dalton Trumbo — the Trumbo-scripted Joseph Losey film The Prowler will be introduced by modern noir master James Ellroy, and they'll even show the movie if ever stops talking — actress Gail Russell, and the granite-jawed Charles McGraw, who appears in Anthony Mann's Border Incident and Reign of Terror (sometimes known as The Black Book, and starring Richard Basehart as that least likely of noir villains, Maximilien Robespierre. ("Don't call me Max!")

LOS ANGELES: Your obedient Jew, Mel Brooks, will be on hand fora festival of his films at the American Cinematheque from January 23 through the 30th. Brooks will kick things off by introducing his little-seen sophomore effort, the 1970 The Twelve Chairs, based on an Ilf and Petrov novel and starring the young Frank Langella, Dom DeLuise, and the criminally underutilized British actor Ron Moody. On Saturday, he'll participate in a discussion between films during a double fill of his first big hit, the 1974 Blazing Saddles, and perhaps his most underappreciated comedy, the 1981 centuries-spanning vaudeville show The History of the World — Part 1. Given Brooks's legendary reputation as one of the funniest talkers of the age, this event might be of interest even to comedy aficionados who already have the movies themselves well memorized.

NEW YORK: The Film Society of Lincoln Center's "Envisioning Russia: A Century of Filmmaking" (January 25 – February 14) is a big, ambitious program that concentrates on the output of Mosfilm, "the largest and most productive film studio during the Soviet era, which remains Russia’s most important film institution even today." Included are such chestnuts as Potemkin and the post-Stalin The Cranes Are Flying, as well as Tarkovsky's Mirror and other, lesser-known films such as Karen Shakhnazarov's1983 Jazzman, about a musician whose tastes run counter to those officially sanctioned by Moscow, and the more recent Happiness and Cargo 200.

Video of the Day: "Lolita" Screen Test

Leonard Pierce — Tue, 08 Jan 2008 20:45:00 GMT

When Adrian Lyne's 1997 adaptation of Vladimir Nabokov's notorious novel Lolita hit theaters, most of the press attention it received focused on the fact that Lyne, striving for a certain literary verisimilitude, actually cast the then-fifteen-year-old Dominique Swain in the title role rather than handing it to an actress of legal age pretending to be fifteen. It was such a bold, controversial move that it took a lot of people a good long while to notice that, verisimilitude aside, the movie wasn't actually very good, and the hotly debated love scenes between Swain and a decrepit Jeremy Irons were less noteworthy than was some abominable casting decisions (a bored Frank Langella as Clare Quilty and Melanie Griffith in way over her head as Charlotte Haze) and a muddled script. However, this early read-through of said script is worth a peek, if only because, thanks to its cheap, loose video quality and 'your next-door-neighbor's basement' mise-en-scene, it actually comes across as a lot more provocative than the movie itself. (Side note to Screengrab readers who wish to avoid termination and/or imprisonment: do not, under any circumstance, Google "lolita screen test". I am a professional.)

Morning Deal Report: Beam Me Up

Peter Smith — Fri, 12 Oct 2007 15:00:00 GMT

More Trek news: Simon Pegg — Shaun of the Dead himself — to play Scotty. Awesome.

Zack Snyder will direct The Last Photograph, an Afghanistan-set drama "based on an original idea by Snyder." (Snyder has original ideas?)

Frank Langella joins Cameron Diaz in The Box, Richard Kelly's intended follow-up to Southland Tales — assuming anyone lets the guy direct after that thing comes out.

— Peter Smith