The Screengrab : schindler's list

Reconstructing Stanley Kubrick’s “Aryan Papers”

Scott Von Doviak — Mon, 05 Jan 2009 18:00:00 GMT

Last summer we told you about Kubrick’s Boxes, the documentary Jon Ronson made about digging through the extensive Stanley Kubrick archives. (Sadly, the YouTube link to Ronson’s film is no longer functional.) As it turns out, Ronson was not the only one given the keys to the legendary filmmaker’s attic. Turner-prize nominated artists (and twins) Jane and Louise Wilson “were invited to delve into the Stanley Kubrick archives at the University of the Arts in London and come up with a piece of work to coincide with a major Kubrick season on the South Bank this year. What they alighted on was the fascinating story of Aryan Papers, a film that he was adapting from Louis Begley's 1991 novel, Wartime Lies,” according to The Guardian.

The Wilsons will tell the story of the unmade film through an installation at the BFI in London. “Kubrick, a secretive obsessional perfectionist by any standards, spent months on preproduction for Aryan Papers, even casting the Dutch actor Johanna ter Steege in the lead role. The Wilsons came across intriguing stills of Ter Steege in different costumes, shot at different angles and in different lights and, taking these as a starting point, then approached the actor herself. The resulting film will cut between the stills and their interview with Ter Steege.”

Kubrick abandoned the project once Steven Spielberg began work on his Holocaust film, Schindler’s List. (Given how many movies on the subject have been made since – and how long it took the director to complete his later films – he probably could have proceeded without worrying about any conflict of interest.) Or, as Louise Wilson notes, he may have had a different reason for moving on to other things: “Having spoken to Johanna, it sounds like he got very depressed. He was so immersed in this research I think he found the process quite disturbing and upsetting.”

If you happen to be in London in the next few months, you can check out the installation at the BFI beginning February 13th.

Related:
The Kubrick Rarities
Kubrick's Marketing Man Speaks

Hollywood Goose-Steps Into the New Year

Phil Nugent — Wed, 31 Dec 2008 18:45:00 GMT

Ben Crair at Slate writes that "One way to measure the approach of the new year is to count the Holocaust films at your local multiplex. The holidays arrive just as studios begin wooing academy members with serious dramas, and there's nothing more serious than genocide." This year has certainly filled theaters with a bumper crop of Nazi slash Holocaust movies, including Bryan Singer's Valkyrie, Stephen Daldry's The Reader, Edward Zwick's Defiance, Paul Schrader's Adam Resurrected, Good, which is based on C. P. Taylor's play and which opens in select cities today, and The Boy in the Striped Pajamas, which was sent from Hell by the devil in lieu of a new STD. Crair breaks these kinds of films down into various categories, such as the ones hailing the courage of "Good Germans", such as Valkyrie (as well as earlier films such as The Desert Fox, starring James Mason as Rommel, Marlon Brando's Nazi of conscience in The Young Lions, and, of course, Schindler's List; tributes to the bravery of "Resistant Jews", such as the ones in Defiance, who have the good fortune to be led by someone played by the actor currently employed as James Bond, Daniel Craig; "Redemption Stories" about survivors trying to find their way back to normal life and human feeling, such as Adam Resurrected or the Sidney Lumet film The Pawnbroker, starring Rod Steiger, which yesterday was inducted into the Library of Congress's National Film Registry. Crair also has a category called "The Fable", which may be just because he had to come up with something to call Roberto Benigni's Life Is Beautiful, and Slate he couldn't have called it what I would have called it because Slate does not carry an "Adults Only" advisory.

The peculiar place that movies with this kind of subject matter occupy in our culture was thrown into sharp relief a few weeks ago when Los Angeles Times blogger Patrick Goldstein wrote a five-star stupid piece using New York Times critic Manohla Dargis's dismissive review of The Reader to complain that "in indie Hollywood that no one wants Manohla Dargis to review their movie, fearing that the outspoken critic will tear their film limb from limb. It’s the ultimate backhanded compliment, since what they really fear is Manohla’s persuasiveness — that she’ll write a review whose combination of vitriolic snarkiness and intellectual heft will actually persuade high-brow moviegoers to drop the film from their must-see list." Dargis, he charged, displays a "“lack of empathy for the challenge of tackling difficult material.” Unless you're a third-grade art teacher instead of an actual paid writer, it's a novel thing indeed to argue, or even imply, that someone should get points for "tackling difficult material;" it may even be that having seen too many movies that were praised by gutless reviewers for the filmmakers' intentions instead of what they'd managed to get on the screen may help to drive audiences away from seeing more movies with grand ambitions. Goldstein took a righteous pasting in some quarters for having chosen to use his space on-line to slip into his cap and bells, but it's doubtful that he would have had the nerve to make such an argument at all--on behalf of a ridiculous movie based on a silly book, an expensive major release with attention-getting sex scenes and big stars and a Harvey Weinstein-approved promotional budget, directed by a man who got an undeservedly smooth ride for his previous ridiculous movie (The Hours) based on a silly novel and full of big stars and with a promotional campaign to match--if he hadn't been able, when the shock troops came around to punch some sense into him, been able to squeal, "It must be treated seriously! It's got Nazis in it!" The last word on how flimsy this line of attack is turns out not to be Life Is Beautiful or Hogan's Heroes but The Boy in Striped Pajamas, an atrocity for the whole family that will probably stand as the ultimate demonstration of how to turn historic tragedy into pap until Jerry Lewis kicks off and we all storm his house and watch The Day the Clown Cried. Until then, Lauren Wissot has a new holiday tradition in mind.

Related Stories: In Other Blogs: The Movie Killer

In Other Blogs: Freejackin'

Scott Von Doviak — Fri, 29 Aug 2008 15:30:00 GMT

The snarky sports blog Deadspin isn’t generally one of our go-to sites here in the land of movie blogdom, but this post containing the text of Roger Ebert’s kiss-off to longtime Chicago Sun-Times sportswriter/annoying douchebag Jay Mariotti is too good to pass up. “What an ugly way to leave the Sun-Times. It does not speak well for you. Your timing was exquisite. You signed a new contract, waited until days after the newspaper had paid for your trip to Beijing at great cost, and then resigned with a two-word e-mail: ‘I quit.’ You saved your explanation for a local television station. As someone who was working here for 24 years before you arrived, I think you owed us more than that. You owed us decency. The fact that you saved your attack for TV only completes our portrait of you as a rat…On your way out, don't let the door bang you on the ass.”

Are you a cinephile or a cinemaniac? Do you even know the difference? David Bordwell thinks he does. “What is cinephilia? Literally, the love of film. But everybody likes, even loves film, no? The term 'cinephilia' connotes an overwhelming passion for film, even an obsession about it. And not just particular films. I meet civilians all the time who are devoted to their favorites—The Godfather, The Princess Bride, The Matrix. But they’re not cinephiles. So is it just a matter of quantity? Is it just that the cinephile enjoys a great many movies? Partly, but there’s still more to it. The cinephile displays symptoms of cinemania, as chronicled in the film of the same name…But I do see differences. For one thing, most cinemaniacs like only certain sorts of movies—usually American, often silent, sometimes foreign, seldom documentaries. Do cinemaniacs line up for Brakhage or Frederick Wiseman? My sense is not. Cinephiles by contrast tend to be ecumenical. Indeed, many take pride in the intergalactic breadth of their tastes. Look at any smart critic’s ten-best lists. You’ll usually see an eclectic mix of arthouse, pop, and experimental, including one or two titles you have never heard of. Obscurity is important; a cinephile is a connoisseur.”

Guest poster Aaron Aradillas looks back at the box office charts from 25 years ago at Some Came Running. Do you remember the number one movie from this week in 1983? “Easy Money was Rodney Dangerfield's follow-up to Caddyshack. It was pretty obvious that Rodney could carry a movie. The only problem was creating a vehicle where he could do his thing. Easy Money wasn't it…Easy Money finds Rodney playing more or less himself in that seemingly reliabe story of a cheerful vulgarian being forced to change his ways in order to receive a big reward. In this case it is Rodney's Monster-In-Law who is leaving him $10 million if he promises to stop drinking, smoking, gambling, and doing all the things we love Rodney for. For some reason filmmakers think this story is a perfect fit for high-wire comic actors. It isn't. It neuters them from doing what we go to see them do.”

At The House Next Door, Steven Boone has another look at Carl Dreyer’s Day of Wrath and makes a surprising connection. “Watching Day of Wrath for the second time at age 35 (in a crisp new digitally restored print at IFC Center), I now see much more E.T. than Schindler's List: There are no villains, no evil—just weak and fearful individuals either hiding from or within a system that provides the cruel certainty and definition of wrathful law pretending to justice. Everyone in Day of Wrath is only trying to be as human and honorable as he/she can be within the limits of a paranoiac theocracy. What appeared to my 19-year-old eyes to be a dour, cold-eyed vision of corrupt power destroying innocents in the name of God now appears as delicate and wise about human drives as that scene in E.T. where Elliot, so used to having no one to really talk to or play with, shows off his toys to the extra-terrestrial and prattles on like no tomorrow.”

In List-o-Mania, Topless Robot brings us the 10 Most Unnecessary Movie Tie-In Comics. How did I ever miss the Freejack comic book? “This sci-fi opus starring Emilio Estevez and Mick Jagger (when was the last time you heard those three words?) didn’t exactly wow moviegoers, possibly because ‘FreeJack’ sounds like a euphemism for public masturbation. Now Comics inexplicably put out an adaptation of the movie long after it had left theaters and was largely forgotten by the general populace. Strangely, Mick Jagger is a far better actor in the comic version.”

Steven Spielberg: Teacher’s Pet?

Scott Von Doviak — Mon, 19 May 2008 15:30:00 GMT

The fourth Indiana Jones movie has finally been unveiled at Cannes, and it didn’t take long for the initial critical reaction to hit the intertubes. (In fact, indiewire critic Eric Kohn actually texted his review line by line from the theater as the movie was screening. No word yet on whether this caused Armond White’s brain to explode.) The consensus so far hasn’t exactly been one of childlike glee (with the exception of Roger Ebert, who says “If you liked the other movies, you will like this one, and if you did not, there is no talking to you.”). Manohla Dargis of the New York Times sums it up thusly: “I was bored out of my mind while watching the movie, which makes me think that Spielberg was terribly bored while directing it.”

Peter Rainer of the L.A. Times takes that last idea and runs with it, asking the musical question, “Will Spielberg take a walk on the wild side?” Seems like it might be a little late in the game for that, but Rainer does offer an interesting analysis of Spielberg’s career trajectory. “Steven Spielberg, who at 22 was hired by Universal to a long-term contract, started out his career as the teacher's pet of the Movie Brat generation,” Rainer writes. “While many of his '70s confederates, who also were to include such directors as Terrence Malick, Jonathan Demme and Philip Kaufman, were attempting to work outside the industry, or subvert it from within through sheer force of artistry, Spielberg was directing episodes of Night Gallery and Marcus Welby, M.D. and then moving on to sharks and flying saucers.”

After doing his part to birth the modern-day blockbuster, however, Spielberg followed a traditional Hollywood road to respectability, moving on to important, “Oscar-worthy” work like Schindler’s List and Saving Private Ryan, movies which Rainer argues are “afflicted with a kind of transcendent Stanley Kramerism. We are made to understand that moral lessons are being imparted and that, in the end, tomorrow will somehow be a better day.” Spielberg only truly began to challenge himself, Rainer argues, with the darker fantasy pictures that followed: AI, Minority Report and War of the Worlds. While conceding that these are flawed films, “more fascinating as psychodrama than as drama,” he also makes the case that they “in many ways upend his beloved early work.”

Some are saying the same about Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull. But they don’t necessarily mean it as a compliment.

Regal Cinemas to Allow Trailers with Fart Jokes

Scott Von Doviak — Wed, 19 Mar 2008 17:00:00 GMT

As regular readers of the Screengrab know, trailers that begin with a green band graphic are approved for all audiences, while those that begin with a red band (pictured here) may contain strong language, violence, sexual imagery and other “objectionable” material. Red band trailers are rarely seen in theaters outside of art-houses; they’re generally confined to the web, even if they’re advertising PG-13 fare. This causes headaches for the makers of raunchy comedies like Superbad, who are unable to fully showcase the crude pleasures their movies have to offer for an audience that has already paid to see, say, Knocked Up.

At the ShoWest convention last week, one major theater chain decided this is just a little silly. Regal Entertainment Group, which operates over 6000 theaters in the United States, “has made the decision to program red band trailers on a case-by-case basis,” Regal spokesman Dick Westerling told the Hollywood Reporter. One catalyst for the change was the ShoWest screening of the red band trailer for Universal’s Forgetting Sarah Marshall. According to the Reporter, “The movie's green band trailer establishes its premise and plot, while the red band trailer gives a much fuller taste of its raunchy humor and sexual calisthenics, and it had exhibitors laughing.” Well, of course. No one enjoys sexual calisthenics more than motion picture exhibitors.

Universal president of marketing and distribution Adam Fogelson is obviously thrilled with Regal’s decision, although he does seem to recognize some limitations. “For example, it would not be appropriate for a red band trailer for a movie like American Pie to run in front of Schindler's List. We all want to be smart and careful about the use of red band trailers, working closely with our partners in exhibition. We don't want moviegoers seeing material that is inconsistent with the movies they are going to see.”

Here’s that red band trailer for Forgetting Sarah Marshall. Enjoy the sexual calisthenics!

Spielberg Talks Tough to Beijing

Phil Nugent — Mon, 18 Feb 2008 18:00:00 GMT

Steven Spielberg has stepped down from his role as "artistic adviser" to the Beijing Olympics, in protest against the Chinese government's failure to use its influence to stop the Darfur genocide. In a letter to Chinese president Hu Jintao that was released to the public last week, Spielberg wrote, "I add my voice to those who ask that China change its policy toward Sudan." Spielberg's decision comes a little less than a year after Mia Farrow, in a Wall Street Journal editorial, hit the Schindler's List director in the soft places by suggesting that for him "to sanitise Beijing's image" at a time when "China is bankrolling Darfur's genocide" would threaten to turn him into the modern equivalent of Leni Riefenstahl. Now that Spielberg has distanced himself from the Chinese government, Farrow told Slate's Kim Masters that she's thrilled about his having had what she calls "a Lillian Hellman moment." (Apparently Spielberg made the announcement while wearing his Blackgama fur and revealing that he had been the model for the character of Nora Charles.)

Masters reports that, "In response to the Spielberg news, a coalition of activist organizations promptly said they will run ads around the world decrying China's inaction. The next move will be pressuring corporate sponsors, including GE, McDonald's, and many other giant American corporations. Farrow is already asking the public to call these companies and speak out, and she has conveniently listed contact information on her Web site." All very admirable, though anyone who can remember, say, Tiananmen Square has to wonder if the Chinese government doesn't have a near-unique capacity for shaking off such things. Characteristically, the first reaction from the Chinese press has been to suggest that Spielberg is talking though his hat about complicated issues that he doesn't understand, though with conciliatory assurances that they think his chase scenes are great and his alien visitors darn cute.

Trailer Review: Defiance

Paul Clark — Fri, 25 Jan 2008 17:00:00 GMT

Oh baby, that Ed Zwick reeeeeeeeeeally wants an Oscar, doesn't he? Haven't failed to bring home the gold despite taking on the Civil War, Gulf War I, terrorism, the samurai lifestyle, and African conflict diamonds, now he's taking the tried-and-true route: a WW2 epic. More to the point, a drama about three brothers protecting a community of Jews from the Nazis. But Zwick being Zwick, there's much more action here than in such films as The Pianist and Schindler's List, with the brothers hiding their Jewish charges in the forest and arming them to fight back. When star Daniel Craig says, "we may be hunted like animals, but we will not become animals," it's hard not to be reminded of his character in Munich, who bluntly declared, "don't fuck with the Jews." After Blood Diamond and The Last Samurai, Zwick's got a lot of explaining to do, and unless I hear that he's somehow turned over a new leaf, I think I'll pass on this one.

Morning Deal Report: Scorsese and DiCaprio, Sitting in a Tree

Peter Smith — Tue, 23 Oct 2007 15:00:00 GMT

Martin Scorsese has announced his next project: the Dennis Lehane adaptation Shutter Island. (Dennis Lehane — so hot right now.) Once again, Scorsese will team up with his new De Niro, Leonardo DiCaprio. . .

Juno screenwriter Diablo Cody (now there's a handle) will direct much-discussed Transformers thespian Megan Fox in Jennifer's Body, a comedy about a cheerleader who kills boys due to demonic possession.

Great World of Sound director Craig Zobel has a new project: Turkey in the Straw, about a small-town political standoff in which a candidate shoots his competitor. I am very curious what this'll be like.

Julia Stiles falls in love with her stalker Paddy Considine in Cry of the Owl.

Steve Buscemi will take a major role in John Rabe, a sort of Chinese Schindler's List about a German businessman who saved hundreds of thousands of Chinese lives in the Nanjing massacre. (Buscemi plays American doctor Robert Wilson, not Rabe.) With no disrespect to Rabe's real heroism and humanity, it's interesting how many films use massive historical crimes to elevate the filmic heroism and humanity of their (usually white) heroes. Call it the Mississippi Burning syndrome. I hope Buscemi's good judgment is in effect here.

— Peter Smith