Thursday, September 24th, 2009

If I do have any readers, you will surely know by now that I adore Werner Herzog's filmmaking style. There is truly no other filmmaker quite like the helmer of Fitzcarraldo. All of the stories from the makings of Herzog's films are almost certainly and consistently more entertaining than the films themselves. Maybe Herzog realizes what a treasure trove he is, and what a lost art his guerilla style filmmaking has become, because Cinematical points out a new site to recruit aspiring directors to join Herzog's Rogue Film School to teach you all the things that actual film school will not. In the about section of the website, points eight and ten tell exactly why one would want to join a class taught by one of cinema's greatest visionaries.

"8. Related, but more practical subjects, will be the art of lockpicking. Traveling on foot. The exhilaration of being shot at unsuccessfully. The athletic side of filmmaking. The creation of your own shooting permits. The neutralization of bureaucracy. Guerrilla tactics. Self reliance.

9. Censorship will be enforced. There will be no talk of shamans, of yoga classes, nutritional values, herbal teas, discovering your Boundaries, and Inner Growth."

The site also notes that there will be another class in 2010 on the east coast. So, if anybody's looking for a birthday/Christmas or whatever the hell else you buy gifts for idea, the $1,500 enrollment to the Rogue Film School would be accepted.

In other news, The Hollywood Reporter's Risky Business Blog has announced that David Cronenberg is in talks with Fox to write and direct a remake of Cronenberg's own critically acclaimed 1986 remake of the 1958 Vincent Price vehicle The Fly. I never really thought that The Fly warranted another remake, but if Cronenberg is aboard, my curiosity will get me in the seats. Also, who else is hoping that Jeff Goldblum will also return?

Bukowskis has the viewing for Ingmar Bergman's personal possessions that are to be auctioned off online at the moment until the auction actually begins on the 28th. Really, aside from a swivel chair, everything on the site looks amazing. The item that I'm interested at how much it will go for is the wooden chess set used in The Seventh Seal.

Finally, The Wrap has reported that Disney has trashed David Mamet's script treatment of The Diary of Anne Frank, which wasn't even set in the Holocaust, nor was the main character Anne Frank. Whenever the original story was announced, I have to admit, I wasn't as shocked as some, seeing that I'm not all that familiar with Mamet's work, and saw no real problem with him pairing with Disney for an adaptation of Frank's writings. I think I was personally more worried about the years and years of Walt Disney's alleged anti-Semitism being projected in a big budget movie about the suffering of the Jewish people. Regardless, I guess for the time being, both the national media's fears of Mamet and mine of Disney's history of racism have both been quelled.

Thursday, September 17th, 2009

Occasionally, I'll feel the need to stop watching or reading about movies online long enough to bitch at the ol' telly during an episode of Glen Beck's Fox News program. I've often wondered exactly how the entire "death panel" thing he harps about all the time would work. The accompanying picture there, via Geekologie, says it all. On a side note, I'm sure most African Americans have to be disappointed after Barack Obama came out as a fan of The Amazing Spider-Man comics, and now wielding a light saber, he's way whiter than even Jimmy Carter.

I just read an article on Yahoo! News Canada, while covering the Toronto International Film Festival, that Nicolas Cage gave an interview and claimed to had dropped out of The Green Hornet's villainous role due to the character not having enough humanity in the script, even having the audacity to point out that Seth Rogen and Evan Goldberg's treatment had a different take on Chudnofsky. Before I join the ranks of bloggers that are building a tower of bitch around Cage for taking basically any role given to him, be it something genius like Charlie and Donald Kaufman in Spike Jonze's Adaptation., or ill fated attempts at a Ghost Rider movie, a remake of The Wicker Man and so on and on, I do have to admit that I enjoy Cage a little and despite his inability to choose a good role, do not necessarily agree with the majority that casting the former Academy Award winner (for Leaving Las Vegas) to be the cinematic equivalent of drinking poison. Still, how much do you think Cage was kicking himself to find out that Christoph Waltz, fresh off of the huge success of Inglourious Basterds, is rumored to be filling his shoes.

Of course, Cage was at TIFF promoting Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans, Werner Herzog's remake of Abel Ferrara's 1992 cult classic. I have attempted not to blog much about this flick as I love Herzog and hate to talk about what is sure to be a huge failure (Cage is joined by Eva Mendes and Xzibit, need I say more). Anyhow, I ran across this older article from Vulture, indicating how much Ferrara hates Herzog for the film, and how little Herzog knows about his fellow director or the film that he is remaking. Interesting read, and despite how terrible the film looks, as always, Herzog is more of a story than the film itself.

Before we can even get over the passing of Patrick Swayze as a nation, Henry Gibson has now passed along. Among other things, Gibson starred in The Nutty Professor (Jerry Lewis, not Eddie Murphy), Nashville, The Kentucky Fried Movie, The Blues Brothers, Innerspace, Magnolia and Wedding Crashers. IWatchStuff has a decent little article about him, including a clip from Magnolia.

Variety reports that the University of Southern California will now be offering a stereoscopic 3-D course. I hate that 3-D is taking over, and want to believe that it is a fad, but most of all, I still just hope that My Bloody Valentine doesn't go down in history as the movie that changed everything.

Thursday, August 27th, 2009

Yesterday, whilst blogging about the first shot of Sigourney Weaver in James Cameron's upcoming science fiction opus, Avatar, I spoke briefly on how we were yet to get to a complete media onslaught. Perhaps, I was wrong, as two major stories come from the film today. First is the unprecedented news that fifty IMAX theaters have already began pre-sales to the midnight showing of the flick that is rumored to revolutionize the medium of 3-D, on December 18th, a full four months and some odd days away. Even more shocking that 20th Century Fox has already started pre-sales is the fact that, via an article at Variety, MovieTickets and Fandango have already reported "healthy" sales for Avatar. This means another day I have to request off of work tomorrow.

Secondly, and quite possibly the stupidest story I've reported in some time, Fathom Studios, according to Movieline, is threatening to sue Cameron and Fox over the similarities between one of the biggest flops in cinematic history, the animated Delgo, and Cameron's upcoming Avatar. This whole story began last week after the debut of Avatar's trailer, when some of the more underwhelmed fans didn't buy into all the hype that had been generating over Cameron's supposed masterpiece, found a few stills that looked similar to the horrendous Delgo, posted a side-by-side comparison, and let the ridicule flow. I find it hard to believe that anybody at Fathom Studios, who more than likely lost personal money on this, could believe that one of the modern masters of the science fiction genre would steal an idea from an animated flick aimed mainly at children, that holds the record for worst box office intake for a film opening in 2,000 or more theaters. In fact, with the little independent CGI picture having a budget of roughly $40 million, and a gross of just under $695,000, the film took home an approximate loss of $39,305,000. As for what the critics thought, Delgo currently holds a 14% on Rotten Tomatoes. To make the entire fiasco even more confusing, Fox currently holds the home video distribution rights to the 2008 disaster. Although, on a side note, the last Cameron film to face a frivolous lawsuit was The Terminator, after Harlan Ellison sued Cameron for a writing credit after the director claimed to have been influenced by two episodes of The Outer Limits that Ellison had wrote. Ellison now holds an "acknowledgment to the works of" credit on the home video/DVD versions of Terminator, let's just hope that while sitting in the IMAX in four months, we don't have to read a credit to Marc F. Adler. Who? Exactly.

In other news, USA Today reported that Steven Spielberg is going to team up again with the late Michael Crichton, in an adaptation of his upcoming posthumous release of Pirate Latitudes. Of course, the team is best known for collaborating on the visually stunning 1993 movie Jurassic Park and its sequel The Lost World. The article also states that DreamWorks has tapped the talent of David Koepp, the screenwriter that adapted the aforementioned Crichton novels into Spielberg films will be returning. With a lot of Spielberg news going here and there lately, including a remake of Harvey and the big screen version of XBox's Halo, we are yet to learn if he will direct or just produce the film. Either way, possibly something to look forward to.

I've mentioned Werner Herzog in the last few blogs after seeing that he has an upcoming film with My Son, My Son, What Have Ye Done. One thing I have yet to mention though, is one of the more entertaining aspects of the director's personal life, was his estranged friendship with the ever-so bizarre actor Klaus Kinski, most notably highlighted in the unique documentary My Best Friend. Therefore, it is perfect timing that Cinematical has a good compilation of behind-the-scenes blow-ups from Kinski, including his work in two Herzog greats, Aguirre, the Wrath of God and Fitzcarraldo.

Finally, Geekologie led me to an interesting site called ThreeFrames. Simple, entertaining concept. A preview...

Sunday, August 23rd, 2009 (Short Film Sunday: Werner Herzog Eats His Shoe)

On Wednesday, I featured the new trailer for the film My Son, My Son, What Have Ye Done on the blog. Upon watching it though, I was slightly disappointed. Was it bad? Did it look like a terrible movie? Not at all, but coming from director Werner Herzog and producer David Lynch, I feel a little let down if I'm not completely mindfucked in a groundbreaking event of cinema. Also, regardless of how good the film turns out, it has given all of us movie bloggers a reason to talk about the two ingenious, truly original directors, in particularly Herzog's antics as director since he is helming the upcoming feature.

I'll start by saying, if the chance ever presents itself to watch a Werner Herzog interview, you'll be doing yourself a favor by doing so. Not only is most of his classic films engaging, the stories behind the camera is usually as fascinatingly entertaining as anything the visionary puts on screen. One great story he often tells when interviewed is about his somewhat bizarre 1970 film Even Dwarfs Started Small. In the film, to make the dwarfs feel more comfortable with his stunts and not feel exploited, Herzog jumped into a cactus for the sole entertainment of his mostly unknown cast of smaller actors. Yet, maybe his best behind-the-scenes story comes courtesy of two films in which he didn't take the director's chair.

The story begins in 1978 with documentarian Errol Morris and his very critically acclaimed movie, Gates of Heaven. The low budget documentary from newcomer Morris chronicled the daily lives of those involved in the pet cemetery business. The seemingly unmarketable film was eventual released and was even at one time on Roger Ebert's top ten films of all time in any genre. Morris' vision will be remembered for many things, but quite possibly more than all, it will be remembered for a wager that Herzog made with him, claiming he would eat his shoe if Gates of Heaven could be completed and secure a release in a public theater.

Being a man of his word, Herzog would fly in from Germany to the premiere of Morris' film at the UC Theater in Berkeley, California, and would prepare and cook the shoes he was wearing when he originally laid down the challenge. Herzog chose to eat the shoe in front of an audience in order to bring some much needed publicity to Morris' film, and would also invite another documentary filmmaker, Les Blank, along to keep the lenses on Herzog's entire adventure, ultimately making a short film that would be as fondly remembered as anything in any of the three men's careers, the twenty minute featured short tonight, Werner Herzog Eats His Shoe.

The short highlights Herzog's entertaining personality, as well as being the first time Blank and Herzog would work together. Blank would go on to direct his most successful and popular feature-length film, Burden of Dreams, documenting the difficulties in the making of Herzog's highly praised Fitzcarraldo. I've never heard exactly why Blank was chosen as the director of this particular short, but I would personally expect it to be because at the same time he was working on a documentary Garlic Is as Good as Ten Mothers, focusing on cooking with garlic, one of the major preparations by Herzog and famed chef Alice Waters used on the shoe in the film. Maybe that in itself will be another great story to hear the director tell in an interview I've yet to see.

So without further adieu, enjoy the wonderful 1980 short, Werner Herzog Eats His Shoe.
Werner Herzog Eats His Shoe