WSJ: How does the notion of aging and death affect the work you do? Has it become more urgent?
CM: Your future gets shorter and you recognize that. In recent years, I have had no desire to do anything but work and be with [son] John. I hear people talking about going on a vacation or something and I think, what is that about? I have no desire to go on a trip. My perfect day is sitting in a room with some blank paper. That’s heaven. That’s gold and anything else is just a waste of time.
WSJ: How does that ticking clock affect your work? Does it make you want to write more shorter pieces, or to cap things with a large, all-encompassing work?
CM: I’m not interested in writing short stories. Anything that doesn’t take years of your life and drive you to suicide hardly seems worth doing.
WSJ: The last five years have seemed very productive for you. Have there been fallow periods in your writing?
CM: I don’t think there’s any rich period or fallow period. That’s just a perception you get from what’s published. Your busiest day might be watching some ants carrying bread crumbs. Someone asked Flannery O’Connor why she wrote, and she said, “Because I was good at it.” And I think that’s the right answer. If you’re good at something it’s very hard not to do it. In talking to older people who’ve had good lives, inevitably half of them will say, “The most significant thing in my life is that I’ve been extraordinarily lucky.” And when you hear that you know you’re hearing the truth. It doesn’t diminish their talent or industry. You can have all that and fail.
via Cormac McCarthy on The Road – WSJ.com.
rePost::15. Inside Terry Gilliam’s head | JessicarulestheUniverse
On the fence whether I was going to watch this. Now, I probably will.
Imaginarium is the film Heath Ledger was doing at the time of his death, and it takes three fine actors to fill the vacancy: Johnny Depp, Jude Law, and Colin Farrell. Having four actors play the same role usually leads to confusion, but in this case it actually makes sense—the character’s appearance depends on the person who’s looking at him. The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus feels like a big, fantastic pop-up book: the spectacle overwhelms the story, but do you really care?
via 15. Inside Terry Gilliam’s head | JessicarulestheUniverse.
rePost::Marc Webb To Direct New Spider-Man Trilogy!? | /Film
I loved watching 500 days of summer and really wanted film makers like Marc Webb who has a sense of ; style and vision, and the chops to execute. I feel that a lot of film makers are found in extremes, between trying to please only themselves and to please most people, or the other extremes trying to please movie studio execs. I hope Marc Webb does the reboot well, is a christopher nolan too much to ask from this obviously talented director? I hope not. I came in with high expectations when I watched 500 days of summer, too high, yet I was not let down.
Last week it was reported that (500) Days of Summer helmer Marc Webb was at the top of the list of candidates to helm a Spider-Man reboot. Vulture now has breaking word that Webb is signed on to direct, not only the Spider-Man reboot, but a new Spider-Man trilogy. That’s right, three movies!
The reboot allows Sony to clean house of all the high price-tag cast and crew from the original trilogy. Webb will be paid roughly $10 million for the first film, with reported substantial bonuses built in “if the picture reaches certain box-office milestones.” Sam Raimi was paid $10 million for the original Spider-Man film, but that was nearly ten years ago. The Evil Dead director’s agreement included a percentage of the film’s grosses (nearly 25 percent when combined with star Tobey Maguire on the last sequel).
via Marc Webb To Direct New Spider-Man Trilogy!? | /Film.
rePost::13*. Daybreakers: the Malthusiastic vampires | JessicarulestheUniverse
How do you know you and your friends are geeky? When after watching a movie you debate what happens in the world after the movie, specifically how the population would be affected sans in malthusian terms. I enjoyed this film because its a film that I believed started with a concept and not the stars. Although better acting and a more developed story (I don’t remember but I believe the film was little over 1hour 40 mins, they had more time if they really wanted to). It’s also commendable that they didn’t go the B-movie route of a little more nudity than was really warranted by the story (half-lie, the movie lover in me commends, the man does not, you had isabel lucas and you didn’t even try? come on…). Another weak point of the film is the relationship between sam oniel and her daughter. (spoiler alert)You’d save your daughter by turning her to a vamp, but you didn’t think about force feeding her he blood rations? All in all I went with little expectations and was thus delightfully surprised with what I saw.
What we have here is a high-concept film that brings up existential questions, Malthusian economics, and parasite biology (For a parasite to be successful, it must not only refrain from killing off its host but also ensure that the host thrives. See the toxo that lives in cats. Compared to toxo the vampire organism is greedy and stupid). However the filmmakers’ skills are strictly B-grade: cheap shock tactics from the Salem’s Lot school, blood and gore splattered across the screen, and ham acting from Neill and Willem Dafoe as the human rebel leader. Ethan at least takes the movie seriously (We still love him, even if one shot caused Noel and I to gasp, “Malaki na ang balakang ni Ethan!”)
So Daybreakers is an entertaining mix of the clever and the cheesy; we’ll call it Camembert. My rating: If you can spot existentialism, Malthusian economics, and parasite biology in a B-movie, String! (The best way to enjoy the movies is to entertain yourself.) If you like fangs, blood, gore, Kibble. If you expect a prestige project, Litterbox.
via 13*. Daybreakers: the Malthusiastic vampires | JessicarulestheUniverse.
rePost::The best films of the decade – Roger Ebert's Journal
The best films of the decade
By
Roger Ebert
on December 30, 2009 3:53 PM | Permalink | Comments (718)
synch hoiffman.jpg”Synecdoche, New York” is the best film of the decade. It intends no less than to evoke the strategies we use to live our lives. After beginning my first viewing in confusion, I began to glimpse its purpose and by the end was eager to see it again, then once again, and I am not finished. Charlie Kaufman understands how I live my life, and I suppose his own, and I suspect most of us. Faced with the bewildering demands of time, space, emotion, morality, lust, greed, hope, dreams, dreads and faiths, we build compartments in our minds. It is a way of seeming sane.
The mind is a concern in all his screenplays, but in “Synecdoche” (2008), his first film as a director, he makes it his subject, and what huge ambition that demonstrates. He's like a
novelist who wants to get it all into the first book in case he never publishes another. Those who felt the film was disorganized or incoherent might benefit from seeing it again. It isn't about a narrative, although it pretends to be. It's about a method, the method by which we organize our lives and define our realities.
Very few people live their lives on one stage, in one persona, wearing one costume. We play different characters. We know this and accept it. In childhood we begin as always the same person but quickly we develop strategies for our families, our friends, our schools. In adolescence these strategies are not well controlled. Sexually, teenagers behave one way with some dates and a different way with others. We find those whose have a persona that matches one of our own, and that defines how we interact with that person. If you aren't an aggressor and are sober, there are girls (or boys) you do it with and others you don't, and you don't want those people to discover what goes on away from them.
via The best films of the decade – Roger Ebert’s Journal.
I trust ebert’s judgement in most anything not action/comedy/non-intellectual. I still don’t know how to think about Synecdoche NY, what I do know is that it speaks to me in a way that I do not know or won’t admit to myself yet.
rePost::Comparing the 1990s and the 2000s: What Our Movies Say About Us | /Film
I was thinking of my – what was my favorite movie of the decade? It was “Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind,” written by Charlie Kaufman and directed by Michel Gondry. And I was trying to think what that film thematically says about the…aughts, and I think that the idea of the tension between reality and fantasy has gotten more pronounced in the last decade, and the ways in which – the movie is sort of like a Philip K. Dick paranoid fever-dream wedded to a screwball romance. And there’s no way it could happened, the technology wouldn’t have allowed it, and the sensibility wouldn’t have allowed it in any other decade.
via Comparing the 1990s and the 2000s: What Our Movies Say About Us | /Film.
read the whole thing its a time sink with links to such excellent lists and articles!!!!
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Favorite Films of This Decade 2000-2009
- Eternal Sunshine of The Spotless Mind
- Be Kind Rewind
- Synecdoche New York
- Lucia Y El Sexo (Lucia and Sex)
- Rattatouile /UP / Wall-E
- Avatar
- Brick
- Requiem For A Dream
- There Will Be Blood / Punch Drunk Love
- Memento / The Dark Night / The Majestic
- Infernal Affairs Series + The Departed
- Almost Famous
- The Hours
- Daywatch / Nightwatch
- Shaun of the Dead
- Pan’s Labyrinth
- Forgetting Sarah Marshall
- 40 Year Old Virgin
- For The Love Of The Game (1999 Thanks for the update chuck!)
- Battle Royale
- Lost In Translation
- The Royal Tenenbaums
- Hero (The movie with Jet Lee)
- Adaptation (Mental Quirk Watch This With Being John Malkovich, I don’t now what made me think it was from the 90’s)
I haven’t seen but would love to see:
- Amorres Perros
- Mulholland Dr. (Come on david lynch)
- Anything Lar’s Von Trier (Haven’t seen anything from this director)
- Jonah Hill‘s recent movies
- Up in the Air
- The Hurt Locker
rePost::James Cameron Is The First Director To Have Two $1 Billion Films: Avatar Passes $1 Billion Worldwide in Just 17 Days | /Film
And what about yearly records? Transformers Revenge of the Fallen took 114 days to hit $402 million, becoming the highest grossing film of 2009 domestically. Avatar will surpass that figure in an estimated 20 days.
via James Cameron Is The First Director To Have Two $1 Billion Films: Avatar Passes $1 Billion Worldwide in Just 17 Days | /Film.
Is it wrong to feel comforted that Cameron beat Michael Bay’s Transformers Revenge of the Fallen?
rePost::Avatar :: rogerebert.com :: Reviews
Avatar
BY ROGER EBERT / December 11, 2009
Cast & Credits
Jake Sully Sam Worthington
Neytiri Zoe Saldana
Grace Sigourney Weaver
Col. Miles Quaritch Stephen Lang
Trudy Chacon Michelle Rodriguez
Parker Selfridge Giovanni Ribisi
Norm Spellman Joel David Moore
Moat CCH Pounder
Eytukan Wes Studi
Tsu’tey Laz Alonso
Dr. Max Patel Dileep Rao
Corporal Lyle Wainfleet Matt Gerald
20th Century Fox presents film written and directed by James Cameron. Running time: 163 minutes. MPAA rating: PG-13 (for intense epic battle sequences and warfare, sensuality, language and some smoking).
Watching “Avatar,” I felt sort of the same as when I saw “Star Wars” in 1977. That was another movie I walked into with uncertain expectations. James Cameron’s film has been the subject of relentlessly dubious advance buzz, just as his “Titanic” was. Once again, he has silenced the doubters by simply delivering an extraordinary film. There is still at least one man in Hollywood who knows how to spend $250 million, or was it $300 million, wisely.
“Avatar” is not simply a sensational entertainment, although it is that. It’s a technical breakthrough. It has a flat-out Green and anti-war message. It is predestined to launch a cult. It contains such visual detailing that it would reward repeating viewings. It invents a new language, Na’vi, as “Lord of the Rings” did, although mercifully I doubt this one can be spoken by humans, even teenage humans. It creates new movie stars. It is an Event, one of those films you feel you must see to keep up with the conversation.
via Avatar :: rogerebert.com :: Reviews.
Hmm, I was really obsessing on the fact that we have the Metro Manila Film Fest this Dec 25 to the 1st week of January. Was wondering how I would be able to watch this at least twice. Hope it is as good as it is said. Need to watch this at IMAX. I’m babbling. I am really excited!!
On James Cameron being such a hippie, we need someone like cameron to counteract micheal bay , enough said!
rePost::Roger Ebert's Journal: Political Archives
Is there the great Filipino Documentary? If there is would someone please let me know.
For those people who can access joost here is the link to the whole film
http://www.joost.com/37rhklr/t/Hoop-Dreams#id=37rhklr
One noble purpose of documentaries, he said, is to be on the side of the kinds of people asking that question. Then he quoted words by Studs Terkel that summarized the spirist of William Gates, Arthur Agee, the makers of “Hoop Dreams” and the film itself: “I live in a community, and if the community isn’t in good shape, neither am I.”
via Roger Ebert’s Journal: Political Archives.