Movie City Indie Archive for October, 2012

2012 FYC Screenplay Season Starts With Universal Pictures

Four screenplays from Universal Pictures’ 2012 slate are available for download: The Lorax; Snow White And The Hunter;  Ted, and prematurely, Judd Apatow‘s This Is 40.

Trailering HOLY MOTORS (2’33”) (U.S.)

That’s a trailer. (And “completely bonkers.”)

TIFF’s “VOD Killed The DVD Star” (1’03″04)

An “Industry Dialogue” with IFC Films’ Jonathan Sehring, Winnie Lau (VP Sales and Acquisitions, Fortissimo Films), Edward Burns, Tom Quinn (RADius-TWC) and Philip Knatchbull (Curzon Artificial Eye). From TIFF’s catalog description: “The last year has seen numerous independent films gross just as much or more through video on demand as through theatrical release. With independent filmmakers such as Edward Burns releasing films exclusively through VoD, and distributors such as Magnolia Pictures and the Weinstein Company’s Radius increasingly moving to multi-platform strategies, VoD seems poised to replace DVD and theatrical as the main distribution channel for independent films. Join Radius-TWC Co-President Tom Quinn, independent filmmaker Edward Burns and other industry experts for a discussion on how to properly position your film in the marketplace and maximize the potential of this burgeoning platform.”

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TIFF Moguls: Producer Jeremy Thomas (59’33”)

Rian Johnson’s “Clip-o-Matic” Reel For LOOPER (1’39”)

Looper clip-o-matic trailer from rcjohnso on Vimeo.

“This is a strange curiosity I thought might be interesting,” writes Johnson. “Just after I finished the script for Looper but before we began preproduction, I asked Joe to record some voiceover, and with help from my friend Ronen Verbit constructed this “fake trailer” using clips from other movies. This is a fairly common thing to do when you’re trying to get a movie off the ground, but it was the first time I tried it. It was meant to show more some of the film’s tone, and to show how the odd concept could be presented in a clear and compelling way in the marketing. Zach Johnson did the sketches. Note that we hadn’t begun the casting process yet, and the clips were chosen just based on their visuals and not by who is in them.”

Apichatpong Weerasethakul’s CACTUS RIVER (Khong Lang Nam) (10’08”)

Of his new film, Apichatpong Weerasethakul writes: “Since she appeared in my film in 2009, Jenjira Pongpas has changed her name. Like many Thais, she is convinced that the new name will bring her good luck. So Jenjira has become Nach, which means water. Not long after, she was drifting online and encountered a retired soldier, Frank, from Cuba, New Mexico, USA. A few months later they got married and she has officially become Mrs. Nach Widner.

“The newlyweds found a house near the Mekong River where Nach had grown up. She spends most of her day crocheting baby socks for sale, while he enjoys gardening and watching television (sometimes without the sound because most of the programs are in Thai).

Cactus River is a diary of the time I visited the couple—of the various temperaments of the water and the wind. The flow of the two rivers—Nach and the Mekong, activates my memories of the place where I shot several films. Over many years, this woman whose name was once Jenjira has introduced me to this river, her life, its history, and to her belief about its imminent future. She is certain that soon there will be no water in the river due to the upstream constructions of dams in China and Laos. I noticed too, that Jenjira was no more.”

Scorsese’s NYFF Memories, from the 1960s to now (4’14”)

ZERO DARK THIRTY trailer 2: two frames


“Her confidence.” All the implications of that shot with the reflection against a tattered stars-and-stripes under glass; the post-credit nightvision POV toward the house… cr.. cr.. unch. [Trailer #2.]

Savides on set of ELEPHANT (14’13”)

Rolling Through Time from Felix Andrew on Vimeo.

2xHarris Savides (RIP) (4’43″/2’48”)


Steve James On HOOP DREAMS (37’21”) at TIFF Lightbox

Trailiering HITCHCOCK: The Wrong And The Good (2’37”)

Really, Anthony Hopkins doesn’t look or sound like Hitchcock, but like a burlesque of the man’s self-advertisement, but a bon-bon of a burlesque it is. The sense of humor is wickedly… right. Then Helen Mirren’s Alma Reville asserting herself to bits and bobs of music by Woodkid? Mischief is afoot.

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It shows how out of it I was in trying to be in it, acknowledging that I was out of it to myself, and then thinking, “Okay, how do I stop being out of it? Well, I get some legitimate illogical narrative ideas” — some novel, you know?

So I decided on three writers that I might be able to option their material and get some producer, or myself as producer, and then get some writer to do a screenplay on it, and maybe make a movie.

And so the three projects were “Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep,” “Naked Lunch” and a collection of Bukowski. Which, in 1975, forget it — I mean, that was nuts. Hollywood would not touch any of that, but I was looking for something commercial, and I thought that all of these things were coming.

There would be no Blade Runner if there was no Ray Bradbury. I couldn’t find Philip K. Dick. His agent didn’t even know where he was. And so I gave up.

I was walking down the street and I ran into Bradbury — he directed a play that I was going to do as an actor, so we know each other, but he yelled “hi” — and I’d forgot who he was.

So at my girlfriend Barbara Hershey’s urging — I was with her at that moment — she said, “Talk to him! That guy really wants to talk to you,” and I said “No, fuck him,” and keep walking.

But then I did, and then I realized who it was, and I thought, “Wait, he’s in that realm, maybe he knows Philip K. Dick.” I said, “You know a guy named—” “Yeah, sure — you want his phone number?”

My friend paid my rent for a year while I wrote, because it turned out we couldn’t get a writer. My friends kept on me about, well, if you can’t get a writer, then you write.”
~ Hampton Fancher

“That was the most disappointing thing to me in how this thing was played. Is that I’m on the phone with you now, after all that’s been said, and the fundamental distinction between what James is dealing with in these other cases is not actually brought to the fore. The fundamental difference is that James Franco didn’t seek to use his position to have sex with anyone. There’s not a case of that. He wasn’t using his position or status to try to solicit a sexual favor from anyone. If he had — if that were what the accusation involved — the show would not have gone on. We would have folded up shop and we would have not completed the show. Because then it would have been the same as Harvey Weinstein, or Les Moonves, or any of these cases that are fundamental to this new paradigm. Did you not notice that? Why did you not notice that? Is that not something notable to say, journalistically? Because nobody could find the voice to say it. I’m not just being rhetorical. Why is it that you and the other critics, none of you could find the voice to say, “You know, it’s not this, it’s that”? Because — let me go on and speak further to this. If you go back to the L.A. Times piece, that’s what it lacked. That’s what they were not able to deliver. The one example in the five that involved an issue of a sexual act was between James and a woman he was dating, who he was not working with. There was no professional dynamic in any capacity.

~ David Simon