Friday, June 10, 2011

For your consideration — "It's not shtump" edition

The Warren Report (video): As part of her promo junket for The Beaver, Jodie Foster reveals that she'll be starring in a science-fiction movie with Matt Damon, directed by Neill Blomkamp (District 9). Lots more good stuff here too on clinical depression, mental groundedness, her kids, work as a survival tool, her approach to characters.... Warren was one of my instructors at TheFilmSchool and is among the best interviewers around. "Art gets me through, art and connection."

Self-Styled Siren: Anecdote of the Week: "That's Just Not an Orgasm" — When movie composer Dimitri Tiomkin got notes on how to score. "I like it, but it isn't orgasm music," said Selznick. "It's not shtump."

Roger Ebert's Journal: Godard's "Film Socialisme" in four minutes flat — "In connection with the premiere of this film at Cannes 2010, Jean-Luc Godard posted this four-minute version of it in fast-forward. He did not explain."

Jim Emerson: Into the Great Big Boring — "But now, 'boring' is hot, at least in overheated Interwebular film criticism circles, since the publication of Dan Kois' New York Times Magazine piece called 'Eating Your Cultural Vegetables,' in which he says..."

Also, Emerson revisits Days of Heaven after 20 years — "So, if you take the drama out of the dialog and the performances, where does it go? Into the world at large."

NYT: Ta-Nehisi Coates on X-Men: First Class — "When we left the theater, my son and I knew we had experienced the most thrilling movie of the summer. 'First Class' is narratively lean, beautifully acted and, at all the right moments, visually stunning. But I had experienced something else." He follows up on his Atlantic blog. Check the comments; on top of all his other smarts, the cat really knows his X-Men.

Slate: Slate's Hollywood Career-O-Matic — What Rotten Tomatoes data tell us about the best, worst, and most bizarre Hollywood trajectories.

Technology Review: The Five Worst (Hard) Science Fiction Movies Ever

Via Glenn Erickson: Backstage promo footage on the set of Roman Polanski's The Fearless Vampire Killers

Neil Gaiman: A Fairly Humongous Doctor Who Q&A Mostly — Answering questions about scripting "The Doctor's Wife" (mostly).

io9: Hula hoops and fish grenades: two contenders for the worst ninja fight ever


Via The New Yorker.

Fountain Square, Indianapolis
Via io9.



Music: Ella Fitzgerald
Near at hand: "The Woman Who Broke the Moon," first draft