It has been fourteen years since writer-director Philip Ridley last made a film. Fourteen very long years. It’s not that he hasn’t been busy in the intervening time, it’s just that he’s been doing his work in live theater but as rewarding as that may be it is no help at all for fans of his work, such as myself, with the misfortune of having an ocean between ourselves and the theaters where these works are actually performed.
Ridley first burst into the public eye in 1990 with arty horror film The Reflecting Skin - which he wrote and directed - and gangster thriller The Krays - which he wrote - films he would follow up with the very Lynchian tale of religious hysteria, The Passion of Darkly Noon, in 1995. But since then? One piece of writing appearing on television and absolutely nothing else, a situation that seems a crime for a director of Ridley’s skills. But he’s back now with Heartless, a new supernatural thriller starring Jim Sturgess about to have its world premiere at the Film4 Frightfest. Here’s how the festival describes it:
From the director of THE REFLECTING SKIN comes HEARTLESS, a menacing and magical tale of Jamie (Jim Sturgess) born with a heart-shaped birthmark on his face. Shunned by those who find him repulsive, the photographer’s son lives in a part of London’s East End notorious for gang violence. When his mother is viciously murdered, Jamie realizes the thugs aren’t wearing disguises at all; they really are demons and hell on earth is beginning to plague the capital city. Yet all is not what it seems in enfant terrible Ridley’s unique horror fantasy landscape ingeniously informed by the current climate of fear running through every strata of modern society.
If Ridley’s past is any indication then expect something truly striking and unusual here and also take the casting of Jim Sturgess (21, 50 Dead Men Walking) as a sign that Sturgess’ star is continuing to rise as Ridley has an unerring eye for casting talent on the rise - his previous features starred Viggo Mortensen, Brendan Fraser and Ashley Judd before any of them had really broken. As for how striking this is going to be? Take a peek at the collection of stills linked below!
Once again, Michael Hawley helps the Twitch readership keep abreast of one film festival after the other in the San Francisco / Bay Area. Thanks, Michael!
The San Francisco Jewish Film Festival (SFJFF) turns a ripe young age of 29 this year, continuing its reign as the oldest and largest festival of its kind in the world. Over the course of 18 days (July 23 to August 10) SFJFF will present 71 films from 18 countries—showcasing the best Israeli and Jewish Diasporan cinema to emerge in the past year. Although I missed last week’s press conference announcing the line-up, I’ve poured over the catalog and compiled this list of ten programs I don’t want to miss.
Continue Reading "SFJFF09—Michael Hawley Anticipates the Line-Up"...
Oh, my ... this year marks the 10th anniversary of the London’s Film4 Frightfest and with the jam-packed lineup just announced I think it’s safe to say that they’ve outdone themselves. Examples? Take a deep breath: Indonesia’s Macabre, France’s La Horde, Norway’s Dead Snow, Japan’s Vampire Girl Versus Frankenstein Girl, Spain’s Hierro, Canada’s Smash Cut, the UK’s Triangle and a screening of the brand new, fully restored version of John Landis’ classic An American Werewolf in London! And, frankly, that’s just the tip of the proverbial iceberg ...
The festival runs from August 27th - 31st, check the full announcement below the break!
Continue Reading "Film4 Frightfest Is Packed With Goodness!"...
Bunny And The Bull is a comedy road movie set entirely in a flat. Stephen Turnbull hasn’t been outside in months and when he finds his mind hurtling back to the disastrous trek he took around Europe with his friend Bunny, a catalogue of adventures unfold. Starring Edward Hogg (Brothers Of The Head ) and Simon Farnaby (‘The Mighty Boosh’, ‘Jam & Jerusalem’), Bunny And The Bull promises to be a touching journey to the end of the room.
I am disappointed in you, Britain. Very disappointed, indeed. The promo reel for Paul King’sBunny and the Bull remains the favorite thing that I saw during my time in Cannes this year and I have been anxiously awaiting the chance to share King’s lo-fi Gonry-esque fantasy with the likes of all you Twitch readers. But, alas, despite an upcoming autumn release date in the UK there is no trailer yet released officially anywhere online and apparently, there’s not a soul alive who managed to capture the trailer when it aired on the UKs Channel Four a couple weeks back. Foresight, people! Foresight!
But all is not lost as the good people at Channel 4 have, at least, seen fit to release a new block of stills from the picture online and they’re looking fantastic. With its cardboard and duct tape approach to special effects and the imaginary road trip that propels the story, this is one that fans of Michel Gondry and Spike Jonez are going to die for ...
To the surprise of pretty much nobody [REC]2 - the sequel to the Spanish zombie hit that spawned Quarantine as an English language remake - has just been announced as the opening night film for the 2009 edition of Sitges. Sitges was the launching site for the original so expectations have always been that the sequel would take its bow there as well but just because a piece of news is expected doesn’t mean it’s not good.
Check the trailer and clips from [REC]2 below the break!
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It is obvious to any Twitchfilm reader who has been around long enough that we are big fans of English director Shane Meadows and his films A Room For Romeo Brass, Dead Man’s Shoes and This Is England. His latest film Le Donk & Scoz-ayz-ee just premiered at Edinburgh International Film Festival but he gave Empire the skinny on his next big film, a horror film, and one we’ve known about for a while now, Beware the Devil...
“It’s based on a book of the same name, based on the life of a guy who, by getting involved with Ouija boards and the occult by trying to disprove it, trying to take the piss out of it, got possessed, had to be exorcised, and later became an exorcist himself. The guy it happened to has died, but his son’s a novelist, and he helped him turn it into a book before he passed away, and now I’m working with him to turn it into a film.” Empire also said Meadows described Beware the Devil to us as “making Dead Man’s Shoes look like Play School”
The man with 30 films somewhere in the production ether has just added another project to his list. Lorenzo di Bonaventura, producer of the Transformers films and the upcoming G.I. Joe: Rise of Cobra feature has dipped his grubby hands once again into the 80s properties pool and won a bidding war- A BIDDING WAR!!! for the rights to make an Asteroids movie. Yes, yes, the game where you, a small triangle, shoot and destroy asteroids of varying shapes and sizes until you are mercilessly crushed by one of them yourself. Insert another quarter and go again!
Now, given that Asteroids was around in the days where back story and characters didn’t matter, we were too caught up in the actual state of the art video game action back then, this gives the script writer Matthew Lopez [Bedtime Stories and Race to Witch Mountain... I know] pretty much free reign to do what he wants and create an exciting world around the simple concept of blowing up Asteroids.
So let’s theorize and make up our own script shall we? Here’s what I can make up off the top of my head. Aliens have redirected asteroids from the belt in orbit around the Sun, that one between Mars and Jupiter, and they are launching them at Earth, hoping to wipe out the human race from a distance. It’s up to the Asteroid Defense Human Defenders [ADHD - get it?], a collection of young, hot, thrill seeking space pilots to intercept these Asteroids before they become Meteorites and plunge into the soft recesses of our fragile Earth. They’ll be doing some plunging into some soft recesses of their own because they are so young and hot and thrill seeking. Either an Asteroid will get through their defenses, kill millions, and one of the pilots will have this big emotional moment where they torture themselves in grief only get their vindication when Earth can finally launch an assault on this Alien race and these pilots will be asked to lead the charge once they arrive at the belt. Or, one of their pilots will die, planting themselves on the front side of a massive Asteroid, and everyone will have a joined emotional moment then everyone can get their vindication when Earth can finally launch an assault on this Alien race and these pilots will be asked to lead the charge once they arrive at the belt. There will be lots of special effects and lots of explosions [which you must have even though there is no sound in the vacuum of space] and I wouldn’t be surprised if it is done in Real 3D. After all, it’s Asteroids damnit!
What say you?
We are mighty big fans of Nimrod Antal‘s 2003 Hungarian subway drama, Kontroll, which at the time, due to its sense of style, humour and intensity, besides being a breath of fresh air in the stuffier Hungarian Cinema circles, also seemed like a Hollywood calling card of sorts. That proved true and resulted in the enjoyable thriller Vacancy and the decidedly more generic-looking Armoured which is on its way to the multiplex presently. But here is the blockbuster big-time moment for Antal, as he is being handed the keys to the Predator franchise. Hmmm, I find this to be pretty exciting. Antal had to beat out some tough competition, namely Neil Marshall, for the gig.
The 1987 original is practically canonized as one of the great 1980s beef-cake action pictures with great action and macho humour and sensibility. And the awesomeness of Predator 2 is often overlooked? I mean that quite seriously, Predator 2 rocks. Can Nimrod Antal and producer Robert Rodriguez stuff lightning in a bottle for a third go-around?
Either way, Robert Rodriguez‘s Troublemaker Studios is aiming for a fall start on Predators with elements of his 1994 screenplay draft and the KNB group practical special effects philosophy. Excited? Ready to wash the bile of the AVP films out of your craw?
Because Fantasia program director Mitch Davis is incredibly proud of and excited by this event and will positively explode if somebody doesn’t show it some love soon, I present the following:
HELL ON EARTH: THE FILMS OF BUDDY GIOVINAZZO
A special tribute to one of the USA’s most unsettling independent voices, known for his haunting depictions of everyday horrors: poverty, addiction, violence and abandonment. Enormously powerful, honest and raw, the shattering work of filmmaker and novelist Buddy Giovinazzo has rarely been shown in this country. To right this wrong, we’ll be paying special tribute to the man with the International Premiere of his new feature, LIFE IS HOT IN CRACKTOWN, and a special screening of the filmmaker’s own 16mm answer print of his seldom-seen director’s cut of COMBAT SHOCK. Giovinazzo will be in town to host both screenings. CRACKTOWN, which stars Kerry Washington, Illeana Douglas, Brandon Routh, RZA and Lara Flynn Boyle, opened this past Friday (July 26) in the United States, to critical acclaim, albeit in a version that needed to be toned down before it could get into theatres. We will be screening Giovinazzo’s original cut, the first time the complete version will have been seen anywhere in the world.
My review for Public Enemies is now available over at Showcase, so I’m bumping this back up with a link included below.]
Yes, I’ve just returned home from a screening of Michael Mann’s Public Enemies - my full review will be up as my column at Showcase tomorrow, I’ll link to it then - and this is the official place for those who have seen the film to discuss it as loud and long as they want. Spoilers are okay here, so if you don’t want to know, don’t read.
As for me? There are certainly flashes of Michael Mann’s particular brilliance - lots of ‘em - but on the whole this doesn’t really live up to his body of work as a whole. Bale is bland and the film as a whole suffers from an extreme case of bloat. Depp is great, though, as are Stephen Graham and Billy Crudup in support roles. On the whole I rate it just okay, which is a pretty major disappointment considering I was expecting excellence.
So, Ricky’s first feature film as director, writer and lead actor is on its way. I’ll make no bones about it, I am a fan, and although Ghost Town was a slightly underwhelming first foray into leading man territory it was affable enough with charm and sarcastic wit to spare. Taking more creative control this time round, The Invention Of Lying should see him hit his stride with more of the edgy humour from his stand-up routines and The Office, though at first glance the trailer has a whiff of 12A muting. An eclectic if not entirely undesirable supporting cast includes Patrick Stewart, Rob Lowe and an ever expanding Jonah Hill. I’m hopeful.
The Invention of Lying takes place in an alternate reality in which lying - even the concept of a lie - does not even exist. Everyone from politicians to advertisers, to the man and woman on the street speaks the truth and nothing but the truth with no thought of the consequences. But when a down-on-his-luck loser named Mark (Ricky Gervais) suddenly develops the ability to lie, he finds that dishonesty has its rewards. In a world where every word is assumed to be the absolute truth, Mark easily lies his way to fame and fortune. But lies have a way of spreading, and Mark begins to realise that things are getting a little out of control when some of his tallest tales are being taken as, well, gospel. With the entire world now hanging on his every word, there is only one thing Mark has not been able to lie his way into: the heart of the woman he loves.
You can check out the trailer below the break. It’s due an October 2009 theatrical release in UK.
Continue Reading "Ricky Gervais in a trailer for THE INVENTION OF LYING"...
Once again, Michael Hawley privileges the Twitch readership with his preview of YBCA’s upcoming calendar. Thanks, Michael!
Norwegian Black Metal, Graphic Sexual Horror and a Headless Woman. Jeez, is it Halloween already? No, it’s just this summer’s insouciant film/video line-up at the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts. But before we dig into what curator Joel Shepard has in store through September, here’s exciting news for YBCA filmgoers. Starting July 6, ticket holders will be allowed FREE admittance into YBCA’s exhibition galleries, whose days and hours of operation have been adjusted to align with evening film and video screenings.
Continue Reading "Michael Hawley Previews YBCA’s Summer 2009 Lineup"...
Seventy years later and 1939 is still hailed as a benchmark year for Hollywood cinema. Celebrating that fact, this evening The Castro Theatre launches its 18-film tribute to 1939, including such classics as Son of Frankenstein and The Man They Could Not Hang, At the Circus and You Can’t Cheat An Honest Man, They Made Me A Criminal and Each Dawn I Die, The Women and Ninotchka, Mr. Smith Goes to Washington and Destry Rides Again, Wuthering Heights and Goodbye, Mr. Chips, Tarzan Finds A Son and Another Thin Man, Gunga Din and The Hunchback of Notre Dame, wrapping up with Golden Boy and Only Angels Have Wings.
If you prefer your home entertainment system to a movie palace, at least 10 of those titles are likewise included in Turner Classic Movies’ 39-film tribute “1939—70th Anniversary of Hollywood’s Greatest Year.” Each Thursday night through the month of July, TCM will shoot off 1939’s most celebrated fireworks, including all 10 Best Picture Oscar® Nominees (reminding—in the light of recent events—that everything old is new again). Robert Osborne offers a preview of the festival at Now Playing: The Show and the full schedule can be found at TCM’s website. TCM’s “39 From 1939” Film Festival also features the premiere of the new Warner Home Video documentary 1939 (2009), which recounts the astonishing accomplishments of Hollywood during this historic film year.
The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences has, of course, been screening all 10 Best Picture Oscar® Nominees throughout the Summer, with only four screenings left to go.
Of related interest, at One Way Street Alan Rode angles in on 1939 by way of a sterling portrait of “the incredible twelve month run of film roles by the great character actor, Thomas Mitchell.”
And, of course, no survey of any given year in cinema history would be complete without a tip of the hat to Thom Ryan’s Film of the Year. He chose Confessions of a Nazi Spy as his focus on 1939.
So, out of sheer curiosity, what is your favorite film from 1939?
Cross-published on The Evening Class.
You can do little wrong when you decide to go to Montreal for the Fantasia International Film Festival and this year’s lineup proves to be no exception. Want a taste? David Morley’s MUTANTS, Adam Mason’s BLOOD RIVER, José Mojica Marins’ EMBODIMENT OF EVIL, Tom Shankland’s THE CHILDREN, Park Chan-wook’s THIRST and Satoshi Miki’s INSTANT SWAMP are just some of the titles at this year’s festival.
There is a lengthy announcement after the break. Take your time and we are sure you’ll find some must-sees. Then we’ll see you in Montreal between July 9th and 27th.
Continue Reading "FANTASIA 2009 announces lineup. She be a doozy!!!"...
The brutal, ultra-hard horror film The Collector, which was formerly known as The Midnight Man, is going to be one of the key horror titles of 2009. The film tells the story of an ex-con who plans to steal a rare jewel from a house while the family is away. The only problem is that a masked marauder entered the house earlier in the night and turned it into a gigantic man-trap. Director Marcus Dunstan,who also produced Feast and wrote Saw IV-VI, made the The Collector with hardcore horror fans in mind. The film is set-up like a thriller, but it slyly switches gears after the first act, and turns into an amped-up, non-stop bloodbath.
The Collector is set for U.S. theatrical release on July 31, 2009. The MPAA’s “R” rating should be prefaced by the word “hard.” For those who cannot wait, Fantastic Fest has teamed up with Scott Weinberg’s new Horror Squad site for a special screening at the Alamo Drafthouse on July 22nd, 2009. Information about the screening as well as some still images can be pursued at the links below.
