Posted on June 26, 2016 at 3:55 pm
Aaron Sorkin (“The West Wing,” “Moneyball,” “The Social Network”) is teaching an online master class in screenwriting. Whether you dream of writing great films or television series or just want to learn how to communicate more effectively, this is an extraordinary opportunity.
Posted on June 26, 2016 at 2:45 pm
The Disney Channel has a new — and family-friendly– remake of the Elisabeth Shue classic Adventures in Babysitting. Here’s a sneak peek.
Posted on June 26, 2016 at 1:56 pm
Werner Herzog is not only one of the most brilliant directors in the history of world cinema; he is also unique in the span of his films, equally impressive in narrative features and documentaries. After a decade of pleading from the AFI Docs festival for the chance to recognize his work at their Charles Guggenheim Symposium, the busy director finally agreed to attend and permit a tribute to his work that included an interview on stage and a screening of his new film about the internet, “Lo And Behold: Reveries of the Connected World.”
Herzog was interviewed by another outstanding director, Ramin Bahrani (“Goodbye Solo,” “99 Homes”). Both were championed by Roger Ebert, who brought them together for a collaboration — the wonderful short film “Future States,” with Herzog providing the voice for the existentially troubled central character, a plastic bag.
Herzog’s documentary may cover some of the most advanced technology in the world, but he does not have a cell phone, he says, “for cultural reasons. Our examination of the world should not only be through applications.” When Bahrani complimented his “location-based” images, Herzog said, “I’m good with locations. I can direct landscapes.” Whether he is shooting burning oil fields in Kuwait (“Lessons of Darkness”), the face of a deaf/blind woman on her first airplane flight (“Land of Silence and Darkness”), or the soft-drink-machine size computer that sent the very first two-letter message over the internet (“Lo and Behold”), his camera movements and images are vital and engaging. He spoke of the importance of being on top of the mechanics of filming (“I am a very pragmatic filmmaker”) and of the poetry, a sort of choreography of the camera, as he conveys “the dance between the actors and the location.”
He distinguished his documentary films from the prevalent approach to non-fiction filmmaking, which he considers more like journalism, “belonging more to television than in a theater.” He is frank about his departure from the conventions of cinema verite; he has no hesitation in asking a subject to move or answer again, to “go beyond the mere facts” in search of “narrative power.” “Illumination is more important than facts….I’m looking for deeper poetry.” But that does not necessarily mean pretty pictures. He will avoid shooting a sunset, calling it “romanticized beauty.”
He says there are things you cannot learn in film school, like “know(ing) the heart of men.” What filmmakers should learn in film school are the tools it takes to get the film made: “lock picking and forging shooting permits.”
Herzog makes films when “there is a story so big I cannot resist.” And he does not stop. “I plow on.”
Posted on June 24, 2016 at 4:25 pm
I live and have worked in Washington DC, and more often than not we find our city badly misrepresented in movies. But this one is different because “The Congressman” was written and directed by someone who knows Washington and politics from the inside,former Long Island Congressman Robert J. Mrazek. It stars Treat Williams, George Hamilton, Elizabeth Marvel and Ryan Merriman. It is available on VOD and is showing in select cinemas.
Here Treat Williams as Congressman Charlie Winship gives a speech about what it means to be American, and to be patriotic, following the aftermath of controversy that occurred when video footage showing that he did not say the pledge of allegiance went viral. He addresses the kind of petty symbolism that our gotcha media focus on and what the principles our country was founded on really mean.
Posted on June 24, 2016 at 12:33 pm
Twenty years ago, Jeff Goldblum and Will Smith flew into an alien mothership and uploaded a computer virus in a movie that is still one of the definitive summer blockbusters, Independence Day. Two decades later, moviemaking technology has made a lot of progress, and it has some striking visuals, but it is missing a lot of the brio of the first, especially Will Smith. This is one of those movies with a story that involves billions of people around the world but pretty much the same six people keep running into each other and their relationship issues are as important as the impending attack that in military terms is deemed “extinction level.”
The alien attack of 1996 did something humans were not able to accomplish on their own after thousands of years. It united the world, which came together to adapt the alien technology and develop a comprehensive monitoring and defense system, including space stations and an outpost on the moon. The US President (Sela Ward) coordinates with other world leaders in what seems to be an era of unprecedented peace and prosperity, if operating under the constant pressure of recovering from unprecedented losses and the fear of another invasion.
In the first film, a nerdy scientist named Dr. Okun (Brent Spiner) who had been hidden away in Area 51 was used as something like a ventriloquist’s dummy by an alien and has been in a coma ever since, tenderly care for by his partner. All of a sudden, his eyes fly open and he is awake. There are other indications around the world that dormant capacities for communication are being triggered by what could be another approaching invasion. That includes the former President (Bill Pullman, with beard, cane, and PTSD) who not only inspired the world with a great speech but personally flew a fighter plane to attack the alien ship.
David Levinson (Jeff Goldblum), who in the last film was a cable company computer technician who was the first to identify the anomalies that indicated an alien interference, visits Africa to speak to a warlord whose people engaged in hand-to-tentacle combat with aliens. The ex-wife played by Margaret Colin in the last film has vanished from the storyline, without even the half-sentence explanation that lets us know what happened to Will Smith’s character. Instead, we meet a scientist played by Charlotte Gainsbourg who says she has identified some symbols, especially a circle with a horizontal line through it, that people who have had some alien contact feel impelled to draw or paint. And the aliens who have been locked up in Area 51 for 20 years are suddenly awake and screaming…or celebrating. Yes, they are back and they are big. One thing the movie does well is show us the scale and scope of this new invasion.
But what it does not do well is connect us to the characters. There are utterly pointless and unconvincing subplots about a past between Goldblum and Gainsbourg, who have no chemistry whatsoever, but still find more sizzle than the subplot about the hopelessly bland trio of the three fighter pilots, the daughter of the former President, the son of the Will Smith character from the last movie, and Liam Hemsworth, trying to be all “Top Gun”-adorably dashing but more “Starship Troopers.” The actors do their best, but they are stuck with clunky sci-fi cliche dialog. The first film had some clever references to classics like “2001,” but this one just borrows shamelessly from other, better films. The aliens may be bigger and better in this return, but the script is not.
Parents should know that this film has extended sci-fi peril and violence with some disturbing images and characters who are injured and killed, including vast destruction and genocide. Characters use some strong language and there is brief potty humor.
Family discussion: What should the President have considered in deciding about the orb? What would you want to ask it?
If you like this, try: the original “Independence Day” and “Close Encounters of the Third Kind”
