The Killer to be remade...in 3D

http://www.hollywoodwiretap.com/?module=news&action=story&id=57455

John Woo is producing a 3D remake of his own classic The Killer. How many kinds of wrong is that?
If you haven't seen the original, you need to acquaint yourself with John Woo's pre-US career-the one where he made the two greatest action films of all time: The Killer and Hard Boiled. These two are a perfect yin and yang for each other, for while one has more story and less action the other is opposite. They strike a balance so that your brain can no longer comprehend their beauty.
This one really needs to be stopped. What needs to be done is for the original to finally be restored and made available to the public in a 2011 quality release. even more so, these two films need to be restored to the big screen in a theatrical re-release. Imagine the glory of blazing guns in Cantonese mono and this...on a giant screen in front of your face:


And if they even think of touching Tequila...this is what hell Chow Yun-Fat will bring down on them. At least I would hope so...there were plans for a Hard Boiled 2 a few years back. Now that's what they should be doing!!!

John Barry dead at 77. R.I.P.

Over the weekend, we lost one of the truly great film composers, heck one of the truly great composers period. Only Ennio Morricone and Bernard Herrmann come close. John Barry was able to capture the mood and spirit of a moment in time unlike any other. He also understood pop music and the force a simple beat could have.
His music certainly changed my life and the way I look at scoring. It also makes one reflect on how the film score has become a lost art. His work on eleven of the James Bond films defined the spirit, joy, ecstasy, sadness and rhythms of life.
The haunting moodiness of The Ipcress File, the bombast of From Russia with Love, the dark moody brass of Goldfinger, the wail and murky grace of Thunderball, the stunningly lush strings and melodies of the aching You Only Live Twice, the haunting brass and deep descending bass of On Her Majesty's Secret Service, the slinky touch and playfulness of Diamonds Are Forever, the whimsical and eastern The Man With The Golden Gun, the romance and majesty of Moonraker, the classical reassurance of Octopussy, the wailing guitar and composure of A View To a Kill, the dark synths pulsating beats and romantic melodies of The Living Daylights, and the truly immortal James Bond Theme. It may have been ruled that Monty Norman wrote this piece, but it is Barry who made it pulsate and have a soul.
Bring out your Bond compilations, and all your soundtracks. The man deserves a grand sendoff.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y952TRNBvDw
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lxjcN609cm4&feature=related

OTHER SIDE OF THE WIND-Welles's film might finally be released!!

http://www.guardian.co.uk/film/2011/jan/23/orson-welles-last-film-release
Please let this be released!!!!

3D-The reel truth

Thank goodness someone in the technical side of the industry has spoken out against the 3D fad.
Walter Murch, the legendary editor and sound designer of Apocalypse Now (the first film to ever be mixed in surround sound) wrote to Roger Ebert on how the 3D process simply doesn't work.
http://blogs.suntimes.com/ebert/2011/01/post_4.html
If it didn't work in the 1980's, why bring it back now? I should ask Disney the same question about Tron.

Where does the Hollywood Renaissance actually begin and end?

Where does the Hollywood Renaissance actually begin?

It is often defined as being the period from Bonnie and Clyde (1967) to Star Wars (1977). Everything else before or since has nothing to do with it.

I have always felt that this limits its impact on our film culture and have always wanted to know just where the ideas that formulated the new wave of American filmmaking ideas actually formed. Of course, the further back you go one can always find some earlier film that could be inspirational.

I traced the ideas and ideals back to the late noir films of the 1950’s, where a both a certain photorealism and desire to attack problems crept into the genre. The primary example is Orson Welles’s Touch of Evil (1958) alongside others such as Kiss Me Deadly(1955), and the early films of Stanley Kubrick: Killers Kiss (1955), The Killing (1956), and Paths of Glory (1957). This in and of itself can be traced back towards two films by one man which revitalized noir and made it a criticism of our own version of humanity. These are Billy Wilder’s Sunset Blvd.(1950) and Ace in the Hole (1951). One examines the dark underside of the Hollywood dream factory and the other reveals our society’s complete lust for fame, fortune, exposure, and power. Combined, they are a portrait of America so true that no one wanted to really think about (and in the case of Ace in the Hole, no one wanted to see this either…) Sadly, Wilder was forced to go running for cover and spent the rest of the 1950’s making more box office friendly products. It was not until the 1960’s that he was able to make a more daring and risky expenditure.

I have already traced the provoking lineage of the Hollywood Renaissance to 1950. Is there any need to trace it further back? By going one year further in time, we arrive in 1949, where the film that changed the world was released, Carol Reed’s The Third Man. Here we have the beginning of everything, the lack of lies, real world locations, shadowy figures in both visuals and plot, no clear sense of good and evil, sympathization with supposedly bad characters, worthless “hero”, and lack of all resolution. It sounds as if I am describing one of the classics form the Hollywood Renaissance. All of it is present here in The Third Man. The medium practically began in 1895, but it took until this time for film to discover both itself and the world outside it. Here we have the first truly modern film that is not afraid to go into war torn Vienna that even after four years cannot pull itself out of the rubble of WWII.

The film is an unsmoked cigarette that is tossed off in self-disgust.

After the runaway success of Jaws in 1975, the Renaissance is often said to have being nearing the end. Star Wars is the film that killed it off completely and ushered in the age of the corporate blockbuster. Both of these successful popcorn entertainments were actually products of the new movement. They were so steeped in the wave of fresh ideas and enthusiasm that their success was more of a direct appeal to the public than selling out. The Renaissance did not die in 1977. It actually continued through notable films and exceptions to the rule through the 1980’s, but with increasing loss of potency.

Apocalypse Now (1979), Being There (1979), Manhattan(1979), The Shining(1980), Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981), Prince of the City (1981), Blade Runner (1982), To Live and Die in L.A. (1985) are just some examples of this work. Films like these became both harder to finance and sell to an audience due to a lack of interest by studios because such high returns could be made from mass marketing one blockbuster. Interestingly, all of these films have become largely influential to the few who have seen them and have sparked entire genres onto themselves. William Friedkin’s career since the Exorcist (1973) has been one long series of ups and downs. In 1985, his To Live and Die in L.A.was released to little fanfare and marginal box office returns. Yet its influence can clearly be seen in the television series Miami Vice, and virtually every late 80’s action film franchise form Lethal Weapon (1987) to Die Hard (1988). It was an unexpected and virtually unseen return to form for Friedkin, who then promptly did nothing with it.

Films like these were unmarketable in the happy go lucky world of film in the 1980’s. The corporations had bought the studios and had decided that every movie must be a blockbuster and make them millions. This is what killed the Renaissance period, this along with the fact that the artists let them do it.

Lumet

I had never heard of Sidney Lumet up until several years ago, but the man’s output is nothing short of astonishing. He has never made a truly bad film, although some are better than others, and each is crafted with such an intricate care towards story and actors that the filmmaking becomes practically invisible. We become wrapped up entirely in these narratives that draw us completely into their fold.

12 Angry Men, The Pawnbroker, The Hill, The Offence, Serpico, Murder on the Orient Express, Dog Day Afternoon, Network, Prince of the City, The Verdict, Before the Devil Knows You’re Dead.

Who else but Lumet could have made films as diverse as these and yet always stayed completely true to the original story’s intent? The genius of a Lumet film is the fact that it is a movie first and foremost. It has no pretensions of being a “film” or something more important. There is no desire for box office glory, mass appeal, or making a name for one’s self. Lumet simply likes making good films.

His extreme workmanship stems from his days directing 50’s live television. In this field everything was done in sequential order, in one take, and live for the masses sitting at home around their television set. There could be no room for error. You simply got what you got and had to make do and live with it. Thus, rehearsal became an important tool for making sure nothing was left to chance. Lumet continued this practice on virtually all of his major productions and thus became known as an “actor’s director”. This is complete crap. It is because of this attention to performance that Lumet’s films stand apart from the rest.

Most had written the man off, but in 2007 Lumet used the independent film industry to his advantage and came way out of left field with Before the Devil Knows You’re Dead. With this film he proved both that he still had fight left in himself, and just what a real filmmaker can do with a movie. Lumet is not afraid to make statements or ask questions to an audience. A key comparison that establishes this is the difference between his The Verdict and Scorsese’s follow up to The Hustler, The Color of Money. Both feature Paul Newman as an aged older man who has nothing left in his dreary life. Both feature the possibility of redemption and of something to live for again. However, it is Lumet’s film that actually makes you feel and believe this. Color of Money is tossed of Scorsese that was done to get financing for The Last Temptation of Christ. The difference between the two is startling.

Lumet can tackle anything given the correct material to start with. His magic is making the material as strong and sound as possible by working with cast and crew to achieve this. Rehearsals add new ideas and inspirations and these are incorporated into the script. Then this is shot for the finished product which thus has the feeling of spontaneity that keeps things fresh for us and the strong narrative we secretly crave.

Spielberg

The reason I write on Spielberg in detail is to examine both the career and impact of the supposed “most successful director ever.” His career completely changed the industry of producing motion pictures and is a key in understanding the inner workings of Hollywood.

Steven Spielberg emerged from Universal Studio’s Television department as a brash wide-eyed kid. His initial foray for the studio after episodes of Columbo and Night Gallery (his segment entitled “Eyes” is stunning given the constraints and format.) was a cheapy “movie of the week”. His was given an extremely tight budget and 12 days to shoot a little Richard Matheson short story about a ordinary man who is harassed on the open highway by a truck. Duel (1971) is the definitive statement of his filmic career. Every single moment is so packed with the nuts and bolts of cinema that no exposition is needed. Man vs. truck. Empty desert highway. All shot on location and perfect visuals. This is a lean and mean film that doesn’t forget to also be a movie at heart. In the final fate of the truck, David Mann is left at the top of the cliff and after rejoicing momentarily he then slumps down exhausted. The credits roll as he aimlessly tosses a rock off in the setting sun. Ultimately, nothing is answered.

Duel was so successful that it was released theatrically in Europe. This led to Spielberg’s first feature The Sugarland Express (1974). If Duel was heavy on filmmaking talent, then Sugarland has the heavier element of Spielberg’s particular brand of Americana. Take the two elements from both films and the result is Jaws (1975). Commonly regarded as the film that broke the New Hollywood movement, Jaws is actually a certified product of the movement. The first half deals with shady local politics, social commentary (although very diluted from Peter Benchley’s original novel), and the tensions of a city man being the new local sheriff. The film takes off from the point of Brody looking out to the open ocean in the wake of the shark. Here, the second half emerges as the true heart of the film. Spielberg is effectively remaking Duel and homaging every classic adventure he had ever seen. We have the clash of three different personalities confronting a very real danger all in the midst of a vast ocean with no outside contact to get bogged down in.

After extremely difficult and trying production, Jaws became the first true blockbuster. Thus Spielberg became the golden child of the entire industry and could do no wrong. Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977) became a bloated special effects extravaganza that was permeated with a heightened sense of nostalgia that had originated in Sugarland. Next came the debacle of 1941 (1979) which was a madcap comedy set in WWII that bombed so horribly no one thought Steven would ever get a job again.

Along comes his friend George Lucas who offers him the opportunity to direct the first in a series of films about an adventuring archaeologist. Spielberg jumped at the chance and Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981) was born. He has acknowledged that Raiders was his make or break point. He had never made a film that came in on budget and schedule. Thus, the 30’s serial film style he was aiming for became the film he made. Shooting was fast, dirty, cheap, and ultimately inventive. The real magic behind Raiders is not escapism but that it is a 30’s serial film that just happened to be made in 1981.

Spielberg was back on top. Thus it was inevitable for the return of whole hearted nostalgia in E.T. (1982) which is probably the most blatant example of this. Watching this film is like rubbing salt in a wound. You simply wince at the unnecessary saccharine positivism. This appeared to a certain degree in the Raiders sequel Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom (1984), but thankfully was kept to a minimum and the film became a darker version of the original’s universe, complete with child slavery, human sacrifice, torture, Thuggees, and a much darker overall tone. Instead of simply remaking the first film Spielberg decided to make an opposition to Raiders. Thus Temple stands as the darker chapter in the Indiana Jones series.

The Color Purple is a landmark novel in African American culture and while not exactly to this writer’s taste, an important work. Spielberg grabbed onto this story and made one of the most egotistical works I have ever seen. 11 Oscar nominations and not a single win. Does that say anything? The film itself became a pointless thing and akin to a Lifetime movie of the week. Empire of the Sun (1987) was a step back from this grandiose sense of self and was essentially Spielberg channeling David Lean. It was also his last good film. It perfectly incorporates Spielberg’s positivism with the childish outlook of 7 year old Jamie Graham as he is thrown into a Japanese prisoner of war camp. It precedes this aspect of Schindler’s List (1993) without becoming too preachy.

A third and uninspired Indiana Jones film, Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade (1989), proved to do the franchise in. (or so we thought.) Aside from Sean Connery as Indy’s father the film is about as uninspired as they come. The Nazis return along with another villain out for his own ends except without any of the interesting qualities of Paul Freeman’s Belloq. Julian Glover is wasted completely here. Just see what he can do with a devilish character such as this in For Your Eyes Only (1981). The character of Ilsa does little but scream, backstab, and sleep with both Joneses (one of the few great laughs, of course delivered by Connery.) The whole film just seems completely uninspired. The tank chase goes on for much too long and was actually improvised. If this is Spielberg improvising, then I’d like to reintroduce him to the Spielberg of 1971 who made Duel.

Then comes the pointless throwback comedy Always (1989), dull Hook (1991), uninvolving Jurassic Park (1993), and Schindler’s List (1993). How can a film about the Holocaust lose? You have the box office clout, major production and promotion, A-list budget and actors, and subject matter that cannot be refuted. What results is a film that is in effect empty. I admire the choice to make a black and white film, but this comes off not as a creative decision but more of a “just because I can” mentality. There is more depth in Empire of the Sun than Schindler’s List. Just because a film is about something important does not make it so.

Billy Wilder should have made this film. Plain and simple. He contributed to the project and was refused the job by Spielberg who promptly didn’t make the film for several years. Only he could have captured the combination of absolute madness and ironic humor that is life.

A sequel to Jurrassic Park and a tossed off Amistad (1997) came before Saving Private Ryan (1998) which takes the built-in potential of Schindler’s List to new heights. There simply had not been a serious decent modern film about WWII. Otherwise people could easily see how shoddy the film is. It takes extreme patience to sit through.

A.I.(2001)is the oddball in Spielberg’s career. It shows the new direction he would take with his post-2000 output with a strange mixture between his patented outlook and Stanley Kubrick’s vision. Kubrick had labored over A.I. for years and only thought it possible after seeing Spielberg’s use of CGI in Jurassic Park. He contacted Spielberg and worked collectively over the years. Eventually he asked Spielberg to direct it as he felt it was more suited to Spielberg’s personality. The film was eventually produced after Kubrick’s death. It is Kubrick’s input and the story material that keeps the film afloat. Spielberg just doesn’t know how exactly to deal with this material. It really is just a confused experiment.

This confusion went on into Spielberg’s next project where he applied the same to Phillip K. Dick short story Minority Report (2002). I don’t know what kind of film Catch Me If You Can (2002) is but it does fit in that odd post-modern category which holds the abomination that is The Terminal (2004).

War of the Worlds (2005) is an unnecessary reimagining of H.G. Wells’s classic tale (and of George Pal’s 1953 film version). Munich (2005) is an attempt to get back to meaningful plot lines but it comes off as overlong and ultimately without much of a message. It also applies the hyper cinematography style of Minority Report to the 1970’s. This combination of realistic period trappings and stylized textures makes the period look fall apart.

The less that is said of a certain fourth entry in a series the better…

Spielberg works best when he is under the gun and out of time. His best films were all produced under extreme stress and I believe this is the real key to his greatness as a filmmaker. Maybe his upcoming project based on Herge’s legendary Tintin comic strips can bring back the hard edge back to his work. Spielberg and escapist adventure have always been a good mix. However, the use of 3D CGI animation leads me to doubt this. Hey, I can dream can’t I?

Key films:

Duel (1971)

Jaws (1975)

Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981)

Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom (1984)

Empire of the Sun (1987)

Terry Gilliam was lamenting on the loss of meaning in cinema when he brought up Spielberg, Schindler's List, and The Master. "Spielberg and the success of most films in Hollywood, I think, is down to the fact that they're comforting, they tie things up in nice little bows, gives you answers, even if the answers are stupid, they're answers. Oh, you go home, you don't have to worry about it. (...) There was a wonderful quote in a book that Freddy Raphael wrote about the making of Eyes Wide Shut, it's called Eyes Wide Open, and he's talking to Kubrick about Schindler's List and the Holocaust, and he says: "The thing is, Schindler's List is about success, the Holocaust was about failure." And that's Kubrick, and that's just spot on. (...) And I know which side I'd rather be on. I'd like to have a nice house like Spielberg, but I know which side I'd rather be on."

This has simplified my entire point into a single comment. And of course it came from Stanley. Go figure. ;)