Authors — Scott Macaulay

IT’S HARD OUT HERE FOR A PIMP

I don’t do much Monday-morning box-offiice opinion on this blog because too many others do it far better and far more obsessively than I’d ever be able to. That said, I’m pretty surprised that in its second week Hustle and Flow, which is our cover story this month in Filmmaker, fell out of the top ten with an estimated 50% drop to $4 million from its only okay opening of $8 million last weekend. Honestly, I had Hustle pegged as a crossover mainstream hit, and when I hung out a couple weeks ago with a studio exec friend, we made […]
by Scott Macaulay on Aug 1, 2005
THE PUPPET MASTER

A few years ago I had the good fortune to be offered an amazing trip by the Italian Trade Commission. A half a dozen producers were invited to tour the Umbria region of Italy as well as Rome over the course of a week. There were great sights, great food, great hotels, great people. At one stop we were interviewed by a local paper who wanted to know our thoughts on Italian film. I riffed off my (somewhat obvious) favorites: Antonioni, Fellini, Pasolini, Argento and Leone. The latter two caused the journalist to laugh at my low-brow tastes. I was […]
by Scott Macaulay on Jul 30, 2005
TWO WEEKS NOTICE?

In the Telegraph’s profile of Nicole Kidman, in which she talks about many things, including her involvement in Steve Shainberg’s currently lensing Fur, one paragraph stands out: “When she finishes Fur she has scheduled two weeks’ work on the drama The Lady from Shanghai in Hong Kong and has nothing else planned except a vague commitment to do a film with Crowe and Australian director Baz Luhrmann sometime in the not-too-near future.” Two weeks work on a Wong Kar Wai film? Um… I wouldn’t lay odds on it. Of the film and Kidman, the director has said, “Normally I will […]
by Scott Macaulay on Jul 29, 2005
FINCHER’S DAY AT THE OFFICE

David Fincher’s music video for Nine Inch Nail’s “Only,” which features effects by Digital Domain, is online here.
by Scott Macaulay on Jul 28, 2005
DEEP PSYCHOLOGICAL PROBLEMS

In an age in which every last Jess Franco movie is the subject of some scholarly essay or post-modern reverie, it’s refreshing to read J.R. Taylor’s interview with ’70s/’80s grindhouse icon Roberta Findlay in this week’s New York Press. And while Taylor starts with a bit of romantic nostalgia for trash-film viewing on the Forty Deuce, Findlay quickly throws some cold water on it all: “‘People who like those old movies seem to have deep psychological problems,’ she explains. ‘Under the best of circumstances, I wouldn’t call any of them art. My first budget was $5,000. That was the deal. […]
by Scott Macaulay on Jul 21, 2005
CHIP SHOTS

If you’ve been reading this blog for a while you’ll know that one topic we occasionally post about is the impending synergy between new consumer electronics devices and downloadable visual media (i.e., movies). I posted previously about Apple’s switch to the Intel processor and linked to a piece speculating that it had something to do with placing an Intel chip with digital rights management controls within a computer like the Mac mini, thereby creating a kind of Tivo-alternative. Now comes this article on the Ars Technica site which continues this thinking, claiming that what Apple is really after is getting […]
by Scott Macaulay on Jul 15, 2005
SCENE 2257, TAKE 2

Since I don’t think readers of this blog always click through to the occasional comments linked below the entries, I thought I’d highlight here a link provided by an anonymous respondent to my blog titled “The Skin Game,” below. In it I highlighted the absurdity of the Department of Justice’s new “2257” regulations and wondered why the indie community, which marshalled a veritable army of producers-turned-activists when promotional screeners were banned, has been completely silent on this issue which involves not only de facto censorship but privacy rights, sidestepping the Fourth Amendment and more. (Currently, the Free Speech Coalition, which […]
by Scott Macaulay on Jul 9, 2005
TO WALK NEXT TO ONE’S SHOELACES IN AN EMPTY FRIDGE

I just returned from the opening of filmmaker Chantal Akerman’s new installation, To Walk Next to One’s Shoelaces in an Empty Fridge, at the Marian Goodman Gallery on 57th St. in New York. It’s a really beautiful work, and anyone interested in the Belgian filmmaker or autobiographical media art in general should make an effort to check it out. The installation takes place in two rooms. In the first, text fragments from an autobiographical writing Akerman published last year are projected on a scrim which scrolls inward within the space like a gossamer Richard Serra sculpture. In the second, a […]
by Scott Macaulay on Jul 8, 2005
THE END OF RENAISSANCE

Via this article in Variety comes sad news: Renaissance, the London-based sales company, has shut down, declaring bankruptcy and pinkslipping its employees. A company that mades its name as a producer of such films as The Madness of King George and Wings of a Dove, Renaissance was one of the international sales companies that took an active interest in the American independent sector. It invested production coin in films like Rose Troche’s The Safety of Objects and was sales repping such films as We Don’t Live Here Anymore, Todd Louiso’s upcoming Macbeth, Gregg Araki’s upcoming Creeeps and two 2005 Sundance […]
by Scott Macaulay on Jul 7, 2005
THE SKIN GAME

Filmmaker has been on press the last week so that has meant that we’ve been slacking on the blog. But one of the things I’ve been meaning to post about is the government’s new “2257” regulations which, on the sheer basis of their audacity, should be provoking outrage in the independent world. Strangely, though, our indie sector has been quiet on this government intrusion on content creators, probably because it specifically targets adult entertainment. Anyway, this Newsday editorial does a far better job than I could have explaining why you should care about these new regulations. Here’s an excerpt: “Regardless […]
by Scott Macaulay on Jul 7, 2005

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