6583 Results for “production”
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“Almost the Entire Movie is Shot on Steadicam but You’d Never Know It”: John Patrick Shanley on Wild Mountain Thyme
As a writer (Moonstruck) and director (Joe Versus the Volcano), John Patrick Shanley has created some of the funniest, most compassionate, and original romantic comedies of the past 35 years, which makes his return to the genre with Wild Mountain Thyme cause for major celebration. Adapting his play Outside Mullingar, Shanley has created his most lyrical and complex film to date, and his most moving. Jamie Dornan and Emily Blunt play Anthony and Rosemary, would-be lovers who have grown up together on neighboring Irish farms without acknowledging their mutual attraction—mostly due to introvert Anthony’s hopeless awkwardness. Anthony’s father (Christopher Walken) […]
by Jim Hemphill on Dec 16, 2020 -
SFFILM and Kenneth Rainin Foundation Announce Winners of Fall 2020 Rainin Grants and New Pilot Grant for Filmmakers with Disabilities
SFFILM, in partnership with the Kenneth Rainin Foundation, announced today eight new recipients of its SFFILM Rainin grants along with two recipients of its new SFFILM Rainin Filmmakers with Disabilities Grant. The grants provide early stage screenwriting and development support, with the latter grant a new pilot program “to provide additional support to Rainin applicants whose films specifically address stories from the disability community.” Among the grant winners are two projects from filmmakers appearing on Filmmaker‘s 2019 25 New Faces: Sephora Woldu and Alison O’Daniel. O’Daniel also interviewed Sound of Metal‘s Darius Marder in our current issue. The SFFILM Rainin […]
by Scott Macaulay on Dec 14, 2020 -
“We Could Have Made A True Crime Film, But Decided Not To”: Jiayan “Jenny” Shi on Finding Yingying
Yingying Zhang came to the US in April 2017 to conduct a year of research on photosynthesis and crop productivity at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. She was considering a doctoral program at the university and planned to marry her boyfriend, Xiaolin Hu, later that year. In her diary, she wrote, “Life is too short to be ordinary” and was anxious to fulfill as many ambitions as she could—but disappeared June that year. It was later confirmed her life had been taken. Jiayan “Jenny” Shi, the director of Finding Yingying, accompanies Yingying’s parents, Ronggao Zhang and Lifeng Ye, her brother […]
by A.E. Hunt on Dec 11, 2020 -
Jim Hemphill’s 10 Best 4K and Blu-ray Titles of 2020
For my final home video column of the year, I’ve decided to round up the best 4K and Blu-ray titles of 2020 that I wasn’t able to cover in previous columns. Maybe “best” is the wrong word, given that it’s impossible for any human being to keep up with even a fraction of all the new physical media releases; let’s just say these are personal favorites that have yielded many hours of diversion in this challenging year. Blade Ten years before Iron Man kicked off the current tsunami of Marvel movies, New Line released this gloriously idiosyncratic adaptation of Marv […]
by Jim Hemphill on Dec 11, 2020 -
The Mankalorian: Two Approaches to Digitally Captured 35mm Looks
The last time I wrote about film color for this magazine was on the ways 35mm shooting and digital color combined in Uncut Gems and Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker to create contemporary looks strongly engaged with the past, resulting in what we might call a look “more filmic than film.” David Fincher’s Mank, along with a second season of the Star Wars TV series The Mandalorian, gives us an opportunity to consider how digital and celluloid tendencies combine from the opposite direction—both were shot digitally, then graded to explicitly evoke celluloid. Once again, color grading and capture format […]
by Jessica Dunn Rovinelli on Dec 9, 2020 -
The Godfather Coda: The Death of Michael Corleone and Continental Divide: Jim Hemphill’s Home Viewing Recommendations
From Apocalypse Now Redux to The Cotton Club Encore, Francis Coppola has never been reticent about reworking past directorial efforts, so it was probably inevitable that he would get around to revisiting The Godfather Part III. Although by any normal standard Godfather III was a respectable success – conceptually bold, rich in visual and emotional textures and literary depth, and a financial hit with seven Oscar nominations – the fact that it wasn’t a flat-out masterpiece like its predecessors left the film with a lingering reputation as a disappointment, and Coppola was always unhappy with the manner in which it […]
by Jim Hemphill on Dec 4, 2020 -
“Palestine May Be the Last Bastion of American Ignorance”: David Osit on Mayor
Conflicts keep Mayor Musa Hadid, mayor of the Palestinian city of Ramallah since 2012, on the move. A modest man who delights in meeting his fellow citizens and problem-solving ways to make their daily existence easier, he’s a walking, talking human “customer service department.” Hadid is less the head of municipality than a crisis manager, listening patiently to every complaint and request that comes his way. Consistently reminded that his power is limited by the unwanted presence of Israeli military and government interference, Hadid’s running of a city in occupation is often frustratingly restricted. In director David Osit’s new documentary, […]
by Erik Luers on Dec 2, 2020 -
Slamdance Announces 132 Features, Shorts and Episodics; Fest Passes Free Until December 31
The Slamdance Film Festival announced today the 132 features, shorts and episodic programs that will comprise its hybrid 2021 edition. Running February 12-25, the festival is billing the program “its most accessible festival ever,” and with good reason. All films, Q&A’s and panels will be available on Slamdance.com, AppleTV, Roku, Firestick and YouTube; “early adopter” passes will be free until December 31; and regular passes are only $10. Additionally, there’s a new section, Unstoppable, showcasing creators with disabilities. The festival’s live component will consist of a two-night drive-in presentation in Joshua Tree open to the public on February 13th and […]
by Scott Macaulay on Nov 30, 2020 -
“It is Being Told Now—Because It is Supposed to Be Told Now”: Christopher Kahunahana on Waikiki and Native Hawaiian Storytelling
With Waikiki opening in New York and Los Angeles on Friday, Oct. 27, 2023 (official site here), we’re reposting Jason Sanders’s 2020 interview with Christopher Kahunahana. A film with “a seventeen-day shoot and two+ years of post-production,” Christopher Kahunahana’s long-awaited feature debut Waikiki marks a coming of age for the emerging Hawaiian filmmaking scene. The first completed narrative feature film by a Kanaka Maoli (Native Hawaiian) filmmaker, Waikiki follows a young indigenous woman, Kea (a mesmerizing Danielle Zalopany), working multiple jobs—hula dancer for tourists, karaoke hostess for drunks, Hawaiian-language schoolteacher for kids—just in order to hold on, but slowly starting to […]
by Jason Sanders on Nov 25, 2020 -
Ulysses, La Strada and Popeye: Jim Hemphill’s Home Video Recommendations, Holiday Edition
One of the more interesting periods in the history of Italian cinema is the era of international co-productions that followed neorealism; kicked off by the massive success of MGM’s 1951 extravaganza Quo Vadis, the Italian film industry entered a boom age in which the location shooting, social consciousness, and limited resources of neorealism gave way to spectacular sets, glamorous Hollywood stars, and lavish budgets thanks to the country’s abundance of breathtaking scenery and attractive production incentives. One of the most expensive and entertaining of the 1950s historical epics was Ulysses (1954), a gorgeously photographed and cleverly written adaptation of Homer’s […]
by Jim Hemphill on Nov 25, 2020
