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“If I’m Viewing On My iPad At Midnight, Do I See Different Recommendations”

August 7, 2013 in Excerpts, Film, Science/Tech | Permalink

We shape our tools, and thereafter our tools shape us. A passage from Tom Vanderbilt’s smart Wired interview with Netflix’s recommendations honchos Carlos Gomez-Uribe and Xavier Amatriain:

“Question:

So if I’m viewing on my iPad at midnight, do I see different recommendations than I would on my TV at 8 pm?

Xavier Amatriain: 

We have been working for some time on introducing context into recommendations. We have data that suggests there is different viewing behavior depending on the day of the week, the time of day, the device, and sometimes even the location. But implementing contextual recommendations has practical challenges that we are currently working on. We hope to be using it in the near future.”

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“He’s Supposed To Have Gone To Lloyd’s, Taken An Insurance Against Martians Being Discovered Before The Film Was Released”

August 6, 2013 in Books, Excerpts, Film, Science/Tech | Permalink

In 1995, just as the Internet began entering the public consciousness with a fury, Tod Mesirow interviewed Arthur C. Clarke. Part of that discussion has now been posted at the Los Angeles Review of Books. An excerpt about 2001: A Space Odyssey:

“Tod Mesirow:

The idea of an intelligent computer, an artificial intelligence like HAL, do you think we’ll achieve that?

Arthur C. Clarke: 

Oh, I don’t think there’s any question of that. I think that the people that say we will never develop computer intelligence — they merely prove that some biological systems don’t have much intelligence.

Tod Mesirow:

What was it like to create the scene when HAL is dying in 2001?

Arthur C. Clarke:

Well, Danny Curry deserves most of the credit for that, and by the way, when I switch off my computer you hear HAL say, “My mind is going.” It happens every time I switch it off. [laughs]

Tod Mesirow:

Was 2001 an interesting experience? You’re planning what would happen if —

Arthur C. Clarke:

Well, it was, you know, a fascinating experience, for many reasons. I was moonlighting at Time Life where I was doing a book called Man and Space. This was in 1964 when the Apollo Program, you know, had been announced. But, no one really believed we would go to the moon and, still sort of had a skepticism. And also, Stanley and I had to outguess what would happen, I believe — this may not be true, maybe Stanley’s publicity department — he’s supposed to have gone to Lloyd’s, taken an insurance against Martians being discovered before the film was released. [laughs] Well, I don’t think — I don’t know how Lloyd’s would have carried the odds on that one. [laughs] So, anyway, we were writing the film, before we had any close-ups of the moon’s surface. We had to guess what it might be like, and there are all sorts of problems. I — we — I think we did pretty well. One or two mistakes. For instance, we show the moon as more rugged then in fact it turned out to be. It turned out to be sort of smooth and sort of sandblasted.”

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“Look Up The Cast List Online, Tweet Out A Comment, Talk To Others…While Superman Played In The Background”

August 5, 2013 in Excerpts, Film, Science/Tech, Urban Studies | Permalink

Superman has had to adjust in the age of smartphones, and some would like movie theaters to make concessions as well. From Hunter Walk, a suggestion for creating an alternative big-screen experience for moviegoers who want to talk, Tweet and multitask during a film:

“In my 20s I went to a lot of movies. Now, not so much. Over the past two years becoming a parent has been the main cause but really my lack of interest in the theater experience started way before that. Some people dislike going to the movies because of price or crowds, but for me it was more of a lifestyle decision. Increasingly I wanted my media experiences plugged in and with the ability to multitask. Look up the cast list online, tweet out a comment, talk to others while watching or just work on something else while Superman played in the background. Of course these activities are discouraged and/or impossible in a movie theater.

But why? Instead of driving people like me away from the theater, why not just segregate us into environments which meet our needs. “

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“If You Censor Art You Will Lose Crime and Punishment But You Will Still Have Raskolnikov”

August 5, 2013 in Excerpts, Film, Videos | Permalink

Paul Schrader, Hollywood poet of the American underbelly, which often hides in plain sight, just did an Ask Me Anything at Reddit to promote his new film, The Canyons. A few exchanges follow.

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Question:

Any insights about John Hinckley and the Reagan assassination attempt? What was your reaction and those of other people involved with Taxi Driver?

Paul Schrader:

I was scouting locations for Cat People when the news came over the radio. I said to the driver, it’s one of those Taxi Driver kids. When I got back to the hotel, the FBI was waiting for me because Hinckley had mentioned the film. They wanted to know if he had tried to contact me. This is a very thorny moral question. My feeling is that if you censor art you will lose Crime and Punishment but you will still have Raskolnikov. But I also feel that there is a level of moral responsibility as well.

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Question:

Is there anything you’ve written that didn’t get produce for whatever reason that you were really bummed to see not be?

Also, did you ever do coke with Scorsese?

Paul Schrader:

Yes, I did one about the crime world in Quebec in the 70s. I did about Ayahuasca and the world of hallucinogens. Those are two that come immediatly to mind and there are more.

The answer to the second question is yes, Marty quit before I did. He had a very bad asthma experience in Rome and fortunately he was able to stop cold.

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Question:

Any chance of you writing for Marty again in the future?

Paul Schrader:

I did an HBO pilot for him but HBO passed. We have no other plans.

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Question:

The lead characters in Raging Bull and in Taxi Driver, played by Robert De Niro, were damaged individuals with serious problems dealing with women. In the case of Jake La Motta, he was a wife abuser, and Travis Bickle was essentially a stalker.

What was your approach to balance these flaws and still make the characters sympathetic to the audience?

Paul Schrader:

I think likability is an overrated quality in screen characters. What they need to be is interesting. If you put an interesting person in front of the viewer for 45 minutes and don’t give another perspective the viewer will begin to empathize with a character he or she previously though beneath empathy. That’s one of the ways art works.

___________________________

Question:

What is it like working with Bret Easton Ellis?

Paul Schrader:

It was a lot of fun with Bret. He was my partner as well as my collaborator. I don’t think we are necessarily on the same page but we are in the same book.

___________________________

Question:

I don’t really have a question, I just thought The Canyons was great, I really enjoyed it. All of the “issues” I’ve read about in various interviews really didn’t show on screen. (Example – not being able to film at the mall, issues with filming at dusk, etc.) So great job.

Paul Schrader:

Thank you. Many people confuse a troubled production with a troubled film, but in fact there is little interrelation. Many great films have had agonizing production problems and many harmonious/happy filmmaking experiences have resulted in stinkers.

••••••••••

A couple of pieces of a Schrader interview from 1982, at the time of Cat People:

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“No, It’s Pronounced Eye-gor””

August 4, 2013 in Film, Videos | Permalink

Two Mel Brooks clips, the first one a fairly rare 1975 British TV interview at the time of the release of Young Frankenstein, my favorite of the comic’s films and one of my top ten all-time screen comedies. 

The second is Brooks having dinner at his pal Carl Reiner’s house, as he has every night for decades, during one of the best episodes of Jerry Seinfeld’s Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee. By the way: I really like Seinfeld, but he would be better off shutting up on certain topics. When he’s not busy showing off his disposable income in his web series, he’s griping about being criticized for not booking any black or female comics during the show’s first season. Well, he should be criticized for that. Life’s a struggle for everyone, but when you’re in the groups that have easiest access to something prized, you should focus on making sure others have a way in also. At the very least, don’t complain if you’re called out on it. Acting put-upon when the truth is pointed out makes you seem petty and small.

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“These Cars–They Are Cars–May Be The Fastest Road-Going Machines In The World”

July 29, 2013 in Film, Science/Tech, Sports, Videos | Permalink

A 1975 documentary about Formula One racing, which has been known at various times as One by One, Quick and the Dead, and Champions Forever. An interesting period piece with a funked-up score, which focuses on Jackie Stewart, Peter Revson and their peers. Stacy Keach is the cool-as-can-be narrator, but racer François Cévert sums it up simply and best: “Steering is hard,” he admits.

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“Do You Think People Will Still Be Going To The Movies In Large Numbers In 30 Or 50 Years?”

July 26, 2013 in Excerpts, Film, Science/Tech, Urban Studies | Permalink

At the Los Angeles Review of Books, Andrew Gumbel has an excellent interview with film producer Lynda Obst, whose new book, Sleepless in Hollywood, examines the puzzling economics of the moment in Hollywood. An excerpt:

“Andrew Gumbel:

As home viewing systems become more sophisticated, what about the movies will remain irreplaceable? Do you think people will still be going to the movies in large numbers in 30 or 50 years, or will it become a minority pursuit devoted to showings of the classics, a bit like opera now?

Lynn Obst:

There’s a lot of thinking about the future of the movie-going experience. One direction is the development of destination theaters, with reclining seats and really good food and alcoholic drinks with waiter service — more of a screening experience. Another is allowing people to watch first-run movies at home, at a price that still works for the distributors. But, one way or another, people are still going to go to the movies. Sure, people who prefer to do so will stay home. But teenagers just want to get away from their parents and be with one another, and the movies provide that opportunity. And the excitement of the communal experience will not diminish. It was so much fun to watch Bridesmaids on the opening weekend in a room full of people who were loving it. That’s true for comedies, and it’s true for a lot of powerful dramas. Movies that aren’t made for that communal experience will probably stop being shown in theaters altogether. But the movies have never been more of a mass experience than right now.

Andrew Gumbel: 

How can you say that when entertainment is increasingly being consumed by individuals sitting in front of their screens?

Lynn Obst:

Movies are one of the great escapes — and that includes escaping from this social media enclosure we’re in. There’s almost nowhere you can go without people being in their own private Idaho, tied to their iPhones. But, at the movies, they turn off their phones and scream at the screen and talk to each other on the way in and out. Movies are one thing we do that brings us together.”

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“The Distinction Between Verbal And Visual Literacy Needs To Be Done Away With”

July 25, 2013 in Books, Excerpts, Film, Science/Tech, Urban Studies | Permalink

In a New York Review of Books essay, Martin Scorsese sums up the new literacy:

“Now we take reading and writing for granted but the same kinds of questions are coming up around moving images: Are they harming us? Are they causing us to abandon written language?

We’re face to face with images all the time in a way that we never have been before. And that’s why I believe we need to stress visual literacy in our schools. Young people need to understand that not all images are there to be consumed like fast food and then forgotten—we need to educate them to understand the difference between moving images that engage their humanity and their intelligence, and moving images that are just selling them something.

As Steve Apkon, the film producer and founder of the Jacob Burns Film Center in Pleasantville, New York, points out in his new book The Age of the Image, the distinction between verbal and visual literacy needs to be done away with, along with the tired old arguments about the word and the image and which is more important. They’re both important. They’re both fundamental. Both take us back to the core of who we are.

When you look at ancient writing, words and images are almost indistinguishable. In fact, words are images, they’re symbols. Written Chinese and Japanese still seem like pictographic languages. And at a certain point—exactly when is ‘unfathomable’—words and images diverged, like two rivers, or two different paths to understanding.

In the end, there really is only literacy.”

 

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“Most Victorian Freaks, However, Actually Earned A Comfortable Living”

July 24, 2013 in Excerpts, Film, Science/Tech, Urban Studies | Permalink

The opening of Nadja Durbach’s Public Domain Review reconsideration of the life of Joseph Merrick, the Elephant Man:

“The scenes are among the most heartless in cinema history: a drunken, abusive showman exhibiting the severely deformed Joseph Merrick to horrified punters. David Lynch’s The Elephant Man begins with its lead character being treated little better than an animal in a cage. But it soon finds a clean-cut hero in the ambitious young surgeon Frederick Treves, who rescues the hapless Merrick from his keeper and gives him permanent shelter at the London Hospital. Supported by charitable donations, the victim recovers his humanity: he learns to speak again (in a decidedly middle-class accent), to entertain society guests and to dress and behave like a well-heeled young dandy. Merrick, no more the degraded show freak, reveals his inner goodness and spirituality and dies happy.

Lynch’s movie is based largely on Treves’ sentimental chronicle. But that narrative is merely one version of events – and one that in the end tells us more about middle-class morality than it does about Merrick. There is another story that casts a different light on what happened. The memoirs of Tom Norman, Merrick’s London manager, are surely as biased as Treves’. But as one of the most respected showmen of his day, Norman’s account challenges head on Treves’ claim that Merrick was ultimately better off in the hospital than at the freakshow.

In August 1884, after checking himself out of the Leicester workhouse, Merrick began his career as “the Elephant Man”. The exhibition of human oddities had been part of English entertainment since at least the Elizabethan period. In the 1880s, alongside the Elephant Man, the British public could see Jo-Jo the Dog-Faced Boy, American Jack the Frog Man, Krao the Missing Link, Herr Unthan the Armless Wonder and any number of giants, dwarfs, bearded women and other “freaks of nature”. Despite the freakshow’s popularity, by the end of the 19th century, middle-class morality was condemning it as immoral, indecent and exploitive.

Most Victorian freaks, however, actually earned a comfortable living. Many were free agents who negotiated the terms of their exhibition and could ask for a salary or a share of the profits. They sold souvenirs to the crowds to make extra money. The freakshow was thus an important economic resource for working people whose deformities prevented them undertaking other forms of labour. Indeed, freak performers did not consider their exhibitions to be obscene or degrading. Rather, they saw themselves as little different from other entertainers.”

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“I Will Be Sort Of The Way I Really Am, Somewhat Skeptical, And That Will Be Funny”

July 24, 2013 in Excerpts, Film | Permalink

Wallace Shawn talking to the Paris Review last year about My Dinner with Andre, one of my obsessions:

“Paris Review:

How did My Dinner with André get set up, as they say?

Wallace Shawn:

After André directed Our Late Night, he decided to get out of theater. Then, three years later, he came back and said, Let’s do something else. And I thought, Let’s not do a play, let’s do a television film of some kind—talking heads, you and me. You’ll be you—you’ll tell about all these amazing things that you did while you were not working in the theater—and I will be sort of the way I really am, somewhat skeptical, and that will be funny. So we talked on tape, audio tape, for many months, and I wrote a script that was based on the transcriptions of those tapes. And after much discussion of all the world’s great directors, André and I decided to send the script to Louis Malle. Amazingly, we reached him quite quickly, through Diana Michener, a mutual friend, and our script must have come at exactly the right moment in his schedule, and apparently it came at the right moment in his life as well, because it rang some bell with him. He read the script almost immediately and then called André and said, Let’s do it. 

Paris Review:

Why Malle?

Wallace Shawn:

Louis Malle was a superb storyteller, and we felt he’d bring out the story, the plot of the script, because it has a plot, even though it seems we’re just idly talking. Malle also had a great sense of humor. And he had a fearless what-the-hell attitude. Many directors would have been terrified that the audience would become bored, and they would have been tempted to illustrate the various stories with flashbacks or at least to cut away to other events in the restaurant. Louis wasn’t frightened of the audience and didn’t do those things.

Paris Review:

How long was the shoot?

Wallace Shawn:

Three weeks. In the first week, though, Louis Malle simply tested out various complicated camera moves. By the end of the week, he’d decided he didn’t want to do any of them. So basically we had ten days, and we went methodically from one angle to the next, with one camera, and we shot ten feet of film for every foot we used, as in any normal film.”

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“I’ve Been Asked By Caesars Palace To Tell You About Gaming”

July 22, 2013 in Film, Science/Tech, Videos | Permalink

Instead of completing fascinating film projects, Orson Welles spent most of his final years shilling for money. Here he is in “Caesars Guide To Gaming with Orson Welles,” a 1978 casino paycheck that’s interesting in its own way.

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“We’re Gonna Shoot It Without A Script”

July 22, 2013 in Film, Videos | Permalink

From the Maysles brothers’ 1963 film Orson Welles in Spain, a clip in which the great and star-crossed director presages the fraying of the traditional studio picture, with its formality. The work he’s discussing turned out to be his uncompleted 1970s movie The Other Side of the Wind.

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“We’re Just Watching ‘Em Get Ready For The End Of The World Here”

July 19, 2013 in Film, Science/Tech, Videos | Permalink

Here’s the trailer for Andrew Bujalski’s Computer Chess, which I blogged about last December. Looks amazing.

“It Was The First Time In My Life That I’d Gone Anywhere With A Sense Of Purpose”

July 18, 2013 in Excerpts, Film | Permalink

From a 1967 Paris Review interview conducted by Maggie Paley, Terry Southern discussing his first screenwriting job, on a little film called Dr. Strangelove:

“Terry Southern

It was the first time in my life that I’d gone anywhere with a sense of purpose. I mean, I’d always traveled, I’d made about ten trips back and forth, but just aimless, with no justification except having the G.I. Bill and using it as a means to be there. It was the first time I’d gone anywhere and been paid for it. It was very satisfying, very interesting, and almost unbelievable to be moving about like that.

Stanley himself is a strange kind of genius. I’d always had a notion that people in power positions in movies must be hacks and fools, and it was very impressive to meet someone who wasn’t. He thinks of himself as a ‘filmmaker’—his idol is Chaplin—and so he’s down on the idea of ‘director.’ He would like, and it’s understandable, to have his films just say, ‘A Film by Stanley Kubrick.’ He tries to cover the whole thing from beginning to end. Including the designing of the ads. He’s probably the only American director who works on big-budget pictures who has complete control of his movies.

Interviewer:

Strangelove was originally conceived as a melodrama, not a comedy. Did you work with Kubrick to restructure the whole thing, or were you able to just insert the jokes?

Terry Southern:

I knew what he wanted. It was a question of working together, rewriting each line, and changing the tone.

Interviewer:

When you started the project, you’d never written movie dialogue. You presumably didn’t know anything about how to write a screenplay.

Terry Southern:

Yes, I knew, because I like movies. And writing dialogue has always been easy for me.”

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Recently Posted On NYC’s Craigslist

July 14, 2013 in Film, Misc., Urban Studies | Permalink

"Before she dies, she has a will drawn up in which she wills a man to her best friend."

“Before she dies, she has a will drawn up in which she wills a man to her best friend.”

 Screenplay for sale – $350000 (Rhode Island)

My novel entitled, Diva On My Doorstep, was published in April of 2010. Since that time, it has been written into a screenplay. The screenplay was written by a professional screenwriter. I am looking to sell the screenplay. This would make for an excellent feature film or a made for TV movie.

A brief synopsis is as follows:

Holly Madsen is marrying the man of her dreams–only he doesn’t know it and neither does she.

Why? Because the heroine’s best friend of my completed novel, Diva on My Doorstep, learns she has terminal cancer and before she dies she is determined to fix the relationship problems in her best friend’s life. Before she dies, she has a will drawn up in which she wills a man to her best friend. People have inherited many things, but a man, well that makes for some interesting conversation. Set in New York City and later Perry, Maine, the character-driven story is a 97,852 word romance. The story brings two people together, against their will, who couldn’t be more perfect for one another.

It will appeal to mainstream hopeless romantics, as well as those who enjoy a good story, a good laugh, a few tears, and a happy ending.

Meet Holly Madsen, a 36-year-old dog food heiress who has everything, or so it seems. She is on again, off again and now back on again to marry her cheating fiané, Daniel. She is two breaths away from saying “I do.” Holly and her best friend Gina go on what was supposed to be Holly and Daniel’s honeymoon before the first wedding was called off. Gina then proceeds to win a couple of free trips in which Holly must accompany her on. Gina takes Holly to different ends of the earth hoping she’ll meet someone who will treat her right so she can be done with her player fiancé, Daniel, once and for all.

Holly’s plastic surgery addicted, grandchild-deprived mother is in constant search of a husband for her daughter. She cannot bear the fact that she has a 36 year old drop dead gorgeous daughter who isn’t married, let alone isn’t pregnant. Holly’s mother, Rochelle, sends a very eligible Dr. Steven Mancini over to Holly’s for a blind date. One small problem — she didn’t inform Holly.

Steven is charming, funny and handsome and turns Holly’s world upside down. He is perfect for her. But the whole thing is too good to be true. He has a secret that Holly comes to discover and it sends her catapulting back into the arms of her fiancé and down the aisle.

Gina hears wedding bells herself and makes an announcement that will have a life-changing effect on Holly and Steven. She vowed to always protect Holly’s heart from breaking and now she’s going to seal the deal once and for all.

"Meet Holly Madsen, a thirty-six-old dog food heiress who has everything, or so it seems."

“Meet Holly Madsen, a 36-year-old dog food heiress who has everything, or so it seems.”

When do we start filming?

When do we start filming?

“I Kind Of Am A Fictional Character”

July 10, 2013 in Excerpts, Film | Permalink

Taking a quick break from creeping out Siri, John Malkovich was being–who else?–John Malkovich during an Ask Me Anything on Reddit. A few exchanges follow.

_______________________

Question:

What is the worst script you have ever read? 

John Malkovich:

i was given a script in france, by a seemingly rather disturbed young man. let’s just say it was not good. also, one night, a woman came in to our yard in france around 2:00 am. i was outside on the phone talking to my producing partners in los angeles. she gave me a script called elle tue (she kills!) which was about the lead character killing a movie star. it was written like it had been done with a butcher knife in red ink. also, it wasn’t very good.

_______________________ 

Question: 

What are your thoughts on space travel? Would you like to go into space?

John Malkovich:

yes, i suppose i would. but don’t you have to go to the bathroom in your space suit and everything? i’m just not sure i could do that.

_______________________

Question: 

Have you spoken Bernard Madoff since 2008? What would you like to say to him if you had the chance?

John Malkovich:

no, i only met mr. madoff once, many years ago. he seemed very pleasant. but, you know, i don’t think i’d have much to impart. for me, in all honesty, it was a good life lesson. and it also must be said that the vast majority of in the world live with nothing and with the hope of nothing their entire lives. i was lucky, as i’ve been my entire life. i could go back to work and make my way in the world.

_______________________

Question:

Stanislavski or Brecht?

John Malkovich:

brecht. he was a miserable human being, but quite smart about theatre.

_______________________

 Question:

Hi John. Say I were to see you in public, would you rather I, or anyone for that matter, pretend I didn’t know who you are or would you rather have a conversation (without a camera shoved at you of course)?

John Malkovich:

normally quite happy to have a conversation. or to be completely ignored.

_______________________

Question:

I once had a friend who, after watching Being John Malkovich, was thoroughly convinced you were a fictional character. I don’t really have a question, just wanted to share! Thanks for all of your amazing work; I am a big fan. 

John Malkovich:

i kind of am a fictional character….•

I'm urinating right now.

I’m urinating right now.

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“I’m The Hottest Thing In Hollywood”

July 10, 2013 in Film, Videos | Permalink

Did you have encounters (sexual and otherwise) with Liberace, Loretta Lynn, Ronald Reagan, Michael Jackson and Charles Manson? Of course not. But Scott Thorson, the source of Behind the Candelabra, says he has. He stopped by Howard Stern’s show recently to overshare about these people and so much more. Language absolutely NSFW, unless you work in an S&M dungeon.

Scott and I are just friends.

Scott and I are just friends.

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“We Drank Here On The Air One Night, Didn’t We?”

July 3, 2013 in Film, Videos | Permalink

In 1981, actor Sterling Hayden, who began looking like Tom Waits’ hobo uncle a decade earlier, visits with Tom Snyder. In part one, Hayden discusses his failed attempts at writing an article for Rolling Stone about the funeral of Yugoslavia’s late dictator Marshal Tito.

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“This Familiar Face Has Been Seen On Movie Screens Since 1927”

June 30, 2013 in Film, Videos | Permalink

Chico Marx, an inveterate gambler, blew through all his motion-picture money and was forced in his later years to play small clubs and do guest appearances on TV shows. Here’s part of his final such television shot, in 1960, on Championship Bridge. He looked like hell.

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“He Understood That The Natural World Is Rife With Curved Forms, Not Straight Lines”

June 25, 2013 in Film, Videos | Permalink

Gaudi, background, 1904.

Gaudi, background, 1904.

As you might have noticed from the Google Doodle, today is the 161st birthday of architect Antoni Gaudi, who designed buildings that often seem to be haunting, hiding, falling, melting–like old women weeping because they’ve been exposed to the sun for too long. And some of his other work looks like a future too good to ever arrive.

From National Geographic: “The Sagrada Família has always been revered and reviled. The surrealists claimed Gaudí as one of their own, while George Orwell called the church ‘one of the most hideous buildings in the world.’ As idiosyncratic as Gaudí himself, it is a vision inspired by the architect’s religious faith and love of nature. He understood that the natural world is rife with curved forms, not straight lines. And he noticed that natural construction tends to favor sinewy materials such as wood, muscle, and tendon. With these organic models in mind, Gaudí based his buildings on a simple premise: If nature is the work of God, and if architectural forms are derived from nature, then the best way to honor God is to design buildings based on his work.”

Here’s the “Casa Batlló” section from Antonio Gaudí, an almost wordless 1985 cine-essay by Hiroshi Teshigahara, who made several genius films, including this one.

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“We’re Never Going To Be Totally Immersive As Long As We’re Looking At A Square”

June 23, 2013 in Excerpts, Film, Science/Tech | Permalink

A little more regarding Steven Spielberg’s comments about the future of cinema (which I posted about recently) from Frank Rose in the New York Times:

“Mr. Spielberg offered a more radical vision. At a time of ubiquitous screens — video, movie and computer — he predicted an end to on-screen entertainment. Instead, he said he thought we’d have a kind of enveloping, wraparound entertainment.

‘We’re never going to be totally immersive as long as we’re looking at a square, whether it’s a movie screen or whether it’s a computer screen,’ Mr. Spielberg said.’ We’ve got to get rid of that and put the player inside the experience, where no matter where you look you’re surrounded by a three-dimensional experience. That’s the future.’

Though most people treat screens as a window, Mr. Spielberg seems to understand them as a barrier, one that prevents viewers — now ‘players’ — from being fully, actively engaged in their entertainment.

The idea of immersive entertainment — in which you can lose yourself and in which the line between fiction and reality blurs — isn’t new at all. And its impact can be disorienting.”

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“She Is Known The World Over For A Breezy, Witty Kind Of Sexuality That Is Her Own Invention”

June 19, 2013 in Film, Videos | Permalink

Mae West, a great and dirty writer as well as a stage and screen icon, is visited by Dick Cavett on a Hollywood backlot in 1976.

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“Tell Me About Your Earliest Involvement With Chinatown”

June 17, 2013 in Film, Videos | Permalink

Roman Polanski–wanted, desired and, now, Skyped. This April 2013 interview took place between the fugitive director and the Roxie Theater in San Francisco. In 1997, while vacationing in Paris, I was seated in a cinema on the Champs-Élysées waiting for the beginning of Howard Stern’s Private Parts. Who walked in just as the credits were about to start but Roman Polanski and an angelic-looking blond, who was either a woman who looked like a girl or a girl who looked like a woman. Polanski laughed aloud during the scene about Howard’s Bergman-esque college film.

Baba-booey.

Baba Booey!

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“An ‘Implosion’ In The Film Industry Is Inevitable”

June 13, 2013 in Excerpts, Film, Science/Tech, Urban Studies | Permalink

Few endeavors are as top-heavy as the Hollywood film industry, and it has a history of its business model capsizing. Is it due another fall and reinvention, with tent-pole, global fare now the norm? Famous filmmakers Steven Spielberg and George Lucas may not be best poised to see what’s next, but they think titanic change is coming. From Paul Bond at the Hollywood Reporter:

“Steven Spielberg on Wednesday predicted an ‘implosion’ in the film industry is inevitable, whereby a half dozen or so $250 million movies flop at the box office and alter the industry forever. What comes next — or even before then — will be price variances at movie theaters, where ‘you’re gonna have to pay $25 for the next Iron Man, you’re probably only going to have to pay $7 to see Lincoln.’ He also said that Lincoln came ‘this close’ to being an HBO movie instead of a theatrical release.

George Lucas agreed that massive changes are afoot, including film exhibition morphing somewhat into a Broadway play model, whereby fewer movies are released, they stay in theaters for a year and ticket prices are much higher. His prediction prompted Spielberg to recall that his 1982 film E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial stayed in theaters for a year and four months.”

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“The Nowness Of Everything Is Absolutely Wondrous”

June 12, 2013 in Film, Videos | Permalink

Here’s the full version of Dennis Potter’s final interview in 1994, with Melvyn Bragg, when the auteur was dying and would interrupt the conversation periodically for a hit of morphine. Because the Singing Detective became such a sensation in the 1980s, he was often linked to the leading American TV producer of the day, Steven Bochco, which galled Potter. He HATED Bochco’s work, and when the two were joined by seminars, he would tell his counterpart exactly that to his face.

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