Back in 1990 the late Roger Ebert and Gene Siskel hosted a TV special which featured directors Steven Spielberg, George Lucas and Martin Scorsese discussing the future of movies.
The answer lies in this programme – recently discovered by Cinephilia and Beyond – where they not only discuss the future of movies but also their careers and a good deal else beside, including:
The possibility of a sequel to E.T. (1982)
Spielberg’s interest in a Howard Hughes project
Lucas on the Star Wars prequels
Scorsese on Goodfellas (1990) and commercial success
The sex scene in Don’t Look Now (1973)
HD television
Film preservation
You can watch the full programme here (along with the fast-forwarded ads):
Titled Eye of the Storm, it was first shown on UK television around the release of 1492: Conquest of Paradise (1992).
Although there is a certain irony that Scott’s career suffered a dip soon after (until his renaissance with Gladiator in 2000), it is a solid profile filled with various collaborators, including David Carradine, Sigourney Weaver, Mimi Rogers, Michael Douglas and his two sons Jake and Luke.
Back in 1999 director Sidney Lumet sat down for a three hour interview about his life and career in television.
He later went on to make his name as a film director with such films as 12 Angry Men (1957), Dog Day Afternoon (1975), Network (1976) and The Verdict (1982).
But his background in theatre and television were a big influence on his subsequent work and this lengthy discussion is a fascinating insight into his early career.
The conversation with Ralph Engelmen in 1999 for the Archive of American Television covered his growing up during the Depression, his early work in theater and the pioneering days of television, the era of McCarthyism and his subsequent transition to feature films.
PART 1
His background and early years in Yiddish theatre growing up during the Depression
Co-directed with Michael Henry Wilson, it explores Scorsese’s favourite American films grouped according to three different types of directors:
Illusionist: Pioneers such as D.W. Griffith or F. W. Murnau, who helped create new editing techniques among other innovations that created the basic blueprint for film grammar and which laid the groundwork for the later appearance of sound and colour.
His documentaries about cinema are like the best film school you never went to, featuring invaluable insights from a master director and a passionate movie fan.
The best compliment I can pay them is that you should just see them as soon as you possibly can.
It was part of the European press tour for War Horse but the length and quality of the conversation made it much more than the usual press junket and red-carpet sound bites (where time is limited).
What made it extra special is that the two guys asking the questions really know their stuff.
Costa-Gavras directed two of the best political dramas ever made in Z (1969) and Missing (1982), whilst Toubiana was was the long time editor of Cahiers du cinéma (1981-1991) and is currently director of La Cinémathèque Française.
“Not since Cannes in ’82 have I been so moved by an audience of lovers. I will never forget today!”
As you can imagine it was a pretty fascinating conversation, which formed part of the Spielberg season they are currently running, which lasts until March 3rd.
Although the questions are asked in French, Spielberg had an earpiece through which quick translations were made, so the conversation flows pretty well.
They never discuss it, but Costa-Gavras’ Z (1968) – one of the great films of the 1960s – was a major influence on Spielberg’s Munich (2005).
Steven Spielberg pops up in movies more often than you might think.
People of a certain age might remember him in The Blues Brothers (1980) but there are some that are not so well known, like Jaws (1975) and Vanilla Sky (2001).
A YouTube user has compiled this neat video of them.
He has been in London this week promoting Tabloid, his new film about a bizarre scandal involving a beauty queen and a mormon, and the event was live streamed over the web on BAFTA Guru.
Interestingly, the film hit the headlines this week when Joyce McKinney (the main subject) announced she was suing Morris for her portrayal in the film, which has echoes of Randall Adams suing Morris, despite the fact that (or maybe because?) his 1988 film The Thin Blue Line got him off death row.
This talk was held at the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis after the success of Sideways, which had been one of the the most acclaimed films of the previous year.
Hosted by LA Times & NPR film critic Kenneth Turan, the conversation goes pretty deep into his career as they cover various aspects of his life and work, including:
His Nebraska background
Film school
His early love of Kurosawa films, silent cinema and the New Hollywood era of the 1970s
Getting in to the film idustry
Using non-professional actors
Why he likes adapting novels
The original ending of Election
Adapting About Schmidt and working with Jack Nicholson
Why he loves voiceover
Shooting physical comedy
Sideways and the idea of personal cinema
The importance of casting
Pros and cons of modern filmmaking technology
Women audiences and Sideways
The influence of silent Italian comedy and Hal Ashby on Sideways
Using success to get the next film made
Fans of his work will find much to chew on here and for aspiring filmmakers it provides interesting insights into one of the best American directors currently working.
This twelve minute montage of Stanley Kubrick movies is a hypnotic tribute to the director.
Incorporating clips from from The Killing (1956) through to Eyes Wide Shut (1999), it highlights various motifs using editing and split-screen effects.
After an introduction from current DGA president Taylor Hackford, Michael Apted hosts a discussion which sees Abrams and Cameron ask Spielberg questions about his films and career.
It isn’t availabe as an embed but if you click on the image below, it will take you to the DGA page where – if you scroll down a bit – the full video can be found, along with highlights and photos:
Lasting over 90 minutes, it is a fascinating talk and covers:
The early visual effects Spielberg employed on Close Encounters and why he re-shot the ending
The classic fight scene in Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981) and the fact that Spielberg didn’t get ill whilst filming in Tunisia because he had Sainsbury’s canned food shipped in from the UK.
Tips on directing children and how a fantastic preview screening of E.T. (1982) upset actor Henry Thomas
How he had to adapt his directorial style for Schindler’s List (1993)
The visual effects breakthroughs on Jurassic Park (1993)
Director Sidney Lumet has died in New York at the age of 86.
He was best known for films such as 12 Angry Men (1957), Dog Day Afternoon (1975), Network (1976) and The Verdict (1982), all of which earned him Academy Award nominations for Best Director.
With over 50 films to his credit he was easily one of the most prolific directors of his era and some of his more overlooked works are well worth seeking out, especially Fail-Safe (1964),
He began directing for live television in 1950 and broke through in to features with the classic court-room drama Twelve Angry Men (1957), which starred Henry Fonda as a member of a jury deliberating over a case.
The 1970s was something of a golden decade for Lumet.
The dark and unjustly neglected drama The Offence (1972) was one of Sean Connery’s best roles as a police officer investigating a series of murders in an English town.
Serpico (1973) was a powerful depiction of police corruption in New York city, with a great lead performance from Al Pacino.
The bank-heist drama Dog Day Afternoon (1975) immediately established itself as one of the great films of that decade and again featured Pacino in one of his most memorable roles.
Network (1976) was also an acclaimed social drama, with Peter Finch as a news anchor who becomes an instant celebrity after his memorably angry speeches connect with the disillusioned public.
Written by Paddy Chayefsky and co-starring Faye Dunaway, William Holden and Robert Duvall, its satire of television and the media is still amazingly relevant 35 years on.
After this extraordinary run of films, it would be a few years before he returned to comparable form with The Verdict (1982), a legal drama about a veteran Boston lawyer (Paul Newman) who seeks redemption in a medical malpractice case.
His output shifted from genre to genre with mixed results over the next three decades, although Prince of the City (1981), Running on Empty (1988) and Q & A (1990) are well worth revisiting.
In 2005 was the recipient of an Academy Award for Lifetime Achievement for his “brilliant services to screenwriters, performers, and the art of the motion picture.”
At the age of 82, he directed the acclaimed thriller Before the Devil Knows You’re Dead (2007), which starred Philip Seymour Hoffman, Ethan Hawke and Marisa Tomei.
Intriguingly, he as was a big supporter of digital filmmaking and at the New York Film Festival in 2007 sang the praises of shooting on digital over celluloid.
The New York Times reported a quote of Lumet’s which serves as a fitting epitaph:
“While the goal of all movies is to entertain, the kind of film in which I believe goes one step further. It compels the spectator to examine one facet or another of his own conscience. It stimulates thought and sets the mental juices flowing.”
Over the last few years it has travelled to various cities across the globe including Berlin, Zurich, Rome and Melbourne.
The archives contain a number of documents from Kubrick’s productions including scripts, letters, research materials, photos, costumes and props.
It also includes materials from films that Kubrick planned but never made, including the Napoleon project from the early 1970s and the Holocaust drama Aryan Papers which he planned in the early 1990s.
The layout of the exhibition is designed so each space is dedicated to a film and it takes up two floors of the Frank Gehry building, on the 5th and 7th floors, with large-scale models and interactive digital installations.
Aside from being a great director David Lynch has some mean skills in the kitchen.
Around the release of Inland Empire (2006) he made these cooking videos where he prepares some quinoa and organic broccoli.
Shot in black and white, they are set to some moody music as the director mentions the qualities of quinoa (“they say that it is the only grain that is a perfect, complete protein”) and he tells a mean anecdote about his travels in Europe involving paper money and sugar water.
Nicole Kidman also remembers working on what would be Kubrick’s final film:
Here is a BBC News report the night he died:
In 2001, his regular producer Jan Harlan, director Martin Scorsese and wife Christiane Kubrick joined Charlie Rose for an hour long chat around the release of the documentary Stanley Kubrick, A Life in Pictures.
There is also this montage (by YouTube user vezina2001) set to the music of Dead Can Dance and Lisa Gerrard:
Angel Heart (1987) remains of the more underrated films of the late 1980s, and around its US release director Alan Parker gave a lengthy interview about it and his career up to that point.
At the time it divided critics and a rough sex scene ruffled feathers at the MPAA, but over time it has become something of a cult favourite with directors such as Christopher Nolan singing its praises (he has admitted it was an influence on Memento).
The interview was part of a series conducted by John A Gallagher and contains some interesting nuggets of information including:
Robert Redford originally owned the rights to the novel
Why he loves switching genres
How Carolco funded it after making lots of money on the Rambo series
Working with Mickey Rourke (who is ‘very much his own man’ – diplomatic words?)
The appeals process with the MPAA over the sex scene
How the greatest crime is just to make ‘another movie’
The importance of shooting on location rather than a studio sound stage
How he got his break writing and filming in the ‘egalitarian’ world of advertising
The pragmatism of choosing Bugsy Malone (1976) as a film project
Alfred Hitchcock was famous for the brief cameos he made in his own films and this compilation is a reminder of the fun that can be had looking out for them.
I think my favourite is the one from Lifeboat (1944) but it is also interesting to note what he does in them.
Note that some involve a musical instrument: in Strangers on a Train (1951) he carries a cello; Rear Window (1954) sees him near a piano; and Vertigo (1958) sees him carrying a bugle.
Another motif is that he often walks across the scene from left to right.
Look out for the bit around the 9 minute mark when he discusses The Terminator and the original studio’s choice for the main role.
“The head of Orion, who were gonna release the film, called me up and said, ‘Are you sitting down? I’ve cast this movie’. I was at a party, and it’s, ‘are you sitting down? It’s O.J. Simpson for the Terminator!’
And I said, ‘This is the stupidest idea I’ve ever heard,’ you know. I didn’t know O.J. Simpson, I had nothing against him personally. I didn’t know he was gonna go murder his wife later and become the real Terminator”
There are also some other web extra videos which didn’t make the broadcast edit.
The teaser for Michael Moore’s as-yet-untitled documentary about the bailout has been released by Overture films.
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The IMDb currently lists it as ‘The Untitled Michael Moore Project‘ and at a screening of the above trailer in New York cinemas ushers walked around collecting donations for the satirical “Save Our CEOs” organization.
Apparently if anyone was silly enough to give money, it all went to a local food bank.
Courtney Hazlett of MSNBC’s ‘The Scoop’ had a recent discussion previewing the film, in which they point out that it could have a broader appeal than his previous work because of widespread bipartisan anger towards Wall Street: