The Godfather

Slideshow: Al Pacino, Christopher Walken at Opening of 48th Chicago International Film Festival

PatrickMcD — Tue, 16 Oct 2012 10:36:57 -0400

CHICAGO – It was true star power as the 48th Chicago International Film Festival kicked off on October 11th, 2012. The Opening Night film was “Stand Up Guys,” and appearing on behalf of the film was Al Pacino, Christopher Walken, Alan Arkin and director Fisher Stevens.

The Chicago International Film Festival is an annual event that celebrates the daring new work of filmmakers from all around the world. From October 11th-25th, the international film community comes to Chicago to present fresh and exciting cinema. There will be new voices, iconic masters and conversations with all facets of the worldwide film community.

Photographer Joe Arce of HollywoodChicago was at Opening Night as movie superstars Al Pacino, Christopher Walker and Alan Arkin walked the premiere night red carpet, and captured these Exclusive Portraits. Click “Next” and “Previous” to scan through the slideshow or jump directly to individual photos with the captioned links below. All images © Joe Arce of Starstruck Foto for HollywoodChicago.com.

CIFF1: Al Pacino at the Opening Night of the 48th Chicago International Film Festival, October 11th, 2012.
CIFF2: Oscar Winner Al Pacino walks the red carpet for ‘Stand Up Guys’ on Opening Night.
CIFF3: Al Pacino has four films scheduled for 2013, including ‘Stand Up Guys.’
CIFF4: Oscar Winner Christopher Walken walks the red carpet for ‘Stand Up Guys.’
CIFF5: Oscar Winner Alan Arkin walks the red carpet for ‘Stand Up Guys.’
CIFF6: Actress Vanessa Ferlito of ‘Stand Up Guys’ on the Opening Night red carpet.
CIFF7: Actress Addison Timlin of ‘Stand Up Guys’ on the Opening Night red carpet.
CIFF8: Oscar winning director Fisher Stevens premieres ‘Stand Up Guys’ on Opening Night.

The 48th Chicago International Film Festival is October 11th-25th, 2012. For more information and to purchase tickets, click on ChicagoFilmFestival.com

By PATRICK McDONALD
Senior Staff Writer
HollywoodChicago.com
pat@hollywoodchicago.com

Film News: ‘Vertigo’ Tops Sight & Sound Poll as Best Film of All Time

BrianTT — Wed, 01 Aug 2012 13:41:03 -0400

CHICAGO – Every decade, the legendary “Sight & Sound” magazine polls some of the most important film historians, critics, and artists in the world (including Roger Ebert) for a list of the best movies ever made. They released the first list since 2002 today and “Vertigo” topped the list, dethroning “Citizen Kane.” Full top ten below, followed by the top tens from 2002 and 1992.

2012
1. “Vertigo”
2. “Citizen Kane”
3. “Tokyo Story”
4. “The Rules of the Game”
5. “Sunrise: A Song for Two Humans”
6. “2001: A Space Odyssey”
7. “The Searchers”
8. “Man with a Movie Camera”
9. “The Passion of Joan of Arc”
10. “8 1/2”

2002
1. “Citizen Kane”
2. “Vertigo”
3. “The Rules of the Game”
4. “The Godfather” & “The Godfather Part II”
5. “Tokyo Story”
6. “2001: A Space Odyssey”
7. “Battleship Potemkin”
7. “Sunrise: A Song for Two Humans”
9. “8 1/2”
10. “Singin’ in the Rain”

1992
1. “Citizen Kane”
2. “8 1/2”
3. “Raging Bull”
4. “La Strada”
5. “L’Atlante”
6. “The Godfather”
6. “Modern Times”
6. “Vertigo”
9. “The Godfather Part II”
10. “The Passion of Joan of Arc”
10. “Rashomon”
10. “Seven Samurai”

By BRIAN TALLERICO
Content Director
HollywoodChicago.com
brian@hollywoodchicago.com

Film News: ‘The Godfather’ Will Hit the Big Screen Again in Cinemark Theatres

TimBMartens — Wed, 29 Feb 2012 14:33:04 -0500

CHICAGO – Are you a movie buff that considers Francis Ford Coppola’s “The Godfather” to be one of greatest movie ever made? Are you too young to have seen it in theaters when it was released in 1972, or missed your chance to see it in theaters? Well, you are in luck my friend, because Cinemark and Paramount Pictures are teaming up to bring “The Godfather” back to the big screen.

Celebrating the 40th anniversary of the classic film, Cinemark and Paramount have teamed up to bring the restored version of “The Godfather” to 55 theaters throughout the country on Thursday, March 1, including one theater right here in Chicago. Locally, the film will play at the Cinemark Century Evanston 18 at 2 p.m. and 7 p.m.

What’s more is Cinemark also plans to show “The Godfather Part II” in theaters on Thursday, April 19. In the span of a month and a half, you can see two Best Picture winners and two of the greatest films ever made on the big screen. Sounds like an offer you can’t refuse.

By TIM MARTENS
Staff Writer
HollywoodChicago.com
tim@hollywoodchicago.com

Interview: Kimberly Peirce Discusses ‘The Godfather,’ Her New Crime Thriller

mattmovieman — Mon, 10 Oct 2011 08:29:49 -0400

CHICAGO – If Robert K. Elder’s book, “The Film That Changed My Life,” is indeed providing a blueprint for the screening series continuing this month at the Music Box, then cinephiles have every right to rejoice. Elder’s book interviewed a wide variety of filmmakers about the films that left a permanent impact on them, and the series reunites Elder and the filmmakers for screenings of their favorite films.

In June, the first installment featured Victor Fleming’s 1939 classic “The Wizard of Oz” hosted by irreverent super-fan John Waters. Now on Oct. 16, the series continues with filmmaker Kimberly Peirce, who will host a 3 p.m. screening of Francis Ford Coppola’s 1972 landmark, “The Godfather,” as well as a screening of her own 1999 masterwork “Boys Don’t Cry.” Though these films may seem as different as night and day, they both share thematic and stylistic similarities, not to mention an overwhelmingly visceral power. Peirce will also return to the University of Chicago on Oct. 19 to host a 5 p.m. panel discussion, “On Passion, Realism and the Arts Career,” with her former teacher, Lauren Berlant. Hollywood Chicago spoke with Peirce about her thoughts regarding new indie business models, Apatowian comedies and her upcoming gangster picture, “The Knife.”

HollywoodChicago.com: Your original film choice for the Elder book was Fellini’s “8 1/2.” What struck you about that film?

Kimberly Peirce: The story structure was unusual to what I had seen before, and it really gave me a sense of permission. When I saw that [film], and saw that it had echoed a lot of the excess that I saw in my own family, it made that connection between making more personal movies as opposed to making movies that were completely devoid of your own personhood, and were these constructs that you saw at the theater that were more commercially minded. It was an early art film that I saw, but it was also emotional and sexual and personal. I obsessively watched “8 1/2” for many years just feeling that if I ever did any [film], it could be like this. “Boys Don’t Cry” isn’t really anything like it—maybe in some ways it is—but it was interesting what a profound impact it had on me. I wanted to do movies like that.

Kimberly Peirce will discuss how The Godfather changed her life at the Music Box on Oct. 16.
Photo credit: Kimberly Peirce

HollywoodChicago.com: “The Godfather” is also a highly personal film. What was it about Coppola’s style that you found so inspiring? You mention in the book that he told you about his admiration for “Boys Don’t Cry.”

Peirce: Yeah, I met him a couple times and he was very supportive. I think with Coppola’s best work, particularly “The Godfather,” there’s definitely realism to it and there’s an amazing attention to detail. But there’s also detail in a profound cinematic sense, even though the details are honest and true, like when Michael sits down in a leather chair. I took a class in the sound work that was done on that. It’s a realistic sound, but it’s amplified to be super-dramatic. So he’s always balancing those two. He also deals incredibly well with violence, both physical and emotional. Michael’s emotionally violent to his family, and I think you see that in both of my films. For me, it’s not enough to just have the physical violence, I have to understand what’s going on underneath. So I think that focus was really similar. Certainly he was dealing with the heavier and darker on an epic scale in those movies. In a way my next film, “The Knife,” has a little bit more in common in that it’s more of a thriller and it’s on a bigger canvas. Same thing—physical and emotional violence with a real story. Certainly “The Godfather” was inspired by real people that he maybe didn’t know but it was a real lifestyle that he was emulating. One of the reasons why it was so hard to do the film the way he wanted was [because] the studio kept trying to force upon him all kinds of choices like non-Italian people. Coppola was drawing from a culture that was really true to him.

HollywoodChicago.com: In the book, you discuss how Coppola allows the audience to experience events at the same instant as the characters, such as the moment where Michael’s lover, Apollonia, is killed. How do you feel this is achieved?

Peirce: Well, you bring up a really interesting topic. It’s interesting that you mention the explosion with Apollonia, because there’s also the moment in front of the hospital where Michael’s defending his father, and he tells the guy with the flowers to act like it’s a machine gun. He says, “Put your hands in your pocket,” and then Michael looks down and sees that the guy’s hands are shaking. Michael looks at his own hands and sees that they aren’t shaking. It’s a moment where Michael is amazed that he’s as confident as he wanted to be. I think that if you can achieve that: a. you’re not tipping your hat to the audience and b. you’re not manipulating them. I think when you watch a movie and it’s time to cry and there’s the music that’s supposed to make you cry [coupled with] the narrative that’s supposed to make you cry, you don’t want to cry because it’s all predetermined for you. The movie is ahead of you and it’s trying to get you to do what it wants you to do versus the opposite where you’re just trying to go along with the character. If you can bring your audience to a natural place where they feel what your character is feeling, you haven’t preordained it. You aren’t forcing it upon them. To me, that’s what you always aim for—to have the audience be inside the protagonist’s point of view as much as possible so they are experiencing the world as the protagonist does.

HollywoodChicago.com: Some artists in other mediums that you’ve revealed as inspirations on your work are photographers, particularly Man Ray. You also have a background in photography…

Peirce: I do. I quit University of Chicago where I was going to school and moved to Japan. I had my first camera, my first dark room and was just consuming all kinds of photography. Man Ray was one [photographer] I studied, [Henri] Cartier-Bresson was another…there’s so many old ones. But particularly with Man Ray, it was the strikingness of the images. They were very graphic and very profound—kind of the opposite of Cartier-Bresson, who was trying to capture the moment.

Chloe Sevigny and Hilary Swank star in Kimberly Peirce’s Boys Don’t Cry.
Photo credit: Fox Searchlight Pictures

HollywoodChicago.com: There are several subtly impressionistic passages in “Boys Don’t Cry.” Do you consider Man Ray an influence on that film?

Peirce: Sure, and again, on my limited budget where I made due with what I had, we had to bring the [audience] from the hardcore reality that Brandon is in a female body yet he is imagining himself as a man. We had to go outside of the physical world and into his imagination, because that’s where he resided, and that’s also where the love story resided. So with very little money, the reason I would look to someone like Man Ray is it’s not advanced CGI. It’s a guy who’s making due with very few instruments. Early on in my career, those sorts of filmmakers and photographers were really influential. I had a little membership to the Anthology Film Archives in New York where you had the cheapest kind of [equipment]. It wasn’t even digital back then, it was just an animation camera that you could photograph films with, so I did a whole bunch of experimental filmmaking. It cost me three dollars an hour. Nowadays you would do it all with Photoshop or one of the visual effects programs. They were causing emotion with very simple means. I would look at a Man Ray photograph and just be flushed with emotion. My goal in making a film is to effect people and touch them. A lot of times you have to go outside of the realm of what’s been done before and say, ‘if I put these two images together and that gives me a sense of possibility,’ it’s like you’re creating a language to entertain the audience.

HollywoodChicago.com: What is the current production status for “The Knife”?

Peirce: Well hopefully it’s going to be shot very soon. I would definitely say next year we would hope to release it. It’s pretty exciting because it’s an action thriller. It’s in the vein of “The Town” and “The Departed” and it’s about a gangbanger who gets in very deep when [infiltrating] a gang. It’s pretty much a suicide mission, so he crosses over to the FBI, but there’s all these limitations to what he has to do in order to actually get protection from the FBI, so he goes back into the gang to get to the top. You’ve seen elements of that story before, so we really have to make sure that it’s terrifying to you. Like Brandon, he could be exposed at any point.

HollywoodChicago.com: You mention in the book that a recurring theme in your work is the dilemma of the outsider desiring to become the insider. With the agent infiltrating the gang in “The Knife,” would you say that theme applies to this film as well?

Peirce: Yeah, that’s interesting you say that. The white FBI agent can only go so far into the African American gang, and the African American who’s in the gang wants to get out but the only power he has is what he has to offer about the gang. So he has to go all the way back in and they have to work together. As he’s moving up the chain, he starts thinking—because [race] does play into it—that the FBI agent may not have my back the same way the gang does. So it’s really a [matter] of, ‘I want to get out but I don’t know that getting out is as good as I originally thought it was.’ He’s getting pulled in deep by both sides. So yeah, it’s interesting that you brought that up. It’s exactly like Michael at the beginning of “The Godfather.” He’s the outsider. He was a military hero, they don’t want him in the gang and what happens? He ends up running the gang.

HollywoodChicago.com: What are your thoughts on the current state of queer cinema? Do you feel that it’s entered the mainstream?

Peirce: In the last decade, there’s definitely been so much more queer film being made. There’s so many more images of queer life out there in terms of on television with “Ellen,” and there’s queer characters now in “True Blood,” “Modern Family,” [etc.] The taboo has been broken. Almost all my friends say, ‘My kids have friends whose parents are queer.’ So I think it’s not only in the media, it’s everywhere in the culture.

Steve Carell stars in Judd Apatow’s The 40 Year Old Virgin.
Photo credit: Universal Pictures

HollywoodChicago.com: Rumor has it that you have an Apatow-produced comedy in development. Is that true?

Peirce: Yes, I am still connected to it. The reason why Apatow comedies work so great is because they’re raw, they show a subculture and they’re truthful. Even though there are formulas to it—obviously “40 Year Old Virgin” has a rise and a fall that you can recognize—Apatow always works with the same group of guys. When you watch that stuff, you feel like those are real people as opposed to when you go to a formulaic romantic comedy. Nothing about those films make you feel like those are real people onscreen who said those jokes. It feels like it’s been contrived. I think in many ways, great new queer cinema is coming out of real queerness, real experiences and real subcultures. That to me is where the movement seems similar to the Apatowian comedies.

HollywoodChicago.com: Apatow’s approach to depicting sexuality is hilarious in its rawness and awkwardness. In “40 Year Old Virgin,” the guys trying to get the virgin laid know as little about sex as he does.

Peirce: He’s portraying the guys as failures. These are the idiot guys who can’t get laid, and you actually see them fail, which you don’t see in your classic formulaic romantic comedy. It doesn’t feel like it was contrived in an office with a bunch of people who are figuring out what would sound funny. I know that with Apatow and those guys, it’s very autobiographical. Even if it isn’t his life story, he really believes in drawing from what’s really funny and what’s really real.

HollywoodChicago.com: When you served on the Sundance jury this year, you mentioned feeling hopeful about the “new indie model” that you had observed there. What was that model, and is it something you’re planning to follow with “The Knife”?

Peirce: Well I don’t know if it’s any different from your basic model where a person has a great story to tell and tries to get it told for the cheapest [price]. That’s the indie model. You just get it done any way you can. What we saw was a fall in the sale of those types of movies. They weren’t really selling for a couple years. I don’t know why exactly—maybe it was after the crash of the stock market. You didn’t have a lot of sales. I was in the jury for the dramatic competition which was phenomenal. I was amazed that you had movies made for $300,000, movies made for $800,000, movies made for $1.2 million. Here I was walking into a theater and with very little means, people were telling stories again that were really moving. So it’s already amazing that people can get their hands on the money because after the fall of the stock market, that wasn’t happening. Then what amazed me was the flurry of buying. It’s an amazing deal for the studios if you think about it because I think they have a hard time making anything for under $9 million. Here you have these movies that on the high end are made for $2 or $2.5 million. The only thing I got scared about is if not all those movies make it, there’s going to be a backlash where they won’t be bought again.

In terms of me and “The Knife,” it’s an interesting scenario. The studio owned the rights to the magazine article in “GQ” called “The Inside Man.” It was a great story, but the script that was developed from it wasn’t that great. I came in and said, “Okay this is how I see to make this movie.” Even though I had the movie, I still had to sell it to the people who owned it. So the writer, Vineet Dewan, and I just donated five months of our time and wrote the whole story. You can’t really pitch a 45-minute outline, so we wrote a 60-page scriptment, which is a screenplay and a treatment. We also made a graphic novel and we technically sold it to the head of production at Universal, even though they owned it. But what we did is very typical of the business right now. If you want to do anything that isn’t a franchise with a 1, 2, 3 and 4 behind it, you have to donate a ton of free time to get it happening. There’s a lot of free labor that’s going on with a lot of creative people, which is tough because we’re all earning less and we’re all working for free. If we love film, there’s a lot more that we have to do in order to get these movies happening. Even if I’m working in the studio system with a major producer like Ron Howard and Imagine, I still have to work as if I’m an indie and I have to donate all this free time in order to convince the powers that be that this is a worthwhile use of their time and money.

They want these types of movies like “The Knife” because it’s like “The Town” and “The Departed.” You can make it for $30 million and it will go on to make $100 million, but it’s not really the business they’re in. In the business, you used to be able to just make a great movie and that was it. Now they don’t even look at it that way. They don’t want to do it unless they can make five great movies. Not even great—five profit-making movies. You talk to anyone in my business and that’s what you’re hearing. So are you willing to put in all this extra effort to tell stories that mean something to you? “The Knife” is a great story and I’ve been working with the real guys whose story it’s based on. That’s been really inspiring.

James Caan, Marlon Brando, Al Pacino and John Cazale star in Francis Ford Coppola’s The Godfather.
Photo credit: Paramount Pictures

HollywoodChicago.com: Do you feel female directors have become more embraced by the studios in the last decade?

Peirce: Well, I’m in an unusual position. With “Stop Loss,” I didn’t shop it around separately from when we wrote it as a greenlit spec script. It came out as an entity in and of itself. The studios, the financiers and the producers signed onto it as opposed to it being an open directing assignment where I’m a female doing male material. If I was out there looking for the jobs that men typically get, I would be coming up against obstacles, but because of the design of “Stop Loss,” I wasn’t in the position to find that out. Same thing with “The Knife.” It wasn’t an open directing assignment that was ready to go where it was me against all the guys. I came in and was like, ‘I know how to make your movie work.’ There may still be lots of gender hurtles but in these last two projects, I’ve skirted by them. But if look at the percentages of the women who are directing, it’s appalling. What I don’t want to do is make it sound like there isn’t a major problem.

HollywoodChicago.com: Kathryn Bigelow’s Best Director win at the 2010 Oscars may have caused this fact to get glossed over.

Peirce: Bigelow’s win was great, but you have to look at how many women are being hired to make movies. Bigelow did [“The Hurt Locker”] in a way that was very independent. How many women are being hired to do jobs that men are typically getting in the studio system? I don’t think it has changed at all. Six percent of all directing jobs are held by women, so I don’t think that it’s getting any better. Of course, there are these star women who do great and we’re happy for that. That doesn’t mean that the overall numbers are changing.

HollywoodChicago.com: What’s next for you besides “The Knife”?

Peirce: I have a miniseries called “The Enclave” for Fox TV and USA Studios, and am working with Andre and Maria Jacquemetton, who are the head writers for “Mad Men.” Were hopefully just about to get it greenlighted. It’s about an American family that relocates to an American compound in the kingdom of Saudi Arabia. There’s suspense and danger when the wife, a Pulitzer Prize-nominated journalist, loses her job after her newspaper uncovers a mysterious murder that may involve the company that her husband works for, the Saudi officials and the CIA.

HollywoodChicago.com: Do you feel that television offers directors more artistic freedom?

Peirce: I do think the freedom in making an independent film is extraordinary. If you go to the festivals and you see what’s being made, your mind will be blown and that’s great and healthy. The problem is, how many of those films can actually get distribution, and how many can actually make a profit, given the way release cycles work? That’s our biggest problem. There’s always going to be freedom if you’re willing to pay for your own movie. TV is not a substitute for independent film, even though TV in many ways is picking up some of the slack. I’m a TV nut that just finished “Downtown Abbey” and am finishing “Mad Men.” What’s great about TV are the characters, conflicts and human emotion. The writing is stellar. In many ways, you’re getting on TV what you can’t get at the movies. They don’t replace independent films, but they’re making money at it. People are tuning in, they’re watching it at home, and TV companies are making money. Therefore, they can keep making that product because the audience has migrated to some extent. You’re seeing that most adult entertainment is at home. What are franchises aimed for? Certainly studios want to get at the four quadrants, but they are always aiming for the teenagers. That was not the concern before. “Mad Men” is not trying to get a huge teen girl audience like “Twilight.” They can have a limited number of people watching it and that can justify making it, which is brilliant. That’s what we want in the movies but we don’t have that. If we go to the studios and say, “Hey, can we make our movie for $15 million?” they won’t think it’s worth it.

HollywoodChicago.com: Last year, films by Aronofsky, Russell and the Coens were outgrossing a lot of the mainstream products when they finally acquired a wide release. It’s been my hope that this will cause the studios to realize that there is an audience for the type of pictures that would often be relegated to art houses.

Peirce: That’s my aim. I’m not trying to make what I would call an art house film, I’m trying to make a movie for a price. What we’re saying to the studio is, ‘I get it, you guys have to make these huge movies. I’m not competing with that. But can we protect one revenue stream which is going to be adult movies made for a price? They’re not made for gazillions of dollars, they’re made for millions of dollars and they’re designed to make a profit and they’re good old-fashioned entertainment. Can we protect a certain amount of theatrical space for that?’ I’m in the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences and I’m in the DGA. This is something that we’re fighting to protect—the adult theatrical experience.

‘The Film That Changed My Life’ series presents ‘The Godfather,’ starring Al Pacino, Marlon Brando, James Caan, Robert Duvall, John Cazale and Diane Keaton. It was written by Mario Puzo and Francis Ford Coppola and directed by Francis Ford Coppola. It will screen Oct. 16 at the Music Box, followed by a discussion with Kimberly Peirce and Robert K. Elder.

By MATT FAGERHOLM
Staff Writer
HollywoodChicago.com
matt@hollywoodchicago.com

Film Review: ‘Kill the Irishman’ Offers History as Explosions

PatrickMcD — Fri, 18 Mar 2011 17:54:37 -0400

CHICAGO – The amalgamation of big time unions and organized crime in post-WW2 industrial America is as enlightening as any struggle for power. Cleveland, Ohio, in the 1950s thru the ‘70s was both on the waterfront and had the East Coast influence of New York City’s most notorious crime families. That history is wasted in “Kill the Irishman.”

Rating: 2.0/5.0

Writer/director Jonathan Hensleigh ignores the result of the union/crime grip on Cleveland to focus on one ruffian who seemed unable to die, despite many attempts on his person. Kill the Irishman is the true life story about the rise of Danny Greene, a longshoreman who worked his way up to union organizer, only to be corrupted by its money and power. His comes off in the film as crass and uninteresting, which seems the opposite of what probably is true.

Greene is portrayed by Ray Stevenson, who plays him from early 1960s dock worker to the Irishman with a price on his head. His early worker organizing is shown as heroic, it is a crusading reporter that discovers the money skimming he’d been practicing with union dues. After enduring a couple of indictments with no jail time, he starts his career anew by renewing mobster activities.

After getting involved in waste management activities, Greene gains some crime family muscle in the form of John Nardi (Vincent D’Onofrio) and Shondor Birns (Christopher Walken). Greene always seems to be one step ahead of disputes, and actually gains a grudging admiration from Cleveland Detective Joe Manditski (Val Kilmer). He continues a life dominated by deals (with New York City mafia ties), his unerring ability to violently dispatch his opponents and his dodging of the many attempts on his life.

When war breaks out between the fissured factions of Cleveland’s organized crime community, there seems to be a hit or car bomb every week. Although Danny Greene is targeted, he manages to outlive many of his close associates. And despite the rallying cry of kill the Irishman, Greene goes down fighting to the very bitter end.

“Kill the Irishman” continues its limited release in Chicago on March 18th. Check local listings for show times and theaters. Featuring Ray Stevenson, Vincent D’Onofrio, Val Kilmer, Christopher Walken, Steve Schirripa and Paul Sorvino. Written and directed by Jonathan Hensleigh. Rated “R”

Continue reading for Patrick McDonald’s full review of “Kill the Irishman”

Overdue Expiration: Ray Stevenson as Danny Greene in ‘Kill the Irishman’
Photo credit: Kim Simms for Anchor Bay Films

Continue reading for Patrick McDonald’s full review of “Kill the Irishman”

Blu-Ray Review: ‘Gomorrah’ Galvanizes With Raw Portrait of Crime

BrianTT — Tue, 01 Dec 2009 12:33:27 -0500

CHICAGO – Matteo Garrone’s revelatory crime picture joins the esteemed group of worthy foreign film Oscar contenders (like “4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days”) inexplicably snubbed by the Academy. But such accolades are meaningless compared to the reaction it has received, breaking box office records in its limited release, while acquiring the passionate support of film icons like Martin Scorsese. It has gained a reputation for being the “ultimate Mafia movie” (even though it’s actually about a different crime family), besting everything from “The Godfather” and “GoodFellas” to “The Sopranos.”

Blu-Ray Rating: 5.0/5.0

Yet Garrone doesn’t even attempt to mimic the larger-than-life style and scope of Coppola or Scorsese, and his film achieves an entirely different kind of greatness, stripping away any shred of romanticism or artifice to reveal the primal horror lying behind scenes of deceptively mundane life. His film also has the distinction of being set in modern-day Italy, which gives the film’s events an unsettling immediacy devoid of any nostalgic undertones (Tony Bennett is nowhere to be found on this soundtrack).

Gomorrah was released on Blu-Ray and DVD on November 24th, 2009.
Photo credit: Courtesy of the Criterion Collection

“Gomorrah” is a fitting title, partly because it sounds like Comorra, the name of Italy’s most powerful crime syndicate, of which the film is about. It will be an education for anyone unfamiliar with the group, which isn’t nearly as well known as the Mafia, but is a good deal larger. The film’s end titles come as a shock, estimating the Comorra’s yearly revenue at $250 billion, while revealing that the group is currently invested in the World Trade Center’s reconstruction. The script, credited with six writers, is based on the book by Roberto Saviano, who acquired his facts by going undercover. His story would be worthy of a film itself, and he now lives under 24-hour police surveillance.

Gomorrah was released on Blu-Ray and DVD on November 24th, 2009.
Photo credit: Courtesy of the Criterion Collection

The people in “Gomorrah” are not wealthy crime lords but ordinary citizens of Naples enlisted to carry out the group’s dirty work. Garrone intercuts five stories from the book, whose diverse subjects are connected only by the organization that rules them all. There’s a 13-year-old boy (Salvatore Abruzzese) fated for recruitment, a seasoned bag man (Gianfelice Imparato) who delivers money to families of imprisoned mobsters, a suave executive (Toni Servillo) intent on mentoring a fresh-faced college grad (Carmine Paternoster), and a dressmaker (Salvatore Cantalupo) who risks his life to aid Chinese rivals. There’s also two “Beavis and Butthead”-type teens (Ciro Petrone and Marco Macor) who’ve become the film’s trademark image, as they charge along a lake in their underwear, firing guns into the water. They embody the current generation raised on Scarface and Tony Montana, who reign as the figureheads of their pop culture-fueled religion.

Even though “Godfather,” “GoodFellas,” and even “Scarface” are deeply sobering films, they are loved by fans for the moments where viewers get to experience the initial exhilaration of mobster life. “Gomorrah” offers no such escapism, since there’s no one to identify with except the Comorra’s helpless victims, whose life choices boil down to joining the mob, or dying by their hand. There’s no buildup to the outbursts of violence, which occur with a sudden, businesslike swiftness, yet leave the protagonists (and audience) trembling and dazed. This makes the film’s global popularity all the more remarkable. Crime always pays at the box office, yet this film has the power to raise awareness of the Comorra’s crimes and influence, which is the first step towards justice.

“Gomorrah” is presented in 1080p High Definition (with a 2.35:1 aspect ratio), and comes equipped with improved English subtitles. The special features include an abundance of behind-the-scenes footage, though the real gems on the disc are extended interviews with Garrone and Saviano. The filmmaker discusses his experience working on the streets of Naples, while the author offers fascinating details on the history behind each of the film’s stories.

‘Gomorrah’ is released by The Criterion Collection and stars Toni Servillo, Gianfelice Imparato, Maria Nazionale, Salvatore Cantalupo, Gigio Morra, Salvatore Abruzzese, Marco Macor, Ciro Petrone and Carmine Paternoster. It was written by Maurizio Braucci & Ugo Chiti & Gianna Di Gregorio & Matteo Garrone & Massimo Gaudioso & Roberto Saviano and directed by Matteo Garrone. It was released on November 24th, 2009. It is Not Rated.

By MATT FAGERHOLM
Staff Writer
HollywoodChicago.com

Blu-Ray Review: Criterion Edition of Akira Kurosawa’s Legendary ‘Kagemusha’

BrianTT — Thu, 20 Aug 2009 09:43:10 -0400

CHICAGO – Now that he is widely recognized as one of the best filmmakers of all time, it’s almost hard to believe that there was a period in the career of Akira Kurosawa when he couldn’t get financing to make a film. Kurosawa went through a very dark time in the ’70s, punctuated by his disastrous experience with “Tora! Tora! Tora!,” and needed the weight of Francis Ford Coppola and George Lucas to help with his comeback, “Kagemusha,” now available in a beautiful Criterion Collection Blu-Ray release.

Blu-Ray Rating: 4.5/5.0

I adore stories like the one behind the making of “Kagemusha” because they reflect the ripple throughout the ages that comes with amazing creativity. In the excellent special feature, “Lucas, Coppola, and Kurosawa,” the interviews draw a definitive line from John Ford (whose “The Searchers” influenced Kurosawa) to Kurosawa’s work to “The Godfather” to “Star Wars” to “Kagemusha,” which itself inspired countless filmmakers. The magic of movies is contagious.

Kagemusha was released on Blu-Ray on August 18th, 2009.
Photo credit: Courtesy of the Criterion Collection

After the commercial failure of “Dodes’ka-den” and the irascible reputation that followed him after “Red Beard,” Kurosawa started to struggle with financial support in the ’70s. When he was forced to back out of “Tora! Tora! Tora!” due to creative differences, he carried with him a reputation that made funding difficult. He reportedly attempted suicide in 1971, had an awful experience on “Dersu Uzala,” and was reduced to going back to one of his loves, painting. The art that came out of that period would eventually turn into “Kagemusha”.

Kagemusha was released on Blu-Ray on August 18th, 2009.
Photo credit: Courtesy of the Criterion Collection

Of course, as impossible as he reportedly was to work with, Kurosawa was still a master. Without even asking to see a script, George Lucas and Francis Ford Coppola, two of the men most inspired by Kurosawa’s work, put their financial weight behind whatever he wanted to do next. They recognized that Kurosawa was a filmmaker who never should have been denied funding just on the chance that he might produce another “Seven Samurai,” “Yojimbo,” or “Rashomon”.

What he did produce was the introduction to the final chapter of his career, one marked more by bright colors and epic storytelling. “Kagemusha” finds its creator returning to the samurai story but with a much more cynical, dark worldview. It’s the anti-hero story, taking the least “samurai-esque” character and turning him into the hero.

A warlord dies and a peasant thief is called upon to impersonate the leader to keep warring factions from knowing of the kingdom’s weakness. The new leader is haunted by the spirit of the old one and Kurosawa continues to play with a regular theme of his career - what is real and what is illusion.

The plot of “Kagemusha” is interesting but it’s primarily a stunning visual experience. There are shots in “Kagemusha” that stand among the best of the ’80s. In particular, a shot of men marching through fog as orange light and shadows play in the background (at around the 20-minute mark) is one of my favorite shots of all time.

Kagemusha was released on Blu-Ray on August 18th, 2009.
Photo credit: Courtesy of the Criterion Collection

“Kagemusha” doesn’t just resemble a cinematic painting. It was designed as a moving piece of art. The 44-minute video piece reconstructing “Kagemusha” through Kurosawa’s paintings and sketches called “Image: Kurosawa’s Continuity” shows an artist who did a lot more than just storyboard. An included booklet of essays and artwork that inspired the film would be enough of a collector’s item for Kurosawa fans to justify a purchase of the entire release.

The film itself has been restored with a high-definition digital transfer and a DTS-HD Master Audio 4.0 soundtrack. The image looks appropriately transferred. I was concerned it would be overly polished, taking away a lot of the original appeal of the film by making it look too plastic in HD. That has not happened.

Unmentioned special features include a commentary by Kurosawa scholar Stephen Prince, a 41-minute documentary on the making of the film, Suntory Whiskey commercials made on the set of “Kagemusha,” a gallery of storyboards painted by Kurosawa and images of their realization on-screen, and theatrical trailers and teasers.

Very few filmmakers are as essential to a viewer’s understanding of the history of the medium as Akira Kurosawa. There are millions of people out there who love “Star Wars” and “The Godfather”. Find one who hasn’t even heard of Kurosawa and tell them the story of how their favorite filmmakers were essential in the comeback of a master. Pass the creative spark along.

‘Kagemusha’ is released by The Criterion Collection and stars Tatsuya Nakadai, Tsutomu Yamazaki, and Kenichi Hagiwara. It was written by Akira Kurosawa & Masato Ide and directed by Kurosawa. The Blu-Ray was released on August 18th, 2009. It is not rated.

By BRIAN TALLERICO
Content Director
HollywoodChicago.com
brian@hollywoodchicago.com

The 10 Best Blu-Ray, DVD Releases of 2008

BrianTT — Tue, 23 Dec 2008 16:43:37 -0500

CHICAGO – For audiences increasingly accustomed to watching movies at home instead of at the multiplex, it was an interesting year for DVDs and Blu-rays.

In this list of top Blu-rays and DVDs of 2008, we cover “Tropic Thunder,” “Dirty Harry,” “The Last Emperor,” “Iron Man,” “The Nightmare Before Christmas,” “Dark City,” “Mad Men,” “Spaced,” “Sleeping Beauty,” “The Godfather” and others including “Band of Brothers,” “Firefly,” “Star Trek,” “Transformers,” “The Wire,” “The Sopranos,” “Dexter,” “24,” “Lost,” “Deadwood” and “Casablanca”.

Of course, the biggest event was the end of the format war between HD-DVD and Blu-ray, but the impact of that Blu-ray victory has yet to fully be realized considering the incredibly small market share still being occupied by the next-gen format. With Blu-Ray players dropping in price by the day and the increasing popularity of HD TVs, it seems like only a matter of time before Blu-Ray supplants DVD in the same way the previous format took over for VHS.

Besides the horrendous economy and the notion that Blu-Ray isn’t significantly superior to DVD to force the change on a technological level, it seems to me that the next hurdle for Blu-Ray is that there just haven’t been enough must-own titles to spur buyers to make the upgrade. Imagine if Blu-Ray had deleted scenes or special features unavailable on the standard version. Imagine the impact that would’ve had on a lot of people’s decision to trade up to HD.

And Blu-Ray wouldn't necessarily even have to resort to format-exclusive features. The more titles that hit the format that truly utilize its potential, the more people will go out and pick up a player. There were a few of those discs this year. "Game-changers,” if you will. They're in the top ten.

But, before we get to that, some honorable mentions. In the world of TV on DVD, the well went considerably dry in 2008. Not only have most of the classic shows already hit the market, but the strike-shortened season of '07-'08 made nearly every new release more lackluster than the season before.

Some of the most notable TV on DVD releases were re-issues of already available material. "Band of Brothers" and "Firefly" both hit Blu-Ray in sparkling sets, while fans of "Star Trek: The Original Series" can now own seasons two and three with remastered video and special effects on standard DVD.

One of the most consistent producers of quality TV on DVD this year was BBC Home Video, releasing excellent season sets for the first and second installments of the brilliant "Torchwood,” a great package for the first volume of "Primeval,” and one of the best mini-series in the history of the form, "State of Play.” HBO didn't lag too far behind with series sets for "Extras,” "The Wire", "Deadwood", and "The Sopranos" all warranting acclaim alongside 2008 gems like "John Adams" and "Generation Kill.”

The first season of "24" was finally given the special edition treatment (the initial release of the first bad day in Jack Bauer's life had been relatively bare-bones) and a few current shows - "Weeds,” "Dexter,” "Lost" - did release above-average season sets. Finally, "Family Guy: Blue Harvest" is a must-own for any fan of the Griffin family, "Frisky Dingo: Season One" was the best Adult Swim title of the year and everyone worth knowing would smile at the third season of "The Muppet Show.”

As for classic movies released on DVD or Blu-Ray, early-year highlights included a great 40th Anniversary Collector's Edition of "In the Heat of the Night" and a Platinum Edition of "101 Dalmatians” and this month's collector's set for "Casablanca" is a beauty. And, while the box set market was underwhelming compared to years past, "The Stanley Kramer Collection,” "The Frank Sinatra Collection,” "Rambo: The Complete Collector's Set,” "5 Films by Dario Argento,” and "The Peanuts Deluxe Holiday Collection" were all notable.

When it comes to current films, the stand-outs were few and far between. There are a couple in the top ten, but lackluster presentations and a dearth of interesting special features were more common complaints this year than in many past. Stand-outs include one of the best transfers in the history of home theaters for "The Transformers" on Blu-Ray, a sparkling gift set release of "Batman Begins" on the new format, and gorgeous sets for the two most successful animated films of the year, "Wall-E" and "Kung Fu Panda.”

Finally, Criterion had another impressive year, moving seamlessly into Blu-Ray at the end of the year with new releases for "Bottle Rocket" and "Chungking Express" along with reissues of some of their best work like "The Third Man" and "The Last Emperor.” Must-add Criterion titles of 2008 included "Blast of Silence,” "The Lovers,” "Before the Rain,” "Mafioso,” and "Europa.”

THE TEN BEST DVD/BLU-RAY RELEASES OF 2008

10. "Tropic Thunder: Director's Cut"

The comedy Blu-Ray release of the year included not only a director's cut worth seeing but also special features nearly as funny as the movie itself. There are a few too many bite-sized featurettes (5-10 minutes before getting thrown back to a menu screen is just annoying), but they were more than balanced out by commentaries, perfect picture and sound, and the fantastic spoof documentary, "Rain of Madness.” Including a satire of a pretentious behind-the-scenes documentary on the release for a satire of pretentious war movies and their obnoxious actors was a stroke of genius.

9. “Dirty Harry: Ultimate Collector’s Edition”

The best DVD box set of the year includes hours of special features, a gorgeous collection of physical collectibles, and fantastic video and audio. What’s most unusual about “Dirty Harry” is that it may be the last time you ever read these words - pick it up on standard DVD, not Blu-Ray. The HD picture makes “Dirty Harry” look a little too plastic and clean. Harry needs to be a little dirtier. But the DVD gift set is remarkable. With new featurettes and interviews with the major players along with some previously available material, it’s a definitive set.