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Roderick Heath's unbelievably comprehensive Australian Film Primer will be unfurled in parts over the next week or so, but we begin with part one, the lesser known but fascinating early years of Oz film. Check back on the Daily and on GreenCine Central for the entirety of the primer in coming days. From Silent films, Westerns and comedies to Peter Finch and the final years of Michael Powell, part one touches on a great deal all by itself. Read more >> |
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In This Dispatch:
- What's New: Revanche, Good Hair, and more.
- What We're Watching: Troubled Water, 50 Dead Men Walking, Lola Montes.
- Explore: Animator Al Jarnow podcast.
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Criterion releases Götz Spielmann's critically acclaimed Austrian film from last year (which GC's Craig Phillips had on his 15 Best list). The SF Chronicle's Mick LaSalle called it "An extraordinary film, mythic in feeling." Roger Ebert: "Revanche involves a rare coming together of a male's criminal nature and a female's deep needs, entwined with a first-rate thriller. It is also perceptive in observing characters, including a proud old man. Rare is the thriller that is more about the reasons of people instead of the needs of the plot." |
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An exposé of comic proportions that only Chris Rock could pull off, this doc visits beauty salons and hairstyling battles, scientific labs and Indian temples to explore how hairstyles impact the activities, pocketbooks and self-esteem of the black community. "Spirited, probing and frequently hilarious," writes Jeanette Catsoulis in the NY Times, "it coasts on the fearless charm of its front man and the eye-opening candor of its interviewees, most of them women." Adds Claudia Puig: "Cause for hope that Rock continues to make documentaries. His style is lively, smooth and up-to-date, like the most coveted 'do." |
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Troubled Water has already won two of Norway's official film awards for 2007 (it was nominated for six), as well as walking away with the Audience Award at the 2008 Hamptons International Film Festival -- which I find a little surprising. Audience awards almost always go to feel-good movies (even sometimes to good feel-good movies) but Troubled Water is too complicated a film to fit easily into that category. It deals with victims and perpetrators who are themselves victims, slowly piecing together... Read review >>
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Watching the IRA-mole-gone-wild, based-on-a-true story, period piece 50 Dead Men Walking, one is put in mind of the recent iPad announcement: nice package, you couldn't come up with a different name? The unfortunately-titled movie is an engrossing, if jumbled autobiopic based on Martin McGartland's memoir of the same name. McGartland - played with star-making verve by Jim Sturgess... Read more >> |
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Critic Sean Axmaker picked this one as his DVD of the Week: "The final film from French auteur Max Ophuls, has been a hard film to see in any form resembling the director's original conception. It was originally released in a version drastically recut by its producers, who were dumbfounded by the dense, layered carnival of affairs of the melancholy memory film Ophuls created. A restoration in the sixties only brought it partly back to Ophuls' grand design. Criterion has mastered this edition from the new 2008 film restoration...where it seems to glow and arise from the screen. It’s the only film that Max Ophuls made in color and widescreen and has long been celebrated as one of the greatest triumphs of color film. This edition finally shows viewers why." |
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Beginning in 1969 and for the next three decades or so, Brooklyn-born artist and animator Al Jarnow created over 100 short films that have been seen by tens of millions of people worldwide... chances are you know his work, even if you didn't know his name. Aaron Hillis chatted with Jarnow about "digital films made by hand," new perceptions he's had about his work in the YouTube era, why he no longer considers himself a filmmaker, and the baffling reason why an animated yak was once rejected from Sesame Street. More >>Also: Listen to Aaron's podcast with Michael Jai White, star of Black Dynamite, which is out on DVD this week. |
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Oscar Winners:
Costume Design
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