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Monday, January 12, 2009

A Night For The Underdogs

Golden Globes Winners List:

Published by Gil Kaufman on Monday, January 12, 2009 at 11:38 am.

It’s fitting that a pair of dark rags-to-riches stories in which the underdog endures great pain to rise up triumphed Sunday night at the Golden Globes. The biggest winner of the evening, “Slumdog Millionaire,” overcame odds just to get made and has built the kind of word-of-mouth buzz most filmmakers only dream of, especially for a small picture filmed in the slums of Mumbai.

And especially on a night when it was up against some major Hollywood heavy hitters like “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button,” “Doubt” and “Frost/Nixon,” all of which were shut out of the major categories.

While “Slumdog” swept up the awards for best drama, director, screenplay and music score, another up-from-the-ashes tale, Darren Aronofsky’s gritty, grappling redemption yarn, “The Wrestler,” put a golden crown on the classic Hollywood comeback story of actor/brawler Mickey Rourke. He snagged the Best Actor in a Drama prize for his sweat-and-blood-soaked take on washed-up wrestler Randy “The Ram” Robinson.

Some wins were expected. Who didn’t think, despite stiff competition, Heath Ledger would win a well-deserved posthumous Best Supporting Actor prize for his harrowing take on the Joker in “The Dark Knight”? But the win by little-known English actress Sally Hawkins of “Happy-Go-Lucky” for Best Actress in a Motion Picture - Musical or Comedy over such boldface names as Frances McDormand and Meryl Streep was a pleasant surprise. And Hawkins’ emotional, rambling and slightly tipsy speech was one of those moments the liquor-lubricated Globes show lives for. Similarly, the surprising Best Motion Picture - Musical or Comedy win for Woody Allen’s “Vicky Cristina Barcelona” elicited an endearingly flustered thank-you from producer Letty Aronson.

Kate Winslet’s double win for Best Actress in a Drama for “Revolutionary Road” and Best Supporting Actress for “The Reader” was not totally unexpected, though it was a very rare dramatic twofer coup with long odds. But if you had money on Colin Farrell scooping the Best Actor in a Comedy or Musical for his little-seen stint as a hit man on the run in “In Bruges,” you knew something the rest of us didn’t.

The Globes are often a predictor for the Oscars — whose nominations will be announced on January 22 — so you can probably expect to see many of the same boldface names in the running again, including last night’s losers, Brad Pitt, Leonardo DiCaprio, Anne Hathaway, Frank Langella, Sean Penn and Meryl Streep.

Here’s a full list of the night’s winners:

Best Supporting Actress: Kate Winslet, “The Reader”

Best Original Song: Bruce Springsteen, “The Wrestler”

Best Supporting Actor in a Series, Miniseries or Movie: Tom Wilkinson, “John Adams”

Best Supporting Actress in a Series, Miniseries or Movie: Laura Dern, “Recount”

Best Performance by an Actor in a Television Series, Drama: Gabriel Byrne, “In Treatment”

Best Actress in a TV Series, Drama: Anna Paquin, “True Blood”

Outstanding Animated Feature: “WALL-E”

Best Performance by an Actress in a Motion Picture - Musical or Comedy: Sally Hawkins, “Happy-Go-Lucky”

Best Mini-Series or Motion Picture Made for Television: “John Adams”

Best Supporting Actor in a Motion Picture: Heath Ledger, “The Dark Knight”

Best Foreign Language Film: “Waltz With Bashir”

Best Performance by an Actress in a Mini-Series or Motion Picture Made for Television: Laura Linney, “John Adams”

Best Screenplay: Simon Beaufoy, “Slumdog Millionaire”

Best Performance by an Actor in a Television Series - Musical or Comedy: Alec Baldwin, “30 Rock”

Best Performance by an Actor in a Mini-Series or Motion Picture Made for Television: Paul Giamatti, “John Adams”

Best Television Series - Musical or Comedy: “30 Rock”

Best Original Score, A.R. Rahman: “Slumdog Millionaire”

Best Performance by an Actress in a Television Series - Musical or Comedy: Tina Fey, “30 Rock”

Cecil B. DeMille Award: Steven Spielberg

Best Director - Motion Picture: Danny Boyle “Slumdog Millionaire”

Best Performance by an Actor in a Motion Picture - Musical or Comedy: Colin Farrell, “In Bruges”

Best Motion Picture - Musical or Comedy: “Vicky Cristina Barcelona”

Best Performance by an Actress in a Motion Picture -Drama: Kate Winslet, “Revolutionary Road”

Best Television Series - Drama: “Mad Men”

Best Actor in a Motion Picture - Drama: Mickey Rourke, “The Wrestler”

Best Motion Picture - Drama: “Slumdog Millionaire”

Sunday, January 11, 2009

Julianne Moore Visits a Porn Set

Throwback Sundays this week remembers Julianne Moore's brilliantly vulnerable performance in P.T. Anderson's breakthrough film Boogie Nights. On a visit to Inside the Actor's Studio, she details getting into the role, as well as she and Anderson's onorthodox research process on the film. She also gives some really great insight into how best she achieves emotion in a scene.

My Adventure in Theatrical Self Distribution

Or how I “invented” the two-month window and spent six months wanting to kill myself every day.

BY JON REISS

Here is part one of another brilliant recent article from the latest edition of Filmmaker Magazine on one filmmaker's case study in his own self distribution path.

- My story is not unlike that of most independent filmmakers these days. We bust our butts for years producing — in our minds — a great film, only to find the distribution landscape radically different from the one in our hopes and dreams.

For a number of years now I had heard a variety of filmmaker pundits declare, “Theatrical is dead, long live the long tail!” But until my own distribution adventure I refused to believe these pronouncements. Now, 18 months after the world premiere of my feature documentary Bomb It at the Tribeca Film Festival and six months after the launch of the film‘s theatrical release, I believe that while there still is a strong role for theatrical releasing in an independent film‘s distribution strategy, savvy low-budget filmmakers must be more creative in the ways they approach these releases. Theatrical is not dead, but the long tail is a lot longer and involves a lot more work than you might expect.

With the help of Cinetic, who repped our film at the Tribeca Film Festival, I had the fortune to secure a DVD deal with a company that has a reputation of paying filmmakers (!), Docurama/New Video, but the golden ring of an overall distribution deal eluded our film. “Too niche,” and, “we don‘t know how to get young people in the theaters” were the common distributor refrains.

Read the rest of the story here:

http://www.filmmakermagazine.com/fall2008/bomb_it.php

The Corporate Takeover of Jay-Z

In a move that many should have seen coming, hip-hop mogul Shawn Carter signaled the corporate takeover of Jay-Z Inc. when he sold the remainder of the franchise to concert promoter Live Nation. After years of building up the brand called Jay-Z, Carter is doing what any smart investor would do at this point: cashing in.....To acquire Jay-Z, Live Nation ponied up a pay package worth $150 million—It’s highest to date. The terms of the deal include $5 million a year for five years to cover overhead for Roc Nation, plus $25 million for any investments or acquisitions. Carter will also receive an initial payment and general advance totaling $50 million, $10 million an album for a minimum of 3 albums, and $20 million for some licensing and publishing rights. Read more...

Friday, January 9, 2009

NY Feature Film needs Actors

Our good friend Rick Borgia (Cookies & Cream, Twists of Fate) has a new feature film that begins production this April. The film, entitled Final Hours has also recently cast Jace Nicole (Cookies & Cream, Phish) in the film in a pivotal role. And even more exciting news to some of our readers, they are looking for a lot of actors.

"Nothing in Life is Free. Sooner or later time runs out and everyone's got to pay."

Tonight, the clock tics for Johnny.

Johnny Torino is slick, ruthless, self-absorbed man with a plan and nothing and no one can stop him....or so he thinks.

When his mission becomes a deadly diamond heist gone terribly wrong, he and his accomplice mistress, Sarah are forced to take refuge in a local tavern, ‘Final Hours’.

Though both are badly wounded, they’ll hold a small group of late night patron’s hostage until the heat of a police manhunt cools off outside.

What Johnny soon find, is himself in the middle of a bad dream, a nightmare of his own life gone wrong, where he'll soon find,that what's eventually in store, is a far more rude awakening.

Here is Rick's casting breakdown for FINAL HOURS.

"PLEASE NO DREAMERS !!!!

YOU MUST HAVE LEGIT CREDITS,

(that means do not list uncredited credits,extra work ect......)

TO SUBMIT:

AS THIS IS A SERIOUS FEATURE FILM.

If i'm interested I WILL LET YOU KNOW.

Please submit headshot with resume to
FINALHOURSTHEFILM@GMAIL.COM

Good Luck!

Rick Borgia / Producer

Cast Needed:

JOHNNY( CASTED )
SARAH ( JOHNNY'S GIRLFRIEND 35-40)
CHARLIE(MALE 45-60)
GINGER (PROSTITUTE 25-35)
SPICE (BLACK/AMERICAN 25-35)
PAUL (40'S)
MONICA (PAUL'S WIFE 30-35)
CONRAD (AFRO-AMERICAN 25-35)
CHRISTINE (CONRAD'S WIFE 25-30)
LUC ( SPANISH 25-30 )
HOODED MAN/MONK ( CASTED )
DETECTIVE DAVID ( CASTED)
DETECTIVE MIKE ( CASTED)
LUCY (JOHNNY'S WIFE 35-40)
BEARDED DRUNK (40-50)
PIMP ( BLACK AMERICAN 30-40 )

DETECTIVE 1 (30-40)
DETECTIVE 2 ( 30-40)
POLICE OFFICER – FEMALE/MALE( 25-30)
POLICE RADIO DISPATCHER (V.O.)

CHARACTERS WITH NO LINES - EXTRAS

OLD WOMAN IN WINDOW- NO LINES
MAN PUSHING SHOPPING CART- NO LINES
BUXOM BLOND- NO LINES
BUXOM BRUNETTE- NO LINES
TWO LOVERS MALE AND FEMALE- NO LINES
DYING DERELICT- NO LINES
2-3 DIAMOND STORE CUSTOMERS

These roles are deferred payment roles. To read more about Final Hours, and Rick Borgia's other past projects including one we blogged about a few months ago Twists of Fate, here is the link. Tell them we sent you!

www.myspace.com/dreamxtremeproductions

Karina Longworth's review of "Luke and Brie..."

Here is Karina Longworth's Spout.com review of Luke and Brie Are On a First Date, directed by Chad Hartigan, which I have been following, and looks interesting. She briefly comments on an interesting point about filmmakers who tell stories directly derived from their personal lives.

"Luke and Brie Are On a First Date, which world premiered in the Hamptons last weekend, is the debut feature by Chad Hartigan, a frequent collaborator of Aaron Katz, and there are definitely some superficial similarities between the two filmmakers’ work. Like Katz’s Quiet City, Luke and Brie follows two attractive young people (George Ducker and Meghan Webster) around a city as they break through awkward uncertainty to forge a tentative romantic connection, and with their dreamy, super-intimate videography, both films have a way of enveloping a viewer in the action (or what passes for action), ultimately serving as delivery vehicles for the kind of heightened realism that marks an unexpectedly life-changing night out. But Luke and Brie plays its drama much closer to the surface, and through a little bit of self-reflexivity, a film that’s virtually wall-to-wall conversation manages to avoid feeling too talky.

Hartigan, who is a Los Angeles-based box office analyst by day, said after the Hamptons screening that Luke and Brie, based structurally on his own first date with his current girlfriend, was shot in 5 days on a budget of $3000. The small scale of the project opens it up to an obvious criticism: surely, all of us could come up with a single night in our romantic lives that seems worthy of dramatization, and many of us could round up some friends and scrape together a few dollars and take a week off work to tell it. So what makes Luke and Brie special? Maybe nothing, and maybe that’s it — maybe it’s not interesting because it’s entering into unchartered territory, but because it takes us through universal, well-worn feelings and makes them feel new. With his camera often seeming to float over faces in extreme close-up, Hartigan’s micro-focus on the nerves, uncertainties, and ambiguities, the posturing and reflex self-medication and unexpected moments of honesty that fuel the night so nails the harrowing aspect of navigating modern romance — in which it’s always easier to do nothing than to do what one really wants — that he’s able to turn the film’s ultimate surrender to traditional romantic closure into something of a surprise.

I had a bit more to say about Luke and Brie on this week’s episode of FilmCouch. The trailer is above (below), and future screening information is here (at http://www.spout.com/). The film is still on the festival circuit and does not have distribution."

http://www.lukeandbrie.com/

The short that started it all

Phish was shot in the summer of 2005, and was a collaboration between Liquid Metal Media, Open Up Pictures, and One Way or Another Productions. It brought together several actors and crew members that after meeting during the production, continued to collaborate with each other till this day. Some of those people include: actor/director Brian Ackley, make up, hair and wardrobe director Crystal Glass, and actress Jace Nicole. It was the first recorded dialogue, narrative film by writer/director Princeton Holt. The controversial short was featured on the Manhattan-Queens based show Urban Movie Review to rave reviews; Phish was featured in a full episode by itself. It then played film festivals, including the Black Media Film and Video Conference of Philadelphia.

Genre: Comedy Short (20mins)

We want to announce that the DVD for Phish will soon be available for purchase at http://www.1wayoranother.net/.