SXSW starts tomorrow, and one of the best parts of the festival is the shorts program, a perennial favorite. I've pre-screened a number of this year's excellent entries, and here is part one of my pre-fest short film coverage.
Tumbleweed! (Texas Shorts)
Wow! Offbeat, whimsical, and completely delightful. Tumbleweed! is an inspirational story of a tumbleweed that refuses to tumble. This seven-minute short is the kind of little nugget that makes the shorts program a must-see. Very loosely set in Texas.
Heimkommen (Narrative Shorts)
A poignant and touching look at sibling tensions in the wake of a tragic accident, Heimkommen (Come Home) tells a story that is simple yet deep. Director Micah Magee is a San Antonio native and Ut Austin grad, and she's also a former Cinematexas co-director.
In the Pines (Narrative Shorts)
In nine minutes, In the Pines managed to re-create the mood I felt after two hours watching Tree of Life.
Tumbleweed! (Texas Shorts)
Wow! Offbeat, whimsical, and completely delightful. Tumbleweed! is an inspirational story of a tumbleweed that refuses to tumble. This seven-minute short is the kind of little nugget that makes the shorts program a must-see. Very loosely set in Texas.
Heimkommen (Narrative Shorts)
A poignant and touching look at sibling tensions in the wake of a tragic accident, Heimkommen (Come Home) tells a story that is simple yet deep. Director Micah Magee is a San Antonio native and Ut Austin grad, and she's also a former Cinematexas co-director.
In the Pines (Narrative Shorts)
In nine minutes, In the Pines managed to re-create the mood I felt after two hours watching Tree of Life.
- 3/8/2012
- by Mike Saulters
- Slackerwood
Say what? You don't recognize the name Ben Steinbauer? Perhaps you remember the hit documentary Winnebago Man, which wowed crowds at film festivals everywhere it played, including SXSW 2009. In 2010, the Austin Film Critics Association awarded it Best Austin Film. This time around, Steinbauer brings a documentary short about Stephen Friedland called Brute Force to SXSW 2012.
Slackerwood: Describe your film for us in a couple of sentences.
Steinbauer: Brute Force is the story of Apple Records recording artist Stephen Friedland, who in 1969 released the song "King of Fuh" that became the most controversial single Apple ever recorded.
What's one thing about the film that is going to make it impossible for people to resist seeing it?
The relationship between Stephen, aka "Brute Force," who is now in his seventies, and his daughter Lilah, aka "Daughter of Force," is funny, charming and endlessly relatable. It will appeal to anyone who has a...
Slackerwood: Describe your film for us in a couple of sentences.
Steinbauer: Brute Force is the story of Apple Records recording artist Stephen Friedland, who in 1969 released the song "King of Fuh" that became the most controversial single Apple ever recorded.
What's one thing about the film that is going to make it impossible for people to resist seeing it?
The relationship between Stephen, aka "Brute Force," who is now in his seventies, and his daughter Lilah, aka "Daughter of Force," is funny, charming and endlessly relatable. It will appeal to anyone who has a...
- 2/27/2012
- by Jenn Brown
- Slackerwood
Sundance Film Festival
PARK CITY -- The recent horror-film subgenre of mischievous young people on holiday getting into more trouble than planned takes to the open waters in Donkey Punch, a formulaic yet clever chiller that offers generous doses of sex and violence aboard a luxury yacht.
Its characters grow increasingly crazed and frantic in Act 2, and by the third, the filmmakers seem to catch the virus: That's when the meticulously reasoned psychological underpinnings of the group paranoia and logical design of character interactions go overboard in an absurd, indeed laughable orgy of grotesque deaths.
The British film, a first effort with a modest budget and no-name cast from director Olly Blackburn, keeps its eye on its commercial hooks long enough to reel in audiences for a couple of weeks of theatrical play before segueing to cable and DVD rentals.
The film neatly develops a sense of foreboding even in its frivolous first minutes where young Brits with handsome bodes frolic in the bars and on the beach of Mallorca while on holiday. Three girls from dreary old Leeds are out for a weekend of fun and perhaps naughtiness. Sexually confident Lisa (Sian Breckin) and free-spirited Kim (Jaime Winstone) are determined to distract downcast Tammi (Nichola Burley) from recent boyfriend woes.
They hit the bars and run into three blokes from London who coax them back to the yacht they are crewing on for the summer. Marcus (Jay Taylor) is a smooth operator, but Bluey (Tom Burke) has a look of danger in his face. Josh (Julian Morris) comes across as an innocent, so interest lies in how everyone will pair off. Then the girls meet the fourth crew member, Sean (Robert Boulter), Josh's older brother and the most mature of the young men.
Kim promises the reluctant Tammi the party will last for "only a drink," but this gets forgotten when everyone decides a late afternoon cruise would be ideal. Champagne leads to party drugs and frank talk of sex. When Bluey colorfully describes a "donkey punch," a sharp blow to the neck of a female during intercourse to increase male pleasure, you just know that Blackburn and co-writer David Bloom have found the opening for their thrill ride.
Soon everyone heads to a bedroom below deck except for Tammi and Sean, who remain above for a meaningful conversation, designating these two as the adults of this lot. Lisa and Bluey naturally pair off, followed by Marcus and Kim. Josh whips out a video camera and, again, you just know that tape is going to play a role.
In a spirit of male camaraderie, Bluey offers Josh his chance with a compliant Lisa and against absolutely no expectations Josh tries out that donkey punch. Moments later, Lisa is dead. The group divides along gender lines about how to respond.
The men all want the women to tell police that Lisa, dazed by drugs and alcohol, fell overboard. The women opt for the truth. Sean probably would agree with the women except that his younger brother is the one who will rot in a Spanish jail. Quite believably, the women do not know how to summon help in a foreign language with ship-to-shore equipment they cannot operate.
The men, lead by bad-boy Bluey, enforce their point of view with Brute Force so the body is buried at sea. Soon after, a kitchen knife gets buried in Bluey's chest. The contest of savagery and survival is on. A rifle turns up and is pointed at the women. A distress flare goes off in someone's gut. A woman breaks out of confinement by breaking through a glass door with her body. Then someone finds a chainsaw. A chainsaw on a yacht? Now you know Blackburn and Bloom are desperate.
The bloodbath looses all logic as the filmmakers ignore fairly well drawn characters in favor of grotesque deaths. That third act needed a real twist, something to surprise an audience while elevating their story above the usual cinematic carnage. It never gets one.
The film, actually shot in waters off South Africa, does get maximum mileage out of virtually a single set, a few lethal props and seven actors. But a much smarter film was possible.
DONKEY PUNCH
The U.K. Film Council and Film4 in association with Screen Yorkshire and EM Media present a Warp X production
Credits:
Director: Olly Blackburn
Screenwriters: Olly Blackburn, David Bloom
Producers: Angus Lamont, Mark Herbert, Robin Gutch
Executive producers: Peter Carlton, Lizzie Francke, Hugo Heppell, Will Clarke
Director of photography: Nanu Segal
Production designer: Delarey Wagener
Music: Francois-Eudes Chanfrault
Costume designer: Sarah Ryan
Editor: Kate Evans
Cast:
Sean: Robert Boulter
Lisa: Sian Breckin
Bluey: Tom Burke
Tammi: Nichola Burley
Josh: Julian Morris
Marcus: Jay Taylor
Kim: Jaime Winstone
Running time -- 98 minutes
No MPAA rating...
PARK CITY -- The recent horror-film subgenre of mischievous young people on holiday getting into more trouble than planned takes to the open waters in Donkey Punch, a formulaic yet clever chiller that offers generous doses of sex and violence aboard a luxury yacht.
Its characters grow increasingly crazed and frantic in Act 2, and by the third, the filmmakers seem to catch the virus: That's when the meticulously reasoned psychological underpinnings of the group paranoia and logical design of character interactions go overboard in an absurd, indeed laughable orgy of grotesque deaths.
The British film, a first effort with a modest budget and no-name cast from director Olly Blackburn, keeps its eye on its commercial hooks long enough to reel in audiences for a couple of weeks of theatrical play before segueing to cable and DVD rentals.
The film neatly develops a sense of foreboding even in its frivolous first minutes where young Brits with handsome bodes frolic in the bars and on the beach of Mallorca while on holiday. Three girls from dreary old Leeds are out for a weekend of fun and perhaps naughtiness. Sexually confident Lisa (Sian Breckin) and free-spirited Kim (Jaime Winstone) are determined to distract downcast Tammi (Nichola Burley) from recent boyfriend woes.
They hit the bars and run into three blokes from London who coax them back to the yacht they are crewing on for the summer. Marcus (Jay Taylor) is a smooth operator, but Bluey (Tom Burke) has a look of danger in his face. Josh (Julian Morris) comes across as an innocent, so interest lies in how everyone will pair off. Then the girls meet the fourth crew member, Sean (Robert Boulter), Josh's older brother and the most mature of the young men.
Kim promises the reluctant Tammi the party will last for "only a drink," but this gets forgotten when everyone decides a late afternoon cruise would be ideal. Champagne leads to party drugs and frank talk of sex. When Bluey colorfully describes a "donkey punch," a sharp blow to the neck of a female during intercourse to increase male pleasure, you just know that Blackburn and co-writer David Bloom have found the opening for their thrill ride.
Soon everyone heads to a bedroom below deck except for Tammi and Sean, who remain above for a meaningful conversation, designating these two as the adults of this lot. Lisa and Bluey naturally pair off, followed by Marcus and Kim. Josh whips out a video camera and, again, you just know that tape is going to play a role.
In a spirit of male camaraderie, Bluey offers Josh his chance with a compliant Lisa and against absolutely no expectations Josh tries out that donkey punch. Moments later, Lisa is dead. The group divides along gender lines about how to respond.
The men all want the women to tell police that Lisa, dazed by drugs and alcohol, fell overboard. The women opt for the truth. Sean probably would agree with the women except that his younger brother is the one who will rot in a Spanish jail. Quite believably, the women do not know how to summon help in a foreign language with ship-to-shore equipment they cannot operate.
The men, lead by bad-boy Bluey, enforce their point of view with Brute Force so the body is buried at sea. Soon after, a kitchen knife gets buried in Bluey's chest. The contest of savagery and survival is on. A rifle turns up and is pointed at the women. A distress flare goes off in someone's gut. A woman breaks out of confinement by breaking through a glass door with her body. Then someone finds a chainsaw. A chainsaw on a yacht? Now you know Blackburn and Bloom are desperate.
The bloodbath looses all logic as the filmmakers ignore fairly well drawn characters in favor of grotesque deaths. That third act needed a real twist, something to surprise an audience while elevating their story above the usual cinematic carnage. It never gets one.
The film, actually shot in waters off South Africa, does get maximum mileage out of virtually a single set, a few lethal props and seven actors. But a much smarter film was possible.
DONKEY PUNCH
The U.K. Film Council and Film4 in association with Screen Yorkshire and EM Media present a Warp X production
Credits:
Director: Olly Blackburn
Screenwriters: Olly Blackburn, David Bloom
Producers: Angus Lamont, Mark Herbert, Robin Gutch
Executive producers: Peter Carlton, Lizzie Francke, Hugo Heppell, Will Clarke
Director of photography: Nanu Segal
Production designer: Delarey Wagener
Music: Francois-Eudes Chanfrault
Costume designer: Sarah Ryan
Editor: Kate Evans
Cast:
Sean: Robert Boulter
Lisa: Sian Breckin
Bluey: Tom Burke
Tammi: Nichola Burley
Josh: Julian Morris
Marcus: Jay Taylor
Kim: Jaime Winstone
Running time -- 98 minutes
No MPAA rating...
- 1/31/2008
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
NEW YORK -- In China, some young filmmakers have started to use digital filmmaking tools to make personal features reminiscent of Italian neo-realism. Films like Ying Liang's Taking Father Home, which screened at the Tribeca Film Festival, focus on individual lives to illuminate the bigger picture of contemporary China. This one is a powerful, provocative work that should be assured of more festival appearances.
The film tells of a young man who leaves his village to find his father, who has absconded to the city. Through his travels, the viewer learns about the horrifying reality of the new China: violent gangsters, listless youths and a breakdown of official and family structures. The final showdown between father and son is brutal and symbolizes how China's modernization has ripped the social fabric of the country asunder.
Father illustrates how such social safeguards of a communist society as free health care and guaranteed employment have been dismantled, replaced with nothing. Ying implies that Brute Force and violence have become the only ways to safeguard personal security.
Ying and producer Peng Shan shot the film by themselves in Peng's home village on next to no money. The biggest prop -- a giant Buddha's head -- cost only $90. Nearly all the cast are members of Peng's extended family. Ying's style is brutally realistic, but he isn't averse to poetic touches. The young searcher always carries two geese on his back to remind him of his rural home, and the giant Buddha's head he encounters, floating in a pond, symbolizes a hope of more peaceful times.
The film tells of a young man who leaves his village to find his father, who has absconded to the city. Through his travels, the viewer learns about the horrifying reality of the new China: violent gangsters, listless youths and a breakdown of official and family structures. The final showdown between father and son is brutal and symbolizes how China's modernization has ripped the social fabric of the country asunder.
Father illustrates how such social safeguards of a communist society as free health care and guaranteed employment have been dismantled, replaced with nothing. Ying implies that Brute Force and violence have become the only ways to safeguard personal security.
Ying and producer Peng Shan shot the film by themselves in Peng's home village on next to no money. The biggest prop -- a giant Buddha's head -- cost only $90. Nearly all the cast are members of Peng's extended family. Ying's style is brutally realistic, but he isn't averse to poetic touches. The young searcher always carries two geese on his back to remind him of his rural home, and the giant Buddha's head he encounters, floating in a pond, symbolizes a hope of more peaceful times.
- 5/19/2006
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
The amount of enjoyment one gets out of the Harrison Ford crime-action thriller "Firewall" depends on one's tolerance for watching thugs terrify an innocent family for most of the movie. Both dutifully formulaic and brazen in its willingness exploit in-jeopardy elements just short of the horror-film threshold, such barriers might prevent audiences from savoring an otherwise old-fashioned thriller.
The film might even turn off the computer-geek crowd: Despite locating its "thrills" in the world of Internet hackers, access codes, scrupulous surveillance and electronic thievery, issues get settled with Brute Force. Boxoffice, at least for a Ford film, looks unpromising.
The movie wants things both ways. On one hand, the premise has a gang of high-tech crooks led by a stereotypic Eurotrash villain (Paul Bettany) spend months electronically monitoring, recording and scrutinizing the daily routine of the family of a Seattle bank's computer security specialist, Jack Stanford (Ford). They know even their medical history. On the other hand, at the time they make their move against the family, they are totally unaware that the bank has been taken over by a larger financial institution and Jack no longer has access to customer data so he can rob his bank electronically for them. Pity they don't read newspapers.
On one hand, the film casts Ford against type as a nerdy guy who spends half the film in foolish, unproductive strategies to save his hostage family. On the other, at the end of the day, it's Indiana Jones/Jack Ryan to the rescue.
Written by Joe Forte and directed by Richard Loncraine in a cool, humorless mode, "Firewall" drives ever forward, alternating between abuse of the captive family and a techno-thriller about binary codes and virtual money. When Jack realizes he has little choice but to cooperate with the gang holding his wife and two children -- a realization that takes more than 50 minutes of the film, unfortunately -- he experiments in a risky scheme to rob his own bank by using his daughter's iPod. His every move is scrutinized by his new boss (Robert Patrick), who has developed an unhealthy suspicion of his security officer.
Meanwhile, his wife Beth (Virginia Madsen in a huge comedown from her role in "Sideways") tries to drive a wedge between the colorless gang members, who are ever so polite -- when not slapping people or threatening to break legs.
In the end, the bad guys are undone by something so implausible as to risk derision. (No spoiler here, but criminals in general should note that when kidnapping a family, try not to include any pets.)
Ford doesn't look so much embarrassed as uncomfortable. The role doesn't suit him or his persona. Just think how much better he was in a movie with a similar theme, "Frantic", where his carefully controlled fear for his wife's safety drives every credible moment. Madsen and actors in smaller roles such as Mary Lynn Rajskub as Ford's assistant and Robert Forster and Alan Arkin as bank officials acquit themselves well. The villains have little dimension or background. As the head baddie, Bettany has little to play other than pure evil, which is banal and boring.
You can't fault the production design, cinematography or hard driving-score. Nevertheless, "Firewall" lacks that special something to lift it above a standard-issue studio thriller.
FIREWALL
Warner Bros. Pictures
Warner Bros. in association with Village Roadshow Pictures presents a Beacon Pictures/Jon Shestack/Thunder Road production
Credits:
Director: Richard Loncraine
Screenwriter: Joe Forte
Producers: Armyan Bernstein, Jonathan Shestack, Basil Iwanyk
Executive producers: Dana Goldberg, Charlie Lyons, Brent O'Connor, Bruce Berman
Director of photography: Marco Pontecorvo
Production designer: Brian Morris
Music: Alexandre Desplat
Costumes: Shuna Harwood
Editor: Jim Page. Cast: Jack Stanfield: Harrison Ford
Beth Stanfield: Virginia Madsen
Bill Cox: Paul Bettany
Janet: Mary Lynn Rajskub
Gary: Robert Patrick
Harry: Robert Forster
Arlin: Alan Arkin
MPAA rating PG-13
Running time -- 104 minutes...
The film might even turn off the computer-geek crowd: Despite locating its "thrills" in the world of Internet hackers, access codes, scrupulous surveillance and electronic thievery, issues get settled with Brute Force. Boxoffice, at least for a Ford film, looks unpromising.
The movie wants things both ways. On one hand, the premise has a gang of high-tech crooks led by a stereotypic Eurotrash villain (Paul Bettany) spend months electronically monitoring, recording and scrutinizing the daily routine of the family of a Seattle bank's computer security specialist, Jack Stanford (Ford). They know even their medical history. On the other hand, at the time they make their move against the family, they are totally unaware that the bank has been taken over by a larger financial institution and Jack no longer has access to customer data so he can rob his bank electronically for them. Pity they don't read newspapers.
On one hand, the film casts Ford against type as a nerdy guy who spends half the film in foolish, unproductive strategies to save his hostage family. On the other, at the end of the day, it's Indiana Jones/Jack Ryan to the rescue.
Written by Joe Forte and directed by Richard Loncraine in a cool, humorless mode, "Firewall" drives ever forward, alternating between abuse of the captive family and a techno-thriller about binary codes and virtual money. When Jack realizes he has little choice but to cooperate with the gang holding his wife and two children -- a realization that takes more than 50 minutes of the film, unfortunately -- he experiments in a risky scheme to rob his own bank by using his daughter's iPod. His every move is scrutinized by his new boss (Robert Patrick), who has developed an unhealthy suspicion of his security officer.
Meanwhile, his wife Beth (Virginia Madsen in a huge comedown from her role in "Sideways") tries to drive a wedge between the colorless gang members, who are ever so polite -- when not slapping people or threatening to break legs.
In the end, the bad guys are undone by something so implausible as to risk derision. (No spoiler here, but criminals in general should note that when kidnapping a family, try not to include any pets.)
Ford doesn't look so much embarrassed as uncomfortable. The role doesn't suit him or his persona. Just think how much better he was in a movie with a similar theme, "Frantic", where his carefully controlled fear for his wife's safety drives every credible moment. Madsen and actors in smaller roles such as Mary Lynn Rajskub as Ford's assistant and Robert Forster and Alan Arkin as bank officials acquit themselves well. The villains have little dimension or background. As the head baddie, Bettany has little to play other than pure evil, which is banal and boring.
You can't fault the production design, cinematography or hard driving-score. Nevertheless, "Firewall" lacks that special something to lift it above a standard-issue studio thriller.
FIREWALL
Warner Bros. Pictures
Warner Bros. in association with Village Roadshow Pictures presents a Beacon Pictures/Jon Shestack/Thunder Road production
Credits:
Director: Richard Loncraine
Screenwriter: Joe Forte
Producers: Armyan Bernstein, Jonathan Shestack, Basil Iwanyk
Executive producers: Dana Goldberg, Charlie Lyons, Brent O'Connor, Bruce Berman
Director of photography: Marco Pontecorvo
Production designer: Brian Morris
Music: Alexandre Desplat
Costumes: Shuna Harwood
Editor: Jim Page. Cast: Jack Stanfield: Harrison Ford
Beth Stanfield: Virginia Madsen
Bill Cox: Paul Bettany
Janet: Mary Lynn Rajskub
Gary: Robert Patrick
Harry: Robert Forster
Arlin: Alan Arkin
MPAA rating PG-13
Running time -- 104 minutes...
- 2/28/2006
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
Opens
Friday, May 30
Diving into their most realistic and ambitious setting yet, the talents at Pixar have produced an exhilarating fish story in the perfectly cast comic adventure "Finding Nemo". Not as flat-out inventive as "Monsters, Inc". or as sardonic as "A Bug's Life" and the "Toy Story" pics, "Nemo" finds its own sparkling depths, achieving a less mechanical feel than its predecessors through a stripped-down, fluid narrative and new levels of visual nuance.
Pixar vet Andrew Stanton demonstrates confidence and exuberance in his first stint at the helm, working from a script he co-wrote with Bob Peterson and David Reynolds. With the exception of toddlers who might find a few scary moments too intense, kids will get right into the flow of "Nemo", while those viewers old enough to drive will appreciate the plentiful humor designed to sail right over kids' heads -- not least of which is the inspired chemistry between leads Albert Brooks and Ellen DeGeneres. Disney is primed to make a whale of a splash at the summer boxoffice.
The marine milieu calls for more visual delicacy and aural subtlety than in past Pixar features -- challenges the filmmakers have met through the work of myriad technicians and artists. Before taking poetic license with their CG creations (real fish don't have eyebrows), the animators and designers took lessons in ichthyology (among other things), to good effect. Their imagery captures not only the play of light through the ocean's depths but the texture of its roiling surface and the luminescence and character-defining locomotion of its inhabitants. Add to that Gary Rydstrom's meticulous sound design and the grown-up music score by Thomas Newman, and the result is the most complex and fully realized environment of any Pixar film.
"Nemo" dazzles from the get-go, beginning with a pre-credits sequence that might prove more frightening to parents than kids, dramatizing as it does the notion that bad things can happen even in suburbia. Clown-fish couple Marlin and Coral (Brooks, Elizabeth Perkins) have just moved to a nice, quiet neighborhood of the Great Barrier Reef -- a peaceful vista of jewel-toned sponges, anemones and sea grasses, and a good place to raise their 400 offspring, who will soon be hatching. Tragedy strikes, leaving Marlin widowed with one survivor in the fish nursery, whom he names Nemo and swears to protect always.
It's no wonder that Marlin turns out to be a nervous, overprotective father who follows little Nemo (Alexander Gould) on his first day of, um, fish school. Nemo's a spirited kid with an endearing flaw -- a smaller right fin that flutters constantly -- and a healthy sense of rebellion, which he takes to extremes in Dad's anxious presence, venturing off the reef into open waters. A diver promptly snares him as an exotic specimen.
Propelled by his frantic search for Nemo, Marlin ventures farther than he'd ever dreamed of going, joined by good-hearted blue tang Dory (DeGeneres). She's eager to help and unfazable, the perfect complement to Marlin's neurotic timidity, however exasperating her continual lapses in short-term memory become. They're two lost souls: He provides her with a purpose, and she lends the traumatized Marlin a newfound resilience, as well as being able to read the Sydney address on the mask the diver left behind. Their journey to the big city unfolds as a series of set pieces centering on encounters with would-be predators and helpful sea folk.
Nemo, meanwhile, is welcomed into a community of fish-tank eccentrics in a dentist's office not far from Sydney Harbor. A scarred, self-possessed Moorish idol named Gill (Willem Dafoe) is the only one of Nemo's tank mates who wasn't born in a pet shop, and the wide-eyed youngster inspires him to devise the latest in a long series of ludicrous escape plans. The goal is to get Nemo home before the dentist presents him as a birthday gift to his terror of a niece (LuLu Ebeling), a deliciously funny concoction of Brute Force and braces.
There's a built-in poignancy to the dynamic between son and single father that neither the script nor the actors overstate. That Nemo has no expectation his father will lift a fin to find him is the dark center of the story, setting in bright relief Marlin's every dance with danger as he pursues his stolen child. There's an especially perilous dash through a field of translucent pink jellyfish, culminating in a moment straight out of "Invasion of the Body Snatchers", with Marlin struggling to keep Dory from falling into a deadly narcotic sleep. But it's not all rough waters: They also luck into the good vibes of surfer-dude turtles who take them through the East Australian Current. Director Stanton is a standout as sea turtle Crush, a mellow dad who teaches Marlin a lesson or two about the parental art of letting go.
The whole cast is aces, with turns from such vibrant talents as Barry Humphries, playing the repentant leader of a self-help group for sharks who are trying to beat the fish-eating habit, and John Ratzenberger as an annoyingly helpful bunch of moonfish showoffs. Geoffrey Rush voices a Sydney pelican who's well-versed in dental procedure, Allison Janney is a vigilant starfish, and Joe Ranft provides a French accent for a finicky shrimp.
But it's the give-and-take between DeGeneres and Brooks that gives the saga its big heart. DeGeneres' character was created with her in mind, so it makes sense that Dory is a fish with freckles, lips and a rueful smile. When, in an episode of lovely, freewheeling lunacy, she insists on communicating with a blue whale in its native language, the combination of vocal calisthenics and facial contortions is sublime.
Her goofy compassion would have only half the impact, however, without Brooks' contrasting nebbish-turned-hero. It's hard to imagine another actor who could deliver lines as angst-ridden and deliriously funny. This is, after all, the tale of a father who not only transcends fear to find his son against all odds but who learns how to tell a joke along the way.
FINDING NEMO
Buena Vista Pictures
A Walt Disney Pictures presentation of a Pixar Animation Studios film
Credits:
Director: Andrew Stanton
Co-director: Lee Unkrich
Screenwriters: Andrew Stanton, Bob Peterson, David Reynolds
Original story by: Andrew Stanton
Producer: Graham Walters
Executive producer: John Lasseter
Directors of photography: Sharon Calahan, Jeremy Lasky
Production designer: Ralph Eggleston
Music: Thomas Newman
Editor: David Ian Salter
Supervising technical director: Oren Jacob
Supervising animator: Dylan Brown
Art directors: Ricky Vega Nierva, Robin Cooper, Anthony Christov, Randy Berrett
CG supervisors: Brian Green, Lisa Forssell, Danielle Feinberg, David Eisenmann, Jesse Hollander, Steve May, Michael Fong, Anthony A Apodaca, Michael Lorenzen
Sound designer: Gary Rydstrom
Cast:
Marlin: Albert Brooks
Dory: Ellen DeGeneres
Nemo: Alexander Gould
Gill: Willem Dafoe
Bloat: Brad Garrett
Peach: Allison Janney
Gurgle: Austin Pendleton
Bubbles: Stephen Root
Deb (& Flo): Vicki Lewis
Jacques: Joe Ranft
Nigel: Geoffrey Rush
Crush: Andrew Stanton
Coral: Elizabeth Perkins
Squirt: Nicholas Bird
Mr. Ray: Bob Peterson
Bruce: Barry Humphries
Anchor: Eric Bana
Chum: Bruce Spence
Dentist: Bill Hunter
Darla: LuLu Ebeling
Tad: Jordy Ranft
Pearl: Erica Beck
Sheldon: Erik Per Sullivan
Fish School: John Ratzenberger
Running time -- 100 minutes
MPAA rating: G...
Friday, May 30
Diving into their most realistic and ambitious setting yet, the talents at Pixar have produced an exhilarating fish story in the perfectly cast comic adventure "Finding Nemo". Not as flat-out inventive as "Monsters, Inc". or as sardonic as "A Bug's Life" and the "Toy Story" pics, "Nemo" finds its own sparkling depths, achieving a less mechanical feel than its predecessors through a stripped-down, fluid narrative and new levels of visual nuance.
Pixar vet Andrew Stanton demonstrates confidence and exuberance in his first stint at the helm, working from a script he co-wrote with Bob Peterson and David Reynolds. With the exception of toddlers who might find a few scary moments too intense, kids will get right into the flow of "Nemo", while those viewers old enough to drive will appreciate the plentiful humor designed to sail right over kids' heads -- not least of which is the inspired chemistry between leads Albert Brooks and Ellen DeGeneres. Disney is primed to make a whale of a splash at the summer boxoffice.
The marine milieu calls for more visual delicacy and aural subtlety than in past Pixar features -- challenges the filmmakers have met through the work of myriad technicians and artists. Before taking poetic license with their CG creations (real fish don't have eyebrows), the animators and designers took lessons in ichthyology (among other things), to good effect. Their imagery captures not only the play of light through the ocean's depths but the texture of its roiling surface and the luminescence and character-defining locomotion of its inhabitants. Add to that Gary Rydstrom's meticulous sound design and the grown-up music score by Thomas Newman, and the result is the most complex and fully realized environment of any Pixar film.
"Nemo" dazzles from the get-go, beginning with a pre-credits sequence that might prove more frightening to parents than kids, dramatizing as it does the notion that bad things can happen even in suburbia. Clown-fish couple Marlin and Coral (Brooks, Elizabeth Perkins) have just moved to a nice, quiet neighborhood of the Great Barrier Reef -- a peaceful vista of jewel-toned sponges, anemones and sea grasses, and a good place to raise their 400 offspring, who will soon be hatching. Tragedy strikes, leaving Marlin widowed with one survivor in the fish nursery, whom he names Nemo and swears to protect always.
It's no wonder that Marlin turns out to be a nervous, overprotective father who follows little Nemo (Alexander Gould) on his first day of, um, fish school. Nemo's a spirited kid with an endearing flaw -- a smaller right fin that flutters constantly -- and a healthy sense of rebellion, which he takes to extremes in Dad's anxious presence, venturing off the reef into open waters. A diver promptly snares him as an exotic specimen.
Propelled by his frantic search for Nemo, Marlin ventures farther than he'd ever dreamed of going, joined by good-hearted blue tang Dory (DeGeneres). She's eager to help and unfazable, the perfect complement to Marlin's neurotic timidity, however exasperating her continual lapses in short-term memory become. They're two lost souls: He provides her with a purpose, and she lends the traumatized Marlin a newfound resilience, as well as being able to read the Sydney address on the mask the diver left behind. Their journey to the big city unfolds as a series of set pieces centering on encounters with would-be predators and helpful sea folk.
Nemo, meanwhile, is welcomed into a community of fish-tank eccentrics in a dentist's office not far from Sydney Harbor. A scarred, self-possessed Moorish idol named Gill (Willem Dafoe) is the only one of Nemo's tank mates who wasn't born in a pet shop, and the wide-eyed youngster inspires him to devise the latest in a long series of ludicrous escape plans. The goal is to get Nemo home before the dentist presents him as a birthday gift to his terror of a niece (LuLu Ebeling), a deliciously funny concoction of Brute Force and braces.
There's a built-in poignancy to the dynamic between son and single father that neither the script nor the actors overstate. That Nemo has no expectation his father will lift a fin to find him is the dark center of the story, setting in bright relief Marlin's every dance with danger as he pursues his stolen child. There's an especially perilous dash through a field of translucent pink jellyfish, culminating in a moment straight out of "Invasion of the Body Snatchers", with Marlin struggling to keep Dory from falling into a deadly narcotic sleep. But it's not all rough waters: They also luck into the good vibes of surfer-dude turtles who take them through the East Australian Current. Director Stanton is a standout as sea turtle Crush, a mellow dad who teaches Marlin a lesson or two about the parental art of letting go.
The whole cast is aces, with turns from such vibrant talents as Barry Humphries, playing the repentant leader of a self-help group for sharks who are trying to beat the fish-eating habit, and John Ratzenberger as an annoyingly helpful bunch of moonfish showoffs. Geoffrey Rush voices a Sydney pelican who's well-versed in dental procedure, Allison Janney is a vigilant starfish, and Joe Ranft provides a French accent for a finicky shrimp.
But it's the give-and-take between DeGeneres and Brooks that gives the saga its big heart. DeGeneres' character was created with her in mind, so it makes sense that Dory is a fish with freckles, lips and a rueful smile. When, in an episode of lovely, freewheeling lunacy, she insists on communicating with a blue whale in its native language, the combination of vocal calisthenics and facial contortions is sublime.
Her goofy compassion would have only half the impact, however, without Brooks' contrasting nebbish-turned-hero. It's hard to imagine another actor who could deliver lines as angst-ridden and deliriously funny. This is, after all, the tale of a father who not only transcends fear to find his son against all odds but who learns how to tell a joke along the way.
FINDING NEMO
Buena Vista Pictures
A Walt Disney Pictures presentation of a Pixar Animation Studios film
Credits:
Director: Andrew Stanton
Co-director: Lee Unkrich
Screenwriters: Andrew Stanton, Bob Peterson, David Reynolds
Original story by: Andrew Stanton
Producer: Graham Walters
Executive producer: John Lasseter
Directors of photography: Sharon Calahan, Jeremy Lasky
Production designer: Ralph Eggleston
Music: Thomas Newman
Editor: David Ian Salter
Supervising technical director: Oren Jacob
Supervising animator: Dylan Brown
Art directors: Ricky Vega Nierva, Robin Cooper, Anthony Christov, Randy Berrett
CG supervisors: Brian Green, Lisa Forssell, Danielle Feinberg, David Eisenmann, Jesse Hollander, Steve May, Michael Fong, Anthony A Apodaca, Michael Lorenzen
Sound designer: Gary Rydstrom
Cast:
Marlin: Albert Brooks
Dory: Ellen DeGeneres
Nemo: Alexander Gould
Gill: Willem Dafoe
Bloat: Brad Garrett
Peach: Allison Janney
Gurgle: Austin Pendleton
Bubbles: Stephen Root
Deb (& Flo): Vicki Lewis
Jacques: Joe Ranft
Nigel: Geoffrey Rush
Crush: Andrew Stanton
Coral: Elizabeth Perkins
Squirt: Nicholas Bird
Mr. Ray: Bob Peterson
Bruce: Barry Humphries
Anchor: Eric Bana
Chum: Bruce Spence
Dentist: Bill Hunter
Darla: LuLu Ebeling
Tad: Jordy Ranft
Pearl: Erica Beck
Sheldon: Erik Per Sullivan
Fish School: John Ratzenberger
Running time -- 100 minutes
MPAA rating: G...
There's no luck in the number 13 for Disney in this straightforward but crude tale of 10th-century Norse warriors and an Arab poet who leads them to victory over a cannibalistic clan of Bear People. Period combat tales flying the flags of honor and courage played well to yesteryear's audiences. But "The 13th Warrior", based on one of Michael Crichton's more obscure novels, is too corny for contempo audiences whose war-movie standards have been set by "Saving Private Ryan" and "The Thin Red Line".
The movie, shot under the name "Eaters of the Dead", the title of Crichton's book, was made nearly two years ago and appears to be getting a halfhearted release by Disney's Buena Vista this week. Certainly the production is well mounted in British Columbia, whose foggy rain forests and craggy fiords perfectly suit the Viking-era fable. And Antonio Banderas again proves his mettle as an exotic leading man in period pieces.
While he's not as flamboyant in this role as in "The Mask of Zorro", Banderas does nothing here to diminish his stature as a sex symbol in action movies. And how long has it been since a courageous hero in an American movie was an Arab?
Director John McTiernan is always a diligent and savvy director, capable of turning out rousing popcorn movies such as "Die Hard" and "The Hunt for Red October". But here he's been handed a script wrongly tooled for the current marketplace.
The plot line, which can be best summed up as the Seven Samurai go up against the Clan of the Cave Bear, is so worn out as to be threadbare. Just about every cliche from westerns and old war films gets trotted out until the movie flirts with comedy.
And Jerry Goldsmith's brassy score, normally so helpful in movies such as this, serves mostly to point out the thundering cliches.
Banderas plays Ahmed Ibn Fahdlan, an Arab exiled from Baghdad, who gets shanghaied -- although given the historical-geographical context, perhaps Oslo-ed is a better word -- by a roving band of Norse men into becoming the 13th warrior, who must be a foreigner, of a rescue mission to their northern homeland.
Seems the kingdom is under siege from a "terror that must not be named." This "kingdom" turns out to be a tiny seaside village whose residents function as takeout dinner for a marauding man-eating tribe that insists on dressing up as bears.
The odds appear overwhelming, but McTiernan favors close shots in the dark of battle scenes where you can't tell who's stabbing or clubbing whom. Miraculously, when the fog and smoke lift, the good guys have dwindled only by two or three while the Bear People are licking more serious wounds.
In the end, the heroes triumph not so much through Brute Force as through recognizing a major flaw in the Bear People's management structure. If you bring down Papa Bear, everyone else in the tribe will admit defeat and retreat into the woods, the Norse men discover.
Apparently, the head of the Bear People has failed to designate a successor. Disney Co. chairman Michael Eisner must hate this movie.
THE 13TH WARRIOR
Buena Vista Pictures
Touchstone Pictures
Producers: John McTiernan, Michael Crichton, Ned Dowd
Director: John McTiernan
Writers: William Wisher, Warren Lewis
Based on the novel "Eaters of the Dead" by: Michael Crichton
Executive producers: Andrew G. Vajna, Ethan Dubrow
Director of photography: Peter Menzies, Jr.
Production designer: Wolf Kroeger
Music: Jerry Goldsmith
Costumes: Kate Harrington
Editor: John Wright
Color/stereo
Cast:
Ahmed Ibn Fahdlan: Antonio Banderas
Queen Weilew: Diane Venora
Herger the Joyous: Dennis Storhoi
Buliwyf: Vladimir Kulich
Melchisidek: Omar Sharif
Wigliff: Anders T. Andersen
Skeld the Superstitious: Richard Bremmer
Running time --103 minutes
MPAA rating: R...
The movie, shot under the name "Eaters of the Dead", the title of Crichton's book, was made nearly two years ago and appears to be getting a halfhearted release by Disney's Buena Vista this week. Certainly the production is well mounted in British Columbia, whose foggy rain forests and craggy fiords perfectly suit the Viking-era fable. And Antonio Banderas again proves his mettle as an exotic leading man in period pieces.
While he's not as flamboyant in this role as in "The Mask of Zorro", Banderas does nothing here to diminish his stature as a sex symbol in action movies. And how long has it been since a courageous hero in an American movie was an Arab?
Director John McTiernan is always a diligent and savvy director, capable of turning out rousing popcorn movies such as "Die Hard" and "The Hunt for Red October". But here he's been handed a script wrongly tooled for the current marketplace.
The plot line, which can be best summed up as the Seven Samurai go up against the Clan of the Cave Bear, is so worn out as to be threadbare. Just about every cliche from westerns and old war films gets trotted out until the movie flirts with comedy.
And Jerry Goldsmith's brassy score, normally so helpful in movies such as this, serves mostly to point out the thundering cliches.
Banderas plays Ahmed Ibn Fahdlan, an Arab exiled from Baghdad, who gets shanghaied -- although given the historical-geographical context, perhaps Oslo-ed is a better word -- by a roving band of Norse men into becoming the 13th warrior, who must be a foreigner, of a rescue mission to their northern homeland.
Seems the kingdom is under siege from a "terror that must not be named." This "kingdom" turns out to be a tiny seaside village whose residents function as takeout dinner for a marauding man-eating tribe that insists on dressing up as bears.
The odds appear overwhelming, but McTiernan favors close shots in the dark of battle scenes where you can't tell who's stabbing or clubbing whom. Miraculously, when the fog and smoke lift, the good guys have dwindled only by two or three while the Bear People are licking more serious wounds.
In the end, the heroes triumph not so much through Brute Force as through recognizing a major flaw in the Bear People's management structure. If you bring down Papa Bear, everyone else in the tribe will admit defeat and retreat into the woods, the Norse men discover.
Apparently, the head of the Bear People has failed to designate a successor. Disney Co. chairman Michael Eisner must hate this movie.
THE 13TH WARRIOR
Buena Vista Pictures
Touchstone Pictures
Producers: John McTiernan, Michael Crichton, Ned Dowd
Director: John McTiernan
Writers: William Wisher, Warren Lewis
Based on the novel "Eaters of the Dead" by: Michael Crichton
Executive producers: Andrew G. Vajna, Ethan Dubrow
Director of photography: Peter Menzies, Jr.
Production designer: Wolf Kroeger
Music: Jerry Goldsmith
Costumes: Kate Harrington
Editor: John Wright
Color/stereo
Cast:
Ahmed Ibn Fahdlan: Antonio Banderas
Queen Weilew: Diane Venora
Herger the Joyous: Dennis Storhoi
Buliwyf: Vladimir Kulich
Melchisidek: Omar Sharif
Wigliff: Anders T. Andersen
Skeld the Superstitious: Richard Bremmer
Running time --103 minutes
MPAA rating: R...
- 8/27/1999
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
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