Soundtrack Wednesday - Out of Sight

Track: Tub Scene

Artist: David Holmes

Movie: Out of Sight

North Country

93/100 (126 min, 2005)
Plot: A fictionalized account of the first major successful sexual harassment case in the United States -- Jenson vs. Eveleth Mines, where a woman who endured a range of abuse while working as a miner filed and won the landmark 1984 lawsuit.
Director: Niki Caro
Writers: Michael Seitzman (screenplay), Clara Bingham (book)
Stars: Charlize Theron, Jeremy Renner and Frances McDormand

They can't do this to us

North Country is one of the most underrated movies of last decade - there are very few movies out there that not only have a great script but also such a tremendous group of actors in them. And here all of them have purpose, great work to deliver and each and every one of them delivers their best. Although the only two actors who got Academy Award nominations for this movie are Charlize Theron and Frances McDormand almost every single actor in the film should get more recognition for their work, most notably Woody Harrelson and Richard Jenkins.

Inspired by the real events North Country follows Josey Aimes, simple but headstrong woman who is looking for a way to support herself and her kids after she leaves her abusive husband. She goes back to her hometown to live with her parents (Sissy Spacek and Richard Jenkins). Her father works in a mine, which is a main source of income for most men and some of the women in the town. Josey decides to take a job there, after the encouragement from her friend Glory (Frances McDormand).

Scene of the Week: Kill Bill: Vol. 2

You don't even know what fucking day you work

directed by Quentin Tarantino

The scene: Budd, Bill's brother, who is a bouncer in a lousy bar gets told off by his boss Larry. What we witness in that barely 3-minute long scene is an epic exchange worthy of the best of Tarantino's moments. Larry takes a marker and proceeds to cross Budd's name on the calender, which is especially funny since Budd, former assassin who is very dangerous, just stands there looking calm, resigned and pretty damn put in his place.

- You looking for me?
- I don't know what car wash you worked before you came here that let you stroll in  minutes late, but it wasn't owned by me - and I own a fuckin' car wash.         
- Larry...there ain't nobody out there, so...
- What's your point? That you're not needed here?
- My point is...l'm the bouncer, and there ain't nobody out there to bounce.    
- You saying that the reason that you're not doing the job that I'm paying you to do is that you don't have a job to do?
- No...
- Is that what you're saying? What are you trying to convince me of, exactly? That you're as useless as an asshole right here? Well, guess what, buddy? I think... you just fucking convinced me. Let's go to the calendar. It's calendar time. Calendar time for Buddy. OK. You working tomorrow?
- Yeah.
- Mm. No, you're n... You don't even know what fucking day you work. Here. You're not working tomorrow. You're working Wednesday. Here you are. There you go. Workin' Thursday?
- Yeah.
- I don't think so. Friday. There's your name.
- If you say so.
- There used to be your name. OK? Saturday. There used to be your name. Uh, Monday... Here. How about that? Fuckin' with your cash is the only thing you kids seem to understand. OK? Now, I want you to go home till I call you. Till I call you. Before you leave, talk to Rocket. She's got a job for you to do. And... the hat. That fuckin' hat. That fucking...How many times have I told you, don't wear that fucking hat here? How many?
- Customers wear hats.
- Well, I'm not the boss of the customers. I'm the boss of you. And I'm telling you that I want you to keep that shit-kicker hat at home.

Helena Bonham Carter Appreciation

Helena Bonham Carter

(26 May 1966, Golders Green, London, England)

"All the ancient classic fairy tales have always been scary and dark."

Today is the birthday of the beautiful English Rose, Queen of the freaks, inspiring muse of Tim Burton and the one and only Bellatrix Lestrange, Marla Singer and Mrs. Lovett - Helena Bonham Carter.

Helena Bonham Carter, daughter of Raymond Bonham Carter, a merchant banker, and Elena Bonham Carter (née Propper de Callejón), a psychotherapist is the youngest of three children. She is the great-granddaughter of former Prime Minister Herbert H. Asquith and her blue-blooded family tree also contains Barons and Baronesses, diplomats, and a director, Bonham Carter's great-uncle Anthony Asquith, who made Pygmalion (1938) and The Importance of Being Earnest (1952), among others. 

After experiencing family dramas that included her father's stroke-which left him wheelchair-bound-and attending South Hampstead High School and Westminster School in London, Bonham Carter devoted herself to an acting career. That trajectory actually began in 1979 when, at age 13, she entered a national poetry writing competition and used her second place winnings to place her photo in the casting directory "Spotlight." 

She went on to star in many costume dramas - "Frankenstein", "Howard's End", "Hamlet" but is best known for her quirky and eccentric characters such as the ones in "Fight Club" and many Tim Burton's movies. Though consistently a versatile and engaging actress, Bonham Carter has never won a major American film award. However, she has received a number of critical awards and has been nominated for five Golden Globes, an Oscar, a SAG Award, and two Emmys.

She has worked with Tim Burton many times, who is also her partner in real life ever since 2001. They live in adjoining residences in London, sharing a connecting hallway, and have two children: Billy Ray Burton, 4, and Nell Burton, who was born December 15, 2007. 

Meet the Dwarfs in the new featurette from Snow White and the Huntsman

I had no idea so many great actors will be playing the Dwarfs in the film - Ian McShane, Bob Hoskins, Nick Frost, Ray Winstone...also I adore the little dance between them and Snow White.

Soundtrack Wednesday - Prometheus

Track: Infected

Artist: Marc Streitenfeld

Movie: Prometheus

Rising Stars: Rooney Mara

Rooney Mara was born on April 17th 1985. She is one of four children of NFL football team New York Giants executive Timothy Christopher Mara and Kathleen McNulty, the granddaughter of Art Rooney, Sr., the founder of the Pittsburgh Steelers football franchise. Her paternal grandfather was Giants founder Tim Mara. As a child Rooney did not want to be an actress but later on in her life, inspired by old movies she took a risk and started to appear in films. Her first film was Urban Legends: Bloody Mary where she starred with her older sister Kate (127 hours, Brokeback Mountain).

She starred in David Fincher's The Social Network as Erica Albricht, Mark Zuckerberg's girlfriend who breaks up with him in the film's opening scene. Though her performance was quite short, Mara was impressive enough there was even some Oscar buzz surrounding her work. For me the look of hurt, pain, shame and betrayal on Erica's face in one of the beginning scenes of the film is simply unforgettable.

Dark Shadows

36/100 (113 min, 2012)
Plot: An imprisoned vampire, Barnabas Collins, is set free and returns to his ancestral home, where his dysfunctional descendants are in need of his protection. Director: Tim Burton
Writers: Seth Grahame-Smith (screenplay), John August (story)
Stars: Johnny Depp, Michelle Pfeiffer and Eva Green

 Burn, baby, burn!

I love Tim Burton's movies. I love his imagination, the beautiful cinematography, Danny Elfman's scores, the bizarre and grotesque world that always hides within the frames of his pictures. Even Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and Alice in Wonderland while definitely weren't the best of his movies, were at least coherent, had a consistent style and at least managed to be entertaining. With Dark Shadows I was hoping it will be a good movie till the very last moment, that is until I actually saw it. I don't know what happened to Tim Burton but Dark Shadows is a huge disappointment and worse yet - complete, embarrassing and ridiculous mess that at times is not even watchable.

The story follows....oh wait that's not right. Dark Shadows doesn't really follow any of the characters, it changes the points of view many times and it never makes much sense. So let me start over - once there was a rich playboy Barnabas Collins who fooled around with the girls. That was until he fell in love with Josette, lovely, blond girl. One of the girls he abandoned - Angelique - turns out to be a witch and she decides to take her revenge - she makes Josette jump out of cliff to her death and Barnabas follows. But he doesn't die - it turns out that Angelique turned him into a vampire.

Snow White and the Huntsman - behind the scenes with Charlize Theron and "Breath of Life" music video.

Brand new featurette promoting "Snow White and the Huntsman" showed up - it features Charlize Theron, who talks about her character - evil Queen Ravenna.

Prometheus Viral Video "Quiet Eye"

Brand new viral video promoting Prometheus and featuring Noomi Rapace premiered today!

New Clip, TV Spot and Soundtrack for Prometheus online!

Prometheus soundtrack is now available on Itunes - you can listen to the samples or buy the album now!
To go to the page click on the album cover below.

There is also the first clip from the movie where you can see the landing of the ship:

And finally a brand new TV Spot where we get to see quite frightening glimpses of the primary antagonists in the movie: 

Cate Blanchett Appreciation

Catherine Élise Blanchett 

 (14 May 1969, Melbourne, Australia)

“If I had my way, if I was lucky enough, if I could be on the brink my entire life - that great sense of expectation and excitement without the disappointment - that would be the perfect state.” 

Visual Parallels: Black Swan + Shame

Visual parallels is something I came up during watching films and noticing very similar shots or events in two different movies. with "Black Swan" and "Shame" their respective protagonists - Nina and Brandon - often find themselves in the very similar locations, situations and at times the shots looks almost identical. Not only are these two people struggling with their inner demons but for some reasons the directors of both movies - Daren Aronofsky and Steve McQueen used very similar places and techniques to show their characters' anguish. We have them looking with admiration and fascination and hidden sadness at someone their admire, we watch them in the subway many times in the movie and we go to hell with them - when they are surrounded by their obsessions, demons and weakness, bathed in red light of the underworld.

"God does not build in straight lines" - Prometheus "Origins" featurette.

There is a fascinating new featurette promoting Prometheus over at Yahoo - click the image below to go there.

In this one we find out the name of the planet - which is actually the name of one of the existing moons , we get to see more shots of Michael Fassbender looking very creepy and we hear Ridley Scott declaring he wants to scare the living shit out of us.

W.E.

50/100 (119 min, 2011)
Plot: The affair between King Edward VIII and American divorcée Wallis Simpson, and a contemporary romance between a married woman and a Russian security guard.
Director: Madonna
Writers: Madonna (screenplay), Alek Keshishian (screenplay)
Stars: Abbie Cornish, James D'Arcy and Andrea Riseborough

Pretty Vacant

W.E. is not a good film. But it is one of this films that have so many fantastic elements in it that you can't really call it bad either. It's not good, it's not bad, but it's definitely not mediocre. It's a film you have to endure in order to see those great parts of it - it's like a trip to the museum where you are wandering around for hours, bored, unimpressed, puzzled, only occasionally seeing a gorgeous piece of art.

I imagine that while Madonna was working on that movie she spent her time reading history books about the affair between King Edward and Wallis Simpson, while listening to Sex Pistols and surrounding herself with the objects from the era. Too bad in her research she actually forgot to read about how to make a movie. W.E. has many things in it but the one thing that is always absent is the focus - the film is scattered and messy and Madonna makes a lot of puzzling choices when it comes both to the plot and the narrative of the picture.

Screaming Sunday - Slither

Sati's movie rating - 65/100
Plot: This blend of black humour and unnerving horror, with its nineteen fifties parodies pays homage to the great B-Movie Sci-Fi genre. Set in modern small town America, when an unsuspecting meteorite drops by and its tiny slug shaped parasitic pilot infects the local inhabitants, then all hell breaks lose, literally. Turning their infected hosts into Zombie type aliens, this is a battle of the fittest, this is the battle to save Mankind, this is pure B-Movie magic. Let the hunt begin.
The heroes: The small town folk.
The antagonists: Bugs from outer space.
What makes it so great? The unique blend of gross and hilarious. The film is filled with quirky and funny (Shelby!) characters who have to find it in them to survive when the town gets infested with awful and hungry bugs.
Best scene: The haunt in the field.
Oh-oh something's not right line: "It's just a bee sting."

Extended Preview and TV spot for "Snow White and the Huntsman"

Searching the youtube today I found some great promo materials for Snow White and the Huntsman, where we get to see more of the footage than we did in the trailers. The movie is a new version of the classic fairytale about Snow White (Kristen Stewart) who wakes the wrath of evil Queen (Charlize Theron) by being more beautiful than she is. The queen sends the Huntsman (Chris Hemsworth) after her to kill her.

While I'm pretty sure the magic forest sequence may cause me to puke on the children sitting in the row in front of me, the film looks pretty great and Charlize Theron was a fantastic choice for the part of the Queen, in spite of the fact that it's pretty hard to believe she could be envious of anyone.

Movie of the Month - May - The Runaways

"Girls nowadays, they don't have any role models. This band is self-empowerment, man - Aphrodite, Cleopatra, Eurydice! No more second-class status, sitting at concerts with asshole boyfriends who worship bands from a Popular Mechanics evaluation of amplifiers. The Runaways have the most chance of any group I've seen... To do with the Beatles did. To tear this world apart."

You probably noticed that for two months now there is a movie of the month image on the sidebar of the blog. Each month I chose a movie I think is underrated and provide the link to my review of it. The movie of the month of May is The Runaways, a very good film featuring wonderful work from Kristen Stewart and Dakota Fanning.

“ ‘2001’ on steroids.” Ridley Scott talks about "Prometheus" + new tv spots

New York Times website has a great article about Prometheus including Ridley Scott's comments.
“God doesn’t hate us,” Mr. Scott added ominously. “But God could be disappointed in us — like children.”

There also 3 new TV spots with few new shots.

Soundtrack Wednesday - Game of Thrones

Track: Main Titles

Artist: Ramin Djawadi

Movie: Game of Thrones

2 new "Prometheus" related gems!

by Sati

Today two new lovely promotional materials showed up on the web - English version of 3-minute long featurette and alternate version of the new trailer with new shots which are quite gory and disturbing. Check them out below.