Archive for the ‘Austin’ Category
Filed under: Comedy, Austin, Interviews, George Clooney
My interview with Up in the Air director Jason Reitman in October was one of the most meta interviews I’ve ever done. Before the interview started, Reitman took my photo with his iPhone. He told me only “I’m not sure if that’s going to work, what I’m doing with that, but if it does, you’ll be thrilled with the results.” I’m still in suspense.
In addition, my interview took place right after a Film School Rejects interview (check it out, Reitman name-checks Cinematical) in which Cole Abaius spent 10 minutes discussing the pie charts the Juno and Thank You for Smoking director had been posting to Twitter. Reitman kept track of which questions interviewers asked him most — I caught him tallying things in a little notebook during our interview — and posted the stats online frequently. Roger Ebert has also written about the pie charts. Cole and I had been reading Reitman’s Twitter feed before our interviews, and not only knew about the pie chart but found out that he had just been enjoying lunch at the Salt Lick, one of the best known BBQ joints in Central Texas.
So that may explain why Twitter, pie charts and barbecue keep creeping into the following Cinematical interview with Jason Reitman. I hope it’s as fun to read as it was to be there in person. The above photo is from the red carpet the evening after the interview, when Up in the Air was the closing-night film for Austin Film Festival.
Filed under: Comedy, Austin, Interviews, George Clooney
My interview with Up in the Air director Jason Reitman in October was one of the most meta interviews I’ve ever done. Before the interview started, Reitman took my photo with his iPhone. He told me only “I’m not sure if that’s going to work, what I’m doing with that, but if it does, you’ll be thrilled with the results.” I’m still in suspense.
In addition, my interview took place right after a Film School Rejects interview (check it out, Reitman name-checks Cinematical) in which Cole Abaius spent 10 minutes discussing the pie charts the Juno and Thank You for Smoking director had been posting to Twitter. Reitman kept track of which questions interviewers asked him most — I caught him tallying things in a little notebook during our interview — and posted the stats online frequently. Roger Ebert has also written about the pie charts. Cole and I had been reading Reitman’s Twitter feed before our interviews, and not only knew about the pie chart but found out that he had just been enjoying lunch at the Salt Lick, one of the best known BBQ joints in Central Texas.
So that may explain why Twitter, pie charts and barbecue keep creeping into the following Cinematical interview with Jason Reitman. I hope it’s as fun to read as it was to be there in person. The above photo is from the red carpet the evening after the interview, when Up in the Air was the closing-night film for Austin Film Festival.
Filed under: Comedy, Austin, Interviews, George Clooney
My interview with Up in the Air director Jason Reitman in October was one of the most meta interviews I’ve ever done. Before the interview started, Reitman took my photo with his iPhone. He told me only “I’m not sure if that’s going to work, what I’m doing with that, but if it does, you’ll be thrilled with the results.” I’m still in suspense.
In addition, my interview took place right after a Film School Rejects interview (check it out, Reitman name-checks Cinematical) in which Cole Abaius spent 10 minutes discussing the pie charts the Juno and Thank You for Smoking director had been posting to Twitter. Reitman kept track of which questions interviewers asked him most — I caught him tallying things in a little notebook during our interview — and posted the stats online frequently. Roger Ebert has also written about the pie charts. Cole and I had been reading Reitman’s Twitter feed before our interviews, and not only knew about the pie chart but found out that he had just been enjoying lunch at the Salt Lick, one of the best known BBQ joints in Central Texas.
So that may explain why Twitter, pie charts and barbecue keep creeping into the following Cinematical interview with Jason Reitman. I hope it’s as fun to read as it was to be there in person. The above photo is from the red carpet the evening after the interview, when Up in the Air was the closing-night film for Austin Film Festival.
Filed under: Festival Reports, Austin
In Austin, you can set your watch by the fall film festivals. We don’t just have SXSW in the spring. Starting around Labor Day, it feels like we have a film festival practically every week, from Austin Gay and Lesbian International Film Festival (aGLIFF) to the Austin Polish Film Festival, Austin Asian American Film Festival and of course Fantastic Fest. One of the oldest and biggest of these local autumn fests is Austin Film Festival (AFF), which spans eight days and seven screening venues, and includes a screenwriters’ conference. In 2009, AFF celebrated its 16th year.
AFF focuses on screenwriters even in its film programming selections, as was evident with the opening-night film. Serious Moonlight is best known as the last script written by the late actress/filmmaker Adrienne Shelly. I admit I wasn’t fond of the movie, but director Cheryl Hines was a trip — mock-vampy on the red carpet (as shown above), and full of excitement about her film. Her screening was up against heavy competition: Matthew Weiner brought an episode of Mad Men to the festival and didn’t reveal which one until just before it screened. (It turned out to be this season’s “Guy Walks Into an Advertising Agency” episode.) Weiner also was featured in panels during the conference portion of AFF.
Filed under: Documentary, Theatrical Reviews, Austin
It’s not uncommon to hear people discussing — or complaining about — the ways in which Hollywood celebrities are involved in politics, whether they’re airing their opinions during a concert or speaking in public on behalf of a politician. Barry Levinson (Diner, Good Morning Vietnam) thought this was an interesting enough topic to address in his documentary Poliwood, which focuses on the 2008 national Democratic and Republican conventions. Unfortunately, the documentary shows us little that we haven’t already seen, and tends to preach to the converted.
Poliwood is subtitled “a Barry Levinson film essay,” which signals us that this will be a more personal style of documentary. Levinson opens the movie with shots from his 1990 feature film Avalon and uses this footage to discuss the ways American lives have changed because of television. His focus is on the Creative Coalition, a non-partisan organization of celebrities that focuses on issues such as arts education. The documentary shifts to the 2008 Democratic National Convention in Denver, where Creative Coalition members such as Anne Hathaway, Tim Daly, and Ellen Burstyn talk about how they include politics in their lives. It’s especially surreal to see Richard Schiff at the convention after his role on The West Wing — in one scene, someone from the Clinton administration walks up to him and says “You played me!” — but Schiff handles it all with good humor.
Filed under: Comedy, Magnolia, Theatrical Reviews, Austin
The first thing everyone seems to mention about Serious Moonlight is that its screenplay is the last one written by the late Adrienne Shelly. Actress Cheryl Hines, who had a role in Shelly’s film Waitress, is making her feature directorial debut with the dark comedy, which stars Meg Ryan and Timothy Hutton. The movie opened Austin Film Festival this year. It sounds like a sure-fire comedy, but unfortunately it just left me with a headache.
Serious Moonlight focuses on a married couple, Louise (Meg Ryan) and Ian (Timothy Hutton), who are supposed to meet in their country house for a rendezvous, but both arrive a day early. Louise wants to surprise her husband, but finds out that he also has a surprise: he’s leaving her. She refuses to accept this, and ends up cracking him on the head with a vase, binding him with duct tape, and refusing to let him loose until he comes to his senses and realizes how much he loves her and wants to stay with her.
Filed under: Comedy, RumorMonger, Fandom, Scripts, Newsstand, Austin
Earlier this month we told you that “Arrested Development” creator Mitch Hurwitz was scripting an absolutely for-reals, big-screen Arrested Development movie, and that he would direct it himself. Speaking at a writing panel this weekend at the Austin Film Festival (where he appeared alongside Steven Zaillian and AD executive producer Ron Howard), Hurwitz dropped a few more hints about what exactly we might be seeing plot-wise, and it sounds like somebody in the Bluth family (or heck, maybe all of ‘em) will be heading to prison.
Honestly, it’s hard to tell what Hurwitz meant when he briefly gave in to moderating producer Marcia Nasatir’s prodding at the “Art of Storytelling” panel in Austin. According to Austin 360, “Hurwitz relented to Nasatir, and said that there would be a heavy jail presence and then made jokes about the inclusion of TARP money, a nod to the inability of a film to be as timely as television due to lag times in production and release.”
Over at Collider, Matt Goldberg wonders if the Bluth family real estate business could easily lead into a comical plotline about the current housing crisis. Methinks you’re onto something, Matt. Might we see another Bluth in prison orange? If so, I vote for putting a Bluth other than George Sr. or Gob behind bars, because the last time Will Arnett went to the slammer, well… we got Let’s Go to Prison. (I know I shouldn’t punish the AD universe for that stinker, but the negative association lingers.)
So what do you think, Cinematicalites? What could Hurwitz’s “heavy jail presence” mean for the Arrested Development movie?
Filed under: Comedy, Independent, Theatrical Reviews, Austin, Cinematical Indie
The screening of Chalk I attended was the only sold-out movie I encountered at Austin Film Festival, and it was on a Tuesday night after the conference had ended. I heard that the previous night’s showing of the feature film sold out as well — and this was at the Arbor’s largest screen. Was it because the movie won AFF’s narrative feature award? Or was there some sort of word-of-mouth building in town among Austin educators, since teachers were the focus of this film? Before the movie started, Chalk’s director Mike Akel asked how many teachers were in the audience, and I saw a large show of hands. It probably didn’t hurt that Chalk was filmed in Austin, either.
Chalk uses that mock-documentary style found in The Office to focus on a group of high-school teachers (and one former teacher, now a vice principal) struggling to deal with their jobs in the course of a school year. There’s the brand-new teacher, Mr. Lowrey (Troy Schremmer), who can’t maintain control of his classroom; a comically ambitious, extroverted teacher, Mr. Stroope (co-writer Chris Mass); the short-haired, strident gym teacher, Coach Webb (Janelle Schremmer); and continually overworked vice-principal Mrs. Reddell (Shannon Haragan). The situations are usually played for laughs, but there are a few touching moments, particularly with Mr. Lowrey as he tries to connect with his students. Since they occasionally look right in the camera and talk to us, we know who has a little crush on whom, who’s about to lose their mind, and who wants to strangle certain other teachers.
Filed under: Documentary, Foreign Language, Gay & Lesbian, Independent, Austin, Other Festivals, Cinematical Indie, The (Mostly) Indie Film Calendar
Welcome to The (Mostly) Indie Film Calendar, a weekly look at what’s happening beyond the multiplexes all around North America. If you know of something indie-related happening near you — a local festival, a series of classic restored films, lectures, workshops, etc. — send the info to me at Eric.Snider(at)weblogsinc(dot)com and I’ll add it to the list. (Please put “Cinematical” somewhere in the subject line so I can easily separate you from the spam.)
Atlanta: The Urban Mediamakers Film Festival, running today through Sunday, is a combination of under-the-radar movie screenings and workshops for independent film professionals — though if you’re just a film lover and you only want to see the movies, that’s fine, too.
Austin: Is it nothing but festivals in this town?! South By Southwest, Fantastic Fest, and now the more intuitively named Austin Film Festival… don’t you crazy Texas kids have jobs? Just kidding. You kids are great, with your film festivals, and your hipster music scenes, and your Alamo Drafthouses. AFF began last night and runs through Oct. 18, with a few dozen features, documentaries, and shorts. Of note: The centerpiece film is Juno, which people have been going crazy about since it premiered at Telluride last month.
After the jump, more fests and events in L.A., NYC, Philly, Portland, and elsewhere….
Continue reading The (Mostly) Indie Film Calendar: Festivals Big and Small, and Karen Black Live!
Filed under: Documentary, Theatrical Reviews, Austin, Comic/Superhero/Geek, Cinematical Indie
I’m not a comic-book reader, so I didn’t know much about the subject of Will Eisner: Portrait of a Sequential Artist before seeing the documentary at Austin Film Festival. I knew he was the creator of The Spirit, a comic-book series that Frank Miller is adapting into a feature film … and that’s about all I knew. Fortunately, the documentary filled in many of the blanks for me about Eisner and provided some interesting details about the artist’s life.
Eisner is credited for being one of the pioneers in the comic-book form — as the film’s title indicates, he believed in making the comics sequential, giving them an ongoing storyline, which was not standard back in the 1930s when he started work as an artist. His character The Spirit was not a traditional superhero with crazy superpowers, but an ordinary guy in the smallest of masks, who happened to fight crime. During WWII and afterwards, Eisner created military instructional manuals that were drawn in a comic-book style to make them interesting and easy to understand. Later in life, he created more dramatic, personal comic books (A Contract with God) that he dubbed “graphic novels,” and paved the way for this type of work to be taken seriously.
Continue reading AFF Review: Will Eisner: Portrait of a Sequential Artist
