2015 DGA Nominations announced!

The Director's Guild of America announced their list of the five best directors of the past year and they are, without much fanfare, Clint Eastwood (American Sniper), Wes Anderson (The Grand Budapest Hotel), Richard Linklater (Boyhood), Alejandro González Iñárritu (Birdman) and Morten Tyldum (The Imitation Game).  There was so much chatter a couple of months ago that the best director race this year would feature not one but two women vying for the title.  Come February and it's still a man's world.  Both Ava DuVernay's Selma and Angelina Jolie's Unbroken haven't received as much love as they would have liked.  Still in the last couple of years, the DGA noms have differed from the Oscars so let's see how this holds.  Meanwhile, The Imitation Game is definitely back in the race and things are beginning to look a bit shaking for Foxcatcher and Gone Girl who were hoping to gain some momentum here.  All eyes are now tuned into the Oscar nominations this Thursday.  The DGA honor will be announced on February 7, 2015. 

Movie Review: Hereafter

I haven't had the urge lately to write up about the movies I've been seeing as they haven't impressed me much.  The ones I watched fell way below my expectation of them, like Love & Other Drugs (which I saw only for Jake and Anne), You Will Meet a Tall Dark Stranger (Woody Allen film, yes, but I hated the weak characters), Get Low (why, hello there, Bill Murray, where have you been?), The Tourist (not as bad as I thought but it had potential to be so much better) and How Do You Know (what were you thinking, James L. Brooks? I don't know until today what the plot was).  So I felt it would take a really good movie to come along to make me write a review.

Well, Hereafter is not that movie.  But it definitely got me thinking about the subject about the movie, afterlife, and made me wish that it did explore more about that theme than just limiting to the character's experience of it.  And it is those characters that will remain with you.  Marie Lelay (Cecile de France), a 2004 tsunami survivor and journalist who is never the same after her near-death experience, Marcus (George and Frankie McLaren), a young boy grieving for the loss for his twin brother Jason and unsure how to continue on in life and George Lonegan (Matt Damon) who is a former psychic who doesn't know how to lead a normal life as his experiences with the dead take over everything.  

Before I saw this movie, I knew that Hereafter was nominated this year for the Best Visual Effects Oscar but I thought it was purely for one scene.  After watching the devastating opening, the scope of the effects of the tsunami are difficult to watch especially after comparing it to the real-life images from the recent Japanese earthquake and tsunami.  The crew and movie fully deserved the nomination and the scene still echoes within me.  

The main reason this film will be a must-watch with many people is because this is a Clint Eastwood film.  I find his films fascinating.  Most directors who are also actors, I find their film more telling, more revealing to me as a personal side of them than when they act because this has to be a story that they want to tell and show.  Looking at Eastwood's filmography, you would never believe this is the same man who was also Dirty Harry.  He becomes his movies, he directs, he produces, he writes, he composes the music and sometimes he also acts in them!  He has guided so many of his actors to award-winning and nominated roles.  You wish you had that same energy and enthusiasm at his age!  He truly is someone to look up to.  

This film has that Eastwood stamp on it too.  And while it's a fine character study, I wish it had been longer and explored more of the subject of which it had hinted.  Peter Morgan's script needed to delve more into it.  Well, that's my two cents, my jumbled thoughts about the movie which I wanted to get out.

Directed by: Clint Eastwood; Screenplay by: Peter Morgan; Cinematography by: Tom Stern; Editing by: Joel Cox and Gary Roach: Music by: Clint Eastwood

Additional Cast: Byrce Dallas Howard, Jay Mohr, Thierry Neuvic, Lyndsey Marshal, Richard Kind

Rating: 

Weekly News Roundup: Clint Eastwood is a busy man and the return of James Bond!

• Clint Eastwood, at 70, isn't resting on his laurels.  His much anticipated Hoover biopic is already underproduction.  Leonardo DiCaprio tweeted about J. Edgar starting shooting on February 5th and they have a new cast member, Josh Lucas, who will be playing Charles Lindbergh.  Ed Westwick aka Chuck Bass from Gossip Girl also has a role of Agent Smith.
• But that's not his only production.  Eastwood might possibly be directing Beyonce (!) in a remake of A Star is Born.  I honestly thought this was a joke at first.  Dirty Harry directing a musical?  But it's completely legit.  Let's give him a chance, right?
• Dark Horizons has some new details from producer Tim Johnson on the upcoming sequel for How to Train Your Dragon and the TV series spin-off.   This means awesome adventures ahead for Hiccup and Toothless.
• Baz Luhrmann (Moulin Rouge) is actually thinking of filming The Great Gatsby in 3D! The horror!! This is a very bad idea, very very bad idea.  
• Bond is back! Don't count out James Bond out of the movie business yet.  The 23rd Bond flick is set to release on November 9th, 2012.  Sam Mendes is attached to direct.  The film could potentially be called "Red Sky at Night" and word is that, Rachel Weisz has been offered a role.    
• Mike White exits Pride and Prejudice and Zombies as director.  Despite another setback, I am still stoked for this project to get off the ground.  Please Universe, we need for this movie to find its director along with Elizabeth Bennett and Darcy.   

What I'm Thankful for: Movies Edition

There are many things in life I'm grateful for but I'm always grateful for good movies and great cinema.  It's got the power to cheer you up when you're down and distract you from life's everyday problems and transport you to someplace special.

A little late but still nevertheless, here's what I give thanks for this past year:

• Christopher Nolan and Inception: One of the finest directors working today, Nolan has moved into the auteur category.  He can open a big movie with his name alone, despite having big Hollywood actors in it. This summer's biggest blockbuster, Inception, proved that he is in a league of his own, demanding complete control of his film from Warner Brothers and for having an original script in a sea of sequels and remakes.  Inception was on everyone's lips this summer, how did they do that? How is that possible? Is that real? And how do I get my own totem? (Yeah, that was all me.) Inception is that rare film that keeps you wondering long after you've left the theater.  For my new movie obsession and favorite director, I'm grateful.  Up next, Batman 3 and the Superman reboot, we can't wait.

• How to Train Your Dragon: Why do I love this animated film so? Mainly because it's about two leads, a one-of-kind dragon named Toothless with behavioral issues and a young Viking apprentice named Hiccup with daddy issues.  This unlikely pair become the pride of the Viking village, Berk, and how they do it is the reason why How to Train Your Dragon is my favorite animated film this year.  This movie has what was lacking in previous DreamWorks films, heart!  And it is this fierce heart and an attitude that being different is not necessarily bad that makes this a top movie for kids to watch and enjoy.  Bonus: The soundtrack composed by John Powell is one of the best of year behind only to Inception. 

• Kathryn Bigelow: She broke the glass ceiling and how! Going up against the big juggernaut that was Avatar, the studio system and director, James Cameron, who was also her ex-husband, Bigelow took a gritty independent war movie called The Hurt Locker and turned it into the movie that Hollywood was talking about.  The winner of almost every major directing award (what were you thinking, Golden Globes?), Kathryn Bigelow became the first woman to win an Oscar and an Director's Guild of America (DGA) award.  For all the little girls who grow up wanting to be behind the cameras rather than in front of it, that's an amazing achievement to look up to.

• Robert Downey Jr: Now this is some comeback story.  A decade ago, Robert Downey Jr. headlining his own True Hollywood Story about his very public addiction problems.  But today, he is a highly respected and sought after actor for so many projects.  There is no genre he can't do.  Comedy (Tropic Thunder, Due Date) to drama (Zodiac, The Soloist) to becoming the ultimate hero Iron Man and leading The Avengers and rebooting how many imagined Sherlock Holmes to be, this is an actor we should be thankful for.  More please!

• Clint Eastwood: He makes us all ashamed to be young and idle.  At 70, he is churning out film upon film per year as an actor, a director, a producer, and composer too.  His past few films have all been Oscar and award contenders and they keep showing us again and again, that his best is yet to come.  Simply amazing!  

• Martin Scorsese and Leonardo DiCaprio: It's no secret that Leonardo is my favorite actor.  But when he pairs up with his favorite director, he pulls out a performance that's extraordinary.  Shutter Island, the most recent collaboration of Scorsese and Leo, was a masterful film of suspense and thrills.  It shows us once again why Scorsese is America's most legendary directors and why the pair of them always produce movie magic.   

Hereafter Trailer and Summary

From director Clint Eastwood and writer Peter Morgan (The Queen), their new collaboration Hereafter which in turn is produced by Steven Spielberg.

Official Synopsis:

"Hereafter" tells the story of three people who are haunted by mortality in different ways. Matt Damon stars as George, a blue--collar American who has a special connection to the afterlife. On the other side of the world, Marie (Cécile de France), a French journalist, has a near--death experience that shakes her reality. And when Marcus (Frankie/George McLaren), a London schoolboy, loses the person closest to him, he desperately needs answers. Each on a path in search of the truth, their lives will intersect, forever changed by what they believe might—or must—exist in the hereafter.



I know the shots of the tsunami are CG but they are very eerie to watch even now. I recognized Cecile de France from Un Secret, the last French film I saw. Is this her first English-language film, I wonder? A very different film from Eastwood who at his age (70) is producing better and better material as he ages. Bring it on!