Category: Film

Hollywood

Post author By Dan
Post date February 9, 2015

Watching Only Connect and the first two clues were:

W: Andy Williams

O: Alice Cooper, in honour of Groucho Marx

And the chap with the Rainbow tattoo got it! They paid for the reconstruction of those letters of the Hollywood sign.

I know the sign fell badly into disrepair but I’d never thought about who paid for them. The full list (at a cost of just under $28,000 each) is:

H: Terrence Donnelly (publisher of the Hollywood Independent Newspaper)

O: Giovanni Mazza (Italian movie producer)

L: Les Kelley (originator of the Kelley Blue Book)

L: Gene Autry (actor)

Y: Hugh Hefner (founder of Playboy magazine)

W: Andy Williams (singer)

O: Warner Bros. Records

O: Alice Cooper (singer), who donated in memory of close friend and comedian Groucho Marx, and who joked that he would also donate an “O” from his last name

D: Dennis Lidtke (businessman)

Tags alice cooper, groucho marx, hollywood

Film Sport

Rope-a-dope

Post author By Dan
Post date February 5, 2015

If any of you saw Rope-a-dope a few years back (think Groundhog Day by way of Jackie Chan) there’s now a follow-up, and it’s just as much fun.

Tags edge of tomorrow, groundhog day, martial arts

Film

Best of the 2010s (so far)

Post author By Dan
Post date February 3, 2015

Highlights from the 50 best films of the decade so far:

50. Gravity

Too low in my opinion. It could only be a piece of cinema (and as a piece of cinema it was outstanding).

30. Scott Pilgrim Vs. The World

Very pleased to see this here. In 20 years of films based on computer games this is both not actually based on a computer and yet the best film computer games have given us.

8. The Grand Budapest Hotel

Moonrise Kingdom shows up earlier on the list and I enjoyed that a lot (I’m a big Wes Anderson fan) but Grand Budapest Hotel is just a delight. It’s so so wonderful. I thought the Oscar nominations this year weren’t great but I could happily see this walk away with plenty of statuettes.

7. Under the Skin

One of the most unsettling things I’ve ever seen. I can completely see why a lot of people might not like it but it’s brilliant. Both the sound and the visuals are perfectly pitched to give you a completely inhuman view of the world.

2. Her

I loved Her. A genuine love story between a man and an AI is no mean feat but at no point does it mock any of the things it so easily could have. Genuinely wonderful.

The list has largely reaffirmed my desire to catch up on a lot of films (Love is Strange, Only Lovers Left Alive, Martha Marcy May Marlene, Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives, Whiplash, The Master).

There is also a glaring omission: Calvary. By the time we hit Under the Skin I still wasn’t worried because Calvary is easily one of the ten best films of the decade so far but no joy. A criminal omission.

(via Kottke)

Tags calvary, gravity, under the skin, wes anderson

Film

Sword fights are pretty cool

Post author By Dan
Post date January 27, 2015

On a related note if you haven’t seen Takeshi Kitano’s Zatoichi you really need to (not just for the sword fights, it’s pretty funny too). If you don’t like blood then… not so much. I read he wanted the blood to look like flowers blossoming on the screen and when it’s bloody it really is quite beautiful.

Tags blood, swords, takeshi kitano, zatoichi

Comics Film

Fantastic Four

Post author By Dan
Post date January 27, 2015

The first trailer for the FF reboot is already better than the other FF films. It has a fair few Interstellar notes, but the ideas of exploration and discovery are what the Fantastic Four should be about. Adventurers, not superheroes. If the film manages that I’ll be a very happy bunny.

Tags fantastic four, trailer

Film Illustration

Alien Queen

Post author By Dan
Post date January 23, 2015

Alien Queen by Tristan Jones

Tags aliens