The Coen Brothers are smart. While the critical community has been arguing about the merits of Burn After Reading, which opens wide tomorrow, Joel and Ethan are already knee deep in their next production. A Serious Man started filming in their home state of Minnesota on Monday.
The project was announced in the spring of 2007, just before No Country for Old Men debuted at Cannes. Last month we learned that relatively little-known Michael Stuhlberg and Richard Kind had been cast in the lead roles in the black comedy set in 1967, with Stuhlberg playing a professor whose wife is leaving him, and Kind playing his sofa sleeping brother. While Christopher expressed his hope that Frances McDormand would be playing the wife, that role has gone to Sari Wagner (identified as Sari Lennick by IMDb), one of a trio of seriously unknown Minnesota actors cast in the film, according to an official statement released by Focus Features. The statement also says that the wife has fallen for one of her husband's "more pompous colleagues," who will be played by Fred Melamed.
The other two Minnesota thespians are Aaron Wolf and Jessica McManus, who will be Kind's son ("a discipline problem and a shirker at Hebrew school") and daughter ("filching money from his wallet in order to save up for a nose job"), respectively. I think it's refreshing that the Coens have chosen to go with actors who don't have any previous, sometimes distracting baggage.
As to Burn After Reading, I agree with the quite positive views of Kim and James; I think it's a frequently hilarious and surprisingly insightful "must see." If you still need convincing, listen to the Coens talk about it over at Moviefone. Here's hoping A Serious Man will provoke the same type of response next year.
How do you follow-up a broad comedy starring the biggest names in Hollywood, George Clooney and Brad Pitt? If you're the Coen brothers, you apparently hit the car in reverse and make your next effort a darker story and cast relative unknowns. Variety reports that the newly minted Oscar winning directors Joel and Ethan Coen have cast Tony-nominated stage actor Michael Stuhlbarg (The Pillowman) and TV's Richard Kind (Mad About You; Spin City) for the two lead roles in A Serious Man, their next film after this fall's Burn After Reading. The actors will play brothers in the 1967-set black comedy, which returns the Coens to Fargoterritory by placing the story in their home turf of Minneapolis.
In fact, when we first learned of A Serious Man, more than a year ago (and almost a year before the Coens each won 3 Academy Awards, for writing, directing and producing No Country for Old Men), the script was described as being "in the vein of Fargo." Now we get a little inkling more about the plot of Serious: Stuhlberg will play a professor named Larry Gopnik, whose wife is leaving him and whose "socially inept" brother (Kind) won't leave the house. Hopefully, to further repeat the analogy to their double-Oscar-winning 1996 film, the Coens can cast Frances McDormand as the wife, she can then win another Academy Award and Kind (pictured above) can, like William H. Macy before him, finally go from near-obscurity to well-known, well-respected supporting actor within the next decade.
There may not be much footage that we haven't already seen in either the original red-band trailer or the international teaser for the Coen brothers' Burn After Reading, but I noted enough bits and pieces to feel these two new videos worthy of sharing. Plus, for those of you who have a preference, George or Brad, you now have a trailer that fits you best. Personally, I'm hoping that the ladies, Frances McDormand and Tilda Swinton, get their own character-centric trailers. And while Focus Features is at it, how about individual spots for John Malkovich? Heck, give Richard Jenkins, J.K. Simmons and David Rasche each their own, too. I'm that excited about this movie that I want more, more, more.
Fortunately, we've only got about a month until Burn After Reading opens on September 12.
The consensus I've gotten from people after they've seen the red-band trailer for the Coen brothers' Burn After Reading is that nobody understands what it's about, and nobody cares, because everybody thinks it looks awesome. Well, if you thought that trailer was confusing, or at least lacking in plot synopsis, just imagine how moviegoers outside the U.S. feel after seeing this new international trailer.
As you can see, marketing to international audiences is more about selling the stars. Hence the CLOONEY, the McDORMAND, the MALKOVICH, the SWINTON and the PITT titles. As for story, there's even less revealed here than in the red-band trailer. In fact, it's almost a joke how little is said about the movie. Each actor/character maybe gets to slip in one or two words, which actually just serve as response to more intertitles telling us about the other major stars of the film: the Coens.
Cinematical is absolutely stoked to be premiering this exclusive poster for Burn After Reading (click to enlarge), written and directed by Joel and Ethan Coen -- whose last film, No Country for Old Men, caused quite the stir last year online, in theaters and at the Academy Awards. Not sure if you heard of it ... something about a cowboy and a weird haircut? Yes? Maybe? Anyway, one thing the Coen boys are known for are their casts, and Burn After Reading is no exception; this flick boasts appearances from, well, read the poster. You've got Brad Pitt, George Clooney, Frances McDormand, John Malkovich and Tilda Swinton. Need I say more? Or less? (Will this post self-destruct in sixty seconds?)
What's being touted as a "dark, spy-comedy," Burn After Reading looks to return the brothers to the kind of humor that was found in films like Raising Arizona or The Big Lebowski (two of my personal favs). The synopsis goes a little something like this: An ousted CIA official's (Academy Award nominee John Malkovich) memoir accidentally falls into the hands of two unwise gym employees intent on exploiting their find. Burn After Reading will premiere at the 2008 Venice International Film Festival before arriving in theaters on September 12th.
After a brief detour through the more substantial, it looks like the Coen brothers are back in full-on madcap comedy mode with this fall's Burn After Reading. The first trailer has made an appearance here, though since it's red-band, the site requires you to go through a cumbersome process involving iTunes. Among other things, it affords the rare treat of seeing John Malkovich punch Brad Pitt in the nose.
It's always hard to predict how Coen movies are going to come together, but although Pitt might deserve an Oscar for the little dance he does at 1:36, I don't think Burn After Reading will be making an awards run -- it looks very, very strange, sort of in the vein of Raising Arizona. (On the other hand, the fact that the utterly insane O Brother, Where Art Thou? managed a screenplay nomination might mean all bets are off.) I cherish the Coens' comic sensibilities -- Intolerable Cruelty and The Ladykillers were trifles, but they made me laugh, really hard. This looks similarly anarchic and over-the-top.
Burn After Reading premieres at the Venice Film Festival in August and hits theaters September 12th.
After the gut-wrenching terror of No Country for Old Men (I haven't been that tense in a movie theater since, well, ever), I can safely say that I am incredibly relieved that the Coens' next film, Burn After Reading, looks like it is going to be a lot more fun. First Showing now has some stills from the Coens' black comedy, and it would appear that the brothers are returning to what I like to call their 'Raising Arizona roots.'
Burn is the story of a CIA agent (played by George Clooney) who is assigned to investigate the case of a former agent named Ozzie Cox (John Malkovich) who has taken his revenge on the agency by writing a tell-all memoir. When Cox's ex-wife (played by Tilda Swinton) steals the only copy and leaves it behind at her gym, the gym's owner (Frances McDormand) and star personal trainer (Brad Pitt) see an opportunity to engage in a little blackmail.
The Coen flick just got the nod to open the Venice Film Festival this year, but Burn will not be making an appearance at Cannes this year (which is a little strange considering the luck they had at the French festival last year). This makes it zero for two for Pitt now that his other high-profile film, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, also failed to make the list for Cannes. Burn After Reading is scheduled for wide release on September 12th, 2008.
As Jack Handey put it, "It takes a big man to laugh at himself, but it takes an even bigger man to laugh at that man." Crimewave is about that big kind of man, and his partner: two electrocutioners on a rampage. They prowl the streets in a truck with a hog-sized stuffed rat on top, with red light bulb eyes. The driver is Faron Crush, who looks like Paul Sorvino playing the Incredible Hulk. HIs sniggering partner Arthur (Brion "I'll tell you about my mother" James) wears a jumpsuit, fingerless leather gloves, and a flat leather cap the shape and color of a cow-chip. If you ever had a nightmare about Gallagher, that's what Arthur looks like. The two maniacs carry with them "a shocker," a killing-machine that has three settings: "Rat," "Man" and "Hero". And they have no motivation beside malice and sheer professionalism.
Often, it's not the finest writing that wins the screenplay award, it's the flashiest. Cinematical doesn't think Globe voters will be able to pass up Diablo Cody's hyper-verbose, show-offy script, chock full of memorable one-liners and quotable dialogue. Plus, Hollywood just can't get enough of her stripper-turned-screenwriter tale. Juno what I'm saying?
So, which grouping will be closest to the Oscars? Who cares? I hate that with every announcement about non-Academy-related awards we get a statement like "since ____, only _____ winners have failed to claim the Oscar ... " Well, the fact that there is some divergence means there is no predicting who will get the Oscar nominations, let along the award. So, let's just appreciate the Director's Guild Awards for what they are. That said, I haven't seen all the films (I'm actually about to head out the door to finally catch There Will Be Blood), so I can't fairly pick my favorite. In fact, two of the nominated films that I have seen are so different in style that it's quite difficult for me to decide which I think is more deserving of this honor. Ultimately, despite the fact that I greatly admired Schabel's ability to make a first-person POV-shot engaging throughout the majority of his film, I'd have to go with the Coen Brothers. Except for that one controversial shot, I think they gave us the best visual storytelling of the year and I also think that they managed to get some of the most amazing performances of the year from their actors. However, my mind could easily change in about an hour when I sit down in front of the work of Paul Thomas Anderson. The winner will be announced on January 26.
An eclectic group of online film notables, including former Times critic Elvis Mitchell, AICN's Harry Knowles, my colleague Glenn Kenny of Premiere.com, Roger Ebert's sidekick Jim Emerson and Jen Yamato of Rotten Tomatoes have gotten together to have a long, in-depth discussion about one of the year's top awards contenders, No Country for Old Men. A lot of topics are discussed during the free-floating talk, ranging from macro subjects like the film's much talked-about ending and the theme of old vs. young to minutiae like what happened to the coin that the gas station attendant won his life with and the significance of Javier Bardem's Prince Valiant haircut. There's also a lot of talk about the significance of feet in the film -- one character gets wounded in the foot and Bardem's character has a peculiar obsession with keeping his feet clean and there are lots of shots of walking feet in the film. What does it all mean?
It's the controversial ending that prompts the most debate, and Harry Knowles talks at one point about a screening of the film that took place in Austin with Josh Brolin in attendance: "A member of the audience stood up and [said] 'Why did they end it like that?!' and Brolin just looked at the guy and he looked angry." Kenny offers a unique interpretation of the last act, specifically referring to two events that happen in quick succession involving Bardem and another character. He believes Bergman's The Seventh Seal was an influence for the CoenBros. on that. To hear the whole thing, just download the MP3 off the film's official website and enjoy.
The San Francisco Film Critics Awards have been announced, and they're especially exciting for us here at Cinematical. Why? Because three of our writers are in the SFFC! Our very own James Rocchi, Jeffrey M. Anderson, and Richard Von Busack are all part of the San Francisco critic "scene." San Fran made some interesting picks, several outside of the expected Oscar nominees. So what were their choices? For Best Foreign Film, they selected Julian Schnabel's TheDiving Bell and the Butterfly (which I am watching when I finish this post). For Best Documentary, they selected No End in Sight (which didn't blow me away, but was certainly well done). Best Adapted Screenplay went to Sarah Polley for Away From Her (great script, one of the most kick-in-the-stomach depressing movies I've seen lately). And Best Original Screenplay went to Tamara Jenkins for The Savages.
Amy Ryan was named Best Supporting Actress for her brilliant portrayal of a highly difficult character in Gone Baby Gone. Ryan's co-star in that film, Casey Affleck, was named Best Supporting Actor for his outstanding work in The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford. Best Actress was Julie Christie for Away From Her and Best Actor was George Clooney in Michael Clayton -- two choices I approve of though I disagree with them. Joel and Ethan Coen took Best Director(s) honors for their latest masterpiece, No Country for Old Men. And -- drumroll please -- the Best Picture Award went to Jesse James. A surprising pick perhaps, but it was an absolutely fantastic film, and hopefully the award encourages more people to see it. The SFFC gave a special citation to an indie called Colma: The Musical, "a homegrown song-and-dance extravaganza about the paradoxical drudgery and surreality of life in a city where the dead outnumber the living one thousand to one." That old story again? See the list for yourself here -- it's a San Francisco treat!
Welcome to the Thanksgiving edition of The Write Stuff!
Thanksgiving is always rough on a screenwriter. You're usually seeing a lot of friends and family, and while they (candied) yammer on about their accomplishments, you have to start all of your sentences with: "We're still waiting to hear on that one..." and "Our agent says we're really close..." and "Grandma, let me explain the WGA strike to you one more time..."
But there is a great deal to be thankful for this year. On Monday, still happy and groggy from a weekend of gorging, representatives from the WGA and the AMPTP will resume talks. Ideally, each side will come away happy and we can end this strike. From a personal note, my writing career was right on the verge of kicking into high gear when the strike was announced, and I certainly don't want to lose that upward momentum. And looking at the bigger picture, we're a month away from Christmas here. Who wants to see not just writers but everyone who works in and around the entertainment industry desperately struggling to pay the bills? The grips, the gaffers, the assistants, the dry cleaners...these people are out of work, too.
So send your good vibes to the negotiating table on Monday. And if you think there's nothing you can do, you're wrong. You can electronically sign this petition to the AMPTP, which starts: "We, the undersigned, fully support the strike of the Writers Guild of America, and agree with the WGA's stated goals of obtaining just and fair compensation regarding revenues generated through "new media". The petition currently has 57, 695 signatures, which is extremely impressive. Won't you add yours?
Putting together last week's list of my favorite screenplays of the 2000's was relatively easy. I came up with about ten worthy candidates and narrowed from there. When I started putting together this week's list -- my favorite screenplays of the 1990's -- things got a lot more complicated. I had a much larger list of worthy candidates to choose from. It made me realize that a) the 90's, particularly the late 90's, was a genuinely incredible time for film, and b) I was going to have to split my list into two halves: 1995 -- 1999 and 1990 -- 1994.
So, in support of all the great screenwriters currently on strike, what follows is my favorite screenplays produced between 1995 and 1999. Read that last sentence carefully! If you've got movies you'd add to or subtract from my list, I would love to hear them, but make sure your choice fits the criteria. On my 2000's list, I was getting comments like "How DARE you not include Citizen Kane, you freaking idiot?"
Now then, with all apologies to the scripts it killed me to leave off (Office Space, A Simple Plan, As Good As it Gets, Chasing Amy, Lone Star, Three Kings, Swingers, Jackie Brown, Kingpin, I could go on and on), here is my alphabetical list:
No Country for Old Men, the new film from Joel and Ethan Coen, is an unquestionable return to form. It is scary, funny, moving, violent, and meaningful, in pretty much equal measure. The Coens' take on the Cormac McCarthynovel of the same name is a pairing as successful, as seamless, as delicious as that of chocolate and peanut butter.
Josh Brolin gives the finest of his four excellent performances this year as Llewelyn Moss. Moss is a struggling everyman who stumbles upon a circle of trucks and dead Mexicans in the desert -- a heroin deal gone bad. Real bad. The lone survivor asks Moss for some agua, and Moss ignores the request. He surveys the scene and eventually comes upon a suitcase filled with $2 million dollars. Moss' response upon finding the money? A simple "Yeah." It's a perfect moment in a movie packed with them. Moss takes the money and returns home to his trailer and his wife Carla Jean (Kelly MacDonald). Soon, his conscience begins to nag at him, and he decides to head back to the scene of the crime to give the dying man a drink. A compassionate decision, but not, as you can probably imagine, an intelligent one.
Javier Bardem plays Anton Chigurh (start to say Chicago and then growl and you're close to the pronunciation). I'll leave his specific involvement in the proceedings up to you to figure out, but just know that he really wants that $2 million. Moss will come to refer to Chigurh as "the ultimate badass," and that's about right. Chigurh is a classic screen villain, the kind we haven't seen in far too long. Every time he appears on screen, cattle stunner in tow, it just makes your heart sink -- somebody is going down. Much like Hannibal Lecter, the guy is a vicious, remorseless killer, but he has a strangely sensible logic and one can't help but be seduced by him. Bardem, sporting a Prince Valiant haircut, gives a flawless performance here, one that will likely be noticed come Oscar time. He completely disappears into Chigurh.
The Coen Brothers are smart. While the critical community has been arguing about the merits of Burn After Reading, which opens wide tomorrow, Joel and Ethan are already knee deep in their next production. A Serious Man started filming in their home state of Minnesota on Monday. 
How do you follow-up a broad comedy starring the biggest names in Hollywood, 
After the gut-wrenching terror of No Country for Old Men (I haven't been that tense in a movie theater since, well, ever), I can safely say that I am incredibly relieved that the Coens' next film, 
Best Screenplay
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An eclectic group of online film notables, including former Times critic 
The San Francisco Film Critics Awards have been announced, and they're especially exciting for us here at Cinematical. Why? Because three of our writers are in the SFFC! Our very own James Rocchi, Jeffrey M. Anderson, and Richard Von Busack are all part of the San Francisco critic "scene." San Fran made some interesting picks, several outside of the expected Oscar nominees. So what were their choices? For Best Foreign Film, they selected Julian Schnabel's The Diving Bell and the Butterfly (which I am watching when I finish this post). For Best Documentary, they selected No End in Sight (which didn't blow me away, but was certainly well done). Best Adapted Screenplay went to Sarah Polley for Away From Her (great script, one of the most kick-in-the-stomach depressing movies I've seen lately). And Best Original Screenplay went to Tamara Jenkins for The Savages.
