Review: Johansson Shines in "Girl with a Pearl Earring" (Happy B'day, Scarlett Johansson)

TRASH IN MY EYE No. 78 (of 2004) by Leroy Douresseaux

Girl with a Pearl Earring (2003)
COUNTRY OF ORIGIN: UK and Luxembourg
Running time: 100 minutes (1 hour, 40 minutes)
MPAA – PG-13 for some sexual content
DIRECTOR: Peter Webber
WRITER: Olivia Hetreed (from a novel by Tracy Chevalier)
PRODUCERS: Andy Paterson and Anand Tucker
CINEMATOGRAPHER: Eduardo Serra (D.o.P.)
EDITOR: Kate Evans
COMPOSER: Alexandre Desplat
Academy Award nominee

DRAMA/ROMANCE

Starring: Colin Firth, Scarlett Johansson, Tom Wilkinson, Judy Parfitt, Cillian Murphy, Essie Davis, Joanna Scanlan, and Alakina Mann

Girl with a Pearl Earring is a speculative account of the story behind the Johannes Vermeer painting of the same title. Set in 17th century Holland, the film revolves around Griet (Scarlett Johansson), a peasant girl who is forced to work in the household of the master painter Vermeer (Colin Firth) as a housemaid to his numerous children. Curious about art and painting, Griet draws the attention of the painter who soon teaches her to mix and grind his paint and fetch colors from market. Griet’s beauty also attracts the eye of Vermeer’s lustful patron, Van Ruijven (Tom Wilkinson), and Van Ruijven coerces Vermeer into painting a commission for his private chamber: the subject – Griet. Tensions arise, however, when Vermeer’s wife suspects intimacy between her servant and her husband. Yeah, but just wait until home girl sees that fabulous canvas her man painted with Griet as both muse and subject.

Peter Webber’s film earned Oscar® nominations (Best Art Direction-Set Decoration, Best Cinematography, and Best Costume Design), and all of them are well deserved. Girl with a Pearl Earring is one of the most beautiful films I’ve seen since the mid-90’s sumptuous fest, Restoration. Webber, ably assisted by his master film photographer Eduardo Serra, frames many of the film’s shots as if they were individual works of art by Vermeer. In fact, the film is like a flipbook of paintings in Vermeer’s style, so accurately does the film capture the look and feel of the artist famous for his beautiful paintings capturing the daily life of domestics and servants.

Not only is the film good to look at, the film is also simply a superbly made drama. Ms. Johansson continues to prove that she is talented young actress. She has relatively little dialogue in the film, but she carries the movie by giving a performance that must be visually interpreted if one is to see into her character. True movie lovers appreciate when a performer can silently establish mood, character, and story so well. Although she won a Golden Globe nomination, the Academy was not forthcoming with an Oscar® nomination. It’s up to us to honor such a performance as if it had been so acclaimed with awards.

9 of 10
A+

NOTES:
2004 Academy Awards: 3 nominations: “Best Art Direction-Set Decoration” (Ben van Os-art director and Cecile Heideman-set decorator), “Best Cinematography”), Eduardo Serra), and “Best Costume Design” (Dien van Straalen)

2004 BAFTA Awards: 2 wins: “Alexander Korda Award for Best British Film” (Andy Paterson, Anand Tucker, and Peter Webber) and “Anthony Asquith Award for Film Music” (Alexandre Desplat); 8 nominations: “Best Cinematography” (Eduardo Serra), “Best Costume Design” (Dien van Straalen), “Best Make Up/Hair” (Jenny Shircore), “Best Performance by an Actress in a Leading Role” (Scarlett Johansson), “Best Performance by an Actress in a Supporting Role” (Judy Parfitt), “Best Production Design” (Ben van Os), “Best Screenplay – Adapted” (Olivia Hetreed), “Carl Foreman Award for the Most Promising Newcomer” (Peter Webber-director)

2004 Golden Globes: 2 nominations: “Best Original Score - Motion Picture” (Alexandre Desplat) and “Best Performance by an Actress in a Motion Picture – Drama” (Scarlett Johansson)

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Happy Birthday, Jeffery

For your 30-something birthday, I wish you a Tim Burton Batman collection.

Boom Goes the Harry Potter Box Office Dynamite

Press release:

“Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows – Part 1” Breaks Franchise Record with $24 Million Midnight Opening

BURBANK, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Warner Bros. Pictures’ “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows – Part 1” broke the franchise record for a midnight opening, earning $24 million at the box office. The announcement was made today by Dan Fellman, Warner Bros. Pictures President of Domestic Distribution.

Opening at approximately 3,700 locations in North America, the midnight shows sold out in advance, as fans lined up for hours to be among the first to see Part 1 of the series’ final title.

The midnight grosses eclipsed the previous record of $22.2 million, set by the sixth film, “Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince,” which opened at midnight on July 15, 2009.

In announcing the new record, Fellman stated, “What makes it even more remarkable is that this film opened in the fall on what is, for most people, a school or work night. The last film opened in the middle of summer, making a midnight show more accessible to a larger segment of the audience. We are all thrilled by these early grosses, which we believe are just the beginning of a record-breaking opening weekend. We are releasing ‘Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows – Part 1’ at 4,125 locations and on over 9,400 screens in an effort to ensure that the fans who have been eagerly awaiting the film will have every opportunity to see it.”

Warner Bros. Pictures presents a Heyday Films Production, a David Yates Film, “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows – Part 1,” a motion picture event in two full-length parts. The film is being distributed worldwide by Warner Bros. Pictures, a Warner Bros. Entertainment Company.

Heading the cast, Daniel Radcliffe, Rupert Grint and Emma Watson reprise the roles of Harry Potter, Ron Weasley and Hermione Granger. The film’s ensemble cast also includes Helena Bonham Carter, Robbie Coltrane, Ralph Fiennes, Michael Gambon, Brendan Gleeson, Richard Griffiths, John Hurt, Rhys Ifans, Jason Isaacs, Bill Nighy, Alan Rickman, Fiona Shaw, Timothy Spall, Imelda Staunton, David Thewlis, Warwick Davis, Tom Felton, Toby Jones, David Legeno, Simon McBurney, Helen McCrory, Nick Moran, Peter Mullan, David O’Hara, Clémence Poésy, Natalia Tena, Julie Walters, Mark Williams and Bonnie Wright.

“Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows – Part 1” was directed by David Yates, who also helmed “Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix” and “Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince.” David Heyman, the producer of all of the Harry Potter films, again produced the film, together with David Barron and J.K. Rowling. Steve Kloves adapted the screenplay, based on the novel by J.K. Rowling. Lionel Wigram is the executive producer, with John Trehy and Tim Lewis serving as co-producers.

Concurrently with its theatrical release, the film is being released in select IMAX® theatres. “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows – Part 1” has been digitally re-mastered into the unparalleled image and sound quality of The IMAX Experience® through proprietary IMAX DMR® technology.

http://www.harrypotter.com/

Review: "Star Wars: The Clone Wars" is Strange, But Fun Star Wars

TRASH IN MY EYE No. 34 (of 2008) by Leroy Douresseaux

Star Wars: The Clone Wars (2008)
Running time: 98 minutes (1 hour, 38 minutes)
MPAA – PG for sci-fi action violence throughout, brief language, and momentary smoking
DIRECTOR: Dave Filoni
WRITERS: Henry Gilroy, Steven Melching, and Scott Murphy; from a story by George Lucas (based on the characters and universe created by George Lucas)
PRODUCERS: Catherine Winder
EDITOR: Jason Tucker
Razzie Award nominee

ANIMATION/SCI-FI/FANTASY/ACTION/ADVENTURE

Starring: (voices) Matt Lanter, Ashley Eckstein, James Arnold Taylor, Dee Bradley Baker, Tom Kane, Nika Futterman, Ian Abercrombie, Corey Burton, Matthew Wood, Catherine Taber, Kevin Michael Richardson, David Acord, Samuel L. Jackson, Anthony Daniels, and Christopher Lee

Star Wars: The Clone Wars is the seventh Star Wars theatrical feature film and the first animated Star Wars movie. This film takes place between the live action Star Wars: Episode II – Attack of the Clones (2002) and Star Wars: Episode III – Revenge of the Sith (2005). According to advertisements for Star Wars: The Clone Wars, it recounts an untold tale of the Clone Wars – the central conflict that begins in Episode II and ends in Episode III. In spite of its ties to two recent Star Wars film, Star Wars: The Clone Wars isn’t getting the love the other Star Wars films have, when one considers early reviews and fan response. While this new film is by no means without its flaws, its light-hearted approach and lack of pompous seriousness make Star Wars: The Clone Wars the most fun Star Wars flick since the original trilogy.

As the film opens, the Clone Wars sweep through the galaxy, and the Jedi Knights are struggling to maintain order and restore peace, as more and more systems side with the Separatists. Darth Sidious (Ian Abercrombie) and his Sith partner, Count Dooku (Christopher Lee), continue to ferment dissension in the Republic; they are the puppet masters behind the Separatist movement and its Droid army.

Count Dooku and his assassin, Asajj Ventress (Nika Futterman), have orchestrated the kidnapping of the infant son of crime lord Jabba the Hutt (Kevin Michael Richardson). Desperate to have access to the shipping lanes on the galaxy’s Outer Rim, which Jabba controls, the Jedi Council pledges to rescue Jabba’s kid, Rotta the Huttlet (David Acord). This mission with its far-reaching consequences is passed off to Jedi Knights, Obi-Wan Kenobi (James Arnold Taylor) and Anakin Skywalker (Matt Lanter), who are on the frontlines of the Clone Wars.

These two Jedi already have their hands full battling a seemingly endless droid army, with only a small, valiant contingent of clone troops, led by Captain Rex (Dee Bradley Baker), on their side. It’s more than enough that Obi-Wan and Anakin find themselves both fighting the droid army and launching a rescue mission, so when Anakin learns that Master Yoda (Tom Kane) has assigned him a padawan learner, a young female named Ahsoka Tona (Ashley Eckstein), he’s not happy. Meanwhile, Dooku and his agents will stop at nothing to foil the Jedi and their desperate, multi-faceted mission.

Star Wars: The Clone Wars is a computer-animated (or 3D animated) film, and its animation certainly looks wanting when compared to the work of such 3D animation studios as Pixar (Toy Story), DreamWorks Animation (Shrek), and Blue Sky (Ice Age). Early in the movie, The Clone Wars’ animation looks stiff, chunky, and even clunky, but as soon as my mind adjusted to the unusual look of this style of 3D animation, it actually began to look charmingly distinctive.

The look of the animation aside, what makes Star Wars: The Clone Wars such a winning film is, honestly, the action. The screenplay fashions a fast-paced narrative that constantly moves the viewer from one end of the galaxy to the next, with the capitol at Coruscant being the anchor (and there’s big action going on there, too). We’re treated to lively battle scenes and heady duels, and while the film lacks strong characterization and personality development of its characters, the film keeps them too busy fighting for their lives and their cause for us to really care.

This is also the first film that really allows Anakin Skywalker to stretch his wings and actually show (rather than tell) us how good a pilot and what a capable Jedi he is (which Obi-Wan Kenobi told Luke Skywalker way back in the original Star Wars). In a lot of ways and unlike any of the prequel trilogies, this is Anakin’s film. The character, after seeming mostly wooden in the prequel trilogy, is charismatic, bold, and brazen in Star Wars: The Clone Wars – a pointed contrast to the mannequin-like performances of the two human actors who played Anakin in the prequel films.

Back in 1999, Ewan McGregor, who portrayed Obi-Wan, described Star Wars: Episode I – The Phantom Menace as being like a fairy tale about a group of heroes flying from one end of the galaxy to another and having adventures. That’s Star Wars: The Clone Wars; it’s a little sci-fi fairy tale adventure – a Saturday morning cartoon version of Star Wars. This is indeed an imperfect flick, but it happily takes the dark out of Star Wars and replaces it with fun.

7 of 10
B+

Sunday, August 17, 2008

NOTES:
2009 Razzie Awards: 1 nomination: “Worst Prequel, Remake, Rip-Off or Sequel”

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Time Runs Out for Blade; Snipes Must Report to Prison

E! Online has reported that Wesley Snipes has been ordered to report to prison immediately to begin serving his 3 year sentence on charges of federal tax evasion.

Review: "Predators" Rocks Except When It Sucks

TRASH IN MY EYE No. 94 (of 2010) by Leroy Douresseaux

Predators (2010)
Running time: 107 minutes (1 hour, 47 minutes)
MPAA – R for strong creature violence and gore, and pervasive language
DIRECTOR: Nimród Antal
WRITERS: Alex Litvak and Michael Finch (from Jim Thomas and John Thomas)
PRODUCERS: Elizabeth Avellan, John Davis, and Robert Rodriguez
CINEMATOGRAPHER: Gyula Pados
EDITOR: Dan Zimmerman

SCI-FI/ACTION with elements of horror

Starring: Adrien Brody, Topher Grace, Alice Braga, Walton Goggins, Oleg Taktarov, Laurence Fishburne, Danny Trejo, Louis Ozawa Changchien, and Mahershalahashbaz Ali

In the 1987 movie, Predator, Arnold Schwarzenegger’s Dutch led a Special Forces team into the Guatemalan jungle. There, they encountered an alien hunter (called “the Predator”) that picked them off one by one. The 2010 movie, Predators, is a direct sequel to the original film, and follows a ruthless mercenary, as he leads a group of trained and untrained killers through a jungle on another planet.

In Predators, Royce (Adrien Brody), an ex-American military turned mercenary, awakens to find himself falling from the sky into a vast, unknown jungle. He soon meets seven other people that arrived there in the same manner. They include Isabelle (Alice Braga), a sniper and black operations soldier; Edwin (Topher Grace), a doctor; Hanzo (Louis Ozawa Changchien), a Yakuza, and Stans (Walton Goggins), a death row inmate; among others. They are killers without a conscience.

The group soon learns that they are not on Earth. After a pack of alien beasts attacks them, Royce deduces that the planet is a game preserve and that they are the game and the prey. When the hunters stalking them finally attack, the humans discover just how formidable they are. Their only hope – to get off the planet – is seemingly an impossible one, but they may get help from the unlikeliest sources.

I found Predators to be immensely entertaining, and this is also one time that I can certainly give credit to the director the film, in this case, Nimród Antal. He works action movie magic out of a script filled with inane characters and inconsistencies. Some of the characters are extraneous and pointless (a Yakuza!) or defy common sense (a death row inmate!). Some of the good ones disappear too early in the film, Danny Trejo’s Cuchillo, a drug cartel enforcer, and Mahershalahashbaz Ali’s Mombasa, a death squad soldier. The audience doesn’t get to know the characters that well, if at all, and they often come across as cardboard cutouts. However, Laurence Fishburne’s Noland is a delight; Fishburne plays him as so deranged that the character is both scary and alluring.

Meanwhile, the director took advantage of a new setting for the Predator franchise (an alien world) and special effects, CGI, and production design talent, improved from the original, to make a movie that looks cool, especially when the Predators attack. The moment the viewer stops and tries to make sense of the plot, story, and concept, Predators begins to fall apart. When the viewer focuses on the chasing and the killing, Predators is just plain fun – so much fun that I didn’t want it to end. So let’s go with this formula for a future film: more Predator action and fewer crappy characters.

6 of 10
B

Saturday, November 20, 2010

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Russell Crowe and The RZA, Again

Both Russell Crowe and The RZA were in American Gangster.  They reunite in Crowe's just-came-out-flick, The Next Three Days.  The duo give a joint interview to BV on Movies.