Five years ago, Samia Shoaib crossed paths with Allison Mack at an audition. Looking back, the actress realizes their brief friendship may have ended very differently. Mack has been in the headlines as of late after she was arrested and charged last week in connection with the purported self-help organization, Nxivm, which, according to the U.S. Attorney's Office, allegedly contains a secret society made up of female "slaves" and "masters" called Dos. Mack has been accused of having a high position within the society and, along with other "masters," recruiting "slaves" by telling them they were joining a women-only organization that would empower them....
- 4/26/2018
- E! Online
Black Swan is the fifth feature to come from the lunatic vision of Darren Aronofsky and with his first Oscar nomination pending, let's look back on his career. While Natalie Portman is front and center for the entire hit movie and Mickey Rourke had a similarly feature-length closeup in The Wrestler, Aronofsky is the star of all five pictures. If not, he has to be considered the co-lead. He's not invisible as a director is the point even though he's not onscreen. But which faces has he used the most to sell his masterpieces and/or follies (depending on your point of view)?
Left: Aronofsky; Right: His parents (I believe) in The Wrestler
Let's investigate.
The Darren Aronofsky Acting Hierarchy
(Quantitatively Speaking)
5 Films
One character actor has appeared in every Darren Aronofsky feature (and so has Aronofsky's dad, no joke). Will they both appear in The Wolverine, Hugh Jackman's...
Left: Aronofsky; Right: His parents (I believe) in The Wrestler
Let's investigate.
The Darren Aronofsky Acting Hierarchy
(Quantitatively Speaking)
5 Films
One character actor has appeared in every Darren Aronofsky feature (and so has Aronofsky's dad, no joke). Will they both appear in The Wolverine, Hugh Jackman's...
- 1/21/2011
- by NATHANIEL R
- FilmExperience
PARK CITY, Utah -- Archimedes couldn't figure out the solution to a vexing problem his king had posed to him. After days of agonized thinking, the Greek mathematician gave up and retired to the bath where in his repose the solution came to him.
No such luck for young Maximilian Cohen (Sean Gullette) who in "Pi" grapples with the most daunting mathematical and ontological questions posed by man.
A brilliant cinematic calculus, "Pi" is an astonishingly accomplished work, integrating questions and insights that have challenged mathematicians, theologians, philosophers and mythmakers for centuries and, within that same equation, extrapolating a profound psychological portrait of one young scientist, who, like Icarus, dares to fly too high. "Pi"'s filmmaker, Darren Aronofsky, won the director's award at Sundance and seems to possess infinite potential.
Admittedly, "Pi"'s appeal will radiate around the cerebral viewer. Its filmic aesthetic, a searing barrage of abrasive sounds and abstract images, will likely strike numb the soft-centered viewer. The challenge for a distributor will be to extend "Pi"'s parameters, much as music labels are sometimes able to take far-flung, avant-garde sounds and make them palatable to the mainstream.
Narratively and structurally, "Pi" charts close in orbit to an Arthur C. Clarke short story, using the outer reaches of scientific and mathematical knowledge as its thematic terrain. Wonderfully, it's a science fiction story, but one of a higher order, not delimited by the superficialities of special effects.
In this ambitious thrust, Gullette stars as a modern-day mad mathematician, Max, who holes up in a tiny urban garret with his electrodes, gadgets, calculators and raw computers, all soldered together in an expressionist hodgepodge of keenly calibrated connections. Max doesn't venture out much, and when he does he shuns all human contact, except with his mentor, a retired mathematician who devoted his life to researching Pi but who has now acknowledged that "life is not mathematics."
Max's obsession with finding a mathematical order to life does not border on mania, it is mania. His mind-set is jarringly transposed to the screen by Aronofsky in a frazzled cacophony of discrete images and assaultive sounds. Indeed, Max is clearly soaring too close to the sun and, at the very least, he needs a break before he suffers a breakdown.
"Pi" is a staggeringly powerful scoping of complex and compact dimension: epistemological questions, about how man can gain knowledge and then try to understand higher dimensions with his finite capacities, are vigorously and imaginatively presented in this most sophisticated, thematic offering. The technical contributions are manifestly superior, including cinematographer Matthew Libatique's involving, expressionistic lensing, as well as composer Clint Mansell's assonantly eloquent score.
For once, film rises to a dimension of thought and illumination that is far beyond its usual pulp, bad-novel sources. Big subject matter fuses with low-budget wizardry and the results in this endeavor are awe-inspiring, yet infinitely wise.
Pi
LIVE Entertainment
Producer: Eric Watson
Screenwriter-director: Darren Aronofsky
Co-producer: Scott Vogel
Executive producer: Randy Simon
Co-executive producers: David Godbout, Tyler Brodie, Jonah Smith
Director of photography: Matthew Libatique
Editor: Oren Sarch
Production designer: Matthew Maraffi
Music: Clint Mansell
Black-and-white/stereo
Cast: Sean Gullette, Mark Margolis, Ben Shenkman, Samia Shoaib, Pam Hart, Stephen Pearlman
Running time -- 85 minutes...
No such luck for young Maximilian Cohen (Sean Gullette) who in "Pi" grapples with the most daunting mathematical and ontological questions posed by man.
A brilliant cinematic calculus, "Pi" is an astonishingly accomplished work, integrating questions and insights that have challenged mathematicians, theologians, philosophers and mythmakers for centuries and, within that same equation, extrapolating a profound psychological portrait of one young scientist, who, like Icarus, dares to fly too high. "Pi"'s filmmaker, Darren Aronofsky, won the director's award at Sundance and seems to possess infinite potential.
Admittedly, "Pi"'s appeal will radiate around the cerebral viewer. Its filmic aesthetic, a searing barrage of abrasive sounds and abstract images, will likely strike numb the soft-centered viewer. The challenge for a distributor will be to extend "Pi"'s parameters, much as music labels are sometimes able to take far-flung, avant-garde sounds and make them palatable to the mainstream.
Narratively and structurally, "Pi" charts close in orbit to an Arthur C. Clarke short story, using the outer reaches of scientific and mathematical knowledge as its thematic terrain. Wonderfully, it's a science fiction story, but one of a higher order, not delimited by the superficialities of special effects.
In this ambitious thrust, Gullette stars as a modern-day mad mathematician, Max, who holes up in a tiny urban garret with his electrodes, gadgets, calculators and raw computers, all soldered together in an expressionist hodgepodge of keenly calibrated connections. Max doesn't venture out much, and when he does he shuns all human contact, except with his mentor, a retired mathematician who devoted his life to researching Pi but who has now acknowledged that "life is not mathematics."
Max's obsession with finding a mathematical order to life does not border on mania, it is mania. His mind-set is jarringly transposed to the screen by Aronofsky in a frazzled cacophony of discrete images and assaultive sounds. Indeed, Max is clearly soaring too close to the sun and, at the very least, he needs a break before he suffers a breakdown.
"Pi" is a staggeringly powerful scoping of complex and compact dimension: epistemological questions, about how man can gain knowledge and then try to understand higher dimensions with his finite capacities, are vigorously and imaginatively presented in this most sophisticated, thematic offering. The technical contributions are manifestly superior, including cinematographer Matthew Libatique's involving, expressionistic lensing, as well as composer Clint Mansell's assonantly eloquent score.
For once, film rises to a dimension of thought and illumination that is far beyond its usual pulp, bad-novel sources. Big subject matter fuses with low-budget wizardry and the results in this endeavor are awe-inspiring, yet infinitely wise.
Pi
LIVE Entertainment
Producer: Eric Watson
Screenwriter-director: Darren Aronofsky
Co-producer: Scott Vogel
Executive producer: Randy Simon
Co-executive producers: David Godbout, Tyler Brodie, Jonah Smith
Director of photography: Matthew Libatique
Editor: Oren Sarch
Production designer: Matthew Maraffi
Music: Clint Mansell
Black-and-white/stereo
Cast: Sean Gullette, Mark Margolis, Ben Shenkman, Samia Shoaib, Pam Hart, Stephen Pearlman
Running time -- 85 minutes...
- 1/26/1997
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
NEW YORK - Eric Bogosian's play depicting the malaise of the younger generation, a hit for Lincoln Center a couple of years back, has been adapted for the screen with felicitous results by director Richard Linklater, who has demonstrated his affinity for these types of characters with such films as "Slacker" and "Dazed and Confused".
Although the downbeat nature of the story and the lack of sympathetic characters may prevent the film from taking off commercially, strong reviews and word-of-mouth should garner it significant attention. Showing at the New York Film Festival, this Castle Rock production is scheduled for a commercial release early next year via Sony Pictures Classics.
The film, which adheres closely to the original play, is concerned with a group of aimless, overgrown adolescents who congregate in the parking lot of a convenience store in the middle of a suburban wasteland. After the canny credit sequence, which shows us a series of barren strip malls while the song "A Town Without Pity" plays on the soundtrack, we are introduced to Tim (Nicky Katt), whose stint in the Air Force has left him directionless and an embittered racist; Buff (Steve Zahn), a spaced-out prankster; Jeff (Giovanni Ribisi), whose intellectual searching and ironic put-downs seem to indicate he is the character closest to the author; Sooze (Amie Carey), Jeff's restless girlfriend, who is desperate to escape to New York and become a performance artist; and Bee-Bee (Dina Spybey), a young, troubled girl who is eager to blend in with the rest of the group.
Watching these young people listen to music, drink beer, litter, and generally make nuisances of themselves are the Pakistani owners of the store, Nazeer (Ajay Naidu) and his wife, Pakeesa (Samia Shoaib). Although they don't want trouble, the pair are not reluctant to whip out a gun when things get out of hand.
The group's lethargy is shaken up with the return visit of hometown boy Pony (Jayce Bartok), who has gone off and become a rock star, complete with MTV videos, a limousine, a sold-out show at the local arena, and a sexy publicist (Parker Posey). His appearance prompts the members of the group into various reactions: Jeff is jealous of his fame and masks it with snide put-downs; Sooze is attracted by Pony's success as an artist; and Buff mainly wants a ride in the limo.
One of the problems with "subUrbia" is that nearly all of the characters onscreen are either silly or unpleasant in varying degrees. Nazeer exclaims at one particularly frustrated point, "You people are so stupid. What's wrong with you?"
Although Bogosian's screenplay makes many cogent points about the deadening effects of suburbia, he provides no answers to that question, and the story wanders on aimlessly for nearly two hours, with a somewhat melodramatic conclusion. Still, there are many laughs, and the characterizations are fully developed and compelling.
Under Linklater's astute direction, the talented young cast play their parts expertly, with Zahn proving that his scene-stealing in "That Thing You Do!" was no fluke. He seems headed for big things. And Katt has sufficient charisma to make his obnoxious character somewhat bearable.
Header: Thu, Oct 10, 1996, 10, End of Header.
subUrbia
Sony Pictures Classics
A Castle Rock production
Director Richard Linklater
Producer Anne Walker-McBay
Executive producer John Sloss
Screenplay Eric Bogosian
Photography Lee Daniel
Editor Sandra Adair
Color/stereo
Cast:
Pony Jayce Bartok
Sooze Amie Carey
Tim Nicky Katt
Nazeer Ajay Naidu
Erica Parker Posey
Jeff Giovanni Ribisi
Pakeesa Samia Shoaib
Bee-Bee Dina Spybey
Buff Steve Zahn
Running time - 118 minutes
No MPAA rating...
Although the downbeat nature of the story and the lack of sympathetic characters may prevent the film from taking off commercially, strong reviews and word-of-mouth should garner it significant attention. Showing at the New York Film Festival, this Castle Rock production is scheduled for a commercial release early next year via Sony Pictures Classics.
The film, which adheres closely to the original play, is concerned with a group of aimless, overgrown adolescents who congregate in the parking lot of a convenience store in the middle of a suburban wasteland. After the canny credit sequence, which shows us a series of barren strip malls while the song "A Town Without Pity" plays on the soundtrack, we are introduced to Tim (Nicky Katt), whose stint in the Air Force has left him directionless and an embittered racist; Buff (Steve Zahn), a spaced-out prankster; Jeff (Giovanni Ribisi), whose intellectual searching and ironic put-downs seem to indicate he is the character closest to the author; Sooze (Amie Carey), Jeff's restless girlfriend, who is desperate to escape to New York and become a performance artist; and Bee-Bee (Dina Spybey), a young, troubled girl who is eager to blend in with the rest of the group.
Watching these young people listen to music, drink beer, litter, and generally make nuisances of themselves are the Pakistani owners of the store, Nazeer (Ajay Naidu) and his wife, Pakeesa (Samia Shoaib). Although they don't want trouble, the pair are not reluctant to whip out a gun when things get out of hand.
The group's lethargy is shaken up with the return visit of hometown boy Pony (Jayce Bartok), who has gone off and become a rock star, complete with MTV videos, a limousine, a sold-out show at the local arena, and a sexy publicist (Parker Posey). His appearance prompts the members of the group into various reactions: Jeff is jealous of his fame and masks it with snide put-downs; Sooze is attracted by Pony's success as an artist; and Buff mainly wants a ride in the limo.
One of the problems with "subUrbia" is that nearly all of the characters onscreen are either silly or unpleasant in varying degrees. Nazeer exclaims at one particularly frustrated point, "You people are so stupid. What's wrong with you?"
Although Bogosian's screenplay makes many cogent points about the deadening effects of suburbia, he provides no answers to that question, and the story wanders on aimlessly for nearly two hours, with a somewhat melodramatic conclusion. Still, there are many laughs, and the characterizations are fully developed and compelling.
Under Linklater's astute direction, the talented young cast play their parts expertly, with Zahn proving that his scene-stealing in "That Thing You Do!" was no fluke. He seems headed for big things. And Katt has sufficient charisma to make his obnoxious character somewhat bearable.
Header: Thu, Oct 10, 1996, 10, End of Header.
subUrbia
Sony Pictures Classics
A Castle Rock production
Director Richard Linklater
Producer Anne Walker-McBay
Executive producer John Sloss
Screenplay Eric Bogosian
Photography Lee Daniel
Editor Sandra Adair
Color/stereo
Cast:
Pony Jayce Bartok
Sooze Amie Carey
Tim Nicky Katt
Nazeer Ajay Naidu
Erica Parker Posey
Jeff Giovanni Ribisi
Pakeesa Samia Shoaib
Bee-Bee Dina Spybey
Buff Steve Zahn
Running time - 118 minutes
No MPAA rating...
- 10/10/1996
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
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