Awards and fall releases are on the mind for industry insiders heading to the Telluride Film Festival this Labor Day weekend, while the final vestiges of specialty summer roll outs head to theaters. Focus Features is taking psychological-thriller The Little Stranger to 500 theaters Friday. The title by Oscar nominee Lenny Abrahamson and starring Domhnall Gleeson, Charlotte Rampling and Ruth Wilson headlines the weekend’s specialty narratives. The weekend also offers multiple documentaries that could not be more different from one another.
Filmmaker Jack Bryan speaks to a who’s-who in the political world including the late John McCain in a film that seeks to connect the dots between the Donald Trump campaign and collusion with Vladimir Putin’s Russia in Active Measures. The feature, bowing via Super Ltd, opens day and date. Laura Nix’s Inventing Tomorrow from Fishbowl Films and Eamonn Films spotlights teens competing in the Intel International...
Filmmaker Jack Bryan speaks to a who’s-who in the political world including the late John McCain in a film that seeks to connect the dots between the Donald Trump campaign and collusion with Vladimir Putin’s Russia in Active Measures. The feature, bowing via Super Ltd, opens day and date. Laura Nix’s Inventing Tomorrow from Fishbowl Films and Eamonn Films spotlights teens competing in the Intel International...
- 8/31/2018
- by Brian Brooks
- Deadline Film + TV
“Active Measures” could hardly be more perfectly timed. It’s a documentary that digs into the relationship between Donald Trump and the powers of Russia, and while it’s not as if the film comes up with some smoking gun that Robert Mueller hasn’t yet, it fills in the Trump-Russia connection in a dogged, rigorously reported, eyebrow-raising way.
The movie is a follow-the-money exposé, and the director, Jack Bryan, lays out the roadmap of cash by making bracing and detailed connections between all the forces at work: the snaky leader-thug Vladimir Putin; the oligarchs he placed under his thumb (except for those who wouldn’t cooperate — he got rid of them); the Russian mobsters who are enmeshed in the workings of the Putin government; and Trump himself. “Active measures” is a phrase used in Russia to describe political warfare by the security services to influence the course of world events,...
The movie is a follow-the-money exposé, and the director, Jack Bryan, lays out the roadmap of cash by making bracing and detailed connections between all the forces at work: the snaky leader-thug Vladimir Putin; the oligarchs he placed under his thumb (except for those who wouldn’t cooperate — he got rid of them); the Russian mobsters who are enmeshed in the workings of the Putin government; and Trump himself. “Active measures” is a phrase used in Russia to describe political warfare by the security services to influence the course of world events,...
- 8/25/2018
- by Owen Gleiberman
- Variety Film + TV
Accompanying the opening this week of "Yoko Ono: One Woman Show" at MoMA is a feature by Lindsay Zoladz. But New York has been covering Yoko for years. Here's a brief timeline. "Here at the Dakota," 1978 By Delia Ephron "Residents of the Dakota feared that the Lennons would appear naked in the courtyard once they moved in. But they proved amicable neighbors: Ono even brought sashimi to a courtyard party, with the names of the host’s children spelled out in peas." "A Talk With Yoko," 1981 By Philip Norman She invited the writer over five months after Lennon’s death. "John Lennon’s Killer," 1981 By Craig Unger A cover story on Mark David Chapman. "Double Fantasy," 1985 By John Leonard “So what if John and Yoko were silly or obtuse?” "The Flux Stops Here," 1989 By Kay Larson "Ono’s 1989 one person show at the Whitney commodified her Fluxus art...
- 5/13/2015
- Vulture
Cinema, as Jean-Luc Godard wrote, is truth 24 times a second. Documentaries both prove and disprove the point; but the truth is their strongest weapon. Here, Guardian and Observer critics pick the 10 best
• Top 10 arthouse movies
• Top 10 family movies
• Top 10 war movies
• Top 10 teen movies
• Top 10 superhero movies
• Top 10 westerns
• More Guardian and Observer critics' top 10s
10. Man With a Movie Camera
To best understand this 1929 silent documentary, one ought to know that its director, the exotically named "Dziga Vertov", was actually born David Abelevich Kaufman in 1896. Some say the name derives from the Russian word for spinning top, but the pseudonym is more likely an onomatopeic approximation of the sound made by the twin reels of film as the director ran them backwards and forwards through his flatbed editor. For Vertov, film was something physical, to be manipulated by man, and yet, paradoxically, he also saw it as a medium...
• Top 10 arthouse movies
• Top 10 family movies
• Top 10 war movies
• Top 10 teen movies
• Top 10 superhero movies
• Top 10 westerns
• More Guardian and Observer critics' top 10s
10. Man With a Movie Camera
To best understand this 1929 silent documentary, one ought to know that its director, the exotically named "Dziga Vertov", was actually born David Abelevich Kaufman in 1896. Some say the name derives from the Russian word for spinning top, but the pseudonym is more likely an onomatopeic approximation of the sound made by the twin reels of film as the director ran them backwards and forwards through his flatbed editor. For Vertov, film was something physical, to be manipulated by man, and yet, paradoxically, he also saw it as a medium...
- 11/12/2013
- The Guardian - Film News
CANNES -- In "Fahrenheit 9/11," Michael Moore drops any pretense that he is a documentarian to pull together from many sources an angry polemic against the president, the Bush family and the administration's foreign policy. Where "Roger & Me" and "Bowling for Columbine" were personal quests for truth, looking at a subject from different angles and talking to people polls apart in their points of view, Moore stays "on message" here from first shot to last. There is no debate, no analysis of facts or search for historical context. Moore simply wants to blame one man and his family for the situation in Iraq the United States now finds itself in.
The film arrives, of course, amid recent revelations of Bush insiders Richard Clarke and Paul O'Neill, the turmoil over the 9/11 commission and the growing sense that the Iraq problem is not going away anytime soon. And the very public dust-up between Moore and the Walt Disney Co.'s Michael Eisner, which has left Moore momentarily without a distributor, certainly raises the film's profile even further. So the film should reach a large enough audience; the question is: Will Moore be preaching to the choir?
Charting the American political scene during the past 3 1/2 years, Moore is forced to rely mostly on other people's material. The assertion that America's Saudi policy has been determined largely by financial ties between the Bush family and the Saudi royals -- including another Saudi clan, the bin Ladens -- comes largely from "House of Bush, House of Saud", by Craig Unger, whom he interviews.
The Bush White House's obsession with Iraq in the immediate aftermath of Sept. 11 despite overwhelming evidence that al-Qaida was behind the attacks comes from former counterterrorism czar Clarke in his book "Against All Enemies". Most of the film's interviews come from TV network news shows or CNN's Larry King.
The movie begins with the contested 2000 presidential election. Moore takes the usual anti-Bush view that the election was stolen. Moore then characterizes Bush as a country bumpkin in the initial months of his presidency, spending 42% of his time on vacation and falling rapidly in public opinion polls.
Then comes 9/11. Moore touchingly conveys this day of infamy with a montage of sounds and visuals that refrains from showing images of airplanes hitting buildings or the World Trade Center collapsing. Instead, we get noise of horror over a blank screen, then shots of crying, horrified people staring into a sky filling with smoke and debris.
Moore recounts the Afghanistan invasion, the "botched" search for Osama bin Laden and the administration's alleged fear-mongering through constantly upgraded, color-coded levels of the terrorist threat issued by the Homeland Security Department, all designed to make the public more willing to back the invasion of Iraq.
Even if one agrees with all of Moore's arguments, the film reduces decades of American foreign-policy failures to a black-and-white cartoon that lays the blame on one family. He ignores facts like the policy to arm and support Afghan rebels that began in the Carter administration. For that matter, the Clinton team never mounted a serious effort to go after al-Qaida even after the 1998 embassy bombings in East Africa.
The Iraq violence is more gruesome than what normally appears on American TV. One particular sequence follows an American patrol on Christmas Eve, but Moore never identifies who shot the footage. Because Moore is very good at jumping in front of a camera when he is around, one can only assume he shot none of the Iraq footage. But his editing is designed to emphasize Iraqi suffering and U.S. military personnel indifference or even hostility.
The movie contains only one episode of Moore's patented "ambushes" of the famous. He collars congressmen leaving Capitol Hill and tries to persuade them to enlist their children to fight in Iraq. Not surprisingly, he has no takers.
When the movie devolves into problems of veteran benefits, harassment of peace groups or the grief of one family over a killed son, Moore simply loses his focus. These are worthy topics but have nothing to do with why the United States is in Iraq.
What Moore seems to be pioneering here is a reality film as an election-year device. The facts and arguments are no different than those one can glean from political commentary or recently published books on these subjects. Only the impact of film may prove greater than the printed word. So the real question is not how good a film is "Fahrenheit 9/11" -- it is undoubtedly Moore's weakest -- but will a film help to get a president fired?
FAHRENHEIT 9/11
Dog Eat Dog Films and Wild Bunch
Credits:
Screenwriter-director: Michael Moore
Producers: Kathleen Glynn, Jim Czarnecki
Director of photography: Mike Desjarlais
Music: Jeff Gibbs
Editors: Kurt Engfehr, Christopher Seward, T. Woody Richman
No MPAA rating
Running time -- 120 minutes...
The film arrives, of course, amid recent revelations of Bush insiders Richard Clarke and Paul O'Neill, the turmoil over the 9/11 commission and the growing sense that the Iraq problem is not going away anytime soon. And the very public dust-up between Moore and the Walt Disney Co.'s Michael Eisner, which has left Moore momentarily without a distributor, certainly raises the film's profile even further. So the film should reach a large enough audience; the question is: Will Moore be preaching to the choir?
Charting the American political scene during the past 3 1/2 years, Moore is forced to rely mostly on other people's material. The assertion that America's Saudi policy has been determined largely by financial ties between the Bush family and the Saudi royals -- including another Saudi clan, the bin Ladens -- comes largely from "House of Bush, House of Saud", by Craig Unger, whom he interviews.
The Bush White House's obsession with Iraq in the immediate aftermath of Sept. 11 despite overwhelming evidence that al-Qaida was behind the attacks comes from former counterterrorism czar Clarke in his book "Against All Enemies". Most of the film's interviews come from TV network news shows or CNN's Larry King.
The movie begins with the contested 2000 presidential election. Moore takes the usual anti-Bush view that the election was stolen. Moore then characterizes Bush as a country bumpkin in the initial months of his presidency, spending 42% of his time on vacation and falling rapidly in public opinion polls.
Then comes 9/11. Moore touchingly conveys this day of infamy with a montage of sounds and visuals that refrains from showing images of airplanes hitting buildings or the World Trade Center collapsing. Instead, we get noise of horror over a blank screen, then shots of crying, horrified people staring into a sky filling with smoke and debris.
Moore recounts the Afghanistan invasion, the "botched" search for Osama bin Laden and the administration's alleged fear-mongering through constantly upgraded, color-coded levels of the terrorist threat issued by the Homeland Security Department, all designed to make the public more willing to back the invasion of Iraq.
Even if one agrees with all of Moore's arguments, the film reduces decades of American foreign-policy failures to a black-and-white cartoon that lays the blame on one family. He ignores facts like the policy to arm and support Afghan rebels that began in the Carter administration. For that matter, the Clinton team never mounted a serious effort to go after al-Qaida even after the 1998 embassy bombings in East Africa.
The Iraq violence is more gruesome than what normally appears on American TV. One particular sequence follows an American patrol on Christmas Eve, but Moore never identifies who shot the footage. Because Moore is very good at jumping in front of a camera when he is around, one can only assume he shot none of the Iraq footage. But his editing is designed to emphasize Iraqi suffering and U.S. military personnel indifference or even hostility.
The movie contains only one episode of Moore's patented "ambushes" of the famous. He collars congressmen leaving Capitol Hill and tries to persuade them to enlist their children to fight in Iraq. Not surprisingly, he has no takers.
When the movie devolves into problems of veteran benefits, harassment of peace groups or the grief of one family over a killed son, Moore simply loses his focus. These are worthy topics but have nothing to do with why the United States is in Iraq.
What Moore seems to be pioneering here is a reality film as an election-year device. The facts and arguments are no different than those one can glean from political commentary or recently published books on these subjects. Only the impact of film may prove greater than the printed word. So the real question is not how good a film is "Fahrenheit 9/11" -- it is undoubtedly Moore's weakest -- but will a film help to get a president fired?
FAHRENHEIT 9/11
Dog Eat Dog Films and Wild Bunch
Credits:
Screenwriter-director: Michael Moore
Producers: Kathleen Glynn, Jim Czarnecki
Director of photography: Mike Desjarlais
Music: Jeff Gibbs
Editors: Kurt Engfehr, Christopher Seward, T. Woody Richman
No MPAA rating
Running time -- 120 minutes...
- 5/18/2004
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
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