Over the last few years the “Mouse House” has gone “all in” on doing live-action remakes of their Animated features film classics. Now we’re not talking about the Pixar flicks, though CGI has certainly been enlisted to give the more fantastic elements. Though it stuns me to say it, kudos to the Hollywood Foreign Press and their Golden Globe awards for pointing out that one such remake was not “live-action” but rather a computer-animated feature. These raids of the Disney “vault” target mainly their 1937 to mid-1990s output. Last year was almost a deluge with digital “re-do’s” of Dumbo, Aladdin, and The Lion King, with Lady And The Tramp streaming on the Disney+ app. Ah, but one hasn’t been “tech’d up”. Maybe because it originated in live-action, on stage because unlike most of the classic fairy tales it’s just a bit over a century old.
- 3/12/2020
- by Jim Batts
- WeAreMovieGeeks.com
Wendy director Benh Zeitlin on Liza Minnelli’s scream (as Sally Bowles) the moment the train goes by in Bob Fosse’s Cabaret: "I’ve always loved that moment. That character is so wild, like such a great ferocious liberated woman character.” Photo: Anne-Katrin Titze
In the final instalment of my in-depth conversation with Benh Zeitlin at the Bowery Hotel in New York, we discussed how he developed a relationship between Shay Walker (mother Angela Darling) and Tommie Lynn Milazzo, who plays her baby Wendy, casting the twins Gavin Naquin and Gage Naquin, and working with his sister Eliza Zeitlin on their “shared vision” for Wendy, shot by Sturla Brandth Grøvlen (Josephine Decker’s Shirley) and starring Devin France as the adolescent Wendy.
Devin France, Gavin Naquin, Gage Naquin, Romyri Ross, and Yashua Mack in Benh Zeitlin’s Wendy
Herbert Brenon’s 1924 silent Peter Pan, my favourite adaptation of Jm Barrie’s play,...
In the final instalment of my in-depth conversation with Benh Zeitlin at the Bowery Hotel in New York, we discussed how he developed a relationship between Shay Walker (mother Angela Darling) and Tommie Lynn Milazzo, who plays her baby Wendy, casting the twins Gavin Naquin and Gage Naquin, and working with his sister Eliza Zeitlin on their “shared vision” for Wendy, shot by Sturla Brandth Grøvlen (Josephine Decker’s Shirley) and starring Devin France as the adolescent Wendy.
Devin France, Gavin Naquin, Gage Naquin, Romyri Ross, and Yashua Mack in Benh Zeitlin’s Wendy
Herbert Brenon’s 1924 silent Peter Pan, my favourite adaptation of Jm Barrie’s play,...
- 3/10/2020
- by Anne-Katrin Titze
- eyeforfilm.co.uk
Wendy director Benh Zeitlin on the Montserrat volcano: "Every time I would go back there I had to rewrite the script because things would just be growing at this rate that’s exponential. It’s so fertile and so alive.”
Benh Zeitlin’s Wendy, a free-range take on Jm Barrie’s classic story of Peter Pan, co-written with his sister Eliza Zeitlin, who is also the production designer, has Wendy Darling living with her single mother (Shay Walker) and twin brothers James and Douglas (Gavin Naquin and Gage Naquin) above the diner they run right by the railroad tracks in rural Louisiana.
Beasts Of The Southern Wild and Wendy director Benh Zeitlin (with Anne-Katrin Titze) on nature: "There are things on this Earth that are so awesome, they’re unexplainable the same way magic is.” Photo: Sam Fetner
One night, the three kids hop on the roof of a freight train,...
Benh Zeitlin’s Wendy, a free-range take on Jm Barrie’s classic story of Peter Pan, co-written with his sister Eliza Zeitlin, who is also the production designer, has Wendy Darling living with her single mother (Shay Walker) and twin brothers James and Douglas (Gavin Naquin and Gage Naquin) above the diner they run right by the railroad tracks in rural Louisiana.
Beasts Of The Southern Wild and Wendy director Benh Zeitlin (with Anne-Katrin Titze) on nature: "There are things on this Earth that are so awesome, they’re unexplainable the same way magic is.” Photo: Sam Fetner
One night, the three kids hop on the roof of a freight train,...
- 2/28/2020
- by Anne-Katrin Titze
- eyeforfilm.co.uk
It’s been eight years since Benh Zeitlin made his astonishing feature-directing debut with Beasts of the Southern Wild, a low-budget landmark set on the bayous of Louisiana that won Oscar nominations for Best Picture, Best Actress (for its extraordinary nine-year-old star Quvenzhané Wallis), Best Director, and Best Adapted Screenplay nods. Now, at 37, Zeitlin is back with Wendy, his folkloric spin on J.M. Barrie’s Peter Pan that top-lines Wendy Darling, the Victorian girl who flew off to Neverland to mother an island’s worth of lost boys. If you...
- 2/26/2020
- by Peter Travers
- Rollingstone.com
Back in 2012, a young filmmaker by the name of Benh Zeitlin burst on to the scene with Beasts of the Southern Wild. Debuting at the Sundance Film Festival, the movie blew away audiences, going on to be a darling of the awards season, even scoring four Academy Award nominations. Zeitlin himself picked up a pair of Oscar nods (Best Director and Best Original Screenplay), firmly entrenching him as someone to watch out for. What would he do next? Well, it took until Sundance 2020 for his follow up to arrive, and now Wendy hits theaters this week. Unfortunately, while his unique aesthetic is still very much in evidence, there are diminishing returns this time around. Overly familiar, unfocused, and grindingly repetitive, this is very much a misfire from Zeitlin. The film is a retelling of Peter Pan, with the gritty and grounded, yet fantastical, approach that Beasts of the Southern Wild also employed.
- 2/25/2020
- by Joey Magidson
- Hollywoodnews.com
Is it worse to be bored or to be annoyed by a lack of ambition? What’s more grating: toe-curlingly twee humor or the type of writing that assumes a child using mild profanity is quirky? And why, of all times, would someone bunch all of these up and make it into a Peter Pan story in 2020? J. M. Barrie’s story has graced the screen a multitude of times as well as on other media, and it isn’t one that begs for another adaptation.
If it were to work, it would need a radically different perspective. It’d also need to toy with its characters, maybe even smudge their identities. The script would have to mix up the location and, while keeping ahold of the themes, adjust them to a different ethos. The performances would have to be solid, and while it’s an admittedly tough ask for something with so many children,...
If it were to work, it would need a radically different perspective. It’d also need to toy with its characters, maybe even smudge their identities. The script would have to mix up the location and, while keeping ahold of the themes, adjust them to a different ethos. The performances would have to be solid, and while it’s an admittedly tough ask for something with so many children,...
- 1/29/2020
- by Matt Cipolla
- The Film Stage
Eight long years after “Beasts of the Southern Wild,” Benh Zeitlin brings that same rust-bottomed sense of magical realism to the legend of Peter Pan, reframing J.M. Barrie’s Victorian classic through the eyes of the eldest Darling. “Wendy,” as the indie-minded not-quite-family-film is aptly titled, re-envisions its title character as a working-class kiddo raised at a whistle-stop diner, who witnesses one of her young friends disappearing on a passing freight train and a few years later decides to follow it to the end of the line, where runaway urchins don’t age and the Lost Boys live like “The Lord of the Flies.”
Although the director’s feral energy and rough-and-tumble aesthetic make an inspired match for a movie about an off-the-grid community doing everything it can to resist outside change (that was essentially the gist of “Beasts” as well), cinema has hardly stood still since Zeitlin’s last feature.
Although the director’s feral energy and rough-and-tumble aesthetic make an inspired match for a movie about an off-the-grid community doing everything it can to resist outside change (that was essentially the gist of “Beasts” as well), cinema has hardly stood still since Zeitlin’s last feature.
- 1/27/2020
- by Peter Debruge
- Variety Film + TV
The lyrical whimsy of 2012 breakout “Beasts of the Southern Wild” owed some measure of influence to “Peter Pan,” so it’s no surprise the classic tale of a boy who won’t grow up provides the foundation for director Benh Zeitlin’s long-awaited followup, “Wendy.” Seven years have passed since “Beasts” became a surprise cultural phenomenon, blending evocative visuals and an imaginative swampy backdrop with complex emotional themes. It seems Zeitlin has been trapped in a Neverland of his own making all along, because “Wendy” feels as if no time has passed at all.
Zeitlin’s wondrous “Pan” riff feels like such a natural continuation of the “Beasts” experience that it practically unfolds in the same immersive universe — pensive voiceover paired with overwhelming, expressionistic bursts of storybook imagery — taking this unusual epic into abstract places where fantasy gives way to the ominous challenges of the adult world.
As usual, mileage...
Zeitlin’s wondrous “Pan” riff feels like such a natural continuation of the “Beasts” experience that it practically unfolds in the same immersive universe — pensive voiceover paired with overwhelming, expressionistic bursts of storybook imagery — taking this unusual epic into abstract places where fantasy gives way to the ominous challenges of the adult world.
As usual, mileage...
- 1/27/2020
- by Eric Kohn
- Indiewire
At first glance, “Bloody Nose, Empty Pockets” unfolds as a brilliant work of cinema verite. Bill and Turner Ross’ boozy hangout movie captures the last raucous night at the Roaring Twenties, a grimy bar on the outskirts of the Vegas strip where various inebriated outcasts bury their sorrows in a blur of anger and poetic laments. It’s late 2016, and with the presidential election about to change the world, the pub serves as a fascinating microcosm of America’s fractured, browbeaten underbelly on the verge of self-destruction.
But here’s the thing. The Roaring Twenties is in New Orleans, not Vegas, and the characters populating its interior didn’t just wander in. Though nothing in the movie acknowledges as much, the Ross brothers cast people to populate the bar, recording the drunken antics of their chosen performers throughout a debaucherous night.
The result is both . This has been the Ross...
But here’s the thing. The Roaring Twenties is in New Orleans, not Vegas, and the characters populating its interior didn’t just wander in. Though nothing in the movie acknowledges as much, the Ross brothers cast people to populate the bar, recording the drunken antics of their chosen performers throughout a debaucherous night.
The result is both . This has been the Ross...
- 1/24/2020
- by Eric Kohn
- Indiewire
Elisabeth Moss stars in The Invisible Man from director Leigh Whannell. The film's debut trailer premiered this week along withThe Banker, directed by George Nolf and starring Samuel L. Jackson, Nia Long and Nicholas Hoult.
The first trailer for Wendy debuted, directed by Benh Zeitlin and starring Shay Walker, Tommie Lynn Milazzo and Stephanie Lynn Wilson. Pixar's Soul released a teaser and features vocal talents from Tina Fey and Jamie Foxx.
A new trailer for Bad Boys for Life debuted this week. The film stars Will Smith, Martin Lawrence and Vanessa Hudgens.
Watch all the latest trailers below.
The first trailer for Wendy debuted, directed by Benh Zeitlin and starring Shay Walker, Tommie Lynn Milazzo and Stephanie Lynn Wilson. Pixar's Soul released a teaser and features vocal talents from Tina Fey and Jamie Foxx.
A new trailer for Bad Boys for Life debuted this week. The film stars Will Smith, Martin Lawrence and Vanessa Hudgens.
Watch all the latest trailers below.
- 11/10/2019
- The Hollywood Reporter - Film + TV
Elisabeth Moss stars in The Invisible Man from director Leigh Whannell. The film's debut trailer premiered this week along withThe Banker, directed by George Nolf and starring Samuel L. Jackson, Nia Long and Nicholas Hoult.
The first trailer for Wendy debuted, directed by Benh Zeitlin and starring Shay Walker, Tommie Lynn Milazzo and Stephanie Lynn Wilson. Pixar's Soul released a teaser and features vocal talents from Tina Fey and Jamie Foxx.
A new trailer for Bad Boys for Life debuted this week. The film stars Will Smith, Martin Lawrence and Vanessa Hudgens.
Watch all the latest trailers below.
The first trailer for Wendy debuted, directed by Benh Zeitlin and starring Shay Walker, Tommie Lynn Milazzo and Stephanie Lynn Wilson. Pixar's Soul released a teaser and features vocal talents from Tina Fey and Jamie Foxx.
A new trailer for Bad Boys for Life debuted this week. The film stars Will Smith, Martin Lawrence and Vanessa Hudgens.
Watch all the latest trailers below.
- 11/10/2019
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
Kayti Burt Nov 16, 2019
Beasts of the Southern Wild filmmaker Benh Zeitlin's next feature will be Wendy. And it now has a release date.
Benh Zeitlin has taken his time crafting his follow-up to 2012 feature film debut Beasts of the Southern Wild. Zeitlin directed, co-wrote, and co-scored by that film (adapted from a one-act play called Juicy and Delicious by Lucy Alibar) made the film for a budget of $1.8 million. It would go on to make over $23 million and would earn four Oscar nominations, including one for Best Picture.
Zeitlin's second film is called Wendy, and it is a reimagining of Peter Pan filmed in Montserrat, an island south of Antigua.
Wendy Release Date
Wendy will arrive on February 28, 2020. Should be a nice bright spot deep into the winter doldrums.
Wendy Story
Here's the full, official synopsis:
The classic story of Peter Pan is wildly reimagined in this ragtag epic from Benh Zeitlin,...
Beasts of the Southern Wild filmmaker Benh Zeitlin's next feature will be Wendy. And it now has a release date.
Benh Zeitlin has taken his time crafting his follow-up to 2012 feature film debut Beasts of the Southern Wild. Zeitlin directed, co-wrote, and co-scored by that film (adapted from a one-act play called Juicy and Delicious by Lucy Alibar) made the film for a budget of $1.8 million. It would go on to make over $23 million and would earn four Oscar nominations, including one for Best Picture.
Zeitlin's second film is called Wendy, and it is a reimagining of Peter Pan filmed in Montserrat, an island south of Antigua.
Wendy Release Date
Wendy will arrive on February 28, 2020. Should be a nice bright spot deep into the winter doldrums.
Wendy Story
Here's the full, official synopsis:
The classic story of Peter Pan is wildly reimagined in this ragtag epic from Benh Zeitlin,...
- 11/6/2019
- Den of Geek
In Benh Zeitlin’s “Wendy,” the reimagining of the classic “Peter Pan” tale, Wendy and the other kids don’t want to grow up.
“Swear on your mother, you will never grow up,” one kid says to the other on the island.
“So began the legend of Peter, the boy that never grew up,” a voiceover explained. “This is where lost boys go when they are really lost.”
Also Read: 'Once Upon a Time': Robin Hood, Peter Pan Among Characters to Return for Series Finale
The film’s synopsis reads: “The classic story of Peter Pan is wildly reimagined in this ragtag epic from Benh Zeitlin, director of ‘Beasts of the Southern Wild.’ Lost on a mysterious island where aging and time have come unglued, Wendy must fight to save her family, her freedom, and the joyous spirit of youth from the deadly peril of growing up.”
Zeitlin...
“Swear on your mother, you will never grow up,” one kid says to the other on the island.
“So began the legend of Peter, the boy that never grew up,” a voiceover explained. “This is where lost boys go when they are really lost.”
Also Read: 'Once Upon a Time': Robin Hood, Peter Pan Among Characters to Return for Series Finale
The film’s synopsis reads: “The classic story of Peter Pan is wildly reimagined in this ragtag epic from Benh Zeitlin, director of ‘Beasts of the Southern Wild.’ Lost on a mysterious island where aging and time have come unglued, Wendy must fight to save her family, her freedom, and the joyous spirit of youth from the deadly peril of growing up.”
Zeitlin...
- 11/6/2019
- by Beatrice Verhoeven
- The Wrap
Wendy and the lost boys take over a mysterious island in the first trailer for Fox Searchlight's Wendy.
A reimagining of Peter Pan, the film follows Wendy (Devin France) as she becomes lost on a mysterious island where aging and time have paused. Throughout the pic, she must fight to save her family, her freedom and her youthful spirit from the deadly peril of growing up.
Tommie Lynn Milazzo and Shay Walker also star in Wendy, which Benh Zeitlin directed and co-wrote alongside Eliza Zeitlin.
The trailer opens with Wendy in her bedroom. "Remember the voice in your head? The ...
A reimagining of Peter Pan, the film follows Wendy (Devin France) as she becomes lost on a mysterious island where aging and time have paused. Throughout the pic, she must fight to save her family, her freedom and her youthful spirit from the deadly peril of growing up.
Tommie Lynn Milazzo and Shay Walker also star in Wendy, which Benh Zeitlin directed and co-wrote alongside Eliza Zeitlin.
The trailer opens with Wendy in her bedroom. "Remember the voice in your head? The ...
- 11/6/2019
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
Wendy and the lost boys take over a mysterious island in the first trailer for Fox Searchlight's Wendy.
A reimagining of Peter Pan, the film follows Wendy (Devin France) as she becomes lost on a mysterious island where aging and time have paused. Throughout the pic, she must fight to save her family, her freedom and her youthful spirit from the deadly peril of growing up.
Tommie Lynn Milazzo and Shay Walker also star in Wendy, which Benh Zeitlin directed and co-wrote alongside Eliza Zeitlin.
The trailer opens with Wendy in her bedroom. "Remember the voice in your head? The ...
A reimagining of Peter Pan, the film follows Wendy (Devin France) as she becomes lost on a mysterious island where aging and time have paused. Throughout the pic, she must fight to save her family, her freedom and her youthful spirit from the deadly peril of growing up.
Tommie Lynn Milazzo and Shay Walker also star in Wendy, which Benh Zeitlin directed and co-wrote alongside Eliza Zeitlin.
The trailer opens with Wendy in her bedroom. "Remember the voice in your head? The ...
- 11/6/2019
- The Hollywood Reporter - Film + TV
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