Cinefile

Godard To Receive An Honorary Oscar--And Likely To Skip The Event

Aug 26, 2010

When legendary French director Jean-Luc Godard (Band of Outsiders) ended up skipping this year's Cannes Film Festival, he faxed the following statements to the fest's reps:

"Due to problems the Greeks would be familiar with, I unfortunately cannot be at your disposal in Cannes. I'd walk to the ends of the earth for the festival... But alas I will not be taking a single step further."

Now it's looking like Godard may skip another major event: next year's Academy Awards ceremony. After the Academy announced that Godard was chosen to receive an Honorary Oscar, the problem of actually getting in touch with him quickly surfaced. The Independent now has the latest on this developing story:

"..After two days of frantic effort, the Academy has failed to track down Godard to inform him of his good fortune. Letters, faxes and calls have all gone unanswered, and they now suspect that the reclusive film-maker may be deliberately ignoring them.

"We've been attempting to reach him since 7 o'clock on Tuesday evening and we have as yet had no confirmation," Bruce Davis, the Academy's executive director, told Hollywood Reporter. "We have tried by telephone, by fax, and by emails to various friends and associates. We have even sent him a formal letter by FedEx."

Today, he does not have an agent to handle inquiries from organisations like the Academy, so the process of contacting him sometimes resembles a French farce. His phone number is a closely guarded secret, and he is impossible to reach via email, since he still does almost all of his work on a typewriter and refuses to use the internet as a matter of principle."

In the end, can you cinephiles actually picture Godard attending Tinseltown's glamorous ceremony?

46th Chicago Int'l Film Festival Announces Its First Titles!

Aug 26, 2010

indieWIRE has the twenty confirmed titles to play at this year's Chicago International Film Festival! Some standout films include: Stone from director John Curran (USA), Tamara Drewe from director Stephen Frears (UK), Louder than a Bomb from directors Greg Jacobs and Jon Siskel (USA), Big Tits Zombie from director Takao Nakano (Japan) and Polish Bar from director Ben Berkowitz (USA).

For more info on the Chicago Film Festival, please visit chicagofilmfestival.com

Can "Girl With The Dragon Tattoo" Be The Next Best Actress Oscar Winner?

Aug 24, 2010

Deadline Hollywood has a cool, early Oscar scoop: Noomi Rapace, of The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo fame, could already be next March's early front-runner for Best Actress!

"I've now confirmed that she is eligible. Because Music Box Films released director Niels Arden Oplev's Dragon Tattoo version in a Los Angeles County theater for a qualifying run this past March, thus making Rapace's performance eligible. I've learned that Music Box Films is about to hire an Oscar publicist, probably Melody Korenbrot, to promote Noomi for a Best Actress nomination. That's right, Best Actress. She's already won the Swedish equivalency of that for the film. Her new agents at UTA and managers at Magnolia are comparing her to Marion Cotillard, who appeared in a small foreign film, came out of nowhere to be nominated and then win the Best Actress Academy Award, then landed big roles in major studio tentpoles. "You can have that same journey. You speak English better than she does," she's been told."

This comes as an interesting development for the breakout Swedish franchise, considering that Rooney Mara (The Social Network) was just cast for the same role in the upcoming American version of the same title.

Poster For Julie Taymor's "The Tempest" Unveiled!

Aug 20, 2010

Ain't It Cool News posted the awesome theatrical poster for director Julie Taymor's upcoming film, The Tempest. Taymor, known for such visually rich films like Across The Universe and Titus, is set to premiere The Tempest as the centerpiece selection for this year's New York Film Festival.

Oh and did we mention that the film is based on William Shakespeare's play?

Von Trier's Unfinished "Dimension" Will Be Released On DVD

Aug 19, 2010

When provocateur film director Lars Von Trier (Antichrist) began making Dimension in 1990, he intended the collage-like film to have a 30 year shooting schedule! The goal was to release the film on Apr 30, 2024, after filming numerous sequences over the years. In the end, production on Dimension came to a stop but Screen Daily says that the 25 minutes of completed footage are to be released on DVD on August 25, 2010, as an entry in a Nordic Short Films disc.

"In 1990, von Trier and his then-scriptwriter Niels Vørsel, announced they would start Dimension — ”a European film collage – a kind of monument of the future. Our idea and goal are to make a feature with the passage of time as its all-prevailing undercurrent,” they declared.

During the next years they filmed three-minute sequences with, among others, Stellan Skarsgård, Eddie Constantine, Jean-Marc Barr, Katrin Cartlidge and Jens Okking. Then in the late 1990s von Trier lost interest, and the project was shelved by his producer, Peter Aalbæk Jensen."

Arceneaux Steps Into New Sundance Job: Director Of External Relations

Aug 18, 2010

The Sundance Institute has hired Jennifer Arceneaux as their Director of External Relations. Not familiar with the title? That's because it's a newly created position that the folks over at Sundance sought fit. In short, the role calls for a marketing executive of the highest caliber.

Screen Daily: "Arceneaux most recently served as director of development for the Museum Of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles and is well known as a strong advocate of the arts with extensive fundraising experience.

Based in Los Angeles, she will oversee the Institute’s fundraising, marketing and communications efforts and supervise a staff of 25."