Posted by Larry Gleeson
Award winning film from renowned journalist JOAN KRON goes in depth with a comedic take on women and their plastic surgery and their career as artists. The film will make its premiere at the 2017 Newport Beach Film Festival. Don’t miss this film!
Source: TAKE MY NOSE PLEASE
Posted by Larry Gleeson
For tickets go to: https://www.newportbeachfilmfest.com/event/the-night-watchmen/
From an executive producer of The Texas Chainsaw Massacre and the creator of The Hamiltons, comes the next “cult movie” horror-comedy gore-fest, The Night Watchmen. In this highly anticipated movie, a mistaken warehouse delivery unleashes a horde of hungry vampires and it’s up to three inept night watchmen, aided by a young rookie and a fearless tabloid journalist, to fight an epic battle against the scourge of undead that threatens to take over the city of Baltimore.
“While directing The Night Watchmen, I wanted to get back to those 80’s horror films that you’d rent on VHS like Night of The Comet, Fright Night, or Killer Clowns From Outer Space…They were fun, cheesy, and scary all at the same time. I had so much fun watching those movies and wanted our audiences to experience the same thing.” – Mitchell Altieri
Director Mitchell Altieri has premiered films at Sundance, SXSW, SF, Paris, as well as popular genre fests like Fantasia and Screamfest. His films The Hamiltons and The Thompsons are award winners, while his latest film, A Beginner’s Guide to Snuff just took home Best Actor, Best Actress, and Best Feature Film at FEARnyc.
“The Night Watchmen has everything you could want from a horror movie.”
-Entertainment Weekly
“Honestly, great, and it has me thinking of The Evil Dead, Big Trouble in Little China, John Dies at the End, and the camp cable re-runs classic Killer Clowns From Outer Space. This kind of in-the-trenches, one-liners at the ready working class horror concept is a rare beast these days.”
-Deadline.com
(Source: Press materials provided by Ken Arnold
Posted by Larry Gleeson
“STRAWS” exposes the negative impact the 500 million plastic straws we use per day have in our oceans.
Throughout the documentary, marine researchers, citizen activists and business owners discuss how it’s possible to make a sea of change through use of sustainable alternatives to plastic, such as Aardvark paper straws.
NEWPORT BEACH, Calif. (April 13, 2017) – Recent reports show that 5 trillion plastic pieces weighing over 250,000 tons are floating at sea, up to 80 percent of plastic in oceans comes from land-based sources and an estimated 5-13 million tons of plastic enter oceans each year. To educate the nation about the growing plastic pollution crisis, director, producer Linda Booker created a new documentary that exposes the negative impact of the billions of plastic straws that live in our landfills and oceans.
“STRAWS,” narrated by American actor and screenwriter Tim Robbins, charts the history of straws and reveals our culture’s current obsession with single use conveniences. Throughout the documentary, marine researchers, citizen activists and business owners discuss how it’s possible to make a sea of change through use of sustainable alternatives to plastic, such as Aardvark paper straws.
“Before diving into the research for this project, I didn’t realize something as small as a plastic straw was such a significant litter and ocean pollution problem,” said Booker. “My goal for this documentary is to make people think about how small habits can add up to huge impact. Removing plastic straws is a tangible, simple change people and businesses can do that can truly help make a difference.”
“STRAWS” will be showcased at the 18th annual Newport Beach Film Festival on Saturday, April 22, at 11 a.m., in Triangle 1. The film is part of the “Short Slice of Life Documentaries” program. Booker and The Last Plastic Straw Founder Jackie Nunez, who is featured in the film, will be in attendance.
(Source: Press materials provided by Mallory Sturgeon, Dittoe PR)
Posted by Larry Gleeson
Angela Shelton is an award-winning filmmaker, whose first screenwriting and producing credit, “Tumbleweeds” (1999), received the Sundance Film Festival Filmmaker’s Trophy (2000) and earned actress Janet McTeer an Academy Award® nomination and a Golden Globe®.
After being named one of the Top Ten Screenwriters to Watch (Variety), Angela followed-up Tumbleweeds with an adaptation of Kaye Gibbons’ novel “Charms For The Easy Life” (2002) starring Mimi Rogers and Gena Rowlands (Showtime). In 2001, she made her directorial debut with the documentary “Searching For Angela Shelton”. Angela traveled the world with the documentary for ten years and became internationally recognized as a social activist and public speaker, raising money for various rape crisis centers and domestic violence shelters. Her memoir, Finding Angela Shelton, published by Meredith Publishing in 2006, describes how making the documentary changed her life.
In 2016 Angela returned, writing, producing and directing her first feature film, “Heart, Baby!,” starring Gbenga Akinnagbe (The Wire), Jackson Rathbone (The Twilight Saga) and Shawn-Caulin Young (Godless).
Posted by Larry Gleeson
Leonard Maltin, one of the world’s most respected film critics and historians, introduced the screening of Rafter Romance, during the 2017 TCM Classic Film Festival at the historic Hollywood Egyptian theater, built in 1922. The film stars Norman Foster and a young Ginger Rogers (just before her first film with Fred Astaire, Flying Down to Rio).
Rafter Romance is a pre-code romantic comedy about two roommates sharing an apartment in a multi-level tenement on a shift basis but have actually never met. As each begins to resent the other’s bad habits, they exchange barbed notes and engage in several hilarious pranks orchestrated against each other. Meanwhile, the two meet outside the apartment and fall in love. Both are juggling careers and trying to make ends meet providing several additional, highly comedic scenes.
Rogers displays a remarkable sweetness and delicious lightness as she moves through the set designs. Dutch-born David Abel provides an eye-pleasing cinematography with a plethora of medium shots coupled with luminous tracking shots. Costumer Bernard Newman, provides several, stylish wardrobe accoutrements with full-length skirts, business suits and accompanying hats for both male and female characters.
The film’s art department of John Hughes and Van Nest Polglase created the sets while Kenneth Holmes supplied props. In addition to the apartment sets, a countryside scene with a lake and accompanying rowboat stands out. Seemingly, most of the production design was deftly constructed to showcase the closeness and intimacy of the film’s lead characters, Mary (Rogers) and Jack (Foster).
Austrian composer, Max Steiner, who would go on to win three Oscars for Best Music and achieve legendary Hollywood status, composed and directed the musical score. Interestingly, the supporting cast of characters portrayed by George Sidney, Laura Hope Crews, Robert Benchley and Sidney Miller added an ethnic complexity that sublimely enhanced the film’s setting and the film’s narrative structure and that all but disappears in post-code films.
While Rafter Romance does have some risque pieces it wasn’t considered to have code issues, despite the suggestive title, and was remade in 1937 under stricter code enforcement as Living on Love.
Unfortunately, the film has rarely been screened in theaters since it’s initial circulation in 1933. Rafter Romance was one of six films handed over to former RKO studio head, Merian Cooper, to settle a lawsuit and he promptly removed them from circulation until their licensing for television in 1955-56. According to the TCM Classical Film Festival website, TCM acquired the films in 2006 and created restored prints with the help of Brigham Young University and the Library of Congress.
The print used for the screening was made possible courtesy of the TCM Collection at the UCLA Film and Television Archive. Rafter Romance, directed by William A. Seiter, had a run time of seventy-three minutes and its rather abrupt ending left the audience wanting more. Seeing Rogers’ acting chops coupled with complex characters made this a most unexpected and quite an exceptional viewing treat. I highly recommend Rafter Romanc and, for full effect, I recommend viewing the film on the big screen – the way it was made to be seen!
Posted by Larry Gleeson
Jack Conway of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM) directed Love Crazy, the first film I viewed at the 2017 TCM Film Festival, dedicated to recently deceased, long-time TCM Host and film historian, Robert Osborne. The film screened at the historic Hollywood Egyptian Theatre, built in 1922, after a brief introductory backdrop of the film by special TCM guest, Dana Delaney.
Love Crazy was the tenth film (out of the fourteen the two made together) in seven years by the leading couple of William Powell and Myrna Loy. The duo was best known for their high brow quips and playful banter starting in 1934 with the pre-code, comedy-mystery, The Thin Man. Powell and Loy would go on to make five additional Thin Man movies; After the Thin Man (1936), Another Thin Man (1939), Shadow of the Thin Man (1941), The Thin Man Goes Home (1944), and Song of the Thin Man (1947).
Love Crazy opens with the familiar quips and double entendres as the couple they portray, Susan and Steve Ireland, is ready to celebrate four years of marriage together. To celebrate their anniversary, Steve insists they replicate their first dinner as a married couple. Only this time he stipulates they have dinner backwards to avoid him having to undertake a rather unpleasant task that took place at the beginning of their first shared meal as man and wife.
Without missing a beat, Susan’s mother, played by Florence Bates, shows up and immediately begins meddling in the couple’s affairs. Steve’s old flame, played by sweltering Gail Patrick, living down below the couple doesn’t help matters. Before long, a series of misunderstandings has Susan filing for divorce. A bewildered Steve discovers if he can fake madness, he can eventually be remanded to Susan’s custody for a period of five years if the Lunacy Commission warrants his release from custody. In a series of madcap situations where Steve pretends to have lost his grip on reality, he manages to get his way.
Yet, even the best laid plans can go awry. One of the high society doctors had crossed paths with Steve and was now serving on the insane asylum release board. Steve eventually escapes from the insane asylum in an outrageous sequence of events. Soon an all points bulletin is issued and an ensuing manhunt takes place as law enforcement officers begin searching the apartment building one apartment at a time. To keep the police, and almost everyone else at bay, Steve decides to go in drag (as Steve’s sister). In doing so, Powell shaves his trademark mustache for the only time in his silver screen career.
Love Crazy is generally regarded by critics as the zaniest of their films together. At it’s most basic level, it’s a marriage farce full of slapstick, references to Freudian psychology and an abundance of physical comedy.
And, MGM does it’s part with impeccable set designs and an abundance of supporting acting talent. The Irelands’ downstairs neighbor, who tries to help Susan pick up the pieces of her life, is a bumptious athlete in the form of Warner Bros. talent Jack Carson. In addition, the lead doctor from the insane asylum is well-known, dialect comic, Sig Ruman.
The film was shot in black and white and had a run time of 99 minutes. The seamless manner exhibited between Powell and Loy never really lets the audience believe the two will end up in divorce. Nevertheless, it doesn’t keep them from pushing the marital boundaries to the edge. Powell looked strong and full of vigor having recently married Diana Lewis, a woman twenty-six years his junior. Reportedly, the two had only known each other three weeks before marrying and would stay married for forty-two years. Loy, on the other hand, had recently separated and her performance had melancholic overtones. Love Crazy was listed as one of the top ten films of the year.
I recommend Love Crazy. And, if at all possible, see it the way it was made to be seen – on the big screen!
Posted by Larry Gleeson
Directed by Tori Garrett
Written by ANNE BROOKSBANK, URSULA CLEARY, JAMES GREVILLE, STEPHEN ROCHE
Produced by SCOTT CORFIELD, IRENE DOBSON
Executive Producers TERRY JACKMAN, STEPHEN ROCHE
Starring JACK THOMPSON, ADEN YOUNG, SARA WEST and RACHEL GRIFFITHS
DON’T TELL is the story of a young woman who fought back after enduring sexual abuse at a prestigious private school. With a dogged and determined local lawyer by her side, Lyndal took on the powerful church that denied her abuse for over a decade. Based on true events that changed Australian child protection laws, Don’t Tell is a poignant story about finding the courage to stand up, speak out and fight against injustice.
Monday, April 24th
7:30 PM
The Lido Theatre
3459 Via Lido
Newport Beach, CA 92663
(Source: press materials provided by Chris Blackmon)
Posted byLarry Gleeson
Posted by Larry Gleeson
Rama Burshtein’s second film, dubbed The Wedding Plan, a romantic comedy about a young woman with elaborate wedding plans with just a month to find a groom and a run time of 110 minutes, screened last Monday, as a pre-roll out for members of the press. Burshtein wrote and directed the film, a Roadside Attractions production and a nominee for Best Film at the 2016 Venice Film Festival. Burshtein’s first film Fill the Void centered around love and marriage as well with Burshtein picking up Ophir Awards (the Israeli version of the US Oscar) for Best Directing and Best Film for her first-time effort.
Actress Noa Koler portrays the film’s lead character, Michal. Despite being a relatively unknown film actress (The Wedding Plan is her first major role in a feature film), Koler garnered the Ophir Award for Best Actress for her notable efforts. Koler delivers a resounding performance displaying a gamut of emotions as Michal, a 32 year-old, Orthodox Jewish woman who wants a husband to love and to experience the comforts and security of marriage. According to Burshtein, the only way to consummate love in this community is through marriage. Seemingly not too much to want in a tight-knit religious community until Michal is jilted by her fiance in the weeks leading up to the wedding day set for the 8th night of Hanukkah. In teachings of Kabbalah, the mystical side of Judaism, the 8th day of Hanukkah is representational of the world of faith and belief.
Not to be derailed in her devotion to marriage, Michal sends out the invitations, gets a beautiful wedding gown and books the hall for her wedding and reception in Bnei Brak, a known ultra-Orthodox center with a unique ambiance of a simpler time. While booking the hall, a noticeable energy is in the air as Michal commits herself to this marriage. She has a hall, a dress and has completed the needed arrangements for a wedding. The only aspect missing is her groom! Michal’s mother and sister are dumbfounded and stupefied as Michal continues with her wedding full steam ahead.
Most of the film is shot in Jerusalem with exterior shots of Tel Aviv, including Jaffa, an ancient port in the city’s southernmost area.
Over the next 22 days, Michal goes on a spiritual adventure of extraordinary faith. Unwavering in her destiny, Michal ventures out on disastrous “blind dates” to find and secure a suitable husband. Her tenacious intellect and her dogged determination to have a husband who is committed to loving her takes the viewer on an intellectually stimulating ride. As the day of the ceremony draws closer, Michal puts everything on the line to find her happiness.
Various characters are introduced including Israeli heart throb, Oz Zehavi, as the delightful and lighthearted Yoz, a handsome, sensational pop musical star. Interestingly, Michal crosses paths with Yoz in Uman, Ukraine in a pivotal sequence shot at the tomb of Rabbi Nachman, an influential Hasidic spiritual leader. A phenomenon among believers is the ability to go through the wall of the tomb to the other side of faith and possibilities.
Michal is attempting to cement her desire to marry and to uncover her life’s pathway. She begs and pleads at the tomb’s wall posing life questions with strong passion. In response, a warm, tender male voice answers and Michal is unsure of herself and overcome with tender, heartfelt emotions until she comes to understand that the wall has a male side and a female side. The male on the other side turns out to be Yoz and he shows Michal how to be light and happy. But is he the one for Michal?
The Wedding Plan is scheduled to open May 12 in New York and May 19th in Los Angeles.
A strong, veteran supporting cast augments Kooler’s performance in a most unequivocal manner. In addition to Oz Zehavi, Amos Taman, a successful television actor on a popular Israeli series, plays Shimi, the owner of the venue Michal has booked for her wedding and Irit Sheleg, a well known media persona, plays Michal’s mother. Most tellingly, a powerful, shoulder-mounted cinematography provided by Amit Yasur captures the energy and life force of Michal’s world and helps create the film’s suspense and emotionality. Moreover, the film’s mise-en-scene is anything but drab as various shades of yellows, reds, pinks and blues complement the more traditional colors of gray, black and brown normally associated with Orthodox Judaism.
The Wedding Plan is an exceptional film full of inspiration on the endless possibilities life has to offer. Along the way, more than a few life truths are revealed and numerous insights into the heart, faith and daily obstacles of an Orthodox Jewish woman seeking love and marriage are brought to light. Highly recommended.
Source: THE WEDDING PLAN
Posted by Larry Gleeson
Adventure, life and death survival, rescue and self-discovery. Based on the true story of the life of first-time screenwriter/director Lori Stoll, the award-winning “Heaven’s Floor” (http://heavensfloorthemovie.com) is a soul-stirring feature touching hearts and inspiring moviegoers on the international film festival circuit. Set on the frozen tundra of the Canadian Arctic and Los Angeles where the real-life events took place, Stoll’s sentimental tale is packing theaters everywhere while collecting awards and picking up deserved accolades along the way – the winner of the Napa Valley Film Festival and the Grand Jury Award winner at the Alaska International Film Awards.
“Heaven’s Floor” will screen at the Newport Beach Film Festival on Sunday, April 23 (2:15pm) and Thursday, April 27 (2:30pm).
In “Heaven’s Floor,” the character based on Stoll, Julia, is played by Clea DuVall. A hot-shot photographer is intrigued at the invitation to embark upon an expedition traversing the spacious Canadian Arctic for a photographic assignment. Upon arrival, she found the promises made by her arrogant guide to be empty and she was utterly unprepared to face the brutal frigid conditions that confronted her. Abandoned and left
to fend for herself, Julia is rescued by an eleven-year-old Inuit girl, Malaya, and the girl’s uncle. They bring Julia to their little Inuit community where the photographer is stuck for over a week. During that time, she bonds closely with and becomes attached to Malaya, played by first-time actress Katie May Dunford, winner of the Best Actress award at the El Dorado Film Festival. Shortly after returning home to Los Angeles, Julia learns that Malaya has become orphaned. Instinctively compelled to bring the girl back home to live with her, conflict ensues between Julia and her husband and son, who resent Julia’s maternal decision. After Malaya struggles to adapt to her new home, family and busy new culture, Julia is left brokenhearted when her adopted daughter decides to return to her homeland.
Stoll’s adopted daughter, Malaya Qaunirq Chapman, serves as the film’s executive producer. Making the motion picture is the realization of a nearly decade-long project with the mother and daughter initially intending to share their story as a book. Instead, Stoll wrote a screenplay for the film that debuted at the Cinequest Film Festival.
(Source: Press material provided by Rick Scott)
