As many of you know, Tom Cruise plays a small roll in Ben Stiller's Vietnam movie farce "Tropic Thunder".

This is the role that many (dumb) critics are saying will revive the actor's career. Apparently, said career has "died" sometime around Mission Impossible 3 and his relationship with Katie Holmes (and Scientology). So in order to appeal to the main stream, Tom Cruise appeared in a fat suit and bald cap to play the vulgar and hip hop dancing Les Grossman.

I don't really know what Ben Stiller and Co. were thinking when they wrote this part. The main joke for Cruise's character is he is a self centered hairy fat man who loves the "F" word. I guess I was supposed to be falling over laughing when he danced to Flo Rida's Low. But, no. I sat quietly and wondered how the hell this is supposed to be funny.

I guess this is kind of the John Travolta in "Hairspray" brand of comedy. "Look at a washed up actor in a fat suit. He dances? No way. That is the funniest thing I've ever seen". I guess lots of people (middle age woman) went to see Hairspray to see John Travolta as a fat woman, but I do not think everyday people know Tom Cruise is in Tropic Thunder. Actual, the people I saw the film in barely even recognized him.

I really enjoyed (the majority of) Tropic Thunder, but when Tom Cruise started to dance over the credits I cringed. It really altered my thoughts on the film. If they had filled the screen time Cruise got being fat and funky, with Robert Downey Jr.'s hilarious (I was falling out of my seat) black Kirk Lazarus, the movie would have been a lot funnier. Even Ben Stiller and Jack Black's characters, who were hit-or-miss funny were better than Cruise.

I am not alone in this viewpoint. The friday night audience at Winston-Salem's Grand Theatre was just not laughing at Cruise. Their were some pity laughs, looks to freinds to see if they were laughing, and confused faces to whether this was supposed to be laugh-worthy; but no real laughter like through the rest of the film.

The day after I watched Tropic Thunder, I watched Paul Thomas Anderson's masterpiece "Magnolia", which also happens to feature Cruise. In Magnolia, Cruise plays a arrogant, sexist, air humping asshole. I laughed a lot, and this was a drama! Maybe if Cruise had brought some of that character into Tropic Thunder, it would have been better.

I just don't think this role is going to be the thing "reviving" Tom Cruise's career. Maybe he should just stick to action movies. Apparently not, Valkyrie, his next feature, looks like a drama that is bound to flop.

And oh, that scene when Barry (Sandler) attended his sister's birthday party and he talked with his brother-in-law (who is a dentist) about his problem, was amazing and touching and perfect. He (Sandler) told him (the brother-in-law) that he has a problem and asked if he could help him- that he sometimes doesn't like himself and that he cries a lot without any reason. Then he cried. It had me.

Absolutamente... NADA. Mas, seja por amizade ao Tom Cruise, o fato é que ele faz uma participação como figurante numa das cenas. Não me pergunte o que ele está fazendo ali, qual o propósito disso, que eu não sei.

Aliás, eu sei! É deixar a gente igual um retardado tentando achar ele na cena. Alguém do elenco em entrevista disse que talvez nem o próprio Paul Thomas Anderson consegue se identificar no quadro, mas ele aparece.

Segundo um site, ele está descendo a escada rolante quando o personagem do Tom Cruise sai do trem. Mas na cena há duas escadas rolantes: numa desce os policiais, na outra... não desce ninguém, embora haja algumas pessoas andando por lá, dando a entender que DESCERAM pela escada rolante. Isso deixa a coisa um pouco mais complexa.

Eu suspeito do policial que se abaixa no fundo. Se você frizar a imagem, poderá ver uma franjinha através do capacete bem ao estilo PTA.

Acho que nunca saberei quem é ele, mas eu sinto sua presença! *-* Isso conforta meu coração. =')

Mas se por acaso você identificá-lo, por favor, conte pra mim. ='/

Eu como bom apaixonado tarado absolutamente louco pelo Paul Thomas Anderson, e somado a isso o fato de eu ter o DVD do filme, fui lá e ripei a cena pra colocar no YouTube.

Uma bala de canela pra quem localizar ele:

Minority Report

(00:46:50 --> 00:47, 55)

UPDATE: Meus palpites (clique para abrir a imagem):

Palpite 1: O lazarento da frente tapa a cara do sujeito, mas o aspecto físico é bem PTA way of life.

Palpite 2: O policial com franjinha. Esse é o meu melhor palpite, mas realmente... não sei. =s

I think.

See, in Punch Drunk Love he doesn’t play the infantile man-child suffering from Arrested Development. Instead, such social and mental handicaps are forced upon him by his suffocating sisters—of which he has seven.

However, one of them does introduce him to a woman played by Emily Watson who is attracted to his childish, medication-necessary, antics (one running joke is about him throwing a hammer through a glass door as a child). She, strangely, is completely drawn into this world because, as I’m willing to purport, she sees the great and caring guy underneath.

That element of the film—the element of “holy shit, a woman is actually falling in love with this guy?”—is played out in a manner that doesn’t allow it to fall prey to the formula of having a turning point scene that sticks out blatantly. In Billy Madison, it was when he sticks up for a kid who pissed his pants. In Big Daddy, it was having a child show up at his door.

The other element that makes Paul Thomas Anderson’s film well done is that it’s not a high concept film (like Billy Madison’s “dumb guy goes back to school” or Big Daddy’s aforementioned random child appearing). It’s a simple film. Boy meets girl type of film done in such a different way that it makes it feel different from any other romance story I’ve seen.

One thing that I noticed in this movie that is done very well is the use of silence. It, mixed with the cacophonous soundtrack, add to the emotion of the scene. Such boredom and such dread sometimes mix with these two elements.

And what definitely adds to the silence and soundtrack is the cinematography which utilizes excellent, long, tracking shots up towards and away from subjects and objects either innocuous or belligerent. The only time that the camera movement stops is when Sandler’s life stops and isn’t as chaotic as everything around it. P.T. Anderson does a good job of marrying the images and the sound to give the effect necessary to pull off this movie in such a way that it keeps it from being like every other Adam Sandler film.

There’s also a nice little sub-plot involving Philip Seymour Hoffman and one of his call-girls, but that whole thing is so ridiculous that I leave to your viewing to experience all that excitement.

Comparada con cierta frecuencia con Ciudadano Kane, Pozos de ambición nos cuenta como nuestro odioso protagonista emprende un viaje hacia la cima del poder al tiempo que baja por la abrupta ladera de la moralidad. Daniel Plainview (Day Lewis) es un personaje apático y contradictorio, que anuncia la salvación para su riqueza personal y que se deshace de sus competidores con su ira incontenible.

De forma paralela tenemos al joven predicador Eli Sunday (un estupendo Paul Dano, el chico de pequeña miss sunshine) que, desde la religión, persigue los mismos objetivos, aunque de forma más pacífica. Ambos quieren controlar su comunidad y el choque de egos es inevitable.

De esta forma Paul Thomas Anderson, una de las mejores promesas juveniles del momento, nos hace reflexionar sobre algunos de los pilares de la sociedad americana (¿y poco a poco mundial?). Hay pocas cosas en américa tan socialmente bien vistas como el hombre que nació en un pueblo de Kentucky en el seno de una familia pobre, trabajó recogiendo tomates desde los 12 años, a los 20 consiguió abrir su tienda y 20 años después controla un negocio de varios miles de millones. Esto es, el hombre "hecho a sí mismo". Aquí se refleja como uno de los cimientos del país, de como se ha ido construyedo. Pero no con una imagen positiva. América, como tantos otros países, o mejor dicho, como el propio ser humano, ha ganado mucho de lo que tiene a base de falta de moralidad. A los indios nativos americanos no se les invitó amablemente a abandonar sus tierras. Los negros fueron tratados como animales durante años y años. Incluso en las oficinas modernas muchas veces hay que pisar al de al lado para destacar. El hombre hecho a sí mismo como figura poética es un engaño, y así lo ha querido retratar el director. Por otro lado centra su atención en la religión, el poder y la familia, tres bases de la sociedad, las tres aparentes y usadas a conveniencia.

La dirección es magistral. La banda sonora es polémica (de uno de los de Radiohead), pero a mí me parece que encaja perfectamente con el tono desquiciado de la película. Porque es una película rara pero fascinante a la vez. Las actuaciones aunque rocen la sobreactuación están formidables. Tanto Dano como, especialmente Lewis, saben mantener al espectador entusiasmado con su sola presencia, teniendo juntos al menos un par de escenas memorables. El final dará que hablar

Un 8,75

Magnolia is incredibly dense, incredibly deep and on an incredibly wide scale.  Clocking in at just over 3 hours long, this movie screams epic.  It interweaves nine separate storylines, all taking place in the San Fernando Valley.  PTA said he wanted to make "the epic, the all-time great San Fernando Valley movie", and I can't help but think that he succeeded.  In fact, there's so much to this movie that I'm going to have to resort to bullet points, and I don't know how far that will take us:

• I just read the Wikipedia article for this, and it really gives you a sense of the depth of this movie, what with all the storylines and the thematic elements and such.
• John C. Reilly is a chameleon.  He can be as silly or as serious as he wants, he can be in fucking Step Brothers or he can be in an incredible string of Oscar bait movies like Boogie Nights (also PTA), Chicago, Gangs of New York, The Hours, and The Aviator.  I just want him to come back to serious roles again, so he can be remembered for not just being Will Ferrell's sidekick.  Then again, an Oscar nominee who makes viral comedy videos is amazing.  Oh, well.  By the way, he's incredible here as police officer Jim Kurring.  That was my original point.  He seems to be one of three purely good souls that are main characters here.  The other two are about to follow, but I just want to say that if you want to remake any movie that had Karl Malden in it, please please please cast John C. Reilly.  They seem like they'd be perfect for each other's roles.
• The second good guy is Philip Seymour Hoffman as Phil Parma, and word has finally gotten out that this could be the best actor in Hollywood.  He hadn't yet come into his own here, and I personally liked his work from Boogie Nights better, but he does the "I know how serious this moment is" cry very well, and a lot.
• The final good guy is child actor Jeremy Blackman as quizboy Stanley Spector.  He's solidly in Haley Joel Osment territory here, with big eyes that are very serious and a way of carrying himself that gives away how intelligent he is, or his character at least.  His character is possibly the most interesting.
• I really wish Tom Cruise wasn't a fucking douchebag Scientologist.  The douchebag part is more important, because everyone still loved Isaac Hayes, even after he quit South Park over his beliefs.  RIP Chef.  I wish Tom Cruise wasn't a douchebag because he's a great actor, really really creepy and awesome here as Frank T.J. Mackey, a guy who teaches other guys how to, you guessed it (actually, I really hope you didn't guess it), turn women into their sexual playthings.  He gets a great reveal.
• I get to talk about Jason Robards again! He's so amazing here as "Big" Earl Partridge, probably my second favorite performance, and he gives vitality to a character on his deathbed throughout the whole movie, while adding the authenticity to that very deathbed.  He's one of those actors that's always himself as the role, like George Clooney or Cary Grant, but he makes it work better than anyone I've seen.
• My favorite performance goes to William H. Macy as former quizboy Donnie Smith, a man who was warped by the childhood that Stanley Spector is on his way to having - his dad took all his prize money, and as he says, "I really do have love to give! I just don't know where to put it."  He's so great and twitchy, I just love his character even though he has such little inherent pathos.
• 728 words and only talking about the actors so far.  Jeez.  Okay, so the writing is so good it's beyond comprehension.  The way that unrelated stories come together without you even realizing it - I mean, it's not your classic come-together story in that all the stories converge on one point, it's that every story influences another story in the movie, whether at the beginning, middle or end, and these connections are what the preamble of the movie talk about, how interlocking circumstance is really what makes the world go round, and if enough circumstances come together, real shit goes down.  And it goes down.  In addition, the dialogue has that great combination of being real and being cinematic and dramatic that now seems to be PTA's trademark.
• Let me backtrack for a second.  Paul Thomas Anderson is an incredible young filmmaker.  His three biggies have been, in succession, Boogie Nights, Magnolia, and There Will Be Blood.  All of them are long, deeply interesting, engaging films that make you think, and hard.  He is on my shortlist of filmmakers to watch as I grow older.
• He was the writer-director on all three of those films, and his directing here is also incredible, if a little Kubrickian in its mercilessness.  Its long closeups on the pained expressions of Cruise, Robards, Philip Baker Hall as game show host Jimmy Gator (also great here), and others are probably the trademark of this film.
• Thematically, apart from the chance encounters thing that I talked about earlier, a lot of this is how familial relationships shape our interactions with the rest of the world, with Robards influencing Cruise, Stanley's dad fucking him up, and others.  It's a really tough theme, but PTA handles it well.
• PTA's director of photography for all of his movies, Robert Elswit, was great if not "oh my god look at that camerawork" great here.  Elswit did win the Oscar for TWBB, though I thought that Roger Deakins deserved it for the second best movie of last year, The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford.  Still, Elswit rules - he also did work for Michael Clayton, and surprisingly, Good Night and Good Luck, and anyone who's seen that movie can tell you how much he did for that movie.

SPOILERS

• If this film is remembered for one thing, it will be the frogs.  Oh my god, the frogs.  Why they fell from the sky, no one tells you when you're watching the movie, except for Stanley when he says, "This happens" at his moment of childhood serenity that happens for most kids at the end of movies of depth (see the two good M. Night movies, Star Wars Ep. I, literally any teen movie that has a protagonist).  See the wikipedia article for its significance, I'm still not entirely sure about it, but what I do know is that it's done so artfully and epically that I don't need to know what it means.  It seems like it fit at the time when a beloved TV icon was about to kill himself after revealing that he may have molested his daughter, when the greatest misogynist the world has ever known cries at his father's deathbed for abandoning his mother, and when a quizboy-turned-thief has a change of heart for the wrong reasons.
• I didn't know that kids say remarkably profound monologues when they pee their pants.  I want to see if that happens a lot.
• The whole issue with Donnie Smith and the braces made me want to cry in the best way, because it's such pure heartache and unadulterated, adolescent love in the craziest way that I have no idea how else to react.

Okay, nearly 1400 words is enough.  Hope you got through it all and don't hate me for it.  I know you won't, Kriti, I'm talking to everyone else.

Francamente, é uma coisa... sei lá... doentia, mas eu precisava ver ele na cerimônia. Ele não apresenta nenhum dos troféus, ele não leva nenhum troféu que o fizesse subir para discursar, maaaassss... A câmera, vez por outra, mostra ele, e isso basta. O Daniel Day-Lewis (meu sósia, lembrando ;D) agradece o Oscar de melhor ator para o Paul Thomas Anderson, e então a câmera mostra ele por TRÊS SE-GUN-DOS. Genti, não é demais? *-*

Baixar 1,4Gb, quase três horas de vídeo, quando o que lhe interessa é apenas 20 segundos... Ah, isso é amor. =')

E eu vou aproveitar pra lançar uma campanha porque ontem... tipo, a bicha do Pablo me deixou arrepiado em pensar que Paul Thomas Anderson poderia promover There Will Be Blood aqui... no BRASIL! *-*

Eu ia sem pensar duas vezes. E ia dar um jeito de agarrar ele. *-* Tirar uma foto atolando a mão na bunda dele, aiai. Genti.

Então, apoie a campanha:

QUEREMOS PAUL THOMAS ANDERSON NO BRASIL!

Ou, também:

AIMEE MANN, TURNÊ MUNDIAL COM ESCALA NO BRASIL!

Obrigado pela atenção, tenha um bom dia. =)

Sombre est ce film qui à sa manière, parle de l'Histoire américaine. Le pétrole, cet or noir qui fait briller les plus grands hommes d'affaire et qui fait tourner le monde aujourd'hui. Le pétrole, un produit de la terre que l'homme réclame au nom de l'argent et par le sang. Paul Thomas Anderson n'est un cinéaste que j'aime particulièrement. Il lui manquait souvent une modestie. Mais ce film est une exception, audacieux et actuel.

Les vingt premières minutes, très fortes visuellement, forment une des plus belles introductions du cinéma. Crues et latentes, les images dégagent un sentiment puissant de souffrance et de solitude. Les deux étant liés dans une forme assez expressioniste. A cette introduction répond la séquence finale enfermant le film dans la folie, comme si elle était la somme de la souffrance et de la solitude du début.

"Je suis un faux prophète, Dieu est une superstition".

Une critique du pouvoir et de l'omniprésence de l'argent dans nos vies, les paradoxes submergent le film. Entré beauté et cruauté, les personnages ne savent à quel Dieu se vouer. Désorientés et contrôlés, les frontières qui les séparent de la folie s'effacent peu à peu mais avec rigueur. Le capitalisme dans sa froideur la plus totale gangrène le sort des personnages et notamment les dux qui s'affrontent tout au long du film: le pétrolier Daniel Plainview (Daniel Day-Lewis) et le prêtre Eli Sunday (Paul Dano). Alors que Danial Day-Lewis m'a laissé de marbre, la prestation de Paul Dano m'a, au contraire, terriblement touché. Une gueule comme on n'en invente pas, il dégage pourtant un charisme inquiétant et séduisant.

]]> http://studentradio.wordpress.com/?p=190 Tue, 29 Jul 2008 08:14:23 +0000 ausrt01 http://studentradio.wordpress.com/?p=190 Show 20- Just filled in while nick was living it up in melb. The playlist included:

MC FROST-I CAN'T STAND YOU'RE WAYS             PRECIOUS MEMORIES- RESPECTISM

ZETA- PEN VS. SWORD                                         SKYHOOKS- HORROR MOVIE

ZETA- RUNAWAY                                                  LES YUEX NOIRS-CIOARA

THE BLACK SORROWS-COME ON COME ON          MC FROST- CONFRONT THE FACT

PRECIOUS MEMORIES- NETHERBY IN SPRINGFIELD

Show 21- Phillip Seymour Hoffman

Film News:Merc. Cinema. Don't forget to book for the new Gus Van Sant film "Paranoid Park" that screens August the 4th. The cost is only $11/$9 for a student.

Seniors on screen starts August 1st. So get anyone over 50 down to 13 Morphett street to see a great selection of films and participate in workshops Tickets only $4. Details for both can be found @ www.mercurycinema.org.au

New Releases include The Savages (NEW PSH film), How About You?, The X Files: I Want To Believe (*Possibly the Razzie of the year) and The Forbidden Kingdom

The Melbourne International Film Festival started last Thursday. It's on till the 10th of August. http://www.melbournefilmfestival.com.au/2008/2008_festival The Brisbane Film Festival too will get underway on the 31st of July till the 10th of August. The impressive line-up will include In Bruges starring Colin Farell and Ralph Fiennes, Wong Kar-Wai's latest movie Ashes of Time: Redux, the B&W animation Persepolis and David Mamet's new Martial Arts film Redbelt. http://www.stgeorgebiff.com.au/

Phillip Seymour Hoffman

In honor of his new film The Savages we wanted to explore the acting man-bear that is the other Hoff man

Hoffman is quite the versatile beast. He is well known for his range of characters. He can go from gay pornstar boom operators, timid joe schmos to aggressive mattress vendors like that.  Alas i do no justice to  him check out his impressive  CV @http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0000450/

A few of our mutual favourites to check out include:

Boogie Nights (1997) dir. Paul Thomas Anderson       The Big Lebowski (1998 ) dir.The Cohens

Happiness (1998 ) dir. Todd Solondz               Punch-Drunk Love (2002) dir. PTA

Playlist: SNIFFIN THE TEARS-DRIVER'S SEAT//REM-HAPPINESS//ELO-LIVIN' THING//AIR SUPPLY-ALL OUT OF LOVE

Catch- TOM ;)

If you don't remember what this film is about, let me refresh your memory: Morally Ambiguous Oilman vs. Morally Ambiguous Prophet (The Fight of the Fucking Century only on PPV [after Girls Gone Wild: First Timers])

It might even be better that I haven't written about this film because, unlike some of my reviews (Blood Simple, Magnolia, Platoon, Boondock Saints), I'm writing after multiple viewings. Therefore, it's bound to be less reactionary and more reflective or analytical.

I first saw this film when it was in the limited stage of its platform release. I was packed into a theater in Pasadena because I really wanted to see Paul Dano tear the motherfucking roof off. I really liked him in Little Miss Sunshine and the scenes we see of him in the trailers are awesome in its most absolute sense.

If you remember the show Carnivale that used to be on HBO, he reminds me a bit of Brother Justin who was a preacher that turned out to be very evil inside. And that's what I see in Dano's character Eli Sunday. A lot of facade and a whole lot more of evil and greed.

I'll be the first to admit that I wanted to see this film because of Paul Dano and not Daniel Day-Lewis. Hell, I've never even seen Gangs of New York (Scorsese is tough for me).

What I got from Paul Thomas Anderson's directing and writing was a film built more upon facial expressions and subtlety than upon dialog. A film that it takes multiple viewings to finally understand some things. It's like a bizarro David Lynch film like Lost Highway or Mulholland Dr. (Inland Empire has no meaning. It's three hours of existential crises that make Samuel Beckett jealous) except instead of the twists being within the plot, they're within the face. There are many things that could've been said but, instead, Anderson chose for them to be expressed.

Which is the pacing complaint arises. When there's no dialog and just two people looking at each other on screen, most people are bound to get bored--especially upon first take. But these "boring" moments are where the film excels. The cold stares of Day-Lewis and the conniving or sniveling, desperate, looks of Dano speak louder than any word could have. Anderson acknowledges the adage\cliche that "a picture is worth a thousand words," and, in a movie where things are composed of 24 pictures per second, why fucking bother with words sometimes? You can't cram 24,000 words into a second of film--but you can at the same time if you take to the adage as Anderson has.

This film excels at speaking depths while silently rolling towards its anti-climax. It is a character study taken to its highest level. It nearly throws plot by the wayside in favor of showing, slowly or quickly, just what Day-Lewis is doing at each and every second. The movie's pace slows enough for us to take in every single piece of the character. It's so beautiful, and it's only upon multiple viewings do you realize such a thing.

Another aspect of this film that really excels is the scoring by Jonny Greenwood. He swirls and moves his pieces like a horror film so as to accent the tension in each scene he's needed. (Fun Fact, by the way: The movie is 158 minutes while the score is only about 50 minutes) Some of his pieces sound like an orchestra simply tuning up before the big show--and it works because that's exactly what this movie has. A lot of tuning before a small piece.

And you haven't listened to his piece "Popcorn Superhet Receiver," you really should (I found a link where you can stream it in Real Audio, which is kind of a shitty format, but it's a good piece of music that deserves a listen). And listen to Radiohead, he's pretty good at guitar too.

There's a weird moment at the beginning of this trailer - a sound actually. When the Paramount Vantage logo flashes on screen, there's a fairly loud noise of what sounds like a giant or ogre shouting. I still to this day have no idea what it is, but I always know it's going to be there at the beginning of the trailer. When I searched for this trailer on youtube and the first one I clicked on didn't have the noise at the beginning, I knew I didn't have the official trailer.

ANYWAY, of course this trailer has to start with Daniel Day-Lewis, extreme close-up, and a nice pregnant pause before the first line of the trailer "Ladies and gentlemen...". Beginning the trailer with anything other than Day-Lewis would be crazy, he's reached a level of acting notoriety where his name creates about half the hype for the movie. When I was first told to watch this trailer it was referred to me as "the new Daniel Day-Lewis movie".

Right after Day-Lewis' opening line comes the next best part of this trailer, the music of Jonny Greenwood (from the band Radiohead). After seeing the film it was clear to me that Greenwood's musical score for the film was one of the best I've ever heard - it was the driving force behind everything that went on. The trailer features a kind of mash-up of the score, with a few of the songs mixed together to provide the driving force behind the trailer just as it did for the whole film.

The first act gives us another mash-up, this one of Day-Lewis' famous speech that he gives to the townspeople to propose a new well - in the actual film it's a bit longer, but I almost prefer the trailer version. It's concise and informative, not to mention easier to memorize. Some parts of the speech are shown, others are voice overs while we see scenes of men doing the actual work. We also are introduced to nearly all the relevant characters of the film: Plainview, his son H.W., Abel Sunday, and Eli Sunday (Paul Dano) - we also get a clip of Eli doing his Church schtick so we know what his character is all about. Not to mention a couple clips of things breaking and falling into the well, and oil shooting out of the ground very forcefully (foreshadowing!).

TURN

What a turn in this trailer. Day-Lewis finishes his speech, which is punctuated by a loud, abrupt sound that sounds like a giant metal door slamming shut. Timed with the sound is the slide for Paul Thomas Anderson, written in beautifully appropriate Old English font. Then the next shot we see is massive oil rig spraying oil everywhere as a fireball ignites at the base, quickly rocketing its way up the derrick. Follow that up with the shot of an oil-drenched Day-Lewis illuminated by fire, watching as if he's worshiping it. At the same time Greenwood's score has changed into something nightmarish and forboding. You can tell things are not right just from these few seconds.

Money becomes an issue - we see businessmen making an offer ( "$150,000 for full title") and Eli Sunday asking Plainview for his money, followed by a brutal slap from Plainview. Follow that up with another great line from Plainview (this time we see him on screen as well) "I look at people and I see nothing worth liking". The end of that line is immediately punctuated with an exploding oil derrick, and a flurry of clips. EVERY ONE of these clips shows something going wrong:

Men running to the burning derrick:

A man falling into an open shaft:

Someone walking away from a man left in the mud:

The rising action in the second act of the trailer continues, with a brief pause for another quote from Plainview ( "I see the worst in people"), followed quickly with a shot of him in Church getting doused in water, a grin still on his face, and a voice over from Dano "We have a sinner with us. Get OUT of here devil!" The second line is heard over a brilliantly done quick three shots:

Plainview:

H.W. (watch it in real time and his head turns from one to the other)

Eli Sunday:

It's basically a modified eyeline match, created with three separate shots, all in just a couple of seconds within the trailer. Anyone who's seen the movie knows how the relationship between Plainview and Sunday is the motivation and most captivating part of the film, and amazingly that theme has been captured within this one tiny portion of the preview.

Next is a final voiceover from Day-Lewis: "I have a competition in me. I want no one else to succeed." This is heard over some more quick clips:

Burning oil running through a house:

Eli Sunday's Church routine:

Plainview carrying H.W. while both are covered in oil (clearly running away from something as other men run the opposite direction):

Another burning derrick:

Plainview spooning H.W. as they're both covered in oil:

Plainview, covered in oil in front of a derrick, like he's conducting an orchestra:

*SPOILER ALERT*

Fittingly the last in the flurry of clips is actually from the last scene in the movie:

*END SPOILER ALERT*

At this point the music has reached its climax and fades out, leaving us with one more clip of Plainview and an eerie quote: "I can't keep doing this on my own...... with these...... people." He then let's out an absolutely maniacal laugh, and we're hit with the most beautiful, punctuating, title shot I've ever seen in a trailer:

Add a touch more ominous music from Greenwood, and you have a masterpiece.

It's a perfect synthesis of two acts - vastly different emotionally, but unified with repeated shots of characters and oil work. The result is a trailer that creates dramatic rising action all the way through - slowly in the first act, but rapidly in the second. It's the second act that really builds up that feeling in your gut, where you know something horrible is coming. Like I mentioned before, the music of Jonny Greenwood plays a major part in creating that feeling.

And it all builds up to a title - something so normal and assumed it couldn't possibly evoke any feelings from the viewer, but this one does. There Will Be Blood. All the suspense and tension and rising dread we felt throughout the preview isn't confirmed by something we see, but by the most ominous title we can imagine.

"There Will Be Blood"

(UPDATE: Adam from L'Enfant Terrible was thoughtful enough to point out to me that the mysterious noise at the beginning of the trailer is Daniel Day-Lewis clearing his throat. I'll admit it took me a few listens to hear it and have it make sense - he does it three times. Now I can sleep easy.)

You look like... a perfect fit,
For a girl in need... of a tourniquette.
But can you save me?
Come on and save me...
If you could save me,
From the ranks of the freaks,
Who suspect they could never love anyone.

'Cause I can tell... you know what it's like.
A long farewell... of the hunger strike.
But can you save me?
Come on and save me...
If you could save me,
From the ranks of the freaks,
Who suspect they could never love anyone.

It struck me down, a gradient
Like Peter Pan, or Superman,
You have come... to save me.
Come on and save me...
If you could save me,
From the ranks of the freaks,
Who suspect they could never love anyone,
Except the freaks,
Who suspect they could never love anyone,
But the freaks,
Who suspect they could never love anyone.

Come on and save me...
Why don't you save me?
If you could save me,
From the ranks of the freaks,
Who suspect they could never love anyone,
Except the freaks,
Who suspect they could never love anyone,
Except the freaks,
Who could never love anyone.

For all that could have been, then, a toast.

If there's a conference next year - and sadly, it really is a case of if and not when - I think I might make the trip.  I'd get press credentials, but I'd need a laptop, airfare, commitment.  In the twilight years of E3, I'm certainly not alone in wondering: is it still worth it?

E3 was once the axis around which the games industry spun, the great stationary star at the centre of an elaborate mobile.  The publicity machines all began there, with an announcement at one press conference or another or a demo on the show-floor.  Games began their time in the media at E3 by necessity, though, not choice.  There was no better network to begin diffusing whatever information publishers opted to share.  There was no Kotaku; news was slow.  Broadband was just a binary glimmer in some techhead's beady eyes; there were no streaming conferences, no game-video aggregators for fans to frequent.  Largely, it was E3 or nothing, and amid the craven crowd, so many brilliant little games simply didn't show right.  There was no time for depth or complexity, subtlety or artistry of any sort.  At the end of the day, if a game didn't sell itself in a two-minute trailer or a quarter-hour demo, it was dead on arrival.

It didn't work, then.  But however negative an experience it may have been for publishers and developers, for those of us on the outside, E3 was a joyous spectacle.  And I don't care how many massive LCDs Sony daisy-chained for their press conference - it's lost that grandiosity.  Development budgets have blossomed into behemoths in every other sense but for the LA presentations that used to be so pivotal.  Enthusiasts are better equipped now to learn about a new game, no matter the season or the mainstream press coverage.  And there are other events: Leipzig, E for All, PAX, the Tokyo Game Show, to name just a few.

Industry yuppies Gamecock threw an attention-seeking funeral march for E3 last year, and I despised them for it.  In 2008, I wonder if, all their hateful, juvenile shenanigans aside, they mightn't have been mistaken.  All that the conference serves to do these days is showcase the next few months of the gaming calendar, and there are easier, cheaper, more appropriate ways to do that; ways that don't see tens of developers wasting precious time on imagined milestones; hundreds of perfectly worthwhile games slip through the cracks; thousands of journalists swept off their feet in all the madness; and millions of fans disappointed, time and again.

But don't misunderstand me.  There were some absolutely brilliant games at the convention this year; more, I think, than in 2007.  The horror genre in particular looks to be seeing something of a renaissance, with Dead Space leading the charge:

For all the wonderful perversity of scoring your teaser with a terrifying rendition of Twinkle Twinkle Little Starl, however, there's another, more traditional horror game on the way that has my (proverbial) panties well and truly twisted.  The newly christened Silent Hill: Homecoming is the fifth instalment proper in the franchise, and after the disappointment of the next-gen debut of Alone in the Dark, I couldn't be more excited to see the genre's best and darkest return to the fore:

I won't get bogged down in the particulars of whether or not Pyramid Head has any place outside of Silent Hill 2.  I won't mention that Pyramid Head, as the embodiment of James' guilt over slaughtering Mary, shouldn't exist now that the town has held him accountable for his hateful sins, because if I'm honest, my reaction to his promised appearance in Silent Hill: Homecoming was basically profuse pant-wetting.

There were, too, a few noticeable absences.  There was nothing to be seen of the 360 motion controller that's had the interwebs all abuzz lately, and for that, I'm grateful to all that's holy.  There was no New Super Mario Brothers 2 or Wii Zelda.  Neither were Level 5, the fan-favourite developers of Dark Cloud and Dragon Quest VIII, anywhere to be seen, and with Metal Gear Solid 4 come and gone and the next Final Fantasy no longer platform exclusive, their latest effort, White Knight Story, stands as Sony's strongest trump card.  Excepting, perhaps, the absence I felt most profoundly: anything new from the Ico team.  Shadow of the Colossus is still the greatest game of all time - never have I been touched or played by a game in quite the same way - and it's been too long since I wandered that masterful world.  Much too long.

I still miss Argo.

TGS and the inevitable reveal can't come soon enough, then, but until then, the new Prince of Persia is an obvious homage, and so breathtaking I can hardly conjure the words to do it justice.  I've already tried once and lost a post amid my procrastinations, so.  Without further ado:

If you're still hungry, there's a few new articles over at Ace Gamez for your enjoyment.  In my Space Invaders Extreme review I suggest that even girl turrets stand a chance, while in the Ticket to Ride piece I talk a little about cock-blocking, which is always fun.

And there's a bunch in the pipeline for All Things Uncertain over the next few weeks, including a review of the Blu-ray of There Will Be Blood, a look at Tana French's forthcoming In the Woods follow-up, and something about Yoko Ogawa's The Diving Pool, which the lovely folks at Harvil Secker sent along this morning to tide me over until galleys arrive for the next Murakami.  I'll say this much already: it looks startlingly original.

For now, though - that's all, folks.

***

Soundtrack to this entry: Filter - Title of Record

Então, Barry, e seu orgão(ou pequeno piano?) são amor, em carne e símbolo. Ele toca o instrumento quando está nervoso. Quando o acaricia, então se acalma. E não é por acaso que Barry e seu orgão (ou pequeno piano?) são tratados como bizarrices no filme. O motivo mora na freqüente pergunta: O que é o amor?

Outra simbologia magistral é o acidente do começo do filme, aonde aquela capotagem, bem é como Barry está prestes a sentir-se: capotado. Virado, sacudido entre seus cacos e ao amor dentro dele. Um amor que ele não consegue expressar, senão com seus choros repentinos, ou com suas porradas em paredes, vidros e banheiros. A força que possue a ameaça de morte que Barry faz a sua irmã para conseguir o endereço de Lena no Havaí, mostra a beleza e mesmo, a força desse amor que reside dentro de Barry. Essa força que cresce, ao ponto de Barry ir de Los Angles até Utah para encontrar o do dono da loja de colchões, e o ameaçar... com amor!

Ameaças, ameaças, ameaças. O amor assusta, e o mais irônico é que Barry, tido como frágil e desequilibrado é que encara de frente a porrada bêbada chamada amor. Falo ainda sobre a trilha que, ousada, não é música, mas o verdadeiro som do coração: um emaranhado de timbres e sonetos, harmonia então quando se respira, resultando em um ofegante suspiro. E concluo dizendo que está no olhar de Sandler e no movimento da câmera, o receio de ser criticado e julgado por sentir tanto as coisas. E mais: os diálogos, que não têm espaço para pieguice ou clichê. Ousado, verdadeiro, mágico, sonoro, musical: Embriagado de Amor foi a melhor porrada que eu já ganhei. Ufa!, respiro... Ofegante.

Falando em porradas e/ou socos, eu assistindo 341 vezes ao filme, não tinha reparado em algo. Nessa semana então que embrigado, fiz a maratona Punch-Drunk Love, percebi outra (das tantas) simbologia, subliminar-sútil sublime. Peguei a cena e tive que upar no youtube, para compartilhar com fãs do filme e do diretor. Abaixo o soco amor:

outros comentários sobre este vídeo

This week's edition: Songs and scores made for one film, then used for another film to create an unnerving experience in its new setting.

De Usuahia a la Quiaca/Pajaros - Gustavo Santaolalla

The Motorcycle Diaries (starts at 3:36)

My Blueberry Nights

Save Me - Aimee Mann

Magnolia (music video)

The Jane Austen Book Club ( starts at 6:58 )

Read on dear web-fiend....

To win a copy, just answer this incredibly simple question:

There will be what?

a. Tea

b. Blood

c. Melted-down cheesestrings

Send your answers to competitions@the-void.co.uk by August 3.

Hoje é aniversário de Paul Thomas Anderson, mas o presente quem ganha, somos nós brasileiros: 11 anos depois de sua estréia, Boogie Nights finalmente será lançado em DVD no Brasil. A data prevista é dia 16 de julho. Antes do parabéns, clique no banner do filme...

E agora, depois de comer os doces e salgados da festa, aprecie sem moderação(e sem legenda), uma das melhores cenas do filme(e da história do cinema):

9 years ago, I was shopping at a virgin megastore and I did my yearly routine of randomly selecting one dvd and one cd from a bin and buying them. That year, I picked the Fiona Apple CD (now one of my favorite artists) and the magnolia dvd (arguably my favorite film ever). I guess, as magnolia points out fabulously :  "This cannot be a matter of chance : strange things happen all the time".

Note : how I managed to pick  up these two and adore them is already quite coincidental. But what do you say about the fact that Fiona Apple and Paul Thomas Anderson (the director) were dating at that time. Freaky !!!

What a masterpiece of cinema that film. First of all, the script is smart, witty and so layered it would make your head spin. And I'm not talking about the obvious layering of the parallel stories. It goes way beyond this and avoids the stupid "lives colliding" cliché by making the stories connected on deeper levels than crossing each other on the street. The pace is a monster of a success and goes from intense, high-paced segments to moving monologues without ever failing to generate some strong, genuine emotion in you.

The acting is top notch, from everyone involved. I'd have to give a special nod to Tom Cruise whose performance in this is so good it almost makes you forget about all the stupidity surrounding that guy. Also notable are, well, everyone else in this film !

The cinematography  is consistently georgous, the camera work is complex and grandiose. The camera follows the feelings and reaches down in your gut like a sharp knife. It plays a big part in why this film is so good and if the treatment was any different, the film would fail.

And lastly, the songs ! Ahhh, the songs ! Aimee Mann has long been one of my favorite songwriters because she just nails the human condition so well. She just knows how to describe the lives of people who are in constant sorrow but have peaks of ephemerous happiness that make life so perfectly liveable. The fact that magnolia is written based on her songs (and not the other way around) is a testimony to a wonderful artist. Oh, and did I mention the fabulous score by Jon Brion ?

All around, the film is perfectly crafted but doesn't lack its faults. But who care about faults when the whole is so enjoyable.

I'm going to go ahead and say it :  Paul Thomas Anderson is the best director on the contemporary scene. Don't agree with me ? write your own blog! :)

Here's his response, at Image.

Before you made Hard Eight I presume that this wasn’t the first script you wrote. How come you chose it to be your first one?

Yes I had only written maybe one or two other scripts that I didn’t really like that much and I liked this one and it seemed that I could do it. It seemed that I could make a movie which was small with only four characters in Reno, Nevada and that I could raise money for it. It was really all I had.

You had no choice!

Yeah but I really didn’t need any other choice. It was that movie that I wanted to make. I got very lucky on that movie just to start making it but I got in a lot of trouble when I made the movie. There were some producers that fired me actually after I… It was my movie. I mean I wrote it and directed it and then I found these guys to finance it and they were real criminals.

(Laughing)

I put the movie together. And they had all these ideas for cuts that I wouldn’t make. Some of them were actually good ideas but I was too arrogant to like see that they were good ideas and they were kind of dicks too. But they ended up taking the movie away from me. It was like this amazing lesson very early on where I was hit fucking repeatedly over and over again and I fought and I desperately tried to get the movie back and it was just a long, long battle. And eventually I got the movie back but there was a period where I did get beat up enough and where I was swimming in the darkest depression and I thought my career is over and I will never get another chance. But I pulled my self out of it somehow and the only way that I could get things going again is if I go to work again. So I went and got Boogie Nights made and the amazing thing in doing that was I went to get Boogie Nights made and that became kind of easy, getting money for it and at the same time I reinvestigated the fight to get my first movie back. And I got that movie back so I was in pre-production on Boogie Night while I was re-cutting and finishing off my first movie. And it was kind of a this great lesson that I learned just having gone in this really deep and dark depression where I couldn’t get out of my fucking bed and the only thing that I could do is just get up and attack, attack and attack. And I am happy that that happened. So it was kind of a great first lesson on my first movie. And I was able to learn right then and there all kinds of mistakes that I have made. All that arrogance where I wasn’t seeing anything and where they were right and I was just too blind to notice it. But I also learned that I was right on a lot of stuff and I should have fought for what I believed. So it’s just kind of a great lesson on my first movie.

This is a second great tip of the season. Beat depression by breaking it!

Yeah! Absolutely!

MP3: Fake Plastic Trees