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Billy Gil

November 18, 2009
Magnolia to Bow ‘Chevolution,’ ‘Outrage,’ ‘The Burning Plain’

The Burning Plain

Magnolia Home Entertainment in January is releasing one great film I have seen and two that I need to.

The Burning Plain

Genre: Drama
Studio: Magnolia
Street date: 1/12
Prebook: 12/15
Price/Format: $26.98 DVD, $29.98 BD
Reserve for purchase (DVD or Blu-ray)
Reserve on Netflix

Charlize Theron and Kim Bassinger star in the latest from Guillermo Arriaga (Babel, 21 Grams, Amores Perros). Theron stars as a restaurant hostess with a secret sex life; Bassinger is a desperate housewife; and Jennifer Lawrence stars as a young woman who falls in love with a man her father hates. In typical Arriaga fashion, the stories intertwine, and, I’m guessing, in typical Arriaga fashion, you won’t want to miss it.

Outrage

Genre: Documentary
Studio: Magnolia
Street date: 1/19
Prebook: 12/22
Price/Format: $26.98 DVD
Reserve for purchase
Reserve on Netflix

Kirby Dick’s searing documentary opens the closet holding allegedly gay and definitely anti-gay rights politicians such as Florida Gov. Charlie Crist, Rep. David Dreier (R-San Dimas) and retired Rep. Jim McCrery (R-La.). Dick, the firebrand behind This Film is Not Yet Rated, another great doc that explored hypocrisy (in that film with the MPAA), interviews blogger Michael Rogers, who outs closeted politicians who vote against gay rights, as well as Rep. Barney Frank, the openly gay Massachusetts Democrat who’s always good for dropping sardonic bits of wisdom into a stew of bull droppings. You might feel conflicted about both Dick’s and Rogers’ tactics with regard to the right to privacy (I sure do), but it’s hard to ignore the film’s point about why such hypocrisy shouldn’t be allowed to continue without exposure when the end result is so damaging to a group of people.


Chevolution

Genre: Documentary
Studio: Magnolia
Street date: 1/19
Prebook: 12/22
Price/Format: $26.98 DVD
Reserve for purchase
Reserve on Netflix

Features interviews with various commentators on the socialist revolutionary, including actor Gael Garcia Bernal, Rage Against the Machine’s Tom Morello and artist Shepard Fairey.

November 17, 2009
Film Movement Expands Into Canadian Market

Canadian film buffs, take note: Independent and foreign film distributor Film Movement is launching a DVD subscription service in Canada.

As it does in the United States, the distribution company will offer Canadian users membership to a sneak preview DVD-of-the-month club at its new Canadian Web site, www.filmmovementcanada.com. Users can purchase 3, 6 or 12 month subscriptions to receive a new DVD each month as the film is opening in theaters, and months they hit retail and rental.

All film movement DVDs contain a feature film as well as a short film by a different director.

“Over the last seven years, Film Movement has grown enormously as a company, consistently exploring new distribution channels and revenue streams,” said Film Movement’s president, Adley Gartenstein. “Opening our DVD subscription service to Canadian consumers is the next logical step for Film Movement as we continue to expand the reach of the company and our ability to share the best in art-house cinema with film lovers across North America.”

November 16, 2009
James Toback’s ‘Two Girls and a Guy’ Features ‘Best’ Downey Performance

Two Girls and a Guy

Writer-director James Toback’s Two Girls and a Guy is one of the lost great movies of the 1990s. What might appear as a “Friends”-era sterile romantic comedy is actually as far removed from that as possible, full of nasty acts of duplicity and retribution and a faked suicide and an ‘NC-17’-worthy love scene (which really looks SO tame by today’s standards). But it’s still being very much of that era, exploring those “Sex in the ’90s” sexual mores like bisexuality and polyamorous relationships similarly explored in movies like Threesome while retaining the talkiness and headiness of films like Before Sunrise.

But likely the reason people will seek Two Girls and a Guy on Blu-ray Disc, recently released by Fox, is Robert Downey Jr.

“It was increasingly frustrating to me, given the absurd nature of the network of distribution and dissemination of movies today, that a movie that contained by far the best performance of an actor who is generally considered as good as any actor working today, to say nothing of the fact that the movie had all kind of acclaim over the years, that the film was largely unavailable,” Toback said of releasing the film on Blu-ray.

Toback approached 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment president Mike Dunn about releasing the film, and he was on board for releasing it on Blu-ray.

“I think anyone who’s seen Blu-ray will never again be able to look at DVD the same way again,” Toback said. “It is as big an improvement over DVD as HD television is over regular television and as big an advance as DVD was over VHS. We’re talking about an exponential leap in quality of sound, richness of color, precision of image … it’s impossible not to feel that there’s been a great discovery achieved.”

The Blu-ray Disc has a new conversation with Toback about the film in which he reveals the degree of improvisation he employed in the film, in particular with some of Downey’s more intense scenes. This is a chance to see Downey away from the respectable, post-addiction, Iron Man suit wearing (but still great) Downey of today and back when he was unhinged and ad libbing on set in weird, scary ways.

“It was very clear to me from the time he did that movie … that his skills are capable of full fruition and display in a movie only if you allow him to try what he wants to try and if you give him stuff that’s challenging and interesting,” Toback said. “When you give him stuff that excites him, he will be absolutely dazzling.

“Right now he’s in the franchise business, and that’s another racket and he’s carrying it off about as well as anyone’s carrying it off in the world. The Downey I worked with in Two Girls and a Guy is not the Downey that’s around today. He’s a different character.

“… I think he’s [now] doing what he wants to do and he’s getting extremely rich and extremely famous and … after being humiliated in an awful way in prison … I think he’s enjoying his success and his fame and his money and his marriage, and I say go with it.”

November 13, 2009
News From AFM 2009

This year IndieFile is reporting updates from the American Film Market (AFM). This page will be updated as news comes in, so check back. If you have news, please send it to indiefile@questex.com or bgil@questex.com.

• More acquisitions — Indican Pictures has acquired Re-generation, a sci-fi film they compare to the likes of Blade Runner and Twelve Monkeys. Starring Peter Stebbings and Clark Johnson, the film will be released in February 2010. Additionally, Breaking Glass has acquired distribution rights for the catalog of Unearthed Films (formerly distributed by TLA Releasing), comprising 26 titles. The deal includes U.S. and select international VOD rights. 

• Nov. 9 — Some news from Cinema Epoch on acquisitions: The company has acquired U.S. distribution rights to Skirt Day, starring Isabelle Adjani. Adjani stars as a teacher at a school for “difficult” children who becomes inadvertently involved in a hostage crisis. The film premiered at the Berlin Film Festival. The film will be released theatrically in early Spring and is one of Cinema Epoch's first theatrical acquisitions in the arthouse/foreign language market. Cinema Epoch also acquired North American distribution rights to Korean films Eye for an Eye and Fighter in the Wind from sales company Finecut, as part of Cinema Epoch's theatrical series of contemporary Korean cinema, which will screen in a tour of U.S. Cities, followed by DVD releases. More titles in the series are forthcoming.

•    Nov. 8 — A panel on changing independent film strategies backs the adage “the more things change, the more things stay the same” — everyone wants a theatrical release, but getting one and having it be successful is trickier than ever (read more here).

But perhaps the strangest thing I heard — or rather, saw — at AFM was footage of Michael Jackson's Neverland estate. And not the pseudo-crazy stuff — the private wing, with junk strewn about everywhere, Christmas garland permanently adorning the stairway and childlike mannequins all over the place. The footage was apparently taken during a police investigation. Alexander Nohe of Walking Shadows has seven hours of this stuff he's selling. Hey look, This is It has already made close to $60 million in the U.S. Alone. My guess is he won't have too much trouble finding a buyer.

•    The 30th AFM is playing host to more than 80 newly accredited acquisition companies, according to Jonathan Wolf, AFM managing director and EVP of the Independent Film & Television Alliance (IFTA). That more than doubles the number of first-time participants in most previous years. This year AFM is screening 486 films in 28 languages, including 75 world premieres and 328 market premieres.

•    Artist View for the 20th year held an opening night party, at Ye Olde King's Head Pub in Santa Monica, Calif. Filmmakers and cast from MTI Home Video films Pandemic and California Dreaming were in attendance. Pictured (L-R): Scott Jones, president, Artist View Entertainment; Patricia Richardson, actress, California Dreaming; Ricki Maslar, producer, Pandemic; Larry Brahms, president, MTI Home Video.

•    Artist View also picked up worldwide distribution for psychological thriller 31 North 62 East, starring John Rhys-Davies of “Lord of the Rings” fame; crime thriller Chicago Overcoat, starring Frank Vincent and Kathrine Narducci of “The Sopranos”; and suspense thriller The Other Side of the Tracks, starring stars Brendan Fehr (“Bones”) and Tanyia Ramond (“Lost”).

•    Bass Entertainment Pictures has inked with Epic Pictures Group for the international releases of psychological thriller Junkyard Dog, starring Vivica A. Fox and Brad Dourif, and action film Kill Speed, starring Andrew Keegan, Nick Carter and Tom Arnold. Both films screened at AFM. Epic also nabbed domestic distribution rights to Kill Speed.

•    Producer/director Damian Chapa (Polanski Unauthorized) and actress and co-producer Leslie Garza host the world premiere of Bobby Fischer Live, telling chess champ Bobby Fischer’s life story, at the Fairfax Theater in Los Angeles Nov. 10 at 7:30 p.m., with a red carpet at 6:30 p.m. Worldwide rights are available through Amadeus Pictures.

•    American Cinema International (ACI) has acquired two comedies from writing/directing team the Polish Brothers: Stay Cool, starring Winona Ryder, Mark Polish, Sean Astin, Hilary Duff, Josh Holloway, Jon Cryer and Chevy Chase; and Smell of Success, with Billy Bob Thorton, Teo Leoni and Kyle MacLachlan.
 

November 11, 2009
Metromix Picks Top 50 Movies of the Decade

Mulholland Dr.

Like any good film fan with mild OCD, I love lists. So I was excited to see for the first time a list of the best films of the decade thus far with Metromix's top 50 movies of the decade. Metromix is unveiling the list in groups of 10 over the next five weeks. Its first 10 already have two of my favorites — Mulholland Dr. and Before Sunset — as well as the most talked about movie in theaters right now. See if any your favorites made the list, and check back every week to see updates.

IndieFile lists new independent films on DVD and Blu-ray Disc, from comedy to horror to short film, as well as news from Cannes, Sundance and other film festivals, interviews and other indie movie news.