Oliver Stone Votes for ‘Bush’ Project

By MICHAEL FLEMING, Variety 
Posted: Sun., Jan. 20, 2008, 3:57pm PT

One need only Google the words “Stone” and “Bush” to find plenty of the director’s critical comments about the Bush administration’s invasion of Iraq. Despite that, the director said he’s not looking to make an anti-Bush polemic.

His goal is to use seminal events in Bush’s life to explain how he came to power, using a structure comparable to “The Queen.”

“It’s a behind-the-scenes approach, similar to ‘Nixon,’ to give a sense of what it’s like to be in his skin,” Stone told Daily Variety. “But if ‘Nixon’ was a symphony, this is more like a chamber piece, and not as dark in tone. People have turned my political ideas into a cliche, but that is superficial. I’m a dramatist who is interested in people, and I have empathy for Bush as a human being, much the same as I did for Castro, Nixon, Jim Morrison, Jim Garrison and Alexander the Great.”

To read the full article by Michael Fleming click here.

written by RHIFF

by Shannonn Kelly 

One our our favorite smokey-voiced actresses is dead. Suzanne Pleshette died Saturday in her Los Angles home of respiratory failure. She was 70.

Pleshette is best remembered as Emily Hartley the hot, smart school teacher and wife to stuttering, laid-back Chicago psychologist Robert Hartley, played by Bob Newhart on the Bob Newhart Show, from 1972-1978.

Married to former Bob Newhart Show co-star Tom Poston in 2001, who also died from respiratory failure in Los Angeles on April 30, 2007.

I only realized the parallel recently that she played yet another smart school teacher in “The Birds” directed by Alfred Hitchcock. Seeing the film last month, I was struck by Pleshette’s complex rendering of Annie Hayworth, the pining dalliance that over-stayed her welcome after being dumped by Mitch (played by Rod Taylor) in Bodega Bay. She probably out-acted Tippi Hendren in many fans eyes.

Sadly, Pleshette was scheduled to receive her star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame on January 31, 2008, which would have been her 71st birthday

To read the New York Times article on Ms. Pleshette, click here.

written by RHIFF

by Shannonn Kelly 

LOS ANGELES, California (AP) –

Every year there are several book-club favorites that turn up at the multiplex. Perusing the list of Academy Award best-picture winners can feel like a trip to Barnes & Noble, from “Gone With the Wind” and “The Godfather” to “The Silence of the Lambs” and “The English Patient.”

But during this tumultuous, strike-hobbled awards season, at least a dozen movies with literary roots have real shots at winning the biggest prizes. Some of those novels, like Khaled Hosseini’s “The Kite Runner,” are beloved and readers feel proprietary about them.

Others, like Ian McEwan’s “Atonement,” which won best drama and musical score at the Golden Globes on Sunday night, and Jean-Dominique Bauby’s memoir, “The Diving Bell and the Butterfly,” which won the directing prize for Julian Schnabel and the foreign-language film honor, seemed impossible to adapt because they were too complicated, too internal.

The adaptations themselves range from the Coen brothers’ “No Country for Old Men,” which maintained much of Cormac McCarthy’s rich Texas vernacular, to Paul Thomas Anderson’s “There Will Be Blood,” in which the writer-director merely used Upton Sinclair’s “Oil!” as a leaping-off point. Still others come from novellas (”Lust, Caution“), graphic novels (”Persepolis“), or are based on non-fiction works such as (”Charlie Wilson’s War,” “Into the Wild,” “A Mighty Heart”).

To read about screenwriter David Benioff and his experience while working on an adaptation of “The Kite Runner”, click Here.

written by RHIFF

by Shannonn Kelly

Actor Brad Renfro is dead at 25 years of age.

Renfro was found dead by his girlfriend Tuesday January 15 around 10 am in his Los Angeles home. Best known for roles such as 1998’s “Apt Pupil” and 1994’s “The Client“, Renfro was plucked from obscurity in Knoxville, Tennessee after playing a drug dealer in a school play to star in “The Client” opposite Tommy Lee Jones and Susan Sarandon. Read more at the New York Times.

written by RHIFF

by Shannonn Kelly

LOS ANGELES (AP) - Four major studios: Warner Bros. Television, NBC Universal, 20th Century Fox Television and CBS Paramount Network Television have canceled dozens of writers’ contracts in a possible concession that the current television season cannot be saved, the Los Angeles Times reported earlier today.

Studios typically pay $500,000 to $2 million a year per writer for them and their staffs to develop new show concepts.

With this latest development the studios save a lot of money, lose their new television season and writers, possibly, lose their homes, because really, this is a ploy for the studio executives to get rid of writers they no longer want. Really, this is all about cleaning house…

Read more

written by RHIFF

by Shannonn Kelly

Normally when a Hollywood award show is on the horizon, our televisions are filled with ads, entertainment news on the fashion and stars and a whole lot of Hollywood glistz and glamor.

Then, on award night you, the television viewer could watch the brightest stars from movies and television step out in their finery on the red carpet for all the world to see and gossip about on Monday.

For the first time since 1944 when the Hollywood Foreign Press Association (HFPA),  started them as a fundraiser, the Golden Globes were starless!

The Golden Globe Awards are generally the third most-watched awards show after the and Grammys and the Academy Awards , and is one of the highest honors for actors and actresses from film and television.

With the WGA Strike still ongoing, the Golden Globes were faced with actors and actresses choosing to boycott the ceremony rather than cross picket lines. Striking writers threatened to picket the Globes.

So, on Sunday January 13, 2008  the Golden Globes were held in the Grand Ballroom of the Beverly Hilton Hotel and broadcast live for a total of 31 minutes; leaving networks to fill the reamining 3 or so hours of programming with film clips and commentary and as if there were nothing better to run, an episode of —still can’t believe it: American Gladiators.

The winners of last nights Golden Globes can be viewed by clicking on this link at Variety.

I’m going to have that nap now…

written by RHIFF

Players below Gerald and Patricia Green in Bangkok Film Festival Federal Indictment

At Variety, they wondered what it took to make something into a true, four-legged industry.  With film festivals, the fitful birth of its own tradeshow was a sign, mentioned in this fest-stress article. 

Now the industry has its first major federal indictment - Gerald and Patricia Green of Film Festival Management were arrested on bribery charges.  They tried to payoff a Thai official so they could land a contract managing the Bangkok International Film Festival.

“Really?  They wanted to manage Bangkok fest that bad?”  Surely there are countless other more worthy festivals that could use some bribe cash, something other than the usual corporate payola.

But then Grady Hendrix put it in perspective:

I never met anyone who took the Bangkok International Film Festival seriously. It was an excuse for the well-connected industry folks to get flown to Bangkok, eat great food, do some shopping and go out with other people on the film festival circuit all on the Thai government’s tab. (I was never invited. Can you tell I’m a little bitter about it?)

From beginning to end it was something of a joke, with few foreign films being subtitled in Thai for local viewers and a line-up usually consisting of leftovers from other fests. It was run by a company in Los Angeles called Festival Management who seemed only to exist to run the Bangkok International Film Festival and they never seemed to do a particularly good job of it.

And yet, every year, the Thai government sunk millions of dollars into the fest.

written by RHIFF

by Shannonn Kelly

We were sad to report this past January the senseless killing of independent filmmaker and animator Helen Hill, who was gunned down in her home in New Orleans.

A bright star as a person and filmmmaker, Helen’s death was deeply felt inside and outside the the filmmaking community. Since Helen’s death an award had been put in place to honor her.

At this time, ReelHeART is pleased to announce indie Halifax animator Heather Harkins has won the first Helen Hill Animated Award.

Harkins created “She’s a Lady Animator”, which showcases  stories of female animators working during the Second World War.

To learn more about Heather Harkins, click here.

To learn more about Helen Hill, click here.

To learn more about how Paul Gailiunas, Helen’s husband and son Francis Pop are doing since January 2007, click here.

written by RHIFF

by Shannonn Kelly

For the couple of years it’s been a kick to see what’s floating around in Hollywood for the most buzzed about screenplays up for production and or option in the annual Black List list of the “Hottest Unproduced Screenplays”.

Some interesting and unusual standouts this year are

Curveball - Eastern Promises screenwriter Steve Knight’s adaptation of award-winning Los Angeles Times reporter Bob Drogin’s book Curveball: Spies, Lies, and the Con Man Who Caused a War, about an Iraqi informant code-named ‘Curveball’ who gave “flawed information about biological weapons that the U.S. government used to justify the war in Iraq.” The book cover reads “an inside story of intrigue and incompetence at the highest levels of government.” Project is set up at Focus Features.

The Wrestler - Robert Siegel’s tale of a 1980’s-era pro-wrestler, now down and out, who decides to make a possibly fatal comeback. Darren Aronofsky will direct Mickey Rourke

Get Back - Chris McCoy comic screenplay about two die-hard Beatles fans who time travel back in time to “prevent John Lennon from ever meeting Yoko Ono, as they blame her for the Beatles’ demise.”

The Human Factor - Anthony Peckham’s (Don’t Say A Word) Nelson Mendela biopic starring Morgan Freeman. Matt Damon is in talks to star at Warner Bros

I Want To F- Your Sister - Lawyer-turned-screenwriter Melissa Stack’s high-concept comedic spec screenplay about “a young man goes to great lengths to protect his younger sister from guys just like him.” MTV Films pre-emptively bought the screenplay for $300,000 against $600,000.

Stack quit her job as a Lawyer after the sale….

written by RHIFF

by Shannonn Kelly 

ReelHeART is happy to announce Danial-DayLewis has won Best Actor for his portrayal as a shrewd oil barron in “There Will Be Blood”, directed by Paul Thomas Anderson.

Having last seen Daniel-Day Lewis in “The Ballad of Jack and Rose” and “Gangs of New York”, it’s been awhile for both audiences and Lewis to get re-acquainted with each other.  Lewis known for his selectivity in roles, gets so deeply immersed in them, that, as a result we only see him in 2-3 films a year. 

He was known to suffer from  pnuemonia while filming “Gangs of New York”, because he wanted to stay true to the wardrobe of the day and not wear a warming coat; he lived off the land in “Last of the Mohicans” and locked himself in a cell for getting into character for “In The Name of The Father”.

Paul Thomas Anderson of “Boogie Nights”, “Magnolia” and “Punch Drunk Love” fame and two time Oscar winner has also won for Best Picture and Best Director for “There Will Be Blood”.

To read about the Los Angeles Film Critics Association and other winners visit the Hollywood Reporter.

To read a review of “There Will Be Blood”, visit Variety.

written by RHIFF