Thompson on Hollywood

Blogger Wells Raises Cash for Tyrannosaur Screening

Hollywood Elsewhere's Jeff Wells is championing Strand's Tyrannosaur and star Olivia Colman to such a degree that he has taken it upon himself to raise cash for a screening. He's soliciting PayPal funds for a screening room, and the dollars are pouring in.

By Anne Thompson
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October 19, 2011 5:17 AM
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Morelia Film Fest Day Two: Mexico by Train, More Delicious Food and Weitz's A Better Life

Day Two of the Morelia International Film Festival in Patzcuaro, Mexico brings a city tour, train ride and more movies. Meredith Brody reports:Today I’ve been told we can sleep in until lunch, and afterwards we’ll be transported to Morelia by train. Or we can join Jim Ramey in a tour of Patzcuaro, which is one of the 100 Historic World Treasure Cities named by the United Nations. Having never been in Michoacán before, of course I opt for the latter, even though there’s a somewhat daunting meeting time of 8:30.

By Meredith Brody
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October 18, 2011 8:00 AM
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Morelia International Film Festival, Day One: Patzcuaro Proves Seductive

The Morelia International Film Festival in Patzcuaro, Mexico proved alluring to intrepid TOH fest correspondent Meredith Brody:I’ve never had a more seductive, mysterious, and glamorous introduction to a film festival. Not the tedious travel from Northern California to Mexico City in a couple of cramped and airless metal tubes, not the long, long taxi ride in the rainy dark night to the boutique hotel cleverly built so one can hear noise in one’s room from both the interior patio on one side and the street on the other (churlish to complain, but there it is, a girl’s gotta sleep).

By Meredith Brody
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October 17, 2011 5:26 AM
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Carrie Rickey Follows Michael Sragow Out Newspaper Critic Door: Farewell Post at Philly Inquirer

Film critic Carrie Rickey held on as long as she did at the beleaguered Philadelphia Inquirer partly because she was an able blogger with an engaged following. It's tough to see her as well as The Baltimore Sun's Michael Sragow leave full-time reviewing far ahead of their proper time. Sragow chose to stay at the paper as an editor, while Rickey took a voluntary buyout.

By Anne Thompson
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October 16, 2011 6:03 AM
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Ted Hope Shares 99 Steps for Making Good Movies; 1. Maintain Wonder & Love for The World...

Check out producer (and iW blogger) Ted Hope's 99 Recommended Steps for Making Good Movies:1. Maintain wonder & love for the world & most/some of the people.2. Recognize the barriers & be empowered by my desire for change.3. Find an inspiring idea & the correct collaborator for it.4. Maintain love & respect for the film industry.5. Develop script.6. Fall in love with project.7. Get non-financier, non-buyer industry types to give feedback on script.8. Maintain wonder & love for the process.9. Further develop script.10. Maintain respect for collaborator(s).

By Anne Thompson
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September 29, 2011 11:16 AM
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Laugh, Don't Cry: Chick Flicks Are Sci-Fi Sub-Genre, Female Stereotypes Still Depressing in Media

The Office actress-writer Mindy Kaling's "Flick Chicks: A guide to women in the movies" in the The New Yorker takes a humorous look at a depressing subject.

By Sophia Savage
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September 28, 2011 7:47 AM
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TIFF 36 Day Seven: Solondz's Dark Horse, Killer Joe Impress; Moth Diaries, Himuzu, Twiggy Disappoint

Festivals

Meredith Brody reports:

By Meredith Brody
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September 15, 2011 7:01 AM
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In Contention Partners with Hitfix

Kris Tapley's six-year-old In Contention Oscar blog is moving from indie status to a new home at rising consumer site Hitfix. It's a good fit for both partners. In Contention gets some resources and support and professional year-round ad sales, while Hitfix's Gregory Ellwood, who will continue to post at the site's Awards Campaign blog, adds a respected Oscar blog with loyal followers, who will presumably check out the site's other offerings and swell traffic. The site, which is aimed at the 18 to 34 demographic, reaches more than 2 million unique users monthly.

By Anne Thompson
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September 14, 2011 6:59 AM
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Anatomy of A High-Brow Art Debate: Sean Penn and the Bitch-Slapping of Malick's Tree of Life

It goes like this. Sean Penn talks to Le Figaro and implies (Exhibit A) Terrence Malick underutilized him in The Tree of Life. The New Yorker's Richard Brody defends Malick and upholds the idea that actors are the equivalent of colors on a painter's brush ("Penn brings an acid yellow to the glass-and-metal grays of his scenes, and it adds something important to the film"), and that Penn's lack of understanding of his own performance doesn't undermine the power or purpose of it. InContention's Kris Tapley calls Penn's comments a bitch-slap, and while he doesn't exactly disagree ("The bookend nature of his role is the weaker element of the film"), he does imply that Penn is being a bit of a diva in the midst of Malick's well-known experimental and unpredictable directing style (both Javier Bardem and Jessica Chastain told TOH! they weren't even sure if they'll appear in Malick's latest project, though both were thrilled to work with him).

By Sophia Savage
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August 22, 2011 6:25 AM
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Wish I Was There: MoMA's “Carte Blanche: Dieter Kosslick, the Culinary Cineaste”

Hungry? You will be after reading Bay Area restaurant critic Meredith Brody's words on MoMA'a food and film series, “Carte Blanche: Dieter Kosslick, the Culinary Cineaste”:In a recent article in the San Francisco Chronicle, Alice Waters said, ”I can’t live without films. They’re like food to me. I need them both.”