Movies

In a World Where People Watch Movies

The Guardian has a great piece on how all movie trailers look alike, sound alike, begin with the words "in a world" and have the same guy doing the voiceover: ... by far the oddest practices in the world of trailers concern the music that accompanies them. Film scores tend to be completed so late in the production process that most trailer editors can't use the correct music even if they want to; normally, however, they don't. Deploying the music from a successful older film to advertise a new ... (read more)

2005/06/13

May Divorce Be With You

This weblog now has a second marriage to debate: the four-year union of the writers Carl Bernstein and Nora Ephron. I love the movie Heartburn, which Ephron wrote as fictionalized revenge after she and Bernstein crashed and burned. They had two sons, the second born prematurely after Carl was caught convening a rump parliament with the future Baroness Jay of Paddington, a member of Britain's House of Lords. In novel and film, Ephron lampooned Bernstein so hilariously that I'd be amazed if he ... (read more)

2005/06/03

Take a Bite of the Apple

Michael Moore is swimming in money after Fahrenheit 9/11, according to a Slate analysis that describes how the filmmaker and Disney rode the controversy over the movie all the way to the bank: Under normal circumstances, documentaries rarely, if ever, make profits (especially if distributors charge the usual 33 percent fee). So, when Miramax made the deal for Fahrenheit 9/11, it allowed Moore a generous profit participation -- which turned out to be 27 percent of the film's net receipts. ... (read more)

2005/05/06

Napoleon Dynamite: Too Uncool for School

I saw Napoleon Dynamite last night after hearing too many personal recommendations to avoid it. ... (read more)

2005/04/08