Posts tagged Film.

Sweet! All of the videos from the 2012 Adrenaline Film Project are live on Vimeo! We had some great films this year and the polish was off the charts considering each team had only 72 hours to make them. Once again a huge thanks to everyone that worked so hard on this event and the participants!

Heads up, coming this Thursday to The Bijou!

Alexander Hacke, who was the central figure in Fatih Akin’s documentary “Crossing the Bridge”, has just returned from Cannes to play live music behind the silent film “The Glasshouse” at the Bijou. Thursday May 31, (7:30 - 8:30pm) Doors open at 7:10.

This is a once in a lifetime opportunity so don’t miss it!

Spotted!!! Andre 3000 in his Hendrix attire. Shooting has started in Ireland for “All Is By My Side”, the new biopic of the legendary guitarist and singer.

First images from Sofia Coppola’s latest film “The Bling Ring” have hit the internet. Emma Watson of “Harry Potter” fame will be starring in her first non-Hermione role since the series ended.

“The Bling Ring” is based on a true story about a group of teenagers who robbed homes of the rich and famous between October 2003 and August 2009, snagging over $3 million dollars in loot from the likes of Paris Hilton, Orlando Bloom and Lindsay Lohan. The film co-stars Taissa Famiga (American Horror Story), Israel Broussard (Flipped), Katie Chang and Claire Julien.

I gotta say I’m pretty excited for this one. I’ve loved all of Sofia Coppola’s films (yes even “Marie Antoinette”) and 2010’s “Somewhere” was one of my favorites of 2010.

Coppola has a knack for bringing the best out in actors and actresses, pushing them beyond the roles they’re accustomed to playing. Stephen Dorff’s performance in “Somewhere” was an excellent example of this, and I’m sure that Emma Watson will thrive under Coppola’s watch.

Well I saw “Men In Black 3” this afternoon. I may be a bit biased just because I’m a huge fan and have been since I was a beeb, but it was actually pretty great. It’s been a while since I’ve watched a movie that wasn’t afraid to be so cheesy, but  cheesy in a very good way. Josh Brolin was fantastic with his Tommy Lee Jones impression, Will Smith is one of the only people in Hollywood that I still think is as cool as I thought he was when I was in 3rd grade, and Jermaine Clement from Flight of the Conchords was hilarious as the main baddie, Boris The Animal. Also nice to see so much animatronics in this day and age of heavy CGI. If you’re a fan of the first two, don’t miss this one, and even if you’re not such a big fan there’s still fun to be had.

As if you needed any more reason to see “Prometheus” on June 8th. It’s been revealed that the first trailer for “Django Unchained” will play before Ridley Scott’s latest Sci-Fi epic.

Variety’s Stuart Oldham is tweeting that “sources” have let him know that the first trailer for Django Unchained will run in front of “Prometheus”, the new Ridley Scott film that opens June 8. There’s not an especially clear connection between the two films, beyond “two things the Internet is really, really excited about,” but the Weinstein Company can’t exactly wait to promote “Django” only in front of their own films, and “Prometheus”— with its R rating and director pedigree— is likely to bring in at least a somewhat similar crowd.

JUNE 8TH JUNE 8TH JUNE 8TH!!!!

Big news for the movie adaptation of one of my favorite video games of all time.

Sony aims to make “Shadow of the Colossus” a large-scale blockbuster with the help of producer Kevin Misher (Mirror Mirror) and have signed Josh Trank (Chronicle) to direct. Back in 2009, Sony had hired Justin Marks (Street Fighter: The Legend of Chun-Li) to pen the screenplay but that evidently did not work out (thankfully).

Trank hit it big with his low-budget found footage film Chronicle earlier this year and has since become widely sought over for several big budget blockbusters, including the “Fantastic Four” reboot and Sony’s own “Venom” - a spinoff for “The Amazing Spider-Man”. With “Shadow of the Colossus” however, Trank may have found his biggest challenge yet.

The story of the game isn’t its focus, nor is its characters. In fact, there are not many characters at all in the game which barely features any dialogue. It’s about a boy named Wander who travels with his trusty companion and only ally – a horse named Agro – across vast open areas, hunting a series of 16 massive and unique Colossi with his stolen magic sword in order to revive Mono, a young girl and his love interest.

The game earned critical praise for its uniqueness in style, its impressive visuals and its award-winning soundtrack, and that’s partially why a film adaptation is difficult to fathom. Unlike most video game properties, “Shadow of the Colossus” isn’t a property that can spawn a continuing franchise. The game didn’t feature much dialogue and there weren’t populated areas with other characters - It was a visual spectacle and more of a puzzle game than a typical action-adventure.

This begs the question of how faithful a Sony Pictures film adaptation could really be. Can they sell a movie to mainstream moviegoing audiences about one kid fighting gigantic monsters, entirely in CGI? Will they force in other characters and backstory a la “Prince of Persia” and take away from what made the game unique? Since it is so dependent on visuals, will it look more real than “Wrath of the Titans”?

It’s really hard for me to imagine how this would be adapted for the big screen. It’s an extremely minimal game with the visuals and manipulation of scale serving as its main driving point. I’m extremely happy that they’re getting Trank to direct since I really enjoyed “Chronicle”, but with the way the movie industry is now, I can’t really see a movie version of “Shadow of the Colossus” coming to fruition without some drastic changes that would significantly reduce its appeal (at least for me).

Check out this article and audio segment by NPR about Randall Poster, the man who works with Wes Anderson to put together his fantastic soundtracks. And don’t forget, Anderson’s latest film “Moonrise Kingdom” is out tomorrow in select theaters.

First trailer for “The Great Gatsby”. Looks like a Baz Luhrmann flick through and through. Although I’m not a big fan of Luhrmann’s movies I must admit he possesses a unique visual flair that not a lot of directors can pull off, and he’s drawing from some great source material. Never thought I’d hear a Kanye West song as part of anything associated with “The Great Gatsby” either. Also, I ♥ Carey Mulligan.

Summer Course: Screenwriting - in Spanish SPAN 399

Are you interested in film? Do you enjoy a good story? Did you like the stories they read to you as a child? In that case, this summer, enroll in SPAN 399: Screenplay Studies, with Prof. Mónica Silver. During the month, we will immerse ourselves in writing a screenplay, and in shooting a film based on our own screenplays. We will generate ideas, build stories, exchange images, construct dialogues. Working in teams, we will watch and analyze short films (cortometrajes) by Latin American directors. We will develop exercises to awaken the imagination, creativity, memory, experience, and powers of observation. All the essential ingredients for storytelling.

In a series of exercises we will learn exactly what is a screenplay, its function, and how it is used. We will become familiar with developing characters through their actions and their words. Every film has a ‘topic,’ a ‘so what?’ that opens the way to telling a story. The correct form of its presentation that allows you to convert it into a recognizable product called ‘film’ is the screenplay (guión).

first page of screenplay from Eugene-based filmmaker David Nieto’s ‘La llamada’

Every story has a core idea that develops into a series of steps until it takes the shape of a final screenplay. Given that every screenplay is created in order to be turned into a film, we will distinguish between literary screenplay (guión literario), valued mostly for the story itself, and the production screenplay (guión técnico), which serves to indicate all of the technical aspects of the production process.

And best of all, you will be speaking and communicating in Spanish in a completely different context: the world of film production.

About the instructor: Mónica Silver is a writer for Theater, Film, and Television in Argentina. She teaches writing in Spanish at Portland State University, the University of Oregon, and at Theater and Film schools in Barcelona, Spain. She is winner of the Primer Premio Nacional de Teatro (the first National Theater Award) of Argentina for the year 2000. You can reach her by email at silver.monica.silver@gmail.com

Summer Session 2 (July 23-August 15)
MTWR, 2:00-3:30pm
See listing in UO schedule of classes

This course fulfills the in-residence SPAN 328+ requirement for UO Spanish Majors [see degree requirements here]