Movies – Page 9 – artdiamondblog.com

At Pixar, “Storytelling is More Important Than Graphics”

Source of book image:
http://bp2.blogger.com/_Sar8IPNlxOY/SClPS33oTxI/AAAAAAAAB_0/B8GjajHtetY/s1600/PixarTouch.jpg

(p. A19) One of Mr. Catmull’s other inspirations was to hire computer animator John Lasseter after he was fired by Walt Disney Co. in 1983. (He had apparently stepped on one too many toes in the company’s sprawling management structure.) Then again, as Mr. Price reports, in the world of computer animators, workplace comings and goings seemed to be part of the job. Mr. Lasseter himself had already quit Disney and then returned before being fired. In the creative ferment of computer animation in the late 1970s and early 1980s, what mattered most was the work itself: Never mind who signs the paychecks – what project are you working on now?
. . .
One of Pixar’s first projects revealed a truth that would point the way to success: Storytelling is more important than graphics firepower. The company created a short film, directed by Mr. Lasseter, called “Tin Toy,” about a mechanical one-man band fleeing the terrors of a baby who wants to play with it. “Tin Toy” made audiences laugh in part because it turned established themes on their heads. The story was told from the toy’s-eye view, close to the floor. The baby, doing what babies do, seemed like a gigantic, capricious monster. “Tin Toy” won the 1988 Academy Award for animated short film.
The upside-down “Tin Toy” point of view seems to fit much of what happened at Pixar afterward. The company made a deal with Disney in 1991: The little animation outfit would produce three movies, and the entertainment behemoth would distribute and market them. With the outsize success of the first movie in the deal, “Toy Story” – it grossed $355 million world-wide – Pixar and Disney were perhaps on an inevitable collision course over control and profits. Mr. Price adroitly depicts the clashes between Mr. Jobs and his nemesis at Disney, chief executive Michael Eisner, and captures the sweet vindication of Mr. Lasseter as the projects he guides outstrip the animation efforts of his former employer.
The sweetest moment in the Pixar saga came two years ago, when Disney bought the company for $7.4 billion in an all-stock deal – one that gave Pixar executives enormous power at their new home. Mr. Jobs sits on the Disney board and is the company’s largest shareholder. (Mr. Eisner left in 2005.) And Mr. Lasseter became the chief creative officer for the combined Disney and Pixar animation studios, where Mr. Catmull serves as president.
The day after the sale was announced, Mr. Lasseter and Mr. Catmull flew to Burbank, Calif., to address a crowd of about 500 animation staffers on a Disney soundstage. “Applause built as they made their way to the front,” Mr. Price reports, “and then erupted again in force” when the two men were introduced. “Lasseter was welcomed as a rescuer of the studio from which he had been fired some twenty-two years before.” In one of their first moves, Mr. Price says, Messrs. Lasseter and Catmull “brought back a handful of Disney animation standouts who had only recently been laid off.” Redemption, after all, is essential to any story well told.

For the full review, see:

PAUL BOUTIN. “Bookshelf, An Industry Gets Animated.” The Wall Street Journal (Weds., May 14, 2008): A19.
(Note: ellipsis added.)

Blacklisting of Voight Urged in Display of Liberal Hollywood McCarthyism

Source of the images: screen captures from the CNN report cited below.

With self-righteous indignation, the left often accuses the right of “McCarthyism.”
But many on the left are happy to limit free speech when what is spoken is not to their liking.
Jon Voight’s column in the Washington Times has ignited a firestorm, and caused at least one Hollywood insider to openly advocate blacklisting Voight from the movie business. The CNN story cited and linked below, gives some of the details.
Unfortunately, this is not an isolated example.
On our campuses, free speech is often violated if the speaker speaks what is not politically correct. For many examples, see some of the cases discussed on the web site of the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education.
Another example is from my own personal experience as a young scholar many decades ago. I had applied to three or four top PhD programs in philosophy and was initially rejected from every one of them, even though I had a nearly perfect GPA, and very high test scores.
I was especially surprised by the rejection from Chicago, because an Associate Dean had visited the Wabash campus the year before and talked with me about applying to Chicago. He had looked at my record and said, ‘with your record, if you score X, or above on the GREs, it is almost certain that you will be accepted.’ (I don’t remember the exact number he said.) Well I scored above X, but was rejected. So I wrote to the Associate Dean, saying I was disappointed and asking if he had any insight about the rejection. He told me that he was dumbfounded and that he would look into it.
Awhile later, I received a letter reversing the decision of the University of Chicago Department of Philosophy. I never learned all the details, but apparently the Dean of Humanities had over-ruled the Department of Philosophy. (This is fairly unusual in academics, and though I do not remember her name, I salute that Dean for taking a stand.)
Years later, the episode came up in a conversation with a member of the philosophy faculty. He said that he had been on the admissions committee the year that I had applied, and that I had been rejected because I had mentioned Ayn Rand in my essay about how I had become interested in philosophy.

For some of the details of the Voight story, see:
Wynter, Kareen. “Bloggers Fire Back at Voight.” CNN Feature, broadcast on CNN, and posted on CNN.com on 8/8/08. Downloaded on 8/8/08 from: http://www.cnn.com/video/?iref=videoglobal
(Note: the clip runs 2 minutes and 27 seconds.)

Voight’s op-ed piece ran in the Washington Times on July 28, 2008 under the title “My Concerns for America” and can be viewed at: http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2008/jul/28/voight/

Paternalistic Doctors With Way Too Much Time on Their Hands

(p. C6) The American Medical Association is hulking mad at Marvel Studios.
Last week, the advocacy arm of the powerful physicians’ group unleashed a tsk-tsk campaign against “The Incredible Hulk,” a Marvel film that opened on Friday and is distributed by Universal Pictures. The complaint was of “gratuitous depictions of smoking.”
In the movie, which drew a PG-13 rating from the Motion Picture Association of America, Gen. Thunderbolt Ross, a bad guy played by William Hurt, is rarely seen without a smoke-spewing cigar. (Presumably, the physicians’ association worries that children who identify with the authoritarian general — who wants to annihilate the Hulk, played by Edward Norton — may be tempted to pick up the habit.)

For the full story, see:
BROOKS BARNES. “Physicians’ Group Furious at Cigars in ‘Hulk’ Movie.” The New York Times (Mon., June 16, 2008): C6.

Sir Laurence Olivier Got Mad at Those Who Ridiculed Charlton Heston’s Acting

(p. 5go!) “In 1985, I took a train to London from Royal Air Force Mildenhall (Base) with a couple of med techs and decided to check out some of the plays,” Brodston recalled in his e-mail.
His theater date was a native Briton who had joined the U.S. Air Force.
“We came upon a play that had Charlton Heston in it, ‘The Caine Mutiny Court Martial,'” Brodston remembered. “We couldn’t afford the tickets, so they put us on the ‘king’s cuff’ (standby tickets for students and servicemen).”
Just as the house lights were dimming, an older woman led Brodston and his companion up the steps to a private box because no one had claimed the seats.
“Be quiet and don’t tell anyone,” she furtively whispered because she wasn’t supposed to give away box seats that normally fetch up to $300 each.
Two minutes into the play, the door at the rear of the box opened, and two people sat behind them. Engrossed in the play, Brodston and friend paid little attention.
“At intermission, we looked up and saw Lord Laurence Olivier and his wife, Joan Plowright, sitting behind us!”
. . .
In 1999, Brodston crossed paths with Plowright in New York, and she remembered the night they shared a box at the London theater.
“Larry used to get mad when people made fun of Chuck’s acting,” Plowright told Brodston. “He loved Chuck in ‘Ben Hur’ and that silly ape movie (‘Planet of the Apes’). He and the children would watch those movies again and again.”

For the full commentary, see:
BOB FISCHBACH. “Bob’s Take on Cinema: A night of fine theater with Chuck, Larry.” Omaha World-Herald (Thursday, June 12, 2008): 5go!.
(Note: ellipsis added.)

Will Smith’s ‘I Am Legend’ Performance Earns the Academy Award that Matters

Will Smith in I Am Legend. Source of photo: http://blogs.bet.com/news/newsyoushouldknow/?p=1398

Will Smith’s remake of Charleton Heston’s The Omega Man, is a pretty good movie. It shows a lone scientist struggling to cure a terrible disease in a world where he has lost almost everything that he valued. The Will Smith character exemplifies the motto of the marines: semper fi.
But I think I still like the Heston version a bit better, even though its special effects are dated, and Heston may have been a bit old for the role.
Why, then? After some thought, I think there is one main reason I like the Heston version better: the villains in The Omega Man, have ideas, while the villains in I Am Legend are subhuman, idealess vampires. The battle of good against evil in The Omega Man is both physical and intellectual, and that makes it easier to care more deeply about the outcome.
Still, I Am Legend is a good movie, showing a heroic man’s lonely struggle to remain true to his mission.
(And his canine companion should have received some sort of award too.)

(p. 2E) West Point, N.Y. (AP) — Will Smith wasn’t nominated for an Oscar this year, but his role in “I Am Legend” has earned a different “academy” award — from the cadets at the U.S. Military Academy.
Smith was named the first winner of the Cadet Choice Movie Award, designed to honor the character that best personifies West Point leadership qualities on the silver screen.

For the full story, see:
“People; Cadets vote Will Smith a winner.” Omaha World-Herald (Mon., Feb. 25, 2008): 2E.

Creative Destruction in the Film Industry

(p. B1) While film still is central in big Hollywood features, it’s unclear how long it will be before even the biggest feature movies go all- digital. The buzz in technical movie-making circles these days involves the two-month-old, ultra-high-resolution digital Red camera. Boosters say it looks nearly as good as 35mm film — and costs around $30,000, or about the same as renting a 35mm camera for 10 days.
Thanks to cheap computers, a similar sort of creative destruction is happening everywhere in the industry. Color adjustment used to require expensive oscilloscope-like monitors. It first moved to specialized — and expensive — software, but lately it’s done with relatively low- cost (say, $200) “plug-ins” by companies like Red Giant Software.

For the full story, see:
Lee Gomes. “Editing on Big Films Is Now Being Done On Small Computers.” Wall Street Journal (Weds., Oct. 24, 2007): B1.

Thor Halvorssen Produces Documentaries that Defend Human Rights

"Thor Halvorssen at his office in the Empire State Building." Source of caption and photo: online version of the NYT article quoted and cited below.

(p. 11) Since 2005, having already founded two nonprofit organizations focused on free speech and human-rights issues, Mr. Halvorssen has made the movie business part of his portfolio of controversy-stirring efforts. Established with a small amount of his money, his nonprofit Moving Picture Institute has raised about $1.5 million in donations to date to pay for, promote and seek distribution for documentary films.

At a time when the most successful documentaries on political or social issues all seem to be anti-corporate, anti-Bush, pro-environmentalist and left-leaning, the Moving Picture Institute has backed pro-business, anti-Communist and even anti-environmentalist ones. The latest, “Indoctrinate U,” follows the first-time filmmaker Evan Coyne Maloney as he turns Michael Moore’s guerrilla interview tactics on their head to address what he sees as political correctness on campus. In one scene, Mr. Maloney strolls into the women’s studies centers on several campuses and, playing innocent, asks directions to the men’s studies center. He is met with genuine bafflement, derisive laughs or icy hostility.

To Mr. Halvorssen his new role as a fledgling movie mogul dovetails perfectly with his other activities. “Pop culture has (p. 12) the power to be transformational culture,” he said. “A film can reach a lot more people than a white paper. You could think of the film as a trailer for the white paper.”

He paused, then said, “Put it this way: What ‘Sideways’ did for pinot noir, I want to do for freedom.”

. . .

His upbringing helped make a self-described “classical liberal” rather than a conservative, big on free markets and individual liberties, and convinced that “government is not your friend most of the time,” he said. “And I abhor fascism, whether it’s socialist or National Socialist.”

. . .

“The Sugar Babies,” a documentary by Amy Serrano that Mr. Halvorssen helped produce, takes on the issue human trafficking of Haitian workers on sugar plantations in the Dominican Republic. A screening at Florida International University in June erupted into what local press described as “a near riot” between Dominican and Haitian audience members.

Other documentaries championed by the Motion Picture Institute include “Hammer & Tickle,” a lighthearted look at the subversive jokes Soviet citizens told about their leaders.

And Mr. Halvorssen was a co-producer of “Freedom’s Fury,” narrated by Olympic swimmer Mark Spitz, which describes the role Hungary’s Olympic water polo team played in that nation’s 1956 uprising against its Soviet occupiers.

No doubt the most contentious film on the Motion Picture Institute roster so far is ”Mine Your Own Business,” billed as ”the world’s first anti-environmentalist documentary.” Phelim McAleer, an Irish journalist who received a fellowship from the Motion Picture Institute, traveled to Romania, Madagascar and Chile, where international environmental groups oppose planned mining operations. His film — financed by Gabriel Resources, a Canadian mining company — portrays environmentalists as condescending elitists while impoverished locals insist they would welcome the jobs and development the mines would bring.

. . .

Mr. Halvorssen speaks of a ”YouTube revolution” with the Internet, along with on-demand cable and satellite television, freeing independent filmmakers from Hollywood dominance.

Ultimately, he added, he hopes that ”exploiting technology, marketing and alternative distribution will transform human rights, making it inspiring and even sexy.”

For the full story, see:

JOHN STRAUSBAUGH. "A Maverick Mogul, Proudly Politically Incorrect." The New York Times, Arts&Leisure Section (Sun., August 19, 2007): 11 & 12.

(Note: ellipses added.)

For more information on the documentaries of Halvorssen’s Moving Picture Institute, see:

http://www.thempi.org/

Poster for the movie "Mine Your Own Busines." Source for poster: http://billhobbs.com/myobposter.gif

Entrepreneurial Capitalism is the Good Kind

Source of book image: http://ec1.images-amazon.com/images/I/41WVH9PAR3L._SS500_.jpg

. . . capitalism as practiced in the U.S. is different from the capitalism practiced in, say, Singapore or Saudi Arabia. "Capitalism…takes many forms, which differ substantially…in their implications for economic growth and elimination of poverty," three economists write in "Good Capitalism, Bad Capitalism." The book identifies four strains of modern capitalism and argues the U.S. version is particularly well-suited to creating and exploiting innovations that boost living standards.

. . .

The book was written by William Baumol, an eclectic New York University economist impressively energetic at 85 years old; Carl Schramm, president and research director of the Kauffman Foundation and a recovering health economist and insurance executive; and Robert Litan, an economist-lawyer who was a budget and antitrust official in the Clinton administration. (Disclosure: I recently spoke at Kauffman’s Kansas City, Mo., headquarters.)

. . .

Along the way, the economists make a point often missed in the romanticism about "small business." They aren’t talking about all small businesses — the corner dry cleaner, for instance — or all the self-employed. Their entrepreneurs are entities that provide a new product or service or develop methods to produce or deliver existing goods and services at lower cost. . . .

It all sounds great — and compelling. A capitalism that cannot spur innovation and/or display flexibility to reorganize itself cannot be a model. In their book, though, the three touch too lightly on an issue about which Mr. Litan has written previously. As he puts it in an interview: "An entrepreneurial society is going to be more of a high-risk society."

The strengths of U.S.-style capitalism are apparent. No place in the past quarter century has better mixed the ingredients of talent, imagination, education, science and capital. But the risks are apparent, too: workers who lose jobs and find new ones that pay far less and lack health insurance, widening disparities between economic winners and losers, challenges posed by stiffening competition from low-wage, increasingly skilled workers abroad, and schools that aren’t improving as fast as the economy is changing.

Preserving the strengths of American capitalism requires finding a way to reduce the anxiety and harm posed by such risks without losing the entrepreneurial vigor. That’s the hard part.

For the full commentary/review, see:

DAVID WESSEL. "CAPITAL; By Capitalism’s Vigor May Hinge On Confronting Its Risks." The Wall Street Journal (Thurs., May 10, 2007): A2.

(Note: ellipses added.)

Helping Russians Remember the Truth About Communism

Some of the crew of Gruz 200, including the director Alexei Balabanov, who is second from the left. Source of the photo: online version of the WSJ article cited below.

(p. B1) The film is named "Gruz 200" (Cargo 200) after the zinc-lined coffins in which dead Soviet soldiers were shipped home from the 1979-89 war in Afghanistan. Messrs. Balabanov and Selyanov say they made the movie as an antidote to what they describe as rising nostalgia in Russia for the Soviet period.

"I show what filth we lived in," said Mr. Balabanov, a director sometimes described as Russia’s Quentin Tarantino. "Society was sick from 1917 onwards," he added, referring to the year the Bolsheviks took power.

The film — a graphically violent story of the sexual abuse of a teenage girl at the hands of a sadistic Soviet policeman — paints a relentlessly negative picture of a time that many Russians recall with warm nostalgia. The filmmakers hope to release the movie overseas but haven’t yet signed up a foreign distributor.

Russian President Vladimir Putin, who restored Russia’s Soviet-era national anthem, has called the 1991 collapse of the Soviet Union "the greatest geopolitical catastrophe of the 20th century," and polls show a majority of Russians regard the period as one of relative prosperity, stability and national pride.

. . .

(p. B2) Mr. Balabanov says "Gruz 200" is based on his own experiences while traveling across the Soviet Union in the 1980s, as well as on stories he heard second-hand.

Mr. Selyanov says he believes it is his "duty" to remind people of what the Soviet Union was really like and combat the rising warmth for the period. "We have to fight this nostalgia," the producer says.

But the film has been dogged by controversy since even before it opened. Mr. Balabanov says three prominent actors who had played in his previous films refused parts once they read the script. "They were scared," he said. The director was forced to use largely unknown actors.

. . .

Russian TV networks, controlled by the state, have balked at even late-night showings — critical to financial success for Russian movies.

"We don’t have the courage to put something like this on the air," said Vladimir Kulistikov, head of the No. 3 NTV network, in a statement.

For the full story, see:

ANDREW OSBORN. "From Russia, Without Love: New Movie Slams Soviet Union." The Wall Street Journal By (Thurs., June 21, 2007): B1 & B2.

(Note: ellipses added.)

The sadistic police captain is portrayed by Alexei Poluyan. Source of the photo: online version of the WSJ article cited above.

“I Couldn’t Write a Prescription for Antiobiotics, Because There Were None”

"THE DOCTOR MIGHT BE IN Cubans young and old at a Havana clinic in 2004." Source of caption and photo: online version of the NYT article cited below.

CUBA works hard to jam American TV signals and keep out decadent Hollywood films. But it’s a good bet that Fidel Castro’s government will turn a blind eye to bootleg copies of “Sicko,” Michael Moore’s newest movie, if they show up on the streets of Havana.

“Sicko,” the talk of the Cannes Film Festival last week, savages the American health care system — and along the way extols Cuba’s system as the neatest thing since the white linen guayabera.

Mr. Moore transports a handful of sick Americans to Cuba for treatment in the course of the film, . . .

. . .

Universal health care has long given the Cuban regime bragging rights, though there is growing concern about the future. In the decades that Cuba drew financial and military support from the Soviet Union, Mr. Castro poured resources into medical education, creating the largest medical school in Latin America and turning out thousands of doctors to practice around the world.

But that changed after the collapse of the Soviets, according to Cuban defectors like Dr. Leonel Cordova. By the time Dr. Cordova started practicing in 1992, equipment and drugs were already becoming scarce. He said he was assigned to a four-block neighborhood in Havana Province where he was supposed to care for about 600 people.

“But even if I diagnosed something simple like bronchitis,” he said, “I couldn’t write a prescription for antibiotics, because there were none.”

He defected in 2000 while on a medical mission in Zimbabwe and made his way to the United States. He is now an urgent-care physician at Baptist Hospital in Miami.

Having practiced medicine in both Cuba and the United States, Dr. Cordova has an unusual perspective for comparison.

“Actually there are three systems,” Dr. Cordova said, because Cuba has two: one is for party officials and foreigners like those Mr. Moore brought to Havana. “It is as good as this one here, with all the resources, the best doctors, the best medicines, and nobody pays a cent,” he said.

But for the 11 million ordinary Cubans, hospitals are often ill equipped and patients “have to bring their own food, soap, sheets — they have to bring everything.” . . .

. . .

Until he had to have emergency surgery last year, Fidel Castro — who turned 80 this year — was considered a model of vibrant long life in Cuba. But it was only last week that he acknowledged in an open letter that his initial surgery by Cuban doctors had been botched. He did not confirm, however, that a specialist had been flown in from Spain last December to help set things right.

For the full commentary, see:

ANTHONY DePALMA. "‘Sicko,’ Castro and the ‘120 Years Club’." The New York Times, Section 4 (Sun., May 27, 2007): 3.

(Note: ellipses added.)