Oh look, another Will Ferrell comedy! This time around he is playing a step dad trying to win the affections of his step kids. His competition is the biological father played by Mark Walhberg.
Under the last government, the UK film council (which supported the funding, production and distribution of British films) was scrapped, as prime minister David Cameron cited that the initiative “wasn’t supporting films people British people want to see, like Harry Potter”. Subsequently, we have been told this has made it far harder for British filmmakers to get their movies made. As David Cameron’s Conservative government have recently been re-elected into parliament (this time as the sole governing party; last time they were part of a coalition), it is time to examine what effect this will have on British filmmakers, both in terms of how they will be able to get their films made now there is a tighter grip on funding, as well as how it will effect the kinds of films they make.
Asif Kapadia isn’t the documentary filmmaker of our times, but he is one of the most timely. In the digital age where all information is online, he manages to make movies comprised almost entirely of footage that can be found on YouTube and somehow turn them into major events in documentary cinema. Since his (ever so slightly overrated) 2011 effort Senna, his style as a documentarian has stubbornly refused to change, yet the way he manipulates archive footage to create something new and horrifying is unparalleled, even if it frequently favours emotional manipulation over creating a deeper look at the self-destructive life of subject Amy Winehouse.
We have come far since the time of the original Peanuts comic strips. It originates in a time when popular culture wasn’t so obvious with the allusions to sex or violence. It actually drew reference to how a child might interpret the adult world.
Japanese cinema has a distinctive style that has been consistent since the days of silent film, when directors where drawing from classic kabuki theater to inform their burgeoning filming style. That is not to say that there’s anything limiting about a cultural pattern in Japanese cinema, seeing as they have given the film world anime, jidaigeki, yakuza, cyberpunk and multiple other notable sub-genres. One recognizable aspect of Japanese cinema is the use of seasons in certain films:
Here’s a worthwhile bet. Can Warner Bros.’ attempt to match Marvel’s success actually be successful without establishing the rest of DC’s pantheon of heroes?
Every week Film Inquiry publishes the movies that are opening in cinemas! This week: Pixels, Paper Towns, Southpaw, The Vatican Tapes, Samba, Unexpected, Big Significant Things and Phoenix.
For as long as there have been films, there have been coming of age movies and there have been high school movies. These types of film, these genres, have become so overdone, that it becomes hard for a single film to really stand out. Dope does.
“I ain’t afraid to die anymore.” Especially when you want that Oscar so bad, right Leo? Kidding.
More than 150 years after the old West faded into legend, the western genre is still very much alive and well. Slow West is the feature debut of writer-director John Maclean. Although it contains some clear watermarks of a first-time director, it is also among the more unique modern westerns in the way that it plays around with traditional western tropes and conventions.
Ever since the glory days of silent cinema, Hollywood has been criticised of running out of ideas. This is why the biopic is the perfect genre for screenwriters and directors. A typical life doesn’t neatly fit into a simple three-act structure, but by highlighting an individual’s greatest successes, and framing them in a way that makes everything else inconsequential by comparison, you can turn something as uninteresting as somebody’s life into a thrilling drama.
Whoa! Frankie Muniz? I thought he was racing cars after Malcolm in the Middle.
When Vêra Chytilová sadly passed away in March of last year, cinephiles across the world mourned the loss of a truly passionate and original filmmaker. Chytilová was the dangerous iconoclast of the Czech New Wave. Both the BFI and Second Run DVD decided that the world must know of her work outside of her nihilistic masterpiece Sedmikrasky (Daisies, 1966), and as such the BFI ran a series showing many of her films at their Southbank cinema, and Second Run released two of her films, Pasti, Pasti, Pasticky (Traps, 1998) and Fruit of Paradise (1970), on their excellent DVD line.
You probably recognize the quote “Power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely”. This is more a story of the former but the latter may apply to the puppetmaster himself. Anyway, if you’ve ever taken an intro to psych class, you’ve probably ran into some mention of the Stanford Prison Experiment.
The marketing team for Paul Feig’s most recent film, Spy, should really reconsider their occupation: this was one of my first thoughts as the credits for the film rolled and I began to head for the exit. The trailers and posters for the film made it seem like little more than Paulina Blart: