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“Making a Movie: Five Things I Wish I’d Known” – David Chen at Slashfilm has made a documentary featuring podcast pal Stephen Tobolowsky, and he’d like to offer these tips to Past David Chen so that he can pave an easier path for the film to take. It’s a fantastic read even if you aren’t planning on making a movie, but if you are, get to know E&O Insurance and why you need it. An excellent mini-primer on what to do before you start filming.
“Jake Gyllenhaal on Losing 30 Pounds and Himself in Nightcrawler” – Ramin Setoodeh at Variety speaks with the actor (who improvised slamming his fist into a mirror during filming, only to slice his hand open) to understand what propelled him during the production of his crime paparazzo movie. This film looks stunning. More than ready for it to hit theaters.
“All the Game of Thrones Fan Theories You Absolutely Need to Know” – Rob Bricken at io9 shares the goods. Did you know the dragons are actually Russian spies? That’s probably not true.
“If Disney Villains Had Heartfelt Obituaries” – Shea Strauss at College Humor gives some posthumous love to Ursula and friends.
“Criterion Goes Pop” – Daniel Carlson at Movie Mezzanine looks at what happens when a movie about blowing up a rogue asteroid is labeled “important.”
“What’s more, striving to preserve pop cinema and celebrate its values and style goes a long way toward legitimizing a Western canon. These movies aren’t just preserved for how they’re executed – they’re hardly the only good movies out there – but for what they say about their filmmakers and the conditions of their production. A film can be many things, including a snapshot of the culture in which it was made; it transports the viewer to the very moment of its making. They’re unconscious ways we tell ourselves what the world was like then, and the manner with which we tell our stories influences how we think about ourselves. The movies become a record of their own creation.”
“The Essential Labor Films” – Ella Taylor at Fandor breaks up movies about us working into a brow-wiping taxonomy.
“How To Fight Parental Franchise Fatigue When Raising Kids in an Endless Summer” – Drew McWeeny’s latest Film Nerd 2.o column adjusts to two kids who want to binge-watch a series in preparation for the blockbuster months.
“I developed the summer movie habit when I was young, just as the industry figured it out, and they got their hooks in deep. I will totally admit to being permanently wired for a sort of excitement as the summer approaches in anticipation of big canvas big premise movies. And while that part of me is happy to play along every summer, there’s another part of me as a life-long cinephile who recognizes that you can’t just eat the junk food. Even the best of these big blockbusters rarely sustain me the way that the truly great movies do, and so I am careful to balance my diet.”
Related Topics: Criterion, Disney, Filmmaking
