Posted: December 29, 2017 | Author: Donald | Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: A DANCE TO THE MUSIC OF TIME: Coco, a word from our sponsors: I am now offering a new service: so much emphasis has been given lately to the importance of the opening of your screenplay, but want to know how well their script is working with the opening pages, Foxtrot For questions: hcasner@aol.com First, I now offer coverage for the first twenty pages at the cost of $20.00. For those who don't want to have full coverage on their screenplay at this time | 11,816 Comments »
For questions: hcasner@aol.com
First, a word from our sponsors: I am now offering a new service: so much emphasis has been given lately to the importance of the opening of your screenplay, I now offer coverage for the first twenty pages at the cost of $20.00. For those who don’t want to have full coverage on their screenplay at this time, but want to know how well their script is working with the opening pages, this is perfect for you. I’ll help you not lose the reader on page one.
Ever wonder what a reader for a contest or agency thinks when he reads your screenplay? Check out my new e-book published on Amazon: Rantings and Ravings of a Screenplay Reader, including my series of essays, What I Learned Reading for Contests This Year, and my film reviews of 2013. Only $2.99. http://ow.ly/xN31r
and check out my Script Consultation Services: http://ow.ly/HPxKE
Warning: SPOILERS
In writer/director Samuel Maoz’s often deeply affecting film Foxtrot, one can say that the title is truth in advertising. Like the basic steps of that dance, the movie is structured in four movements, with a fifth one returning to the beginning as the movements begin to repeat themselves.
The basic story revolves around an Israeli family who receives news that their soldier son died at a roadblock he was stationed at. The grief here is palpable and broad. And then they discover that there is more to come.
The first step is the viewpoint of someone driving a truck; the second the revelation of the son’s death; the third, a dramatization of the son’s life at his outpost; the fourth, another scene with the family; and then back to the truck that began the dance in the first place.
I can’t really fault the movie. It’s extremely well made. And it’s heartfelt and sincere and the hand of the writer/director can be seen throughout as each segment is approached in a different style. Read the rest of this entry »
Posted: December 29, 2017 | Author: Donald | Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: Claes Bang, Dave Franco, Dominic West, Elizabeth Moss, James Franco, Michael W. Weber, Robert Ostlund, Scott Neustadter, The Disaster Artist, The Room, The Square, Tommy Wiseau | 2,005 Comments »
For questions: hcasner@aol.com
First, a word from our sponsors: I am now offering a new service: so much emphasis has been given lately to the importance of the opening of your screenplay, I now offer coverage for the first twenty pages at the cost of $20.00. For those who don’t want to have full coverage on their screenplay at this time, but want to know how well their script is working with the opening pages, this is perfect for you. I’ll help you not lose the reader on page one.
Ever wonder what a reader for a contest or agency thinks when he reads your screenplay? Check out my new e-book published on Amazon: Rantings and Ravings of a Screenplay Reader, including my series of essays, What I Learned Reading for Contests This Year, and my film reviews of 2013. Only $2.99. http://ow.ly/xN31r
and check out my Script Consultation Services: http://ow.ly/HPxKE
Warning: SPOILERS
After watching The Square, the new film from writer/director Robert Ostlund (he previously gave us the cheeky Force Majeure), I have to say I’m not exactly sure what point he was trying to make. At the same time, it was so entertaining and involving, I guess I’m not exactly sure I cared.
The story revolves around a man named Christian (I doubt Ostlund randomly drew the name out of a hat), the curator for a modern art museum in Sweden. The museum’s newest installation is, well, a square. That’s it, a square, with some wording about what the square means (though after hearing the words a few times, I’m not sure I knew exactly what that was).
I think it has something to do with the idea that whoever is in the square is supposed to be treated as equal to anyone else, a safe place where they are protected from harm. Read the rest of this entry »
Posted: December 17, 2017 | Author: Donald | Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: Diana Agron, Greta Gerwig, Lady Bird, Laurie Metcalf, Lois Smith, Lucas Hedges, Margaret Betts, Melissa Leo, Novitiate, Saoirse Ronan, Timothée Chalamet, Tracy Letts | 3,835 Comments »
First, a word from our sponsors: I am now offering a new consultation service: so much emphasis has been given lately to the importance of the opening of your screenplay, I now offer coverage for the first twenty pages at the cost of $20.00. For those who don’t want to have full coverage on their screenplay at this time, but want to know how well their script is working with the opening pages, this is perfect for you. I’ll help you not lose the reader on page one.
Ever wonder what a reader for a contest or agency thinks when he reads your screenplay? FosCheck out my new e-book published on Amazon: Rantings and Ravings of a Screenplay Reader, including my series of essays, What I Learned Reading for Contests This Year, and my film reviews of 2013. Only $2.99. http://ow.ly/xN31r
and check out my Script Consultation Services: http://ow.ly/HPxKE
Warning: SPOILERS
I think I will begin this review with a personal anecdote. Years ago, I was in the audience for one of the final previews for Stephen Sondheim’s musical Merrily We Roll Along, a tale told in reverse about three friends who betray the ideals they had when just starting out. It was a disaster. An unmitigated one at that. And it closed, I believe, around two weeks after it opened, if it lasted that long.
It was so terrible, I though the songs, with a couple of exceptions, were not just Sondheim’s worst, they were just bad.
A year later, I was in the cutout section of a record store (remember those?) and I ran across a cast recording for the show. I bought it and listened to it anew and realized the songs were wonderful and that it had been the production that was, well, let us be kind and say…lacking. Read the rest of this entry »
Posted: December 14, 2017 | Author: Donald | Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: Allison Janney, Craig Gillespie, I, John Hawks, Lucas Hedges, Margot Robbie, Martin McDonagh, McDormand, Missouri, Paul Walter Hauser, Peter Dinklage, Sam Rockwell, Sebastian Stan, Steven Rogers, Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Tonya, Woody Harrelson, Zeljko Ivanek | 728 Comments »
First, a word from our sponsors: I am now offering a new consultation service: so much emphasis has been given lately to the importance of the opening of your screenplay, I now offer coverage for the first twenty pages at the cost of $20.00. For those who don’t want to have full coverage on their screenplay at this time, but want to know how well their script is working with the opening pages, this is perfect for you. I’ll help you not lose the reader on page one.
Ever wonder what a reader for a contest or agency thinks when he reads your screenplay? FosCheck out my new e-book published on Amazon: Rantings and Ravings of a Screenplay Reader, including my series of essays, What I Learned Reading for Contests This Year, and my film reviews of 2013. Only $2.99. http://ow.ly/xN31r
and check out my Script Consultation Services: http://ow.ly/HPxKE
Warning: SPOILERS
I, Tonya, the new film from writer Steven Rogers and director Craig Gillespie, is a fictional account of the ice skating scandal where the husband of skater Tonya Harding, along with her bodyguard, conspired to break the leg of Tonya’s main rival, Nancy Kerrigan.
No matter what else it may be, I, Tonya is very successful and could easily be a real crowd pleaser. Structurally, it’s a forthright dramatization of the events punctuated with talking head interviews of the characters looking back on events. It’s often extremely funny and at times manages to show some empathy for the title character.
Though it is effective, it also at times feels a bit condescending and exploitive, as if the filmmakers were treating this as an elongated Jerry Springer show. So the laughs are sometimes a bit cruel and at the expense of the real life counterparts.
Read the rest of this entry »
Posted: December 13, 2017 | Author: Donald | Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: Agatha Christie, Albert Finney, Barry Keoghan, Collin Farrell, David Sachet, Efthymis Filippou, Ingrid Bergman, Johnny Depp, Josh Gad, Kenneth Branagh, Michael Green, Murder on the Orient Express, Paul Dehn, Poirot, Sidney Lumley, The Killing of a Sacred Deer, Yorgos Lanthimos | 2,433 Comments »
First, a word from our sponsors: I am now offering a new consultation service: so much emphasis has been given lately to the importance of the opening of your screenplay, I now offer coverage for the first twenty pages at the cost of $20.00. For those who don’t want to have full coverage on their screenplay at this time, but want to know how well their script is working with the opening pages, this is perfect for you. I’ll help you not lose the reader on page one.
Ever wonder what a reader for a contest or agency thinks when he reads your screenplay? FosCheck out my new e-book published on Amazon: Rantings and Ravings of a Screenplay Reader, including my series of essays, What I Learned Reading for Contests This Year, and my film reviews of 2013. Only $2.99. http://ow.ly/xN31r
and check out my Script Consultation Services: http://ow.ly/HPxKE
Warning: SPOILERS
When I saw writer/director Yorgos Lanthimos and writer Efthymis Filippou’s earlier film Dogtooth, I must be honest and say I didn’t have the most favorable reaction and many might consider that odd.
I felt it a rather dated attack on middle class mores that had already been done to death in the 1950’s and 60’s, especially in the off-Broadway theater.
But then I saw The Lobster, their last film, an hysterical satire and social commentary on love and relationships and the society that promotes them.
And now I’ve seen their latest, The Killing of a Sacred Deer, and I realized I was partially right about my earlier analysis because the more I see of their work, the more I realize the turgid social commentary of those decades are not their main influences. Rather, these two artists are the 21st Century embodiment of the existentialist/theater of the absurd practitioners like Beckett, Ionesco, Sartre, Albee and others of that ilk.
Read the rest of this entry »
Posted: December 10, 2017 | Author: Donald | Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: Adam Sandler, Ben Stiller, Catcher in the Rye, Claes Bang, Danny Strong, Dominic West, Dustin Hoffman, Elizabeth Moss, Emma Thompson, Griffin Dunne, Hope Davis, J.D. Salinger, Joan Didion: the Center Will Not Hold, Kevin Spacey, Nicholas Hault, Noah Baumbach, Rebel in the Rye, Ruben Outland, Sarah Paulson, The Meyerwitz Stories (Both Old and New), The Square, Vanessa Redgrave, Victor Garber, Whit Burnett | 8,257 Comments »
For questions: hcasner@aol.com
First, a word from our sponsors: I am now offering a new service: so much emphasis has been given lately to the importance of the opening of your screenplay, I now offer coverage for the first twenty pages at the cost of $20.00. For those who don’t want to have full coverage on their screenplay at this time, but want to know how well their script is working with the opening pages, this is perfect for you. I’ll help you not lose the reader on page one.
Ever wonder what a reader for a contest or agency thinks when he reads your screenplay? Check out my new e-book published on Amazon: Rantings and Ravings of a Screenplay Reader, including my series of essays, What I Learned Reading for Contests This Year, and my film reviews of 2013. Only $2.99. http://ow.ly/xN31r
and check out my Script Consultation Services: http://ow.ly/HPxKE
Warning: SPOILERS
The Meyerwitz Stories (Both Old and New) opened both on the Netflix streaming platform and in the theaters at the same time. The goal, as I surmise it, it to have a qualifying run for the Oscar race (and screeners have been sent) while giving it as little theatrical distribution as possible.
Sort of like having your cake and eating it to.
It’s hard to say, but I’m not sure they have that strong a chance. Many voters might feel like this is cheating (and Cannes refused to show any Netflix product).
But The Meyerwitz Stories…, written and directed by the intelligent and erudite Noah Baumbach, is quite good, even quite marvelous and definitely deserves an audience. Read the rest of this entry »
Posted: December 10, 2017 | Author: Donald | Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: Adele Haneal, Antoine Reinartz, Arnaud Valois, BPM (Beats Per Minute), Francis Lee, Gemma Jones, Gheorghe Ionescu, God’s Own Country, Ian Hart, Josh O’Connor, Nahuel Pérez Biscayat, Philippe Mangeot, Robin Campillo | 6,036 Comments »
For questions: hcasner@aol.com
First, a word from our sponsors: I am now offering a new service: so much emphasis has been given lately to the importance of the opening of your screenplay, I now offer coverage for the first twenty pages at the cost of $20.00. For those who don’t want to have full coverage on their screenplay at this time, but want to know how well their script is working with the opening pages, this is perfect for you. I’ll help you not lose the reader on page one.
Ever wonder what a reader for a contest or agency thinks when he reads your screenplay? Check out my new e-book published on Amazon: Rantings and Ravings of a Screenplay Reader, including my series of essays, What I Learned Reading for Contests This Year, and my film reviews of 2013. Only $2.99. http://ow.ly/xN31r
and check out my Script Consultation Services: http://ow.ly/HPxKE
Warning: SPOILERS
Though God’s Own Country could be described as England’s Brokeback Mountain, such a quick and superficial comparison should not take away from the startlingly effectiveness of both films.
The British story takes place in Yorkshire, a location as harsh and cold and unforgiving as the title implies (the phrase was first used to describe Wicklow Mountains in Ireland, but has come to be used to describe many locations, including Yorkshire, that are considered favored by God). Read the rest of this entry »
Posted: December 9, 2017 | Author: Donald | Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: Ben Affleck, Cate Blanchett, Chris Hemsworth, Chris Terrie, Craig Kyle Christopher Yost, Eric Pearson, Gal Gadot, Henry Cahill, Jason Mamoa, Jeff Goldblum, Josh Whedon, Justice League, Rachel House, Ray Fisher. Jeremy Irons, Taiko Waititi, Thor: Ragnorak, Zach Snyder | 211 Comments »
For questions: hcasner@aol.com
First, a word from our sponsors: I am now offering a new service: so much emphasis has been given lately to the importance of the opening of your screenplay, I now offer coverage for the first twenty pages at the cost of $20.00. For those who don’t want to have full coverage on their screenplay at this time, but want to know how well their script is working with the opening pages, this is perfect for you. I’ll help you not lose the reader on page one.
Ever wonder what a reader for a contest or agency thinks when he reads your screenplay? Check out my new e-book published on Amazon: Rantings and Ravings of a Screenplay Reader, including my series of essays, What I Learned Reading for Contests This Year, and my film reviews of 2013. Only $2.99. http://ow.ly/xN31r
and check out my Script Consultation Services: http://ow.ly/HPxKE
Warning: SPOILERS
When I was young, I tended to not favor DC Comics, but gravitated toward those of the Marvel variety. This is because as a barefoot boy with cheek I never really fit in, was an outsider, so I found the Marvel universe, with its conflicted superheroes and conflicted supervillains, to be more reflective as life as I saw it.
Spiderman was especially someone I could identify with and why Spider-Man: Homecoming is the best Spidey film because it most closely mirrored what my life at school was like.
This approach, which often drives the movies based on Marvel characters, is why I have usually found these films, even the subpar ones, better than the DC ones, with a couple of exceptions (The Dark Knight Rises).
Read the rest of this entry »
Posted: November 13, 2017 | Author: Donald | Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: Ali Fazal, Ben Stiller, Brad’s Status, Eddie Izzard, Ethan Cohen, Gary Basaraba, George Clooney, Grant Heslov, Joel Cohen, Judi Dench, Julianne Moore, Lee Hall, Luke Wilson, Matt Damon, Michael Gambon, Michael Sheen, Mike White, Oscar Isaacs, Paul Higgins, Shrabani Bash, Stephen Frears, Suburbicon | 135 Comments »
First, a word from our sponsors: I am now offering a new consultation service: so much emphasis has been given lately to the importance of the opening of your screenplay, I now offer coverage for the first twenty pages at the cost of $20.00. For those who don’t want to have full coverage on their screenplay at this time, but want to know how well their script is working with the opening pages, this is perfect for you. I’ll help you not lose the reader on page one.
Ever wonder what a reader for a contest or agency thinks when he reads your screenplay? Check out my new e-book published on Amazon: Rantings and Ravings of a Screenplay Reader, including my series of essays, What I Learned Reading for Contests This Year, and my film reviews of 2013. Only $2.99. http://ow.ly/xN31r
and check out my Script Consultation Services: http://ow.ly/HPxKE
Warning: SPOILERS
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Suburbicon, the new postmodern, neo-noir written by Joel and Ethan Cohen, Grant Heslov, and the film’s director George Clooney (perhaps two writers too many), is probably best described as if the Cohen brothers had adapted a James Cain novel with a bit of A Raison in the Sun tossed in for good measure.
The basic premise is that seemingly mild mannered middle class family man Gardner (Matt Damon) has paid some thugs to break into his house pretending to rob it, but in reality they have been hired to kill Gardner’s wheelchair bound wife (Julianne Moore) for the insurance money and so he can marry his sister-in-law (Julianne Moore redux), who has a set of perfectly good legs thank you very much. Read the rest of this entry »
Posted: November 10, 2017 | Author: Donald | Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: 78/52, Alexander O. Philippe, Alfred Hitchcock, Bria Vinaite, Brooklyn Prince, Chris Bergoch, Danny Elfman, Elijah Wood, Guillermo del Toro, Jamie Lee Curtis, Marli Renfro, Martin Scorsese, Peter Bogdanovich, Psycho, Sean Baker, The Florida Project, Willem Dafoe | 10,950 Comments »
For questions: hcasner@aol.com
First, a word iefrom our sponsors: I am now offering a new service: so much emphasis has been given lately to the importance of the opening of your screenplay, I now offer coverage for the first twenty pages at the cost of $20.00. For those who don’t want to have full coverage on their screenplay at this time, but want to know how well their script is working with the opening pages, this is perfect for you. I’ll help you not lose the reader on page one.
Ever wonder what a reader for a contest or agency thinks when he reads your screenplay? Check out my new e-book published on Amazon: Rantings and Ravings of a Screenplay Reader, including my series of essays, What I Learned Reading for Contests This Year, and my film reviews of 2013. Only $2.99. http://ow.ly/xN31r
and check out my Script Consultation Services: http://ow.ly/HPxKE
Warning: SPOILERS
Writer/director Alexander O. Philippe’s 78/52 is not only everything you wanted to know about the infamous scene in Alfred Hitchcock’s seminal film Psycho that did for showers what Jaws would later do for Fourth of July swimming in the seas, but everything you didn’t know you wanted to know (the name derives from the set piece requiring 78 camera set ups and 52 shots).
There has always been something perverse, not just about all of Hitchcock’s oeuvre, but especially in Psycho.
It’s not just that the movie is horrifying and scares the shit out of you.
It’s not just that it’s somewhat mean spirited (not just to the audience, but to the characters on screen).
It’s just that you can tell Hitchcock is having fun killing someone in such a way that both terrifies the audience while making them enjoy it and then feel guilty about it.
Read the rest of this entry »
