Household War: John C. Reilly (left) faces down Jonah Hill in CYRUS.

Wow. Four films worth talking about, all opening in the same week, and I’ve got interviews for all of them. I’m also pretty strung out to begin with, so I’m not going to attempt to get them all in within a single show, or even a couple of shows. Instead, we’ll start off with two comedies that are somewhat interrelated because they both break the mold in their own ways. Then, next week, we’ll be back with one episode looking at a fantastic documentary about the event that gave birth to the gay rights movement, and another episode about a beautiful and riveting drama from Italy starring Tilda Swinton. (Yeah, I could tell you titles, but, hell, listen to the show — they’re mentioned at the end).

Flawed Production: Agnès Jaoui (left) endures the ineptitudes of Jamel Debbouze (center) and Jean-Pierre Bacri in LET IT RAIN.

This week, we’ve got Agnès Jaoui discussing LET IT RAIN, her film about a politician (Jaoui herself) enduring an inept documentary crew (Jamel Debbouze and frequent Jaoui collaborator Jean-Pierre Bacri) in her public life, and family friction in her private one. As with the director’s previous effort, LISTEN TO ME, the interlocking havocs set the stage for a keenly nuanced view of the human condition, only this time with a considerably lighter tone.

Marisa Tomei (left) and John C. Reilly in CYRUS.

Then we’ll be talking with Jay and Mark Duplass about their new film CYRUS, wherein John C. Reilly tries to woo Marisa Tomei while fending off attacks from her passive-aggressive, live-at-home son, played by Jonah Hill. And if that log-line gives you chills, remember that the Duplasses were responsible for such cutting-edge, indie projects as THE PUFFY CHAIR and BAGHEAD. Here, they let that feeling of spontaneity — ganged to an exceptional cast — work its magic, and the result is a comedy with a refreshing sense of humanity.

Good stuff this week, with even more to come next. Click on the player to hear the show.

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LET IT RAIN
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CYRUS
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When Reilly was Cyrus (sort of).

Not Quite Human: Delphine Chanéac as Dren in SPLICE

In Volume 1, Episode 17 of the Cinefantastique Podcast, Dan Persons Lawrence French, and Steve Biodrowski delve into the worlds of science fiction, fantasy, and horror, unraveling the mysteries of genetic engineering and bad parenting as they analyze SPLICE, Vincenzo Natali’s thoughtful variation on the old “mad scientists create a monster” scenario. Also this week, the usual round-up of news, home video releases, and upcoming events.

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Days of Future's Past: Iconic images from Fritz Lang's METROPOLIS.

In Volume 1, Episode 14 of the Cinefantastique Horror, Fantasy & Science Fiction Podcast, Dan Persons, Lawrence French, and Steve Biodrowski visit the futuristic city of METROPOLIS, the 1927 science fiction classic from director Fritz Lang. The subject of a recent restoration that added over twenty minutes of footage, the film is ripe for reappraisal. Is it even better than before, or is the additional running time a mere marketing ploy to get you to buy more DVDs? Also under consideration this week: a Frank Frazetta obituary, Dario Argento does Dracula in 3D, plus a week’s worth of news and a look at upcoming home video releases.

Top: Ink. Left: The Ghost Writer. Right: The Imaginarium of Dr. Parnassus

It’s a genre light week, with no new horror, fantasy, or science fiction titles released in cinemas, so Dan Persons, Lawrence French, and Steve Biodrowski take this opportunity to shine a little much-deserved light on some overlooked and/or under-rated genre titles. The main topic of discussion is INK, the surprisingly good low-budget fantasy film about a girl kidnapped by a dream demon. Also under analysis, Roman Polanski’s Kafkaesque thriller THE GHOST WRITER, starring Pierce Brosnan and Ewan McGregor, playing in limited release in New York and Los Angeles. And Terry Gilliam’s THE IMAGINARIUM OF DR. PARNASSUS, which received only a small release earlier this year.

Jeff Bridges and Maggie Gyllenhaal in CRAZY HEART

So if the acceptance speeches didn’t get anywhere close enough to satisfying your curiosity about how these films came about, click on the players below. We’ve got MIGHTY MOVIE PODCAST interviews with the directors of all these films:

And come back Friday, when have an interview with the director of the Piaget Producer’s Award winner, THE EXPLODING GIRL

It's Beautiful, Now Give It Up: Dr. Albert C. Barnes with his collection in THE ART OF THE STEAL

At one point in the new film THE ART OF THE STEAL, one of the people protesting the moving of Dr. Albert Barnes’ art collection (Picasso, Modigliani, Renoir, Cézanne, amongst others) from its home outside Philadelphia into the city proper stands outside the gates of the museum’s eventual home, screaming, “Philistines!” The art world occasionally turns on such clashes of passion, but this level of fervor is particularly striking, and says a lot about a near-century-long struggle between one man’s vision and the acquisitional imperative of the moneyed elite.

THE ART OF THE STEAL traces the history of Dr. Barnes — himself quite wealthy, but also quite progressive when it came to ideas on art, culture, and education — the foundation he formed after the Philly elite initially derided his collection, and how said elite has tried for decades to gain control of that collection, now valued at over $25 billion. They finally succeeded, but not before director Don Argott, producer Sheena M. Joyce, and executive producer Lenny Feinberg (himself a graduate of the Barnes Foundation) managed to trace the manipulation and subterfuge employed to finally win the prize. The film’s a riveting examination of how noble goals can be undone by the most insidious of politics, and how the quest for a literally priceless collection of art can motivate powerful people to circumvent a man’s dying wish.

I got to speak to Argott, Joyce, and Feinberg about the difficulties in portraying the full dimension of this story on the screen, and why a big, shiny, high-profile new museum will not necessarily serve Dr. Barnes’ collection well. Click on the player above to hear the interview.

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Much Cooler Art Thieves

Hanging on with a Wing and a... uh... oh: Desi in OCTOBER COUNTRY

A tangent here, but stick with me: At the beginning of the animated film, MY NEIGHBORS THE YAMATAS, director Isao Takahata envisions the world of his titular family as an ocean voyage, complete with pounding waves and raging storms, but arriving eventually at a safe port. If the analogy was transferred to OCTOBER COUNTRY, the new documentary by Michael Palmieri and Donal Mosher, the familial vessel would also be facing typhoons, hailstorms, shark-infested waters, and a foggy void where the safe landing should be. And you may as well throw an iceberg in for good measure.

Filmmakers Mosher (whose family is depicted, and who also is a photographer, musician, and writer) and Palmieri do not hedge in their depiction of the upstate N.Y. Mosher family, whose various members have undergone such trials as teen pregnancy, drug abuse, and molestation. But they don’t overdramatize events, either, and for all the darkness that’s revealed, there’s also a glimmer of hope in the idea that people can endure all this pain and sorrow and still remain, however tenuously, a family. Letting his camera take its cue from the photo series Mosher did on his clan, Palmieri creates haunting visuals that complement the group’s shadowed history.

Mosher and Palmieri were happy to discuss their concerns in pulling back the veil on one family’s struggles, and how they’re hoping that this one story can bring a new perspective to the challenges facing the working class in today’s U.S. Click on the player above to hear the interview.

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Happier Disasters

Martin Scorsese and Leonardo DiCaprio on the set of SHUTTER ISLAND

The embargo on the SHUTTER ISLAND press conference has lifted, so I’m putting it out for your entertainment and enrichment. However, I believe the embargo on criticism is still in place, so I can’t really set this up in the way that I’d like. You’re just going to have to wait for the BRAND NEW Cinefantastique Podcast to get my opinion (as well as that of editor Steve Biodrowski) on the film.

Suffice it to say that SHUTTER ISLAND is Martin Scorsese’s latest work, a dark exploration of the human psyche that has Leonardo DiCaprio’s U.S. Marshal going to the titular island to investigate the disappearance of an inmate from a hospital for the criminally insane. There, he discovers more than a smattering of sinister doings, and a couple of doctors — played by Ben Kingsley and Max von Sydow — whose ministrations may or may not figure in the conspiracy. Curiosity piqued? The film opens on February 19th.

Click on the player above to hear the New York press conference that featured Martin Scorsese, Leonardo DiCaprio, and Ben Kingsley.

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Another Day, Another Freaky, Scorsese Island

Well, Not Everything Belongs to the People: Leo Tolstoy (Christopher Plummer) and the Countess Sofya (Helen Mirren) in a reassuringly indulgent moment of intimacy from THE LAST STATION

The core of THE LAST STATION’S story is the conflict between Leo Tolstoy and his wife, the Countess Sofya, over the rights to his works. But frack that, what really matters is that you’ve got Christopher Plummer as Tolstoy and Helen Mirren as the Countess, and the opportunity to watch them seduce, cajole, clash, and otherwise play off each other. Throw in Paul Giamatti as Tolstoy’s staunchest disciple and Sofya’s most daunting antagonist, and even if the battle was about the divvying up of Dave & Buster’s prize tickets, you know you’d want to watch.

Fortunately, director Michael Hoffman — who scripted from the Jay Parini novel and whose previous credits include RESTORATION and A MIDSUMMER’S NIGHT DREAM — gives his actors a suitably meaty drama to tear into. Beyond fame for writing War and Peace and Anna Karenina, Tolstoy also happened to be a potent political force in his time, dedicated to an early incarnation of Socialism. All well and good, except that the Countess — a passionate supporter of her husband all the way to hand-copying War and Peace six times — came to realize that the man’s growing public profile meant watching him drawn further from her love and deeper into the machinations of his acolytes, including their push to get him to sign over the rights to his stories to the Russian people. As the Countess fights for what she feels is only the due owed to her and Tolstoy’s children, the conflict is witnessed by two young disciples, Valentin (James McAvoy) and Masha (Kerry Condon), whose growing love affair plays in contrast to the dissolution of Tolstoy’s marriage.

I got Hoffman to talk a bit about managing the on-screen, emotional pyrotechnics, and recreating a bit of early twentieth century Russia in Germany. Click on the player above to hear the interview.

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www.sonyclassics.com/thelaststation

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Giamatti’s Adventures in Post-Communism Russia

The Face Looking Back: Sophie Okonedo in SKIN

You could probably forge a good, absurdist, dark comedy out of a government where racial identity can be declared and reversed by official decree, and white parents whose child’s skin is, because of a genetic quirk, darker than theirs struggle to get their kid designated Caucasian. I can imagine Terry Gilliam going to town on something like that, or maybe even Kevin Smith in a more thoughtful mode. But this isn’t absurdist comedy, this was South Africa in the throes of apartheid, and the story told in Anthony Fabian’s debut feature, SKIN, turns out to have been all too real.

The actual person, Sandra Laing, suffered through a kind of industrial-strength crisis of identity, with her parents determined to ensure that her privileges be protected via that all-important white designation, and her own growing awareness that, whatever the government stamped on a piece of paper, she would have no shortage of difficulty in finding a place in so divided a society. Director Fabian shot the film in South Africa, and brought together a strong cast, including Sophie Okonedo as Sandra and Sam Neill and Alice Krige as her parents. The result is quite moving — a human and unusual perspective on the insanity of institutionalized racism.

Anthony Fabian and I got a chance to talk about his motivation for taking on this project, and how the dictates of apartheid could twist the motives of even the best-intentioned of parents. Click on the player above to hear the interview.

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Truly Absurd Bureaucracy