News from IFC

9 articles

9 October 2008 10:48 AM, PDT

By Aaron Hillis

Brooklyn-born auteur Darren Aronofsky turned mathematical patterns and theories into a brooding thriller (1998's "Pi"), injected us with a bravura adaptation of Hubert Selby Jr.'s reckless-addiction novel (2000's Oscar-nominated "Requiem for a Dream"), and raced against the clock of mortality in an ambitious love story spanning ten centuries (2006's unfairly maligned "The Fountain"). So what's a filmmaker's next move, having already zoomed a 26th century Hugh Jackman around the galaxy in an oversized soap bubble containing the Tree of Life?

Curiously, you resurrect Mickey Rourke's career. One of the most wildly anticipated films of 2008, Aronofsky's humanist drama "The Wrestler" will close this year's New York Film Festival. But even before it officially opens in December, the Oscar buzz for Rourke as past-his-prime wrestler Randy "The Ram" Robinson is already starting to be deafening (and rightly so). Shot with handheld verité techniques that put you right up in Rourke's fascinating mug,

Aaron Hillis

7 October 2008 8:44 AM, PDT

By Matt Singer

According to the trailer of David Zucker's new comedy, "An American Carol," "America's most infamous filmmaker -- totally arrogant, completely clueless -- [has] finally gone too far." Of course, Zucker, a former liberal activist who became a "9/11 Republican," is referring to Michael Moore, the inspiration for the central character in "An American Carol," one Michael Malone (Kevin Farley), a filmmaker who's visited by three Dickensian ghosts after he demands that July 4th be abolished ("I love America. That's why it needs to be destroyed!").

Zucker's spoof is perhaps the most high-profile film to take on Moore, but it's by no means the first. In fact, in the last four years, Moore's work has inadvertently given birth to an entirely new strain of conservative filmmaking whose sole mission is to discredit him by taking issue with his documentary aesthetic, his politics, his personal success, even his physical appearance.

Matt Singer

7 October 2008 6:53 AM, PDT

By Michael Atkinson

The British have a thing about underage sociopathy -- we in the U.S. will puzzle and wonder as a culture about the latest school shooter or the very occasional death-metal bogus-ritual killing, but in tabloid-crazy England a news story of a child murdering a child pinches very powerful nerve endings, and the social wound of it is felt universally and lasts for years, if not indefinitely. While the American character, often amnesiac and marinated in ideas of personal freedom and frontier independence, tends to take these things in stride (does anyone even off-handedly remember the name of that Virginia Tech psycho?), the convention-loving Brits are commonly, in contrast, traumatized for good. (There's a reason England is the most surveillance-saturated nation in the world.) This is the underlying dynamic of John Crowley's adroit and heartfelt "Boy A" (2007), which is inspired at least in part by the 1993 abduction and killing,

Michael Atkinson

6 October 2008 4:24 PM, PDT

"This film was always meant to be an animated film. I never thought there was a chance to do it any other way -- not as a fiction film, and definitely not as a classic documentary film." Ari Folman, the writer/director of "Waltz with Bashir," described his unconventional and powerful doc about the 1982 Sabra and Shatila massacre and his personal involvement and memories of the incident to the press at the New York Film Festival.

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IFC

6 October 2008 4:18 PM, PDT

"I didn't know anything about it until I read the script," admitted Clint Eastwood at the New York Film Festival's press conference for "Changeling," his highly anticipated film based on the 1920s Wineville Chicken Murders and an incident in which the police tried to convince a single mother that the boy they had brought to her was her missing son, when he was actually a runaway looking for a free trip to California. Angelina Jolie plays the mother, while John Malkovich is the reverend who comes to her aid. Eastwood discussed making modern day L.A. look antique and how he comes up with musical themes for his films.

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IFC

6 October 2008 4:01 PM, PDT

"It was almost like an odyssey, because we spent five years -- the first few years we had to retrieve material from different parts of the world." Wearing his signature sunglasses, Wong Kar-wai addressed the press after a New York Film Festival screening of "Ashes of Time Redux," the restored and recut version of his 1994 martial arts film "Ashes of Time," starring an unbelievable cast that includes Maggie Cheung, Tony Leung, Leslie Cheung and Brigitte Lin, who also appeared at the press conference. Cinematographer Christopher Doyle shared some memories of the original production, while Wong described visiting various locations around the globe to find prints of the film, including a warehouse owned by a San Francisco theater owner that was "almost like 'Raiders of the Lost Ark."

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IFC

6 October 2008 3:28 PM, PDT

By Alison Willmore

The Oscar category of animated short film doesn't tend to get a lot of attention, but in 2001 it was host to one of the most unlikely and awesome nominations in recent Academy Award history. Alongside a tasteful watercolor-based work about a father and daughter and a stop-motion drama set in plague-era Europe was Don Hertzfeldt's "Rejected," a profane, hilarious and brilliantly absurd short filled with non sequitur-spouting stick figures and fluffy creatures bleeding from lower orifices, one that imagined an animator driven mad by his hopeless attempts to please corporate sponsors. The film didn't win, but did fuel a devoted fan base that's followed Hertzfeldt in his staunchly independent career of crafting totally distinctive animated shorts that have grown in ambition and sophistication even as he's continued to hand-draw his work and avoid computer influence. His last title, "Everything Will Be Ok," won the short film

Alison Willmore

6 October 2008 7:21 AM, PDT

By Matt Singer and Alison Willmore

Who would have guessed that Mickey Rourke would be hailed the comeback of the year, with his role in Darren Aronofsky's "The Wrestler" getting critical acclaim from all comers? It's been a tough road for the actor/former boxer, and he brings every bit of wear and tear to the film, which is all the better for it. In honor of Rourke, on this week's IFC News podcast we look at other actors who've faded from the spotlight only to make great comebacks, and a few who never managed to make their return work.

And don't forget to check out our footage of Aronofsky, Rourke and co-star Marisa Tomei at the New York Film Festival.

Download now (MP3: 35:53 minutes, 32.9 Mb) Podcast feeds: [Xml] [iTunes]

[Photo: "The Wrestler," Fox Searchlight Pictures, 2008]

Alison Willmore

6 October 2008 7:06 AM, PDT

By Neil Pedley

With the fall season's heavy hitters already starting to make an appearance, this week's feast of indie offers some calm before the big studio storm. Enjoy it while it lasts.

"Ashes of Time Redux"

Celebrated Hong Kong filmmaker Wong Kar-wai gathered together lost and damaged footage to painstakingly rework his only martial arts epic, first released in 1994, into a fresh, definitive edition (complete with an all new score from Yo-Yo Ma). With a blindingly colorful palette, Wong paints a looping, stylized portrait of an embittered agent Ouyang Feng (the late Leslie Cheung) who channels the unbearable pain of a broken heart into commissioning bounty hunters to commit acts of vengeance. Tony Leung Ka Fai, Maggie Cheung, Carina Lau and Jacky Cheung round out the still-impressive cast.

Opens in New York and Los Angeles.

"Body of Lies"

In terms of the global espionage thriller, orange is the new

Neil Pedley

9 articles