 Hello and welcome to the unofficial Brian De Palma website. Here is the latest news: |
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Hello and welcome to the unofficial Brian De Palma website. Here is the latest news: |
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E-mail
Geoffsongs@aol.com
Paterno Family
Challenges
Accusation
of Cover-Up
Scorsese tests
new Zaillian
script for
The Irishman
with De Niro,
Pacino, Pesci
James Franco
plans to direct
& star in
adaptation of Ellroy's
American Tabloid
"Badfellas"--
Besson's Malavita
looks to team up
De Niro & Pfeiffer
Sean Penn to
direct De Niro
as raging comic
in The Comedian
Scarlett to make
directorial feature
debut with
Capote story
Keith Gordon
teaming up
with C. Nolan for
supernatural
thriller that
he will write
and direct
Recent Headlines
a la Mod:
-Picture emerging
for Happy Valley
-De Palma's new
project with
Said Ben Said
-De Palma to team
with Pacino & Pressman
for Paterno film
Happy Valley
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De Palma interviewed
in Paris 2002
De Palma discusses
The Black Dahlia 2006
Enthusiasms...
Alfred Hitchcock
The Master Of Suspense
Sergio Leone
and the Infield
Fly Rule
The Filmmaker Who
Came In From The Cold
Jim Emerson on
Greetings & Hi, Mom!
Scarface: Make Way
For The Bad Guy
Deborah Shelton
Official Web Site
Welcome to the
Offices of Death Records
The Film Society Lincoln Center today revealed its lineup for the 50th New York Film Festival, which runs from September 28 through October 14. Brian De Palma's Passion is one of the selections, making it two films in a row for De Palma, who brought Redacted to NYFF five years ago. Curiously, the article linked to above, written by Eugene Hernandez, states that this is De Palma's "first fiction feature since Femme Fatale." Despite being based on actual murders, the two films De Palma has made since Femme Fatale are both fiction films, as well: The Black Dahlia and Redacted. (Although Redacted begins with the onscreen disclaimer, "This film is entirely fiction, inspired by an incident widely reported to have occurred in Iraq," those words are themselves redacted to make way for a message that begins, "redacted visually documents imagined events...") In any case, the blurb included about Passion sounds tantalizing: "Brian De Palma brings great panache and a diabolical mastery of surprise to a classic tale of female competition and revenge. Noomi Rapace and Rachel McAdams are super-cool and oh so mean."NYFF will open with the world premiere of Ang Lee's highly anticipated Life Of Pi, and close with the world premiere of Robert Zemeckis' Flight. Other films include Alain Resnais' You Ain't Seen Nothin' Yet, Léos Carax's Holy Motors, Olivier Assayas' Something In The Air, Michael Haneke's Amour, and Noah Baumbach's Frances Ha. Resnais films bookend the NYFF's 50 years, as his film, Muriel, Or The Time Of Return, screened at the very first festival in 1963, according to the article.
Passion is a remake of Alain Corneau’s elegant thriller Crime d’amour, which we presented at our Festival in 2010. De Palma follows the structure of the original while making it entirely his own. The film centres around two women: Christine (Rachel McAdams), an elegant, ice-cool blonde career woman who holds a senior position with a high-powered advertising agency; and her assistant Isabel (Noomi Rapace), a shy and reticent brunette. Christine has a silky smooth charm, but underneath her veneer of control hides a tangle of kinky sexual needs. Isabel, smart and creative despite her hesitance, harbours a growing ambition.
When Christine claims credit for a daring marketing campaign that was entirely Isabel’s idea, the gloves start to come off in subtle ways. Isabel is initially disarmed by her boss’ candour: as Christine explains it, stealing her idea was simply business. But things change when Christine humiliates Isabel in public. With the plot set in motion, De Palma uncorks all the stops and, with wild abandon, launches into a labyrinthine revenge story.
As Isabel schemes, Christine parries her thrusts with calculated bravura. De Palma relishes these kinds of baroque plots; here he lets rip with a series of set pieces in the style for which he is famous. McAdams and Rapace revel in the expanse De Palma always allows his actors, while the story twists and turns in unexpectedly. Scratch below the surface: passions rage.
Wild Side Video released new region 2 DVD and Blu-Ray editions of Brian De Palma's Obsession last month in France. Both editions feature a remastered version of Obsession, with new special features, including a brief interview with De Palma, presented as part of a 26-minute video essay by Samuel Blumenfeld, coauthor of Brian De Palma: Conversations with Samuel Blumenfeld and Laurent Vachaud. (According to the Principal Archivist at the Swan Archives, the De Palma interview appears to be from 2004, perhaps from the same interview De Palma did for the French Sisters DVD that was released around that time-- see comments section below.) The DVD edition of Obsession is a two-disc set that includes a PDF of Paul Schrader's original screenplay (not included in the Blu-Ray package, according to Amazon). Both editions include two bonus De Palma shorts: Woton's Wake and The Responsive Eye. They also include Laurent Bouzereau's "Obsession Revisited," as well as a trailer for the film.
The Oregonian News Network posted an interview with Anne Richardson, who runs the blog Oregon Movies, A to Z. Richardson indicates in the interview that she is a former student of Brian De Palma. It seems most likely that she would have been involved in the class De Palma taught at Sarah Lawrence College in 1979, where he taught students how to make a film by making Home Movies with them. In the Oregonian interview, Richardson is asked to tell her favorite story about the movies. "At film school," Richardson replies, "Prof. Brian De Palma constantly referred to all his films as 'turkeys'. When I was making my thesis film, I called him up to ask for advice on one particular shot. I was hugely honored when, as he was answering my question, he began referring to my film as a turkey."
Thanks to Rachel McAdams Online for discovering that the screenings schedule has now been posted at the website of the 69th Venice International Film Festival, which runs from August 29th through September 8th. While Terrence Malick's To The Wonder will premiere on Sunday, September 2nd, Brian De Palma's Passion will premiere on Friday, September 7th, one day before the end of the festival. This makes De Palma's film one of the final big premieres of the festival, and also separates the two Rachel McAdams films by five days. While there is no official word yet on which actors will appear at the festival, it would be fun to see McAdams attend both premieres. When the festival films were first announced, the running time for Passion was listed at 94 minutes. The new listing shows the film running 100 minutes.
Armond White, writing about the current Claude Sautet retrospective at the Film Society of Lincoln Center, says that "a stunning montage" in Sautet's Les Choses de la Vie (The Things Of Life) "no doubt inspired Brian De Palma’s Femme Fatale climax." Sautet's film, released in 1970, established his international reputation. White states that it is "a more operatic version of the usual Sautet melodrama." According to White, "The montage details life in shocking, lyrical increments. Jean Boffety’s cinematography captures natural light and existential tragedy in captivating, musical counterpoint. Sautet may be practiced in face-to-face contretemps but the car crash sequence–a Nouvelle Vague salute to the crisis/memories/fate flashbacks of Hollywood’s classic Slattery’s Hurricane–is one of cinema’s most exquisite examples of melding kinetics to philosophy."