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Recent Headlines
a la Mod:

Domino is
a "disarmingly
straight-forward"
work that "pushes
us to reexamine our
relationship to images
and their consumption,
not only ethically
but metaphysically"
-Collin Brinkman

De Palma on Domino
"It was not recut.
I was not involved
in the ADR, the
musical recording
sessions, the final
mix or the color
timing of the
final print."

Listen to
Donaggio's full score
for Domino online

De Palma/Lehman
rapport at work
in Snakes

De Palma/Lehman
next novel is Terry

De Palma developing
Catch And Kill,
"a horror movie
based on real things
that have happened
in the news"

Supercut video
of De Palma's films
edited by Carl Rodrigue

Washington Post
review of Keesey book

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Exclusive Passion
Interviews:

Brian De Palma
Karoline Herfurth
Leila Rozario

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AV Club Review
of Dumas book

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« February 2013 »
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Interviews...

De Palma interviewed
in Paris 2002

De Palma discusses
The Black Dahlia 2006


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The Virtuoso
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Carrie...A Fan's Site

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No Harm In Charm

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Scarface: Make Way
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(Blow Out)

Carrie: The Movie

Deborah Shelton
Official Web Site

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italkyoubored

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site

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A note about topics: Some blog posts have more than one topic, in which case only one main topic can be chosen to represent that post. This means that some topics may have been discussed in posts labeled otherwise. For instance, a post that discusses both The Boston Stranglers and The Demolished Man may only be labeled one or the other. Please keep this in mind as you navigate this list.
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Saturday, February 2, 2013
VIDEO: DE PALMA TALKS POLITICS, 'ZERO DARK', MORE
10-MINUTE INTERVIEW WITH RUSSIAN JOURNALIST:
ORWELLIAN PARANOIA, TORTURE, OBAMA, GUNS, WOMEN, 'PASSION', 'REDACTED', ETC.



In the video above, Brian De Palma is interviewed by a Russian journalist, RT.com's Valeria Paikova, who asks him plenty of political questions relating to the cinema. Beginning with a quote from Oliver Stone about how the U.S. is living in an Orwellian state, De Palma says that he understands Stone's paranoia, because both men share strong views on America's foreign policy. After some elaboration, De Palma added that since he himself has been making anti-war pictures since the 1960s, he understands "why Oliver thinks we're being followed all the time," because "we probably are." And from here, the interview gets only more and more interesting, as the discussion covers the gun situation in the U.S., the depiction of torture in Kathryn Bigelow's Zero Dark Thirty (which De Palma found to be realistic), how Obama is trying to change things, etc., etc. The interview actually slows down a little at the end when De Palma is asked for the umpteenth time about the misogyny question, and whether his new Passion, as a film "exclusively about women, for women," is something of an ultimate answer to such criticisms. But it's a terrific interview, nonetheless.

Posted by Geoff at 1:12 AM CST
Updated: Saturday, February 2, 2013 1:16 AM CST
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Thursday, January 31, 2013


Posted by Geoff at 4:45 PM CST
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Wednesday, January 30, 2013
DE PALMA & DONAGGIO INTV'D IN FEB CAHIERS
DE PALMA LIKES 'SILVER LININGS PLAYBOOK', ACCORDING TO ONE CAHIERS READER
The February 2013 issue of Cahiers du cinema features a section devoted to Brian De Palma's Passion, including separate interviews with De Palma and composer Pino Donaggio, as well as an essay by Stéphane du Mesnildot, titled "De Palma au carré" ("De Palma Squared"). Dimitry Heu-Mojaïsky has his copy of the magazine already, and tweeted today that in this issue, we learn that De Palma liked David O. Russell's Silver Linings Playbook.

Meanwhile, a tweet from TheWickerWoman goes something like this: "No matter what: Caleb Landry in Antiviral + Passion by De Palma = best post coitus cinema ever."

And Steven Tuffin tweets from Belgium, "Writing #Passion review. Even lesser #DePalma is still great #DePalma in my book. Fuck that digital look though!"


Posted by Geoff at 11:35 PM CST
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Thursday, January 24, 2013
TWO NEW 'PASSION' STILLS
COURTESY OF THE ARP SELECTION WEBSITE


The two pictures above appeared on the ARP Selection website, along with other pics we've seen previously.


Posted by Geoff at 5:18 PM CST
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Wednesday, January 23, 2013


Posted by Geoff at 8:50 PM CST
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Tuesday, January 22, 2013
'PASSION' GETS BELGIUM PREMIERE AT FEB FILM CLUB
AND YET ANOTHER POSITIVE FRENCH REVIEW OF DE PALMA'S LATEST
The Genres Next Door monthly film club presents a premiere in Brussels, Belgium, of Brian De Palma's Passion on February 7. According to its website, Genres Next Door's monthly film club projects films that explore different sexualities and minority lifestyles through films that would otherwise see little or no distribution in Belgium. Tweets from Dutch journalists indicate that De Palma has been doing more interviews ahead of the premieres in Belgium and France (Feb. 13). Lindsey of Rachel McAdams Online tells us that Algemeen Dagblad is one of the biggest Dutch journalists. His tweet, according to Lindsey, says that he has finished writing up his interview with De Palma, and that he hopes that Passion will make it to Dutch theaters, which is not the case in all countries. "Unjustified!" he writes. And if you speak Dutch, you can listen to (and understand) an interview with Ghent Film Festival director Patrick Duynslaegher, discussing De Palma, at Radio 1. (Big thanks to Lindsey for steering us in the right direction on that, too!)

"DE PALMA AT THE TOP OF HIS ART"
Meanwhile, Avoir-Alire's Kevin Bertrand posted a review of Passion yesterday, stating that "after five years of absence, Brian De Palma returns to top form." Bertrand likes that De Palma added his own twist to the Alain Corneau source material, and feels that making the two protagonists closer in age makes the erotic power plays involved in the story more credible. "Just like his characters," writes Bertrand, "Brian De Palma takes pleasure in manipulating his world, multiplying twists, blurring the boundaries between dream and reality to lose the viewer in a con game to the diabolically black conclusion."

Posted by Geoff at 12:47 AM CST
Updated: Tuesday, January 22, 2013 6:48 PM CST
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Saturday, January 19, 2013
BIG DE PALMA CAREER INTERVIEW, 'PASSION', 'CARRIE'
ALSO DONAGGIO, PJ SOLES, WILLIAM KATT, & MORE IN NEXT MONTH'S ISSUE OF FANGORIA
Fangoria has posted a preview of the cover and contents of next month's issue, with a big cover story on Brian De Palma. Here are a few highlights listed from the upcoming issue:

INTERVIEW: BRIAN DE PALMA From “Sisters” to “Carrie” to the new “Passion,” he’s been thrilling us in the most stylish ways. Plus: horrific highlights from decades of De Palma.

FEATURE: THE “PASSION” MASK How to make a face that suits two of the screen scene’s most accomplished actresses.

INTERVIEW: P.J. SOLES She turned a small part in “Carrie” into a memorable mean girl. Plus: Pino Donaggio and William Katt on making beautiful music with Carrie.

PREVIEW: “CARRIE” She’s headed for the prom again this year, and director Kimberly Peirce is chaperoning.

FIRST RITES “Carrie” on through the changes


Posted by Geoff at 1:22 AM CST
Updated: Saturday, January 19, 2013 1:32 AM CST
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Friday, January 18, 2013



In English:
"# Passion film, new # DePalma, sophisticated remake of Love Crime or how to make a good movie from a bad one"

Posted by Geoff at 6:18 PM CST
Updated: Friday, January 18, 2013 6:26 PM CST
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Tuesday, January 8, 2013
MORE FRENCH PASSION FOR 'PASSION'
CRITIC SURPRISED THAT DE PALMA MADE SUCH A PERSONAL FILM OUT OF CORNEAU REMAKE
TF1 News Film Critic Romain Le Vern posted a review today of Brian De Palma's Passion, calling it De Palma's "best film since... a long time." Le Vern echoes the review posted yesterday by Jean-Baptiste Morain, each with the suggestion that De Palma has made a personal film that stands among his finest works. Below is a Google-assisted translation of Le Vern's review:
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"Two women engage in a perverse game of manipulation within a multinational corporation. Isabelle (Noomi Rapace) is fascinated by her superior (Rachel McAdams), Christine. The latter takes advantage of her influence over Isabella to drive into a game of seduction and manipulation, domination and servitude.

"On paper, this new feature by Brian De Palma presents itself as an American remake of the French Love Crime, the last film by the late Alain Corneau and far from the best. A project that a priori portends a controlled movie replay, sterile or impersonal. Surprise: it's not. From Dressed To Kill to Obsession, from Body Double to Snake Eyes, Brian De Palma has always been fascinated with the questions raised by the cinema and could never help but tell (almost) all his stories in the form of mise-en-scène.

"Although we thought he had broken his own obsessions with objects bordering on pastiche (Femme Fatale) and uninspired (his very unsuccessful adaptation of the cult novel by James Ellroy, The Black Dahlia, a very soft sci-fi Mission To Mars) and been ostracized from the system after taking the risk of anti-war Redacted (YouTube version of Casulaties Of War), Brian De Palma has regained form and his Passion marks a return with great fanfare to the overwrought cinema of the 70s Mannerist, reflecting the ambition of a system of manipulation by illusion.

"Hitchcock's ghost still haunts

"This manipulative maze-like film could be terminal like Mulholland Drive, David Lynch, fed self-citations (a lot of Sisters, a little Raising Cain), themes (voyeurism, fetishism, manipulation, schizophrenia, alienation), Biblical symbols and stylistic figures allow the auteur to settle scores. With himself. With his appetite for evil. Hitchcock with his superego.

"In search of beauty in vulgarity - the vulgarity of time exacerbated by the emergence of new media and new ways of espionage (sex tape, YouTube) such as social networks - De Palma films the grimey dreams of innocent girls, probes the impossibility of desire in a world of phallic metal towers in which women make war to seduce men and uses the original frame of Corneau to talk about what has always been connected: the truth rigged, optical illusions, false pretenses, artifice to describe subjectivity (the distortion of time, split-screen, the deformation of reality).

"Above all, we have to see the pleasure of Brian De Palma, simple pleasures and communicative, filming for the beauty of movement, especially in the operatic last half-hour amplified by the music of Pino Donaggio, reviving the best suspensions of disbelief from his past films such as, at random, the suspenseful sequence of the prom in Carrie. The final shot is both climax and nod to De Palma’s aficionados, causing a jolt.

"De Palma directed both actresses (Noomi Rapace and Rachel McAdams, impeccable) like lionesses, savoring the slow devouring of praying mantises. For a long time we do not know who the brunette or blonde, Hitchcock heroine or De Palma-esque bitch, proves the most toxic. But one thing is sure: dream into nightmare, nobody has been innocent."


Posted by Geoff at 10:35 PM CST
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Monday, January 7, 2013
MORAIN: 'PASSION' IS ONE OF DE PALMA'S FINEST
"NO REALISM, BUT FORMALISM AT ALL COSTS; FILMED WITH GREAT PRECISION & MASTERY"


Les Inrockuptibles critic Jean-Baptiste Morain has just posted a review of Brian De Palma's Passion, which opens in France on February 13. Morain calls it one of De Palma's finest films. Below is a Google-aided translation of the review:
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"Funny idea on paper: the new De Palma is adapted from the last film directed by Alain Corneau, Love Crime, starring Kristin Scott Thomas and Ludivine Sagnier, a game of manipulation that goes wrong between employees of the same company. What was the interest in this rather easy-going French thriller? He draws from it a film in his own way, the one that we prefer, a mixture of Hitchcock and Lang, erotic and morbid fever in an atmosphere where the baroque and fantastical reality and imagination are blurred constantly, where the characters are manipulated, to humiliate each other without really knowing who prevails over the other.

"No realism in Passion, but formalism at all costs. No plausibility either, but suspense, pitfalls, daydreams or nightmares that seem to fit into each other. Passion is also a film of women, mostly bisexual, a film where the one man band will leave pale and deceived like a rookie. Who is nice: blonde, brunette or redhead? Mystery. And if they were one? The twists succeed more twists in a game of mirrors where revenge leads the dance. Passion is nearly a genre film. De Palma returns to his 70s Hitchcockian vein, a period when he amused himself by making variations on the themes of the old master, to draw his own cinema, both haunted by the model and its ability to give life and day to a very personal film.

"De Palma said one day, in a bonus DVD: 'Hitchcock, I know very well of what he speaks.' Another way of saying acquaintances between fantasy filmmakers of Catholic formation, where sex is at the same time a horrific vision and completely exciting. Filmed with great precision, uncluttered, with a knife, with a mastery of every second, Passion is undoubtedly one of the finest films of Brian De Palma."


Posted by Geoff at 9:18 PM CST
Updated: Monday, January 7, 2013 9:20 PM CST
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