TheIllusionist Tagged Articles at Cinematical

It became as clear as day to me after watching American History X that Edward Norton was a real actor that I needed to pay attention to. I wasn't the only one who felt that way. It's not that The People vs. Larry Flynt or Rounders weren't on the top of my cinematic appreciation list, but his portrayal as a reforming skinhead -- the pure humanity that he exposed through the character -- remains unforgotten. His careful consideration of the roles he plays leaves him with a resume flowing with fulfilling roles both for himself and for his audiences. In a recent interview with the Guardian Unlimited the actor talked about everything from the digital revolution in filmmaking, to working with David Fincher, to the freedom that acting gives a person to experience their full range of emotional expression. Norton appears to be fearless ... he is not afraid that the accessibility of filmmaking materials will kill the art of creating cinema.

He's certainly not afraid of vulnerable roles that show the ugliness inside a person. Acting to him is "in some ways, a free pass to exorcise all kinds of emotional stuff without the consequences." In preparing for a role, Norton has no go-to method. In fact, he relies on no methodology but instead approaches each role with a new way of creating. "So in the beginning, I always feel like I'm fumbling for an entry point." It should be a relief to any actor that someone of Norton's stature still feels like a fraud the minute a new project comes to fruition.

He is also not afraid of choosing films because they are poignant to him at the time. In fact, that is the number one reason he has chosen to work on Fight Club, 25th Hour and The Illusionist. "Most of the films that I've ever really responded to are ones that I feel were really involved in their times. They were documents of a moment, or an exploration of what was dysfunctional, fucked up or painful about that moment in time." Those films spoke to him directly as reflections on what was happening around him. They also happened to be great scripts made by talented artists. This is what is responsible for the variety and range of the roles that he chooses. "I like a lot of things, I just like them well done."

• Emmanuel Lubezki got a nod for Children of Men. This is only his second nomination with ASC. I say 'only' because he has an incredible body of work. Children of Men was a gorgeous film in many aspects and the rest of his work can be summed up in that same statement -- Y Tu Mamá También, The New World as well as even more extravagant films such as The Cat in the Hat and Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events.

• Dick Pope is receiving his first ASC nomination for The Illusionist. Pope is also responsible for Vera Drake -- an exceptional film.

• Robert Richardson is in the running for The Good Shepherd. This is his eighth ASC nomination. Dare I say it again? Eighth nomination. Rightfully earned though, he's responsible for so many great films since the 80s: Platoon, JFK,Casino and Kill Bill.

• Vilmos Zsigmond has received his third nom for The Black Dahlia. Zsigmond is the veteran in comparison to the rest. His body of work began in the 50s and includes The Deer Hunter and Melinda and Melinda.

• Finally, Dean Semler for Apocalypto. This is nomination number two and makes me curious to actually see this film.

I'm all for these guild awards, with their specific categories and distinct recognitions, but I'm not sure I understand the Costume Designer Guild's honor for "Distinguished Actor." If the reasoning is that the recipient of this award is someone who looks good in costumes, or makes costume designers look good, then Helen Mirren makes sense as this year's winner. But this reason doesn't explain why the guild is also giving Sandra Bullock an award. Suddenly, the logic falls apart -- especially for anyone who has seen Miss Congeniality 2.

The costume designers don't need to give actors any more praise. And Mirren certainly doesn't need any more trophies this year. To me, the guild's recognition of the different genres of costume design is interesting and appealing enough without some unnecessary star-kissing.

The categories for the Costume Designer Guild Awards separately acknowledge achievements for modern costume, period costume and fantasy costume. The lumping of these genres together into the Best Costume Design Oscar doesn't give credit to the differences between them, and it often ignores the difficulty of modern costuming, which many people assume is as easy as the everyday act of getting dressed in the morning.

One of the weird things about film festivals (well, to me at least, maybe it's not to anyone else) is the concept of "hold review" films. "Hold review", as the term implies, means that we aren't supposed to publish full reviews of certain films until their actual release date. This makes sense from a distributor's standpoint, because they want reviews to go up right as the film is coming out, so that, theoretically, the plethora of reviews will drive butts into seats, and give the distribs some return on their investment. The interesting thing is, that probably half the films on the SIFF review list are films that Cine has already reviewed from earlier fests, before said films acquired distrib, and generally speaking, when we run a fest review of a film that scores distrib down the road, we almost always run another review then, with a pointer back to our fest review.

Since we prefer to stay in the good graces of our friends at both the distributor and fest end of things, though, we nonetheless rigorously comply with the "hold review" lists. We can tease you, we can tantalize ... we just can't tell you everything you want to know. Here's what we can tell you about the SIFF films I've seen so far for which I can't give you full reviews ... yet (think of it as a little cinematic foreplay) -- and links to those for which we've previoiusly run reviews.