edmond Tagged Articles at Cinematical

I used to think Julia Stiles was the next big thing. That was back when she seemed to star in every Shakespeare update around (10 Things I Hate About You; Almereyda's Hamlet; O). Then she somehow became better remembered as "Nicky", the deer-in-headlights character from The Bourne Identity and its sequels. Sure her part increased through the series, but all I can think of is that line, "I can send Nicky to do that, for Chrissakes." Now, I associate her with any role that's so easy even she could do it. Which certainly seems to apply with a movie in which she's just been cast, Cry of the Owl. According to The Hollywood Reporter, Stiles is replacing Sara Polley in the thriller, which makes me wonder if maybe the part is too simple for the now-very-respected Polley. "They can send 'Nicky' to do that, for Chrissakes," the actress must have thought.

Cry of the Owl is based on a novel by Patricia Highsmith (author of The Talented Mr. Ripley, which starred Bourne co-star Matt Damon) and was previously adapted by Claude Chabrol. This version will be helmed by Jamie Thraves, who directed my favorite Radiohead video, "Just", as well as videos for Blur ("Charmless Man") and Coldplay ("Scientist"; "God Put a Smile Upon Your Face"). The movie co-stars Paddy Considine (The Bourne Ultimatum) as a new guy in town who Stiles' character falls for. Problem is, he's also stalking her. Scott Speedman (who was probably looking forward to working again with Polley, his My Life Without Me co-star) plays her ex, who plots revenge for being dumped. The movie begins shooting in Toronto next week.

To be fair to Stiles, I have to admit that coming from Highsmith, Cry of the Owl may not be just another stalker thriller. Also, she has been delivering fine performances in little-seen movies like A Little Trip to Heaven and Edmond -- never mind that she also starred in The Omen remake. She's also just made her directorial debut with the short Raving and she's set to star in an adaptation of The Bell Jar. Perhaps one of these days I'll have something new, and more favorable, to associate her with.

It's getting closer to Halloween, and that means scary movies. Of course, I love scary movies and I watch them all year long, but I watch them with a purpose in October. Most critics don't bother with scary movies, or pre-judge them, and that has led to the recent rash of horror films being withheld from the press. It goes without saying, also, that the studios know they're making bad movies by playing it safe with their remakes and sequels, rather than rolling the dice on a new idea. Most of the current horror movies have this in common: they're remakes or sequels, they were withheld from the press, and they flopped.

Hmm. I wonder if this is a pattern that ought to be avoided in the future?

Despite being directed by Neil LaBute -- a filmmaker whose entire reputation was established by critics who singled out his great debut In the Company of Men (1997) -- The Wicker Man remake (233 screens) was withheld from those same critics, and it has officially flopped, returning only $23 million on a $40 million budget.

The official Cinematical presence at the 2006 Fantastic Fest was the wonderful Jette Kernion, and I think she managed to bang out about eight reviews ... while the fest was still running! I saw JK everywhere, from the queues to the parties to the local barbecue pits. Frankly I think her coverage rocked the house, and I'm not just saying that because she let me butt in line with her for The Beach Party at the Threshold of Hell.

But since the FF guys were cool enough to welcome Cinematical with such eerily open arms, I figure it's only right to share my favorite movies, moments and memories of mayhem from the 2006 FantFest. And so I shall.

The Best Flicks

Simon Rumley's seriously disturbing The Living and the Dead, the Swedish vampire flick Frostbite, Adam Green's fun-time slasher throwback Hatchet, William Friedkin's compellingly intense Bug and the quietly cool haunted Brit flick Lie Still. I also had an unexpectedly good time with Mel Gibson's Apocalypto -- and although I'd already seen Abominable, The Host, The Fountain, Pan's Labyrinth and Severance, they're all films I have no problem recommending. Oh, and William H. Macy's performance in Edmond ... wow.

I also trekked away from the festival to enjoy a good portion of Feast -- which was negated by my plane ride home. Lindsay Lohan's Just My Luck was the in-flight movie, and that flick packs perhaps the worst screenplay I've dealt with in three years. Stunningly bad.

Oh, and right before I nodded off every night, I watched just a little bit more of The Office: Season 2. If you don't watch this show, you're plain old robbing yourself of multiple peals of bulky laughter. And why would you want to do that?

It's hard to know, just from talking with Bai Ling, which of her roles have been leads and which have been walk-ons -- she seems to view all of her activities as equally relevant chapters in the Story of Bai. An eye-witness to the massacre in Tiananmen Square in 1989, she departed for NYU film school in 1991 and began to land roles. Fifteen years later, she's a fixture on party circuits, an unabashed lover of American pop culture -- the trashier the better -- and, at 35, an actress with serious credentials. She recently played the female lead in The Beautiful Country and Face, both dramas about Asian-American identity, and was praised by the New York Times for showing "tremendous range" in the latter. Next up is a starring role in Shanghai Baby, adapted from the controversial 2001 novel about sexuality in modern China.

In between the big roles, there's a portfolio of pop-ons. You probably remember the eyeball-collecting villainess in The Crow, and the interpreter who delivers Chairman Mao's icy retorts in Oliver Stone's Nixon: "You're as evil as I am ....". She was also the begoggled ninja in Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow and has a quick comedic turn as a peep-show stripper in David Mamet's Edmond, released Friday. And yet another one is forth-coming, this time as an abstruse oracle called Serpentine in Richard Kelly's sophomore sprawl, Southland Tales.

Appropriately, the film Bai is best-known for is one she wasn't even in: Ling's posing with a large, phallic lightsaber in the June 2005 Playboy may have caused George Lucas to snip her role as Senator Breemu out of the wholesome-as-a-Happy Meal Star Wars: Episode III. Her comments at the time indicated that belief; Lucas denied it. When Cinematical recently spoke with Bai, in Manhattan to do press for Edmond, she was feeling diplomatic.

"You know who I hate? Faggots. Because they hate women." When Glenna (Julia Stiles) says this, it's a casual admission; something tossed off in the down moments of a one-night stand. It's a confession to a near total stranger that presumably won't cause any ripples in her real life, or ever be mentioned again. But Edmond (William H. Macy) is way ahead of her. Before meeting Glenna tonight, he knocked the teeth of a black man all over an alley in Times Square, and considered it a victory not just for himself but for what he views as the long-suffering white race. What luck, that he's found a kindred spirit he can tell his story to, detail by detail! Edmond is David Mamet's contribution to that strange film genre that dates back to John Ford's The Searchers, in which a lonely anti-hero's expectations of how things should be racially-wise, sexual propriety-wise, and otherwise-wise, must be adhered to by the rest of the world, lest he go completely schizoid.

Despite the considerable violence Edmond eventually racks up, Mamet's motormouthed version of Travis Bickle ends up coming off more like the world's most annoying bar patron than someone truly menacing. His pathos is inherently comedic, even if the filmmakers don't want it to be. His bete noire, we find out, isn't really blacks or women or city life, but high prices! Repeatedly thwarted in his attempt to find a low-priced call girl, Edmond at one point becomes enraged when a peep-show stripper is unable to make change for ten dollars from behind her glass window. "Give me the ten dollars! Give me the ten dollars!" Edmond yells, exasperated at how he ended up at such a moment in his life. The arguing of these two characters is so absurd that it almost saves the rest of the film, which is plodding, labored, and ultimately too theatrically-grounded for its own good.

Hey, have you seen the new trailer for Edmond yet? If you haven't, then you should seriously check it out. Based on the play by David Mamet (who also wrote the screenplay) William H. Macy plays a business man who stumbles onto the streets of New York one night and gets into a whole mess of trouble. Hands down, Macy is one of the finest actors working today. Even though it seems as if the dude shows up in every other film, each role he chooses is different and adds yet another layer to his already diverse repertoire.

Recently, Macy was interviewed by Coming Soon and let everyone in on plans to make his directorial debut with a film called Keep Coming Back. While he admits to directing a "little film for HBO" awhile back, he's not counting that one. Speaking about the new film, Macy said it will star the beautiful Salma Hayek and hopes to begin production sometime around the holidays. Macy was silent as far as plot goes, but did note the script (written by Will Alditch) was "witty and adult and smart, and yet, kinda broad and outrageous." Yeah, so basically, it can be about anything. In addition to directing his first flick, Macy also alluded to the fact that he and wife Felicity Huffman hope to share the stage in a Broadway play sometime in the next five years.

Love, sex, relationships, marriage, lies, cheating, betrayal, murder. Yeah, that pretty much describes a day in the life of most men on this planet. But that's what men do -- they wage a war inside against what feels good and what is good. They sin. This isn't to say women don't share in the sinning game -- they most certainly do. A lot. It's just men are the ones that get caught. They're the ones we pay more attention to. We expect it from a man, whereas we'd like to think of a lady as, well, a lady.

I've sinned. Oh yeah, if you searched hard enough inside my cramped New York City apartment, there's a little box of secrets kept hidden from the occasional guest. Not many people know the contents of said box. Those that do, however, were at some point shocked, deceived, disappointed and angry at me. They had to make a choice: Walk out of my life forever or close the box, put it away and continue on with the rest of our day. Sins and secrets. The two make a perfect match. One hides the awful actions of the other. It's the most common love affair human beings have with themselves. And things are swell until the love affair becomes a love triangle. After all, it's only a matter of time before consequence joins the party.

Sins and secrets. The following films are full of them. Yes, I know it's hard to think of such evil when the charismatic Zach Braff is sitting in a tree house above, taunting us with a face full of coming-of-age angst. Oh, but he's hiding something inside that cute, melancholy persona. He's hiding something big. Just like you. Or me. Welcome to this week's Trailer Park: