sean ellis Tagged Articles at Cinematical
Public Service Announcement: Check Out 'The Broken' at the After Dark Horrorfest
Filed under: Horror », New Releases »
There are a few positive reviews of The Broken floating around from Sundance 2007 and elsewhere, but I wanted to add an endorsement tied to its berth in this year's installment of the fledgling After Dark Horrorfest, which runs this week. In past years I've been generally disinterested in the Horrorfest programming, which has seemed heavy on schlock, but The Broken seemed intriguing, so I ventured out and saw it on Saturday.You know the cliche that something or other "sent a chill down my spine"? People who use that phrase -- including me -- usually do so metaphorically. This time I mean it literally. There are moments in The Broken that sent a physical chill running through my body. I'm not ready to call Sean Ellis's sophomore feature a great film; after one viewing, I'm not sure it makes total sense. But it is genuinely, supremely creepy. Fans of the genre should give the After Dark folks some of their hard-earned cash this week.
I should say that this is decidedly my kind of horror film: slow, moody, with little gore, few jolt scares, minimum exposition, and a maximum of atmosphere. (It also does another thing that I love, which is have events unfold on a small, personal scale while suggesting that something far larger in scope is happening.) In other words, it may not be for all tastes. It's original enough not to have a direct analogue, but in terms of mood and the types of scares it offers, think a quieter version of last year's The Strangers, with supernatural elements. And scarier.
Horrorfest's website, including participating theaters and a trailer for The Broken (that I wouldn't recommend watching, as it gives away too much without giving you a sense of the film) is here.
Indies on DVD: The Host, Cashback, Perfume
Filed under: Comedy », Drama », Foreign Language », Sci-Fi & Fantasy », New on DVD », Cinematical Indie »
If you missed The Host during its theatrical run, now you can catch up with one of the best movies of the year. it's been well covered at Cinematical (reviews by James Rocchi and Jeffrey M. Anderson, interview with director Bong Joon-ho by Scott Weinberg, brief comments by yours truly) and Magnolia has issued a collector's edition, packed with features, on DVD, Blu-Ray and HD-DVD. The single-disk regular edition on DVD includes only deleted scenes and an audio commentary by the director. Don't expect a straightforward monster movie; there's plenty of dysfunctional family melodrama and a cracked sense of humor popping up at unexpected moments. At the risk of sounding like a broken record, I'll again beat the drum for Sean Ellis' Cashback, which I mentioned yesterday in the Indie Weekend Box Office report. It's also from Magnolia, but unlike The Host, Cashback is part of Magnolia's 'limited theatrical release slightly in advance of the DVD to generate some publicity' program; I don't know how successful the program has been, but I'm glad that more people may be checking out this dryly humorous, dreamy fantasy of a young single man. The disk includes the short film that the feature was based on, as well as a "making of."
Tom Tykwer's Perfume: The Story of a Murderer struck me as a pretty picture whose glittering charms lay entirely on the surface. But Kim Voynar had a different reading altogether, calling it "a deeply mesmerizing exploration of one man's desperate search for his own humanity ... very much more than your average serial-killer story." On balance, I think this is a film that generates discussion; therefore I recommend it. The Dreamworks DVD is skimpy on the features, with only "The Story of Perfume" on board, so a rental may be best.
SIFF Review: Cashback
Filed under: Comedy », Independent », Sci-Fi & Fantasy », Magnolia », Theatrical Reviews », Festival Reports », Shorts », Seattle », Cinematical Indie »
A couple years ago at the Seattle International Film Festival, I attended a screening of a set of short films. I don't recall now what the topic of the set was, but the funniest of them was a cute little short called Cashback, about a group of hapless night employees at a grocery store and the various ways in which they fight off the relentless boredom of their jobs.
One of the guys -- an aspiring artist -- could stop time. And he used his boring night job to freeze time, turning the customers in the store into models so he could strip them and practice drawing nudes. It was a well-done little short altogether (even nominated for an Oscar), and when the screening was over, they mentioned that it was being made into a feature. Now here we are, two years later, and one of the funniest films I've seen at SIFF this year is Cashback -- the feature-length version ( which had its debut last year at Cannes).
In order to flesh out a short into a feature, you have to add in some details like more plot and characters. The challenge is in taking a well-made short like Cashback (which really stood alone just as it was) and trying to turn it into a bigger story, without losing any of the charm that made the short successful. Writer-director Sean Ellis (who, according to the "trivia" section on the film's IMDb site, wrote the feature-length script in just seven days, including the entire short within the feature ) backs up a little from where he started with his short, fleshing out the back story of the main character, Ben (Sean Biggerstaff, who has kind of a Brit Zach Braff vibe going here), who develops a terrible case of insomnia after a painful breakup with his girlfriend.
Lena Headey Stars In The Broken
Filed under: Drama », Horror », Thrillers », Casting »
It looks like Lena Headey isn't resting on the inevitable buzz from her work as Queen Gorgo in the highly anticipated 300 to make her a familiar face to moviegoers. Not only does Headey have a part in the upcoming Spartan green-screen epic, but she also has four other films on their way to the big screen. Another high profile project for Headey will be her turn as Sarah Connor in the TV series The Sarah Connor Chronicles, based on The Terminator films. Variety reports that Headey will star in the new psychological thriller from Sean Ellis, The Broken. Ellis is a relative newcomer, but has already received an Oscar nomination last year for his short film Cashback. The Broken is Ellis' second full-length feature, and considering that Ellis is only 36, I think he still has some time to beef up his resume. The film is about a woman (Headey) who is involved in a horrible car crash, and while that alone isn't enough to invoke the willies; the hook is that the other driver in the accident appears to be her double. Headey leads an international cast that includes Richard Jenkins, Michelle Duncan and Asier Newman. The Broken is being produced by French production heavy Gaumont and is currently shooting in London for a 2008 release.
[via Empire Online]
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