The Academy has announced the new class of invited members for 2014 and, as is typical, many of which are among last year's nominees, which includes Barkhad Abdi, Michael Fassbender, Sally Hawkins, Mads Mikkelsen, Lupita Nyong'o and June Squibb in the Actors branch not to mention curious additions such as Josh Hutcherson, Rob Riggle and Jason Statham, but, okay. The Directors branch adds Jay and Mark Duplass along with Jean-Marc Vallee, Denis Villeneuve and Thomas Vinterberg. I didn't do an immediate tally of male to female additions or other demographics, but at first glance it seems to be a wide spread batch of new additions on all fronts. The Academy is also clearly attempting to aggressively bump up the demographics as this is the second year in a row where they have added a large number of new members, well over the average of 133 new members from 2004 to 2012. As far as...
- 6/26/2014
- by Brad Brevet
- Rope of Silicon
The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences is extending invitations to join the organization to 271 artists and executives who have distinguished themselves by their contributions to theatrical motion pictures.
Those who accept the invitations will be the only additions to the Academy’s membership in 2014.
“This year’s class of invitees represents some of the most talented, creative and passionate filmmakers working in our industry today,” said Academy President Cheryl Boone Isaacs. “Their contributions to film have entertained audiences around the world, and we are proud to welcome them to the Academy.”
The 2014 invitees are:
Actors
Barkhad Abdi – “Captain Phillips”
Clancy Brown – “The Hurricane,” “The Shawshank Redeption”
Paul Dano – “12 Years a Slave,” “Prisoners”
Michael Fassbender – “12 Years a Slave,” “Shame”
Ben Foster – “Lone Survivor,” “Ain’t Them Bodies Saints”
Beth Grant – “The Artist,” “No Country for Old Men”
Clark Gregg – “Much Ado about Nothing,” “Marvel’s The Avengers”
Sally Hawkins – “Blue Jasmine,...
Those who accept the invitations will be the only additions to the Academy’s membership in 2014.
“This year’s class of invitees represents some of the most talented, creative and passionate filmmakers working in our industry today,” said Academy President Cheryl Boone Isaacs. “Their contributions to film have entertained audiences around the world, and we are proud to welcome them to the Academy.”
The 2014 invitees are:
Actors
Barkhad Abdi – “Captain Phillips”
Clancy Brown – “The Hurricane,” “The Shawshank Redeption”
Paul Dano – “12 Years a Slave,” “Prisoners”
Michael Fassbender – “12 Years a Slave,” “Shame”
Ben Foster – “Lone Survivor,” “Ain’t Them Bodies Saints”
Beth Grant – “The Artist,” “No Country for Old Men”
Clark Gregg – “Much Ado about Nothing,” “Marvel’s The Avengers”
Sally Hawkins – “Blue Jasmine,...
- 6/26/2014
- by Michelle McCue
- WeAreMovieGeeks.com
Michael Fassbender and Lupita Nyong’o of 12 Years a Slave were two of the 271 artists and industry leaders invited to become members of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, which determines nominations and winners at the annual Oscars. The entire list of Academy membership—which numbers about 6,000—isn’t public information so the annual invitation list is often the best indication of the artists involved in the prestigious awards process. It’s worth noting that invitations need to be accepted in order for artists to become members; some artists, like two-time Best Actor winner Sean Penn, have declined membership over the years.
- 6/26/2014
- by Jeff Labrecque
- EW - Inside Movies
Pop quiz: What do Chris Rock, Claire Denis, Eddie Vedder and Josh Hutcherson all have in common? Answer: They could all be Oscar voters very soon. The annual Academy of Motion Pictures Arts & Sciences invitation list always makes for interesting reading, shedding light on just how large and far-reaching the group's membership is -- or could be, depending on who accepts their invitations. This year, 271 individuals have been asked to join AMPAS, meaning every one of them could contribute to next year's Academy Awards balloting -- and it's as diverse a list as they've ever assembled. Think the Academy consists entirely of fusty retired white dudes? Not if recent Best Original Song nominee Pharrell Williams takes them up on their offer. Think it's all just a Hollywood insiders' game? Not if French arthouse titans Chantal Akerman and Olivier Assayas join the party. It's a list that subverts expectation at every turn.
- 6/26/2014
- by Guy Lodge
- Hitfix
Bill Murray's in his element as an unwitting secret agent in the spy spoof "The Man Who Knew Too Little".
But while the performance is vintage Murray, the vehicle is a little wobbly.
Based on the unpublished novel "Watch That Man" by England's Robert Farrar, the mistaken-identity story has an unmistakably warmed-over feel, playing out like a Peter Sellers movie that got away.
The elements are certainly all there, but director Jon Amiel ("Copycat", "Sommersby") and co-writer and frequent Murray collaborator Howard Franklin ("Larger Than Life", "Quick Change") have opted for a laid-back, low-key approach to the kind of material that cries out for more of an "Austin Powers" broadness.
As a result, the intermittently amusing picture never quite attains crowd-pleasing status. While it could use a big hit, Warner Bros. shouldn't expect "The Man Who Knew Too Little" to do too much at the boxoffice.
Murray tones down the patented sarcasm as Wallace Ritchie, an Iowa video store clerk who treats himself to a trip to London, where he'll be able to celebrate his birthday with his very successful, big-business brother, James (Peter Gallagher).
As it happens, Wallace's surprise visit coincides with a very important party James is having for potential investors. Determined to keep Wallace occupied and out of the way for a few hours, James gets him a ticket to "Theatre of Life", one of those participatory pieces in which role-playing audience members interact with the performers.
The rules are simple. Wallace must wait at a phone booth until he gets the call to show up at a designated location. But quicker that you can say, "Sorry, Wrong Number", he inadvertently intercepts a call made for a real-life, hired assassin whose people are hell-bent on reviving the Cold War with Russia.
After some initial awkwardness, Wallace quickly gets into his "role," gleefully unaware that the fate of the entire free world is hanging on his every movement.
Playing his part in a "Walter Mitty" state of sustained bliss (he never does cotton to his mistaken identity status), Murray brings an infectious, little-boy innocence to the picture.
It's too bad director Amiel and screenwriters Farrar and Franklin couldn't give the picture a stronger comic backbone. While the pace picks up a bit toward the end, it's a case of too little, too late.
THE MAN WHO KNEW TOO LITTLE
Warner Bros.
Regency Enterprises presents
An Arnon Milchan/Polar production
A Jon Amiel film
Director: Jon Amiel
Screenwriters: Robert Farrar and Howard Franklin
Producers: Arnon Milchan, Michael Nathanson, Mark Tarlov
Based on the novel, "Watch That Man" by Robert Farrar
Executive producers: Elisabeth Robinson, Joe Caracciolo Jr.
Director of photography: Robert Stevens
Production designer: Jim Clay
Editor: Pamela Power
Costume designer: Janty Yates
Music: Chris Young
Casting: Michelle Guish
U.S. casting: Hopkins, Smith & Barden
Color/stereo
Cast:
Wallace Ritchie: Bill Murray
James Ritchie: Peter Gallagher
Lori: Joanne Whalley
Sir Roger Daggenhurst: Richard Wilson
Boris: Alfred Molina
Embleton: John Standing
Running time -- 95 minutes
MPAA rating: PG-13...
But while the performance is vintage Murray, the vehicle is a little wobbly.
Based on the unpublished novel "Watch That Man" by England's Robert Farrar, the mistaken-identity story has an unmistakably warmed-over feel, playing out like a Peter Sellers movie that got away.
The elements are certainly all there, but director Jon Amiel ("Copycat", "Sommersby") and co-writer and frequent Murray collaborator Howard Franklin ("Larger Than Life", "Quick Change") have opted for a laid-back, low-key approach to the kind of material that cries out for more of an "Austin Powers" broadness.
As a result, the intermittently amusing picture never quite attains crowd-pleasing status. While it could use a big hit, Warner Bros. shouldn't expect "The Man Who Knew Too Little" to do too much at the boxoffice.
Murray tones down the patented sarcasm as Wallace Ritchie, an Iowa video store clerk who treats himself to a trip to London, where he'll be able to celebrate his birthday with his very successful, big-business brother, James (Peter Gallagher).
As it happens, Wallace's surprise visit coincides with a very important party James is having for potential investors. Determined to keep Wallace occupied and out of the way for a few hours, James gets him a ticket to "Theatre of Life", one of those participatory pieces in which role-playing audience members interact with the performers.
The rules are simple. Wallace must wait at a phone booth until he gets the call to show up at a designated location. But quicker that you can say, "Sorry, Wrong Number", he inadvertently intercepts a call made for a real-life, hired assassin whose people are hell-bent on reviving the Cold War with Russia.
After some initial awkwardness, Wallace quickly gets into his "role," gleefully unaware that the fate of the entire free world is hanging on his every movement.
Playing his part in a "Walter Mitty" state of sustained bliss (he never does cotton to his mistaken identity status), Murray brings an infectious, little-boy innocence to the picture.
It's too bad director Amiel and screenwriters Farrar and Franklin couldn't give the picture a stronger comic backbone. While the pace picks up a bit toward the end, it's a case of too little, too late.
THE MAN WHO KNEW TOO LITTLE
Warner Bros.
Regency Enterprises presents
An Arnon Milchan/Polar production
A Jon Amiel film
Director: Jon Amiel
Screenwriters: Robert Farrar and Howard Franklin
Producers: Arnon Milchan, Michael Nathanson, Mark Tarlov
Based on the novel, "Watch That Man" by Robert Farrar
Executive producers: Elisabeth Robinson, Joe Caracciolo Jr.
Director of photography: Robert Stevens
Production designer: Jim Clay
Editor: Pamela Power
Costume designer: Janty Yates
Music: Chris Young
Casting: Michelle Guish
U.S. casting: Hopkins, Smith & Barden
Color/stereo
Cast:
Wallace Ritchie: Bill Murray
James Ritchie: Peter Gallagher
Lori: Joanne Whalley
Sir Roger Daggenhurst: Richard Wilson
Boris: Alfred Molina
Embleton: John Standing
Running time -- 95 minutes
MPAA rating: PG-13...
- 11/10/1997
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
A sweeping and breathtakingly vivid distillation of novelist Michael Ondaatje's complex novel of love and war in North Africa and Italy before and during World War II, Miramax's "The English Patient" is a sublime and complex masterwork that will have strong appeal with discriminating audiences. Elliptically structured as it threads through four central story lines, this Saul Zaentz production, however, may test the patience of viewers who favor more straightforward narratives. Nevertheless, this brilliantly realized movie mosaic will get a boost from strong reviews as well as possible awards, especially in the technical areas.
If this reverberating drama has a center, it is the titular character, the English Patient (Ralph Fiennes) who, at the end of World War II, clings to life in an Italian monastery, his skin withered from burns and his lungs too weak to allow him to leave his bed. "The English Patient", as he is called for lack of a more accurate name, further suffers from memory loss. The only clues he and his nurse (Juliette Binoche) have to his identity come from a small book of the writings of Herodotus, with a few personal letters and maps stuffed between its pages.
It's around the mystery of this bandaged man's identity that screenwriter-director Anthony Minghella constructs a much wider story. Through the personal prism of these four main stories the overall picture emerges. Using sounds and colors and other associative bits of story tissue, Minghella connects the "Patient" to his most immediate past as a member of a group of cartographers who have come together in the most desolate area of the African desert to map out the terrain for England's Royal Geographic Society. Like most international expeditions, they are a motley and diverse group and include most prominently team leader Count Laszlo de Almasy (Fiennes) and a young English couple (Colin Firth, Kristin Scott Thomas).
To follow the story's multicharacter winds and twists, and to appreciate the different levels of reality in this epic tale -- most prominently the prewar, wartime and postwar rules of the game -- requires rapt viewer attention. In addition, the swirling multinational cast of characters and places also deepens and widens the rich story veins; the film surges as a love story, a war story, and most powerfully as personal stories of characters trying to tap their identity in a cataclysmic time.
Admittedly, the story embroidery at times seems too aswirl, threading back and forth in time and place, but, fortunately, Minghella is a narrative cartographer of the most sophisticated order. He has a pointillist's sense of direction, and soon the viewers learn that the narrative dots aren't connected in A-B-C order but appear in bursts and batches, linked and enlivened by the film's cinematic synapses of colors, cuts, sounds and other subtle textures.
While the film's technical eloquence is, perhaps, its strongest suit, the players are never subsumed by either the vastness of the terrain or the complexity of the tale. Fiennes is marvelous as the enigmatic patient Almasy. In both his deathbed scenes and in his earlier death-defying escapades in the desert, he exudes the robust fiber of a man who tests his limits on all fronts.
As the vivacious and thoroughly modern Englishwoman whom Almasy falls in love with, Scott Thomas is strikingly charismatic. She's clearly a flame in this sandy parchment, and her performance is likely to win wide appreciation. Willem Dafoe is also effective as a mysterious burglar who carries his own debilitating physical and psychological burdens, while Juliette Binoche radiates decency as the kind nurse with festering inner scars.
The technical team, including an array of Oscar winners, deserve highest medals for their expertise and daring. Cinematographer John Seale's grand and roiling nature imagery, coupled with editor Walter Murch's pristine cuts, magnify the storytelling to the highest degree. Similar praise for costume designer Ann Roth for the wide-ranging historical costumes.
It's not only the sights but the sounds that enrapture here. Backdropped by a wonderfully sinewy score, featuring the slithers of the oboe and other desert-life sounds, "The English Patient" courses with life and vitality.
THE ENGLISH PATIENT
Miramax Films
A Saul Zaentz production
an Anthony Minghella film
Producer Saul Zaentz
Screenwriter-director Anthony Minghella
Based on the novel by Michael Ondaatje
Director of photography John Seale
Production designer Stuart Craig
Music Gabriel Yared
Executive producers Bob Weinstein,
Harvey Weinstein, Scott Greenstein
Associate producers Paul Zaenta,
Steve Andrews
Line producer Alessandro von Normann
Costume designer Ann Roth
Editor Walter Murch
Casting Michelle Guish, David Rubin
Color/stereo
Cast:
Almasy Ralph Fiennes
Hana Juliette Binoche
Caravaggio Willem Dafoe
Katharine Clifton Kristin Scott Thomas
Kip Naveen Andrews
Geoffrey Clifton Colin Firth
Madox Julian Wadham
Hardy Kevin Whately Fenelon-Barnes
Clive Merrison D'Agostino Nino Castelnuovo
Running time -- 159 minutes
MPAA rating: R...
If this reverberating drama has a center, it is the titular character, the English Patient (Ralph Fiennes) who, at the end of World War II, clings to life in an Italian monastery, his skin withered from burns and his lungs too weak to allow him to leave his bed. "The English Patient", as he is called for lack of a more accurate name, further suffers from memory loss. The only clues he and his nurse (Juliette Binoche) have to his identity come from a small book of the writings of Herodotus, with a few personal letters and maps stuffed between its pages.
It's around the mystery of this bandaged man's identity that screenwriter-director Anthony Minghella constructs a much wider story. Through the personal prism of these four main stories the overall picture emerges. Using sounds and colors and other associative bits of story tissue, Minghella connects the "Patient" to his most immediate past as a member of a group of cartographers who have come together in the most desolate area of the African desert to map out the terrain for England's Royal Geographic Society. Like most international expeditions, they are a motley and diverse group and include most prominently team leader Count Laszlo de Almasy (Fiennes) and a young English couple (Colin Firth, Kristin Scott Thomas).
To follow the story's multicharacter winds and twists, and to appreciate the different levels of reality in this epic tale -- most prominently the prewar, wartime and postwar rules of the game -- requires rapt viewer attention. In addition, the swirling multinational cast of characters and places also deepens and widens the rich story veins; the film surges as a love story, a war story, and most powerfully as personal stories of characters trying to tap their identity in a cataclysmic time.
Admittedly, the story embroidery at times seems too aswirl, threading back and forth in time and place, but, fortunately, Minghella is a narrative cartographer of the most sophisticated order. He has a pointillist's sense of direction, and soon the viewers learn that the narrative dots aren't connected in A-B-C order but appear in bursts and batches, linked and enlivened by the film's cinematic synapses of colors, cuts, sounds and other subtle textures.
While the film's technical eloquence is, perhaps, its strongest suit, the players are never subsumed by either the vastness of the terrain or the complexity of the tale. Fiennes is marvelous as the enigmatic patient Almasy. In both his deathbed scenes and in his earlier death-defying escapades in the desert, he exudes the robust fiber of a man who tests his limits on all fronts.
As the vivacious and thoroughly modern Englishwoman whom Almasy falls in love with, Scott Thomas is strikingly charismatic. She's clearly a flame in this sandy parchment, and her performance is likely to win wide appreciation. Willem Dafoe is also effective as a mysterious burglar who carries his own debilitating physical and psychological burdens, while Juliette Binoche radiates decency as the kind nurse with festering inner scars.
The technical team, including an array of Oscar winners, deserve highest medals for their expertise and daring. Cinematographer John Seale's grand and roiling nature imagery, coupled with editor Walter Murch's pristine cuts, magnify the storytelling to the highest degree. Similar praise for costume designer Ann Roth for the wide-ranging historical costumes.
It's not only the sights but the sounds that enrapture here. Backdropped by a wonderfully sinewy score, featuring the slithers of the oboe and other desert-life sounds, "The English Patient" courses with life and vitality.
THE ENGLISH PATIENT
Miramax Films
A Saul Zaentz production
an Anthony Minghella film
Producer Saul Zaentz
Screenwriter-director Anthony Minghella
Based on the novel by Michael Ondaatje
Director of photography John Seale
Production designer Stuart Craig
Music Gabriel Yared
Executive producers Bob Weinstein,
Harvey Weinstein, Scott Greenstein
Associate producers Paul Zaenta,
Steve Andrews
Line producer Alessandro von Normann
Costume designer Ann Roth
Editor Walter Murch
Casting Michelle Guish, David Rubin
Color/stereo
Cast:
Almasy Ralph Fiennes
Hana Juliette Binoche
Caravaggio Willem Dafoe
Katharine Clifton Kristin Scott Thomas
Kip Naveen Andrews
Geoffrey Clifton Colin Firth
Madox Julian Wadham
Hardy Kevin Whately Fenelon-Barnes
Clive Merrison D'Agostino Nino Castelnuovo
Running time -- 159 minutes
MPAA rating: R...
- 11/6/1996
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
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