Father Geek esta aqui con Coffin Joe Jr.'s Latin-AICN column for this week.
Writer/Director and close family friend Guillermo del Toro returned to his home in Austin, Texas this week for the 1st time in many months. He has been all over the world shooting THE DEVIL'S BACKBONE and BLADE 2 back to back for the last year and ahalf. He returned to premiere "... my little Spanish film" for family and friends, and the Austin film maker community Sunday night. It is fantastic!!! Beautiful, moody, scary, important. Annnnnnd totally del Toro's. No studio interference like with MIMIC, No lack of funds like with CRONOS. As Guillermo said in his brief intro: "...so if you don't like it you have no one to blame but ME!" This thriller is just that. It is NOT a mere Horror flick, rather a mystery/chiller set in a historic reality more along the lines of the best of Hitchcock, but it's NO simple rehash of that great Director's work. As this director said,"It's NOT a Ghost story, it's a story of crime, and war, and children, and love that has a Ghost in it." Although the picture is NOT autobiographical Guillermo stated after the screening, "...this was a work I have wanted to bring to the screen for 16 years, it is full of the images from my youth... although I grewup in Mexico, not Spain and am not an orphan." The sound, the look, and the feel of this moving motion picture are nothing short of Phantastic. An Astounding work of the cinema artform! It opens wide in the USA with subtitles on November 21st. See it in a theater, you will not regret it.
Another film brought to Father Geek's attention this week is a micro budgeted feature written and directed by Joseph Gonzales who grewup in Taft, Texas, pop. 3222, but who has now relocated to Hollywood. They are currently in the casting process and have cast Ron Jermy in one of the roles although the pic is NOT a porn flick. They will begin filming in late November. It's a romantic comedy, called, LOVE'S FUNNY, and they're shooting it on Beta due to the very small budget. They are filming in California, and in Texas, and are planning on showing it in several film festivals. We'll keep you informed on the progress of this little indie film as we get the word.
Now here's Coffin Joe...
Hey there, Coffin Joe Jr. here, for yet another installment of Latin-AICN, all the way from São Paulo, Brazil. The local film festival begins this week, and I´m looking forward to watching some great flicks from all over the globe. Can´t wait to see Richard Linklater´s "Waking Life", Alfonso Cuaron´s "Y tu Mamá Tambien", "Amelie", and a bunch of other flicks that will be screened.
Hope you guys dig what we have this week. Read on.
USA/ARGENTINA/COLOMBIA
Here´s something sent by our regular spy Kryall:
Johnny Depp as Simon Bolivar,
Maybe this is why Jlo dropped out of the Frida Kahlo movie.
This thriller is just that. It is NOT a mere Horror flick, rather a mystery/chiller set in a historic reality more along the lines of the best of Hitchcock, but it's NO simple rehash of that great Director's work. As this director said,"It's NOT a Ghost story, it's a story of crime, and war, and children, and love that has a Ghost in it." Although the picture is NOT autobiographical Guillermo stated after the screening, "...this was a work I have wanted to bring to the screen for 16 years, it is full of the images from my youth... although I grewup in Mexico, not Spain and am not an orphan." The sound, the look, and the feel of this moving motion picture are nothing short of Phantastic. An Astounding work of the cinema artform! It opens wide in the USA with subtitles on November 21st. See it in a theater, you will not regret it.
Another film brought to Father Geek's attention this week is a micro budgeted feature written and directed by Joseph Gonzales who grewup in Taft, Texas, pop. 3222, but who has now relocated to Hollywood. They are currently in the casting process and have cast Ron Jermy in one of the roles although the pic is NOT a porn flick. They will begin filming in late November. It's a romantic comedy, called, LOVE'S FUNNY, and they're shooting it on Beta due to the very small budget. They are filming in California, and in Texas, and are planning on showing it in several film festivals. We'll keep you informed on the progress of this little indie film as we get the word.
Now here's Coffin Joe...
Hey there, Coffin Joe Jr. here, for yet another installment of Latin-AICN, all the way from São Paulo, Brazil. The local film festival begins this week, and I´m looking forward to watching some great flicks from all over the globe. Can´t wait to see Richard Linklater´s "Waking Life", Alfonso Cuaron´s "Y tu Mamá Tambien", "Amelie", and a bunch of other flicks that will be screened.
Hope you guys dig what we have this week. Read on.
USA/ARGENTINA/COLOMBIA
Here´s something sent by our regular spy Kryall:
Johnny Depp as Simon Bolivar,
Maybe this is why Jlo dropped out of the Frida Kahlo movie.
Now here's Coffin Joe...
Hey there, Coffin Joe Jr. here, for yet another installment of Latin-AICN, all the way from São Paulo, Brazil. The local film festival begins this week, and I´m looking forward to watching some great flicks from all over the globe. Can´t wait to see Richard Linklater´s "Waking Life", Alfonso Cuaron´s "Y tu Mamá Tambien", "Amelie", and a bunch of other flicks that will be screened.
Hope you guys dig what we have this week. Read on.
USA/ARGENTINA/COLOMBIA
Here´s something sent by our regular spy Kryall:
Johnny Depp as Simon Bolivar,
Maybe this is why Jlo dropped out of the Frida Kahlo movie.
USA/ARGENTINA/COLOMBIA
Here´s something sent by our regular spy Kryall:
Johnny Depp as Simon Bolivar,
Maybe this is why Jlo dropped out of the Frida Kahlo movie.
Simón BolÃvar en Hollywood
BOGOTÃ -
La vida del Libertador Simón BolÃvar será llevada a la pantalla grande con todas las de la ley. El hombre inmortalizado en la historia de América Latina, va para Hollywood. La cinta será protagonizada por Johnny Deep, recordado por sus papeles en "El Joven Manos de Tijera" y "Don Juan de Marco". Su Manuelita será Jennifer López, quien se ha vuelto casi que indispensable en las pelÃculas de corte latino. Anthony Hopkins también hará parte del reparto del film titulado "BolÃvar Libertador".
El largometraje, que pretende contar como este héroe dedicó su vida a liberar a los pueblos oprimidos por la colonización española, comenzará a rodarse en Mendoza, Argentian, en febrero del próximo año. Los colombianos no pueden faltar en esta historia. El guión se basó en textos creados por el Nóbel de Literatura, Gabriel GarcÃa Márquez. La intérprete Shakira participará en la banda sonora con canciones compuestas para la cinta de estilo épico."
For those of you who don´t speak Spanish, Johnny Depp is going to play Simon BolÃvar in a movie version of the revolutionary leader´s life, with Jennifer Lopez as Manuelita. Anthony Hopkins is also a part of the cast. The screenplay is based on writings of acclaimed novelist Gabriel Garcia Marquez.
Shooting will take place in Mendoza, Argentina in February of 2002.
Colombian singer Shakira is slated to contribute songs to the movie´s soundtrack.
BRAZIL
-Actor Charlton Heston is in Manaus, to shoot the movie "Papa: Rua Alguém 555", directed by Italian Egidio Eronico. In the film, Heston plays nazi doctor Joseph Mengele. F.Murray Abraham ("Amadeus") also stars in the film, which takes place in 1977, dealing with a alledged encounter between Mengele and his son, who confronts his father about his past.
-Here´s something interesting regarding the "Lord of the Rings" trilogy, written by Pablo Villaça, the guy behind a very cool Brazilian movie site called Cinema em Cena:
"Dear Friends;
As you know, New Line Cinema intends to release "Fellowship of The Ring" (a.k.a. LOTR - Part 1) worldwide in the same day. Well, unfortunnely, we received confirmation that the movie's release will be delayed in two weeks in Brazil (maybe three). The reason was not clarified, but some of our sources indicate that the problem may lie in the release of Xuxa Meneghel's new movie: "Dwarves".
Who is this Xuxa person, you may ask. Well, she's the host of a children's TV show produced by Globo (the major tv station of Latin America) and she releases a new movie every year (since 1999). Regrettably, her movies are total garbage and are produced only to cash in her popularity (she often share the screen with any singer who is making success in Brasil in the last ten months).
Answering a demand made by our readers, we started a campaing to convince Warner (the movie's distributor in Brasil) to release the movie alongside the rest of the world - and if you could help us, we would be enormously grateful.
All you have to do (if you chose to help us in this noble task) is ask your BRAZILIAN readers (which, we're sure, you have a lot) to go to: This Site And click at the link at the bottom of the page to send their support to us. In November, we will forward the list of signatures to Warner Brazil and hope for the best. In our case, Xuxa is Sauron - and we are organizing a Fellowship of the Release to face her. Help us, please! :)
Thank you very, very, very much; Pablo Villaça - editor of Cinema em Cena (www.cinemaemcena.com.br)"
That sucks.
COFFIN JOE JR. MOVIE REVIEWS
"EL ESPINAZO DEL DIABLO"
Writer/Director: Guillermo del Toro
"EL ESPINAZO DEL DIABLO" Writer/Director: Guillermo del Toro
Plot goes something like this: kid is dropped at an orphanage in the middle of nowhere in Spain ,during the Civil War. It seems the place is haunted by a ghost since the day a bomb fell from the sky in the patio of the orphanage.
I consider myself a fan of del Toro´s work, I thought "Cronos" was the best international genre flick to come out in a long time, and I still think it´s better than anything that has been released in the field in the last decade anywhere, including the Japanese sensation "The Ring", or any horror flick from Spain, Italy, US, Hong Kong, France, etc. "Mimic" was good, certainly better than most Hollywood genre films, and when you think about it, he managed to make a decent movie at Dimension, something I think is basically impossible (Amenabar pulled it off with "The Others" as well, but that´s an exception to the rule).
I was really looking forward to "El Espinazo del Diablo", or the "Devil´s Backbone" if you prefer. I was not disappointed. This is a coming of age story, sort of a horror version of "Oliver Twist", but it´s no ordinary fairy tale, it´s nasty, violent, and sometimes pretty mean. It´s a great little story, with some great twists, sad characters with some secrets in their pasts, and even a political subplot creeps in for all you history buffs out there. It´s really nice to see Federico Luppi again, he shines here, as do Marisa Paredes and Eduardo Noriega, but the real stars are the kids, and they are very good.
Director of photography Guillermo Navarro ("Jackie Brown", "Spawn") who worked with del Toro on the director´s previous two films, is in stylish mode here, with some beautiful crane shots and moody lighting.
The title sequence is really cool, one of the best I´ve seen in a while and it ranks right up there with the notorious "Seven" title sequence, as one of the best I´ve ever seen. Loved those smoky fonts.
The ghost, a kid named Santi, is one spooky little man. There´s one sequence in particular, where he chases the main character, Carlos, down a corridor, that creeped me out. The wooden leg of Marisa Paredes´s character was also kinda creepy, but very cool, neat FX work there.
As for the title, in a strange way, it´s only a small part of the story, and, you know what, my only complaint, is that it should have played a larger role in the whole thing. What if Jacinto had that strange backbone? Just an idea, I thought was cool, but that´s just a small complaint, the movie is basically a classic.
Go see this the moment it opens at a theater near ya, because you don´t get quality flicks like this one very often, so get your fat ass to a movie screen that plays this movie.
Fun fact about this movie: legendary Spainsh helmer Pedro Almodovar ("All About my Mother") is one of the producers.
"The Devil´s Backbone" will open in the US on November 21st , distributed by Sony Pictures Classics.
That´s it for me, I´m done for this week.
Coffin Joe Jr. says: bye.
