EricHarrison.org - Houston Movie Blog

MovieHouston.com and EricHarrison.org going on temporary hiatus

The Editor — Tue, 02 Feb 2010 01:04:00 GMT

Regretfully, we're stepping across the border into the Orange Free State where we shall wander largely off line for several weeks. Careful observers may have noticed that we've already been skirting the borderline of Nowhereville for more than a month. Our posts have been few though we've tried as best we can. Sorry.

We'll be back. Can't say exactly when. It's also possible you'll see scattered postings as time and circumstance allows, but it seems appropriate to make this announcement to explain why you've seen little commentary thus far on the current awards season and why you'll see scant if any coverage of the coming Oscar nominations or of the Oscar race in general. Or of South by Southwest. It's not that we're here on the job but doing badly. We're not here. We're hiding out with Winnie Mandela over yonder where the law can't catch us.

Or something.

Mel Gibson: 'I can't do this' (Then he breaks off an interview and leaves the room)

The Editor — Mon, 25 Jan 2010 06:10:00 GMT

What is wrong with this guy?

Mel Gibson grew jittery and weird during an interview with the Los Angeles Times and, 19 minutes into it, ...

Aw, let's let Geoff Boucher tell it:

Mel Gibson took a deep breath, shook his head and stared down at his palms. "I just can't do this. You've got me at a disadvantage." The movie star, his voice a croak, was a mere 19 minutes into an interview, but it was clear there was no way he was going to make it to 20.

"I'm coming rapidly to the conclusion that right now, today, my brain cannot function. Honestly? I'm six days off the cigarette. You're looking at someone who's having a pretty bad withdrawal from a 45-year habit."

The question that sent the jittery Gibson on his way out of the room was about the cultural riptides that await anyone who brings religion into the modern public life of Hollywood. "I'm not running away from it. I want to give you a fair trot. I like where you're coming from with these questions. I just feel ill-equipped to answer."

These are difficult days to be Mel Gibson, with or without nicotine.

You may recall that I posted a clip the other day that showed how Gibson reacted when a reporter, who happened to be Jewish, broached the subject of Gibson's return to acting for the first time since he got arrested in 2006 for drunk driving and then flew into an anti-Semitic tirade. Gibson grew testy, leaned forward and asked: "Do you have a dog in this hunt?"

That sounded to some like Gibson was asking: "Are you a Jew?"

Surely these types of questions don't come as a surprise to him?

What? Did the guy think he could do round after round of media interviews without anyone asking questions?

By the way, the movie Gibson is promoting is titled Edge of Darkness.

Given the scary side he can't keep hidden, the title sounds appropriate. But Edge of Sanity might be better.

Weinsteins blow 'Hurricane Season' straight to DVD shelves

The Editor — Sat, 23 Jan 2010 17:39:00 GMT

Movies starring well-known actors -- even past-prime, Oscar-winning stars -- get sent straight to DVD fairly frequently. Still, the fate of Hurricane Season is surprising.

The movie set, set in Louisiana in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, stars Forrest Whitaker, Taraji Henson and the rapper Lil Wayne. Whitaker won an Oscar only three years ago for his starring role as Idi Amin in The Last King of Scotland. Henson was nominated just last year for her supporting role in The Curious Case of Benjamin Button.

Tim Story, the director, isn't likely ever to win anything of significance for his directing work, but he did an admirable job with Barbershop (2005) and blasted off into the big leagues with Fantastic Four and Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer. The two comic book pics had a combined worldwide gross of $620 million.

So he steps away from the comic books and makes a film about real people that has an outstanding cast, a poignant backdrop and even a sports theme...and it goes straight to DVD?

The Weinstein Company slipped it quietly into video stores last month, according to the Los Angeles Times. The studio wanted it kept so quiet that when a reporter from the Times called last week to ask when it would be released into theaters (it was supposed to come out last year), the reporter was told that no hard release date had been set yet.

Whitaker plays a real-life a high school basketball coach in Marrero, La., who leads a team of players who all had been displaced a year earlier by Katrina and leads them on a path to the state championship.

'Do you have a dog in this hunt?'

The Editor — Wed, 20 Jan 2010 20:47:00 GMT

No comment.

Hubble 3D film heading to theaters in March

The Editor — Fri, 15 Jan 2010 06:21:00 GMT

This strikes me as being worth a look, if for the 3D images if nothing else. But it looks like IMAX Hubble 3D will have more than a smidgen of true-life drama. And with the involvement of Leonardo DiCaprio and Warner Bros., you've got to figure it'll be more than the kind of documentary shown mainly to school kids on field trips to NASA or to the museum.

Houston Film Critics Society name 'Hurt Locker' best movie of 2009 and honor Clooney and Mulligan for acting

The Editor — Sun, 20 Dec 2009 02:34:00 GMT

The Houston Film Critics Society honored The Hurt Locker as the best movie of 2009 Saturday in a ceremony that included the bestowing of a lifetime achievement award on the late Patrick Swayze and the naming of G.W. Bailey as Humanitarian of the year for his work with the Houston-based Sunshine Kids Foundation.

The group also named George Clooney best actor for his work in Up In the Air and Carey Mulligan best actress for her performance in An Education.

Bailey, a veteran character actor who appears on television's The Closer, joked that he first thought the award was late recognition for his work in the Police Academy movies, but he teared up while accepting his award and discussing the foundation's work.

The Sunshine Kids was founded in 1982 to improve the quality of life for children with cancer by involving them in activities and travel. Bailey did volunteer work for the foundation for years and has served as executive director since 2001.

The Museum of Fine Arts hosted the film clip-filled awards presentation.

I can't say I agreed with all of our picks, but I've got no complaint at all about the three awards we gave to The Hurt Locker.

In addition to winning the best picture prize, it was honored for its cinematography, and its director, Kathryn Bigalow, was named the year's best director.

Up In the Air also won three awards -- apart from Clooney, Anna Kendrick won for best supporting actress and Jason Reitman and Sheldon Turner were given the award for best screenplay.

Other awards went to The Cove for best documentary and to Sin Nombre for best foreign language film.

Other winners included Christoph Waltz as best supporting actor award for his work as a sadistic Nazi in Inglourious Basterds, and Up for best animated feature. Up’s composer, Michael Giacchino, received the award for best score.

The other music award went to by Jarvis Cocker, Wes Anderson & Noah Baumbach for composing the year’s best song, Petey’s Song from Fantastic Mr. Fox.

The society handed out one other special award – an outstanding achievement award to Margaret Stratton, a veteran Houston film publicist who retired this year.

Right now is when I ordinarily would refer you to the official site now for more information, but let's just say that improving the society's website is on the to-do list for 2010.

Kudos to society member Joshua Starnes and to el presidente Nick Nickolson for directing and orchestrating the program and everything that comes with it.

Here's the list:

2009 BestPicture - The Hurt Locker

2009 BestDirector - Kathryn Bigelow, The Hurt Locker

2009 BestActor - George Clooney, Up in the Air

2009 BestActress - Carey Mulligan, An Education

2009 BestSupporting Actor - Christoph Waltz, Inglourious Basterds

2009 BestSupporting Actress - Anna Kendrick, Up in the Air

2009 BestScreenplay - Jason Reitman and Sheldon Turner, Upin the Air

2009 BestAnimated Film - Up

2009 BestCinematography - Barry Ackroyd, The Hurt Locker

2009 BestDocumentary - The Cove

2009 BestForeign Film - Sin Nombre

2009 BestOriginal Score - Michael Giacchino, Up

2009 BestOriginal Song - Petey's Song by Jarvis Cocker, WesAnderson &

Noah Baumbach, The Fantastic Mr. Fox

2009Outstanding Achievement Award - Margaret Stratton

2009Humanitarian of the Year Award - G.W. Bailey

2009Lifetime Achievement Award - Patrick Swayze

On The Day of the Vow, South African race relations a far cry from what's suggested by 'Invictus'

The Editor — Thu, 17 Dec 2009 07:33:00 GMT

Invictus, a new Clint Eastwood-directed fable of South African reconciliation, is enthralling American critics as it marches toward at least one near-certain Oscar nomination -- for Morgan Freeman as Nelson Mandela. The movie tells of how the wise, kind and impishly inscrutable Mandela, newly elected, guided and cajoled his divided nation into coming together as one. It is a hopeful tale, an inspiring tale that we want so badly to believe in, even as we recognize its rendering of Mandela and South Africa as glaringly oversimplified. The movie is based on fact and, despite creative license, it is built on a sturdy foundation of truth: Mandela did begin to forge something of a national identity by using the unlikely vehicle of rugby, a sport much loved by South Africa's white minority and despised as a symbol of apartheid by South African blacks.

But lest anyone believe the country strolled from the rugby field and into the future holding hands and singing Kumbaya, I direct your attention to a story in today's New York Times.

Written by Barry Bearak, an old colleague from the L.A. Times (and a Pulitzer Prize winner), the story presents some sobering truths:

Fifteen years after South Africa was born anew as a multiracial democracy, most of the nation's whites still celebrate Dec. 16th as the Day of the Vow, "a covenant said to be made between their ancestors and God in 1838 that led to the slaughter of 3,000 Zulus," Bearak writes.

South African blacks long commemorated Dec. 16th as well, but for them it marked the start of armed struggle against apartheid in 1961.

After apartheid was dismantled and a new government elected in 1994, lawmakers kept Dec. 16 as a holiday, but they proclaimed it a Day of Reconciliation, "a time for all races to come together in the spirit of national unity." Much the same as they do at the end of Invictus.

But a new poll released last week found that 31 percent of whites do not think race relations have improved in the intervening 15 years. Sixteen percent of them think race relations are worse.

"Income inequality remains among the worse in the world," Bearak writes. "About 29 percent of blacks are unemployed, compared with 5 percent of whites, according to recent figures. When statistics include discouraged workers — dropouts from the labor force — the jobless rate climbs to nearly 50 percent."

Previously:

Mandela's long rugby fixation depicted in 'Invictus ' is 'poppycock,' says author

Clint Eastwood discusses 'Invictus'

Houston Film Critics Society to honor Patrick Swayze, G.W. Bailey Saturday at its Best of 2009 Awards Ceremony

The Editor — Thu, 17 Dec 2009 03:14:00 GMT

The Houston Film Critics Society will present a Lifetime Achievement Award posthumously to Patrick Swayze on Saturday during its Best of 2009 Award Presentation. The society also will give its Humanitarian of the Year Award to G.W. Bailey, an actor known for his parts in the Police Academy movies and in TV's The Closer.

Bailey, who will attend to accept the award, is being recognized for his work with the Houston-based Sunshine Kids Foundation.

The presentation is free and will be full of video clips, so I hope you can make it. It will take place at 4 p.m. Saturday at the Museum of Fine Arts' Brown Auditorium. The free event will be followed by a reception in the museum galleries.

Members of the organization will announce awards in 15 categories in a presentation that will be filled with film clips.

Bailey, who was born in Texas, has long volunteered for the Sunshine Kids, an organization that provides activities, trips and events for young cancer patients. Bailey became executive director of the organization in 2001.

This is the second year the Houston Film Critics Society has presented awards to the year's best movies. Founded in 2007, the group is comprised of critics from area newspapers, TV stations and websites and was organized for the purpose of increasing public awareness of cinematic excellence and to encourage the publication and broadcasting of substantive critical commentary on film.

Mandela's long rugby fixation depicted in 'Invictus ' is 'poppycock,' says author

The Editor — Mon, 14 Dec 2009 02:51:00 GMT

Invictus opened in third place this weekend (behind The Princess and the Frog and The Blind Side), but as one of the few feel-good adult dramas of the holiday season (and a likely Oscar contender on several fronts) there's a good chance it will have legs. Since it purports to tell the true story of how Nelson Mandela used the unlikely vehicle of rugby to unite his divided nation, it doesn't hurt to know what really happened.

Did Mandela really become as obsessed with rugby as he does in the film? Did he start poring over materials a year-out to determine who South Africa's team would play in the quarter-finals? Did he interrupt top-level meetings to learn game scores? Did he form a close personal bond with the team captain that pushed the young athlete (and therefore the team) to perform better during the long lead up to the 1995 World Cup?

Paul Ackford, a writer with Britain's Telegraph newspaper, says "poppycock."

You may read his brief account of how it actually occurred HERE.

And if after seeing the film you're moved to learn the full story behind it, here is a link to the factual book on which the movie is based.

Animators downplay race as a factor in creating 'The Princess and the Frog'

The Editor — Fri, 11 Dec 2009 17:46:00 GMT

When word got out that Disney was making The Princess and the Frog, its first movie with an African American heroine (set in the American South, of all places) critics of the company began sharpening their knives. Disney, after all, does not have a sterling history when it comes to portraying ethnic characters. And given the way black characters were depicted in so many early Hollywood cartoons as cannibals, monkeys and jive-talking crows, some would argue that the company had a lot of making up to do.

Sure enough, scrutiny was intense. Disney was praised by some, but others began criticizing the movie sight unseen.

A rumor got out that the princess was to be a chambermaid to a white woman during the New Orleans Jazz Age. (She isn't. She's a waitress with ambitions of opening her own restaurant though her mother is a seamstress who works for a wealthy white family.) The princess (who is voiced by Tony-award winning singer Anika Noni Rose) originally was to be called Maddy (short for Madeleine), but Disney changed her name to Tiana, reportedly because some thought Maddy sounded too much like Mammy.

Others examined the characters physical features, with some critics saying the prince she falls in love with (a dark-skinned man from the fictional country of Maldonia who is given voice by a Brazilian actor) doesn't appear to be of black African descent.

Then when Disney released an early trailer that showed a snaggle-toothed, talking firefly with a heavy Cajun accent, some thought he was an ugly black stereotype of the sort Disney used to populate its movies with.

On top of this, there was criticism from women who felt the story reinforced the notion that a woman's worth is based on her attractiveness and attachment to a man.

Miraculously, however, if two of the film's lead animators are to be believed, none of this filtered back to them as they worked on the movie.

"No, not really," said Mark Henn, a 30-year veteran of Disney who created the main character of Tiana. "None at all."

"You focus on what your role is and really you sort of get absorbed into that," said Mike Surrey, whose job it was to create and animate Ray, that talking firefly. The movie's 42 animators toiled in their rooms, making thousands of drawings each, which they then animated over approximately 18 months.

Every day, the animators would get together to watch dailies, footage of the scenes selected to be approved that week. They'd all sit together in a screening room and pore over all aspects of the character, offering comments and suggesting changes. This process is the same for every film.

"So that, really, is what it becomes about," Surrey said, "just making the movie."

By the time a movie reaches animators, both men said, important character decisions have already been made by the director, the script (or at least the first draft) has been written, and often the story already has been mapped out visually with storyboards that are put on a reel with stand-in talent doing the voices.

"That's usually when we come into the picture," Surrey said. "So whatever's happened up to that point is mysterious to us. We're more focused on 'where's my character.'"

Surrey and Mark Henn came through Houston earlier this month on a multi-city tour to promote The Princess and the Frog, which opens today. (I'll post a review shortly.)

The rest of the interview and a review of the movie will be posted shortly.

The film is Disney's hand-drawn movie since Home On the Range five years ago. Computer-generated images -- and now digital 3D -- have taken over. Since the story of The Princess and the Frog harkens back to classic tales like Cinderella (which Henn credits with making him want to become an animator), hand-drawn animation makes sense for this project. But, again, the animators say they weren't privy to the decision-making process.

Henn said, however, that the instigating factor was the return of John Lasseter to Disney three years ago as principle creative executive.

Lasseter, who had worked for Disney in the 1980s, was a pioneer of computer-generated animation, oversaw all of Pixar's animated works and personally directed such films as Toy Story and its sequel, A Bug's Life and Cars. But he felt it was time for Disney to return to its roots.

"John Lasseter basically came back to the studio three years ago as our new creative exec and said, 'This is Disney animation and, yes, we're making 3D films now and that's fine, but Disney animation is all about hand drawn," Henn said. "'That's your heritage. That's our legacy, and we should be doing that.'

"So the short answer (to why The Princess and the Frog is hand drawn) is that John Lasseter said we're going to do this and the studio said ok.

"i think there was still some skepticism about that," Surrey said, "but John was fully confidant."

The animators were all for it.

"The powers that be decided what 5, 6 years ago that cg is the way to go -- it's the way we're going to make money, it's the way we're going to make our movies," Surrey said. "But we all knew as animators (and Mark has been doing it for 30 years and myself for 20), we knew that it's really the story that's going to dictate how good your film is."

So, in a sense, The Princess and the Frog is a landmark and a gamble on several fronts -- Disney's first black American heroine, a stylistic throwback to classic Disney and the test of whether Lasseter was right that audiences in the digital age will still embrace hand-drawn animation.

Lots of people will be watching eagerly to see how well it does this weekend.

Clint Eastwood discusses 'Invictus'

The Editor — Thu, 10 Dec 2009 02:36:00 GMT

Pardon the swarmy, TV-style questions posed to Eastwood (what do you expect from a TV interviewer?), but I'm posting a clip from the Invictus junket because it's an interesting movie, in a conventional old-style Hollywood kind of way. Even though Invictus portrays Nelson Mandela as the ultimate Magic Negro (if you don't count Michael Clarke Duncan's role in The Green Mile), the film nevertheless is a fascinating study of the way the newly elected South African president used the unlikely vehicle of rugby to help unite a divided nation. You may glimpse a trace of Hoke Colburn in Morgan Freeman's portrayal, and the movie does a disservice to Mandela in never showing him as passionately engaged in the affairs of state (where is his cabinet?) as he is with rugby, but you must give kudos to Invictus for not letting Mandela's heroic stature and legend obscure the fact that he is human. The movie does, regretably, let Mandela's supposed impish inscrutability obscure his humanity (I kept waiting for him to refer to Matt Damon as "grasshopper"), but that's a different issue.

Michael Bay's Victoria's Secret Commercial

The Editor — Tue, 08 Dec 2009 16:17:00 GMT

It looks like a bunch of outtakes from one of the Transformers' movies. If nothing else, they show that that Fox dame is expendable.

Coen brothers returning to Texas for next movie

The Editor — Wed, 02 Dec 2009 07:35:00 GMT

Looks like the Coen brothers will be heading back to Texas for their next film -- a remake of True Grit with Jeff Bridges in the John Wayne role. The cast also will feature Matt Damon and Josh Brolin.

The Coens made their first film, Blood Simple in Austin and parts of No Country For Old Men were shot in the state.

The Austin American-Statesman reports that the production will be headquartered in the city with scenes shot in the surrounding rural and small--town areas. That should suit Brolin just fine. When I interviewed him in Austin in 2007 when No Country opened, he seemed genuinely taken with Austin, in no small part because of the great time he had hanging with Robert Rodriguez when they shot Planet Terror, Rodriguez zombie movie that comprised half of Grindhouse.

Among other things, Brolin credited the experience (and Rodriguez) for igniting in him a burning desire to direct movies. He promptly went home to California and made a short film, X, which debuted in Austin at South by Southwest the following year.

The White House gate crashers

The Editor — Fri, 27 Nov 2009 00:17:00 GMT

TV and radio jaw flappers are spending the holidays hashing over the White House gate crashers, discussing the Secret Service's screw up, the President's safety and the nerve of those awful social climbers who breached White House security for their own selfish purposes. But I'm reminded of The Yes Men Fix the World, a documentary that played at the just-completed triumphant Cinema Festival Houston Arts (I think that's how those words fit together). If you didn't see the movie, you can read about it HERE.

Whatever else the Yes Men's antics show, it's that you pretty much can go anywhere you want if you're decent-looking, well-dressed and white. If you look the part, people just assume you belong.

Let's hope the Secret Service gets its act together. The next gate crashers might have more nefarious goals than posing for pictures and promoting a silly reality show.

New 'Wolfman' posters

The Editor — Thu, 26 Nov 2009 08:58:00 GMT

I remember seeing The Wolf Man on television late at night when I was a kid. For me, Lon Chaney's portrayal of Lawrence Talbot in that 1941 Universal Pictures classic is the definitive interpretation of a werewolf. Even though the makeup looks hokey when I see old movie stills now, every cinematic werewolf I've seen since then has been sorely lacking.

I even still remember the poem recited in that movie about the werewolf legend:

Even a man who is pure in heart
and says his prayers by night,
may become a wolf when the wolfbane blooms
and the moon is shining bright.

Those are the words I remember anyway. The words were slightly different in the very early marketing I saw for the new Wolfman movie that opens in February. I'm not sure if they altered them or if I'm remembering them wrong. Doesn't matter. What does matter is that they used the lines at all.

This is no updated version or new-fangled reimagining but an honest-to-goodness remake. I'm hoping they recapture some of the magic.

You see the new one sheet accompanying this post. And I've got another Wolfman poster at the end.

'The Messenger'

The Editor — Wed, 25 Nov 2009 02:05:00 GMT

Good or bad, depressing or hopeful, movies that have anything to do with the Middle East fare poorly at the box office. We live in escapist times. Serious films travel a rough road, whatever their subject. There's no reason to think The Messenger will fare better, but it would be a shame if it slips through the cracks.

Ben Foster stars as an Army officer just back from Iraq who is assigned the job of notifying next-of-kin about casualties. This is an astute and sensitively drawn character study of a conflicted soldier struggling to fit back into society, a soldier whose unhealed wounds are both physical and psychic.

The Messenger is the directorial debut of Oren Moverman, a screenwriter who co-wrote the scripts for Jesus' Son and I'm Not There. This movie more closely resembles intelligent character-based dramas from the 1970s with their often-flawed lead characters than it does any recent war-related film. It is, however, like the recent The Lucky Ones in one important way. That overlooked 2008 comedy-drama also was about soldiers back from Iraq, and neither film was about the Middle East, terrorism or war but rather about America and the difficulties that soldiers often face upon returning home.

Foster turns in a career-making performance. His girlfriend since childhood (played by Jena Malone) still cares for him, but she is engaged to marry someone else. He finds himself drawn to a war widow (Samantha Morton) who has just learned that her husband has been killed in Iraq. That is an awkward situation made more so by his orders to remain aloof and detached from the people whose lives he enters and irrevocably changes. Woody Harrelson, as his commanding officer, has never been better.

You may recognize Foster from Six Feet Under or the X-Men movies (he played Angel). He also did stand-out work in 3:10 to Yuma (and considering that the stars of that film were Christian Bale and Russell Crowe, that's saying a lot). Foster is out in front here, and he carries the film superbly. Go see it and you will witness a star in the making.

Roald Dahl's grandson to speak at MFAH screening of 'Fantastic Mr Fox'

The Editor — Wed, 25 Nov 2009 00:54:00 GMT

Fantastic Mr. Fox is scheduled to start in five minutes and I'm not there. Bummer. I'll catch the movie after it opens, but I had wanted to attend tonight's screening at the Museum of Fine Arts because Roald Dahl's grandson, Luke Kelly, will be there to speak after the screening. And I believe Wes Anderson's family will be there.

I sat directly behind Anderson's mother when The Life Aquatic With Steve Zissou had its local premiere at the museum in 2004. I've loved or admired nearly all of Anderson's films, but I hated Life Aquatic. Sitting behind the director's mother sort of puts pressure on a fella to be on his best behavior. No heavy sighs. No shouting at the screen. No rude comments while filing out.

Forget Palin's gams, what's up with these women's weight?

The Editor — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 19:10:00 GMT

Superficial me: I haven't paid much attention to Claire Danes lately, but I found her distractingly, almost shockingly, thin in Me and Orson Welles. I didn't even recognize her at first.

I just saw The Messenger. The formerly thin Samantha Morton is the anti-Claire.

I guess life happens.

Cinema Arts Festival Houston - What manner of beast?

The Editor — Sun, 15 Nov 2009 08:01:00 GMT

As the Cinema Arts Festival Houston draws to a close, several things are clear. Firstly, the festival was a great success. I saw wonderful movies, was enriched by smart discussion about cinema and the city -- or at least a good-sized portion of it -- was excited both by exposure to the films and by the lively presence in the city of great talents such as Tilda Swinton, Guillermo Arriaga and Richard Linklater.

Cinema Arts Festival Houston undoubtedly is, finally, the film festival the city deserves. I'm certain it will grow in coming years to become not only an even more important part of the city's fabric but also the kind of ambitious and smartly programmed festival that justly receives attention far beyond Houston and the state of Texas.

But other things are clear as well.

Film festivals -- the great ones -- all bear distinctive stamps. Some, such as Austin's South by Southwest, have reputations for discovering and nurturing emerging talent while the Austin Film Festival has a focus on screenwriting. Some festivals are known as film markets, places where studio executives flock to compete for the rights to distribute independently produced features. Others, such as Toronto and Venice, are known as launching pads for year-end prestige pictures that typically dominate award-season discussion.

The inaugural year of the Cinema Arts Festival Houston suggests that it, too, has a clear personality. It is a personality that is distinctly Houston, which will be good for differentiating it from other festivals but it potentially could hamper the festival as well.

As has been stressed repeatedly over the last several days, ours is a festival shaped by the city's strong arts organizations and art supporters. This collaboration, as festival curator Richard Herskowitz remarked Wednesday, is "what makes this festival unique."

This, no doubt, is why Herskowitz is called a "curator" instead of the festival's director. It also surely is the reason for the festival's clunky and pretentious name. And it is the reason why nearly every film I saw was set in the theater or visual art worlds or concerned writers or musicians. Indeed, the festival bills itself as the only festival devoted to movies about the arts.

The arts are a fertile subject for motion pictures. It always has been. It has produced and will continue to produce wonderful movies. But to shape a festival around the cinematic representation of other, non-filmic arts seems to suggest that movies, standing on their own, don't measure up.

Let's state it unequivocally: Cinema is art. It doesn't need to be about theater or painters or musicians or writers to rise to the level of art. The name and stated purpose of this festival suggests that its founders don't recognize this. I find this very troubling.

To be sure, film lovers sit on the festival's board. Also, Herskowitz' film selections and his discussions with filmmakers during Q&As (particularly his astute comments on Io Sono L'Amore on Thursday to Tilda Swinton and Luca Guadagnino, the film's director) suggests that Herskowitz has a deep knowledge of and appreciation for film art.

I saw 10 of the movies that were presented over the five days of the festival and loved or greatly admired all but one. That is a far better average than at any other film festival I have attended. The quality of Herskowitz' film choices and of the panel discussions and special presentations persuades me that Cinema Arts Festival Houston (despite that dreadful name) will do the city proud.

But I hope festival organizers somehow can be made to understand that great movies don't need the crutch of an arts-theme.

Richard Linklater chuckled on stage Wednesday night and said the specialness implied by the "arts' in the name ("not just 'cinema,' he said, 'but 'cinema ARTS') had impressed him. But as a founder of the Austin Film Society and a creator of artful and daring movies that, to a one, steers far clear of pretentiousness, Linklater knows that "arts" is an unnecessary redundancy.

I'll go even farther: The festival's focus on movies about "art" insults movies and it insults people who love them.

Festival organizers are to be commended for putting on a terrific show, but would any of them ever entertain the idea of creating a museum devoted to art about movies?

I seriously doubt it.

Until they do, they should focus their film festival on the art of motion pictures. Oh, and come up with a sensible, unsnooty name.

'Me and Orson Welles' based on historical fact...with some embellishment

The Editor — Thu, 12 Nov 2009 08:44:00 GMT

If you're like me, you'll walk out of the theater after seeing Me and Orson Welles wondering how much of the story is true. Clearly, the movie's main event -- the Mercury Theatre's 1937 Broadway production of Julius Caesar -- is historical fact. Orson Welles, Joseph Cotton, John Houseman and the other actors portrayed in the film are, of course, real people.

But what about Zac Efron's character, a just-shy-of-17-year-old high school student who lucks into a role? Is he based on a real person?

I knew the film was based on a book, so I immediately assumed it was a memoir written by the grown-up actor. But, no, it was a novel, written by Robert Kaplow after Kaplow saw a photograph from the play that showed a young boy sharing the stage with the genius Welles.

Kaplow wondered who the boy was -- what a story he must have!

Kaplow conducted research and interviews and then proceeded to write a novel that hewed closely to historical fact but with character embellishments. He inserted a romantic triangle, for one thing, the director, Richard Linklater, told the audience after a screening of the film at the Cinema Arts Festival Houston Wednesday night. And Kaplow ended the story with a piece of pure, dramatic invention that works extremely well in the film.

(Kaplow discusses the writing of the book in this essay he wrote in 2003 for NPR.)

Arthur Anderson, the boy in the photo, is still alive though in his 90s. Kaplow says he still owns the ukelele (disguised as a lute) that he plays in the photograph. He played it for Kudlow at his kitchen table when the write visited him in his New York home.

Anderson stayed with the play through its entire run and continued as a part of the theater troupe for years.