The Mist: Two-Disc Collector’s Edition–***1/2
DVD Review

If you saw Frank Darabont’s adaptation of Stephen King’s The Mist in theaters, whether you liked it or not, you need to pick up the DVD. If you haven’t seen this horror throwback, then you’d do well to skip right to disc two of this Collector’s Edition DVD set. The film, which was a respectable genre picture in its own right, gets a whole new life in DVD’s black & white presentation of the feature film.

Darabont introduces the black & white version of The Mist as his “director’s cut”, his original vision. And what an original vision it is. The film, which was full of genuinely terrifying moments, has a spookier feel. Some scenes—the opening sequence, a tentacle monster attack, a web-filled pharmacy scene, anything that happens in the mist—were made to be shot in black & white.

You can see the inspiration of 1950s/1960s sci-fi and horror films in this version of the film, which still follows a group of residents trapped inside a grocery store as a mist full of man-eating creatures engulfs their tiny New England town. Though the film could have also used a new score to go along with this new vision, the story of a small group of sane people who must survive a growing cult mentality fueled by the town’s self-proclaimed prophet still resonates. Only this time, it’s on a different, more appropriate plain.

Many other films have had multiple versions released over time. A director’s cut here. An extended final vision there. Kudos to The Weinstein Company for releasing this The MistDVD set with both versions of the film. We may also have lackluster box office results from the original theatrical run to thank, but either way, it’s rare for a DVD to offer so much in one release.

Special Features:
Exclusive Black & White Presentation of the Film
Collectible Booklet with Written Commentary by Darabont
8 Deleted Scenes with Optional Commentary
Audio Commentary with Writer/Director Darabont
When Darkness Came: The Making Of The Mist
Taming The Beast: Shooting Scene 35
Monsters Among Us: A Look At The Creature FX
The Horror Of It All: The Visual FX Of The Mist
Drew Struzan: Appreciation Of An Artist

Darabont’s intro to the black & white version courtesy of YouTube:

The Mist, directed by Frank Darabont and starring Thomas Jane and Marcia Gay Harden, is available Tuesday, March 26 on DVD.

During my formative years as a film consumer, Anthony Minghella directed The Talented Mr. Ripley. I remember seeing the film with a group of friend who quickly disregarded it because of Tom Ripley’s apparent sexual orientation. To them it was a “gay” movie. But like all of Minghella’s work, Ripley was beyond such a simple descriptor.

Minghella directed some of the most thoughtful films about love and loss, Ripley included. The only comparable working director is Ang Lee. Though history may hold Minghella in the same regard as it does a Bergman or a Felinni, this former head of the British Film Institute will at least be considered one of the most important voices in British at turn of the 21st century.

Minghella directed such contemporary classics as Truly Madly Deeply and The English Patient (for which he won the Best Director Oscar). His other works included The Talented Mr. Ripley, Breaking and Entering and Cold Mountain. He had just completed a 90-minute pilot for HBO’s The No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency. Though he was a known in recent years as director, his roots as a writer were apparent in his often passive, literary cinematic style.

The sudden loss of Minghella is shocking and sad. Still, I can’t help but think that, wherever he is now, Mighella is watching all of us who mourn and saying, “Thank you for missing me.” Because we do, and we will.

Now, in his own words:

13 Game of Death (2006)–***
DVD Review

13: Game of Death is everything I wanted Saw to be. This psychological thriller/splatter film from Thailand is just topical enough, just perverse enough and just tense enough to make for an entertaining evening of blood, shit and satire.

The film follows Chit (Krissada Terrence), a music instrument salesman who is having the worst day of his life. He’s broke. His car has been repossessed. And to top it off, he loses his job. When Chit seems to be completely out of luck, he receives a mysterious phone call telling him he can win loads of cash. All he has to do is complete 13 tasks for an Internet game show without fail and without question. But what starts out as a simple game evolves into something more violent and disturbing than Chit could have expected.

I know I’m watching an effective movie when 30 minutes in, I’m nauseous. 13: Game of Death cultivates its sickeningly twisted tone with such nonchalance that it’s disturbing. Unlike gruesome American horror films that try, and try hard, to shock audiences, this Thai thriller hardly ever feels forced, making it much more effective.

Equally effective is the dark sense of humor that pervades the narrative. The tasks are often disgusting, but it’s hard to turn away because the are completed with an unexpected comedic flair. No, that’s no permission to cast Shia LaBeouf in the inevitable American remake, but it is a solid recommendation for anyone who prefers a little belly laughing with their blood.

13: Game of Death, starring Krissada Terrence and directed by Chukiat Sakveerakul is available on DVD today.

“When talented people are interesting, it’s amazing. That’s like Tanna.” - Director Henry Jaglom, Hollywood Dreams

In her debut role as Margie Chezik, the effervescent Tanna Frederick manages to create a character who is equally zany and tragic. Margie isn’t just complicated, she’s a full-bodied enigma whose cunning is hardly limited to her interaction with the other characters. By the end of the film Hollywood Dreams, a film about a deceptive, ambitious, but ultimately troubled young actress, the audience knows that it has been taken in by Margie, too. And thanks to Frederick, we enjoy every second of it.

Part III (Read Part I and Part II)

FC: You’ve developed this relationship with Henry, now, but you are obviously trying to branch out into other acting work. And with Irene in Time, now you’re doing these different roles for a director you’re comfortable with. How does that set you up, or how do you expect it to set you up for the future?
TF: I think it will be really great when people do see Irene in Time because people will be able to see a different side of my acting. To be honest with you, I guess I haven’t really thought about people’s perceptions because I’m kind of oblivious to the fact that I swing so broadly from character to character. Only after the movie came out, and I went to film festivals and left screenings and people were actually freaked out by me as a person. I thought, “Wow, yeah, I guess I really do play a screwball in Hollywood Dreams.” [laughs] But graduating from the University of Iowa and having done the theater since I was nine and doing five shows a year and going from this character to that character, especially at a program like the University of Iowa where you are doing these extreme characters and these extreme scripts that are produced by new playwrights so people are all about risk taking, you just kind of take it for granted that people know that you have built a character, that there is a process. I haven’t been really worried about, “Are people going to see me in a certain way? Are people going to type cast me?” because I’m always different in every character. I think I’m boldly different. Not giving myself kudos or anything, but I am, well, Irene is very different from Margie. At first I thought people would be type casting me and giving me scripts that are crazy, neurotic, innocent girls, but actually people are offering me a wide array of different scripts right now. I’m surprised by the characters. I’m working on this Western surf film. I think that’s great. It’s very Kurosawa. That’s in development. It was offered to me by someone who saw Hollywood Dreams and thought I would be great as an action hero, as a silent, kung-fu fighting surfer…So I’m not being type cast, which is great.

FC: Is that what you wanted to do then, you wanted to go into film, even though you come from a theater background? Did you want to move into that?
TF: Yeah. I got a lot of flack in Iowa for coming straight out to Los Angeles. Everybody said, “You’re too big for film. You’re not going to make it. It’s not worth it. Why wouldn’t you go to Chicago or Minneapolis first? Or to New York?” A lot of people will tell you a lot of stuff. People were telling me my features were too big for film. They just didn’t understand why I was going straight to film. But I said, “That’s what I want to do. That’s my dream.” So I didn’t let anybody stop me from doing that. I figured, all these people who I saw fluttering out to Chicago and Minneapolis would eventually make their way out to Los Angeles. I’d say 95 percent of them have come here. It was after they went out and realized that a lot of productions are being cast with people from Hollywood who have credits. Now they’re coming out here and trying to build their resumes here. I’m glad that I was kind of naïvely stupid enough to come here and bypass that little time of dipping your toe in and just jumping in. I’ve always been more of a jumper than a wader in the water. Just get in there and do it.

FC: And in the process you’ve managed to connect with one of the last truly independent visionaries of film.
TF: Yeah

FC: If they’re intention was to go a more artistic route with it, and then you go to L.A. and get this work with an independent visionary. That was kind of a boon.
TF: I didn’t anticipate that. I was hoping to make fairly commercial films [laughs]. There were a lot of other people who had a much more extensive knowledge of independent filmmakers and independent films. I guess I’m more geared toward commercial tastes. Like Will Ferrell in Blades of Glory. Brilliant [laughs]. It was kind of ironic that I was surrounded in high school and college by people who were so into the independent world. Somehow I got hooked up with, as you said, one of the greatest independent filmmakers. That was a nice surprising, unexpected happening.

FC: You just can’t escape it.
TF: No, I just go with it [laughs].

Read All About Tanna, Part I & Part II

Hollywood Dreams is available on DVD May 6. Pre-order at Amazon.com.

Warner Bros. is officially cashing in on Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. The L.A. Times is reporting WB and Producer David Heyman will release the seventh Potter novel in two parts. Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows will be filmed concurrently with one director.

The best news? Director David Yates will direct Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Part I and Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Part II. Yates scored with Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, the highest grossing film of the series after The Sorcerer’s Stone, and is currently helming The Half-Blood Prince adaptation (out in November).

As convoluted as the seventh book apparently gets (didn’t read it), The Deathly Hallows as two films may make sense. Rowling’s meandering has always been the flaw in the book series, but the streamlined film versions have given way to some of the best screen adventures of the decade. With The Deathly Hallows, Part II getting a May 2011, we’ll be able to remember 2001-2011 as the Decade of Potter. Take that Peter Jackson.

“When talented people are interesting, it’s amazing. That’s like Tanna.” - Director Henry Jaglom, Hollywood Dreams

In her debut role as Margie Chezik, the effervescent Tanna Frederick manages to create a character who is equally zany and tragic. Margie isn’t just complicated, she’s a full-bodied enigma whose cunning is hardly limited to her interaction with the other characters. By the end of the film Hollywood Dreams, a film about a deceptive, ambitious, but ultimately troubled young actress, the audience knows that it has been taken in by Margie, too. And thanks to Frederick, we enjoy every second of it.

Part II (Read Part I)

FC: Continuing on your relationship with Henry Jaglom, you starred in his play A Safe Place. Did you know him at that time? Was that as early as that relationship started?
TF: What had happened was I was in a play out here and waiting tables and doing extra work on Days of Our Lives. Doing whatever I could to pay the bills and doing rehearsals of this play. It wasn’t A Safe Place. It was a different play written by a dear friend of mine, Lee Simon. This guy came to rehearsals, one of my friends, and said, “I just wrapped a day of filming with Henry Jaglom. He’s the most brilliant independent director.” And I was like, “That’s cool. How did you get that?” He was like, “Well, you know if you write Henry a letter telling him how much you love his films, he’ll call you in and he’ll cast you.” So I wrote a letter about how much I adored Déjà Vu and went and dropped it off at his office. He called me the next day and we had a heated two hour conversation about his work.

FC: But you hadn’t…
TF: I hadn’t met him, and I hadn’t actually seen the film.

FC: And you had a heated two hour conversation about a work you hadn’t seen?
TF: Yeah, yeah. I was in full Hollywood hustle mode. [laughs] I was like, “God, Déjà Vu was so romantic, but so devastating. And what you did in that one scene, wow.” He’s a talker, so I just fed him questions and made him talk about the film, so I didn’t actually have to bring up anything from it. Then he invited me to a screening of Festival in Cannes. And I went and saw it and I met Henry face to face. Festival in Cannes was just amazing. I felt this completely déjà vu-ish sense of, “Wow, this is exactly what I want to do. I feel like I’ve seen this movie a thousand times, and this is exactly how I want to work.” So it was kind of serendipitous and fortuitous that I lied. [laughs] Actually then, he hired me to come to the office and put up window posters for Festival in Cannes. So I went around Los Angeles and hung up these window cards for Festival in Cannes in store windows when the movie was opening. While I was working there making, like, 75 bucks a week, he gave me his play A Safe Place, and he said do it for your acting class if you’re interested. I went one step further and got the play produced. I found a theater company that wanted to produce it and ran it out here for three months. I have to say, it was with the intention that I wanted Henry to see my work, to see that I can really understand and get his films, and I would be really great to work with. He did end up coming to almost every performance in the play and correcting me on every single line of dialogue that was wrong. But we then started planning the next movie and incorporated A Safe Place into (Hollywood Dreams). So that’s how we got started.

All About Tanna continues here.

Read All About Tanna, Part I.

Hollywood Dreams is available on DVD May 6. Pre-order at Amazon.com.

“When talented people are interesting, it’s amazing. That’s like Tanna.” - Director Henry Jaglom, Hollywood Dreams

In her debut role as Margie Chezik, the effervescent Tanna Frederick manages to create a character who is equally zany and tragic. Margie isn’t just complicated, she’s a full-bodied enigma whose cunning is hardly limited to her interaction with the other characters. By the end of the film Hollywood Dreams, a film about a deceptive, ambitious, but ultimately troubled young actress, the audience knows that it has been taken in by Margie, too. And thanks to Frederick, we enjoy every second of it.

TheFilmChair: I just watched Hollywood Endings and I have to say you were fantastic. I’m always excited to talk with people when I’m very impressed by what I’ve seen.
Tanna Frederick: Thank you.

FC: You can take my word, or you can take the New York Times’s, I guess. You’ve been getting great reviews. How does that make you feel? This is your first on screen performance. What does that do when you are getting NY Times raves, Oscar and Golden Globe talk?
TF: It makes me feel wonderful. It’s really exciting to know that you can choose the track that you want to follow out here. You can do art that inspires you and that’s challenging and you don’t have to necessarily compromise between commercial and independent. I think that has a lot to do with the technology we have now, and a lot of films now are being produced by the independent world, a lot of the valuable films. I think that I’m very fortunate to have made “Hollywood Dreams” at a time when people are hungry and want something from independent films. I feel really lucky in that sense. And then to have found a director like Henry Jaglom who I just jive so well with and who jives with my idea of fun and art. It’s a total blessing.

FC: When you talk about independent, now, he’s old school independent. He’s been around, making movies his way. You just completed, or completed last year, principle photography on another one of his movies, and you are going to be in another Henry Jaglom film.
TF: Yeah, the one coming up. Everyone was left hungry, which is a good thing, to know what happened to my character Margie Chezik in Hollywood Dreams. Did she make it? What happened to her life? So were actually doing a sequel to Hollywood Dreams.

FC: That’s awesome.
TF: It’s called Queen of the Lot. There’s a scene in Hollywood Dreams that was cut out, but we are putting back in at the beginning of Queen of the Lot where I say, “I’m going to be just like Norma Shearer. I’m going to be queen of the lot.” That opens the next movie and it’s about Margie when she’s successfully made three big commercial films. She’s now Cinderella, but what does Cinderella have after she has a prince? What does Margie have now that she’s famous? She’s sort of lost and dealing with addictions and trying to figure out why she’s not happy still. It’s going to be with the same cast, David Proval, Karen Black, and then Noah Wyle is stepping in as the romantic lead. So I’m really excited about that. We’re shooting that this summer.

Irene in Time is the second film we completed, and it’s almost finished. It’s being edited and ready for rough cut screenings. It’s scheduled to be released in a September/October time frame. It’s a completely different character from Margie, which was fun for me. With Henry, he’s so open. He’s so respectful with people’s talent and range. I just really said I wanted to do something different. Margie was so bold in the movie, and my character in the next movie is very subdued. It’s a great, different character. It’s more of Jaglom’s magical realism, women’s films, where it’s about fathers and daughters. My character’s father died at a very young age, so she’s on her search, trying to find her ideal man, which is hard for her to find because she can’t find someone who’s just like her daddy.

All About Tanna continues here.

Hollywood Dreams is available on DVD May 6. Pre-order at Amazon.com.

Clever it ain’t, but at least it’s honest. Here’s an Clinton endorsement from a parade of maniacs, psychopaths, liars and crooks. I wonder why this one isn’t on HillaryClinton.com? Hmm.

I’m just kind of wonder why Jack didn’t use this Joker quote: “Now comes the part where I relieve you, the little people, of the burden of your failed and useless lives.” Seems more the style of Clinton Democrats.

Hey Jack, here’s a celebrity endorsement video that really works.