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  #31  
Old 01-25-2015, 08:27 AM
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Joe: David Gordon Green on Nicolas Cage, Suspiria and Little House on the Prairie
David Gordon Green says Suspiria is too expensive to remake during the found footage boom, compares his Little House on the Prairie to John Ford movies.
April 10th, 2014 Fred Topel


At a press conference for his new movie Joe, Nicolas Cage said that director David Gordon Green wrote him a letter asking him to be in the movie. We interviewed Cage and Green at the Toronto International Film Festival, but now that Joe is opening Friday, I had the chance to speak with Green by himself a little bit longer. The film, based on Larry Brown’s book, stars Cage as the title character, the head of a tree clearing crew who develops a bond with his young worker, Gary (Tye Sheridan). Gary’s abusive father Wade is played by Gary Poulter, a nonactor Green discovered who passed away after the film was complete. We delved further into Joe with Green and also got some updates on his Little House on the Prairie and Suspiria remake projects, and his next movie Manglehorn, starring Al Pacino.


CraveOnline: What was in the letter you wrote to Nic?
David Gordon Green: Basically, I’d heard he hadn’t worked in over a year and I assumed there was something bubbling in his brain about that and I felt like I had the key in this project. I’m a huge Nicolas Cage fan. I love an actor that is a credible comedic actor and then he makes a turn and wins an Oscar for a dramatic performance and then fights his way into Bruckheimer’s world and makes The Rock. I just love an actor that’s got that kind of appetite and takes those kind of risks and has that diversity to his career. So I wrote him my appreciation of that and said, “By the way, will you read my script?”

Did you write a letter to Tye Sheridan too?
No, he wrote a letter to me.

Did he really?
He did and I’d been in the editing room on Mud. Jeff Nichols (http://www.craveonline.com/film/inte...nichols-on-mud) is a good friend of mine. They were editing that in Austin where I live so I’d seen a few cuts in the rough cut stage of that movie. Jeff put it in Tye’s ear about this project as it started to come together, told him about the movie and I got a nice e-mail from him. Called him in. He lives in East Texas and we brought him into Austin, talked about the role and he did a killer audition.

As I had with a lot of the other cast of the film, I was exploring nonactors for that role. I was exploring nontraditional actors and auditioning kids at boys homes and group homes and juvenile detention centers, looking for the real Gary. Getting to know the technical requirements of the role started to make me doubt that I should do that, the more I was getting to know some of these kids. I thought it was very valuable research getting to know the look in the eye of a young man that’s going through the situation that is the domestic life that Gary Jones goes through. I talked to a lot of them and it was heartbreaking. But, I knew I was going to have to get emotionally really connected to a character and at the same time have a technical perspective to be able to achieve the structural narrative requirements of this movie, to make it what I wanted it to be.

When I met Tye, he had a beautiful understanding of the voice of these kids, but he also had some film experience. He also had not developed any bad habits. He also had an energy to take this type of research and join me on that adventure rather than me going alone to learn about the authenticity of some of these emotional circumstances.

What did he say in his e-mail to you?
He said, “I love the script and I would love to meet with you about it, and I’m the right guy for the job.”

I appreciate Nic wanting to get back into more grounded territory, but did you want some of the crazy Nic Cage also?
This movie, the character was about restraint. That was the one intention of every scene. I want you to feel these things internally and suppress them, keep suppressing and let’s not let the water boil, but let’s let it get hot. So the beauty of Nic in a lot of ways is the perception that an audience brings. Everyone has a different favorite Nicolas Cage movie or least favorite Nicolas Cage movie, people that appreciate the crazy and some appreciate the calm. Here, I wanted to utilize everything. I wanted to have all those unpredictable qualities and yet at the same time make something that he’s never made before so we could diminish people’s expectations in a way and not bring those perceptions to the table but utilize all the baggage.

He still freaks out a little with the dog.
Oh yeah, and it’s amazing, his process is really beautiful. We’d be lighting a scene and then you’d hear him getting into character. He’d just start talking out loud. He’s sitting at the bar one day and we’re going to shoot the bar scene where Willie-Russell comes in and he’s going to go to a difficult place where he is going to let a little bit of the gas out. He’s going to hit the pedal a little bit.

I see him, he’s just going through something in his head and we’re backing off and we’re getting everything set up technically. I just hear him talking to himself. That day in the headlines of the newspaper there was a story about African painted dogs. A kid had fallen into a pit at the zoo and been eaten by these dogs. I saw that’s his process. He’s talking about this. Then I just had everybody kind of hustle quietly and we just started rolling. What you see in the movie is him talking and telling a story to the woman behind the bar. He’s just telling her the story of the headline news of that day in reality, but it’s Nic getting into character. It really started to blur the lines between where Nic ends and Joe begins.

Is an interesting aspect of Joe and Gary’s relationship that Joe’s not really mentoring Gary? He’s just treating Gary like an adult.
Yeah, there’s no ageism in this movie. The kid works hard and he likes him. I think he sees himself in the kid. Early in the movie we kind of structure it almost like a flashback. The way we introduce Gary is almost like it could be Joe when he was a kid. You never connect the two. He’s looking at the car window in the rain. He might as well be looking at himself when he was 16 years old. There are all these moments of reflection where we cut to Gary so I really wanted to play with that a little bit and have those seeds of connection in nontraditional ways.


We talked about your admiration for people like the tree clearers in Joe and the backhoe drivers in Toronto too. It’s one thing to admire those workers. How did you make tree clearing cinematic?
Just get a good DP. Tim Orr shooting at the right time of day in the right location is pure cinema.

Did he shoot Prince Avalanche for you too?
Yes.

So he saw something in the tree clearing and the road painting.
And in our new movie, locksmithing.

Are you still working on a Little House on the Prairie movie?
Yes.

What stage is that in?
We are just getting the script in shape. Hopefully we’ll turn that into something. It’s a pretty exciting piece of property.

Looking at the original book or any of the TV series?
Using the novels, the book series as our reference.

I don’t know how much they differed anyway.
Quite a bit. But they’re great stories, just really great American pioneer stories.

Are you still working on Suspiria?
No, I put that on the shelf for a while. The horror genre’s playing its game right now with its found footage interests. We’ll wait until they want to put back on the Polanski.

Is that why Suspiria won’t work now, because everyone’s doing found footage?
It’s a relatively expensive movie to make, my particular version of it. You can turn a camera on it and do any number of versions of it but mine is not cheap.

You work in the low budget realm. Why would Suspiria the one you want to spend money on?
Well, every movie’s different. That’s just a movie that requires big set builds and big construction and international locations, a lot of things. A lot of production and logistics just cinematically to achieve what I want. I wanted to do basically an opera version of it, not a low-fi nitty gritty version of it. You can make a modest budgeted Joe, shooting in locations that are forests and costumes you get at the thrift store. By the time you make something that has a sense of elegance and epic scope to it, you have to construct most of that, building multiples of wardrobe and multiples of locations and some perspective. There’s a massive construction endeavor in the version of Suspiria that I’d imagined.

Was it going to be a very faithful remake of the Argento film?
Mm-hmm.



Wouldn’t a period piece like Little House also be pricey?
It doesn’t need to be but there are certainly elements of epic scope. I’m looking at it as more of a John Ford movie, kind of in the great western genre. But at the same time, it’s a little house on a prairie. It’s not like I’m making a big special effects extravaganza or something like that.

In Manglehorn, does Pacino like to improvise too?
Oh yeah. Oh yeah. We played a lot. I need to call him. He likes to play. We just finished production.

What’s the final cut of that movie coming in at?
The running time? 91 minutes. I love an efficient length of a movie.

But Joe is almost two hours.
Yeah, I know. I think a lot of it is my attachment to the source material whereas Manglehorn was an original idea that I got to play with. I find myself drawn to repeat viewings on movies that are around an hour and a half. I like that length.

Is Joe a particularly male story?
I mean, he’s a male and I think to be honest, I think it does deal with the issues of masculinity and manhood, the mythology of a man in his environment. I look at it as a father/son story but I think it’s relatable in a way and emotional enough where I don’t think it distances a female viewer from the experience.

Not a female viewer, but it deals with things that are male as opposed to what women in that community might be going through.
Right, but it would be interesting. That’s one of the reasons I’m really drawn to Little House on the Prairie is that I think finding the efforts and struggles of survival and hardship through a female perspective is very fascinating. It came through the exploration of Joe where I got excited about this and acquired the rights.

When did you first read the book Little House on the Prairie?
When I was 11.

When did you read Joe?
When I was 21.

So this has been on your mind for a while too?
Mm-hmm.

What are some great scenes from Larry Brown’s book that either you didn’t shoot or didn’t make the final cut?
There’s an enormous amount about the Wade character, Gary Jones’ father, an enormous amount. Some of it we shot and some of it we didn’t, but when you’re trying to streamline the narrative and make the movie centered around Joe, you lose some of that. At the same time, there’s also some great stuff we filmed with Joe and his ex-wife. It just seemed like we were letting everybody know so much about Joe, I was really tempted to hold back. She did a great performance in their scenes together but the only thing that remains is her looking at him sitting in a jeep and he rolls down the window halfway and gives her a look, and says everything you need to know about those two people. So it was fun having those opportunities of okay, that scene works but it lets us know a little bit more than we need to know right now. Let’s let the movie breathe and unfold.

When you work with nonactors, are basic things like getting them to memorize lines more difficult?
Oh, I never try to get anybody to memorize lines. I’m not worried about that. As long as it sounds right. As long as they’re saying the right thing to some degree.

But even that, do nonactors ever have trouble remembering the gist?
I don’t remember ever having that problem. I’m very confident in my casting. I try to cast people that I really believe in their voice and what they bring to the table that’s going to be at least as valuable as anything that me or a screenwriter bring to the table.




http://www.craveonline.com/film/inte...on-the-prairie

Last edited by SisterNightroad; 01-25-2015 at 08:31 AM..
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Old 01-27-2015, 06:16 AM
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Never seen in such good quality:


Last edited by SisterNightroad; 01-27-2015 at 06:20 AM..
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Old 01-29-2015, 12:30 PM
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Joss Whedon's 5 favorite horror characters
The producer/co-writer of ''The Cabin in the Woods'' (now on DVD) talks about his inspirations

1. Ian Holm as the Android Ash (Alien, 1979)

When he says [of the alien], ”I admire its purity,” I saw a piece of humanity that I’d never seen before. Everything he did made perfect, logical sense. Ripley became [the hero], but Ian was the one who stayed with me.

2. Shawnee Smith as Meg Penny (The Blob, 1988)

She’s a cheerleader, she’s intelligent, she has a machine gun, and I love her. I had a picture of her framed on my desk the entire time I was running Buffy. She’s just tough as nails and sympathetic and lovely, and definitely a seminal character for me.

3. Donald Pleasence as the Priest (Prince of Darkness, 1987)

There was a lot more to him as an actor than being portentous in John Carpenter films. But I never loved him being portentous in John Carpenter films more than in Prince of Darkness. The way he describes evil is so exciting.

4. Jennifer Rubin as Taryn White (A Nightmare on Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors, 1987)

She was so badass. [Dream Warriors] changed the dynamic of the horror movie in a way that I appreciate — the idea that the people facing horror could be empowered by it and confront what they were fighting. It’s very Ur-Buffy as well.

5. Chip with a razor blade (Phenomena, 1986)

That movie is so ridiculously chock-full of horror: There are terrible murders, Jennifer Connelly just happens to have control over insects, there’s a crazy person living nearby. By the time you get to the monkey with a razor blade [who saves Connelly’s life], you’re just like, Oh my God! If you look at Cabin in the Woods, you can see the influence of ”Oh, you mean we can just never stop coming up with stuff?”


(As told to Adam B. Vary)
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Old 02-04-2015, 01:35 PM
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Synapse Films Blu-ray update: “PHENOMENA,” “MANOS,” etc.


Genre Blu-ray/DVD specialist Synapse Films has a hot lineup of horror titles coming on disc in 2015, and we got a few details on what’s up with some of them, including their next Italian-horror releases.

Right now, the company is hard at work on its trio of Dario Argento titles: PHENOMENA (pictured above, a.k.a. CREEPERS), TENEBRE and, further down the road, the 4K restoration of SUSPIRIA. Synapse’s Don May Jr. tells Fango, “We’re working with the high-definition PHENOMENA and TENEBRE masters from France’s Wild Side, but doing additional work to make the presentations the best they can be. It’s not confirmed yet, but our plan is to include all three editions of PHENOMENA: the 116-minute version, the 110-minute version and New Line’s 82-minute CREEPERS. It might be fun to include CREEPERS in hi-def for the first time.” Both PHENOMENA and TENEBRE will include new interviews and other bonus features as well.

From the sublimely stylish to the ridiculous, Synapse is also busy preparing Harold P. Warren’s classic Z-movie MANOS: THE HANDS OF FATE for its hi-def unveiling, working from a restoration by Ben Solvey. “It’s been a long road,” May says, “but we’re excited that Ben has picked us to help him release MANOS. We’re in authoring and compression right now, and we have extras created by Ben and Daniel Griffith’s Ballyhoo Motion Pictures, including a making-of and a commentary.”

In addition, May reveals that their special edition of Curt McDowell’s bizarre adult/horror/mystery/black comedy THUNDERCRACK! will be out for its 40th anniversary this year, which will also see Synapse’s releases of Jim McCullough’s Bigfoot cult fave CREATURE FROM BLACK LAKE, Jim Wynorski’s SORCERESS starring Julie Strain and Linda Blair and Kurando Mitsutake’s SAMURAI AVENGER. Keep your eyes here for more details on these discs as we get ’em, and look for a bunch of PHENOMENA coverage (including new chats with Argento, actress Daria Nicolodi and others) in Fango #340, on sale next month!



http://www.fangoria.com/new/synapse-...ena-manos-etc/
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Old 02-10-2015, 09:02 AM
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17 Moments of Movie Terror in the Bathroom
Ryan Lambie 2/6/2015 at 8:44AM

From toilet-based scares to nasty encounters in the shower, here's a selection of 17 memorable moments of terror in the bathroom...

The following contains potential spoilers and scenes which may be considered NSFW.

The scariest moments in horror are often the most intimate -- this is why knives are a far nastier, button-pushing instrument of death than the gun. As the Joker famously put it in The Dark Knight, “You can savor all those little emotions...”

Intimacy may be the key to understanding why, in horror films, so many dreadful things tend to happen in bathrooms. The bathroom is often where we go to be by ourselves - either to answer the call of nature, brush our teeth, or simply relax in the bath after a hectic day at work. Equally, the water closet also sees us at our most vulnerable: naked, or at least with our pants down, and often with nothing more to defend ourselves with than a mobile phone or a copy of TV Quick.

The following is by no means an exhaustive catalogue of every terrible bathroom moment that has occurred in cinema, but it hopefully offers a broad cross-section. So from nasty experiences on toilets to far-from-relaxing encounters in the bathtub, here’s our selection of horrifying bathroom moments...

Psycho (1960)



Here's the granddaddy of the bathroom horror scene, and likely the one you’ll immediately think of when someone asks you to think of an unpleasant scene set in a restroom. It’s important to remember just how boundary-pushing the shower stall death of Marion Crane was back in 1960 (famously, this was the first time we’d seen a flushing loo in an American movie). The US censors also complained to Hitchcock that they could see actress Janet Leigh’s nipple during the bloody onslaught - Hitchcock, mischievous old soul that he was, told the board that he’d cut the scene out, screened it for them again, and the censors gave Psycho a pass.

The secret to the shower scene’s brilliance is the sound and editing. Hitchcock can’t really show us anything as graphic as a knife slicing flesh, but he can give us the sensation of violence through jolting cuts and the sonic jabs of Bernard Herrmann’s classic score.

Shivers (1975)



Leave it to director David Cronenberg to direct a bathroom scene that is so repulsive and disturbing that it seems to have scorched itself on the minds of numerous other filmmakers. Cronenberg's low-budget feature debut sees a breed of disgusting, man-made parasites - part leech, part turd - spread a venereal disease through an exclusive high-rise building.

In Shivers’ most effective scene, one of these parasites pushes its way up through the drain and into the bathtub of horror queen Barbara Steele, who’s enjoying a bit of me-time with a glass of wine. Her moment of relaxation is ruined when the loathsome critter noses its way out of the plughole and slowly, deliberately makes a beeline for an intimate area between the poor woman’s legs. What happens next is far from explicit - we see nothing but the thrashing of her legs and the shattering of her wine glass - but it’s all we need to know. It’s a horrible, squirm-inducing moment.

Deep Red/Profondo Rosso (1975)



At the height of his creative powers in the 70s and 80s, Dario Argento specialised in staging a string of elaborate, grisly and slickly-executed murder scenes. Profondo Rosso was among the very best of his giallo movies, with a sparky pair of leads (played by David Hemmings and Daria Nicolodi), an intriguing central mystery, and of course, Argento’s trademark horror set-pieces.

This particular one is particularly withering: the unseen killer attacks a woman in her own bathroom and, in a horribly protracted sequence, drowns her in a bathtub of scalding water. Argento’s camera lingers over every unpleasant, murderous detail, before later delivering the warped punchline: the victim, in her dying moments, scrawled some incriminating evidence in the condensation on the wall.


The Shining (1980)



There's an entire article to be written, perhaps, about the significance of bathrooms in Stanley Kubrick's The Shining. As Jack Nicholson's wannabe novelist Jack Torrance slowly goes crazy in the remote environs of the Overlook Hotel, notice how the film's most disturbing moments occur in water closets of one sort or another. Butler Delbert Grady fatefully tells Torrance to punish his family in one. The famous "Here's Johnny" sequence takes place in another.

For the purposes of this article, we're concentrating on the scene where Torrance, midway through the film and still teetering on the brink of insanity, wanders into room 237 and sees a naked woman lying in a bath. Seemingly hypnotised by her curviness, Torrance wanders in, and the woman - naked, obviously - gets out of the bath and stalks towards Jack. It’s only when they embrace that Jack realises the woman is in fact a hideous old ghoul. It's both an effective jump-scare and a further insight into the decaying state of Jack's mind.

Poltergeist (1982)



Did Steven Spielberg direct the best moments in this 80s cinematic ghost train, as the legends suggest, or was it Tobe Hooper? Whoever it was, they allowed their imagination to run riot. What starts as a low-key tale of the supernatural soon branches out into wildly unpredictable horror territory, as the malevolent force terrorises the Freeling household with a series of freaky occurrences. The goriest: the one where paranormal investigator Marty (Martin Cassella) looks in the mirror and promptly peels his own face off. We’re allowed a moment to gasp at the horror of it, before a cut reveals that it was all in the character’s mind. Gratuitous? Yeah. Effective? Undoubtedly.

The Dead Zone (1983)



Here’s David Cronenberg again, this time with his superb adaptation of Stephen King’s best-selling novel. Eschewing gore for the most part, Cronenberg angles the story of small-town psychic, Johnny (Christopher Walken) as a chilly tragedy, and the result is one of the most satisfying King-derived films yet made.

There is, however, one scene where Cronenberg lets the blood flow. Having been unmasked thanks to Johnny’s psychic powers, serial murderer Frank Dodd (Nicholas Campbell) is cornered in his mother’s bathroom. The cops break the door down, but not before Frank has managed to terminate himself in one of the most unpleasant ways we can think of: essentially, he head-butts a pair of scissors.

For several years, the more graphic parts of this sequence were snipped out by a horrified BBFC. They’ve since been reinstated in all their gory glory. Even now, it’s a gasp-inducing moment; not because of its special effects, but because the sheer notion of it is enough to send a shudder down our spines.

A Nightmare On Elm Street (1984)



Wes Craven’s 1984 slasher was all about a demon which could strike while his victims were at their most vulnerable - in their dreams. In one stand-out sequence, Craven went for a double-whammy of horror intimacy, and had dream demon Freddie Krueger attack heroine Nancy Thompson (Heather Langenkamp) when she foolishly falls asleep in the bath.

The scene appears to be influenced by Cronenberg’s Shivers, particularly when you compare the camera angles and pacing; in fact, Craven lifted Cronenberg's bathing scene once before, in his lesser-seen Deadly Blessing (1981). There, a young woman (Martha Jensen) is attacked by a snake while she's lying in the bath.

The equivalent scene in A Nightmare On Elm Street is far more accomplished. Like the foul beast in Cronenberg’s film, Krueger’s familiar gloved hand emerges in a particularly vulnerable are, pulling Nancy under the water and into a scary underwater netherworld. While later sequels drifted into self-parody, Craven’s original film saw Krueger at the height of his unnerving powers.

Friday The 13th Part V: A New Beginning (1985)



The Friday The 13th series occasionally dabbled in bathroom horror over its long history. In the original film, a victim received an axe to the face and fell against a shower curtain. In the deceitfully-titled Final Chapter, Voorhees bucked the horror trend and killed a young man in a shower stall instead of a young woman (interestingly, he chose to crush his face rather than stab him).

For the purposes of this article, we've chosen the bizarre toilet sequence from Friday The 13th Part V: A New Beginning. Here, bejewelled young buck Demon (Miguel A Nunez, Jr) attempts to enjoy a relaxing poo in a ramshackle outside toilet, only to be impaled by a huge spike. Far scarier than the murder is the Glee-like singing contest that takes place between Demon and his girlfriend Anita (Jere Fields. There's a time and place for everything, but engaging in a duet while emptying your bowels? There should be some sort of law against it.

Ghoulies (1985) and Ghoulies II (1988)



The enjoyably schlocky horror Ghoulies offers a rare example of a scene being inserted into a film to fit with its advertising campaign. When Ghoulies’ producer Charles Band came up with a poster depicting a little green monster emerging from a toilet, an additional sequence was shot to tie in with it.

The lavatorial humour was retained for the 1988 sequel, where a young man's attacked by a monster rising up from the U-bend (as seen in the video above). It delivers on what the first film's strapline promised: “They’ll get you in the end.”

Ghoulies III: Ghoulies Go To College (1991) offered a Hitchcockian twist on the scenario: a showering co-ed is attacked by a group of critters wielding a sink plunger. Classy.

Street Trash (1987)



Like the toilet scene in Ghoulies, this one plays out like a grotesque, schoolboy joke. A batch of home-made booze called Tenafly Viper has the nasty side-effect of turning its unsuspecting drinkers into puddles of goo, which is essentially all you need to know about this messy B-horror. Such is the fate awaiting one poor old geezer, who drinks a bottle of the spiked booze while sitting on a loo in the remains of a demolished building, writhes in pain, and manages to flush himself down the pan. It should be a joylessly grotesque moment, but the dayglo colours and sheer absurdity of the scenario make it strangely entertaining. Note, too, the wobbly cardboard walls.

Fatal Attraction (1987)



You’re probably well aware that Fatal Attraction originally had a much different, more downbeat ending, in which Glen Close’s infatuated Alex Forrest committed suicide after being given short shrift by Michael Douglas’s love rat, Dan Gallagher - an act which leaves Dan framed for her murder.

Test audiences, baying for blood, wanted a more gratifying come-uppance for Alex, so this sequence was shot instead. As a piece of suspense, it’s nicely staged; Anne Archer’s Beth runs a bath, unaware that a crazed, knife-wielding Alex has broken into the house. A desperate struggle ensues between Dan and Alex, before Beth ends the encounter with a single gunshot.

Audiences clearly liked this new ending, because the film was a massive hit, making $320m and sparking a string of other evil-woman-in-our-midst thrillers (The Hand That Rocks The Cradle, Single White Female, and so forth).

Arachnophobia (1990)



Frank Marshall's spider-infested comedy thriller found time to pay homage to Hitchcock's Psycho, as an arachnid creeps into a shower stall and leaves its occupant screaming for her life. It's more of a throwaway gag than a horror scene - the young woman showering is intercut with a scene of her father sitting on the toilet, blissfully unaware of the spider lurking beneath his arse - but like the rest of the film, our visceral reaction to creepy-crawlies still gives it impact.

Jurassic Park (1993)



Steven Spielberg’s the master of inserting horror moments into films otherwise aimed at a broad audience; at his best, he has an eye for a starkly nasty image. Take, for example, the blood-stained remains of a lilo washing up on a beach in Jaws, or the silhouette of a small boy in a doorway, just seconds before he’s kidnapped by aliens in Close Encounters Of The Third Kind.

Spielberg was firing on all cylinders when he made Jurassic Park, a broad thrill-ride of a movie laced with moments of quiet brilliance: the shaking of a cup of water heralding the approach of the monster we’ve all been waiting for, the Tyrannosaurus Rex. Had Spielberg or effects supervisor Stan Winston botched this moment, the whole film could have collapsed. Instead, it’s a masterpiece of anticipation and then pulse-pounding excitement. And in the middle of it, that brief, yet unforgettable moment: terrified lawyer Donald Gennaro (Martin Ferrero), hoping to find protection from the T-Rex by hiding in the loo. He barely has a chance to scream before the tyrant lizard leans down and gobbles him up like sushi in a suit. Sublime.

Scream 2 (1997)



Wes Craven breathed new life into the slasher genre with his self-referential Scream series, and Scream 2 continued its run of gore and arch humour. Early in the sequel, Phil Stevens (Omar Epps) heads to the bathroom during a screening of Stab - a film-within-a-film based on the events in the original Scream. Entering a stall, he hears strange noises from the next cubicle, and mystifyingly places his head against the partition to try to make out what it is. His reward? A knife in the ear.

The scene was parodied, predictably, in 2000’s Scary Movie, where Shawn Wayans is killed by a phalus through the ear during a screening of Shakespeare In Love. For us, the most horrifying aspect of either scene is that anyone would think of putting their head against any surface in a public loo. If Phil hadn’t been killed by a psycho’s knife, he probably would have died from some hideous disease within a few days in any case. At the very least, he’d probably have left the bathroom with someone’s curly trouser hair stuck to his face.

Final Destination (2000)



Death is cast as the ultimate serial killer in the Final Destination series: invisible and, thanks to his ingenious ability to make his crimes look like accidents, almost undetectable. In the original film, Death stalks a young victim in a bathroom, where all manner of mundane dangers hide: razors, pointy nose-hair scissors, and electricity in close contact with water. In this instance, a wire cord for hanging washing over a bath becomes a deadly noose. It's a wince-inducing scene, partly because it's a reminder of how dangerous everyday objects can be if we're unlucky - or, in this film's case, if we've somehow ended up on Death's hit list.

Slither (2006)



James Gunn’s irreverent sci-fi comedy clearly took inspiration from Shivers, from the design of its parasitic monsters to this bathroom horror sequence, which, like that earlier cult horror, was considered strong enough to be featured on its poster. This time, the leech-like creatures crawl in through an open window, and makes a beeline for an unsuspecting woman's face. It's a scene played for gross-out laughs more than terror, but it says a lot about how well the idea of a crawling parasite plays into our subconscious fears that, even as Kylie (Tania Saulnier) is frantically killing the alien slug with what appears to be a pair of hair straighteners, we still can't help but feel a hint of revulsion.

The Conversation (1974)



To conclude, here's what might be the most unsettling bathroom scene of the lot, since Francis Ford Coppola's bravura thriller contains a moment of unexpected and surreal terror. Surveillance specialist Harry Caul (Gene Hackman) explores a deserted hotel room, and hears the sound of running water from the bathroom. Lifting the lid on the toilet, he stands transfixed as a cloud of blood bubbles up from the piping, forms a skin on the top and then comes oozing down the sides of the pan.

It's a moment that seems to come from a half-remembered nightmare, and aptly summarises what the best of the scenes on this list achieve: they appeal to a nervy, primal bit of our subconscious that would prefer not to dwell on things like death and defecation for too long. Here, those subjects come together in a stomach-turning stew.

In his video essay The Pervert's Guide To Cinema, philosopher and critic Slavoj Zizek describes the cinema as a kind of sewage works for the subconscious, where all our fears and desires are projected on the screen, and then come rising back up in ways that horrify but also thrill us - just like the blood in Francis Ford Coppola's grim toilet.

"The art of cinema is in playing with desire but at the same time keeping it at a safe distance," Zizec says. "When we spectators are sitting in a movie theatre and looking at the screen, are we not basically staring at a toilet bowl, waiting for things to reappear out of the toilet? Is the entire magic of [cinema] designed to conceal the fact that we are watching ****, as it were?"


http://www.denofgeek.us/movies/movie...n-the-bathroom
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Old 02-25-2015, 11:27 AM
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Celebrate The ‘Demons’ 30th Anniversary With This Deluxe Bag Of Goodies
By JonathanBarkan on February 25


To celebrate the 30th anniversary of Demons, the 1985 horror film written by Dario Argento (Suspiria) and directed by Lamberto Bava (Delerium), Rustblade has announced several package deals built around the soundtrack of the film, which was composed by Claudio Simonetti (Goblin).

The big kahuna that they’re offering is a deluxe bag, which includes a bevy of goodies, from the soundtrack on vinyl to an autographed poster. The full list of its contents can be found below.

Rustblade describes the soundtrack:

The lower tones as the main characters move through the dark theater give a distinctly ‘creepy’ air to the movie. A distinctly frightening melody characterizes the ‘transformation’ sequences as the 2nd prostitute slowly becomes a demon. The same melody appears throughout the film in different places.

You can pre-order the package via Rustblade. Shipping begins on May 29th.


Deluxe Ultra Limited Bag (100 Copies Only) Contains:
Blue Transparent Vinyl
Poster
Tin Box with CD
Bonus Cd “Soundtrack Remixed”
Trasparent Postcard
Metropol Ticket
Litte Bag
Siver Pin
Autographed Poster by Claudio Simonetti
Embroidery patch.



http://bloody-disgusting.com/news/33...e-bag-goodies/
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Old 03-06-2015, 04:15 PM
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Default translated from the italian edition of Rolling Stone with google's help, enjoy!

The terrific playlist of Dario Argento
The selection of music that accompanies the interview with the master of suspense




The masters of the fear, the thriller and the hard-boiled, the ones that scare us (in a good way, of course) with their films and their works, what do they fear? We asked at the XXIV edition of the Rome Film Festival.

A unique festival, entirely devoted to crime novel and noir fiction: a film festival where the best film in competition is awarded the Black Lion (they're adorable, the prize is themed). In the "Fear at Midnight" events are being placed unpublished international works , thrilling horror cinema, retrospectives and tributes to the protagonists of the international Noir.

For literature, instead, there are meetings and conferences with the best mystery writers and the assignment of the Raymond Chandler Award for career and the Giorgio Scerbanenco Prize for the best Italian noir novel.

With this framework, what better than an interview in two voices, those now distinctive of Dario Argento and Carlo Lucarelli?
To flush out their fears and their worst nightmares, to find out what they cannot write about and what they wish they could say about Edgar Allan Poe.

We begin our chat with Dario Argento, the master of the nightmare for excellence.


We ask now: What is Dario Argento afraid of?
Phobias I have many, but as a child I was really terrified by a corridor: the corridor of my house.

I was very small and the corridor obsessed me because it started from my bedroom and ran through the house.
In the evening, when I went to bed, I kept staring at it. It was so long and in dim light and for that frightened me. It scared me every night.


Let's speak about your autobiography: "Fear", published by Einaudi and edited by Marco Peano
I put everything in it. From when I was a child, at the age of four years, until now. Since I received black marks in school because I refused to read Manzoni, because I wanted to read Dos Passos instead, and about when I did the "diviner", as I shot a movie, to be able to find the suitable woods.

I wanted to tell the realization of all my work, why I love Banana Hoshimoto and how I write my scripts, just thinking that the story I want to tell is not fiction but it really happened, somewhere, someplace.


What would you like to ask Lucarelli?
I know him well, we worked together in the past. I would ask him how he manages to do all those history programs for RAI (translator's note: RAI is the acronym for Italian RAdio-television)
I like them a lot, but I'd really want to understand how he manages to make so many!


What kind of program would you like to do on TV?
I'd like to adapt Edgar Allan Poe's tales, bring them on television. It would be a gift made especially for the one who I consider my master.

I am a great reader, I love novels and essays. I've never been, even as a child, a fan of comic books, while I really loved literature.


Why don't we talk about Turin, scenario of your films?
I recently brought to Turin, to Tff (translator's note: Turin's Film Festival), my restored copy of Deep Red.
I presented at the Festival and it was a great emotion to find myself again in those places. I rarely happen to see the places where I shot my movies one more time.

I like the metaphysical parts of Turin. The Art Deco ones. I am fascinated by the courts, by the stairs. It 's a city full of stairs and staircases, beautiful, each one different. I like the architecture of some buildings, so gothic, and I especially like the layout of the city, such as the periphery.

The periphery, in fact, was created by Fiat for the workers. Those small houses, those gardens, I liked them a lot, among other things I've also shot a movie there, Sleepless. It was a movie all filmed in the suburbs. Yes, that movie is all made in suburbs and courtyards.


What is the actor you directed with most difficulty?
Surely the first. Tony Musante, in The Bird with the Crystal Plumage. He criticized me from the start.

Since I was a novice he thought he could do what he wanted. But I had a clear idea of ​​how I wanted to do the film.
I had made the critic for many years, I was passionate about movies, I knew very well what I wanted to do and how to do it. There were conflicts that lasted until the end of the production!


When one becomes an accomplished director do these problems disappear?
Not at all. The problem remains. For example, I had some disagreements with the leading actress of Opera, Cristina Marsillach.
She was young, she was 19 when we shot. Yet she gave me a lot of problems too.


What was the most difficult film to shoot?
Surely Suspiria, although it was great fun to realize. At the time there were no means for the special effects I wanted, so we had to actualize a lot with games of mirrors, it was all very complex. And also shooting Opera was very difficult, I had to film in a theater, it was a mess.


Could you suggest some good horror, released recently, that you liked?
There are not many at all. Lately I only watch oriental movies, Korean or Japanese, they are very good horror movies. But the titles are hard to remember ... But also from South America are coming interesting titles, in addition to the current Japanese or Korean film that I really like.


David Lynch will make a third series of Twin Peaks. What do you think?
I found Twin Peaks bizarre, but not outstanding. I do not know, in the end everyone does what he wants. It seems a bit weird. Had he got no better ideas?


Which TV series follows?
Everyone asks me this thing of the TV series! There are many, all of them are similar, interesting, well done. It is useless to discuss about it, they are really the best of American cinema.


Here's what the master of suspense listens to and why ("I have so many favorite songs, but I think that I cannot make a playlist, I can't choose!"):

1. "My Way" Sid Vicious

"Because it is one of the most beautiful songs sung by Sid Vicious."




2. "Sunday Bloody Sunday" U2

"This, I have always adored it."




3. "Purple Rain" Prince

"There was a period in the '70s and' 80s when there was an explosion of wonderful songs, I can hardly choose. I like that song by Prince, what's the name ... Purple Rain. "




4. "Imagine" Lennon

"For me it's the only essential song, the one that cannot miss. But strictly sung by Lennon. "




5. "Viva l'Italia" Francesco De Gregori

"When I went to America I brought along some Italian songs to hear them, to have something from my country. And there was a song that when I listened to it, I was always a bit moved, since I was so far away. And it was this, De Gregori's. "






- See more at:http://www.rollingstone.it/musica/ne....6K8YkC39.dpuf

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Old 04-24-2015, 11:24 AM
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'Django' and Dario Argento's 'Suspiria' Getting Classy TV Series Remakes
Two cult classic Italian properties have been picked up for English-language TV revamps.


In a watershed deal for the Italian television industry, two production companies have inked a development and production pact to turn the spaghetti western "Django" and the Dario Argento-directed occult horror film "Suspiria" into international TV series.

French television producer Atlantique Productions and top Italian indie production company Cattleya will first re-imagine Sergio Corbucci's 1966 western — which of course spawned Quentin Tarantino's own homage, the slave revenge western "Django Unchained," along with a bevy of sequels and spinoffs— "with the grit and edginess of modern television dramas," per a press release.

The overseas producers will then jump into the "smart horror" parade with "Suspiria De Profundis," from the 19th century Thomas De Quincey novel that influenced Dario Argento's stylish, seminal 1977 giallo horror. Though directors, showrunners and casts have yet to be unveiled, Argento will serve as the series' artistic supervisor. Set in fin de siècle London and Rome, "Suspiria De Profundis" will be an English-language period horror series — a la cable's most prestigious example, "Penny Dreadful" — with De Quincey as a kind of "Sherlock Holmes" meta lead character.

This isn't the first time someone has taken a crack at remaking "Suspiria." Austin indie David Gordon Green most infamously tried to resurrect the film, but in a 2013 interview with TOH! said: "It's just not the right time for that movie to exist. It's a classy, elegant horror movie and people want to see things that are a little more raw, like found footage. Nobody's really begging for something that's elegant, classy and expensive."

Not the right time for that movie to exist, maybe. But a series? Yes.

Both "Django" and "Suspiria" will be 12 50-minute episodes with storylines expected to unfold over multiple seasons. The series will be shopped to broadcasters at next week's Mip TV market in Cannes. Atlantique Productions’ Olivier Bibas and creative director Patrick Nebout will executive produce with Cattleya partners Riccardo Tozzi, Giovanni Stabilini and Marco Chimenz.




http://blogs.indiewire.com/thompsono...makes-20150408
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Old 07-04-2015, 03:34 PM
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What happened to the Suspiria remake?



Three years ago, a remake of Dario Argento's Suspiria seemed to be ready to go ahead. So what happened to it? Its former director explains.

Visually and aurally sumptuous, Dario Argento's Suspiria was one of the most striking horror movies of its age. The soundtrack was cacophonous, the cinematography drenched in colour and often beautiful - even when Argento was spattering the screen with claret.

In 2008, director David Gordon Green risked the ire of horror fans everywhere when he revealed to MTV that he planned to remake Argento's nightmare classic. It could have been a starry affair, too, with Natalie Portman on board as producer and star. That incarnation of the movie appeared to fall apart, though, and Portman ultimately went on to make Black Swan with Darren Aronofsky - a film about a ballet dancer with more than a touch of Argento's delirious brand of storytelling running through it.

Thereafter, news on the project went a bit quiet, until Green, who by 2011 added the comedies Your Highness and Pineapple Express to his portfolio of exquisitely-shot southern dramas, started talking about Suspiria in interviews again.

Green told us of his desire to make Suspiria in 2011. "That'll be a lot of fun," he said. "I've written it with the sound designer, so we've really written it from a unique perspective. We've come at it not from a traditional narrative way, but from the perspective of sound. It's a fun experiment for me, to see how it works out."

For a while, Green's Suspiria seemed to once more gather pace. A cast had reportedly been assembled, which included Michael Nyvqvist (The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo, Mission: Impossible - Ghost Protocol), Isabelle Huppert (Heaven's Gate, The Piano Teacher) and Isabelle Fuhrman (The Orphanage, The Hunger Games). Lack of Portman's star wattage aside, that's an admirable roster of actors.

In April 2012, the announcement came that Suspiria's financing was secured, the rights to reuse Goblin's booming soundtrack was granted, and that shooting was to begin that September.

Predictably, things didn't quite pan out.

Early 2013 brought the news that Suspiria was caught in some kind of weird legal quagmire from which, to date, it hasn't emerged. But Green's recently provided an update of what he's called his "opera" take on Suspiria.

"That would have been the ****,” Green told Crave. "I wrote it with my sound designer. I love Argento’s film and we wrote a very faithful, extremely elegant opera, basically of [Suspiria]. I don’t mean musical opera, but it would be incredibly heightened music, and heightened and very operatic and elegant sets. Isabelle Huppert was going to be in it, [and] Janet McTeer. We had an amazing cast of elegance and prestige that we were engineering for it."

The problem, it seemed, was that $20m was a lot to ask for an industry which widely sees the likes of Saw and Paranormal Activity as the benchmark for horror. If you can make a hit horror movie for $1m or even less, what's the point in risking 20 times more than that?

"...the economic model for a horror movie was not where I wanted it to be to make a $20 million elegant movie from a guy who was an unproven horror director," Green explained.

Green also suggests that the tepid commercial performance of the bawdy fantasy spoof Your Highness may have affected Suspiria's chances.

"If people would have given that movie [Your Highness] the hundreds of millions of dollars at the box office that it deserved, Suspiria would exist for us all to enjoy!"

But Green adds that, while he won't be directing the remake himself, the new Suspiria may still appear. "I'm actually hopeful that it's happening," Green said, "with a great Italian director that I had breakfast with last week."

Meanwhile, there's a Suspiria TV adaptation in the offing, said to be a 12-episode season of 50 minute episodes, called Suspiria De Profundis. According to The Playlist, it'll involve "fearful mysteries" solved by a "Sherlock Holmes-style lead character." Argento himself is said to be consulting on the show, which will be shot in English.

So while the fate of Green's Suspiria still looks uncertain, Argento's classic movie may still resurface in a new, small-screen form. Now, if only someone could tell us which Italian film director Green had breakfast with recently.

On a final, semi-related note, Asia Argento's drama Incompresa was a high-profile entry at Cannes in 2014. Just saying.



Read more: http://www.denofgeek.com/movies/susp...#ixzz3exJFEKQV


P.S. In Italy word is spreading that Federico Zampaglione (singer of italian alternative-rock band Tiromancino, and recently critically appreciated horror movie director) is the "great italian director" that David Gordon Green is in contact with.
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Old 09-10-2015, 09:08 AM
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Luca Guadagnino Talks Making ‘Splash,’ Next Is ‘Suspiria’ Redo


Six years after launching “I Am Love” from Venice, Luca Guadagnino is back on the Lido with the more ambitious “A Bigger Splash,” a psychological drama about a rock star and a photographer (Tilda Swinton and Matthias Schoenaerts, respectively) whose vacation on the sun-drenched Sicilian island of Pantelleria takes an unexpected turn when a record producer (Ralph Fiennes) and his daughter (Dakota Johnson) burst on the scene. Guadagnino spoke about the process that led to making “Splash,” which Fox Searchlight has set for a May 13, 2016, U.S. release.

“I am Love” took your career to the next level, after “The Protagonists” and “Melissa P.” Now comes “A Bigger Splash.” What took you so long?

Last month I counted how many scripts I’ve read since “I am Love,” and it’s more or less 500. It gave me a fantastic read of the business. Many things I was reading six years ago seemed to be very much the thing to be done then, and then the effect evaporated immediately. I got the feeling that even if I had great stars, a great studio, I knew there was something false, like a trompe l’oeil, so I ran away from trompe l’oeils. Having said that, I truly would love to be making films at a brisker pace, and I’m dedicating myself to that. But I am a control freak. I need to have a great deal of control and the ability to share my control with my collaborators and grant them the freedom and the quality of work I think these people deserve. If I don’t have those elements, I walk away.

StudioCanal, which asked you to direct this remake of Jacques Deray’s “La piscine,” seem to have been instrumental in creating the conditions to get “Splash” done.

I think that StudioCanal — and I’m not saying this to be unctuous — these people are the real thing. I grew up with a concept of cinema as a directorial thing, meaning the director is allowed to sail the ship. Not a dictatorial thing. Studiocanal believes in this. The inspiring quality of the collaboration that came out between me and them, Olivier Courson and Ron Halpern, and the rest of the team, it’s really remarkable.

On “Splash,” you worked with writer David Kajganich. How did this film come together creatively?

I think a script is great when it starts with the structure and works with the structure without falling into the typical three-act system in which the audience is ahead of the movie. I hate that; but that is like 99% of what I read. I like the idea that you do not precede the narration, and that’s what we tried with David.

The actors, Tilda Swinton, Ralph Fiennes, Dakota Johnson, Matthias Schoenaerts, really gave you a lot. Tell me about working with them.

I am glad that they were so generous. Moviemaking is a dirty, tiring affair. The joy comes from the possibility to be free on set and really let loose.

The music obviously plays a very important part. Can you tell me about your relationship with the Rolling Stones? Did they know that you were going to have a character (Harry) who had been their manager?

From day one the Rolling Stones were the spirit of the film, not just the soundtrack. We gave them the script and they gave a tip: they said: ‘Change that thing you had in Ralph Fiennes’ monologue to this.’ That was a great moment.

What’s on the horizon?

I’m going to direct a remake of Dario Argento’s “Suspiria.” I’m going to shoot the movie this winter. I think my friends at StudioCanal will be part of it.




http://variety.com/2015/film/news/lu...ia-1201587085/
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Old 09-10-2015, 09:14 AM
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Luca Guadagnino Discusses Suspiria Remake
Bigger Splash director on his Argento appropriation


Last we heard, back in 2012, David Gordon Green (Prince Avalanche, Joe) was attached to direct the controversial remake of Dario Argento's Suspiria. Just this week, however, the news has arrived that Green's iteration of the project is definitively off the table, with Luca Guadagnino now in the frame to deliver his own take. At Venice with his crime drama A Bigger Splash, Guadagnino shared some of his thoughts.

"The film by Dario Argento was a very indicative moment of growing up for me because I saw it when I was 14," the director tells Empire. "I think it changed me forever. I was obsessed [with Argento] through all my adolescence. [My version] is going to be set in Berlin in 1977. It’s going to be about the mother and the concept of motherhood and about the uncompromising force of motherhood. It’s going to be about finding your inner voice – the title is very evocative on these grounds."

Argento's 1977 original involves Jessica Harper's Suzy, who arrives in Freiburg to attend a renowned ballet academy, only to discover that it's a front for a powerful coven of witches. It marked the beginning of the director's Three Mothers trilogy, followed by Inferno (1980) and The Mother Of Tears (2007).

Guadagnino's version, he says, will be "very different. The movie by Dario Argento was maybe a child of its own times. It's very delicate; almost childish. I have a very strong interest in German literature and film, so I think [my] Suspiria will have to focus very strongly on that moment in history, in 1977, when Germany was divided and a new generation was claiming and asking to recognise the debt of guilt that forged the new Germany after the war against the fathers who wanted to deny the responsibility."

Locations and casting have yet to be worked out, but the director does clarify that the previously announced Isabelle Huppert and Isabelle Fuhrman are no longer linked to the project. "That was for a version by David Gordon Green," he says. "That’s not the case for me. I can’t say anything about the casting right now. I will announce very soon."

Guadagnino's A Bigger Splash, starring Dakota Johnson, Matthias Schoenaerts, Ralph Fiennes and a silent Tilda Swinton, plays at the BFI London Film Festival on October 9, and is out in the rest of the UK on February 12 next year.



http://www.empireonline.com/news/story.asp?NID=45330
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Old 04-16-2016, 10:09 AM
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Iggy Pop has given us un update on The Sandman:

Speaking of Cinema what about The Sandman of Dario Argento?
"That movie is really pissing me off: there has been a fundraiser on the Indiegogo platform yet we cannot start. Sometimes they tell me that Dario has slowed down due to health reasons, others that everything is ready and we're going to shoot in Belgium. Too bad. it is a wonderful project as is the short story by ETA Hoffmann that inspired the film. I would be the villain that tears off the eyes of kids in their sleep and gives them to feed his children. But first, excuse me, me and my new record are going to make a real big mess around the world."


Sorry for eventual mistranslations.
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Old 04-27-2016, 07:42 PM
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Been a fan since I saw Suspiria in college. Loved the whole three mothers trilogy plus several of Argento's other films.
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Old 11-14-2017, 05:26 PM
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What Happened to Dario Argento’s ‘The Sandman’?

Dario Argento has been in the game a long time. From his directorial début in 1970, The Bird with the Crystal Plumage (now out on a beautiful disc from Arrow US), to his most recent film, 2012’s Dracula 3D, Argento has managed to build an astounding resume. Certainly his later efforts have not been on par with his earlier output (though, I think there are more bright spots than most), but fans still hold out hope his next time in the director’s chair will recapture the magic of his Giallo glory days. Enter, The Sandman.

The Sandman was announced in June of 2014 as part of the Off-Frontières co-production market. Little was known right off the bat except that Argento signed on to direct a script written by David Tully (Djinn). These early details were quickly followed with news of rock legend Iggy Pop taking on the titular villain role. Before long we were given solid info as to what the heck the film would be about, and undoubtedly, it sounded like the perfect match for Argento’s phantasmagoric sensibilities.

Inspired by the original Sandman of German folklore that plucked out the eyes of children who wouldn’t sleep, The Sandman website describes the tale as follows:

“THE SANDMAN tells the story of a young student in the city who struggles to forget their childhood trauma at the hands of the serial killer dubbed ‘The Sandman’. As a child the student killed The Sandman years ago, on Christmas Eve, after witnessing the murder of their mother. This memory is repressed until they see the beautiful woman who lives in the apartment across the way dying at the hands of that same masked killer. We follow our protagonist to find out who is the real killer. This is a story of voyeurism and obsession and is a direct homage to Giallo films of the past.”

Needless to say, diehard fans of Argento and Iggy Pop were more than intrigued. In October of 2014, they were given the opportunity to get involved with the project. An Indiegogo page launched to help fund The Maestro’s film; the campaign sought a total of $165k to help “partially” bankroll the production. Tax credits, due to the Canadian/German co-production status, were said to bolster a large chunk of the film’s remaining budget. The launch page stated, “While those monies are secured, it is not enough to make the film. We are dedicated to bringing a quintessential masterwork to the faithful fans of Dario and Iggy. It’s the first time for us to approach you and ask for your support before making the film… because we want to do it right and deliver!”

The perks offered to help drum up that sweet cash ranged from copies of the film, signed posters, and even the chance to don the infamous black gloves of the killer on-screen. That particular perk was “one and done”. It went for $5k! Another exciting addition to the crew of The Sandman was Claudio Simonetti, one of the masterminds behind many of Italy’s finest scores. He would be composing for the film along with Akira Yamaoka (Silent Hill series) contributing the theme for the soundtrack.

Everything sounded great. For the first time in a long time, a script written specifically for Argento was handed to him with the promise of full artistic freedom. The crowdfunding campaign was a huge success, exceeding with 119% to goal. With $195,633 raised by 1082 backers, The Sandman was coming. Hopes were that it’d be released in time for Christmas the following year. It has now been three years since the initial announcement. Sadly, The Sandman has yet to go into production.

So, what exactly happened? Personally, I was over the moon with excitement when the word first broke (I didn’t back the project as I was one broke mo-fo in 2014). I’ve stated this before, but to reiterate, Argento is a part of the Holy Trinity of directors that helped shape my genre tastes. Romero and Craven complete that particular trifecta. I was hungry for more info on this movie. Realizing there hadn’t been any substantial news regarding The Sandman in some time, I started to do some digging.

It’s important to note that filmmaking is often a long, arduous journey. Projects can stop and start at the drop of a dime. Unfortunately, a lot of fans who put up their cash during the campaign have yet to receive their promised perks. Obviously, items such as copies of the film will have to wait, but what about signed posters? A quick peek at the comments on the Indiegogo page show a lot of anger from backers. People are requesting refunds and even labeling the campaign a “fraud.” Some commenters are more understanding but remain upset over the “Updates” which have come with less consistency as time has gone on. All hope is not lost, however. Argento has actually spoken on the matter. In August of last year, IndieWire interviewed Argento. In regards to The Sandman, he had this to say:

“Iggy Pop keeps asking, ‘How long do we have to wait on this film?’ Honestly, it’s not my fault. This film is a co-production by many different producers in different countries. They apparently can’t agree on a number of things, including where to shoot, locations, things like that. It goes on and on. I know it’s been dragging on. Time goes by and they haven’t reached an agreement. I must say that I myself have been thinking about some other projects in the meantime. I still need to work on them, think about them.”

While The Maestro’s patience might be wearing thin, he recently hinted at two possible projects in his near future. As quoted by Dark Universe, he stated, “Let’s see what will start first.” There was no confirmation that one of these could be The Sandman, but the producers have recently become more vocal about the production’s progress. Just last month, a post on the film’s Facebook page revealed that locations are locked (Ontario) and financing is still being secured. And those perks? On July 5th, a reminder to backers went out to make sure all mailing info was up to date. The signed posters were close to being shipped!

It’s certainly been a long journey for Dario Argento’s possible return to the sub-genre that made him a horror-household name. Here’s hoping the wait is worth it for fans and backers of the project.

Note: I attempted to reach out to “Team Sandman”. They did not respond to request for comment.



http://bloody-disgusting.com/editori...entos-sandman/
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