LFM in the News – Page 7 – LFM: Libertas Film Magazine

LFM’s Jason Apuzzo at The Huffington Post: The New Star Wars, Disney & Why Sci-Fi Was So Great in the 1970s

[Editor’s note: the post below appears today at The Huffington Post.]

By Jason Apuzzo. It’s by far the biggest, best and most surprising entertainment news of 2012, yet still no one knows quite what to make of it: starting in 2015 we’re getting a new Star Wars trilogy, beginning with Episode VII, supervised by George Lucas and produced by Disney.

As Darth Vader might say, there’s “a tremor in the Force.” The question is: what will this new Star Wars look like, now that we don’t have Emperor Palpatine to kick around any more?

There’s certainly been nothing like this news in Hollywood in years, with rumors swirling around about the new Star Wars films almost on a daily basis. What will the new storyline be? Who will direct the films? Will Mark Hamill, Carrie Fisher or Harrison Ford make a cameo? Did Boba Fett survive the Sarlacc Pit?

And will SPECTRE or the Miami Heat be the new villains?

LukeLeia — Mark Hamill and Carrie Fisher.

It seems incredible that overnight Star Wars has managed to reinvent itself – again – and become the biggest, most talked-about sci-fi franchise around. (Imagine what James Cameron must be thinking right now.) The question on everyone’s mind, though, is what exactly a new Star Wars trilogy will look like with limited involvement from George Lucas, the original cast having hit retirement age, many crucial characters gone, and having to pick up where 1983’s Return of the Jedi left off – i.e., with Ewoks playing victorious drum solos on Stormtrooper helmets.

In other words, what is the ‘essence’ of a Star Wars film now that the series can’t lean on standbys like Yoda or Obi-Wan Kenobi or exploding Death Stars anymore?

For clues to this mystery, it’s best to go back to the 1970s, the fabulous era – at least, for science fiction fans – when Star Wars was born.

Although the 1950s are justifiably regarded as science fiction’s Golden Age, the era of the 1970s easily rates a close second. It was the period when science fiction finally replaced the Western as the great American movie genre.

BuckRogers — From "Buck Rogers in the 25th Century."

To be fair, what we’re calling ‘the ’70s’ here probably began around 1968 with the release of 2001: A Space Odyssey and Planet of the Apes, and didn’t end till around 1984, with the release of The Terminator. So maybe we should call this sci-fi’s ‘modern’ era – or simply ‘the Star Wars era.’ Science fiction had a distinctive flavor during this period – it was darker, more realistic, and also more emotional – and Star Wars set the tone for the time.

It was also during this era that science fiction became more popular than ever – more popular even than comic book movies are today – dominating both the box office and prime time television.

Of the top 15 highest grossing movies of all time adjusted for inflation, four are sci-fi films from this period: the original Star Wars trilogy, plus Steven Spielberg’s E.T. A host of other films from this time – Alien, Blade Runner, Close Encounters of the Third Kind, Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan, just to name a few – are similarly regarded as classics. Plus, television series like The Six Million Dollar Man (and its spin-off, The Bionic Woman), Battlestar Galactica and Buck Rogers in the 25th Century were huge hits – with the Galactica franchise still around with us today.

So how did they do it back then? What made sci-fi of this period so wildly popular?

The key thing to understand about ’70s or Star Wars-era sci-fi was how it revised and updated a genre that had gotten old and slightly creaky (think Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea). It did so in three major ways:

1) Science fiction became more realistic.

The big leap forward in sci-fi ‘realism’ came in 1968 with Stanley Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey, which Kubrick made after consulting with scientists and engineers at NASA and MIT, and after devising new visual effects techniques like front projection. After 2001, which played out like a Cinerama documentary shot in space, sci-fi films couldn’t afford to look anymore like they were shot in your parents’ garage (even if they were). Continue reading LFM’s Jason Apuzzo at The Huffington Post: The New Star Wars, Disney & Why Sci-Fi Was So Great in the 1970s

LFM’s Govindini Murty at The Atlantic: Catching the References in Hitchcock, From ‘The Birds’ to the Blondes

[Editor’s Note: the full version of the article below and its accompanying slideshow appear today on the front page of The Atlantic.]

A guide to the famous Hitchcock trademarks that appear in Sacha Gervasi’s film about the director

By Govindini Murty. Sacha Gervasi’s new film Hitchcock takes a smart and entertaining look at the creation of Alfred Hitchcock’s scandalous Psycho, one of the seminal films of the 20th century. Based on Stephen Rebello’s book Alfred Hitchcock and the Making of Psycho, it sheds light on Alfred Hitchcock’s (Anthony Hopkins) pivotal collaboration with his wife Alma Reville (Helen Mirren), his battles with studio executives and censors, and his ambiguous relationships with his leading ladies Janet Leigh (Scarlett Johansson) and Vera Miles (Jessica Biel).

And while Psycho was considered a risky departure for Hitchcock, the film shared much with the director’s prior work, ranging from the influence of ’20s German Expressionist cinema to Hitchcock’s obsession with beautiful blondes, voyeurism, and split identities.

Here is a cultural guide to some of the themes, personalities, and cinematic references in Hitchcock.

Robert Bloch’s novel Psycho

Robert Bloch’s 1959 novel Psycho created a sensation for its depiction of the violence lurking in small-town America. The story of a demented killer who cross-dresses as his tyrannical mother in order to murder young women, the novel was based in part on the true story of convicted killer Ed Gein. When Alfred Hitchcock decided to film Psycho, he was told it would be impossible because of its controversial subject matter and was turned down by Paramount. It was only when Hitchcock announced he would fund the film’s $800,000 budget himself that Paramount agreed to distribute it.

Although Hitchcock declared that he only filmed what was in the novel, screenwriter Joseph Stefano made significant changes to the story, turning Norman Bates from a pudgy, unattractive middle-aged figure into a shy, handsome young man. Stefano also changed the story’s structure, beginning the movie with the more sympathetic Marion Crane character, rather than with Norman Bates.

>>>TO READ THE REST OF THE ARTICLE AND SEE THE ACCOMPANYING SLIDESHOW, PLEASE VISIT THE ATLANTIC.

Posted on November 28th, 2012 at 9:36am.

LFM’s Jason Apuzzo at The Huffington Post & AOL-Moviefone: Skyfall & How James Bond Stays Current at 50

[Editor’s Note: the post below appears today on the front page of The Huffington Post and AOL-Moviefone. I had the opportunity to see Skyfall at a screening of the recent AFI Festival in Hollywood, and wish to thank the AFI Festival for making that possible.]

By Jason Apuzzo. How does James Bond do it? He barely seems to have aged a day. The famously overworked British Secret Service agent, drinker of vodka martinis, and seducer of dangerous women (why are Bond’s girlfriends always pointing guns at him?) is now 50 years old in the movies — yet it hardly shows.

With Skyfall, the latest 007 thriller opening this weekend, it’s now been five decades since the Bond character debuted on screen in 1962’s Dr. No. Since that memorable first film, in which Sean Connery saved the world from a megalomaniac with metal hands — while rescuing Ursula Andress from the confines of a white bikini — James Bond has saved the world from nuclear bombs and space lasers, cheated death using jet packs and exploding cigarettes — and even found time to romance women with names like ‘Plenty O’Toole’ and ‘Xenia Onatopp.’

It’s been a busy, full life for the world’s most famous secret agent — which begs the question of why, as currently embodied by Daniel Craig in the latest film, the character suddenly seems so fresh and relevant to the world of today.

The question arises because the James Bond of Skyfall no longer seems like an exhausted relic from another era, as he often did during the ’90s and early 2000s. Instead, he now feels like a character who has been fully and (for the most part) successfully reinvented as a merciless, sardonic and lethal warrior for our age of terror.

And although Skyfall isn’t quite the classic some critics are making it out to be, it’s easily one of the best Bond films since the 1970s.

On this point, I must confess to having given up on Bond long ago. Until recently 007 was looking like a tired hero — a guy in a middle-age crisis, a character to put in the next Expendables. M needed to send Bond into retirement — maybe ship him off with a fifth of vodka and a Russian mistress (I recommend Anya Amasova, aka Agent XXX from The Spy Who Loved Me) to James Bond Island off the coast of Thailand. Even SPECTRE would probably leave him alone.

After all, with the Cold War long over (despite Vladimir Putin’s best efforts), Great Britain no longer the force it once was, and with women less eager to play characters named ‘Kissy Suzuki’ or ‘Dr. Molly Warmflash,’ you’d think 007 would be quietly boxed away in the attic by now along with vinyl records and your parents’ fondue pot.

Casino Royale in 2006 seemed to change all that, but director Sam Mendes’ Skyfall really confirms it; Bond now absolutely works as a hero for the 21st century. The question is: why?

There are three reasons, in my opinion:

1) Bond has been fully reinvented for the War on Terror era.

This process began in Casino Royale, but Skyfall digs much deeper into the purpose and mentality of our intelligence agencies in the post-9/11 world — and strongly reaffirms their value. Without giving away too much of Skyfall‘s plot, suffice it to say that the entire purpose of the film is to re-invent the James Bond mythology to fit the current war, which as Judi Dench’s M memorably states is fought primarily “in the shadows” — with our enemies less likely to be nation states with massed armies than shadowy, sociopathic operators working within hidden networks.

And it’s precisely in this environment that Bond thrives.

As Skyfall opens, information pertaining to NATO penetration of worldwide Islamic terror cells has been stolen in Istanbul, and Bond has to get the data back before Western agents are exposed and killed. As the story unfolds, Bond’s value as an experienced field agent — able to make human judgments in murky situations and act, where technology alone is inadequate — is constantly reinforced, even when his physical and emotional resources are depleted.

Bond and his colleagues are also depicted as patriotic and reflexively selfless, to the point of being subtly associated with Winston Churchill and his legacy. (Look for references to Churchill’s wartime bunker along with visual cues of a vintage British bulldog.) In the midst of this, the tone of the film is more sober — and befitting of wartime — than what we’ve seen from the Bond series in a long time. Continue reading LFM’s Jason Apuzzo at The Huffington Post & AOL-Moviefone: Skyfall & How James Bond Stays Current at 50

LFM’s Govindini Murty & Jason Apuzzo at The Huffington Post: A Conversation With Fashion Icon Ozwald Boateng on Style, Africa, and His New Film A Man’s Story

[Editor’s Note: the article below appears today at The Huffington Post.]

By Govindini Murty & Jason Apuzzo. During his meteoric career, Ozwald Boateng’s been called the coolest man on Earth, and the fashion world’s best-kept secret. Yet the candid new documentary A Man’s Story, opening this weekend in New York and Los Angeles, makes certain that the British fashion designer and style icon no longer remains a secret.

In a career already spanning two decades, the 45 year-old Boateng has outfitted celebrities from Will Smith to Russell Crowe, from Jamie Foxx to Mick Jagger. At age 28, he became the youngest tailor – and the first of African descent – to open a store on London’s legendary Savile Row. Boateng’s also designed menswear for Givenchy and bespoke costumes for films like The Matrix and Ocean’s Thirteen, and he’s even been the subject of his own Sundance Channel TV series, House of Boateng. He’s also the recipient of an OBE (Order of the British Empire) for his contributions to the clothing industry.

Throughout all this, however, Boateng’s private side – such as his quiet struggles in the rarified world of British fashion, or his efforts to foster entrepreneurial investment in Africa – have taken a back seat in public to his style innovations.

Director Varon Bonicos’ new documentary, A Man’s Story – for which Bonicos filmed Boateng from 1998 through 2010 – reveals much about Boateng’s personal life: from the challenges of growing up as a young man of African descent in London of the ’70s and ’80s, to the abiding influence of his father on his life and career. The result is a warm and often poignant film that humanizes Boateng, while doing full justice to the glamorous place he occupies in the world of men’s fashion.

We spoke with Ozwald Boateng and Varon Bonicos in Los Angeles, where they are promoting A Man’s Story. The interview has been edited for length.

GM: What is your passion for film – and in particular, how are you inspired by the intersection of film and fashion?

OB: Film has always been a really good tool for me to communicate emotion about why I create a collection. I’m probably one of the first designers to make short films. The first time I did it was back in 1994. The invite for my first fashion show was a VHS cassette. And it kind of became part of the language of my designing collections – I was always putting together short films.

Apart from that, I think fashion designers are directors anyway. We spend a year designing a collection for a fashion show that lasts maybe fifteen minutes. We have to design the look of the catwalk, cast the model for each look, work up the sound, the lighting – it’s a lot of work that goes into that fifteen minutes.

JA: Film has been so important in terms of influencing men’s style, men’s self-perceptions. I was curious whether there were film icons, movie stars who have influenced your sense of style?

OB: Sean Connery, of course, since I was a kid – you know, James Bond. Or The Thomas Crown Affair – you can’t beat those three piece suits. The Italian Job with Michael Caine – again the suits. If you’re a designer, there’s got to be some films that you’ve seen that have inspired you creatively. There’s no escaping that. Film is such a very good tool for communicating emotions, and all designers and creative people look to inspire an emotional response.

JA: You mention Connery and Bond, and he was so crucial in selling the Savile Row style here in the States.

OB: Absolutely.

JA: You yourself have become an icon on behalf of that style. Was that something you planned from the outset as a designer – to be so out front selling the look yourself?

OB: No, actually, I tried to stay out of it. In the early years, it was because I was a very young guy working in a very old discipline – so really, that’s tough to begin with. And then I was trying to do it in a very modern way – so again, that’s tough. Add me, visually, into the mix of all that, and that just complicates things. So for the first few years, I didn’t let anyone take any pictures of me. Basically, a lot of people had no idea what I looked like. And because my name did not necessarily sound African, a lot of people … just thought I was some kind of middle aged white guy [laughs]. So no-one actually knew what I looked like, and that was the best thing – because it allowed everyone to focus on the work. Continue reading LFM’s Govindini Murty & Jason Apuzzo at The Huffington Post: A Conversation With Fashion Icon Ozwald Boateng on Style, Africa, and His New Film A Man’s Story

LFM’s Govindini Murty on Lars Larson’s National Radio Show

LFM Co-Editor Govindini Murty was on Lars Larson’s national radio show Friday talking about The Master and the re-releases of Finding Nemo and Raiders of the Lost Ark. Special thanks, as always, to Lars and his staff for inviting Govindini on. She always has fun appearing on his show.

Lars’ show is broadcast on over 200 stations nationwide, and runs at different times across the country, so to find his show be sure to check out his website here.

Posted on September 18th, 2012 at 2:20pm.

LFM’s Govindini Murty on Lars Larson’s National Radio Show

LFM Co-Editor Govindini Murty was on Lars Larson’s national radio show Friday talking about The Ambassador and other new releases. Special thanks, as always, to Lars and his staff for inviting Govindini on. She always has fun appearing on his show.

Lars’ show is broadcast on over 200 stations nationwide, and runs at different times across the country, so to find his show be sure to check out his website here.

Posted on September 4th, 2012 at 2:29pm.