Aue546uertdhfilm journal international november 2015 by poledobesterex

A Prometheus Global Media Publication

INTERNATIONAL

November 2015

Fr om t h e E di t or’s D e s k

RESISTING NEW RELEASE STRATEGIES During the past few months, the motion picture industry has witnessed several attempts to break away from traditional distribution strategies. The results to date have not been favorable. We’ve seen Sony’s The Walk and Universal’s Everest open on IMAX and Premium Large Format screens in an effort to bolster interest in those films. At best, give distribution credit for trying to find new ways to motivate the public to come see their movies. Then there is Beasts of No Nation, which Netflix opened in only 31 theatres and released simultaneously on its streaming service. The results were terrible, mainly due to the leading U.S. circuits’ refusal to show the film. The movie did a poor $51,000 at the box office and Netflix has declined at press time to release numbers for its streamed views. The most revolutionary studio strategy is Paramount’s partnership with AMC and Cineplex on the sixth Paranormal Activity and Scouts Guide to the Zombie Apocalypse. This experiment allows exhibitors a percentage of digital grosses in exchange for the studio being allowed to release the film on demand just 17 days after it leaves most theatres. For the first time, a studio is allowing exhibition a piece of the digital gross. This strategy is understandable for certain movies. But it also establishes a precedent and as such could spell disaster in the long run for exhibition; this is why the large majority of exhibitors are refusing to play these titles. As long as the theatrical run turns out more money than any other release pattern, the three-month window will endure—and nearly all believe this is the best for the industry.

TRULY A PHENOMENON The motion picture industry is gearing up for the most anticipated film in the history of the business. Considering the last decade has seen movies like Avatar, The Avengers, Jurassic World and The Hunger Games, it’s hard to imagine another film arousing attention and excitement that eclipses those films. The movie, of course, is Star Wars: Episode VII—The Force Awakens, which opens in theatres on Dec. 18. People of all ages are eagerly awaiting this film and got their first glimpse of it during halftime on “Monday Night Football” a few weeks ago. The trailer was primed for 10:05 p.m. and by 9:45 p.m. Nielsen reported that the NFL coverage peaked. Sites like Fandango and MovieTickets.com experienced serious technical challenges to keep up with the demand for tickets. Both ticket sites are expecting record-breaking sales for the movie. The record-holder for domestic gross is Avatar with $760.5 million, and some industry pundits believe Star Wars could gross over $1 billion.

NOVEMBER 2015

In Focus This editor never believed that Titanic’s original opening of about $1.5 billion worldwide would be beaten, and then Avatar passed $2 billion worldwide. So this is no easy trip for The Force Awakens, but all eyes and ears around the globe will be watching and listening for the box-office results. As we went to press, we learned that Star Wars broke the record for the highest number of first-day pre-sale tickets on Fandango. The site has sold eight times as many tickets as it did on the first day for the previous record-holder, The Hunger Games, in 2012. Congratulations to the Disney marketing team for their creative and innovative campaign that has made this film such a highly anticipated event.

THE GROWTH OF PREMIUM LARGE FORMAT In this issue of Film Journal International, Charlotte Jones, principal analyst, cinema, at IHS Technology, offers a very informative article on Premium Large Format theatres. This is by far one of the most in-depth reports on this topic that we have published. According to the report, the total digital premium large format (PLP) cinema market consisted of 1,623 screens worldwide at the end of 2014. This is an increase of nearly 15.8 percent from just six months earlier. This total includes both exhibitor-branded PLF screens and IMAX and other global technology brands. The exhibitor-branded PLF screen was the fastest-growing segment, rising 22.3 percent in 2014 to 926 screens. Of the total 169 new PLF screens worldwide, the largest net gain was in the Asia/Pacific arena (78) and Western Europe (38). China remains the second-largest market for PLF screens globally with a combined total of 124 screens—made up of Poly Film’s Polymax, Wanda X Land and China Film Giant Screen (known originally as DMAX). Other globally branded PLF screens include Dolby Cinema and Screen X Technology from CJ-CGV. The article concludes that “cinema is moving towards an array of premium tiers and experiences based on a superior technology proposition, in combination with service, marketing and branding elements as well as improving the overall customer experience. Nonetheless, the superior attributes of PLF screens and the accompanying technology upgrades are increasingly seen by exhibitors as a primary driver of revenues. Investment in next-generation technology and experiences is seen as pivotal in regards to remaining both competitive and relevant in the wider entertainment mix.” ш

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DANIEL CRAIG IN S PECTRE, PG. 8 JENNIFER CONNELLY IN S HELTER, PG. 28 AND S AOIRSE R ONAN IN B ROOKLYN, PG. 24

ACUL AR / 8

Daniel Craig is back, and so is Sam Mendes, in new Bond thriller. MASS. HYSTERIA / 12 Tom McCarthy directs docudrama based on The Boston Globe’s series on the Catholic Church pedophile scandal.

BROOKLYN BOUND / 24 Director John Crowley and writer Nick Hornby adapt Colm Tóibín’s acclaimed novel about a young Irish immigrant’s journey to the New World. SEEKING SHELTER / 28 Paul Bettany directs wife Jennifer Connelly in gritty tale of NYC homeless.

DINO MITE / 16 Disney and Pixar’s latest animated adventure toys with alternate history: What if dinosaurs still ruled Earth! WRITER’S BLOCK / 20 Jay Roach helms biopic based on the life of blacklisted screenwriter Dalton Trumbo.

THE GOOD D INOSAUR, PG. 16 THE CONTRAST QUESTION: PART 2 / 30 Bright, high-dynamic range, economically viable—pick any two.

CATE BLANCHETT AND R OONEY M ARA IN C AROL , PG. 54

DEPARTMENTS IN FOCUS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3 REEL NEWS IN REVIEW . . . . . . . . . . . . 6 EUROPEAN UPDATE . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 65 SNACK CORNER . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 66 CONCESSIONS SPOTLIGHT. . . . . . . . . . 67 ASIA-PACIFIC ROUNDABOUT. . . . . . . . 68 TRADE TALK . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 70 FILM COMPANY NEWS . . . . . . . . . . . . 72 ADVERTISERS’ INDEX. . . . . . . . . . . . . . 74

REVIEWS

SPOTLIGHT, BROOKLYN,TRUMBO, BURNT, ROOM,THE WONDERS, I SMILE BACK, ROCK THE KASBAH, BEASTS OF NO NATION, EXPERIMENTER, AND MORE, PGS. 54-64

CONSTRUCTION & Design O UR ANNUAL OVERVIEW LOOKS AT THE EVOLUTION OF THEATRE DESIGN AND EATING OPTIONS , NEW BRANDING INITIATIVES FROM TOP THEATRE CIRCUITS , TREND - SPOTTING WITH

5G S TUDIO COLLABORATIVE , THE

INTRODUCTION OF BREWERIES IN CINEMAS ,

P REMIUM L ARGE FORMAT, D OLBY CINEMAS, MOVIE TAVERN’S LOBBY BARS, AND NEW INNOVATIONS FOR THE LOBBY. PGS . 32-53 THE RISE OF

THE DESIGNER BEHIND

BRYAN CRANSTON AND H ELEN M IRREN IN TRUMBO, PG. 20

MOVIE TAVERN’S LOBBY PUB COLLEGEVILLE , PA ., PG 50

REEL NEWS IN REVIEW

PARAMOUNT’S BRAD GREY RENEWS CONTRACT Paramount Pictures chairman and CEO Brad Grey, who was named CEO in 2005, has renewed his contract through 2020. The studio’s top film this year was Mission: Impossible–Rogue Nation, which has grossed $679 million worldwide. Paramount plans to increase its 2016 output to 15 films; upcoming titles coming out under Grey’s watch include Star Trek Beyond, Mission: Impossible 6 and a World War Z sequel. CARMIKE ACQUIRES SUNDANCE CINEMAS Carmike Cinemas acquired Sundance Cinemas, giving the Georgia-based chain an additional 37 screens across five theatres in California, Texas, Wisconsin and Washington. “Sundance has been enormously successful in creating a compelling consumer experience and shares our mission and vision of offering a world-class moviegoing experience, including an impressive premium dining offering,” said Carmike President and CEO David Passman in a statement. “We expect that this acquisition will allow Carmike to capture proportionally higher attendance rates for non-blockbuster titles and provide additional luxury expansion opportunities.” NATO INDUCTS NEW OFFICERS The National Association of Theatre Owners has some new officers on deck: Celebration! Cinemas Inc. CEO John D. Loeks is now NATO’s chairman, while Jeff Logan, president of Logan Luxury Theatres, steps in as secretary. Vice

chairwoman Amy E. Miles, CEO of Regal Entertainment Group, and treasurer Byron Berkley, president of Foothills Entertainment, were both re-elected. “NATO’s strength comes from its volunteer leaders,” said NATO president and CEO John Fithian in a statement, “and we are fortunate to have the dedicated service of the most talented people from across our industry.” RENTRAK AND COMSCORE SET TO MERGE Nielsen, watch out: Rentrak and ComScore are coming for you. The two media-measurement firms—Rentrak focusing on film and TV, ComScore on digital media—are reportedly set to join forces, with ComScore acquiring Rentrak in a stock-for-stock merger that would give ComScore shareholders ownership of approximately two-thirds of the new company. After the merger, which the boards of directors of both companies have approved, Rentrak will operate as a subsidiary of ComScore, with Rentrak CEO Bill Livek serving as the executive vice chairman and president of the merged company.

Publisher/Editor

Robert Sunshine Vice President, Film Expo Group

Andrew Sunshine Executive Editor

Kevin Lally Design & Production

Rex Roberts Associate Editor

Rebecca Pahle Exhibition/Business Editor

Andreas Fuchs Far East Bureau

Thomas Schmid Technology Editor

Bill Mead Concessions Editor

Anita Watts Advertising Associate

THEATRE CHAINS REJECT PARAMOUNT’S VOD PLAN Paramount’s gotten on several theatres’ bad side with their early Video On Demand release plan for Paranormal Activity: Ghost Dimension, which would see the film hit VOD 17 days after it all but leaves theatres. While AMC Entertainment and several other large chains approved the plan, which gives exhibitors a cut of VOD revenue, Regal Entertainment Group, Cinemark and more have opted not to screen the film. “We are not collapsing windows. We want the theatrical window to flourish,” argued Paramount VP Rob Moore. “There is no question that we are going to do less theatrically, but I believe we will make it up digitally. This is about the long-term health of the business, so there is not this long period of time when a consumer can’t watch a movie.”

Robin Klamfoth

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NOVEMBER 2015

venture during the press tour for Skyfall, a massive production that swallowed up two years of his life and left him utterly exhausted. “I needed time away,” Mendes tells Film Journal International on the phone from his native England. “It’s a full-on experience making a Bond movie, and the thing to remember is that directors stay on until the very end. Everyone else has used the time during post-production

Daniel Craig is back,and so is Sam Mendes, in Bond thriller set in Europe and Mexico b y E t han Alter

to have a rest or start thinking about the next movie. So when you, as the director, finally finish the film two days before the first press screening and then the producers come at you a week later, saying, ‘Hey, we’ve got this great idea for the next movie!’ you want to punch them all.” Fortunately, Mendes avoided severing his relationships with the Bond creative team—currently headed up by Barbara Broccoli and Michael G. Wilson—by

JONATHAN OILEY © MGM, DANJAQ & COLUMBIA PICTURES

s promised by the closing credits of Skyfall, James Bond will return in the latest 007 blockbuster from Sony Pictures, Spectre, which launches its not-so-clandestine mission to dominate the American box office on November 6. But Skyfall’s director, Sam Mendes, wasn’t supposed to be coming back along with the current Bond, Daniel Craig. The filmmaker took himself out of the running to direct Bond’s next ad-

ACULAR

NAOMIE HARRIS (AS MONEYPENNY), RALPH FIENNES (AS M) AND MONICA BELLUCCI AS LUCIA SCIARRA. BELOW, LÉA SEYDOUX. reactively throwing haymakers. Instead, he stepped away and took the long hiatus his mind and body required. In the interim, Skyfall went on to become the highestgrossing James Bond feature in the franchise’s now 24-film history, grossing $300 million in the U.S. alone and an additional $800 million abroad. The reviews were also among the best that a Bond movie had ever received, a welcome change from the critical drubbing that the previous installment, Quantum of Solace, endured four years earlier. Skyfall’s massive success provided Broccoli and Wilson with enough incentive to wait until Mendes was ready to seriously consider suiting up to helm another globetrotting spy spectacle. And they proved genuinely patient, even pushing back their preferred production schedule to accommodate his. “Initially, they wanted me to have the next film ready for the summer of 2015,” the director reveals, adding that he rejected that idea outright as being “too soon.” But as his personally enforced hiatus from Bond continued—during which time the stage-trained director returned to the theatrical world, mounting such shows as a musical version of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and a production of King Lear starring Simon Russell Beale—Mendes found himself wondering and even worrying about what was next for Bond. “I started feeling possessive of the characters,”

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he admits, pointing not only to 007, but also the new incarnations of classic franchise personalities that reappeared in Skyfall, like Moneypenny (Naomie Harris), Q (Ben Whishaw) and the next M (Ralph Fiennes, assuming the one-letter name previously assigned to Judi Dench). “I sort of supervised their births, and I wanted to watch them take their first steps.” Like any proud parent, Mendes soon found himself jotting down a list of hopes, ideas and, most importantly, plot points, for his cinematic children. Armed with those germs of a narrative, he signaled to the producers that he was finally ready to return to the fold. “I felt like I had a story to tell, and story and character is the only way I can ever get into a movie. I’d found my own way in on my own time and Barbara and Michael allowed me that time.” As Mendes explains it, the story told in Spectre is a logical extension of Skyfall’s dominant theme: the notion of a secret agent who works in the shadows, only to run headlong into his very real mortality. It’s an idea that’s beautifully established in Skyfall’s opening shot: a still frame of a figure striding down a dark hallway, his face only coming into focus when he pauses in a small pool of light. The figure, of course, is Bond, and by the end of the complete pre-credits sequence, he’s paid the price for leaving the safety of the shadows by plunging to his apparent

death. “Skyfall is about facing up to aging and mortality, and what you leave behind,” Mendes explains. “Bond is a figure who leaves no trace—no family, no children, no wife, no sign he was ever there. And is that worth it?” Mendes promises that the opening sequence of Spectre, which unfolds in Mexico City during the annual Day of the Dead festival, will similarly set up the central thematic core that the rest of the film revolves around. “This scene is much more first-person and subjective [than that one in Skyfall]. Instead of traveling over a large distance, it’s right in the middle of Mexico City, and it’s about placing the audience in the middle of the most heady, exotic and slightly scary atmosphere. And within that, there’s a lot of intense danger and action. There’s a saying in Mexico: ‘The dead are alive.’ That’s one of the central themes of this movie, the idea that people you thought were dead in your life perhaps aren’t and that old grudges and enmities might be reborn.” It’s no secret who might be holding a grudge against Bond; after all, the name of 007’s next adversary doubles as the film’s title: SPECTRE, a multinational criminal conglomerate that operates in the same shadows that cloak top MI6 agents. The trailers for Spectre strongly imply that this organization has been in Bond’s life for years without his knowledge, manipulating events from behind the scenes. But as even casual Bond fans know, the character’s history with SPECTRE (which stands for Special Executive for Counterintelligence, Terrorism, Revenge and Extortion) extends further back than Craig’s tenure. The organization is mentioned for the first time in the very first Bond movie, Dr.

NOVEMBER 2015

No, when Sean Connery’s inaugural 007 squared off against SPECTRE-backed scientist Julius No ( Joseph Wiseman). SPECTRE and its grey-suited leader, Ernst Stavro Blofeld, continued to bedevil both Connery and his temporary replacement, George Lazenby, in five additional films: From Russia with Love, Thunderball, You Only Live Twice, On Her Majesty’s Secret Service and Diamonds Are Forever. When Connery left the franchise for the second—and final, save for oneoff Thunderball remake Never Say Never Again—time, SPECTRE closed up shop as well, the casualty of a protracted rights dispute between original Bond producers Albert R. Broccoli and Harry Saltzman and independent producer Kevin McClory. (Short version: McClory collaborated with Bond creator Ian Fleming on the ninth 007 novel, Thunderball, and secured the film rights to the book, which introduced Blofeld and SPECTRE, after a separate legal battle with the author. He later reached agreement with Broccoli and Saltzman to make Thunderball as the fourth Bond film, but the competing copyright claims eventually proved too much of an interference, leading the movie franchise to omit all reference to the organization and its boss going forward.) The legal stalemate persisted for five decades, finally resulting in an agreement between the current producing team and McClory’s estate in 2013, one year removed from Skyfall’s massive success. Even had he not been able to use SPECTRE as the enemy (or the title) of his next Bond film, Mendes says he likely wouldn’t have altered the story he wanted to tell. “I would have pursued the same thematic content, but perhaps in a different form,” he remarks, adding that he remained studiously apart from any of the legal wrangling. “My job is to direct a movie, not a franchise. At the end of the day, I’ll use what I’ve got. Being able to use SPECTRE wasn’t everything, but it certainly adds a huge amount. I’m very happy that [the rights] were cleared up and [SPECTRE] was available to us when we started the movie.” What Mendes declines to reveal, however, is whether Blofeld will make his return to the Bond mythos along with the criminal enterprise he masterminded. The widespread assumption is that Blofeld is back and he’s being played by two-time Oscar-winner Christoph Waltz. That’s an assumption that both the actor and virtually everyone else associated with the film has vociferously denied, and it’s worth

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noting that Spectre’s credits identify Waltz’s character as being “Franz Oberhauser,” not “Ernst Blofeld.” On the other hand, no attempt is being made to mask the fact that, whatever his name, Waltz is most definitely playing Bond’s nemesis, and poses an even greater threat to 007 than his previous opponent, Skyfall’s Raoul Silva ( Javier Bardem). “Silva was Bond’s negative image; that was where we were going with the character and Javier ran with it,” Mendes explains. “This character similarly has a history with Bond in the way Silva did, but Christoph is a very different actor and has taken the role in a very different direction.” Mendes is well aware that the Blofeld rumors will continue to persist right up until the film’s release, helped along in part by script leaks and internal studio conversations that were made public by last year’s notorious Sony hack. Among the details that have been widely reported online are the repeated references to “Blofeld” that appear in notes on Spectre’s screenplay. But the director says that those comments reference a much earlier draft of the script, which bears little resemblance to the finished film. “When I studied the information that was online, there were all sorts of things that had been long abandoned. I think what amused me was the idea that any of this would be a news story. [Disagreements] happen with every big movie. On both Skyfall and American Beauty, I received questions [from the studio] saying, ‘Is the ending going to be satisfying?’” Besides, by now Mendes is accustomed to intense scrutiny that comes

with overseeing a high-profile franchise like Bond. “You have to embrace the fact that these movies are created and driven by fans; they’re a dialogue with that audience. They’re going to review the title, the casting, the choice of director, the trailer, the poster and the song. The movie is the final piece of that relationship. So of course they’re going to say that Blofeld is in it! That’s the fun of it, and if you fight it, you might as well not be doing it. When I don’t want that anymore, I’ll go make a movie that nobody’s heard of and I’ll have privacy from the audience until I show it.” That response begs the question: Is Mendes weary of the very public spectacle that making a Bond movie has become? Or will he be tempted back for a third film (after an extended break, naturally)? “I don’t want to say anything definitive at this stage,” he hedges. “I’ve done this before: I’ve said ‘No,’ and then I’ve said ‘Yes.’” His final answer will most likely depend on Craig, whose own future with the franchise is unclear. Previous reports have suggested that the actor is contractually obligated to make one more Bond film after Spectre, but Craig has been very vocal in the press about wanting to leave the character behind. “I know from my experience, it’s [a decision] that comes to you after you’ve finished and he really hasn’t finished,” Mendes says. Should Craig decide to renew his license to kill one more time, it’s hard to imagine that Mendes wouldn’t be directing his final mission. “He’s a friend and Spectre brought us much closer. That relationship is really what got both of us through the movie.” ш

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Mass. Hysteria by Daniel Eagan

Tom McCarthy Directs Ensemble Cast in Docudrama Based on The Boston Globe’s Pulitzer Prize-winning Investigation into the Catholic Church Pedophile Scandal

The screenplay, co-written by director Tom McCarthy and Josh Singer, focuses on Spotlight, a four-member Globe team which took on long-term investigative projects for the paper. In the script, which is structured like a mystery, Marty Baron (played by Liev Schreiber), the Globe’s new editor and an outsider to Boston politics, pushes the team to dig into abuse accusations about John Geoghan, a priest.

Speaking by phone from his office, McCarthy emphasizes how important a part research played in preparing and writing the script. Much like the Spotlight team, McCarthy and Singer had to be meticulously accurate. Get anything wrong, from accents to addresses or clothes, and viewers cousld dismiss the entire story. “I guess our main concern was trying to remain true to the spirit of those

KERRY HAYES © OPEN ROAD

umors of widespread sexual abuse within the Catholic Church were largely just that—rumors—until a 2002 series of Boston Globe articles detailed how the Church hid pedophilia among more than 70 local priests. Spotlight, an Open Road Films release, reveals how the newspaper exposé came about. Already an awards contender, the drama opens in theatres on Nov. 6.

THE NEWSROOM CAST OF SPOTLIGHT, FROM LEFT: MICHAEL KEATON, LIEV SCHREIBER, MARK RUFFALO, RACHEL MCADAMS, JOHN SLATTERY AND BRIAN D’ARCY JAMES.

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NOVEMBER 2015

journalists and the reporting they did,” McCarthy says. “That was our guiding principle. What would the reporters do? What would Marty Baron do? Understanding of course that our job’s a little different, we’re telling a narrative feature and we have to do it in two hours or so.” McCarthy and Singer interviewed Spotlight editor Walter “Robby” Robinson (played by Michael Keaton), reporters Mike Rezendes (Mark Ruffalo) and Sacha Pfeiffer (Rachel McAdams), and researcher Matt Carroll (Brian d’Arcy James). But as Singer says, reaching beyond that core group led to unexpected details. “You’re always looking for context,” McCarthy explains. “We interviewed editors past and present, people who are still working at the Globe, some who weren’t involved with the Spotlight investigation. Some of those said to us, ‘Hey, prior to Spotlight we didn’t go deep enough on some of this. Why didn’t we dig deeper?’ “That pushed our research, and maybe thematically our work beyond what was initially presented to us as a story about reporters going after the Catholic Church. Those interviews got us asking, ‘Why didn’t they [dig deeper]? Why didn’t the cops say anything? Why didn’t the school board say anything? Why didn’t the lawyers say anything?’” In the movie, Marty Baron tells his reporters that he isn’t interested in finding a villain as much as exposing a pattern of deceit. “We arrived at a similar approach in our process,” McCarthy says. “I remember the day we did, right here in my office. In movies like these, the tendency is to portray the Church in the worst possible light. But it’s a grey area. There’s a moment when Matt is interviewing the mother of a victim, and she says yes, of course, the Church pushed back against her, but so did the other parishioners, her friends.” Showing how personal beliefs and loyalties influence the Globe writers lets McCarthy emphasize the suspense elements in the script. The newspaper series is kept under wraps for months, leading some to wonder if the series is being deliberately buried. Legal ploys keep vital records out of reach. Boston’s elite power brokers approach Robinson to question Baron’s motives, pointing out that he is the paper’s first Jewish editor. In turn, each Spotlight member will face painful personal choices. As director, McCarthy draws upon a long tradition of journalism mov-

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ies stretching back to silent days, when montages would show the latest edition running through presses. With its long corridors and antiseptic lighting, the Globe newsroom evokes the Washington Post shown in Alan J. Pakula’s direction of All the President’s Men. “We had to build that newsroom,” McCarthy reveals. “Our production designer Steve Carter worked very hard to find a place where we could shoot as realistically as possible, with natural light. He eventually found a massive old Sears

department store near Toronto, with windows around the perimeter just like the newsroom.” Despite the sensitive nature of the story, McCarthy says that almost everyone cooperated with the production—with two notable exceptions. “There’s a scene at Fenway, it was supposed to be a game between the Red Sox and the Yankees,” he recalls. “And the Yankees organization didn’t feel that the subject matter was appropriate. They refused to let us film, and actually recommended the Red Sox not

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to let us either. As a lifelong Yankees fan, that hurt. And it didn’t sit very well with the Sox, who felt strongly that this was a story that should be told. They were very supportive.” A meeting between Baron and Cardinal Bernard Law (played by Len Cariou), one marked by subtle threats and jockeying, posed another problem. “They met in Law’s office at his home,” McCarthy says. “But the land and the building are now owned by Boston College, which didn’t want to be associated with that dark period. And I went to Boston College. So my team and my school both let me down.” McCarthy assembled an exceptional cast for Spotlight, in part because the performers responded so strongly to the story. Ruffalo read the script overnight and was the first actor to sign onto the project. He spent weeks observing Mike Rezendes. Most of the leads spent time with their characters as well, with the exception of Stanley Tucci, who plays attorney Mitchell Garabedian. Instead, Tucci studied hours of television footage of the lawyer. Actors can sometimes fall into a trap of simply imitating the people they are playing. In Spotlight, each lead feels fully defined and believable. “That’s an actor’s work,” McCarthy notes. “The script is certainly the road map toward that end and hopefully that provides a lot of answers concerning character. Research is also crucial. But ultimately, actors have to dig and capture the essence of these people as best as they can. That’s instinct and craft. The great actors have both.” Once the locations and cast were set, McCarthy says that shooting went very smoothly. “I really credit our cinematographer, Masanobu Takayanagi,” McCarthy says. “How he shot this movie, he’s just brilliant. He gets the story so well, and we had enough prep time so we could find what we felt was the tone of the movie. Plus, he lit the newsroom and the Spotlight office so we could move quickly once we were in them.” (Takayanagi also shot the Bostonbased gangster film Black Mass.) This is the fifth time McCarthy has worked with editor Tom McArdle. “Early on I was hearing from him,” McCarthy reveals. “He was very reassuring: ‘It’s all cutting very easily, just keep doing what you’re doing.’ Of course he’s down in New York cutting, outside the fog of war.” Spotlight starts with one incident and expands to encompass a worldwide scandal

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TOM MCCARTHY AND A HEADLINE FROM THE JAN. 6, 2002, Globe.

that is still unfolding. One of the challenges McCarthy faced was transporting viewers back to a more innocent time when the reporters involved had no sense of the scope of what they were covering. All the while avoiding the story’s potential landmines. Although he is not practicing, McCarthy was raised a Catholic, and says that most of his family is still “very connected” to the Church. He praises Pope Francis, cites good works by the Church, and insists that Spotlight is not “pillorying” Catholics. “But the Church is a big institution, institutions are manmade, and institutions fail. The Catholic Church on this particular issue failed. Full stop. There’s no denying that, no rationalizing. There’s a reason why the Pope has just apologized yesterday— again—for the shame he feels at how the institution failed.” Which may be why one scene about a half-hour into the movie has resonated so strongly with viewers. It’s the first time the Spotlight team meets with one of the victims of sexual abuse, Phil Savi-

ano (played by Neal Huff ). The founder of SNAP (Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests), Saviano describes just what “abuse” means, in details both shocking and painful. It is a devastating moment made all the more powerful by McCarthy’s understated staging. “Once we were in that space, Robby’s office, it was just being true to the reporters and their work,” McCarthy says. “We’d call or e-mail them, ‘Where would you guys stand, would you cram into an office?’ That makes the blocking pretty easy; of course, you put Phil off by himself, Robby at his desk, Sacha and Matt here, Mike there, still standing. “Then it was just finding the tempo, watching a couple of rehearsals. Finding our rhythm based on one, the material, and two, the performances. With so many of these scenes we had actors who could just carry the material. Once we unleashed them, they were good to go.” But the director emphasizes that the emotions of the scene were more important than technical issues. “Meeting the survivors, hearing their stories, these people who have had the courage to come forward and realize the effect they can have, even if by divulging something so painful and personal, viewers really connect to that emotionally,” McCarthy says. “We felt like we needed to give Phil his say.” McCarthy may downplay his contributions, but the scene is a textbook example of setting, characters and dialogue combining to create an emotional truth. “I think when we shot that scene, we could all feel it,” the director admits. “We could feel it in Neal’s performance. The other reporters were just starting to feel like an ensemble. Everyone was so dialed in, how we shot and then ultimately edited the scene was actually quite easy.” An actor himself, McCarthy elicits sharp, focused performances from his cast, in particular Keaton’s worried, driven Robby Robinson. Working with former “West Wing” writer Josh Singer, he came up with a screenplay that went beyond surface details to question how society responds to scandals. But it is McCarthy’s skills as a director that make Spotlight so engrossing. By trusting the performers, and by telling the story without exaggerating its details, he has turned out one of this year’s more powerful movies. ш

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ixar features thrive on a “What if ?” scenario. What if toys came to life behind our backs? What if monsters really did live in the closet? What if a rat could cook? What if feelings had feelings? Opening on Nov. 25, The Good Dinosaur starts from a number of intriguing premises. What if the asteroid that drove dinosaurs to extinction missed hitting the planet? What if instead dinosaurs evolved into a sort of agrarian society of farmers and herders? More important, what if you took the familiar “boy and his dog” narrative and flipped it? Directed by Peter Sohn, The Good Dinosaur is a coming-of-age story about a young apatosaur named Arlo (voiced by Raymond Ochoa). Separated from his family, he must make his way back home across a wild and sometimes hostile wilderness. Along the way, he meets Spot ( Jack Bright), a feral human from a time when our race had not yet learned to talk. Speaking by phone from Pixar headquarters, Sohn describes how his drawing of a long-necked dinosaur using his head to plow triggered ideas that helped lead to Meg LeFauve’s screenplay. (The genesis of The Good Dinosaur came from Bob Peterson, the original director of the project.) Like most Pixar movies, The Good Dinosaur had its share of setbacks and personnel changes. “I’ve been here fifteen years, and pretty much every film I’ve worked on has been like that,” Sohn admits. “When I worked as a story artist on Finding Nemo, one of the big things that Andrew Stanton taught me was to fail as fast as you can. You say, ‘Let’s try this thing,’ but that can go into dead ends. You’re like, ‘We spent a week on that?’ Okay, let’s go back and build that other idea. It hurts sometimes to lose things, but you understand that the film is growing, it’s becoming, it’s telling you what it needs.” Sohn points out that at Pixar “most of the people up top are directors, they’ve made films and gone through this journey. They’ve always given advice as a sugges-

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DINO

DISNEY AND PIXAR’S LATEST ANIMATED ADVENTURE TOYS WITH ALTERNATE HISTORY: AN ASTEROID NEVER HIT EARTH AND DINOSAURS STILL RULE! NOVEMBER 2015

by Daniel Eagan

MITE

PETER SOHN DIRECTS THE GOOD DINOSAUR, WITH RAYMOND OCHOA AS ARLO, ABOVE. tion, not an order. And [chief creative officer] John Lasseter has essentially been an amazing net. Places where I’ve fallen, he’ll say, ‘I’ve fallen in that same place. Keep moving.’” In earlier versions of The Good Dinosaur, Arlo was much older. Sohn and his team discovered that his age made it too difficult to depict his character’s growth in a sincere way. By making Arlo

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younger, Sohn could tap into his own insecurities as what he calls a “chubby, super-awkward” child. The son of Korean immigrants, Sohn grew up in The Bronx. He remembers that when his mother, who didn’t speak English, had extra money, she would take him to the movies. There, he would try to translate the stories for her.

“There were movies where I didn’t have to translate anything, those beautiful Disney animated movies that were so well-told visually,” he says. “Later on I tried to learn everything I could about animation, and as I grew older I tried to understand more about observation, tried to find those gestures to communicate.” The Good Dinosaur has very little dialogue, and in the case of Spot, none at all, so finding nonverbal ways to communicate became crucial. “We try to break down what the characters intend, what’s the conversation they need to have,” he explains. “What I mean is, what would they say if they had dialogue? So through animation and gestures you find a performance, a way to ‘say’ the line without actually saying it.” Since the two leads are so young—a first for a Pixar feature—Sohn and his team found themselves focusing on their eyes as a means of communication. “When you see how expressive their eyes can be, both in line and on the computer, you can start to break down their gestures. At Pixar there are so many controls for the eyes and the eyebrows. There’s the outer eyebrow, the middle eyebrow, the inner eyebrow, and that’s just for the left eye. The upper eyelid, the bottom eyelid, the inner upper eyelid, the pupil, the iris, the sides of the socket— they all help communicate gestures, and that’s just one of the tools of the body we have to work with.” Also new to Pixar movies is how Sohn and his team treat Nature. Arlo’s family lives near the Clawtooth Mountains, in-

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spired in part by the Tetons in Wyoming. Sohn wanted the settings to be beautiful, but also scary and dangerous. “I wanted Nature to come alive in a different way,” he says, “to breathe, become a character in the story. A river could in fact be a sort of tool to support Arlo’s emotional journey. When he’s having a tough time, the river will be roiling. When he’s connecting to Spot, the river can be placid, glassy. This is in part a survival movie, so you have to feel the threat and beauty of Nature.” To enhance viewers’ connection to Nature, Sohn turned to sound designer Craig Berkey. “Our world is 99 percent outdoors,” the director notes. “I think there’s only a couple of shots that are inside anything. Craig’s from the Banff area, which is pretty mountainous, and he’s worked on outdoors movies like True Grit and No Country for Old Men. So he completely understood the sound of that world.” Having worked in so many departments at Pixar, Sohn was trained to understand when story ideas do and don’t work. “You have to learn to let go while still trying to guide the film as best as you can,” he observes. “The jobs may have given me some confidence, but at the same time there’s still a lot that I don’t know. And that was one of the great things about Denise Ream, our producer. She surrounded me with experienced people in those areas where I didn’t feel confident.” Like a true New Yorker, Sohn talks rapidly, his words sometimes spilling together. He has a disarming, self-

deprecating sense of humor. Although he doesn’t claim to be an actor, he has voiced some parts. “I play fat characters: Emile, a garbage-eating rat in Ratatouille; Squishy, a chubby, naive, heartfelt student in Monsters University. They’re like, ‘Be fat and be heartfelt,’ and I’m like, ‘Okay, whatever.’” (Sohn was also the model for Russell, the young scout in Up.) In addition to its two child leads, The Good Dinosaur features voice work from Jeffrey Wright (“He brought a really strong bear hug to his voice”), A.J. Buckley (“a really great drawl”), and Anna Paquin (“a real firecracker, she’s got this electricity to her”). For the part of Butch, a Tyrannosaurus Rex, Sohn wanted “a voice with the texture, the natural truth, of someone like Sam Elliott. And eventually someone said, ‘Why don’t you try talking to him?’ I was like, ‘Yeah, right.’ But we sent his agent some materials and Sam agreed to the concept. He is completely the dude you want him to be, so down-to-earth, genuine, full of heart. When I was pitching to him, he kind of tapped me on the shoulder and said, ‘I can feel your heart in this thing, let’s jump in there and try it out.’” Sohn invests himself completely in his projects, even during interviews. Over the phone he adopts a low, gruff voice to imitate Sam Elliott. He speaks often of finding a family at Pixar, a tribe of film nerds. In The Good Dinosaur, Arlo is an outsider, and Sohn admits to feeling that way himself. “It’s funny, the character’s journey, it became a sort of parallel for me,” he says, “because of the people I would meet, people whose love of this movie and its characters would help move this thing forward.” At the same time, collaboration with scores of artists forces Sohn to hold onto his personal vision. “Story’s always hard,” he offers. “Focusing on story to honor that original heart of the film. You see the same thing over and over. You tell a joke, imagine telling the same joke a thousand times. When all the changes come, you have to keep watching the movie like an audience member, letting it hit the heart and gut before getting analytical about it.” Re-rendering software has made it easy to revamp sequences without starting from scratch. “It’s not like a reshoot,” Sohn explains. “In animation, changes can be very last-minute. Hopefully, the heart will remain. Even though there are tumultuous changes, you hope that the heart still remains. It’s a tough thing to guard and protect.” ш

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PHOTOS © BLEECKER STREET

Bryan Cranston gives an acclaimed performance as blacklisted writer Dalton Trumbo in Jay Roach’s Biopic, TRUMBO

WRITER’S BLOCK by Harry Haun

n the annals of epic Oscar blunders, it is generally conceded that the perfect storm formed around 1956’s Best Motion Picture Story. The winner was not Jean-Paul Sartre (for The Proud and the Beautiful). Nor was it the more deserving Cesare Zavattini (for Vittorio de Sica’s Umberto D) or even Leo Katcher for the formulistic Eddy Duchin Story. And it definitely wasn’t High Society, MGM’s musical remake of the Katharine Hepburn movie and play The Philadelphia Story, which the writers branch had idiotically nominated, not realizing that it was already twice removed from an original story. “No, no, no,” they quickly amended, struggling to save face, “we meant the other 1956

BRYAN CRANSTON AS DALTON TRUMBO, WHO CO-WROTE ROMAN HOLIDAY (AT RIGHT), BUT WAS NOT GIVEN CREDIT FOR THE OSCAR-WINNING SCRIPT FOR FORTY YEARS. 20

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ROMAN HOLIDAY STILL COURTESY PARAMOUNT PICTURES

DIRECTOR JAY ROACH AT WORK ON THE SET OF TRUMBO.

movie called High Society.” That’s right, the one that starred The Bowery Boys. This was greeted with gales of laughter, which only increased when The Boys’ studio boss cracked, “This just proves what we’ve known all along—that the Bowery Boys series couldn’t have lasted this long if not for the fine writers.” Eventually, the nomination was nullified—for fear that, given the cynical perversity in Hollywood, it would win. Anything that runs from Jean-Paul Sartre to The Bowery Boys in a single category can’t end well, and this didn’t: The winner for Best Motion Picture Story of 1956 was—to use the title of another 1956 movie—the man who never was. Screen credit went to one Robert Rich, but the script’s actual author was Dalton Trumbo, the most unbowed and prolific of the blacklisted screenwriters known as The Hollywood Ten. The film he won for was The Brave One, a boy-and-his-bull yarn he dreamed up at a bullfight, wondering how the bull felt. This was not Trumbo’s first time at the Oscar rodeo. He had won in the Best Motion Picture Story category three years before with his tale of a royal princess who goes AWOL in The Eternal City (Roman Holiday). The name on that statue was Ian McLellan Hunter, a friend who fronted for him. For 15 years—from September 1945, when Our Vines Have Tender Grapes was released, to October 6, 1960, when Spartacus world-premiered in New York City—Dalton Trumbo’s name did not appear on a movie screen (although he secretly scripted almost 20 films, among them Gun Crazy, He Ran All the Way and Cowboy). The blacklist that had wrecked so many lives and stymied so many careers officially died that October. A second nail in its coffin soon followed on December 15, 1960, when Trumbo’s name once again appeared on the screen, this time for Otto Preminger’s Exodus. Preminger had fired the original novelist, Leon Uris, from the project on the grounds that “he didn’t have a proper feel for the material” and hired Trumbo, whom he had secretly employed previously on The Court-Martial of Billy Mitchell. This period of silence and suppression has been thoroughly documented: Trumbo’s late son, Christopher, put together a 2003 play from Additional Dialogue: The Letters of Dalton Trumbo, called Trumbo: Red, White & Blacklisted. Then there was the 1977 biography by Bruce Cook, called simply Dalton Trumbo, followed ten years later by Trumbo the documentary. All of the above, particularly the last two, go into the new screen stew, Trumbo, starring Bryan Cranston, adapted by John McNamara, and

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opening in theatres on Nov. 6 via Bleecker Street Media. Heretofore, Hollywood has treated its infamous blacklist period as an annoying gnat buzzing around a bigger picture (The Way We Were, The Front, Guilty by Suspicion), but this new Trumbo is a report from the disquieting calm in the center of the hurricane— what it was like to take a stand, then endure a world of closed doors. Trumbo was adept at finding doors left ajar by producers who needed scripts quick. “In my mind, I think this film is very relevant to what goes on today,” contends the film’s director, Jay Roach. “History repeats itself. Politicians are expert at exploiting fear to get people to conform to their way of looking at the world. After a terrorist attack, you can convince people that, to be safe, you must strip away protections for privacy or suppress speech. You can turn people against people around them who are not a part of the threat but you can make them seem like they are. That’s how some constitutional protections often get stripped away. They’re more fragile than you realize. If you can exploit fear, you can convince people that even something as fundamental to democracy as freedom of speech is a threat to national security.” Roach, who was born a decade after the post-World War II Hollywood witch hunts, admits he had to dig deep into research to get his bearings for this film. “Personally, I didn’t know much about the details,” he says. “Like lots of other people, I thought it was related to Senator Joe McCarthy’s Commie-chasing in the early ’50s. It was, obviously, in certain ways—but this predated McCarthy’s rise to prominence. “One of the most incredible parts of the story was that the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC) was invited by Hollywood to come and investigate the industry. The Motion Picture Alliance, formed by Ward Bond and Hedda Hopper and Ayn Rand, wrote the manifesto. It was an organization that was partly organized to resist unionization, and some people just decided unions were a Communist plot, so they formed the MPA before the war. It sort of calmed down during the war, then re-emerged. People like John Wayne got heavily involved. He was president of the MPA for a couple of terms. I had no idea that Hollywood kind of turned on itself. HUAC wasn’t initiated by Washington or the government. It was initiated by the MPA writing a letter to a very conservative Congressman saying, ‘Come out and help us clean up Hollywood. There are subversives here. They’re hypnotizing Americans through mainstream American movies.’ Of course, it’s an absurd idea, but when you can exploit fear of a legitimate enemy, you can round up people just using that fear and make them seem like they’re related to the threat. Look what happened.” Hopper, the right-wing gossip columnist and all-round Mad Hatter, led the charge in Hollywood against Trumbo and others who flirted with Communism or were self-deluded card-carriers in the ’40s. When they refused to name names to investigating committees, they became her personal targets—people to ride out of town on a rail. In the film, Hopper is played somewhere to the right of Wonderland’s Red Queen with delicious regality by Helen Mirren, fresh from her Tony- and Olivier-winning performance of Queen Elizabeth II in The Audience on Broadway and in London. “’Dame Helen Mirren,’ as we enjoyed calling her, was just phenomenal,” the director confesses. “I loved working with her. She was incredibly eager to get Hedda right. She did a tremendous amount of research on Hedda’s career and personal quirks. She loved the outfits. There’s nobody who can wear a hat better than Helen Mirren—come to think of it, nobody wears a crown better than Helen Mirren. She wore all those flowery hats that looked

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like centerpieces at someone’s dinner party, and she wore them like they were completely normal. She really captured the zealous, completely-in-her-own-mind patriotic drive Hedda Hopper had. It was important the person who would take on Trumbo would have that much force of personality.” The trickiest part of the production was in approximating the iconic celebrities that pass in review. Michael Stuhlbarg manages to suggest Edward G. Robinson in subtle ways without getting specific, but Christian Berkel’s Preminger and David James Elliott’s Wayne don’t go much farther than some excellent vocal inflections. “If they used vocal coaches, I wasn’t aware of it,” Roach admits. “Mostly, I think, they just listened to tapes. I urged them not to obsess about matching the tapes. What’s most important when you’re playing a real-life character is that you capture the essence, the charisma, the confidence or lack of confidence—just try to show what the person cares about and feel what this person might have felt and trust the audience to gather the authentic qualities of the person through performance.” Roach’s favorite line in the film is Preminger’s: “It’s better,” he critiques Trumbo about his first draft, “but it lacks genius.” He was tempted to try it on the Trumbo cast. The most successful facsimile is the dead-on Kirk Douglas imitation turned in by Dean O’Gorman of the Hobbit movies. “He’s from New Zealand and has a very thick accent but somehow transformed himself. I found a really fantastic Kirk Douglas interview with Mike Wallace from around that era that he listened to and studied. I tried to help him figure out how much would be enough of a verisimilitude to go for without making it a caricature, but Dean did most of that work on his own.” Very sneakily, Roach introduced the impersonation in some grainy footage of the 1953 Oscar ceremonies. (Douglas, who would be responsible for putting Trumbo’s name back on the screen, ironically was the one who announced his front had won the Oscar for Roman Holiday.) “That was deliberate that we snuck him in there in that low-resolution black-and-white. We degraded our footage to match that period’s.” The 98-year-old Douglas gave O’Gorman high marks for the performance. “Kirk saw the film after we completed it and said he really liked what Dean had done. I was so happy. That was the most important little stamp of approval you could go for. Kirk said the only thing he wished we’d done was thought of asking him to play himself.” Preminger and Douglas, who later did In Harm’s Way together, were contentious about which one of them really broke the blacklist with Trumbo’s screen credit. Exodus went into release two months after Spartacus, but ten months earlier The New York Times announced that Preminger would credit Trumbo with the screenplay for Exodus, which possibly forced Douglas to do the same with Spartacus. “We talked to Kirk before the film went into production, and he’s very sharp on this subject,” Roach says. “He wrote a book about it. He said for quite a while he’d intended to give Trumbo credit, but Preminger did beat him to the punch. In a way, Douglas had more to risk. He was not as independent as Preminger was. His own production company had invested a whole lot of money in Spartacus, and they were running behind and over budget because they’d fired a director before they hired [Stanley] Kubrick. He had a lot on the line. I think the heroism of what Kirk did can’t be understated. It was such a bold choice to put an ex-Communist’s name on the front of his film. Trumbo was the first blacklisted screenwriter to be credited in 13 years.” It’s hard not to overlook the parallel that Spartacus freed the

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blacklisted writers as well as the slaves. “It’s certainly related,” admits Roach. “Rather than let one person be crucified for standing up for all, other people in Spartacus’ camp stood up and were not only willing to not inform on him but to even go further and die with him. Which was an incredible tribute to the people who refused to inform on friends.” Roach is particularly proud of a scene where Hopper finally realizes all her flag-waving hyper-patriotism was for naught. “The night Trumbo’s name finally appeared on the screen marked the beginning of the end of the blacklist. Hedda’s watching the movie premiere on TV, and out comes John Kennedy who says, ‘It’s a fine picture. I think it’ll be a big hit.’ That happened. I liked that moment because it feels like Dorothy throwing water on the Wicked Witch of the West. Trumbo’s name coming up in the Spartacus credits broke a spell that had been woven in fear. She’d spent so much time conjuring, and it all suddenly just vaporized and she melted.” As the battered but unbeaten good guy of the occasion, Bryan Cranston has a crusty role that falls comfortably within his skill set. Like Mirren, he has been raking in the awards of late (Emmys for “Breaking Bad” on television, and a Tony for playing LBJ in All the Way), and this performance might well win him other award consideration. Roach found Cranston such a dream to work with that he’s doing it again, directing the HBO version of All the Way, which will air in the spring. “Bryan’s one of those actors who’s not only prepared, he’s eager to try all the layers—all the sort of tonal adjustments you could take along the continuum of tone—and he’s prepared all of the versions before he shows up, so he knows it when he gets there. Then he allows for discovery by just being on

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top of it. When the other actors join in and the energy shifts a little on the set, he’s like an incredible jazz musician. He knows the piece so well that he can go off on any new melody or key change or tempo change.” And what would Trumbo make of Trumbo? Roach suspects he would have a Kirk Douglas reaction: “He would want to write it himself. He wrote zillions and zillions of words to achieve the best 10,000 to make a great screenplay. I read a beautiful memo he wrote about Spartacus and the way that it had first been cut. It was a 40-page essay on the way it should have been cut to serve the story, and he was right. Kirk Douglas said so in his book. That’s why being right really mattered to Trumbo. Sometimes, being right is overrated—especially when you’re dealing with people who don’t rely on logic or science to win an argument—but Trumbo wouldn’t give up. I’m sure that I would have probably received at least a 50page memo from him. “In a way, we had Trumbo’s legacy with us in the form of his daughters, Mitzi and Nikki, who talked to us quite a bit and visited the set a number of times. They were very opinionated. They had their own Trumbo, and we listened to them. In some cases, they had a very significant impact on the details of how things were. They just thought we weren’t authentic enough in the screenplay. Even in the edits—I showed them early cuts—they gave us very, very good notes on what it was really like to be in a house where you had to keep secrets. You had to answer the phone carefully. They didn’t have pseudonyms in school, but they could never say what their father did for a living because he was busy writing black-market screenplays and winning Academy Awards that they weren’t even allowed to talk about.” ш

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KERRY BROWN © FOX SEARCHLIGHT

EMORY COHEN AND SAOIRSE RONAN

DIRECTOR JOHN CROWLEY AND WRITER NICK HORNBY ADAPT COLM TÓIBÍN ’S ACCLAIMED NOVEL ABOUT A YOUNG I RISH IMMIGRANT ’S JOURNEY TO THE N EW WORLD

s the last vestiges of September’s movie slump roll to an end and awards season comes out of hibernation, expectations for Brooklyn are high. Between Birdman, Wild and The Grand Budapest Hotel, distributor Fox Searchlight was the uncontested MVP of last year’s Oscars, and this year Brooklyn looks to be their heavyweight contender. Snapped up for a reported $9 million days after its Sundance premiere, the film hits U.S. theatres on Nov. 4, a case of prime “Hey Oscars, look at me!” positioning. The pedigree is there, too: Saoirse Ronan, an Oscar nominee at 13 for Joe Wright’s Atonement, stars, working from a script by Wild scribe Nick Hornby. Hornby’s source material is Irish literary icon Colm Tóibín’s 2009 novel of the same name, about a young woman who immigrates from a

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sleepy Irish village to bustling Brooklyn in the early 1950s. Historical drama: Check. On a surface, somewhat mercenary level, everything about Brooklyn spells awardseason catnip. None of that matters to director John Crowley, who, speaking the day after Brooklyn’s New York Film Festival premiere, comes across as not wanting much to do with Hollywood’s Oscar-

industrial complex. A film, theatre and TV director who gave Andrew Garfield his first pre-The Social Network break with 2007’s heartbreaking Boy A, Crowley broke out of the independent film arena for 2013’s poorly received thriller Closed Circuit. The experience taught him, above all else, that what he really wants to do is “make smaller, independent projects.” Large-scale Hollywood movies don’t “excite me as much as finding a story which has a lot of odds stacked against it, which a lot of people will have no interest in directing,” he adds. “Something like Brooklyn, for instance, which is a tricky one to get SCREENWRITER NICK HORNBY

AND DIRECTOR JOHN CROWLEY

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BOUND

right. There are a million and one reasons why something as small as Brooklyn shouldn’t work. And that excites me, to try and get all the way through that.” Brooklyn being “tricky” comes not just from the general difficulties that face independent film, though those are certainly a factor: Hornby, also a veteran of the indie sphere, notes that “no one’s found a way of doing it that works in terms of ‘Ah, this is how you get a movie made. I’ve learnt, from all my other films, that if you do this, this and this. then the movie gets made really quickly.’” For Brooklyn in particular, it’s easy to see how elements of the story might have been a tough sell. The story Crowley, Hornby and Tóibín tells is, in many ways, a small one: Eilis (Ronan), a shop girl whose future in her small Irish village is nonexistent, goes to America,

NOVEMBER 2015

KERRY BROWN © FOX SEARCHLIGHT

BY R EBECCA PAHLE

SAOIRSE RONAN AND DOMHNALL GLEESON where she struggles with homesickness and experiences what Crowley calls “the essential problem of being in exile. When you leave home and go to a new country, you’re certainly not from the new country you’re living in, but when you go back home

you’re not from that place anymore, either.” Her new life starts to shape itself, with a new career path and a new love interest, an Italian-American plumber named Tony (Emory Cohen), coming into the picture. But events transpire that force Eilis to

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choose between her new world and the old, represented by Jim, a hometown lad played by Domhnall Gleeson. It’s an authentic film, and one boasting a sweet sense of humor thanks to Julie Walters’ boardinghouse owner character and her various chatterbox charges. Hornby bemoans the “arrogant and slightly stupid” attitude that people from previous generations “never laughed, never had a joke, never slept with each other… If you make a film saying the reality of their lives was really grim, it just isn’t true to what we know of life. People laugh every day. It’s human nature.” What Brooklyn doesn’t have, and thankfully so, is bombastic dramatic moments or melodrama. Crowley cites the admittedly odd combination of the Dardennes Brothers and John Ford as two of Brooklyn’s key stylistic influences, noting that the film goes from a more “artless,” naturalistic style during the Irish scenes to something with a more classic, Old Hollywood feel as Eilis settles into her new American life. The goal, Crowley argues, was always to work towards emotion, “not sentimentality. If we ever had to rely on music or tricks in editing to generate a bit of emo-

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tion, we’d lost. That was not the film that I wanted to make.” Instead of manufactured drama, the core of Brooklyn is Eilis’ gradual and beautifully presented transition from a passive girl who is “not at all in control of anything in her life” to a young woman who “is completely in control of who she is and what she wants.” “I felt a huge responsibility” in making Brooklyn, Crowley notes, “partly because it’s such a well-loved book, but I also felt a massive responsibility to the thousands and thousands of silent immigrants whose stories have never been told. Who lived normal lives. Who just got on with it, got married, had kids. Had lives which weren’t filled with melodrama and bad things happening to them, but who may have had a huge echo chamber of sadness inside of them because of what they had been through.” Through Brooklyn speaks to the immigrant’s experience, and to the Irish immigrant’s experience in particular—Crowley notes that “the myth of going to America and making good and coming back with a bit of glamour is very potent in the Irish imagination still”—it also presents what is in very many ways a universal story. That, plus Tóibín’s evocative writing, is what helped the non-Irish Hornby tap into the

source material. There was little research involved: “The fun thing about adaptation is that someone else has done it for you! Last year, when Wild came out, people said, ‘Oh, did you go on the trail?’ And I said, ‘No, why would I do that? Cheryl [Strayed, who wrote the memoir on which Wild was based] has written about being on the trail! My job is to dramatize what she’s already done.’” “I felt very moved reading the book. I think, when you’re moved by something, then things start to chime, whatever they are. I can remember feeling homesick in my life, and the utter misery of it,” Hornby continues. “Back then, there was this enormous and painful physical journey that you had to make to go across the Atlantic,” whereas now, going from one country to another is a matter of a quick plane ride, and phones, e-mail and Skype make communicating in the meantime a cinch. But none of that makes much of a difference to the emotional experience, Hornby argues: “Modern conveniences and technology don’t altogether alter the fundamental fact of changing one life for another.” Crowley concurs, noting that Brooklyn “resonates with people who haven’t got a drop of Irish blood in them.”

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Not to discount the power of the written word, but a huge part of why Brooklyn works so well comes from Ronan, whose enormously expressive face allows her character’s emotion to shine through even when she’s not speaking a single word. “She would have been a great silentmovie actress,” says Crowley. “She just has an old-fashioned face. There’s something about it which is like a Botticelli painting or something. And with those eyes, she’s an amazing watcher. When you point a camera at her and she’s looking off-camera at something, it’s so interesting.” For Jim and Tony, too, Crowley wanted actors with an old-fashioned air; Gleeson has a sophisticated-yet-approachable Gregory Peck feel, while Cohen’s authentic, grounded quality is reminiscent of a young Brando. All the actors had to “get their head around what it meant to be in this period, the kind of body language and basic manners and way of interacting with other people that they had to take on. When we were meeting actors for it, you would know if somebody felt too urban and contemporary. It starts in the casting, the kind of world that you’re building up,” Crowley explains. Ronan, who came on the project shortly after Crowley did, had “obviously proven herself as a sort of juvenile

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actress,” the director notes, “but what she hadn’t given yet was the performance that took her from that up to adulthood. It seemed like this was the perfect opportunity for her to be able to knock the ball out of the park. What transpired, which was wonderful for the project, is that between us meeting and when we shot the film, which was almost a year to the day, she underwent all the things that Eilis underwent. She left home. This was the first film that she had done without one of her parents as a chaperone. She moved to London, got a flat, got a boyfriend. And she was really shocked at how homesick she was. I remember having lunch with her about a month before we started shooting, and it really pressed on her. I said, ’You’re in the exact right place to make this film right now!’ I had moved to London eighteen years before and experienced something very similar. That emotional churning and volatility was all available to her as we began shooting, and she was able to channel it right into the role.” For Hornby, Brooklyn represents the third straight film with a female protagonist, an unexpected change of form for an author best known for maleled books like High Fidelity and About a

Boy. Add in his 2004 novel Funny Girl and the upcoming BBC miniseries “Love, Nina,” and you have five straight projects based around female experiences. “It’s clearly not a coincidence now!,” Hornby laughs, before noting that “I haven’t necessarily isolated the things that make it not a coincidence.” While Hornby doesn’t know what draws him to female stories, he does acknowledge that “actress talent in the U.K. and the U.S. is phenomenal, and [Hollywood movies] never give them enough to do. If you write something where a young actress is on every single page, it’s incredible to behold that somebody with Saoirse’s talent or [An Education star] Carey [Mulligan’s] talent comes roaring at it. ‘Are you kidding me? You’ve given me a script where I’m on every single page, with these lines and this dramatic situation? Try taking this away from me!’ And so many actors are like, ‘Yeah, I like indie movies, but I’ve just been offered the part of Wolfman, and they’re giving me $15 million.’ Whereas with girls, it’s like, ‘Well, I could be Spider-Man’s girlfriend, or I could do this.’ It really feels as though we are tapping into talent that is underused. It’s very rewarding to see Saoirse’s work in this film.” ш

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SEEKING SHELTER

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PHOTOS © SCREEN MEDIA FILMS

ften you don’t have to scratch an actor very hard to find the director lurking under the epidermis. Latest case-in-point is Paul Bettany, who switched camera positions the hard way—doubledebuting as director and writer of Shelter, a grimly real urban drama in which Mrs. Bettany ( Jennifer Connelly) and Anthony Mackie play a pair of New York City’s homeless, begging for coins and brandishing “I Used To Be Somebody” signs. Bettany found his inspiration to make this switch practically on his Tribeca doorstep and, indeed, dedicated his film labors “to the couple who lived outside my building.” Shelter, opening on Nov. 13 from Screen Media Films, is his imagined backstory of the two people who lived in the streets in front of his apartment house. “I would pass them every day on the school run with my children and try to talk to them,” Bettany recalls, “but they were quite recalcitrant and not interested in returning the serve. Eventually— I’m ashamed to say—they sort of became part of the landscape of the city and I never really saw them at all.” That literally became true when Hurricane Sandy struck and there was a mandatory evacuation of riverside property in lower Manhattan. “In the madness of trying to get three kids and a dog and a cat in the car and head for higher ground, I never stopped to think whether this couple—my neighbors—would weather the storm. When it was over, everybody sort of returned to New York City—but not them.” Bettany never saw them again, in fact—and he couldn’t stop thinking about them. As a direct result, a scenario started forming in his mind: Who were they, and

BETTANY AND CONNELLY ON THE SET OF SHELTER.

PAUL BETTANY DIRECTS WIFE JENNIFER CONNELLY IN GRITTY TALE OF NYC HOMELESS by Harry Haun

what had brought them to the desperate place where their lives intersected with his? “We’re all one family tragedy away from that,” he reflects. “Last year we passed two milestones in New York City: the first apartment for $100 million sold, and there were 62,000 homeless people every night seeking shelter. Many of them were children in a city that is home to more millionaires than any other city on Earth.” Before the couple literally and even figuratively entered the picture, Bettany had been pondering the possibility of making a film about judgment. “The world is increasingly a gray area, but we seem forever entrenched in black and white positions. I wanted to make a film that investigates judgment, and I thought this couple would make really good candidates for that. I wanted to make them the worst people imaginable—in America, that would be an ex-terrorist and a junkie mom who abandons her kids—and then make you love them because everyone’s worthy of forgiveness. I wanted you to think, ‘There but for the grace of God go I.’” Street life proved the great leveler here for the audience—the relentlessly grueling nitty-gritty of everyday survival—and Bettany hooked up with several homeless

ANTHONY MACKIE

organizations to keep him (and his screenplay) real. “They vetted the script. They let me make the soup runs, talk to homeless people on the street, all that. And they did the same for my wife. They were incredibly helpful with her character research.” Connelly’s raw, wrenching portrayal of a heroin addict in freefall is the film’s chief calling card. A ravishing beauty in real life, she scruffed up quite credibly here—much to the consternation of her hubby-director. “She lost a terrifying amount of weight during the filming, and I was very anxious about that,” he admits, “but she is a remarkably committed actress—the most prepared actor I’ve ever worked with. “I remember we were up in Harlem in an alleyway, and the prop guy brought

a retractable needle for her to inject with, but it wasn’t the same syringe. I told her I’d take the camera back 20 feet so nobody would notice, but she said, ‘No, don’t do that,’ and jabbed the needle right into a vein. That blood you see on her arm is real.” Mackie plays a Nigerian Samaritan who breaks her downward spiral, an illegal immigrant nursing a terrible secret. Gradually, grudgingly, they form a relationship of co-dependency, which photographs much like love. Save for bits by Bruce Altman as her dad and Kevin Geer as a doorman, the two have the film all to themselves, just getting from A to B in the mundane grind of surviving the streets. This is the Bettanys’ third picture together. They were Charles Darwin and wife in Creation and Russell Crowe’s best friends in A Beautiful Mind, and, for a while, Bettany was technically aboard Shelter as an actor. “I lied and said I’d be in it to get funding,” he sheepishly confesses, “but then I cut the scene. I didn’t want my first experience as a filmmaker to be linked to an acting job. Except for the obvious cheat of having my wife, an Oscar-winning actress, in the film, I really wanted it to be a first-time filmmaker’s experience. A lot CONTINUED ON PAGE 31

Design Right, Build Right, Stay Right.

In-theater screen monitoring for maintaining presentation excellence For more information visit: www.harkness-screens.com/curolux

NOVEMBER 2015

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The Contrast Question, Part 2 Bright, High Dynamic Range, Economically Viable—Pick Any Two by Tom Bert, Sr. Product Manager, General Entertainment, Barco

n our previous article in the October edition, we elaborated on the ambient parameters that have an impact on the true perceived contrast ratio and image quality of an electronic display. This was in the context of the contrast-ratio inflation that is happening, leading to marketing messages being sent around on extended dynamic range and high dynamic range. In this article we’ll zoom in on the internal parameters at play. The technical product parameters are tuned and tweaked to enhance the contrast ratio of a display. We will do this in the most generic way, covering both direct-view displays and projection setups. Due to the background of the author, the focus will be more on projection. This is also the domain where contrast ratio is most subject to discussion. We will limit ourselves to the true internal parameters: Everything that happens after light leaves the display is impacted by the ambient parameters, as discussed in our previous article. As you will understand, you cannot completely disconnect them. Both impact the final net results: the perceived image quality.

SPATIAL

LIGHT MODULATION

The key component of any display (electronic and other) is the spatial light modulation. Or in a more common wording: how you create pixels. A static display without any pixels is just a piece of paper, and electronic display without any pixels is just a white light source. The moment you start applying ink on the paper, you start modulating the light differently on different positions: You create pixels and an image appears. The same applies for electronic displays: The moment you start modulating the white light and create a matrix of pixels, an image becomes visible. Historically, emissive displays were an important display technology; in CRTs and plasma screen, no light was generated (internally and externally) where no pixels were created. Currently OLED and LED displays are the only remaining relevant technologies of that type. The dominant display technologies today (LCD displays

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and all projectors) are transmissive, starting from a non-modulated white light source, through filtering in different steps, the pixels are created. This brings us to the first design parameter impacting contrast ratio. To achieve a high contrast ratio, you want your blacks to look black. In a transmissive display, this means throwing away a lot of the light generated at the start. This not only makes the total setup less (power) efficient, it also put a practical limit on the achievable brightness. Every display technology (LCD, DLP, LCoS…) has an inherent contrast, defined by the basic physical properties. Once you define the minimum (black), you put an upper limit on the maximum (white). This means that if you tune the technology to filter away a lot of light (dark black), you lose brightness. There are several ways to circumvent the tradeoff mentioned above. A commonly used one is to use different displays in parallel—e.g., dual projection. You hereby compensate for the loss in brightness by adding up the light from two (or more) displays. It is clear that you hereby introduce a new tradeoff: By doubling the amount of displays, you (at least) double the total system cost. A second way to work around the first tradeoff is to put display not in parallel but in series: different light modulators sequentially modulating the light coming from the previous one. The reasoning behind this is: If I put two bright modulators with each 100:1 contrast sequentially, I have created a 10,000:1 system (100 x 100 = 10k). This is correct theoretically. First, you do not only create an even higher inefficiency (throwing away light from the source), but the involved system complexity will more than double the cost. In such a sequential system, containing, guiding and managing the light is significantly more complex than in a “standard” system. Since the light modulator in every display is the most critical and complex (and hence expensive) component, adding more complexity there has the biggest impact on total system cost.

SECRET

OPTION

So…should we just accept that it is impossible to build a bright, high contrast and economically viable display? The attentive reader will have noticed that we still have some tricks up our sleeve—some parameters besides the light modulator that we can tune for higher contrast and better image quality. The first one is the light source where it all starts. So far we have assumed that this is not modulated (not temporal and not spatial). Even though that was the case in the first generation of electronic displays, this is no longer the case: Backlights in LCD TVs are today often a matrix of “white” LEDs, allowing then to adapt to the content. The same is true for the light sources in projectors (lamp, LED or laser): These can be modulated to synchronize with the spatial light modulator (LED, DLP, LCoS) and enhance contrast ratio. A second parameter that can be optimized is the total system efficiency. Above we mentioned that every transmissive technology has an inherent contrast ratio. This is true, but we didn’t mention that this contrast ratio depends on the system design around it. The biggest contributing factor is the angle at which the light is transmitted—more specifically, the cone of angles in which all light enters and leaves. In the case of projectors, you’ll come across such parameters as f-number and etendue. It is this author’s belief that these latter ways of improving contrast ratio have significantly fewer tradeoffs than the ones mentioned in the first paragraphs. Even though the theoretical limits on what you can gain on contrast ratio are lower, the practical implications for system brightness and cost are much lower.

CONCLUSION A lot of buzz is being created around enhanced contrast ration on electronic displays. Definitions of “the best solutions” will be different per market. In this article, we wanted to make it clear what tradeoffs are involved when designing the best solution. Furthermore, we wanted to reveal the existence of alternative solutions, with fewer tradeoffs, that are commonly overlooked. ш

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SEEKING SHELTER CONTINUED FROM PAGE 29 of people on the film were students—recent students—and it was an intense, extraordinary time. I made it for $1 million and shot it in 21 days. You have to have a pretty good plan for that, but there’s nothing quite as important as a good plan you can abandon if something better comes up.” Paula Hidobro’s camerawork gives into the grime of the situation but occasionally rises to shots of surprising beauty. “Our photography was handheld because we had no money, and I wanted to have a style of filmmaking that suited having no money,” Bettany explains. “The natural tendency is to shoot handheld for the grit. I had no interest in that. It was handheld because it was the quickest way I could shoot. I didn’t want to waste time on complicated shots and dolly tracks. I just had 21 days.” This still allowed him to get in some impressive directorial flourishes. One scene in a blinding rainstorm has the couple falling off a curb into a puddle, which suddenly dissolves into an underwater sequence. “It took 20 minutes to shoot, up against a piece of black fabric—and with kids still swimming in the pool!” he beams. “That sequence was born out of practicality. The thing about coming off heroin is that you will have the worst flu you can imagine for three to six

days, and then the rest of it is boring. So why film that boring part? And yet I had to let the audience know that she was now clean of drugs. And also I had to turn the story to winter. So I thought, ‘Why don’t they fall in water?’ Lots of things in the movie were happy accidents like that.” Bettany turned back into an actor immediately on hanging up his megaphone. “I finished the shoot at three o’clock in the morning, got in a car and went to JFK to go do an acting job. And then the movie sat in bins for five months. I started going crazy. I couldn’t edit. Every filmmaker I spoke to—Darren Aronofsky and others— said, ‘Oh, my God! I love to put my film down for five months after shooting.’” But first-timer Bettany was too antsy for that. He bought an editing program and whittled a 15-minute street-begging segment down to two minutes. Unfortunately, he hadn’t learned how to edit audio, so the sound of Connelly’s begging was scattered throughout the sequence, making the scene feel as if a whole day was passing. When the designated editor put the words in Connelly’s mouth properly, it played much too long. Bettany opted for his shortcut, and that’s what is in the film. It was the actor in Bettany that unleashed the director. “Mostly, the days are

gone when you have lineups,” says the 44-year-old Brit whose acting career is nearing two decades. “It used to be, when I first started in the business, you’d come to work in whatever state you were—hung over, alert, with your coffee—and you’d sit on the set with the director and the other actors and the director of photography, talk about the scene and rehearse it. Then you would invite the crew to see what you had done, and go away a couple of hours to get into makeup and costume while the crew and the director and the DP work out how they would cover it. So many times I’d come out of my trailer and find marks set for me to stand. Everything had been figured out. I found myself thinking, ‘Why are you paying me? Why didn’t we discuss this? Maybe I’d have come up with something cooler than what they thought of.’” As the new director on the block, Bettany democratically let the actors have their say. “My obligation as a director is quality control and my story, so I watch the actors, and if my actors are doing something that I never thought of, I’ll sit with myself and think, ‘Does the film that I need to tell in this moment support what they’re doing?’ It’s interesting. I’d never thought of that. If it did, I’d shoot it. If it didn’t, we’d talk—but nine out of ten times I went with the actors.” ш

to help more kids live. St. Jude patients Sam and Gabby

The lifesaving work of St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital® is powered by movie magic. Each year, theatre partners across the country donate pre-show advertising space during the holidays to run the St. Jude Thanks and Giving® campaign movie trailer. Featuring a cast of Hollywood celebrities, this star-studded trailer lets moviegoers everywhere know that at St. Jude, we won’t stop until no child dies from cancer. Please join today and support St. Jude’s mission: Finding cures. Saving children.®

NOVEMBER 2015

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gn De si an d ru ct io n Co ns t

HOW THEATRE DESIGN HAS ADAPTED TO CHANGING NEEDS AND FOOD OPTIONS

Always Evolving

by Bruce Proctor President, Proctor Companies

THE EARLY DAYS In the early days, cinema design fell into two categories: nickelodeon-style, which varied widely in both size and style and was often a retail store by day converted to a

NATE SINGER / COURTESY THEATRE HISTORICAL SOCIETY OF AMERICA, HISTORICTHEATRES.ORG.

he first commercial film presentation in the United States happened in 1896 at New York’s Koster and Bial’s Music Hall, traditionally a vaudeville theatre. For the next two decades, cinematic presentations were increasingly intermingled with vaudeville acts. During this time, nickelodeons sprang up around the country, offering an evening of film entertainment for just a nickel. In her book The Transformation of Cinema, Eileen Bowser estimates that in 1910 as many as 26 million Americans visited nickelodeons each week, representing more than a quarter of the population of the United States at the time.

The introduction of talking pictures represented a major disruption to the entertainment industry. Talkies, which represented a better value for consumers and a more profitable product for producers, debuted in 1926, after which the appeal of live performances diminished rapidly. In 1932, when the Palace Theatre in New York–considered by many to be the epicenter of vaudeville–shifted exclusively to film presentations, it marked a seminal point in the history of cinema.

VINTAGE CONCESSION STAND AT THE LOEWS STATE IN LOS ANGELES.

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cinema at night, and theatre-style, which retained the traditional live-performance ornamentations of vaulted ceilings, grand interiors, sweeping balconies, marquees and velvet curtains. While nickelodeons were more accepting of their patrons eating during showings, operators of upscale theatres viewed the practice as gauche and remained reluctant to allow food in their venues. Then the Great Depression hit. The additional revenue that serving food generated became too tempting to ignore, even for high-end theatres. So the smell of freshly popped popcorn wafted through lobbies across the U.S., and new theatres, now generally less ornate to save on construction and maintenance costs, almost uniformly included a candy counter in their designs, the precursor to today’s modern concession stand. After the Great Depression, box-office receipts continued to rise and the industry profited handsomely, fueled by the postwar economic boom. Movie attendance reached its peak in 1946 when, incredibly, more than half of all Americans went to the movies each week.

NEW CHOICES But from 1946 onward, the cinema industry no longer enjoyed the role of the disruptor; it became the disrupted. In the 1950s, televisions began to appear in living rooms across America. This new technology prompted many to predict the demise of the cinema industry. But that was not to be.

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The industry adapted and survived. Theatre operators began selling more types of candies like Milk Duds, Jujubes and Raisinets in addition to popcorn and soda, and they began showing movies in full, glorious color. Coupled with the increasing prevalence of air-conditioned auditoriums, these upgrades to the moviegoing experience continued to draw Americans out of their houses and down to the local cinema. The next disruption came in the 1960s in form of color TV. Again, pundits predicted the end of cinema. Again, they were wrong. In 1963, about the same time that color televisions were hitting the market, Stan Durwood of American Multi-Cinema built the first multiple-screen theatre in Kansas City, Missouri. With the introduction of multi-screen cinemas, moviegoers weren’t limited to just one title; they had a choice–and they loved it. Over the next decade, multiplexes became the norm and the number of screens in the United States exploded.

THE STATION CONCEPT The introduction of the multiplex impacted not only auditorium design but lobby design as well. Concession stands, which were feeling the burden of increased throughput, variety and volume, grew larger and more complex, featuring greater inventory capacity and offering a fuller range of menu items like pretzels, nachos, pizza, hot dogs and ice cream. Even so, they were unable to keep pace with the increased demand generated by ever-larger theatres, reaching a breaking point in the early 1970s which resulted in long lines and frustrated patrons. Stan Durwood described the problem succinctly: “We would watch helplessly as the last few people in line simply gave up and walked away, their money still in their pockets. It was killing us. We knew we had to do something.” My father, Bill Proctor, founded Proctor Companies in 1972 to address this issue. He believed he could apply the principles of the fast-food industry to theatre concession stands to increase efficiency and decrease wait times. The result, created in

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MODERN CONCESSION STANDS FEATURE GREATER INVENTORY AND RANGE OF MENU ITEMS. conjunction with AMC Theatres, was the Station Concept. In the Station Concept, attendants have access to every menu item in a three-step triangle. Station overlap is reduced to minimize cross-traffic and space conflict. High-volume prep equipment–popcorn poppers, ovens and refrigeration units– keep products ready and available. And self-serve aisle dividers enable customers to shop while in line. The Station Concept increased sales, decreased wait times, and changed concession stand design forever.

IN-THEATRE DINING Then, beginning in the mid 1980s, a series of new disruptions hit the industry. First came videotapes, then video-rental outlets, DVDs, pay-per-view, streaming services, and shorter release windows. In response, In-Theatre Dining (ID) was born. While it would be an exaggeration to say that In-Theatre Dining has saved the industry, it certainly has been vital in keeping it relevant and healthy. Entering the scene around the beginning of this century, InTheatre Dining has significantly enhanced the moviegoing experience, capturing dollars that would have otherwise gone to local bars and restaurants. And the impact on theatre design has been huge. In a recent conversion of an aging

multiplex to an ID concept cinema, the theatre operator removed 1,100 of his original 2,000 seats. The remaining seats were converted to large, comfortable, fully featured recliners, and vertical spacing was increased to maintain unbroken lines of sight over servers delivering food and drink. Proctor Companies converted one entire auditorium into kitchen space, and back-room corridors were enlarged to accommodate heavier server traffic. Digital communication systems relayed order information instantly and tracked prep and delivery times. Remarkably, even with a 55% reduction in seating capacity, revenues are up–way up. In-Theatre Dining is here to stay. What does the future hold? I can’t say for sure, but I do know one thing: The cinema industry will adapt. It will reimagine itself. And it will find compelling new ways to bring customers in the door. After all, that’s what it’s been doing for the last 120 years. Bruce Proctor is president of Proctor Companies, which designs and builds food and beverage venues for movie theatres around the world. He is certified as an executive concession manager by the National Association of Concessionaires and still loves going to the movies. ш

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Successful Strategies

by Mike Cummings Principal, TK Architects

PREMIUM AUDITORIUMS AND ENHANCED DINING FORGE A NEW ERA FOR MOVIE COMPLEXES

s I meet with exhibitors from outside of the U.S., they typically ask what is new in the U.S.

cinema markets (or some variation of that question). What they want to know is what U.S. exhibitors are doing in their new facilities. The answer varies slightly based on the country, location and culture. First, I point out that several exhibitors

are developing facilities more like an entertainment center. These normally include a significant cinema component; they are cinema people after all. The facilities will normally include bowling, a games arcade, a restaurant and bar/lounge. Most interna-

AMC OUTLINES THEIR THREE-PRONGED STRATEGY IN THEIR INVESTOR PRESENTATION.

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MARCUS THEATRES HAS FIVE AUDITORIUM TYPES AND THREE F & B CONCEPTS tional markets are not keenly interested in this type of development. Next, I mention that the cinema complexes of today are much different than those of a decade ago. While exhibitors do have different approaches and solutions, there are common themes focusing on three common factors: Ϣ Market-adaptive approach Ϣ Luxury and premium auditoriums Ϣ Enhanced food and beverage service To illustrate this point, I reviewed information from the large publicly traded exhibitors in the U.S. In the interest of full disclosure, some of the exhibitors are our clients, and some are not. All of the information presented is taken from investor presentations and quarterly

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investor conferences and is available on their public websites. Let’s look at what they are doing.

MARKET-ADAPTIVE APPROACH The “one size fits all” prototypical approach of the 1990s is over. Exhibitors are carefully evaluating each location and deciding the appropriate type of facility to build or create through renovation. For example, AMC described a threepronged strategy in their 2015 Second Quarter Investor Presentation (see illustration, at left). Marcus Theatres has created a total of five different auditorium types and three food and beverage concepts that are

increasing financial performance. Tim Warner’s comments in the Cinemark Second Quarter 2015 conference call also reinforce this approach: “Elaborating further on our enhanced concepts, we continue our market-adaptive approach to the expansion of VIP and in-theater dining concepts, as well as repositioning of select underutilized theaters with reclining seats. We are encouraged by the exceptional results generated by these enhanced concepts, and remain opportunistic about further expansion on a global basis. “Cinemark, I think, has been the leader throughout the industry and throughout the globe in this area. We also are focused on recliners and repositioning some of our underutilized theaters. It’s more

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market-adaptive, we don’t necessarily think that there is one solution that’s going to work everywhere, It’s the same with our Cinemark Bistro. We have some very successful bistros and food concepts.”

LUXURY AND PREMIUM AUDITORIUMS Premium-large-format (PLF) theatres have been performing very strongly for the last few years and that trend seems likely to continue. Tim Warner’s comments in the Cinemark Second Quarter 2015 conference call spoke specifically about XD: “Shifting attention to our XD strategy, we continue to experience great success and remain the number-one private-label premium large format in the world, with 193 screens globally. We consistently generate a strong premium percentage of box office,

and the second quarter was no exception. Nearly 34% of our worldwide second-quarter box office was generated from premium formats, including XD and 3D.” Gerry Lopez indicated a similar result during the AMC Second Quarter Conference Call: The truth is…we think the future involves IMAX. We’ve got 150 of them out there and are always looking for an opportunity to add more. And Dolby Cinema…when fully deployed over the next 10 years, we are expecting 100. So this is not an either-or to us, it’s an end game. It’s IMAX and Dolby Cinema combining to deliver the greatest value for our shareholders.” Recliner-mania is sweeping the U.S. theatre market right now and everyone seems to be on board. AMC clearly started the trend and seems to be about halfway

through their planned re-seat strategy of converting 35% of their screens. Regal is very quickly converting many of their locations to recliner seating, as they noted in their 2015 Second Quarter Conference Call: “As we look ahead into 2016 and 2017, we have a long runway of opportunity, and ultimately expect to outfit at least 2,000 screens with luxury seating.” Marcus is also focusing heavily on recliners and has converted 30% of its screens to Dream Loungers. And it does not stop there. Full in-theatre dining auditoriums are also a popular amenity and combine luxury auditoriums with enhanced food and beverage service. AMC expects nine percent of their screens to be dine-in theatres. Marcus’ concept is called Big Screen Bistro, while Cinemark’s concept is named Movie Bistro.

CINEMARK HAS ESTABLISHED FOUR DISTINCTIVE BRANDS. 36

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REGAL OUTLINES ITS INVESTMENTS SINCE 2012; BELOW, THE MACGUFFINS F & B OPTION

ENHANCED FOOD AND BEVERAGE SERVICE In addition to the combination of in-theatre dining, exhibitors are utilizing multiple food and beverage concepts. Regal is focusing heavily on upgrading the food and beverage choices for their customers. Their second-quarter investor presentation indicated they have enhanced food menus currently at 164 locations and alcohol programs at 88 locations. During the conference call, CEO Amy Miles indicated their expectations to end 2015 with 185 theatres serving the enhanced menu and 135 sites with some type of alcoholic beverage service. Marcus offers two signature food and beverage concepts beyond the traditional concession stand: Take 5 and Zaffiro’s Express. AMC is focusing on three enhanced F&B options: F&B Kiosks, Marketplace and MacGuffins. As Gerry

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Lopez noted in the AMC Second Quarter Conference Call, “The single most impactful initiatives from a financial perspective are the MacGuffins or loungers, the bars. We’re up to 108 as of the end of June and they are adding about $0.37 per patron when we put them into a building. $0.28 of the $0.37 is gross profit. So quite the successful run... It’s about a third of the fleet, a little less than that.” While it might be natural to think that exhibitors are achieving better financial performance because of the great box office in 2015, they were achieving significantly better performance during 2014 using these strategies (a down year at the box office). If you drill down into the luxury and premium auditoriums and enhanced food and beverage sections

above, you will notice that exhibitors are creating unique brands for each of the concepts they are utilizing. This allows them to build customer awareness and appreciation, and at the same time create shareholder value. Recliner-mania is definitely reinventing the U.S. cinema market. From my perspective, there are much more meaningful and broader underlying strategies that are driving this trend. Since the primary strategy is a market-adaptive approach, there are going to be new innovations and combinations to come.

REFERENCES: AMC, A Wanda Group Company, Goldman Sachs 24th Annual Communacopia Conference, Sept. 16, 2015. Cinemark Investor Presentation, Q2 2015. Regal Entertainment Group Investor Presentation, Fiscal Second Quarter 2015. The Marcus Corporation, Investor Presentation, September 2015. Thomson Reuters Streetevents Transcript, Second Quarter, Regal Entertainment, July 30, 2015.

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gn De si an d ru ct io n Co ns t by Andreas Fuchs

‘C

onsumer demand for more exciting and engaging entertainment experiences is generating more growth.” Mike Voegtle, partner at 5G Studio Collaborative (www.5gstudio.com), names the reason behind the manifold changes that movie theatres have been going through of late. Earlier this year, 5G Studio Collaborative set up a division dedicated exclusively to entertainment design and architectural “programming” of spaces in sports, gaming—and cinema, of course. In addition to Voegtle, who has guided the firm’s work for leading chains during eight of the last ten years since its founding, the new Entertainment Studio counts on veteran architect Rick Walker as division director. “We are really trying to make places where people want to be,” Walker says. He draws a line to “back in the day” when films were the main attraction and theatre design was all about getting guests in and out of the auditoriums efficiently. “Now we are trying to attract people with amenities besides the movies. The films are still there, of course, but there are other avenues of attracting people.” Based in Dallas, Texas–5G Studio also has offices in Atlanta, Georgia; Miami, Florida; and Jakarta, Indonesia–Walker brings three decades of experience in theatrical exhibition, including many years for Cinemark.Voegtle used to work for Walker, in fact. “Rick was my boss at a previous firm

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STUDIO COLLABORATIVE COUNTS DOWN TRENDS IN ENTERTAINMENT DESIGN

High Five that was doing a lot of traditional cinema design,” he says about learning “the ins and outs of how to build a movie theatre” some 20 to 25 years ago. That experience,Voegtle further notes, provided the basis when he started to draw up theatre plans at his own company back in 2007. “Cinema eateries were just starting to pick up traction specifically in the Southwest,” he recalls. “They were really big in Dallas and I worked on projects for folks like Movie Tavern, Studio Movie Grill and Alamo Drafthouse.” After Voegtle merged his company with 5G Studio, “we started to talk about how to expand that overall entertainment experience” at the movie theatre. “Having Rick bring his experience to our group really opened many doors for us to expand on that experience and really helped us grow…the entertainment sector at 5G Studio.” In line with the firm’s name, Film Journal International takes the occasion of November’s special focus on Design, Construction and Lobbies to have Voegtle and Walker review five key trends that are shaping the filmgoing experience. Not surprisingly, given our own track record, this publication has reported on one and all many times before.

CUISINE, CRAFT BEERS & COCKTAILS Beginning with “Dinner at the Movies” seems appropriate—not only because the concept of in-theatre dining has filled our magazine’s menu with many delicious recipes over the years, but also because

Mike Voegtle was in on the development right from the get-go. “We understand how cinema eateries work architecturally,” he assures. “How the food and beverage service works, how the service inside the auditoriums functions. There are totally different models of how to do this and we understand those very well.” Walker adds that the experience is no longer about the food during the movie alone. “Why not have a restaurant [as] part of this deal?” he reports many exhibitors as asking. “After all, we have food you can eat in the dark and then there are items you might not want to eat in the dark that we could serve on the other side.” Exhibitors are dedicating more and more space, time and resources to full-service restaurants with bars and lounges complementing the lineup, Walker says. “We are really trying to create a place with a lot of warmth and the type of offering that is a bit more geared towards adults, by comparison to the kinds of theatres in the past which were really more aimed at the teenage crowds.” Obviously the concept of theatre dining has been expanding, and we are not just talking about footprint here, but also about menus and moviegoer palates. “And because of that, the design palette has changed as well” towards what Voegtle calls more of a hospitality product. “Much of the new interiors for theatres are coming directly out of our Interior Design Studio,” he says, naming another advantage that 5G has to offer. The firm also does resorts and hospitality venues, as well as public and residential,

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commercial and lifestyle developments. “It is really that particular team and that experience, and the talent that we have, which is helping shape the spaces that we are designing.” For Voegtle, “being able to take that traditional theatre experience that Rick and I have along with 5G Studio’s hospitality and restaurant experience provides a product to our clients that is very unique.”

LOBBIES & LOUNGES The lobby is a great place to show uniqueness, Voegtle agrees. “Traditionally, movie-theatre lobbies were sized to accommodate people waiting to get inside the auditoriums, as well as standing in line for concessions. As more and more exhibitors are adopting the reserved-seating model, less lobby space is dedicated to people actually waiting in line. More food offerings in the auditoriums require less of the traditional concession stand that you would normally see,” he continues. “So the theatre lobby

uses are much different. Those spaces are becoming lounges and places that people visit and want to hang out in.” Voegtle points to higher-end bars that offer craft beers and cocktails. “People go there just for a night out on the town that sometimes does not even involve seeing a movie.” In his view, that represents “the main difference in the approach that we take now. This new lobby is less geared towards the pre-functionality of the movie itself. Instead, more attention is paid to how it can operate as a standalone revenue-generating space for the exhibitor.” Overall ease of flow remains an integral part of that view, Walker concurs. “We used to be really careful making sure that people exiting the shows were not getting across the lines of people trying to get inside. Nowadays, we are purposefully redesigning spaces to funnel everyone back towards the lobby, hopefully through a gaming space or entertainment center, and back to the bar area. Our goal as designers and architects is

to make all offers visible and have them be integral to that lobby space itself.” That goal applies to both new construction and adapting existing spaces.

RISING ROOF LINES & RECLINING SEATS “On the retrofits versus new builds,” Voegtle and the 5G Studio team “are seeing a split in the market, depending on location and the area.” Definitely on the rise are retrofits and adaptive reuse of existing retail, such as vacant department and grocery stores that offer the “necessary ceiling heights that make them good candidates for theatre conversions.” As an architect and designer, “a new build obviously allows us much more flexibility,” he contends. “But the retrofits are interesting too because we have to get extremely creative. I believe that the upfront program aspect of these spaces is one of the things that our group has been really good at–how to be utilizing that existing space in a way to maximize revenue

MIKE VOEGTLE, RICK WALKER AND GEORGIA THEATRE CO.’S BEECHWOOD CINEMA IN ATHENS, GEORGIA.

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for our clients.” Voegtle believes the firm’s “value proposition also includes partnering with our exhibitors and to help them build their new centers in the most economical way possible.” In each case, there are unique sets of challenges. “Working around an existing structure and raising roof areas where applicable and re-facing buildings on the outside are actually more challenging than a new build where we can do anything we want and all that we think is right.” Nonetheless, we will be seeing more retrofits, Walker and Voegtle foresee, “especially as we are seeing recliners being installed in theatres. They lose at least half the seats and more often upwards of 60%. These smaller-capacity auditoriums help us in retrofits because these department-store type facilities usually do not have the space for the large auditoriums and giant screens.” Again, a major change can be noted. Voegtle reminds our readers that theatres

are no longer designed for maximum capacity and for fitting in as many people per square foot/meter as possible. “We have about half a dozen or more conversion projects on our drawing boards that involve taking out existing seating, reworking stadium rakes, and installing extra-wide and reclining lounger chairs.” It is about offering guests a better experience. “People can go anywhere to watch movies,” he knows. “So exhibitors want to make sure that what they provide is more appealing than what the competition offers.” The proof is in the profit pudding, Walker assures. “Theatres are charging the same price as they charged before. They are packing their auditoriums and they are actually making more money even though they have reduced the actual seat count.” This no longer represents an attempt at creating a competitive niche in the marketplace, both architects feel. “It started to feel like the norm,” Voegtle believes.

“Everybody understands that in order to remain competitive, you’ve got to at least meet that standard now.” “It is a necessity,” Walker agrees, “because other exhibitors are also trying to adapt in order to equalize the market…just to keep up. Guests start to expect that type of experience rather than the same old go-sit-in-the-chairand-eat-popcorn way again.” He cannot “remember the last time we have done just a traditional auditorium with a 22/23-inch [58 cm] fixed seat, without some other offering to enhance that experience.”

MOVIE SCREENS & MEZZANINES Enhancing picture sizes remains a big part of the upmarket mix. Exhibitors continue to “maximize their auditorium viewing screens,” Voegtle confirms. “Sometimes more for perception maybe than in reality,” he has observed. “We are seeing many more floor-to-ceiling and wall-to-wall screens,

THE MOVIEHOUSE & EATERY IN AUSTIN, TEXAS.

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BOWLING AT “THE SPOT” IN SAN MARCOS, TEXAS. even though the image…may not necessarily fill the entire surface. But when moviegoers walk into an auditorium seeing that large screen, they are wowed.” Presentation format matters, especially those that give “everybody an edge up on 3D capabilities on the big releases like Star Wars and similar types of product where people want to see it on the biggest screen possible.” With the advent of digital, it also became possible to place the projector inside the auditorium. “Seven, eight years ago, there was a push to eliminate the idea of a traditional mezzanine.” Voegtle feels some are doing this better than others. “I think many exhibitors have concerns about moving away from the projection mezzanine. And, indeed, it does make operations a heck of a lot easier when you have one, even with digital.” Walker believes “we have pushed away the myth that if you do not build the mezzanine, your building is going to be cheaper… After all, that mezzanine not only is a place to put your equipment but the place to run all of the infrastructure. When a theatre does not have

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that…you have to get really creative about where everything goes, how to run it across the entire building.You end up spending a lot of money solving problems that you did not have when there was a mezzanine. So, I just do not believe in the myth that you save money by not building a projection mezzanine, because you spend it somewhere else.” Going boothless helps, however, during the conversions of existing spaces.

EVOLVING ENTERTAINMENT One such conversion is at the heart of a current project by the 5G Entertainment Studio team. And it covers the final of our five trends. “We have several folks on board that have done quite a few entertainment centers,” Voegtle elaborates. “Traditional movie theatres are expanding their offering to include attractions like bowling, gaming, arcade games. We also have companies that want to expand on their dinner-and-a-movie concept with ancillary activities.” The common goal for all is “building a better box for the

customer from an experience standpoint.” Walker says “The Spot” in San Marcos, Texas, does just that: hitting the spot. “While it has a smaller movie section of six auditoriums that probably seat about 50 people each, the venue does come with eight lanes of bowling. Everything looks more like a nightclub with a large bar, food service and several event rooms that guests can rent–all in 34,000-square-foot [3,160 sq. m] conversion of a former department store.” The project was developed by Mitchell Roberts of EVO Entertainment, whose evolutionary ideas were just featured in our September 2015 issue. “He has a vision of expanding this type of venue and taking them more mainstream,” Walker attests. “Entertainment and cinema design is continually evolving as leisure destinations that span generations,” Walker concludes. Entertainment companies–and that is exactly what exhibitors have always been–are “always searching for innovative and new ways to reach and retain their customers, among all age demographics.” ш

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gn De si an d ru ct io n Co ns t

s competition between movie theatres heats up, operators are doing whatever they can to attract customers and differentiate themselves from the competition. In the past, operators lured customers with larger screens and enhanced projection and sound systems. But enhanced sound and projection has become old news, as more and more theatres have made the switch to digital and the difference in picture quality has become indistinguishable.

MOVIE THEATRES ARE INCORPORATING BREWERIES TO ATTRACT NEW PATRONS

Drink Up! The latest trend has seen operators trading more seats for fewer, more comfortable recliner seats. Operators have noticed that the decrease in the number of seats hasn’t had an effect on the bottom line and, if anything, the auditoriums have become packed with patrons clamoring for a spot in the theatres with the new luxurious seats— even making reservations in some cases. But the cinema industry isn’t content with just offering a more comfortable seat and a quality sensory experience; they are

aggressively looking to enhance their offerings. Dine-in theatres are the next logical step to up the ante, with better food than the typical nachos and pretzel bites. We’re talking about food that comes on a plate and you eat with a knife and a fork. It only makes sense that a delicious brew would accompany the meal, and theatre chains are finally tapping into the “dinner and a movie” moniker and becoming a one-stop shop. “Alcohol is a lucrative business,” says Paul Georges,

ONE OF THE AUDITORIUMS IN THE FLIX BREWHOUSE IN THE MERLE HAY MALL IN DES MOINES, IOWA. 42

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THE CAFÉ AND BREW VATS AT FLIX BREWHOUSE. a principal in the architecture firm JKRP Architects, “it’s only natural that operators are starting to offer alcohol to their patrons within the theatre.” Concessions have always been the main income generator for theatre owners. The film used to be what attracted people to theatres and the concessions would make the money, but now with DVR, On-Demand and high-definition flat-screen televisions, operators have a lot more competition. Not only are they competing with the theatre a few miles down the road, they are competing with living rooms across the country. The experience in the theatre has to be different. “We’ve actually been commissioned to design a few theatres that have full brewery functions and full-service bars, where white-gloved waiters and waitresses serve your meal at your seat in the auditorium. It’s really a unique experience,” Georges comments. But along with the bar and brewery comes a host of other considerations that are not your typical

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movie experience. “Not only do you have to make sure the theatre functions smoothly getting patrons in and out effectively, now you have to consider that someone might want to stay and linger a little longer. And how do you serve people while they are watching the film without disrupting other patrons? It’s not an easy task,” says Georges. “Not to mention the brewery aspect. How do you show off the brewery tuns so they look good to patrons but still function for the needs of the brewmaster? It’s still a very industrial and sensitive operation and needs to be just right.” Another very important consideration when designing a venue that not only shows films but also serves alcohol is the restrictions that may come into effect with liquor licenses. Many operators planning to open a theatre/restaurant forget that there may be design considerations in addition to the licensing requirements. “The rules differ from municipality to municipality, but some only permit alcohol consumption in certain zones within the space,” says Bob

McCall, another partner at JKRP Architects. “We get to be a little more creative in how we parse the spaces, either with drink rails or flooring and ceiling material changes to better define the drinking areas. One thing you don’t want to do is make the patron feel they can only drink in a certain place or that they have to go to the drinking room that feels like the smoking section. It should feel as much like a normal restaurant as possible.” The appeal of this type of venue for both the patron and the operator is that it functions as more than just a place to see a movie. The operator has the ability to keep the patron in the building longer and therefore has more opportunities to make sales on food and drinks, in addition to getting the casual diner who just wants to grab a drink and some appetizers without having to see the movie. The patron benefits with a more luxurious experience, and can now conveniently get a high-quality meal and a high-quality drink delivered to them right in the theatre. ш

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gn De si an d ru ct io n Co ns t

The Rise of Premium Large Format

by Charlotte Jones, Principal Analyst, Cinema IHS Technology

remium large format (PLF) is one of the fastest-growing and most active areas of cinema exhibition, with significant potential to grow in size over the next ten years. The business environment for PLF cinema is also becoming increasingly competitive amid a startling array of brands and technologies. The total digital premium large format (PLF) cinema market reached a total of 1,623 screens worldwide at the end of 2014, an increase of 15.8% from 1,401 just six months earlier. This total includes both the increasing array of exhibitor-developed and branded PLF screens plus a now-growing proliferation of global technology brands, led by the long-established large-format brand IMAX. Exhibitor-branded PLF was one of the fastest-growing segments, rising 22.3% to finish 2014 at 926, up from 757 screens as of mid-2014. Of the 169 net new exhibitor PLF screens worldwide, the largest net gain can be attributed to Asia-Pacific (78 screens) and Western Europe (38), which actually recorded more net additions than North America (31), albeit from a lower base. In Western Europe, exhibitor PLF screens more than doubled by the end of

INVESTING IN THE NEXT GENERATION OF CINEMA EXHIBITION

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2014, driven by new screen openings in the major Euro territories. The U.K. was one of the fastest-growing markets, with PLF screens doubling over the six-month period from 11 to 22, as all major exhibitors increased their provision of PLF screens, led by Vue Entertainment with 12 VueXtreme screens. The U.K. is now one of only three markets (alongside Australia and North America) where all top five circuits have their own PLF offer. Pan-European operator Kinepolis also confirmed its reputation as an innovator, launching Laser Ultra, the first exclusively laser-based PLF brand by a circuit, combining laser projection from Barco and Dolby Atmos immersive sound. In contrast, Central and Eastern Europe remains the most underpenetrated region for exhibitor PLF. Global brand PLFs including IMAX as well as RealD’s LUXE umbrella brand account for the vast majority of PLF screens. North America, the largest market for exhibitor PLF screens, finished 2014 with 408 screens. Although growth has steadied, activity is still dominated by the major circuits including Regal Entertainment’s RPX brand and Cinemark’s XD screens. China remains the second-largest market for PLF screens globally, with a combined 124 screens derived from three PLF brands: China Film Giant Screen (CFGS, originally known as DMax, with 73 screens), Poly Film’s

Polymax (14 screens) and Wanda X Land (37 screens) with data up to the end of 2014. The market there is growing rapidly, up from 82 screens as of H1 2014. CFGS operates as a local Chinese PLF brand with installations across multiple circuits, but has yet to classify as a truly international PLF brand. There are now a total of 81 individual circuits worldwide (not including multiple brands under cross-territory ownership) with active PLF screens, up from 72 just six months prior.

GLOBAL TECHNOLOGY

BRANDS PROLIFERATE Competition in the globally branded PLF sector has intensified following the launch of Dolby Cinema in late 2014, a new premium concept that combines Dolby proprietary technologies (and a deal with Christie for laser-illuminated projectors) for image quality (with HDR), immersive sound and intrinsic design features. Barco Escape is also a new contender in this space, based on a novel panoramic screen format (similar to CJ CGV’s Screen X) that requires specially prepared content for the three-screen configuration (one large screen at the front and two panels at the sides). This fits into the wider PLF category based on its superior technology attributes, an associated upcharge and experiential nature of the screen.

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NORTH AMERICA, THE LARGEST MARKET FOR EXHIBITOR PLF, FINISHED 2014 WITH 408 SCREENS. CJ CGV also launched an industry-wide proposition for its Screen X technology, initially focusing on China and the U.S. (where it also has screens). There were 75 screens in 44 sites with Screen X installed in Korea at the end of 2014. RealD Luxe, established in 2013 as a global umbrella brand for the PLF experience, had a total of six screens across Russia and Bulgaria, plus a number scheduled to open in China later in 2015, for a total of around 30 screens under contract. Although successful PLF includes a mix of technology, marketing and service, the technology element is a key battleground in this space, with both IMAX and Dolby launching laser-based projection systems (in conjunction with Barco and Christie, respectively). Dolby will therefore be the first exclusively laser-based platform, resetting the bar for the PLF sector in general. Together, the non-IMAX and non-exhibitor global PLF screens accounted for just 2.6% of screens in the wider global PLF category, but this share is likely to increase significantly following the signing of a major 100-screen (over ten years) deal between Dolby and AMC Entertainment in the USA. The new screens will be branded Dolby Cinema at AMC Prime, setting up a new era of collaboration in branding and design features.

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The maximum number of parallel PLF brands operating in a single site has traditionally been two (exhibitor PLF brand and IMAX), although with scope to potentially broaden this with multiple configurations of brands throughout a circuit as the sectorâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s segmentation grows. For example, Cinemark has Barco Escape screens either in combination with IMAX or its own private-label XD screen, but not all three side-by-side. Globally, PLF screens accounted for just 2.3% of the total allocation of digital 3D screens worldwide (67,226) as of Q1 2015. However, with the sheer number of new screens and brands operating, it is clear this is now a core focus for exhibitors who are looking to strategically invest in the next generation of cinema exhibition with a view to retaining audiences but also to remain relevant amid parallel improvements in the home-entertainment sector such as 4K, UHD and also HDR. This raises a number of strategic questions regarding the opportunity for PLF screens in terms of potential footprint and pattern of incremental revenue growth, as well as the impact this niche now has on the viability of non-premium cinema in general. The cost of a PLF screen in a new-build venue (around $125,000) equates to a cost saving of at least three times compared to

a retrofit in an existing venue ($500,000 to $660,000). Therefore, the ongoing process of opening new screens in demand areas and closing underperforming venues has a strong influence on prospective PLF growth. One of the primary attributes of PLF is a larger screen, typically over 15 meters, although Dolby has stipulated that screen size is not a factor. Early anecdotal evidence suggests around three to five percent of global screens fall into this larger category of 15 meters-plus, which would give a total addressable market of 7,000 screens out of a global total screen footprint of 141,457 at year-end 2014. This is in addition to net screen growth factoring in a greater cost advantage to installing PLF screens in a new build. In general, cinema is moving towards an array of premium tiers and experiences based on a superior technology proposition, in combination with service, marketing and branding elements as well as improving the overall customer experience. Nonetheless, the superior attributes of PLF screens and the accompanying technology upgrades are increasingly seen by exhibitors as a primary driver of revenues. Investment in next-generation technology and experiences is seen as pivotal in regards to remaining both competitive and relevant in the wider entertainment mix. Ń&#x2C6;

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gn De si an d ru ct io n Co ns t by Andreas Fuchs

‘H

ere at Dolby, we love the cinema experience and we do believe that Dolby Cinema is going to elevate the bar.” As executive creative director for Dolby Laboratories, Vince Voron wants to see “the industry

VINCE VORON RAISES DESIGN BAR FOR DOLBY CINEMA

‘A Magnificent House’ improving not just from a sensory perspective, but to also to take the measure of all the technologies available in making those experiences as compelling as possible.” Voron joined Dolby in the summer of 2013 after two decades at Apple and seven years at Coca-Cola North America. As senior design manager on the industrial-

design team, he “was involved with all of Apple’s products up to the iPhone. In Atlanta, I was working on a number of things from industrial design to packaging to helping with the launch of Coca-Cola Freestyle. I am having a blast at Dolby because we are truly at the intersection of entertainment, happiness, technology, and a lot of other

things that I dabbled with at both Apple and Coca-Cola.” When the happy technologist-designer came to San Francisco, we wondered, was Dolby already working on Dolby Cinema or was his expertise mainly sought for product look and design? “Well, there were a few things happening,” he confirms. “It was at an inflection point where Dolby was leveraging many of their technologies and starting to execute them in a consumer enterprise fashion.” Voron and the Dolby team were “heavily into the design of our Dolby Voice Conference Phone that launched in 2014, as well as amplifying our Dolby Atmos brand, not just across cinemas but also for our home products… And Dolby Cinema and our Dolby Vision platforms were just commencing.” Voron gives credit to Eight Inc. for helping them “develop the vision or manifesto in bringing these ideas to life.” The design agency and architecture firm developed the first Apple Stores, making Eight Inc. “maybe one of our core partners over the last few

years,” he opines. The fact that “Dolby was looking to many different industries and experts over the last few years is a testimony to how serious they are in investing in these new platforms.” Voron credits Dolby for “looking at unusual or non-traditional partners to help design a cinema. And the fact that they took to a leader with the firm who…reinvented retail,” should be taken as further proof: At Dolby and with Dolby Cinema, “we are reinventing the cinema experience through design, through architecture and technology.” To accomplish that task, Dolby has a dedicated in-house department to guide and assist its exhibitor partners through the entire process. “We set up a multifunctional creative team that resides within the marketing division,” Voron explains. “One of my departments is design and within that organization we have architects, graphic designers, industrial designers and software interface designers.” And that same team has been growing over the last two years. One of the architects is “fo-

cused on conceptualization and execution of the design elements for all of our partners,” Voron says. “And then we have one that is closely related to the construction phase and the business side.” For both new construction and developing retrofit solutions, Dolby’s architects and designers collaborate closely with their counterparts in exhibition. “We developed very specific design guidelines on all of these various elements in order to bring them to life. And we have created a design archetype lab,” he says, citing another instance of learning from the best. “When they were designing the very first Apple retail stores, they invested in a lifelike prototype. At Dolby, too, we actually built a 90-seat, scaled-down replica of the Dolby Cinema auditorium before we introduced the concept and before scaling it commercially.” Speaking of scaled down and/or scaling up, one of those exhibition partners–AMC Entertainment–is taking a huge step in retrofitting and upgrading their very own

DOLBY CINEMA AT AMC PRIME AUDITORIUM

AMC Prime experience. Voron is pleased to be working with two experts there who are leading the architectural construction part and “the brand and consumer experience side.” Whereas Dolby Cinema @ AMC Prime does not involve the “100 percent execution of our design archetype” in the same way as new construction does, exemplified by the world’s first Dolby Cinema at JT Eindhoven in The Netherlands (http://bit.ly/fji0715jteindhoven), the process remains about customization. “With AMC we have a great opportunity to leverage on their existing AMC Prime experience as a Premium Large Format application.” Within the existing footprint, and in addition to Dolby Atmos as a fully deployed key ingredient, those auditoriums are indeed primed for adding Dolby Vision

image-enhancement technologies. “Modifying the portals has been an interesting process for us,” Voron says about the signature entrance treatment to the Dolby Cinema and adding “the audiovisual pathway” leading to the experience. “At AMC Burbank and the AMC Empire in New York City, we have added considerable elements…generating opportunity for serendipity to take place. We took a very simple idea of what was going to be just an 8 x 10 inch [20 x 25 cm] digital flat display and we turned this into a 15-meter [50-foot] curved wall patented design of sensory path finding.” Despite all the many auditorium entrances in your (not so) average megaplex, “you can’t help but be drawn into our audiovisual pathways.” Voron provides additional feedback

from Cinesa La Maquinista in Barcelona, Spain (www.cinesa.es/Peliculas/Dolby). “On one side of the hallway where you come through the lobby, guests encounter very expensive, high-end digital displays that advertise upcoming movies. On the right-hand side is our audiovisual pathway and that received all the attention as people are coming into the theatre.” He calls this a compelling example that makes Dolby’s case. “They were drawn to the expansiveness of the pathway and the allure in it. They wondered what was going on in that particular area.” Technically. this experience is created by “a series of short-throw projectors that have a low-key profile. They allow us to design that audiovisual pathway to feel like you are entering into the setting of the

INSIDE DOLBY CINEMA: AMC BURBANK OFFERS A PRIME PRESENTATION BY BILL MEAD

his past April at CinemaCon, Dolby Labs surprised the industry by demonstrating their all-encompassing new format, Dolby Cinema. Dolby Cinema is an optimized combination of Dolby Atmos immersive sound with improved image using a laser-powered projector specially developed by Dolby with projector manufacturer Christie incorporating Dolby Vision, Dolby’s High Dynamic Range (HDR) imaging technology. In addition, Dolby Cinema incorporates the auditorium itself into the design to put the patrons in the best possible environment for the ultimate cinema experience. Shortly following Dolby’s announcement, AMC Theatres and Dolby announced plans to add Dolby Cinema to its own branded premium large format initiative, AMC Prime. AMC and Dolby announced that initial installations would begin immediately, with plans to install up to 100 AMC Prime locations with Dolby Cinema by 2024. On Oct. 5, Dolby and AMC held an afternoon demonstration of their latest installation at the AMC Burbank 16 to give Los Angeles industry media an update on AMC’s progress. Hosting the event was Doug Darrow, Dolby’s senior VP for cinema, and John McDonald, AMC’s executive VP for facilities and construction. Entering the auditorium, one is struck immediately by how different it seems from most conventional rooms. Drawing patrons into the auditorium is Dolby Cinema’s signature entrance, a 40-foot curved walkway with the left side wall entirely illuminated with a large glowing image. At first glance, the image appears to be rear-projected, but it is actually from five edge-blended projectors cleverly mounted overhead in the walkway’s ceiling.The audiovisual walkway’s side-wall image itself is subtle but elegant and intended to be themed consistent with the feature showing.

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Once inside the auditorium and settled into one of AMC’s comfortable reclining seats, one is struck immediately by the design of the auditorium’s walls and the cool-looking high-tech red ambient lighting that makes you feel as if you were inside an expensive European sports car. The design of the auditorium and lighting is intended to allow the Dolby Cinema projector to reveal its reportedly 1,000,000-to-1 contrast ratio. The walls have been designed to provide the acoustical characteristics to bring out the best in Dolby Atmos, and are visually subdued with non-reflective matte-gray and black fabrics that prevent

film. We consider this a decompression zone between the theatre lobby and the movie that you are about to see.” When the final adventure of The Hobbit launched at JT Eindhoven, “we featured environmental scenes of the villages,” he elaborates. “It was not for promotional purposes or like, ‘Hey, make sure you buy some popcorn before you go in.’ One of the things we found quite rewarding from a design perspective is that consumers are actually going up and touching the wall. They cannot believe it: ‘Is it real? Am I going to fall?’ For me, testimony of a great design is if you can generate curiosity. When someone caresses something, it shows they are really curious about how it is made.” Voron lauds this physical component as creating “engagement of consumers with the film

and the environment they are about to go into. In my perspective this is a first step to a very innovative and new experience.” Studios and filmmakers are excited about the opportunity, as recent atmospheric scenery for the releases of Tomorrowland and The Martian have demonstrated. Getting material is indeed a priority now; Voron mentions those films rendered in Dolby Vision. “We are providing this as a service and promotion to our studio partners who invest in upgrading their films in Dolby Vision. And they have been very receptive and open to our goal of making the experience an environmental one. In the longer term, we hope that–as they are shooting their films–filmmakers will also think about capturing non-trailer-based segments of the environments for us. So, over

stray light from reflecting back and potentially degrading the image. According to McDonald, AMC has already completed eight AMC Prime installations with Dolby Cinema, and four more are currently under construction. McDonald went on to explain AMC’s decision to incorporate Dolby Cinema, believing it to be the best possible way to show movies, and revealed that AMC plans to have approximately 50 AMC Prime installations with Dolby Cinema in operation by 2017. Stuart Bowling, Dolby’s director of creative relations, went on to introduce the select clips, explaining the aspects of their sound and picture. This particular auditorium had been equipped with a 48-channel surround system, a 60-foot screen with five channels behind, and an industrial-grade subwoofer system to match. Dolby showed their new Dolby Cinema trailer, which in a very

time, what we project on those walls will become even more compelling and more unique.” Looking back, he takes pause. “The design that we ended up with was not the design we initially started with. It was a two-year process of innovation and prototypes at many various levels and with different technologies that led us there.” That audiovisual pathway leading to the auditorium is intentionally curved, he adds. “We set up the entrance in such a way that you cannot see the end of the path when you enter. We want to provoke curiosity and surprise instead. We want to be leading the way, so that the experience keeps building up.” Voron takes the analogy of the arrival at a magnificent house. “It is like walking on a beautifully decorated and CONTINUED ON PAGE 74

few seconds using a split-screen was able to effectively educate and demonstrate the impact of High Dynamic Range content. On the left was a conventional image with approximately 2,000-to-1 contrast, while the right side was Dolby Cinema, approaching a 1,000,000to-1 ratio. With a peak brightness of 31 foot-Lamberts in the white area, the blacks remained a solid black, revealing the subtle shadow details that are normally lost in conventional projection. Dolby went on to show clips from several recent features released in Dolby Cinema, Disney/Pixar’s Inside Out and Disney’s Tomorrowland, demonstrating the ability of Dolby Cinema to show the expanded color range, known in the industry as REC2020. The Dolby Cinema projector, being laser-illuminated, can reproduce colors that are typically outside the spectrum of conventional Xenon-illuminated projectors, adding excitement and emotion to animated content, where filmmakers can push and manipulate colors to new limits. The Dolby Cinema demo is spectacular for what you see, but also what you don’t see as well. The visual walkway eases patrons into the auditorium. During the feature, you see the bright areas sparkle with highlights while the blacks remain deep and rich with shadow detail and, depending on the particular feature being presented, you may see colors you may have never encountered. But you don’t see visually irritating lighting or signs that will degrade the picture quality and ultimately the enjoyment of the movie. AMC Prime, incorporating Dolby Cinema, represents the state-of-the-art in cinematic presentation. Although launched just this year, the development of Dolby Cinema pulls together years of Dolby’s technological accomplishments into one branded format representing the best image, sound and auditorium design that today’s science can produce. As this format continues to grow and expand, we are all going to be enjoying more colorful, brighter and even darker cinema experiences in the coming years. ш

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Lo bb ie s Fo cu so n by Rebecca Pahle

he dinner-and-a-movie concept has really been blowing up over the last few years, as more and more exhibitors have realized the importance of added value as a way to compete with the convenience of Netflix and VOD. Movie Tavern is not one of those exhibitors—by which I mean the Dallasbased chain’s acknowledgement of the peanut butter-and-chocolate combination that is a movie screening and a good meal is nothing new. Founded in 2001 and boasting 171 screens across 21 theatres, Movie Tavern (a division of Southern Theatres) offers a variety of food and beverage options beyond then-normal concession stand fare. As evidenced by its name, the company doesn’t see the food-service component of its operation as an afterthought— “Well, we’re really a movie theatre, but I suppose we should provide some food, too.” Movie Tavern’s desire to provide its customers with the level of quality one would find in a restaurant is of tantamount concern from the top down. To that end, in 2014 the circuit hired Don Watson as their new COO. Watson’s experience is not in the film exhibition arena, but rather in what he calls “eatertainment.” In that area, there are few more equipped to usher Movie Tavern to new heights. “It’s either been music or bowling or surfing or those types of things, and now it happens to

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Movie Tavern Champions Innovation and Expansion

Brewing Up a Good Time! be movies,” he explains. “It’s a lot more challenging, with the number of people and the recurring films so close together… Most people, when they go into the theatre, they don’t have any idea of the complexity behind the curtain, if you will, of what’s going on to successfully serve the food and the drinks to them.” Watson has certainly come on during a dynamic time in Movie Tavern’s evolution. When I spoke to Watson and director of marketing Danny DiGiacomo, they were looking forward to two ribboncutting ceremonies that will take place in December for locations in Nicholasville, Kentucky and Exton, Pennsylvania. This year also sees the arrival of two new locations, in Baton Rouge, Louisiana and Flourtown, Pennsylvania. “We’re also going into New York and probably Florida this coming year,” notes Watson, in addition to opening a location in North Carolina’s Fort Bragg (“our first Movie Tavern on a military institution,” he explains) and a second location in the Atlanta market; one Movie Tavern has already planted its flag in nearby Tucker, Georgia, with two other locations approximately an hour away in Roswell and Suwanee, Georgia. “We’re really looking for underserved markets when it comes to theatres, more specifically underserved when it comes to the cinema-eatery arena,” Watson explains. “We look to see what’s in the area, and if we’re the first comers, then that’s a big plus for us. We also look

more in suburbs than in major metropolitan, downtown-type areas, so that we can keep people in their neighborhoods and they don’t have to travel into the city centers.” That rapid geographical expansion is only one element of Movie Tavern’s growth. Many locations have undergone renovation, be it in-theatre (with, for example, luxury seating), in the kitchen (Watson describes “bringing in new equipment that’s either more ergonomically fit for the kitchen or things that make it faster or easier”) or in the lobby. All the lobby renovations “really consist of bringing that tavern experience into the lobby,” DiGiacomo explains. “So we have a full bar, very open concept. A lot of them seat sixty-plus people. It has that tavern feel. People can utilize the lobby bars completely separately, like if they just want to come in and watch the game on television. The main gist of our renovations and expansions are to really bring that Movie Tavern experience to the lobby as well as to the auditoriums.” And it’s been successful. Watson is “amazed,” not to mention “very happy,” about how the newer “bars and lounge areas and dining rooms are seemingly a destination unto themselves.” Two theatres that underwent renovations over the last several years—Aurora, Colorado, and the Hulen location in Fort Worth, Texas—had a dramatic increase in their earning power as a result. After upgrades—including lobby work and add-

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ing “wider, fatter recliners”—they’re now “the second- and third-highest venues in the company,” behind Movie Tavern’s “juggernaut” Collegeville, Pennsylvania location, built four years ago and “the very first of the new prototype.” Giving these locations an updated look and functionality, Watson argues, “most emphatically had a dramatic effect.” In terms of design, Movie Tavern doesn’t consciously tailor renovated lobbies to whatever state individual theatres call home—there’s not necessarily “regional-type décor or anything [like that],” Watson notes—but “we have a number of different design packages, and we try to essentially match it to the area and the region that we’re going to. We try to mix it up a little bit. And all the [designs] will be determined by the marketing, in some respects, or the size of the bar, the size of the dining area, that sort of thing.” He adds that theatres in Denton, Deerbrook and Bedford, Texas currently have changes waiting in the wings: “We’re either

moving, adding new screens or adding seats and remodels to the lobby.” It’s undoubtedly a busy time for Watson, in addition to the rest of the Movie Tavern team; he describes his biggest challenge as “finding a good, guest-oriented staff and then being able to retain them. It’s a very different animal than your conventional restaurant. If you think about it, if you’ve got a thirteen-screen theater, it’s like having thirteen hidden dining rooms. And the food has to come out very rapidly, in about, say, 20 or 30-minute increments. And to be able to crank out three or four thousand meals in a day in some of our larger theatres when they’re coming that close behind each other, as far as the film schedule, that’s a huge challenge as well.” Given the juggling of tasks Movie Tavern employees are called on to do, training is of critical importance to the company, as is constantly updating menus, “trying to make them more cook-friendly with a good taste profile so we can stay

competitive.” In addition, alcohol is served at all Movie Tavern locations—it’s called Movie Tavern, after all. “I wouldn’t visit them if they didn’t sell alcohol!,” Watson jokes. The core element of Movie Tavern’s success, in Watson’s words, is that “we’re constantly trying to innovate… Taking care of the guest is primary. We fall down occasionally, but as a general rule we do a pretty good job of it.” While Netflix and VOD may be a threat to what he terms “conventional” movie theatres, chains like Movie Tavern have the edge. “If you think about it, [the selling point of Netflix and VOD was that you can] enjoy a movie in the comfort of your home, where you can have your favorite foods and that sort of thing. And now we’re saying, ‘Come on over, sit in a recliner that’s probably better than anything you have in your house, and enjoy a constantly changing menu of popular items along with your favorite beverage.’ We’ve really come full circle, in my mind.” ш

THE LOBBY IN MOVIE TAVERN’S ROSWELL, GEORGIA, LOCATION.

NOVEMBER 2015

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Lo bb ie s Fo cu so n

FJI

surveys the latest initiatives from top manufactures (and one leading circuit) focused on making the theatre lobby an essential location for a great night out. BARCO Premiering at CinemaCon 2014, the “Barco Lobby Experience” was introduced to drive cinema innovation through a collection of captivating visualization technologies that bring the box office, concessions and lobby area to life while monetizing this often overlooked area of the theatre footprint. The Lobby Experience is unique in its ability to engage, entertain, inform and, most

THE BARCO LOBBY EXPERIENCE

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New Innovations Make the Lobby a Vibrant Gathering Place

Enhancing the Experience importantly, motivate customers to purchase advance tickets or order movie merchandise. Mobile phones are a key element in the Lobby Experience equation, enabling realtime interaction between customers and the displays to drive engagement and purchases, as well as extend branding opportunities through social media. Barco’s interactive Lobby Experience offers scalable solutions ranging from a simple digital concession board, to interactive movie posters with POS capabilities, to animated box-office signage, to a networked array of synchronized video walls featuring the latest movie trailers, called “Lobby Domination.” Dynamic lighting solutions and high-impact audio can be added to amplify this visceral, enveloping experience. One important revenue opportunity of the Barco Lobby Experience is to empower unique and compelling advertising opportunities. The solution not only enables exhibitors to broadcast theatre promotions, but also studio content and third-party advertising of food and beverage, consumer products and for other retailers. Major dealer and exhibitor partners such as Bardan Cinema and Showbiz Cinemas are implementing the “Barco Lobby Experience” into locations covering the U.S., Latin America and the Caribbean, with more exhibitors planned to come onboard in the coming year. To learn more about Barco Lobby Experience, contact Shawn Medlin at shawn. medlin@barco.com.

CHRISTIE Christie ® Experiential Networks® (CEN) debuted their latest digital signage installation in the lobby of Michiganbased Emagine Entertainment’s recently opened Emagine Palladium theatre in Birmingham, Michigan. Part of CEN’s nationwide rollout that is on track for 200 theatre lobbies in North America this year, the technology includes three “digital posters,” including interactive Christie FHD651-series 65” LCD panels; a “hero wall” composed of eight 55” screens in a herringbone pattern; and a video strip composed of eight 40” LCD screens. Other theatres scheduled for CEN installations include Missouri’s Wehrenberg Theatres, Frank Theatres, Florida’s EPIC Theatres and Spotlight Theatres in Georgia. “Just as CEN has done with Emagine Palladium, we create a new and exciting digital advertising network within the theatre lobbies of our exhibitor partners as well as expanding upon existing sys-

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ence and encouraged social sharing to help drive ticket sales. Fans could feel part of the team by building their own player card, or by taking a virtual swing at R.A. Dickey’s famous knuckleball. Interactive Media Zones are located at 45 Cineplex theatres across Canada. Software is created by Cineplex Digital Solutions and advertising space is sold by Cineplex Media. (cineplex.com)

PLAYING WITH THE TORONTO BLUE JAYS AT CINEPLEX’S IMZ.

tems to generate incremental revenue,” stated Kevin Romano, Christie’s senior director, Global Media Networks. “We manage all aspects of the network including sales, content creation, interactive programming, deployment, nationwide monitoring, and maintenance.” Christie partnered earlier this year with leading cinema-advertising company Screenvision to coordinate the Screenvision broadcast delivery system with Christie Experiential Networks. “Christie brings to Screenvision the ability to expand our overall advertising solution, by arming us with the means to deliver a whole new experience for advertisers to connect with moviegoers in the lobby, with more exciting, experiential ‘wow factor’ capabilities, as soon as guests step into our exhibition partners’ venues,” said Darryl Schaffer, Screenvision’s executive VP, operations and exhibitor relations. “Consumers can respond to and interact with brands, exhibitor and studio promotions in the theatre lobbies prior to and after experiencing the immersive, pre-show programming in the theatre auditorium,” noted Christie’s Romano. (christiedigital.com) CINEPLEX Earlier this year, Cineplex Entertainment introduced a new digital solution that helps advertisers connect with consumers in a new and exciting way. The company has constructed Interactive

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Media Zones (IMZ) in the lobbies of its theatres across Canada, offering sophisticated digital engagement opportunities with moviegoers through a wide range of technological abilities. The result? A powerful marketing tool. The zones feature fully customizable templates on massive 84-inch touchscreens. Activations can leverage touch, gesture, image capture, onscreen content manipulation technologies, social-media connectivity and participant data capture, creating custom-designed experiences to meet the needs of each client. Since their introduction, IMZ units have become popular with moviegoers and advertisers alike–with Cineplex working with clients in industries such as automotive, technology, entertainment and professional sports. An activation with the the Toronto Blue Jays provided guests with a first-hand baseball experi-

NEC NEC Display Solutions offers moviegoers the highest-quality cinema experience and the ultimate in lobby signage, from menu boards to video walls—and everything in between. NEC specializes in a full range of desktop and large-screen LCD displays as well as multimedia and digital-cinema projector solutions for just about any display need imaginable. (necdisplay.com) OMNITERM Omniterm’s integrated digital signage solution was developed within their Integra Theatre Management Software framework to allow theatres to control all of their digital signage applications from one central location. The Integra software automatically creates both the “Coming Soon” and “Now Playing” playlists based on the film schedule without any additional involvement from your personnel. With this technology you can increase your sales, reduce costs, generate additional revenue, and improve your customers’ experience. (omniterm.com) ш

NEC LOBBY SIGNAGE

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CAROL WEINSTEIN CO./Color/1.85/Dolby Digital/118 Mins./ Rated R Cast: Cate Blanchett, Rooney Mara, Sarah Paulson, Kyle Chandler, Jake Lacy, John Magaro, Cory Michael Smith, Kevin Crowley, Nik Pajic. Directed by Todd Haynes. Screenplay: Phyllis Nagy, based on novel The Price of Salt by Patricia Highsmith. Produced by Elizabeth Karlsen, Stephen Woolley, Christine Vachon. Executive producers: Tessa Ross, Dorothy Berwin, Thorsten Schumacher; Bob Weinstein, Harvey Weinstein, Danny Perkins; Cate Blanchett, Andrew Upton, Robert Joliffe. Co-producer: Gwen Bialic. Director of photography: Edward Lachman. Production designer: Judy Becker. Editor: Affonso Gonçalves. Costume designer: Sandy Powell. Music: Carter Burwell. Music supervisor: Randall Poster. Sound: Geoff Maxwell. A Weinstein Co. and Film4 presentation, in association with StudioCanal, HanWay Films, Goldcrest, Dirty Films and InFilm, of a Karlsen/Woolley/Number 9 Films/Killer Films production, in association with Larkhark Films Ltd.

Faithful adaptation of Patricia Highsmith’s love story features two moving performances in a wonderfully realized production.

Has any novelist

fared better on film than Patricia Highsmith? Well, yes, if box office is the criteria. But few writers have benefited more from C ATE B LANCHETT adaptation than the author of Strangers on a Train, The Talented Mr. Ripley, and The Two Faces of January. All three books are terrific but flawed: high concepts with memorably disturbing characters, but wandering plots and sometimes clunky action. Alfred Hitchcock, Anthony Minghella and Hossein Amini retained Highsmith’s psychological insights and dramatic tensions while tightening her narratives; the movies are, arguably, better than the books. The same can be said about Carol, a beautifully wrought adaptation of Highsmith’s 1952 novel The Price of Salt, directed by Todd Haynes (Far from Heaven) from a screenplay by Phyllis Nagy (Mrs. Harris). Everything about this intelligent film—the casting, performances, production design, cinematography and, of course, script and direction—works in concert (the music especially) to realize

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onscreen what is now considered to be one of Highsmith’s signature books, given its progressive subject and themes. Like their predecessors, Haynes and Nagy make small but elegant adjustments to the story—how the two leads, Carol Aird and Therese Belivet (Cate Blanchett and Rooney Mara), meet, for example—but fans of the novel will be pleased that the filmmakers remain faithful to the author’s original. The Price of Salt is an unconventional love story with an even more unconventional ending, one that Highsmith would publish under the pseudonym Claire Morgan despite that, or rather because, she had established her reputation as a crime writer: A lesbian intrigue pairing a married woman with an ingénue would not do in the Eisenhower era, although attitudes were beginning to change. (The paperback edition of The Price of Salt sold a million copies, many bought by women who wanted to read about people like themselves.) Almost as shocking as the sex was Highsmith’s social agenda: The married woman, Carol, fights for joint custody of her young daughter, so the story’s central conflict revolves around moral and legal issues as much as it does matters of the heart. Haynes, the modern master of melodrama, knows what to do with this kind of material, and he has an instinctive feel for the ’50s, evoking the period in exquisite detail (the cateye glasses, the cocktail hats and kid gloves). Production designer Judy Becker employed a palette of “sour greens, yellows and dirty pinks,” colors popular at the time, and cinematographer Ed Lachman shot the movie on Super-16 stock to enhance the period look, further reinforced by the scotchy browns and smoky greys of Manhattan taverns and Midwestern winterscapes. Carol was filmed in Cincinnati, a city that embraces retro-chic (or vice versa), but the most significant action takes place during a road trip through Ohio, Illinois and Iowa, where Carol and Therese flee (in a hulking Hudson four-door the color and style of a Hamilton-Beach mixer) in order to find themselves. The Price of Salt is said to have inspired Vladimir Nabokov when plotting Lolita, another tale of forbidden love involving a great escape into the American heartland, although the similarities are probably best left to conjecture. All that said, Carol depends on the performances by Blanchett and Mara, perfectly cast and brilliantly directed. Blanchett not only

looks the part as envisioned by Highsmith (“her eyes were gray, colorless, yet dominant as light or fire”), she captures the character’s complicated, conflicted personality, a mixture of self-absorption, wistfulness and kindness. Mara stands in for Highsmith herself, who noted that she was inspired to write the book by a chance encounter with a stranger much like Carol; one imagines the author in her early 20s to have been much like Therese (pronounced Teh-rez), inexperienced but confident, silent, smart, serious and, of course, a little dark. The co-stars balance the film. Kyle Chandler plays Harge, Carol’s handsome but oafish husband, in a way that allows us to empathize with him, or at least with his situation; he loves his wife, and his anger at losing her could have devolved into homophobic spite. Sarah Paulson, as Carol’s best friend (and former lover) Abby, is the counterweight to Harge, a woman who also lost that which she desires, but understands that the heart wants what it wants. One thing missing in this otherwise eloquent translation: Highsmith’s high anxiety. Ostensibly a romance, The Price of Salt is also a suspenser, for lack of a better description, a thriller with the volume turned down. Carol and Mara’s crosscountry travels are fraught with more than passion—as in Lolita, there’s a stranger trailing them, there are threats, there’s a gun—but Haynes and Nagy play this tension, at least initially, for laughs—a nice touch, given the time limits of a two-hour movie, but one that belies Highsmith’s moody sense of foreboding. Then again, Carol is one of the few stories Highsmith imagined that might have a happy ending. —Rex Roberts

SPOTLIGHT OPEN ROAD FILMS/Color/1.85/Dolby Digital/ 128 Mins./Rated R Cast: Mark Ruffalo, Michael Keaton, Rachel McAdams, Liev Schreiber, John Slattery, Brian d’Arcy James, Stanley Tucci, Billy Crudup, Paul Guilfoyle, Jamey Sheridan, Len Cariou, Neal Huff, Michael Cyril Creighton. Directed by Tom McCarthy. Written by Josh Singer, Tom McCarthy. Produced by Michael Sugar, Steve Golin, Nicole Rocklin, Blye Faust. Executive producers: Jeff Skoll, Jonathan King, Pierre Omidyar, Michael Bederman, Bard Dorros, Tom

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Ortenberg, Peter Lawson, Xavier Marchand. Co-producers: Kate Churchill, Youtchi Von Lintel. Director of photography: Masanobu Takayanagi. Production designer: Stephen Carter. Editor: Tom McArdle. Costume designer: Wendy Chuck. Music: Howard Shore. An Open Road Films presentation, in association with Participant Media and First Look Media, of an Anonymous Content and Rocklin/Faust production.

Riveting account of the Catholic Church sex-abuse scandal in Boston and the newspaper journalists who reported it.

Assured and efficient, Spotlight presents its

highly charged story with compassion and professionalism, in a way mirroring the work of the reporters it portrays. What could have been a one-sided social-issue movie opens up into an absorbing real-life drama with a message far broader than its subject suggests. A short prologue in 1976 Boston captures the collusion between the Catholic Church, police and lawyers in covering up an incident of sexual abuse between Father John Geoghan and a young boy. When a rookie cop asks when Geoghan will be arraigned, his cynical boss mutters, “What arraignment?” The movie jumps forward to July 2001, when new executive editor Marty Baron (Liev Schreiber) prepares to take over the Boston Globe. A transplant known for cutting jobs, Baron meets with his on-edge staff, including Walter “Robby” Robinson (Michael Keaton), the head of a four-person investigative team that runs the “Spotlight” series. Baron tasks Robinson and his crew—reporters Mike Rezendes (Mark Ruffalo) and Sacha Pfeiffer (Rachel McAdams) and data researcher Matt Carroll (Brian d’Arcy James)— with following up on a recent column about Geoghan, who has been shuttled around to different parishes by church higher-ups. Everyone is resistant at first. The Catholic Church wields considerable power in Boston, most of the Globe’s readers are followers, and even the Spotlight journalists were raised in the faith. Unearthing the documents necessary to write the series might require suing the Church, a tough political move. Lawyers involved in the case, including Eric MacLeish (Billy Crudup) and Jim Sullivan (Jamey Sheridan), could be disbarred for even talking to reporters. The persistent Rezendes persuades lawyer Mitch Garabedian (Stanley Tucci) to offer some leads. Rezendes and Pfeiffer start interviewing defendants. The team meets with Phil Saviano (Neal Huff), leader of a victim-support group, in Robinson’s office. And at that moment Spotlight switches from an understated procedural into a tale of escalating shock and horror. But how should the Spotlight team tell the story? Intent on exposing a corrupt system and not just individuals, Baron delays the series until the journalists find more evidence. Caught in the middle, Robinson and his team face tough

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personal decisions, possibly estranging their families and friends. Director Tom McCarthy, who co-wrote the screenplay with Josh Singer, uses an evenhanded, just-the-facts style that brings the magnitude of the scandal into sharp relief. Spotlight doesn’t shy away from damning details, but it also doesn’t let anyone off the hook. Not just the Church was at fault. When Pfeiffer meets Saviano in a bar, a Penn State football game is playing behind them on TV. Anchored by the script, a dedicated cast lets nothing get in the way of the story. Keaton and Schreiber are especially effective, holding themselves back to make the material, and not their performances, the focus of the movie. The original Spotlight series could have fallen apart at any step before the first article appeared in early 2002. This movie faced many of the same risks, especially in deciding guilt. It’s easy to fault someone or something for a terrible wrong. It’s much harder to show that we are all to blame. That willingness to question conventional beliefs is just one of the factors that sets Spotlight apart from typical Hollywood fare. —Daniel Eagan

BROOKLYN FOX SEARCHLIGHT/Color/1.85/112 Mins./ Rated PG-13 Cast: Saoirse Ronan, Emory Cohen, Domhnall Gleeson, Jim Broadbent, Julie Walters, Jessica Paré, Eve Macklin, Brid Brennan, Fiona Glascott, Jane Brennan, Nora-Jane Noone, Jenn Murray, Eva Birthistle, Michael Zegen. Directed by John Crowley. Screenplay: Nick Hornby, based on the novel by Colm Tóibín. Produced by Finola Dwyer, Amanda Posey. Executive producers: Alan Moloney, Christine Langan, Beth Pattinson, Thorsten Schumacher, Zygi Kamasa, Hussain Amarishi. Director of photography: Yves Bélanger. Production designer: François Séguin. Editor: Jake Roberts Costume designer: Odile Dicks-Mireaux. Music: Michael Brook A Fox Searchlight, BBC Films, Telefilm Canada, Irish Film Board, Sodec and BFI presentation of a Wildgaze Films, Finola Dwyer Prods., Parallel Films and Item 7 production, in association with Ingenious, BAI, RTE and Hanway Films.

An old-school, emotionally soaring take on an Irishwoman’s new life in America, interrupted by the lure of the old sod, featuring a star-making turn by Saoirse Ronan.

This disarmingly

lovely film is set in the early 1950s, yet seems to emanate from a remote, bygone world. Which SAOIRSE RONAN is disconcerting, given that the ’50s is hardly the Middle Ages. Perhaps with regard to its un-cynical portrayal of courtship and love, though, it is. Brooklyn also feels remote

from the film tropes du jour, with its mostly chaste romance, linear narrative, absence of dark backstory or sting-in-the-tail plot twist. This Saoirse Ronan starrer offers the kind of escapist pleasures that moviegoers from the period might have enjoyed—like the characters who pay 65 cents to see The Quiet Man. Based on the eponymous novel by acclaimed Irish writer Colm Tóibín, Brooklyn keeps a tight focus on Eilis Lacey (the luminous Ronan), a young Irishwoman who chafes at her cramped options in Enniscorthy, working for a witchy shopkeeper. She reluctantly agrees to sail to New York, leaving behind her beloved sister Rose and ailing widowed mother, in search of more lucrative work. A kindly Irish priest (Jim Broadbent) helps her find a job in a department store and a perch in a boarding house among other Irish girls, who are kept in line by a comically snappish landlady (Julie Walters). Initially timid and passive–she’s no Horatio Alger–Eilis succumbs to homesickness. At an awkward “social” her landlady prods her to attend, she meets Tony Fiorello (Emory Cohen) an Italian-American plumbing apprentice and rough diamond, with a thing for Irish girls. Instantly smitten, Tony courts her in a charmingly earnest fashion difficult to conjure up in the age of Tinder. Eilis blossoms, excels in an evening accounting course, and puts down roots in the new country–until a family tragedy calls her home to Ireland. Back in Enniscorthy, Eilis’ new accounting skills not only attract a good job offer, she’s also drawn back into the seductive world of her old friends, among them newly single Jim Farrell (Domhnall Gleeson), delicious-looking, well-off, and eager to make his life with her. In effect, Eilis must decide not only between two men but between two countries, two worlds. You’d think such a turning point would be too slim to hang a climax on. Yet when Eilis makes her choice, you’ll likely tear up. Maybe because Brooklyn touches on the universally resonant question of what home is. For Eilis, is it the security, familiarity and, yes, insularity of her old world? Or a passionate if less predictable bond, and her self-created life in a new land? Nick Hornby’s screenplay expertly translates the emotional shadings of Tóibín’s novel. Casting is impeccable, down to each of the catty girls in the boarding house, with “Mad Men”’s Jessica Paré in a cameo as the department store supervisor. Gleeson artfully subdues his charisma to appear less vital than his competition. As Tony, Emory Cohen maybe overdoes the method Marlon Brando shtick, but otherwise pulls off a rough-edged working-class guy who can’t believe his luck that the innately refined Eilis loves him back. But the true revelation is Ronan, who has evolved from the she-devil in Atonement to become an actress of exquisite presence, of the less-is-more school. Director John Crow-

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ley, a native of Cork, Ireland, capitalizes on the purity of her features in close-ups shot in whited-out light that’s simply heart-catching. “It’s all about what is going on in her eyes,” Crowley says. The film observes that “the heart can be true to more than one person. Eilis has to cauterize a part of her in order to be able to properly own and live her life.” —Erica Abeel

TRUMBO BLEECKER STREET/Color/1.85/Dolby Digital/ 124 Mins./Rated R Cast: Bryan Cranston, Diane Lane, Helen Mirren, Elle Fanning, Louis C.K., John Goodman, Michael Stuhlbarg, Stephen Root, Roger Bart, Adewale AkinnuoyeAgbaje, David James Elliott, Alan Tudyk, Dave Maldonado, John Getz, Dean O’Gorman, Christian Berkel, Richard Portnow, Madison Wolfe. Directed by Jay Roach. Screenplay: John McNamara, based on the book Dalton Trumbo by Bruce Cook. Produced by Michael London, Janice Williams, Shivani Rawat, Monica Levinson, Nimitt Mankad, John McNamara, Kevin Kelly Brown. Executive producer: Kelly Mullen. Director of photography: Jim Denault. Production designer: Mark Ricker. Editor: Alan Baumgarten. Music: Theodore Shapiro. Costume designer: Daniel Orlandi. A Bleecker Street and ShivHans Pictures presentation of a Groundswell production.

Good-spirited, provocative and satisfying look at the great Hollywood screenwriter Dalton Trumbo in his element before HUAC and the blacklist got to him. Bryan Cranston is terrific as the left-wing activist with the right ideas at the wrong time.

ay Roach (Game Change, Meet the Parents) manages to stay on the light side even with this evocation of a dark period in Hollywood and American history, when paranoia and ignorance took hold during the McCarthy years that initiated over ten years of a misplaced antiCommunist assault on political expression. The panic gripped the whole country but was curiously most focused on the movie industry. Trumbo, a flashy evocation of the times, provides extra dividends for those who love true Hollywood lore on the left side and good guys winning. It’s the late 1940s and Dalton Trumbo (Bryan Cranston)—the high-flying industry screenwriter and insider who will become the most high-profile of the famous blacklisted Hollywood Ten—is comfortable in his country spread north of Los Angeles, busy writing and often surrounded by friends and family. Among the latter are devoted wife Cleo (Diane Lane in a quiet and dignified role) and oldest daughter Niki (Elle Fanning, who ages from 13 to 31 here). Family man and writer Trumbo is also a creature of his socio-political beliefs, meaning he’s an activist on behalf of labor, civil rights, free speech and just the right to think differently and keep thoughts private. Socialist-leaning and a Communist

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capitalist (America invented it; China copies), Trumbo lives in relative affluence and without apology. In fact, in looks and manner he also epitomizes the iconic movie hero of an American good guy. But bad guys hover and drastically change his situation when the government’s Commie-hunting House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC) starts investigating and questioning suspect Americans; the special interest in the Hollywood movie industry makes the outspoken Trumbo easy pickings but, called to testify at hearings regarding his leanings, he and a number of industry colleagues refuse to answer questions. They become known as the Hollywood Ten (Ring Lardner, Jr. and Waldo Salt were among the other writers) and are cited for contempt of Congress and sentenced to prison terms. (Fictional Trumbo pal Arlen Hird, played by Louis C.K., is an amalgam of many of these oppressed.) The punishing blacklist follows, depriving Trumbo and others of their Hollywood jobs and livelihood. As depicted in the film, director Sam Wood (John Getz), with whom Trumbo worked, is an early enemy who cooperates with the hearing by naming names. (Actor Robert Taylor is another namer, as depicted in the film’s archival material.) But the film’s most notorious carriers of the anti-Communist paranoia and fervor are gossip columnist Hedda Hopper (a wildly amusing Helen Mirren) and stars like John Wayne (David James Elliott), who heads the right-wing, anti-Communist Motion Picture Alliance. And there are the complicit studio bosses like Louis B. Mayer (Richard Portnow), who, sensitive to his ticket-buying public, changes allegiance when pal Hopper threatens to use the power of her popular column against him. More complex is Trumbo friend and fellow progressive Edward G. Robinson (a fine Michael Stuhlbarg). The great actor eventually coughs up names after repeated HUAC grillings, using as an excuse to Trumbo that as an actor and unlike the writers, he can’t hide behind a pseudonym if blacklisted. But the film is mainly Trumbo’s story. Initially deprived of work, he is forced to move his family from their lovely country home into a lower-middle-class L.A. neighborhood but finally finds some work writing scripts using pseudonyms. Most noteworthy is his assignment on Roman Holiday, whose screenplay credit went to his friend Ian McClellan Hunter (Alan Tudyk). The film won the Oscar for Best Screenplay. Trumbo further shows a survivor’s pluckiness in taking on assignments writing crap (or finding others who will) for a crass but sympathetic exploitation producer (a hilarious John Goodman), who runs a B-movie mill. But the output is so plentiful, Trumbo also serves as a middle man to find blacklisted writers who will take on assignments. The ending of all this, as movie fans know,

is Hollywood-perfect. By 1960, both actor/ producer Kirk Douglas (Dean O’Gorman) and producer/director Otto Preminger (Christian Berkel), with their respective Spartacus and Exodus, insist that Trumbo rightfully put his name on the scripts he did for these blockbusters. The curse of his 13year Hollywood exile is broken and Trumbo is back in the business where he belongs. The production is handsome and Roach, who we can almost hear telling Cranston and Mirren to “give it a little more,” keeps this colorful look at a bright and dark Hollywood authentic and the characters just short of caricature. All is enlivened to convey the way many studio films back then were fashioned. Because that’s entertainment. —Doris Toumarkine

BURNT WEINSTEIN CO./Color/2.35/Dolby Digital/100 Mins. / Not Yet Rated Cast: Bradley Cooper, Sienna Miller, Daniel Brühl, Omar Sy, Matthew Rhys, Alicia Vikander, Sam Keeley, Riccardo Scamarcio, Emma Thompson, Uma Thurman, Lily James, Henry Goodman, Sarah Greene, Stephen Campbell Moore. Directed by John Wells. Screenplay: Stephen Knight. Story: Michael Kalesniko. Produced by John Wells, Erwin Stoff, Stacey Sher. Executive producers: Bob Weinstein, Harvey Weinstein, Michael Shamberg, Kris Thykier, David Glasser, Claire Rudnick Polstein, Dylan Sellers, Negeen Yazdi. Director of photography: Adriano Goldman. Production designer: David Gropman. Editor: Nick Moore. Music: Rob Simonsen. Costume designer: Lyn Elizabeth Paolo. A Shiny Penny Prods., 3 Arts Entertainment and Battle Mountain Films production. In English and French with English subtitles.

This four-star foodie pig-out about the attempted comeback of a onetime-bad-boy, high-end chef into the Michelin pantheon delivers to both food snobs and fast-foodies who can digest smart entertainment. The menu feature has star Bradley Cooper as the plat du jour in what should be hailed as one of his best performances.

ere’s a recipe: Take a big raw slab of Anthony Bourdain, add two parts Marco Pierre White legend, one part Gordon B RADLEY COOPER Ramsay talent and attitude, and season with heaps of attractive people, settings and food imagery throughout and voilà—you have good starter ingredients for what is a sure dish especially for dining snobs. Others who love their movies classy, smart and wholly of the moment will also place reservations. But to fill seats, don’t forget to add a strong cast, gorgeous cinematography, a knowing script crackling with wit and some

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surprises (from Stephen Knight, responsible for Eastern Promises and the underappreciated Locke) and a director like John Wells. Stir all together, serve and, voilà again: You have Burnt and satisfied customers who will extend beyond the hardcore culinary crowd. Yes, the story, like many meals we cherish, is dependably by-the-numbers, this one sailing on a smooth arc that asks: Will gifted and revered chef Adam Jones (Bradley Cooper, never better), who screwed up royally at a Michelin restaurant in Paris (drugs, womanizing, temper, debts, dirty tricks) and has been shucking oysters (a million reached!) as penance in a New Orleans dive, make a comeback in London by achieving the coveted Michelin three stars in his own restaurant now that he’s cleaned up his act (or has he)? With no money or place to stay but with his immutable reputation for greatness in the kitchen, Adam gets immediately to work putting together his team (sous-chef, chef de parti, etc.), seeking recruits from what was JeanLuc’s, the three-star Paris restaurant where his life went down the tubes. For the brick and mortar he needs, Adam finds Tony (Daniel Brühl), a savvy young restaurateur and maître d’ as debonair as Louis Jourdan and with a discreet crush on Adam, and asks him to put his dying father’s London restaurant in his hands. A little wary, Tony bites. (Adam has also mastered the art of manipulation.) Adam also taps Michel (Omar Sy), a co-worker from Jean-Luc’s who started his own Paris restaurant which Adam, out of envy, cruelly sabotaged with a call to health inspection after depositing vermin there. But the forgiving Michel, now in London in need of work, insists all is forgiven. Ever the user, Adam taps young David (Sam Keeley), in awe of Adam, not just to work in his kitchen but to give him a place to sleep. He also recruits Jean-Luc alum Max (Italian star Riccardo Scamarcio), just released from prison. Finally, on both the work and romantic fronts, Adam hires single mother Helene (Sienna Miller, dressed down and also never better), a gifted chef like Adam. There’s an obvious attraction between the two, but she may be too much like Adam for anything in or out of the kitchen to work. Also in the mix as Adam launches his new restaurant Adam Jones at the Langham is another Jean-Luc worker—now rival London chef Reece (Matthew Rhys), who runs his own Michelin-graced restaurant. His is a cold, minimal space that Adam eagerly picks apart. Envy comes into play here, but so does Adam’s fire to compete. There’s also attractive young Anne-Marie (Alicia Vikander), Jean-Luc’s daughter and a former drug abuser who had a fling with Adam during his disastrous Paris days. Has she reappeared in his life to help or do harm? And, as part of Tony’s deal with Adam to hand over his family’s restaurant, the

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family requires that Adam regularly see Dr. Rosshilde (Emma Thompson), to assure he’s off drugs and booze and behaving. At least he keeps his appointments. As his restaurant gets going, there are more setbacks (a potentially disastrous consequence when a suspected team of Michelin reviewers shows up) than successes (the Times reviewer is pleased). And there are plenty more surprises and reversals along the way to Adam’s Michelin-star dream. Burnt is all fun and top-rated entertainment, moving as fast as a high-end kitchen. Yes, some of the performer accents are tricky. Cooper beautifully aces his few French lines. Brühl’s accent, in spite of his Italian family name, is distinctly that of a Spanish speaker. And Vikander’s French (as the daughter of a Frenchman) is a bit off. The food porn is served (with an orgy of close-ups) but no high-end culinary tricks or detailed prep work is on view, except for a broad lesson in whipping together an omelette. But why nitpick when Burnt is so filling? —Doris Toumarkine

ROOM A24/Color/2.35/Dolby Digital/118 Mins./Rated R

Cast: Brie Larson, Jacob Tremblay, Joan Allen, Sean Bridgers, William H. Macy, Tom McCamus, Megan Park, Amanda Brugel. Directed by Lenny Abrahamson. Screenplay: Emma Donoghue, based on her novel. Produced by Ed Guiney, David Gross. Executive producers: Andrew Lowe, Emma Donoghue, Jesse Shapira, Jeff Arkuss, David Kosse, Rose Garnett, Tessa Ross. Director of photography: Danny Cohen. Production designer: Ethan Tobman. Editor: Nathan Nugent. Music: Stephen Rennicks. Costume designer: Lea Carlson. A Telefilm Canada, Film4 and Bord Scannan Na hEireann/ Irish Film Board presentation, with the participation of Ontario Media Development Corp., of an Element Pictures/No Trace Camping production, in association with Duperele Films.

Beautifully rendered and acted drama about a young captive and her remarkable bond with the child she bore while held prisoner is a potent award-season contender.

he scenario depicted in Room sounds forbiddingly claustrophobic and oppressive: a young woman and her five-year-old son kept imprisoned by a sociopath in a 10-foot by 10foot garden shed with only a skylight revealing the outside world. And, yes, it is a miserably confined and austere existence. But “Ma,” the heroine of Room, is determined to create a rich life for Jack, the child she bore by her abductor, and her spirit shines through the first half of this riveting drama, abetted by the visually resourceful work of director Lenny Abrahamson (Frank). Anything but a wallow in despair, Room is a stirring and poignant dual character study that becomes even more fascinating once it escapes that backyard enclosure.

Skillfully adapted by Irish writer Emma Donoghue from her acclaimed best-selling novel, Room also owes much of its success to its very fortuitous casting. Brie Larson, a standout in films like Short Term 12 and The Spectacular Now, takes her career to an entirely new level with her feisty, empathetic and complex performance as a victim who refuses to act like one, and then-seven-yearold Jacob Tremblay is a miraculous find as the boy whose extremely circumscribed upbringing hasn’t diminished his sense of play and curiosity. Abrahamson immediately immerses us in the world Ma has fashioned for her son, whom she unconditionally loves even though his father is her rapist and captor. She’s established a kind of normalcy for him, reading to him, playing games, exercising, even baking a cake for his fifth birthday. Deprived of friends, Jack always says a friendly hello to the furniture and objects in the place he’s come to know simply as “Room.” (The abductor allows them a TV, but Jack thinks everything he sees there, cartoons and flesh-and-blood actors, is imaginary.) He sleeps in a wardrobe at night as the man known as Old Nick unlocks the door and “visits” his mother, bringing the food and supplies they need to stay alive. When Old Nick shuts down their heat in spite after a fight with Ma, the crisis inspires her to devise an escape plan for her son (the details of which are the one script element that strains credibility). But Jack does indeed escape, in a very suspenseful sequence that simultaneously captures his awe and wonder at seeing the outside world for the first time and such basic sights as trees, cars and animals. Act two is equally compelling, as it explores the aftermath of Ma’s seven-year ordeal. Naturally, there’s the media circus to deal with, but also Jack’s adjustment to so many overwhelming new sensations and Ma’s posttraumatic stress disorder and her family’s unrealistic expectations about her ability to resume the life stolen from her as a teenager. In the interim, her mother Nancy (an excellent Joan Allen) and father Robert (William H. Macy) have divorced, and Dad is simply unable to look at her child without disgust. Fortunately, Nancy has a new man in her life, Leo (Tom McManus), who is exquisitely sensitive to the family’s delicate situation. Donoghue’s script and Abrahamson’s direction are also exquisitely sensitive to a scenario that could have been sordid or purely sensational. Much of what ensues is seen from the vantage point of little Jack, rendering this story of unimaginable cruelty a fable-like aura that reflects the love and commitment Ma has invested in her unsought child. That moving and ultimately heartfelt human dimension is what earned Room the Audience Award at the Toronto International Film Festival and will surely win the affection of a wider audience as it enters awards season. —Kevin Lally

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THE WONDERS OSCILLOSCOPE LABORATORIES/Color/1.85/ 111 Mins./Not Rated Cast: Alexandra Lungu, Sam Louwick, Alba Rohrwacher, Monica Bellucci, Sabine Timoteo, Agnese Graziani, Luis Huilca Logroño, Eva Morrow, Maris Stella Morrow, Margarethe Tiesel, Andre M. Hennicke, Carlo Tarmati. Written and directed by Alice Rohrwacher. Produced by Carlo Cresto-Dina, Karl “Baumi” Baumgartner, Tiziana Soudani, Michael Weber. Director of photography: Hélène Louvart. Production designer: Emita Frigato. Editor: Marco Spoletini. Music: Piero Crucitti. Sound: Christophe Giovannoni. Costume designer: Loredana Buscemi. A Tempesta and Rai Cinema presentation of a Tempesta, Rai Cinema Amka Films, Pola Pandora Filmproduktions, RSI Radiotelevisione Svizzera/SRG SSR, ZDF/ Das kleine Fernsehspiel production, in collaboration with Arte. In Italian, German and French with English subtitles.

A teenage girl’s coming of age is elegantly threaded into this lugubriously madcap Tuscany-set drama about family, history and obsession.

The state of the

ramshackle Tuscan farmhouse inhabited by the family whose members dart and gambol all through The Wonders, ALEXANDRA LUNGU Alice Rohrwacher’s sleepy one-ring circus of a film, perfectly mirrors their everyday state of affairs. It’s beautiful in its way but not exactly well-maintained. Nevertheless, it stays up, just like this family stays together even as many of their violently oppositional attitudes would seem to be pulling them apart. Wolfgang (Sam Louwick) is their German-born patriarch, a looming and unshaven figure of perpetual rage who doesn’t seem quite able to comprehend the modern world. Also frustrating is the fact that he’s managed to have four girls with his wife Angelica (the filmmaker’s sister, Alba Rohrwacher). He erupts at just about everyone within range at all times, like a perpetually exploding minefield. The target of most of Wolfgang’s wrath is, ironically, his eldest, Gelsomina (Alexandra Lungu), also the only one of the girls who seems able to help him in their beekeeping business. Making things even tenser is Wolfgang’s inexplicable decision to take in Martin (Luis Huilca Logroño), a troubled teenage boy with a criminal record who only speaks German. Writer-director Rohrwacher never explicates the source of Wolfgang’s rage, but it seems in part to be directed at the modern, or at least outside, world. Because of that, the family seems to live in partial isolation. “When he’s not here, we can breathe, right?” Angelica jokes to them in a quiet moment away from Wolfgang. It’s an increasingly untenable situation for deeply shy Gelosima,

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who’s old enough to be at least as interested in watching cute boys on scooters as she is in helping her dad scrape bees off honeycombs. Dropping a roman candle of wonder into the family’s lo-fi life is the appearance of an absurd TV show that wants to wrap a supposed showcase for the area’s Etruscan heritage inside a ticky-tack competition for cash and a trip that will pit many of the local farmers against one another. It’s precisely the kind of thing that will send Wolfgang into a fit. But Gelsomina, in what looks like her first act of pseudo-rebellion ever, signs the family up for the competition anyway. She might be doing this for the family (they could clearly use the money). Or she might just be doing it out of the fascination she and her sisters hold for the show’s host, an ethereal creature draped in diaphanous garments and played with precisely the right level of vacuous grace by Monica Bellucci. Gelsomina’s quiet revolt against the opaque illogic of Wolfgang’s many rules is eventually echoed by the other women in the family. It’s that background of stiffening resolve that carries the film through some of its many sundappled longueurs. Rohrwacher is not precisely a storyteller, as this quasi-magical-realist film, with its many dangling threads, amply proves. But she is a great dramatist nonetheless, tracing not just the potent dynamic of an already volatile family as it is faced with one new stressor after another, but the drama of watching an initially uncertain girl slowly unfold her wings and step into the wind. —Chris Barsanti

I SMILE BACK BROAD GREEN PICTURES/Color/2.35/85 Mins./ Rated R Cast: Sarah Silverman, Josh Charles, Thomas Sadoski, Mia Barron, Terry Kinney, Chris Sarandon, Skylar Gaertner, Shayne Coleman, Oona Laurence. Directed by Adam Salky Screenplay: Amy Koppelman, Paige Dylan, based on Koppelman’s novel. Produced by Brian Koppelman, David Levien, Mike Harrop, Richard Arlook. Executive producers: Skip Klintworth, Jens Meurer, Christian Angermayer. Director of photography: Eric Lin. Production designer: Brandon Tonner-Connolly. Editor: Tamara Meem. Music: Zack Ryan. Costume designer: Cathryn Hunt. A Koppelman/Levien production, in association with Oscar Crosby Films and Film House Germany.

An atypical serious performance by Sarah Silverman can’t salvage this incessantly clichéd addiction drama.

No cliché goes unused in I Smile Back, a

tedious addiction drama only notable for featuring comedian Sarah Silverman in a dramatic lead performance. Director Adam Salky’s film seems to have learned everything it knows about drug abuse and its messy personal/familial/social consequences from

other movies, such that there isn’t a second during this housewife-on-the-rails saga that isn’t overly formulaic and, consequently, lacking in insight. That’s also true of its portrait of suburbia, here cast as a sunshiny place of big mansions and picturesque parks that’s actually also home to debilitating ennui, detachment and misery. Taking its cue from American Beauty, The Ice Storm, Reservation Road and countless other trite tales that indulge in fantasies about the rich and powerful quietly suffering amidst comfort and security, it’s a character-by-way-of-environment study devoid of depth or novelty. Salky’s film opens with Laney Brooks (Silverman) thinking back on happy times while sitting on a bathroom toilet, topless, snorting cocaine as her husband Bruce (Josh Charles) and their young son and daughter play outside. Laney makes her kids’ lunches every day, decorating their paper bags with fanciful decorations, but her nervous demeanor and far-off glances are clear signs of mounting instability. Before long, I Smile Back is following Laney as she flees her children’s elementary school (after a drug-induced bit of forgetfulness) to rendezvous with a married family friend (Thomas Sadoski) at a motel room, where they partake in rough coke-fueled sex–a bit of willful degradation that’s par for the course for Laney, whose subsequent activities involve repeatedly debasing herself while under the influence, to the detriment of her marriage and her personal safety. Silverman does her best to embody Laney as a three-dimensional person, but Paige Dylan and Amy Koppelman’s unsubtle script stymies those efforts at every turn, saddling Laney with self-described “daddy issues” that the actress can barely articulate without seeming contemptuous of such a banal explanation for Laney’s bad behavior. A trip to rehab, as well as a later return home, allows Salky to shoot Silverman as a lonely figure adrift in cold, barren spaces. Those compositions underline her emotional condition almost as leadenly as Laney’s conversations with a counselor (Terry Kinney), whose advice amounts to little more than cherishevery-moment truisms. Substance-abuse treatment does little to quell Laney’s worst impulses, and soon she’s back at home making more ill-advised decisions, this despite the fact that it’s giving her traumatized son anxiety and making Bruce want to cut ties for good. I Smile Back at least has the good sense to know that Laney’s type of chronic selfdestruction rarely leads to happy-ever-afters. Yet other than refusing to present a cozy vision of therapeutic healing, Salky’s film hits all the familiar addiction-drama notes–the sneaking of drinks behind the spouse’s back, the inappropriately rude and spiteful dinner conversation insults, the painful confrontthe-past encounters, the frantic relapses, the rock-bottom mistakes–without offering any-

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thing approaching a fresh perspective. Like its character’s own conduct, it’s simply a familiar descent into a predictably tragic hell. —Nick Schager

ROCK THE KASBAH OPEN ROAD FILMS/Color/2.35/Dolby Digital/102 Mins./Rated R Cast: Bill Murray, Bruce Willis, Kate Hudson, Zooey Deschanel, Danny McBride, Scott Caan, Leem Lubany, Taylor Kinney, Kelly Lynch, Sarah Baker. Directed by Barry Levinson. Written by Mitch Glazer. Produced by Bill Block, Jacob Pechenik, Steve Bing, Mitch Glazer, Ethan Smith. Executive producers: Brian Grazer, Tom Freston. Director of photography: Sean Bobbitt. Production designer: Niels Sejer. Editor: Aaron Yanes. Music: Marcelo Zarvos. Costume designer: Deborah Lynn Scott. A Dune Films, QED International, Shangri-La Entertainment and Venture Forth production.

Incessantly bigoted views of a country and culture unfortunately comprise this unholy— and worse, unfunny—mess.

In a last-ditch move to

salvage his washed-up career in rock-music management, Richie Lanz (Bill Murray) finds himself in Kabul with his secretary/ BILL MURRAY client (Zooey Deschanel). The terrified girl, who hitherto has lived on his promises to feature her singer-songwriter skills but only does cover acts in lousy bars, soon flees. Whereupon Richie becomes entangled with a couple of sleazy American war profiteers (Scott Caan and Danny McBride), a very experienced and popular local hooker (Kate Hudson) and a definitely borderline-case mercenary (Bruce Willis) before discovering some real talent in a Pashtun girl, Salima Khan (Leem Lubany), who aspires to be the first female competitor on her country’s TV version of “American Idol,” “Afghan Star.” Barry Levinson’s film, from a script by Mitch Glazer, starts high with Murray, doing world-weary better than just about anyone else, enduring the audition of one very unmusical, very fat and very funny hopeful client. If only the film had stayed in L.A. and wrought laughs out of the fertile ground of that city’s particularly dire wannabes and sundry showbiz losers. But once it lands in Afghanistan, Rock the Kasbah becomes tedious, noisy and unfunny drek, with discomfiting racist overtones in its portrayal of Muslims, who are mostly bearded, be-turbaned, scruffily violent and dim-witted menaces. It’s a particular shame that a good cast wastes their time manfully trying to eke comic gold out of this ordure. The early loss of Deschanel in the plot is the first nail in the coffin here, as her off-center prettiness and

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quirky charm I always find appealing. Her comic flair is but a teasing appetizer, however, and the entrée, her distaff replacement Hudson, however bedizened in come-hither harem drag and purring lines like “I’ll fuck you like a musketeer on crack,” pales by comparison. (How Hudson has somehow managed to still maintain her It Girl image, so very long after Almost Famous, is truly mystifying.) Lubany is lovely and has some comely pipes, but her presentation as the grateful-to-theAmerican native girl is a Hollywood tradition that refuses to die, and should. By this point, too, Murray seems to have exhausted his once-so-welcome blasé comic shtick, although it’s probably more the fault of lazy screenwriters who come up short and expect him to somehow salvage their mediocrity with his formidable presence. Murray seems to be giving the same performance these days, after his try at seriousness as Franklin Roosevelt. Willis, given little to do, basically has little choice but to phone it in, while Caan and McBride behave like The Two Stooges in a way to almost make you see why Americans can be so loathed abroad. On the meager plus side, Taylor Kinney as a soldier steals the few scenes he’s in through sheer convincing stalwartness and the serious physical appeal of the good ole Hunkus Americanus variety. —David Noh

CRIMSON PEAK UNIVERSAL/Color/1.85/Dolby Digital & Datasat Digital/119 Mins./Rated R Cast: Mia Wasikowska, Jessica Chastain, Tom Hiddleston, Charlie Hunnam, Jim Beaver, Burn Gorman, Leslie Hope, Jonathan Hyde, Doug Jones. Directed by Guillermo del Toro. Screenplay: Guillermo del Toro, Matthew Robbins. Producers: Thomas Tull, Jon Jashni, Guillermo del Toro, Callum Greene. Executive producer: Jillian Share. Director of photography: Dan Laustsen. Production designer: Tom Sanders. Editor: Bernat Vilaplana. Music: Fernando Velazquez. Visual effects supervisor: Dennis Berardi. Costume designer: Kate Hawley. A Universal Pictures and Legendary Pictures presentation of a Legendary Pictures/DDY production.

While there may be some slight stiffness in the storytelling joints, Guillermo del Toro’s Gothic love story is a visually ravishing delight.

Seizing its inspiration in equal part from

vintage Victorian literature and classic Hammer horror films, Crimson Peak is the latest reminder that Guillermo del Toro remains one of contemporary cinema’s finest craftsmen. He constructs his movies as carefully as an architect might design a house, supremely attentive to the smallest details of every shot. The architect comparison is particularly apt for this movie, in which del Toro and his crew, led by production designer Thomas E. Sanders, have built a crumbling Gothic manor

that instantly joins the ranks of cinema’s alltime-great haunted houses. It’s a fever dream of an Old World home: part Downton Abbey, part Thornfield Hall and part Dracula’s Castle. Like painters, del Toro and his cinematographer, Dan Laustsen (who previously shot the director’s famously compromised sophomore feature, Mimic) use color as a way to establish mood and texture within scenes and shots. Costume designer Kate Hawley gets into the mix as well; one striking image positions our heroine, New York-born heiress turned English bride Edith Cushing (Mia Wasikowska, our leading modern-day Victorian-era actress) in the center of the frame, clad in a yellow dress, while behind her wind whistles past a barren tree that sits beneath the grey sky. In that moment, she’s the personification of the candle flames that flicker and dance in the interior of her new home, somehow staying alight despite the drafty air. That’s the level of specificity that del Toro brings to every scene of Crimson Peak, employing all of the tools at his disposal to build a transporting piece of cinema. You’ll notice, perhaps, that I have yet to mention “storytelling” among those tools. That’s because plot is the least interesting, though not the least thoughtful, element of Crimson Peak. Where most horror-movie narratives are driven by surprise, this one is based around inevitability. Warned as a child by the ghost of her mother to beware the words “Crimson Peak,” it’s inevitable that Edith will wind up there, seduced by the batting eyes and soothing demeanor of a dashing baronet, Sir Thomas Sharpe (Tom Hiddleston). It’s inevitable as well that Sir Thomas and his spinster sister, Lady Lucille (Jessica Chastain, attacking her role with a ferocity that shouldn’t be confused with camp), will have dark secrets that explain their status as orphans and the manor’s ghostly population…not to mention their own extra-close relationship. And finally, it’s inevitable that once said secrets come out, Crimson Peak will run red with human blood as well as clay, as the doomed love story of Edith and Tom draws to a suitably tragic finale. Del Toro and his co-writer Matthew Robbins maneuver these plot points into place with the same precision the director brings to the visuals. Perhaps too much precision; in movies like Hellboy II: The Golden Army and even Pan’s Labyrinth, del Toro loosens his rein on the plot mechanics and allows for seemingly unplanned confrontations and discoveries. Crimson Peak’s deliberateness sometimes causes the proceedings and performances to read as stiff, even though great undercurrents of feeling are coursing through the scene. There will also be a substantial segment of the audience disappointed that the movie isn’t more overtly horrific, with big scares to complement its big emotions. Those viewers would do well to remember

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that del Toro’s films have rarely been scary in the conventional sense; even his most seemingly traditional horror movie, The Devil’s Backbone, is more interested in employing ghosts as metaphors than as bogeymen. Besides, Crimson Peak goes out of its way to satiate the audience’s bloodlust in the climax, with some choice bits of gory mayhem that del Toro executes with cheerful panache. Another master craftsman, Alfred Hitchcock, once remarked on how he enjoyed playing the audience like a piano. To watch Crimson Peak is to observe del Toro delivering a virtuosic performance on a grand organ. —Ethan Alter

GOOSEBUMPS COLUMBIA/Color/2.35/3D/Dolby Atmos/103 Mins./ Rated R

Cast: Jack Black, Dylan Minnette, Odeya Rush, Amy Ryan, Ryan Lee, Jillian Bell, Halston Sage, Timothy Simons, Ken Marino. Amanda Lund. Directed by Rob Letterman. Screenplay: Darren Lemke. Story: Scott Anderson, Larry Karaszewski, based on the books by R.L. Stine. Produced by Deborah Fine, Neal H. Moritz. Executive producers: Tania Landau, Bill Bannerman, Ben Weisbren, Bruce Berman, Greg Basser. Director of photography: Javier Aguirresarobe. Production designer: Sean Haworth. Editor: Jim May. Music: Danny Elfman. Costume designer: Judith Makovsky. Visual effects supervisor: Erik Nordby. Creature makeup effects: Stephen Prouty. A Columbia Pictures and Sony Pictures Animation presentation, in association with L Star Capital and Village Roadshow Pictures, of an Original Film and Scholastic Entertainment production.

Perennially popular children’s-book characters come alive with overwhelming effects–to underwhelming effect.

ince the 1992 publication of his first “Goosebumps” book, Welcome to Dead House, young-people’s author R.L. Stine has written over 60 more, prolifically creating a best-selling series that shows no signs of slowing down. For those not doing the math, that’s an average of nearly three books a year. But what’s equally remarkable is that each of the “Goosebumps” books has sold itself by following the same winning formula: in which various groups of mildly misfit kids find themselves while facing monsters, demons, haunted masks, etc. What kid wouldn’t buy into that? Mr. Stine is nothing if not a storyteller still in touch with his own inner kid. So why hasn’t any major studio tapped into this source material before now? It hasn’t been for a lack of trying. As long ago as 1998, Tim Burton was all set to direct a “Goosebumps” movie, from an original screenplay by Scott Anderson and Larry Karaszewski. Why that never happened is no doubt a long, tedious story involving the usual undone deals and/or development hell.

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But the script survived that process, and it has now served as the jumping-off point for this film’s screenplay, by Darren Lemke–who has stuck to the smart idea of not adapting any of the Stine books, even while bringing back several of Stine’s most memorably monstrous characters. But the key character here is a (hopefully) fictionalized version of Stine himself–or, as he is initially known here, Mr. Shivers. As portrayed by Jack Black, Shivers is a reclusive misanthrope who lives in an old dark house with his Mila Kunis-cute teenage daughter, Hannah (Odeya Rush). It’s a role tailor-made for Black’s scenery-scorching talents, yet he plays it with relative restraint. Early on, his Shivers is all cold glares and clipped verbal warnings to the new boy next door, Zach (Dylan Minnette), to stay off his property and away from his daughter. Just another overprotective screen dad doing his best to thwart a potential teen romance. Of course, such parental restraining orders, plus the prospect of a hook-up with a Mila Kunis-cute girl, plus the sound of screams coming from the old dark house, add up to a dare that no teen romantic lead could refuse. Recruiting dorky football team equipment manager Champ (Ryan Lee) as his typically goofy teen sidekick, Zach breaks into Mr. Shivers’ booby-bear-trapped cellar, eventually ending up in the top-floor library– where the entire “Goosebumps” canon lines the shelves. But why are all the leather-bound volumes locked? Being the type of teen hero who can’t help but stumble into trouble, Zach just has to crack one open and find out. Before you can say “Jumanji,” the sleepy streets of “Goosebumps”’ standard-issue small town are teeming with, among other monstrosities, a Godzilla-size praying mantis, towering Venus fly-traps, a Lilliputian army of savage garden gnomes, space-suited alien storm troopers, and, of course, zombies. And a killer clown. Led by a diabolical ventriloquist dummy named Slappy, they quickly turn this movie into a CGI swarm-fest, operating on your basic, nonstop chase-movie dynamic: The monsters are on the move, while the kids and Shivers/Stine (“You’re him,” Zach finally guesses) stay barely one step ahead. The continuous rollout of more and more monsters is fun to behold, in a funhouse sort of way. But, as befits a film primarily aimed at pre-teens, the film is never really scary, and rarely suspenseful. Even after the monsters are loose, and Black’s Shivers/Stine has become the makeshift team’s default leader, the comic tone remains steadfastly kid-oriented. As much as anything, the teen characters’ interactions play like those of a 21st-century version of an old Disney action comedy starring Tommy Kirk and Annette Funicello–only with snappier, snarkier dialogue. Sometimes. Along the way, we get a fairly serviceable monologue from Black’s Shivers/Stine, informing the gang that, as an ostracized

boy, he spent all his time alone, making up monsters who were so real to him that they became real. That’s as good an explanation as any. But who really needs such a literal rationale for what amounts to meta-fiction? As it stands, this speech comes across as something the writers concocted to suggest that Shivers/Stine has a heart–or that they do. It’s difficult to imagine that Goosebumps’ appeal will extend much beyond the twenty-somethings who embraced the books growing up and the children that generation has begun to spawn. The guess is that the movie will do enough box-office business to inspire at least a Goosebumps 2. Judging from the antics on display here, the idea of further adventures seems less than alluring. —Michael Sauter

BRIDGE OF SPIES WALT DISNEY-TOUCHSTONE/Color/2.35/ Dolby Digital/135 Mins./Rated PG-13 Cast: Tom Hanks, Mark Rylance, Alan Alda, Amy Ryan, Eve Hewson, Peter McRobbie, Billy Magnussen, Austin Stowell, Domenick Lombardozzi, Sebastian Koch, Michael Gaston, Dakin Matthews. Directed by Steven Spielberg. Written by Matt Charman, Ethan Coen, Joel Coen. Produced by Kristie Macosko Krieger, Marc Platt, Steven Spielberg. Executive producers: Jonathan King, Daniel Lupi, Jeff Skoll, Adam Somner. Co-producers: Christoph Fisser, Henning Molfenter, Charlie Woebcken. Director of photography: Janusz Kaminski. Production designer: Adam Stockhausen. Editor: Michael Kahn. Music: Thomas Newman. Costume designer: Kasia Walicka-Maimone. A DreamWorks Pictures, Fox 2000 Pictures and Reliance Entertainment presentation, in association with Participant Media, in co-production with Afterworks Ltd. and Studio Babelsberg, of an Amblin Entertainment/Marc Platt production. In English, German and Russian with English subtitles.

In Steven Spielberg’s dramatically inert, fact-based Cold War thriller, Tom Hanks plays an insurance lawyer asked to defend a Soviet spy before being sucked into a dangerous Berlin prisoner exchange; somehow the master generates more sparks out of the first part’s legal badinage than the final act’s shadowy spy games.

ridge of Spies sits at the lit-fuse junction of Cold War paranoia, the legal ethics of treating enemy combatants, the dividing TOM HANKS of Berlin, and nuclear holocaust. But the work of three screenwriters—Matt Charman and Joel and Ethan Coen—one of the era’s most astute directors of thoughtful popular cinema, and even Mark Rylance and Tom Hanks operating in pitch-perfect sync can’t wrestle this incredible, fact-based but ungainly moralistic spy saga into shape.

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The calm at the center of this storm is Rudolf Abel (Rylance), a monkish little man arrested by federal agents at the film’s start in 1957 and charged with being a Soviet spy. Since we’re shown Abel dealing with dead drops and coded messages, his guilt is never in doubt. The only question is who will be foolish enough to represent him. Spielberg layers this part of the story in A-bomb paranoia as a way of reminding us that since most Americans assumed the Soviets were about thirty seconds away from covering the country in mushroom clouds, they had little patience for giving spies like Abel a fair trial. The unlucky man selected by the Bar Association to represent Abel is James Donovan (Hanks). A Brooklyn insurance attorney, he hasn’t worked a criminal trial in years and isn’t crazy about defending the most hated man in America. Still, he takes the case, civic duty and all, and is instantly approached by the CIA, who want to know everything Abel is saying and roll their eyes at attorney-client privilege. The more he is pushed to betray his client and his lawyerly duties, and the more the judge signals that the trial is just a formality, the more Donovan digs in his heels. It helps that he finds Abel fine company. Anybody would. Rylance plays Abel as another of his slow-moving, resolute and resonant, deeply wry characters. Gentle and witty, Abel doesn’t seem the type to raise his voice if his clothes were on fire. (It makes sense that when this story was first being developed decades ago, Alec Guinness was tapped for Abel; Rylance is maybe the one actor since Guinness who can make quietude sing so clearly.) He reads to Donovan—another of Hanks’ decent and deadpan average Joes just trying to do the right thing while surrounded by amoral dullards—like a honorable soldier deserving of fair treatment. There are echoes here of more blatant recent film analogies to the post-9/11 debate over civil liberties and torture, with Donovan holding the line and declaiming about American fair play being the best way to show the Soviets what America is made of. Although the knotty legalisms and ethical arguments would make this part of the film seem like slow going, Hanks, Rylance and Spielberg make it into something that snaps and crackles with modern relevance, particularly once Donovan begins paying the price for doing his job too passionately. Spielberg can still be a dangerous filmmaker when he gets his hands on Big Ideas. But in the early stretches of Bridge of Spies he shows a cannier ability to twist those ideas into a captivating story. In other words, things have improved since the days of Amistad. What can account, then, for the film turning into such a drag? Donovan thinks he’s done with his patriotic volunteer work, only to have his government ask for one more service. During the first section, the film slips in glances of Francis Gary Powers (Austin Stowell) preparing to fly his supposedly

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untouchable U-2 spy plane over the USSR. It’s a long build toward explaining why Donovan gets another assignment. This time he is sent to Berlin just as the Wall is going up to negotiate a prisoner exchange. Still steaming over Abel’s show trial, when he finds out about an American student being held in East Berlin, Donovan takes the negotiations in a different direction than the CIA intended. There is no reason why this part of the film, filled with dangerous reversals and espionage shell games, shouldn’t crackle with le Carré-esque tension. But as Donovan negotiates in one smoky Berlin room after another, Bridge of Spies starts losing air like a balloon pricked by a needle. Even a climactic meeting on a snow-covered bridge braced by snipers and barbed wire can’t find a pulse. There are many culprits for the film’s failure, from Thomas Newman’s simpering score to the screenplay’s many missteps—the offhand comment that Donovan was a prosecutor at the Nuremberg trials makes him seem far less a babe in the woods, and not bothering to even briefly touch on what secrets Abel stole, or why and how, seems like an oversight. (This is now the second film in a row after last year’s Unbroken that the Coen Brothers have scripted in a strictly connect-the-dots fashion.) But in the end, Bridge of Spies never locates its story, compelling civil-liberties argument or not. Rylance’s hangdog Zen can get you pretty far, as can tense nucleartinged confrontations in grey Warsaw Pact surroundings. But just stringing these events together and topping them off with a typically Speilbergian five minutes of excess treacle isn’t enough to make a film. —Chris Barsanti

BEASTS OF NO NATION NETFLIX/Color/2.35/137 Mins./Rated R Cast: Idris Elba, Abraham Attah, Jude Akuwudike, Emmanuel ‘King Kong’ Nii Adom Quaye. Directed and photographed by Cary Joji Fukunaga. Screenplay: Cary Joji Fukunaga, based on the novel by Uzodinma Iweala. Produced by Amy Kaufman, Cary Joji Fukunaga, Daniella Taplin Lundberg, Riva Marker, Daniel Crown, Idris Elba. Executive producers: Jeff Skoll, Jonathan King, Bill Benenson, Laura Bickford, Fiona Druckenmiller, Jamal Daniel, Donna Gigliotti, Ted Sarandos, Pauline Fischer, Sarah Bowen, Elizabeth Koch, Kristina Kendall, Nnamdi Asomugha, Elika Portnoy, Todd Courtney, Mark Holder, Peter Pastorelli, Uzodinma Iweala, Tommee May. Co-producers: Anthony Brandonisio, Tony Tagoe. Production designer: Inbal Weinberg. Editors: Mikkel E.G. Nielsen, Pete Beaudreau. Music: Dan Romer. Costume designer: Jenny Eagan. A Netflix presentation of a Red Crown production, in association with Participant Media and Levantine Films, in association with New Balloon and Mutressa Movies, of a Primary Prods. and Parliament of Owls production, in association with Mammoth Entertainment, Radicalmedia and Come What May Prods.

War is (a beautiful) hell in Cary Joji Fukunaga’s disconcertingly picturesque combat film.

The enduring battle

waged in war movies—particularly those made at the studio level—has long been how to depict that IDRIS ELBA high-stakes drama and adrenal excitement of combat without glorifying it. Certainly since the Vietnam era, filmmakers have sought to put the brutality of wartime bloodshed front and center, as a way, perhaps, to draw a distinct line between the more jingoistic tales of heroism Hollywood churned out during World War II at the behest of the U.S. government. (Although, even then, there were films and filmmakers that sought to offer a jaundiced vision of war, most notably 1946’s Best Picture winner, The Best Years of Our Lives, directed by William Wyler.) Such disparate contemporary combat movies as Platoon, Saving Private Ryan and The Hurt Locker all seek, in varying ways, to recreate the sound and fury of battle with stark and often horrifying imagery. As bluntly effective as this approach frequently is, the lurking danger is that viewers will recoil at the violence while also being seduced by the stylized visual aesthetic. Put another way, the bloodshed itself isn’t beautiful, but the way it’s filmed most definitely is. We’re then put in the awkward space of bemoaning war, while praising the way it’s fought onscreen. That’s the conundrum posed by Beasts of No Nation, Cary Joji Fukunaga’s unnervingly beautiful evocation of present-day guerrilla warfare in Africa and the child soldiers who are frequently conscripted in that fight. Fukunaga’s technical prowess—which was showcased in his first two features, Sin Nombre and Jane Eyre, as well as the blockbuster HBO series “True Detective”—is given its grandest showcase here, and the director doesn’t allow his relatively small budget (a reported $6 million) to limit his ambition. Filmed in Ghana, but set in an unnamed African nation, Beasts consists almost entirely of exterior locations with only a handful of established actors, most notably Idris Elba, working opposite nonprofessionals like the film’s young star, Abraham Attah. The 14-year-old plays Agu, whose family is torn asunder by the endless civil war that’s being waged between the ruling government and various challengers. As his town becomes a battleground in this conflict, Agu watches his mother and younger siblings speed away in the crowded front seat of a barely functioning getaway vehicle. His father and elder brother stay behind, but are quickly executed by soldiers, and Agu himself barely avoids becoming another casualty. Alone in the wilderness, he’s found by a guerrilla army headed by a veteran fighter (Elba) who commands the respect of his troop through a mixture of kindly paternalism and ferocious discipline. Handed a weapon and told where to point it, Agu quickly becomes adept

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at fighting and killing in the name of a cause he’s too young to fully comprehend. What he does know is that he’s shooting the men who turned him into an orphan and, for now, that’s reason enough to pull the trigger. Adapted from a novel by Uzodinma Iweala, Beasts of No Nation relies on narration to place viewers in Agu’s headspace, one of the film’s many nods towards Francis Ford Coppola’s enormously influential war movie, Apocalypse Now. As penned by Coppola and John Millius and delivered by Martin Sheen, Willard’s musings have a weary cynicism that help offset the grandeur of the production. Agu’s commentary tends to be more neutrally descriptive, which perhaps makes sense given his age, but also negates the ability of this narrative device to reveal more about a character’s personality. Then again, that might be intentional on Fukunaga’s part; throughout the film, there’s a very real sense that the director is less concerned with telling the story of this specific child soldier than with using him as a representative for all child soldiers. The details of Agu’s life, as well as the circumstances of his enforced recruitment, are certainly sketched lightly enough to be applicable to any number of kids trapped in his particular plight. Beasts, then, plays like a social-advocacy documentary that’s been dramatized as a narrative feature in the hopes of reaching a wider audience and potentially making a more lasting impression. And the movie does make an impression, at least on an aesthetic level. The beauty of the natural locations often provides a gripping contrast with the brutality of the violence happening within them. (Terrence Malick’s The Thin Red Line is another obvious reference point in that respect.) Fukunaga also brings a mesmerizing scale to the smallest, most offhand moments; in one scene, he uses Agu’s trip to pick up more ammo as the impetus for an extended tracking shot revealing the geography of the trench where the boy’s squadron has holed up. (It’s almost as if the director is trying to top his celebrated Steadicam shot from “True Detective.”) But moments like this one are also illustrative of the film’s main limitation: the deeper impact and implications of war too often get lost in the fog of artistry. —Ethan Alter

EXPERIMENTER MAGNOLIA/Color/1.85/Dolby Digital/108 Mins./ Rated PG-13 Cast: Peter Sarsgaard, Winona Ryder, Jim Gaffigan, Dennis Haysbert, Taryn Manning, Kellan Lutz, Anton Yelchin, Anthony Edwards, Lori Singer, Edoardo Ballerini, Josh Hamilton, Vondie Curtis Hall, Danny Abeckaser. Written and directed by Michael Almereyda. Produced by Michael Almereyda, Uri Singer, Fabio Golombek, Danny A. Abeckaser, Aimee Schoof, Isen Robbins, Per Melita. Executive producers: Jeff Rice, Claudio Szajman, Rogerio Ferezini, Lee Broda, Mark Myers, David Randall, Trevor Crafts, Christa Campbell, Lati Grobman.

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Director of photography: Ryan Samul. Production designer: Deana Sidney. Editor: Kathryn J. Shubert Costume designer: Kama Royz. A BB Films/FJ Prods./Intrinsic Value production.

Indie filmmaker Michael Almereyda’s oddball rendering of Stanley Milgram’s infamous 1961 experiment pitting his collaborators in a Yale facility against some unknowing subjects in a rigged exercise to explore obedience to authority reveals the obvious, but sometimes interestingly.

Thematically similar but a tad more satisfying

than the recent indie The Stanford Prison Experiment, Experimenter, about another controversial academic foray exploring the dark side of human behavior, has star Peter Sarsgaard as its trump card to strengthen its hand. The actor is again impossible not to watch and is backed by convincing performances and director Michael Almereyda’s (Nadja, Cymbeline) confident, if quirky, direction. Indie fans of good work offering something different will find rewards here. Obsessed with the German people and Nazi cruelty during the Holocaust, social scientist Stanley Milgram (Sarsgaard) delves into researching human acquiescence to authority, no matter the command. At Yale in 1961, when evil and obedience were on display worldwide via the televised Eichmann trials, he develops an experiment using colleagues (really his co-conspirators) and innocent volunteers in his quest for answers. Controversy surrounds this experiment and still resonates today. It was well-intentioned and justly motivated, but fundamentally weak (like the Stanford prison exercise). Milgram uses colleague James McDonough (Jim Gaffigan) to fool subjects found randomly into believing that he (James), like them, has been brought into the exercise as a volunteer. James is strapped in a chair near each “teacher” volunteer, who is ordered to administer to him shocks that allegedly grow stronger each round. The unknowing volunteer is ordered to increase the voltage even to a fatal level—while James, in performance, groans louder and louder in pain and protest. The teachers are many and they largely behave badly, obeying and going the distance. The experiments lasted through 1962. Milgram published a paper in 1963, a book followed, and he eventually achieved a measure of celebrity, with occasional appearances on talk shows. In 1974, he landed at City College of New York. A TV movie, starring William Shatner (Kellan Lutz), was made about the researcher and his experiment. Milgram succumbed to a heart attack in 1984, but the controversy lives on. Sarsgaard is utterly convincing but not likable or understandable. In other words, who to hang onto in this story? Experimenter is a film of ideas, with at least one sticking: that we are all puppets with awareness and

sometimes can see the strings. This amounts to the first step in our liberation. But what is the point? Yes, academics, often in the area of psychology, can be driven oddballs and Milgram was criticized for the ethics of his experiments, but what came of that? Controlled testing and results are often flawed. And people have behaved badly throughout history and often don’t have the resources to resist authority. But underlying reasons and possible solutions aren’t explored. Stylistically, Experimenter has some interest. Almereyda steps out of the safety zone to deliver a real, recurring elephant in the room. This is no spoiler, as the creature has no relation to the plot except to maybe symbolize the experiment’s flaws—deception, really—that Milgram hardly addresses (hence, the elephant). Sarsgaard directly addresses the camera, metaphorically collapsing a sacred wall. Archival footage of Eichmann on trial, however, does inject an element of Milgram’s sense of purpose. —Doris Toumarkine

MEADOWLAND CINEDIGM/Color/2.35/105 Mins./Rated R Cast: Olivia Wilde, Luke Wilson, Giovanni Ribisi, Elisabeth Moss, Ty Simpkins, John Leguizamo, Kevin Corrigan, Merritt Wever, Scott Mescudi, Mark Feuerstein, Juno Temple. Directed and photographed by Reed Morano. Screenplay: Chris Rossi. Produced by Olivia Wilde, Margot Hand, Matt Tauber, Aaron L. Gilbert. Executive producers: Jennifer Levine, Jason Cloth, Alex Garcia, Santiago Garcia Galvan, Marla Rand, Scott Paterson, Lauren Selig. Production designer: Kelly McGehee. Editor: Madeleine Gavin. Music: Adam Taylor. Costume designer: Mirren Gordon-Crozier. A Bron Studios production.

Despite some pitfalls, Meadowland is a compelling look at how a married couple handles the disappearance of their young son.

rief is a difficult theme to tackle onscreen, emotionally manipulative and often a set-up for actors, writers and directors to strut their stuff. Also, grief is downright unpleasant to watch. That said, Meadowland, marking cinematographer Reed Morano’s self-assured directorial debut, is a riveting film, handled with nuance (at least for the most part). The first scene unfolds rapidly as Sarah and Phil (Olivia Wilde and Luke Wilson) drive into a highway gas station where their young son goes to the bathroom and disappears. The parents’ horror and panic is palpable as they desperately search the immediate area and hopelessly run up and down the turnpike, cars streaming by in either direction. In the next scene, a year has passed and they are hosting a get-together with friends, making every effort to establish the appear-

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ance of normalcy, though they still have no idea if their son is alive or dead or what happened to him, adding yet another layer of ambiguity to their grief. Sarah grows increasingly tipsy and can barely restrain her anguish. From that point on, the film is largely an exploration of how Phil and Sarah respectively deal with their loss. Sarah, an English teacher in a blue-collar New York neighborhood, is the more damaged of the two and most of the story—told through brief, episodic scenes—is hers. She refuses to believe that her son is dead and will not speak with the detective or look at the pictures he shows the couple of unidentified boys who’ve been killed by a known abductor-pedophile. Meanwhile, she has taken on the role of mom to a troubled youngster (Ty Simpkins) at school who is bullied by the other kids and lives with indifferent, if not abusive, foster parents. At night she wanders around Times Square in a seemingly fugue state, and as she continues to unravel, tiny self-inflicted slash marks appear on her arm. By contrast, Phil, an outer-borough beat cop, has little doubt his son is dead and joins a support group that does not help him at all. He tries to get advice from another bereft father, Pete (John Leguizamo), who lost his daughter to a hit-and-run driver. Pete can offer no real solace. Still, in an attempt to create a bond with his new pal—and appease his own rage vicariously—Pete unlawfully gives Phil the address of the intoxicated driver who killed his daughter. But Pete’s actions only backfire, as Phil is repelled by the morally corrupt gesture. His frustration and misery further fueled, Phil drives to a roadside shrine of someone who was killed on the spot and destroys it. The film boasts quite a few revealing and unexpected scenes, thanks to Morano’s tight direction and Chris Rossi’s script that resonates despite the pedestrian events that are depicted. Responding to a noise complaint, Phil visits the home of a battling couple (Juno Temple and Scott Mescudi) whose distaff member makes an aggressive play for him. Phil is lonely and his marriage is disintegrating. It’s easy to imagine him taking the encounter to the next level and it’s clear he’s toying with the idea. Yet, in the end, it’s far more credible—emotionally right and sad—when he decides against it and walks out the door. Also well-executed is the frictionfilled relationship between Sarah and Phil’s unemployed druggy brother, Tim (Giovanni Ribisi), who comes to live with the grieving couple. He’s burdening them, but, worse, he seems indifferent to their loss, though Sarah’s tearful outburst that he never remembered their son’s birthday is as tortured for him as it is for her. Despite the ongoing conflict, they have an odd kinship. Yet their relationship remains static too and it works. The acting is understated and subtle. Wilde has an expressive face, most forcefully when she says nothing, and Morano’s lingering

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close-ups are especially effective. Indeed, her evocative cinematography —her previous credits include Frozen River and Kill Your Darlings— makes very real a claustrophobic working-class world in literal and metaphoric disarray. Still, the film suffers from monotony; there’s little variety in each scene’s rhythm and tone. While the film moves quickly early on, ultimately there’s a lack of momentum, and the score signaling what the audience should be feeling throughout needs cutting. But most nettlesome is the contrived ending as Sarah spirals out of control, followed by a turnaround moment and then an absurd final scene (involving an elephant) aspiring to suggest that Sarah has achieved a sense of closure where there is none; it mostly succeeds in underscoring the creative team’s inability to come up with a plausible conclusion. —Simi Horwitz

THE ASSASSIN WELL GO USA ENTERTAINMENT/Color-B&W/ 1.85 & 1.37/104 Mins./Not Rated

Cast: Shu Qi, Chang Chen, Zhou Yun, Satoshi Tsumabuki, Juan Ching-tian, Hsieh Hsin-ying, Sheu Fang-yi, Ni Dahong. Directed by Hou Hsiao-hsien. Screenplay: Hou Hsiao-hsien, Chu Tien-wen, Hsieh Haimeng, Zhong Acheng. Produced by Hou Hsiao-hsien, Chin Yiqi, Peter Lam, Lin Kufn, Gou Tai-chiang, Tung Tzu-hsien. Executive producers: Hou Hsiao-hsien, Liao Ching-song. Director of photography: Mark Lee Ping Bing. Editor: Huang Chih-chia. Music: Lim Giong. Costume designer: Hwarng Wern-ying. Sound editor: Tu Duu-chih. Special effects: Ardi Lee. Martial arts consultant: Stephen Tung Wai. A SpotFilms, Central Motion Pictures International and Sil Metropole Organization production, in association with Wild Bunch. In Mandarin with English subtitles.

A trained killer must choose between duty and honor in director Hou Hsiao-hsien’s first martial-arts movie.

aiwanese filmmaker Hou Hsiao-hsien won Best Director at Cannes for The Assassin, a lavishly appointed, glacially SHU Q I paced martial-arts movie about vendettas, betrayals, and the rigors of Academy framing. Esteemed by critics, Hou’s movies are at their best an acquired taste. Years in the making, The Assassin is his first wuxia title—a genre that has become the last resort of art-house directors trying to connect to a broader audience. Set during the decline of the Tang dynasty in the ninth century, The Assassin focuses on Nie Yinniang (Shu Qi), an efficient, highly trained killer first seen dispatching a presumably corrupt official on horseback. But Yinniang’s emotions get in the way during

another assignment, when she spares her target after spotting his young son. Jiaxin (Sheu Fang-yi), a sort of martialarts nun and Yinniang’s handler, angrily sends her to the Weibo province to kill its governor, Tian Ji’an (Chang Chen)—Yinniang’s cousin and her former betrothed. Reacquainted with her father Nie Feng (Ni Dahong), Yinniang steals through Ji’an’s court, listening to his pronouncements and decrees, spying on his family and concubine Huji (Hsieh Hsin-ying), at times sparring anonymously with his guards. Her emotions stirred by the sight of Ji’an with his young son, Yinniang is unable to bring herself to kill him. When Ji’an orders Nie to escort a disgraced official to the border, Yinniang secretly follows, saving them from an ambush by other assassins. Now Yinniang must answer to Jiaxin, who duels her former student for disobeying her. The plot to The Assassin relies on wuxia staples, like secret assignations, fights in birch forests, or an intruder escaping guards by leaping onto a palace rooftop. Court intrigues, double-crossing minions, cryptic officials and bumbling peasants are as fundamental to the genre as the leads’ stylized combat poses and miraculous skill with weaponry. Hou buries his familiar plot under elliptical dialogue and narrative digressions. To fans, story is less important than execution, which makes some of Hou’s choices here all the more puzzling. The opening scene unfolds in black-and-white and the old Academy 1.37 aspect ratio. Hou switches to color and a 1.85 frame for a musical number, then returns to 1.37 for the remainder of the film. As a result, most of cinematographer Mark Lee Ping Bing’s compositions are medium shots, with the action pulled back away from the camera. In Hou’s hands, the Academy frame emphasizes costumes and sets instead of performances. For one scene, the camera lurks behind candles and a gauzy curtain. Pretty? Yes, but also absurdly indulgent. It takes a certain kind of skill to turn Shu Qi, one of the warmest and most charming movie stars in Asia, into a stony cypher. (Bedecked in black like Zorro, she remains glamorous.) The other performers can’t break free from genre stereotypes. Villains hiss, leaders orate, teachers preach, Yinniang suffers silently. Critics who wouldn’t be caught dead at a Yuen Woo Ping or Tsui Hark movie have been blustering about Hou’s idiosyncratic take on violence or his “startling bursts” of action. But the only thing startling about The Assassin’s action is how poorly executed it is. The fights fly by in a blur, choreographed less for impact than to cover the actors’ limited martial-arts abilities. The Assassin does prove that if you slow it down enough, even kung fu can be boring. —Daniel Eagan

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OUR BRAND IS CRISIS WARNER BROS./Color/1.85/Dolby Digital, Datasat Digital & SDDS/107 Mins./Rated R Cast: Sandra Bullock, Billy Bob Thornton, Anthony Mackie, Joaquim de Almeida, Ann Dowd, Scoot McNairy, Zoe Kazan, Dominic Flores, Reynaldo Pacheco, Louis Arcella. Directed by David Gordon Green. Screenplay: Peter Straughan, inspired by the documentary by Rachel Boynton. Produced by Grant Heslov, George Clooney. Executive producers: Sandra Bullock, Stuart Besser, Jeff Skoll, Jonathan King, Steven Mnuchin. Director of photography: Tim Orr. Production designer: Richard A. Wright. Editor: Colin Patton. Music: David Wingo. Costume designer: Jenny Eagan. A Warner Bros. Pictures presentation, in association with Participant Media and Ratpac-Dune Entertainment, of a Smokehouse Pictures production. In English and Spanish with English subtitles.

Nasty but funny satiric comedy-drama about two U.S. political strategists on opposite sides in a presidential run in Bolivia. Flirting, skullduggery and deep cynicism— along with painful truisms—course through this fast and flashy amusement.

No fingers will be wagged (or lawsuits

launched) if some viewers of Our Brand Is Crisis swear they are watching real-life, nowmarried power political-consulting couple Mary Matalan (leaning right) and James Carville (leaning left and on the Clintons), the bickering celeb warriors who, before coming together romantically, snapped at each other from their opposing corners. Sandra Bullock and Billy Bob Thornton (right down to his Carville-like bald head, pronounced drawl and bawdy manner) certainly suggest the reallife couple. Bullock brings off her reinvented neurotic and driven character perfectly and Thornton is also convincingly dangerous. The backdrop here is the Bolivian presidential election, in which Castillo (Joaquim de Almeida) is significantly behind frontrunner Rivera (Louis Arcella). Castillo team operatives (well-paid Americans, of course) Ben (Anthony Mackie) and Nell (Ann Dowd) make a snowy trek into a far-west mountain region to retrieve and recruit ace political consultant Jane (Bullock), burned out and recovering as a pottery maker in the solitary confines of her log cabin. The two rekindle her passion (or is it an addiction) to the game and bring her onboard to lead the team behind Castillo, in spite of him lagging at number four or five in the race. Once she recovers from high-altitude disorders, Jane immediately gets to work in La Paz. Because this effort will have at its heart an effective media and marketing campaign to sell the candidate to the people, there is already onboard team member Rich Buckley (Scoot McNairy), the jerky media maven who can block shots for commercials but is otherwise clueless. Later to join are Eddie (Reynaldo Pacheco), a local kid who has long idolized Castillo, and young genius egghead LeBlanc

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(Zoe Kazan), whom Jane recruits to do all the nitty-gritty background research needed for a victory (and scandal-mongering). As marketing, positioning and perception are at the heart of winning, Jane—a cold, savage, calculating animal—at first plays nice, devising a campaign to improve Castillo’s image. But she needs more and goes rogue. When Jane encounters rival Pat Candy (Thornton), her competitive juices are fired and she’s all the more determined to win. And he’s all the more determined to get his former lover back in bed. Candy is an oily charmer, with sex on his brain running a close second to winning. Both driven schemers share a philosophy that winning is everything, by any means necessary. Castillo slowly moves up. LeBlanc unearths dirt about Rivera, but Castillo too has some dark passages, which all make their way into the media. On the plus side, Jane visits Eddie in the poor sector where he lives with this older orphaned sibling, and some real bonding and eye-opening occurs. With George Clooney as producer and Participant Media as backers, it’s no surprise that Our Brand Is Crisis, inspired by Rachel Boyton’s 2002 documentary, has strong sociopolitical and ethical messages lurking within its entertainment. As in an effective documentary, the medium delivers the messages fun and effectively. Wherever there is politics, there is corruption, because there’s always money to buy an election. That will likely never change, but Our Brand is Crisis briefly renders a bad thing amusing. —Doris Toumarkine

JEM AND THE HOLOGRAMS UNIVERSAL/Color/2.35/Dolby Digital, Datasat Digital & SDDS/118 Mins./Rated PG Cast: Aubrey Peeples, Stefanie Scott, Aurora Perrineau, Hayley Kiyoko, Molly Ringwald, Juliette Lewis, Ryan Guzman, Isabella Kai Rice, Barnaby Carpenter, Nathan Moore, Justin Alastair. Directed by Jon M. Chu. Screenplay: Ryan Landels. Produced by: Jason Blum, Scooter Braun, Jon M. Chu, Steven Davis, Brian Goldner, Bennett Schneir. Executive producers: Jeanette Brill, Couper Samuelson. Director of photography: Alice Brooks. Production designer: Kevin Bird. Editors: Michael Trent, Jillian Twigger Moul. Music: Nathan Lanier. Costume designer: Soyon An. Visual effects supervisor: James David Hattin. A Universal Pictures and AllSpark Pictures presentation of a Blumhouse/Chu Studios production, in association with SB Projects.

For this ’80s cartoon adaptation, saying you’re “truly outrageous” doesn’t mean you actually are.

Jem and the Holograms is a top-notch example of a direct-to-DVD Disney movie. As a theatrical release…not so much. Director Jon M. Chu has turned the neon pink of the original Saturday morning cartoon into a bland beige.

In updating this prime slice of ’80s ham for the 21st century, screenwriter Ryan Landels made Jerrica Benton (Aubrey Peeples), originally a music executive who uses a literal hologram to create a rocker alter-ego named Jem, a suburban teen whose acoustic crooning of a self-written song goes viral, leaving the whole world breathless with wonder as to who the mystery musical genius “Jem” really is. In short order, Jerrica is snapped up by Starlight Music head honcho Erica Raymond (Juliette Lewis), who begrudgingly accedes to her one demand: that her sisters, Kimber (Stefanie Scott), Aja (Hayley Kiyoko) and Shana (Aurora Perrineau), be her band. Once in L.A., a plotline involving Jerrica’s growing popularity is interwoven with one where she’s led on a scavenger hunt by a robot built by her dead father. Both subplots feel like they’re completely different movies, and both of those movies are boring. While “Normal teen finds fame on YouTube” is ostensibly more recent and fresh than “Jem and the Holograms”’ original retro wackiness, no amount of breathless asides about “the Internet!” and “viral video!” can keep the proceedings from feeling tired. We’ve seen everything in this movie before. Without much to recommend it by way of plot or character development, Jem needs actors who can rise above their thinly written material. Two of them do. Both Juliette Lewis and Ryan Guzman have the charisma to pull off the preening narcissist villain and hunka-hunka love interest, respectively. Lewis hits Jem with a defibrillator every time she’s onscreen, and each time Guzman opened his mouth, my entire theatre started cooing. The performance scenes, too, are high-energy and interesting to watch; Chu, a music-video director whose first high-profile film gig was directing Step Up 2:The Streets, knows his way around a musical number. And there’s a mid-credits stinger that’s more interesting than the rest of the movie combined; I want to take it, Lewis and Guzman and shuffle them off to make another Jem movie, one that’s more fun than hokey and has lead performances with more staying power than New Coke. Chu does himself no favors by juxtaposing Jem’s climactic final gig with social mediasourced clips of fans talking about how much the pink-haired rocker has meant to them. Though the subject of this praise is, within the context of the movie, 2015 Jem, these appear to be real-life fans of the ’80s cartoon; one clip has an animated snippet playing in the background. It’s an endearing meta-nod, a sort of ’80s Jem passing the glitter-studded baton to her 21st-century successor. And it would be effective if Chu’s version of Jem felt in any way worthy of inspiring such strong emotions. As it is, there’s a massive disconnect between what Chu says Jem—and, by extension, Jem—is (a touching tribute to the power of family, a paean to not letting others define you, “truly outrageous!”) and what Jem actually is: not much. —Rebecca Pahle

NOVEMBER 2015

EUROPEAN UPDATE ANDREAS FUCHS FJI EXHIBITION/ BUSINESS EDITOR

LONDON FEST FÊTES BIZ For “filmmakers and executives at all stages of their careers,” the industry program at the 59th edition of the BFI London Film Festival (Oct. 7-18, www.bfi.org. uk/lff) offered a “range of valuable opportunities to develop skills and make new connections,” festival director Clare Stewart promised. Activities were intended to help them “to grow their business and expertise in an environment where they can also see the best new films from around the world.” One key element was the new “LFF Connects” series of “thoughtprovoking and high-impact talks” that included Christopher Nolan, Tacita Dean (Tate Modern), Alexander Horwath (Austrian Film Museum) and Heather Stewart (British Film Institute creative director) conducting a “conversation that reframes the future of film as a medium.” Additional guests were Laurie Anderson (LFF Connects: Performance/Music), Guy Maddin (Art), Chris Milk (Creative Technologies) and Geena Davis keynoting the first global symposium outside of the U.S. for the Institute on Gender in Media and Women that she founded. Additional highlights of LFF’s industry partnerships included Film London’s Production Finance and Micro Markets, with over 800 faceto-face meetings in two days for the former. And one day for the latter uniting 25 filmmaking teams with financiers on projects budgeted at €1 million and under (US$1.136 mil.). Market Place Live provided an interactive approach to “bringing a project to market” with experts from finance, distribution, international sales and marketing. As the international industry focus was on China, of course, LFF also partnered with the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences for

NOVEMBER 2015

a panel highlighting its support of the global filmmaking industry. Mark Johnson, producer and Foreign Language Film Award Committee chairman, appeared onstage to discuss the process of submitting a film into the Oscar race.

THE IMPORTANCE OF BREAKING RECORDS On Oct. 8, the broadcast of a live performance of Oscar Wilde’s The Importance of Being Earnest starring David Suchet as Lady Bracknell, beaming from London’s West End to 372 cinema sites in the U.K., marked “the highest opening-week gross for any commercial West End theatre production screened in cinemas.” Ticket sales of £508,041 (US$785,000; €691,500) ranked second for the night, only behind The Martian. “This shows just what an appetite there is beyond the West End for such classic and entertaining plays,” noted Christine Costello of More2Screen (www.more2screen.com). “From the moment we announced this release back in March, we have had a fantastic reaction from our cinema partners and their audiences.” The equally Important recorded release of this cinema event rolls out internationally into the U.S. (Nov. 3), Canada (Dec. 5) and Australia (Feb. 6). Across Europe, an additional 88 cinemas in 11 territories were part of the initial U.K. broadcast

PROMOTING EUROPEAN FILMS Hamburg, Germany-based European Film Promotion (www. efp-online.com) selected cities of Angels and Saints in the United States and Russia to present the latest and greatest that European cinema has to offer. From Oct. 25 to Nov. 8, EFP’s LA Screenings will showcase a

record number of 27 European titles among the total lineup of 81 submissions in the ForeignLanguage category. After eight years, EFP welcomes more than two-thirds of the European countries now–36 total this year–that are taking advantage of “the extra presentation and promotion” this series offers, organizers noted. “Since most of the films are still available for the U.S. market, distributors and international buyers are invited to the screenings along with Academy members.” Some of the films will be presented by their talent in person. Latvia and Albania are participating in the Screenings for the first time. Another first launched at Westwind festival in St. Petersburg (Oct. 21-25). The third edition of this Creative Europe/MEDIA Programme-supported event included theatrical screenings. Nine films shown at the Angleterre Hotel (www.angleterrehotel. com/about-us/cinema) “serve as the engine” for EFP’s first VideoOn-Demand festival on ivi, which is deemed to be Russia’s most popular online cinema. For a list of films available for one year on ivi, check www.efp-online.com/ download/pdf/IVIfilms.pdf. With the change from Moscow to St. Petersburg and the extension to include the online availability of 26 Oscar submissions from across Europe, “EFP is reacting to the present unstable situation for European films in the Russian distribution market,” the organization said. “EFP wants to continue the dialogue with Russian audiences,” explained EFP managing director Renate Rose. “The two-track approach…will make Westwind into a special endeavor for reaching out to a larger audience.”

TESTA TAKES KENCAST INTERNATIONAL KenCast Inc., the technology backbone provider behind the DCDC delivery network (www. kencast.com/products/digitalcinema), appointed Fabrice Testa as head of international business development in the company’s expansion activities across the EMEA, Russia and CIS and APAC regions. KenCast’s initial focus will be on “building the digitalcinema delivery network, offering the technology platform that is widely deployed in North and Latin America,” said chief executive officer Eric Reed. “The timing is ideal, as our initiatives in these regions have picked up significantly.” Testa brings 25 years of digital tech experience and has “contributed to the massive digitization of the European landscape,” the announcement stated, including key positions with XDC and dcinex, as well as DSAT Cinema. “Digitization is now behind us,” Testa knows, “but we are still far away in terms of digital delivery for both movies and live events in Europe. Hence, there are great opportunities for KenCast to gain market share and for cinema stakeholders to benefit from their superior technology.”

WALTZ AWARDS SWISS FILMS During the IWC gala dinner held as part of the 11th Zurich Film Festival (Sept. 24 to Oct. 4, www.zff.com/en), Oscar-winning actor Christoph Waltz presented the first-ever “Filmmaker Award.” The Swiss luxury watchmaker had invited some 200 guests celebrating two winners to the theme of “For CONTINUED ON PAGE

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SNACK CORNER ANITA WATTS FJI CONCESSIONS EDITOR

PREPARING FOR CHANGE New Food Guidelines Will Impact Your Operation

he legal issues that face the food and beverage operations in our theatres are a mountain of moving targets, unpredictable, sometimes confusing, but also dangerous. Pleading ignorance of conflicting rulings will not get you out of violations. As we finish out a great year and look forward to another great year in 2016, we don’t want to risk all our hard-won revenue with complications from legal problems that could be avoided. This is a review of where our big issues stand, the organizations that are working to help you, and the things you need to think about for next year. The current biggest issue is menu labeling. The FDA final ruling that theatres with more than 20 locations would be included in the compliance to list calorie information on menus and menu boards was to go into effect this December. However, this past July it was extended by another full year to December 2016. The time frame gives the FDA and the market time to sort out some of the finer details and questions about how the ruling is to be applied. In September, the FDA finally issued a draft guidance document to help with the understanding of the requirements and provide guidance to retailers to implementation. It would be in your best interest to read it. According to the FDA, “This guidance represents the Food and Drug Administration’s (FDA’s) current thinking on this topic. It does not create or confer any rights for or on any person and does

not operate to bind the FDA or the public. You may use an alternative approach if the approach satisfies the requirements of the applicable statutes and regulations. If you want to discuss an alternative approach, contact the FDA staff responsible for implementing this guidance. If you cannot identify the appropriate FDA staff, call the telephone number listed on the title page of this guidance.” The other issues that we currently face are continued legislation around the country to introduce taxes on sugar products, drink size and other calorie restrictions, and actual warning labels. Municipalities across the country have come to the conclusion that they can demonstrate their concern for the obesity problem by taxing sugar products, including food and beverage. Some legislation is focused on labeling and warnings for GMO products. Other caloric/ sugar-based legislation is coming in the form of sugar “warnings” (state of New York) and cup sizes (New York and California). The list is long and growing. You need to use all the resources at your disposal. Both NATO and the NAC have government action committees that are specifically working to represent our interests and inform us of legislation that affects us. Both organizations have online resources, seminars and meetings that you can attend, committees that you can join, and people you can call for help. They also partner with other organizations such as the Beverage Association and Restaurant Association to share resources and content.

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Dan Borschke, executive director of the NAC, has made government relations one of the top priorities of his responsibilities. He passionately believes his members must stay on top of these issues and can benefit from combining their voices through the NAC to have some input into legislative decisions. He notes, “NAC didn’t have a government-relations effort just five years ago, but with our continuous partnership with NATO, the American Beverage Association, the National Confectioners Association and the National Agricultural Marketing Association, we are not just playing defense but also have an aggressive advocacy program for our members. The real work will continue to be at the municipal and state level, where real budgetary needs are impacting our membership with higher taxes, labeling and actual proposals for product bans. We thank the NAC membership for their continued support of this very important Association obligation.” Some of the things you need to think about for next year include preparation for menu labeling, reading up on the current legislation that affects your theatres, and being ready as some of the same problems we currently face continue. Cost is a factor

with all of these. Changing and managing your content for calorie labeling must be addressed as well as collecting and distributing new taxes on sugar. Another issue that has worsened in 2015 is random health and fire inspections that take place on a daily basis around the country. Small infractions are found and citations are handed out. Municipalities have decided this is an easy way to collect revenue that is completely legal and seemingly uncontrolled. There are efforts under way to force restrictions on when, where and how municipalities can inflict inspections and citations. But this is a long battle that will most likely continue to be a challenge in 2016. The bottom line on this topic is that our legal issues and woes will increase, not decrease, for the foreseeable future. The end results are debatable, but the government seems to have landed squarely on the side of more intervention, not less when it comes to food and beverage consumption. The best thing you can do is prepare as much as possible, consider all possibilities, budget for changes and contingencies, and get involved and contribute to the process. Send your comments to Anita Watts at anitaw@reactornet.com.

NOVEMBER 2015

CONCESSION SPOTLIGHT

KEEP IT POPPING Weaver’s Joe Macaluso Champions New Flavors

eturning to the supplier side of the business for this month’s Concession Spotlight, we meet with Joe Macaluso, senior VP of sales at Weaver Popcorn. Joe has had a long career in sales in the food and beverage industry and has many long-term relationships to show for it. But let’s start at the beginning. Writing these profiles has been a great way for me to learn important details about our executives’ lives, and one of Joe’s interesting gems is that he graduated from college, started his first job and got married all in the same week in 1981. He began as a route salesman for Coca-Cola Bottling in Youngstown, Ohio. He was promoted to district manager and then to sales center manager in Columbus, Ohio. He was able to go through many of the CocaCola training programs which have helped drive his career. In 1995, Joe moved to Indiana to work for Weaver Popcorn Company as the senior VP of sales for the grocery, snack and concession divisions. He focused on increasing market share by building brand awareness and product loyalty. In 1997, he shifted focus to Weaver’s microwave division and became the senior VP of sales for Walmart, club, and dollar stores. He held this position for the next 14 years. In 2011, Joe was recruited to become an owner with the Abby Candle Company in Muncie, Indiana. He helped get the company on its feet and to the next level by landing their first national account, creating a sales program with a regional retail channel system, and increasing revenue by 46% in the first year. He also started a distributor program and was a part of the company’s management team. But Weaver wanted him back, and Joe wanted to return. Asked about his mentors along the way, Joe responds, “Owen Segal from Coca-Cola and Mike Weaver from Weaver Popcorn

NOVEMBER 2015

JOE MACALUSO, V P OF S ALES , WE AV ER POPCORN

Company. They taught me to never give up. These guys are relentless and would die before giving up. They also taught me to listen and ask a lot of questions before making a recommendation and to focus on action. Don’t just talk about it, go out and put together a plan to make it happen.” In 2014, Joe returned to Weaver in his current position as senior VP of sales for the concession division, U.S. and Canada. He really loves the concession industry and loves his job and the people he has known and worked with for many, many years. The popcorn business is in his blood, he understands it and knows how much his product helps his customers make money. He is tasked with growing the company’s market share, which is his strength, and he has already accomplished that in 2015 and even more substantially with his customer commitments for 2016. Joe is focused on the sales efforts of the company in all its forms, and selling is his passion. As a fellow salesman, it is great to talk with Joe about what works and what doesn’t and he really understands the value of great salesmanship to any company. I asked Joe whether he thinks gourmet popcorn is a fad or here to stay. “Here to stay. The RTE [ready-to-eat] category has doubled in the retail channel during the past fi ve years. Many of the growing new brands and fl avors

introduced over the past few years have been manufactured with wet poppers versus hotair poppers, and since the concession stand typically uses wet poppers, concessionaires have the ability to offer these additional fl avors and duplicate the success that the RTE category has experienced.” I also asked how he sees the concession stand continuing to evolve over the next fi ve years. “In regard to popcorn,” he feels, “the concession stand has been slow to react to the successful trend that has taken place in the retail-channel RTE popcorn category. Consumers want more than just butter fl avor. Natural—corn, oil and salt—is the fastestgrowing fl avor now, representing 30.9 percent of the total RTE popcorn category in retail during the last quarter, and we have yet to see many concession stands selling the natural fl avor. As we move into the future, I think they will react faster to the trends that we see in other channels, like that of the RTE popcorn.” Joe has been married to his wife Kathy for 34 years and they have two daughters and live in Carmel, Indiana. He is an avid outdoorsman, enjoying hiking and cycling when he can. He has climbed Mt. Hood and Mt. Rainer and completed the triple-bypass ride in Colorado. He spends time with family and friends and loves to travel. He is involved with the National Association of Concessionaires and industry trade and charity events and sees himself staying at Weaver well into the future. —Anita Watts

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ASIA/PACIFIC RoundAbout THOMAS SCHMID

CAMBODIA REVEALS ACADEMY AWARDS PICK Cambodia has selected the feature film The Last Reel (2014), directed by Sotho Kulikar, as its official submission for the Best Foreign-Language Film category at the upcoming 88th Academy Awards. The drama is one of the first Cambodian movies to have been directed by a woman and has already won prizes at this year’s Tokyo International Film Festival and the Far East Film Festival in Udine, Italy.

single film, the last reel of which was supposedly destroyed after the Khmer Rouge took power. Sophoun doesn’t believe her mother and embarks on a vigorous search to recover the allegedly lost print. During the course of her investigation, she is able to dig up some dark secrets about the roles her parents played during the Khmer Rouge regime. The Last Reel follows in the wake of director Rithy Panh’s The Missing Picture, which was nominated for a Foreign-Language Film Oscar in 2013. Although it didn’t win, it was the first Cambodian motion picture ever to make the shortlist. The country did not submit a film last year.

THAILAND D ECIDES ON GAY-THEMED FILM CAMBODIA’S THE LAST REEL Like so many other contemporary Cambodian films, The Last Reel deals with the country’s terrifying past under the genocidal Khmer Rouge regime, which ruled between 1975 and 1979. Characterized by stylish cinematography, the drama tells the story of a young, rebellious and listless female college student, Sophoun, who would rather spend her time with her motorbikedriving hoodlum boyfriend than attending to her studies. One day she discovers a number of dusty movie still photos in a former cinema that was converted into a car-repair shop. To her big surprise, she recognizes her own mother as a young woman in the pictures. When Sophoun confronts her mum about the photos, she reluctantly admits that she used to be a big movie star “in the old times.” Her fame was based on a

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Meanwhile, Cambodia’s neighboring country Thailand also has revealed its choice for the 88th Academy Awards: a gay-themed coming-of-age drama. How to Win at Checkers (Every Time) was directed by Korean-American Josh Kim and stars a largely unknown cast. It is the debut film of Kim, who according to press reports even learned to speak and write Thai in preparation for his movie.

THAILAND’S HOW TO WIN AT CHECKERS (EVERY TIME) An eight-member committee fielded by the awkwardly named National Federation of Thai Motion Picture and Content Associations

eventually selected How to Win at Checkers (Every Time) from among 59 contenders. “The film has successfully been able to raise issues that people in Thailand don’t openly talk about,” Weerasak Kowsurat, the Federation’s secretary-general, told the Associated Press. Thailand is at its core still an extremely conservative society where issues like homosexuality are rarely discussed and often swept under the carpet, a surprising fact for many visitors who have stumbled across a prolific gay and transsexual scene both in the capital of Bangkok and various tourist resorts around the country. How to Win at Checkers (Every Time) tells the story of an 11-yearold boy who is being raised in a poor suburban district of Bangkok by his gay older brother. When his brother is called up for a military draft lottery, the boy devises a plan to help him dodge it. Thailand recruits young men for compulsory military service through a controversial–and corruption-prone–lottery, where the offspring of wealthy people routinely buy their way out by bribing officials. While transgender people generally are exempt from participating in the lottery, it is still required for males claiming to be gay. While no Thai movie has ever been nominated for a Foreign-Language Film Oscar, a string of local movies have won prizes at various film festivals over the past decades. Most notable among these is perhaps Apichatpong Weerasethakul’s fantasy drama Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives, which won the Palme d’Or at the 2010 Cannes Film Festival.

IRAN S ELECTS PROPHET FILM FOR 2016 O SCARS The Islamic Republic of Iran has selected the epic biopic

IRAN’S MUHAMMAD: THE MESSENGER OF GOD Muhammad: The Messenger of God (top right), a film focusing on the early childhood life of the prophet Mohammed, as its contender for next year’s Foreign-Language Film Academy Award. Directed by Majid Majidi, the movie was reportedly produced with a budget of almost $40 million, which was partly funded by the government, effectively making it the most expensive film in the country’s cinematic history. Released in late August, the film has barely earned $2 million at the local box office, although it reportedly was screened in 130 theatres across the country. Majidi said his movie is intended to help alleviate “the violent image” various Islamic and jihadist groups have created for the Muslim religion. Majidi himself is no stranger to the Academy Awards. His film The Children of Heaven was nominated for the ForeignLanguage Film Oscar at the 1998 Academy Awards, although it didn’t win. However, Iran received the prestigious trophy at the 85th Academy Awards in 2012 for the internationally acclaimed social drama A Separation, directed by Asghar Farhadi. The movie also bagged several prizes at film festivals around the world. For inquiries and feedback, contact Thomas Schmid at thomas. schmid@filmjournal.com.

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DAY & DATE DownUnder DAVID PEARCE

ummer has come early to Australia, with temperatures passing 30 degrees C (86 degrees F) in most capital cities early in October. Summer has come to local films at the box office as well: Boosted by the strong box office of three family films (Paper Planes, Oddball and Blinky Bill: The Movie), plus some of the year’s earlier films such as Mad Max: Fury Road, The Water Diviner and the more recent Last Cab to Darwin, this year already has the highest box-office figure ever for local films, with a total expected to exceed A$70 million. The success of the family films has prompted Screen Australia to encourage more producers into this sector of the industry. The agency is calling for onepage submissions for live-action family films that can be made for under A$7 million. Ten of the submissions will be selected for a two-day workshop in Sydney in March next year. Up to three of those ten will receive government funding to develop a first draft. Although three family films have done well this year, there are few in the pipeline, with the majority of upcoming films filling a darker niche.

Ј Kelly Rogers and David Ross were co-founders of the Rialto chain of cinemas in New Zealand before selling it to Reading. In recent years they have been establishing Monterey Cinemas, a new boutique chain with a more mainstream target audience than the original Rialto art-house circuit. Their first new cinema in Howick, Auckland, the Monterey, takes the name of a previous, now-closed cinema in the suburb. Their latest cinema is the Monterey Upper Hutt (near Wellington), reopening and updating a theatre that closed NOVEMBER 2015

in 2012. The cinema is getting a new foyer as well as an upgrade into the digital era. “It’s going to appeal to families and children and practically everyone,” says Rogers, adding, “We’ll be providing expanded food and beverage offerings with food and drink you will be able to take to your seat.” Rogers and Ross also co-own the Bridgeway Cinemas in Auckland and an upscale cinema in Tauranga.

Ј Do we really want Smello-vision resuscitated? Scent of Mystery, starring Denholm Elliott and directed by Jack Cardiff, opened in New York, Chicago and Los Angeles in January 1960 in cinemas especially fitted out for the experience. The movie was not a success, mainly due to very poor reviews. The film was rereleased with a new title, Holiday In Spain, by Cinerama without the scents, but it fared little better. Last year, Cinerama specialists David Strohmaier and Paul Sittig completed a restoration for its Blu-ray release under the Holiday In Spain title without the smelly gimmick. Australian writer-producer Tammy Burstock is part of a team that was involved in the restoration of the movie, and a premiere cinema screening of the restored film with fabulous “Smell-o-vision” scents was due to happen in Bradford, England in late October, to be followed by Denmark, with hopes for new screenings around the world. Burnstock recently stated, “The film is not a wonderful piece of cinema, I have to admit. However, it is an amazing piece of history for both scent and Cinerama reasons.”

December 8-10, 2015 Hong Kong Convention & Exhibition Centre The only convention serving the Asian cinema exhibition and distribution communities

Educational Seminars Trade Show Screenings & Product Presentations

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Send your Australia/New Zealand news to David Pearce at insidemovies@hotmail.com.

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TRADE TALK CINEASIA TO HONOR CINÉPOLIS INDIA Cinépolis India will be honored with the DLP Cinema® Marketing Achievement Award at CineAsia 2015 in Hong Kong in December. Javier Sotomayor, managing director of Cinépolis India, will accept the award. Cinépolis India is a wholly owned subsidiary of Cinépolis and is the first international exhibitor in India. The company started its operations in India in 2009 at Amritsar and currently operates 217 screens under the brand names of Cinépolis, Cinépolis VIP and Fun Cinemas. Cinépolis, founded in 1971 and headquartered in Morelia, Mexico, is the world’s fourth-largest movie theatre circuit, operating more than 465 multiplexes with over 4,300 screens in 13 countries and serving more than 200 million patrons annually. The circuit is a pioneer of premium and luxury movie theatres. Cinépolis is the fastest-growing multiplex chain in India, having reached more than 100 screens organically in less than five years. Last year, Cinépolis acquired 83 screens of Fun Cinemas across India.

JOHN PARTILLA NAMED SCREENVISION CEO The board of directors of Screenvision named John Partilla as the company’s new chief executive officer, concluding an extensive search to replace former CEO Travis Reid. Partilla will focus on elevating Screenvision’s position in the broader video media landscape, integrating new and emerging technology, strengthening the preshow advertising platform, and creating tentpole programs for brands. Prior to joining Screenvision, Partilla served as CEO of Olson from January 2013. Under his leadership, the company grew 20 percent, making it the third-largest independent digital agency in the U.S before it was acquired by ICF in 2014.

ST. JUDE HOSPITAL L AUNCHES 12TH ‘THANKS AND GIVING’ DRIVE Since 1962, when entertainer and Hollywood star Danny Thomas founded St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital, St. Jude has changed how the world treats childhood cancer and other life-threatening diseases. In the beginning, many of Thomas’ friends in Hollywood raised funds and awareness to help him fulfill his dream that “no child should die in the dawn of life.” Continuing Hollywood’s long

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tradition of caring, the lifesaving work of St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital is powered by movie magic through the generosity of exhibition partners. Industry leaders including Regal Entertainment Group, AMC, Cinemark USA, Carmike Cinemas, Marcus Theatres, Malco Theatres and many others donate pre-show advertising during the holidays to air the St. Jude trailer across the country and in Puerto Rico, letting moviegoers know that at St. Jude, they won’t stop until no child dies from cancer. Theatre partners raise awareness that is critical to fundraising success and help keep Danny Thomas’ promise that families never receive a bill from St. Jude for treatment, travel, housing or food–because all a family should worry about is helping their child live. Please join in finding cures and saving children by participating in the St. Jude “Thanks and Giving” movie trailer program. To learn more, visit stjude.org/theatres.

CHRISTIE EXTENDS VIVE AUDIO LINE Christie extended its Christie Vive Audio™ line with the introduction of the LA2 premium screen-channel loudspeaker and the LA3S3ohm premium surround-channel loudspeaker. The speakers continue the Christie Vive tradition of using ribbon-driver technology to provide timbre-matching, enhanced voice intelligibility and low distortion. “Our market research shows that the majority of ‘new build’ cinema auditoriums have 250 seats or less,” said Phil Sanchez, senior product manager at Christie. “With the introduction of the LA2 product, Christie is filling the gap between its LA1/S115 and LA3/ S115 screen-channel solutions, price and performance-wise, for these theatres.” Both products are expected to be available in November. Christie just celebrated the 200th installation of the Christie Vive Audio purpose-built line-array speaker system at Southern Theatres’ Movie Tavern Flourtown 8 in Flourtown, Pennsylvania. The company anticipates the sale of its 300th Vive Audio system by the opening of Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens on Dec. 18, 2015.

SANTIKOS 16- PLEX IS ALL BARCO L ASER Barco has partnered with Santikos Theatres for the first-ever multiplex powered exclusively by laser cinema projectors. The Texas-based

exhibitor’s new Casa Blanca Theatre will utilize Barco’s Flagship and phosphor laser projectors to illuminate all 16 screens. The agreement marks the first 100% laser-powered projection cinema in the world. The new site, slated to debut in early 2016, will offer a specialty restaurant, in-theatre dining service, a 16-lane state-of-the-art bowling venue, and luxury recliner seating. Barco recently installed the first flagship laser projector in the Republic of Korea. Lotte Cinema, one of the country’s major multiplexes, has equipped its auditorium with Barco’s ultrabright 6P laser cinema projector for premium screens (DP4K-60L). Lotte Cinema recently launched its own premium auditorium brand, Super Plex, which features a 22-meter wide screen, immersive 3D sound system with premium speakers, and a brighter 3D system with 2.4-gain silver screen.

FANDANGO L AUNCHES NEW RESEARCH UNIT Fandango announced the formation of FandangoLabs, the company’s new research and development unit dedicated to innovating moviegoing products and services. FandangoLabs will explore bringing to market exciting new ways for consumers to experience movies on the big screen and share new audience conveniences to grow advanced ticketing and drive theatre attendance. FandangoLabs will work with multiple facets of the film and technology industries, enlisting a diverse array of leaders as inaugural members to its advisory board, including Dave Hollis, Walt Disney Studios executive VP, theatrical distribution; George Dewey, head of digital marketing at 20th Century Fox; David Doyle, chief information officer and senior VP, Regal Entertainment Group; Alwyn Hight Kushner, president and COO, TCL Chinese Theatres; Jason Blum, founder and CEO of Blumhouse Productions; and Jennifer Panasik, portfolio director, media and technology, at IDEO. Global design firm IDEO will serve as a Fandango innovation partner in this new venture. Fandango also recently signed an agreement with Latin American e-commerce company B2W Companhia Digital to purchase its entertainment ticketing subsidiary, Ingresso. com, based in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. With more than six million registered customers, Ingresso is Brazil’s largest online and mobile movie ticketing service

NOVEMBER 2015

GDC DEPLOYS CINÉPOLIS

CINEPLEX ANNOUNCES SECOND REC ROOM

GDC Technology announced the deployment of its flagship product, the SX3000 Standalone Integrated Media Block™ with Enterprise Series Storage, to Cinépolis, the largest cinema chain in Latin America and fourth-largest in the world. The Mexican-based circuit operates more than 4,388 screens in 13 countries.

Cineplex Entertainment announced plans to build a Rec Room™ in Calgary, Alberta. Scheduled to open in December 2016 in Deerfoot City (formerly Deerfoot Mall), the two-story, nearly 50,000-square-foot dining and entertainment complex will be The Rec Room’s second location—with the first slated to open in Edmonton, Alberta, in the spring of 2016. “The Rec Room is a social destination that brings together an incredible dining, amusement-gaming and entertainment experience all under one roof,” said Pat Marshall, VP, communications and investor relations, at Cineplex Entertainment. Developed with the support of Shape Properties, The Rec Room aims to have broad appeal with young adults and families, while also serving as an ideal gathering spot for corporate events and parties. Some features of The Rec Room include: Ϣ A large attractions area that will boast an assortment of amusement games and interactive feature attractions alongside recreational activities like pool, shuffleboard and ping-pong. Ϣ Multiple dining options including an upscale casual restaurant featuring an open kitchen and a contemporary menu as well as “eatertainment-style” dining concepts in the games area. Ϣ An expansive, multi-level patio featuring outdoor fireplaces and bocce ball courts. Ϣ A bar area which features a massive highdefinition screen, an ideal place for Flames fans to watch the game or for friends to gather for a pint of craft beer, a glass of wine or a signature cocktail. Ϣ An auditorium-style space that will be used for live entertainment like comedy and musical acts. Cineplex plans on opening several more locations of The Rec Room nationally over the course of the next few years.

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ALAMO’S NEW MISSION ENLISTS SONY 4K SYSTEM Alamo Drafthouse Cinema has expanded its 4K footprint by purchasing the first high-brightness Sony SRX-R515DS dual 4K projection system in the U.S. Alamo Drafthouse New Mission is due to open its doors later this year at 2550 Mission Street. Formerly San Francisco’s historic New Mission theatre, the iconic century-old movie palace has been restored to its former glory after four years of painstaking work overseen by Alamo Drafthouse founder and CEO Tim League. “Since installing our first 4K projector, we’ve known it’s the only way to give customers the picture quality they deserve,” says Tim Reed, chief development officer at Alamo Drafthouse Cinemas.

MARCUS THEATRES PACTS WITH HOLLYWOOD SOFTWARE Woodland Hills, CA-based Hollywood Software signed an exclusive deal with Marcus Theatres, the fifth-largest theatre circuit in the United States, to use Hollywood Software’s Enterprise Web theatre-management platform to centrally manage operations for its nearly 700 screens. Enterprise Web gives circuit management a look at operations inside all its theatres from one centralized website, where shows can be monitored for operational issues that could put them at risk, and then evaluated to determine actual performance versus plan. It also allows exhibitors to have just one qualified staff member take over tasks previously assigned to every theatre manager on a weekly basis–such as KDM management, title mapping, and trailer pack building–thus creating circuit-wide efficiencies. “The benefits of a centralized management platform for our theatre-management systems will be realized by multiple departments, all while streamlining work, increasing accuracy and avoiding lost shows,” said Mark Collins, director of projection technology at Marcus Theatres.

NOVEMBER 2015

CGV STARIUM INSTALLS CHRISTIE L ASER PROJECTOR CGV, a subsidiary of CJ Group and South Korea’s largest multiplex cinema chain, has installed Christie’s 6-Primary (6P) laser projection system in CGV Starium, which houses one of the largest screens in the world. Located in the Times Square shopping mall in Seoul’s Yeongdeungpo district, CGV Starium is a deluxe 545-seat auditorium equipped with a giant screen that measures 32 meters in width

and a Christie CP42LH high-frame-rate 3DLP® 4K RGB laser projector. The upgrade will replace CGV Starium’s existing Christie 4K dual xenon system with a pair of Christie 4K laser projection heads, a 6P modular laser light farm with fiber-optic delivery, Christie 4K 3D high-bitrate server, and a new premium white screen. This particular system is designed to achieve over 14-foot lamberts onscreen in 3D and a light output of 108,000 lumens.

4DX TO DEBUT SOUTH AFRICA

4DX signed a partnership with South Africa’s Nu Metro Cinemas for the first 4DX site in all of Africa. Scheduled to open before the end of 2015, the 4DX installation will be at the V&A Waterfront in Cape Town, Africa’s largest and most popular tourist attraction. With this new agreement, 4DX will have screens on five of the six habitable continents. In September, a number of existing partners opened 4DX theatres in UAE, Ukraine and China. VOX Cinemas opened a new site in the Mall of Emirates of UAE, recently renovated to be the largest entertainment facility in the Middle East. Planeta Kino Cinemas added a 4DX theatre in Livi, the second site to open in Ukraine. And 4DX opened four new sites in China in September. 4DX now has 204 auditoriums in 35 countries.

CARMIKE SELECTS KRONOS CLOUD Carmike Cinemas selected the Kronos Workforce Central suite of workforce management solutions deployed in the Kronos Cloud. Kronos will be used in all its 270 locations around the country. Kronos will perform all configuration, maintenance, upgrades and support of the workforce management solution, enabling the IT department of Carmike Cinemas to focus on other business priorities. By replacing a mix of systems as well as manual processes with automated Kronos time and attendance, employee scheduling and mobile applications, Carmike Cinemas will standardize processes and gain real-time visibility into critical labor data. The automated workforce management solution will also help Carmike more accurately manage compliance with complex labor laws and regulations that vary across cities and states, including overtime, meal breaks and sickness-related reporting. ш

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filmCOnews [A24] Jeremy Saulnier, director of A24’s buzzed-about upcoming thriller Green Room, is reteaming with the distributor for Hold the Dark, an adaptation of William Giraldi’s 2014 novel about a hunter tasked with tracking and killing a pack of wolves that has been taking children from a small Alaskan village. Macon Blair, Saulnier’s creative partner and star of the writer-director’s 2013 indie hit Blue Ruin, will write the screenplay. [BROAD GREEN PICTURES] 12 Years a Slave writer/coexecutive producer John Ridley will step into the director’s chair for a yet-unnamed film about the 1992 L.A. riots that followed the acquittal of four police officers for the near-fatal beating of Rodney King. The script has been set up for years at Imagine Entertainment, and Broad Green Pictures will produce and distribute. Ridley also created the 2015 Emmy-nominated series “American Crime.”

[DRAFTHOUSE FILMS] Who else but Drafthouse would acquire John Rad’s cult classic Dangerous Men, described by the offbeat distributor as “a pulse-pounding, heart-stopping, brain-devouring onslaught of ’80s thunder, ’90s lightning and pure filmmaking daredevilry.” The film was in production for nearly two decades before embarking on a very limited theatrical run that was nonetheless sufficient to garner it a small but passionate group of fans. Drafthouse will bring Dangerous Men to theatres once more on Nov. 13, with a VOD release planned for December. [DREAMWORKS] Following the massive success of Colin Trevorrow’s Jurassic World, DreamWorks is reviving the writer-director’s script for Stealing Time, a time-travel adventure film that was set up at Columbia

[DISNEY ] The last month has seen a lot of changes to the Walt Disney schedule through 2020. Upcoming Pixar films now include Cars 3 (June 16, 2017), Coco (Nov. 22, 2017), Toy Story 4 (June 15, 2018), The Incredibles 2 (June 21, 2019) and two untitled films (March 13, 2020 and June 19, 2020). Switching to Marvel, Ant-Man sequel Ant-Man and the Wasp will hit theatres on July 6, 2018, pushing Black Panther forward to Feb. 16, 2018 and Captain Marvel back to March 8, 2019. Three more superhero movies are set for 2020. Disney Animation’s Gigantic will come out on March 6, 2018, to be followed by an untitled Disneytoon Studios movie on April 12, 2019 and a Disney Animation title on Nov. 25, 2020. Finally, the Mouse House has called dibs on four dates, ranging from late 2017 to late 2019, for live-action fairytale adaptations.

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around seven years ago and eventually stalled. Tim Dowling (Role Models) will write a new draft of the script, with Trevorrow co-executive producing. A director has not yet been chosen; Trevorrow himself already has two films, Star Wars: Episode IX and Focus Features’ The Book of Henry (see below), on his plate. [FOCUS] And speaking of The Book of Henry, Colin Trevorrow’s secret-shrouded Jurassic World follow-up…production has just begun! We still don’t know much about the project, save that it was written by novelist Gregg Hurwitz and stars Naomi Watts as a single mother raising two boys (Room’s Jason Tremblay and St. Vincent’s Jaeden Lieberher), one of whom is a genius. Maddie Ziegler, Dean Norris, Lee Pace, Sarah Silverman and Bobby Moynihan also star.

KONG AND GODZILLA TO JOIN FORCES Another cinematic universe of the kind so popularized by Marvel Studios is hitting screens courtesy of Warner Bros. and Legendary, who are joining forces for one monster of a franchise starring King Kong and Godzilla. 2017’s Kong: Skull Island and 2018’s Godzilla 2 will be the fi rst two fi lms in the series, followed by the newly announced Godzilla vs. Kong, hitting screens in 2020. Legendary also owns the rights to iconic monsters Mothra, Rodan and Ghidorah, so you can probably expect a fly-by from them as well. SONY PLANS ANIMATED G HOSTBUSTERS Sony’s plan to create a Ghostbusters shared universe is well underway. The studio already has two Ghostbusters movies in the works—Paul Feig’s female-centric reboot and a normal ol’ dude version being directed by Joe and Anthony Russo—and now they’ve reportedly added another. Th is third movie is rumored to be an animated fi lm, created by Sony Pictures and Sony Pictures Animation, with original Ghostbusters director Ivan Reitman likely co-producing. K ATE WINSLET TO PLAY FAMED PHOTOG Kate Winslet signed on to play photographer Lee Miller— whose work ran the gamut from fashion photography to documenting the liberation of World War II concentration camps—in an untitled biopic based on the The Lives of Lee Miller, a biography penned by Miller’s son Anthony Penrose. No writer or director has yet been chosen. Troy Lum and Andrew Mason of Hopscotch Features are producing.

[FOX SEARCHLIGHT] Fabulous indeed: Jennifer Saunders and Joanna Lumley, stars of the classic British TV comedy “Absolutely Fabulous,” will return for director Mandie Fletcher’s appropriately titled Absolutely Fabulous: The Movie. Edina (Saunders) and Patsy’s (Lumley) big-screen debut sees the pair of permanently boozy gal pals getting into trouble along the French Riviera. Fox Searchlight will release the film in 2016. Principal photography has begun on Fox Searchlight’s Gifted, starring Chris Evans as Frank, a single man attempting to provide a normal childhood for his mathgenius niece (Mckenna Grace). Lindsay Duncan plays Frank’s mother, who has her own ideas about how her grandchild should be raised. Octavia Spencer and Jenny Slate round out the cast, with The Amazing Spider-Man’s Marc Webb directing. [KINO LORBER] Kino Lorber acquired U.S. rights to Su Rynard’s environmental documentary The Messenger, about the grim fate of the world’s songbirds. The film will be released in New York City on Dec. 4 and Los Angeles on Dec. 11, followed by an expansion to over 30 additional markets. [LIONSGATE] Toni Collette, Tracy Letts and Sam Trammell joined the cast of Daniel Ragussis’ feature debut Imperium, about an FBI agent (Daniel Radcliffe, previously cast) who infiltrates a whitesupremacist group in order to expose a plot to create a dirty bomb. Ragussis co-wrote the film with FBI agent Mike German, whose counterterrorism work inspired Imperium. Lionsgate’s specialty label Lionsgate Premiere will distribute the film. Already gaining Oscar buzz for her starring role in an adaptation of one best-selling book, Room’s Brie Larson is reportedly in talks to lead another. This time

NOVEMBER 2015

around the source material is The Glass Castle, Jeannette Walls’ memoir about her unconventional upbringing at the hands of dysfunctional parents. If Larson signs onto the Lionsgate project, she’ll be reteaming with Destin Daniel Cretton, the director responsible for her breakout role in 2013’s Short Term 12. Lionsgate is putting a lot of faith in Patrick Rothfuss’ fantasy series The Kingkiller Chronicle; under a deal announced in October, the studio will develop movies, TV shows and videogames from the series, with simultaneous release of projects across different mediums planned. Kingkiller centers on the wizard Kvothe and takes place in a fantasy world called Temerant; since the publication of its first book in 2007, the series has sold a combined total of 10 million copies. [NEW LINE] New Line acquired the rights to Keith Donohue’s 2014 horror novel The Boy Who Drew Monsters, about a 10-year-old boy suffering from Asperger’s and agoraphobia whose drawings—of, guess what, monsters—come to life. Directing the film will be The Conjuring and Furious 7’s James Wan, while Ian Goldberg (TV’s “Once Upon a Time”) and Richard Naing will pen the script. Judah Lewis, Jake Gyllenhaal’s young co-star in Jean-Marc Vallée’s upcoming Demolition, is reportedly in negotiations for the lead in New Line’s The Babysitter, a 2014 Black List entry about a boy in love with his babysitter (Australian actress Samara Weaving). McG (Terminator Salvation) will direct and coproduce. [PARAMOUNT ] Paramount Pictures signed on to produce and distribute Downsizing, Alexander Payne’s follow-up to 2013’s Nebraska. Matt Damon and Reese Witherspoon star in the comedy-drama, about a man who undergoes a procedure to shrink himself. Production will

NOVEMBER 2015

begin in the spring of 2016, with an expected release date the following year. [SONY ] Matthew Senreich, Tom Sheppard and Zeb Wells, writers on the popular stop-motion show “Robot Chicken,” have been chosen by Sony and Ubisoft Motion Pictures, a division of videogame publisher Ubiosft, to pen their live-action/animation hybrid Rabbids. The rabbits—sorry, “rabbids”—in question are wild-eyed mischief-makers who star in a series of Ubisoft videogames and a spin-off TV show titled “Rabbids Invasion.” [SCREEN GEMS] Principal photography has begun on Lakeshore Entertainment and Sony division Screen Gems’ Underworld 5, which sees TV director Anna Foerster (“Outlander”) take a turn on the vampires-vs.werewolves franchise. Star Kate Beckinsale—and, presumably, her black leather catsuit—returns, as do Underworld: Awakening’s Theo James and Charles Dance. Series newcomers Tobias Menzies (“Game of Thrones”), Lara Pulver (“Sherlock”) and Bradley James (“Merlin”) put in their first appearances. [SONY PICTURES CLASSICS] Sony Pictures Classics picked up North American rights to Maggie’s Plan, from writer-director Rebecca Miller (The Ballad of Jack and Rose). Greta Gerwig stars as Maggie, a woman whose plan to have a baby through artificial insemination is complicated when she falls in love with a married man (Ethan Hawke). Julianne Moore, Bill Hader and Maya Rudolph costar. The film had its worldwide debut at September’s Toronto International Film Festival and will be released sometime after 2015. [STARZ ] Starz acquired U.S. rights to the dark comedy The Family Fang,

about a brother and sister (Jason Bateman and Nicole Kidman) on the hunt for their missing performance-artist parents (Christopher Walken and Maryann Plunkett). Bateman also directed the film, which was adapted from Kevin Wilson’s 2011 novel of the same name by Rabbit Hole’s David Lindsay-Abaire. [STX ENTERTAINMENT ] First-time director Kelly Fremon snagged Hailee Steinfeld, Woody Harrelson and Kyra Sedgwick to star in her untitled coming-of-age comedy, based on a spec script (also by Fremon) previously titled Besties. Steinfeld, playing one of the “Besties” in question, discovers that her best friend has been dating her brother behind her back. Chaos, as it does, ensues. STX Entertainment is releasing the film, which counts James L. Brooks (Terms of Endearment) among its producers. [20TH CENTURY FOX ] Fox 2000 is serving up a sequel to the 1997 film Soul Food, titled More Soul Food. George Tillman, Jr., who directed the first movie, is back on deck as a co-writer. The sequel will focus on the second generation of the close-knit Joseph family, played in the original by Vanessa Williams, Vivica A. Fox, Nia Long, Mekhi Phifer and others. [ WARNER BROS.] Nat Wolff (Paper Towns) is reportedly in negotiations to star in Warner Bros.’ Death Note, a live-action adaptation of a popular Japanese manga/anime series about a book that lets the student who finds it kill people by writing their names. Adam Wingard of indie hits The Guest and You’re Next is making his big-budget debut with the film, with Jeremy Slater (Fantastic Four) the latest writer to tackle scripting duties. [ WEINSTEIN COMPANY ] Jake Gyllenhaal and Benedict Cumberbatch are in talks to

star in The Current War, a 19thcentury historical drama about the rivalry between scientists Thomas Edison (Cumberbatch) and George Westinghouse (Gyllenhaal). Me and Earl and the Dying Girl’s Alfonso Gomez-Rejon is in talks to direct. [INDEPENDENT ] James Cameron and Robert Rodriguez are teaming up for the sci-fi actioner Alita: Battle Angel, an adaptation of a Japanese manga series about a kick-butt female cyborg discovered in a trash yard with no memories of her former life. Cameron, who has been trying to get Battle Angel made for more than 15 years, will co-produce the film through his Lightstorm Entertainment banner, with Rodriguez directing. Nicholas Hoult, Henry Cavill and Luke Evans have signed on for the Iraq-set war drama Sand Castle, about a soldier (Hoult) sent with his unit to repair a broken water system in a village whose inhabitants are distrustful of Americans. Screenwriter Chris Roessner based the story on his own experience as a machine gunner in Iraq. Fernando Coimbra of Netflix’s “Narcos” is set to direct. Michael Moore has chosen a distributor for his latest, the globetrotting documentary Where to Invade Next. We wish we could tell you the name of the distributor but, well, it hasn’t been announced as of press time. What we do know is that it’s a brand new label created by Alamo Drafthouse founder and CEO Tim League and Tom Quinn and Jason Janego, founders and former coPresidents of RADiUS. Reviews for Where to Invade Next out of Toronto, where it had its worldwide debut in September, were overwhelmingly positive, with many reviewers citing the lighter tone adopted by the famously contrarian director. The film will hit U.S. theatres this December. ш

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AD INDEX NOVEMBER 2015

BALLANTYNE STRONG . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .2 CINEMA SOLUTIONS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .18 DOLPHIN SEATING . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .26 ENPAR AUDIO . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .27 FRANKLIN DESIGNS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .13 HARKNESS SCREENS. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .29 MOVING IMAGE TECHNOLOGIES . . . . . . . .5, 15, 75, 76 PORT WINDOW GLASS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .23 PROCTOR COMPANIES . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .21 RENTRAK. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .7 ST. JUDE CHILDREN’S HOSPITAL . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .31 TK ARCHITECTS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11 WILL ROGERS FOUNDATION . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .19

EUROPEAN UPDATE CONTINUED FROM PAGE 65 the Love of Cinema.” Set up by the Association for the Promotion of Film in Switzerland (Verein zur Filmförderung in der Schweiz), the sponsorship award is worth CHF 100,000 (US$104,600; €92,125) and intended to support “promising film projects” during their production or postproduction stages. Waltz said, “Providing sponsorship for filmmakers is a necessary and relevant task, one which makes a significant contribution to the diversity of Swiss film.” The team behind Und morgen seid ihr tot received the main amount for their upcoming production, telling the true story of two Swiss citizens who were kidnapped by the Taliban in Pakistan, and their successful escape after eight months in captivity. 2:1 Films was lauded for Europe, She Loves, showing five couples struggling for everyday survival in a Europe shaken by the economic crisis. “The scripts of both these films stood out for their compelling storytelling and the exceptional sensitivity with which these two very different stories were told. Hopefully we’ll be able to see both of them on the big screen soon,” said George Kern, chief executive officer of IWC. For director Marc Forster, who was also a member of the jury, this Filmmaker Award represents a real milestone for the domestic film industry. “We are plugging a gap in the existing funding available for films,” he explained. The Association for the Promotion of Film in Switzerland was co-founded by Forster, Kern, the co-directors of the Zurich Film Festival, Nadja Schildknecht and Karl Spoerri, and Marc Walder, chief executive officer of Ringier. ш

INSIDE DOLBY CINEMA CONTINUED FROM PAGE 53 engaging footpath. You are building up this anticipation that–once you walk through the door and get inside this house–your expectations are going to be rewarded with something even more magnificent. It is wonderful prelude for the entrance.” As guests enter the Dolby Cinema, in the majority of thresholds, particularly in new construction, the area is completely flat. “After walking through the environment of the film…it almost feels like you are walking onstage,” Voron says. “You have this huge floating screen that is being augmented by faceted acoustic panels. They are designed to create somewhat of a forced perspective that starts off high in the back of the cinema and, then encroaching upon it, gets bigger as you get closer to the screen. All panels are black and you cannot see the speakers. That was done to create a feeling that what the guests are about to see is even bigger than the screen itself and bigger than life.” With that comes the removal of all distractions. “While we did not want the auditorium to be an ordinary square box, we also needed to make sure that during the film there were no reflections of metal surfaces or bright surfaces of any kind. We tried to make everything matte black and selected different shapes for the acoustic panels on the wall. After all, our Dolby Vision laser projection is so bright and brilliant. When you see those images projected in an ordinary cinema with so many architectural distractions, the light just reflects everywhere.” The reasons “why we have chosen certain architectural elements and materials for the inside,” Voron describes as “a mixture of art and science.” In closing, Voron shares his personal hopes for the magnificent house that Dolby built. “When guests walk into one of our exhibitors’ venues and they see they have an option for the Dolby Cinema Experience, we want to create enough visual curiosity to either buy a Dolby Cinema ticket or to do so on the next purchase. And after their visit to the Dolby Cinema, we want them to walk away with a sense that they have an experience in an exclusive and premium environment. We really intend to help them escape and to be transported along that journey in entertainment that our studio partners are spending so much time and money bringing to life.” ш 74

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NOVEMBER 2015