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Sundance '07: Quint sees Anthony Hopkins' directorial debut SLIPSTREAM!!!
Ahoy, squirts! Quint here.
I went in to Anthony Hopkins' debut as a writer/director knowing only that he had a great cast and that there was a noirish aspect to the flick. I think Hopkins' reputation had me expecting a completely different film. I thought I was in for a delicately plotted actor's showcase, the twist being the noir setting, with quick witted characters in fedoras.
What I got was an extremely experimental film I would have expected more from a youthful film student testing out the medium for the first time.
The film plays as a fractured narrative, a dream-state that bends different realities. On one level you have a hitman losing his mind, on another level you have a screenwriter writing the story of the hitman and the film crew shooting it. Those blend and mix and make Hopkins' film. At times they even procreate and spawn other levels of bizarreness.
The editing is absolutely squirrel-fucking insane. Tony Scott will watch this movie with a stiffy. Vern will watch this movie and go into "avid fart" seizure. There is not one scene that goes by without the frame flipping or time reversing for a line and then going back forward again or some almost subliminal stock footage being cut in or something even more random happening, like a car inexplicably changing color for a few frames and then turning back.
At the Q&A afterwards, Hopkins said that he views the whole thing with a great sense of humor. His whole goal was to make a film that threw every single film convention out the window, sot he result is a kind of mix of David Lynch bizarreness and Terry Gilliam's dream quality, creating something wholly new.
I don't know if that's a good thing or a bad thing. It's certainly not a film that everyone will enjoy, in fact I'd say most people wouldn't have the patience for it. It's the very definition of experimental filmmaking, but on a much larger scale than most such films. This is an experimental film made by a Knight of the Round with cinematography by Dante Spinotti (LA CONFIDENTIAL, MANHUNTER) and dozens of recognizable faces, from Hopkins himself to Jeffrey Tambor, Christian Slater, Michael Clarke Duncan, John Turturro, Reba the Mail Lady from Pee-Wee's Playhouse and even Kevin McCarthy.
That was my favorite part of the film, the use of Kevin McCarthy... at one point Slater's character goes on a very long monologue about INVASION OF THE BODY SNATCHERS and then we get a few minutes with Kevin McCarthy doing his thing. It was great seeing him on the screen again. C'mon, Joe Dante. Or Weird Al. Get your butts moving and put McCarthy to work again!
All in all, the audience reception was great. I'm still personally trying to figure out just what the hell SLIPSTREAM is. It all wraps up and makes its own little bit of sense at the end, of course, but I still struggle with my opinion of the film. At times I really respect and admire the film for its weirdness,
-Quint
quint@aintitcool.com
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I'm there ; )
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Squirrels raped my childhood, sir.
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Just didn't want you to be alone, for shame.
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You leave us on a comma, wanting more,
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Sorry.....
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interesting
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Especially from a guy I really thought was content to phone it in after a long illustrious career. i know most would see something like this as pretentious, but I don't think Hopkins is going for even art house level prestige here. Weird films like this often charter ideas and allow other filmmakers to cherry pick what works about it int he future. It seems like alot of filmmakers are trying out the cinema verite style that influenced alot of the golden age of the 70's and I say it's about fucking time.
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wasn't Hopkins directorial debut "August"?
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Hopkins is a mac, acting-wise that is, but I'd never expect him to make a fucked-up movie. That's totally intense and in all the right flavours. I wanna lick it. http://tinyurl.com/2fly9x
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Dammit, you beat me to it! "August" was indeed Sir Tony's debut as a writer/director. There's nothing like good journalistic research is there?
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so what, Quint? at other times you hate it and think it's childish crap? Seriously, would people give this movie the time of day without Hopkins' name behind it?
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This makes people keep hitting refresh or continually coming back to this page later. Thus ensuring total AICN dominance over our time on the internets.
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C'mon Quint, are you going to do a proper review of the movie?
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love the man(he actually looks like my now passed away grandfather) and this sounds pretty cool. I am really liking this streak of films by established actors. I will check this out as soon as it is released.
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it probably would've been trashed or, at minimum, given a bad grade. I need a review free of Hopkins man-love.
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I think Bill Paxton came out in it too. It was kind of boring then Hamill was made out to be the villain when you thought he was the protagonist. I was like, FUCK THIS SHIT!!! Seems to be a popular movie title.
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I used to watch that movie all the time when I was a kid. I was a huge fan of anything post apocalyptic, and the addition of Luke Skywalker really helped.
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just because Tony Scott gets an erection does not mean it will be a good film - Days Of Thunder? The Fan?
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Tony Scott editing? oh god no. Shouldn't someone explain to A-Hop that that only belongs in c-rate thrillers where the editor is trying to disguise the crappiness? Well, if it's really an experimental film I could give it a chance since it might be trying to achieve something "interesting" rather than "cool"... sigh.
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As with any beloved actor turned director I'm sure Hopkins will win many pointless awards whilst everybody kisses his backside regardless if his films are any good.
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was Hopkins directorial debut. http://tinyurl.com/2amkj7 Change the headline fellas. Though yes, this is his first time round the 'auteur' block proper ;-)
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I see we been round this block before. Ignore me - usually a wise thing to do.
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so does my squirrel.
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That is all.
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I'm enjoying your reports from Sundance '07, I am a fan. But don't you feel weird that AICN spent a bunch of money getting you to Sundance and your talkbacks are getting beaten by Steven Seagal rumors and Silver Surfer's nutsack?
I'm just saying. -
...specifically Ice Cube's classic line "Hoes gotta eat too".
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I wouldn't feel bad if I were Quint. It's like saying to the directors at Sundance "don't you feel bad that you are making powerful films about the human condition and the Pirates of the Carribean sequel makes a trillion dollars?" I doubt they would really care and neither should Quint, who is providing a good service at Sundance. I go through phases where I post alot for a month and then can't be bothered for a while and these Sundance updates are the only interesting thing I've seen on this site in a while. These are the films that I'm actually going to be going to the theatres to see over the next year or so, with a very small minimum of big budget crap. I can already tell you everything you need to know about Spider Man 3 and Transformers, they will both be complete bastardizations of their far more interesting and sincere source material. The films being shown at Sundance are the ones that will actually make a difference, no matter how small it is given tehir limited appeal. They won't be forgotten by the audience t-minus four seconds after they leave the theater (with the exception of anything Josh Hartnett or Jessica Alba is involved in). The public is gonna support what they are gonna support and since the average tastes on this site have degraded steeply since it became a film industry staple I would expect them to be more interested in Steven Segal and whatever god awful superhero flick they will overrate to ridiculous proportions. But for me and I'm sure at least a few other people the indies are where its at.
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It was just an observation, not a criticism of Quint or his Sundance articles.
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Gonna have to pass.
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Yeah I didn't mean to sound insulting there toward you. I even thought about putting a disclaimer saying this wasn't aimed at your comment in the least. it's a fair question you asked. Sorry if it came off hostile.
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Juggfuckled never touched me in the way that the Batman Begins "script" review did. Anyway, I read this hoping to find the requisite "...[actress name here], who is even more attractive in real life" line.
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Jan 24, 2007 9:42:02 PM CST
Anyone remember the Slipstream movie with Mark Hamill?
by allpowerfulwizardofoz
It also had Bill Paxton.
http://www.amazon.com/Slipstream-Steven-Lisberger/dp/B00005M2DO -
Sorry Quint: Anthony Hopkins first film as a director was his adaptation of Anton Chekov's Uncle Vanya, August (he wrote the music, too).
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0115591/ -
more so than the piece about Hopkin's movie. A series of raised arms holding camera phones to take pictures of the present movie star. It probably says more about modern society than I'm sure Mr. Hopkins' film does.
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a version of Chekov´s UNCLE VANYA entitled AUGUST or soemthing like that ages ago.
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0115591/ -
whilst on IMDB that Hopkins appeared in FREEJACK, with Emilio Estefez and Mick Jagger AFTER he was in THE SILENCE OF THE LAMBS.
Jesus.
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