Sundance: Benh Zeitlin returns with "Wendy"

by  Abe Fried-Tanzer

Eight years ago, director Benh Zeitlin, just twenty-nine at the time, brought his debut feature Beasts of the Southern Wild to Sundance, where it took home the Grand Jury Dramatic Prize. It went on to score four Oscar nominations, including one for Best Picture and a bid for directing for Zeitlin. Since then, he has produced a few projects, but now marks the much-anticipated release of his second effort behind the camera.

Wendy is a creative retelling of the Peter Pan story, with Wendy (Devin France) and her twin brothers (Gage and Gavin Naquin) helping their single mother at the diner where she works and watching excitedly as trains go by their windows every night...

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King Aragorn... and Other Luminaries

It's a big day for your Lord of the Rings fans, even if you don't know it. Read on.

On this day in history as it relates to the movies
1882 Bela Lugosi is born in what was then Hungary (and now Romania). He vants to suck your blood as the original big screen Dracula. A century later Martin Landau will win a justly deserved Oscar for playing him in Tim Burton's wonderful Ed Wood (1994).
1895 Rex Ingram, one of the earliest successful black actors in Hollywood was born. Credits include: The Thief of Baghdad (as the genie), Huckleberry Finn (as Jim), and Cabin in the Sky (as Lucifer Jr)... 

1901 Frank Churchill is born in Maine. He wrote songs people still listen to today including "Baby Mine" from Dumbo and "Someday My Prince Will Come" from Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. Tragically he committed suicide at age 40 mere months after his winning his Oscar for Dumbo...

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"Pan" Sinks. "Steve Jobs" Sizzles.

It's your weekend box office report. Both The Martian and The Intern experienced small drops from their previous weekends, reminding everyone that Matt Damon and Anne Hathaway, who co-starred in Interstellar just last year, have always been fairly bankable. Their takes also indicate good word of mouth and leggy runs ahead in future weeks. The news was not good for Hugh Jackman and Pan however, perhaps reminding us that not every movie star can remain bankable when they're buried in silly makeup and made to look unlike themselves - not everyone can be Johnny Depp who people (for whatever reason) like to see buried in cartoonish makeup. Curiously Johnny Depp also once made a bad Peter Pan picture but that's another story...

BOX OFFICE WIDE
800+ screens (Oct 9th-11th)
01 The Martian $37 (cum. $108.7) Podcast, Matt's foot-in-mouth tour
02 Hotel Transylvania 2 $20.3 (cum. $116.8) Tim on the director Genny Tartakovsky
03 Pan $15.5 NEW Peter Pan Movies
04 The Intern $8.6 (cum. $49.5) Review
05 Sicario $7.3 (cum. $26.7) Podcast, Emily Blunt
06 Maze Runner: Scorch Trials $5.2 (cum. $70.6)
07 The Walk $3.6 (cum. $6.3) Review
08 Black Mass $3.1 (cum. $57.5)
09 Everest $3 (cum. $38.2)
10 The Visit $2.4 (cum. $61)

Jason reminds us, with sound reasoning, not to cry for Garrett Hedlund despite another massive flop (Pan) on his hands.

BOX OFFICE LIMITED (excluding prev. wide)
(Oct 9th-11th)
01 Ladrones (375 screens) $1.3 NEW 
02 He Named Me Malala (689 screens) $.6 (cum. $.7) 
03 99 Homes (689 screens) $.6 (cum. $.8)  The return of Andrew Garfield  Review
04 Steve Jobs (4 screens) $.5 NEW Review
05 Goodbye Mr Loser (51 screens) $.3 NEW  
06 Grandma (205 screens) $.2 (cum. $6.2)  Poster Blurb, Lily Tomlin's Filmography, Review 
07 Goodnight Mommy (86 screens) $.1 (cum. $.6)  Interview, Oscar Submission
08 Freeheld (51 screens) $.1 (cum. $.1)
09 Learning to Drive (71 screens) $.06 (cum. $3.2)
10 Labyrinth of Lies (16 screens) $.05 (cum. $.09) Interview, Review, Beauty Break

Meanwhile in select cities, business was solid for the heavily promoted human rights documentary He Named Me Malala and crazy robust for the Oscar Best Picture hopeful Steve Jobs which racked up some of the highest per screen averages ever in extremely limited release. The Michael Fassbender led drama goes wide next week.

Sadly, there continued to be a lack of interest in Julianne Moore & Ellen Page's lesbian drama Freeheld. It's grossed a tiny $140,00ish to date, despite four very well liked actors (Michael Shannon & Steve Carell are in the supporting roles). In truth the buzz hasn't been good on it (apart from a few vocal supporters) but still... I feel the guilt about not having seen it yet. In my defense, I have been totally sick as previously documented, so what little leave the house energy I've had has gone to the NYFF.   

What did you see this weekend? Was it money well spent? 

Posterized: Joe Wright's "Pan" and Peter Pan Movies

Jackman and Wright talk on setYou have to admit that Joe Wright was asking for it. He went and titled his Peter Pan epic, Pan, which is functioning like a command for the nation's critics who have done so mercilessly. It probably didn't help that he uglified one of our most handsome movie stars (no one needs to see Hugh Jackman going the Johnny Depp route). Worse, he truly stepped in it early on by casting the very white Rooney Mara in one of the few iconic roles meant for a Native American actress. (This issue has been discussed at very high volumes in the past few years since moviegoers and the media are sick to death of Hollywood's white-washing. But Hollywood is still wearing ear plugs.)

Will you see his latest despite the reviews?

And how many Peter Pan related movies have you seen? (More on Peter and Joe after the jump)

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Tim's Toons: Animated Features at Cannes

This week, the Cannes Film Festival was home to the premiere of Inside Out, the new film by Pixar Animation Studios, and one of its best-reviewed pictures. The film is playing out of competition, as has been the recent tendency of most Hollywood products, and animation in particular. It has been a special habit of films made by DreamWorks Animation in the 21st Century, with all sorts of things from Spirit: Stallion of the Cimarron in 2002 up to How to Train Your Dragon 2 last year muscling their way onto the Croisette.

There has, however, been a small but meaningful history of animated movies to have been given slightly more honorable treatment, and allowed to play in the big kids’ sandbox. Since the festival’s first edition in 1946, there have been seven animated features entered into the main competition, if my count is right, and they make for a fascinating cross-section of how the international cinema scene regarded the state of that particular art across the years. Here, in order, are those seven films.

Make Mine Music (1946)
The eighth feature made by the Disney studio, and the third of that company’s dubious “package films”, attempts to make entire features by jamming a bunch of short films into one vague thematic frame. Like any anthology, it has peaks and valleys, though the latter dominate, and the film is infinitely less impressive than its quasi-sequel Melody Time. Let us not be baffled by its Cannes slot; this was the fest’s first year & they were figuring it out, everybody loves Disney, and it’s a nice post-war feel-good effort. It won Best Animation Design, a discontinued award.

six more after the jump including Persepolis and... Shrek 2 (!?)

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