There's something ironic about the fact that the better visual effects are, the more difficult it can be to notice them at all. At the top level, talented VFX artists create imagery so seamlessly lifelike that the average moviegoer isn't even aware that the fantastical creatures and majestic landscapes they're watching were painstakingly crafted on…
Read More
February 2013 was a bittersweet month for the visual effects house Rhythm & Hues. Due to the increased cost of effects-based work in Hollywood and the competitive nature of the business, they were forced to declare bankruptcy, fire hundreds of people and close up shop. Two weeks later, the company was given the Academy Award…
Read More
Ever wanted to spend an afternoon visiting the museum of Night at the Museum or grappling with the xenomorphs from Alien? You may be able to soon, provided you're willing to travel to Malaysia. 20th Century Fox is partnering with property conglomerate Genting Malaysia to open its first theme park, featuring attractions based on the…
Read More
Last year at CinemaCon, 20th Century Fox previewed very early footage for Ang Lee's Life of Pi. Attendees at the presentation were floored, and the buzz on all the blogs was that Pi was an Oscar contender. Some argued that April was too early to be calling for possible Oscar contenders, and they were probably…
Read More
On Sunday Ang Lee took the Best Director Oscar for Life of Pi, which also won three other awards, making it the big Oscar winner this year. But what of the more than 400 visual effects employees who spent Sunday protesting business practices that make VFX work a losing proposition for many artists? The Oscar wins…
Read More
There's no better place than the Oscars to see all your favorite movie stars assembled in one place, but the trailer for Jimmy Kimmel's Movie: The Movie V2 might be a close second. In his post-Oscars show last year, Kimmel debuted an epic, star-studded 9-minute trailer poking fun at every obnoxious movie trope under the…
Read More
Here are the winners of the 85th Oscars. It was a rather strange year, with only the sixth tie in the history of the awards (for Sound Editing) an excess of references to Chicago, and a surprise win in the Best Director category for Ang Lee. (And those who expected Jessica Chastain to take the Best…
Read More
In a weird way, special effects are never less noticeable than when they're done really well. The best artists are able to blend the real and the unreal so seamlessly that it's all but impossible to tell where one ends and the other begins. So it's cool to get a chance to see the painstaking…
Read More
Last night the effects house Rhythm & Hues earned a BAFTA for work on Life of Pi. Today, the company confirmed that it is moving into bankruptcy. It's not an easy business, Hollywood. The company was previously the object of possible acquisition by Prime Focus, but that deal did not happen, which contributed directly to…
Read More
We've got a bunch of cool movie art for you today. The Academy and Gallery1988 commissioned a small group of artists to create original screen prints inspired by this year’s nine Best Picture nominees. After the jump you can see some of them, including: AMOUR by artist Matt Owen, ARGO by Anthony Petrie, BEASTS OF THE SOUTHERN…
Read More
For the 70th year, the Hollywood Foreign Press handed out their Golden Globe Awards Sunday night. Hosts Tina Fey and Amy Poehler entertained an audience of TV and movie fans there to bestow awards to shows like Girls, Modern Family, Smash, Breaking Bad, Homeland and Downton Abbey and films like Lincoln, Argo, Django Unchained, Life of Pi, Silver Linings…
Read More
Emma Stone and Seth MacFarlane woke up at the crack of dawn this morning to announce the nominees for the 85th Academy Awards. Academy members nominated nine contenders for Best Picture, with Amour, Argo, Beasts of the Southern Wild, Django Unchained, Les Miserables, Life of Pi, Lincoln, Silver Linings Playbook, and Zero Dark Thirty all…
Read More
With just days to go until Oscar nominations are announced, the Writers Guild of America has unveiled its list of nominees for their top screenplay awards. As expected, many of these are films that have picked up plenty of accolades already. It'll surprise no one to see that Zero Dark Thirty, Moonrise Kingdom, and Lincoln are among the…
Read More
We're already at the point in the award season where a few films have been solidified as the big winners and prime Oscar candidates. Zero Dark Thirty, Moonrise Kingdom, Silver Linings Playbook, and Lincoln have been awards frontrunners for weeks, and will likely continue to dominate slates of official accolades until the season ends with…
Read More
This morning Megan Fox, Ed Helms, and Jessica Alba announced the nominations for the 2013 Golden Globes. The Hollywood Foreign Press Association, the organization behind the event, is famous for nominating films and performances simply based on their star factor -- if there's an actor that members of the HFPA want to hang out with,…
Read More
Life of Pi was one of our favorite films of the year, but there was some disagreement during our podcast review about the effectiveness of the ending. In this bonus episode, Dave and Dan Trahctenberg take another look at the film and delve into the ending of Life of Pi. Be sure to check out Drew McWeeny's review,…
Read More
Dave and Adam chat about the terribleness of Red Dawn, the sociopathy of Mouse Hunt, and the awesomeness of Key and Peele. Special guest Laremy Legel joins us from Film.com. You can always e-mail us at slashfilmcast(AT)gmail(DOT)com, or call and leave a voicemail at 781-583-1993. Downloador Play Now in your Browser: Subscribe to the /Filmcast:…
Read More
A cinematic adaptation of Life of Pi has been in the works basically since Yann Martel's novel was published in 2001, but in the early stages the project had some trouble picking up steam. It passed through the hands of several directors, including M. Night Shyamalan, Alfonso Cuarón, and Jean-Pierre Jeunet, over several years before…
Read More
If 3D gets a bad rap, it's often for good reason. Done badly, 3D drives up ticket prices while adding nothing to the experience; done very badly, it robs you blind while destroying the picture. But every so often, a movie comes along that reminds you of how powerful the technology can be when wielded…
Read More
After a great deal of time in development, during which multiple directors tried to crack the story, Yann Martel's novel Life of Pi was filmed by director Ang Lee, with newcomer Suraj Sharma in the role of Pi, a boy who is stranded at sea in a lifeboat with a man-eating tiger for company. There's…
Read More
At a time when some studio projects (ahem, New Year's Eve) seem less about telling a good story than about cramming together as many celebs as possible, it's surprising to hear of an actor getting cut because he was too famous for a film. But that's what exactly happened to Tobey Maguire, if recent reports are to…
Read More
The year-end prestige movie season looks possibly even more competitive than usual this year, but Fox seems pretty confident they've got a four-quadrant hit in Life of Pi. Though the project suffered several stops and starts during its development process, it's finally taken shape under the care of director Ang Lee, and the early buzz…
Read More
Fox's official website for Ang Lee's literary adaptation Life of Pi is up and running, and while it's currently light on useful info, it is full of gorgeous imagery to ooh and ahh over. There's a brief 10-second clip showing what appears to be an early encounter between protagonist Pi (newcomer Suraj Sharma) and the…
Read More
It's not like anyone needs another excuse to hit up Ridley Scott's Prometheus this weekend, but in case you weren't totally sold on Fox's other big 3D summer releases, they're sweetening the deal with a glimpse of one of this fall's most intriguing films. The studio plans to unveil uncut clips from Ang Lee's literary…
Read More
As Paramount's G.I. Joe: Retaliation heads into next spring and Universal's Ted moves up into G.I. Joe's old date, Fox is making a few edits of their own to the upcoming release calendar. Ang Lee's Life of Pi has been shifted away from hyper-competitive late December to Thanksgiving weekend, while the Wedding Crashers quasi-reunion The Internship…
Read More
Thursday morning at CinemaCon, 20th Century Fox presented footage, clips and trailers from their upcoming 2012 line-up. Included in the reel was 10-15 minutes of Ang Lee's adaptation Life of Pi, an extended trailer for Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter, new footage from Prometheus, clips from Neighborhood Watch, and our first look at Taken 2. Per usual, I…
Read More
Life of Pi has taken its good sweet time journeying from the bookshelf to the box office. First published in 2001, Yann Martel's novel passed through the hands of M. Night Shyamalan, Alfonso Cuarón, and Jean-Pierre Jeunet before ultimately ending up with Ang Lee in 2009. A tricky adaptation process and budgetary woes helped keep…
Read More