In Contention

Tag: Nothing But the Truth

  • Director Lurie writes up “real man” Roger Ebert

    Roger EbertDirector Rod Lurie recently presented his film “Nothing But the Truth” (which finally benefited from a mass-market release by landing on DVD last week) at Roger Ebert’s Ebertfest.  Using the sad news of Ebert’s paper, the Chicago Sun-Times, filing Chapter 11 in March as a spring-board, Lurie writes up a nice love letter to the famed critic in this Huffington Post item.

    In the piece, Lurie recounts Eberts physical reactions to the film’s screening and the undeniable passion for cinema that still oozes from his every pore, despite the throat cancer that has been such a terrible burden.  Here’s a taste:

    This all registered with me with a special profoundness. I have followed his writing since I was a teenager. When I was 14, I sent him a letter asking for his ten best of all time list. He wrote me back. In longhand. That’s a mensch for you (Citizen Kane was number one, I remember). He is the one critic who can convince me to see films that everybody else hates because he has a unique sense of finding hidden talent and hidden value. Whenever I have a film coming out, his is the one opinion I take personally. When he has given me a smack here and there I have deserved it…

    Ebert now communicates by writing on a small pad. Matt Dillon and I were peppering him with questions. Matt wanted to know who his favorite directors were (I think I saw Hawks, Huston, and Keaton on the list), I asked him what movie has he never seen that everybody would have expected to have come under his gaze (The Sound of Music)…As I watched him write his answers — and he did it with zeal and pleasure — it struck me that his pen had become an IV to him. His lifeblood.

    It’s a great read and a touching dedication.  Read the full piece here.

  • SANTA BARBARA: ‘Truth,’ Winslet light up the town

    Kate Winslet receives the Montecito Award at the 24th Annual Santa Barbara International Film FestivalI’ll dig into individual film reviews in due time.  It’s been a slow start up here in Santa Barbara but the first two nights have been charming enough.

    Rod Lurie’s “Nothing But the Truth” gets better and better each time I see it, particularly where Lurie’s work as a writer is concerned.  Some beats are on the nose, perhaps too much for some people’s tastes, but I think he’s really developing as a filmmaker.  And the flick went over like gangbusters with the crowd at the packed Arlington Theatre opening night gala yesterday.  All the clever jokes found a home.  The performances caught their stride with the viewers, it seemed, and everyone seemed to be in tune with the film’s tight rhythm.  Most of all, the message seemed to settle (not surprising in a town this left of center), and that’s encouraging.

    Jeff Bridges and James Cromwell were among the A-listers who came out to celebrate the film, which has been all but smothered by an untimely Yari Film Group bankruptcy.  And the after-party at Paseo Nuevo up the street was slammed — too slammed.  But, as always, upstairs in a V.I.P. setting is the place to be, and that’s where Lurie and his sharp college-bound son yukked it up with Bridges and “Truth” star Noah Wyle, among others.

    Here’s my brief one-off on the film from back in September when it was playing Toronto.

    Tonight, Kate Winslet was in town to accept the Montecito award, becoming the first person in the history of the Santa Barbara International Film Festival to be awarded twice.  With that in mind, festival director Roger Durling took playful umbrage on stage with her remarks at the Golden Globe ceremony a week ago when she claimed she never wins anything.

    Film critic and historian Leonard Maltin sat down with Winslet for a two-hour conversation through her career that I frankly expected to be a bore, but it was a lively and candid chat.  Clips from her wide ranging portfolio were peppered in here and there, but the cutest moment came when the actress couldn’t stop chuckling at the “Titanic” clip.  “It’s so funny because I don’t see me and Leo playing Jack and Rose,” she said.  “It’s just me and Leo.  What are we doing there?  It’s so funny to me that we were in ‘Titanic,’ I don’t know how to explain it.”

    (more…)

  • Santa Barbara heats up

    The Arlington Theatre in Santa BarbaraThe air smells cleaner.  The sound of waves crashing outside the hotel room is soothing.  The hippies are dancing in the streets.

    It’s nice to get away from the mess of this morning and the frustration of Oscar season in general for eight days.  But the awards circuit isn’t out of sight by any means.  Kate Winslet, Michael Shannon, Penelope Cruz, Mickey Rourke, Viola Davis, Melissa Leo, all of them set to be feted over the course of the week.  Panels will include Andrew Stanton, Dustin Lance Black and Eric Roth, among others, are set for panels, while festival guest director David Fincher will be the toast of the town throughout, leading to his big to-do on Friday, Jan. 30.

    And yet, it doesn’t feel as stifling as it might.  Sometimes a couple hours drive out of the heart of the beast does a body good.

    With that, one of the season’s casualties drops this evening, Rod Lurie’s “Nothing But the Truth,” which was all but buried when Yari Film Group went under last month.  As festival director Roger Durling has said, the film deserves to be seen and it’s a hell of a gesture on Durling’s part to give the pic some limelight.

    So with that, I’m throwing on the suit and heading out for the evening.  I’ll be here all week catching a number of films I’ve missed over the last couple of months and even a few I’d like to enjoy once more.

    What Oscar nominations?

  • A night at the Critics’ Choice Awards

    Sean Penn at the 14th Annual Critics\' Choice AwardsIt’s an event that keeps on getting better and better, a little awards show that’s escalated into one of the hallmarks of the film awards season, whether the “we’re one of the best Oscar predictors” stuff is annoying or not (which it is).

    The night had a number of surprises, but in a sense, one of those surprises became a foregone conclusion half-way through the show.  The whole room could tell — “Slumdog Millionaire” was going to walk away with the first clean BFCA sweep since “A Beautiful Mind” in 2001.  Nothing for “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button.”  Nothing for “Frost/Nixon.”  Nothing but the usual for the slowly-becoming-silver-medal-bound “The Dark Knight.”

    Two big wins for “Milk” were nice.  Sean Penn’s victory as Best Actor might have been inevitable, even though Mickey Rourke’s portrayal was probably the year’s most critically acclaimed of the year.  I couldn’t help keeping an eye trained on Mickey two tables over, one of the wandering cameras crammed in his face as Penn delivered his acceptance.  Clearly the “Wrestler” gang was a bit disheartened, nabbing only one win — for Bruce Springsteen’s title track.  But Fox Searchlight was beaming nonetheless with it’s five “Slumdog” trophies.

    I did as much mingling as the two minute commercial intervals would allow, but I did manage to finally meet the lovely Kate Beckinsale, nominated tonight for her criminally underseen performance in “Nothing But the Truth.”  She’s a real sweetheart, happy for the few pockets of support she’s been able to find for the film, which was essentially avalanched by the Yari bankruptcy last month.  There’s still Santa Barbara in a couple of weeks.

    I have to say, being in the middle of Heath Ledger’s standing ovation was somewhat emotional.  The win wasn’t surprising in hindsight, but as Laura Dern was opening the envelope, I couldn’t help but think the idea of major awards was suddenly a pipe dream for this performance.  But it all went away quickly and Christopher Nolan gave a touching, spot-on acceptance speech on behalf of the actor.

    (More, plus the full list of winners, after the jump.)

    (more…)

  • 12/20 Oscarweb Round-up

    Amy Adams• Darren Aronofsky interviews Danny Boyle about the technical aspects of “Slumdog Millioniare.” [/Film]

    • Erik Childress catches up with the season mid-way through the first phase. [eFilmCritic]

    • David Carr takes note of the big Universal trade spend.  Hey, if you’re going to decide against advertising with the lowly online types, you might as well make it count in traditional media. [The Carpetbagger]

    • Tom O’Neil gets together a bunch of us Oscar bozos to talk the Best Picture chances of “WALL-E.” [Gold Derby]

    • The film, meanwhile, tops Anne Thompson’s diverse list of the year’s best.  Oy. [Thompson on Hollywood]

    • Patrick Goldstein gives a few column inches to an under-the-radar documentary short, Leslie Iwerks’s “Downstream.” [The Big Picture]

    • The hull is breached!!  By the way, that’s Barry Dale JOHNSON.  Fact checker needed on aisle three. [Washington Post]

    • Noah Forrest podcasts it up with “Gomorrah” helmer Matteo Garrone. [Movie City News]

    • Donna Freydkin catches up with increasingly Oscar-likely Amy Adams. [USA Today]

    • Somehow this escaped me all week, but rest in peace Sam Bottoms. [Los Angeles Times]

    • Brent Simon spends a little quality time with “Nothing But the Truth” star Kate Beckinsale. [Vulture]

  • What movie were you watching?

    The last-minute switcheroo suggests, perhaps unintentionally, that Rachel is less a martyr to the cause than a schemer looking to cover her tracks. The muddying of her motives might be truer to life, but it obliterates the movie’s tidy morality play and leaves us wondering whether the bad guys had the right idea after all.

    The wrong-headed closer to Sam Adams’s dubious review of Rod Lurie’s “Nothing But the Truth.”  Under 500 words?  In the L.A. Times?  Seriously?

  • 12/13 Oscarweb Round-up

    Michelle Williams in Wendy and Lucy• Rod Lurie wants to steer comparisons of “Nothing But the Truth” away from Judith Miller, evokes Susan McDougal. [Los Angeles Times]

    • The company behind releasing his film, meanwhile, goes into chapter 11. [Variety]

    • Is the Academy ready to award digital performances? [Variety]

    • Sasha Stone spotlights the seasons actor reunions. [Awards Daily]

    • 10 best Christmas bits from non-Christmas movies. [Cinema Blend]

    • Theater (er, theatre) chains across the pond plan to invest in digital technology to capitalize on upcoming releases from Steven Spielberg and James Cameron. [Daily Telegraph]

    • Iranians don’t seem to understand the correllation of the Ayatollah in Darren Aronofsky’s “The Wrestler” to The Iron Shiek of 20 years ago. [Daily Telegraph]

    • Gaby Wood talks to “Revolutionary Road” helmer Sam Mendes. [The Guardian]

    • Clint Eastwood digs into his star and its purpose with Bruce Headlam. [New York Times]

    • Mark Olsen chats with Kelly Reichardt and Michelle Williams about “Wendy and Lucy.” [Los Angeles Times]

    • Kind of difficult not to take stabs at Fox lately. [The Big Picture]

    • Erica Abeel talks “I’ve Loved You So Long” with director Philippe Claudel. [indieWIRE]

    • A couple of talking points with John {atrick Shanley, Meryl Streep and Viola Davis on “Doubt.” [Newsweek]

  • Hell of a thesp

    (from left) Kate Beckinsale and Vera Farmiga in Nothing But the TruthI mostly enjoyed this by-the-numbers Adam Liptak New York Times piece concerning Rod Lurie’s upcoming “Nothing But the Truth.”  I’d say this little anecdote about Vera Farmiga’s acting prowess is probably the best part of an otherwise ho-hum article, though:

    But the film’s most striking performance comes from Vera Farmiga, who plays the C.I.A. operative, here called Erica Van Doren. In one scene Van Doren, suspected of leaking her own identity, is given a lie detector test. “We brought in a real polygraphist to polygraph her,” Mr. Lurie said. “He actually connects her up to the machine and asks her, ‘Is your name Erica Van Doren?’ and so on.”

    Mr. Lurie thought that would be good for verisimilitude. But it turned out the machine had something to say about the power of Ms. Farmiga’s acting. The polygraph operator, Mr. Lurie recalled, pulled him aside afterward: “He says: ‘You’re not going to believe this. The machine says she’s telling the truth.’”

    Farmiga is solid in the film, as is, really, the entire cast, from Kate Beckinsale on down.  I also agree with Jeff Wells that the film is not getting the attention it deserves, but that’s directly attributable to a) the amount of money Yari Film Group/David has to toss at an awards campaign versus the pocket books of major studios/Goliath, and b) the late-year, November/December glut of Oscar contenders, many of which have fallen out and will continue to do so, but for the time being, are ruling the conversation.

    My thoughts, published during the film’s Toronto run, can be found here.

  • Posters for ‘Nothing But the Truth,’ ‘What Doesn’t Kill You’

    Yari Film Group has just released the poster art for its awards season duo, Rod Lurie’s “Nothing But the Truth” and Brian Goodman’s “What Doesn’t Kill You.”  Each of these films is struggling under the weight of big-spending studios this season, and it’s a shame.  Each contains an exemplary 2008 performance (Kate Beckinsale in “Truth” and Mark Ruffalo in “Kill”).

    I also really like the poster design.  Okay, so the “Kill” one-sheet is a clear rip-off of “The Departed,” but I still like it.  And the “Truth” poster is crisp and sophisticated, not as on-the-nose as it could have been.  Nice work overall in what has been an awful year for poster art.  Have a look:

    Nothing But the Truth and What Doesn\'t Kill You

  • 11/19 Oscarweb Round-up

    Kate Beckinsale• David Poland misses the stylistic point of “Revolutionary Road.” [The Hot Blog]

    • Anne Thompson is on the right track, though. [Thompson on Hollywood]

    • Dave Karger digs into the Oscar prospects of the elusive “Seven Pounds.” [Entertainment Weekly]

    • Pete Hammond covers the week in screenings, much of which you’ve already read here.  But he gets more second-hand gossip that Clint Eastwood knocks it out of the park in “Gran Torino.”  Press-at-large screenings start in two weeks. [Notes on a Season]

    • Michael Ordoña talks to Nicole Kidman and Baz Luhrmann (the L.A. Times are getting the royal Fox treatment lately) about “Australia.” [The Envelope]

    • Tom O’Neil talks “Nothing But the Truth” with star Kate Beckinsale. [Gold Derby]

    • Someone call the medic, Grandpa is hearing voices. [Peter Bart]

  • ‘Nothing But the Truth’ trailer

  • New original song contenders from ‘Madagascar,’ ‘Truth’

    Madagascar: Escape 2 AfricaIt looks like that rather flimsy Best Original Song category is finding a few more contenders to hopefully erase the embarrassment of last year’s nominees (three for “Enchanted,” nothing for “Into the Wild” — at least “Once” took the gold).

    First up, will.i.am and Hans Zimmer have cranked out four new tracks for “Madagascar: Escape 2 Africa” which, if the competition falls apart, could find a place at the table.

    It also looks like Rod Lurie’s “Nothing But the Truth” will sport a new tune over the closing credits, a soulful little number by Coby Jones called, well, “Nothing But the Truth.”

    Lurie supplied us with the track (which he co-wrote with Jones) over the weekend.  Have a listen:

    [display_podcast]

    I like it.  Jones and Lurie might find some trouble going up against another low-key number from Bruce Springsteen of all people, but there isn’t much in the way of quality competing for a spot in this category so maybe it could squeeze in alongside The Boss and Peter Gabriel.

    Fox Searchlight is also high on the Bollywood-inspired “Jai Ho” from “Slumdog Millionaire,” and with “High School Musical 3” dominating the box office over the weekend…who knows?  Meanwhile Jon Brion’s “Little Person” from “Synecdoche, New York” has its fans (none of which are likely to be Academy members), while one of my favorite tunes of the year is — yes — Huey Lewis’s “Pineapple Express.”  Sue me.

    More on the Best Original Song predictions chart.

  • OFF THE CARPET: Who we are, who we want to be

    (from left) Josh Brolin and Toby Jones in W.In the last few weeks, drama has persisted in the yet-to-be-heated Oscar season.  Producers are debating exhibitors in public and mid-summer opinions of awards-caliber product are being revisited — in some cases disavowed — as more and more viewers get their peeks.

    On the positive side, two studios have launched the screener circuit with indie films they hope can muster some remembrance, while the foreign film news bite barrage has come to a close with the qualification deadline.  But there isn’t much to go on in terms of assessing the season, not a lot in the way of tangible grist for the mill.

    Lots of smoke, very little fire.

    In part, that should explain a lack of predictions updates here at In Contention, shifting and sliding for no reason.  And indeed, this week’s update isn’t a massive overhaul — or even an overhaul — beyond putting a few things into context here, trimming the fat there.  But as I set out to update our projections this week, I became more and more aware of 2008’s striking theme of self-reflection this Oscar season.  And hey, it seemed as good an idea for a column as any.

    (more…)

  • Release date for ‘Nothing But the Truth’

    Yari Film Group has locked in the release date of December 19th for Rod Lurie’s “Nothing But the Truth,” hoping to cash in on the awards season on the heels of mainly positive reaction at this year’s Toronto International Film Festival.  My thoughts are here.

    In my opinion, the film’s best chances at nominations are Kate Beckinsale for lead actress and Vera Farmiga for supporting.  The former will have to duke it out in a tight category while the latter has the luxury of an empty one.  But hopes are also high for Alan Alda’s prospects, who delivers the heart of the film in a quality monologue in the third act.

  • 9/9 Oscarweb Round-up

    (from left) Larry Charles and Bill Maher on the set of Religulous• Jeffrey Wells digs “Nothing But the Truth” (again), but wasn’t so much for the Toronto debut’s after party. [Hollywood Elsewhere]

    • Lou Lumenick, meanwhile, calls the film “silly” and “an endless mopefest.” [Lumenick on Film]

    • Nancy Kriparos catches up with a few more flicks in Toronto, including the awards sneaker “Dean Spanley.” [Awards Daily]

    • Peter Bart talks to Bill Maher about the comedians new documentary “Religulous.” [Peter Bart]

    • James Rocchi is on board for “The Wrestler,” calling it a reflection of “poisonous” American entertainment culture. [Cinematical]

    • Peter Sciretta also reviews the film… [/Film]

    • …after fumbling to produce an incoherent initial reaction IMMEDIATELY after seeing the film. [/Film]

    • Bob Tourtellotte reports a toned-down, hype-controlled festival. [Reuters]

    • Stephanie Zacharek gets some face time with Ed Harris. [Salon]

    • Presumably trying to beat Variety’s list of 10 to the punch, Karen Durbin picks five actors to watch (including the overreaching “Miracle at St. Anna” star Omar Benson Miller). [New York Times]

    • Anne Thompson hands MTV’s credit over to /Film for yesterday’s Depp/Hoffman/Batman “news.”  Nothing confirmed yet on that, of course. [Thompson on Hollywood]

    • And about that…Devin Faraci is holier than thou. [CHUD]

  • SHORT TAKE: “Nothing But the Truth” (***)

    (from left) Vera Farmiga and Kate Beckinsale in Nothing But the TruthI gave a brief reaction to Rod Lurie’s “Nothing But the Truth” a few weeks ago, but I thought now would be a good time to fully explore what the film has to offer.  Debuting tonight at the Toronto International Film Festival, “Truth” holds up on multiple viewings and, given the particulars of the narrative, one might be inclined to recommend a second look.

    Lurie has built a modest career efficiently telling stories on the screen.  He hasn’t knocked a critically acclaimed success out of the park, nor has he cranked out a considerably popular film that attracted the masses, but it is difficult to argue against even his lesser efforts.  The guy has a confident hand and knows how to put a solid film together.

    “Nothing But the Truth” isn’t quite the best film in his stable (stellar acting chops place “The Contender” in that position for me), but it is certainly close and will likely find a core of champions that appreciate how Lurie can work so assuredly in difficult terrain, tackling subject matter not easily simplified for the screen in a way that entertains and, above all, actually says something.

    Kate Beckinsale stars as Rachel Armstrong, a D.C. columnist who outs CIA agent Erica Van Doren (Vera Farmiga) in a piece that raises questions about a covert operation in retaliation for an attempted presdential assassination.  (The attempt, by the way, provides a gripping opening sequence for the film.)

    A shit-storm ensues for both women.  Van Doren can’t drop her kids off at school without the media hounding her every move, while Armstrong is ushered by federal agents to meet with a special counsel assigned as prosecuting attorney (played with slick southern panache by Matt Dillon).  The government wants the source of the information, of course, and being a good journalist, Rachel gladly tells them to screw off.  But with no shield laws to protect her decision, a swift court schedule ultimately finds her behind bars.

    (more…)

  • OFF THE CARPET: Indies on the march

    (from left) Evan Rachel Wood and Mickey Rourke in The WrestlerMaybe mid-way through the Toronto Film Festival, two things are strikingly clear: Darren Aronofsky has the goods with “The Wrestler” and Danny Boyle’s streak of successful versatility at the helm continues with “Slumdog Millionaire.”

    Both films, which enjoy pre-Toronto success at Venice and Telluride respectfully, are also evidence that surprises will happen this time of year.  And with an uncharacteriztically level playing field in Toronto this year, we should be thankful they are getting a fair shake.

    One of them is set for distribution, however, while the other is waiting out a buyer.  But will “The Wrestler” find a home and see a release in 2008 or will an awards-heavy distributor pick it up and save it for a rainy day in 2009’s awards season?

    Both options are on the table, it’s just a matter of who bites first, and what they bring to the table.

    On the horizon, everyone is awaiting their post-Toronto peeks at films like “Australia,” “Revolutionary Road,” “Milk” (landing a trailer this week) and “The Soloist.”  David Fincher’s 20 minutes of footage from “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button” may have been caught off guard by over-zealous bloggers in Telluride, but the damage may not have been as considerable as some may have thought.

    Speaking of “The Soloist,” chatter is making its way out of the Paramount camp that Robert Downey Jr. is outstanding as LA Times columnist Steve Lopez and hopes are high for a Best Actor nomination.  And as far as “Milk” is concerned, prognosticators may have the wrong idea going in as to which supporting performance has the awards-worthy chops.  More on that at a later date.

    (more…)

  • OFF THE CARPET: Make way for the little guys…or not

    Anne Hathaway in Rachel Getting MarriedIt may be Labor Day, but the work at hand is breathing down our necks. So it is that we come to the first weekly Oscar column of the new awards season.

    Though to be frank with you, I’m beginning to wonder whether we’ll be able to keep the conversation going, much less interesting on a weekly basis as we push through the last four months of the year. I knew going in to this year that it was going to be a somewhat low-key season, and my own worst fears have been founded in a number of pre-Toronto screenings of films that will be discussed in a week’s time, films leaving me cold, irritated or otherwise just unconvinced.

    I don’t sense a lull on the level of 2005 by any means, but I do get the feeling that after two solid years of cinematic goodness, 2008 could just be one of those “rebuilding” years, to steal a sports term and painfully attempt its application here. It’s interesting (and telling) that my two favorite films of the year are a stoner comedy and a superhero adaptation respectively (though the latter obviously has a legion of fans banking on major awards success…more on that later).

    The most intriguing component for me is the playground that Toronto will provide for a bevy of independent and genuinely smaller product. The heavy-hitters (or, at the very least, the presumed heavy-hitters) are incomplete and not prepared for fall fest unveiling (aside from “Frost/Nixon,” which has already been seen and seems to be riding a wave of confidence at Universal).

    But efforts like Mike Leigh’s “Happy-Go-Lucky,” Jonathan Demme’s “Rachel Getting Married,” Vicente Amorim’s “Good,” Guillermo Arriaga’s “The Burning Plain,” Rian Johnson’s “The Brothers Bloom,” Richard Eyre’s “The Other Man,” etc. — true indies with a fighting chance to turn some heads — won’t have to suffer in the shadows of big studio films angling for the press of an Oscar season starting gun.

    Meanwhile, Cannes entries such as Fernando Meirelles’s “Blindness,” Charlie Kaufman’s “Synecdoche, New York,” Matteo Garrone’s “Gomorrah” and Steven Soderbergh’s “Che” get an uninhibited second chance in front of festival audiences. Ditto Clint Eastwood’s “Changeling,” in the case of the New York fest.

    (more…)