Next Cinema Lounge

The Cinema Lounge meets Monday, November 11 to discuss trailers of the past and present and look at how they've changed. Are trailers an art form or a nuisance? See below for the Film Society's semi-annual trailer program, taking place the following day.

Cinema Lounge, a film discussion group, takes place the second Monday of every month at 7:00 PM at Borders Books, 600 14th St., NW in Washington, DC (near the Metro Center Metro stop).

Fall Trailer Program Features Blockblusters, Sequels, Series, and Serious Film

Compliments to Film Society Coordinating Committee Members Cate Nielan and Michael Kyrioglou for organizing this fall's Coming Attractions film trailer program. Mark your calendars! The program begins next week at 7:00 p.m. on Tuesday, November 12 at the Loews Cineplex Wisconsin 6 Theatres (4000 Wisconsin Avenue NW, Washington, DC). Join ever popular host and film critic Bill Henry and fellow film fans for a sneak preview and scintillating discussion of this holiday season's Bond, DiCaprio, hobbits, Santa Claus, wizard boys, blockbusters and all!

2002, a year of box office records, blockbusters galore, and it's not yet over! Come see the trailers for the final crop of the big fall movies, the remaining contenders for next year's Oscars. Venture into the world and art of movie marketing. Share your opinions with fellow fans, and talk back to the critic! All while you munch on the complimentary burritos from Chipotle. Not quite dinner and a movie, but close!

Don't get left behind and miss out on all of the fun. Everything is up for grabs, we'll see and discuss trailers for Antwone Fisher, The Life of David Gale, Standing in the Shadows of Motown, Solaris, The Dancer Upstairs, and Empire as well as Die Another Day, Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets, Star Trek: Nemesis, Gangs of New York, and The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers. Got some behind-the-scenes gossip? We'll discuss that too. And there'll be lots of fun, free movie giveaways, including CDs, t-shirts, hats, movie posters, and door prizes.

Ticket prices for this one-time-only event are $5.00 for DC Film Society members and only $8.00 for non-members and guests. For ticket sales and further information as it becomes available, please call (202) 554-3263.

Partial Trailer Program List
Adaptation (Sony)
Anger Management (Sony)
Antwone Fisher
Daddy Day Care (Sony)
The Dancer Upstairs
Daredevil
Darkness Falls (Sony)
Eight Crazy Nights (Sony)
Empire (Universal)
Emperor's Club (Universal)
House of 1,000 Corpses (Lions Gate/Trimark)
The Life of David Gale (Universal)
Made in Manhattan (Sony)
National Security (Sony)
Solaris
Standing in the Shadows of Motown (Artisan)

All Or Nothing: Interview With Director and Star

By James McCaskill

EDINBURGH, Scotland. Mike Leigh's All Or Nothing had its UK premiere at the 2002 Edinburgh International Film Festival and is opening November 1 in Washington. Most of his films have looked at the life of the London underclass and this film follows that tradition. This raw look at life in a public housing estate in the south of London does not pull any punches while exploring events in a long weekend. Penny's love for her partner, taxi driver Phil, has long since waned. Phil, played by Timothy Spall in his sixth film for Mike Leigh, has never challenged the world. He is a gentle soul caught in a hard life. Penny, played by Lesley Manville has worked in three previous Leigh films, is a checkout at a supermarket.

Life is passing their children, Alison Garland as Rachel and James Corden as Rory, as well. They seem to have inherited their father's low expectations. Rachel cleans in a home for the elderly and Rory is unemployed and bitter.

The following is from a press conference held after the press showing.

Q: What qualities did Timothy Spall have for this role?

Spall interjected, "Aside from natural beauty?"

Leigh: "Qualities? His ability to flower and mature. He brings a great sense of people and life with passion and emotional depth, a sense of humor. Both are actors of great versatility."

Q: Were you surprised by what they do with the roles?

Leigh: "Not the least. That is the great thing with working with this kind of actor. Only blown away by what one has chance to be while working with them."

Q: What is the state of British filmmaking?

Leigh: "The good news is that they get made at all. Love to see more British films made and seen. Not fall into traps of aping Hollywood. Lot of talent around. I am optimistic about the future. People will find ways to make films anyhow. About funding – Studio Canal helps finance many of mine as they are European films."

Q: Do you think in terms of European films as opposed to British films?

Leigh: "Films should be funded cross borders. The bottom line is simple: People make films or do not [make films]. If they are not being shot people will find other ways of making films."

Q: How do you develop your characters?

Manville: "The way Mike works? Rehearsals. That's the great thing Mike does. You are always going to play characters not like you. Very liberating. Play different ends of social scale."

Spall: "There is a sense of absolute collaboration. Mike is the author but you get a sense of co-authorship, co-ownership. Totally unique; part of a parallel universe. It is a pool that you dip into to move these characters forward. It is a work of art, improvisation. Story comes out of a growing organism that becomes a film. It is an organic sharing of the way it is done."

Manville: "You know what the film is about. You know what working with Mike is about."

Spall: "Once you work in such details. Once you think about the character's back story." "Having had a little taste of the way Hollywood works (Vanilla Sky). What I experienced there was a town as varied as any other. If you are in films that get an international audience people will say 'get me that guy.' They watch film all the time. Their entire life is about movies. Independent producers like the Coen brothers, they are independent but they are Hollywood. I prefer playing the lead and Mike has given me the chance to play the lead more than any other director. I prefer Mike. We have had a close relationship over the years. Because you are involved in the process, it feels shared. You are in it together. Never been asked to do something not organic. Never feels anything other than germane."

Q: What is your next film?

Manville: "No idea."

Spall: "Going back to Hollywood. Shooting Last Samurai with Tom Cruise in Japan. I'm playing a samurai.

Q: Did you ever drive a mini-cab?

Spall: "The thing about being an actor is that the prospect of being a mini-cab driver is around the corner. I come from working class South London."

Q: What impresses your family most: working with Mike Leigh or Tom Cruise?

Spall: "My family is unperturbed by both. They are neither impressed nor unimpressed. My kids sometimes come to the set and see what I do. I still live in South London, not in a Council flat any more. They know Mike more than Tom Cruise. My son is now an actor so he is not impressed with glitz and glamour. I am now doing bargains with God: 'If I don't get the part give it to him.' "

Manville: "If my son wanted to be an actor, I'd break his legs."

Q: Why South London?

Leigh: "This is not a documentary. If it were it would have a wider range of social issues, and you would see a much wider range of color of skin. I just heightened and distilled a specific situation. This film deals with specific issues.

Q: What scene was the most difficult to do?

Manville: "Technical level harder to do. The scene where both of us were crying was hard to do. It had long shots and it is harder to sustain things. No sense ever of pulling something out of the hat. It happens slowly so it feels rooted, feels right." "I love that about the process Mike uses. Makes total sense to do when at the end of the day you present a 3D character. Love the whole notion of not having a script. Taking a character in any direction that feels right.

Leigh: "You must choose the crew carefully. They need to feel part of process. The set is not precious. Not one of those 'Don't talk.' Have a laugh. They are so dedicated. They knew they were doing something extraordinary."

Spall: "It [the filming] is very precise. Crew is waiting for the next instalment. 'Ah, that's where this film is going.' They know we are all in it together."

Manville: "They have a great sense of journey, of discovery, creativity."

Rabbit-Proof Fence

By James McCaskill

EDINBURGH, Scotland. Rabbit-Proof Fence was shown in the Edinburgh International Film Festival. In an interview, the director Phillip Noyce, actress Everlyn Sampi, and Doris Pilkington, author of the book Follow the Rabbit-Proof Fence, upon which the film is based, talked about how the film came to be made.

What would you do if the government kidnapped your daughter? Rabbit-Proof Fence is based on real events that occurred in the 1930s. Between 1905 and 1971 it was the policy and practice of the Australian government to take, by force if necessary, racially mixed children. The children were taken to missions, often religious missions, for re-education and classification. ("This is your new home. We don't speak that jabber here. Speak English," says a mission worker to newly arriving children at the Moore River Native Settlement.) Light skinned children were told that they were orphans and that they were white. Dark skinned children were trained for menial jobs as domestics and farm workers. ("They can't be left as they are. The Native must be helped," says a government bureaucrat.)

Sadly, the government officials really thought they were helping. The reason behind the action was to prevent a third race in Australia. Kenneth Branagh gives a wonderfully nuanced performance as A. O. Neville, the English civil servant who was the Chief Protector of Aborigines in Western Australia for almost 40 years. In researching this role Branagh read many books on Neville and decided that he was "very much a product of that latter part of the British Empire, which still believed in a sort of paternalistic interventionist policy in the ultimate Christian air to uplift the subject races."

In brief, Rabbit-Proof Fence is based on the actual ordeal of three young girls, eldest 14, who escaped the Moore River Settlement and successfully evaded trackers and police to walk 2000 kilometres back to their home in Jigalong. Early in the film a mother points out a hovering bird and says, "Spirit bird will always look after you." The spirit bird was working overtime in assisting the girls over scrub and desert country.

The actual fence is a 1,500 mile long scar running across the face of Australia. The girls reasoned that by following it they would return to their home, a junction on the fence. To screenwriter/producer Christine Olsen, "The fence, to me, was always such an amazing symbol for the Europeans attempt to tame the land: to draw a line in it to keep out rabbits–the pests they had introduced. It was such a magnificent symbol for a lot of what has happened to Australia."

Why was Phillip Noyce asked to direct this film? He is usually associated with big budget Hollywood films such as Clear and Present Danger, Patriot Games, and The Bone Collector and the soon to be released The Quiet American, filmed in Vietnam and Sydney, starring Sir Michael Cain and Brendan Fraser. Olsen called Noyce the 'dream di rector' because not only was he Australian and this was part of his history but his 1974 film, Backroads, treated the Aboriginal people in the film as people, nothing more, nothing less. Noyce said about his first film, "In this film a black man and a white man steal a car and go careening around Australia." Olson also felt that if Noyce directed it, "the film would get an international audience and I thought it was a film that actually had the potential for it." She almost did not get him as, forgetting the time difference between Australia and Los Angelas, she called him at 3.30 AM. Not amused, Noyce told her to contact his office. It took six months to get him to read the script as he was finishing up The Bone Collector. Everyone in his office who read the script urged him to read it. "It was another two months before I actually opened the screenplay to see what all the fuss was about and I couldn't put it down." "When I started reading the screenplay I realized it was a very, very special story and by the end of it I was close to tears."

Noyce says that when he began to read the story he was aware of their aboriginality but about half way through they ceased to be black or white they were just children in distress, powerless, fighting back and finally triumphing. "This was a film that has to be made." "Took three years for me to get at what the story was: getting home."

"Story is about mothers and their children. You can not get more universal that that," Noyce stated. "I hope the audience is so involved in wanting these kids to get home, that they forget about race and identify with the plight of these three characters."

Casting the three children proved to be a major undertaking. They are the film. For this casting director Christine King (Moulin Rouge, Two Hands) joined Noyce in an Australian-wide search for Aboriginal actors. They weren't alone as eight other sub-casting directors, teachers, parents and community leaders, all armed with handicams, joined the search. Noyce says they were looking for "three tiny needles in a huge haystack." The tradition of performance is central to Aboriginal culture but discipline needed to make a film isn't. In the end 16 children were found. All were from the countryside as aboriginal children in big cities are like big city kids everywhere. They had lost their cultural heritage that is crucial to the believability of this film. In the end Everlyn Sampi (11 years), Laura Monaghan (9 years), and Caitly Lawford (6 years) were selected as much for their chemistry as a threesome as they were for their individual talents: Molly's leadership, Gracie's practical questioning and Daisy's theatricality.

Just as principal shooting began the youngest from tiny Fitzroy Crossing found Adelaide too much too handle so Tianna Sansbury was recast as Daisy. Everlyn Sample is the powerful and charismatic star of the film. All who worked with her feel that she as a career in film if she wants it, something she is not certain about. She was not certain she wanted to make this film and ran away three times. The first time they found her in a phone box calling a travel agent to get her home.

The Aboriginal culture is shown throughout the film and traditional protocols had to be followed. Permission had to be obtained from the tribal elders to tell a Western Australian film in Flinders region. Care had to be taken that the right dialect was spoken. There once were over 500 but now most are extinct. The people in the Jigalong spoke Matudjara but Wangajunka, a similar dialect, is spoken in the film. (These unfamiliar words were carefully spelled for me by Pilkington.)

One of the most moving moments in the film involves a traditional celebration. The "Women's Business," as a white actor called it, was filmed with the girls and a group of non-actors mostly from Alice Springs. The cultural pride of the women comes through. Cinematographer Chris Doyle (Temptress Moon, Red Rose/White Rose, Chunking Express, Liberty Heights among others) successfully portrays the dance in a beautiful and moving way.

The most difficult scene for the children, adult cast and film crew was the one in which the children were forcibly taken away from their mothers by Constable Riggs (Jason Clarke, Better Than Sex, Praise, Risk). Noyce said it was an intense scene for all. "The issue of black or white disappeared. It was a child, our child, we were the children, we were the mothers and we were the fathers. It was primordial, basic. A mother who wants to protect her child, a child who wants to stay with her mother."

Why has it taken so long for this information to come out? "There are many reasons," said Noyce. "Most Australians live in cities. Most cities are on the east coast. Most Australians live their lives without contact with an Aboriginal. We hardly saw them. The only history was safely locked away in government files. That suited us very well. We did not have to face it." Pilkington said, "It was very difficult for all. A group of men who were brought up in Conchilla, a boy's home, decided to meet in a part in New South Wales. Seeing the movie enabled them to talk about their experiences." "It was," she added, "very difficult for them to face their history. But now they are saying, 'Now I am going to search for my mother.' The first thing they want to do is connect with their family and their land. I am very proud to be a part of it."

Despite a royal report being made in 1997, there is much denial. It is traumatic for a 50 year old, raised as white, to suddenly discover that his mother is alive after all and aboriginal. "There is an effort by conservatives to discredit the film. They are convinced it never happened," Pilkington continues. "People were ashamed of their relationships to traditional people. They did not want friends to know that father was a black man. A missionary brainwashed me to believe that my people were devil worshipers. It took me ten years to understand my people and culture." She added, "I sent letters to my sister along with books. Sister returned them, saying 'Told you 20 years ago I did not want to know my history." Pilkington told her mother, "Mum, she does not want to know us." "OK, she is dead then," her mother replied.

When the film was shown in Jigalong, "my mother and aunt [the real Molly and Daisy] and family came. My great big uncle came out crying. Nothing was said as people walked away." Later her aunt told the press, "She [Molly] made me walk all the way," meaning the long trek across Australia.

The healing part of the process continues. According to the author the aboriginals need rights, justice and equal opportunity. Her remaining goal is to write stories for youngsters in their own language. Problems remain. Alcoholism is high and there is little employment opportunities in rural areas. Some things are changing. Indigenous people's history is now taught in schools. Newspapers no longer use negative stereotypes.

The film has had a very positive impact on Jigalong. Working with the tourist industry has brought about a Visitor's Center. Children re-enact the Rabbit-Proof Fence story.

Make certain you stay for the closing credits. They feature shots of the real life Molly and Daisy and it is worth seeing these ladies as they are today.

"Those other kids that were taken, they were much younger. They didn't know mother. But I was older. I knew mother. I wanted to go home to mother." Molly Craig (84 years), Jigalong, August 2000.

The Documentary
Making the film was an undertaking that happily was captured in a documentary, Following the Rabbit-Proof Fence, which looks at how director Phillip Noyce found the three female child actors who would play the lead roles. It also follows the day-to-day filming. Eight film companies applied to the book's publisher, University of Queensland Press, for film rights, Pilkington said. "Olson was the only woman filmmaker. UQP made the decision." She added, "I purposely kept away [from the filming]. No writer wants to see his work desecrated." "My son was on the set. He told me that in the filming of one scene he wanted to run in and set Everlyn free." Pilkington is understandably close as this is her mother and aunt's story.

Following the Rabbit-Proof Fence was shown at the Edinburgh International Film Festival. Director: Darlene Johnson. Producers: Tom Zubrycki and Emma Cooper. Music: Peter Gabriel. Cast: Phillip Noyce, Everlyn Sampi, Tianna Sansbury, Laura Monaghan. The documentary is narrated by Kenneth Branagh. This is Darlene Johnson's second documentary on this topic. She had made Stolen Generation, a documentary about the history of the removal of aboriginal children from parents.

Argentine Films Continue To Win International Prizes

By James McCaskill

The Fédération Internationale de la Presse Cinématographique (FIPRESCI) awarded the International Critics Prize to the Argentine film Tan de Repente (Suddenly), directed by Diego Lerman at the Viennale Vienna International Film Festival (Austria, October 18-30, 2002). The film was honored by the judges for "a plot-twisting riot-girls road movie that announced the strength of an Argentinean New-New-Wave.

This comes at a time when the Argentine film industry is having a funding crisis as the government's monetary problems have not improved. Important leaders of the film industry have been asked to step down from their posts. Only recently the President of the Argentine National Film Institute, Jorge Coscia, asked Claudio Espana to resign as artistic director the Mar del Plata International Film Festival, saying it was for "differences of criteria." Espana, who had been in charge of the last two festival, considered the decision as "unfair." Filmmaker Migues Pereira (The Internal Debt, The Last Sowing) replaces him. The next festival is scheduled for March 6-15, 2003.

The Toronto International Film Festival

If you missed this comprehensive review of the Toronto International Film Festival (which was posted late), see the October Storyboard.

Calendar of Events

Previous Storyboards

October, 2002
September, 2002
August, 2002
July, 2002
June, 2002
May, 2002
April, 2002
March, 2002
February, 2002
January, 2002
December, 2001
November, 2001
October, 2001
September, 2001
August, 2001
July, 2001
June, 2001
May, 2001
April, 2001
March, 2001
February, 2001
January, 2001
December,2000
November, 2000