22nd Jul2013

Red 2 Press Conference – Film

by timbaros

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Bruce Willis, Mary-Louise Parker and Helen Mirren at today’s press conference for Red 2 – opening on 2 August, 2013

Here are some highlights of the press conference:
Q: Which elements of being an action here that you enjoyed and did you actually drive in Paris?
Mary Louise-Parker: I am a horrible driver and I don’t drive ever and the one scene where the director asked me to drive I drove into a wall and the director put it on a loop and watched it over and over again.
I love doing any scenes with Bruce Willis – that is the best part of the movie. My character is kind of sort of hopeless with action, she fails miserably and it was fun.
Q: When you get a contract for one of these movies that you got to have a regal moment , was some of that stuff ad libbed.
Helen Mirren: I can’t remember how that came about. I think the writers have written it and thought it was very funny, of course, that I would pretend to be the queen, I suggested that it should be a bit of a performance.
Q: Did comic books play a significant part of your childhood? If you were interested in comic books, which ones and why?
Bruce Willis: I am not a comic book guy..
Q: When you do your job, how difficult is it to stay in shape and to do the stunts you need to do?
Willis: I have to think about the food that I eat. I do let the stunt men take over.
Mirren: I was over the moon the first time I got offered the role in Red. Are people giong to think that I sold out but then I thought how incredibly stupid I was and that it was an incredible opportunity to do something that I have never done before. I couldn’t wait to do the second one. All I try to do is mix it up at times. When the penny drops as far as Red concerns I thought it was a perfect opportunity to mix it up, coming off doing The Queen the first queen, brilliant just to jump in the opposite direction.
Willis: I liked to work with this group of actors – we were very fortunate to get Tony Hopkins back.
Q: Why are you thrilled to return?
Parker: I feel like I have gotten luck so many times and I’ve had more than my share.
Mirren: This movie has expanded from the first and they go to incredible locations that they didn’t write me in to. You always learn from the first that the wonderful fully realized quirky characters, and the comedy and the romance and the action. That is the very difficult part to make a film that has genuine romance, great comedy and has a lot of action in it. At the same time, all of these characters are very serious as to who they are and what they do. I think it is just faster and funnier and little more furious then the first one.
Q: Which characters would you like to move visit?
Mirren: Almost all of them I would like to revisit. It is great to play a character that can develop with time, in real time in a way that as you get old the character gets older as theworld around you changes, the character changes – you can only really do that in television There was a character I played many years ago in a film called Cow, a very old movie – a characher Iwould like to revisit now.
Parker: I would like to play this character again. I did a play 17 years ago that I would like to remount – a play called How I Learned to Drive.
Willis: Of all the many rolesyouplayed, which one qwould you return to:
My favorite part of making films is the actual day to day process of getting in front of the camera and trying to make it seem life like, trying to make it funny, trying to make it romantic, and all this i know is a big part of film – sales of it all, the explanation of how we made the move,but my favorite part is actually making the movie.

22nd Jul2013

Summer of Cinema Video – Film

by timbaros

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22nd Jul2013

The Frozen Ground – Film

by timbaros

 

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In the 1980s in Anchorage, Alaska, Robert Hansen kidnapped 30 women, then took them into the wilderness where he shot and buried them.

Hansen, who owned a bakery, was a regular family man, with a good-looking wife and two children. Regardless, he stalked the streets of Anchorage for more than 13 years, driving around the city looking for young prostitutes to kill.

The Frozen Ground concentrates on the story of detective Glenn Frothe (called Sargent Jack Halcombe in the film). About to retire, Halcombe believes he can solve the cases of the missing women with an eyewitness to Hansen’s brutality: 17-year-old Cindy Paulson, who was taken from the streets by Hansen, but managed to escape and is now the one person who can put him in jail. Paulson, however, is not the best witness. Unstable, on drugs, and emotionally a wreck, she refuses to engage with Halcombe and the investigation and continues to work as a prostitute. In the meantime, another woman goes missing, and still lurking around the city is Hansen, who spots Paulson and arranges with a local thug to kidnap her.

Will Cindy tell all to Halcombe and help in the capture of Hansen? Or will Hansen get to Paulson first and add another murder to his list?

Films based on actual events tend to get dramaticised for the big screen, so it not really clear how much of this film is the actually true. Nicolas Cage plays Halcombe, the detective with children himself, who doesn’t want to see another young woman killed. Vanessa Hudgens, in her first dramatic role in a film, is able enough to pull off Paulson, one minute speaking like the young woman she, and the next minute having a breakdown. It is John Cusak, however, who steals this movie. His Hansen is so cold, so brutal, so cunning, that we believe someone who looks like Cusak could be a serial killer. Furthermore, Cusak and the real Hansen look eerily alike. Hansen was a normal family guy living a secret life, a secret life so sordid and horrible, it is hard to believe a man like him existed.

For those curious, Robert Hansen was convicted in 1983 and is currently serving 461 years in prison. He is now 74-years-old, and will die in prison, because Alaska does not have the death penalty.

Review originally posted on Hereisthecity.com – click on this link to view