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      in Movies

      David Bordwell, Scholar Who Demystified Filmmaking, Dies at 76

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      Roger Ebert called him “our best writer on the cinema.” His scholarship focused on how movies work.David Bordwell, a film studies scholar whose immersive, accessible writing transcended the corridors of academia and illuminated the mechanics of moviemaking to a generation of cinephiles and filmmakers, died on Feb. 29 at his home in Madison, Wis. He was 76.The cause was interstitial pulmonary fibrosis, said his wife, Kristin Thompson, a prominent film scholar who frequently collaborated with him.Dr. Bordwell taught at the University of Wisconsin for 30 years and wrote or co-wrote more than 20 books, including “Film Art: An Introduction” (1979), a textbook written with his wife that is widely used in film studies programs. After retiring in 2004, he and Dr. Thompson analyzed movies on his blog at davidbordwell.net and in videos for the Criterion Channel.Hailed as “our best writer on the cinema” by Roger Ebert, Dr. Bordwell’s film analysis avoided ivory tower theories on the social and political undertones of movies in favor of clear, frame-by-frame examinations of scene structure, shot angles and other elements of filmmaking.In a blog post about “The Social Network,” David Fincher’s 2010 film about the founding of Facebook, he analyzed the facial expressions of Facebook co-founder Eduardo Saverin (played by Andrew Garfield) during a scene when Mark Zuckerberg (Jesse Eisenberg) blindsides him.Dr. Bordwell used a single frame that he cropped into several images.In the first image, only Eduardo’s eyes are visible. “Certainly they give us information — about the direction the person is looking, about a certain state of alertness,” Dr. Bordwell wrote. “The lids aren’t lifted to suggest surprise or fear, but I think you’d agree that no specific emotion seems to emerge from the eyes alone.”We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      in Television

      Book Review: ‘The House of Hidden Meanings,’ by RuPaul

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      Chronicling the high-heeled path to drag-queen superstardom, the new memoir also reveals a celebrity infatuated with his sense of a special destiny.THE HOUSE OF HIDDEN MEANINGS: A Memoir, by RuPaulAs “The House of Hidden Meanings” is RuPaul’s fourth book and his first straightforward memoir, it’s understandably being marketed as an opportunity to see the pop culture icon in a new light. The striking, almost intimidating, black-and-white cover photograph notably subverts the expectation of seeing Ru in glamorous technicolor drag. All the artifice has been stripped away, we’re being told: This is RuPaul stripped bare.But the meanings laid bare in the text contradict RuPaul’s narration again and again. What’s revealed is a striver high on his own supply who tries to spin his story as empathetic wisdom draped in Instagram-ready captions.About 70 pages in, RuPaul — at the time, a Black high school dropout driving luxury cars across the country to help a relative flip them for profit — declares without irony, “Americans have always been frontiersmen, people who are open to a new adventure, and I felt this as I drove cars alone, back and forth, across the United States.”I wearily recalled an earlier section of the book. Explaining the conservative environment of his childhood in San Diego, RuPaul summarizes the Great Migration in a paragraph that would be considered too concise even for a Wikipedia entry, then declares, “All the Black people in our neighborhood were transplants from the South, and so they had inherited a kind of slave mentality, which was based on fear.”Aside from breathtaking dismissiveness of the decades of racial violence that made the migration necessary, it’s chilling to see a public figure known as a champion of the marginalized so easily dismiss survivors of Jim Crow-era terror as people who “hold onto their victim mentality so fiercely; it becomes a defining feature of their identity.”The way we tell our stories has a way of telling on us. The memoir reveals an author who thinks he understands outsiders when, really, all he understands is that he wanted to become famous and eventually became famous. And given RuPaul Charles’s truly extraordinary talent, that would be fine if the book (and his brand) weren’t so invested in trying to convince the rest of us that he has unique insight into the joke called life.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      in Movies

      ‘Dune: Part Two’ Gives Sci-Fi-Obsessed Silicon Valley a Reason to Party

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      In a top-floor atrium in downtown San Francisco on Thursday evening, tech workers from Google, Slack, X and Mozilla mingled next to a pair of cardboard cutouts of Timothée Chalamet and Zendaya.Dustin Moskovitz, a Facebook founder, chatted as others sipped from cannily named cocktails like the Fremen Mirage (gin, coconut Campari, sweet vermouth) and the Arrakis Palms (vanilla pear purée, gin, Fever-Tree tonic). Tim O’Reilly, a tech industry veteran, dropped by. Alex Stamos, the former head of security at Facebook, was also spotted.“Do you think they’ll let me take home one of the freaky sandworm popcorn buckets?” someone in the crowd tittered. The suggestively designed buckets had become a sensation across social media.The techies were all there to celebrate Silicon Valley’s newest obsession: “Dune: Part 2,” the latest movie adapted from the Frank Herbert-authored science-fiction saga, which helped inspire many of them to become interested in technology. The film, which follows the 2021 installment “Dune,” sold an estimated $81.5 million in tickets in the United States and Canada over the weekend, the biggest opening for a Hollywood film since “Barbie.”The invitation-only private screening at the IMAX theater in downtown San Francisco was hosted by two tech executives turned podcasters of “Escape Hatch,” a weekly show focused on sci-fi and fantasy films. And it was not the only game in town.Across Silicon Valley — from venture capital firms to tech executive circles — people had booked their own private screenings of the movie, directed by Denis Villeneuve. On Thursday, the venture firm 50 Years invited founders, friends and investors to “come fuel your imagination with stellar science fiction” in a theater takeover.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      in Movies

      Can You Identify These Books and Their Film Adaptations That Became Best Picture Winners?

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      Welcome to Great Adaptations, the Book Review’s regular multiple-choice quiz about literature that has gone on to find new life in the form of movies, television shows, theatrical productions and other formats. With the 2024 Academy Awards ceremony on March 10, this month’s challenge focuses on nonfiction books that were adapted into films that went on to win the Oscar for best picture. Just tap or click your answers to the five questions below. And scroll down after you finish the last question for more information and links to the books. More

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      in Theater

      Jacqueline Woodson’s ‘The Other Side and ‘Show Way’ Go to BAM

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      A dance performance of “The Other Side” and a musical adaptation of “Show Way” head to the Brooklyn stage for young audiences.Jacqueline Woodson has always seen her books while she writes them, visualizing what the characters look like, how they might speak and move. “I imagine them line by line,” she said during a recent phone interview. “I see the pictures.”A prolific author of books for young people (and in later years, for adults), Woodson has won nearly every award possible for a children’s author: the Coretta Scott King award, a National Book award, many Newbery medals, a MacArthur grant. A few of those books have been staged, filmed or set to music. Since Woodson was named the Kennedy Center’s Education Artist-in-Residence in 2021, more have been adapted. Soon, the Brooklyn Academy of Music will bring two of those Kennedy Center productions, “Show Way the Musical” and “The Other Side,” to its Fishman Space. So now audiences in Brooklyn, where Woodson has long lived, can see these books, too.“Song and dance get inside of you in a different way,” she said approvingly. “Adding the dimension of music and movement to that narration touches us in a much deeper and more radiant way.”“The Other Side,” with choreography by Hope Boykin and a score by Ali Jackson, will have four performances this weekend. “Show Way the Musical,” with music and lyrics by Tyrone L. Robinson, runs March 16-17. Recommended for children 7 and older, each deals with difficult subject matter. “The Other Side,” about a Black girl and a white girl who live on opposite sides of a fence, addresses segregation. “Show Way,” a history of the women in Woodson’s family and the quilt they sewed, touches on enslavement. But both are ultimately hopeful, at times even joyful.“Show Way the Musical,” with music and lyrics by Tyrone L. Robinson, is a history of the women in Woodson’s family and the quilt they sewed.Kyle Schick / Elman StudioAmy Cassello, BAM’s interim artistic director, believes in art as a way to help young viewers understand this history, however fraught. “It sets the scene for learning and openness and understanding,” she said.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

    • 113 Shares189 Views

      in Movies

      ‘Dune: Part Two’: Here’s Everything You Need to Know

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      Before you see the second film in Denis Villeneuve’s adaptation of the sci-fi epic, try this refresher on spice, the Imperium and the Kwisatz Haderach.Since the weird, wild universe of “Dune” emerged from the pages of Frank Herbert’s novel in 1965, filmmakers have yearned to bring it to the screen. In the 1970s, Alejandro Jodorowsky was thwarted in his attempt to turn his elaborate vision into cinematic reality. In 1984, David Lynch was forced to cram volumes of lore into two hours, and the result was an ugly-beautiful disaster. In the latest foray, Denis Villeneuve has created an engrossing, believable world, smartly dividing the first book in the series into two parts. “Dune: Part One” was a critical and box office hit when it was released in 2021, and now “Part Two,” which opens in theaters nationwide on Friday, is poised to pick up where the last film left off. Here’s a primer to bring you up to speed.Where are we?In the film, Paul Atreides becomes a member of the Fremen, a native people of the planet Arrakis living mostly in its hidden corners. Niko Tavernise/Warner Bros.“Dune” is set about 20,000 years in the future, and much of the series takes place on the desert planet of Arrakis. Part of the galactic empire of the Imperium, which is ruled by the Padishah Emperor Shaddam, Arrakis is vital because it offers a necessary resource — spice — that exists nowhere else. In “Part One,” the emperor transferred control of Arrakis from the brutes of House Harkonnen to their longtime foes, House Atreides. But the gift was a trap, something Duke Leto Atreides suspected but hoped to turn to his advantage by establishing an alliance with the Fremen, a native people of Arrakis who live mostly in its hidden corners. Before Leto’s plans could bear fruit, the emperor secretly sent his elite force to aid Baron Vladimir Harkonnen (Stellan Skarsgard) in regaining control of the planet and in destroying Leto’s troops and family. (In the process, Leto died.)Why is spice so important?“Part Two” opens with the words “Power over spice is power over all.” After a religious revolt against robots millenniums before the start of the series, the use of intelligent machines was banned. People have since relied on preternatural abilities that are developed through training and the use of psychotropic drugs such as spice, which can expand consciousness and extend life. The resource is particularly crucial to the navigators, who enable interstellar travel.What’s the deal with Paul Atreides?Paul Atreides battling Feyd-Rautha Harkonnen (Austin Butler) to determine who will control the spice — and the universe.Niko Tavernise/Warner Bros.Paul Atreides (Timothée Chalamet) is the son of Leto and his concubine, Lady Jessica (Rebecca Ferguson), who is a member of the Bene Gesserit, a mystical sisterhood that surreptitiously manipulates the levers of power. It has been seeding self-serving myths and conducting a breeding program for generations. The relationship between Leto and Jessica had been arranged in hopes that she would give birth to a daughter who could then conceive the Kwisatz Haderach — a male Bene Gesserit with “a mind powerful enough to bridge all space and time.” Instead, Jessica bore Leto the son he desired. (A Bene Gesserit can control everything that goes on in her body.)We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      in Television

      ‘Shogun’ Remake: This Time, the White Man Is Only One of the Stars

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      A 1980 adaptation of the best-selling novel cast it as the tale of a white hero in an exotic Japan. A new version tells a more kaleidoscopic story.Gina Balian, a television executive who had worked on the hit series “Game of Thrones” for HBO, had just left to help FX start a new limited series division when an agent sent her a nearly 1,200-page novel.It was “Shogun,” James Clavell’s 1975 best-selling chronicle of a hardened English sailor who lands in Japan at the dawn of the 17th century looking for riches and ends up adopting the ways of the samurai. Balian’s first reaction was that she had already seen this book on television — back in 1980, when NBC had turned the novel into a mini-series that earned the network its highest Nielsen ratings to date.Most of what she remembered about the first adaptation was Richard Chamberlain — its white, male star. But as she started reading, she discovered the novel had a much more kaleidoscopic point of view, devoting considerable pages to getting inside the heads of the Japanese characters.“I thought that there was a story to be told that was much wider and deeper,” said Balian, who is co-president of FX Entertainment. It didn’t hurt that something about it also reminded her of “Game of Thrones,” in terms of the “richness of so many characters’ lives.”It took 11 years, two different teams of showrunners and a major relocation to bring “Shogun” back to the screen. The 10-part series debuts on Hulu on Feb. 27 with the first two episodes, followed by new ones weekly, and will premiere on Disney+ outside of the United States and Latin America.Both Hollywood and Western audiences largely have moved beyond viewing the world as a playground where (mostly) white protagonists prove their mettle in exotic lands. Shows and films like “Squid Game” and “Parasite” have shown that audiences can handle Asian characters speaking their own languages.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      in Theater

      Amy Herzog on Adapting Ibsen’s ‘An Enemy of the People’ for Broadway

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      At a rehearsal for “An Enemy of the People,” a Broadway revival of the 1882 play, the actor Jeremy Strong paced around an auditorium, wearing pants that were damp from kneeling in ice.As Thomas Stockmann, a doctor who tries in vain to warn his Norwegian coastal community about contamination in the town’s springs, Strong looked shaken, but hopeful. “We just have to imagine that the water will be clean and safe and the truth will be valued,” said Strong, known for playing the fragile yet ruthless media executive Kendall Roy on four seasons of “Succession.” “We just have to imagine.”To anyone intimately familiar with “An Enemy of the People,” written by Henrik Ibsen, those lines might sound slightly off key. Ibsen ended the play on a more defiant note, with the doctor boasting that he is the strongest man in the world, because the strongest are those who stand alone.“That didn’t resonate with me at all,” said Amy Herzog, who wrote the new adaptation, which is scheduled to begin performances on Tuesday.Herzog watches a rehearsal of “An Enemy of the People,” which stars Jeremy Strong, right, opposite Michael Imperioli, left.Caroline Tompkins for The New York TimesInstead of ending with Ibsen’s image of a lonely, heroic truth-teller, she changed it. And it isn’t the first time she’s boldly revamped his work.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More