February 9, 2012

Activism and Terrorism Collide in If a Tree Falls

by Rebecca Pahle | Published Feb. 9, 2012

With the Oscar-nominated documentary If a Tree Falls: A Story of the Earth Liberation Front, co-directors Marshall Curry and Sam Cullman turned their camera on an issue that is at once historical and current: The Earth Liberation Front (ELF), a '90s environmental activist group made up of once-peaceful protestors who took to committing acts of arson after the non-violent demonstrations they had been participating in were ignored by the government and often met with brutality by pepper spray-wielding police. Sound familiar? (No comments yet)

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Bringing Together Comedy, Politics and Economic Meltdown in Gnarr

by Rebecca Pahle
In case you haven't heard, the economy hasn't been doing that well for the past few years. No country has felt the economic crisis so keenly as Iceland, where the collapse of a once-soaring economy left citizens feeling betrayed by their politicians. Against this backdrop rose an unlikely political hero: Jón Gnarr, the comedian who ran for mayor of Reykjavík as a joke… and won. His campaign—in which he promised to build a Disneyland in the city and refused to talk to his opponents if they hadn't watched "The Wire"—was filmed, from start to finish, by Gaukur Úlfarsson for his feature documentary Gnarr. (No comments yet)

Into the Sunset: Cinema’s Greatest Swan Songs

by Laurel Dammann
There’s a circular pattern to the careers of many directors: Their early films tend toward rough experiments. Then they mature and develop their own distinct artistic voice. Finally, secure in their success, they drive off into the sunset of their career, all too often trading in the fame they had at their peak for something more like the obscurity they started with. The decline of a director’s work at the end of their career is an all-too-common trend, but it's one that Hungarian director Bèla Tarr, with his final film The Turin Horse, has managed to avoid. With The Turin Horse coming out on Friday, we're taking a look at three other directors who refused to leave their legacy poorly wrapped. (No comments yet)

Don’t Go in There! Cinema’s Scariest Haunted House Movies

by Kyle Rupprecht
Creaky floorboards. Rattling window shutters. Creepy noises in the attic. What could be scarier than a lonely old house on a dark and stormy night? The haunted house subgenre has been around for a long time and has proven to be endlessly fascinating to moviemakers and audiences alike. With the two newest entries in this enduring subgenre—The Woman in Black and The Innkeepers—hitting theaters today, MM is taking a look back at some of the scariest haunted house movies of all time. (No comments yet)

The Challenges (and Rewards) of Big Miracle

by Rebecca Pahle
Let's not beat around the bush: Directing a movie with ten major characters sounds pretty tough. Directing a movie with ten major characters, a bunch of non-professional actors and three massive animatronic whales that can only be reached for repairs by diving into some pretty chilly water? Even tougher. Shooting in Alaska, where one of the only weather conditions that stays consistent from day to day is the freezing cold? Was Big Miracle director Ken Kwapis nuts?! (No comments yet)

Haskell Wexler: The Last Indie Rebel

by Timothy Rhys
Haskell Wexler is simply one of our greatest living cinematographers. He’s in a class by himself as much for his fearless sense of justice as for his groundbreaking technical innovations, but it’s his lifelong commitment to putting his lens where his mouth is—as with his second film as a writer-director, 1985's stunning Latino—that makes Wexler such a unique source of inspiration to so many moviemakers.
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