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GOING THE DISTANCE Q&A with Director Nanette Burstein
Personally, I’ve never been in a truly long distance relationship, but I once dated a guy that lived in DE (less than 2hrs away) and he broke up with me citing – logistics. Dated another guy in Allentown, (again, less than 2 hrs away in the other direction) sent him a text once with a very steamy promise if he agreed to drive to me after work. His reply, “Not during the week, cause I’d have to leave your place super early in the morning to get to work on time”. .. So this rom/com starring Drew Barrymore and real life love interest Justin Long is very relate-able. The movie…
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Jennifer Lawrence in WINTER’S BONE / Q&A with dir Debra Granik
How long was the pre-production period? The actors, Jen and John Hawkes (who played Teardrop) came down a week ahead of time. Jen had to do a lot of work learning how to use the farm machinery and the squirrel skinning. John visited some bars and got recordings of people's voices in the community to learn accents. "This was a crucial part of the production, to have time before rolling to get acclimated and steeped and immersed in the groove."
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Jeff Bridges in CRAZY HEART
By Le Anne Lindsay, Editor I have a friend who’s an aspiring music journalist, similar to Maggie Gylenhaal’s character in Crazy Heart. She likes to review lesser known musicians who come into town and play Philly’s smaller venues. That honky tonk sound with a rootsy rock influence, by musicians with snow on the roof, but plenty of sexy fire still in the belly — John Doe, to name one, is really her thing. So it was great to watch the movie with her and see it through her eyes and better yet, she treated! It would seem the Producers of Crazy Heart banked on the success of last year’s has…
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Commentary – The Road
Just how near is the apocalypse? My screenings last week consisted of 2012, a CGI version of the next Noah’s Art event. And Philadelphia Film’s Society’s filmadelphiaIndependent presentation of The Road, a bleak, cold look at the future after an unnamed cataclysmic occurrence on the earth. Then to top it off or seal the doom, my Bible study class focused on Matthew 24:4-28, where Jesus tells his disciples of all the end time miseries and destruction to come, “But all these things are merely the beginning of birth pangs”. One things for sure, if life continues after these “birth pangs” and its anything like The Road, then truly woe unto…
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Commentary – Eden is West
I knew from the film synopsis that Eden is West was to have some comic overtones, but I still didn’t expect to enjoy it, I figured with all that talk of critically-acclaimed director, the film would be so full of deep meaning and subtext that I’d be itching for it to be over. Not so, actually it’s completely engaging, maybe not from the first scene, but as soon as Elias (Riccardo Scamarcio) washes up on the shores of a nudist resort, the film stays on a lively pace. Elias is an immigrant who along with many other of his countrymen is trying to illegally come into a new country in…
