Film


January 5, 2009

Jack White, Edge & Jimmy Page star in doc, "It Might Get Loud"

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Davis Guggenheim, who won an Oscar for directing Al Gore's An Inconvenient Truth, has shot a documentary starring U2's The Edge, Led Zeppelin's Jimmy Page and The White Stripes' Jack White. Similiar to Guggenheim's previous doc, this one also is very dialogue heavy with its stars in one room.

Who hasn't wanted to be a rock star, join a band or play electric guitar? Music resonates, moves and inspires us. Strummed through the fingers of The Edge, Jimmy Page and Jack White, somehow it does more. Such is the premise of IT MIGHT GET LOUD, a new documentary conceived by producer Thomas Tull.

IT MIGHT GET LOUD isn't like any other rock'n roll documentary. Filmed through the eyes of three virtuosos from three different generations, audiences get up close and personal, discovering how a furniture upholsterer from Detroit, a studio musician and painter from London and a seventeen-year-old Dublin schoolboy, each used the electric guitar to develop their unique sound and rise to the pantheon of superstar. Rare discussions are provoked as we travel with Jimmy Page, The Edge and Jack White to influential locations of their pasts. Born from the experience is intimate access to the creative genesis of each legend, such as Link Wray's "Rumble's" searing impression upon Jimmy Page, who surprises audiences with an impromptu air guitar performance. But that's only the beginning.

While each guitarist describes his own musical rebellion, a rock'n roll summit is being arranged. Set on an empty soundstage, the musicians come together, crank up the amps and play. They also share their influences, swap stories, and teach each other songs. During the summit Page's double-neck guitar, The Edge's array of effects pedals and White's new mic, custom built into his guitar, go live. The musical journey is joined by visual grandeur too. We see the stone halls of Headley Grange where "Stairway to Heaven" was composed, visit a haunting Tennessee farmhouse where Jack White writes a song on-camera, and eavesdrop inside the dimly lit Dublin studio where The Edge lays down initial guitar tracks for U2's forthcoming single. The images, like the stories, will linger in the mind long after the reverb fades.

IT MIGHT GET LOUD might not affect how you play guitar, but it will change how you listen. The film is directed by An Inconvenient Truth's Davis Guggenheim, and produced by Thomas Tull, Lesley Chilcott and Peter Afterman.

The film is slated to be released sometime in 2009, but no real details have emerged about exactly when that will happen. It will have it's U.S. premiere at the Sundance film festival later this month.

Video of the three stars answering questions at the film's premiere at the Toronto Film Festival after the jump........

Continue reading "Jack White, Edge & Jimmy Page star in doc, "It Might Get Loud"" »

February 3, 2009

"The Trials of Ted Haggard" - A sympathetic and sad doc on the fallen preacher by Alexandra Pelosi


I finally got a chance to see Alexandra Pelosi's very sympathetic documentary of disgraced evangalist Ted Haggard, which is now playing on HBO. While I still find Haggard to be a hypocrite and homophobic individual, Pelosi's documentary goes a long way to humanizing the former preacher and shows just how sad his life has become.

In the end of the all too short documentary (it's only 45 minutes), you are left feeling bad for the preacher. While I am glad to see that the one-time powerful evangalist preacher, who made very public comments against homosexuality and abortion and was a supporter of the far right-wing agenda and political candidates, it's disgraceful to see how he is exiled from numerous churchs, who are so hypocritical in their teachings.

Anyway, it's definitely worth checking out "The Trails of Ted Haggard"

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As president of the National Association of Evangelicals, he had millions of followers.

But in 2006, his career as a spiritual leader ended abruptly when it was revealed that he'd had a sexual relationship with a male prostitute.

Haggard seemed to be a devoted husband. He was married with five children and pastor of Colorado's New Life Church. But he was living a double life.

When Mike Jones, a self-confessed male prostitute, went public with claims that Haggard had paid for (gay) sex and drugs, Haggard initially denied it, saying he didn't know Jones.

But Haggard eventually admitted that some of the claims made by Jones were true, and he was banished from his church.

In a goodbye letter, read by another pastor, haggard made this confession: "I am guilty of sexual immorality. There is a part of my life that is so repulsive and dark that I've been warring against it all my adult life."

A new HBO documentary titled "The Trials of Ted Haggard," chronicles the former pastor's struggles after his fall from grace.

For the record, Alexandra Pelosi is the daughter of Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi and former writer for Newsweek. This is her third documentary. Her first was "Journeys with George," which she filmed while following then Governor Bush as he ran for President in 2000 and went a long way to making him look like a good guy. Her second doc was "Friends of God," which was a smarter and balanced version of the awful "Religulous."

February 12, 2009

"Inglourious Basterds" Preview Now Online

After years of being in pre-production, Quentin Tarantino's Inglourious Basterds is finally being released this summer. The trailer, which was just released, looks awful. Really awful and boring and something I wouldn't pay to see in a theatre.

June 16, 2009

Michael Moore's "Save Our CEOs" coming Oct 2nd


Michael Moore, who really is just a left-wing version of Bill O'Reilly, has a new film coming out on October 2nd called Save Our CEOs. The film is supposedly about how Citibank, Bank of America, AIG, Goldman Sachs, JP Morgan and other banks have caused the economic collapse and are now profiting from it. I'm sure the movie will do everything it can to make the greedy vultures who knowingly caused this current economic crisis look even worse than they already do.

In Moore's last film, Sicko, he went after the U.S. healthcare industry. Unfortunately, his film was so ridiculously slanted and filled with so much misinformation that it did absolutely nothing to help the push for much needed healthcare reform.

I'm curious to see if Save Our CEOs will be critical of President Obama's policies. Recently, Moore has been very outspoken about his disappointment with Obama and has publicly attacked his bailouts of the auto-industry, amongst others.

December 18, 2009

"The Runaways" film trailer

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