It seems like every 2-3 months is bringing stronger reasons to believe that Bollywood and Hollywood want to have a working relationship!
The first time I posted about this was in February and then again in May.
Well, now it's August and there's loads more to report :)
Hollywood is starting to take the Indian market very seriously. In other words they've realized that there's a billion people in India, that the country's economy is developing very fast, the people of India are veeeery interested in cinema and Hollywood only has about 8% of the market... oooops...
The problem is that the way they've dominated Western markets just isn't going to work in India. In the words of Gareth Wigan, vice chairman of Columbia TriStar - "The importing of American films into India is not filling a gap (...) You're not bringing a dish to a bare table. You're bringing a dish to a table where you have to move a lot of other dishes to fit in, and that's not true in a lot of other countries."
Disney, Warner Bros and Columbia/Sony in particular seem to be seeing this 8% market problem and there's no longer any doubt - they're looking for opportunities!
So a number of things have been happening...
Disney have made a deal with Yash Raj films (which is one of the biggest production companies in Bollywood) to make animated films for Indian audiences.
They've also apparently been in touch with Shahrukh Khan, hoping to invest in his production company - Red Chillies Entertainment. And they're not the only ones either, apparently Sony and Fox are considering the same move!
There's also a number of projects which are essentially Bollywood films, but with some of the money coming from Hollywood.
The first of these to come out is Saawariya, with Columbia/Sony Entertainment behind it. It will be released this November. It's directed by Sanjay Leela Bhansali (the director who also did Devdas) and will star Rani Mukherji and Salman Khan. The first teaser trailer is looking absolutely stunning. See it here.
Warner Bros is venturing out into Bollywood with "Made in China", which will be directed by Nikhil Advani (the director of Kal Ho Naa Ho) and will star Akshay Kumar.
Perhaps most excitingly, both of these films will have mainstream American distributors which makes their chances in the international box office much better! :)
But also Bollywood stars are being offered Hollywood movies!
Shilpa Shetty is rumoured to be in talks for the next James Bond movie, as well as possibly starring in a movie with Keanu Reeves. But there have been a number of other Bollywood stars approached for various projects, this article lists most of them.
Less dynamically, but Hollywood producers also seem to be thinking about Bollywood directors for their Hollywood projects. Santosh Sivan (the director of Asoka) has been approached with a script set in a colonial background.
Finally, perhaps less energetically, but Bollywood is making its own attempts at venturing into Hollywood and making use of their talents.
They have roped in a leading Hollywood VFX man into Pixion - a post-production studio in India. David Crawford is behind films like "Titanic", "Spiderman" and "Mission Impossible II"!
UTV is trying to make a big World War II movie with Vishal Bharadwaj (Omkara) as the director, hopefully bringing together Uma Thurman and Hrithik Roshan, but at the moment the project will remain in pre-production for a while yet.
UTV has also ventured into co-production with Fox on a Hollywood film - it will be Shyamalan's next film.
Not bad, huh? :-D
P.S. Not strictly related to the Hollywood-Bollywood issue, but I'll put it in anyway ;-P Danny Boyle's next film is set in India and he's supposed to have met Shahrukh Khan about it.
Wednesday, August 29, 2007
Tuesday, August 28, 2007
The Wroclaw Film Festival (19-29 July)
I've been horribly neglecting my blog this past month :-/
There's lot of things to write about, but I'm going to start with my impressions from the Wroclaw film festival cause otherwise I'll totally forget them (that was at the end of last month!).
It was the 7th time this festival took place (the 2nd time that it took place in Wrocław - it's been moving to bigger cities as it's been growing). I've been attending this festival ever since the very first edition when it took place on just 4 screens in Sanok (now it's 14 screens!) and I guess one of the strongest impressions I got this time round is how important this festival has become. It's by far the biggest festival in Poland now (probably the biggest in this part of Europe actually). This year they showed 460 films of which 231 were full length feature films. I don't think there are any audience numbers available but it was definitely well over 100 thousand people.
When 4 months, 3 weeks and 2 days opened the festival (it's the Romanian film that won the Cannes film festival this year), it struck me how respectfully the makers of the film were treating this festival and how interested they were in our response to the film. It's very much an international scale festival now!
But lets get to the films... I saw a lot of them obviously ;-P So I'll just cover the ones that got the strongest reactions from me (in no particular order - or rather in more or less the order I watched them).
The story of 4 months, 3 weeks and 2 days is a girl in communist Romania trying to get an abortion. But it's actually not about abortion or communism at all. The real topic of the film is women and how little emotional support they have from men. I don't think it paints a saintly picture of women or anything like that. For most of the film they don't tell their men anything of what's bothering them and then when finally the men pressurize them to find out what's wrong it comes out in a way that if I were a man I wouldn't understand either ;-P And I think that's quite a fair portrayal of women (I think many of us are like that). But on the other hand you understand exactly why the women are so guarded. The atmosphere that men create just doesn't allow for that kind of openness and I think the film is an amazing portrayal of male chauvinism and it's awsome that a film like this was directed by a man :)
As my criteria for writing about a film is strong feelings, here's a film I had strong negative feelings about ;-P As the Shadow is an Italian film about an Italian woman (Claudia) who is learning Russian. She develops a crush on her teacher, Borys (a Ukrainian). They sort of end up together (although it's hard to say really) and then he asks a favour of her. His cousin (Olga) from the Ukraine is coming to Italy and as he's going to be out of town for a while, he wants Olga to stay at Claudia's house. Claudia finally agrees reluctantly and then finds that actually Olga is quite a nice guest. One day Olga goes out for the night and doesn't come back.
The director of the film was at the screening and I knew I wouldn't like the film the moment she started talking. She came out and said that she's glad that so many people came to the screening (in the standards of the festival it was actually rather empty) and then started saying that this film has traveled to many important festivals and won many awards (I checked - imdb lists just one festival and award and it's a very obscure one!). The whole way she approached us was with this air of superiority, which particularly struck me because just the day before Cristian Mungiu had been so modest and genuinely interested in how the Polish audience would react (and he was presenting a film that won the Golden Palm!!). I fully expected that the Italian director would approach her topic with the same air as she did her audience and was not disappointed.
I rolled my eyes when during a conversation about alcohol between Claudia and Olga, Olga says that in the Ukraine they drink because they're unhappy or because it's cold. Not to mention the names of the Ukrainian characters - Borys and Olga? er... great... (and guess which part of the Ukraine they were from - yes, you guessed right, Kiev) And that's not the worse part... The film has lots of Russian in it, but the director didn't even bother to make it sound right. Her Borys was an Italian and spoke with such a strong accent that even I heard it (and honestly, my Russian is almost non-existant!). Her Olga was a part Polish, part Italian actress who spoke with a slightly smaller accent, but still one I thought I could hear.
The catalogue description suggested that the point of the film was to de-stereotype Eastern Europeans, but instead the director didn't do even some basic homework on the Ukraine!
I also got to see two of Guy Maddin's films :D I developped an interest in him at previous editions of the festival. He's a Canadian director who is strongly influenced by German expressionist films from the silent era and has such bizzarre storylines that I feel unable to explain or repeat them ;-P They showed Brand Upon the Brain which is one of Maddin's more recent films. I don't feel able to convey to you what the film is like in any other way but by linking to the trailer:
The other Maddin film they showed was a 1992 one called Careful which was just as enjoyable and crazy :)
A hilarious and warm film that I saw was Irina Palm. It's a big European co-production about a middle aged lady who desperately needs money because her grandson is ill and so she starts earning money in the Soho area by wanking men off...
One of the biggest discoveries of the festival for many people was Hal Hartley (there was a full retrospective of his films). He was also present for the entire festival (and apparently doing lots of film watching as well :) ).
They actually had to move his films to a bigger screening room because all the people that were interested weren't managing to get in.
I didn't have particularly strong feelings about him myself, but he's definitely an American (independent) director worth discovering. His films have great dialogues and are very amusing portrayals of American society.
They had a small section of "cinema of dance" at the festival this year. While most of what I sat through was boring enough for me not to continue with that section, the first screening made a huge impression me. It was a a few films by the DV8 Physical Theatre - they're a British dance group and the way they approach both dance and film was fascinating for me.
As this is also something that has to be seen to be explained, here's the trailer for The Cost of Living:
And here's a scene from the film:
Disappointingly, there was only one Bollywood film this year and I'd already seen it on DVD, but it was still awsome to see it on the big screen. Omkara is an adaptation of Shakespeare's "Othello". It's a film where a lot of stars are acting against their image - especially Saif Ali Khan who is the ugly villain with yellow teeth (Saif usually plays cute romantic heroes :D ). Here's the trailer:
Another fun film was I'm a Cyborg, but that's Ok (Park Chan-Wook's latest film). It's a Korean film about a girl who thinks she's a cyborg.
Probably the most political film I watched at the festival was AFR. It's a Danish film made to test freedom of speech (or so the director told us :) ). When the Muslim cartoon issue came about in Denmark, the Danish (right wing) prime minister defended the right of Danish papers to publish such things. So the director of this film decided to test freedom of speech in Denmark and using all sorts of clips from TV, doing his own interviews with politicians (though not being entirely truthful with them about how the material would be used) and using actors to conduct other interviews, he created a film in which the Danish prime minister had been assassinated by his gay lover. He also made the film version of the prime minister an alter-globalist fighting for the rights of Third World countries (which is of course totally against what the right wing Rasmussen believes in). The director of the film was not punished in any way, so in his opinion Denmark passed the test ;)
A really nice Australian film that I saw was Japanese Story which is a sort of romance between an Australian girl and a Japanese businessman.
Something I really recommend people see once it releases is Persepolis. It's an animated film about a girl growing up in Iran and then emigrating to Europe. There's a lot of humour in it, but it's also packed full of Iranian history and culture. Here's a teaser trailer:
There's lot of things to write about, but I'm going to start with my impressions from the Wroclaw film festival cause otherwise I'll totally forget them (that was at the end of last month!).
It was the 7th time this festival took place (the 2nd time that it took place in Wrocław - it's been moving to bigger cities as it's been growing). I've been attending this festival ever since the very first edition when it took place on just 4 screens in Sanok (now it's 14 screens!) and I guess one of the strongest impressions I got this time round is how important this festival has become. It's by far the biggest festival in Poland now (probably the biggest in this part of Europe actually). This year they showed 460 films of which 231 were full length feature films. I don't think there are any audience numbers available but it was definitely well over 100 thousand people.
When 4 months, 3 weeks and 2 days opened the festival (it's the Romanian film that won the Cannes film festival this year), it struck me how respectfully the makers of the film were treating this festival and how interested they were in our response to the film. It's very much an international scale festival now!
But lets get to the films... I saw a lot of them obviously ;-P So I'll just cover the ones that got the strongest reactions from me (in no particular order - or rather in more or less the order I watched them).
The story of 4 months, 3 weeks and 2 days is a girl in communist Romania trying to get an abortion. But it's actually not about abortion or communism at all. The real topic of the film is women and how little emotional support they have from men. I don't think it paints a saintly picture of women or anything like that. For most of the film they don't tell their men anything of what's bothering them and then when finally the men pressurize them to find out what's wrong it comes out in a way that if I were a man I wouldn't understand either ;-P And I think that's quite a fair portrayal of women (I think many of us are like that). But on the other hand you understand exactly why the women are so guarded. The atmosphere that men create just doesn't allow for that kind of openness and I think the film is an amazing portrayal of male chauvinism and it's awsome that a film like this was directed by a man :)
As my criteria for writing about a film is strong feelings, here's a film I had strong negative feelings about ;-P As the Shadow is an Italian film about an Italian woman (Claudia) who is learning Russian. She develops a crush on her teacher, Borys (a Ukrainian). They sort of end up together (although it's hard to say really) and then he asks a favour of her. His cousin (Olga) from the Ukraine is coming to Italy and as he's going to be out of town for a while, he wants Olga to stay at Claudia's house. Claudia finally agrees reluctantly and then finds that actually Olga is quite a nice guest. One day Olga goes out for the night and doesn't come back.
The director of the film was at the screening and I knew I wouldn't like the film the moment she started talking. She came out and said that she's glad that so many people came to the screening (in the standards of the festival it was actually rather empty) and then started saying that this film has traveled to many important festivals and won many awards (I checked - imdb lists just one festival and award and it's a very obscure one!). The whole way she approached us was with this air of superiority, which particularly struck me because just the day before Cristian Mungiu had been so modest and genuinely interested in how the Polish audience would react (and he was presenting a film that won the Golden Palm!!). I fully expected that the Italian director would approach her topic with the same air as she did her audience and was not disappointed.
I rolled my eyes when during a conversation about alcohol between Claudia and Olga, Olga says that in the Ukraine they drink because they're unhappy or because it's cold. Not to mention the names of the Ukrainian characters - Borys and Olga? er... great... (and guess which part of the Ukraine they were from - yes, you guessed right, Kiev) And that's not the worse part... The film has lots of Russian in it, but the director didn't even bother to make it sound right. Her Borys was an Italian and spoke with such a strong accent that even I heard it (and honestly, my Russian is almost non-existant!). Her Olga was a part Polish, part Italian actress who spoke with a slightly smaller accent, but still one I thought I could hear.
The catalogue description suggested that the point of the film was to de-stereotype Eastern Europeans, but instead the director didn't do even some basic homework on the Ukraine!
I also got to see two of Guy Maddin's films :D I developped an interest in him at previous editions of the festival. He's a Canadian director who is strongly influenced by German expressionist films from the silent era and has such bizzarre storylines that I feel unable to explain or repeat them ;-P They showed Brand Upon the Brain which is one of Maddin's more recent films. I don't feel able to convey to you what the film is like in any other way but by linking to the trailer:
The other Maddin film they showed was a 1992 one called Careful which was just as enjoyable and crazy :)
A hilarious and warm film that I saw was Irina Palm. It's a big European co-production about a middle aged lady who desperately needs money because her grandson is ill and so she starts earning money in the Soho area by wanking men off...
One of the biggest discoveries of the festival for many people was Hal Hartley (there was a full retrospective of his films). He was also present for the entire festival (and apparently doing lots of film watching as well :) ).
They actually had to move his films to a bigger screening room because all the people that were interested weren't managing to get in.
I didn't have particularly strong feelings about him myself, but he's definitely an American (independent) director worth discovering. His films have great dialogues and are very amusing portrayals of American society.
They had a small section of "cinema of dance" at the festival this year. While most of what I sat through was boring enough for me not to continue with that section, the first screening made a huge impression me. It was a a few films by the DV8 Physical Theatre - they're a British dance group and the way they approach both dance and film was fascinating for me.
As this is also something that has to be seen to be explained, here's the trailer for The Cost of Living:
And here's a scene from the film:
Disappointingly, there was only one Bollywood film this year and I'd already seen it on DVD, but it was still awsome to see it on the big screen. Omkara is an adaptation of Shakespeare's "Othello". It's a film where a lot of stars are acting against their image - especially Saif Ali Khan who is the ugly villain with yellow teeth (Saif usually plays cute romantic heroes :D ). Here's the trailer:
Another fun film was I'm a Cyborg, but that's Ok (Park Chan-Wook's latest film). It's a Korean film about a girl who thinks she's a cyborg.
Probably the most political film I watched at the festival was AFR. It's a Danish film made to test freedom of speech (or so the director told us :) ). When the Muslim cartoon issue came about in Denmark, the Danish (right wing) prime minister defended the right of Danish papers to publish such things. So the director of this film decided to test freedom of speech in Denmark and using all sorts of clips from TV, doing his own interviews with politicians (though not being entirely truthful with them about how the material would be used) and using actors to conduct other interviews, he created a film in which the Danish prime minister had been assassinated by his gay lover. He also made the film version of the prime minister an alter-globalist fighting for the rights of Third World countries (which is of course totally against what the right wing Rasmussen believes in). The director of the film was not punished in any way, so in his opinion Denmark passed the test ;)
A really nice Australian film that I saw was Japanese Story which is a sort of romance between an Australian girl and a Japanese businessman.
Something I really recommend people see once it releases is Persepolis. It's an animated film about a girl growing up in Iran and then emigrating to Europe. There's a lot of humour in it, but it's also packed full of Iranian history and culture. Here's a teaser trailer:
Saturday, July 14, 2007
Order of the Phoenix publicity in full throb
The new Harry Potter film has now released and the publicity for it is going on in full throb, which means there's loads of great interviews with the Trio (and Daniel Radcliffe in particular) floating around.
Here's a long interview with Daniel Radcliffe from Entertainment Weekly. He talks a lot about Equus in it. My favourite bit from it is:
The publicity photos for the play were extremely provocative, and spread all over the Internet as soon as they were released. What was it like shooting them?
I remember being a little bit hyper that day. At that point, we'd just done the nude scene in rehearsals [for the first time]. And I was basically wanting to get my kit off as much as I possibly could, to try and get used to the idea, and in front of as many strangers as I could. I'd be like, ''Ready now? Is this where I take them off?'' And they'd be like, ''Dan! Hold back! Wait! Just give us 10 minutes, please!''
Daniel Radcliffe on Regis and Kelly:
Daniel Radcliffe on the Tonight Show with Jay Leno:
Daniel Radcliffe on the Late Night with Conan O'Brien (part one):
And here's part two:
Here's the whole Trio on Unscripted. It's a little stiff at the beginning, but gets hilarious by the end :D
And this is a bit of Emma Watson doing publicity on Extra:
And here's a longer interview on the David Letterman show. I was actually shocked at how patronizing Letterman was at the beginning especially. But maybe I'm oversensitive or something. She handled it well at any rate :)
And finally, this is Rupert Grint on the Craig Ferguson show:
Post edited to add another article from Entertainment Weekly. It talks a bit about some on set stuff, for example:
A few hours later, Oldman has nailed his scene, decompressed, and begun bantering naughtily with his castmates. ''Have you noticed,'' he asks Isaacs, ''how long my wand is?'' ''Yes,'' Isaacs volleys back, ''it expands in the warm, doesn't it?'' Radcliffe listens and grins broadly. He asks Oldman for advice on a tough role he's signed on for in Equus, a London revival of Peter Shaffer's 1973 play about a troubled stable boy, for which Radcliffe will appear naked eight times a week. ''You'll have to shave,'' Oldman tells him. Radcliffe's wide eyes open even wider: ''What — down there?'' Oldman nods, eyes closing. ''Especially down there.''
Here's a long interview with Daniel Radcliffe from Entertainment Weekly. He talks a lot about Equus in it. My favourite bit from it is:
The publicity photos for the play were extremely provocative, and spread all over the Internet as soon as they were released. What was it like shooting them?
I remember being a little bit hyper that day. At that point, we'd just done the nude scene in rehearsals [for the first time]. And I was basically wanting to get my kit off as much as I possibly could, to try and get used to the idea, and in front of as many strangers as I could. I'd be like, ''Ready now? Is this where I take them off?'' And they'd be like, ''Dan! Hold back! Wait! Just give us 10 minutes, please!''
Daniel Radcliffe on Regis and Kelly:
Daniel Radcliffe on the Tonight Show with Jay Leno:
Daniel Radcliffe on the Late Night with Conan O'Brien (part one):
And here's part two:
Here's the whole Trio on Unscripted. It's a little stiff at the beginning, but gets hilarious by the end :D
And this is a bit of Emma Watson doing publicity on Extra:
And here's a longer interview on the David Letterman show. I was actually shocked at how patronizing Letterman was at the beginning especially. But maybe I'm oversensitive or something. She handled it well at any rate :)
And finally, this is Rupert Grint on the Craig Ferguson show:
Post edited to add another article from Entertainment Weekly. It talks a bit about some on set stuff, for example:
A few hours later, Oldman has nailed his scene, decompressed, and begun bantering naughtily with his castmates. ''Have you noticed,'' he asks Isaacs, ''how long my wand is?'' ''Yes,'' Isaacs volleys back, ''it expands in the warm, doesn't it?'' Radcliffe listens and grins broadly. He asks Oldman for advice on a tough role he's signed on for in Equus, a London revival of Peter Shaffer's 1973 play about a troubled stable boy, for which Radcliffe will appear naked eight times a week. ''You'll have to shave,'' Oldman tells him. Radcliffe's wide eyes open even wider: ''What — down there?'' Oldman nods, eyes closing. ''Especially down there.''
Macaulay Culkin in "Party Monster"
I always love it when someone does something drastically against their image and while I'm not a particular fan of Macaulay Culkin, I'm amazed that he did a film like Party Monster. How much further from his Home Alone image can you go? lol No idea about the quality of the film as a whole, but seeing the clips of him in it is hilarious - check them out, they're below.
Saturday, July 07, 2007
Friday, July 06, 2007
Why Polish figure skating is fun ;)
Here's a clip from I think an old exhibition in Oświęcim. There's Mariusz Siudek (European and World Championship medalist) skating with Bartosz Domański (or at least I think that's him in the dress ;-P, he was Polish National Champion twice) and eventually a third guy takes the ice, but I don't know much about him.
At any rate - it's fun ;-P
At any rate - it's fun ;-P
Wednesday, July 04, 2007
The EU in youtube sex controversy
My ponderings about whether it's possible to put down clear guidelines as to what is obscene seem to be relevant yet again...
Here's the article. The EU put together a short clip of sex scenes from famous European films that were funded by them and it has received a surprising amount of attention with many people terming it "soft porn".
Polish politics make an appearance in the story as well of course *rolls eyes*
A Polish MEP from the conservative League of Polish Families has accused the commission of using "immoral methods" to promote itself.
European Commission spokesman Martin Selmayr said there had been a flood of complaints from Poland about an intimate scene between two men - but refused to accept there was anything controversial about the film.
If you want to make your own mind up about it then see below:
For the other EU European cinema clips see here.
Here's the article. The EU put together a short clip of sex scenes from famous European films that were funded by them and it has received a surprising amount of attention with many people terming it "soft porn".
Polish politics make an appearance in the story as well of course *rolls eyes*
A Polish MEP from the conservative League of Polish Families has accused the commission of using "immoral methods" to promote itself.
European Commission spokesman Martin Selmayr said there had been a flood of complaints from Poland about an intimate scene between two men - but refused to accept there was anything controversial about the film.
If you want to make your own mind up about it then see below:
For the other EU European cinema clips see here.
Tuesday, July 03, 2007
The protests start - more on "Gandhi, My Father"
I'm following up one of my previous posts. While Gandhi, My Father will be out in about a month, we've already got the first attempt to stop its release.
The more I find out about Harilal, Gandhi's oldest son, the more I understand how heavy the material can potentially be. Check out this article and also the short wikipedia article about Harilal.
The more I find out about Harilal, Gandhi's oldest son, the more I understand how heavy the material can potentially be. Check out this article and also the short wikipedia article about Harilal.
Saturday, June 30, 2007
More Order of the Phoenix promotion
I'm putting it up because whenever Daniel Radcliffe talks about nudity or kissing I giggle (sad, I know).
Here's a news clip from the first press junket which I think was in the UK:
And here's the Japanese press conference (the world premiere was in Japan this year):
Here's a news clip from the first press junket which I think was in the UK:
And here's the Japanese press conference (the world premiere was in Japan this year):
Thursday, June 28, 2007
Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix clips
11 scenes from the new Harry Potter film as well as some cast interviews and backstage clips have been released here.
Some of the best in my opinion are:
P.S. (edited June 30th) You can also access those clips here
Some of the best in my opinion are:
- "I see them too"
It's the first proper glimpse we've had of Luna. It's just 2-3 lines, but she's perfect! (and very funny ;) ) - "How long have you worked here?"
Umbridge is probably also going to be a lot of fun ;) I so love that Snape is like twice taller than her on that clip ;) - "I will attempt to penetrate your mind"
Occlumency lessons were something I've been really looking forward to seeing and while I'm not sure I entirely like it (and am fully anticipating to hate the worst memory scene), at least the intensity of the scene hasn't fallen below my expectations. - "Hand me the prophecy"
Now this is something for which my expectations were rather low (probably because I'm not a big fan of the climax of book 5), so I'm positively surprised!
P.S. (edited June 30th) You can also access those clips here
Wednesday, June 27, 2007
Indian film releases I'm excited about...
So there's Chak de India, the new Shahrukh release in August, which I'm anticipating to be rather awful judging by the trailer (though of course because it's a Shahrukh release I'm still a little excited ;)). The premise of the film is Shahrukh's character coaching a women's field hockey team. The first teaser is below:
But I also think it's high time to introduce the topic of Akshaye Khanna onto this blog (yes, there are in fact Indian actors other than Shahrukh that I'm a fan of lol). Some of you may have seen Akshaye in Dil Chahta Hai. Otherwise he's not a Bollywood star that has gotten much attention before this year really. But recently his career seems to have taken off. His style of acting is rather rare in mainstream terms (I'd say he's usually a very subtle actor even in Western standards) and I think he's quite into experimenting with different things, so with the recent surge of interest in him, he seems to have had some interesting film offers to choose from. The result is that I'm quite excited about a few films with him him attached that are coming up ;)
So firstly, there's Gandhi, My Father which is probably going to release in August and is getting even some international focus. While Gandhi as a character has featured in a huge amount of films, this film seems to be a very unique (and controversial) take on him. You might like to read up on this film a little here. But if you don't - then well basically it's about Gandhi's family and the conflict he had with his son (Akshaye plays the son). They never got on well and apparently Gandhi forbade him to become a lawyer which is what his son really wanted to do. The film tries to paint both Gandhi and his son in grey colors and tells the story of how Gandhi's sacrifice for the nation was very difficult on his family. Below is one of the first trailers for this film:
On a lighter Akshaye Khanna note, there's Naqaab. I don't know when this is going to be released, but I assume probably soon as the trailers have started coming out. I've no idea what this film is about ;-P But it's probably totally crazy, as the directors of it (Abbas-Mustan) are the ones responsible for films such as Baazigar (1993) and Baadshah (1999). The difference is that now they have the special effects to pull off a silly James Bond type movie with James Bondy type effects if they really wanted to ;) Trailer is below:
Finally, on a rumoured Akshaye Khanna note, he may be part of a much talked about and controversial film (I think it's Western financing), which has been in pre-production for a very long time. Even though When Kiran met Karen seems to be appearing in news articles quite a lot considering how early the stages of its production are (for all we know it might not even get made), there's hardly any info about its plot. What mainly gets repeated is that it's a "lesbian flick".
P.S. This month my blog has been rather neglected, the reason is that June is my busiest school period, but now that's almost finished, there's hope I'll improve ;) (though I'll be off-line for about 2-3 weeks in the second half of July - first bit of August).
But I also think it's high time to introduce the topic of Akshaye Khanna onto this blog (yes, there are in fact Indian actors other than Shahrukh that I'm a fan of lol). Some of you may have seen Akshaye in Dil Chahta Hai. Otherwise he's not a Bollywood star that has gotten much attention before this year really. But recently his career seems to have taken off. His style of acting is rather rare in mainstream terms (I'd say he's usually a very subtle actor even in Western standards) and I think he's quite into experimenting with different things, so with the recent surge of interest in him, he seems to have had some interesting film offers to choose from. The result is that I'm quite excited about a few films with him him attached that are coming up ;)
So firstly, there's Gandhi, My Father which is probably going to release in August and is getting even some international focus. While Gandhi as a character has featured in a huge amount of films, this film seems to be a very unique (and controversial) take on him. You might like to read up on this film a little here. But if you don't - then well basically it's about Gandhi's family and the conflict he had with his son (Akshaye plays the son). They never got on well and apparently Gandhi forbade him to become a lawyer which is what his son really wanted to do. The film tries to paint both Gandhi and his son in grey colors and tells the story of how Gandhi's sacrifice for the nation was very difficult on his family. Below is one of the first trailers for this film:
On a lighter Akshaye Khanna note, there's Naqaab. I don't know when this is going to be released, but I assume probably soon as the trailers have started coming out. I've no idea what this film is about ;-P But it's probably totally crazy, as the directors of it (Abbas-Mustan) are the ones responsible for films such as Baazigar (1993) and Baadshah (1999). The difference is that now they have the special effects to pull off a silly James Bond type movie with James Bondy type effects if they really wanted to ;) Trailer is below:
Finally, on a rumoured Akshaye Khanna note, he may be part of a much talked about and controversial film (I think it's Western financing), which has been in pre-production for a very long time. Even though When Kiran met Karen seems to be appearing in news articles quite a lot considering how early the stages of its production are (for all we know it might not even get made), there's hardly any info about its plot. What mainly gets repeated is that it's a "lesbian flick".
P.S. This month my blog has been rather neglected, the reason is that June is my busiest school period, but now that's almost finished, there's hope I'll improve ;) (though I'll be off-line for about 2-3 weeks in the second half of July - first bit of August).
Saturday, June 23, 2007
Experimental Travel
As the summer holidays are approaching, you might want to find out a bit about experimental travel (see the definition on wikipedia).
There are many very creative ideas to follow, for example what is known as Blind Man's Buff Travel:
Hypothesis
Explore and experience a new place without seeing it.
Apparatus
A friend to guide you and a blindfolding mechanism of some kind.
Method
Spend 24 hours blindfolded in a new location.
You will find many more ideas of how to travel the world in an experimental way here. I also recommend looking at the stories of people who followed some of these ideas, which you will find on the home page of the experimental travel website (the four featured experiments).
There are many very creative ideas to follow, for example what is known as Blind Man's Buff Travel:
Hypothesis
Explore and experience a new place without seeing it.
Apparatus
A friend to guide you and a blindfolding mechanism of some kind.
Method
Spend 24 hours blindfolded in a new location.
You will find many more ideas of how to travel the world in an experimental way here. I also recommend looking at the stories of people who followed some of these ideas, which you will find on the home page of the experimental travel website (the four featured experiments).
Wednesday, June 13, 2007
And I thought Poland had it bad...
This is a short follow-up to my big pornography post. While Polish politicians have been debating about a total ban on pornography, Iran seems to have taken their politic debates muuuuch further. If the proposal passes, anybody involved with the making, distribution (including websites) or production of porn films in Iran could be sentenced to death.
Thursday, May 31, 2007
Order of the Phoenix set report
The Harry Potter Lexicon is one of the most amazing Harry Potter sites on-line. It's a total encyclopedia of everything to do with the world in the books, compiled from a huge range of sources. It is so good that J.K.Rowling admits to using it when she needs to check on some small fact somewhere.
Anyway, they've put up the first part of a report from the set of the new film and since it's in their own detailish style I found it a great read :)
Here's a small, random quote which apart from being amusing also relates to a conversation I once had with one of you about the appropriateness of fan fiction about real people:
interviewing Jason Isaacs wearing leather head to toe (Jason, not me) and discovering that he reads fan fiction about himself and gets a huge kick out of the more far-out stuff
I really hope we're going to get the whole interview once the film is out lol
Anyway, they've put up the first part of a report from the set of the new film and since it's in their own detailish style I found it a great read :)
Here's a small, random quote which apart from being amusing also relates to a conversation I once had with one of you about the appropriateness of fan fiction about real people:
interviewing Jason Isaacs wearing leather head to toe (Jason, not me) and discovering that he reads fan fiction about himself and gets a huge kick out of the more far-out stuff
I really hope we're going to get the whole interview once the film is out lol
Monday, May 28, 2007
Teletubbies and the profound effect they might be having on Polish children
Apparently Polish officials are worried that Teletubbies promote homosexuality. The reason they think this is because Tinky Winky carries a woman's handbag. They are considering taking the show off public TV if their psychologists confirm these very terrible fears.
(For those who can't read Polish - I swear, I didn't make this up! That is really what the article says!)
(For those who can't read Polish - I swear, I didn't make this up! That is really what the article says!)
Friday, May 25, 2007
A cinema boycott in Poland?
There is a cinema boycott this weekend in Poland (not that I think many people know this ;-P). It is a reaction to the closure of napisy.org - a site which distributed Polish subtitles to films illegally.
They make a couple of valid points. ZAIKS (which is the body that deals with copyright in Poland) indeed charges too much and have often been the cause for rising prices of cinema tickets. I also think that it should be ok to copy your own CDs and DVDs that you have bought legally for your own use (does anybody who owns an mp3 player not do this?). And having people who do nothing more than translate dialogues in films sued and threatened with prison is a bit extreme - it's not them who should be in the first line of fire when it comes to piracy (particularly when they're translating stuff that wasn't even released in Poland although that is of course not always the case). But the people boycotting also seem to fail to see that piracy is stealing. The film industry really needs a lot of money (more than most other industries) to be able to make professional films. Even outside of the USA making a feature film usually costs millions of dollars and that money has to come from somewhere. If everyone pirated films then the film industry would not be possible to sustain at all.
Yes, I'll agree that we need changes in the law (and that goes not just for Poland), but no, piracy is not ok and people should stop pretending it is. I mean if you don't have enough money to buy a book you want to read then you don't just go and steal it, do you? I guess what frustrates me about piracy is not just that people do it (I understand why people do it and even though I'm a lot stricter about it than most, I could find faults with myself as far as this goes). What annoys the hell out of me is that most people do it without any sort of feeling that it's wrong.
Unfortunately, for these reasons I rather take a sarcastic view point on this boycott - people who don't go to the cinema boycotting cinemas... *rolls eyes*
Anyway for those of you who can read Polish you can read more about it here and here.
Some day, I will probably follow up this post with something longer since I've been collecting links on this topic in one of my many draft posts for a while now. But I want to look at copyright in a much broader light than this (including the software industry which faces somewhat different threats than the film industry) and therefore it's going to take me a rather long time to write ;-P
If you think differently about this then I do, let me know :) I'm up for having my opinion on this challenged.
They make a couple of valid points. ZAIKS (which is the body that deals with copyright in Poland) indeed charges too much and have often been the cause for rising prices of cinema tickets. I also think that it should be ok to copy your own CDs and DVDs that you have bought legally for your own use (does anybody who owns an mp3 player not do this?). And having people who do nothing more than translate dialogues in films sued and threatened with prison is a bit extreme - it's not them who should be in the first line of fire when it comes to piracy (particularly when they're translating stuff that wasn't even released in Poland although that is of course not always the case). But the people boycotting also seem to fail to see that piracy is stealing. The film industry really needs a lot of money (more than most other industries) to be able to make professional films. Even outside of the USA making a feature film usually costs millions of dollars and that money has to come from somewhere. If everyone pirated films then the film industry would not be possible to sustain at all.
Yes, I'll agree that we need changes in the law (and that goes not just for Poland), but no, piracy is not ok and people should stop pretending it is. I mean if you don't have enough money to buy a book you want to read then you don't just go and steal it, do you? I guess what frustrates me about piracy is not just that people do it (I understand why people do it and even though I'm a lot stricter about it than most, I could find faults with myself as far as this goes). What annoys the hell out of me is that most people do it without any sort of feeling that it's wrong.
Unfortunately, for these reasons I rather take a sarcastic view point on this boycott - people who don't go to the cinema boycotting cinemas... *rolls eyes*
Anyway for those of you who can read Polish you can read more about it here and here.
Some day, I will probably follow up this post with something longer since I've been collecting links on this topic in one of my many draft posts for a while now. But I want to look at copyright in a much broader light than this (including the software industry which faces somewhat different threats than the film industry) and therefore it's going to take me a rather long time to write ;-P
If you think differently about this then I do, let me know :) I'm up for having my opinion on this challenged.
Shahrukh and Saif at the 49th Filmfare Awards
I found these clips from Filmfare Awards 2003-2004 when Shahrukh and Saif were hosting together. It must have quite soon after Kal Ho Naa Ho since they were making references to it all the time (in the film, everytime Kantaben - one of the characters - sees the two of them together it looks as if they're having some sort of romance or something). Anyway, the clips are so silly I had to post them ;)
Tuesday, May 22, 2007
Random Shahrukh video
Just found this clip and thought it was hilarious, so I'm posting :) It's from one of Shahrukh's live concerts (he's hinted he might be coming to Poland on the next tour he does :) ).
Thursday, May 17, 2007
"I think this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship" - the Indian and American film industries working together
Collaborations between the two biggest film industries in the world sound like a very natural thing, but Indian cinema has never been taken seriously enough for it to happen.
Attitudes, however, are changing on many levels (also see my post from February).
For one thing - who'd have thought that tabloid stories from Bollywood would be the subject of a comedy show on mainstream American TV? (the story of a supposed fallout between Shahrukh and Big B is quite old now, but still talked about in India - they've both repeatedely said there's no truth in it, Shahrukh of course in his own unique way)
But there are also some much more serious changes. A fairly recent story is that UTV Motion Pictures and 20th Century Fox are co-producing M. Night Shyamalan’s next film - The Happening. India has been in co-productions before now (though AFAIK quite rarely), but this time we're talking about a major blockbuster.
That's not the end of things for UTV either. There's also talk of an international project which would co-star Uma Thurman and Hrithik Roshan.
The Shyamalan film sounds rather awful - toxic plants... er right... But I'm very curious how the situation between the Indian and American industries is going to develop.
Just to finish this post on a totally random note (and get rid of something that has been in my drafts since February or something like that ;-P), here are two funny clips - one from this year's Academy Awards with Ellen Degeneres as the host and one from the Filmfare Awards which are the most important awards in India (and take place around the same time that the Academy Awards do) - this year they were hosted by Shahrukh.
(if you desperately want to have an explanation for the sudden appearance of these two clips in this post then I suggest you assume that this is just a way of showing some similarities and differences between the two industries ;))
P.S. Unlike my dad I don't expect everyone to know the quote in the title of this post (since the film it comes from was made in 1942). It is from Casablanca which incidently might be remade in India.
Attitudes, however, are changing on many levels (also see my post from February).
For one thing - who'd have thought that tabloid stories from Bollywood would be the subject of a comedy show on mainstream American TV? (the story of a supposed fallout between Shahrukh and Big B is quite old now, but still talked about in India - they've both repeatedely said there's no truth in it, Shahrukh of course in his own unique way)
But there are also some much more serious changes. A fairly recent story is that UTV Motion Pictures and 20th Century Fox are co-producing M. Night Shyamalan’s next film - The Happening. India has been in co-productions before now (though AFAIK quite rarely), but this time we're talking about a major blockbuster.
That's not the end of things for UTV either. There's also talk of an international project which would co-star Uma Thurman and Hrithik Roshan.
The Shyamalan film sounds rather awful - toxic plants... er right... But I'm very curious how the situation between the Indian and American industries is going to develop.
Just to finish this post on a totally random note (and get rid of something that has been in my drafts since February or something like that ;-P), here are two funny clips - one from this year's Academy Awards with Ellen Degeneres as the host and one from the Filmfare Awards which are the most important awards in India (and take place around the same time that the Academy Awards do) - this year they were hosted by Shahrukh.
(if you desperately want to have an explanation for the sudden appearance of these two clips in this post then I suggest you assume that this is just a way of showing some similarities and differences between the two industries ;))
P.S. Unlike my dad I don't expect everyone to know the quote in the title of this post (since the film it comes from was made in 1942). It is from Casablanca which incidently might be remade in India.
Saturday, May 05, 2007
Equus review
I'm back from London and saw Equus at the Gielgud Theatre last Saturday. Unlike Ziggy I enjoyed it, so we might have a blog war now *grin* (that is if Ziggy even reads my blog entry of course ;-P).
This was the first time for me to have known the text of a play quite well before seeing any performance of it which was an interesting experience in itself. I guess the biggest surprise for me was how many jokes that I hadn't seen in the text they found and how so many of the dialogues were a lot funnier when performed then when read.
In terms of humour perhaps what surprised me the most was that the scenes in the second act which built up into the culmination point (in which Alan Strang blinds 6 horses) were some of the funniest of the whole play.
The design of the play I think worked great with the text. I particularly liked how they did the horses. The dancers playing them did an awsome job with the movement and the lighting and the masks really created a brilliant effect.
As far as the acting goes, it varied from person to person I guess. I have to partly agree with Ziggy that Daniel Radcliffe wasn't as good as perhaps he could have been, but I'm no where near as harsh!
I think his main limitation is voice projection. More than anybody else on stage he was having to strain his voice which meant that how he could use his voice on stage was very limitted. When you compare to the older generations of actors or even to the girl who played Jill, they sounded pretty much as if they were speaking in a normal tone. It kind of created the impression that Alan was constantly speaking with a raised voice at everyone. Whether that was actually the point - I don't know. At any rate I didn't like it. When reading the text I always pictured Alan as somebody who projects this sense of being calm, but might blow up at any moment. Whereas the Alan Daniel Radcliffe was playing was somebody who was struggling with himself much more visibly. I don't know whether this was deliberate or whether it was his lack of voice training that made it seem so (I rather think the voice was the bigger issue - surely the scene in which Alan and Dysart are sitting, smoking and very calmy talking together wouldn't intentionally be interpretted that way?).
But there were positive things to be said about Daniel Radcliffe as well IMO. I actually thought he did an awsome job in the culmination scene. He really gave it all he had and that's always been something I've respected a lot in actors when they can do that. It takes guts to reveal yourself that way and I don't mean the nudity ;-P I mean yes, it takes guts to do that as well ;) but I'm talking more of what he did emotionally in that scene. I think many actors either have too much of an ego or not enough guts to really be able to do a scene like that, so to me that already commends Daniel Radcliffe a lot. I also think it's great he took such a role in the first place. That in itself tells you that he's really serious about developping himself as an actor. Personally, I think the actors who really try to challenge themselves are the ones who often turn out good work throughout their whole careers rather than just during a phase of it. Even when they have many faults to start with, they often get very far.
But ok, enough about him ;) The other actors in general did a great job as well. I thought Richard Griffiths as Dysart was really good. Perhaps he was the reason why the play somehow felt so much more funny to me in performance than on the page ;) But he really captured the character well I feel.
The horses were all absolutely brilliant, as was the young horseman (just awsome). I'm definitely going to be keeping an eye on Will Kemp now (he played Nugget and the young horseman).
Also Alan's parents were very well played - they actually made a much better impression on me in performance than when I had read them on the page.
Going back to the play itself, unlike Ziggy (;-P) I really loved the culmination point. Both in terms of acting and the choreography of it. Somehow it feels weird to be giving details since it's a major spoiler (even if you're only ever going to read the play), but the way they did it was really beautiful. The nudity was quite amazing in that lighting with that choreography and design and all. The way the horses moved, the sounds they made, the way Alan moved amongst them - really awsome choreography.
Something again that struck me when comparing text to performance was that it was so much more weirder to have Dysart talking to Alan all through that scene. It's such a private moment for Alan that it felt quite bizzarre to me (though I really liked the effect).
Something that struck me rather negatively about the text which I hadn't seen at all when reading was that the division into acts felt very weird. In the first act the scenes and places are all rather mixed up and disjointed. Time passes in a way in which the viewer (or reader) can't really even tell how long Alan has been in the hospital before one thing or another happens. This is not a bad thing by any means. I rather like it actually. It's the contrast between this and the second act which makes it feel wrong. The second act is one tightly knit unit in which you can quite precisely work out how time passes. It almost feels like just one or two scenes, something emphasized further by it being shorter than the first act. It's a silly thing really but somehow it bothered me.
Now I'll go back to Ziggy's post and refute what I don't agree with ;-P
So firstly, Daniel Radcliffe is just 17. Perhaps they could have indeed found an actor over 20 who they could make to look and act like a 17 year old and who would have done a better job, but I very much doubt they could have found a 17 year old who would have managed this. It's a very difficult role and any theatrical performance requires somebody who reaaally knows his craft (unlike film where it is indeed possible to pretty much take somebody off the street if he or she suits the part - in some film styles this is actually desirable!). And whatever one might think of Daniel Radcliffe he has had a huge amount of acting experience for his age - more than most actors have at 20 something. Yes, the lack of theatrical experience is a minus, but you probably wouldn't find many actors that age who would have much more.
As for "being over the top" - I don't really know what is meant by that. All I saw was the voice being raised for the majority of the play. Otherwise I thought he was quite subdued actually...
As for this part of Ziggy's post:
This sad spectacle has been created for two purposes only:
a) To earn bucketloads of cash, because of the Harry Potter's celebrity appearance
b) To give Daniel Radcliffe "credibility" so that he can say "Look I did a play, I'm a real actor now."
The project itself had actually been in the works for quite some time. I think there was even talk of having a big revival of Peter Schaffer's plays, but I'm not sure this has received financial backing.
Kenneth Branagh was originally supposed to direct Equus when the idea for the project first came to light and it was meant to have been ready 1 or 2 years before now. There was gossip that Daniel Radcliffe had been offered the part but that he had declined it based mainly on schedule conflicts and also not feeling old enough to play the part (he would have been about 15-16 then). The play was then supposed to go forward without Daniel Radcliffe.
Eventually, however, Branagh left the project (according to gossip because of artistic differences with the producers), the whole thing was postponed and then Thea Sharrock took over the project. The part was offered to Daniel again and this time he accepted.
In other words - the project has a history much like very many projects...
Yes, of course when you have a name as famous as Daniel Radcliffe attached then it helps a lot with publicity and of course they used it. And yes of course Daniel Radcliffe wanted to show he was capable of things other than Harry Potter, but these were hardly the reasons to make this play! Nobody sat down thought up those two reasons and decided "aha, we shall make this play with Daniel Radcliffe". It just doesn't work that way.
Besides, I don't understand the logic of it being a bad thing for Daniel Radcliffe to want to develop and challenge himself as an actor even if it didn't work out as well as it could have. If he doesn't challenge himself he'll never get better!
As for the comments about the writing - I generally like it and I can give the reasons for it if you like ;) But I'd like to hear what you didn't like ;-P
This was the first time for me to have known the text of a play quite well before seeing any performance of it which was an interesting experience in itself. I guess the biggest surprise for me was how many jokes that I hadn't seen in the text they found and how so many of the dialogues were a lot funnier when performed then when read.
In terms of humour perhaps what surprised me the most was that the scenes in the second act which built up into the culmination point (in which Alan Strang blinds 6 horses) were some of the funniest of the whole play.
The design of the play I think worked great with the text. I particularly liked how they did the horses. The dancers playing them did an awsome job with the movement and the lighting and the masks really created a brilliant effect.
As far as the acting goes, it varied from person to person I guess. I have to partly agree with Ziggy that Daniel Radcliffe wasn't as good as perhaps he could have been, but I'm no where near as harsh!
I think his main limitation is voice projection. More than anybody else on stage he was having to strain his voice which meant that how he could use his voice on stage was very limitted. When you compare to the older generations of actors or even to the girl who played Jill, they sounded pretty much as if they were speaking in a normal tone. It kind of created the impression that Alan was constantly speaking with a raised voice at everyone. Whether that was actually the point - I don't know. At any rate I didn't like it. When reading the text I always pictured Alan as somebody who projects this sense of being calm, but might blow up at any moment. Whereas the Alan Daniel Radcliffe was playing was somebody who was struggling with himself much more visibly. I don't know whether this was deliberate or whether it was his lack of voice training that made it seem so (I rather think the voice was the bigger issue - surely the scene in which Alan and Dysart are sitting, smoking and very calmy talking together wouldn't intentionally be interpretted that way?).
But there were positive things to be said about Daniel Radcliffe as well IMO. I actually thought he did an awsome job in the culmination scene. He really gave it all he had and that's always been something I've respected a lot in actors when they can do that. It takes guts to reveal yourself that way and I don't mean the nudity ;-P I mean yes, it takes guts to do that as well ;) but I'm talking more of what he did emotionally in that scene. I think many actors either have too much of an ego or not enough guts to really be able to do a scene like that, so to me that already commends Daniel Radcliffe a lot. I also think it's great he took such a role in the first place. That in itself tells you that he's really serious about developping himself as an actor. Personally, I think the actors who really try to challenge themselves are the ones who often turn out good work throughout their whole careers rather than just during a phase of it. Even when they have many faults to start with, they often get very far.
But ok, enough about him ;) The other actors in general did a great job as well. I thought Richard Griffiths as Dysart was really good. Perhaps he was the reason why the play somehow felt so much more funny to me in performance than on the page ;) But he really captured the character well I feel.
The horses were all absolutely brilliant, as was the young horseman (just awsome). I'm definitely going to be keeping an eye on Will Kemp now (he played Nugget and the young horseman).
Also Alan's parents were very well played - they actually made a much better impression on me in performance than when I had read them on the page.
Going back to the play itself, unlike Ziggy (;-P) I really loved the culmination point. Both in terms of acting and the choreography of it. Somehow it feels weird to be giving details since it's a major spoiler (even if you're only ever going to read the play), but the way they did it was really beautiful. The nudity was quite amazing in that lighting with that choreography and design and all. The way the horses moved, the sounds they made, the way Alan moved amongst them - really awsome choreography.
Something again that struck me when comparing text to performance was that it was so much more weirder to have Dysart talking to Alan all through that scene. It's such a private moment for Alan that it felt quite bizzarre to me (though I really liked the effect).
Something that struck me rather negatively about the text which I hadn't seen at all when reading was that the division into acts felt very weird. In the first act the scenes and places are all rather mixed up and disjointed. Time passes in a way in which the viewer (or reader) can't really even tell how long Alan has been in the hospital before one thing or another happens. This is not a bad thing by any means. I rather like it actually. It's the contrast between this and the second act which makes it feel wrong. The second act is one tightly knit unit in which you can quite precisely work out how time passes. It almost feels like just one or two scenes, something emphasized further by it being shorter than the first act. It's a silly thing really but somehow it bothered me.
Now I'll go back to Ziggy's post and refute what I don't agree with ;-P
So firstly, Daniel Radcliffe is just 17. Perhaps they could have indeed found an actor over 20 who they could make to look and act like a 17 year old and who would have done a better job, but I very much doubt they could have found a 17 year old who would have managed this. It's a very difficult role and any theatrical performance requires somebody who reaaally knows his craft (unlike film where it is indeed possible to pretty much take somebody off the street if he or she suits the part - in some film styles this is actually desirable!). And whatever one might think of Daniel Radcliffe he has had a huge amount of acting experience for his age - more than most actors have at 20 something. Yes, the lack of theatrical experience is a minus, but you probably wouldn't find many actors that age who would have much more.
As for "being over the top" - I don't really know what is meant by that. All I saw was the voice being raised for the majority of the play. Otherwise I thought he was quite subdued actually...
As for this part of Ziggy's post:
This sad spectacle has been created for two purposes only:
a) To earn bucketloads of cash, because of the Harry Potter's celebrity appearance
b) To give Daniel Radcliffe "credibility" so that he can say "Look I did a play, I'm a real actor now."
The project itself had actually been in the works for quite some time. I think there was even talk of having a big revival of Peter Schaffer's plays, but I'm not sure this has received financial backing.
Kenneth Branagh was originally supposed to direct Equus when the idea for the project first came to light and it was meant to have been ready 1 or 2 years before now. There was gossip that Daniel Radcliffe had been offered the part but that he had declined it based mainly on schedule conflicts and also not feeling old enough to play the part (he would have been about 15-16 then). The play was then supposed to go forward without Daniel Radcliffe.
Eventually, however, Branagh left the project (according to gossip because of artistic differences with the producers), the whole thing was postponed and then Thea Sharrock took over the project. The part was offered to Daniel again and this time he accepted.
In other words - the project has a history much like very many projects...
Yes, of course when you have a name as famous as Daniel Radcliffe attached then it helps a lot with publicity and of course they used it. And yes of course Daniel Radcliffe wanted to show he was capable of things other than Harry Potter, but these were hardly the reasons to make this play! Nobody sat down thought up those two reasons and decided "aha, we shall make this play with Daniel Radcliffe". It just doesn't work that way.
Besides, I don't understand the logic of it being a bad thing for Daniel Radcliffe to want to develop and challenge himself as an actor even if it didn't work out as well as it could have. If he doesn't challenge himself he'll never get better!
As for the comments about the writing - I generally like it and I can give the reasons for it if you like ;) But I'd like to hear what you didn't like ;-P
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