A Most Wanted Man

A MOST WANTED MAN is an excellent film based on the book by John le Carre. It is a spy thriller full of suspense, starring Philip Seymour Hoffman, Rachel McAdams, Willem Dafoe, and Robin Wright.  All the performances are exceptional. I was especially impressed with McAdams’ portrayal of an attorney helping immigrants, which Hoffman’s character refers to as “a social worker who helps terrorists.”

A MOST WANTED MAN is one of the best films I have seen in a long time and is currently playing in theatres. For more information visit http://amostwantedmanmovie.com/.

What Just Happened

Yesterday I saw the movie, WHAT JUST HAPPENED, starring Robert De Niro, and liked it. It showed a few days in the life of a Hollywood producer (De Niro). Robert De Niro’s performance was superb, and probably the reason why I enjoyed this movie, which is based on a book, about the film industry.

De Niro’s character produced a movie starring Sean Penn, and the studio disliked the ending. Immediately following a test screening of the film, he was told by a studio executive that he had to change the ending or the studio would take the movie out of the Cannes Film Festival. As a result, the producer had the arduous task of imploring the writer/director to change the film’s ending. Meanwhile, he was dealing with the emotions of a teenage daughter from his first marriage, struggling with the notion of getting back together with his second ex-wife (Robin Wright Penn), and getting celebrity Bruce Willis to shave his “Grizzly Adams beard” and lose weight so that he looks like a movie star, for the next film he is producing.

WHAT JUST HAPPENED may intrigue some even more about heading to Hollywood to start a career in the film industry, but on the other hand, it will probably just confirm to others why they are not working in Hollywood. Independent filmmaking has become extremely popular because an independent filmmaker does not deal with studio notes or test screenings, is not told to change the ending of his or her masterpiece, and may not be dealing with movie star egos because the budgets cannot afford them. However, it is mentioned in the movie that De Niros’ character’s movie is an official selection at Cannes Film Festival, even though the judges only watched 10 minutes, because it has big stars in it.

It is important to note that WHAT JUST HAPPENED, directed by Barry Levinson, is an independent movie I watched at an independently-owned movie theatre. WHAT JUST HAPPENED had a very high budget ($25 million), and that places it on the upper-end of the independent filmmaking world. The majority of independent filmmakers do not have budgets over two million dollars. But, at any rate, please support independent movies.