| 'Nazi' row engulfs Disney film about champion racehorse Secretariat Roger Ebert rushes to defence of horse and film that Andrew O'Hehir calls 'a work of creepy master-race propaganda'On the surface, it appears to be the wholesome, family-friendly tale of a housewife and mother who overcomes her lack of horse-racing knowledge to train a thoroughbred colt to the 1973 US Triple Crown. But Disney film Secretariat has fostered an almighty row in the US over suggestions by an eminent critic that it features undercurrents of white power and nazism.Andrew O'Hehir of Salon is credited with having sparked off the controversy, following a review in which he describes Randall Wallace's film, which stars Diane Lane and John Malkovich, as "a work of creepy, half-hilarious master-race propaganda almost worthy of Leni Riefenstahl ... [about how] all right-thinking Americans are united in their adoration of a Nietzschean Ãœberhorse".Elsewhere in his appraisal, O'Hehir writes: "It's legitimate to wonder exactly what Christian-friendly and 'middle-American' inspirational values are being conveyed here, or whether they're just providing cover for some fairly ordinary rightwing ideology and xenophobia."The critic's concerns were immediately countered by the veteran film writer Roger Ebert of the Chicago Sun-Times in a lengthy critique of O'Hehir's review that doubles as a defence of Secretariat – both the movie, and the horse."His review resembles a fevered conspiracy theory," Ebert says. "I saw a straightforward, lovingly crafted film about a great horse. But, Ebert writes: "We learn the horse is a carrier not merely of Ron Turcotte's 130 pounds, but of nazism, racism, Tea Party ideology and the dark side of Christianity."I'm not making this up. How did a lifelong liberal like myself manage to leave peacefully at the end, instead of organising the audience and leading a demonstration right then and there?"O'Hehir later responded, admitting his review was "unorthodox and admittedly inflammatory", and pointing out that his reference to Nazi wartime propaganda director Riefenstahl was a "deliberately outrageous claim". However, he said he stood by his suggestion that Secretariat's "idealised vision of normal life" represents a "fantasia of American whiteness and power".Secretariat centres on the horse of the same name which won the Kentucky Derby, Preakness Stakes, and Belmont Stakes in 1973 to take the Triple Crown, the first horse to do so in 25 years. The film opened in the US at the weekend and has so far been met with mainly positive reviews. It arrives in the UK on December 10.Horse racingDramaUnited StatesBen Childguardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds guardian.co.uk |
Sean Connery fails to appear in Spanish court Letter from actor cites health reasons for non-appearance at Costa del Sol corruption trialSir Sean Connery has failed to appear in court in Marbella where he and his wife had been summoned to testify in a corruption case.In a letter delivered to the court, Connery, 80, cited his and his wife's age and health reasons for their non-appearance. He also claimed that he had insufficient time to make travel arrangements to get from the couple's home in the Bahamas to the Costa del Sol.The actor had been threatening to sue for damages on the grounds that the allegations have caused him both personal and financial harm. But in the letter he apparently apologises for not appearing and says the couple are willing to co-operate with the court. Legal sources in Marbella suggested the issue could be resolved through a rogatory commission – that is, that Connery and his wife could testify in the Bahamas. They have not been charged with any crime. The judge will decide next week how to proceed.Connery, his wife, Micheline Roquebrune, and 25 others were summoned in connection with Operation Goldfinger, an investigation into alleged property fraud. The investigation has uncovered apparent irregularities surrounding the sale in 1998 of Malibu, the couple's Marbella property, for €6.4m (£5.6m).The local authority claims it is owed €2.7m on the deal, which resulted in 72 luxury flats being built on the site after Connery sold it, despite planning permission only to build five family homes. The development yielded a €53m profit. Spanish tax officials say Connery and his wife were connected to a company involved in the scheme and that they and the developer, a company called By the Sea, were both represented by the same law firm. The police believe €37m of the €53m was shipped abroad to the UK and Uruguay.Among the other 25 Goldfinger suspects are Julián Muñoz, the former mayor of Marbella, his ex-wife Mayte ZaldÃvar, the singer Isabel Pantoja and the former Marbella town planning adviser Juan Antonio Roca, who faces a separate trial regarding property fraud amounting to more than €2bn. Several lawyers associated with the defendants face charges. During a search of one of the lawyers' offices police found €860,000 in cash.Operation Goldfinger is a spin-off from the far larger Operation Malaya investigation into corruption in Marbella. The investigation began in 2006 and among those charged are some people connected with the Goldfinger inquiry, including Roca who is accused of running Marbella as his private domain.Charges against the 94 accused in the Malaya case include the alleged laundering of €2.4bn. When Roca's house was raided police uncovered a collection of luxury cars, a helicopter, 300 works of art, 103 thoroughbred horses and a tiger.Sean ConnerySpainStephen Burgenguardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds guardian.co.uk |
The Thin Red Line: No 10 Terrence Malick, 1998In the 1962 James Jones novel on which it is based, this is a story about the Guadalcanal campaign, fought in the Solomon Islands in 1942-3. And while The Thin Red Line holds a deserved place in the annals of war movies it is rather more a war dreamed of by Terrence Malick than the one actually fought for in reality. For Jones, the "thin red line" came from Kipling and stood for the infantry, but it was also the line that separated the sane from the mad. The author of From Here to Eternity, Jones had actually served at Guadalcanal, but in the preface to his novel he admits he had created a place of the imagination. In truth, that is the key to Malick's film which, filmed in Queensland and in the Solomon Islands, is as interested in the flora and fauna of the Pacific as it is in the outcome of the combat. So we see American soldiers trying to take a hill, but we see more of the long grass in the wind than we do of the enemy. Beneath it all – the shooting and the talk – there is a sense of the island having been there long before and long after the battle.There were always some critics who found this approach arty, and the film vacant of conventional excitement. It is a marvel that it ever got made as an expensive American picture, with a star-studded cast. But unlike Fred Zinnemann's 1953 epic From Here to Eternity, which starred Deborah Kerr and Donna Reed, there are no women as characters – even if we glimpse them as dream figures in the minds of the soldiers. It's a deeply mysterious movie, interested in so many things above and beyond war, and so beautiful that the sudden sight of bodies and damage come as a surprise. Malick wrote the film himself and he shot and edited it according to his own timetable. It's a measure of his reputation that so many big names were willing to be in this half-abstract picture – if only for a few scenes: John Travolta, George Clooney, Sean Penn, John Cusack, Adrien Brody, Elias Koteas, James Caviezel, Woody Harrelson. But the standout performance comes from Nick Nolte as a ranting colonel whose authority has been questioned, and who is the clearest proof of the army that James Jones loved and hated.Action and adventureDavid Thomsonguardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds guardian.co.uk |
Joe Queenan's guide to horror film cliches Horror movies divide into several very different categories: slasher, zombie, vampire, mainstream horror, Asian horror and revolting Eli Roth films. Devotees of one category often have no interest in the others, a fact that is incomprehensible to snooty types who cavalierly make no distinctions. All of these subgenres rely on worthy, battle-tested cliches that appear again and again. Indeed, horror is the one genre in which the absence of cliches would ruin everything. If the Japanese started making horror movies that did not revolve around creepy little girls who come back from the dead to avenge themselves on other, even creepier little girls, no one would go to see them. If there was not somehow a sense in the Saw-style movies that the victims deserved to be dismembered, the genre would implode. If zombies didn't constantly turn up in unusual places – convenience stores, high-rise student housing, rural Pennsylvania – aficionados would drop the subgenre just like that. And if vampires weren't likable in some strange, misunderstood, vampiric way, vampire movies would be nowhere near as popular as they are.Small children are often evil in horror movies, a tradition that descends from The Bad Seed and The Exorcist and The Omen. When they are not evil, they are troubled loners who consort with invisible playmates who are evil. If one hears children humming innocent nursery rhymes in the background, you can bet your bottom dollar that somebody's getting a carving knife through the retina pretty damn soon. Conversely, it is very rare to hear a baritone or heldentenor on the soundtrack of a horror movie. Teens in horror movies are usually spoiled brats who deserve to die. They are always the products of broken homes. This is why they are so often home alone. Since horror movies are marketed toward teens, this seems to suggest that at some level, teens already understand that everybody wants to see them die, preferably in some hideous fashion. Yet they flock to see the movies. Strange.Horror films work best in rural settings, because rustics are scary in and of themselves, and because there are lots of frightening farm tools on hand, and also because there are no neighbours to beg for help when the flaying and amateur surgery get into full swing. One should never trust a handyman or a farmer in a horror film. It is said that in space no one can hear you scream, but no one can hear you scream in Nebraska or south Dakota or rural Slovakia, either. Horror films do not work well in places like Holland, because horror films require basements, for the crucial scene where the prettiest girl, for no good reason, descends into the miasmic cavern in which Leatherface obviously spends most of his free time. Linen closets and tidy storage areas are surprisingly common in Asian horror films, which may have cultural ramifications that go over the heads of moviegoers in the west. In the west, linen closets are simply not scary. Neither are vestibules. They're just not.Horror movies almost always contain a scene in which a woman washes her face in a sink, and when she straightens up and looks in the mirror, a girl missing half her face is staring directly back at her. If she decides to take a bath, the tub will soon fill up with hair, blood or a woman with purple skin and one eye missing. Horror movies also contain lots of scenes in which the living dead or the living undead zip past an open door or window, but nobody sees them. A surprise appearance by subaquatic, recently deceased femmes fatales is another popular trope; the distaff dead, like U-boats, do not like to surface. The more gruesome films in the genre require captives to sacrifice one section of their bodies in order to preserve others; this always comes as a surprise.Women constantly take showers in horror films, even though this has been a terrible idea ever since Psycho. People check into remote, deserted motels, even though this too has been a bad idea since Psycho. If the people who inhabit horror movies had only seen Psycho at an impressionable age, an awful lot of carnage could have been avoided. This, in fact, is the basic joke in Scream.It is always a bad idea to go to sleep in horror films, or accept a ride from strangers, or respond to a personal ad. It is an even worse idea to get in an elevator, a popular hideout of the promiscuously dead. Computers are another place where the dead sometimes lay low. Priests are generally well-meaning but incompetent in this genre, but nuns are to be avoided. Rabbis rarely appear in horror films. In a horror movie, you should never purchase a dirt-cheap house or apartment without making detailed inquiries about how many previous tenants were skinned alive in the pantry. But be aware: estate agents can never be trusted. It is pointless to look at the images on the security camera in your apartment or office to see if the monster is in the lobby, because the dead cannot be seen on conventional cameras, no matter how high the resolution. You should never have any kind of medical operation in a horror film, particularly a transplant, because you will inherit the eyes of a witch, the heart of a cannibal or the kidneys of a murderous transvestite. Never go into a darkroom alone, because someone in the film you are developing will come to life and rip your lungs out. Finally, never answer the phone in a horror movie. To avoid disaster, text.The classic cliched horror movie: The Ring The Ring, a remake of Hideo Nakata's 1998 Ring, is the horror movie that introduced the west to all the cliches that are so popular in the east, and that are now popular everywhere. It is the only American horror movie that is scarier than the film it is based on. The heroine is an attractive woman who stumbles on a series of weird, inexplicable deaths. Even though young people are dying in droves, the police dismiss it as one of those zany coincidences. Soon, she starts to receive phone calls from the dead. She becomes involved with a scary little girl whose eye keeps poking out from beneath a mane of matted black hair, never a good sign. She is dating the initially skeptical boyfriend, who comes around to her point of view, then dies. She makes the statutory trip to the asylum, for a chat with the uncommunicative witness to the murder that launched the movie. Other great cliches: the strange little boy who seems to understand more than he is saying. The water seeping from the bathroom door. The girl who has been left to die by friends or family and is now coming back to even the score. The spasmodic, time-lapse camera work that enables the dead girl to cover enormous distances in a short period of time. And, of course, the surprise twist at the end. Two of them, in fact. All in all, The Ring puts Carrie to shame.HorrorJoe Queenanguardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds guardian.co.uk |
No end in sight for New Zealand's Hobbit saga Prime minister John Key says situation 'still 50-50' after attempt to persuade Hollywood executives to shoot films in countryTalks between New Zealand's prime minister and Hollywood executives over the future of the Hobbit films ended in deadlock earlier today.John Key met with 10 Warner Brothers officials at his Wellington official residence to try and persuade them to shoot in the country, where director Peter Jackson's earlier Lord of the Rings trilogy was filmed and where sets remain. The move followed street protests across New Zealand yesterday by thousands concerned that the country could lose out on a production whose predecessor put it on the map as a viable location for big-budget Hollywood films.The talks followed an acting union's boycott over pay and conditions which threatened to derail the films. The boycott, which was backed by other unions across the globe, was withdrawn last week, but Jackson said the row had damaged relations and caused concern in Hollywood that New Zealand was not a "stable" location to make films.Describing the situation as "still 50-50", Key confirmed that the sticking point remained uncertainty over industrial relations. He said talks would reconvene later and a decision was expected in the next 24 to 36 hours."[The executives] have a lot of goodwill towards New Zealand, but there's no question that the industrial action caused concern on their side," he told the New Zealand Herald. "If it wasn't for the industrial action, they [Warner Brothers] were good to go."Earlier in the day, Key had warned he would not be drawn into a bidding war to prevent Warner from moving production to another country – the UK, Australia, Canada and eastern Europe have all been suggested as alternative locations – even though losing the films could cost the country up to $1.5bn."In the conversations I've had with Warner Brothers so far I've made it quite clear if it comes to a bidding war, then New Zealand's out, because I don't think that's the right way to run this," he said. "We don't want to be renegotiating with every single production company that comes to New Zealand."The project has already suffered a series of delays, including the resignation of director Guillermo del Toro, who quit in May as the uncertain financial future of movie studio partner MGM put the project in doubt. Jackson, originally on board only as producer and co-writer, officially signed on to direct earlier this month.The Hobbit is based on the adventures of Bilbo Baggins, a hairy-footed homunculus who lives in a land, Middle-earth, which is filled with wizards, elves, goblins and trolls. He goes on a quest to find treasure belonging to a company of dwarves which has been stolen and hoarded by a great dragon, Smaug. The book, first published in 1937, is the precursor to the Lord of the Rings, which Jackson filmed 10 years ago.Filming on the two-part big screen adaptation is due to start next February, with a release date for each part of December 2012 and December 2013 respectively.Lord of the RingsPeter JacksonScience fiction and fantasyJRR TolkienNew ZealandFilm industryBen Childguardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds guardian.co.uk |