DGA Awards Announce Film Nominees Los Angeles – Directors Guild of America President Taylor Hackford today announced the DGA’s nominees for Outstanding Directorial Achievement in Television and Commercials for the year 2011. “The caliber of work being done on television these days is incredible, and our director nominees in each category are an indispensable element to the success of every project — establishing and enhancing the vision and tone, eliciting outstanding performances and furthering the narrative arc through their creative choices,” said Hackford. “That they are able to create excellence regardless of obstacles like tighter schedules and in an environment in which audiences have more entertainment options to choose from — is a true testament to the importance of directorial skill in television.” The winners will be announced at the 64th Annual DGA Awards Dinner on Saturday, January 28, 2012 at the Grand Ballroom at Hollywood & Highland in Los Angeles. Movies For Television And Mini-series...
- 1/10/2012
- by THE DEADLINE TEAM
- Deadline TV
HollywoodNews.com:Directors Guild of America President Taylor Hackford today announced the DGA’s nominees for Outstanding Directorial Achievement in Television and Commercials for the year 2011.
?The caliber of work being done on television these days is incredible, and our director nominees in each category are an indispensable element to the success of every project — establishing and enhancing the vision and tone, eliciting outstanding performances and furthering the narrative arc through their creative choices,? said Hackford. ?That they are able to create excellence regardless of obstacles like tighter schedules and in an environment in which audiences have more entertainment options to choose from — is a true testament to the importance of directorial skill in television.?
The winners will be announced at the 64th Annual DGA Awards Dinner on Saturday, January 28, 2012 at the Grand Ballroom at Hollywood & Highland in Los Angeles.
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Movies For Television And Mini-series
The nominees for the Directors Guild...
?The caliber of work being done on television these days is incredible, and our director nominees in each category are an indispensable element to the success of every project — establishing and enhancing the vision and tone, eliciting outstanding performances and furthering the narrative arc through their creative choices,? said Hackford. ?That they are able to create excellence regardless of obstacles like tighter schedules and in an environment in which audiences have more entertainment options to choose from — is a true testament to the importance of directorial skill in television.?
The winners will be announced at the 64th Annual DGA Awards Dinner on Saturday, January 28, 2012 at the Grand Ballroom at Hollywood & Highland in Los Angeles.
***
Movies For Television And Mini-series
The nominees for the Directors Guild...
- 1/10/2012
- by Josh Abraham
- Hollywoodnews.com
Suspect Zero
Suspect Zero does not enter the territory of Silence of the Lambs and Seven with any timidity. It's an invasion, stemming from a determination to one-up both films in unpleasantness and claim the territory as its own. The trouble is that those films, no matter how queasy they made one's stomach, came from meticulously written, rock-solid screenplays. Suspect Zero is more intricate than meticulous. The filmmakers throw in just about every angle you can jam into a serial-killer movie, every nerve-jangling camera move and image, every double twist and implausible revelation that any such movie can withstand. The movie exhausts its audience rather than entertains it.
E. Elias Merhige, who directed the justifiably celebrated Shadow of the Vampire, is clearly a talented director. He stages scenes to maximum impact and keeps more than a few balls in the air at any given moment. But lack of credibility and unsavory subject matter defeat him in this outing. Without star power and burdened with a convoluted plot difficult to get across in advertising, Suspect Zero will test Paramount's marketing skills. The film will perform best in urban situations and mainly with males.
Aaron Eckhart plays an aspirin-gulping FBI agent sent down to "the minors" in New Mexico after screwing up a serial-killer case in Dallas. All too conveniently and rat unbelievably, his former partner and lover, Carrie-Anne Moss, quickly joins him in this career purgatory. On Day 1 on the job, Eckhart is confronted with a homicide deliberately staged at theArizona/New Mexico border to make the murder an interstate crime, which demands FBI involvement.
In a very creepy opening sequence, much of it shot in very tight or very wide shots, the film shows an enigmatic man played with hyper-intensity by Ben Kingsley commit this murder. So the film is not so much a whodunit as a whydunit.
The makers don't make it easy for audience members to sort out that why. What's with all those clues Kingsley's character leaves at each crime scene? Why is he forever faxing the FBI guy reports of missing children? What is the meaning of scenes shot in red tint that show events from the past or future? And what gives with the huge black truck that slowly cruises past playgrounds? Pretty soon some in the audience may want Eckhart to pass them the aspirin.
Writers Zak Penn and Billy Ray do tie all these seemingly random bits together. Sort of. Much of it comes down to a serial killer hunting down other serial killers and a former elite federal agent trained to view crimes telepathically, a technique referred to as "remote viewing." But these are a pretty unlikely gimmicks on which to hang a thriller. Worse, much of it feels overly familiar, derived from other movies or novels.
Kingsley is mesmerizing though hardly empathetic as the killer with a method to his madness. The rest of the cast turn in workmanlike performances as their characters are too thin and occupied with the business at hand to make much of an impression.
Merhige makes excellent use of remote, seriously underpopulated New Mexico locations, Ida Random's naturalistic sets and Michael Chapman's moody cinematography, even though an occasional camera move suffers from self-consciousness. Suspect Zero has enough going for it to eventually develop a cult following. But compared to Silence of the Lambs and Seven, it's still the minor leagues.
SUSPECT ZERO
Paramount Pictures
Paramount in association with Intermedia Films and Lakeshore EntertainmentA C/W production
Credits:
Director: E. Elias Merhige
Screenwriters: Zak Penn, Billy Ray
Story by: Zak Penn
Producers: Paula Wagner, E. Elias Merhige, Gaye Hirsch
Executive producers: Jonathan Sanger, Moritz Borman, Guy East, Nigel Sinclair, Tom Rosenberg, Gary Lucchesi
Director of photography: Michael Chapman
Production designer: Ida Random
Music: Clint Mansell
Co-producers: Lester Berman, Darren Miller
Costume designer: Mary Claire Hannan
Editors: John Gilroy, Robert K. Lambert
Cast:
Thomas Mackelway: Aaron Eckhart
Benjamin O'Ryan: Ben Kingsley
Fran Kulok: Carrie-Anne Moss
Rick Charleton: Harry Lennix
Harold Speck: Kevin Chamberlin
Highway Patrolman: Julian Reyes
Raymond: Keith Campbell
MPAA rating: R
Running time -- 100 minutes...
E. Elias Merhige, who directed the justifiably celebrated Shadow of the Vampire, is clearly a talented director. He stages scenes to maximum impact and keeps more than a few balls in the air at any given moment. But lack of credibility and unsavory subject matter defeat him in this outing. Without star power and burdened with a convoluted plot difficult to get across in advertising, Suspect Zero will test Paramount's marketing skills. The film will perform best in urban situations and mainly with males.
Aaron Eckhart plays an aspirin-gulping FBI agent sent down to "the minors" in New Mexico after screwing up a serial-killer case in Dallas. All too conveniently and rat unbelievably, his former partner and lover, Carrie-Anne Moss, quickly joins him in this career purgatory. On Day 1 on the job, Eckhart is confronted with a homicide deliberately staged at theArizona/New Mexico border to make the murder an interstate crime, which demands FBI involvement.
In a very creepy opening sequence, much of it shot in very tight or very wide shots, the film shows an enigmatic man played with hyper-intensity by Ben Kingsley commit this murder. So the film is not so much a whodunit as a whydunit.
The makers don't make it easy for audience members to sort out that why. What's with all those clues Kingsley's character leaves at each crime scene? Why is he forever faxing the FBI guy reports of missing children? What is the meaning of scenes shot in red tint that show events from the past or future? And what gives with the huge black truck that slowly cruises past playgrounds? Pretty soon some in the audience may want Eckhart to pass them the aspirin.
Writers Zak Penn and Billy Ray do tie all these seemingly random bits together. Sort of. Much of it comes down to a serial killer hunting down other serial killers and a former elite federal agent trained to view crimes telepathically, a technique referred to as "remote viewing." But these are a pretty unlikely gimmicks on which to hang a thriller. Worse, much of it feels overly familiar, derived from other movies or novels.
Kingsley is mesmerizing though hardly empathetic as the killer with a method to his madness. The rest of the cast turn in workmanlike performances as their characters are too thin and occupied with the business at hand to make much of an impression.
Merhige makes excellent use of remote, seriously underpopulated New Mexico locations, Ida Random's naturalistic sets and Michael Chapman's moody cinematography, even though an occasional camera move suffers from self-consciousness. Suspect Zero has enough going for it to eventually develop a cult following. But compared to Silence of the Lambs and Seven, it's still the minor leagues.
SUSPECT ZERO
Paramount Pictures
Paramount in association with Intermedia Films and Lakeshore EntertainmentA C/W production
Credits:
Director: E. Elias Merhige
Screenwriters: Zak Penn, Billy Ray
Story by: Zak Penn
Producers: Paula Wagner, E. Elias Merhige, Gaye Hirsch
Executive producers: Jonathan Sanger, Moritz Borman, Guy East, Nigel Sinclair, Tom Rosenberg, Gary Lucchesi
Director of photography: Michael Chapman
Production designer: Ida Random
Music: Clint Mansell
Co-producers: Lester Berman, Darren Miller
Costume designer: Mary Claire Hannan
Editors: John Gilroy, Robert K. Lambert
Cast:
Thomas Mackelway: Aaron Eckhart
Benjamin O'Ryan: Ben Kingsley
Fran Kulok: Carrie-Anne Moss
Rick Charleton: Harry Lennix
Harold Speck: Kevin Chamberlin
Highway Patrolman: Julian Reyes
Raymond: Keith Campbell
MPAA rating: R
Running time -- 100 minutes...
- 9/9/2004
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
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