The Penn Museum will be starting their new film series Live From the Archives this Thursday March 15^th at 6pm. The series will showcase some of the folks who are creating new film works using the Penn Museum’s expansive film archives that currently reside on Archive.org.

The first installment is titled Elephant in the Dark: Refractions of Muslim Identity. The screening will take place at the Rainey Auditorium at the Penn Museum. The screening is free and the night will start off at 5pm with a reception with the filmmakers. Check out synopses of the films below, with links to the respective trailers. (more…)

With the amount of hype and hyperbole that surrounded John Carter, it’s almost impossible for any film fan to come into it with no pre-existing expectations. The film is the $275 million dollar project that has been in development at various studios for over half a century and has been referred to by many as of late as Disney’s Heaven’s Gate.

All this talk is due to the film going massively over budget and rumored to have been the catalyst of the departure of former marketing president MT Carney. Carney was reportedly behind the last minute name change of the film thanks to the failure of another Disney film Mars Needs Moms, the film which was budgeted at $150 million and only made $40 million of that back.

The film’s journey to the screen also has all the elements of a film journalist schadenfreude, with blogs churning out stories about the possible failure of yet another attempted Disney franchise. With the rumored break even point for John Carter being over $750 million the House of Mouse needs a box office home run and the film has an enormous uphill battle ahead of it.

If the film manages to find it audience this should be very easy. The film is the epic story of a broken Civil War Captain from Virginia, John Carter who is mysteriously transported to Mars, once there he finds himself entangled in yet another civil war and a love triangle to boot.  Thanks to a difference in gravity between planets Carter is given super-human strength. He kicks a lot of alien ass as he tries to end the war, bring peace to Mars and capture the heart of a princess.

The film is a spectacle and story in the grandest sense our screens have not seen since James Cameron unleashed Avatar onto the world.

More after the jump!

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Given the recent tragedy in Ohio, I really feel a film like We Need to Talk About Kevin, which opens this Friday March 9th at the Ritz at the Bourse is extremely timely and even more important than ever. It’s a hard film to watch, introducing us to an individual that we see grow into a child that decides to commit violence against his peers.

I got to speak with Ezra Miller who plays the troubled teenage Kevin in the film, and I found him very introspective and amazingly insightful about what went into this character. I hope you enjoy this interview and I really hope you check out the film.

 Note: This interview was conducted over a month ago before the events in Ohio.

I read that you actively sought out this role originally, what was that process like for you to try to get the role?

It was a process of constantly badgering my poor agent, even when the project seemed to disappear because of various production reasons, after I had already auditioned.  Almost weekly I would ask my agent where the project had gone and how I could find it again.

By the end of that year of waiting he was probably grateful it had resurfaced, because he had probably grown tired of saying the project had disappeared and he couldn’t find it. I was very stubborn when it came to the pursuit of this project.

What interested you most about the role of Kevin and when you approached the role what did you think was going to be the most challenging for you?

Funny enough, your questions share an answer. What I think was most interesting about the role to me was that this was someone who was incredibly challenging to understand as a character. I felt that there was a hope, a possibility that I could find a way to make him even remotely understandable or identifiable.

That is what excited me that this was someone who was mentally challenging to understand at all, and nearly impossible to understand his actions. But I felt a common human motivation sort of under many, many layers of this character that I could strongly identify with.

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Dante Lam’s newest big budget Hong Kong action film The Viral Factor, will be screening at the AMC Loews Cherry Hill starting March 9th for a limited theatrical run. The film stars Jay Chou and Nicholas Tse. While most of you will remember Chou as Kato in The Green Hornet, some of you might remember Tse from Bodyguards and Assassins which played at Cinefest last spring.

I am a huge fan of Dante Lam and have been since I saw The Vampire Effect. The folks over at China Lion were nice enough to send me a screener and if you a fan of the new wave of Hong Kong action you will not be disappointed. The Viral Factor is like a Michael Bay film on steroids, but with heart.

While on a mission to escort a scientist with a copy of the smallpox virus, Chou’s character is shot, loses the scientist and his fiance, who oddly enough is his partner.  He then is given two weeks to live, goes to reunite with his lost brother and father, and then has to stop the stolen virus from mutating into a super virus, plaguing the world.

It’s a great film with tons of insane action sequences and some great fight choreography. The film is a send off of sorts since Chou has stated that this will be his last action film. The film will be presented in its native Chinese with English subtitles.

I give The Viral Factor a 3.75 out of 5 stars and hope you check it out when it opens Friday and support international film!

The folks behind Calendar Girl will be test screening their newest production Mancation this Thursday, March 8th at The Trocadero.

The film is directed by Frank Vain who was also the producer and second unit director on Calendar Girl, and stars Joey Fatone of N’Sync fame with Danica Mckellar, who you probably recognize as Winnie Cooper from the Wonder Years. Geeky fun fact: she also guest starred on the Super Mario Super Show.

The plot to Mancation goes something like this:

 Mancation is a raucous comedy about Vince, who has carefully planned out every aspect of his seemingly successful life, only to have his plans come crashing down around him, leaving his three under-qualified friends to pick up the pieces in the wildest and most spontaneous weekend of their lives.

Sounds like a lot of fun! Tickets are $10 and can be picked up here. The screening kicks off at 7pm. In the meantime check out the trailer below.

In connection with the awesome From Asbury Park to the Promised Land: The Life and Music of Bruce Springsteen exhibit, the National Constitution Center is hosting a special screening of The Promise: The Making of Darkness on the Edge of Town on Wednesday, March 14th.

In the 90 minute documentary, Emmy award winning filmmaker Thom Zimmy follows Bruce and the E Street Band through the entire process of making the album.

According to the NCC, the “documentary debuted at the Toronto International Film Festival in 2010 and combines rare archival footage of Springsteen and the E Street Band shot between 1976 and 1978, including home rehearsals and studio sessions, shots of young Springsteen and Steve Van Zandt at the piano, as well as interviews with Springsteen, band members, manager Jon Landau, former manager Mike Appel, and others closely involved in the making of the classic album.”

Tickets to the screening are $20… and while that might seem like a steep price, admission also includes access to the Springsteen exhibit. You can score tickets via the Constitution Center’s official website.

The Promise: The Making of Darkness on the Edge of Town @ the NCC
Wednesday, March 14th, 5pm

National Constitution Center
525 Arch Street (19106)
(215) 409-6600
www.constitutioncenter.org

I may not be the biggest Will Ferrell fan, but I will give the man this… unlike most actors/comedians in Hollywood he is not afraid to take some chances and do some strange and interesting things for art. From doing surreal dramas to localized beer commercials, Ferrell seems to somehow keep people guessing as to what eccentric project he will come up with next.

Speaking of which, his newest film Casa De Mi Padre opens Friday March 16th is definitely one of the more interesting projects to be added to that list. The film, which appears to be mostly in Spanish with English subtitles looks heavily influenced by overly dramatic telenovelas.

The film stars Ferrell as Armando Alvarez a ranch hand who has worked on his father’s ranch his entire life. When the ranch encounters financial difficulties, his wealthy younger brother comes in to save the day with his beautiful fiancé… only his business dealings turn out to be less than legit and somehow pits them in a war with Mexican drug lords.

Want to check out Casa De Mi Padre on Monday, March 12th at the Ritz East? Simply comment with your favorite Will Ferrell comedy by Saturday March 10th. 25 people will be chosen at random to check out the film for free! Check out the trailer below.

TCM, one of the finest channels on basic cable, will be making a stop in Philadelphia on its Road to Hollywood Tour. The tour is a build up for its “TCM Classic Film Festival” that will be held in Hollywood April 12-15th. TCM will be holding a free screening via an archival 35mm print of the 1959 Hitchcock classic North By Northwest at our very own Prince Music Theater introduced by TCM host Ben Mankiewicz and actress Eva Marie Saint.

Tickets are free and can be picked up here. I am a huge fan of TCM and honestly cant wait for this screening! Check out the trailer below!

Medium Rare Cinema, who were doing shows over at Mt. Airy’s Video Library, have now relocated and are now doing shows at Philly’s own Broad Street Ministry in Center City. Their first show at the new venue will be a screening of Burn! starring Marlon Brando. In the film Brando stars as a mercenary who deliberately instigates a slave revolt on an island in the Caribbean so he profit off the resulting improved sugar trade.

If you’re not familiar with Medium Rare Cinema their M.O. is they show cuts of films that are usually created for the screenings themselves, that didn’t exist before. When Burn! was originally released in the US in 1970, United Artists cut 20 minutes of political material for fear of alienating the Spanish government. The version being screened will have that footage re-inserted.

The screening will take place this Saturday, March 3rd at 6pm and tickets are a mere $5 and you can get more info here.  There will also be prizes and a post film discussion.

For 15 years now the First Glance Film Festival of Philadelphia has been giving movies by graduates, undergraduate and complete rookies a venue to show what they are capable of and how creative they can get with a movie camera.

Well, it’s that time again as the First Glance Film Festival has thrown the doors open and have begun looking for submissions for the 2012 festival. Categories include almost anything and everything you can think of, including documentaries, feature films, animation, science-fiction, horror, music videos and more. Not only will all selected films get both digital and theatrical distribution, but some films will actually be screened in Las Vegas in 2013.

Add in the cash prizes and the sheer joy of seeing a movie you made on the big screen, and why wouldn’t you go out and try your hand at film making. The early deadline is March 15th and the regular deadline is April 15th. Check out the website for all the particulars and get going! The next Godfather or Sixth Sense or Wrestler isn’t going to make itself.

First Glance Film Festival
www.firstglancefilms.com

For this week’s Geek of the Week I got to spend of a few minutes with one of my favorite Philly film geeks, Lansing Sylvia the Director of Development over at the Philadelphia Film Society. I first got to know Lansie during the 20th Philadelphia Film Festival where she helped me co-ordinate some of the great content and contests for Geekadelphia.

For it being her first year she really brought a fresh passion and perspective that I feel was really missing from the festival, and I look forward to see what she brings to the Film Society in the years to come. I hope you enjoy our little chat about all things Philly film.

Most of our readers will probably know you as the voice of the Philadelphia Film Society’s Twitter, so what exactly do you do at the Film Society and how did you land that gig in the first place?

I haven’t been able to do the Twitter as much as before.

So what I do at the Film Society is I am the Director of Development, which is philanthropic foundational individual and corporate giving. So what that means is I am partially responsible for keeping the lights on.

How I got the gig is I got my masters in non profit leadership and one of my professors had just joined the board of the Film Society, so she knew they were looking for someone with development and marketing experience. She also knew I wanted to stay in Philly, so she recommended me to Andrew our executive director who met with me and I was hired about four or five weeks after I graduated.

What is it like working with an organization like the Philadelphia Film Society?

One of the things I am constantly amazed at is how tiny the Philadelphia Film Society is, the year round staff is like 6 people and we have a great seasonal staff that comes in as well.  Working in such a small environment, its like working in a family. It really honestly is.

Everyone plays a role and those roles always change.  That is the best thing but it is also the most challenging.

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Can’t wait for eX-Fest in April? Nope, neither can I. Well the folks over at Exhumed Films are going to tide you over with a great exploitation double feature featuring the great Redneck Hicksploitation film Redneck Miller and the grindhouse classic The Candy Snatchers.

While The Candy Snatchers is readily available to the average cinephile Redneck Miller is a not available on DVD or VHS and is well worth the price of admission alone. This film was originally a break out selection of Quentin Tarantno’s Farewell tribute to the original Alamo Drafthouse in Austin back in 2007. You can read a great little review on aint-it-cool-news here. I caught Redneck at eX-Fest last year and it was by far my favorite film of the night.

As usual the showing will take place at the iHouse in Philadelphia on 35mm and will be a mere $15 for admission. Head here for more info here. See you there!