6 Responses to “CARLA GUGINO SAYS BRIAN DE PALMA IS NOT JUST A VISUAL DIRECTOR”

1. harry georgatos
   January 14th, 2011 at 3:45 pm

   For the last 12 years I’ve been waiting for an extended cut of the alternate ending of SNAKE EYES to appear on DVD or preferably Blu-Ray but no one at the studio has done a thing. With alternate endings appearing left, right and centre with so many other films SNAKE EYES would have been an obvious choice. I hated the theatrical version as the ending seemed anti-climatic. The audience would have been better served with a huge action set-piece to send audience out on a high in the same way Ethan Hunt was hanging on the roof-top of TGV bullet train in MISSION:IMPOSSIBLE. The last 30 minutes of SNAKE EYES were extremely disappointing! The first hour of the movie were extremely involving with De Palma’s hypnotic precision. For the love of God just release the alternate version on DVD and Blu-Ray!!!!

2. Hollywood Outbreak
   January 14th, 2011 at 5:52 pm

   Harry, you make a very good point regarding Mission: Impossible in relation to Snake Eyes’ ending. De Palma said that he decided to cut it out because it just didn’t work.
   However, with Gugino’s recent comments, I’d love to see how the Tidal Wave Sequence in an Extended Cut of the picture. I totally didn’t hate the movie like you did, but
   I tend to be a total De Palma apologist..I pretty much love everything he does. I think he put himself in a big creative hole since, like you said, the first hour was completely involving. How does one live up to that? I watch tons of movies for my job, but for some reason I always come back to De Palma’s movies - I just love his visual compositions, his use of music…and that sense of heightened reality (I’m stealing from a Gugino phrase) that he brings to his work. For me, his movies have always been about manipulating the audience…I think he loves saying that the camera lies 24 times a second. Neways..yes..Paramount must release SNAKE EYES on Blu-ray w/ that Tidal Wave scene…just heard that Criterion is releasing BLOW OUT on Blu-ray in April…very psyched for that…

3. harry georgatos
   January 16th, 2011 at 5:41 pm

   I would love to see all of De Palma’s movies released on Blu-Ray. I have all of De Palma’s films on DVD except for MURDER A LA MOD. It’s the only film of De Palma I have never seen. It’s never been released threatrically, on VHS or DVD in my home country of Australia. I’ve looked on Amazon.com but it has been deleted. Like you I am a big De Palma fan from his guerrilla filmmaking with GREETINGS and it’s sequel Hi,MOM!. De Palma’s great period began with SISTERS, PHANTOM OF THE PARADISE, OBSESSION, CARRIE, THE FURY, DRESSED TO KILL (his one true masterpiece) BLOW OUT, SCARFACE, BODY DOUBLE, THE UNTOUCHABLES, CASUALTIES OF WAR and his last great film in CARLITO’S WAY. I would have loved RAISING CAIN, because it’s pure visual De Palma, but the cops are too simplistically portrayed. THE BONFIRE movie is an extremely damaged movie with the characters too cartoonish. De Palma wanted a 3 hour movie and 2 days before principal photography was forced by the studio to rip out 40 to 50 pages. The film has a technical fascination but is not the film that does justice to the book. MISSION:IMPOSSIBLE is a travesty of screenwriting with an appalling plot for undemanding 15 year old kids. The premise doesn’t ring true. CIA would not implicate Ethan unless they had all dead bodies. Unless Phelps and Claire’s bodies were on a morgue slab Ethan would not be implicated. Period! The only reason why the film works on a certain level is because of De Palma’s skilled direction. After seeing what Christopher Nolan did with INCEPTION, MISSION:IMPOSSIBLE should have been that great! All De Palma films have a hypnotic fascination in the way they are put together but his films after CARLITO’S WAY have failed to capture my imagination as THE FURY, BLOW OUT, DRESSED TO KILL, SCARFACE etc. I’ve always wanted to see De Palma make THE DEMOLISHED MAN as his style of filmmaking is more suited to this type of sci-fi filmmaking. De Palma is a natural born filmmaker. Somehow I think Christopher Nolan is todays elite filmmaker as everyone of his films are put together by a professor of film language. TOYER should be vintage De Palma. My fingers are crossed.

4. Hollywood Outbreak
   January 20th, 2011 at 9:26 am

   That’s correct..re: Mission: Impossible tons of plot holes. Raising Cain is my favorite DePalma film (granted, it is not his “Best”) movie…so many of his personal obsessions were on display w/ the film. Just wondering what you thought of Femme Fatale and The Black Dahlia. His films post-Carlito’s Way I watch mainly for his visual compositions, the compelling scores (specifically Morricone’s Mission to Mars theme and Mark Isham’s score to Black Dahlia)..my argument is if I want to see well structured storylines and stellar acting I’ll watch cable or a Mike Leigh picture. As you know, DePalma loves to manipulate his viewers and w/ his work I just love watching pure visual and aural cinema…which is why something as convoluted as Femme Fatale still appeals to me on a visceral level. Still, I agree…much of his early work, when his obsessions were coupled with inspired and twisted material, he was at his best. Heck, I’ll even forgive Bonfire of the Vanities for the movie’s opening steadicam shot. Regarding Christopher Nolan….I love his films, he reminds me a bit of Nicolas Roeg…I really dug The Prestige. But when it comes to cinematic sequences that are permanently embedded in my memory (I’m thinking of Than’s death scene in Casualties of War as I’m writing this), De Palma stands alone. Of course, you and I are probably in the minority, but all of the De Palma fans I’ve encountered over the years are usually cinephiles who understand that De Palma is so much more than an Alfred Hitchcock clone. Those assertions, to this day, continue to annoy me!!

5. harry georgatos
   January 20th, 2011 at 4:26 pm

   I agree with you when people say De Palma rips off Hitchcock. When I look at a De Palma movie I know it is distinctly a film by De Palma. People tell me De Palma with BLOW OUT rips off BLOW UP. Story-wise there’s simillarities but visually BLOW OUT is nothing like BLOW UP! FEMME FATALE is a throwback to his early films, but I thought De Palma uses conventional devices in creating an alternate reality. FEMME FATALE is no match to what David Lynch did in MULHOLLAND DRIVE which I consider a masterpiece. Still FEMME FATALE has all of De Palma’s stylistic tricks with the split-screen, the use of the diopter lens, the long crane tracking shots, the use of the sudden triple cuts, the process shots. Story-wise when it comes down to it is a pretty conventional morality tale with a labyrinthine plot structure. Rebecca Romin Stamos is no match as a femme fatale when one compares her to Linda Fiorentino’s dynamite performance in THE LAST SEDUCTION. That would have to be the definitve femma fatale at this point in time. FEMME FATALE is more of a film for fans of the director. THE BLACK DAHLIA is a masterful piece of direction with impressive set-pieces, especially the set-piece where Aaron Eckhart meets his demise. De Palma in THE BLACK DAHLIA uses multiple different points-of-view, as he has done in other films of his (mainly SNAKE EYES). THE BLACK DAHLIA would have to be the most convoluted plot De Palma has worked with and requires multiple viewings. I still think Curtis Hanson’s LA CONFIDENTIAL has high-powered performances that THE BLACK DAHLIA can’t match. The star of THE BLACK DAHLIA is De Palma’s skilled direction of a noirish Los Angeles that reminded me of Batman’s Gotham City and it’s seedy characters. Fiona Shaw at the climax badly overacts and the plot conclusions seem mechanical. Still I see many good qualities in THE BLACK DAHLIA. As for MISSION TO MARS when I first saw it I was dismayed at the lack of story and cheesy dialogue. Watching it over on DVD I’ve grown to like it even more. It’s an ode to space travel of ’50’s optimism and may very well be the best B space movie made. It has complex space travel set-pieces executed with hypnotic precision with a score that brings an emotional humanist quality. Still I would rather see De Palma direct the sci-fi mindbender THE DEMOLISHED MAN as I believe it would bring him back the box-office glory of MISSION:IMPOSSIBLE and THE UNTOUCHABLES. For me Christopher Nolan is the elite filmmaker on the world stage today. All of his films are masterpieces with his no-budget FOLLOWING onto THE PRESTIGE, which is put together by a filmmaking magician. The biggest magic trick in the film was the plot which makes Nolan the real magician.

6. harry georgatos
   January 21st, 2011 at 4:04 pm

   CASUALTIES OF WAR is a powerful anti-war movie. Than’s death set-piece would have to be one of the most inspired piece of direction and editing I have seen with a passionate and moving score that emphasises the inhumanity to what’s happing to Than. The use of the split-diopter lens in this sequence highlights Michael J Fox heplessnes as Than is being repeatedly stabbed. The cinematography of the beautiful Vietnamese countyside is seductive as the horrors of American bombs destroy the natural landscape. The psychology that De Palma uses to explore why American soldiers rape and murder this girl is the knowledge of being blown up at any time with boredom leading to sexual frustration. This is the same psychology De Palma uses in his Iraq film REDACTED. REDACTED is more of a film for the film festival crowd as this type of film that criticizes American foreign policy was always going to fail at the box-office. The extreme Right in the United States wanted De Palma incacerated for giving aid and comfort to the terrorists. The subject matter of REDACTED is part of honest and legitimate cinema. One can’t tell a filmmaker they can’t explore the psychology of why American soldiers would turn to the dark side and commit these crimes. REDACTED at the end of day is just not that good of a film. It comes off as news journalism and does not have movie stars like Sean Penn or Michael J Fox to get some type of audience. I’m no fan of digital photography but the medium gives an immediacy to what’s happening in that country. The second half of the film has some tedious exchange of dialogue that tests the patience. At times the film is very rough around the edges. De Palma had a limited budget but the film needed to have being as well crafted as THE HURT LOCKER to have found some type of audience. REDACTED apparently had a lot redacting done to De Palma’s script as lawyers were telling De Palma he can’t show this or that. Like I said the film is very rough around the edges during the second half of the film but needed to be more acessible for a mainstream audience if De Palma wanted to get his message across. Somehow with REDACTED I think De Palma wanted to get back to his early roots of GREETINGS and Hi,MOM!