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Written by Matthew Toomey

Created: 03 August 2010

Where Have All The Movies Gone?

When I wrote my review this week for The Special Relationship, I realised just how quiet this year has been at the movies.  In the first 6 months of the year, just 96 films were released in Brisbane cinemas.  Over the same period of time, I’d seen 109 films in 2009 and 117 in 2008.  I had to go as far back as 2003 to find a quieter year – just 93 films in all.

I try to see every movie that’s showing.  Maybe I’m an obsessive compulsive but I like to give every film a chance and sometimes I’m pleasantly surprised.  An example from this week would be Step 3D – definitely better than I thought it’d be.  What I’m trying to say is that maybe I should be taking 2010 as a blessing.  With 21 less films than in 2008, that’s about 42 hours that I’ve been able to spend on other things.  Don’t ask me what those things are.  The time has slipped away too quickly.

But I’m left asking myself… why the shortfall in movies?

My initial reaction is that we’ve been inundated with blockbusters and cinema owners are a little risk averse when it comes to trying smaller films.   When you see the numbers thrown up by films like Inception, Twilight and Toy Story 3, it makes sense.  These films have been huge.  People flock to them on opening weekend and there are many sold out sessions.  They are taking up a bigger slice of the screens at big multiplexes such as Event Cinemas.

With all the marketing and hype for the blockbusters, it’s almost impossible to market other films.  Films that struggled to find an audience in the US and the UK aren’t finding their way to Australia (many are going straight to video instead).

What’s also interesting is that cinemas like the Palace and the Dendy (often synonymous with independent cinema) are showing more and more commercial product.  At the Dendy this week, you can see Killers, Inception, Knight & Day and Step Up 3D.  At the Palace Barracks, you can see the same four films.  Yes, they do show a few smaller films (which is great) but are they showing as many as they once did?  I can’t confirm that for sure but I’ve got a hunch (based on the numbers mentioned above).  I can’t really blame them either – it’s great to create a niche market but it’s hard to turn away the large percentage of the public who are prepared to pay to see films like Killers and Step Up 3D.

I’m not really making a point.  It’s more of an observation.  I’m not sure if I want to see more movies in cinemas.  It would be great to have more variety but perhaps that’s not possible – both in terms of quality and commerciality.  I’m going to be following the trend over the next few months to see if it starts to turn back around.  I might also pose the question to a few cinema owners if I get the chance.

Other News

To quickly race through other news, the Palace Centro and Palace Barracks in Brisbane now have their own Twitter feed.  You can find out about special events by following them right here - https://twitter.com/palacebrisbane.

Inception is still powering on at the box-office.  It’s been number 1 in the United States for three consecutive weeks and has now taken $193.3m.  Here in Australia, it also held up well in its second week with just a 19% drop-off.  It’s posted $16.3m over its first 11 days.  Great to see.  I'm also enjoying the hits on my Inception review through the Rotten Tomatoes website - over 3,700 and still counting!  Some good publicity for The Film Pie.

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Written by Matthew Toomey

Created: 26 July 2010

Inception

Inception continues to be the film on everyone’s tongues.  We haven’t had such a buzz in the film world since Avatar came out last December.  Inception has been a trending Twitter topic for over a week and I’ve had plenty of people chime in with their own thoughts.

I know not everyone has been a fan but you have to impressed with how it has so generated discussion.  Who’d have thought an action film would require so much thought.  In my review, I said that “Inception may be the most intelligent action film you will ever see.”  It was my first thought on leaving the cinema last Wednesday and I stand by that statement.  Rotten Tomatoes has used it as my quote and it’s nice to see a few people chiming in with their comments on the link below.  My review has had over 1,500 hits to date so I’m quietly chuffed.

Matt's Inception Review On Rotten Tomatoes 

I saw the film for a second time on Friday night and I stand by my review.  I picked up much more on the second viewing (particularly with the opening).  I mentioned it my review but even watching it a second time, the two best scenes are still (1) Joseph Gordon Levitt’s hallway fight sequences, and (2) the very last scene.  I couldn’t wait to hear the audience gasp once again.  Christopher Nolan, you are a genius.

I’ve perused numerous forums on the internet looking for interpretations and explanations.  I’m fairly happy with the conclusion I’ve reached but I’m tempted to watch it one more time to see if I can pick up anything else.  For the record, there are only two films which I’ve seen more than twice in the cinemas – Romeo & Juliet (the version with Leo and Claire) and Billy Elliot.

The box-office in the United States illustrates that word of mouth is strong.  Inception took in $43m during its second week for a total of $143m in its first 10 days.  That’s only a 31% drop from its opening weekend – a very impressive feat.  Even more astonishing was that it held off the new Angelia Jolie thriller Salt (which has had good reviews).

I have a general rule that a film here in Australia will make about 1/10^th of what it does in the U.S.  Inception opened a little stronger than that with a healthy $7.4m opening weekend in Australia.  I suspect it too will hold up next weekend as word spreads.

Inception does mark my first A+ of the year and my first since January 2009 (The Wrestler).  No film is flawless but this one is close enough to warrant that grading.  You can hear me passionately speak about with Spencer Howson on last week’s 612ABC show by clicking on the link below.

612ABC Podcast - Reviewing Inception

If you haven’t seen it yet, be sure you do!

2010 Toomey Awards

I announced the nominees four weeks ago and the time has come to reveal the winners of my 2010 Toomey Awards.  It’s the 11^th time that I’ve produced this list and it’s the 11^th time that I’ve agreed with all the winners (since I am the only voting member).

It was very tough trying to pick some of the categories (best film was tricky indeed) but the films and performances that I’d like to honour from the past 12 months can be viewed by clicking below.

Winners Of 2010 Toomey Awards

You can go back over the last ten years and look at all the previous winners with this link.

Winners Of Toomey Awards - 2000 to 2010

That’ll do it from me for another week.

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Written by Matthew Toomey

Created: 19 July 2010

Here Comes Inception!

There’s no full length review attached to this week’s Film Pie e-newsletter.  I’m holding off until I see the media preview on Wednesday night.  The Australian critics have already seen it in Sydney and Melbourne but we’re waiting a little longer up here in Brisbane.

I don’t think I’ve been as excited about a film since Avatar.  There’s been a lot of hype (given the reputation of Christopher Nolan) but since most of the early reviews have been sensational, it looks like it’s going to be incredible.

Here’s a sampling of some of the comments on Twitter from a few Sydney / Melbourne critics who have already seen the film –

“INCEPTION is the most awesomely complex & clever film I've watched in a long time. You'll be unpicking it forever...” – Marc Fennell

“I very rarely give a film 5 stars (that's a classic for the ages rating) but after writing my INCEPTION review I'm leaning towards doing so.” – Thomas Caldwell

“Inception: if there's a better blockbuster this year I'll eat my hat in somebody else's dream within a dream within a dream.” – Luke Buckmaster

“INCEPTION was quite incredible. Fear not, I shan't spoil. So glad someone's doing intelligent, original work at a blockbuster level.” – Lee Zachariah

Even the tough to please Jeffrey Wells from the U.S. gave it an endorsement – “It definitely comes together with a second viewing while the things you enjoyed the first time are agreeably underlined and intensified. My ambiguous feelings about Chris Nolan's epic have now been significantly lessened. I am pretty much in the boat now. Faraci was more right than Scott. Inception is dense and challenging, but a masterpiece of its kind.”

And of course, the grand master of film criticism, Roger Ebert summed it up as follows – “The movie is a perplexing labyrinth without a simple through-line, and is sure to inspire truly endless analysis on the web.”

I must close with my friend Sam Dagan in London who posted this on my Facebook wall – “I saw Inception. I guess a B+. I left the cinema thinking it was thought provoking, but I didn't want to think anymore after 2.5+ hours. Perhaps they were trying to plant a seed and then after... F***! I'm still thinking about it.”

The film officially opens on Thursday and you’ll be able to see it (multiple times) from then on.

Welcome To The World Of Rotten Tomatoes

One of my favourite film websites is Rotten Tomatoes.  If you’re not familiar, it collates all the reviews of the world’s leading film critics.  It posts a single quote from their review and links through to the full text if you want to see it.

Most importantly, it summarises each critic’s opinion as either “fresh” or “rotten”.  It then expresses this as a percentage.  This tells you what percentage of critics approved of the film.

This can be very useful when looking at the general consensus of a film.  You might read a really bad review and then think twice about seeing a certain movie.  But what if that critic is in the minority?  Maybe it’s not his genre or he was having a bad day when he saw it.  Rotten Tomatoes should give you a better answer.

Toy Story 3 stands at a phenomenal 99% approval (from 225 reviews).  Inception is at 84% (from 209 reviews) – so I guess there are some who didn’t like it.  Conversely, Sex & The City 2 scored just 16% and The Bounty Hunter managed just 8% (these are my 2 worst films of the year so far).  Nice to see most other critics agree.

Anyway, it’s taken a while but I’m finally managed to knock down the wall and get accreditation for Rotten Tomatoes.  From now on, my reviews can be found through that site.  My official page is at http://au.rottentomatoes.com/author/author-13810/. 

I don’t have a photo up yet but will hopefully work on that over the next few weeks.

It’s great news for my site as well given the increased traffic through the Rotten Tomatoes link.  If I can keep coming up with some snazzy quotes, it might help get a few more people interested in what the Film Pie has to offer.

The main page at Rotten Tomatoes tells you about what’s currently showing in Australia – go to http://au.rottentomatoes.com/ to find all your review info.  But I better not plug it too hard since I still want people to visit my own site. J

Well that’s it from me.  See you next week for the winners of the 2010 Toomey Awards!

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Written by Matthew Toomey

Created: 12 July 2010

The Waiting City Q&A

Last Friday night, I was lucky enough to host a question and answer session with Australian stars Joel Edgerton (Animal Kingdom) and Radha Mitchell (Finding Neverland) at the Brisbane premiere of their new movie – The Waiting City.

I have to confess that it’s pretty cool to get such an opportunity.  I didn’t really know what to expect but I have to say that they were both really nice people.

We had about 20 minutes to have a drink before the Q&A and we spoke about everything from Dr. Patel (they hadn’t heard of him before so I thought it an opportune time to enlighten them) to an interesting experience Radha had on the set of recent movie (which is a bit too crude to mention in this blog).

I had a quick chat to Joel about Animal Kingdom and whether he knew it would be such a success.  He always thought they were making a good movie but yes, not even he could believe how good it was when he saw it for the first time.  Must be a great feeling as an actor.

You can view a picture of the three of us outside the cinema by clicking here.

The Q&A was great.  It went for almost an hour and the audience (around 200 people) had some interesting questions to ask.  It’s not my favourite film of the year but it will get people thinking and generate discussion.  The stars then snuck off for an evening of relaxation (I snuck in one more chat with Joel about Acolytes) and then jetted off the next morning.  Joel was heading back to the States and Radha was off to visit some friends at Maroochydore (a favourite holiday destination of mine).

What the whole process had me thinking about was the importance of these events for the promotion of small Australian films (well, just about every Australian film is classified as “small” these days).

The Waiting City was shot in late 2008 and premiered at the Toronto Film Festival in September 2009.  One of the reasons it has taken so long to reach our own shores was that both Joel and Radha were busy shooting other films.  They were waiting until they both had some free time so they could tour Australia and promote the film prior to its release.  The first week in July 2010 was the best time they could slot in.

Some films market themselves (aka Twilight).  Others need all the help they can get.  Brisbane was the last stop on their Australian tour.  They had visited a number of capital cities where they had Q&A sessions and numerous radio interviews.  Here in Brisbane, they had a chat with Kelly Higgins-Devine on 612ABC a few hours before coming to the premiere.  It must be tiring for the stars getting the same questions over and over again but they know the importance of it.  A poster in a handful of cinemas won’t get the job done.  They have to get out and sell the film.

If it’s good, then you’d like to hope that all the interviews and Q&A sessions will help spread the word.  That’s the plan anyway.  It doesn’t always work that way.  I recently attended a screening of an Australian film where the director was going to be in attendance to answer questions afterwards.  Just 10 people showed up for the screening and 5 left as the credits started to roll.  I too snuck away.  I wasn’t a big fan of the film and I had another one to catch.  I did feel sorry for the director though – putting your heart and soul into a movie that no one seems to care about.

Such is the reality of Australian cinema.  I’ll continue to support it however and do my best to drum up interest.  I’d rather pay to see a mediocre Australian film than a mediocre American one.  It’s crucial that our industry remains healthy and with the more films we make, the more chance there is for actors, directors, writers, cinematographers, editors, etc to find their feet and show what they’re made of.

Australian International Movie Convention

In other quick news, the Australian International Movie Convention is coming up soon on the Gold Coast.  It kicks off on August 15 and runs for approximately a week.  All the major distributors are there trying to sell their upcoming films to cinema owners.  I went along briefly for the first time last year (for the premiere of Charlie & Boots) and it was fun to see how the system works.

It promises to be a big convention this year with Tomorrow When The War Began having its Queensland premiere with a big red carpet bash on August 15.  Many stars will be there and I’ve organised an interview with director Stuart Beattie (who wrote the script for the Pirates Of The Caribbean movies). 

Three days later, Will Ferrell and Mark Whalberg will be there to promote their new film called The Other Guys.  I’m not sure who else will be popping by but it should be a pretty big convention this year with these two stars in attendance.

That’s it from me for another week.  Inception is out next Thursday (July 22) and the early critic reviews from the States are fantastic.  It’s my most anticipated film of the year and the media preview for folks such as myself is on July 21.  I can’t wait to tell you all about it!