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| Ebertfest Blog: Entry 2--Spall & Sewell Are Awake! |
by Peter Sobczynski
The first day of Ebertfest kicks things off with an epic movie, a few weird questions and a discussion lasting long into the night.
As Chaz Ebert welcomed the crowd gathered for the opening night of this year’s Ebertfest, she admitted that the feeling in the air was “a little melancholy”--much of that due to the unexpected absence of Roger Ebert as the result of a broken hip (ironically sustained while down at the Pritikin Center in Florida to build up his strength and energy to attend the festival in the first place) but perhaps part of it due to this year’s kickoff selection, Kenneth Branagh’s wildly ambitious and four-hour-long full-text adaptation of that most melancholy of dramas, William Shakespeare’s “Hamlet.” And yet, that sense of melancholy never really took hold--thanks to the combination of the support for Ebert from everyone in the Virginia Theater, the presence of a couple of great guests, one expected (Timothy Spall) and one a surprise (Rufus Sewell) and the opportunity to see an already-impressive film in the visual grandeur of 70mm, everyone in the theater was instead feeling a sense of excitement and elation that never once waned, not even as the post-film discussion stretched out to 1:00 AM.
The festivities kicked off as Chaz Ebert welcomed everyone to the festival and promised that the next five days would be an exciting time for everyone. She then asked for everyone in the theater to send positive thoughts Roger’s way and while she didn’t go so far as to promise anything about a possible appearance from the man of the hour, she did make the observation that “the festival is five days long and you know Roger. . .” This was enough to excite the crowd on its own, but Chaz followed it up with another thrill when she announced that in addition to Timothy Spall, the acclaimed British actor who played Rosencrantz in the film, the post-screening Q&A would also include fellow co-star Rufus Sewell (who also starred in a previous Ebertfest favorite, “Dark City.”). Sitting a couple of rows down in the very front row (the perfect place to watch a four-hour film, naturally), there was this high-school girl who was already extraordinarily excited at the thought of being able to see Timothy Spall in the flesh. When they announced that Sewell was there as well, she looked as though she might literally go into hysterics. (At this point, I suppose that I should mention that it was around this time that I realized that I left my camera back in the motel room by mistake.)
After film scholar David Bordwell came out to introduce both the film and the 70mm process that we were about to experience (in comparing the visual astonishments of the format with those of the digital video stuff that is all the rage with the kids, he snorted “Who cares about pixels? We’re looking at molecules here!”), the film finally began. I have already gone into the artistic merits of the film in previous articles on this year’s festival, so I won’t bother recapping them here except to make the following observations.
1. Seeing “Hamlet” for the first time in its intended 70mm format since its original 1996 release, I was once again struck by what an incredible-looking film it is. The depth and precision of the image afforded by the format is simply staggering and when you combine it with the equally impressive central set that most of the action is based in and around, the result is one of the most visually astonishing films ever made.
2. Although some of the brief star turns by famous faces in the film are as distracting as they have always been (Jack Lemmon and Robin Williams are the worst offenders because they retain their familiar tics and mannerisms to such a degree that we can only see them and not the characters they are playing), Charlton Heston’s performance as the Player King was even more impressive than I remembered it. Instead of reaching for the rafters, as Branagh does in their main scene together, he creates a nuanced and beautifully modulated performance that shifts from the operatic to the reserved with such skill and dexterity that you never notice him shifting those gears. This film features any number of excellent and world-acclaimed actors--so many that even the briefest roles feature the likes of John Gielgud and Judi Dench--but with the possible exception of Kate Winslet, whose turn as Ophelia is pretty much definitive, Heston’s may actually be the best of the bunch.
3. Speaking of Winslet, is it wrong to think that she manages to look incredibly gorgeous even while being clad in an old-timey straightjacket during her big breakdown scene? If so, I would just like it to be known that I never want to be right.
After the film came to its conclusion, with bodies littering the floors of Elsinore and Richard Attenborough monologue, the audience was treated to a welcome bit of nostalgia in the form of an old “Siskel & Ebert” clip of them reviewing the film back in 1996--naturally, they both loved it but it turns out that Siskel felt the same way about Jack Lemmon that I do. (They also make reference to a 2 ½-hour version of the film that was supposedly being prepared for a general theatrical release as most theaters in 1996 weren’t equipped to handle70mm--does anyone out there know if this ever came to pass?) When that ended, Spall and Sewell came out on stage and after being presented with the Golden Thumb awards that all first-time guests receive for appearing on the Ebertfest stage (and yes, I did get one last year when I was part of the discussion for “Beyond the Valley of the Dolls”--I like to claim that it was the first finger I received from Ebert since I suggested to him that his review of “Raising Arizona” might be in error), sat down with Bordwell and moderator Ed Tracy to talk about the film and their careers for the next hour or so. Among the highlights of that conversation:
1. Although Sewell appears as Fortinbrass throughout the film, it turns out that all of his scenes were shot over the course of one day. Although the piecemeal approach caused Sewell to admit that he was afraid that what he was shooting seemed to be like “a very advanced Duran Duran video,” he admitted that he was lured to the project when Branagh promised him that “I’ll put you on a great horse in shining armor and make you look like a god and you’ll share a trailer with Jack Lemmon.”
2. Spall talked about the all-star casting and how it helped to improve the film by fleshing out characters that have often been given the short shrift in the past. According to him, “every character that turns up thinks that the film is about them.” He also talked about the thrill of watching Charlton Heston perform and told a story about Heston advising him on putting on makeup while Spall was thinking “This is , like, God’s mate!”
3. Spall also revealed that because he was only paying his actors a minimal wage that was far below their usual performance fees, Branagh offered to pay for the gasoline required to get them to the location. Unfortunately, one of the actors (not named) flew in from San Francisco on a private jet and the cost of that round of fueling was more than the person was paid for their actual acting services.
4. The oddest question during the Q&A period, possibly as the result of punchiness from the extremely late hour, came from a guy who started things off by saying that he didn’t like the that much because he felt that was too oratorical (of course, criticizing a Shakespeare adaptation for being too oratorical is kind of like criticizing “Smokey and the Bandit” for having too many car chases), then somehow compared the film unfavorably to the more reserved acting style of Peter Fonda in “Easy Rider,” a character who could barely formulate an entire sentence, and wound things up by deploying the phrase “close-up of the facial,” an expression that one ordinarily doesn’t hear in polite mixed company, especially so close in tandem to the likes of Peter Fonda.
  
Day 2 of Ebertfest will kick off at 9:30 AM (everyone will no doubt be well-rested and daisy-fresh) with a panel discussion at the University of Illinois’ Illini Union on the topic of “What Does the Future Hold for Independent Film?” The movies start with Tom DiCillo’s “Delirious,” a dark satire featuring Steve Buscemi as a sleazy paparazzi who blows his big chance to insinuate himself in the big leagues when a homeless kid (Michael Pitt) that he took pity on and made his unpaid assistant becomes an overnight celebrity and the new boyfriend of a Britney-like pop tart. Next up is Sally Potter’s “Yes,” a strange romantic drama in which Joan Allen, Sam Neill and Simon Abkarian enact the story of a bored scientist who strays from her husband into the arms of a man who was a surgeon in Lebanon and is now a cook in London through a screenplay in which all the dialogue is written in iambic pentameter. The day winds up with “Canvas,” a drama starring Joe Pantoliano and Marcia Gay Harden about a family struggling to cope in the face of mental illness. This film will be preceded by “Citizen Cohl: The Untold Story,” a short film tribute to the late Dusty Cohl, the co-founder of the Toronto International Film Festival and an Ebertfest fixture almost.
Previous Entries In The Ebertfest Blog
EBERTFEST 2008: ROMANCE, CIGARETTES AND THE HULK? YES, I'M DELIRIOUS!
EBERTFEST BLOG: DAY 1--WAIT, I'M DOING A BLOG?
link directly to this feature at http://hollywoodbitchslap.com/feature.php?feature=2466
originally posted: 04/24/08 04:27:11
last updated: 04/24/08 09:07:41
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