Exclusive: For NASA’s pioneering Black astronauts, gravity wasn’t the only barrier impeding them from reaching the highest heights. They also faced another implacable force, in the form of racial bias.
National Geographic Documentary Films today announced filmmakers Lisa Cortés and Diego Hurtado de Mendoza will direct and produce The Space Race, a feature documentary “that will uncover the little-known stories of the first Black pilots, engineers and scientists to become astronauts” and the obstacles that impacted their trajectory. Frank Marshall and Tony Rosenthal of The Kennedy/Marshall Company will executive produce the film, along with Carolyn Bernstein of National Geographic Documentary Films and Leland Melvin. The project will be produced by Kennedy/Marshall’s Alexandra Bowen and Aly Parker, Diamond Docs’ Mark Monroe and independent producer Keero Birla. Monroe will also serve as the film’s writer.
Astronaut Ed Dwight is interviewed for ‘The Space Race.
National Geographic Documentary Films today announced filmmakers Lisa Cortés and Diego Hurtado de Mendoza will direct and produce The Space Race, a feature documentary “that will uncover the little-known stories of the first Black pilots, engineers and scientists to become astronauts” and the obstacles that impacted their trajectory. Frank Marshall and Tony Rosenthal of The Kennedy/Marshall Company will executive produce the film, along with Carolyn Bernstein of National Geographic Documentary Films and Leland Melvin. The project will be produced by Kennedy/Marshall’s Alexandra Bowen and Aly Parker, Diamond Docs’ Mark Monroe and independent producer Keero Birla. Monroe will also serve as the film’s writer.
Astronaut Ed Dwight is interviewed for ‘The Space Race.
- 3/31/2023
- by Matthew Carey
- Deadline Film + TV
Chai Vasarhelyi and Jimmy Chin expressed differing opinions on sharing one’s own work.
Oscar-winning Free Solo wife- and- husband directors Elizabeth Chai Vasarhelyi and Jimmy Chin debated the niceties of promoting one’s own work in a talk about their filmmaking careers - spotlighting the professional climbers who have been the subject of two of their films.
They were talking at an event in the Cph:Conference Artists & Auteurs series at Cph:Dox on March 21.
“There’s always been those athletes that were really good at self-promotion – leveraged what they did to make their career or start a business,” said Chin,...
Oscar-winning Free Solo wife- and- husband directors Elizabeth Chai Vasarhelyi and Jimmy Chin debated the niceties of promoting one’s own work in a talk about their filmmaking careers - spotlighting the professional climbers who have been the subject of two of their films.
They were talking at an event in the Cph:Conference Artists & Auteurs series at Cph:Dox on March 21.
“There’s always been those athletes that were really good at self-promotion – leveraged what they did to make their career or start a business,” said Chin,...
- 3/22/2023
- by Ben Dalton
- ScreenDaily
Chai Vasarhelyi and Jimmy Chin expressed differing opinions on sharing one’s own work.
Oscar-winning Free Solo wife- and- husband directors Elizabeth Chai Vasarhelyi and Jimmy Chin debated the niceties of promoting one’s own work in a talk about their filmmaking careers - spotlighting the professional climbers who have been the subject of two of their films.
They were talking at an event in the Cph:Conference Artists & Auteurs series at Cph:Dox on March 21.
“There’s always been those athletes that were really good at self-promotion – leveraged what they did to make their career or start a business,” said Chin,...
Oscar-winning Free Solo wife- and- husband directors Elizabeth Chai Vasarhelyi and Jimmy Chin debated the niceties of promoting one’s own work in a talk about their filmmaking careers - spotlighting the professional climbers who have been the subject of two of their films.
They were talking at an event in the Cph:Conference Artists & Auteurs series at Cph:Dox on March 21.
“There’s always been those athletes that were really good at self-promotion – leveraged what they did to make their career or start a business,” said Chin,...
- 3/22/2023
- by Ben Dalton
- ScreenDaily
Exclusive: Oscar winners Chai Vasarhelyi and Jimmy Chin and BAFTA-nominated director Natalie Hewit are boarding the National Geographic documentary Endurance (working title), the incredible story of “the epic search to find the lost ship of Antarctic explorer Sir Ernest Shackleton.”
The announcement comes almost exactly a year after Shackelton’s ship Endurance was discovered eerily intact on the Weddell Sea floor near the northernmost part of the Antarctic, more than a hundred years after the vessel sank. The Falklands Maritime Heritage Trust organized and funded the mission to find the historic wreck.
Map of the Sir Ernest Shackleton expedition in Antarctica onboard the Endurance
Shackelton and his crew of 27 set sail in late 1914 on an exploratory mission endorsed by Winston Churchill, then Britain’s First Lord of the Admiralty. The ship became trapped in sea ice, forcing the crew to quit the vessel and set up camp on an ice floe.
The announcement comes almost exactly a year after Shackelton’s ship Endurance was discovered eerily intact on the Weddell Sea floor near the northernmost part of the Antarctic, more than a hundred years after the vessel sank. The Falklands Maritime Heritage Trust organized and funded the mission to find the historic wreck.
Map of the Sir Ernest Shackleton expedition in Antarctica onboard the Endurance
Shackelton and his crew of 27 set sail in late 1914 on an exploratory mission endorsed by Winston Churchill, then Britain’s First Lord of the Admiralty. The ship became trapped in sea ice, forcing the crew to quit the vessel and set up camp on an ice floe.
- 3/21/2023
- by Matthew Carey
- Deadline Film + TV
Dog tags belonging to two members of the Band of Brothers, made famous by Stephen E. Ambrose’s book and the 2001 Steven Spielberg-Tom Hanks HBO miniseries, have been discovered in the UK 78 years after D-Day and are being spotlighted for a documentary for Dan Snow’s History Hit streamer.
Snow’s team discovered the tags belonging to Richard A. Blake and Carl Fenstermaker after digging at Aldbourne, Wiltshire, where the 101st Airborne Division, otherwise known as Dick Winters Easy Company, were stationed during World War II. The tags were found by archaeologist Richard Osgood and a team of veterans from Nightingale and Aldbourne Heritage Centre supported by Breaking Ground Heritage.
Members of the Easy Company were made famous by the Emmy-winning HBO series Band of Brothers from Spielberg and Hanks, which dramatized the experiences of the battalion and starred Damian Lewis as Winters and David Schwimmer as Captain Herbert Sobel.
Snow’s team discovered the tags belonging to Richard A. Blake and Carl Fenstermaker after digging at Aldbourne, Wiltshire, where the 101st Airborne Division, otherwise known as Dick Winters Easy Company, were stationed during World War II. The tags were found by archaeologist Richard Osgood and a team of veterans from Nightingale and Aldbourne Heritage Centre supported by Breaking Ground Heritage.
Members of the Easy Company were made famous by the Emmy-winning HBO series Band of Brothers from Spielberg and Hanks, which dramatized the experiences of the battalion and starred Damian Lewis as Winters and David Schwimmer as Captain Herbert Sobel.
- 6/6/2022
- by Max Goldbart
- Deadline Film + TV
Over 100 years after explorer Sir Ernest Shackleton’s Endurance was shipwrecked, The New York Times reported on March 9 that the ship has been discovered. The miraculous story is now set to become a NatGeo documentary.
Airing as part of the network’s “Explorer” franchise this fall, “Endurance” will chart the discovery of Sir Shackleton’s shipwrecked Endurance, which sank in the Antarctic in 1915. The ship was located at the bottom of the Weddell Sea, east of the Antarctic Peninsula, using undersea drones. The Endurance22 search expedition team had been searching for more than two weeks in a 150-square-mile area around where the 144-foot wooden ship went down. The wreck was found at a depth of 3,008 meters.
NatGeo is partnering with ABC News, Snow’s History Hit, All3Media label Little Dot Studios, and Consequential for the feature, directed by BAFTA nominee Natalie Hewit.
The Endurance initially sank in 1915 after being “crushed...
Airing as part of the network’s “Explorer” franchise this fall, “Endurance” will chart the discovery of Sir Shackleton’s shipwrecked Endurance, which sank in the Antarctic in 1915. The ship was located at the bottom of the Weddell Sea, east of the Antarctic Peninsula, using undersea drones. The Endurance22 search expedition team had been searching for more than two weeks in a 150-square-mile area around where the 144-foot wooden ship went down. The wreck was found at a depth of 3,008 meters.
NatGeo is partnering with ABC News, Snow’s History Hit, All3Media label Little Dot Studios, and Consequential for the feature, directed by BAFTA nominee Natalie Hewit.
The Endurance initially sank in 1915 after being “crushed...
- 3/9/2022
- by Samantha Bergeson
- Indiewire
The wreck of Ernest Shackleton’s ship “Endurance” has been found 107 years after it sank off the coast of Antarctica and National Geographic has been swift to commission a documentary on the subject that has fascinated the world for over a century.
National Geographic has partnered exclusively with History Hit, the SVOD and content platform co-founded by historian Dan Snow; All3Media’s Little Dot Studios and production company Consequential for a documentary detailing the successful search and discovery of one of the great lost shipwrecks of history — Ernest Shackleton’s “Endurance.”
“Endurance” left South Georgia for Antarctica on Dec. 5, 1914, carrying Shackleton and 27 other men with the goal of reaching the South Pole and crossing the continent via an overland trek. However, nearing Antarctica, the ship became trapped in pack ice and sank in 1915. The crew made it by sea to uninhabited Elephant Island before Shackleton and five men set off...
National Geographic has partnered exclusively with History Hit, the SVOD and content platform co-founded by historian Dan Snow; All3Media’s Little Dot Studios and production company Consequential for a documentary detailing the successful search and discovery of one of the great lost shipwrecks of history — Ernest Shackleton’s “Endurance.”
“Endurance” left South Georgia for Antarctica on Dec. 5, 1914, carrying Shackleton and 27 other men with the goal of reaching the South Pole and crossing the continent via an overland trek. However, nearing Antarctica, the ship became trapped in pack ice and sank in 1915. The crew made it by sea to uninhabited Elephant Island before Shackleton and five men set off...
- 3/9/2022
- by Naman Ramachandran
- Variety Film + TV
National Geographic has greenlit an epic documentary detailing the successful search and discovery of Sir Ernest Shackleton’s sunken Endurance ship near Antarctica, helmed by British historian Dan Snow.
The network has partnered with ABC News, Snow’s History Hit, All3Media label Little Dot Studios and Consequential for the feature, which will form part of Nat Geo’s Explorer series. BAFTA-nominated director Natalie Hewit is attached.
The doc will chart the successful search by the Falklands Maritime Heritage Trust for famed explorer Shackleton’s shipwrecked Endurance, which sank in 1915 near Antarctica. Miraculously, Shackleton plus 27 crew all survived following an epic journey to South Georgia to get help.
Led by Polar Geographer Dr. John Shears and Marine Archaeologist Mensun Bound aboard the South African icebreaker Agulhas II, a crew of scientists and archaeologists teamed with filmmakers and Snow to document the events in real time leading up to the discovery.
Nat...
The network has partnered with ABC News, Snow’s History Hit, All3Media label Little Dot Studios and Consequential for the feature, which will form part of Nat Geo’s Explorer series. BAFTA-nominated director Natalie Hewit is attached.
The doc will chart the successful search by the Falklands Maritime Heritage Trust for famed explorer Shackleton’s shipwrecked Endurance, which sank in 1915 near Antarctica. Miraculously, Shackleton plus 27 crew all survived following an epic journey to South Georgia to get help.
Led by Polar Geographer Dr. John Shears and Marine Archaeologist Mensun Bound aboard the South African icebreaker Agulhas II, a crew of scientists and archaeologists teamed with filmmakers and Snow to document the events in real time leading up to the discovery.
Nat...
- 3/9/2022
- by Max Goldbart
- Deadline Film + TV
Frank Hurley’s 1919 silent footage turns Sir Ernest Shackleton’s gruelling expedition into a travelogue with cute penguins
Pioneering Australian photographer and film-maker Frank Hurley was the official witness to Sir Ernest Shackleton’s gruelling expedition attempting to cross the Antarctic landmass, which lasted three years from 1914 to 1917. For most of the time the crew were utterly cut off from news of the outside world and the expedition became an epic ordeal when, on the way there, their ship (aptly named Endurance) was crushed and sunk by pack ice. Shackleton and his men were forced to journey onwards in a lifeboat in the desolate cold, finally to South Georgia, then rescued and brought by a Chilean vessel to the harbour in Valparaíso where they were accorded a hero’s welcome.
This 1919 silent movie is Hurley’s filmed record of Shackleton’s voyage and what is startling about it is its...
Pioneering Australian photographer and film-maker Frank Hurley was the official witness to Sir Ernest Shackleton’s gruelling expedition attempting to cross the Antarctic landmass, which lasted three years from 1914 to 1917. For most of the time the crew were utterly cut off from news of the outside world and the expedition became an epic ordeal when, on the way there, their ship (aptly named Endurance) was crushed and sunk by pack ice. Shackleton and his men were forced to journey onwards in a lifeboat in the desolate cold, finally to South Georgia, then rescued and brought by a Chilean vessel to the harbour in Valparaíso where they were accorded a hero’s welcome.
This 1919 silent movie is Hurley’s filmed record of Shackleton’s voyage and what is startling about it is its...
- 1/26/2022
- by Peter Bradshaw
- The Guardian - Film News
Documentary filmmaker George Butler, best known for his 1977 film Pumping Iron that raised Austrian bodybuilder Arnold Schwarzenegger to Hollywood prominence, died of pneumonia Oct. 21 at home in New Hampshire. He was 78 and his death was confirmed by his son, Desmond Butler, a Washington Post reporter.
Butler directed more than 10 films during his four-decade career. He co-directed Pumping Iron with Robert Fiore.
The son of a British Army officer, he spent his childhood in Somalia and Jamaica.
His final project, Tiger Tiger, is scheduled for next year. The film follows a big cat conservationist into the wilds of India and Bangladesh.
Butler had covered bodybuilding as a journalist in the 1970s, collaborating on a book on the subject before raising funds for the film. The film exponentially raised the profile of Schwarzenegger, who had scored just a few small TV and film roles at the time. The film depicted his training at Gold’s Gym in Venice,...
Butler directed more than 10 films during his four-decade career. He co-directed Pumping Iron with Robert Fiore.
The son of a British Army officer, he spent his childhood in Somalia and Jamaica.
His final project, Tiger Tiger, is scheduled for next year. The film follows a big cat conservationist into the wilds of India and Bangladesh.
Butler had covered bodybuilding as a journalist in the 1970s, collaborating on a book on the subject before raising funds for the film. The film exponentially raised the profile of Schwarzenegger, who had scored just a few small TV and film roles at the time. The film depicted his training at Gold’s Gym in Venice,...
- 10/30/2021
- by Bruce Haring
- Deadline Film + TV
Exclusive: Oscar-nominated filmmaker Fernando Meirelles, known for hits including The Two Popes, The Constant Gardener and City Of God, is launching a slate of environmental films in association with UK production firm Make Waves.
Four of the projects on the $20M documentary slate have already attracted talent and funding.
Meirelles himself will direct Soil, a feature-length documentary about the little-known microscopic world beneath our feet, which will reveal the revolutionary solutions that could help avert a planetary food crisis.
The “flagship” film on the slate is Blue Carbon, which will be directed by BAFTA and Emmy-winning filmmaker Nicolas Brown (Serengeti Rules). With 2021 Grammy-nominated DJ Jayda G as its protagonist, the feature will spotlight a movement to grow an ocean forest across the planet to help combat climate change. The film will weave together stories of ocean activists, scientists and frontline communities, and will feature music from Brazilian samba artist Seu Jorge...
Four of the projects on the $20M documentary slate have already attracted talent and funding.
Meirelles himself will direct Soil, a feature-length documentary about the little-known microscopic world beneath our feet, which will reveal the revolutionary solutions that could help avert a planetary food crisis.
The “flagship” film on the slate is Blue Carbon, which will be directed by BAFTA and Emmy-winning filmmaker Nicolas Brown (Serengeti Rules). With 2021 Grammy-nominated DJ Jayda G as its protagonist, the feature will spotlight a movement to grow an ocean forest across the planet to help combat climate change. The film will weave together stories of ocean activists, scientists and frontline communities, and will feature music from Brazilian samba artist Seu Jorge...
- 3/17/2021
- by Andreas Wiseman
- Deadline Film + TV
Every so often, we need a gripping seafaring-disaster song, and that time has come. While shipwrecks have never been at the top of any pop songwriter’s checklist, they’ve nonetheless set sail every so often in the rock era, dating back at least to Gordon Lightfoot’s Number One hit “The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald” and the late Harry Chapin’s “Dance Band on the Titanic.” More recently, the Decemberists’ perversely jaunty “The Mariner’s Revenge Song” added a grim new twist — the tale of two survivors of...
- 1/12/2021
- by David Browne
- Rollingstone.com
Shane Warne.
Fourteen documentary projects – spanning a feature film about Shane Warne, a Vr project that traverses the historical expedition of Ernest Shackleton, to a short about Australia’s femme and butch scene in the 1950s – will share in $2.1 million of production funding from Screen Australia.
Twelve projects funded through the Producer Program, and two through the Commissioned Program.
Screen Australia head of documentary Bernadine Lim said,:“This is an exciting lineup of projects telling uniquely Australian stories across science, social issues, modern legends and even big cats, through different formats and media. It’s fantastic to support three co-productions which open up the teams to international opportunities in financing as well as audience reach.”
“The past few months have presented several challenges for the sector but it’s been great to see that many documentary projects have been able to continue production in some form, and we’re...
Fourteen documentary projects – spanning a feature film about Shane Warne, a Vr project that traverses the historical expedition of Ernest Shackleton, to a short about Australia’s femme and butch scene in the 1950s – will share in $2.1 million of production funding from Screen Australia.
Twelve projects funded through the Producer Program, and two through the Commissioned Program.
Screen Australia head of documentary Bernadine Lim said,:“This is an exciting lineup of projects telling uniquely Australian stories across science, social issues, modern legends and even big cats, through different formats and media. It’s fantastic to support three co-productions which open up the teams to international opportunities in financing as well as audience reach.”
“The past few months have presented several challenges for the sector but it’s been great to see that many documentary projects have been able to continue production in some form, and we’re...
- 6/3/2020
- by jkeast
- IF.com.au
Anna Marsh, the newly appointed CEO of leading European film and TV group Studiocanal, comes off as self-contained and mild-mannered, but her bullish track record at the company and relationships with big-name producers such as David Heyman (“Once Upon a Time in Hollywood”) and Andrew Rona (“Non-Stop”) suggests she has an iron fist in that velvet glove.
A 12-year Studiocanal veteran, Marsh — who replaced Didier Lupfer as chief executive — knows the company inside out. She started managing international sales in her early 30s, then became executive VP of distribution and, later, managing director of the banner’s U.K. subsidiary. At 40, the sophisticated New Zealand-born, France-educated Marsh now ranks as one of Europe’s most powerful executives in the industry, and one of the continent’s few women in a top leadership position in entertainment.
Marsh has succeeded in “striking distribution deals and built relationships with creative talent and with every platform and every studio,...
A 12-year Studiocanal veteran, Marsh — who replaced Didier Lupfer as chief executive — knows the company inside out. She started managing international sales in her early 30s, then became executive VP of distribution and, later, managing director of the banner’s U.K. subsidiary. At 40, the sophisticated New Zealand-born, France-educated Marsh now ranks as one of Europe’s most powerful executives in the industry, and one of the continent’s few women in a top leadership position in entertainment.
Marsh has succeeded in “striking distribution deals and built relationships with creative talent and with every platform and every studio,...
- 2/13/2020
- by Elsa Keslassy
- Variety Film + TV
Tom Hardy will soon return to the big screen as Eddie Brock in a sequel to his 2018 hit Venom, but he’s also planning to head south in a new survival thriller. Hardy will star in a biopic of Ernest Shackleton, the legendary polar explorer who, after a disastrous crash in the Antarctic, led his […]
The post ‘Shackleton’: Tom Hardy to Play the Famous Polar Explorer in New Biopic appeared first on /Film.
The post ‘Shackleton’: Tom Hardy to Play the Famous Polar Explorer in New Biopic appeared first on /Film.
- 2/8/2020
- by Ben Pearson
- Slash Film
Tom Hardy isn’t the most prolific actor in Hollywood today. Outside of his TV run on “Taboo,” the actor’s most recent film output is 2018’s “Venom.” So, when the actor attaches himself to a project, we tend to pay attention.
Read More: ‘Venom 2’ Director Andy Serkis Has “Very Clear Ideas” For The Sequel & Confirms Tom Hardy Is Helping With The New Script
According to Variety, Hardy has a new acting project lined up in a film titled “Shackleton.” The film, produced by Heyday Films, is a biopic about Sir Ernest Shackleton, who was an Irish explorer that is most famous for leading three separate journeys through Antarctica in the early 20th Century.
Continue reading Tom Hardy To Star In New Biopic About Explorer Ernest Shackleton at The Playlist.
Read More: ‘Venom 2’ Director Andy Serkis Has “Very Clear Ideas” For The Sequel & Confirms Tom Hardy Is Helping With The New Script
According to Variety, Hardy has a new acting project lined up in a film titled “Shackleton.” The film, produced by Heyday Films, is a biopic about Sir Ernest Shackleton, who was an Irish explorer that is most famous for leading three separate journeys through Antarctica in the early 20th Century.
Continue reading Tom Hardy To Star In New Biopic About Explorer Ernest Shackleton at The Playlist.
- 2/7/2020
- by Charles Barfield
- The Playlist
The British branch of the production outfit will partner with Heyday Movies to make the biopic about the legendary polar explorer. StudioCanal is to produce a film about legendary polar explorer Sir Ernest Shackleton in collaboration with David Heyman’s Heyday Films, one of the production companies involved in the Best Picture Oscar contenders Once Upon a Time… in Hollywood and Marriage Story. Venom star Tom Hardy has been attached to the project. Penned by Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy scriptwriter Peter Straughan, Shackleton will further the collaboration between Heyday Movies and StudioCanal. The firms previously collaborated on Paddington and have Marc Munden’s forthcoming The Secret Backyard in the pipeline, as well as an adaptation of Pippi Longstocking, the beloved character created by legendary Swedish scribe Astrid Lindgren. StudioCanal has been attached to the project for four years and is set to finance the project entirely. The attachment of Harry Potter producer.
David Heyman’s Heyday Films, the company behind this year’s hot Oscar contenders “Once Upon a Time in Hollywood” and “Marriage Story,” and Hardy Son & Baker (“Taboo & Christmas Carol”) are set to produce “Shackleton,” the long-gestating biopic of legendary polar explorer Sir Ernest Shackleton.
Tom Hardy is on board to play the title role, and will also produce the pic alongside Dean Baker through their banner Hardy Son & Baker which originated the project.
“Tom and I were always fascinated by Shackleton as a leader and his contagious optimism and absolute belief in his team,” Baker told Variety. “At a time where leaders seem to be more about self than society, Shackleton sacrificed his own needs to ensure the wellbeing of his team – thats inspirational,” added Baker.
Written by “Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy” scribe Peter Straughan, “Shackleton” will reteam Heyday Films and Studiocanal, who most recently delivered two successful “Paddington...
Tom Hardy is on board to play the title role, and will also produce the pic alongside Dean Baker through their banner Hardy Son & Baker which originated the project.
“Tom and I were always fascinated by Shackleton as a leader and his contagious optimism and absolute belief in his team,” Baker told Variety. “At a time where leaders seem to be more about self than society, Shackleton sacrificed his own needs to ensure the wellbeing of his team – thats inspirational,” added Baker.
Written by “Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy” scribe Peter Straughan, “Shackleton” will reteam Heyday Films and Studiocanal, who most recently delivered two successful “Paddington...
- 2/7/2020
- by Elsa Keslassy
- Variety Film + TV
Off Broadway Korean-pop musical “Kpop” topped the nominations for the 2018 Lucille Lortel Awards, snagging nine nominations for the annual awards for Off Broadway fare.
“Kpop,” which Ars Nova (“Natasha, Pierre and the Great Comet of 1812”) produced in association with Ma-Yi Theater Company and Woodshed Collective, led a list of musical nominees that also included “Bella: An American Tall Tale” (six nominations) and “The Lucky Ones” (five.) The top-nominated play was “Mary Jane” (six nominations), the Amy Herzog play that premiered at New York Theatre Workshop in a staging that starred Carrie Coon (who’s nominated for an acting award).
Special awards will be given to Eve Ensler, for the lifetime achievement award; Michael Friedman, the late composer who will be inducted into the Lortel’s Playwrights’ Sidewalk; and Wp Theater, for body of work.
The full list of the 33rd annual Lucille Lortel Awards nominations follows. Winners will be announced...
“Kpop,” which Ars Nova (“Natasha, Pierre and the Great Comet of 1812”) produced in association with Ma-Yi Theater Company and Woodshed Collective, led a list of musical nominees that also included “Bella: An American Tall Tale” (six nominations) and “The Lucky Ones” (five.) The top-nominated play was “Mary Jane” (six nominations), the Amy Herzog play that premiered at New York Theatre Workshop in a staging that starred Carrie Coon (who’s nominated for an acting award).
Special awards will be given to Eve Ensler, for the lifetime achievement award; Michael Friedman, the late composer who will be inducted into the Lortel’s Playwrights’ Sidewalk; and Wp Theater, for body of work.
The full list of the 33rd annual Lucille Lortel Awards nominations follows. Winners will be announced...
- 4/4/2018
- by Gordon Cox
- Variety Film + TV
‘Torch Song’, ‘Jerry Springer The Opera’ Among Off Broadway’s Lortel Awards Nominees – Complete List
The name Jerry Springer isn’t one you’d likely connect with Off Broadway’s prestigious Lucille Lortel Awards, but there he is, or the opera named after him anyway, with 4 nominations.
The Off-Broadway League announced nominees for the 2018 Lortel Awards for Outstanding Achievement Off-Broadway today. See the full list of nominees below.
This year’s awards ceremony, to be hosted by Laura Benanti and Jason Jones, who appear together on TBS’s The Detour, is set for Sunday, May 6, at the NYU Skirball Center. The evening will honor Tony-winning playwright and performer Eve Ensler (The Vagina Monologues) with a Lifetime Achievement Award, and longstanding Off-Broadway company Wp Theater for their Outstanding Body of Work.
Also this year, the Lortel Awards will posthumously elect composer Michael Friedman onto the Playwrights’ Sidewalk in front of the Lucille Lortel Theatre in Manhattan’s West Village. The 41-year-old Friedman, who won an...
The Off-Broadway League announced nominees for the 2018 Lortel Awards for Outstanding Achievement Off-Broadway today. See the full list of nominees below.
This year’s awards ceremony, to be hosted by Laura Benanti and Jason Jones, who appear together on TBS’s The Detour, is set for Sunday, May 6, at the NYU Skirball Center. The evening will honor Tony-winning playwright and performer Eve Ensler (The Vagina Monologues) with a Lifetime Achievement Award, and longstanding Off-Broadway company Wp Theater for their Outstanding Body of Work.
Also this year, the Lortel Awards will posthumously elect composer Michael Friedman onto the Playwrights’ Sidewalk in front of the Lucille Lortel Theatre in Manhattan’s West Village. The 41-year-old Friedman, who won an...
- 4/4/2018
- by Greg Evans
- Deadline Film + TV
The inventive musical adventure Ernest Shackleton Loves Me tells the story of a single mom who is struggling to balance her familial obligations and her work as a video game composer. One sleepless night, she posts a dating video and gets a response from famed 20th century polar explorer Ernest Shackleton. What follows is an odyssey of virtuosic electro-violin performance from Val Vigoda and Wade McCollum's charismatic and lush vocals.
- 2/21/2018
- by David Clarke
- BroadwayWorld.com
Imperative Entertainment — the company behind the recently released Ridley Scott film All the Money in the World — is developing a survival drama based on the newly published New Yorker series "The White Darkness."
In the features, reporter David Grann chronicles British explorer Henry Worsley’s 2015 attempt to re-create his hero Ernest Shackleton’s infamous odyssey across Antarctica.
The two adventurers, separated by a century but connected in their single-minded focus, battle obliterating conditions, penetrating isolation and their own inner demons in the last remaining frontier on Earth.
Imperative’s Dan Friedkin and Bradley Thomas will produce the survival story as a...
In the features, reporter David Grann chronicles British explorer Henry Worsley’s 2015 attempt to re-create his hero Ernest Shackleton’s infamous odyssey across Antarctica.
The two adventurers, separated by a century but connected in their single-minded focus, battle obliterating conditions, penetrating isolation and their own inner demons in the last remaining frontier on Earth.
Imperative’s Dan Friedkin and Bradley Thomas will produce the survival story as a...
- 2/9/2018
- by Mia Galuppo
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
Queen Elizabeth has historic new wheels. The beloved British monarch, 88, will ride to the state opening of parliament in her Diamond Jubilee stagecoach that has been called a "living time capsule," made with wood taken from the Tower of London, Henry VII's warship, Sir Isaac Newton's apple tree and the door of 10 Downing Street, the U.K.'s The Mirror reports. The new carriage, created over the course of a decade by Australian Jim Frecklington from his team's workshop in Sydney, is only the second one built for the royal family in 100 years. "I wanted to create something very special to mark the Queen's reign,...
- 6/4/2014
- by Andrea Billups
- PEOPLE.com
I remember the first time I saw Sherman’s March and realized how revealing autobiographical documentary could be. Filmmakers who turn the camera on themselves run a high risk of self-indulgence, but when done right their films can intimately show the resilience of the human spirit, especially when their challenges appear insurmountable, whether in situations as grandiose as in Ernest Shackleton and Frank Hurley’s South or as ostensibly mundane as Steven Ascher and Jeanne Jordan’s Troublesome Creek. The process of making autobiographical films can even be beneficial for the filmmakers, psychologically or otherwise, provided they place therapy on a backseat to […]...
- 1/28/2014
- by Randy Astle
- Filmmaker Magazine - Blog
I remember the first time I saw Sherman’s March and realized how revealing autobiographical documentary could be. Filmmakers who turn the camera on themselves run a high risk of self-indulgence, but when done right their films can intimately show the resilience of the human spirit, especially when their challenges appear insurmountable, whether in situations as grandiose as in Ernest Shackleton and Frank Hurley’s South or as ostensibly mundane as Steven Ascher and Jeanne Jordan’s Troublesome Creek. The process of making autobiographical films can even be beneficial for the filmmakers, psychologically or otherwise, provided they place therapy on a backseat to […]...
- 1/28/2014
- by Randy Astle
- Filmmaker Magazine-Director Interviews
After parallel successes on stage and screen, the Londoner is being lauded as one of the greatest actors of his generation
However good they are, actors always need a defining role to transform them into a film star, and as the kidnap victim Solomon Northup in the Steve McQueen-directed 12 Years a Slave, Chiwetel Ejiofor has found his.
Always an impressive performer on screen – certainly since his breakthrough role as a refugee doctor opposite Audrey Tautou in 2002's Dirty Pretty Things – Ejiofor is now on the cusp of joining the global film-acting elite. He has already been the recipient of scores of year-end critics' awards for 12 Years a Slave, as well as Golden Globe and Bafta nominations – and the industry will view it a significant scandal if an Oscar nomination doesn't materialise on 16 January.
Northup is the central figure in McQueen's project to confront the Us with its slavery past.
However good they are, actors always need a defining role to transform them into a film star, and as the kidnap victim Solomon Northup in the Steve McQueen-directed 12 Years a Slave, Chiwetel Ejiofor has found his.
Always an impressive performer on screen – certainly since his breakthrough role as a refugee doctor opposite Audrey Tautou in 2002's Dirty Pretty Things – Ejiofor is now on the cusp of joining the global film-acting elite. He has already been the recipient of scores of year-end critics' awards for 12 Years a Slave, as well as Golden Globe and Bafta nominations – and the industry will view it a significant scandal if an Oscar nomination doesn't materialise on 16 January.
Northup is the central figure in McQueen's project to confront the Us with its slavery past.
- 1/11/2014
- by Andrew Pulver
- The Guardian - Film News
After years of trying to get it off the ground as a feature, producer Amy Baer and filmmaker Wolfgang Petersen are set to turn the story of polar explorer Ernest Shackleton into a limited series for cable television.
"Endurance" deals with Shackleton's 1914 Imperial Trans-Antarctic Expedition which aimed to cross the icy continent from sea to sea via the South Pole.
Disaster struck when his ship, Endurance, became trapped in pack ice and was slowly crushed before the shore parties could land. For well over a year they struggled to survive and reach help - ultimately they were all rescued with no loss of life.
Petersen ("Air Force One," "The Perfect Storm") will produce and direct from a script by Steve Zaillian. Alan Gasmer ("Vikings") will also produce for Sony Pictures Television. Negotiations are presently underway with a cable network.
Source: Deadline...
"Endurance" deals with Shackleton's 1914 Imperial Trans-Antarctic Expedition which aimed to cross the icy continent from sea to sea via the South Pole.
Disaster struck when his ship, Endurance, became trapped in pack ice and was slowly crushed before the shore parties could land. For well over a year they struggled to survive and reach help - ultimately they were all rescued with no loss of life.
Petersen ("Air Force One," "The Perfect Storm") will produce and direct from a script by Steve Zaillian. Alan Gasmer ("Vikings") will also produce for Sony Pictures Television. Negotiations are presently underway with a cable network.
Source: Deadline...
- 11/13/2013
- by Garth Franklin
- Dark Horizons
Press Release: PBS announced today its slate of Winter/Spring 2014 programs, including the long-awaited return of Masterpiece “Sherlock, Season 3” starring Benedict Cumberbatch as the legendary British sleuth, on Sunday, January 19 at 10 p.m. Et. The highly acclaimed “Sherlock” follows Season 4 of “Downton Abbey,” which debuts with eight new episodes January 5 on Masterpiece. The two shows bolster Sunday night as a hallmark of British drama on PBS, whose ratings that night have grown 26 percent (8-11 pm, 2011-12 season: 9/19/2011-9/23/2012 to 2012-13 season: 9/24/2012-9/22/2013) season over season. The schedule also reinforces PBS’ move into 10 p.m. programming on several key nights.
PBS also announced a number of new programs, including the real-life adventure series Chasing Shackleton, the broadcast premieres of biopics “Salinger” on American Masters (about the reclusive Catcher in the Rye author) and Hawking, an intimate portrait of physicist Stephen Hawking’s extraordinary life and career, along with a roster of...
PBS also announced a number of new programs, including the real-life adventure series Chasing Shackleton, the broadcast premieres of biopics “Salinger” on American Masters (about the reclusive Catcher in the Rye author) and Hawking, an intimate portrait of physicist Stephen Hawking’s extraordinary life and career, along with a roster of...
- 10/23/2013
- by theTVaddict
- The TV Addict
I don't care what anyone says, Leonardo DiCaprio is a great actor. I'm shocked the guy hasn't won an Oscar yet, but his day will come. Who knows? maybe his best actor win lies in this new film project he is attached to.
Warner Bros. has just acquired a pitch for a film called King Harald, which is being written by a guy you've probably never heard of before. His name is Mark L. Smith and he's written films like Vacancy, Vacancy 2, and The Hole. He also scripted another film for DiCaprio's production company called Endurance, which is about "Polar explorer Ernest Shackleton, who led an expedition of 28 to the South Pole in 1914. When ice crushed the ship, Shackleton found a way to lead the entire crew back to safety despite the lethal cold."
This next film project sounds a lot more ambitious than anything else he's done before as it's based on Harald Hardrada,...
Warner Bros. has just acquired a pitch for a film called King Harald, which is being written by a guy you've probably never heard of before. His name is Mark L. Smith and he's written films like Vacancy, Vacancy 2, and The Hole. He also scripted another film for DiCaprio's production company called Endurance, which is about "Polar explorer Ernest Shackleton, who led an expedition of 28 to the South Pole in 1914. When ice crushed the ship, Shackleton found a way to lead the entire crew back to safety despite the lethal cold."
This next film project sounds a lot more ambitious than anything else he's done before as it's based on Harald Hardrada,...
- 8/7/2013
- by Joey Paur
- GeekTyrant
Leonardo DiCaprio may get a viking movie after all.
Warner Bros. Pictures has acquired the pitch "King Harald" for Mark L. Smith to write and DiCaprio to potentially star in.
The story follows Harald Hardrada, the 11th Century conqueror who has been called the last great Viking king. His thirst for battle led to him being briefly exiled to Russia before returning in triumph.
DiCaprio and his Appian Way partner Jennifer Davisson Killoran will produce. DiCaprio previously circled a now seemingly defunct film about Viking warriors that Mel Gibson was attached to direct.
Scribe Smith also penned the upcoming Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu' project "The Revenant" which DiCaprio and Sean Penn are attached to star in, and the DiCaprio produced "Endurance" about Ernest Shackleton's disastrous 1914 expedition to the South Pole.
Source: Deadline...
Warner Bros. Pictures has acquired the pitch "King Harald" for Mark L. Smith to write and DiCaprio to potentially star in.
The story follows Harald Hardrada, the 11th Century conqueror who has been called the last great Viking king. His thirst for battle led to him being briefly exiled to Russia before returning in triumph.
DiCaprio and his Appian Way partner Jennifer Davisson Killoran will produce. DiCaprio previously circled a now seemingly defunct film about Viking warriors that Mel Gibson was attached to direct.
Scribe Smith also penned the upcoming Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu' project "The Revenant" which DiCaprio and Sean Penn are attached to star in, and the DiCaprio produced "Endurance" about Ernest Shackleton's disastrous 1914 expedition to the South Pole.
Source: Deadline...
- 8/7/2013
- by Garth Franklin
- Dark Horizons
Leonardo DiCaprio is so dang pretty that he had to get quite a few years into his career before he could believably play an adult, let alone a physically imposing adult. Recently though, in things like, say, Shutter Island and Django Unchained, he’s really come into his own as a manly man. What’s the next logical step in this development? To play a Viking warlord, of course. Deadline is reporting that Warner Bros. and DiCaprio’s own Appian Way are looking to set up a project called King Harald, which is being thought of as a potential starring vehicle for the actor, and which he’s certainly going to at least get a producing credit on. Apparently the deal started as a story pitch from Mark L. Smith, the writer of Alejandro Gonzalez Innarrito’s The Revenant as well as another Appian project called Endurance about polar explorer Ernest Shackleton. This...
- 8/7/2013
- by Nathan Adams
- FilmSchoolRejects.com
Exclusive: Warner Bros has made a preemptive acquisition of King Harald, a pitch that Mark L. Smith is writing as a potential vehicle for Leonardo DiCaprio. The subject: Harald Hardrada, the 11th Century conqueror who has been called the last great Viking king. The deal also calls for a blind script deal for Smith, who scripted The Revenant, a New Regency project that has Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu attached to direct, and a potential cast of Sean Penn and DiCaprio. He also scripted for Appian Way Endurance, a movie about Polar explorer Ernest Shackleton, who led an expedition of 28 to the South Pole in 1914. When ice crushed the ship, Shackleton found a way to lead the entire crew back to safety despite the lethal cold. Smith also scripted an untitled biker film for Warner Bros based on an idea by Tom Hardy, who is eyeing it as a star vehicle to...
- 8/6/2013
- by MIKE FLEMING JR
- Deadline
Hitchcock's silents are now on the Memory of the World register – I can think of five others that deserve the same recognition
If, when you consider our national heritage, you think of murder, guilt, sex and cheeky humour – well, somebody out there agrees with you. The decision to add Alfred Hitchcock's nine surviving silent movies to Unesco's UK Memory of the World register puts his early work on a cultural par with the Domesday Book and Field Marshal Douglas Haig's war diaries – also selected for the list this year.
The nine silents were all directed by Hitchcock in the 1920s and include better-known films in the director's classic thriller mode such as The Lodger and Blackmail as well as comedies (Champagne, The Farmer's Wife) a boxing movie (The Ring) and dramas (The Pleasure Garden, Downhill, Easy Virtue and the lush, rustic romance The Manxman). The collection was nominated by the BFI,...
If, when you consider our national heritage, you think of murder, guilt, sex and cheeky humour – well, somebody out there agrees with you. The decision to add Alfred Hitchcock's nine surviving silent movies to Unesco's UK Memory of the World register puts his early work on a cultural par with the Domesday Book and Field Marshal Douglas Haig's war diaries – also selected for the list this year.
The nine silents were all directed by Hitchcock in the 1920s and include better-known films in the director's classic thriller mode such as The Lodger and Blackmail as well as comedies (Champagne, The Farmer's Wife) a boxing movie (The Ring) and dramas (The Pleasure Garden, Downhill, Easy Virtue and the lush, rustic romance The Manxman). The collection was nominated by the BFI,...
- 7/12/2013
- by Pamela Hutchinson
- The Guardian - Film News
South: Sir Ernest Shackleton’s Glorious Epic of the Antarctic It was surprising to see the large crowd waiting to get into the 2012 San Francisco Silent Film Festival screening of South: Sir Ernest Shackleton’s Glorious Epic of the Antarctic (1920). I did not think that a documentary would interest so many people, but the theater was packed. South — the screening was narrated by Paul McGann — tells the story of the 1914-1916 expedition across the Antarctic, led by explorer Ernest Shackleton on the ship "The Endurance." Shackleton was accompanied by a crew, a kennel of dogs, and photographer Frank Hurley. Whether the Antarctic adventure can be called successful or not, is up for debate. After being locked in ice for nine months, the ship got stuck, eventually shattering and sinking in the Weddell Sea. South‘s most striking scene, in fact, was of the crew watching "The Endurance" crack and fall apart in an icy grave.
- 6/5/2013
- by Danny Fortune
- Alt Film Guide
Ice scripted by Lori Nelson which is based on the true story of Ernest Shackleton's Antarctic Endurance expedition, will be developed into an action-adventure feature film by Robert Chartoff and Lynn Hendee of Chartoff Productions. Variety reports that Nelson also produces the project which is being sent out to directors, aiming for a 2015 release which coincides with the 100th anniversary of Shackleton's Imperial Trans-Antarctic Expedition. This was an attempt to become the first land crossing of the continent but disaster struck when the Endurance ship became trapped in pack ice and crushed in 1915. Of the 27 men on the expedition, no lives were lost.
- 9/27/2012
- Upcoming-Movies.com
Ice scripted by Lori Nelson which is based on the true story of Ernest Shackleton's Antarctic Endurance expedition, will be developed into an action-adventure feature film by Robert Chartoff and Lynn Hendee of Chartoff Productions. Variety reports that Nelson also produces the project which is being sent out to directors, aiming for a 2015 release which coincides with the 100th anniversary of Shackleton's Imperial Trans-Antarctic Expedition. This was an attempt to become the first land crossing of the continent but disaster struck when the Endurance ship became trapped in pack ice and crushed in 1915. Of the 27 men on the expedition, no lives were lost.
- 9/27/2012
- Upcoming-Movies.com
In any other country Branagh's achievements would be a source of acclaim and collective pride
Is there something about Kenneth Branagh that justifies the sour press that has so often mugged him – including, let it be admitted, on occasion in the Guardian? Or does the intermittent Branagh-bashing say more about media culture than the man himself? In any other country, Mr Branagh's achievements would be a source of full-throated acclaim and collective pride – and indeed he has rarely been out of favour with the public. Mr Branagh may not be the supreme actor-director of his generation – but then, though he has few peers, he has never claimed to be. At 50, the record is already too prodigious to list in full: highlights include a memorable breakthrough in Fortunes of War, a succession of fine Shakespeare roles on stage and screen, compelling TV roles as the explorer Ernest Shackleton, the fascist Reinhard Heydrich and,...
Is there something about Kenneth Branagh that justifies the sour press that has so often mugged him – including, let it be admitted, on occasion in the Guardian? Or does the intermittent Branagh-bashing say more about media culture than the man himself? In any other country, Mr Branagh's achievements would be a source of full-throated acclaim and collective pride – and indeed he has rarely been out of favour with the public. Mr Branagh may not be the supreme actor-director of his generation – but then, though he has few peers, he has never claimed to be. At 50, the record is already too prodigious to list in full: highlights include a memorable breakthrough in Fortunes of War, a succession of fine Shakespeare roles on stage and screen, compelling TV roles as the explorer Ernest Shackleton, the fascist Reinhard Heydrich and,...
- 5/6/2011
- The Guardian - Film News
Terrence Malick makes us believe in magic when we know it doesn't exist. He has created his own legend as an unreachable recluse
He may be the only film-maker working now to whom the word "magical" can be applied, yet in nearly 30 years he has directed just five films. He has a degree in philosophy from Harvard; he taught at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology; he has published a translation of Heidegger's Vom Wesen des Grundes. He has a reputation as a recluse, whereas in reality he is a charming, amiable fellow happy to talk about a wide range of topics – but not film. He came close once to doing a film of Walker Percy's novel The Moviegoer, and in 1999 he did produce a picture about the great Ethiopian runner, Haile Gebrselassie, called Endurance. Then a year later he produced another documentary, The Endurance, about the polar explorer Ernest Shackleton.
He may be the only film-maker working now to whom the word "magical" can be applied, yet in nearly 30 years he has directed just five films. He has a degree in philosophy from Harvard; he taught at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology; he has published a translation of Heidegger's Vom Wesen des Grundes. He has a reputation as a recluse, whereas in reality he is a charming, amiable fellow happy to talk about a wide range of topics – but not film. He came close once to doing a film of Walker Percy's novel The Moviegoer, and in 1999 he did produce a picture about the great Ethiopian runner, Haile Gebrselassie, called Endurance. Then a year later he produced another documentary, The Endurance, about the polar explorer Ernest Shackleton.
- 4/21/2011
- by David Thomson
- The Guardian - Film News
James Cracknell is no stranger to intrepid feats, which makes him the perfect guide to Sir Ernest Shackleton's expedition across the Antarctic. An incredible tale, it is a story of remarkable courage and inspired leadership. Three years after Roald Amundsen arrived at the South Pole, Sir Ernest Shackleton launched an expedition to cross Antarctica by a route that would take him and his team past the Pole.
- 4/4/2011
- Sky TV
Two decades ago, Kenneth Branagh was "the new Olivier". Now he's directing a comic-book adaptation. Why? Because he was never meant to be an idol
In 1989, when he was not yet 30 years old, Kenneth Branagh appeared in a stirring version of William Shakespeare's Henry V. The film, which Branagh also directed, won tons of awards. God, was it stirring. Everybody thought the St Crispin's Day speech was just terrific, even the French, who came out somewhat worse for wear at the Battle of Agincourt and whom Shakespeare despised. Everybody wondered where this combustible young talent had come from. The answer: Belfast. Since the cultural megalith Laurence Olivier had already produced, directed and starred in his own Oscar-winning Henry V 44 years earlier, the year Adolf Hitler finally went down for the count, and since Branagh had more than held his own in this revival, it seemed obvious that the actor was throwing down the gauntlet,...
In 1989, when he was not yet 30 years old, Kenneth Branagh appeared in a stirring version of William Shakespeare's Henry V. The film, which Branagh also directed, won tons of awards. God, was it stirring. Everybody thought the St Crispin's Day speech was just terrific, even the French, who came out somewhat worse for wear at the Battle of Agincourt and whom Shakespeare despised. Everybody wondered where this combustible young talent had come from. The answer: Belfast. Since the cultural megalith Laurence Olivier had already produced, directed and starred in his own Oscar-winning Henry V 44 years earlier, the year Adolf Hitler finally went down for the count, and since Branagh had more than held his own in this revival, it seemed obvious that the actor was throwing down the gauntlet,...
- 3/31/2011
- by Joe Queenan
- The Guardian - Film News
Rep. Giffords' brother-in-law Scott Kelly has been in orbit since October. He tells Peter J. Boyer about how he heard of the shooting, his twin's return to space, and Nasa's new shine.
When astronaut Scott Kelly blasted into orbit last October, bound for a six-month stint aboard the International Space Station, among the items he brought with him were two books, tales of heroic sojourners overcoming dire peril far from home. One of the volumes was Slavomir Rawicz's The Long Walk, the story of a Polish cavalry officer's escape from the Soviet gulag in Siberia, and his 2,000-mile trek to freedom in British India. The other was South, Sir Ernest Shackleton's classic memoir of disaster, and escape, on an Antarctic expedition in 1915. Life aboard the space station seemed almost a dull routine in comparison.
Related story on The Daily Beast: Why Obama Won't Touch Gun Control
In the ‘60s and ‘70s,...
When astronaut Scott Kelly blasted into orbit last October, bound for a six-month stint aboard the International Space Station, among the items he brought with him were two books, tales of heroic sojourners overcoming dire peril far from home. One of the volumes was Slavomir Rawicz's The Long Walk, the story of a Polish cavalry officer's escape from the Soviet gulag in Siberia, and his 2,000-mile trek to freedom in British India. The other was South, Sir Ernest Shackleton's classic memoir of disaster, and escape, on an Antarctic expedition in 1915. Life aboard the space station seemed almost a dull routine in comparison.
Related story on The Daily Beast: Why Obama Won't Touch Gun Control
In the ‘60s and ‘70s,...
- 2/18/2011
- by Peter J. Boyer
- The Daily Beast
One rarely thinks of the earth's ecological system as second-hand goods. However, a stunning documentary written and directed by Canadian filmmaker Jean Lemire uses the degradation of the earth's atmospheric health as the basis for exploring climate changes in Antarctica. No doubt inspired by Ernest Shackleton's legendary struggles (whose history hangs over this expedition with ghostly prescience), the scientists and filmmakers expect their three-masted schooner to be locked in place by pack ice throughout the Antarctic winter. Instead, they discover that, with a 6-degree Celsius rise in temperature resulting from global warming, the pack ice will not form and stay solid for long. This phenomenon offers a dangerous warning about the degradation of the earth's atmosphere. Important marine patterns of migration and mating have been thrown dangerously off cycle. Instead of being able to freely cross from...
- 9/24/2010
- by George Heymont
- Huffington Post
The Eighth Doctor Paul McGann will be narrating passages of Sir Ernest Shackleton’s diaries over the newly restored film South which was filmed by a cameraman taking part in Shackleton’s doomed expedition to cross the Antarctic continent. The film will be shown as part of the ten year anniversary of the Bristol Silents series (of which McGann is [...]...
- 9/23/2010
- by Andrew Reynolds
- Kasterborous.com
The Wildest Dream director Anthony Geffen has cemented his relationship with that doc’s executive producer, Mike Medavoy. They are getting their Geffen Medavoy Pictures banner off the ground with a branded slate of high-end documentaries--most shot 3D--to bring to life ancient empires, dinosaurs and other historical topics. Budgets on the 3D films will fall between $11 million and $15 million. It's a non-exclusive relationship and Medavoy continues with Phoenix Pictures. Their first 3D documentary together will focus on Antarctic explorer Sir Ernest Shackleton, who spearheaded an expedition to the South Pole that left his crew stranded in sub-zero tundra after ice crushed their ship in 1915. Using shrewd management and harrowing treks through mountains, glaciers and brutal waters over 18 months, Shackleton kept all 27 members of his crew alive until they could be rescued. Medavoy and Geffen will produce together, hire a director and start production at year’s end. Medavoy said other...
- 8/24/2010
- by MIKE FLEMING
- Deadline
It got pretty hot in the Northeast this week. Actually, that's an understatement. I've never seen so many people covered in so much sweat. Everyone looked like Robert Hays in that scene from Airplane! where his face is pouring out water. And we weren't even trying to land an airliner. Fortunately, there are ways of tricking the brain into thinking it's cooler. Some people do it by watching dramas like Never Cry Wolf or Vertical Limit or The Day After Tomorrow. I'm a documentary kind of guy, so I've been revisiting some favorite non-fiction films set in frozen settings. The heat wave may be past its worst highs, but keep these five docs in mind for the next time there are such sweltering conditions as we experienced in the past couple days.
Nanook of the North (Robert J. Flaherty, 1922)
Learn how to build an igloo and hunt seal in this...
Nanook of the North (Robert J. Flaherty, 1922)
Learn how to build an igloo and hunt seal in this...
- 7/10/2010
- by Christopher Campbell
- Cinematical
I’m really excited about Austin Film Society’s newest series: A Summer of Restoration: Selections from Milestone Films.
From July 3rd to August 7, every Saturday at the Ritz the very good and creative people at Afs are bringing some of the highlights from Milestone Films, an organization that is responsible for distributing and restoring some of the greatest films throughout history.
From the Afs press announcement: “With an emphasis on the physical restoration of classic films and a spiritual restoration of our 21st century souls, Austin Film Society presents a wide selection of films, old and new, from the wonderful Milestone catalog.”
The line-up delivers on that promise of spiritual restoration, with a slew of titles that will renew your interest in the cinema’s power to inspire.
6/12: Village Of Dreams – A recent Japanese film offering insights on what it means to be a child.
6/19: The Edge Of The World...
From July 3rd to August 7, every Saturday at the Ritz the very good and creative people at Afs are bringing some of the highlights from Milestone Films, an organization that is responsible for distributing and restoring some of the greatest films throughout history.
From the Afs press announcement: “With an emphasis on the physical restoration of classic films and a spiritual restoration of our 21st century souls, Austin Film Society presents a wide selection of films, old and new, from the wonderful Milestone catalog.”
The line-up delivers on that promise of spiritual restoration, with a slew of titles that will renew your interest in the cinema’s power to inspire.
6/12: Village Of Dreams – A recent Japanese film offering insights on what it means to be a child.
6/19: The Edge Of The World...
- 6/7/2010
- by Daniel Metz
- OriginalAlamo.com
"For scientific leadership, give me Scott; for swift and efficient travel, Amundsen; but when you are in a hopeless situation, when there seems to be no way out, get on your knees and pray for Shackleton." -Sir Raymond Priestly
Ernest Shackleton was the also-ran of the last great age of exploration, when men forged their way across the Antarctic wilderness, mapping the left over bits of land that had resisted the last few centuries' forays. The world's largest desert, so cold it gets only a few inches of actual rain per year, a mile of ice extends underfoot, dwarfing everything we've ever built. It's a wasteland the size of Europe so hostile, so alien, that even with our billions of crowded people and warehouses of fancy toys, only a few thousand researchers ever even temporarily live there. And at the beginning of the twentieth century, handfuls of men trekked into...
Ernest Shackleton was the also-ran of the last great age of exploration, when men forged their way across the Antarctic wilderness, mapping the left over bits of land that had resisted the last few centuries' forays. The world's largest desert, so cold it gets only a few inches of actual rain per year, a mile of ice extends underfoot, dwarfing everything we've ever built. It's a wasteland the size of Europe so hostile, so alien, that even with our billions of crowded people and warehouses of fancy toys, only a few thousand researchers ever even temporarily live there. And at the beginning of the twentieth century, handfuls of men trekked into...
- 3/3/2010
- by Steven Lloyd Wilson
Penguins, Nicole Kidman and Narnia – Paul Howlett picks his film highlights
Christmas Eve
Over the Hedge
(Tim Johnson, Karey Kirkpatrick, 2006) 4.25pm, BBC1
A DreamWorks animated adventure in which Rj, the cynical racoon (laconically voiced by Bruce Willis) teaches a burrowful of innocent woodland animals to forage off the waste of an encroaching housing estate rather than rely on boring old natural food, before inevitably seeing the error of his ways. Plenty of good slapstick fun for kids and cine-literate gags for adults, although it all seems a bit glib compared to Shrek and co.
Corpse Bride
(Tim Burton, Mike Johnson, 2005) 6pm, ITV1
Life, in Burton's typically weird and ghoulish fantasy, is a dull, grey affair: death is much more colourful and fun, as young Victor (voiced by Johnny Depp) discovers when he is whisked into the underworld by the maggoty Corpse Bride (Helena Bonham Carter). Trouble is, he's in love...
Christmas Eve
Over the Hedge
(Tim Johnson, Karey Kirkpatrick, 2006) 4.25pm, BBC1
A DreamWorks animated adventure in which Rj, the cynical racoon (laconically voiced by Bruce Willis) teaches a burrowful of innocent woodland animals to forage off the waste of an encroaching housing estate rather than rely on boring old natural food, before inevitably seeing the error of his ways. Plenty of good slapstick fun for kids and cine-literate gags for adults, although it all seems a bit glib compared to Shrek and co.
Corpse Bride
(Tim Burton, Mike Johnson, 2005) 6pm, ITV1
Life, in Burton's typically weird and ghoulish fantasy, is a dull, grey affair: death is much more colourful and fun, as young Victor (voiced by Johnny Depp) discovers when he is whisked into the underworld by the maggoty Corpse Bride (Helena Bonham Carter). Trouble is, he's in love...
- 12/23/2009
- by Paul Howlett
- The Guardian - Film News
Perfectly timed to cash in on the recent spate of interest in the ill-fated 1914-16 Antarctic expedition led by polar explorer Ernest Shackleton, this large-format documentary of the fascinating tale is a natural for science museums. "Shackleton's Antarctic Adventure" will have no problem translating to its eventual berth on public television as it was co-produced by NOVA/WGBH Boston. Directed by George Butler -- who also made "Endurance", a recent Sundance documentary about the same subject -- the film is necessarily condensed. Those looking for a comprehensive telling of the story should look elsewhere. But the giant-screen format adds immeasurably to conveying the visual starkness of the frigid settings.
As a quick reminder, Shackleton wanted to lead the first expedition to cross Antarctica. Recruiting a 27-man crew despite an advertisement promising "small wages ... bitter cold ... constant danger ... safe return doubtful," he led them and 70 sled dogs on a wooden ship called "Endurance", which eventually was crushed by ice floes. Their rescue was accomplished only when Shackleton and a few of his men made two hazardous journeys. First, they made an 800-mile voyage on rough seas on only a lifeboat. Second, they trekked on foot more than 30 miles of rugged and uncharted terrain.
The most powerful attribute of the film, which is narrated well by Kevin Spacey, is the inclusion of amazing footage that consists of still photos and 35mm film shot by Frank Hurley of the original expedition. (The footage was previously seen in the classic 1919 documentary "South".) The film also includes new footage shot by Butler replicating the original journey. Butler's footage was shot in the actual locations, and it is thankfully free of the cheesiness so normally prevalent in such re-creations. A retracing of Shackleton's steps across the Antarctic tundra by a trio of renowned modern-day mountain climbers demonstrates well the hazards he and his comrades must have faced.
SHACKLETON'S ANTARCTIC ADVENTURE
WGBH Enterprises and Giant Screen Films
Director: George Butler
Screenwriters: Moses Richards, Crystal V. Spijer
Producers: Susanne Simpson, Scott Swofford, George Butler
Co-producer: Louise Rosen
Executive producer: Susanne Simpson
Director of photography: Reed Smoot
Additional photography: David Douglas
Music: Sam Cardon
Narrator: Kevin Spacey
Color and black & white/stereo
Running time -- 40 minutes
No MPAA rating...
As a quick reminder, Shackleton wanted to lead the first expedition to cross Antarctica. Recruiting a 27-man crew despite an advertisement promising "small wages ... bitter cold ... constant danger ... safe return doubtful," he led them and 70 sled dogs on a wooden ship called "Endurance", which eventually was crushed by ice floes. Their rescue was accomplished only when Shackleton and a few of his men made two hazardous journeys. First, they made an 800-mile voyage on rough seas on only a lifeboat. Second, they trekked on foot more than 30 miles of rugged and uncharted terrain.
The most powerful attribute of the film, which is narrated well by Kevin Spacey, is the inclusion of amazing footage that consists of still photos and 35mm film shot by Frank Hurley of the original expedition. (The footage was previously seen in the classic 1919 documentary "South".) The film also includes new footage shot by Butler replicating the original journey. Butler's footage was shot in the actual locations, and it is thankfully free of the cheesiness so normally prevalent in such re-creations. A retracing of Shackleton's steps across the Antarctic tundra by a trio of renowned modern-day mountain climbers demonstrates well the hazards he and his comrades must have faced.
SHACKLETON'S ANTARCTIC ADVENTURE
WGBH Enterprises and Giant Screen Films
Director: George Butler
Screenwriters: Moses Richards, Crystal V. Spijer
Producers: Susanne Simpson, Scott Swofford, George Butler
Co-producer: Louise Rosen
Executive producer: Susanne Simpson
Director of photography: Reed Smoot
Additional photography: David Douglas
Music: Sam Cardon
Narrator: Kevin Spacey
Color and black & white/stereo
Running time -- 40 minutes
No MPAA rating...
Perfectly timed to cash in on the recent spate of interest in the ill-fated 1914-16 Antarctic expedition led by polar explorer Ernest Shackleton, this large-format documentary of the fascinating tale is a natural for science museums. "Shackleton's Antarctic Adventure" will have no problem translating to its eventual berth on public television as it was co-produced by NOVA/WGBH Boston. Directed by George Butler -- who also made "Endurance", a recent Sundance documentary about the same subject -- the film is necessarily condensed. Those looking for a comprehensive telling of the story should look elsewhere. But the giant-screen format adds immeasurably to conveying the visual starkness of the frigid settings.
As a quick reminder, Shackleton wanted to lead the first expedition to cross Antarctica. Recruiting a 27-man crew despite an advertisement promising "small wages ... bitter cold ... constant danger ... safe return doubtful," he led them and 70 sled dogs on a wooden ship called "Endurance", which eventually was crushed by ice floes. Their rescue was accomplished only when Shackleton and a few of his men made two hazardous journeys. First, they made an 800-mile voyage on rough seas on only a lifeboat. Second, they trekked on foot more than 30 miles of rugged and uncharted terrain.
The most powerful attribute of the film, which is narrated well by Kevin Spacey, is the inclusion of amazing footage that consists of still photos and 35mm film shot by Frank Hurley of the original expedition. (The footage was previously seen in the classic 1919 documentary "South".) The film also includes new footage shot by Butler replicating the original journey. Butler's footage was shot in the actual locations, and it is thankfully free of the cheesiness so normally prevalent in such re-creations. A retracing of Shackleton's steps across the Antarctic tundra by a trio of renowned modern-day mountain climbers demonstrates well the hazards he and his comrades must have faced.
SHACKLETON'S ANTARCTIC ADVENTURE
WGBH Enterprises and Giant Screen Films
Director: George Butler
Screenwriters: Moses Richards, Crystal V. Spijer
Producers: Susanne Simpson, Scott Swofford, George Butler
Co-producer: Louise Rosen
Executive producer: Susanne Simpson
Director of photography: Reed Smoot
Additional photography: David Douglas
Music: Sam Cardon
Narrator: Kevin Spacey
Color and black & white/stereo
Running time -- 40 minutes
No MPAA rating...
As a quick reminder, Shackleton wanted to lead the first expedition to cross Antarctica. Recruiting a 27-man crew despite an advertisement promising "small wages ... bitter cold ... constant danger ... safe return doubtful," he led them and 70 sled dogs on a wooden ship called "Endurance", which eventually was crushed by ice floes. Their rescue was accomplished only when Shackleton and a few of his men made two hazardous journeys. First, they made an 800-mile voyage on rough seas on only a lifeboat. Second, they trekked on foot more than 30 miles of rugged and uncharted terrain.
The most powerful attribute of the film, which is narrated well by Kevin Spacey, is the inclusion of amazing footage that consists of still photos and 35mm film shot by Frank Hurley of the original expedition. (The footage was previously seen in the classic 1919 documentary "South".) The film also includes new footage shot by Butler replicating the original journey. Butler's footage was shot in the actual locations, and it is thankfully free of the cheesiness so normally prevalent in such re-creations. A retracing of Shackleton's steps across the Antarctic tundra by a trio of renowned modern-day mountain climbers demonstrates well the hazards he and his comrades must have faced.
SHACKLETON'S ANTARCTIC ADVENTURE
WGBH Enterprises and Giant Screen Films
Director: George Butler
Screenwriters: Moses Richards, Crystal V. Spijer
Producers: Susanne Simpson, Scott Swofford, George Butler
Co-producer: Louise Rosen
Executive producer: Susanne Simpson
Director of photography: Reed Smoot
Additional photography: David Douglas
Music: Sam Cardon
Narrator: Kevin Spacey
Color and black & white/stereo
Running time -- 40 minutes
No MPAA rating...
- 2/26/2001
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
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