Xixax Film Forum

The Director's Chair => The Director's Chair => Topic started by: MacGuffin on May 19, 2006, 01:07:13 PM

Title: Abel Ferrara
Post by: MacGuffin on May 19, 2006, 01:07:13 PM
Last Crew Gearing Up
Ferrara's King of New York prequel.

Variety reports that The Last Crew, writer-director Abel Ferrara's long-gestating prequel to his 1990 gangland cult classic King of New York, is finally slated to go before cameras next month in New York City.

Michael Pitt (The Dreamers) will star as the youthful Frank White, portrayed in King of New York by Christopher Walken. Mark Wahlberg was once rumored to be up for the role.

The Last Crew is budgeted at $10 million. The story recalls Frank White's rise to power in the 1970s. Check out this review of an older draft of the script.

The indie production commences principal photography on June 9.
Title: Re: Abel Ferrara
Post by: Split Infinitive on May 19, 2006, 11:11:12 PM
So... I've never seen a Ferrara movie.  I've considered seeing Bad Lieutenant and King of New York, but his reputation for downbeat ugliness always steered me clear.  Is he someone worth taking the time to check out, or can I keep his films in the lower third of my Netflix queue where they've been for the last year?  He's intriguing... I'm just not usually in the mood to sit through a film bearing the descriptions of most of his.
Title: Re: Abel Ferrara
Post by: soixante on May 20, 2006, 02:58:28 AM
Bad Lt. and King of NY are well worth seeing.  Bad Lt. is a rather intense film, but if you are a fan of Harvey Keitel, it is essential viewing.  He is brilliant.

Ms. 45, a low-budget film he did in 1981, is worth a look, too.

Ferrara's films tend to be downbeat, but sometimes life is downbeat.
Title: Re: Abel Ferrara
Post by: Split Infinitive on May 20, 2006, 01:11:10 PM
Quote from: soixante on May 20, 2006, 02:58:28 AM
Bad Lt. and King of NY are well worth seeing.  Bad Lt. is a rather intense film, but if you are a fan of Harvey Keitel, it is essential viewing.  He is brilliant.

Ms. 45, a low-budget film he did in 1981, is worth a look, too.

Ferrara's films tend to be downbeat, but sometimes life is downbeat.
That's the problem -- I'm almost never in the mood for a resolutely downbeat picture (at least, I might not be by the time the film arrives from Netflix).  During the summer, though, I'm usually more inclined to watch something that will depress me, because the cheerfulness of the season balances me out.

Thank you for the recommendations.  I'll probably start with King of New York, but that'll be a month or two at least.
Title: Re: Abel Ferrara
Post by: modage on May 20, 2006, 02:02:09 PM
well i hated bad lieutenant, if that balances things out. 
Title: Re: Abel Ferrara
Post by: MacGuffin on August 09, 2006, 08:33:51 PM
For Christ's Sake: IFC Films Picks Up Ferrara's 'Mary'

The Reeler hears this afternoon that IFC Films has picked up rights to Abel Ferrara's long-languishing Mary. Featuring Juliette Binoche as an actress transformed by her portrayal of Mary Magdalene, you might recall the film earning its recent local buzz via co-star Matthew Modine's late-night phone calls to Cindy Adams and a particularly spirited Ferrara appearance at this year's Tribeca Film Festival. It probably bears mentioning Mary won a Special Jury Prize at Venice in 2005 as well, and the pick-up coincides with the upcoming Sarajevo Film Festival's plans to honor Ferrara and Béla Tarr with career retrospectives.

No word yet on a release date, and the details do not specify whether or not IFC will be releasing via its First Take day-and-date arm. Look for those specifics eventually as official announcements are made this week.
Title: Re: Abel Ferrara
Post by: MacGuffin on November 28, 2006, 10:41:26 AM
Dafoe, Hoskins, Modine ready to tell "Tales"
Source: Hollywood Reporter

Willem Dafoe, Bob Hoskins and Matthew Modine are set to star in writer-director Abel Ferrara's "Go Go Tales," a screwball comedy that has taken a circuitous path to production.

Dafoe will play the owner of a New York go-go dancing club whose brother and financial backer (Modine) threatens to pull the plug on his business. The owner and his accountant (Hoskins) face a bumpy night as the strippers threaten to strike. Ferrara's longtime pal, Italian actress/filmmaker Asia Argento, will play a small role as one of the dancers.

Ferrara originally was slated to begin principal photography on the project in January 2005, but after distribution rights for several territories were presold, the production never got off the ground. According to a statement from Bellatrix Media, which is producing the project, Italian state film organization Istituto Luce and producer Gam Film filed suit against the director, who then filed a counterclaim against them. The parties settled out of court, with the screenplay rights and Ferrara's services turning over to Bellatrix, owned by Swiss entrepreneur Massimo Gatti.

Principal photography began Monday in Rome and moves to New York in January. Ferrara's credits include "Bad Lieutenant" and "The Funeral"
Title: Re: Abel Ferrara
Post by: MacGuffin on March 03, 2007, 01:02:30 AM
Ferrara returns to Bad Lieutenant territory
Source: Guardian Unlimited

Bronx-born director Abel Ferrara is preparing to begin shooting his $4m (£2m) Italian film noir in Naples. Based on Giuseppe Farrandino's novel Pericle il Nero, the project is said to mark a return to the dark tone of his 1992 cult hit Bad Lieutenant. Casting is under way. Ferrara has just wrapped shooting in Rome on the screwball comedy Go-Go Tales with Bob Hoskins, Willem Dafoe, and Asia Argento.
Title: Re: Abel Ferrara
Post by: MacGuffin on August 28, 2007, 07:34:59 PM
SCRIPTLAND: Bringing back 'Bad Lieutenant'
Producer Edward R. Pressman hopes to reinvent the grim 1992 indie drama. But will what jolted audiences in 1992 work now?
Source: Los Angeles Times

Hide your stash -- the Lieutenant is headed back out on the streets. And he's just as bad as you remember him. If not worse.

When writer-director Abel Ferrara's "Bad Lieutenant" was released in 1992, the grim drama that starred Harvey Keitel as the most spiritually anguished, nakedly self-destructive cop in New York City polarized viewers and left a scorching mark in independent film. It was nominated for best feature at the Film Independent's Spirit Awards, and Keitel's legendary raw performance won him the Spirit for best male lead and a slot in the unofficial acting hall of fame.
 
Veteran producer Edward R. Pressman ("Badlands," "American Psycho"), who developed and produced the first movie, is poised to revisit the Lieutenant and "try to reinvent the film in a way that would be relevant again," as he puts it. So earlier this year one of his co-producers, Stephen Belafonte (the new Mr. Scary Spice), brought in Billy Finkelstein, a Flushing, Queens-bred TV writer whose deep cops-and-criminals résumé is a hit list of street cred: "L.A. Law," "Murder One," "Law & Order" and "NYPD Blue."

The new version -- with a working title of "Bad Lieutenant '08" -- is less a sequel or a prequel than an attempt to take the raw material of the original film and weave it into 21st century, post- 9/11 New York. In the draft I have, dated July 24, 2007, Finkelstein provides the Lieutenant with a small amount of addiction back story, the event that prompts his promotion from sergeant and the drug-related murder of five Senegalese illegal immigrants to pursue.

He has also given his tortured protagonist, who went nameless in the first film, a name: Terence McDonough. Meanwhile, the familiar relentless tear of reckless drug-taking, gambling, stealing and sex continues unabated.

The original film was rated NC-17 -- a rating that was still new and provocative at the time -- and justifiably, given not just its sexual violence, drug abuse and nudity, but also its punishing emotional brutality. The question is: What will the Bad Lieutenant do with more money and looser standards to play with? And is it possible to have the same effect?

"We have to factor in the passage of time and what's happened in the interim," says Finkelstein, who has yet to write in an updated nod to Keitel's full-frontal, drug-addled glory. "I don't know that the same sorts of things that caused us to sit up and take notice 15 years ago are necessarily gonna have the same effect now."

Pressman has discussed the new version with Ferrara and Keitel, although neither is attached to the project. But neither Pressman nor Finkelstein seems particularly worried about criticism from purist fans of the cult film. (Pressman is trying a similar reinvention with the Stephen Schiff-scripted "Money Never Sleeps," a revisiting of the iconic '80s master of the universe Gordon Gekko from Oliver Stone's "Wall Street.")

"These things have to stand on their own two feet," says Finkelstein, who's currently finishing up a second draft. "Listen, how many movies have been made about Jesse James and Eliot Ness? There are certain characters that are part of our literature and they will be revisited -- that's just the nature of it. There's a difference between appreciating something and putting it in amber."
Title: Re: Abel Ferrara
Post by: Ravi on August 29, 2007, 11:40:26 AM
Is that the quickest original-to-remake window ever?
Title: Re: Abel Ferrara
Post by: modage on August 29, 2007, 11:48:23 AM
Quote from: Ravi on August 29, 2007, 11:40:26 AM
Is that the quickest original-to-remake window ever?
not counting foreign movies remade in the US (and vice versa)?
Title: Re: Abel Ferrara
Post by: matt35mm on August 29, 2007, 12:34:53 PM
I like the idea.  Of course they could easily screw this up, but I can definitely see the potential for a movie like this to use a character and a basic, raw idea and plug it into our time.  The best way for this to work is for it to be less of a re-make than a companion piece of sorts, working along with the first movie to reveal something about the past and the time that we live in now.  I like the way that it's "pitched" in the article, as weaving the raw material into this moment in time.  What's different, what isn't?  Let's really take a look at it.

I HOPE that's where they're going, because it doesn't sound like people are exactly clamoring for a re-make of Bad Lieutenant, so I can't imagine that anyone thinks this is where the big bucks are gonna be.
Title: Re: Abel Ferrara
Post by: Pubrick on August 29, 2007, 01:32:17 PM
Quote from: Ravi on August 29, 2007, 11:40:26 AM
Is that the quickest original-to-remake window ever?

you know it's not. (http://xixax.com/index.php?topic=9152.0)
Title: Re: Abel Ferrara
Post by: MacGuffin on May 14, 2009, 01:17:36 AM
Ferrara to transform 'Jekyll'
Forest Whitaker, 50 Cent to star in redo
Source: Variety

Abel Ferrara is taking another walk on the wild side with a re-imagining of Robert Louis Stevenson's "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde," which will be contemporized and titled "Jekyll and Hyde."

Forest Whitaker and Curtis "50 Cent" Jackson are attached to play the lead roles in the classic tale about a doctor who invents a potion that unleashes his violent alter ego.

Glasshouse Pictures' Brett Walsh and Cheetah Vision Films' Randall Emmett are producing; Luc Roeg, Michael Robinson and Andrew Orr are exec producing for U.K. production banner Independent.

Sean Walsh, Bonnie Timmermann and Chris Lighty also receive exec producer credits.

Independent is handling international sales on the project, which will begin lensing in late summer.

"The combination of such formidable talent in front of and behind the camera will turn this wonderful gothic story into a modern classic for a whole new generation," said Roeg.
Title: Re: Abel Ferrara
Post by: SiliasRuby on May 20, 2009, 12:06:43 AM
Yeah baby yeah....Not one but two, TWO films of Jekyl and Hyde coming soon.
Title: Re: Abel Ferrara
Post by: MacGuffin on October 07, 2009, 07:05:57 PM
Snipes, Ferrara reunite on 'Game'
'New York' duo reteam for action thriller
Source: Variety

Wesley Snipes and helmer Abel Ferrara are reuniting on action-thriller "Game of Death."

It's their first project together since Ferrara's 1990 cult pic "King of New York."

Snipes stars as politician's bodyguard who must fend off five of the world's top assassins. Zoe Bell and Robert Davi co-star.

"Death" was penned by James Agnew. Producers are Billy Dietrich and Rafael Primorac. Exec producers are Voltage Pictures' Nicolas Chartier and Nadine de Barros, and Roger Grad. Bridge financiers Alastair Burlingham and Steve Robbins of Perpetual Media Capital also exec produce.

Pic started shooting this week in Detroit.

Sony Pictures Worldwide Acquisitions Group has U.S. rights, brokered by American Entertainment's Joe Cohen.

Voltage is handling foreign sales and has sold most of the overseas rights, including Germany, France, U.K., Latin America and East Europe.
Title: Re: Abel Ferrara
Post by: Reinhold on October 07, 2009, 08:00:06 PM
when did he get out of jail?

it's too bad that Snipes hasn't been in anything that I've liked-- this sounds kind of cool.

edit: Well, i did like the first blade when I was a kid.
Title: Re: Abel Ferrara
Post by: jenkins on December 13, 2013, 12:32:29 PM
imo this year's most glorious trash culture news is the dcp restoration of ms. 45 (from drafthouse, such a fabulous company!)

(https://xixax.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fi.imgur.com%2FPX8hpWW.jpg&hash=f86a46f60d92dae1d661f56cb3a23228f8e0a4ea)

i've seen this in film, which seems perfect because it's a grainy dirty early80s nyc movie. i couldn't imagine it being any better in dcp. then i watched the new trailer, and now i'm mountains-high excited

http://vimeo.com/79813616
Title: Re: Abel Ferrara
Post by: Reel on December 13, 2013, 12:39:34 PM
looks great, but having never seen it I really shouldn't have watched that trailer! FUUUCCCKKK!!  :doh:


wish I had one of these for times like this:

(https://xixax.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fupload.wikimedia.org%2Fwikipedia%2Fen%2F6%2F6b%2FNeuralizer1.jpg&hash=0cf07167306ddb89f576dc308d03114ee8c340ca)
Title: Re: Abel Ferrara
Post by: jenkins on December 13, 2013, 12:47:26 PM
awwww

i recommend the trailer for people who don't already think they want to see it, and i know what reelist means, the trailer will tell you surprises the movie will show you. even knowing what happens, the cool and maybe unexpected quality is how it happens. it's got impressive cinema
Title: Re: Abel Ferrara
Post by: ElPandaRoyal on December 14, 2013, 04:26:27 AM
I saw this ages ago, knowing nothing about it, when I was about 14 or 15, by chance when I was flipping through channels and realized it just about to start. What a sick, demented, twisted, entertaining flick. And Zoë Lund was such a stunning woman. When I later found out she died really young I felt kinda sad about it.
Title: Re: Abel Ferrara
Post by: wilder on March 29, 2014, 04:12:04 PM
Director Abel Ferrara on Mysterious 1975 Death of Pier Paolo Pasolini: 'I Know Who Killed Him'
via The Hollywood Reporter

Ferrara just finished shooting a biographical film titled "Pasolini" about the acclaimed Italian director, poet, journalist and intellectual.

ROME -- The death of acclaimed Italian film director, poet, journalist and intellectual Pier Paolo Pasolini has been shrouded in mystery for nearly 40 years, but director Abel Ferrara, who just finished shooting a bio-film about the end of the Italian director's life, says he knows who did it.

Pasolini died in 1975 after being run over several times by his own car at the seaside near Rome.

Police at first arrested a young male prostitute, but he was released for lack of evidence. Soon after, a search was launched for three men who reportedly opposed Pasolini's leftist and libertine views, but they were never found. And in 2005, police reopened the case after some evidence emerged that Pasolini may have been involved in an extortion scheme. But the case remains a mystery.

Bad Lieutenant director Ferrara just finished filming on Pasolini, and he told Italian media: "I know who killed him," without revealing a name. Local media were split on whether the remark was true insight Ferrara picked up in his research or was aimed at increasing interest in the film, which stars Wiliem Dafoe in the title role.

At least one person close to Pasolini hopes it's the former: His cousin Guido Mazzon has lobbied hard to open the case again so that new evidence can be evaluated.

"I hope that what is claimed with such certainty by the American filmmaker is true, because we cannot bear another round of unfounded speculation," he said.

Pasolini, who was 53 when he died, was a protagonist in the neorealism movement in Italian cinema as well as in poetry, theater and art.

He won top awards in Berlin in back-to-back years with jury prize winner The Decameron in 1971 and Golden Bear winner The Canterbury Tales the following year. He also had films screen in competition in Cannes and Venice.
Title: Re: Abel Ferrara
Post by: OpO1832 on May 14, 2015, 12:26:44 PM
The male prostitute that was arrested was a patsy for sure. This extortion scheme which has come to light seems to be rather interesting, does anyone have any more information on this? I am sure its in Italian so we would have to refer to google translate.

I hope Abel does a few things: (A) re-link with Nic St. John (B) If he does any sequel to a movie, it should be The Addiction, and make it black and white on film........ (C) If he does do The Last Crew, it needs to star Michael Pitt, he has to play a young Frank White! It should be 2hrs + and unrated or a very hard R. (D) Continue to make documentaries cause his brand of docs are fascinating.

I always happy to to see Abel release a new movie.
Title: Re: Abel Ferrara
Post by: wilder on December 11, 2020, 04:58:55 AM
Ethan Hawke Teaming With Abel Ferrara On The New War Film, 'Zeros And Ones'
The Playlist

According to Capstone Group, who will be shopping the project around to potential distributors and studios, Ethan Hawke has teamed up with legendary filmmaker, Abel Ferrara, for a new feature, "Zeros and Ones." The film is said to be a war thriller about an American soldier under siege in Rome. Joining Hawke in the film are actors Cristina Chiriac and Phil Neilson. Both of them previously worked with Ferrara on his most recent feature, "Siberia."

Here's the synopsis for the new feature:

JJ (Ethan Hawke) is an American soldier stationed in a Rome under siege, locked down, and at war. The Vatican being blown into the night sky is only the beginning of our hero's journey to uncover and defend against an unknown enemy but threatening the lives of the entire world.

"'Zeros and Ones' is a film of lockdown and war, danger and espionage, American soldiers, Chinese middlemen, Mid Eastern holy men, provocateurs, diplomats, rogue elements of the CIA and KGB," said Ferrara. "I cannot wait to roll the cameras next week in a way that is safe because this film was written during and with an understanding of the pandemic."


Title: Re: Abel Ferrara
Post by: jenkins on December 28, 2020, 07:51:15 PM
just finished Napoli, Napoli, Napoli (https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1489223/), which hosts a rather expansive perspective of Naples, Italy. a wise perspective. it is a neighborhood "built for people to live, but not to have a life." there are no job possibilities and so people orient themselves toward drugs and drug money (the mafia). no movie theater: seems crazy. just atrocious urban planning and no one at the time of this documentary had helped breathe life into it. more than a couple female prisoners are interviewed, lots of hardship and personal strength

here is Ferrara singing during the end credits and he's so legit and everything but there he is singing the n word

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B2GeLEhfUqo
Title: Re: Abel Ferrara
Post by: jenkins on January 07, 2021, 12:51:24 PM
King of New York approaches big topics and that's when you start to see a new type of Ferrara I think, and what I mean is the Ferrara of today begins back then, but for me the truly transitional movie was Mary, that's when I had to think twice about this guy and what he does. i watched Pasolini and that's a movie that treats emotions seriously. it confronts expansive human topics and when Pasolini dies it shows his mother's reaction, which is significant. it's not a plot point when Pasolini dies it's a real thing. i want to see it in a theater because the killing and other parts of the movie take place at night and i find darkness always works best on a big screen. but i'll probably watch it at home again and i will watch it again because it is a truly human movie and i appreciate that. it's not about shock and awe it's meaningful and that's cool. part of me wants to find it funny that Dafoe is playing Pasolini but the joke is on me. he treats his role seriously and Ferrara made a serious movie
Title: Re: Abel Ferrara
Post by: putneyswipe on January 18, 2021, 10:02:10 PM
Mulberry St. is a very fun hangout with Abel's goonish pals, him also being a goon, just a great film about an insular community facing change and way better than it has any right to be.
Title: Abel Ferrara
Post by: WorldForgot on October 07, 2022, 09:38:29 AM
A true independent. New York's Bad Boy -- a buddhist, now living in Rome. Finding an Abel Ferrara film at the right time iz akin to a great conversation. There's no superficiality in his work. Even the more aesthetic pieces have the texture of philosophy. And never academic, always personal. He's really there.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2AsMsu8DU10

As of late, filmmaker Michael Bilandic interviews his former boss and mentor Abel Ferrara for Metrograph (https://metrograph.com/its-like-being-a-pope).

QuoteThey say you should never meet your heroes, but I'd say otherwise. In 2007, I quit my job at the video store to work on a documentary about the Chelsea Hotel directed by the legendary and infamous Abel Ferrara. The story goes that Abel was interviewed as a subject for the project initially, but mid-interview declared that he was the director now. Amazingly, everyone seemed on board, and that was that. He'd been living in Italy for a few years, was in town to present Go Go Tales at the New York Film Festival, and looking to extend his stay. The producers booked him a room in the Chelsea, and all of a sudden he was living here again and making a new movie. At the time, I had little-to-no experience working on feature film sets, and to say I was thrown into the eye of the tornado would be a gross understatement. I was in my twenties and he was in his fifties, yet I'd never known anyone who worked as hard, partied as hard, or had as many ideas (that were actually seen through to completion) as this guy. It was a 24/7 job, running around the hotel at all hours meeting with every type of weirdo, and I loved it.

After Chelsea on the Rocks premiered at Cannes in 2008, Abel stayed on in New York, moving downtown above an Italian restaurant in Little Italy, and I was upgraded from his assistant to producer. We had a tiny office with a Mac Pro tower that we got free from the Apple store, a La-Z-Boy, and a big screen TV that played only sports (it was the feed to the bar downstairs). From that space we worked on a slew of feature films, shorts, web series, and off-the-wall obscurities, including a documentary about the Feast of San Gennaro, Mulberry St. (2010). I learned way more in this ultra chaotic and highly productive environment than I did in the entirety of my time at NYU, and in the midst of it all somehow made my first feature (which Abel generously executive produced), 2011's Happy Life. Around 2014, he moved back to Italy, got sober, and started a new chapter in his life and career. I've been fortunate to still work with him off and on in the years since. Whenever he comes to town, whether to shoot a documentary on a local arthouse theater, as with The Projectionist (2019); to be celebrated with a complete retrospective in the elite halls of MoMA; or to throw his own endearingly ramshackle festival of his own films, his collaborators' films, and his fave cult classics, as he did in 2021, you know you're in for something personal, all-consuming, and potentially explosive. And that at some point he will likely play a Dylan-esque cover of Schoolly D's "Just Another Killer."

It goes without saying that Abel's most iconic films King of New York (1990) and Bad Lieutenant (1992) are absolute canon, and that Christopher Walken's and Harvey Keitel's respective performances in them are unrivaled. But what truly impresses, in a career with over 30 features to his credit, is the sheer volume of low-key classics Abel's amassed. He's been going full force, pedal to the metal, since the '70s, and openly mocks the concept of ever slowing down.

I had the pleasure of Zooming with him, upon his return from Venice where he'd just premiered his latest film Padre Pio (2022) starring Shia LaBeouf. Unsurprisingly, there was a lot to catch up on.

MICHAEL M. BILANDIC: Okay, what's up? We're recording.

ABEL FERRARA: What's happening? Yeah, I was just doing an interview with Béatrice Dalle. You know that chick, the French actress?

MB: Of course. She's in my favorite film of yours, The Blackout (1997).

AF: Yeah, right. Okay, that crazy chick. They're here doing a thing on Pasolini, so we did this interview.

MB: She's making a movie about Pasolini?

AF: Yeah, she's searching all over. You know, she has this little French crew. They went through the whole deal—where he was born, and where he was this.... I just talked some crazy shit to her for five minutes.


MB: Where are you right now?

AF: I'm in Rome.

MB: You in your apartment?

AF: Yeah. Yeah. [Flips camera phone around to tour apartment.] You've never been?

MB: I've never been there.

AF: It's like Tommaso (2019)! This is like Tommaso. Can you see it or is it too dark?

MB: It's a funny thing. I feel like I have been to your place, though, because you've shot it so much. I love how you've integrated your apartments and neighborhoods throughout the years into your work; from The Driller Killer (1979) to Chelsea on the Rocks (2008) to Mulberry St. (2010) to Piazza Vittorio (2017). And, of course, Tommaso. If you were to shoot a movie in your apartment today, what would it be? What's the vibe like over there right now?

AF: [Opens another mineral water bottle.] Yeah, I played it out. I mean, how many Tommaso's can we make? Hello, my life is interesting [self-mocking voice]. You know, the relationship with Cristina [Chiriac] is interesting but I don't know if we should do another movie about it.

MB: You were talking about Tommaso 2 for a period.

AF: Yeah, now we're on to 3. We're gonna skip 2.

MB: I was just walking through San Gennaro earlier while they were setting up, and having these flashbacks to Mulberry St.

AF: Well, what's the Feast like now?

MB: I saw Joey Reynolds, the radio host, in an apron selling cheesecakes. I saw the "Cannoli King," Baby John. A lot of familiar faces. The big drama this year is they're not allowed to sell anything Godfather-related.

AF: Is someone suing them for that? Well, it was only that one maniac who like co-opted the whole thing, selling tapes, remember that maniac?

MB: Yeah. They're saying it's a bad influence on the culture, I think.

AF: Is Coppola suing them or is it like an anti-mob thing?

MB: It's anti-mob. They don't want that connotation.

AF: That's really fucking crazy.

MB: But then you still have, you know, meatball-eating contests and cannoli-eating contests, so it's clear—

AF: Well, cannoli-eating contests and Godfather are two different things. I thought they didn't make no more cannolis?! Remember when they came in and busted everybody because it was like the trans fat, remember that night? They came down, cops and everybody, the news station, and they shut down all the cannoli stands because of trans fat in the cannoli!

[...]

MB: Yeah, and we shot something with him. We filmed the premiere of his movie The Dukes (2007). It starred Peter Bogdanovich and was about an aging doo-wop group who decide to rob a dentist's office for the gold fillings, or something like that.

AF: You still got that footage? That was crazy. Remember Frankie fucking rented that bus, and we all went, that was the psycho fucking opening of all time. Man, find that shit, that was awesome.

MB: Ben Gazzara was there. Sylvia Miles...

AF: It was every fucking wacko like that, and they're all dressed up as if they were at the fucking Cannes Film Festival. Meanwhile it was just some dopey fucking thing.

MB: Speaking of film festivals, you just got back from Venice. How was that?

AF: Yeah. We were like the fucking losers circle, you know? Nobody wanted the film in any of the competition sides. Not Cannes, or anyone. So we're in this thing, it's called Authors' Nights [Giornate degli Autori; in English, Venice Days]. It's like getting into Venice through the back end, you know?

MB: It got a lot of attention.

AF: Yeah, Shia is like, you know, he's a movie star, man. He was cool, he came. The film was divided. The English-speaking people and the American critics, they trashed this fucking film. I mean, we got some fucked up... [Laughs]. Well you got to see it.

MB: When First Reformed (2017) came out, Schrader was talking about how he went on a tour of all these churches across the country with it. It's incredible how there's a whole world of Christian film production and exhibition out there, it's like a whole other ecosystem.

AF: You know, the funny thing is I'm a Buddhist, but this fucking film is as Catholic as can be. There's nothing even close to it. The monks are fucking besides themselves, they love it, you know? The first time we showed it to these guys, I thought we're going to show it to two or three of the main Capuchin monks from where Padre Pio came from. We get in the theatre—this was like, it wasn't the final cut; I just wanted to show it to these guys and get a vibe, right? Clearing the theatre, I turn around and there's like 20 of them. I'm with the writer [Maurizio] Braucci, and I'm thinking, "Man, we could get burnt at the stake here, these guys might..." [Laughs.] You know, you don't know. No one had seen the film. I'm thinking, fuck. These dudes, it's like a gang of them in the thing. They fucking loved it, man. I mean, really, really heavy, heavy players. So even that interview, that long interview Shia does on YouTube—did you see that? And that dude [Bishop Barron] has like a fucking audience of 35 million people, you know? So anyway, we're trying to get it to the Pope. Because it's like, there's the monks, and then there's the real Vatican with the priests.

MB: That's wilder than any film festival, getting into the Vatican.

AF: Yeah, yeah, get it to that crew because this film has a whole different audience.

MB: Do you know about this whole Trad Cath thing in New York? In the last couple years it's become a very fashionable to be an orthodox Catholic again. I met a girl the other day, and she said, "I'm Catholic, but I don't like to talk about it because I don't want people to think that I'm being trendy."

AF: Oh, wow. That's crazy. Well Shia is right there, bro, because he's out front.

MB: I gotta ask you about this. So I texted Sean [Price Williams] a couple of weeks ago. I was like, "What are you up to? You want to grab a beer?" And he's like, "Oh sorry, I'm in Ukraine with Abel right now." I almost spat my drink out. I knew you guys were talking about it, but—

AF: We just went. We couldn't talk about it. What happens is you talk about this shit, and then... You know, I met [Sergei] Losnitza, and then somebody else. It turns out the guys running that country are all film producers, you know? Zelensky and his guys, they're all film people. And they all knew me. So when I call, I says, "What do you think?" They're like "Oh, man, you gotta come," and the next minute they got us tickets on this crazy—I mean, it wasn't so simple but they got us to Kyiv and it was cool. You know, it was like a 20-hour train trip from Warsaw. It was an adventure. But it was crazy, man. It was like Mulberry St. We just walked around and just fucking filmed whoever we bumped into. It wasn't like a big...

MB: Right, you don't overthink it, you just go in.

AF: Yeah, we just went there. You know what I mean? I was scared, but when you got there, you know, the war isn't in Kyiv—there is a war though. When you go places where the Russians were... it's a nightmare, man, because these guys got weapons, they just blow the whole fucking block up. They was saying, "Do you want to have a bulletproof vest and a helmet?" You look at a building and the whole building's dropped. Like, you're going to wear a fucking bulletproof vest? It's a nightmare, it's a real world war. It's like a real fucking catastrophe.

MB: So bleak.

AF: Anyway, so we started shooting. But it's going to be a long haul.

MB: On a brighter note, I thought of you the other day. The Jets game on Sunday...

AF: The Sunday game, man. I'm watching, because I get the Europass, right? And I'm watching and they're terrible, but in a heartbreaking, nightmarish way, right? And I just shut the computer down. They're down 13 points with two minutes to go. Their chances of winning, they have this statistic, was .001 percent. Then in the middle of the night I look at the news, and it goes "Jets win," and I thought it was like a gag, you know? If it was normal television in the old days, where there's no replay, I would have missed the greatest comeback almost in the history of football. It was an insane game.

MB: When Fassbinder was making Querelle (1982), the whole shoot was structured around Dallas, the soap opera. Production had to stop so that he could watch it. I kept thinking about that when we were working, with these Jets games. It felt like the whole week revolved around that and set the tone on set.

AF: Back then, they almost won. They were like a game from the Super Bowl. But that was like 10 years ago. Mulberry St. was, what, 10 years ago? More? That's a good movie.

But now, I'm writing a book. My autobiography. Did I tell you this? I got a fucking deal from the Italian publisher who published Oliver Stone's book and Tarantino's, right? This chick's like this punked-out cool chick, but she's got a real '70s sensibility. She's a big fan.

Title: Re: Abel Ferrara
Post by: wilder on February 20, 2023, 06:41:52 PM
Late 2023

Bad Lieutenant (1992) on 4K UHD blu-ray from Kino, from a new 4K restoration

(https://i.imgur.com/eCXZmVr.jpg)

The Lieutenant (Harvey Keitel) is a corrupt cop steeped in gambling debt who exploits his authority to sexually harass teenage girls, embezzle money and abuse drugs. His troubles come to a head when a mob lackey delivers an ultimatum: pay off his debt, or else. His fate appears sealed. But when The Lieutenant learns that a $50,000 reward is being offered to whoever catches a pair of thugs who raped a nun (Frankie Thorn), he jumps at the opportunity, hoping that he can still redeem himself.
Title: Re: Abel Ferrara
Post by: WorldForgot on June 04, 2023, 03:49:43 PM
"A Snake Pit Gig": The Making (and Undoing) of Abel Ferrara's "Cat Chaser" (https://hidden-films.com/2015/09/09/a-snake-pit-gig-the-making-and-undoing-of-abel-ferraras-cat-chaser/)

QuoteOver the past year, I have spoken with Ferrara, Weller, Redman, Borrelli (who is now a hypnotherapist), "Cat Chaser's" director of photography Anthony Richmond, executive producer Josi Konski, first assistant director Louis D'Esposito (now co-president at Marvel Studios) and second assistant director Glen Trotiner. I also heard from Milián, via a brief email sent by his publicist. Co-executive producer Guy Collins provided some scant recollections via email (basically that the film remains a fond memory despite certain "dynamics" between Ferrara and the cast). He referred all other questions to Peter Davis, who politely declined to be interviewed. (Panzer died in a freak ice skating accident in 2007; Leonard died in 2013 and Durning in 2012). Other performers, including Forrest and McGillis, also politely refused interviews, and Santoni, as well as several associate producers and crew members, did not return calls or emails.

The accounts of those willing to be interviewed comprise a multifaceted, sometimes tragic story, about a would-be classic crime caper that wasn't properly developed or released—and, with the right tools, effort and publicity, still could be.