Netflix’s crime anthology series Kaleidoscope allows viewers to watch the episodes in any order, piece together clues, and solve a heist that’s inspired by true events. The just-released official trailer introduces the key players who’ve set their sights on breaking into a vault that’s weatherproof, shock-proof, and thief-proof. The payoff? 7 billion, if the team can successfully crack open the world’s most secure vault.
Netflix is hoping to lure in true crime fans and anyone with a knack for solving mysteries by dishing up the fun “watch in any order” twist. Only “White: The Heist” needs to be watched last. Otherwise, it’s up to each individual viewer to decide where to begin.
Kaleidoscope premieres on Sunday, January 1, 2023.
The series stars Giancarlo Esposito, Paz Vega, Rufus Sewell, Tati Gabrielle, Peter Mark Kendall, Rosaline Elba, Jai Courtney, Niousha Noor, Jordan Mendoza, Soojeong Son, and Hemky Madera. Eric Garcia...
Netflix is hoping to lure in true crime fans and anyone with a knack for solving mysteries by dishing up the fun “watch in any order” twist. Only “White: The Heist” needs to be watched last. Otherwise, it’s up to each individual viewer to decide where to begin.
Kaleidoscope premieres on Sunday, January 1, 2023.
The series stars Giancarlo Esposito, Paz Vega, Rufus Sewell, Tati Gabrielle, Peter Mark Kendall, Rosaline Elba, Jai Courtney, Niousha Noor, Jordan Mendoza, Soojeong Son, and Hemky Madera. Eric Garcia...
- 12/13/2022
- by Rebecca Murray
- Showbiz Junkies
Netflix has never been shy about putting experimental TV on its platform, as seen with interactive specials like “Bandersnatch.” Now, the streamer is playing with the medium’s episodic format with “Kaleidoscope,” a new anthology series set to premiere New Year’s Day.
“Kaleidoscope” is loosely inspired by a real-life story of 70 billion in bonds gone missing in Manhattan during Hurricane Sandy, focusing on a group of thieves as they undergo a multi-decade-long plan to pull off the perfect heist on a seemingly unbreakable vault. The first season features eight episodes, with each installment bouncing around a 24-year timeline from when the crew’s preparations began to six months after the heist day itself.
Uniquely, with the exception of the finale — which depicts the actual heist itself — every episode of the series is designed to be watched in any order, and the show randomizes the experience so that each viewer...
“Kaleidoscope” is loosely inspired by a real-life story of 70 billion in bonds gone missing in Manhattan during Hurricane Sandy, focusing on a group of thieves as they undergo a multi-decade-long plan to pull off the perfect heist on a seemingly unbreakable vault. The first season features eight episodes, with each installment bouncing around a 24-year timeline from when the crew’s preparations began to six months after the heist day itself.
Uniquely, with the exception of the finale — which depicts the actual heist itself — every episode of the series is designed to be watched in any order, and the show randomizes the experience so that each viewer...
- 12/13/2022
- by Wilson Chapman
- Indiewire
A new Netflix anthology is on the way and it's likely to put a spin on your typical water cooler discussions. "Kaleidoscope" is certainly the kind of show you'll want to unpack with your friends: it's got high stakes, lots of intrigue, a mystery, and action-packed criminal hijinks. There's just one problem. Should you discuss the miniseries with someone before either of you has finished, you'll quickly realize that something is off: neither of you will have seen the same episodes.
"Kaleidoscope" isn't your average Netflix series — it's an immersive experience. Unlike most shows, this series was designed to be watched in any possible order. In fact, Netflix itself will be scrambling the episodes so that each viewer watches the series unfold in a different way.
While this is certainly a new approach for the streamer, this non-linear series isn't too far off from its prior experimental endeavors. The streaming...
"Kaleidoscope" isn't your average Netflix series — it's an immersive experience. Unlike most shows, this series was designed to be watched in any possible order. In fact, Netflix itself will be scrambling the episodes so that each viewer watches the series unfold in a different way.
While this is certainly a new approach for the streamer, this non-linear series isn't too far off from its prior experimental endeavors. The streaming...
- 12/4/2022
- by Shania Russell
- Slash Film
Viewers are given the opportunity to choose which order they view the episodes in with Netflix’s Kaleidoscope, loosely inspired by true events that might have occurred during Hurricane Sandy. In the just-released behind-the-scenes video, series creator/showrunner Eric Garcia and his cast explain the setup and the beauty of audience members being able to determine which order they watch the crime drama unfold.
Series star Giancarlo Esposito believes audiences will want to rewatch the episodes to suss out all the clues they might have missed. “Every episode had multiple connections to every other episode,” says showrunner Garcia.
In addition to Esposito, the ensemble includes Rufus Sewell, Paz Vega, Tati Gabrielle, Peter Mark Kendall, Rosaline Elbay, Niousha Noor, and Jai Courtney. Showrunner Eric Garcia serves as writer and also executive produces along with Russell Fine, Fred Berger, Brian Kavanaugh-Jones, Justin Levy, Ridley Scott, David W. Zucker, Jordan Sheehan, Clayton Krueger,...
Series star Giancarlo Esposito believes audiences will want to rewatch the episodes to suss out all the clues they might have missed. “Every episode had multiple connections to every other episode,” says showrunner Garcia.
In addition to Esposito, the ensemble includes Rufus Sewell, Paz Vega, Tati Gabrielle, Peter Mark Kendall, Rosaline Elbay, Niousha Noor, and Jai Courtney. Showrunner Eric Garcia serves as writer and also executive produces along with Russell Fine, Fred Berger, Brian Kavanaugh-Jones, Justin Levy, Ridley Scott, David W. Zucker, Jordan Sheehan, Clayton Krueger,...
- 11/23/2022
- by Rebecca Murray
- Showbiz Junkies
Kaleidoscope. (L to R) Paz Vega as Ava Mercer, Giancarlo Esposito as Leo Pap, Jai Courtney as Bob Goodwin, Peter Mark Kendall as Stan Loomis in episode ÒWhiteÓ of Kaleidoscope. Cr. Courtesy of Netflix © 2022 Spanning 25 years, Kaleidoscope (previously titled Jigsaw) is an all-new anthology series following a crew of masterful thieves and their attempt to crack a seemingly unbreakable vault for the biggest payday in history. Guarded by the world’s most powerful corporate security team, and with law enforcement on the case, every episode reveals a piece of an elaborate puzzle of corruption, greed, vengeance, scheming, loyalties and betrayals. How did the crew of thieves plan it? Who gets away with it? Who can be trusted? Loosely inspired by the real-life story where seventy billion dollars in bonds went missing in downtown Manhattan during Hurricane Sandy, Kaleidoscope consists of eight episodes spanning from 24 years before the heist to 6 months after.
- 11/22/2022
- by Hollywood Outbreak
- HollywoodOutbreak.com
We’re getting the first behind-the-scenes look at Kaleidoscope (fka Jigsaw), Netflix’s upcoming heist drama anthology series from Eric Garcia and Ridley Scott, starring Giancarlo Esposito, Rufus Sewell, Paz Vega among others. The clip features cast and creatives from the series, which is set to premiere January 1, 2023 on Netflix.
Kaleidoscope is loosely inspired by the real-life story where seventy billion dollars in bonds went missing in downtown Manhattan during Hurricane Sandy. It consists of eight episodes spanning from 24 years before the heist to 6 months after.
Per Netflix, it follows a crew of masterful thieves and their attempt to crack a seemingly unbreakable vault for the biggest payday in history. Guarded by the world’s most powerful corporate security team, and with law enforcement on the case, every episode reveals a piece of an elaborate puzzle of corruption, greed, vengeance, scheming, loyalties and betrayals.
The anthology series takes a non-linear approach to storytelling,...
Kaleidoscope is loosely inspired by the real-life story where seventy billion dollars in bonds went missing in downtown Manhattan during Hurricane Sandy. It consists of eight episodes spanning from 24 years before the heist to 6 months after.
Per Netflix, it follows a crew of masterful thieves and their attempt to crack a seemingly unbreakable vault for the biggest payday in history. Guarded by the world’s most powerful corporate security team, and with law enforcement on the case, every episode reveals a piece of an elaborate puzzle of corruption, greed, vengeance, scheming, loyalties and betrayals.
The anthology series takes a non-linear approach to storytelling,...
- 11/22/2022
- by Denise Petski
- Deadline Film + TV
Netflix’s new anthology series “Kaleidoscope” will give viewers their own unique experience watching a team of skillful thieves attempt to pull off a robbery they’ve been planning for over 20 years. In a sneak peek clip, the cast and crew share the intricacies of the series and how it’s making a new spin on the traditional anthology series.
“Every episode had multiple connections to every other episode,” said the show’s creator, showrunner and executive producer Eric Garcia in the clip. Garcia is also one of the “Kaleidoscope” writers.
Also Read:
How ‘The Witcher’ Switch From Henry Cavill to Liam Hemsworth Will Impact Demand for the Show – and the Stars | Charts
In the eight-part series, the audience will follow “a crew of masterful thieves and their attempt to crack a seemingly unbreakable vault for the biggest payday in history. Guarded by the world’s most powerful corporate security team,...
“Every episode had multiple connections to every other episode,” said the show’s creator, showrunner and executive producer Eric Garcia in the clip. Garcia is also one of the “Kaleidoscope” writers.
Also Read:
How ‘The Witcher’ Switch From Henry Cavill to Liam Hemsworth Will Impact Demand for the Show – and the Stars | Charts
In the eight-part series, the audience will follow “a crew of masterful thieves and their attempt to crack a seemingly unbreakable vault for the biggest payday in history. Guarded by the world’s most powerful corporate security team,...
- 11/22/2022
- by Raquel "Rocky" Harris
- The Wrap
Nicole Beharie‘s Abbie Mills may be dead, but “Sleepy Hollow” is actually very much still alive. Fox has renewed its supernatural drama for a fourth season, a show that many (once again) thought would head to the graveyard instead. Sans former female lead Beharie, “Sleepy” stars Tom Mison as Ichabod Crane, Lyndie Greenwood as Jenny Mills, Lance Gross as Daniel Reynolds and Jessica Camacho as Sophie Foster. The 20th Century Fox Television and K/O Paper Products series hails from Alex Kurtzman, Roberto Orci, Len Wiseman and Phillip Iscove. The first three executive produce the show, as do Clifton Campbell,...
- 5/13/2016
- by Tony Maglio
- The Wrap
Sleepy Hollow, Season 2, Episode 12, “Paradise Lost”
Written by M. Raven Metzner
Directed by Russell Fine
Airs Mondays at 9pm (Et) on Fox
The energy level greeting the return of Sleepy Hollow after its midseason finale is far different than the energy level that greeted its second season premiere. At that time, there were only vague concerns that the show couldn’t maintain this level of absurd energy; and now those concerns have been proven right. Sleepy Hollow’s second season to date has proved that there’s a limit to its madness, as lead actor chemistry and impressive visuals have been offset by some shaky plotting and the sense that the writers have no idea what to do with anyone other than Tom Mison or Nicole Beharie.
In that context, “Paradise Lost” is a midseason premiere that meets those expectations, an episode with a few lively action scenes and some...
Written by M. Raven Metzner
Directed by Russell Fine
Airs Mondays at 9pm (Et) on Fox
The energy level greeting the return of Sleepy Hollow after its midseason finale is far different than the energy level that greeted its second season premiere. At that time, there were only vague concerns that the show couldn’t maintain this level of absurd energy; and now those concerns have been proven right. Sleepy Hollow’s second season to date has proved that there’s a limit to its madness, as lead actor chemistry and impressive visuals have been offset by some shaky plotting and the sense that the writers have no idea what to do with anyone other than Tom Mison or Nicole Beharie.
In that context, “Paradise Lost” is a midseason premiere that meets those expectations, an episode with a few lively action scenes and some...
- 1/6/2015
- by Les Chappell
- SoundOnSight
USA Network’s Graceland re-opens its doors this Wednesday at 10/9c, and it’s not long at all before FBI whiz kid Mike Warren finds cause to slip away from D.C. and visit the sun-baked beach house — though what he finds there may surprise him. Guns downstairs? Unlabeled fridge finds? Strange bedfellows? Oh, and who’s the new guy…?
Jeff Eastin, who previously created USA’s White Collar, shared with TVLine a look at the changes that Graceland the show has undergone, all while maintaining (if not amplifying) its darker, sexy tone.
Related | USA Sets Summer Dates for Covert Affairs,...
Jeff Eastin, who previously created USA’s White Collar, shared with TVLine a look at the changes that Graceland the show has undergone, all while maintaining (if not amplifying) its darker, sexy tone.
Related | USA Sets Summer Dates for Covert Affairs,...
- 6/11/2014
- TVLine.com
Photo Courtesy of USA Network
Graceland, Season 1, Episode 12: “Pawn”
Written by: Jeff Eastin
Directed by: Russell Lee Fine
Airs Thursdays at 10 pm (Et) on USA
On this week’s Graceland finale, Briggs continues acting shady, Johnny has his feelings hurt, Jakes chooses a side, Paige encourages Mike’s hunt for Briggs, and Jangles finally reveals himself and attacks.
Graceland‘s at its best when everyone in the house is working together against a common enemy; so, while it was entertaining watching the house nearly implode as dissension separated the team, getting not one but two scenes with the whole house (sans Briggs, at first) gathered is still a nice treat, as well as a return to the happy days at season’s beginning. With any ensemble cast, it’s difficult for shows to find a group of people that not only work well together, but also have excellent chemistry on screen.
Graceland, Season 1, Episode 12: “Pawn”
Written by: Jeff Eastin
Directed by: Russell Lee Fine
Airs Thursdays at 10 pm (Et) on USA
On this week’s Graceland finale, Briggs continues acting shady, Johnny has his feelings hurt, Jakes chooses a side, Paige encourages Mike’s hunt for Briggs, and Jangles finally reveals himself and attacks.
Graceland‘s at its best when everyone in the house is working together against a common enemy; so, while it was entertaining watching the house nearly implode as dissension separated the team, getting not one but two scenes with the whole house (sans Briggs, at first) gathered is still a nice treat, as well as a return to the happy days at season’s beginning. With any ensemble cast, it’s difficult for shows to find a group of people that not only work well together, but also have excellent chemistry on screen.
- 9/13/2013
- by Ashley Laggan
- SoundOnSight
Photo Courtesy of USA Network
Graceland, Season 1, Episode 7: “Goodbye High”
Written by: Joe Henderson
Directed by: Russell Lee Fine
Airs Thursdays at 10 pm (Et) on USA
On this week’s Graceland, Paul makes a shocking confession, Jakes uses professional means for personal gain, Charlie comes clean about her drug usage to the house, and Mike ponders his future.
After last week’s stunning revelation–Briggs attends Narcotics Anonymous meetings for heroin addiction–”Goodbye High” picks up with Briggs offering Mike the truth. In the early days of Briggs’s undercover status, he made the idiotic decision to confront the head of a Mexican drug cartel alone. He never got the chance to meet the man; instead, he was kidnapped by members of the cartel, held in a shack, and fed a steady diet of heroin for two weeks straight before being released. (If the news came out that Briggs was a heroin addict,...
Graceland, Season 1, Episode 7: “Goodbye High”
Written by: Joe Henderson
Directed by: Russell Lee Fine
Airs Thursdays at 10 pm (Et) on USA
On this week’s Graceland, Paul makes a shocking confession, Jakes uses professional means for personal gain, Charlie comes clean about her drug usage to the house, and Mike ponders his future.
After last week’s stunning revelation–Briggs attends Narcotics Anonymous meetings for heroin addiction–”Goodbye High” picks up with Briggs offering Mike the truth. In the early days of Briggs’s undercover status, he made the idiotic decision to confront the head of a Mexican drug cartel alone. He never got the chance to meet the man; instead, he was kidnapped by members of the cartel, held in a shack, and fed a steady diet of heroin for two weeks straight before being released. (If the news came out that Briggs was a heroin addict,...
- 7/26/2013
- by Ashley Laggan
- SoundOnSight
Aaron Tveit and Daniel Sunjata
Graceland, Season 1, Episode 1: “Pilot”
Written by Jeff Eastin
Directed by Russell Lee Fine
Airs Thursdays at 10 pm (Et) on USA
Though a solid episode, Graceland‘s premiere was somewhat bland and unremarkable. The pilot tried to strike a balance between gritty primetime thriller and light-hearted summer TV and mostly succeeded–the final product was entertaining to watch, if not particularly satisfying.
Graceland centers on a group of undercover agents (DEA, FBI, and Customs) playing house together on a Southern California beach. The house–nicknamed “Graceland”–was seized in a drug raid by the Us Government and handed over to top Us agents investigating everything from drug deals to illegally imported birds. According to the creators, Graceland‘s premise is based on a true story.
Graceland‘s premiere opens on a dark note: scenes of FBI agents proudly graduating are smoothly intercut with scenes from...
Graceland, Season 1, Episode 1: “Pilot”
Written by Jeff Eastin
Directed by Russell Lee Fine
Airs Thursdays at 10 pm (Et) on USA
Though a solid episode, Graceland‘s premiere was somewhat bland and unremarkable. The pilot tried to strike a balance between gritty primetime thriller and light-hearted summer TV and mostly succeeded–the final product was entertaining to watch, if not particularly satisfying.
Graceland centers on a group of undercover agents (DEA, FBI, and Customs) playing house together on a Southern California beach. The house–nicknamed “Graceland”–was seized in a drug raid by the Us Government and handed over to top Us agents investigating everything from drug deals to illegally imported birds. According to the creators, Graceland‘s premise is based on a true story.
Graceland‘s premiere opens on a dark note: scenes of FBI agents proudly graduating are smoothly intercut with scenes from...
- 6/8/2013
- by Ashley Laggan
- SoundOnSight
When you’re dating someone who looks like White Collar‘s Neal Caffrey, it’s hard to keep the relationship casual — as Neal’s on-and-off girlfriend Sara discovers in the following exclusive video from Tuesday’s episode (USA Network, 10/9c).
Related | Matt’s Inside Line: Scoop on White Collar and More!
Sara’s got a new client who has created a perfume line inspired by Marie Antoinette’s signature scent. When the con man asks if Sara has a date to the launch party, she replies, “Would it matter if I did?” Based on his swoonworthy response, we’re guessing...
Related | Matt’s Inside Line: Scoop on White Collar and More!
Sara’s got a new client who has created a perfume line inspired by Marie Antoinette’s signature scent. When the con man asks if Sara has a date to the launch party, she replies, “Would it matter if I did?” Based on his swoonworthy response, we’re guessing...
- 2/15/2013
- by Vlada Gelman
- TVLine.com
"Graceland" will be the latest quirky/addictive character-driven dramedy on USA's roster -- a niche that's kept them in the top spot in terms of original cable programming. The network announced today that it was giving a series order to the show, which is from "White Collar" creator Jeff Eastin. Like "White Collar," "Graceland" sounds like a mix of crime elements and domestic/workplace banter -- the series stars Daniel Sunjata ("Rescue Me"), Aaron Tveit ("Howl"), Brandon Jay McLaren ("Falling Skies"), Vanessa Ferlito ("Death Proof") and Manny Montana ("The Chicago Code") as agents from the DEA, FBI and U.S. Customs who are forced to live together undercover in a Southern California beach house. In other works, it's like "The Real World," but scripted and with more guns...? Russell Fine directed the pilot, which Sean Daniel executive produce. USA...
- 6/29/2012
- by Alison Willmore
- Indiewire
USA Network is doubling its bet on Jeff Eastin. The cable network has picked up to series Graceland, the new pilot from White Collar creator/executive producer Eastin. The one-hour drama, from Fox TV Studios, follows a group of diverse agents — from the Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA), Federal Bureau of Investigations (FBI) and U.S. Customs — whose worlds collide while forced to live together in an undercover beach house in Southern California. Sean Daniel served as executive producer on the pilot, which was directed by Russell Fine. “Graceland is very much in our sweet spot — it has that fantastic and rich look associate with most of our shows, but we also want to go to very edgy and dark places with it,” USA co-president Jeff Wachtel said. “The characters’ day job takes them to places we haven’t gone with our original series.” Eastin will run both Graceland and White Collar,...
- 6/29/2012
- by NELLIE ANDREEVA
- Deadline TV
Photo by Eric Liebowitz/USA Network
White Collar returns tonight on USA and we'll all find out the fate of Mozzie, who was last seen lying in Central Park with a bullet in his chest. Fans are praying the producers have not killed him off. In the meantime we spoke with a tight-lipped Matt Bomer and Tim DeKay about everything except Mozzie's survival. Here’s what they had to say about their on-screen chemistry, how their characters have developed and working with the rest of the cast.
Tune in to the White Collar midseason premiere on January 18 at 10 p.m. Est/9 p.m. Central on USA.
Q: You have such great chemistry on screen and you seem to get along well off screen. How do you continue to maintain that?
Tim: We went to therapy once a week.
Matt: Couples therapy.
Tim: Yes. It really —
Matt: It’s worth it.
White Collar returns tonight on USA and we'll all find out the fate of Mozzie, who was last seen lying in Central Park with a bullet in his chest. Fans are praying the producers have not killed him off. In the meantime we spoke with a tight-lipped Matt Bomer and Tim DeKay about everything except Mozzie's survival. Here’s what they had to say about their on-screen chemistry, how their characters have developed and working with the rest of the cast.
Tune in to the White Collar midseason premiere on January 18 at 10 p.m. Est/9 p.m. Central on USA.
Q: You have such great chemistry on screen and you seem to get along well off screen. How do you continue to maintain that?
Tim: We went to therapy once a week.
Matt: Couples therapy.
Tim: Yes. It really —
Matt: It’s worth it.
- 1/18/2011
- by Pop Culture Passionistas
- popculturepassionistas
Photo by: Glenn Watson
Tim Matheson’s name used to be synonymous with the classic‘70s frat film Animal House. But after enjoying almost 50 years in theentertainment business (not bad for a 63-year-old), Matheson has finally seemedto officially shed his Eric Stratton association.
These days, the actor/director is better known as the goldenboy of USA Networks, where he frequently works behind the camera and makes the occasionalguest appearance on shows like Burn Notice, White Collar, and Covert Affairs.
In a recent interview, Matheson talked about whether heconsiders himself more of an actor or a director, his role at USA, and theparts he’d like to explore at the network.
Q: Since you’re doing both the acting and directing, do youconsider yourself more of an actor or a director?
Tim: I think at the moment—that’s so hard. I think right nowI’m more of a director...
Tim Matheson’s name used to be synonymous with the classic‘70s frat film Animal House. But after enjoying almost 50 years in theentertainment business (not bad for a 63-year-old), Matheson has finally seemedto officially shed his Eric Stratton association.
These days, the actor/director is better known as the goldenboy of USA Networks, where he frequently works behind the camera and makes the occasionalguest appearance on shows like Burn Notice, White Collar, and Covert Affairs.
In a recent interview, Matheson talked about whether heconsiders himself more of an actor or a director, his role at USA, and theparts he’d like to explore at the network.
Q: Since you’re doing both the acting and directing, do youconsider yourself more of an actor or a director?
Tim: I think at the moment—that’s so hard. I think right nowI’m more of a director...
- 8/3/2010
- by Pop Culture Passionistas
- popculturepassionistas
Ten cinematographers will vie for television honors in the American Society of Cinematographers' 22nd annual Outstanding Achievement Awards competition.
The nominees in the TV movie-miniseries-pilot category are Oliver Bokelberg for NBC's "Raines" pilot; David Franco, HBO's telefilm "Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee"; Ben Nott, TNT's miniseries "The Company"; Rene Ohashi, CBS' telefilm "Jesse Stone: Sea Change"; and Michael Weaver, ABC's "Pushing Daisies" pilot.
Nominees in the episodic television category were chosen for one episode of a regular series. They are James L. Carter for "Ending Happy" from CBS' "CSI: Crime Scene Investigation"; Eagle Egilsson, "Inside Out" from CBS' "CSI: Miami"; Russell Lee Fine, "All of Us are in the Gutter" from NBC's "The Black Donnellys"; John Fleckenstein, "Welcome to the Club" from ABC's "Women's Murder Club"; and Glen Winter, "Noir" from CW's "Smallville".
The awards will be held Jan. 26 at the Grand Ballroom at Hollywood & Highland.
The nominees in the TV movie-miniseries-pilot category are Oliver Bokelberg for NBC's "Raines" pilot; David Franco, HBO's telefilm "Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee"; Ben Nott, TNT's miniseries "The Company"; Rene Ohashi, CBS' telefilm "Jesse Stone: Sea Change"; and Michael Weaver, ABC's "Pushing Daisies" pilot.
Nominees in the episodic television category were chosen for one episode of a regular series. They are James L. Carter for "Ending Happy" from CBS' "CSI: Crime Scene Investigation"; Eagle Egilsson, "Inside Out" from CBS' "CSI: Miami"; Russell Lee Fine, "All of Us are in the Gutter" from NBC's "The Black Donnellys"; John Fleckenstein, "Welcome to the Club" from ABC's "Women's Murder Club"; and Glen Winter, "Noir" from CW's "Smallville".
The awards will be held Jan. 26 at the Grand Ballroom at Hollywood & Highland.
- 12/1/2007
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
PARK CITY -- Freedom's just another course for everything else to lose. In this story of a young woman just released from prison who tries to recon-nect with her young daughter, "freedom" entails the possibility of returning to drugs. Starring Maggie Gyllenhaal, "Sherrybaby" might find its widest audience on the Lifetime network.
In this hu-mane and vital story, filmmaker Laurie Collyer has captured the horror of having a life go out of control. In addicts' terms, Sherry (Gyllenhaal) has a lot of "wreckage": things she must clean up in her life caused during her drugging and jailing. When Sherry is released on parole to a halfway house, she makes a full-hearted attempt to re-enter her daughter Alexis Ryan' Simpkins) life. Not surprisingly, the little girl is wary, and it's evident that her brother (Brad Henke) and sister-in-law (Bridget Barkan) have bonded strongly with Alexis.
It's a daunting undertaking for someone as fragile as Sherry, especially because she doesn't clearly see the fine line of her addiction. Socially and psychologically, it's survival one day at a time. Enduring the abrasions of the halfway house as well as the hostilities of her parole officer (Giancarlo Esposito), Sherry inevitably lets the pressures get to her: a sip of beer, and it's straight back down that slippery slope.
Buoyed by Gyllenhaal's hauntingly complex portrait of the vivacious but addictive Sherry, the film is no mere by-the-numbers chronology of addiction. Gyllenhaal's sympathetic and charismatic performance binds us to the horror of Sherry's personal demons. In true addict fashion, Gyllenhaal bounds between euphoria and despair.
Under Collyer's understanding hand, other performances are exemplary, most prominently Danny Trejo as a weather-beaten but life-driven addict.
Technical contributions cap off the intelligent storytelling: Cinematographer Russell Lee Fine's incisive framings clue us to the delicate personal relationships, while composer Mark Livesey's edgy sounds nudge us to the horrors that one weak moment can wreak.
SHERRYBABY
Sherry Films
Credits:
Screenwriter-director: Laurie Collyer
Producers: Marc Turtletaub, Lemore Syvan
Executive producer: Jeb Brody
Director of photography: Russell Lee Fine
Production designer: Stephen Beatrice
Music: Jack Livesey
Costume designer: Jill Newell
Editors: Curtiss Clayton, Joe Landauer
Cast:
Sherry: Maggie Gyllenhaal
Bobby: Brad Henke
Parole Officer Hernandez: Giancarlo Esposito
Bob Sr.: Sam Bottoms
Lynette: Bridget Barkan
Alexis: Ryan Simpkins
Marcia: Kate Burton
Andy: Rio Hackford
Dean: Danny Trejo
No MPAA rating
Running time -- 96 minutes...
In this hu-mane and vital story, filmmaker Laurie Collyer has captured the horror of having a life go out of control. In addicts' terms, Sherry (Gyllenhaal) has a lot of "wreckage": things she must clean up in her life caused during her drugging and jailing. When Sherry is released on parole to a halfway house, she makes a full-hearted attempt to re-enter her daughter Alexis Ryan' Simpkins) life. Not surprisingly, the little girl is wary, and it's evident that her brother (Brad Henke) and sister-in-law (Bridget Barkan) have bonded strongly with Alexis.
It's a daunting undertaking for someone as fragile as Sherry, especially because she doesn't clearly see the fine line of her addiction. Socially and psychologically, it's survival one day at a time. Enduring the abrasions of the halfway house as well as the hostilities of her parole officer (Giancarlo Esposito), Sherry inevitably lets the pressures get to her: a sip of beer, and it's straight back down that slippery slope.
Buoyed by Gyllenhaal's hauntingly complex portrait of the vivacious but addictive Sherry, the film is no mere by-the-numbers chronology of addiction. Gyllenhaal's sympathetic and charismatic performance binds us to the horror of Sherry's personal demons. In true addict fashion, Gyllenhaal bounds between euphoria and despair.
Under Collyer's understanding hand, other performances are exemplary, most prominently Danny Trejo as a weather-beaten but life-driven addict.
Technical contributions cap off the intelligent storytelling: Cinematographer Russell Lee Fine's incisive framings clue us to the delicate personal relationships, while composer Mark Livesey's edgy sounds nudge us to the horrors that one weak moment can wreak.
SHERRYBABY
Sherry Films
Credits:
Screenwriter-director: Laurie Collyer
Producers: Marc Turtletaub, Lemore Syvan
Executive producer: Jeb Brody
Director of photography: Russell Lee Fine
Production designer: Stephen Beatrice
Music: Jack Livesey
Costume designer: Jill Newell
Editors: Curtiss Clayton, Joe Landauer
Cast:
Sherry: Maggie Gyllenhaal
Bobby: Brad Henke
Parole Officer Hernandez: Giancarlo Esposito
Bob Sr.: Sam Bottoms
Lynette: Bridget Barkan
Alexis: Ryan Simpkins
Marcia: Kate Burton
Andy: Rio Hackford
Dean: Danny Trejo
No MPAA rating
Running time -- 96 minutes...
- 1/23/2006
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
HBO Films
NEW YORK -- Filmmaker Jim McKay, known for his well-observed, miniaturist dramas of New York life ("Girls Town", "Our Song"), has come up with another winner in this drama about the imminent closing of a beloved Brooklyn diner. Touching on themes of race relations, gentrification and upward mobility, "Everyday People" resonates with generous warmth for all of its complicated characters. The film serves as the opening-night attraction for this year's New Directors/New Films series, co-presented by the Museum of Modern Art and the Film Society of Lincoln Center.
Taking place over the course of a single long day, the film is set at Raskin's, a fictional Brooklyn diner bearing no small resemblance to the legendary Junior's (it was actually filmed at another N.Y. dining institution, Ratner's, on the Lower East Side). Ira (Jordan Gelber), the diner's young Jewish owner, is closing a deal to sell the struggling restaurant to a real estate consortium, represented by Ron (Ron Butler), an aggressive black businessman who believes that the intended redevelopment will serve to upgrade the depressed area.
Arthur (Stephen McKinley Henderson), Raskin's maitre d' and longest-lasting employee, is given the task of informing the staff that their jobs will last but three more weeks, and the news is predictably not taken well. Particularly irate is Sol (Stephen Axelrod), a former doctor who became a junkie and went to prison and who counts on his admittedly menial employment to help him keep his life together.
As the news resonates among the staff, we are introduced in greater detail to the various characters, including cashier Joleen (Bridget Barkan), a single mother trying to make ends meet; waitress Erin (Sydnee Stewart), who's working to support herself while she pursues her dream of becoming a poet; Betty (Iris Little-Thomas), Erin's mother, a successful businesswoman; and kitchen worker Samel (Billoah Greene), who's about to begin college.
Perhaps the film's most arresting figure is Akbar (played in riveting fashion by Reg E. Cathey), a customer who spends his days in front of the restaurant hawking ribbons promoting black identity and haranguing passersby.
McKay's screenplay, developed from improvisational workshops with dozens of actors conducted by the filmmaker and executive producer Nelson George, has its stereotypical aspects -- certainly, the central story line feels overly familiar -- but it has an undeniable authenticity in its characterizations and situations and an empathy that is all too rare even in independent cinema. The ensemble cast, featuring a mixture of veterans and newcomers, deliver nary a false note in their performances, and Russell Lee Fine's cinematography evocatively captures the diner's Old World ambiance.
NEW YORK -- Filmmaker Jim McKay, known for his well-observed, miniaturist dramas of New York life ("Girls Town", "Our Song"), has come up with another winner in this drama about the imminent closing of a beloved Brooklyn diner. Touching on themes of race relations, gentrification and upward mobility, "Everyday People" resonates with generous warmth for all of its complicated characters. The film serves as the opening-night attraction for this year's New Directors/New Films series, co-presented by the Museum of Modern Art and the Film Society of Lincoln Center.
Taking place over the course of a single long day, the film is set at Raskin's, a fictional Brooklyn diner bearing no small resemblance to the legendary Junior's (it was actually filmed at another N.Y. dining institution, Ratner's, on the Lower East Side). Ira (Jordan Gelber), the diner's young Jewish owner, is closing a deal to sell the struggling restaurant to a real estate consortium, represented by Ron (Ron Butler), an aggressive black businessman who believes that the intended redevelopment will serve to upgrade the depressed area.
Arthur (Stephen McKinley Henderson), Raskin's maitre d' and longest-lasting employee, is given the task of informing the staff that their jobs will last but three more weeks, and the news is predictably not taken well. Particularly irate is Sol (Stephen Axelrod), a former doctor who became a junkie and went to prison and who counts on his admittedly menial employment to help him keep his life together.
As the news resonates among the staff, we are introduced in greater detail to the various characters, including cashier Joleen (Bridget Barkan), a single mother trying to make ends meet; waitress Erin (Sydnee Stewart), who's working to support herself while she pursues her dream of becoming a poet; Betty (Iris Little-Thomas), Erin's mother, a successful businesswoman; and kitchen worker Samel (Billoah Greene), who's about to begin college.
Perhaps the film's most arresting figure is Akbar (played in riveting fashion by Reg E. Cathey), a customer who spends his days in front of the restaurant hawking ribbons promoting black identity and haranguing passersby.
McKay's screenplay, developed from improvisational workshops with dozens of actors conducted by the filmmaker and executive producer Nelson George, has its stereotypical aspects -- certainly, the central story line feels overly familiar -- but it has an undeniable authenticity in its characterizations and situations and an empathy that is all too rare even in independent cinema. The ensemble cast, featuring a mixture of veterans and newcomers, deliver nary a false note in their performances, and Russell Lee Fine's cinematography evocatively captures the diner's Old World ambiance.
"The Grey Zone" is an existential morality play about the Holocaust that asks: What would you have done? The question may make you uncomfortable -- indeed, discomfort seems to be the reigning principle behind the film, which writer-director Tim Blake Nelson ("O") has based on his own play. What may cause equal discomfort, though, is Nelson's decision to strip away all sentiment, ethnicity or heroism from his work.
This artistic choice relegates "The Grey Zone" to the nether regions of the boxoffice landscape. Some may applaud Nelson's fierce determination to, as he puts it, "de-sentimentalize" his subject matter and to rid the concentration camp of "quaint ways of speech." But the end result feels distinctly off-off-Broadway, a work of such rigid artistic principles that its theatrical life will likely be measured in days rather than weeks.
"The Grey Zone" derives from fascinating yet horrifying facts. In the death camps, the Nazis selected willing prisoners to act as Sonderkommandos, men who would prepare fellow Jews for the gas chambers, then process their corpses after gassings. In return, this elite group received unheard-of privileges until the time of their own slayings.
In 1944, Auschwitz's 12th Sonderkommandos staged an armed revolt that managed to destroy two crematoria. Nelson bases his dramatization of this rebellion partly on a memoir by Miklos Nyiszli, a Hungarian Jewish doctor who assisted the notorious Dr. Mengele in his ghastly medical experiments.
The Hungarian Jews that make up this 12th group prove to be the most efficient of the Nazis' facilitators. But as their own deaths draw near, the men grow desperate to give their lives meaning. For their mutiny to succeed, they persuade female inmates in a nearby munitions factory to smuggle gunpowder to them.
Then a freak incident triggers the rebellion. A young girl somehow survives a gassing. The group revives her but has no way to hide. Her very presence endangers the uprising.
Nelson, working in a meticulous re-creation of an extermination plant in Bulgaria's Boyana Studios, lets everything -- the routine of the death mills, the conspiratorial planning, the relationships of prisoners with their captors -- unfold in a matter-of-fact way. You are to understand that brutality is the norm, and that those in special squads have ceased being human.
Everyone talks in the same clipped, measured tones, with emotions minimized. Maybe this is the way things were in the camps. Maybe this isn't. But in choosing this approach, Nelson lets some individuality seep from his drama.
Harvey Keitel, playing the officer in charge, tries out a serviceable German accent. But all the other actors, playing Hungarians or Poles, speak in flat American accents. But late in the film, it's a shock to realize that even though everyone is speaking English, you are meant to imagine that Keitel can't understand what the men are saying. This takes you out of the film's reality in a more jarring way than any quaint way of speech.
The rebellion itself is treated as partially successful yet clumsily staged and poorly organized. Historical accounts differ on this point, but this interpretation again falls in line with Nelson's determination not to taint any character with a whiff of heroism. Having denied their own humanity, these men are granted none by Nelson either.
The acting is solid. Standouts include David Arquette as the most emotional of the bunch, Steve Buscemi as a Pole who trusts no one and Allan Corduner as Nyiszli, who will do anything to save his wife and child on the outside. Mira Sorvino and Natasha Lyonne play brave munitions workers who refuse to divulge the uprising despite hideous torture.
Maria Djurkovic's grim, ashen sets and Russell Lee Fine's claustrophobic cinematography are all too efficient in trapping the viewer inside this gray zone where the question is asked over and over: What would you have done?
THE GREY ZONE
Lions Gate Films
Millennium Films presents
a Goatsingers production
in association with Killer Films
Producers: Pamela Koffler, Christine Vachon, Tim Blake Nelson, Avi Lerner, Danny Lerner
Screenwriter-director: Tim Blake Nelson
Based on the play by: Tim Blake Nelson
Executive producers: Danny Dimbort, Trevor Short, Brad Weston, John Wells, Harvey Keitel
Director of photography: Russell Lee Fine
Production designer: Maria Djurkovic
Music: Jeff Danna
Costume designer: Marina Draghici
Editors: Tim Blake Nelson, Michelle Botticelli
Color/stereo
Cast:
Hoffman: David Arquette
Muhsfeldt: Harvey Keitel
Abramowics: Steve Buscemi
Dina: Mira Sorvino
Rosa: Natasha Lyonne
Nyiszli: Allan Corduner
Schlermer: Daniel Benzali
Rosenthal: David Chandler
Running time -- 108 minutes
No MPAA rating...
This artistic choice relegates "The Grey Zone" to the nether regions of the boxoffice landscape. Some may applaud Nelson's fierce determination to, as he puts it, "de-sentimentalize" his subject matter and to rid the concentration camp of "quaint ways of speech." But the end result feels distinctly off-off-Broadway, a work of such rigid artistic principles that its theatrical life will likely be measured in days rather than weeks.
"The Grey Zone" derives from fascinating yet horrifying facts. In the death camps, the Nazis selected willing prisoners to act as Sonderkommandos, men who would prepare fellow Jews for the gas chambers, then process their corpses after gassings. In return, this elite group received unheard-of privileges until the time of their own slayings.
In 1944, Auschwitz's 12th Sonderkommandos staged an armed revolt that managed to destroy two crematoria. Nelson bases his dramatization of this rebellion partly on a memoir by Miklos Nyiszli, a Hungarian Jewish doctor who assisted the notorious Dr. Mengele in his ghastly medical experiments.
The Hungarian Jews that make up this 12th group prove to be the most efficient of the Nazis' facilitators. But as their own deaths draw near, the men grow desperate to give their lives meaning. For their mutiny to succeed, they persuade female inmates in a nearby munitions factory to smuggle gunpowder to them.
Then a freak incident triggers the rebellion. A young girl somehow survives a gassing. The group revives her but has no way to hide. Her very presence endangers the uprising.
Nelson, working in a meticulous re-creation of an extermination plant in Bulgaria's Boyana Studios, lets everything -- the routine of the death mills, the conspiratorial planning, the relationships of prisoners with their captors -- unfold in a matter-of-fact way. You are to understand that brutality is the norm, and that those in special squads have ceased being human.
Everyone talks in the same clipped, measured tones, with emotions minimized. Maybe this is the way things were in the camps. Maybe this isn't. But in choosing this approach, Nelson lets some individuality seep from his drama.
Harvey Keitel, playing the officer in charge, tries out a serviceable German accent. But all the other actors, playing Hungarians or Poles, speak in flat American accents. But late in the film, it's a shock to realize that even though everyone is speaking English, you are meant to imagine that Keitel can't understand what the men are saying. This takes you out of the film's reality in a more jarring way than any quaint way of speech.
The rebellion itself is treated as partially successful yet clumsily staged and poorly organized. Historical accounts differ on this point, but this interpretation again falls in line with Nelson's determination not to taint any character with a whiff of heroism. Having denied their own humanity, these men are granted none by Nelson either.
The acting is solid. Standouts include David Arquette as the most emotional of the bunch, Steve Buscemi as a Pole who trusts no one and Allan Corduner as Nyiszli, who will do anything to save his wife and child on the outside. Mira Sorvino and Natasha Lyonne play brave munitions workers who refuse to divulge the uprising despite hideous torture.
Maria Djurkovic's grim, ashen sets and Russell Lee Fine's claustrophobic cinematography are all too efficient in trapping the viewer inside this gray zone where the question is asked over and over: What would you have done?
THE GREY ZONE
Lions Gate Films
Millennium Films presents
a Goatsingers production
in association with Killer Films
Producers: Pamela Koffler, Christine Vachon, Tim Blake Nelson, Avi Lerner, Danny Lerner
Screenwriter-director: Tim Blake Nelson
Based on the play by: Tim Blake Nelson
Executive producers: Danny Dimbort, Trevor Short, Brad Weston, John Wells, Harvey Keitel
Director of photography: Russell Lee Fine
Production designer: Maria Djurkovic
Music: Jeff Danna
Costume designer: Marina Draghici
Editors: Tim Blake Nelson, Michelle Botticelli
Color/stereo
Cast:
Hoffman: David Arquette
Muhsfeldt: Harvey Keitel
Abramowics: Steve Buscemi
Dina: Mira Sorvino
Rosa: Natasha Lyonne
Nyiszli: Allan Corduner
Schlermer: Daniel Benzali
Rosenthal: David Chandler
Running time -- 108 minutes
No MPAA rating...
HBO Films
NEW YORK -- Filmmaker Jim McKay, known for his well-observed, miniaturist dramas of New York life ("Girls Town", "Our Song"), has come up with another winner in this drama about the imminent closing of a beloved Brooklyn diner. Touching on themes of race relations, gentrification and upward mobility, "Everyday People" resonates with generous warmth for all of its complicated characters. The film serves as the opening-night attraction for this year's New Directors/New Films series, co-presented by the Museum of Modern Art and the Film Society of Lincoln Center.
Taking place over the course of a single long day, the film is set at Raskin's, a fictional Brooklyn diner bearing no small resemblance to the legendary Junior's (it was actually filmed at another N.Y. dining institution, Ratner's, on the Lower East Side). Ira (Jordan Gelber), the diner's young Jewish owner, is closing a deal to sell the struggling restaurant to a real estate consortium, represented by Ron (Ron Butler), an aggressive black businessman who believes that the intended redevelopment will serve to upgrade the depressed area.
Arthur (Stephen McKinley Henderson), Raskin's maitre d' and longest-lasting employee, is given the task of informing the staff that their jobs will last but three more weeks, and the news is predictably not taken well. Particularly irate is Sol (Stephen Axelrod), a former doctor who became a junkie and went to prison and who counts on his admittedly menial employment to help him keep his life together.
As the news resonates among the staff, we are introduced in greater detail to the various characters, including cashier Joleen (Bridget Barkan), a single mother trying to make ends meet; waitress Erin (Sydnee Stewart), who's working to support herself while she pursues her dream of becoming a poet; Betty (Iris Little-Thomas), Erin's mother, a successful businesswoman; and kitchen worker Samel (Billoah Greene), who's about to begin college.
Perhaps the film's most arresting figure is Akbar (played in riveting fashion by Reg E. Cathey), a customer who spends his days in front of the restaurant hawking ribbons promoting black identity and haranguing passersby.
McKay's screenplay, developed from improvisational workshops with dozens of actors conducted by the filmmaker and executive producer Nelson George, has its stereotypical aspects -- certainly, the central story line feels overly familiar -- but it has an undeniable authenticity in its characterizations and situations and an empathy that is all too rare even in independent cinema. The ensemble cast, featuring a mixture of veterans and newcomers, deliver nary a false note in their performances, and Russell Lee Fine's cinematography evocatively captures the diner's Old World ambiance.
NEW YORK -- Filmmaker Jim McKay, known for his well-observed, miniaturist dramas of New York life ("Girls Town", "Our Song"), has come up with another winner in this drama about the imminent closing of a beloved Brooklyn diner. Touching on themes of race relations, gentrification and upward mobility, "Everyday People" resonates with generous warmth for all of its complicated characters. The film serves as the opening-night attraction for this year's New Directors/New Films series, co-presented by the Museum of Modern Art and the Film Society of Lincoln Center.
Taking place over the course of a single long day, the film is set at Raskin's, a fictional Brooklyn diner bearing no small resemblance to the legendary Junior's (it was actually filmed at another N.Y. dining institution, Ratner's, on the Lower East Side). Ira (Jordan Gelber), the diner's young Jewish owner, is closing a deal to sell the struggling restaurant to a real estate consortium, represented by Ron (Ron Butler), an aggressive black businessman who believes that the intended redevelopment will serve to upgrade the depressed area.
Arthur (Stephen McKinley Henderson), Raskin's maitre d' and longest-lasting employee, is given the task of informing the staff that their jobs will last but three more weeks, and the news is predictably not taken well. Particularly irate is Sol (Stephen Axelrod), a former doctor who became a junkie and went to prison and who counts on his admittedly menial employment to help him keep his life together.
As the news resonates among the staff, we are introduced in greater detail to the various characters, including cashier Joleen (Bridget Barkan), a single mother trying to make ends meet; waitress Erin (Sydnee Stewart), who's working to support herself while she pursues her dream of becoming a poet; Betty (Iris Little-Thomas), Erin's mother, a successful businesswoman; and kitchen worker Samel (Billoah Greene), who's about to begin college.
Perhaps the film's most arresting figure is Akbar (played in riveting fashion by Reg E. Cathey), a customer who spends his days in front of the restaurant hawking ribbons promoting black identity and haranguing passersby.
McKay's screenplay, developed from improvisational workshops with dozens of actors conducted by the filmmaker and executive producer Nelson George, has its stereotypical aspects -- certainly, the central story line feels overly familiar -- but it has an undeniable authenticity in its characterizations and situations and an empathy that is all too rare even in independent cinema. The ensemble cast, featuring a mixture of veterans and newcomers, deliver nary a false note in their performances, and Russell Lee Fine's cinematography evocatively captures the diner's Old World ambiance.
- 4/13/2004
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
This review was written for the festival screening of "The Grey Zone".
"The Grey Zone" is an existential morality play about the Holocaust that asks: What would you have done? The question may make you uncomfortable -- indeed, discomfort seems to be the reigning principle behind the film, which writer-director Tim Blake Nelson ("O") has based on his own play. What may cause equal discomfort, though, is Nelson's decision to strip away all sentiment, ethnicity or heroism from his work.
This artistic choice relegates "The Grey Zone" to the nether regions of the boxoffice landscape. Some may applaud Nelson's fierce determination to, as he puts it, "de-sentimentalize" his subject matter and to rid the concentration camp of "quaint ways of speech." But the end result feels distinctly off-off-Broadway, a work of such rigid artistic principles that its theatrical life will likely be measured in days rather than weeks.
"The Grey Zone" derives from fascinating yet horrifying facts. In the death camps, the Nazis selected willing prisoners to act as Sonderkommandos, men who would prepare fellow Jews for the gas chambers, then process their corpses after gassings. In return, this elite group received unheard-of privileges until the time of their own slayings.
In 1944, Auschwitz's 12th Sonderkommandos staged an armed revolt that managed to destroy two crematoria. Nelson bases his dramatization of this rebellion partly on a memoir by Miklos Nyiszli, a Hungarian Jewish doctor who assisted the notorious Dr. Mengele in his ghastly medical experiments.
The Hungarian Jews that make up this 12th group prove to be the most efficient of the Nazis' facilitators. But as their own deaths draw near, the men grow desperate to give their lives meaning. For their mutiny to succeed, they persuade female inmates in a nearby munitions factory to smuggle gunpowder to them.
Then a freak incident triggers the rebellion. A young girl somehow survives a gassing. The group revives her but has no way to hide. Her very presence endangers the uprising.
Nelson, working in a meticulous re-creation of an extermination plant in Bulgaria's Boyana Studios, lets everything -- the routine of the death mills, the conspiratorial planning, the relationships of prisoners with their captors -- unfold in a matter-of-fact way. You are to understand that brutality is the norm, and that those in special squads have ceased being human.
Everyone talks in the same clipped, measured tones, with emotions minimized. Maybe this is the way things were in the camps. Maybe this isn't. But in choosing this approach, Nelson lets some individuality seep from his drama.
Harvey Keitel, playing the officer in charge, tries out a serviceable German accent. But all the other actors, playing Hungarians or Poles, speak in flat American accents. But late in the film, it's a shock to realize that even though everyone is speaking English, you are meant to imagine that Keitel can't understand what the men are saying. This takes you out of the film's reality in a more jarring way than any quaint way of speech.
The rebellion itself is treated as partially successful yet clumsily staged and poorly organized. Historical accounts differ on this point, but this interpretation again falls in line with Nelson's determination not to taint any character with a whiff of heroism. Having denied their own humanity, these men are granted none by Nelson either.
The acting is solid. Standouts include David Arquette as the most emotional of the bunch, Steve Buscemi as a Pole who trusts no one and Allan Corduner as Nyiszli, who will do anything to save his wife and child on the outside. Mira Sorvino and Natasha Lyonne play brave munitions workers who refuse to divulge the uprising despite hideous torture.
Maria Djurkovic's grim, ashen sets and Russell Lee Fine's claustrophobic cinematography are all too efficient in trapping the viewer inside this gray zone where the question is asked over and over: What would you have done?
THE GREY ZONE
Lions Gate Films
Millennium Films presents
a Goatsingers production
in association with Killer Films
Producers: Pamela Koffler, Christine Vachon, Tim Blake Nelson, Avi Lerner, Danny Lerner
Screenwriter-director: Tim Blake Nelson
Based on the play by: Tim Blake Nelson
Executive producers: Danny Dimbort, Trevor Short, Brad Weston, John Wells, Harvey Keitel
Director of photography: Russell Lee Fine
Production designer: Maria Djurkovic
Music: Jeff Danna
Costume designer: Marina Draghici
Editors: Tim Blake Nelson, Michelle Botticelli
Color/stereo
Cast:
Hoffman: David Arquette
Muhsfeldt: Harvey Keitel
Abramowics: Steve Buscemi
Dina: Mira Sorvino
Rosa: Natasha Lyonne
Nyiszli: Allan Corduner
Schlermer: Daniel Benzali
Rosenthal: David Chandler
Running time -- 108 minutes
No MPAA rating...
"The Grey Zone" is an existential morality play about the Holocaust that asks: What would you have done? The question may make you uncomfortable -- indeed, discomfort seems to be the reigning principle behind the film, which writer-director Tim Blake Nelson ("O") has based on his own play. What may cause equal discomfort, though, is Nelson's decision to strip away all sentiment, ethnicity or heroism from his work.
This artistic choice relegates "The Grey Zone" to the nether regions of the boxoffice landscape. Some may applaud Nelson's fierce determination to, as he puts it, "de-sentimentalize" his subject matter and to rid the concentration camp of "quaint ways of speech." But the end result feels distinctly off-off-Broadway, a work of such rigid artistic principles that its theatrical life will likely be measured in days rather than weeks.
"The Grey Zone" derives from fascinating yet horrifying facts. In the death camps, the Nazis selected willing prisoners to act as Sonderkommandos, men who would prepare fellow Jews for the gas chambers, then process their corpses after gassings. In return, this elite group received unheard-of privileges until the time of their own slayings.
In 1944, Auschwitz's 12th Sonderkommandos staged an armed revolt that managed to destroy two crematoria. Nelson bases his dramatization of this rebellion partly on a memoir by Miklos Nyiszli, a Hungarian Jewish doctor who assisted the notorious Dr. Mengele in his ghastly medical experiments.
The Hungarian Jews that make up this 12th group prove to be the most efficient of the Nazis' facilitators. But as their own deaths draw near, the men grow desperate to give their lives meaning. For their mutiny to succeed, they persuade female inmates in a nearby munitions factory to smuggle gunpowder to them.
Then a freak incident triggers the rebellion. A young girl somehow survives a gassing. The group revives her but has no way to hide. Her very presence endangers the uprising.
Nelson, working in a meticulous re-creation of an extermination plant in Bulgaria's Boyana Studios, lets everything -- the routine of the death mills, the conspiratorial planning, the relationships of prisoners with their captors -- unfold in a matter-of-fact way. You are to understand that brutality is the norm, and that those in special squads have ceased being human.
Everyone talks in the same clipped, measured tones, with emotions minimized. Maybe this is the way things were in the camps. Maybe this isn't. But in choosing this approach, Nelson lets some individuality seep from his drama.
Harvey Keitel, playing the officer in charge, tries out a serviceable German accent. But all the other actors, playing Hungarians or Poles, speak in flat American accents. But late in the film, it's a shock to realize that even though everyone is speaking English, you are meant to imagine that Keitel can't understand what the men are saying. This takes you out of the film's reality in a more jarring way than any quaint way of speech.
The rebellion itself is treated as partially successful yet clumsily staged and poorly organized. Historical accounts differ on this point, but this interpretation again falls in line with Nelson's determination not to taint any character with a whiff of heroism. Having denied their own humanity, these men are granted none by Nelson either.
The acting is solid. Standouts include David Arquette as the most emotional of the bunch, Steve Buscemi as a Pole who trusts no one and Allan Corduner as Nyiszli, who will do anything to save his wife and child on the outside. Mira Sorvino and Natasha Lyonne play brave munitions workers who refuse to divulge the uprising despite hideous torture.
Maria Djurkovic's grim, ashen sets and Russell Lee Fine's claustrophobic cinematography are all too efficient in trapping the viewer inside this gray zone where the question is asked over and over: What would you have done?
THE GREY ZONE
Lions Gate Films
Millennium Films presents
a Goatsingers production
in association with Killer Films
Producers: Pamela Koffler, Christine Vachon, Tim Blake Nelson, Avi Lerner, Danny Lerner
Screenwriter-director: Tim Blake Nelson
Based on the play by: Tim Blake Nelson
Executive producers: Danny Dimbort, Trevor Short, Brad Weston, John Wells, Harvey Keitel
Director of photography: Russell Lee Fine
Production designer: Maria Djurkovic
Music: Jeff Danna
Costume designer: Marina Draghici
Editors: Tim Blake Nelson, Michelle Botticelli
Color/stereo
Cast:
Hoffman: David Arquette
Muhsfeldt: Harvey Keitel
Abramowics: Steve Buscemi
Dina: Mira Sorvino
Rosa: Natasha Lyonne
Nyiszli: Allan Corduner
Schlermer: Daniel Benzali
Rosenthal: David Chandler
Running time -- 108 minutes
No MPAA rating...
- 10/18/2002
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
"The Grey Zone" is an existential morality play about the Holocaust that asks: What would you have done? The question may make you uncomfortable -- indeed, discomfort seems to be the reigning principle behind the film, which writer-director Tim Blake Nelson ("O") has based on his own play. What may cause equal discomfort, though, is Nelson's decision to strip away all sentiment, ethnicity or heroism from his work.
This artistic choice relegates "The Grey Zone" to the nether regions of the boxoffice landscape. Some may applaud Nelson's fierce determination to, as he puts it, "de-sentimentalize" his subject matter and to rid the concentration camp of "quaint ways of speech." But the end result feels distinctly off-off-Broadway, a work of such rigid artistic principles that its theatrical life will likely be measured in days rather than weeks.
"The Grey Zone" derives from fascinating yet horrifying facts. In the death camps, the Nazis selected willing prisoners to act as Sonderkommandos, men who would prepare fellow Jews for the gas chambers, then process their corpses after gassings. In return, this elite group received unheard-of privileges until the time of their own slayings.
In 1944, Auschwitz's 12th Sonderkommandos staged an armed revolt that managed to destroy two crematoria. Nelson bases his dramatization of this rebellion partly on a memoir by Miklos Nyiszli, a Hungarian Jewish doctor who assisted the notorious Dr. Mengele in his ghastly medical experiments.
The Hungarian Jews that make up this 12th group prove to be the most efficient of the Nazis' facilitators. But as their own deaths draw near, the men grow desperate to give their lives meaning. For their mutiny to succeed, they persuade female inmates in a nearby munitions factory to smuggle gunpowder to them.
Then a freak incident triggers the rebellion. A young girl somehow survives a gassing. The group revives her but has no way to hide. Her very presence endangers the uprising.
Nelson, working in a meticulous re-creation of an extermination plant in Bulgaria's Boyana Studios, lets everything -- the routine of the death mills, the conspiratorial planning, the relationships of prisoners with their captors -- unfold in a matter-of-fact way. You are to understand that brutality is the norm, and that those in special squads have ceased being human.
Everyone talks in the same clipped, measured tones, with emotions minimized. Maybe this is the way things were in the camps. Maybe this isn't. But in choosing this approach, Nelson lets some individuality seep from his drama.
Harvey Keitel, playing the officer in charge, tries out a serviceable German accent. But all the other actors, playing Hungarians or Poles, speak in flat American accents. But late in the film, it's a shock to realize that even though everyone is speaking English, you are meant to imagine that Keitel can't understand what the men are saying. This takes you out of the film's reality in a more jarring way than any quaint way of speech.
The rebellion itself is treated as partially successful yet clumsily staged and poorly organized. Historical accounts differ on this point, but this interpretation again falls in line with Nelson's determination not to taint any character with a whiff of heroism. Having denied their own humanity, these men are granted none by Nelson either.
The acting is solid. Standouts include David Arquette as the most emotional of the bunch, Steve Buscemi as a Pole who trusts no one and Allan Corduner as Nyiszli, who will do anything to save his wife and child on the outside. Mira Sorvino and Natasha Lyonne play brave munitions workers who refuse to divulge the uprising despite hideous torture.
Maria Djurkovic's grim, ashen sets and Russell Lee Fine's claustrophobic cinematography are all too efficient in trapping the viewer inside this gray zone where the question is asked over and over: What would you have done?
THE GREY ZONE
Lions Gate Films
Millennium Films presents
a Goatsingers production
in association with Killer Films
Producers: Pamela Koffler, Christine Vachon, Tim Blake Nelson, Avi Lerner, Danny Lerner
Screenwriter-director: Tim Blake Nelson
Based on the play by: Tim Blake Nelson
Executive producers: Danny Dimbort, Trevor Short, Brad Weston, John Wells, Harvey Keitel
Director of photography: Russell Lee Fine
Production designer: Maria Djurkovic
Music: Jeff Danna
Costume designer: Marina Draghici
Editors: Tim Blake Nelson, Michelle Botticelli
Color/stereo
Cast:
Hoffman: David Arquette
Muhsfeldt: Harvey Keitel
Abramowics: Steve Buscemi
Dina: Mira Sorvino
Rosa: Natasha Lyonne
Nyiszli: Allan Corduner
Schlermer: Daniel Benzali
Rosenthal: David Chandler
Running time -- 108 minutes
No MPAA rating...
This artistic choice relegates "The Grey Zone" to the nether regions of the boxoffice landscape. Some may applaud Nelson's fierce determination to, as he puts it, "de-sentimentalize" his subject matter and to rid the concentration camp of "quaint ways of speech." But the end result feels distinctly off-off-Broadway, a work of such rigid artistic principles that its theatrical life will likely be measured in days rather than weeks.
"The Grey Zone" derives from fascinating yet horrifying facts. In the death camps, the Nazis selected willing prisoners to act as Sonderkommandos, men who would prepare fellow Jews for the gas chambers, then process their corpses after gassings. In return, this elite group received unheard-of privileges until the time of their own slayings.
In 1944, Auschwitz's 12th Sonderkommandos staged an armed revolt that managed to destroy two crematoria. Nelson bases his dramatization of this rebellion partly on a memoir by Miklos Nyiszli, a Hungarian Jewish doctor who assisted the notorious Dr. Mengele in his ghastly medical experiments.
The Hungarian Jews that make up this 12th group prove to be the most efficient of the Nazis' facilitators. But as their own deaths draw near, the men grow desperate to give their lives meaning. For their mutiny to succeed, they persuade female inmates in a nearby munitions factory to smuggle gunpowder to them.
Then a freak incident triggers the rebellion. A young girl somehow survives a gassing. The group revives her but has no way to hide. Her very presence endangers the uprising.
Nelson, working in a meticulous re-creation of an extermination plant in Bulgaria's Boyana Studios, lets everything -- the routine of the death mills, the conspiratorial planning, the relationships of prisoners with their captors -- unfold in a matter-of-fact way. You are to understand that brutality is the norm, and that those in special squads have ceased being human.
Everyone talks in the same clipped, measured tones, with emotions minimized. Maybe this is the way things were in the camps. Maybe this isn't. But in choosing this approach, Nelson lets some individuality seep from his drama.
Harvey Keitel, playing the officer in charge, tries out a serviceable German accent. But all the other actors, playing Hungarians or Poles, speak in flat American accents. But late in the film, it's a shock to realize that even though everyone is speaking English, you are meant to imagine that Keitel can't understand what the men are saying. This takes you out of the film's reality in a more jarring way than any quaint way of speech.
The rebellion itself is treated as partially successful yet clumsily staged and poorly organized. Historical accounts differ on this point, but this interpretation again falls in line with Nelson's determination not to taint any character with a whiff of heroism. Having denied their own humanity, these men are granted none by Nelson either.
The acting is solid. Standouts include David Arquette as the most emotional of the bunch, Steve Buscemi as a Pole who trusts no one and Allan Corduner as Nyiszli, who will do anything to save his wife and child on the outside. Mira Sorvino and Natasha Lyonne play brave munitions workers who refuse to divulge the uprising despite hideous torture.
Maria Djurkovic's grim, ashen sets and Russell Lee Fine's claustrophobic cinematography are all too efficient in trapping the viewer inside this gray zone where the question is asked over and over: What would you have done?
THE GREY ZONE
Lions Gate Films
Millennium Films presents
a Goatsingers production
in association with Killer Films
Producers: Pamela Koffler, Christine Vachon, Tim Blake Nelson, Avi Lerner, Danny Lerner
Screenwriter-director: Tim Blake Nelson
Based on the play by: Tim Blake Nelson
Executive producers: Danny Dimbort, Trevor Short, Brad Weston, John Wells, Harvey Keitel
Director of photography: Russell Lee Fine
Production designer: Maria Djurkovic
Music: Jeff Danna
Costume designer: Marina Draghici
Editors: Tim Blake Nelson, Michelle Botticelli
Color/stereo
Cast:
Hoffman: David Arquette
Muhsfeldt: Harvey Keitel
Abramowics: Steve Buscemi
Dina: Mira Sorvino
Rosa: Natasha Lyonne
Nyiszli: Allan Corduner
Schlermer: Daniel Benzali
Rosenthal: David Chandler
Running time -- 108 minutes
No MPAA rating...
- 9/13/2001
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
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