Like the Best Picture-nominated The Descendants, A Separation is a family drama played out against the background of a broken marriage. But A Separation makes The Descendants look like a clumsy student film. Husband and wife Nader and Simin are getting a divorce. Simin wants to take their 11-year-old daughter outside the country. (Why, she refuses to say. A sly political statement from the filmmaker?)

Nader's aged father suffers from Alzheimers and cannot be left alone. With his wife out of the house, Nader hires a poor and highly-observant Muslim woman named Razieh to care for his dad. Razieh finds the duties a challenge to both religious observance -- is it a sin to undress a man who is not a family member? -- and her own stamina -- she has a 4-year-old daughter and is expecting another. Pay close attention at the beginning of the story, because every detail returns as the movie turns into a courtroom drama that will threaten to destroy the lives of each character in turn.

The characters are so perfectly acted and the script, by Asghar Farhadi, who also directs, is so skillfully constructed, that a series of slight misunderstandings between Razieh and Nader build believably to scenes of explosive dramatic force and heartbreaking revelations.

As 'foreign' as some of the elements of Iranian society in the film may seem, the story here is universal. The tragedy and the comedy of the tale lies in the deep understanding human nature. Every character reacts just as a real person would in the same circumstances. Liela Hatami (as Simin) and Peyman Moadi (as Nader) suggest layers and layers beneath the surface. Indeed, the entire cast, right down to the little girl who plays the four-year-old daughter, feel more like real people captured in a documentary never actors.

The 'dirty' framing of the camerawork reminded me of the social realist style employed by Zhang Yimou in The Story of Qiu Ju, which is my favorite example of the form. The camera is often hand-held, but the cameraman doesn't move. He just reframes, using obstacles in the foreground to cloud the picture, giving it a rough, confident feel that is one level more composed than a run-and-gun documentary.

The biggest stylistic flourish is at the beginning and the end, where the audience is put in the point of view of the judge. And how are we to judge this separation? The filmmakers are generous enough to leave the final sentence to the audience. I have my own personal answer. I believe the daughter will stay with the father, still hoping to bring the parents back together. Of course, as is often the case in real life, there is no right answer.

FilmCraft: Editing
by Justin Chang

Editing begins just where you would want a book on the art of film editing to start: Walter Murch. If you haven't heard of Walter Murch, you probably haven't studied editing. Murch has been a leading theorist and lecturer on the art of montage, as well being, you know, the guy who cut films like Apocalypse Now and The English Patient. After a brief bio, the text on Murch explains his theory in his own words, with a nicely-edited interview and breakout boxes that discuss the challenges of particular scenes in various films.

The entire book is structured in this way, and after Murch we meet more of the huge names in the world of editing, including Ann V. Coates (Lawrence of Arabia), Richard Marks (As Good As It Gets) and Lee Smith (Inception). There are also short "Legacy" articles which touch on the work of other famous editors, like the late Sally Menke (Pulp Fiction).

Depending upon how you learn, this book may prove more useful than a textbook. While it doesn't structure the information in the linear way a textbook would, it does deliver it in a memorable way: 'from the horse's moouth', via the oral tradition of the editing bay.

FilmCraft: Cinematography
by Mike Goodridge & Tim Grierson

Cinematography follows the same structure as Editing, with a compilation of interviews illustrated by screen shots, and sometimes scans of the d.p.'s own notes or behind-the-scenes photos. The cinematographers who are included are a great mix of established giants like Vilmos Zsigmond, Rodrigo Prieto and Vittorio Storaro and giants-in-the-making like Matthew Libatique and Dion Beebe. The "Legacy" articles include James Wong Howe, Sven Nykvist and Freddy Young.

My favorite interview is probably the one with Christopher Doyle (In the Mood for Love, Hero). I love reading interviews with Doyle, since he is both dismissive of methods (and filmmakers) he doesn't like, and rhapsodically articulate about what he does like. He tells a nice anecdote about working with Wong Kar-wai, who is constantly asking him "Is that all you can do?" Doyle's response: "It won't happen again."

Summary

I'm pretty much in love with this series, and am now hotly anticipating the next two books: Costume Design and Directing. If you're someone who loves films, then I'm betting you'll also fall for these gorgeous titles. If bookstores still exist by the time you read this, get down to one and browse these books and tell me you don't covet them.

Disclosure: Review copies were provided by the publisher. The reviewer sometimes writes for MasteringFilm.com, a website run by Focal Press.

Grantland Oscarmetrics: The 'Yes,' The 'Huh,' And the 'What The Hell?!' of Nominations Day

Vulture: Patton Oswalt’s Wonderful Oscar Snub Response

Kickstarter: A $60 Fifty Dollar Follow Focus

Chris Jones Blog: Avid or Final Cut Pro X? Tips for setting up your first feature film cutting room. - Interestingly, he lists some none-of-the-above options, like Lightworks.

A photo gallery of old movie houses - from John Ott on Google+

Deadline: How Did Last Year’s Festival Films Fare At The Domestic Box Office?

Most of these links come from the @makingthemovie Twitter stream. If you'd like to see them as they come, follow us on Twitter.

Though great swaths of Shakespeare's play Coriolanus have been cut out of the new film version, starring-and-directed-by Ralph Fiennes, no violence has been done to the text. It breathes with cinematic life and startling immediacy.

Part of that is accomplished by transporting Shakespeare's Rome to a modern, Balkan setting. Only a few elements seem out of place -- such as the custom of begging the people for a consulship nomination, and the laying down of guns to have a knife fight in the middle of a battle.

That fight is between Aufidius (Gerard Butler) and Caius Martius (Fiennes), a Roman general better known by his war-name Coriolanus. Coriolanus and Aufidius are mortal enemies, but when the people of Rome, stirred up by some scheming politicians, banish Coriolanus, he joins forces with Aufidius to seek revenge upon the entire city, his family included.

Like all of Shakespeare's classic plays, there are layers upon layers. You may know Shakespeare as a great poet of joy, friendship and love; after this play, you will be convinced he had equal talent in portraying pride, righteousness and rage. Coriolanus will bow to no man; but his unyielding mother Volumnia, played with hypnotic conviction by Vanessa Redgrave, has her fingers fast around his heart, moreso than even his best friend Menenius (a superb Brian Cox) or his fragile wife (Jessica Chastain).

If you're the type of person who already knows they don't like Shakespeare, then why are you reading this? If you love Shakespeare on film, as I do, then rejoice! Not since Kenneth Branagh's debut with Henry V has an actor/director given delivered such a one-two punch of a film. Fiennes is masterful in his portrayal of Coriolanus, and confident behind the camera, filling the movie with moments, small and large, that amplify the themes of the text.

Martial law, famine, war, political ambition, the meaning of loyalty to country, loyalty to one's fellow soldiers -- and loyalty to family -- the play and now film explores each in turn. To Shakespeare, Rome was not a quaint and noble old civilization, but a land of savage violence. (Witness Titus Andronicus.) It was also a reflection of the Elizabethan society in which he lived, a way to disguise political comment in the form of historical curiosity.

When Coriolanus was performed circa 1607/08, the execution of former hero general Robert Devereaux, 2nd Earl of Essex, in 1601, would still have been in popular memory. There had been famines, and popular insurrections. And the English had fought for their lives to turn back a Spanish Armada. All of which I bring up only to muse on what people will be getting out of our great films today. What has made Shakespeare transcend time and place so effortlessly? I have some ideas, but I'd rather you go see Coriolanus (if you live in one of the three cities in which it is screening) and share your own reactions.

In this time of wars and occupiers and political infighting, does Coriolanus still draw blood?

Carnage does not pretend it isn't based on a play, unlike Ides of March. There are two -- at least, perhaps more -- times where the characters decide, under the flimsiest of motivations, to stay in the same room yelling at each other.

If you're willing to overlook that, and the rather uninspired directing by the usually confident Roman Polanski, you'll be treated to three excellent performances and a very good one. Jodie Foster is a bit out-matched by Kate Winslet, John C. Reilly and Christophe Waltz, even though her character, Penelope Longstreet, a pious liberal with a quiet desperation, is the most developed of the quartet.

John C. Reilly plays her husband, Michael, an affable cookery salesman who can acquiesce to his wife's liberal instincts for only so long. Their son has suffered from a schoolyard attack by the son of the Cowans (Winslet and Waltz), but which boy was the true victim is the subject of much debate. Waltz, as a lawyer who advises pharmaceutical companies on how to deny culpability, is perfectly cast in terms of his sly, slimy persona. His accent, however, is never explained in the text, which makes his character's hyper-sensitivity to the use of English words less-than believable. Kate Winslet has already proven her facility with an American accent many times, and has no such believability problems. Her portrayal of the buttoned-up Nancy's descent into candor is the highlight of the film.

The play is a translation of a French original by playwright Yasmina Reza, Le dieu du carnage (The God of Carnage). I saw her celebrated play Art in London in the late 90's, and that was also a very funny and very vicious examination of upper-middle-class mores. This play/movie doesn't quite have the same climactic finish as Art. The energy ramps up, but there seems to me to be a great deal further to go when the figurative curtain drops. The ending felt more like an intermission break -- the veneer of society peeled back only halfway.

The screenplay for Carnage is credited to Polanski and Reza. Christopher Hampton translated it for the London stage, and I bet I'd have preferred his version. Still, as a royal rumble between great actors, you can do worse than to give them a proven stage property and set them at each others throats. Reza's tale seems to endorse the idea that civilization is really a fragile construction, but also a self-healing one. For all they tear each other down, these couples are simpatico in many ways. I could see friendships forming out of this encounter that last longer than the marriages.

Rampart

Rampart is the second collaboration between writer/director Oren Moverman and actor Woody Harrelson, the first being 2009's The Messenger, which I watched last week on Netflix streaming, and which blew me away. Once again, they have created an unforgettable character. Harrelson's Officer Dave "Daterape" Brown is the kind of hard-ass, manly cop you would expect to be terse and plainspoken. Instead, he relishes florid language and quoting esoteric legal opinions. His tragic flaw is his own moral certainty, which blinds him to the shades of grey all around him.

Rampart takes place in the middle of the scandal surrounding the Rampart division of the Los Angeles Police Department in 1999. In this climate, "Daterape" Brown's brutal tactics that once made him a hero, now make him a pariah. Moverman, along with his co-screenwriter, the crime novelist James Ellroy, has chosen an elliptical, expressionistic style for this story and it works like gangbusters.

As Dave's paranoia and self-destructiveness metastasize, editor Jay Rabinowitz skillfully whipsaws us through his encounters with his family, the top brass and a string of women. The gritty, high-contrast cinematography by d.p. Bobby Bukowski is phenomenal. The only stylistic flourish that felt too strained was a deposition scene where the conversation literally went in circles.

Like The Messenger, this film is a difficult sell in traditional commercial terms. Is Dave a victim of weak-spined politicians, or a symbol of police corruption? What are we to make of the characters played by Ned Beatty and Robin Wright who may or may not be double-dealing against him? Can any movie which foregrounds character so much over the plot be sold to mass audiences? Then again, Drive has done okay. I hope Rampart will be able to find the same smart genre audience.

I've seen this as "creating2" "creating3" "creating4" "creating5" "creating6" etc. Had a crash while importing an image -- images longer than around 10000 pixels in one dimension will cause Avid to hang. Also, TIFF in 16bit RGB instead of 8bit RGB.

No problem, right? Force quit Avid and restart. Problem is, it doesn't see the drive I was importing to anymore, so it gives this file error. (Some speculation on Avid boards talks about permissions and stuff.)

Anyway, the fix is easy if annoying. Full system reboot. Hopefully you've fixed whatever in the image caused the crash in the first place. Once I was rebooted it saw the drive again and I was able to proceed.

Free PDF screenplay downloads from this year's Sony films, including Moneyball

Tips for Using Audio Engineering Mistakes Creatively - warning: geeky

NYTimes: A new theory of what makes films satisfying

The documentary A Personal Journey Through American Films with Martin Scorsese is now available free online

Quentin Tarantino’s favorite films of 2011

Most of these links come from the @makingthemovie Twitter stream. If you'd like to get them as they come, throw us a follow.

Carano is an MMA fighter by profession, and it shows. The audience I saw this with literally applauded the fight sequences. She may have room to grow as an actress, but as an action star, she is born fully-formed. The fights here feel more dirty and real than standard movie fights, even though you know they are still heightened in subtle ways. The aesthetic is the opposite of the school of elegant wire-fu. In Haywire the actors do amazing things, but never have to defy physics or gravity to do them.

The cool fights would be for naught if the story wasn't interesting. At first it seems like it might be a "female Bourne" movie. But it's rather the opposite in several ways. Sure, Mallory has been double-crossed and she's looking for revenge, but she remembers everything. She behaves like a real mercenary might in her situation. She doesn't have an unlimited supply of cool weaponry or a lot of well-placed friends who can assist her. All she has is what she can improvise with in the situation. She knows when to set a trap and wait and she knows when to come charging in with the element of surprise.

Due to the partial-flashback structure of the plot, it is the audience that is playing catch-up for the first part of the film. Dobbs and soon-to-retire director Steven Soderbergh have their cake and eat it too, introducing us to Mallory in-control before showing us how she handles situations outside her expectations. An innocent bystander-cum-hostage, Scott (Michael Angarano) becomes the audience surrogate. We know we're supposed to root for Mallory, but we also feel Scott's sense of danger.

The other players are all great, especially Ewan MacGregor as Mallory's slimy ex-boyfriend and employer. In the end, I was enjoying the film so much I wished Dobbs and Soderbergh had spent more time unwinding what they coiled up. At just 92 minutes, there had better be a sequel in the works -- I want more.

Soderbergh also did the cinematography, which feels a bit raw and under-lit at times. Since my taste as a cineaste runs toward meticulously-composed images, it was a bit of a hurdle for me at first. But once I accepted the film as a run-and-gun affair that just happens to have A-level actors, it all snapped into place.

The screening I attended was part of the Q&A with Jeff Goldsmith series, and so we were treated to an interview with Carano after the film. She revealed that the plot had been nipped and tucked in several ways via a string of reshoots. They added more fights, and saved the life of a particular character. (Which one? -- you'll just have to go subscribe to the podcast.) Whatever they did, it paid off. This is not a profound film, but it has no pretensions of being one. As a showcase for Carano's talents and genre thriller, it is deadly effective.

Kevin Kelly on Tin Tin and the Uncanny Valley

Ted Hope's Really Good Things In Indie Film Biz 2011

The Lion King Rises: Dark Knight Trailer Mashup - via @jvartus

NYTimes: Inside the Production Design of ‘Hugo’

"Americans love the movies as much as ever. It's the theaters that are losing their charm." - Roger Ebert on slumping movie biz

New facebook group for low budget filmmakers, films, & fans

Most of these links come from the @makingthemovie Twitter stream. If you'd like to get them as they come, throw us a follow.

OLD POSTS UPDATED:
Filmmaking Tax Credits by State

The Inbetweeners Movie is billed as Britain's #1 Comedy of 2011, so of course I would be interested in seeing it even if I wasn't already a fan of the television series, which has run for three hilarious seasons on E4 in the UK. Being a fan, I can't really speak to how this film would play to a viewer who isn't already familiar with the gang of four awkward, horny teen boys: Will, Jay, Neil and Simon.

What I can say is that it fits in well with the show, finding all the fellas back in fine form for a Lad's Vacation in Greece. The trademark social awkwardness and snappy banter is on full display, and I laughed many times while watching.

Writers Iain Morris and Damon Beesley are so good at capturing the inner workings of the teen male mind, I was disappointed that they did not put more effort into creating equally awesome female characters. In this film, each of the boys get a distaff foil, and they are all played by very winning actresses who do what they can with the weak material they are given.

In the end, the film is all about the boys -- well, and maybe Greg Davies as Mr. Gilbert, whose speech to the graduating students is worth quoting at length:

This isn't The Dead Poets Society and I am not that bloke on BBC2 who keeps getting kids to sing in choirs. I especially don't want to hear how well you are settling down at uni or how much growing up you have done in the past twelve months. At best, I am ambivalent towards most of you, but some of you I actively dislike, for no other reason than your poor personal hygiene or your irritating personalities. I hope I have made myself clear on this point -- and in case any of you think I am joking, I am not. I assure you, once my legal obligation to look after your best interests is removed, I can be one truly nasty f*cker. Good luck with the rest of your lives and try not to kill anyone. It reflects very badly on all of us here.

American audiences might compare this film to American Pie as a raunchy teen comedy. I don't think the plotting of The Inbetweeners Movie is quite at that level, but it is assuredly better in terms of witty rejoinders and sentimental moments punctured by colossal acts of stupidity.

Sound & Picture

Just fine. It looks and sounds better than the T.V. show, which was at a normal professional standard. The production value is higher thanks partly to the change in location - Malia, Greece, doubled with various beach cities in Europe.

Bonus Features

There is an entire second disc filled with bonus features, the main one being a very, very in-depth Making Of documentary. This will be of interest to filmmakers who want to see as much behind-the-scenes as they can, although it is oriented towards fans of the actors and is very heavy on them. There is some good info from the production people on some of the shooting challenges -- on boats in rough weather, finding locations, keeping paparazzi from shooting Joe Thomas' junk.

I skipped over "Joe Thomas: Dangerman" which seemed like it would be repeating info from the documentary; I made it through most of "Things We Did Instead of Rehearsing" which just an amusing reel of the actors horsing around in the rehearsal room. The "Deleted Scenes" were interesting as far as those things go. It's rare you ever come across a deleted scene that you thought shouldn't have been deleted, and this is no exception, although there are some funny moments in these, such as Jay urinating on the floor of a club bathroom. The "Bloopers" were dull. I didn't bother checking out the rest of the bonus features. Unless I'm mistaken, there was no commentary track -- a glaring omission that you'd never see on a big American comedy release.

Overall

A fitting send-off for a great series but not destined to become a comedy classic. Still, there are enough funny quotes and moments I can see myself re-watching it.