News Archive - April 2002

April 30

First Images from Terminator 3
Aitn't it Cool News has published the first 3 images from the set of Terminator 3.  

April 29

All Work and no Play makes DonkeyKong a Dull Boy
Working from early morning to late night nowadays (14 hours - work and studies), it's a little hard to find the time (and strength!) to keep the site updated daily, like I managed to do during the last month and a half. I'll do my best   DonkeyKong

April 28

Carlsberg + Cronenberg = Crolsberg
The last pic concluded the Cronenberg Beer series (which I nickname Crolsberg). I hope you liked it.

As you noticed already (duh!), they were all actual Carlsberg pics that I heavily retouched. Go to the Crolsberg vs. Carlsberg Page to see a comparison between the original images and the resulting ones.

Why did I do that? Quite a few people asked me "What is Cronenberg", so the temptation was too big. The inspiration came to me when drinking Carlsberg, thinking it was very close to Cronenberg and would be a good answer to the question above. When working on the logo, I noticed Carlsberg's tag line is Probably the Best Beer in the World - well, it fitted just right and there was Probably the Best Dir in the World. Too big of a coincidence, you say? You decide...

Needless to say, every picture had its own challenge. For example, notice the special lighting of the logo on the first Bottle image and the Window image. The Table image was naturally tough to handle too. All in all, I think most of them came out quite good and realistic (some, like the Window, look even more "natural" then the originals).

All is left for you is to vote for your favorite one!

   


April 26

Car Wreck Kills Lisa "Left Eye" Lopes
Lisa "Left Eye" Lopes, member of hip-hop R&B group TLC, was killed in a car accident in Honduras. She was 30 years old. See report on CNN.  

Willem Dafoe on Spider-Man
Coming Soon! published a small section of Willem Dafoe talking about one of the more dramatic and emotional scenes in Spider-Man, which opens May 3.  

Minority Report
The new Steven Spielberg movie, Minority Report opens June 21. DarkHorizons.com has published the poster for the movie that you see on the right.  

April 25

New Pic from Crash
Added a new pic to Behind the Scenes of an alternate take from Crash.  

April 24

Cannes and Spider News
As already mentioned, the 55th Festival will take place in Cannes, 15-26 May 2002. The official list of movies showing there was published today.

The Feature Films Jury consists of 9 persons, including directors David Lynch (president) and Bille August, and actress Sharon Stone. The Short Films and Cinefondation Juries consists of 5 persons, including director Martin Scorsese (president).

Now for the good news: Cronenberg's Spider is IN the competition. The running time of the movie is 1:38. Here are the phone numbers of the movie, intended for the press:
France: 0143188000/06 (fax: /09)
Intl.: (207) 4943478 (fax: (207) 2928381)

Other films of interest:
In Competition:
     Hollywood Ending (1:54) by Woody Allen - Opens the festival
     All or Nothing (2:08) by Mike Leigh
     Sweet Sixteen (1:46) by Ken Loach
     The Pianist (2:28) by Roman Polanski
     Kedma (1:40) by Amos Gitai - From Israel
Out of Competition:
     Ararat (1:55) by Atom Egoyan

Cronendrome Updated, Spider News
The Cronendrome has been updated, and published 3 new images of a double-sided flyer for the upcoming Spider. Read more about it on the site's News section.

Don't forget to check out the site's Spider page, which includes Cronenberg's comments on Spider and past "On the Set" reports.

I added 4 new Spider pics to Behind the Scenes - all are taken from Cronendrome.

Oh, and the site has finally discovered The Plasma Pool. Too bad it only mentions the name and doesn't have a link, ha?

April 23

2 New Pics of Cronenberg
Added 2 new pics of Cronenberg to Behind the Scenes.

April 22

New Pic from Videodrome
Added a new pic to Behind the Scenes, which shows Cronenberg and his son, Brandon, on the set of Videodrome.  

April 21

New Pic from Fast Company
Added new pic from Fast Company to Behind the Scenes.  

6 Woody Allen Movies
I added a new section, Others (in the bottom of the menu) for all kind of non-Cronenberg issues. Currently it contains 6 movies by Woody Allen, which is one of my favorite directors. I wish to have more of his movies in DivX, so if you know or can rip any, please let me know. The same goes for movies by Atom Egoyan.  

April 20

New Pic from Naked Lunch
Added new pic from Naked Lunch to Behind the Scenes.  

DK's Recommendation: Requiem for a Dream
Requiem for a Dream (2000) is, in my opinion, the best movie made in the last several years. Someone said that you don't watch the movie - you experience it. I totally agree.

It's a difficult movie to take. It deals with drugs and puts it in your face without any mercy (somebody described it as being smacked on the head for 100 minutes). It follows the stories of 4 different people, each escaping reality and getting deteriorated by his own addictions: To drugs, to pills, to alcohol, to TV, to his dreams of a better life. I haven't seen in years such an amazing and effective combination of acting, photography, editing, lighting, music, writing, makeup and costume design. This movie is "perfect" in each of these fields. The entire cast is fantastic, but Ellen Burstyn is extraordinary, giving the performance of her life. It's unbelievable that Julia Roberts got the Oscar instead, that year.

This movie, made for $4.5m, is only Darren Aronofsky's second feature (after the fantastic Pi). He handles it like its his 20th on a budget of $45m. It didn't take him long to become one of my favorite directors, and I can't wait for his next movie.

Don't forget to check out the fantastic official site for a taste of the movie. Also, try to get the trailer, which is one of the best I've seen, and the great soundtrack by Clint Mansell (of Pop will Eat itself).

DK's rating: 10/10
Requiem for a Dream - 102 min, NC-17 (this is the uncut version)

Alice in Chains Singer Layne Staley Presumed Dead
According to MTV, a body believed to be that of Alice in Chains' Layne Staley was found in the Seattle home of the singer Friday evening. The cause of death was undetermined. An autopsy is scheduled for 7 a.m. PT. See also an article in CNN.

(Thanks to scorcho)

 

April 19

2 New Pics from Camera
Added 2 new pics from Camera to Behind the Scenes.

April 18

2 New Pics from eXistenZ
Added 2 new pics from eXistenZ to Behind the Scenes.

April 17

2 New Pics from Shivers
Added 2 new pics from Shivers to Behind the Scenes.

Transcript to The Fly fixed
Chris Foster from The Fly Film Archive, completed all the 15 scenes missing from the transcript to The Fly and added location headers. I myself did some formatting and proofing. The new, fixed version is in RTF format.

April 16

2 New Pics from Stereo
Added 2 new pics from Stereo to Behind the Scenes.

Thanks to David Cronenberg filmography and www resource for the pics, taken from the book David Cronenberg: A Delicate Balance.

 

One more "Regular"
Added Ronald Mlodzik to the Regular Cast. Credit goes to Bill.

Contribute to the Site
If you too have something to contribute (news, info, pic, etc. - no matter how minor it is), please inform me by mail or using the board. You'll be credited for that, don't worry

Fixing the Videodrome Sync Problem
Added to the Movies section a solution to the audio sync problem in the Videodrome rip. It worked great for me.

April 15

Transcript to The Fly
This is gonna make some of you very happy. It's quite rare, I think - the transcript to The Fly is in the Scripts/Books section. 5 small parts are skipped, but it's nothing serious. I have no idea who wrote the transcript, so I can't credit him. sorry.

Panic Room Soundtrack Released
Howard Shore's soundtrack to Panic Room is officially released tomorrow. You can buy your copy at Amazon for $15.

April 14

2 New Pics from Scanners
Added 2 new pics from Scanners to Behind the Scenes.

April 13

Geena Davis is a Mom
Congratulations to Geena Davis (45) who gave birth this Thursday to her first baby girl (what did you expect, a maggot?). She is married to surgeon Reza Jarrahy, who is 15 years younger than her. This is her fourth marriage, after being married to Richard Emmolo, Jeff Goldblum and Renny Harlin.

No Surprises on the Best Makeup Poll
I admit, it was obvious. We haven't had such a consensus since March 29's poll for What type of webhost banners do you prefer?

5 New Pics from eXistenZ
Added 5 new pics from eXistenZ to Behind the Scenes.

News Archive Split
The News Archive is now split by months (so it's no longer one huge file). Older months are listed at the bottom of the "current" News Archive page.

Red Dragon's Trailer
The trailer to Red Dragon (the prequel to Silence of the Lambs/the remake to Manhunter). will be seen in front of The Bourne Identity and Windtalkers. Both films are scheduled for a June 14 release. I have to admit that I have absolutely no expectations from this movie.

April 12

No More Annoying Banner on the Top!
Noticed something different? I bet you do. I managed to get rid of the banner on the top. Shhhhh... don't tell eSmartWeb

You'll still get pop-ups from time to time, but very rarely. Please report errors on the page if you get any.

Futurama on Star World
The Indian channel Star World is finally starting to broadcast the great Futurama series, on Sundays (11:00am GMT) and Saturdays (01:00am GMT), starting April 14.

Most of you don't have this channel; those of you who live in the following countries, are getting this on cables/satellite: Bangladesh, Brunei, China, Georgia, Hong Kong, India, Indonesia, Israel, Kazahstan, Korea, Macau, Malaysia, Maldives, Middle East, New Caledonia, New Zealand, Pakistan, Philippines, PNG, Singapore, Sri Lanka, Taiwan, Thailand, Vietnam.

5 New Pics from The Fly
Added 5 new pics from The Fly to Behind the Scenes, including 2 tiny but worthy pics of Goldblum in makeup for the deleted stage 4-b.

Today's Poll on the IMDB
Check out today's Poll on the IMDB - Director most likely to have pursued moviemaking on the advice of his therapist. Guess who's there? twice!

DK's Recommendation: Buffalo '66
Since I forgot to mention Vincent Gallo's birthday (40) yesterday, I'll make it up by recommending this movie:

Buffalo '66 (1998), an excellent idnie, made for $1.5m. Vincent Gallo not only stars in it, but he also directed it, wrote the script and the music, and sings 8 of the background songs. Gallo is a very talented artist, and this is obviously one of his most personal projects. Very quiet and sensitive drama/comedy, with excellent cast: The highly talented and sexy Christina Ricci stars alongside Gallo; Anjelica Huston and Ben Gazzara are amazing and hilarious as his indifferent parents; Kevin Corrigan as the stupid best-friend; And guest appearances by Rosanna Arquette, Mickey Rourke, Kevin Pollak and the voice of Gallo's father (singing Fools Rush in).

DK's rating: 8.5/10
Buffalo '66 - 1:50, 640x352

April 11

Naked Lunch VHS Rip Released
A huge thanks to podulator for getting and sharing Naked Lunch.

This one is a VHS rip in good quality, and it's the closest you're gonna get, since they haven't released an English DVD for the movie yet - there's only a German-dubbed DVD, hard to get and in bad quality.

Image is 512x380 and audio is in OggVorbis format. Go grab this gem now.

P.S.: Of course, you want a DivX cover too . Well, I haven't made one yet. You'll get it as soon as I do.

3 New "Regulars"
Added Ivan Reitman (the known director), Joe Silver and Norman Snider to the Regular Cast and Crew.

New pic of Cronenberg and the film crew of Cronenberg en Chair et en Os
The clip added yesterday is from the offical site of Jose Gerel, who photographed this documentary, amongs others. On the same site there's a nice pic of Cronenberg with the film's crew (added to Behind the Scenes). Cronenberg and the film crew of the documentary "Cronenberg en Chair et en Os (2000)"

2 existing pics recognized
2 of the pics on the Behind the Scenes "Misc" section were recognized as belong to Stereo and The Fly shootings and were moved to their right place.

April 10

The Plasma Pool is 1 month old
That's right, boys and girls. This site, which began it's life as a small page with several links is celebrating 1 month in its current form (namely, as a site). I really had no idea it would develop into the thing you're seeing in front of you.

It's a really tough work to keep it updated on a daily basis, believe me. I'll do my best to keep it that way, although I'm expecting to be a lot busier. What I need from you is enthusiasm and participation to keep me going, that's all. I refer you to The future of this site in the FAQ.

Some statistics about the site and its visitors:
• The site had visitors from at least 30 countries.
• It currently has about 40 different visitors daily.
• Most of the known (that also means excluding US) visitors are from (in order): Canada, France, UK, Denmark, Sweden, Netherlands, Germany, Finland and Japan.
• 96% of the visitors are using Windows and 96% are using IE (so who said you hate Micro$oft?)

You can take a look at the News Archive (link is always at the bottom of this page) to see some of the site's short history.

Short Cronenberg Clip
Added to Misc a short clip (2 min) in RealPlayer format, from the 45 min Cronenberg en Chair et en Os ("Cronenberg in Flesh and Bone") by Frederic Benudis, broadcasted on 24 November 2000 on the French TV channel Canal+ (500K).

2 New Pics
Added 2 very interesting pics:

The first one is a shot of the joined twins from Dead Ringers. This might be from the nightmare seen in the movie, but might also be from the first nightmare, which was deleted (or could it be an alternate ending?)

The second one is a shot from The Fly, not seen in the film.

Rare Soundtracks
If you're a soundtrack freak, you should check out Rare Soundtracks. This site is full of information about unreleased scores, bootlegs, promos and regular releases that are considered "hard to find" or "out of print".

April 9: Holocaust Remembrance Day


Today is Holocaust Remembrance Day. There will be no updates to the site.

Today I dedicate this site to most of the members of my family, who were murdered in the holocaust by the Nazis. I'm also sending my worm love to my two grandmothers who survived these unimaginable hardships, suffering and killing of their brothers, sisters, parents and relatives, and who are still with us and relive the horrors every day (I wish I could offer you comfort and better health).

I'm sure you can find many sites dealing with the Holocaust on its different aspects. Here are just a few:

Yad Vashem
Simon Wiesenthal Center
Holocaust Denial on Trial
The Nizkor Project
Holocaust Memorial Center
The Holocaust History Projet
United States Holocaust Memorial Museum

April 8

Spider's Main Titles
Added 12 shots of Spider's main titles to the Behind the Scenes section.

Cuppa Coffee Animation from Toronto completed the opening title sequence in the beginning of February. Read more about it on Design in Motion.

Megadeth Disbanding after Nearly 20 Years
Heavy metal group Megadeth is breaking up after Dave Mustaine (founder, vocalist, lead guitarist) announced his departure from the band, due to serious injury in his left arm and hand.

Read Mustaine's message to the fans right here.

April 7

Spider release dates
According to IMDB, Spider is to be released on October 4 (UK) and November 6 (France).
Of course, if you live in France, you can watch it much earlier, in next month's Cannes Film Festival. See the FAQ.

Bootleg Preview for Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers
Here's something special for you: A bootleg preview of Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers:

480x223 Quicktime, 20 MB (or mirror 1, mirror 2).

LOTR SE DVD and Shore's Music
There's some interesting info about The Lord of the Rings Special Edition DVD and Howard Shore's job for it in particular, on filmmusic.com: He's going to write new music, expand current cues, and record previously written music. He has also been adapting the score into a concert suite, which will be performed this August by the Hollywood Bowl Orchestra. That piece will also be expanded into an hour-long concert version, to be performed in February 2003 in London.

If you can't wait to get the expanded score released sooner than 2004, feel free to add your name to this petition. There are already 1150 signatures there.

New Howard Shore pics
4 new Howard Shore pics added to the Regular crew.

Jason X opens April 26
After being postponed for almost a year, Jason X will open in the US and Canada on April 26 (the movie was already released in Spain on November 2001).

Cronenberg about his character, Dr. Wimmer: "I basically play a stupid doctor who deserves to die."

A few interesting things about the movie:
• This was the world's first movie to be shot completely digitally (using no film, whatsoever). It beat Star Wars: Episode II to this honor by nearly a full year.
• It had 4 different US release dates before final release.
• The movie is set in the year 2455 because they didn't want to mess up the Freddy vs. Jason timeline.
• Screewnwriter Todd Farmer based much of the movie on Alien.
• International versions are uncut. Reportedly, the version scheduled for US release had to be edited to get an R rating instead of an NC-17.

April 6

Cannes Film Festival
The 55th Film Festival will take place in Cannes from 15th to 26th May 2002. The president of the jury this year is director David Lynch. For more info, visit festival-cannes.fr.

You should already know (from the FAQ) that Cronenberg's Spider will premiere there.

Woody Allen has accepted an invitation to attend the festival. That would be his first appearance there (much like his first appearance in last month's Oscar awards). His new movie, Hollywood Ending, has been selected as the festival opener on May 15. Allen: "The French people have been so supportive and nice to me over the years, and I've been invited so many times that I wanted to give something back to them by coming... Particularly since I felt this film was so right for the occasion."

Jodie Foster to Concentrate on Kids
Jodie Foster has closed her production company, Egg Pictures, and has vowed to scale down her acting commitments to one film every two years in order to raise her two sons.

33 New Pics!
Added 33 (!) new pics to the Behind the Scenes section:

24 new Camera pics
3 new Spider pics
3 new eXitenZ pics
1 new Videodrome pic
1 new Dead Ringers pic
1 new Shivers pic

The page is getting too heavy, even for thumbnails, I know.

  

Felicia's Journey rip reshared
ununun is resharing Felicia's Journey (1999) by writer/director Atom Egoyan. Although I haven't seen the movie yet, I'm sure it's great. It has got wonderful reviews when released and when shown in Cannes. You can read more about the movie at IMDB and get more details about the rip at isonews.

Regulars updated
The Regular crew and cast has been updated with Friday the 13th: The Series (First Season, Episode 12: "Faith Healer") (1988) cast and crew.

German Cronenberg Fan Site
There's an interesting German Cronenberg Fan Site. Not too much stuff there, but you should definitely take a look at its Movies page, which features lots of photos (and even a clip) from the early Cronenberg movies Stereo (1969) and Crimes of the future (1970).

April 5

Camera online on the web again!
Thanks to the Cronendrome (see earlier acticle, below), the lost location of the online Camera short by Cronenberg has been found, on the Toronto International Film Festival 2001.

You can watch the full 6-minutes movie right now, streamed in RealPlayer:
Camera - Low quality (34 Kbps)
Camera - High quality (225 Kbps)
(the two have a slight different aspect ratio)

Also, check out Behind the Scenes for 4 new Camera pics.

And, of course, the Movies page has been updated accordingly.

A different Cronendrome
A Cronenberg fan site called Cronendrome was added to the Links. Notice this is not the Cronendrome site you saw earlier on the Links page, but rather a different site with the same name. It's got lots of great stuff and lots of images. So check it out.

Oh, and this site has discovered The Plasma Pool 3 days ago

Lining up for Star Wars Episode II
This may sound like a joke, but it's not. liningup.net is the official site for participating in the line up for Star Wars Episode II, outside the Gruaman Chinese Theater. Members of this site began yesterday to mark the days until the opening of Episode II - yes, a 7 weeks (!) waiting. At least 20 people are already confirmed to be there.

Now, I love movies, but these people should be committed, stat!

April 4

Star Wars Episode II Soundtrack
John Williams's soundtrack to Star Wars Episode II: Attack of the Clones will be released on April 23. You can pre-order it on Amazon for $14.

Naturally, it already leaked to the net. And some say it's the best Star Wars sountrack since The Empire Strikes Back.

SoundtrackCinema.com is giving away 5 copies of the score - one of them is signed by Mr. Williams himself. The contest is eligible for residents of the US and Canada only.

Some Dead Ringers info
There's some interesting info about Dead Ringers on Criterion's official page for the DVD:

First, you should know that this DVD release is out of print and unavailable. Since many consider it to be much better than the other DVD release, you should grab if you get the chance.

Second, the movie was filmed in full frame (1.33:1) and was designed to be masked for various theatrical aspect ratios. The Criterion DVD is 1.66:1, which is Cronenberg’s preferred framing. I guess filming in 1.33:1 and masking into 1.66:1 is Cronenberg's usual method: I'm almost certain he did the same in Crash and eXistenZ (and see the comparison page for eXistenZ for a slight difference in masking).

April 3

Spider-Man 2 in the making
Spider-Man will premiere in the US in exactly one month. So what if it's not even out yet? According to Dark Horizons and Coming Attractions, they are already working on a sequel (pre-script stage). Sam Raimi, Tobey Maguire and Kirsten Dunst will be there.

April 2

Exotica rip released
Another huge thank you to Schubi for releasing this amazing movie.

Exotica (1994), written and directed by Canadian Atom Egoyan, is one of my favorite movies. I rate it 10/10, so if you're familiar with my taste already, you know what it means, for good or for worse. Don't let the name (or the silly description on the VHS cover) confuse you - this is not a porn or even an erotic movie. It's a slow-paced drama with a very special "atmosphere", close to the one in Crash (incidently, Elias Koteas plays in both).

Excellent direction, script, cast (especially Don McKellar as Thomas Pinto), music (Mychael Danna) and photography (Paul Sarossy) make this indie (budgeted at 2 million Canadian Dollars) no less than a masterpiece. Simply a must.

Exotica (English, 608x336, 2-pass DivX 5.0, AC3 2.0 - same as source) {Schubi}

DK's Recommendation

Requiem for a Dream (2000)

An experience. See more details on April 20.
DK's rating: 10/10 | DVD | OST | Download


DK's Recommendation

Buffalo '66 (1998)

Vincent Gallo's personal and sensitive drama/comedy. See more details on April 12.
DK's rating: 8.5/10 | Buy | Download


DK's Recommendation

Exotica (1994)

A masterpiece. See more details on April 2.
DK's rating: 10/10 | Buy | Download


Older news:
March 2002