By Emily Fiffer for Fathom | Nettles are prickly suckers. They yield to few men. After a recent trip to London and a meal at Nopi in Soho, I can say with certainty that one man — lauded chef Yotam Ottolenghi (Plenty, Jerusalem, Ottolenghi restaurants, Nopi, you know the drill) — coaxes nettles the way I assume Jack Nicholson does women. Deftly, assertively, poetically. Until rendered powerless. …read more
Source: FULL ARTICLE at Forbes Latest
From the perspective of someone who never lived through it, there’s something romantic about the political idealism of the 1960s and ’70s. It seemed to be a time when there was great power in the voices of passionate young people, who would frequently storm the castle to have their say. The films of that time too, held real movie stars. Not just perfect-looking celebrities, but unique actors such as Robert De Niro, Diane Keaton, Jack Nicholson, Al Pacino, Barbra Streisand, Robert Redford… icons of the screen who are unlike anyone we see working today. That’s probably why many of them are still working today.
Including Robert Redford, whose ninth film as a director, The Company You Keep, pairs old school movie actors with a story about radical ’70s protestors. The film is based on a novel by Neil Gordon, and tells a fictionalized account of the members of a real anti-war movement called the Weather Underground. As old news footage tells us at the beginning of the film, members of the Weather Underground were charged with plotting to blow up government buildings and for the accidental death of a security guard in a bank robbery gone awry.
By hnn
SALEM, Ore. — Nurse Ratched slept here.
The punctiliously cruel psychiatric ward tyrant in the book and movie “One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest” was brought to cinematic life by the actress Louise Fletcher during filming here at the Oregon State Hospital in the 1970s.
But the melding of real life and art went far beyond the film set. Take the character of John Spivey, a doctor who ministers to Jack Nicholson’s doomed insurrectionist character, Randle McMurphy. Dr. Spivey was played by Dr. Dean Brooks, the real hospital’s superintendent at the time.
Dr. Brooks read for the role, he said, and threw the script to the floor, calling it unrealistic — a tirade that apparently impressed the director, Milos Forman. Mr. Forman ultimately offered him the part, Dr. Brooks said, and told the doctor-turned-actor to rewrite his lines to make them medically correct. Other hospital staff members and patients had walk-on roles….
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Source: FULL ARTICLE at History News Network – George Mason University
AP
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Source: FULL ARTICLE at AOL
Iranian officials on Monday dismissed the Oscar-winning film “Argo” as anti-Iran, state TV dismissed it as CIA commercial, some viewers disparaged it as U.S. propaganda while others welcomed a fresh view of their recent history.
All this is despite the fact that the movie based on the escape of six American hostages from the besieged U.S. Embassy in Tehran in 1979 has not been screened in any Iranian theaters.
Despite that ban, many Iranians have seen the movie. In downtown Tehran, bootleg DVDs of “Argo” sell for about 30,000 rials, or less than $1.
The movie has set off a spirited exchange of views.
The discussions have often pried open a generational divide: Iranians who took part in the 1979 Islamic Revolution picking apart the portrayals of Tehran at the time, but Iranians too young to recall the events getting a different view of the upheavals.
“I want to know what the other side is saying,” said Shieda, a 21-year-old University of Tehran student, who gave only her first name to avoid possible backlash for speaking with foreign media.
Tehran City Council member Masoomeh Ebtekar — who was one of the students who occupied the U.S. Embassy and acted as the Iranian students’ spokeswoman — says the film exaggerates the violence among crowds that stormed the compound in November 1979.
Fifty-two Americans were held hostage for 444 days, but a handful of embassy staff were sheltered by the Canadian ambassador. Their escape, using a fake movie as a cover story, is recounted in “Argo.”
Ebtekar insists the hostage-takers were mostly students, but other accounts suggest militants and members of the Revolutionary Guard were closely involved in the crisis.
Actor-director Ben Affleck “shows scenes of a very violent and very angry mob throughout the film,” Ebtekar said. “It is never mentioned that these are a group of students.”
Iranian Culture Minister Mohammad Hosseini said, “The movie is an anti-Iran film. It is not a valuable film from the artistic point of view. It won the prize by resorting to extended advertisement and investment,” he said, according to the official IRNA news agency.
He said Hollywood has “distorted history” as part of what Iranian officials call a “soft war” of cultural influence in Iran.
Iran‘s state TV called the movie “an advertisement for the CIA.”
The semiofficial Mehr news agency called the Oscar “politically motivated” because First Lady Michelle Obama at the White House joined Jack Nicholson via video link to Los Angeles to help present the best picture prize.
In contrast, retired teacher Reza Abbasi who saw the Revolution first hand, said: “I know Hollywood usually changes reality to make it attractive for movie lovers, but more or less it was close to the realities then.”
Others said “Argo” also shows the need for Iranian filmmakers to deal more with issues from the Revolution.
The moderate Hamshahri newspaper said the movie “targeted the culture and civilization of Iran,” but is worthwhile for Iranians to see a different perspective of the events that led to the collapse of relations between the U.S. and Iran.
“Iranian audiences are seeing a …read more
Source: FULL ARTICLE at Fox World News
The first lady was introduced by Jack Nicholson, who noted that the Best Picture trophy is usually announced solo.
