Maybe you are afraid to commit?  Maybe you like the feeling that you can test the merchandise before you buy?  Or maybe, you are like one of my friends whose theory about finding the right one goes, “It’s just like waiting for a bus, another one will always come along.”  Your career can start to resemble the dating field, a little uncertain, a little frustrating and sometimes, full of surprises. Not knowing what you are looking for in your next career move is okay.  No one said you have to get it right out of the gate.  Interviewing until you know what is right for you can resemble dating, but at least at the end of the process you won’t need to worry about who is going to pick up the tab.

One of the most under valued skills during the interview process is the ability to LISTEN!  This applies whether you are the job seeker or the interviewer for that matter.  What is that?  Yeah, I said it, “Listen Up!”  Talking, multi-tasking, distractions, or moving too fast forces you to derail quicker than any express train traveling through downtown.  The more you listen the more you learn.  When you listen you do so for non-verbal queues as well.  While some of you are natural listeners, other folks may need to be interrupted, or physically gagged in order to get a word in.  Which one are you?

 

 

Do you believe in magic? Do you remember how you felt when you saw a magic trick for the first time? Have you ever wondered what a magician’s life is really like? That is the story behind The Illusionist, a rapturously animated feature film by French animation director Sylvain Chomet about the languishing art of amusement, recently nominated for an Oscar.

 

2011 was a great year for animated short films. All of the shorts that were nominated for the Oscars had artful animation. My first film, Ingrid Pitt: Beyond the Forest, (http://ingridpitt.co.uk)  in collaboration with Oscar-nominee Bill Plympton, was actually among the initial 45 animated shorts that qualified for an Academy Award! See the AWN list:

http://www.awn.com/news/short-films/academy-screens-next-oscar-winning-animated-short

I went to various film festivals in LA and San Diego, showed my film at DreamWorks Animation, and got to see all the nominated short films, thanks to Shorts International, the distributor of all nominated shorts and my own film.  My review and filmmaker interviews below for the 5 nominees are in the order from my least favorite to my favorite, with a prediction of Oscar winner at the end.

Mike Newell's film is the best movie adapted from a video game made thus far. It also happens to be the first good movie based on a video game. But the bar was set pretty low so Prince Dastan could easily jump over it with the help of Mr. Spectacle producer Jerry Bruckheimer. While I'll probably need the sands of time to travel back and remember the film by the end of the summer, the journey while I was sitting in the theater was a nice trip.

King Sharaman (Ronald Pickup, NEVER SAY NEVER AGAIN) had two sons — Tus (Richard Coyle, TOPSY-TURVY) and Garsiv (Toby Kebbell, ROCKNROLLA). One day out in the market, he has a run in with Dastan (Jake Gyllenhaal, BROTHERS), an orphan boy who saves another young child from having his hand cut off by palace guards. Taken by the boy's spirit, the king adopts Dastan as one of his own.

To get a sense of this actioner take an awesome Bond girl, say like Tatiana, have her train with Jason Bourne and let her loose against the CIA. And one of the main reasons it all works is that you have Angelina Jolie at the helm. She really is the first female action star.

To start Evelyn Salt (Jolie) has been taken prisoner by the North Korean government. When a prisoner swap is arranged, she asks her partner Ted Winter (Liev Schreiber, TAKING WOODSTOCK) why the CIA didn't just write her off — his answer is that her boyfriend Mike Krause (August Diehl, INGLOURIOUS BASTERDS) wouldn't let them. Now free and married, Salt is looking to take a desk job. But a Russian spy named Orlov (Daniel Olbrychski, BREAK POINT) walks into CIA HQ and wants to defect. He has an elaborate tale of Russian agents planted in the U.S. since they were children and that one is about to assassinate the Russian president on U.S. soil. He says the agent's name is Evelyn Salt.

This is the least rewarding of the cinematic HARRY POTTER experiences mainly because it doesn't satisfyingly work as a film on its own. Unlike the LORD OF THE RINGS series, each film worked as a solo film, while setting up the continuing journey. DEATHLY HALLOWS - PART 1 tries to find its EMPIRE STRIKE BACK moment to end on, but without making Voldemort declare he is Harry's father, this film left me wanting more, but not in a good way. And yet I want more.

This PART 1, PART 2 nonsense will mean nothing after July 2011. After that DEATHLY HALLOWS can be enjoyed on DVD or Blu-ray or whatever comes next in home entertainment as one complete film. But because I am not clairvoyant I can't comment on the complete DEATHLY HALLOWS, because I have only seen half the film. PART 1 is kind of like the equivalent of tantric sex; all build up and no climax. But for POTTER fans, it's still sex… unless they're kids, because it's a family franchise, right?

We are told right from the start that this is inspired by a true story. But we quickly discover that it's not inspired by true characters. It's not surprising that a survival film like this would be populated with stock characters, but there is nothing surprising about anything that happens with them. The filmmakers wanted to make an underwater cave story and that is the only part he gets right.

Frank McGuire (Richard Roxburgh, MOULIN ROGUE!) is the best cave explorer in the world. He's a cold, no-nonsense taskmaster. His son Josh (Rhys Wakefield, TV's HOME AND AWAY) hates him for it and slacks off on his responsibilities at the latest expedition into a massive cave system that stretches miles into the Earth. The billionaire funder/adventurer Carl Hurley (Ioan Gruffudd, FANTASTIC FOUR) arrives to check out the latest discoveries. He has brought his new girlfriend Victoria (Alice Parkinson, X-MEN ORIGINS: WOLVERINE), who he met on a climb of Everest. While down in the cave, a freak storm hits and quickly begins to flood the caverns. The crew must follow the water down and hopefully discover its exit to the sea in order to survive.

Sony isn't new to conjuring up magical transfers to Blu-ray and THE ILLUSIONIST is no exception. This 1080p presentation exquisitely captures Sylvain Chomet's moody animated ode to French comedian extraordinaire Jacques Tati. The flawless visual dimension of this title gives the animation added depth and nuance. For instance, the fog and smoke effects come off natural, not smudges moving across the screen. The digital color palette, while muted, is crisp and clean. One can see the lines of the original hand-drawn artwork clearly. I found no digital anomalies at all in the release. It's pretty much perfect.

The performance doesn't falter in the DTS-HD MA 5.1 lossless soundtrack either. With so  little dialogue, the soundscape relies heavily on sound effects and music to communicate its story. The sound mix is never bombastic, which is the nature of the film, but it's filled with nuance. Rain seems to surround us. Traffic whizzes across the soundscape. Crowd scenes represent the size of the audience whether it's full of crazed teens or just a few spectators trying to enjoy the illusionist's act. What little dialogue there is is clear and presented exactly as it was meant to be, whether it's supposed to be understood or just there to work with the environment. The dialogue, effects and music are woven together perfectly with one never overpowering the most important element of the moment. The quality of the sound matches that of the picture wonderfully.

Despite having the superhero in the title, this animated feature seems less like the Dark Knight’s story and more like that of James Gordon, who at this time is new to the Gotham police department. Based on what is hailed as a seminal comic series from writer Frank Miller and artist David Mazzucchelli, the transition from the page to the screen is faithful, but also highlights the differences between mediums.

Bruce Wayne (Ben McKenzie, TV’s SOUTHLAND) was returned to Gotham from training abroad. He has begun the preparation for becoming the vigilante, but hasn’t found his identity yet. Jim Gordon (Bryan Cranston, TV’s BREAKING BAD) is the new lieutenant in town, having been exiled to the most corrupt city after smoking out police corruption in his last post. His wife Barbara (Grey DeLisle, TV’s THE FAIRLY ODDPARENTS) is pregnant and he is guilty to bring a new child into this dirty, grim world.