Category: Films

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Bottle Rocket Criterion out this Tuesday!

The long-awaited Bottle Rocket Criterion Collection edition is out this Tuesday! The Blu-Ray edition has been delayed, to be released December 16 according to Amazon.com.

Be sure to buy Bottle Rocket and all of your holiday gifts through our links. It helps support the site!

DVD Beaver has a great feature on the new Criterion DVD set compared to the original DVD. Be sure click through, but here is a preview of the new Criterion Collection edition:

Update: Looks like DVD Beaver has cut off our image stealing, so head over there to see the screencaps.

(more after the break)

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Geeking Out about Rushmore

The kids over at Playing In Peoria are Geeking Out about Rushmore this week. From Dustin:

I run a comedy podcast called Playing in Peoria (www.playinginpeoria.org) in Chicago.  Every week we do a segment called “Weekly Geek Out” where we spotlight something we love.  This latest episode (http://playinginpeoria.org/pipcast/2008/11/07/freddie-mercury-in-retirement-and-am-priet-2008-episode-23/), we “geeked out” on Rushmore, which has long been a favorite of ours and many of our listeners.

Check it out already.

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Bad news for Cahiers du cinéma

Potentially bad news about the great film journal Cahiers du cinéma, a founding institution of the French Nouvelle Vague. From DaveKehr.com:

News from Paris: the website “Les Cahiers aux Cahiers” is reporting that the venerable magazine is on the point of being sold to the UK based publisher Phaidon. Known primarily for its lush art books, Phaidon has promised, according to a press release from present owners, the Le Monde group, posted on the Cahiers aux Cahiers site, to support “the continuance and development of ‘Les Cahiers du cinema.’” But there seems to be anxiety on all sides, from both the dissident editors behind the “Cahiers aux Cahiers” site and the group “Les Amis des Cahiers,” whose directors are the current publisher, Claudine Paquot, and Jean-Pierre Beauviala, Thierry Jousse, Bernard Latarjet, Michel Piccoli, and Serge Toubiana. Meetings have been called for this weekend. A suivre . . . .

Dommage.

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Ian Dingman interview

From Stickers and Donuts.

7. How did you get to do the cover art for Bottle Rocket’s Criterion Collection? Will we see your work just on the cover, or is it on the booklet, too? (Also, do you have a favorite Wes Anderson movie?)
I received a message from Criterion outlining the “Bottle Rocket” project and asking if I was interested. Of course I was interested as well as excited. I had seen the movie a long time ago and have always been a fan of Wes’ movies as well as Eric’s artwork. He unfortunately was unavailable for the project.

The assignment turned out to be a massive undertaking that was slowly crafted over eight months. Wes was involved in every aspect of the project and nothing made it to final art without Wes’ approval. Things to look forward to: on-screen menu pages galore, my awkward hand-drawn version of Futura, and among other things I’m leaving out, a 24-page booklet that might interest even the most casual Wes Anderson fans. Favorite Wes Anderson movie? Rushmore, hands down.

Read the rest over at the delightful blog, Stickers and Donuts.

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Bill Murray talks the Fox

From ComingSoon.net:

Q: What is your role in Wes Anderson’s upcoming animated “Fantastic Mr. Fox”?

Murray: I’ll be playing the badger.

Q: What is your badger voice?

Murray: Unfortunately, my badger… I worked really, really hard on a Wisconsin accent, ’cause I thought that would be an appropriate badger voice. And for the first couple scenes I did this Wisconsin badger voice that I thought was so funny. I did the first couple scenes and then Wes goes, “Nah, I don’t think so. I would think it’s kind of a Savile Row badger.” Who here has seen a badger walkin’ down Savile Row? Anybody? (Laughter) Yeah. That’s what I said. But these are these new directors. You know, you just gotta give ’em their… you know, let ’em hang themselves. I’ve seen some pictures of it. I think it’s old-fashioned ’cause it’s taking ’em a very long time to get it done, but they’re very excited (complete interview).

Other articles of interest:

“Nico: the return of the rock’n’roll star” from The Independent (U.K.)

“After divorce, Bill Murray looks for renewal” from Associated Press

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Glory can’t fade if it is permanent

Talk about school spirit…

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Houston Chronicle article, Rushmore tonight in the park (Houston)


(credit: Houston Chronicle, more photos after the break)

First, if you live in the Houston area, you can see Rushmore tonight on the big screen!

Discovery Green’s free movie series celebrates Houston on film with a 10th anniversary screening of this indie classic by Houstonian Wes Anderson.

Event times: 5 September 2008 (Friday), 7.30 pm (link)

Andrew Dansby has written a great article about the 10th anniversary of Rushmore for the Houston Chronicle (link):

It takes a special eye to see Houston as the setting for a fairy tale. Wes Anderson thought about shooting his second film, Rushmore, in New England, but he couldn’t find a location that worked for the titular school.

So he asked his mother, real estate agent Texas Anderson, to shoot his alma mater, St. John’s School, “standing in the circle and rotating while shooting one photo after another,” she said. The search ended there.

Having found Rushmore Academy right in his backyard, Wes Anderson’s next task was finding Houston locations for the rest of the film. (By the way, the city is never stated as the setting in the movie.) He shot most of it at St. John’s, but there are also scenes filmed at a home in West University, Lamar High School, a barbershop in the Heights, North Shore High School, the Forest Club on Memorial and a stadium parking lot just outside the Loop (see map on Page E3).

Continue reading “Houston Chronicle article, Rushmore tonight in the park (Houston)”

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A few tidbits…

An interview with Life Aquatic animator Henry Selick (no mention of Wes or TLA, sadly).

Selick’s new film Coraline debuts in December. He was scheduled to work with Wes on The Fantastic Mr. Fox, but scheduling conflicts with Coraline prevented a second collaboration.

Wes was mentioned in a recent article in The Guardian (U.K.):

Soundtracks and musical scores fit a specific purpose. However, what I find interesting are scores that go beyond their specific purpose and take on multiple lives.

Film soundtracks have always had the power to impact culturally. From the obvious: Ennio Morricone’s theme to the Good, the Bad and the Ugly, or dialogue from Scarface – to the less obvious: Wes Anderson reusing Sven Libaek’s Shark Theme in the Life Aquatic (a score that in turn found itself on a Volvo Advert).

Using a film sample or being under the influence of a score will almost always result in the adjective “cinematic” being used to describe a band’s sound. It’s a rich tradition in hip-hop, rock and dance, and I enjoy the approximation and interpolation of movies and music (link).

Friend of the site and contributor Derek Hill discussed the musicology of Wes Anderson in a recent guest blog post.

In the September issue, Paste Magazine choses Dr. Nelson Guggenheim (Brian Cox, Rushmore) as their third favorite cinematic high school principal (vote for Dr. G in their poll!).

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Cool new t-shirts from Waterloo

(click on the image to visit the Waterloo product page)

Very cool.

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Bottle Rocket available for pre-order on Amazon

The Criterion Collection edition of Bottle Rocket — out 25 November — is now available for pre-order from Amazon.com. Order yours here, and help support this site.

We’ve decked out the page in a Bottle Rocket theme to celebrate. Let us know what you think.

And, now, to the original BR trailer: