#Tim Monich

[chalamet-chalamet]

Timothée with his movement and dialect coaches for ‘A Complete Unknown’ (7/25/23)

Credit to dailymail

[all-action-all-picture]

Val Kilmer as Doc Holliday in Tombstone (1993, he should have got an Oscar, but didn't even get a nomination). Kilmer's accent in the film is based on an old recording that he obtained from Tim Monich, a dialect coach, of a very slow talking "Southern gentleman" from an era now long gone.

This was one of the cases where two similarly themed films were being made at the same time - the other in this case was the Kevin Costner starrer Wyatt Earp. The producers of the latter film engaged many Hollywood costumiers meaning they were unable to work on Tombstone. Tombstone's costume designer, Joseph Porro, hired other firms including some from the UK/Europe, who produced colourful Victorian era clothing which gave the film and its characters (Doc in particular) a unique look. In some cases this may even have been more period correct for Tombstone of that time.

[rwrbmovie]

BTS of #RWRBMovie: Uma Thurman as Ellen Claremont + her accent (under the cut)

>> BTS: Taylor on working with Uma

via Variety:

In McQuiston’s novel, Claremont reads as an alternate reality version of Hillary Clinton, but López strove to differentiate the character from current female politicians. “So many women in politics are asked, it seems, to sacrifice whatever their idea of femininity is in favor of an exchange for power,” he says. “It was so important to me that this was a woman who could hold both things — that she could be a powerful woman who also presented her own femininity in the world without apologies.”

From Gay Times:

For López, it was important to cast an actor who “you would actually vote for president”. “We did a list of all the people that we thought would work in this role and Uma was always at the top of it,” he reveals. “We sent her the script and she wanted to meet with me, which was great for me! I figured, even if she doesn’t do the movie I get to have a Zoom with Uma Thurman.”  Thurman was heavily involved in the creative process from the beginning, arriving at her and Lopez’s first meeting with “so many thoughts about the character”. “She had actually studied the script. We both realised that we were interested in the same thing,” continues Lopez, which was telling the story of a woman who is the president and a mother, “who is powerful but retains her sense of femininity”. The director highlights the harmful trope “in American culture” of women in power being “asked to deny their femininity”. “Both Uma and I were interested in creating a woman on-screen who did not feel like she had to make that sacrifice,” he says. “Once we realised that we wanted the same thing, it became very easy for her to say yes, which I’m grateful for.” 

ML via Collider:

From the day I first encountered her, as a moviegoer, I’ve just loved her. It was a real blessing to have her there with us. She came to this film with the exact same set of desires for the character that I had. We had a lot of conversations about how, in American politics, women in power often have to sacrifice their understanding of their own femininity, in order to attain and hold onto power. What was most important to her and I was that Ellen can both be powerful and maintain her definition of femininity for herself. I included Uma in conversations about costume design, production design, and of the oval office set. When she walked onto the set, I have never encountered a more prepared actor. She understood, implicitly. She already understood why every piece of furniture was chosen for her. She understood why every article of clothing was there. It was a master class in prepared acting. She really rose, and she brought everybody’s game up.

ML via OutSFL:

I adore her [Uma Thurman]. She was so very happy to be in this movie, which was so wonderful. She really understood Ellen. She and I had so many wonderful conversations about her before production. I involved her in a lot of costume design decisions. She was really wanting to understand this woman holistically.

>> UMA'S ACCENT

via Variety:

“Red, White & Royal Blue” was already a few weeks into production in the U.K. when Thurman reached out to Lopéz so the director could hear her perform as Alex’s mother, President Ellen Claremont, for the first time. McQuiston envisioned Claremont as a fiery Democrat from Texas, so Thurman worked with dialect coach Tim Monich on a buttery Texas drawl that has become one of the standout features of the film. “And I was like, ‘Uma, it sounds great,’” López says of their first Zoom conference. “And she says, ‘Are you sure?’ And I’m like, ‘I think so.’ But I was also very distracted. Then she gets on set and I finally listen to her. I’m like, Okay, we’re good, we’re good. We’re very, very good.”

ML via Windy City Times:

Uma came in so prepared and so eager to be there. She was happy to be a part of it and we just had the best time with her. It was a very happy set and that is thanks to Uma in many ways, too. 

[ulkaralakbarova]

A young man leaves Ireland with his landlord’s daughter after some trouble with her father, and they dream of owning land at the big giveaway in Oklahoma ca. 1893. When they get to the new land, they find jobs and begin saving money. The man becomes a local barehands boxer, and rides in glory until he is beaten, then his employers steal all the couple’s money and they must fight off starvation in the winter, and try to keep their dream of owning land alive. Meanwhile, the woman’s parents find out where she has gone and have come to America to find her and take her back. Credits: TheMovieDb. Film Cast: Joseph Donnelly: Tom Cruise Shannon Christie: Nicole Kidman Stephen Chase: Thomas Gibson Daniel Christie: Robert Prosky Nora Christie: Barbara Babcock Danty Duff: Cyril Cusack Mary Kay: Eileen Pollock Kelly: Colm Meaney Dermody: Douglas Gillison Grace: Michelle Johnson Bourke: Wayne Grace Joe Donnelly: Niall Tóibín Paddy Donnelly: Jared Harris Colm Donnelly: Steven O’Donnell McGuire: Barry McGovern Gordon: Gary Lee Davis Farmer: Peadar Lamb Peasant: Mark Mulholland Peasant: P.J. Brady Landlord: Wesley Murphy Priest: Jimmy Keogh Villager: J.G. Devlin Villager: Gerry Walsh Tavern Keeper: Brendan Cauldwell Peter: Derry Power Matthew: Noel O’Donovan John: Macdara Ó Fátharta Lady: Eileen Colgan Lady: Kate Flynn Lady: Joan O’Hara Map Vendor: Frankie McCafferty Hat Vendor: Poll Moussoulides Irish Vendor: Pat Kinevane Flag Vendor: Donncha Crowley Fruit Vendor: Tim McDonnell Thug: Todd Hallowell Thug: Ken McCluskey Rebel Leader: Brendan Ellis Flynn: Clint Howard Coniff: Jeffrey Andrews Glenna: Judith McIntyre Olive: Rynagh O’Grady Lamplighter: Martin Ewen Social Club Policeman: Brendan Gleeson Doctor: Frank Coughlan Crew Boss: Hoke Howell Old Man: Arnold Kuenning Immigrant: Rocco Sisto Immigrant: Michael Rudd Railworker: Donré Sampson Derelict: Harry Webster Officer: Mark Wheeler Tomlin: Rance Howard Blacksmith: William Preston Prostitute: Pauline McLynn Prostitute: Joanne McAteer Prostitute: Cara Wilder Prostitute: Aedin Moloney Piano Playing Prostitute: Helen Montague Boxer: John-Clay Scott Boxer: Clay M. Lilley Boxer: Cole S. McKay Boxer: James Jude Courtney Boxer: Jeff Ramsey Boxer: Anthony De Longis Boxer: Carl Ciarfalio Bigoted Man: Tim Monich Boston Maid: Alecia LaRue Turner: Ian Elliot Social Club Thug: Bobby Huber Social Club Woman: Julie Rowen Social Club Woman: Louisa Marie Henchman: Brian Munn Honest Bob: Bob Dolman I.M. Malone: Phillip V. Caruso Immigration Policeman: Tom Lucy Dancing Girl (uncredited): Kris Murphy Film Crew: Original Music Composer: John Williams Producer: Brian Grazer Costume Design: Joanna Johnston Producer: Ron Howard Editor: Daniel P. Hanley Editor: Mike Hill Animal Coordinator: Greg Powell Screenplay: Bob Dolman Stunts: Tony Brubaker Stunt Coordinator: Walter Scott Director of Photography: Mikael Salomon Stunts: Corey Michael Eubanks Stunts: Gary Powell Movie Reviews:

[theredmaynefiles]

Fan Interview: A  Conversation With Eddie Redmayne

It’s been a difficult year for everyone. On top of everything else, I was diagnosed with MS early this summer – so, yeah, it’s been a year of struggles, in many ways. So what better way to cheer up than starting off a morning by talking to Eddie Redmayne & hearing that lovely British accent? For myself & four other fan bloggers, that was just how last Wednesday went, as it was time for another fan interview session! This was my third time speaking to him & each time I’ve been struck by how much more relaxed he is with us as compared to other interviews he’s done. It truly is just a chat between friends. He remembers our names & asked about my son, & I got the opportunity to thank him for the amazingly kind letter he sent to me during the summer. (If you missed my post about that, you can find it here). Then, of course, it was time to talk about The Trial of The Chicago 7, & the first thing I wanted to know was how he nailed his American accent so well & whether he found it difficult:

Me: Hi, Eddie! Before I jump into my question, I wanted to say a quick thank you for the letter that you sent to myself & my son, Jake, earlier in the summer. That really meant a lot to us!

Eddie: You’re so welcome! How is Jake doing?

Me: He is doing quite well. He’s actually sitting in the room with me right now because he wanted to listen in.

Eddie: Say hi to Jake for me! And how are you doing, Marci?

Marci: I’m doing well, thanks! So, you’ve mentioned before that you sometimes do voices on the tube and there’s been a lot of people that have been really surprised by your American accent. How did you practice your American accent for this role?

Eddie: Years ago on The Yellow Handkerchief I worked with a lovely man called Michael Buster, who is based in Los Angeles, and he’s a dialect coach. He trained with a man named Tim Monich, who is the sort of don of dialect coaches, who I worked with a bit on The Good Shepherd. My process on The Yellow Handkerchief and Hick, actually, after that, and a little bit on Red, when I did it on Broadway, was I’d go to see Michael. I’m not inherently good on accents. Some people can just burst into impressions, and I’ve never been that actor, sadly. So it takes quite a lot of work for me, but I love that work. You know when we were talking about process — process is a nebulous thing, but when you have an accent, you have a sort of tangible thing to start with, and I have to learn it like music. I have to start months early and break it down to tiny sounds, and there are moments when you’re like…I’m never going to be able to be free with this. But the reason I have to start so early is that by the time it comes to filming, I need to be able to improvise, I need to be able to completely have it in my body in some ways. And so what happened on this one is Michael — even though there was not a big budget on this movie, I was quite insistent that I was able to work with Michael. When the film was first going to happen with me in it, Michael flew over to London and we spent two weeks working on the accent. That involves working through sessions, watching material, recording on my iPhone and walking around the streets of London, as you said, and on the Tube kind of talking to myself. Because quite often, you feel like you’re articulating it correctly, and when you hear it back in relation to what Michael is doing, it’s only when you’re listening back to both of your voices, you realize how wrong it is. And so I was doing all that, and I was excited to go to Toronto, and Hannah had found somewhere for us to live, and we were taking the kids, and Iris was coming out of school, and I got a call from Michael when he got back to Los Angeles and he said, “I’m so sorry to hear it’s fallen through.” And that was the first I’d heard that the film wasn’t happening. So that’s the extraordinary thing, that I’ve sort of been working for it and so excited for it, and obviously Aaron — in some ways it’s a dream project for me. So suddenly it was like — will it happen again? I put it to rest for several months thinking I can’t get my hopes up on this one because it’s been gestating for 15 years. But the accent and the words were still kind of rumbling around inside me, and when it did resurrect itself, I flew to New York a week before my family flew out, before we started shooting, and Michael came there and we did a week’s work. He came for the first day on the set, and then he kind of left me to it. It’s riveting on accent things with a dialect coach — it’s far more than it sounds like because there’s a kind of investigation where the character came from, when they moved somewhere, what else (?) they might have. But there was an interesting choice there because when you listen to Tom, he has a very specific…when he says an “ing” sound, he tends to pronounce “een.” And it’s quite eccentric, and I was desperate to go there because it felt so specific to him, and I was sort of gently discouraged by both Michael and Aaron. And I think it was because his voice itself had an eccentricity to it, so if it was me, an English actor doing an American accent for the first time as far as quite a few audience members were concerned, it might be off-putting. So I ended up simplifying it to a sort of less specific version of who he was.

A bit later, we talked about Tom Hayden himself & I found his response especially riveting – particularly what he said about each of us having our own moral compass & set of beliefs & yet still having glaring hypocrisies within that. I think that’s something we’re striving, as a society, to become more aware of:

Me: Tom Hayden was a truly remarkable person, who dedicated his life to speaking out and fighting passionately for what he knew to be right. Is he someone you were very familiar with before you took this role, and did his history make this role especially appealing to you?

Eddie: I didn’t know anything about Tom Hayden. I didn’t know anything about the Chicago 7. In fact, being totally frank, my knowledge of this moment of American history was pretty blurry. Randomly, Hannah and I had started watching the great seminal documentary on the Vietnam War on Netflix months before I was offered this. And we just had found a complexity of how that war was entered, as with everything historically, rooted so much in the past, we found that kind of riveting. So I didn’t know much about Tom, but the more I read about him from firstly his upbringing, the complexity of having sort of an alcoholic father, but then at an early age being willing to put himself on the line when he was  being a journalist and on the Freedom Rides when he was being locked up. One of the things in this film, you think Tom’s scared of going to prison — he’s been to prison. He just wants to get through this trial in order to get on with the serious business. He sees it as a barricade in some ways to what he wants to be doing. By this time his integrity — he is totally extraordinary and someone who’s really willing to live by his beliefs. We all our own moral compass, we all have our own set of beliefs, but we also often all having glaring hypocrisies within that. And I found him a great model of integrity. It’s interesting because there’s something that Jane Fonda said about him: that he understood that progressives had to be prepared to take power and learn to govern, not just to protest. And that was something that she says he talked about, and I found that interesting.

You can check out our entire interview in Charlotte’s awesome post here. The Trial of The Chicago 7 is out on Netflix TODAY, so please check it out. At a time when we are fighting for change in our world, this film & the history behind it are especially important. Just like the Chicago 7, we have to make our voices heard. If people don’t want to hear, then that’s all the more reason to speak up! 

We all owe a great debt of thanks to the ever amazing Charlotte of @bespokeredmayne, who is responsible for setting up our fan interviews & who also moderates. The other fans involved were Ivonne of @eddieronline on Twitter, Ali of eddieredmayne.net, & Erina of @amazingeddieredmayne on Instagram.

[acsversace-news]

Before Penelope Cruz signed on for Season 2 of Ryan Murphy’s American Crime Story, there was one person she had to call.

“I called [Donatella Versace], and I said, ‘I need to know how you feel about me doing this.’ I knew Ryan wanted to portray her in a very respectful way. She told me that she was not involved with the show, but if somebody was going to play her, she was happy it was me.”

Cruz needed that blessing in order to take on the project. “That was what made me decide to do it. I could not say yes before that phone call, because I didn’t think that would be respectful.” During that conversation, Cruz and Versace discussed the day she received the news about her brother and the pressure to continue working.

“What an amazing love story, this brother and sister. They loved each other so much, and I’m so sad she lost him that way.”

Finding Donatella’s Voice (and Her Own)

Once Cruz said yes to the role, then the intimidation set in. For one thing, the first season of American Crime Story (The People v. OJ Simpson) was a huge success. Second, she was playing somebody that she knows and likes.

“We all know how she talks, how she moves. At the same time, I didn’t want to do an imitation, and Ryan didn’t want that from any of us. He didn’t want an imitation or caricature of any kind. I tried to capture an essence without trying to do an imitation. And it was such a pleasure to play her because she’s a very inspiring woman, very strong. Imagine the challenges she’s had in her life, everything she had to do in the moment that she lost somebody that she loved so much. So I did my own personal homage to Donatella and Gianni because I feel a lot of affection for them, even if I never met Gianni, but I always admired him so much and same with her. All of these things made me feel a healthy kind of pressure, to be able to do our own tribute to them.”

When it came to developing character, of top priority, of course, was finding Donatella’s unforgettable voice.

“That was the most difficult thing and the most scary thing for me and the thing that took longer than a month of work. I prepared for many, many months with Tim Monich (voice coach), and we worked really hard on it. I love when I have an interesting character, that time of preparing and research, and I love Tim Monich as a coach. I think he’s really one of the best in the world.”

In order to get that voice down, Cruz spent hours watching videos of Donatella.

“If I was on set, all the time in between shooting, maybe some days I was watching three or four hours of Donatella backstage and interviews. In those four or five months of preparation, I would watch material of her every day and that was really helpful.”

On Fashion and Ryan Murphy

No stranger to the red carpet herself, Cruz found new appreciation for all of the behind-the-scenes moving parts in fashion, what goes into putting together a couture collection.

“It takes a lot of talent, because they are very talented, and they are true artists, but at the same time, they have to have a business mind and have to be incredibly hard workers. It’s a combination of a lot of things that create that success, and it’s a big team of people. I love, for example, to see that a lot of the people who are with Donatella have been with her for years, and they all love working with her. I think that says a lot about a person.”

Donatella to fashion is a bit like Ryan Murphy to television, with frequent collaborators and cutting-edge style.

“What Ryan has done, with flashbacks, telling the story out of order in time, it’s a very modern and interesting structure that keeps you on your toes for the whole series. He’s an amazing storyteller.”

“I Need to Feel Insecure When I Begin a Movie”

On the series, Donatella faces scrutiny for her own creations, demonstrating unexpected vulnerability from one of fashion’s powerhouses. Cruz sees a bit of that vulnerability in herself, with each role she takes.

“I was lucky to be starting work so young, to be traveling and learning, and the thing I love the most about our job as actors is that we are students. Some movies can be more successful than others, but everything can teach you something. It can be an experience for you. I need to feel insecure when I begin a movie, and every day when I’m on a set, that insecurity, if I didn’t have that, I think I’d have to do something else.”

[cracked]

Tim Monich, the dialect coach for Gangs Of New York, managed to do the impossible by researching dead dialects -- that is, ways of speaking that no living person had ever heard with their own ears -- and teaching it to modern actors. "But how do you research a dead dialect?" Easily! Well, no, not easily at all -- with incredible difficulty, in fact: Monich studied old poems and newspaper articles that were mocking the dialects to try and deduce the way people of the era spoke. Then he forced Liam Neeson and Leonardo DiCaprio to talk that way.

At one point, Neeson's character called a bunch of his enemies "nancy boys," only for Monich to clarify that the correct term for the era and location was "Miss Nancies." Which was a huge relief for all the 19th-century New York hooligans in the audience, who totally would've noticed that sort of thing.

That set points to something else pretty cool about the film's development. Those buildings you see in the background? They haven't existed in over a hundred years, so Scorsese had most of 1860s New York rebuilt from scratch in Rome, because "had most of 1860s New York rebuilt from scratch in Rome" is the kind of predicate you can be the subject of when your name is Martin Scorsese. I'm allowed to make those kinds of stupid grammar jokes when my entry is about dialects, okay?

6 Insane Ways Movies Are Trying To Be Authentic

[kevinpolowy]

'The Great Wall' Star Matt Damon on Making Up That Accent and Getting Archery Tips from YouTube

Matt Damon has never played anyone quite like William Garin, the 11th century Euro-tripping mercenary who helps the Chinese military battle an army of ancient monsters in the action movie The Great Wall. So he had little frame of reference when it came to crafting the character.

Take the actor’s vaguely Irish accent in the film. “The accent, we just made up, literally,” said Damon, who worked with dialect coach Tim Monich. (Watch our interview with him above.) “We kind of thought, theoretically, what we needed, it couldn’t be modern English. It had to be understandable. And then [Monich] made rules for it, the way he does for any dialect we’re working on. So we kind of cobbled it together that way.”

Related: ‘The Great Wall’ Star Matt Damon on Whitewashing Accusations, ‘Avatar’ Comparisons, and Making a ‘Grand Creature Feature for the World’

For Garin’s archery expertise, Damon turned to the same resource you might look to for cute kittens or skateboarding fails: “I looked up on YouTube and found these speech archers that are these incredible guys who can shoot arrows really quickly and accurately,” he said. Damon was shooting The Martian in Budapest while preparing for The Great Wall — and it just so happened that the world’s most renowned speed archer, Lajos Kassai, lived just outside the capital city. He started to train with Damon on the weekends.

Damon, who hit his stride as an action star in the blockbuster Jason Bourne movies, said the stunt work gets easier the more he does it…with a caveat. “The older I get, they get easier, because I do them less,” he said, laughing. “I always want it to look as good as possible, so if we can get away with putting in somebody who’s more agile than I am, or can do a better job, then I’ll always do that. But if the audience is going to know, then I’ll try and do it.”

The Great Wall, directed by Zhang Yimou, is now in theaters. Watch the trailer:

Read more:

Moana Had Brothers?! Meet ’em in Exclusive Deleted Scene From Disney’s Animated Blockbuster

 Oscars 2017: A Guide to the Three Short-Film Categories — The Nominees and Our Picks to Win

‘Fast & Furious 6’ Co-Star Luke Evans on the Future of Owen Shaw and Helen Mirren’s Role

[viralhottopics]

6 Insane Ways Movies Are Trying To Be Authentic

A great artist knows that the most important details are the ones their audience might not necessarily notice — like the soft clouds in the background of the Mona Lisa, or the surprisingly detailed scribblings in John Doe’s notebook in Se7en, or the recipe for The Antidote that I’ve been hiding in my articles for the past few years. (“Antidote for what?” you might be asking. Don’t worry. All will become clear soon.) This is especially true of movies, that often hide the weirdest and most interesting work in the places nobody bothered to check. For example…

6

Everything In Zootopia Is Moving All The Time

What most people don’t realize about animated movies is that most of the frame isn’t actually animated. There’s usually a single static background with a few animated cells on top of them — this is clear in low-budget TV cartoons, where the moving frames tend to have a slightly different color from the immobile background, but it’s more cleverly hidden in big-budget Disney movies because of that aforementioned big budget. The reason they don’t animate the entire frame is, of course, because that would be insanely fucking time-consuming. It’s way easier to have one still picture while Batman or Scooby-Doo conduct their slapstick antics on an entirely different layer.

Unless you’re making Zootopia, in which case — for the first time in Disney history — absolutely everything is moving. And by “everything” I mean, in fact, “all the things.” Every shadow shimmers. Every car sputters. Every strand of hair twitches and wafts in the wind. All 30,000 leaves on that tree are moving, thanks to technology developed just for this movie.

Part of the reason this is so crazy is, as made clear in the first paragraph of this entry, it’s completely unneeded. As humans, we’re pretty dumb, and aren’t likely to notice that maybe that bush back there doesn’t have an ant crawling on it. But Disney had to push the boundaries, just like they always have, to create a living, breathing, utterly convincing world that is so magical and wondrous that it never even had to get around to explaining what the hell the predators eat in this universe. A fox can’t live on blueberries, guys.

5

John Carpenter Hinted Who The Thing Was With Eye Light

The Thing is a movie about a shape-shifting alien who infiltrates a team of rugged, hairy, stern men. The interstellar beast picks them off one by one, feasting on their sweet, succulent, deeply heterosexual juices, until only the manliest — Kurt Russell and Keith David — are left alive. One of the nerdiest film debates in modern pop culture is about the order in which this happens — The “thing” is indistinguishable from a human once it takes that human’s form, so a lot of the tension comes down to figuring out who can be saved and who needs to be consumed through cleansing fire. It’s sorta like being out to dinner with a bunch of your friends and one of them keeps farting.

Director John Carpenter specifically shot the movie so it’s unclear in what order who gets infected, and whether Russell or David are infected at the end. But it turns out there’s one detail that Carpenter and cinematographer Dean Cundey kept secret until recently, and it has to do with eye light.

“Eye light” is a camera trick that puts a slight gleam in an actor’s eye, giving them slightly more life. You can see it here, with Keith David’s character Childs:

And here with Kurt Russell’s MacReady:

But not with David Clennon’s Palmer — who, in this scene, is revealed to be The Thing.

…Which, again, was intentional. That’s supposed to be the hint. Now, does this completely change the movie? Spoiler alert: Nope. I rewatched it, specifically watching for eye light stuff, and I didn’t notice any great foreshadowing or crazy hints. But it’s quite possible I’m just not smart enough to put the whole picture together. Since this is a whole new tool available for our collective movie-watching, feel free to post your wacky eye-light-based theories on my Facebook wall, after you’ve rewatched the movie of course.

4

Gangs Of New York Has Period-Appropriate Dialects

People love to offer their opinions on whether movie accents are “good” or “bad” because people love to pretend that they’re smarter than they are. A lot of folks ripped apart Charlie Hunnam’s accent in Pacific Rim because he talks like a mush-mouthed victim of a botched neural surgery, apparently not realizing that his real accent also sounds fake (also also that movie is perfect, and none shall dare criticize it before me). Everyone talks weird, and it all sounds insane, so can anyone really say what a “good” accent even sounds like?

Of course, and Tim Monich, the dialect coach for Gangs Of New York, managed to do the impossible by researching dead dialects — that is, ways of speaking that no living person had ever heard with their own ears — and teaching it to modern actors. “But how do you research a dead dialect?” Easily! Well, no, not easily at all — with incredible difficulty, in fact: Monich studied old poems and newspaper articles that were mocking the dialects to try and deduce the way people of the era spoke. Then he forced Liam Neeson and Leonardo DiCaprio to talk that way.

At one point, Neeson’s character called a bunch of his enemies “nancy boys,” only for Monich to clarify that the correct term for the era and location was “Miss Nancies.” Which was a huge relief for all the 19th-century New York hooligans in the audience, who totally would’ve noticed that sort of thing.

That set points to something else pretty cool about the film’s development. Those buildings you see in the background? They haven’t existed in over a hundred years, so Scorsese had most of 1860s New York rebuilt from scratch in Rome, because “had most of 1860s New York rebuilt from scratch in Rome” is the kind of predicate you can be the subject of when your name is Martin Scorsese. I’m allowed to make those kinds of stupid grammar jokes when my entry is about dialects, okay?

Anyway, here he is poking around the place, rambling like a crazy old man. The poor camera operator can’t keep track of what he’s even talking about. That is one of my favorite videos in the world. I honestly like it better than Gangs Of New York.

Oh, and speaking of dialects…

3

Arrival Makes Way More Sense Than It Needs To

Arrival is a sci-fi movie about figuring out an alien language and, spoiler alert, using it to see the future (it’s also one of the best movies I’ve ever seen oh my god go watch it so good). And since I brought it up, I know what you’re thinking: “Wow — did they actually invent a language that I can use to see the future?”

No. But they did do absolutely everything else. You know those weird circles that the aliens use to communicate? Yeah, that functions as a consistent language. You could learn to read and write in it just from watching the movie enough, if you’re that kind of person.

Then, they wrote an actual computer program that could interpret the language they made up. The stuff you see in the movie where a computer analyzes the symbol? That’s not just random, science-looking animations. That’s a program, written just for the movie, interpretting a language that was also written exactly for the movie, in real time. Science consultant Stephen Wolfram even came up with a scientific explanation for how the aliens travel. It involves quantum! All this despite the fact that 99 percent of audiences would’ve been fine with the explanation I just gave (which, if you’ve forgotten, is just the words “It involves quantum!”).

But you see, it really seems like this movie was made for that one percent of geniuses in the theater. There’s even a part later in the movie when Amy Adams is standing in front of a white board covered in physics jargon:

All those equations are relevant to the problems her and Jeremy Renner’s characters are facing in the movie right then, but — here’s the kicker — that wasn’t what was on the board when they shot it. Due to an oversight during shooting, the whiteboard was accidentally covered in high-school level physics, so they had Wolfram come up with a bunch of equations to use and then super-imposed them into that scene with computers (a process made especially difficult because of Amy Adams’ hair).

All so that every physicist who saw this movie could finally enjoy a sci-fi flick without ripping their own hair out in frustration.

2

The Witch: All The Materials And Music Are Authentic For the Time Period

If you haven’t seen The Witch, stop reading this article and go watch it right now. (Then come back and finish reading. I need your click-dollars to finance my underground squirrel-fighting ring.) If you’ve seen The Witch, then oh my god, how good was it? Sorry for fanboying out for this entire column. I promise I’ll get myself under control for next month.

Part of the reason people love The Witch is because it’s so beautiful. Well, there’s a reason for that: Like Kubrick’s Barry Lyndon, it was shot almost entirely with natural light. Which, for indoor scenes, meant they had to use as many candles as possible.

I say “almost” entirely because of one scene involving a crow, which had to use a flickering lightbulb, since fire would’ve scared the crow. If you haven’t seen the movie, I’m not going to spoil the scene with the crow. If you have seen the movie, then there is not a sliver of a chance in hell that you’ve forgotten the scene with the crow.

On top of that, all the music was recorded with period-appropriate instruments, using period-appropriate techniques. Which is not something anybody would ever notice but certainly helps the movie feel unique. Even the story itself — and lots of the dialogue — is based on real accounts of witchcraft and possession from 17th-century Massachusetts. When Caleb is in the throes of a fever/possession, his delirious ranting is word-for-word the rantings of 17th-century children who were, allegedly, possessed by Satan. Making this officially the most metal movie anyone has ever seen. Also I’m going to move on because 400-year-old dead children aren’t very funny.

1

Meryl Streep Can Do Everything

Meryl Streep is so good that it’s become a punchline. People genuinely worry that she’s too burdened by how good she is, and that people expect perfection from her and take it for granted when she delivers. And after some research, I’ve figured out her secret: She’s not actually pretending. Like Stanley Kubrick and Akira Kurosawa, she’s doing all this shit for real.

The first, and most famous, example is her portrayal of Sophie in Sophie’s Choice. First, she learned German. Then she learned Polish. Then she learned to speak German in a Polish accent. Roger Ebert (whose opinions on film are unassailable) described it as “the only accent [he has] ever wanted to hug,” and I don’t even know what that means, but it sounds pretty positive?

But okay, accents are whatever — we’ve seen lots of accents in this article already. Fine! How about the freaking violin? That’s the hardest instrument to learn, according to people who argue about this sort of thing on the internet, and she learned to play in a matter of weeks.

Most recently, for the movie Ricki And The Flash, Streep learned to play guitar… from Neil Young, because that’s who teaches you guitar when you’re Meryl Streep. Jesus, between Streep and Scorsese, it’s becoming increasingly clear to me that rich people just seem to have more opportunities to do cool stuff than people like me. Maybe I should become rich? Anyway, Streep then practiced with a band in a bar for months. By the time she actually got around to shooting the damn movie, she had ripped her fingers open on the strings.

Alright, enough gushing about cool stuff I like. Let’s end this article in the best way any article could ever end: with a video of Neil Young and Meryl Streep jamming out on a stratocaster that probably cost more than my fucking car.

Let’s be real. I drive a Civic.

JF Sargent is a senior editor for Cracked and the only writer you can trust. Follow him on Twitter and Facebook.

Read more: http://bit.ly/2p0RFO7

from 6 Insane Ways Movies Are Trying To Be Authentic

[jason5577]

Interview: Issey Ogata on How Martin Scorsese’s #Silence Made Him Question His Own Beliefs January 9, 2017 By Jazz Tangcay Posted in BEST PICTURE Interviews SUPPORTING ACTOR "Martin Scorsese’s Silence is an epic in the classic sense of the word. Visually breathtaking and intensely haunting, it’s a memorable, visceral journey that took over thirty years for Scorsese to bring to the screen. Andrew Garfield plays Sebastião Rodrigues, one of two Jesuit priests sent on a mission to 17th-century Japan to searching for their missing teacher, Father Ferreira (Liam Neeson). Issey Ogata plays the formidable Inoue Masashige, known as the Inquisitor. His role is integral to the story and looms large in landscape as impenetrable as it is vast. I caught up with Ogata and spoke with him, ably assisted by a translator, to discuss how Silence opened his own eyes to a fresh way of regarding to his own beliefs, and how he spent six years waiting for the role until Silence finally went into production. Awards Daily: How did the role come about for you? Issey Ogata: Back in 2009, I was asked to audition for the role of Inoue and did a video audition. I met with the casting directors, and when Martin came to Japan I was cast for the role. As you know, the film was postponed. During those six years, I held on to that one scene that I read in the audition and had built up the character while I waited for the film to materialized. AD: I read that Scorsese said that you audition was striking. IO: [laughs] I didn’t hear that. AD: What did he say to you about the role of the Inquisitor? IO: He didn’t say much. It was more a case of Scorsese being very supportive of ideas that I had. There were times he would ask me to hold something for a bit longer, but otherwise, he was really complimentary. AD: You have a comedic background, playing over 600 vignettes in your comedy career. How did that help you with Silence? IO: It helped 100% having that background. In playing Inoue I used the same process. I went from external to internal. By that I mean, what kind of facial expressions does he make? How he holds his body, and his tone. I also looked at his vocabulary and that’s how I shape my characters. As I play around and explore options, I look at what I feel intrigues me and I pursue those qualities. The fact that Inoue’s character comes to life pays tribute to my theater background and that’s something that I’m happy about. AD: Were you an admirer of Endo before you came on? IO: I wasn’t a fan so to speak. I had tried reading the book when I was younger but I couldn’t complete it. Once I was offered the role, I read the book and was able to appreciate its power that goes way beyond the mind. Now, I can appreciate it, all these years later. AD: What can you tell us about working with your dialogue coach Tim Monich and how you prepared your scenes in working with him? IO: I wouldn’t be where I am without Tim Monich. He’s a true veteran and professional. He would help keep me focused on my English, isolating the character work and focusing on how words were pronounced. I learned so many things from him. I was learning lines that Tim gave me and that would help me communicate with Andrew Garfield, otherwise, he’d have no clue what I was saying. [laughs]. In a way, it was a surreal experience speaking in English, but he was so helpful to my work. AD: A lot of the characters go through a transformation. How would you say your character transformed? IO: The character is a high-ranking government official and normally he’d be in the office, but because of what was going on in Nagasaki with the Christian revolt he was sent to the field. He was physically persecuting the Christians, forcing them to apostatize, if not, he was torturing them. Then he meets Rodrigues. Until then, Christians were just numbers to him, but Rodrigues transforms him. They have this interaction that transforms Inoue as a person, as a human being. By the end, Inoue takes his name away and his identity, which is an extremely drastic thing to do. I felt that Inoue recognized that act. By the end, he felt he can’t do anything about it because it’s beyond himself, it’s destiny, it’s what the government requires of him and he felt powerless. I wonder whether Inoue would check in from time to time on Rodrigues. It’s something I could see happening. AD: Scorsese shot the film in sequence, how did that help you as an actor? IO: That was really great and something I’m grateful for that. There’s this distance at the start between Inoue and Rodrigues, and they become closer by the end of the film. To shoot it in order was helpful so I could understand the growth of that relationship even more. AD: Was there any scene that was particularly difficult to film? IO: When Liam’s character is hung upside down. I was thinking if I mess up, he’s going to be stuck there. [laughs] AD: Silence deals with faith head-on. How did you react to the film when you saw the finished product? IO: When I first saw the film, I was speechless. It was so powerful, and I realized that there was this thing where you can be moved beyond words. I needed the time to digest it all. It’s a film that will stay with me for life, and it raised a lot of questions and inspired me to think about my own life, beliefs and my own identity. It created an interest for me to explore spirituality, belief in God, a higher power and I’m interested in Japanese history, and what it means to be Japanese. The film is so rich and inspires so many things in me, and that’s how I feel." #SilenceMovie 2016 #Scorsese #BestDirector #AndrewGarfield #BestActor #Oscar #worthy #YōsukeKubozuka as #Kichijiro #YoshiOida as #Ichizo #ShusakuEndo #ShinyaTsukamoto as #Mokichi #adamdriver , #IsseiOgata as The #Inquisitor #Inoue Masashige #LiamNeeson , #martinscorsese , #Silence , #tadanobuasano as The #Interpreter #forgiveness #Christianity #persecution

[freefilmuniversity-blog]

Tim Monich: The Sound of Movies

Foto from www.justabookaway.org

Written By King Williams, (@iamkingwilliams) on Twitter or Instagram

(Also, check out 'Free Film University: Spring Semester', available NOW as a FREE eBook download, right here)

Name: Tim Monich

Department: Dialect & Speech

Position: Dialect Coach

Next Project: The Wolf of Wall Street (2013), Director: Martin Scorsese; Starring: Leonardo DiCaprio, Jonah Hill, Matthew McConaughey, Margo Robbie (Pan AM) & Jean Dujardin (The Artist)

IMDB: http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0598106/

The ability to hear and experience sound is one of the most undervalued senses we have, sound changes our perception of the world around us with each and every passing moment. Everyday we experience a multitude of sounds, ranging from traffic jams, ticking alarm clocks, crying children or the roar of an ocean; sound gives us so many unconscious cues to our life. In film the speech of a character is often one of the most forgotten aspect of character lost on audiences, when done right it brings a level of unspoken authenticity and authority; but when done wrong it becomes annoying as a tack in a shoe.

Foto from www.altfg.com

Brad Pitt as Lieutenant Aldo ‘The Apache’ in ‘Inglorious Basterds’ http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3ft7kkXO98c

Whether it’s a Francophile slave owner in Mississippi Calvin Candie in ‘Django Unchained’, deep south World War II Lieutenant Lt. Aldo ‘The Apache’ Raines in ‘Inglorious Basterds’ or a suave impersonating high society aristocrat known as Jay Gatsby in the upcoming remake ‘The Great Gatsby’. Mr. Tim Monich is simply the voice of modern day film. His influence on voice and dialect can be seen in recent critical and commercial hit films such as: Quentin Tarantino’s ‘Django Unchained’ (2012), David Cronenberg’s ‘Cosmopolis’ (2012), Martin Scorsese’s Academy Award winning ‘Hugo’ (2011) & the Coen Bros, ‘True Grit’ (2010).

I had the pleasure of meeting Mr. Monich as he has been working on director Martin Scorsese’s 2013 film ‘The Wolf of Wall Street’, written by Terrence Winter, creator of HBO’s ‘Boardwalk Empire’. The film based on the immensely popular book of the same name detailing the notoriously lavish rise and fall of Wall Street bad boy Jordan Belfort. The film stars Leonardo DiCaprio, Jonah Hill, Matthew McConaughey, Margo Robbie (of the ABC series Pan AM), alongside Kyle Chandler (of TV’s Friday Night Lights, Super 8) & rounded out by Jean Dujardin winner of Best Actor this previous year for ‘The Artist’.

Foto from www.caughtonset.com

“…they have these ideas that you must have goals & long-term plans. And everything that has happened to me has been the exact opposite…” – Tim Monich

“ …To tell you the truth, I got into the movies by accident.” – Tim Monich

Mr. Monich now approaching 30 years in film this year, kindly took out some time out of his rather busy schedule to give a little insight into what he does as the preeminent dialect coach working in film today. Monich, who at about 6’1 and built like a retired NFL player seems who seems more of a nurturing football coach upon first meeting him. He speaks very distinctly and directly; immediately able to talk with anyone on just about anything, aiding in his ability to really listen and understand voices. These things all help in his ability to teach even the hardest of dialects to actors. And with that we begin.

King Williams: How’d you even become a dialogue coach in the first place?

Tim Monich: Well I started off doing a few plays in high school, but I have to say I didn’t plan on it. But after I graduated, I went to the UC Riverside for a year but then I decided to go to Carnegie-Mellon for drama. When I was there as an undergrad, I majored in directing. After graduating at CMU, I stayed as a graduate assistant for further train with Edith Skinner. Once I graduated from CMU, I was hired to teach at Juilliard where Edith also taught and I taught there for 12 years from 1975-1987.

Edith Skinner

Edith Skinner was the renowned dialect and speech coach of the Juilliard School of Performing Arts as well as a professor at Columbia University. She was and still is considered one of the most important contributors to the modern understanding of spoken English phonetics. She is also associated with the American Theater Standard associated with her 1942 work ‘Speak with Distinction’, which is considered by many to be the most important texts in teaching drama. She was also the first instructor recruited by Orson Welles collaborator John Hausman for the Drama Institute at The Juilliard School in 1968.

Speak with Distinction

Edith Skinner’s seminal 1942 work ‘Speak with Distinction’ is considered by many to be the most comprehensive study on speech and dialogue. Commonly associated with the teaching of theater to top drama schools as well a public speaking courses, it is taught as a way to teach dialogue in classics and elevated texts. Coincidentally, Monich would later help revise this work in addition to already been a former student of Skinner.

Monich is the living personification of the tenets of the work of legendary dialect and speech Columbia University and Juilliard professor Edith Skinner. Monich is the student of the legendary dialect and speech teacher Edith Skinner, who was the student of the great Columbia University professor William Tilly, who was the student Henry Sweet, whom was the basis for the character of Henry Higgins in the literary classic “Pygmalion”…

KW: — So how did you get into movies?

TM: I worked in the theater & taught at drama school years before I was in movies. I worked at Juilliard for 12 years prior to even arriving in film…to tell you the truth I got into movies by accident.

I got into movies by coaching Arnold Schwarzenegger in Conan the Destroyer and Red Sonia (1985) during the ADR sessions (Automated Dialogue Replacement recording).

Conan the Destroyer Trailer

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XeXWsXrs_00

KW: How do you go about actually doing what you do? That is how do u even identify proper dialogue…how do you even know what a person should sound like?

TM: — You try and work back and imagine in an educated what people sound or sounded like.

KW: — Yea, like in the case of Gangs of New York or what you did for Leo [DiCaprio] in Django, how did you go about that?

TM: For me, I’m always recording. I go to places and make recordings and interviews with people… For ‘Gangs of New York’, I worked back and made a strong educated guess as to what a person in Boston sounded like in 1750…Jumping ahead to The Great Gatsby {due May 10th, 2013}, I gave Leo older recordings of older people. Because people don’t talk the same way now as they once did.

Foto from www.hitfix.com

TM: — And in the case of {Calvin} Candie in ‘Django Unchained’, I had Leo listen to recordings of old Mississippians, but I wanted Leo to provide youth to the voice. It was two men, one man in his 60’s and one man in his 70’s. It was important as he listened, that he used that voice but to make sure not to add in the voice what happens when you get older. The young, upper class white Mississippian voice doesn’t exist anymore in young people.

Leonardo DiCaprio as ‘Calvin Candie’ in ‘Django Unchained’

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bQASoZP2RIo

Foto friendsamongoodfriends.wordpress.com

TM: But I have to say I’m most happy of the work I did with Leo in ‘Blood Diamond’ (2006) and Matt Damon in ‘Invictus’ (2009). Both were these distinctive South African accents and both of them came out so incredibly.

Matt Damon as ‘Francois’ & Morgan Freeman as South African President

Nelson Mandela in ‘Invictus’

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Z286w5pRSo

Leonardo DiCaprio as ‘Danny Archer’ in ‘Blood Diamond’

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f5xmFbefCHs

KW: That’s good you bring up those two movies in particular because it would be so easy to just phone in a generic accident but the really put in effort to make those believable.

TM: —Yea, audiences are much more sophisticated now. Audiences have heard these accents. Expectations are much more fine-tuned. You can’t generalize for audiences anymore...I have a collection of over 6,000 recordings. Recordings from everyone, average people to J.R.R. Tolkien to Ernest Hemingway to Teddy Roosevelt’s daughter. If you were to take a listen to then entire collection it would take nearly 2 months to do so.

TM: I also record TV. Tavis Smiley, Charlie Rose are good places to get foreign accents of different types of people.

Matt Damon as ‘Francois’, ‘This is our Destiny’ ‘Invictus’ 2009

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KE-ok-meF3E

KW: So how do you get an actor ready to perform using an accent?

TM: I prefer that the actor speak the way they would normally speak, in addition to consulting with the director. I usually give the actor 4 or 5 choices for the character and then they select one, from there I make tapes according to the dialect. I also talk to the actor about their thoughts on the character and delving into the background of the character.

Foto from www.NYTimes.carpetbagger.blogs.nytimes.com

TM: For example with Brad Pitt in ‘Inglorious Basterds’ he had a list of over two dozen phrases to learn for his character that I drilled him on. We also used a special phonetic style using real phonetics and sound approximations. It’s the repetition of practice that leads to getting an accent right.

KW: So what would advice would you give to those aspiring actors/actresses who want to get into the business?

TM: Studying with a great teacher really helps. But do voices, do voices everywhere, at the supermarket, at the movies. Oh, and you really need to understand language, phonetics; a little bit about geography really helps too.

TM: I’d say also if you really want to go further look at migration patterns, that will add more depth to your speech.

TM: …for example if look at the history of the construction of the Erie Canal. The history of its construction, the people who worked on it, it explains a lot why accents in Chicago sound similar to those in upstate New York and all along the Great Lakes.

KW: Well do you have anything to say in closing?

TM: I love what I do, theater and film. I have a healthy obsession with it. I only dreamed at being better for myself. Once I started in high school doing drama, I didn’t plan on going to teach at Julliard, it just happened; I never dreamed of films it just happened. I only dreamed of being better myself, my desire was to learn and explore and get good at it.

Foto from mckellen.com

King Williams @iamkingwilliams, is a filmmaker, writer and generally cool guy to know. His first documentary film The Atlanta Way: A Documentary on Gentrification and novel of the same name will be released this spring. In addition to this blog, he also is a contributing writer for Mixtape Magazine and is releasing his first novel fall of 2014.

‘Free Film University’ is brought to you by a collaboration between Psyentific Films & Mixtape Magazine.