Brian De Palma: auteur or charlatan?

Thanks for posting the Zsigmond interview, Sharky!

That De Palma doc sounds like fun. I remember some genius in this forum suggesting Carrie was the best film of the 1970s.

Quote :

At 75, well past the point of worrying about his reputation, De Palma offers quite a bit of gossip as he recalls his résumé. Orson Welles couldn’t remember his lines on Get to Know Your Rabbit, De Palma’s first attempt to make a studio movie. Cliff Robertson was an impossible, egotistical jerk on Obsession, to the point of trying to sabotage Geneviève Bujold’s performance. Even though De Palma discovered Robert De Niro, the actor still squeezed him for a huge salary on The Untouchables (and, like Welles, also had difficulty in remembering his lines). Sean Penn felt Michael J Fox needed a little extra help getting angry while shooting Casualties of War, so he insulted him by whispering “television actor” in his ear. He also shoved him to the ground. De Palma was pleased with the result. The best, though, is the diss he pours over everyone who has tried to make a version of Carrie since his. “It’s great to see others do it wrong.”

http://www.theguardian.com/film/2015/oct/01/de-palma-documentary-review-noah-baumbach-jake-paltrow

I'm looking forward to seeing it.

Here's part of the Baumbach/De Palma interview that supplements Criterion's DRESSED TO KILL.


I caught a screening of BLOW OUT back in 2011 and Baumbach introduced it. Interesting guy.

Aw yea

http://www.indiewire.com/article/brian-de-palma-is-dressed-to-kill-again-with-new-action-thriller-lights-out-20151109

Quote :

Brian De Palma, the legendary director known for gangster movies like "Scarface," "The Untouchables" and "Carlito's Way," is set to return to the big screen with the action-thriller "Lights Out." The filmmaker was recently awarded the Jaeger-LeCoultre Glory to the Filmmaker Award at the 2015 Venice Film Festival. He's also the subject of a new documentary by Noah Baumbach and Jake Paltrow, which A24 will release theatrically next year.

"Lights Out" tells the story of Lin Shen, a blind Chinese girl who gets caught up in a conspiracy to expose a top-secret assassination program. The movie will be the first joint venture of Arclight Films and Huace Media under the name Aurora Alliance Films.

The plot synopsis sits well with the mission De Palma has taken in the past few years. Once a filmmaker that some critics referred to as a "misogynist," he's now trying to skew his perspective to align more with feminist agendas. He tried and somewhat missed with his last film "Passion," so we'll have to wait and see how this time pans out.

"We’re excited and honored to be working with one of the great living film directors, Brian De Palma, on 'Lights Out,'" said Ying Ye, Managing Director of Aurora Alliance Films. "De Palma is a proven master of suspense; in the hands of the legendary director, 'Lights Out' promises to be a thriller for the ages, full of empowering messages, harrowing plot turns and great action sequences."

Casting is currently underway for top roles, including an A-list Chinese actress to star as the female action hero lead.

Michelle Yeoh, anyone?

FieldsMan wrote:

Michelle Yeoh, anyone?

Yeoh's Malaysian. Hard to think of an A-list Chinese actress who's known in the West now - all the Four Dans are getting on a bit.

Besides, hardly any of De Palma's announced projects get made. He's not bankable and doesn't seem bothered. Plus he's on record as thinking his best work's behind him. Certainly Passion was a disappointment, critically and financially.

Ah, thought she was half Malaysian, half Chinese… Probably pushing it a bit in age anyway.

I was wondering what happened to that Joe Paterno project with Al Pacino. Guess I missed this news: http://deadline.com/2014/09/joe-paterno-movie-suspended-hbo-happy-valley-al-pacino-brian-de-palma-836931/

"Suspended" as in dead.

De Palma seems destined to spend the rest of his days in development hell.

Domino is finished but unreleased, and has already been denounced by De Palma. And what's the odds that his recently-announced Weinstock-inspired project will even get made?

De Palma seems in combative mood despite his many setbacks:

https://theplaylist.net/de-palma-domino-predator-soderbergh-20180605/

He'd dead on about Soderbergh... Never understood the acclaim he receives.

The author's depiction of the foreign press is weird. The reason why De Palma might get a better reception over here is because there is less moralizing about his work. Not for any desire to suck up to him.

FieldsMan wrote:

He'd dead on about Soderbergh... Never understood the acclaim he receives.

Soderbergh can be fun but I wouldn't list him on any great directors list.

I like De Palma's style and that he seemed to be one of the more intelligent of the movie brat generation. I also appreciated that his "homages" that routinely sound and are labelled as ripoffs really don't feel that way in the context of the films they are in despite being obvious nods. He has the tact and intelligence that Tarantino does not in that regard.

But a great director...no. Admittedly I haven't seen all of his work and there are many times where I find myself going...but that was just like...
But....the exception and why I can go along with people adoring his canon...
Mission Impossible is a masterpiece. Highly intelligent and yet fun, a summer film that also is a ride for spy nerds. Despite the production chaos I think DePalma manages to create his finest work and it remains the reason why I respect him. An absolutely perfect film. A damn masterpiece that the series has never lived up to.


Soderbergh can make intelligent statements, and Sex, Lies still has emotional resonance today-particularly how you can see the entire indie film industry's origins in it. But after that there are only a few films with some importance. His digital era stuff starts to make the older material look like action films. But visually they are crap outside of Sex Lies, the B&W Kafka and some of the neon lit sections of the Oceans series.

Brian De Palma is a terrific director. The biggest criticism you can level against him is that much of his visual style was stolen from Michael Powell and Dario Argento. But it's hardly unique for a director to be directly influenced by another director.

Salomé wrote:

much of his visual style was stolen from Michael Powell and Dario Argento.

DePalma would argue those were tributes. Regardless, his use of splitscreen is beyond comparison, however old-fashioned some find that technique.

Erica Ambler wrote:

Salomé wrote:

much of his visual style was stolen from Michael Powell and Dario Argento.

DePalma would argue those were tributes. Regardless, his use of splitscreen is beyond comparison, however old-fashioned some find that technique.  

I didn't mean stolen as a pejorative term in this context. All great directors steal. Orson Welles always claimed he stole everything he knew from John Ford.

Out of curiosity hegottheboot, which Brian De Palma films have you seen? Because no De Palma fan would list his "Mission: Impossible" among his best work.

Salomé wrote:

no De Palma fan would list his "Mission: Impossible" among his best work.

MI, Untouchables and Scarface have probably been seen more times than the rest of DePalma's films put together.

No shame in being a gun-for-hire when you've got three ex-wives to pay.

If you want to get a taste of the real De Palma, I would recommend "Obsession", "Blow Out" and "Dressed to Kill" as your starting points.

The visual anemia he references in the above piece can be perfectly illustrated by this sequence from "Dressed to Kill". When was the last time you saw a visually rich scene like this in any mainstream release?

Erica Ambler wrote:

Salomé wrote:

no De Palma fan would list his "Mission: Impossible" among his best work.

MI, Untouchables and Scarface have probably been seen more times than the rest of DePalma's films put together.

No shame in being a gun-for-hire when you've got three ex-wives to pay.

The accusations leveled against De Palma in regard to his misogyny are always quite odd to me.
Certainly there are other directors who have done far more to earn such a label who have escaped such scrutiny *cough* Quentin Tarantino *cough*.
As with Shane Black, the entire accusation seems based upon on a handful of creative choices.

x

To be honest not a whole, whole lot. I need to see more. As a lifelong Hitchcock nerd I always avoided the pastiches and heard many of his films were directly inspired from Hitch classics. But I now realize that many articles played up that and that instead of being ripoffs they are more akin to artistic musings with fantastic technique.

But my adoration for M:I is not simply that it is a perfectly effective thriller. It is the rare summer film with intelligence, a spy film that isn't an insult to spy fiction, a narrative where everything is character driven and the lead character never even fires a gun-and one of the great conflicted productions that actually resulted in gold. I know DePalma doesn't really consider it his, and neither would Cruise and that they butted heads-and that all the M:I series are made with hectic last minute change shoots.
But I really do think the first is a darn masterpiece. It may not be as revered as Carrie, Blow Out etc. but I think it should be. If it were not a big summer film I feel it would be far better remembered. Plus it has an amazing sound mix....that you can only hear on Laserdisc or archival print screenings.