Catfish: The Best Film You Shouldn't Know About

You know what I love about movies in 2010? For the first time in far too long audiences have the opportunity to walk into a theater for a fresh, unsullied cinematic experience without the pall of tell-all trailers or dozens of behind-the-scenes blog posts muddying their enjoyment. Earlier this summer, Inception director Christopher Nolan caused a raucous and was accused of using secrecy as a form of hype because he—gasp—decided to keep some things about the movie under his hat and now Catfish arrives in theaters riding a wave of Sundance buzz that can be summed up in two words: Spoiler Alert.

If you’ve seen Catfish (I have and promise you it’s fantastic), tell no one what to expect. If you haven’t, the best thing you can do is go into the theater with as little knowledge about the film as possible. Complicated and remarkable, the documentary has been plagued with debate about the validity of the story since it debuted in January. Speaking to the group over the phone as they prepared to screen the documentary in San Francisco, I asked why people were so hung up on the idea that the film isn’t true.

“I guess it’s too good to believe,” Ariel began. “There’s a trend recently of fake documentaries as a genre; Cloverfield—”

“Best in Show,” Joost quips.

“Blair Witch Project,” Ariel replies. “But we were completely surprised the first time, at Sundance, someone said, ‘Hey, that’s a mock-doc.’ We were completely taken aback because we’d experienced this and it had never occurred to us that this was fake, because we were there.”

Perhaps one of the reasons some are dubious is because Catfish seems to document every moment of the tales unraveling, a feat that leads many to believe the situations were staged. However, Ariel explains cameras are constantly rolling in the group. They didn’t set out to make a film, they just happened to be recording what was happening in their daily lives and ended up with over 250 hours of footage to cull from when editing.

“Nev and I don’t have home video from when we were growing up so we’ve kind of been making up for it the last six or seven years,” Ariel offers. “And now he has a document of probably the strangest thing that will ever happen to him.”

Asked if anyone else could have made this film, the group erupts with laughter.

“[No one] would have had the time to stick around so long and let everything percolate,” Ariel contends. “That’s why documentaries end up being in retrospect. This documentary is in real time, while it’s happening, because we were spending so much time together.”

One of the things that makes Catfish so tragically beautiful and tangible is its use of Facebook, Google Earth, email and cell phones to tell that story, making it relatable to everyone’s day to day existence and highlighting the death of true human interaction thanks to our dependence on technological intermediaries. I couldn’t help but wonder what relics of simpler times the filmmakers miss in the information age.

“Hand written letters,” Joost offers. “There’s something nice about knowing someone took the time to write you a letter and take it to the mailbox, that it takes a week to get there and a week for a reply. There’s an elegance to written correspondence that’s been lost with email.”

“I miss landlines because you get to speak to people’s parents and you have to be really polite,” Ariel laughs. “You’re like, ‘Oh, hello, Mister Jenkins,’” his voice feeble and quivering, “‘This is Ariel. Is Lisa there?’ And they’d be like--”

“Ahhh, Ariel,” Joost jumps in with a tone that’s fatherly and commanding. “We’ve heard about you. How are you doing? The basketball team is doing very well. I saw your slam dunk on Sunday.’”

“‘Thank you, Mister Jenkins.’”

“I miss not having a cell phone,” Nev says. “I hate cell phones and take every opportunity I can to not carry it with me. It just destroys intimacy. We all use our cell phone as this crutch to keep us distracted and it gives us the excuse to not try very hard in our real life.”

Catfish opens in Los Angeles and New York September 17

Behind the Scenes of The Other Guys

One of the biggest shockers in store for movie goers this summer won’t be found in the last few seconds of Inception. The real revelation is that Mark Wahlberg is seriously funny, a fact audiences will come to realize when his hilarious new film, The Other Guys, hits theaters August 6th. “If you come from a different background, doing serious films, and you try to do a broad comedy and it’s not funny, you’re probably not going to get the chance to do it again,” Wahlberg says of his decision to dive into the comedy fray with two of the strongest talents working in the genre today.

The movie co-stars Will Ferrell and was directed and written by Adam McKay, who also helmed Ferrell’s earlier opuses, Anchorman, Talladega Nights and Step Brothers. Considering Ferrell and McKay’s relationship dates back to the beginning of their tenure at Saturday Night Live in 1995, grew to include co-founding FunnyorDie.com, and birthed some of Ferrell’s most beloved roles, Wahlberg easily could have taken a backseat and let them handle the comedic pyrotechnics. But rather than play the patsy and let them have all the fun, the actor exploits his brooding tough guy image, perfected with roles such as his Oscar-nominated turn in The Departed, and turns in a side-splittingly funny performance that’s neck-and-neck with Farrell’s.

“It was really just about letting go, being fearless, not being afraid to look ridiculous and have people laugh at you instead of with you,” the actor explains. “Coming from the background I come from, you can be a little self-conscious. It’s okay to be cool but it’s not okay to be corny. That’s something I’ve dealt with over the years as an actor; not worrying what people think.”

He says the most important parts of the equation were finding a script that suited him, in this case one McKay wrote specifically with Wahlberg and Ferrell in mind, and a group of collaborators who were like-minded. “This set was so loose and relaxed. On most sets I’ve worked on, it’s always kind of fun but then it’s time to get serious. Usually I’ll take the fun too far and the director will come over (whispering), ‘Hey, calm down, we’ve got to shoot this, let’s get serious for a minute.’ That never happened on this movie. They let me go nuts and then they’d encourage me to go even further, to the point where I’d get to my trailer at the end of the day and I’d be exhausted with laughter.”

As the only member of the cast with demonstrable cinema cop experience, Wahlberg also had the pleasure of knowing he was on solid footing, firmly inside his wheelhouse. “I certainly felt very comfortable when it came to anything cop-ish or action-y, but I basically just wanted to follow their lead when it came to anything [comedic]. I did whatever they told me. I’d learn the lines, show up and say the lines and if they wanted me to try anything else, I would---.”
In the middle of downplaying his comic abilities, his co-star Michael Keaton, who got his big break alongside legendary Jim Belushi in the short-lived comedy series Working Stiffs and knows a hell of a lot about what constitutes “funny,” can’t help but interject. “I have to jump in and say something here,” Keaton blurts. “[Mark] is ridiculously funny. We’d all go, ‘Who the fuck knew this was in this guy?’ He does voices and impressions. I was knocked out. When you look at him, he seems nice enough, but he’s ridiculously funny.”

When Wahlberg demurs, shaking his head and seeming to blush a bit, McKay speaks up as well. “[Mark’s] got such great instincts, when he points it towards comedy, it’s such a pleasure to watch.”

Wahlberg does not, however, need any help looking like a bad ass. McKay laughs when he recalls Wahlberg’s nonchalance at the action portions of their buddy cop flick. “We’d be shooting a big action scene,” McKays says, “and Will and I were like, ‘Wow! Look at this! We’re breaking a window,’ and Mark would come over, almost yawning, and be like, ‘Yeah, yeah, we did this one time except I was being shot out of a canon and I was on fire.’”

The Other Guys opens August 6.

Hollywood Bites Reviews "Inception"

As Inception arrives in theaters this Friday, little is publically known about the film other than what writer-director Christopher Nolan told the LA Times in January; that the enigmatic thriller revolves around “corporate espionage by way of dream invasion.” Think of it as The Matrix meets James Bond with a side of Freud, starring Leonardo DiCaprio, Ken Watanabe, Ellen Page, Tom Hardy (in a star-making turn) and Joseph Gordon-Levitt. Got it? Good. Because that’s as much of a spoiler as your gonna get.

If you’re hungry for a spoiler, you’ve come to the wrong place because elaborating on Inception’s plot will do nothing to enhance the rapturous experience of settling into a darkened movie theater to witness one of the best films of the year courtesy of perhaps the greatest director working in Hollywood today. This is a movie best viewed with a blank slate and an open mind; just sit back, relax and let it blow you away. And then dash back into the theater for a second showing.

Since Momento, there’s been no question of Nolan’s ability to create labyrinthine plots that are both mind-bending and heartbreaking. But Inception ups the ante to a blockbuster scale which surpasses the director’s dark Batman dreamscapes by leaps and bounds. Visually stunning, wonderfully acted and richly layered, it’s a film that deserves immeasurable praise (it will surely be heaped with accolades come award season) and multiple viewings. During the summer movie season, when audiences are too often told to switch their brain to auto-pilot, Nolan delivers a thoughtful, compelling, vividly woven film that may prove to be his opus.

The only thing you need to know about Inception is this: It’s brilliant!

Behind the Scenes of Inception

Before attending a screening of Inception, Christopher Nolan’s hotly anticipated new film, Warner Brothers issued explicit instructions to all attendees not to tweet, Facebook, blog or otherwise spread internet word about the film. Usually when a studio issues that kind of edict, it’s because they realize they have a turkey on their hands and they don’t want any advanced negative word of mouth, but in the case of Inception, the veil of secrecy is actually a service to filmgoers. In the Google Age, most films are ruined before you step foot in the theater thanks to reviews that overshare, trailers that leave nothing for later, and blogs focused on publishing every possible spoiler.

Whether out of respect or fear, Nolan has managed to pull off a coup. As Inception arrives in theaters, little is known about the film other than what the writer-director told the LA Times in January; the enigmatic thriller is about “corporate espionage by way of dream invasion.” Think of it as The Matrix meets James Bond with a side of Freud, starring Leonardo DiCaprio, Ken Watanabe, Ellen Page, Tom Hardy (in a star-making turn) and Joseph Gordon-Levitt.

At the press day for the film, whose grandeur and complicated logistics made The Dark Knight look like a cake walk according to the auteur, Nolan bandied back questions about secrecy as a form of hype to promote his movie. “It’s difficult to balance marketing a film with wanting to keep it fresh for the audience,” Nolan replied. “My most enjoyable experiences as a moviegoer have always been going to [see a movie] that I don’t know everything about. You want to be surprised and entertained by the movie. I think too much is given away in movie marketing.”

Without revealing too much (trust me, you want to be surprised) the film was partially sparked ten years ago by Nolan’s fascination with dreams and their similarity to movies. His intrigue with the subject grew from childhood and he was drawn to the idea of trying to portray an imaginary realm onscreen. “I think for me, the primary interest, in dreams and making this film, is the notion that your mind, while you’re asleep, can create an entire world that you’re also experiencing without realizing you’re doing it. I think that says a lot about the potential of the human mind.” Nolan took the idea of dreamscapes and used that as a jumping off point to create a limitless “playground for action and adventure.”

DiCaprio, who admits he’s not a big dreamer, says he was drawn into the film for a number of reasons, but especially the chance to work with Nolan. “This was an extremely ambitious concept that Chris was trying to pull off and he accomplished it with flying colors,” DiCaprio offers. “There’s very few directors in this industry that could pitch to the studio an existential, high-action, high-drama, surreal film and have the opportunity to do it, and that’s a testament to his previous work in [films like] Momento and The Dark Knight.”

Everything about Inception solidifies Nolan’s reputation as one of the best directors working in Hollywood today and he will no doubt be doing major red carpet duty come awards season. One of the most stunning sequences in the film involves Gordon-Levitt in an extended fight sequence that calls to mind Fred Astaire’s anti-gravity dance in Royal Wedding, but about a hundred times cooler.

Asked about the logistics and training involved in shooting the scene, Nolan beams, “We had a stunt guy who looks exactly like Joe, made up perfectly -- and he stood there on set every day for three weeks and didn’t do a thing. Joe insisted on doing everything himself, apart from one shot. He just did the most incredible job with these bizarre sorts of torture devices.”

“Thanks!” Gordon-Levitt replies. “It was just about the most fun I’ve ever had on a movie set. It was also probably the most pain I’ve ever been in. But, you know, pain in a good way, like in the way I guess an athlete must [feel]. They have to put on the pads and wrap their ankles and they get a little beat up during the day but that’s just part of slamming yourself into walls and jumping around.” Referring back to the ode to Astaire, the actor smiles and says, “It’s sort of like how Sesame Street and Star Wars both use Jim Henson puppetry. It’s similar technique, but a very different effect.”

Inception opens July 16.