The genius of Andrei Tarkovsky, the Russian film-maker who died in 1986, will be celebrated in a seven-film season opening at the IFI tomorrow with Ivan's Childhood and continuing in August with screenings of Andrei Rublev, Solaris, Stalker, Nostalghia, The Sacrifice and, my favourite Tarkvosky film, Mirror.
Later this month the IFI will present an attractive season of new and recent South Korean cinema, including 11 feature films that have not been seen in Ireland as well six given a limited release here: Spring, Summer, Autumn, Winter . . . and Spring, Memories of Murder, Save the Green Planet, A Tale of Two Sisters, and two films directed by Park Chan-wook, Sympathy for Mr Vengeance and the powerful psychodrama, Old Boy.
Don't look now - or ever
In one of the most unnecessary plans ever mooted for a remake, producer Mark Gordon has taken the sacrilegious decision to proceed with a new version of Nicolas Roeg's terrific 1973 thriller, Don't Look Now, which was based on a Daphne Du Maurier story and starred Julie Christie and Donald Sutherland. Gordon dismissively claims that Roeg's movie "was very much of its time, with a lot of atmospherics that wouldn't necessarily work today. But it has a great idea and a wonderful backdrop and setting. We hope to take the feeling of the story, continue to set it in Venice and make it contemporary."
Gordon recently produced Lasse Hallström's Casanova, which was shot in Venice and stars Heath Ledger in the leading role.
School of film
The Film Academy is a new summer course aimed at introducing second-level students to the skills of film-making. Organised by John Norton and Deirdre McNally of Trinity Films, it runs for a fortnight at Ardmore Studios in Bray, with separate sessions beginning on July 18th and August 1st, and consisting of practical classes aimed at the 12-14 and 15-18 age groups.
The course will cover screenwriting, directing actors, production management, production design, sound design, camera and lighting techniques, film editing, film music, and digital and visual effects. Each class will storyboard, shoot and edit a short film.
For further information, e-mail thefilmacademy@eircom.net, or telephone (01) 669-7737.
De Palma's The Recyclables
Brian De Palma is planning a prequel to his 1987 The Untouchables, which starred Kevin Costner as agent Eliot Ness and Robert De Niro as Al Capone. The new film, The Untouchables: Capone Rising, begins with the young Capone's arrival in Chicago and follows his ascendancy through the criminal ranks and his collision course with Irish cop Johnny Malone, who was played in the original by Oscar-winning Sean Connery.
Meanwhile, De Palma, whose last movie, Femme Fatale (2002), went straight to video here, is completing The Black Dahlia, based on James Ellroy's novel and featuring Josh Hartnett, Scarlett Johansson, Hilary Swank and Irish actors John Kavanagh and Fiona Shaw.
Weitzes cast big dreamerz
Brother Paul and Chris Weitz are lining up actors from their earlier films - American Pie, About a Boy and In Good Company - for a new social satire. Along with Chris Klein, Willem Dafoe and Mandy Moore, American Dreamz stars Hugh Grant as a disaffected British TV personality and Dennis Quaid as a US president going through a nervous breakdown. "The movie examines the role of dreams and ambitions in American culture," Paul Weitz says. "It's about what's wrong with America and how close it is to what's right with America."
What's a hooligan?
English-speaking cinema audiences on opposite sides of the Atlantic don't always speak the same language, which is why Duplex was released here last year as Our House. Fever Pitch, the second movie based on the Nick Hornby novel and now transposed to the US, has been re-titled as The Perfect Match for release here on August 5th. And the soccer violence drama, Hooligans, due on August 26th, has been re-named Green Street in the US - presumably because Americans wouldn't know what a hooligan is - as well as here.
However, there's still no sign of a title change here for the oddly named US release, The Sisterhood of the Travelling Pants, which also opens here on August 26th.
