STACK #181 Nov 2019

YOUR TO FILM, TV, GAMING & MUSIC ESSENTIAL GUIDE

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ISSUE 181 Nov ’19

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ISSUE 181 Nov ’19

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YOURMONTHLYMUSIC GUIDE TOWHAT’S IN-STORE AT hot INSIDE UNDERWORLD • BAD//DREEMS • 2019ARIAAWARDS PAUL KELLY SONGS FROM THE SOUTH: HITS1985 -2019

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Founder Nic Short Editor-in-Chief Paul Jones Film & TV Editor Scott Hocking Contributors

Issue 181 NOV 2019

Music Editor Zoë Radas Online Editor Amy Flower

Creative Director Gary Siewert DVD Consultant Kerrie Taylor Games Consultant Sachi Fernando Music Consultant Mike Glynn Marketing Manager Fleur Parker

WELCOME

STACK is a family magazine and as such I can’t repeat what one of our chief games writers said about Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order via email, as he was about to fly back to Australia from the US press event. Needless to say it was positive and alongside an excited expletive came the words, “Easily the best Star Wars game since Star Wars: Force Unleashed ”. This has been the undercurrent of opinion for some time now. At E3 this year, spots for hands-on sessions were extremely limited and subsequently hotly contested. Again, the feedback was very good. It certainly isn’t a given that a reputable developer will always deliver a quality product, especially when working within the legal and lore restrictions connected with the Star Wars license (we’d hate to be part of that approval process), but when you have a studio like Respawn (Titanfall, Apex Legends) behind the wheel, the odds are more favourable than successfully navigating an asteroid field. With the final film in the sequel trilogy, The Rise of Skywalker, due to hit cinemas on December 19, could there be a better time to drop a new Star Wars game? On the film front this month, Disney’s stunning CGI update of The Lion King is easily the studio’s best ‘live-action’ remake since The Jungle Book , featuring photo-realistic wildlife that could easily have escaped from a David Attenborough documentary. It’s just the first in a wave of blockbusters that will be filling JB shelves throughout the Christmas quarter. Paul Jones, Editor-in-Chief

Chief Contributors Bob Jones , Gill Pringle Contributors Glenn Cochrane, Jeff Jenkins, Simon Lukic, Billy Pinnell, Denise Hylands, Bryget Chrisfield, Simon Winkler, Nathan Lawrence, Jake Cleland, Holly Pereira, Adam Colby, Dan Nicholson, Alex Deutrom, Bec Summer, Anthony Horan Social Media Manager Sally Carlier-Hull Production Manager Craig Patterson Correspondence STACK 33 Jessie Street, Richmond, VIC 3121

RATINGS GUIDE

Disclaimer STACK is published by Scribal Custom Pty Ltd (ACN 092 362 135). © Copyright Scribal Custom Pty Ltd, 2019 All rights reserved. All material appearing in this publication is copyright unless otherwise stated or it may rest with the provider of the supplied material or advertisement. No part of this publication may be reproduced without the written permission of Scribal Custom Pty Ltd. No responsibility is accepted for accuracy of advertisements or information. Whilst care has been taken in the research and preparation of this publication, the publishers, writers or anyone else associated cannot accept any responsibility for any loss, injury or hardship arising from the content contained herein or reliance therefrom, howsoever caused, and it remains your responsibility to evaluate the accuracy, completeness and usefulness of any such content. Views expressed are not necessarily endorsed by the publisher or the editor. By the very nature of this publication, things change daily and we cannot take responsibility for any changes or inaccuracies that occur subsequent to going to press.

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Issue 181 NOV 2019

YOUR TO FILM, TV, GAMING&MUSIC ESSENTIALGUIDE

YOUR TO FILM, TV, GAMING&MUSIC ESSENTIALGUIDE

stack.com.au

.com.au

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ISSUE 181 Nov ’19

ISSUE 181

ISSUE 181

Nov ’19

MUSIC

GAMES

Nov ’19

MEMBER EXCLUSIVE COMPETITION STACK Issue 181 NOVEMBER2019 “Everything you see -exists together in a delicate balance.”

PAUL KELLY SONGS FROM THE SOUTH: HITS 1985 - 2019

stack.com.au

stack.com.au

ISSUE 181 Nov ’19

ISSUE 181 Nov ’19

MUSIC

MUSIC

YOURMONTHLYMUSIC GUIDE TOWHAT’S IN-STORE AT hot INSIDE UNDERWORLD • BAD//DREEMS • 2019ARIAAWARDS PAULKELLY SONGS FROM THE SOUTH: HITS 1985 - 2019

YOURMONTHLYMUSIC GUIDE TOWHAT’S IN-STORE AT hot INSIDE UNDERWORLD • BAD//DREEMS • 2019ARIAAWARDS PAULKELLY SONGS FROM THE SOUTH: HITS1985 - 2019

FAST& FURIOUS:HOBBS&SHAW • NEILGAIMAN

NEED4SPEED:HEAT • CYBERPUNK2077 • PCSPEAKERS

INSIDE UNDERWORLD • BAD//DREEMS • 2019ARIAAWARDS

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Extras Pages 10 / 16–17

FILM & TV Pages 18–40

Music Pages 41–67

Games Pages 1–29

4-5 REGULARS This month, our roving reporter heads to JB Hi-Fi Doncaster, Vic. 6-7 STAR WARS JEDI: FALLEN ORDER This is the Star Wars game you’re looking for. 8 STAR WARS: THINGS WE’D LIKE TO SEE Ten things we want in a Star Wars game. 10 PS5 vs. Scarlett The battlelines are drawn. 14-15 MARIO & SONIC Once bitter rivals, now friendly competitors - we look at how it happened. 16 DEATH STRANDING STACK spotlights the more ‘creative’ developers in the video game universe. 18 cyberpunk 2077 CD Projekt were in town for PAX and we spoke Cyberpunk 2077 with them. 18 ESPORTS: ODDITY Team Oddity talk ambition. Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order; Disney Classic Games: Aladdin and the Lion King; Need for Speed: Heat; Death Stranding; Terminator: Resistance; Mario & Sonic at the Olympic Games Tokyo 2020. 28 STACK RECOMMENDS Grid and Ghost Recon: Breakpoint. 22-24 PC SPEAKERS Wired for PC-sound! 26 oUT THIS MONTH

44-47 INTERVIEWS + BULLETINS Chats with British electro lords Underworld and Adelaide rockdogs Bad//Dreems, plus we look into 2019’s ARIAs hopefuls – and if you tell us who you’re backing, you would win an Audio-Technica turntable! 48-49 PAUL KELLY Our Paul tells us all about the magical ways he meshes words with music, as he releases his third record of Greatest Hits. 50 MUSIC HISTORY: NOVEMBER Ozzy grabs a thief, The Hooties settle beef, and a runaway hay bale brings grief then relief: here’s your calendar of notable dates, events, and oddities of music history for November. 54-56 BREAKOUT BELTER: YEAH YEAH YEAHS This month Bryget Chrisfield investigates the Yeah Yeah Yeahs’ heart-bursting Fever To Tell (2003). 60-64 ALBUM REVIEWS Neil Young & Crazy Horse, Brightness, Underworld, ALTA, Sudan Archives, Opeth, Geowulf, Archie Roach, Cold War Kids, and many more. 66 VINYL: FOR THE RECORD Paul Jones offers a guide to preserving your cherished vinyl collection.

10 EXTRAS Local hero and national treasure Bryan Brown produces and stars in Palm Beach . 16-17 BOB J Our resident film historian looks back at the Oscar-winning 1957 classic The Bridge on the River Kwai .

18-19 THE LION KING Director Jon Favreau breaks new ground with his stunning CGI update of the Disney classic. 20-21 good omens Neil Gaiman on adapting his collaboration with Terry Pratchett as a BBC mini-series. 22 The Fast & the furious Five of our favourite rivalries from the Fast franchise. 24 THE SECRET LIFE OF PETS 2 We chat with manic bunny Snowball’s alter ego, Kevin Hart. 26 ANGEL HAS FALLEN The Butler is back, and Morgan Freeman is now the US President. 28 VICTOR CROWLEY Director Adam Green springs a surprise fourth Hatchet film. 26-32 REVIEWS The Lion King, Fast & Furious: Hobbs & Shaw, Angel Has Fallen, Midsommar, Dragged Across Concrete, Late Night, The Australian Dream, Palm Beach, Doom: Annihilation, Mystify: Michael Hutchence, Ma, Rabid, The Expanse: S3, The Handmaid’s Tale: S3, Good Omens, Doctor Who: Classic Season 10

Cinema Pages 12–14

12-13 DOCTOR SLEEP STACK talks with the director and cast of the highly anticipated sequel to Stephen King’s The Shining . 14 BRITTANY RUNS A MARATHON This year’s Sundance audience favourite is an uplifting tale about finding happiness through positive change. 17 IN CINEMAS THIS MONTH Frozen II, Last Christmas, Charlie’s Angels, Ford v Ferrari, 21 Bridges .

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DVD BEST-SELLERS for OCTOBER 2019

A self-described film nut, Lucy finds it difficult to narrow down an all-time personal favourite when asked. “I’m very passionate about foreign films, especially Japanese cinema. I love Kurosawa – Ran has to be in my top five,” she offers, while also heartily recommending recent South Korean award- winner Parasite as a must-see. Lucy confesses she was highly sceptical about the whole superhero film phenomenon, but working at JB convinced her to give the Marvel thing a chance. “At first I just wrote it off entirely,” she admits, “but

they were all so popular and I thought I’d just sit down and watch a few. And I actually really enjoy them! I went to see Avengers: Endgame at the cinema and had a really good time.” Lucy also likes to take her work home with her. “I buy a lot of movies and also collect Funko Pop! Vinyls. I think I invest a fairly large portion of my wages back into the company,” she laughs. “It’s getting to the point where I actually don’t have any more room. I need to invest in some new shelving, pronto.” The clientele at the Strand Arcade store are a fairly mixed bunch, says Lucy. “We tend to get a few older people coming in for DVDs because they maybe aren’t so comfortable with streaming services or buying things online, and they really like to get physical copies,” she notes. “We also get the young professionals who like TV shows like Better Call Saul and Suits .” Customer interaction and robust discussion about cinema are a highlight of the job for Lucy. “I love it when I get a customer who wants to have a good talk, and I can get an idea of their interests and suggest something good that they may not have seen. If they’re after something indie, there’s a recent film called

SHOP TALK

1 Toy Story 4 2 Chernobyl 3 John Wick: Chapter 3 4 Aladdin (2019) 5 X-Men: Dark Phoenix 6 Men in Black: International 7 Annabelle Comes Home

A fter working in one of the very first JB stores in New Zealand, Lucy Buchanan travelled across the ditch and is now preparing to celebrate her fourth Christmas as part of the team at Sydney’s Strand Arcade store, located off (and below) the busy Pitt Street Mall.

8 Wentworth: Season 7 9 Deadwood: The Movie 10 Yesterday

BLU-RAY BEST-SELLERS for OCTOBER 2019

1 Chernobyl 2 Toy Story 4

3 X-Men: Dark Phoenix 4 John Wick: Chapter 3 5 Aladdin (2019) 6 Annabelle Comes Home 7 Men in Black: International (JB Exclusive) 8 John Wick: Chapter 3 (JB Exclusive) 9 Deadwood: The Movie 10 Avengers: Endgame

The Miseducation of Cameron Post that’s just wonderful.”

Lucy Buchanan at JB Strand Arcade, Sydney

PRE-ORDER OFFERS JB's

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DOOM: ANNIHILATION STACK says: “An action-packed reboot that hews a lot closer to the vdeo game source material, while also taking its cues from James Cameron’s Aliens .” RELEASE DATE: NOVEMBER 13 SPECIAL OFFER: Pre-order and enter online for your chance to WIN A PS4 500GB JET BLACK CONSOLE. Competition closes 11.59PM on Sunday, 10/11/19. https://www.jbhifi.com.au/pages/doom-annihilation

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Coarse language and crude sexual humour

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EXTRAS

visit stack.com.au

it a mix of The Big Chill and The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel . “ Palm Beach is a film that exposes how, despite having everything one could wish for, our humanness continues to trip us up,” says Rachel Ward. “It has lots of fun setting up the

BRYAN BROWN

D escribing himself as a “Sydney suburban boy shaped entirely by the western suburbs” and a “confident bloke”, Bryan Brown is more than a local hero – he’s a fair dinkum national treasure. In a career spanning over four decades he has appeared in Australian classics like Newsfront (1978), The Chant of Jimmie Blacksmith (1978) and Breaker Morant (1980), as well as beloved TV mini-series A Town Like Alice (1981) and The Thorn Birds (1983). Brown has also maintained an international presence – notably teaching Tom Cruise how to mix drinks in Cocktail (1988). He also has fifteen credits as a producer,

including Dead Heart (1996), Dirty Deeds (2002), Beautiful Kate (2009) and most recently the baby boomer drama Palm Beach (2019), in which he also stars. Directed by his wife Rachel Ward, Palm

Beach focuses on a group of longtime friends who gather to celebrate a milestone birthday. The event isn’t without emotional fireworks of course, as personalities clash, tensions begin to mount, and old secrets are laid bare. Brown calls

Breaker Morant

idyllic, only to dismantle it, come perilously close to destroying it and, finally, to arrive at a fleeting moment of complete happiness before the tables are inevitably turned again.” Brown succinctly adds: “Paradise doesn’t exist, life exists.

[ Palm Beach ] is very much about life,

as much as it is about struggle

Doesn’t matter where you are.” The film boasts a distinguished ensemble cast that includes Sam Neill, Greta Scacchi, Jacqueline McKenzie and Richard E. Grant – a combination that Brown calls ‘harmonious’. “The movie is very much about life, as much as it’s about struggle. The actors are very alive and they’ve got to keep that humour and that energy in the scenes where it’s demanded...” The iconic Sydney location (which viewers will recognise as the setting for Home and Away ) is also very much a character in the film, and Brown explains why it was the perfect backdrop for the story. “The more the screenplay developed, the more it became a Palm Beach story – and it had to be Palm Beach. The more wonderful and exotic it was, then the more we had to have the opposing struggles of these people.”

Palm Beach

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© 2018 Palm Beach The Movie Pty Ltd, Create Nsw, Spectrum Films Pty Ltd, Screen Australia. © 2019 Universal Sony Pictures Home Entertainment Australia Pty Limited. All Rights Reserved.

CINEMA FEATURE

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SHINE ON

STACK talks with the director and cast of Doctor Sleep , the highly anticipated sequel to Stephen King’s The Shining . Words Gill Pringle

S tarring in Stephen King’s Doctor Sleep , the long-awaited sequel to The Shining , Ewan McGregor admits he was terrified by Stanley Kubrick’s 1980 horror classic, famously starring an unhinged Jack Nicholson. “It took me a long time to see it because it was so talked about as being the most terrifying movie ever. I finally watched it when I was at drama school, when I was 18. “So it’s interesting going back to it now because it dates a little bit, but it’s still very frightening. And Kubrick’s use of music and the oddness of what’s happening there, and the hotel itself. The scariest bit for me is when Jack goes in the bar and Lloyd the barman appears. That was always the most frightening moment for me, because you don’t really know then what’s reality,” says McGregor, who today plays Danny, the now grown-up son of Nicholson’s Jack Torrance character. Directed by Mike Flanagan, Doctor Sleep makes a big deal of Stephen King’s authorship and tacit approval, something that Kubrick failed to earn despite The Shining ’s enormous popularity. We meet McGregor’s troubled Danny Torrance 40 years after his terrifying stay at The Shining ’s Overlook Hotel. Still irrevocably scarred by his childhood trauma, he has fought to find some semblance of peace and is now in recovery after years of alcoholism.

“I love horror films,” she smiles teasingly. “But it was very disturbing and creepy.” Ask them both what age group should go see their own (US) R-rated movie, and Curran warns, “This is not for children. I think 15 year olds would be okay – but only if they are mature. But it’s completely and utterly terrifying and if you are not disturbed by extremely terrifying things and you are 17, then yeah, I think they could be able to see it,” adds the worldly-wise teen. For director and screenwriter Flanagan, he’s still pinching himself that Doctor Sleep won King’s seal of approval. “We had the completely surreal experience of being able to bring the final cut of the movie to Bangor to show Steve. It’s the first time I’ve ever met him, and we sat in a theater next to him and watched the whole movie. I don’t remember much because I spent the whole time staring at him. He must have felt really weird,” he recalls. But when King leaned over as the final credits rolled, placing a hand on his shoulder and saying, “You did a beautiful job,” Flanagan promptly fainted. “I woke up to Trevor [Mace, producer] fanning me awake in the lobby,” laughs the director, whose previous horror outings include Oculus and the acclaimed TV series The Haunting of Hill House .

But that peace is shattered when he encounters Abra, a courageous teenager with her own powerful extrasensory gift, known as the “shine.” Portrayed by newcomer Kyliegh Curran, Abra recognises that Dan shares her power, and seeks his help to combat the evil Rose the Hat and her followers, The True Knot, who It's not like we're trying to remake The Shining . Instead it's borrowing characters and some of the cinematic language of that film... feed off the shine of innocents in a quest for immortality. Forming an unlikely alliance, Dan calls upon his own powers, facing his fears and the ghosts of his past, as he and Abra engage in a life- or-death battle with Rose, played by Rebecca Ferguson. McGregor is somewhat taken aback when Curran, 13, suddenly confesses she’s seen The Shining and loved it.

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CINEMA

FEATURE

Did you know?

Director Mike Flanagan had to convince

Stephen King that, despite the author’s distaste for Stanley Kubrick's The Shining (1980), audiences were more familiar with that version, and largely preferred it to King's own 1997 TV adaptation. As such, Doctor Sleep

had to be a sequel to Kubrick's film and include some direct references to it.

Rebecca Ferguson as Rose the Hat

but was forced to return as he had nowhere else to live. Thereupon a ceiling fell in on his head in a nightmarish scenario involving a roommate. “But I had nowhere to go so I had to stay for another few months where my door would open at night, the phones would ping at night and it was really scary. I eventually got the hell out of there.” Among Doctor Sleep ’s broader strokes

Regardless of King’s personal disapproval of The Shining , McGregor was hesitant to sign on to a sequel of the iconic film. “Doing something that’s associated with a classic, famous movie is always interesting. But if it’s not good, then you don’t want to be a part of that. “So at first there was a trepidation about tackling something that’s linked to The Shining , but then when I read the script I was so impressed, I felt like it was a different kind

something at school, you get totally picked on.” Swedish actress Ferguson – best known for The Greatest Showman and the Mission: Impossible films – was delighted to be cast as the villain. “I was so exhilarated when I read the script; those parts rarely come to me,” she says. “I enjoy watching people like Jessica Chastain do roles like this, but didn’t think it would ever happen for me.” After learning she was cast as Rose the Hat, she began her research in earnest. “I immediately started watching interviews with female serial killers,” she says, eyes glinting. “I find the darker aspects of people fascinating.” Ferguson also became its an addiction or the urge to kill. “But in the case of Rose the Hat, she does it because she loves her family and needs to feed them. It’s done from a place of love, not hate. There’s about nine people in her own family but all the families are dying off because there‘s not enough ‘steam’ or ‘shinea‘ to feed them all.” Dressed in hobo chic as a caravan traveler, Ferguson’s beauty and unlikely attire makes Rose the Hat’s killing urge all the more lethal. “She’s terrifying,” says Curran. “The True Knot is absolutely evil, but it’s conflicting having them as antagonists, because they look like regular people.” obsessed with Ted Bundy. “There’s something very still and also very intelligent about him. That complete passion towards the selfish need of something, whether

of movie. It’s not like we’re trying to remake The Shining . Instead it’s borrowing characters and some of the cinematic language of that film, but it’s much more, and it’s not nearly as claustrophobic as The Shining was.” No stranger to psychic phenomenon, McGregor tells STACK about living in a haunted house during his drama student years. “I was living in Manor Park in London and there was something very strange about that house. I was actually burnt there one night, wearing a robe. I was burnt from out of nowhere. I took my robe

is a notion that if you have a gift that other people don’t understand, then somehow they might suck the life out of that gift; that one must

hide any special abilities for fear somebody could exploit them. Curran certainly feels that way. “I feel like people who have a special gift are squashed in order to fit the normal mold so I think this film speaks out for them.” McGregor concurs: “There’s

M U S T S E E F I R S T

off and the whole back of it was singed – and there was nothing on fire. “But there had been a man who died there in the basement in a fire,” adds the actor, who immediately left for the weekend

a sort of fear of things we don’t fully understand. I think about my kids being at school in Britain, where if you are really good at

Doctor Sleep opens in cinemas on November 7

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CINEMA FEATURE

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This year’s Sundance audience favourite, Brittany Runs a Marathon is an uplifting tale of finding happiness through positive change. Words Gill Pringle I nspired by a true story, Brittany Runs a Marathon is about a twenty-something forced to hit the brakes on her hard-partying MARATHON WOMAN

and veg. I worked out a lot and ran.” Raised in Las Vegas, Bell’s

gift for comedy emerged early, competing in high school improv tournaments before pursuing a career in Los Angeles. She believes everyone can relate to Brittany’s story of finding happiness through self- determination. “Everyone has experienced setbacks so it’s a powerful message about how we have the final say in our own lives.” While Brittany offered a welcome twist on the archetypal comedy sidekick, Bell doesn’t plan on hanging up those roles anytime soon. Best pals with Channing Tatum since making 22 Jump Street together, the duo plan to re- team for a quirky take on Ron Howard’s beloved mermaid classic Splash – but with Bell in the Tom Hanks role and Tatum as a merman. “I’m excited to do something with Channing again. He’s such a normal, sweet, down-to-earth guy – but in an incredible movie star’s body.” Real Brittany, Brittany O’Neill, can’t quite believe her own small story of personal change is up there on the big screen, even if her old roommate has taken certain liberties with the facts. “Paul was already a huge part of my

ways after a wake-up call from her doctor. Refusing to prescribe her with the uppers she uses to fuel her all-night NewYork club lifestyle, the good doctor proposes she lose 60lbs instead. Guys! I see you yawning, hoping your girlfriend doesn’t drag you along to see Brittany with her. But consider this: Winner of this year’s Sundance film festival audience award, Brittany Runs a Marathon is a hoot. And with 22 Jump Street ’s hilarious Jillian Bell in the hot seat, it’s so much more than a chick flick, turning a mirror on anyone faced with tough life choices. Shamelessly stealing from the story of his former roommate’s decision to run the New York Marathon – and in the process changing her entire life – writer-director Paul Downs Colaizzo says, “My concept for the film was to take a stock character from big American comedies – the ‘hot mess’, the ‘fat sidekick’ – and turn the camera squarely in her direction. What’s her human story? What does she want? What does she struggle with? And how is her story everyone’s story?” For Bell, it was a chance to go deeper, typecast in her own “fat sidekick” comedy roles like in Rough Night, Fist Fight or Office Christmas Party . “Brittany was very different from anything I’d been offered before; broad comedic characters or weird women,” says the actress when STACK meets with her in NewYork. “But Brittany just felt very real to my own life and I related. I was actually quite nervous about

Winner of this year’s Sundance

film festival audience award, Brittany Runs a Marathon is a hoot

Preparing like for no other role, she also lost 40lbs and became a passionate runner. “I did it in a very untraditional way. I ate healthy food and exercised,” she smiles, eyebrow firmly arched. “Nowadays people do fad diets and instead I just ate very clean; a lot of proteins

decision to get healthy and then he helped me create a fundraising video so I could pay the entry fee for the marathon,” she says. “But Paul’s version of my story helped me realise I was focusing too much on my weight instead of finding other metrics to prove that I should be allowed to love myself. So, honestly, I ended up being inspired by a story that was inspired by me.”

doing this because it was outside of my comfort zone and it meant I had to be very vulnerable on the set,” she admits.

Britanny Runs a Marathon is in cinemas now

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CINEMA

PREVIEWS

SCREENING IN november 2019

Stephen King's best-selling sequel to The Shining comes to the screen under the direction of Mike Flanagan ( The Haunting of Hill House ). 40 years after the traumatic events in the Overlook Hotel, the adult Danny Torrance (Ewan McGregor) encounters a teenaged girl who also possesses the gift of "shining" and must protect her from a merciless group known as The True Knot, who feed on the shine in their quest to attain immortality. The world will shine again on Nov 7 . (See page 12) DOCTOR SLEEP

As anybody with a little girl in their lives will likely attest, Disney’s Frozen is a firm favourite, with a song that just won't let go. In the inevitable and highly anticipated sequel, Elsa embarks on a journey to discover the origin of her magic powers, along with Anna, Kristoff, Olaf and Sven. The quest will take them to an ancient forest in an enchanted land, with their adventures scored to a bountiful soundtrack (including a new song by Idina Menzel). Venture into the unknown on Nov 28 . frozen II

last christmas

charlie's angels

ford v ferrari

21 bridges

Co-written by Emma Thompson (who also co-stars) and directed by Paul Feig ( Bridesmaids ), this festive rom-com sees former Mother of Dragons Emilia Clarke as a department store worker who dresses as Santa's elf. Henry Golding ( Crazy Rich Asians ) plays her love interest and, naturally, the music of George Michael and Wham! features prominently (along with some unreleased material). Give it your heart on Nov 7 .

Yes, the 1970s TV staple is getting another big screen outing, this time with Elizabeth Banks calling the shots as director. In this take on the story, the Angels (Kristen Stewart, Naomi Scott and Ella Balinska) are called in to deal with some dangerous new tech that is set to save the energy industry – but threatens all of us if it falls into the wrong hands. Unseen, undivided and unstoppable on Nov 14 .

Matt Damon and Christian Bale star as car developer Carroll Shelby and British racing driver Ken Miles, respectively. Together they battled corporate interference, the laws of physics, and their own personal demons to build a revolutionary race car for Ford Motor Company and take on the dominating vehicles of Enzo Ferrari at the 24 hours of Le Mans in France, 1966. Start your engines on Nov 14 .

Black Panther 's Chadwick Boseman stars as a disgraced NYPD detective who is given a shot at redemption in this slick-looking crime-thriller produced by Marvel heavyweights Joe and Anthony Russo. His mission is to catch a cop killer, which involves shutting down all avenues in and out of Manhattan – namely the titular number of bridges on the island. The only way out is through him on Nov 21 .

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EXTRAS FEATURE

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River Kwai ) when his flight to London was delayed in Paris. Gripped by the storyline he made enquiries about the film rights, only to discover that screenwriter/producer Carl Foreman had already bought an option on the book. Foreman was blacklisted in Hollywood in the 1950s because of his suspected Communist sympathy and membership in the Communist Party. Now exiled in England, Foreman had already tried to interest British film mogul Sir Alexander Korda in a joint film production of Boulle's novel. But Korda turned him down, stating that the story was far too anti-British. Moreover, he considered that the British colonel who orders his PoWs to construct a bridge for the Japanese Death Railway was either insane or a traitor. Korda's rejection allowed Spiegel to buy the film rights from Foreman, who he then immediately hired to write the first-draft screenplay. On Spiegel's advice, Foreman wrote in a part for an American commando ordered to blow up the bridge, primarily so that Spiegel could interest Columbia Pictures in the project. However, he omitted to inform the studio on who was actually writing the script because they would never have accepted a screenwriter who was on the Hollywood blacklist. Disillusioned by using a novice director for The Strange One , Spiegel sought the best for his new project and veteran director Howard Hawks was his first choice. Hawks was initially interested, but after reading the script he just didn't see it as a big grossing film and suggested that Spiegel use a British cast, an all British crew and a limited budget. After considering John Ford, William Wyler and Nicholas Ray, Spiegel finally settled on English director David Lean, whose wartime films showed his admirable grasp of the British military mind. However, Lean did not like Foreman's script, considering it be too melodramatic. Spiegel hired another

The Bridgeon theRiverKwai

1957

Directed by David Lean

F ollowing the enormous success of his multi- award-winning film On the Waterfront (1954), long and hard for his next production. He eventually chose The Strange One , with a screenplay by Calder Willingham based on his novel and Broadway play End as a Man . It was set in a Southern military academy whose code of honour fostered the corruption and brutalisation of the young cadets rather than independent producer Sam Spiegel searched

protecting them. Spiegel's intention had been to produce a movie that aligned with the then popular Teen-Pic genre. The resulting movie, however, became a mere horror story about the evil tricks of malevolent cadet Jocko De Paris (played by Ben Gazzara) wreaking havoc on the school and his classmates. Although most of the young cast and its director came from the New York Actors Studio, there was

certainly no Marlon Brando or Elia Kazan amongst them. Consequently, their total lack of film experience was all too plain to see. The Strange One earned no laurels, least of all from Spiegel, who expunged it from his memory by never referring to it again. Spiegel happened upon Pierre Boulle's best-selling novel Le Pont de la Riviere Kwai (English translation: The Bridge Over the

DID YOU KNOW: Pierre Boulle based his novel on his own experiences as a PoW of the Japanese during WWII. The Japanese forced Allied PoWs to build the Burma railway which resulted in some 30,000 PoW deaths.

Col. Nicholson (Alec Guinness) leads the PoWs into the Japanese prison camp

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Xxxxxxxxxxx Director David Lean, Alec Guinness and Sessue Hayakawa (who played the camp commander Colonel Saito) take a break whilst filming on location

The Bridge over the River Kwai is completed

Hollywood blacklisted writer, Michael Wilson, who together with Lean revamped Foreman's screenplay. There were numerous changes in the casting. Spiegel wanted Humphrey Bogart for the role of the American commando ordered to blow up the bridge, but he was already committed to another production for Columbia. Spiegel then tried for Cary Grant, who was also unavailable. It was then offered to William Holden, who accepted the part. Charles Laughton was Lean's first choice for the part of the military correct but maniacal Colonel Nicholson, but Laughton was too unfit to secure insurance. Sir Laurence Olivier was next but was too busy filming with Marilyn Monroe in The Prince and the Showgirl (1957). Lean then suggested Noel Coward – an idea that was not too absurd after his brilliant performance playing a surrogate Louis Mountbatten in Lean's film In Which We Serve – but he too declined. A determined Spiegel now pursued Alec Guinness, then primarily known as a comedy actor in the Ealing Studio pictures. Guinness rejected the part three times as he found the fanatical bridge-builder Nicholson too blinkered for audiences to take seriously. Furthermore, he and David Lean did not like each other having clashed on Oliver Twist nine years earlier. But Spiegel did what he always did best: he persisted. A worn down Guinness finally relented and signed up for the part. When the cast and crew arrived on location in Ceylon (now Sri Lanka) the initial relationship between Lean and Guinness was indeed decidedly frosty, as the actor knew that Lean would have preferred Charles Laughton for the role. But as the production progressed Guinness came to admire Lean, describing him as "a man of genius cocooned with outrageous charm". (They would go on to make a further three award-winning motion pictures together and

William Holden as the American Shears, who escapes from the camp but is ordered to return to blow up the bridge

in building a real railway bridge at a colossal cost, only to destroy it in half a minute. He addressed his critics that everything had to be in proportion, stating, "There is no story in Kwai without a bridge and the bridge acquires a meaning only when it's destroyed. The question of the money spent in building the bridge is only a number on the cost sheet." He then had a furious argument with Columbia chief Harry Cohn over the film's extreme length of two hours and forty-one minutes. The fact that Spiegel had made the film his own way and his refusal to cut a single minute of it was proof of the growing power of independent producers and the diminishing control exercised by the heads of the Hollywood studios. Following the film's premiere and its subsequent success, Columbia Studios was keen to enter the film for Academy Award recognition. Spiegel realised that any hint of the blacklisted writers he had employed would be a disaster for his production. He believed the least incriminating way to handle the problem was to credit the author Pierre Boulle for Best Screenplay, which was exactly what the brazen Spiegel did. The Bridge on the River Kwai received eight nominations and won seven Academy Awards including Best Picture for Spiegel, Best Director for Lean, Best Actor for Alec Guinness and sure enough, a Best Screenplay Oscar for Pierre Boulle – who couldn't speak or write a word of English. This injustice was finally resolved in 1985 when the Academy made amends in a private ceremony, at which the widows of the now exonerated Carl Foreman and Michael Wilson were presented with the

Fact: None of the major characters has a first name. They are all referred to by their rank and surname only. Bill Holden's character, Shears, is an alias that he stole from a dead fellow serviceman because he thought he would get better treatment as an officer.

Guinness came to recognise that he owed much of his international film career to David Lean.) Shooting began in Ceylon in October 1956 and continued for eight arduous months. Lean was slow and meticulous and ran well over schedule and budget. Although the cast grumbled at the excessive number of takes, they sensed that the film was going to be special. The famous opening scene of the tattered PoWs, led by Colonel Nicholson marching into the Japanese prison camp defiantly whistling the "Colonel Bogey March" was suggested by character actor Percy Herbert, who played the part of prisoner Grogan. Herbert had been a real-life PoW, captured by the Japanese in Singapore and imprisoned for four years in the infamous Changi Prison. He told Lean that the Allied prisoners would sometimes whistle "Colonel Bogey" to annoy the Japanese guards. The grand finale of the film was the blowing up of the bridge, which had taken over six months to prepare and build. Spiegel was later reproached for his extravagance

Join STACK ’s resident filmhistorian Bob J and our community of cinema buffs to have your say eachmonth in ' Bob J’s Classic Movie Club ' Facebook group.

Oscars that their late husbands should have received almost thirty years before.

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FILM FEATURE

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THE

EVENT MANE Director Jon Favreau tells STACK of his mission to push boundaries and break new ground with the stunning CGI/ live-action version of Disney’s classic The Lion King .

Words Gill Pringle

W idely regarded as an animated and Tim Rice’s original song, Can You Feel the Love Tonight and for Hans Zimmer’s original score. Three masterpiece, Disney’s 1994 classic, The Lion King , won Oscars for Elton John

years later, the stage show inspired by the film made its Broadway debut, winning

six Tony awards. Recently marking its 9,000th show – it remains one of Broadway’s biggest hits 22 years later. Therefore, when Jon Favreau was asked to direct a CGI-animated remake, he was naturally uneasy. “I felt a tremendous responsibility not

I felt a tremendous responsibility not to screw it up

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COOL WITH THE KIDS

F U R T H E R V I E W I N G . . .

Beyoncé Knowles-Carter was immediately on Jon Favreau’s wishlist to play Simba’s childhood friend-turned-love-interest, Nala, bringing the fierce and intelligent lioness to vivid life. “When you think of somebody who you’d be excited to interpret the role of Nala, especially the musical performances, Beyoncé is in a class all by herself,” says Favreau. “It’s a struggle, when you have tweens and teens at home, to be thought of as cool, because you’re irritating to your children. But having Beyoncé in my film definitely bought me a lot of credibility on the home campus with my kids and their friends. I’m a big fan of her music and was very excited to explore what she could bring. “With kids of her own, the fact that she’s working on The Lion King is something that she can share with her family, too,” he adds. “Kids have very strong opinions, and I’ve made a lot of good decisions on my collaboration on these family films because I’ve listened to my family. They definitely aren’t shy in telling me what they think about my plans.”

to screw it up,” says the director who brought to

and setting up shots as if he were standing in Africa alongside Simba. Three years in the making,

the table everything he had learned from helming 2016’s The Jungle Book . “ The Lion King is such a beloved property,” he tells STACK . “Disney has had tremendous success with the original animated movie and then the Broadway version, so I knew I had to be careful with it. I wanted to demonstrate that we could be respectful of the source material while bringing it to life using mind-blowing techniques and technologies.” It was a trip to Africa that pointed Favreau in the direction of The Lion King . “I went on safari in Africa six months prior to first talking to Disney about when we saw lions up on a rock, they all said, ‘Oh, look, it looks like The Lion King.’ “This story has become a frame of reference that’s familiar to everyone. It pops up in music, on TV shows, in comedy routines, as part of sketches. It’s continually referenced. It’s such a deep part of our culture that it felt like there was a tremendous opportunity to build on that and retell the story in a different medium.” In his mission to push boundaries, Favreau has brought The Lion King back to the big screen in a whole new way, employing an evolution of storytelling technology that blends live-action filmmaking techniques with photo- real computer-generated imagery. Environments were designed within a game engine, with state-of-the-art virtual reality tools enabling the director to walk around in a virtual set, scouting doing this film,” he says. “I remember when a warthog ran by our safari vehicle, one of the people in our group started singing Hakuna Matata . Then

Favreau was determined not to make any missteps.

“There are lots of steps to this process and that’s why it took so

long, although each phase was always different. In the beginning, it was pencils and voices. And then, always for me, casting is the foundation of great cinematic storytelling. “I didn’t come from the tradition of visual direction, it’s always been about storytelling and performance. I came up as an actor and so I have my foundation, you can’t

compromise one iota on cast, you have to get the best people you can, because they are the ones who are going to do everything.” The Lion King ’s stellar voice cast includes Donald Glover as Simba, Beyoncé as Nala, Chiwetel Ejiofor as Scar, Billy Eichner as Timon, Seth Rogen as Pumbaa, and the great James Earl Jones reprising his original iconic

This story has become a frame of reference that's familiar to everyone

and we would give that to the animators who would then turn it into what a lion would do or a hyena would do, because if we just motion captured their face and put a human expression on the animal’s face, I was concerned that would blow the illusion of it being a naturalistic documentary. “We looked at all those Attenborough BBC documentaries, and how much emotion could be expressed without human performance, just through music and editorial and the stories you are telling. And looking at movies like Babe , that was inspiration for how we did Jungle Book ; how much expression and emotion that would come out of these characters without having a human performance.” With so many original Lion King fans all grown up now with their own families, Favreau’s stunning new reimagination is the must-have movie this November.

performance of Mufasa. “We just built off of our cast, so it started with us just in a room, like theatre rehearsal, it was like what you would do when you grab a book for the first time and everyone walks around the stage and you start to figure out your character, and I had them all performing together,” explains Favreau. “They would get into groups and everybody was miked up so that the sound is usable for the film, and we would have them interact and improvise with one another. “At that point, we would shoot video on long lenses, just to have reference on what they did with their faces

• The Lion King is out on Nov 13

19

TV FEATURE

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Renowned fantasy writer Neil Gaiman talks to STACK about adapting his much-loved collaboration with the lateTerry Pratchett, Good Omens , as a BBC mini-series. Words Scott Hocking

N eil Gaiman’s best- selling novels Stardust and Coraline have been adapted as successful feature films and, more recently, American Gods was brought to life as a television series. But when it came to mounting a TV adaptation of Good

child Antichrist and the spookily accurate prophecies of a witch named Agnes Nutter, this whimsical comic fantasy was nominated for the World Fantasy Award and has gained an enormous cult following over the decades. Now the novel has been

muses. “The technology wasn’t there. There’s an incredible amount of CGI used in lots of different ways [in the series]. There’s the big, obvious CGI and then there’s the sort where people will say, ‘Where in Soho were you filming?’ And I will have to say, ‘That was a car park on a disused airfield and we went in and digitally made it Soho.” That’s not to say attempts weren’t made over the decades. “Terry Gilliam spent years trying to get it made and was never able to get it off the ground, despite having a fantastic script,” says Gaiman. “And at one point Terry actually had Johnny Depp and Robin Williams as Crowley and Aziraphale. He expected people to make it but the timing was wrong. He went to Hollywood to pitch it just after 9/11, and nobody was interested in an end of the world comedy at that point.” Fast forward to 2019, and a story concerning a world spiraling towards Armageddon suddenly becomes scarily topical. “I think we were really lucky in that [the

P h ot o c r e d i t B e o w u l f S h e e h an

adapted as a six-episode BBC mini-series, written by Gaiman and showcasing a wonderful double act by Michael Sheen and David Tennant (as angel and demon, respectively) alongside an all-star cast that includes Jon Hamm, Michael McKean, Miranda Richardson, and Frances McDormand as the voice of God. When STACK speaks with Gaiman, one of the first things we ask is why a screen adaptation of Good Omens took so long to materialise. “I think it was the technical challenges,” he

Neil Gaiman

Omens , which he co-wrote with author Terry Pratchett ( Discworld ),

Gaiman made it his personal mission to deliver something his late friend and collaborator would be proud of. First published in 1990, Good Omens is a satirical take on the biblical Armageddon, which a demon named Crowley and his angel pal Aziraphale are attempting to sabotage in order to maintain their cozy lifestyle in England. Featuring chattering satanic nuns, a displaced

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