Martin Cuff Consulting

HBO shot Fatherland in Prague in 1994 – a year in which we were somewhat pre-occupied in the Republic of South Africa – so I missed it entirely. In fact I’d never even heard of it until I caught it on tv today. Based on a Thomas Harris novel of the same name, it’s set in 1964 and starts with an intriguing premise: that Hitler defeated the Allies in 1944 and established a Nazi super-state across Europe.

Against this backdrop, President (Joseph) Kennedy is about to arrive on a State Visit to meet the 75-year old Hitler to formally end the Cold War; Hitler needs American support to finally defeat the Soviets in the East. But the Germans have a nasty little secret that threatens to derail the entire deal….. An American journalist and a German detective investigate.

It’s definitely a tv movie in size and scope, but it’s a pretty chilly thriller nonetheless. And the Nazi meets the 60s styling is impressive too.

For a while I thought Roller Derby was a made-up sport, like Dodgeball, or Extreme Ping-Pong. Turns out there really is a competition where girls in short-shorts pummel the hell out of each while skooting round an indoor bike track on rollerskates. Who knew?! And the girls take on such rockin’ names too -  my favourite: Smashley Simpson. All this – the rules, the myths, the bruises – is marvellously evoked in Drew Barrymore’s directorial debut “Whip It!”

“Whip It” (so named after a killer move that’ll get the protagonist four valuable points on the scoreboard) stars the can-do-no-wrong Ellen Page as Bliss, a grunge-leaning teenager unhappily stuck in Bodeen, Texas, with a part-time job in the say-no-more Oink Joint, a postal mom (literally) who’s obsessed with beauty pageants and deportment, and a sweet-n-savvy best friend who’ll be on the first bus out after graduation. One fortuitous day Bliss stumbles upon Roller Derby and her life’s turned upside down. Sweet, funny and laden with friendship, it’s like a coming of age movie, but on wheels.

In spite of the strong Texas location, the production actually filmed in Detroit, no doubt taking advantage of Michigan tax breaks and the fact that warehouse space can be bought for a dollar an acre now there’s a recession.  To support the all-star cast of grrrrl-power, (Kirsten Wiig, Zoe Bell, Eve – awesome!), real roller girls were selected from local Michigan teams such as The Detroit Derby Girls, and The Grand Raggidy Roller Girls.

Just a week to go until we open the doors at the V&A Waterfront World Media & Legacy Centre.

For broadcasters, bloggers, photographers and writers, the V&A Waterfront World Media & Legacy Centre offers a range of turn-key solutions including hot desks with high speed internet access, editing facilities, camera, lighting and equipment hire, libraries of rights-cleared music, photography and HD video footage, production services from live studio broadcasts to roving news teams to single photo-journalists, studio space and camera positions through the Waterfront and beyond. We are also able to offer events and press conference facilities accommodating from 20 to 1500 guests. We’re also the place you’ll need to come to if you want permits to film or shoot anywhere within the 300 hectare Waterfront zone.

The V&A Waterfront World Media & Legacy Centre doesn’t just offer service, it also offers content. We have own Content Website, where you can find Stock Photography, Stock Video Library and accompanying editorial. And we’ll also be posting and updating great local stories on everything from South African soccer history and local culture to a daily diary of events – in short, offering a great pool of unique leads and angles for you to develop.

I’ll start right out by saying that He’s Just Not That Into You is set in Baltimore, and that’s perhaps the most interesting thing about it. A wry-ish look at the pitfalls and pratfalls of dating amongst an extended Chinese Whisper of friends and acquaintances, He’s Just was clearly conceived as some modern When Harry Met Sally – complete with mockumentary vignettes from completely unrelated people. Unfortunately it fails.

He’s Just Not Into You stars just about everybody except Cameron Diaz, but only Jennifer Aniston and that spunky little Irish-looking guy from Entourage come across as even vaguely authentic. I remember there was a lot said in the blogosphere about the heinous portrayal of the male gay best friends in the film but I didn’t find it at all troubling given that EVERYONE is a Twitter Update rather than a fully formed character. I’m not saying it’s not amusing. It’s just that there’s really nothing to work with, and nothing to hang the humour on except some really rather sorry social pathologies. I guess, I really just wasn’t into it.

And again smokin’ Bradley Cooper as an adulterer; I shall clearly have to have words.

I finally got around to seeing the Location Movie of the Year – The Hangover. Buying entirely into the mythology of “what happens in Vegas, stays in Vegas”, The Hangover features three friends who lose the groom at a riotous bachelor party involving drugs, strippers, hospitals, tigers and Mike Tyson. (not entirely sure which is scariest.) A lot of iconic Vegas locations appear – Caesars Palace, The Bellagio etc. And some other lesser known ones too. Location pics here.

But did I like it? Well, yes, sort of. I think I was a bit disappointed actually, given the hype surrounding the film. I was expecting fall-about belly-laughs, but ended with just smiling at most of the japes. I also think it’s partly because the main characters are actually all pretty unlikeable – one’s a dubious hen-pecked husband, one’s a scary pedophile who’s too close to the edge, one’s an adulterer. A very goodlooking, Bradley Cooper looking-smokin-in-every-scene-adulterer, but nasty nonetheless. Only Justin Bartha’s character emerges unscathed. So: funny, just not always funny ha-ha. Vegas will score some travellers though.

Oh God, the Eighties were execrable. It was an awful time to be a teenager; combine all that adolescent angst and hormones with atrocious clothes, dreary New Age music and really worthy self-absorption. I wonder how any of us ever survived it. Or survived it without being resoundingly slapped. I was reminded again of how ludicrous and cringe-worthy it all was with the delightful, quirky Brit movie Son of Rambow.

Set in a rural English private school – in real life the Ashlyn’s School in Berkhampstead – Rambow tells the story of Will Proudfoot, a sweet, imaginative young boy being raised by his widowed mother and the extended family of Good Christians (again, that oxymoron!) called The Brethren. Will is banned from music or television, so when he is exposed to his first home video – Rambo – his mind is blown wide open, and he joins forces with the cheeky school troublemaker Lee to make his own stunt-filled action movie.

I’m never quite sure what to make of Tim Burton’s movies. There’s always a bit of an ick factor that I can’t put my finger on – though the presence of the (and I don’t know how to say this kindly) repulsive Helena Bonham Carter probably has something to do with it. His movies always seems to have all the right ingredients, but they just don’t quite work together. So it was with some trepidation that I took Rose and Kazi to see Alice in Wonderland in 3D over the long weekend.

It’s a re-imagining of the Alice tale, so Alice is a decade or so older and about to be farmed off in marriage to some pale and chinless aristocrat. She’s a revisionist, grrl-powerish Alice, this one though, so she rebels against her fate and falls down the rabbit hole into Wonderland again. But Wonderland has changed for the worse in her absence; the Red Queen has won the throne, and enslaved the populace, and it appears that Alice is the only one who can stop her.

So Wonderland itself was a bit grim – it looked post-apocalyptic, and frankly the gloom of 3D specs didn’t help. Johnny Depp’s a shameless old hack too – The Hatter is Jack Sparrow before he went to sea. I did like the scope of the opening scenes that were shot on location however, when young Alice is being sold off like so much chattel for an alliance with a wealthy business partner; the elegant garden party looks completely beautiful. It was filmed at Antony House between the villages of Torpoint and Antony in Cornwall, England, a property managed by the National Trust but still lived in (by some cunning aristo plot) by the Carew Pole family. Some 250 extras from the villages appeared in the scene.

OK, so I’m jumping ahead of myself somewhat, but I’m back in Serbia for a couple of weeks of hoopla, including the first days of filming of Ralph Fiennes directorial debut Coriolanus.

Set in the early years of the Roman Republic, Coriolanus is one of Shakespeare’s most politically challenging examinations of the way power corrupts. Quite sharp then that the production aims to use actual tv footage of the mass demonstrations around the Serbian parliament building during the overthrow of Milosevic as an integral part of the production….

Now if only for a glimpse of Gerard Butler…..

Body of Lies is a strange film that’s handicapped to a degree by the fact that its two towering leads – diCaprio and Crowe – conduct most of their interactions telephonically.

DiCaprio plays Roger Ferris, a CIA operative in Iraq who’s distinguished from his fellow countrymen by actually liking the Middle East and Middle Easterners generally. But in spite of his fervour and relative decency, Ferris is continually undermined by his boss (Russell Crowe), a lard-ass cynic who observes and controls Ferris’ every move via real-time images from a high altitude spyplane. This way he also fucks up Ferris’ more sensitive relationships – budding girlfriend, Jordanian spy chief, Arab stoolpigeon, that kind of thing. The plot such as it is revolves around attempts to lure out a shady Bin Laden-ish recluse, mostly by prodding his ego via the creation of a fake rival terror outfit. Frankly they could have made a really good hour-and-a-half movie about that subplot alone.

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Silence on the film-watching front, mainly because I’ve been flat out on developing a Media and Legacy Centre for Africa’s biggest visitor drawcard – the V&A Waterfront in Cape Town.

Just a hop and a skip from the brand new Cape Town Stadium, the media centre will be offering a one-stop shop for premium media services, including:

• Press Conference venues and dedicated interview rooms
• Broadcast facilities including studios
• Dedicated camera positions throughout the V&A and at prime locations across Cape Town
• A media centre with hot desks, telephone lines, storage lockers, photocopy / fax etc.
• Video Production services
• Photographic Production services
• A/V and Photo Camera Rentals
• A/V and Photo Camera Repair
• A/V and Photographic Consumables & Equipment
• Photography Library
• Video Library
• Music Library
• Tourism services including flight bookings, accommodation, tours and transfers
• Concierge services
• Office Space for temporary Corporate HQs
• Conference and Meeting Rooms

Find out more at our swanky new website: www.waterfrontmediacentre.co.za