Congratulations go out to Kristina Reed, also known as wife of long-time blogging.LA’s Mack Reed not (just) for producing the Academy Award-winning Animated Short Paperman, but for getting kicked out of (and getting let back into) the 2013 Oscars.

According to The Hollywood Reporter:

After Disney’s Paperman won the Academy Award for best animated short Sunday, producer Kristina Reed began throwing paper airplanes, about three or four — with kisses on them, like the ones seen in the film — from her seat in the mezzanine.

The paper planes were nowhere near the stage, instead shooting straight down from the balcony. It went largely unnoticed by the crowd, but security didn’t think the act was very sweet, kicking her out of the Dolby Theatre auditorium.

It would turn out to be temporary. After a short protest, security brought her back to her seat about five to 10 minutes later.

The story has been picked up by Gawker, HuffPo, ABC, MSN, and more.

(Photo lifted from Mack’s Facebook feed… thanks, Mack!)

I can’t take credit for finding this, spotted on facebook on a friend of a friends liking it chain of posts.  None the less it is a great view of Burbank to Toluca Lake in 1958.  Isn’t that sound track something else?  The turds at the Getty images won’t allow embedding, but you can view it HERE.

This article was originally published at 8Asians.com and has been reposted here with permission.

Terminator Salvation. Sherlock Holmes 1,2, and 3. Lego: The Piece of Resistance. Godzilla. Stephen King’s It. Death Note. Justice League. What do all these disparate movies past, present, and future have in common? One amazing Taiwanese American producer, Dan Lin.

And you might have heard of his latest film Gangster Squad, an LAPD period movie about a battle to take back LA from the mafia. Named back in 2008 by Variety as one of top 10 producers to watch, Lin has definitely lived up to the title, and with all the classic blockbusters being tacked to his name, he and everything he does will be worth watching for long after Gangster Squad hits the streets this Friday.

Here are 8Questions with Dan Lin about his new film and more from a roundtable press interview:

Read the rest of this entry →

This weekend, the LA 3-D Club is hosting the 9th Annual LA 3-D Movie Festival at the Downtown Independent Theater. The festival opens Friday, December 14th at 8pm with Robin Hood: Ghosts of Sherwood 3D, a 2012 feature from Germany, directed by Oliver Krekel and starring Martin Thon, Tom Savini, and Kane Hodder.

Short films in competition will screen at 1pm and 3pm on Saturday, December 15th, followed at 5pm by a special presentation of 20th Century Fox’s Maggie Simpson in The Longest Daycare,  a 2012 3-D animated short film starring the youngest family member of  The Simpsons. The screening will be followed by a Q&A with members of the creative team behind the film, including director David Silverman.

The festival’s Closing Night will showcase the feature U2 3D, the 2008 concert film that was shot in South America during the band’s Vertigo tour.  U2 3D will screen for FREE at 8pm on Saturday,  December 15th and will be introduced by 3D Producer and 3ality Technica CEO Steve Schklair.

Sunday, December 16th will be dedicated to remembering and celebrating the life of Ray Zone, LA 3-D Club Vice President and 9th Annual LA 3-D Movie Festival C0-Chair in a free public memorial at the theater. Ray was an author, 3-D film producer, speaker, and award-winning 3-D artist who passed away on November 13, 2012. A reception, hosted by the International 3D Society, begins at 5pm, followed by family and friends speaking in memorial to Ray in the theater. The evening will include displays of Ray’s art, writing, and film work.

If you buy a pass to the festival, you could be the lucky winner of a FujiFilm FinePix REAL 3D W3 digital camera. A Festival Pass is $30 and gets you into all screenings and events during the weekend  and enters you into a drawing to be held at the awards ceremony on Saturday evening at 7pm.

Come out and support a great local organization, a fantastic independent theater and see some amazing indie 3-D films and music videos from all over the world.

The 9th Annual LA 3-D Movie Festival
December 14th through 16th, 2012
Downtown Independent Theater
251 S. Main Street, Los Angeles 90012

Desert Noir, click to embiggen

If you love classic film noir and like it even better in 3D this could be do not miss this Sunday. The LA 3-D Club is sponsoring the screenings that will take place at the Downtown Independent Theater on Sunday October 28 at 7pm.  All the information you could want on the event as well as purchasing tickets online can be done HERE.

Deets:  Sunday 10/28, 7PM.  Admission $6 for current LA3DClub members, $12 for non-members, (admission is waived with USC Student ID). Downtown Independent Theater, 251 S Main, Los Angeles CA 90012. MAP HERE

Don’t even argue with me: Sergio Leone‘s Once Upon a Time in the West is the best film ever made. Leone got together with fellow Italian filmmakers Bernardo Bertolucci and Dario Argento, studied some of the greatest Westerns (High Noon, The Searchers, etc.), including their locations and iconic shots, and came up with a film that is simultaneously a parody of and loving homage to the Western genre. You’ll see things that are subconsciously familiar, like dusters and Monument Valley, and things that are deliciously unfamiliar, like Henry Fonda as one of the meanest villains ever to grace the screen.

And hopefully you’ll see it all this Saturday, August 4 at 7:30 p.m. at the Aero Theater in Santa Monica, as part of the American Cinematheque film series. Of course, that part about Once Upon a Time being the greatest film ever made is subjective, but don’t seriously call yourself a movie lover or film buff until you’ve seen this classic.

Superheroes, nasty villains, and zombies will visit us as the Hero Complex Film Festival returns to Los Angeles on May 18-21, at the Regal Cinemas at L.A. Live. Cinema classics will be screened with stars and creators of the movies, such as RoboCop with an appearance by Peter Weller, Shaun of the Dead featuring director Edgar Wright, and A Clockwork Orange with Malcolm McDowell. On Monday, pioneer comic book creator Stan Lee (Spider-Man, X-Men, Fantastic Four, etc.) will be there for a not yet announced screening. Although the $105 festival pass is listed as sold out, individual screening passes can be had for $20, which isn’t much more than a movie ticket on a weekend night nowadays.

See link above for full schedule and details.

M*A*S*H ambulance with recent paint job

Two of my L.A. area loves, hiking and filming locations, were married recently when I joined a group of hikers to tour the set of the television series M*A*S*H in Malibu Creek State Park. As a bonus, much of the original Planet of the Apes movie was shot there too.

More pics after the jump

Winners have been selected and notified via email. Thank you for your comments!

It’s hard to remember when I was last affected by a film as much as I have been by Wim Wenders’ Academy Award nominated 3D documentary Pina. I’ve seen it in the theater three times and love it more each time.

PINA is a feature-length dance film in 3D with the ensemble of the Tanztheater Wuppertal Pina Bausch, featuring the unique and inspiring art of the great German choreographer, who died in the summer of 2009.

PINA is a film for Pina Bausch by Wim Wenders.

He takes the audience on a sensual, visually stunning journey of discovery into a new dimension: straight onto the stage with the legendary Tanztheater Wuppertal Pina Bausch ensemble, he follows the dancers out of the theatre into the city and the surrounding areas of Wuppertal – the place, which for 35 years was the home and centre for Pina Bausch’s creativity.

Pina is going to being showing at the fabulous Downtown Independent starting Friday, March 2nd through Thursday, March 8th. Blogging LA has FIVE (5) PAIRS OF TICKETS TO GIVE AWAY TO THE SCREENING OF YOUR CHOICE AT THE DOWNTOWN INDEPENDENT.

Leave a comment by 12pm on Thursday, March 1st stating why you would like to see Pina. Five winners will be selected and notified by email.

If I’m getting redundant in my topics — maps, cycling, birds, maps — file your complaint with the other contributors here who have far better things to do than post. In the meantime, I just keep plugging away in this lonely place — this time with another historic map from Big Map Blog — and  just in time for that local trade association’s annual function known as the Academy Awards this Sunday. If I were giving out the Oscars, Big Map Blog would get one for bringing all us little people out there in the dark this awesome and timely 1937 addition to its collection of cartrography: Hollywood Starland, at right (moderately embiggenable if clicked).

Sure the artist misspells Katharine Hepburn’s name, and strangely enough the then 14-year-old Hollywoodland sign isn’t anywhere to be found. But don’t let those oversights keep you from clicking on over and marveling at the full-size version of this otherwise meticulously glorious representation of a bygone era in celebrity worship so bitingly chronicled just a couple years later in Nathanael West’s “Day of the Locust.”

God bless Bobcat Goldthwaite who has written/directed what very well may be the most satisfyingly angriest movie of our times and for all time: God Bless America!

Was a brand spanking new Laemmle theater with seven screens. Santa delivered! Wednesday night the NoHo 7 theater, newest addition to LA’s awesome “we’re not afraid of subtitles” Laemmle chain.

Read the rest of this entry →

As I’ve mentioned here in the past, it’s a fine tradition of my people to celebrate the 25th of December with Chinese food and a movie. This year, I’ll be in Tucson, but were I in LA, I’d be at Cinefamily washing down the General Tsao’s chicken with a big heaping glass of Japanese teenager bloodlust. Yes, that’s right, Battle Royale is screening at the Cinefamily December 24 through January 2, in what is, apparently, its first ever North American theatrical run.

Shalom.

It somehow didn’t hit my radar until just now, but this weekend the Japan Film Society is hosting its first-ever LA EigaFest. The films will screen at the Chinese Theaters, kicking off Friday night with the West Coast premiere of Milocrorze: A Love Story (which looks like it’s going to be amazing) and closing out on Sunday with a 2011 remake of the Japanese classic, Hara-Kiri. If you don’t already have plans for the weekend, this looks like a lot of fun. I’m going to try to make it to at least one screening if I can.

Courtesy communicatrix via the Blogging LA Flickr pool.

Rocket Video, the independent video store on La Brea, closed at the end of September after three decades of supplying esoteric and hard-to-find films to amateur and professional film buffs alike.  The reasons probably are obvious – the Amazon of independent video shops, Netflix, ate up a huge chunk of its customers, plus the shitty economy – so, in a way, it’s a little surprising that it managed to survive as long as it did.  Manager Jeffrey Miller penned a lovely tribute to his store over on Zocalo, recalling a few fond memories about his great customers:

My favorite was Faye Dunaway. Certainly, she could be a little demanding. The first time I encountered her, she bounded through the doors of the store and yelled, “Quick, I need Reservoir Dogs right now! I’m double parked on La Brea!” Another time, when we called to tell her a certain title had come in, she was livid. “What are you doing calling me?” she yelled into the receiver. “I am trying to write! Don’t you know I have to answer my own phone?”

Read the rest of this entry →