Screening Gotham: Film School Finally Pays Off For Marc Forster

Some of today's movie news of note from around New York:

--Pretty much everyone in the world has developed an opinion by now on how Marc Forster is going to fuck up the James Bond franchise when he takes the helm of its 22nd installment this fall. Sure, the guy is no Martin Campbell or, you know, Lee Tamahori, so I can sympathize to a point. (I actually like the guy's films on the whole, and I'm fairly certain I'm Stay's only defender.) But more interesting to me, and not just trivially, is that NYU alum Forster will be the first film school grad to direct a Bond movie. This will have many consequences I can't even begin (or want) to theorize, but overnight, The Impossible Dream became that much more concrete for ham-fisted, miniDV-wielding freshmen around the world. Anyway, congrats to Forster and the Tisch School of the Arts, which will no doubt amend its marketing materials by lunchtime today.

--A little birdie sent word Tuesday that Nathan Lee has started a biweekly DVD column for The Voice's Web site. The first installment of Commentary Track features an extended riff on the new Criterion issue of Chris Marker's Sans Soleil and La Jetée, followed by a look at Warner's Cult Camp Classic bunch. I owe Lee thanks; I would have totally overlooked "Lana Turner hamming it up as a pagan priestess" otherwise.

--A little bit of late word that the New York Asian American International Film Festival returns next month with its 30th annual event; at last the city will get the chance to check out Gina Kim's Sundance oddity Never Forever, starring Vera Farmiga as a New York woman who launches an affair with a Korean immigrant to help save her marriage. Look, you just have to see it. The film closes this year's festival July 28; tickets are on sale now. (And read more about Never Forever in The Reeler's pre-Sundance interview with Gina Kim.)

Posted at June 20, 2007 9:35 AM