This week one of my favourite series of the year kicks off – the Film Star Face Off starring Michael Fassbender and Ryan Gosling. Every Friday night a Fassbender film will face off against a Gosling film, giving you the chance to admire and respect the work of these fine actors. Friday nights don’t get much better than this! Here are my picks for the week.
This week one of my favourite series of the year kicks off – the Film Star Face Off starring Michael Fassbender and Ryan Gosling. Every Friday night a Fassbender film will face off against a Gosling film, giving you the chance to admire and respect the work of these fine actors. Friday nights don’t get much better than this! Here are my picks for the week.
Thursday 3rd December 8.30pm… Supermensch: The Legend of Shep Gordon.
In this warm, entertaining and enlightening documentary, actor Mike Myers turns the camera onto one of the legends of the entertainment industry; manager and producer Shep Gordon. The consummate Hollywood insider Shep Gordon is known for managing the careers of Alice Cooper, and had stints working with Blondie, Luther Vandross, Anne Murray, Teddy Pendergrass and Raquel Welch, among others. He’s also the man responsible for creating the “Celebrity Chef”, and has worked as a Producer in the film industry since the early 80s. This debut directorial effort by Myers features a who’s who of Hollywood and an obscene amount of outrageously good rock ’n’ roll anecdotes, but what’s surprising about Shep’s story is it’s also a story about a about a sensitive, caring man, looking for a soul mate and a family. You’ll be hard pushed to find such a likable and honourable guy in the entertainment industry today, and Gordon’s story is a reminder that you can be “the man”, and a great guy too.
Friday 4th December, kicking off at 8.30pm … Hunger vs Half Nelson
Half Nelson is Ryan Goslings’ first film in the Film Star Face Off, and is up against Fassbender’s breakthrough film, Hunger. Half Nelson was released a couple of years after the romantic drama The Notebook thrust Gosling onto the heartthrob A-list, and his seriously good performance as a drug addicted school teacher secured him an Oscar nomination for Best Actor. It was the beginning of a change of direction for the actor who began immersing himself in complex characters, and building relationships with up-and-coming directors, such as Nicolas Winding Refn (Drive, Only God Forgives) and Derek Cianfrance (The Place Behind the Pines, Blue Valentine). What followed was a series of collaborations that delivered disarming and often exhilarating character driven performances that went to dark places while often oozing sexuality and an untouchable coolness.
Like Gosling, Michael Fassbender has built a career on collaborations with directors such as Steve McQueen who he worked with on Hunger, Shame and 12 Years a Slave. Hunger is the story of IRA activist and hunger striker Bobby Sands, and shows an actor prepared to go to extreme lengths to get inside the psyche of his character. It’s a trait we see again and again in Fassbender’s performances as he takes on psychoanalysis in A Dangerous Method, sex addiction in Shame, and British literature in Jane Eyre and, most recently, Macbeth. It’s a tough trying to make a call as to which of these fearless, versatile and intense actors will win tonight’s Film Star Face Off – maybe just sit back and enjoy what these talented gentlemen have to offer.
Sunday 6th December, 8.30pm …The Suspicions of Mr Whicher: The Murder at the Road Hill House.
The Suspicions of Mr Whicher is a series of four British television feature films staring Paddy Considine as the real life 19th century Detective Jack Whicher. The first film is based on Kate Summerscale’s book of the same name and tells the story of how Whicher was sent to Wiltshire in 1860 to solve the tragic case of murdered three year old Saville Kent. Making his life difficult are uncooperative local cops and a local community that does everything it can to undermine him. It’s a difficult case, one made even more challenging by a sudden bout of self-doubt by Whicher. In the vein of Sherlock Holmes or Hercule Poirot, The Suspicions of Mr Whicher is as much a whodunit as it is a tale of a personal crisis. Handsomely shot and genuine in period detail, catch the following three Whicher films on Sunday evenings throughout December on Rialto British.