The Discarded Image (Julian Palmer)
Published on 14 Nov 2017
YouTube
In this video essay I breakdown how David Fincher uses popular music in films like Fight Club, The Social Network and the new Netflix series Mindhunter.
Category: 2010. The Social Network
How Rooney Mara Became One of the Most Exciting Actresses Working Today
Rooney Mara is addicted to filmmaking vision, and it’s resulted in one of the most surprising young careers Hollywood has right now.
Zack Sharf
Jul 7, 2017
IndieWire
It’s the “A Ghost Story” scene critics can’t stop talking about. Still grieving from the loss of her husband, the widow M returns home and consumes an entire vegan chocolate pie in one sitting. David Lowery captures the moment in a nearly four-minute long take, but the stillness of the camera makes it feel like an eternity. It’s up to Rooney Mara to fill the frame with a sense of hopelessness that anyone who’s been through the grieving process can relate to. She does so with the commitment and the sensitive gusto that has defined a majority of her 12 years as an actress.
Mara first began acting as an extra in movies starring her sister, Kate, before landing television supporting roles on shows like “Law & Order: Special Victims Unit,” “Women’s Murder Club” and “ER.” Now she’s one of the most exciting film stars in the business, with one of the year’s best films in select theaters (read IndieWire’s A review here) and a potential Oscar contender hitting awards season on November 24 (“Mary Magdalene”). Her ascension to becoming an indie film darling has been marked by careful decision-making, and it all started with a shot from Hollywood’s most demanding auteur.
With “A Ghost Story” now playing, it’s become increasingly clear Rooney Mara will never stop surprising when it comes to her performances. Here’s how she made it happen.
Cross-Examining David Fincher’s Interrogations
Sheryl Oh
August 8, 2017
Film School Rejects
Allegiances are never simple in a Fincher film.
David Fincher makes some seriously memorable films. That’s like saying water is wet, but his movies are impeccably crafted without seeming ostentatious or painfully clinical. Arguably, the best part about his films is the talking. You won’t find a film of his where character dynamics aren’t laid bare in the form of a lengthy conversation. Literally putting words on screen has been a landmark of his since the beginning of his film career.
Notably, many of Fincher’s movies crescendo to significant arguments and interrogations, and it is never just run-of-the-mill grilling. He has the ability to make talking – for want of a better term – interesting. Part of what makes his interrogations so enveloping and immersive is the insistent, intimate focus on the subjects at hand. Characters are thrust into settings but also command them in cinematically satisfying ways:
Fincher gives us just enough of any given setting, and the details are always overshadowed by the manner in which the characters move and interact within them. (Jones, 44)
Fincher has a new Netflix series coming out in a couple of months; one which will undoubtedly feature some of his signature wordy conversations. While awaiting the release of Mindhunter, we examine what it takes for him to put together the perfect interrogation scene.
Why CG Sucks (Except It Doesn’t)
RocketJump Film School
Published on Aug 4, 2015
YouTube
Are computer generated visual effects really ruining movies?
We believe that the reason we think all CG looks bad is because we only see “bad” CG. Fantastic, beautiful, and wonderfully executed CG is everywhere – you just don’t know it. Truly great visual effects serve story and character – and in doing so are, by their very definition, invisible.
Written and Narrated by Freddie Wong
Edited by Joey Scoma
Assistant Editor – Joshan Smith
Interiors: The spaces in David Fincher’s films
Interiors is an online film and architecture journal, published by Mehruss Jon Ahi and Armen Karaoghlanian, that analyses and diagrams films in terms of space.
A Pair of Artists Use Architecture to Study Film
The founders of “Interiors,” a journal dedicated to film and architecture, diagram scenes from movies such as “Fight Club,” “Psycho,” and more.
Colin Warren-Hicks
January 30, 2014
Metropolis
If cinema is a matter of what’s in the frame, David Fincher is an artist who is very much concerned about all four corners of his canvas.
by INTERIORS Journal
June 3, 2013
ArchDaily
“Their positioning throughout the scene provides us with an understanding of how David Fincher uses space within the film, and in doing so, how he also maintains the architectural integrity of the film.”
Mehruss Jon Ahi and Armen Karaoghlanian
2012-01
Interiors
“The vastness of the desert around them emphasizes the fact that the handcuffed John Doe is captured; a lack of freedom despite the free space around him.”
Mehruss Jon Ahi and Armen Karaoghlanian
2013-01
Interiors
“David Fincher switches from a subjective perspective onto an objective perspective after the reveal has been made.”
Mehruss Jon Ahi and Armen Karaoghlanian
2014-01
Interiors
The Fincher Analyst 