Jane Campion would like to apologize. “I didn’t get back to you that weekend because I got sick,” she says. “I got food poisoning.” Campion isn’t talking to her publicist or a manager. Nor is…
Perfection is rarely achieved in movies, but this heaven-sent concert doc hits the sweet spot. Over two days in January 1972, the Queen of Soul, Aretha Franklin — she was 29 at the time — sweeps into the New Temple Missionary Baptist Church in Watts in front of a congregation and testifies to God in song. The blessed thing took nearly half a century to come out because director Sydney Pollack failed to sync the image with the sound. Then digital angels stepped in, and glory, glory, hallelujah!
Perfection is rarely achieved in movies, but this heaven-sent concert doc hits the sweet spot. Over two days in January 1972, the Queen of Soul, Aretha Franklin — she was 29 at the time — sweeps into the New Temple Missionary Baptist Church in Watts in front of a congregation and testifies to God in song. The blessed thing took nearly half a century to come out because director Sydney Pollack failed to sync the image with the sound. Then digital angels stepped in, and glory, glory, hallelujah!
Perfection is rarely achieved in movies, but this heaven-sent concert doc hits the sweet spot. Over two days in January 1972, the Queen of Soul, Aretha Franklin — she was 29 at the time — sweeps into the New Temple Missionary Baptist Church in Watts in front of a congregation and testifies to God in song. The blessed thing took nearly half a century to come out because director Sydney Pollack failed to sync the image with the sound. Then digital angels stepped in, and glory, glory, hallelujah!
Perfection is rarely achieved in movies, but this heaven-sent concert doc hits the sweet spot. Over two days in January 1972, the Queen of Soul, Aretha Franklin — she was 29 at the time — sweeps into the New Temple Missionary Baptist Church in Watts in front of a congregation and testifies to God in song. The blessed thing took nearly half a century to come out because director Sydney Pollack failed to sync the image with the sound. Then digital angels stepped in, and glory, glory, hallelujah!
Perfection is rarely achieved in movies, but this heaven-sent concert doc hits the sweet spot. Over two days in January 1972, the Queen of Soul, Aretha Franklin — she was 29 at the time — sweeps into the New Temple Missionary Baptist Church in Watts in front of a congregation and testifies to God in song. The blessed thing took nearly half a century to come out because director Sydney Pollack failed to sync the image with the sound. Then digital angels stepped in, and glory, glory, hallelujah!
Perfection is rarely achieved in movies, but this heaven-sent concert doc hits the sweet spot. Over two days in January 1972, the Queen of Soul, Aretha Franklin — she was 29 at the time — sweeps into the New Temple Missionary Baptist Church in Watts in front of a congregation and testifies to God in song. The blessed thing took nearly half a century to come out because director Sydney Pollack failed to sync the image with the sound. Then digital angels stepped in, and glory, glory, hallelujah!
Perfection is rarely achieved in movies, but this heaven-sent concert doc hits the sweet spot. Over two days in January 1972, the Queen of Soul, Aretha Franklin — she was 29 at the time — sweeps into the New Temple Missionary Baptist Church in Watts in front of a congregation and testifies to God in song. The blessed thing took nearly half a century to come out because director Sydney Pollack failed to sync the image with the sound. Then digital angels stepped in, and glory, glory, hallelujah!
Perfection is rarely achieved in movies, but this heaven-sent concert doc hits the sweet spot. Over two days in January 1972, the Queen of Soul, Aretha Franklin — she was 29 at the time — sweeps into the New Temple Missionary Baptist Church in Watts in front of a congregation and testifies to God in song. The blessed thing took nearly half a century to come out because director Sydney Pollack failed to sync the image with the sound. Then digital angels stepped in, and glory, glory, hallelujah!
Jane Campion would like to apologize. “I didn’t get back to you that weekend because I got sick,” she says. “I got food poisoning.” Campion isn’t talking to her publicist or a manager. Nor is she addressing one of the dozens of Netflix handlers who have been by her side continuously since last September as she’s flown all over the world — unveiling her latest opus, “The Power of the Dog,” at film festivals and to Oscar voters.
No, the person who Campion ghosted over email is … Guillermo del Toro. Since the two of them are about to talk about their latest movies — just days after del Toro has put the final touches on a big-budget remake of the noir thriller “Nightmare Alley,” based on the 1946 novel by William Lindsay Gresham, and hours ahead of the film’s New York premiere — this could get awkward. But fortunately, the Oscar-winning director is not the least bit offended.
“I want to get food poisoning too,” del Toro quips while patting his belly. “It’s the only way I can lose weight.”
Not even the most meal-conscious cinephile could resist what Campion and del Toro have cooked up over their careers. After Campion took a decade-long break from film work — a list of credits that includes “The Piano,” “The Portrait of a Lady” and “In the Cut” — so she could focus on the TV series “Top of the Lake,” she’s returned with a vengeance. “The Power of the Dog,” the story of two brothers (played by Benedict Cumberbatch and Jesse Plemons) and the woman (Kirsten Dunst) who comes between them, is ostensibly a Western, but it’s more interested in depicting a portrait of corrosive masculinity and repression. And del Toro, having swept the Oscars with 2017’s “The Shape of Water,” could find himself at the podium again with “Nightmare Alley,” a noirish tale of a carnival huckster (Bradley Cooper) whose relentless pursuit of wealth — and women (Rooney Mara and Cate Blanchett) — ends in tragedy.
Like “The Power of the Dog,” “Nightmare Alley” transcends its genre to expose the rotting core at the heart of the American dream. The two longtime mutual admirers are meeting to discuss their films for the benefit of Variety Directors on Directors presented by MGM Studios and United Artists Releasing, which is being filmed for posterity (an element that Campion, who hates to be photographed, is none too thrilled about).
“I wish we could just have our talk without all the cameras,” she confesses to del Toro. ”That would be much more fun.”
Despite her nerves, Campion warms up quickly around the ebullient del Toro, talking about everything from the rise of streaming services to Jungian dream analysis. All of it culminates with del Toro inviting her to the world premiere of “Nightmare Alley” in New York that night. But she has her own “Power of the Dog” screening to attend at the same time, a reminder of the grueling demands of Oscar campaigning.