Mank (David Fincher, 2020)

[beamish14]

This is an amazing time to be a Welles fan, given how we now have The Other Side of the Wind, Too Much Johnson, Welles/Hopper,
a fresh Quixote restoration attempt, and beautiful Blu-Rays of his films. But in spite of all of this newfound reevaluation and wealth of fresh insights into his
creative gifts, we're getting "Pauline Kael's Raising Kane: The Motion Picture".

[Drucker]

I mean do we know that for sure? Don't most Fincher films feature a toxic protagonist or two who is often to blame for their own downfall/shortcomings?

[Never Cursed]

Somehow I don't think the legacy of Orson Welles is going to be horribly negatively affected by this one film. I doubt many would bolster Kael's essay now, but that doesn't mean a dramatization of her basic points is inherently threatening to or damaging of Welles or his reputation. I'm honestly more interested by/concerned with the script's passion-project quality to Fincher than its relation to Raising Kane.

[therewillbeblus]

From the look of the trailer, this feels like Fincher and his father are taking the relatable human development in Kane and reflexively applying specifically structured scenes to project these ideas onto Mank's life. I predict those who have the same issues with The Social Network's literalism will pick this apart, and those who can look past rigid historical accuracy to reach the emotional core will love it. Personally, rather unsurprisingly, I think this looks incredible- especially if Mank's infamous alcoholism plays into these themes to the degree it appears to

[AlexFar]

I would add that what we know of the Kael connection is based on a 1994 draft of the screenplay and this teaser doesn’t necessarily suggest one direction or the other, except that it would be a particularly ironic for a film affecting the Wellesian baroque to portray him as a thief.

[FrauBlucher]

Trent Reznor has done the music

[flyonthewall2983]

According to this interview it's the first time that him and Atticus Ross have not performed on one of their soundtracks, strictly composing the music which was performed by a "socially distanced orchestra" which they oversaw.

[Ovader]

This is an amazing time to be a Welles fan, given how we now have The Other Side of the Wind, Too Much Johnson, Welles/Hopper,
a fresh Quixote restoration attempt, and beautiful Blu-Rays of his films. But in spite of all of this newfound reevaluation and wealth of fresh insights into his
creative gifts, we're getting "Pauline Kael's Raising Kane: The Motion Picture".

Off topic to the forthcoming MANK film so feel free to move my post to an appropriate thread. Where did you read about a fresh Quixote restoration attempt?

[Big Ben]

Interesting visual parallel between the close up of the bottle of alcohol falling out of Oldman's hand and the snow globe falling out of Welles' hand in Citizen Kane.

[therewillbeblus]

That's the main image I was thinking of in brewing my optimistic hypotheses

[beamish14]

This is an amazing time to be a Welles fan, given how we now have The Other Side of the Wind, Too Much Johnson, Welles/Hopper,
a fresh Quixote restoration attempt, and beautiful Blu-Rays of his films. But in spite of all of this newfound reevaluation and wealth of fresh insights into his
creative gifts, we're getting "Pauline Kael's Raising Kane: The Motion Picture".

Off topic to the forthcoming MANK film so feel free to move my post to an appropriate thread. Where did you read about a fresh Quixote restoration attempt?

There was a lengthy court battle regarding the negatives, with Oja Kodar
eventually taking control of them.I had thought that it was actually in progress, but it's really just speculation at this point. I just hope they're
properly preserved, and the same goes for the enormous amount of It's All True footage that is still sitting at the UCLA Film & tTelevision
Archive.

[Nasir007]

Poster. Is this the first netflix poster to have credits? They usually just have the logo and movie name. They look fanmade most of the times (check out the horrid posters for Rebecca).



We also have a release date and rating. Curious billing style.

[The Fanciful Norwegian]

The final poster for Marriage Story also had a full billing block. More recently there's this for The 40-Year-Old Version. So rare but not completely unprecedented.

[bainbridgezu]

Love the poster (does Netflix sell these anywhere?), but wondering why Oldman is a dead ringer for Rip Torn?

[swo17]

I was gonna say he looks more like Danny Huston. But maybe that's because I just watched a movie with Danny Huston

[soundchaser]

I thought Jack Nicholson when I first saw it, so it's obviously a stunning likeness of...someone.

[Nasir007]

New trailer.

If of course all looks very promising and you just know the academy is going to gobble this up.

I am intrigued by the image. It is being shot digitally with an 8K monochrome sensor and finished at a 6K DI.
If there was any film that might have merited shooting film and/or academy ratio it would have been this.
I know most people don't care but would have interesting. I just think digital always looks too scrubbed clean (like it did to me in Roma).

[SSF]

Explore behind the scene images and sample the film’s score here:

https://www.thewhitewinecameupwiththefish.com/1

[therewillbeblus]

More details on how Fincher and co. manipulated the sound and visuals to emulate a restored print from the era depicted

[Red Screamer]

I don't know, from the trailer the cinematography unmistakably has that pristine digital look. Doesn't have to be a bad thing, but it's not exactly The Good German.

[therewillbeblus]

I agree, plus the article seems to focus more on the sound design

[Nasir007]

Early word promises an all-timer instant classic.

[Red Screamer]

You linked to three tweets, two of which are just vague hyperbole that don't mention the movie by name and one that calls it "the most accurate movie about old Hollywood" which is pointless praise, especially from someone who I doubt is a scholar of film history.

[TheKieslowskiHaze]

Early word promises an all-timer instant classic.

I'd bet that Joey Magidson tweet is about Borat and not Mank. A few days after that tweet, he wrote a glowing review of the former.

[hearthesilence]

This feels more and more like a lifelong dream project for Fincher. Even before his father wrote the script in the '90s, David Fincher has shown a great affinity for this era in quite a few of his music videos - they either consciously evoke that era ("Vogue," "Holding On") or draw heavily from the films of that era (particularly when by Fincher's own admission he's using visual ideas lifted from Kane - "Oh Father," "End of the Innocence," "Roll with It," etc.)