FILM 1698: GAGA: FIVE FOOT TWO

This documentary goes behind the scenes with pop provocateur Lady Gaga as she releases a bold new album and prepares for her Super Bowl halftime show.

FILM 1431: BLOW OUT

TRIVIA: Quentin Tarantino stated in an interview that this film is his favorite Brian De Palma movie. In fact, Tarantino cast John Travolta in Pulp Fiction (1994) because he liked his performance in this movie so much.

In the French version, John Travolta's voice was dubbed by Gérard Depardieu.

The use of a split-focus diopter lens is evident in several scenes, in particular the sound recording scene and the hospital scene. The split-focus lens is attached to the main lens, and it affects only the left or right portion of the main lens' view. This changes the focal distance of part of the image, allowing objects at two distances (in the foreground and background) to be in sharp focus.

The idea of a man discovering a crime by listening to a recording is a reinterpretation of Michelangelo Antonioni's film Blow-Up (1966), but using sound instead of photographs.

Brian De Palma got the idea for the story while doing the sound mix on his previous movie, Dressed to Kill (1980).

John Travolta and Nancy Allen had previously starred in Carrie (1976).

FILM 1403: LOVE & MERCY

TRIVIA: The real Wilson reported having a mild dissociative experience while watching the film. He started to believe that Paul Giamatti was the actual Eugene Landy and felt "absolutely in fear" for several minutes.

During the Q&A at the film's premier at SXSW '15, Brian Wilson stated that his favorite scene in the movie was the intimate scene between Cusack and Banks, reflecting a happy moment between his real life wife and himself.

The studio scenes were improvised in a live, unrehearsed pseudo-documentary style with two 16mm handheld cameras. Dano, who once played in a band, was really directing the actors on how to play their instruments, who themselves were also real life musicians. While these scenes were mostly unscripted, Dano directly quoted some lines spoken by Wilson from the original session tapes.

Atticus Ross's original score, composed almost entirely from original Beach Boys multi-track recording stems, was inspired by the Beatles' experimental sound collage "Revolution 9" and Danger Mouse's Beatles/Jay-Z mash-up "The Grey Album".

A third era which focused on Brian Wilson's infamous bed period in the 1970s was considered, but ultimately discarded, leaving some of his most troubled years to the viewer's imagination. When asked who would have filled the third Wilson role, Pohlad responded that he had considered Philip Seymour Hoffman.

Dano alternates throughout the film between singing for real and lip-syncing to original recordings of Wilson's singing.