Can 'Hacksaw Ridge' redeem Mel Gibson? Do you believe? Do you believe Mel Gibson, the movie star, the Oscar- winning producer and director, the part- time pariah, can be redeemed in the eyes of the Hollywood establishment? I think it just happened. With this, his fifth feature film as director, Gibson’s the toast of the Lido, after being toast himself, or perilously near it, in Hollywood and environs. Let's leave aside his off- screen travails and acknowledged anger management challenges. Let's overlook his rant against Jews during a 2. Malibu drunken- driving arrest. Gibson’s directorial follow- up to “Apocalypto” 1. Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, whose Oscar nominations come out in January.“Hacksaw Ridge” is a fervent, extraordinarily bloody World War II drama about the first conscientious objector to win the Medal of Honor. It’s the most bloodthirsty movie about a pacifist ever made. That paradox is hardly beside the point; it holds the key to the film’s likely worldwide success. It stars an enormously sympathetic Andrew Garfield as Desmond T. Doss, the Seventh- day Adventist assigned as a medic to the 3. Infantry, 7. 7th Army Division. The Virginia- born Doss refused to carry a gun owing to his religious beliefs. He was widely derided as a coward and a freak by his fellow enlisted men. Doss ended up saving 7. Battle of Okinawa. ![]() ![]() Mel Gibson’s Hacksaw Ridge, which premiered today at the 73rd International Venice Film Festival, is a brutally effective, bristlingly idiosyncratic. Mel Gibson is not the first person who comes to mind among Oscar contenders. But advance buzz is growing on World War II drama “Hacksaw Ridge” (Lionsgate. In emotional terms, Doss was the reason the battle was won. And the war. Far grislier in its images of battlefield slaughter than “Saving Private Ryan,” if not especially concerned with the moral horrors of war, “Hacksaw Ridge” received a 1. Lido, across the water from Venice, a few hours after its early morning media screening. Andrew Garfield stars in 'Hacksaw Ridge,' directed by Mel Gibson. Oscar season is clearly on its way. In his first directorial outing since 2006's 'Apocalypto,' Mel. The Bodyguard (2016) Online Free Plot Summary: A retired bodyguard who has settled into a corner of the world where China, Russia and North Korea meet as he suffers. Find Showcase Cinema de Lux Ridge Hill showtimes and theater information at Fandango. Buy tickets, get box office information, driving directions and more. The first Hacksaw Ridge reviews have come out of Venice. Will the war drama from director Mel Gibson help redeem the actor's troubled career? Tarzan (2016) Online Free Plot Summary: Tarzan, having acclimated to life in London, is called back to his former home in the jungle to investigate the activities at. Can 'Hacksaw Ridge' redeem Mel Gibson? Gibson's latest directorial effort stars Andrew Garfield as a pacifist solider in WW II. Watch Adventures in Babysitting (2016) Full Movie Plot Summary: Two teen rival babysitters, Jenny and Lola, team up to hunt down one of their kids who accidentally. Gibson’s take, scripted by Andrew Knight and “Kentucky Cycle” dramatist Robert Schenkkan, keeps Doss’ spirituality at the heart of everything. Visually echoing Seventh- day Adventist beliefs, Gibson begins his story of hellfire with slow- motion images of napalmed soldiers flooded by the . The festival opened with a film even more warmly received than Gibson's: Damien Chazelle’s extraordinary widescreen musical “La La Land,” destined like “Hacksaw Ridge” for many Academy Award nominations come January. Two of the world's most pleasurable and vital film festivals, the four- day Telluride and the 1. Venice, take place simultaneously. Chazelle's film pays homage to a host of film musicals and directorial masters past. It is a work of pure faith, although not the religious kind. ![]() With “Jesus VR: The Story of Christ,” the doctrine’s hardly in doubt. Touted as “the first virtual reality feature- length film ever made,” this 9. Christmas and available on various platforms, including Google Cardboard and Oculus Rift. It’s photographed in 4. K, 3. 60- degree digital. When you have the headgear and the headphones on, you can look straight ahead, straight behind, left, right, up, down, swivel in a full circle, whatever, and you’ll see some part of what is best described as a cinematic diorama in the round. You’re essentially an invisible extra in the Jesus story, from manger birth to crucifixion death, alongside Second Shepherd on the right. In the manger scene, I swung around in my swivel chair and found myself mere inches from a wet- nosed cow. There is virtually no cutting or camera movement. The images are blurry, as if you’re sitting too close to a 1. Zenith TV console, the way I used to sit when . But without a better, crisper image, filmmaking this rudimentary inspires three little words: not there yet. During the break, the VR headsets came off for a cool- down and people asked a few questions. Someone wondered about the weirdness of the static visual quality combined with allegedly immersive technology. Director Hansen chewed his fingernails a bit, and then admitted they tried moving the camera now and then, or cutting within a pageant- like tableau, but it didn’t work.“It took you out of the scene,” he said. Someone else called the “Jesus VR” demonstration “a solitary experience.” Hansen chewed his nails again, and then muttered: “Is that good or bad?”“It’s only an observation,” the woman said. Producer Barder jumped in. It’s a very personal experience . That year, audiences heard Al Jolson sing on screen in a Vitaphone short released the year before “The Jazz Singer.” The technology was crude. The camera's mobility, so joyous and free in the best silent films, had abruptly vanished. Yet the public was intrigued. It took some time for the movie industry to figure it all out. Maybe that’s where we are now with VR. Years from now, when virtual reality seems less like a threat and more like a filmmaking avenue full of promise, we'll see things differently. VR will become truly, scarily, mundanely immersive in gamer- style scenarios or pornography or, who knows, another Son of God retelling. When we get there, I’ll remember the demonstration of “Jesus VR” in the 2. Venice film festival. And, if nothing else, I'll remember that cow. At this year’s Venice Film Festival, Michael Phillips is serving on the Biennale College Cinema panel. The Biennale paid for travel and lodging. Twitter @phillipstribune. RELATED STORIESVenice audiences enchanted by 'La La Land'1. Don't Breathe' tops box office again over Labor Day weekend.
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