Cartel, a Santa Monica, Calif.-based editorial and post house, has been launched by managing partner Marc Altshuler, partner/EP Lauren Bleiweiss, managing partner/editor Andy McGraw and partner/editor Leo Scott. Also on staff is editor Kyle Valenta, among others. Altshuler was a co-founder of music house Human. Bleiweiss was an EP at Human and after that served in the same capacity at Final Cut prior to forming Cartel….
Michel Haddi, a noted fashion photographer, has joined the directorial roster of Filmmaster Productions, which maintains shops internationally, including in Milan and Rome. With more than 20 years of experience in fashion and luxury, Haddì has portrayed some icons of our era including Kate Moss, Clint Eastwood, Martin Scorsese, David Bowie, Georgia May Jagger, Johnny Depp and Angelina Jolie. Haddi is known for his black-and-white pictures published by leading publications. He is also famous for his collaborations with Vogue, Tatler, GQ, Allure, Vanity Fair, Interview, Rolling Stone, Elle, Harpers Bazaar, The Sunday Times and The Washington Post. Haddi’s campaign work spans luxury retailers such as Armani, Yves Saint-Laurent, Emilio Pucci, Lancetti, Neiman Marcus, Guerlain and Rochas….
Review: Writer-Director Coralie Fargeat’s “The Substance”
In its first two hours, "The Substance" is a well-made, entertaining movie. Writer-director Coralie Fargeat treats audiences to a heavy dose of biting social commentary on ageism and sexism in Hollywood, with a spoonful of sugar- and sparkle-doused body horror.
But the film's deliciously unhinged, blood-soaked and inevitably polarizing third act is what makes it unforgettable.
What begins as a dread-inducing but still relatively palatable sci-fi flick spirals deeper into absurdism and violence, eventually erupting — quite literally — into a full-blown monster movie. Let the viewer decide who the monster is.
Fargeat — who won best screenplay at this year's Cannes Film Festival — has been vocal about her reverence for "The Fly" director David Cronenberg, and fans of the godfather of body horror will see his unmistakable influence. But "The Substance" is also wholly unique and benefits from Fargeat's perspective, which, according to the French filmmaker, has involved extensive grappling with her own relationship to her body and society's scrutiny.
"The Substance" tells the story of Elisabeth Sparkle, a famed aerobics instructor with a televised show, played by a powerfully vulnerable Demi Moore. Sparkle is fired on her 50th birthday by a ruthless executive — a perfectly cast Dennis Quaid, who nails sleazy and gross.
Feeling rejected by a town that once loved her and despairing over her bygone star power, Sparkle learns from a handsome young nurse about a black-market drug that promises to create a "younger, more beautiful, more perfect" version of its user. Though she initially tosses the phone number in the trash, she soon fishes it out in a desperate panic and places an order.
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