Whitehouse Post has promoted James Dierx to editor on its L.A. roster.
Having attended film school at Depaul University in Chicago, Dierx joined Whitehouse Post as an intern in 2007, working his way up to assistant editor. In 2011 he moved to Whitehouse Los Angeles, transplanting from Chicago where he had just directed and edited his Cats in Tanks, which was featured at the Gold Coast Film Festival and became a viral success with over one million YouTube views.
Dierx has since gone on to work with directors like Smuggler’s Henry-Alex Rubin, documentarian Rory Kennedy, music video director Hiro Murai, and MJZ’s Dante Ariola. Dierx’s reel ranges from Allstate to Toyota, GE to Barbie and Google, and agency relationships include BBDO, Saatchi and Saatchi, 72andSunny, David & Goliath, CP+B, Leo Burnett, and TBWAChiatDay. In addition to his awards for Cats in Tanks, Dierx also received AICE Trailer Park Gold in 2009, and a Silver Plaque at the Chicago International Film Festival TV Awards in 2015.
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.
The one rule to follow is that... Read More