Eric Bonniot, an industry veteran with extensive experience on the production and post sides of the business, has joined Nerve as exec producer of its studios in Los Angeles and Mexico City, which specialize in visual effects, mixed media motion graphics, commercial photography and print design. Bonniot most recently served as exec producer at production house Uncle, and prior to that in the same capacity in the commercials division of A Band Apart. He earlier was president/CEO of post/VFX house 525 Studios (which was later consolidated into Riot, Santa Monica), and managing director of London post facility Rushes….The Corner Store, Toronto, has signed director Philip Kates for Canadian representation. He continues to be handled in the western Canada spot market via Joe Media, Calgary, and for French Canadian work through Moskito Films, Montreal. Kates is with New York-based Harpoon for spot representation in the U.S., Mad Cow Films, London, for U.K. adverts, JSA International for European and national jobs, and Republic, Sydney, for commercials out of Australia and New Zealand. The Jennifer Hollyer Agency reps Kates for film and television projects….Holiday Films, the Toronto shop headed by exec producers Derek Sewell and Josefina Nadurata, have added director Adam Massey for Canadian representation. Massey, who's repped in the U.S. by Los Angeles-based Untitled Inc., has directed campaigns for Budweiser, Coke, McDonald's, Molson's, Southwest Airlines, Lucky Jeans, Ford and Altoids….
Review: Director Bong Joon Ho’s “Mickey 17” Starring Robert Pattinson
So you think YOUR job is bad?
Sorry if we seem to be lacking empathy here. But however crummy you think your 9-5 routine is, it'll never be as bad as Robert Pattinson's in Bong Joon Ho's "Mickey 17" — nor will any job, on Earth or any planet, approach this level of misery.
Mickey, you see, is an "Expendable," and by this we don't mean he's a cast member in yet another sequel to Sylvester Stallone's tired band of mercenaries ("Expend17ables"?). No, even worse! He's literally expendable, in that his job description requires that he die, over and over, in the worst possible ways, only to be "reprinted" once again as the next Mickey.
And from here stems the good news, besides the excellent Pattinson, whom we hope got hazard pay, about Bong's hotly anticipated follow-up to "Parasite." There's creativity to spare, and much of it surrounds the ways he finds for his lead character to expire — again and again.
The bad news, besides, well, all the death, is that much of this film devolves into narrative chaos, bloat and excess. In so many ways, the always inventive Bong just doesn't know where to stop. It hardly seems a surprise that the sci-fi novel, by Edward Ashton, he's adapting here is called "Mickey7" — Bong decided to add 10 more Mickeys.
The first act, though, is crackling. We begin with Mickey lying alone at the bottom of a crevasse, having barely survived a fall. It is the year 2058, and he's part of a colonizing expedition from Earth to a far-off planet. He's surely about to die. In fact, the outcome is so expected that his friend Timo (Steven Yeun), staring down the crevasse, asks casually: "Haven't you died yet?"
How did Mickey get here? We flash back to Earth, where Mickey and Timo ran afoul of a villainous loan... Read More