Check out Mondo’s awesome new poster of 13 Assassins: 

You can see more closeups here.

With one successful screening already under his belt, one of our promoters, Spencer Howard, is already moving forward with his next. Here are some tips from Howard on how to make your Tugg screening a success, as well as information on his new screening.

I love movies.  You know all of the clichés about them transporting you to another world, the storytelling marvels and the flights of fantasy. For me, the communal experience of watching a movie beats all of those clichés. I’ve had the opportunity to go to many different special screenings where the audience was made up of people just like me. We were there with a common purpose and a mutual respect for the experience. I have laughed with these people and cried with them and cheered with them. I’ve had to drive 100 miles to Atlanta for these screenings. I’ve gone to New York and Austin for screenings. My town of Columbus, GA just didn’t do what other places did. So I decided to throw one myself.

All I had to do was sell 50 tickets. If I did that, the show would go on and I would bring a taste of that screening glory to my town. And sell we did. We met our goal in under a week and our show went on. Everyone had a blast, we gave out prizes, talked movies after and got people excited for more. You can read all of the details about it here on my blog. The screening inspired me to do many more and it also inspired me to believe everyone should be doing them. It’s not hard and if you’re considering it; do it. Here are a few things I learned that might be useful to you if you give it a shot.

The first thing to figure out is who your audience is. I screened Comic-Con: Episode IV a Fan’s Hope. So I stopped in at my local comic shop and talked to the owner, an old friend. He agreed to let me put flyers up and he told every customer who walked through his doors. Then I went online. I have a blog so I did a write-up there, telling people I was putting this thing together. I implored everyone that this was our screening and that with their help, we could make it happen. On Facebook, I invited every one of my friends, regardless if they even lived here (some bought tickets just out of support). With every ticket sold and milestone crossed I updated my page and the event page I created. 

We organized prizes for a raffle and started posting teasers for those and then announced them. It gave folks a reason to check back with us and encourage people to be talking about the screening. Twitter was a great help as well, I reached out to Morgan Spurlock, the director, and Harry Knowles of AintitCool.com. Both were amazing and retweeted me and even provided personal notes for me to read to the audience. The constant contact and conversation made our show reach its threshold in no time. We had a great group of people, a lot of whom I’d never met show up. I now talk to these folks all the time and they’re excited about the next show. It’s not hard, it just requires some legwork.  It is completely worth it.

Howard is hosting a screening of “Extraterrestrial” next. You can find more information about it by going here
 

Check out this timeline of Bond Girls through the ages. At a whopping 56 ladies (many of them out to kill him), you have to admit that James Bond has earned his martini.

Anthony Hopkins brings Hitchcock back to the screen in Sacha Gervasi’s coming film.

“The Fox Searchlight production, which could be ready by year’s end, stars Anthony Hopkins as Hitchcock and Helen Mirren as his wife and creative collaborator, Alma Reville. The cast includes Jessica Biel as Vera Miles, Scarlett Johansson as Janet Leigh and James D’Arcy as Anthony Perkins.” Read More

One day about eight years ago, I walked out of a Target store and the earth started moving. The ground became a giant balance board, sliding back and forth on top of a ball. I had never had vertigo before and have only had one attack since. I had gone shopping by myself so the only account I have of what happened is my own, which could be inaccurate. I couldn’t move for what seemed like a minute or two, but was probably a few seconds. I thought I was screaming for help but no one stopped, either because I wasn’t screaming or I seemed insane.

I finally made it to the side of the building and leaned on it for a few minutes before stumbling into the help desk to ask for water. I think I may have sat down on the floor, maybe I was standing. I was definitely crying and desperate.

I recovered eventually and drove home safely, but that moment of vertigo is burned in my memory as one of the scariest, loneliest, and most out of control moments of my life.

I had seen Vertigo before this happened and had loved it, but after experiencing vertigo myself, I had a whole new appreciation for the film. The dolly zoom that Hitchcock made famous in Vertigo is a remarkable depiction of what vertigo does. Vertigo continually shifts your visual perspective, making it impossible to see things accurately. This film, for me, explores loss of control and loss of perspective better than any film that came before or after.

Watching Scottie fall into his obsession with Madeleine, and subsequently turn Judy into her, is creepy. I feel sorry for Judy when I watch the film, but there is also a part of me that wants Scottie to succeed in completely transforming her. I shouldn’t want to see this. I should want Judy to run away and be safe. But I still want Scottie to win, I still sympathize with him even in his most horrible moments and I think that was Hitchcock’s plan all along. I want to see Scotty succeed because then order succeeds, control over chaos succeeds, and the ground might possibly stop moving.

—Emma Holder

Hitchcock on why he likes to scare people and one of the scariest experiences in his life.

Hitchcock reportedly spent a week filming the museum scene  just to get the lighting right.

The title became a issue of hot debate between Hitchcock and the studio. See Paramount’s list of suggested replacement titles.

We personally are very happy Hitchcock won.

What the press had to say on this edgy new Hitchcock:

“[The] secret [of the film] is so clever, even though it is devilishly far-fetched.”

–New York Times

“Hitchcock has never made a thriller more stately and deliberate in technique”

-Sight and Sound

“Vertigo is prime though uneven Hitchcock… Stewart, on camera almost constantly throughout the film’s 126 minutes, comes through with a startlingly fine performance as the lawyer-cop who suffers from acrophobia—that is, vertigo or dizziness in high places.”

–Variety

Happy Vertigo day everyone!