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In 1968, Dan Rowan, one of the hosts of the variety series Rowan & Martin’s Laugh-In, introduced a guest by describing him as “an act you’re just not gonna believe.” “This guy plays the bugle, plays the guitar, and sings — all at the same time. … This is a unique act, he’s the only one of his kind, and we’re lucky.” His co-host, Dick Martin, retorted, “I guess we are lucky … There could have been two.” Rowan brought Martin over to the guest, the Legendary Stardust Cowboy, who dressed in yellow pants,...

Mubi is exclusively playing Tyler Hubby's Tony Conrad: Completely in the Present (2016) from April 8 - May 8, 2017 in the United Kingdom and United States.Tyler Hubby (left) and Tony Conrad (right)I met Tony Conrad in 1994 just as he was re-emerging as a composer and musician. I was recording with my Hi-8 camera when he played one of his first public shows as a violin soloist and have been recording since.Tony was electrifying in how he could always find ways to confront establishment ideas and personal belief systems. Not only was his sabre rattling at the foundations of western culture inspiring, it was also just, and deeply resonated with my ideas of the role of art in society.Over the years as I worked as an editor on films like The Devil and Daniel Johnston, Double Take and The Great Invisible I kept shooting performances and interviews with Tony,...

I can see the comments now. Who the hell is Tony Conrad, and why the hell is there a documentary about him?

In many ways, that’s kind of the point with regards to the existence of the debut film from editor-turned-director Tyler Hubby. Hubby, best known for editing award-winning documentaries like The Devil And Daniel Johnston, jumps behind the camera for a briskly paced and yet lovingly dense look at an artist who has gone far too long unsung among the masses.

Entitled Tony Conrad: Completely In The Present, Hubby’s film takes a look at the life and work of Conrad, who may not be familiar but has surely inspired or been directly involved with some of your favorite musical and avant garde art collectives. An artist in various mediums, Conrad has worked in realms ranging from experimental film to public access television over his expansive 50-plus year career,...

All this week, IndieWire will be rolling out our annual Fall Preview, including offerings that span genres, a close examination of some of the year’s biggest breakouts, all the awards contenders you need to know about now and special attention to all the new movies you need to get through a jam-packed fall movie-going season. Check back every day for a new look at the best the season has to offer, and clear your schedule, because we’re going to fill it right up.

“The Light Between Oceans,” September 2

Derek Cianfrance’s sweet spot is relationship dramas that don’t balk at showing just how damn hard it can be to love someone and to sustain that love (hi, “Blue Valentine”), and with his big screen adaptation of the bestselling novel of the same name, he takes those interests and skills right to a post-World War I landscape tailormade for a sweeping,...

Many authors use a pseudonym to mask their real identity or to place distance between the text and themselves, but no one creates an entirely new identity with different experiences and actually send them out into the world. Well, that’s exactly what Laura Albert did. The 40-year-old San Francisco former phone-sex operator turned housewife created a literary persona named Jt Leroy, who took the world by storm with his “exploits” about his sordid childhood mired by prostitution, drug addiction, and vagrancy. The new documentary “Author: The Jt LeRoy Story” chronicles Albert’s creation from the height of LeRoy’s fame at fashion events and rock shows to the New York Times pulling the rug out from under the story. Watch an exclusive clip from the film below.

Read More: Sundance Review: ‘Author: The Jt LeRoy Story’ Casts a Major Literary Scandal in New Light

The film is directed by Jeff Feuerzeig,...

A decade on from his extraordinary film The Devil and Daniel Johnston, Director Jeff Feuerzeig returns with another documentary about a troubled artist, this time charting the bizarre tale of cult writer Jeremiah “Terminator” LeRoy. LeRoy’s stranger-than-fiction rise to fame, from an “AIDS suffering, sex-change son of a truck-stop prostitute” to cult literary sensation, rattled […]

The post Author: The Jt LeRoy Story Review appeared first on HeyUGuys.

Before Kristen Stewart, James Franco, Helena Bonham Carter, and writer-director Justin Kelly turn it into a narrative drama, this fall the documentary Author: The Jt LeRoy Story will arrive. Acclaimed since its Sundance premiere, Jeff Feuerzeig’s documentary follows a writer and actor who fooled the world with a man who identifies as transgender, tricking the rich and famous in Hollywood, the fashion world and elite literary circles. Ahead of a September release, the first trailer has now arrived.

We said in our review, “Author: The Jt LeRoy Story relives the literary hoax of the early aughts, the truly weird and out of control tale of Jt LeRoy. An allegedly gender-fluid HIV positive son of a West Virginia truck stop hooker, he rose to the heights of indie stardom befriending the likes of Courtney Love, Shirley Manson, Lou Reed, Michael Pitt, Billy Corgan and filmmakers Gus Van Saint and Asia Argento...

It might be missing the industry saturated Park City fervor, but the smaller, shorter, and more intimate Columbia, Missouri based True/False Film Festival is the Rolls-Royce (by way of John Deere) of doc focused cinema. Filmmaker Laura Poitras is not alone in stating that her “love for True/False runs deep – from the smart programming, passionate audiences, inspired buskers, and fabulous venues.” Time and time again, selected filmmakers throughout this year’s edition expressed their love of the fest, while plenty of filmmaker personalities from prior editions could be spotted milling around town as casual filmgoers happy to pay to relive the experience.

With a highly curated program just shy of 50 films shown on 9 different screens (each of which are walkable in just 5-10 minutes of one another) over just 4 days, True/False centers its attention on quality and community, both locally and cinematically. For a city with a...

From the director of The Devil and Daniel Johnston, Author: The Jt LeRoy Story charts the literary universe created by writer Laura Albert. LeRoy, her literary alter ego, has enraptured and enraged readers since the 1990s. Filmmaker spoke with Dp Richard Henkels about he sought to have the documentary “feel like a feature film, not a TV doc.” Author had its world premiere at the 2016 Sundance Film Festival. Filmmaker: How and why did you wind up being the cinematographer of your film? What were the factors and attributes that led to your being hired for this job? Henkels: I was on a […]...

From the director of The Devil and Daniel Johnston, Author: The Jt LeRoy Story charts the literary universe created by writer Laura Albert. LeRoy, her literary alter ego, has enraptured and enraged readers since the 1990s. Filmmaker spoke with Dp Richard Henkels about he sought to have the documentary “feel like a feature film, not a TV doc.” Author had its world premiere at the 2016 Sundance Film Festival. Filmmaker: How and why did you wind up being the cinematographer of your film? What were the factors and attributes that led to your being hired for this job? Henkels: I was on a […]...

Cartel Land and The Wolfpack were the big winners last year, and judging from the massive submissions that the fest received for the U.S. Docu section, all sixteen items listed below should already be considered winners. Among the alluring filmmaker names we have the likes of The Devil and Daniel Johnston‘s Jeff Feuerzeig (Author: The Jt LeRoy Story), the Lost in La Mancha team of Keith Fulton & Lou Pepe (The Bad Kids), Gasland‘s Josh Fox (How to Let Go of the World (and Love All the Things Climate Can’t Change)), Actress’ Robert Greene (Kate Plays Christine) and Clay Tweel, who makes it two for two with Finders Keepers in 2015 and now Gleason this year. Take that Alex Gibney. We also have an undisclosed director for Holy Hell – which should make for an interesting Q&A. Here are all sixteen for which we’ll be extensively covering next month.

Daniel Johnston has already been the subject of one great music documentary, 2005's The Devil and Daniel Johnston, but a mind as deeply complex as his is deserving of another. Two years ago, his longtime fans Lana Del Rey and Mac Miller donated to Gabriel Sunday's crowdfunded short film on the lo-fi icon, earning executive producer credit. Hi, How Are You Daniel Johnston? will star Johnston in an imagined conversation with his younger self from 1983, when he was recording his seminal album Hi, How Are You, with the singer-actress Soko also appearing as his long-lost love, Laurie. Lana soundtracks the film's first trailer (as she very often does), with a stirring cover of Johnston's devastating "Some Things Last a Long Time" from 1990. A snippet of her cover comes in around the trailer's 1-minute mark, and you can watch the short film on Vimeo on November 11.

 

The Violet Crown Cinema has an encore screening of its Arthouse Monthly series Sunday night with the acclaimed new documentary I Am Big Bird: The Caroll Spinney Story. In her review, Jette says it's a "pleasant and sometimes touching profile of Caroll Spinney, who has spent decades portraying both Big Bird and Oscar the Grouch on Sesame Street and elsewhere." Tickets are on the verge of selling out, but if you miss out on this one-time local screening, the film is available now on cable and digital VOD from Tribeca Film. In addition, Violet Crown is holding over Austin-shot indie Arlo and Julie (Elizabeth's review) for another week, with daily screenings.

The Austin Film Society kicks off the weekend with Jess Franco's 1971 avant-garde horror film Vampyros Lesbos, which screens tonight at the Marchesa. On Sunday afternoon, Afs is teaming up with the Austin chapter of the National Alliance on...

Frank

Written by Jon Ronson and Peter Straughan

Directed by Lenny Abrahamson (as Leonard Abrahamson)

UK/Ireland, 2014

The look of Frank’s title character is based on English musician and comedian Chris Sievey’s guise Frank Sidebottom, very much a cult figure in the UK during the 1980s and 90s but virtually unknown outside of the island. (International audiences may recently have got a glimpse of the late Sievey’s material as Sidebottom in one memorable sequence of Filth.) Lenny Abrahamson’s film, however, is not the story of Frank Sidebottom, with co-writer Jon Ronson instead taking inspiration from his own time as a keyboardist for Sievey in order to explore fictional territory.

Ronson’s fictional stand-in in Frank is, appropriately enough, named Jon, and is played by Domnhall Gleeson. He is a small-town office stooge who dreams of escaping his humdrum life with musical pursuits, despite an apparent lack...

It may have been the most New York moment in years.

Robert De Niro, onstage Wednesday night at the Beacon Theatre, introduced Time Is Illmatic, the new documentary on Nas' 1994 landmark debut Illmatic, to kick off the Tribeca Film Festival. "Twenty years ago, I would've been 20 years too old for this music," quipped the actor and festival co-founder to a boisterous crowd of fans, media and seemingly every important hip-hop figure in mid-Nineties New York.

Nas: My Life in 20 Songs

Unlike music docs that attempt to deify or elevate the obscure — Anvil,...

Shane Meadows has joked that the release of a new Stone Roses album in 2015 would be quick for the band.

The Stone Roses released their last album Second Coming in 1994, five and a half years after their self-titled debut.

After splitting in 1996, the band reunited in 2011 and at the time promised a "live resurrection" with new material, though have only played old songs at their live shows and festival appearances so far.

During Meadows's documentary The Stone Roses: Made of Stone, the director got visibly excited about the 'New Song' on the running order for a band rehearsal for their Warrington Parr Hall comeback.

However, the band played no new songs during that performance, and no new material is heard on the film itself.

Asked if he heard any new music during the making of the film, Meadows told Digital Spy: "No, we didn't. The day I think we were...

This week sees the release of Shane Meadows's The Stone Roses documentary Made of Stone.

The film has won rave reviews, but has also drawn criticism for refusing to dig too deep into the backstage fallings-out of the combustible foursome - both past and present.

So when Digital Spy met up with the director and his producer Mark Herbert, we did a little digging of our own about the making of the film. Here's what they had to say.

It's very clear what the film is and isn't - did you have that in mind when you were there at the reunion announcement?

Shane: "It was more when we met the band for the first time."

Mark: "We're so excited about them getting back together. We've both seen [BBC Stone Roses doc] Blood on the Turntable, those documentaries. This is about how excited are we, how can we get this excitement? I think...

It’s practically a sub-genre unto itself at this point: Don’t-Call-Them-Indie Rock Docs Featuring Artists Whose Body of Work Remains Virtually Unknown to Mainstream Audiences. (The Devil and Daniel Johnston, Scott Walker: 30th Century Man, Dig! are just a few recent entries.) Seth Pomeroy’s Couldn’t You Wait?: The Story of Silkworm is the newest offering sure to confuse Netflix’s categorizing algorithm....

Liev Schreiber is calling from the gym. It’s clearly not a New York Sports Club, judging from the background noise. In fact, it’s a boxing gym. The actor was training to portray a boxer in a movie — more on that below — and he’s since adopted those sessions into his regular workout routine. On Friday, though, the Tony-winning actor and star of such films as The Manchurian Candidate and Defiance will be at New York’s Lincoln Center to participate in a film symposium called Roughcut, a special spin-off of TropFest, the Australian short-film festival that’s become...

It goes without saying that The Dude in The Big Lebowski is one of Jeff Bridges best performances and easily his most memorable character (with Kevin Flynn from Tron and Tron Legacy coming in as a close second). The character is larger than life, but would you believe that The Dude has some real-life inspiration in a man? Sundance Award winning director Jeff Feuerzeig, director of The Devil and Daniel Johnston and the Espn 30 for 30 documentary The Real Rocky (on Netflix Instant now), actually knew The Dude himself (real name Jeff Dowd) and caught up with him at Lebowski Fest in Tampa, Florida. Thankfully, he filmed the meeting and put footage together for a cool documentary short that you can watch in full below! Here's Jeff Feuerzeig's documentary short The Dude, brought to our attention in SlashFilm's Page 2: It's amazing to see just how close Bridges performance and...

[Editor's Note: This interview was published during the 2011 Sundance Film Festival.] Many will dismiss The Lie as another mumblecore graduate and not get why it’s worth making a movie for this, which is fine. Let them. There are enough of us out there who do get this. Written by Leonard with the participation of Jess Weixler, Mark Webber and Jeff Feuerzeig (director of The Devil and Daniel Johnston and an upcoming Untitled Chuck Wepner Project), I see this as a modern telling of Elia Kazan's The Arrangement, but do not take that to mean Leonard is conjuring Kirk Douglas in any way. Although come to think of it, Weixler could probably do a very fine Deborah Kerr. I invite you to check out my review, and listen to my pre-festival phone interview below where writer/director/co-star Joshua Leonard --- where we dig into the fabric and genesis of the film and how the actor went from The Blair Witch Project...

Title: The Weird World of Blowfly Director: Jonathan Furmanski At 72 years old, Clarence Reid could be your cranky neighbor or arthritic uncle — until, that is, he slips on a homemade superhero costume and starts spitting out raunchy rhymes that would make 2 Live Crew proud. At once a sort of niche canonization along the lines of “The Devil and Daniel Johnston” and a more generalized travelogue documentary about the third-tier touring life for marginal and nostalgia acts, “The Weird World of Blowfly,” so named for Reid’s funky alter ego, is a nonfiction curio that gets by on the personality of its subject, and little more. By day, Reid...

Even Mel Gibson and a puppet that talks like Ray Winstone can't lift unmitigated misery into big-screen magic

Is it faintly conceivable that "a hopelessly depressed individual" would outsource his psyche to a garrulous glove puppet to distance himself from "the negative aspects of his personality"? Not really. Depression isn't like that.

The Beaver gets it right in its first few minutes, when Mel Gibson's Walter has yet to place his trust in rodent therapy. Then, all he does is stare vacantly at the ceiling from the marital bed or lie comatose on a lilo or a couch. That's pretty convincing. For depression doesn't prompt weird and imaginative behaviour; its manifestations are as dreary as its impact on the lives of its victims.

We frequently hear the complaint that cinema perpetuates "myths and stereotypes" about mental illness. Its "pervasive negative portrayals" are accused of having "harmful effects". Well, the...

One of the very few disappointments of meeting Jeff Dowd, the inspiration for the Coen Brothers' creation of The Dude in "The Big Lebowski," is that he's hardly the lethargic, carefree type that Jeff Bridges went on to turn into one of the most famous characters in recent memory, though of course his Dude would probably never remember it. Dowd, a producer's rep who's responsible for helping to usher in too many indie filmmakers to name by handling debuts like Justin Lin's "Better Luck Tomorrow," the Jennifer Westfeldt starrer "Kissing Jessica Stein" and "Blood Simple," which is where he first met the Coen Brothers, is actually quite articulate and considerate in person, something that's captured well in this short documentary from "The Devil and Daniel Johnston" director Jeff Feuerzeig that's as much about his days as an activist in Seattle as it is about sipping White Russians in bowling alleys.

Hollywood couple, Naomi Watts and Liev Schreiber are about to make another film together, reports Variety this week. The boxing drama follows real life athlete, “New Jersey heavyweight boxer, and womanizer, Chuck Wepner, who boxed 15 rounds with Muhammad Ali and inspired Sylvester Stallone to pen Rocky.” The film is simply called Bleeder. Yikes! Sounds kinda scary. Ha!

Watts and Schreiber are joined on the cast by Mad Men star Christina Hendricks. The film is shopping for buyers in Cannes as we speak, and has Jeff Feuerzeig as director.

Past projects of Naomi Watts include King Kong, The Painted Veil (where Schreiber portrays her lover), the gem Eastern Promises, The International, You Will Meet a Tall Dark Stranger, and Fair Game. Her partner’s recent films include Defiance, X-Men Origins: Wolverine, Repo Men, and Salt. the couple have two children. Meanwhile, Hendricks recently appeared on Body of Proof and can be...

The X-Men Origins: Wolverine actor will star in the true story of an amateur pugilist that lasted 15 rounds against the greatest boxer of all time, Muhammad Ali; and was used as inspiration for Rocky. Jeff Feuerzeig will direct The Bleeder from a script he co-wrote with Jerry Stahl (the upcoming Thin Man remake starring Johnny Depp). Feuerzeig helmed the 2005 Sundance Award winning documentary The Devil and Daniel Johnston. The story behind The Bleeder inspired the Academy Award winning classic Rocky which was written by and starred Sylvester Stallone. Liev Schreiber will portray Chuck Wepner, a former New Jersey heavyweight boxer and womanizer who boxed 15 rounds with Muhammad Ali. Wepner and Ali fought back in 1975, with Wepner even knocking the Great One down at one point during...

It always happens at this time every year: producers go to the Cannes marketplace with armfuls of potential projects, and we get a flood of casting reports as actors are attached left and right. Some of these will get made, some won't, and some will get made with an entirely different cast. One of the big ones today is a boxing drama called The Bleeder, which has Naomi Watts, Liev Schreiber and Christina Hendricks set to appear. Before The Fighter I'd have guessed this might be one that we'd hear about during Cannes and never again, but in the wake of that success it might happen. The Bleeder has Jeff Feuerzeig (The Devil and Daniel Johnston) directing from a script he wrote with Jerry Stahl, based on " the true story of former New Jersey heavyweight boxer and womanizer Chuck Wepner who boxed 15 rounds with Muhammad Ali and inspired Sylvester Stallone to pen Rocky.

Filed under: Movie News

The life of New Jersey boxer Chuck Wepner, who once went 15 rounds with Muhammad Ali, inspired Sylvester Stallone to write the inspirational underdog classic 'Rocky.'

Now the heavyweight boxer's life is the basis for another boxing drama, 'The Bleeder,' with Naomi Watts, Liev Schreiber and 'Mad Men''s Christina Hendricks set to star.

"There's a guy named Chuck Wepner, the Bayonne Bleeder," Schreiber recently told MTV. "It's this wonderful story of what happened to that guy as a result of his rise to fame. That's the next thing I'd like to do. It's just a remarkable, hilarious film."

Jeff Feuerzeig, who won the 2005 Sundance documentary directing award for 'The Devil and Daniel Johnston,' co-wrote the script with Jerry Stahl and will direct.

'The Bleeder' will mark the first time real-life couple Watts and Schreiber have co-starred since 2006's 'The Painted Veil.

Source: FilmShaft - Watts, Schreiber and Hendricks join ‘The Bleeder’

Naomi Watts, Live Schreiber and Christina Hendricks have been added to the cast for upcoming boxing drama The Bleeder. The film – which is based on the true story of Chuck Wepner, a New Jersey Heavyweight boxer who inspired Sylvester Stallone to write 'Rocky' – will be directed by Jeff Feuerzeig, who won the 2005 Sundance documentary directing award for ‘The Devil and Daniel Johnston’.

This is the director’s first foray into feature filmmaking, following several music documentaries. The script was co-written with novelist/screenwriter Jerry Stahl of ‘Bad Boys II’ and ‘CSI’ fame and will be financed by Maxar Pictures. The film – which Hyde Park International will be taking to Cannes next week to scope out potential buyers – will join a sales slate that includes ‘Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance 3D’, ‘Echelon’ and the Paul Rudd starring vehicle ‘Our Idiot Brother...

Naomi Watts, Liev Schreiber and Christina Hendricks have joined a boxing drama titled The Bleeder. Jeff Feuerzeig (The Devil and Daniel Johnston) is directing the film, which he co-wrote with Jerry Stahl. The Bleeder tells the "true story of former New Jersey heavyweight boxer and womanizer Chuck Wepner who boxed 15 rounds with Muhammad Ali and inspired Sylvester Stallone to pen Rocky."

The film is being produced by Mike Tollin and Carl Hampe, with Ashok Amritraj, Philip Fier and Matty Beckerman are serving as exec producers. Linda Zander's Maxar Pictures are financing the film which is being shopped at Cannes this week by Hyde Park International. Other films they are selling include: Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance 3D; spy thriller The Double, starring Richard Gere and Topher Grace; Jason Statham starrer Echelon; and Paul Rudd starrer Our Idiot Brother.

Watts and Schreiber are husband and wife in real-life so I am...

Naomi Watts and Liev Schreiber are about to take their relationship to the silver screen in the upcoming boxing drama "Bleeder."

Helmed by Jeff Feuerzeig, the biopic is based on the true story of former New Jersey heavyweight boxer and infamous womanizer Chuck Wepner, who boxed fifteen rounds with Muhammad Ali and inspired Sylvester Stallone to pen "Rocky."

The voluptuous "Mad Men" femme Christina Hendricks is also set to co-star—perhaps as one of Wepner's ladies on the side.

In sum, Schreiber is a lucky man.

And, at 6'3", he certainly possesses the physical presence of a professional boxer, which should help him tackle this seemingly challenging role.

Feuerzeig, who won the 2005 Sundance documentary-directing award for "The Devil and Daniel Johnston," co-wrote "Bleeder"—his first narrative feature—with "Bad Boys II" scribe Jerry Stahl.

According to Variety, the flick is making the rounds at Cannes, so hopefully someone will bite.

Naomi Watts, Liev Schreiber and Christina Hendricks will star in boxing drama The Bleeder , to be directed by Jeff Feuerzeig, reports Variety . The Ashok Amritraj's Hyde Park International project is "based on the true story of former New Jersey heavyweight boxer and womanizer Chuck Wepner who boxed 15 rounds with Muhammad Ali and inspired Sylvester Stallone to pen 'Rocky.'" Feuerzeig, who directed The Devil and Daniel Johnston , co-wrote the script with Jerry Stahl.

Naomi Watts (King Kong), Liev Schreiber (X-Men Origins: Wolverine) and Christina Hendricks ("Mad Men") are set to star in boxing drama "The Bleeder," to be directed by Jeff Feuerzeig. The new movie is based on the true story of former New Jersey heavyweight boxer and womanizer Chuck Wepner who boxed 15 rounds with Muhammad Ali and inspired Sylvester Stallone to write "Rocky." Feuerzeig, who won the 2005 Sundance documentary directing award for "The Devil and Daniel Johnston," co-penned the script with Jerry Stahl (Bad Boys II). Muhammad Ali vs Chuck Wepner - Round 15:...

Naomi Watts, Liev Schreiber and Christina Hendricks are set to star in the boxing drama "The Bleeder" reports Variety.

The story is based on the true story of former New Jersey heavyweight boxer and womanizer Chuck Wepner who boxed 15 rounds with Muhammad Ali and inspired Sylvester Stallone to pen "Rocky."

Jeff Feuerzeig ("The Devil and Daniel Johnston") will direct from a script he co-wrote with Jerry Stahl. Mike Tollin and Carl Hampe are producing.

Naomi Watts, Liev Schreiber and Christina Hendricks are set to star in the boxing drama The Bleeder.  Per Variety, the film is based on the story of Chuck Wepner, the New Jersey heavyweight boxer who fought 15 rounds with Muhammad Ali and inspired to Sylvester Stallone to write Rocky.  The biopic is the natural transition for documentary filmmaker Jeff Feuerzeig (The Devil and Daniel Johnston) to directing narrative features.  Feuerzeig co-wrote the script with Jerry Stahl (Bad Boys II). Studio home Hyde Park International is shopping The Bleeder at the Cannes Film Festival this week along with Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vegneance, The Double, Echelon, and Our Idiot Brother.  If I were a billionaire cinephile hanging out in the French Riviera right now, I'd have a hard time passing up the Watts/Schreiber/Hendricks package.  Hit the jump for more on Wepner. Here's the Wikipedia account of the Wepner/Ali...

The world has come down with a serious case of Bieber Fever… and with Justin Bieber: Never Say Never out in theaters tomorrow, we figured that this would be the perfect time to talk about some of our favorite Music/Band documentaries. There are so many that a couple have certainly been left out… but that just gives you something to discuss at the end!

Honorable Mention: The Fearless Freaks

If you have ever been to a The Flaming Lips concert, you know the kind of crazy, high energy show that these guys put on. In The Fearless Freaks viewers get to see the makings and evolution of this band from Oklahoma. It is an honest, genuine film that delves much deeper than just showing a band playing a show.

10. The Decline Of Western Civilization Part II: The Metal Years

The popularity of big hair rock music was at its...

Insights on romance from the cult songwriter. Few famous musicians have had a tougher go at love than Daniel Johnston. Or a tougher go at life, really — ever since he began to distribute his homemade cassette albums around Austin, Texas in the early '80s, this West Virginian pop savant's story has been fraught with heartbreaks and breakdowns. And while one need only Netflix the brilliant 2006 documentary The Devil and Daniel Johnston to be touched and inspired by the many bouts with psychosis Johnston has survived, the new six-disc box set of his earliest and roughest recordings, The Story of an Artist, offers the most moving record of the one ache that still hangs in Johnston's heart. The pure-hearted romantic met a strapping young lass named Laurie in his college days, got in a single kiss with her, and has been lovesick — and writing songs about her — [...]...

I am a bit shocked but definitely thrilled that I Am Love won last week's Trailer Park poll with 26% of the votes. Now, if only that meant it would also do better at the box office than losers like Sex and the City 2 and The Other Guys, which came in second place (you Cinematical readers certainly have different tastes).

This week's crop of trailers is pretty underwhelming. None are relatively bad -- okay, maybe the one for Grown Ups is bad, but it's still the perfect kind of advertising for the kind of movie it is and the kind of audience it's targeting -- but for the most part they're extraordinarily ordinary. And that's fitting since the only trailer I could even imagine making my top choice this week is for a film called The Extraordinary Ordinary Life of Jose Gonzalez. Part of my reason for liking this international...

I’m a big fan of the documentary film The Devil And Daniel Johnston. Though it did focus mainly on Johnston’s struggles with bipolar disorder, I think it was a film that was well executed and appealing to people who are familiar with Johnston’s music and art work. In a recent interview with the BBC, Johnston expressed that he was less than satisfied with the outcome, as he wished it would have focused more on his music instead of his struggles with mental illness which is quite understandable.

Read more on Daniel Johnston expresses desire to direct his own film…...

I confess that the movie Lemmy was a pleasant surprise for me at SXSW. You'd think I would learn my lesson -- just because you aren't familiar with or aren't fond of a certain type of music, or musician, that doesn't mean you won't like a documentary about it/them. One of my favorite music documentaries is The Devil and Daniel Johnston but you won't find any of Johnston's albums in my house. I was assigned to review Lemmy for Cinematical and wasn't terribly enthusiastic, not being a big Motorhead fan, but as you can see from my review, I liked the documentary very much and found Lemmy to be a quite fascinating subject.

After Lemmy played the Paramount, filmmakers Greg Olliver and Wes Orshoski appeared onstage for a Q&A. They were shortly joined by Lemmy himself, who is even more entertaining in person than he is in the movie.

Though his life has already been the subject of a compelling documentary, The Devil and Daniel Johnston, there’s certainly more to be told about the life of the truly odd and troubled outside musician Johnston, and it seems filmmaker David Miller (My Suicide) is already hard at work on sharing it. Here’s what he to say about the project to Pedestrian, via the Playlist:

“I’ve got a few things going - we’re doing a Daniel Johnston biopic and I’m Producing and Writing and Gabriel Sunday our star [from My Suicide] he’s going to be Directing and playing young Daniel. It’s going to be an epic super hero story and it’s going to be a narrative biopic so it doesn’t really cover any of the same stuff that the famous Devil And Daniel Johnston Documentary that won Sundance in 2005 covers.”

Struggling with mental illness that has had him institutionalized,...

Director hints that the award-winning actor might play the cult singer-songwriter in a biopic of Johnston's life

Philip Seymour Hoffman could be in the running to play Daniel Johnston in an upcoming biopic, the film's writer/producer said this week. David Miller has begun work on an "epic superhero story" about the splendid and troubled singer, which Miller hoped would also feature Johnny Depp.

"It doesn't really cover any of the same stuff as The Devil and Daniel Johnston documentary," Miller told Pedestrian.tv (via TwentyFourBit). The director, who is in the midst of pre-production, finishing the screenplay and approaching possible actors, added: "There's so many people reaching out that are huge Daniel Johnston fans. Philip Seymour Hoffman and John C Reilly for example. Johnny Depp's a big Daniel Johnston fan, though we'd like him to play the older brother."

Miller is currently promoting My Suicide, an indie comedy he wrote with his son,...

By Jeff Sneider

  I hadn't heard of the movie, the filmmaker or the website before today, but in a recent interview withPedestrian, "My Suicide" director David Miller mentioned an intriguing bit of news about a potential biopic of schizophrenic musician Daniel Johnston. He is the subject of one of the best documentariesin recent memory, Jeff Feuerzeig's "The Devil and Daniel Johnston," which wo...

I feel like the best music documentaries are the ones you can enjoy even if you know nothing about the musicians or type of music being profiled ... or better yet, don't actually like the music in question. For example, I loved the movie The Devil and Daniel Johnston, but have no interest in hearing any more of Johnston's music. Along the same lines, I went into Lemmy knowing very little about the musician's work, pretty much classifying it in a very generic Heavy Metal corner of the music world that I haven't paid much attention to. And yet, after 90-odd minutes of watching this profile of the driving force behind Motorhead, I was pleased to see Lemmy himself onstage for a Q&A and actually entertained the idea of going to a Motorhead concert later this week. (My eardrums are asking me to please go see a nice quiet movie instead.

Not so long after playing the savage mutant Sabretooth, who clashed with Hugh Jackman's lead character in X-Men Origins: Wolverine, Liev Schreiber is ready for another bout of vicious fighting.

The 42-year-old actor is working on an as-yet-untitled biopic about Chuck Wepner, the former heavyweight boxer from New Jersey who was Sylvester Stallone's inspiration for his fictional film fighter Rocky Balboa.

Schreiber told MTV: "There's a guy named Chuck Wepner, the Bayonne Bleeder. He's the guy that Rocky was based on. He went 15 rounds with [Muhammad] Ali in 1974 and it's this wonderful story of what happened to that guy as a result of his rise to fame."

Wepner challenged Ali for the heavyweight title in 1975. He lost, but managed to send Ali to the mat in the ninth round.

Schreiber said that director Jeff Feuerzeig - who previously made the 2005 documentary The Devil and Daniel Johnston - will helm the new film.

Liev Schreiber recently spoke up about his next desired role. "There’s a guy named Chuck Wepner, the Bayonne Bleeder. He’s the guy that 'Rocky' was based on," Schreiber said. "He went 15 rounds with [Muhammad] Ali in 1974 and it's this wonderful story of what happened to that guy as a result of his rise to fame."Schreiber didn't talk timetables or casting or anything like that, but he did name "The Devil and Daniel Johnston" director Jeff Feuerzeig as the man who will helm it. "That's the next thing I'd like to do," the actor said. "It’s just a remarkable, hilarious film and I hope we get to make it." Ok, that could be cool. But ironically, I just don't see how they can make this better than the original "Rocky" itself. That movie is fantastic! What I find funny is that people will be like "Aw hell no Liev Schreiber,...

Liev Schreiber recently spoke up about his next desired role. "There’s a guy named Chuck Wepner, the Bayonne Bleeder. He’s the guy that 'Rocky' was based on," Schreiber said. "He went 15 rounds with [Muhammad] Ali in 1974 and it's this wonderful story of what happened to that guy as a result of his rise to fame."Schreiber didn't talk timetables or casting or anything like that, but he did name "The Devil and Daniel Johnston" director Jeff Feuerzeig as the man who will helm it. "That's the next thing I'd like to do," the actor said. "It’s just a remarkable, hilarious film and I hope we get to make it." Ok, that could be cool. But ironically, I just don't see how they can make this better than the original "Rocky" itself. That movie is fantastic! What I find funny is that people will be like "Aw hell no Liev Schreiber,...

Depp and Girlfriend Make American Lover: Johnny Depp and his girlfriend of 12 years, Vanessa Paradis, are rumored to be appearing together in the new movie My American Lover for director Lasse Hallstrom. Depp was quoted saying, "Vanessa plays the French feminist Simone de Beauvoir and I play her lover Nelson Algren who is real macho." Production is expected to get underway in 2011 according to the news, but don't hold your breath. [Bang Showbiz via The Playlist]

Brody, Shawkat and Janney also Peel Oranges: On the heels of Friday's announcement, Adam Brody, Alia Shawkat and Allison Janney are set to join the cast of The Oranges for director Julian Farino. The trio join already cast Leighton Meester, Catherine Keener and Hugh Laurie in the dramedy written by Jay Reiss and Ian Helfer, centers on a man's romantic relationship with the daughter of a family friend, which turns their lives upside down. Shooting is expected to...

MTV News had the chance to speak with Liev Schreiber (X-Men Origins: Wolverine) who revealed that he's working on a biopic about Chuck Wepner, the boxer who was Sylvester Stallone's inspiration for Rocky Balboa. "There's a guy named Chuck Wepner, the Bayonne Bleeder. He's the guy that 'Rocky' was based on," Schreiber said. "He went 15 rounds with [Muhammad] Ali in 1974 and it's this wonderful story of what happened to that guy as a result of his rise to fame." Wepner was a heavyweight boxer from Bayonne, New Jersey. He won 35 out of 51 fights during his career, 17 of which were knockouts. In 1975, Wepner challenged Ali for the Heavyweight title. He ultimately lost, but managed to send Ali to the mat in the ninth round. The following year, Wepner went on to fight professional wrestler Andre the Giant. Schreiber said that director Jeff Feuerzeig (The Devil and Daniel Johnston) will helm the new film.

Liev Schreiber is eyeing a biopic of New Jersey heavyweight boxer Chuck “The Bayonne Bleeder” Wepner reports MTV News.

A Marine and security guard before turning boxer, Wepner famously lasted through 15 rounds in a fight with Muhammad Ali, being knocked out only seconds before the fight's end. That fight was said to be the inspiration behind Sylvester Stallone’s "Rocky".

Though he won far more than he lost, Wegner's losses to the likes of George Forman, Sonny Liston, Joe Bugner and even Andre the Giant are more remembered. Jeff Feuerzeig ("The Devil and Daniel Johnston") will direct.