Francis Ford Coppola

Latest Articles

Interview: Sofia Coppola provides direction to Somewhere

Suite surrender
Six years before Kathryn Bigelow became the first woman to win the Oscar for Best Director, Sofia Coppola was the third to be so nominated, for Lost in Translation .
By PETER KEOUGH | January 04, 2011

Interview: Sofia Coppola provides direction to Somewhere

More spooks

AMC crosses Rubicon
Two years ago, AMC made a deal to develop a series based on Francis Ford Coppola's classic 1974 film The Conversation . That show still hasn't materialized, but with Rubicon , AMC has now brought us a drama with a similar premise.
By RYAN STEWART | July 27, 2010

Music for the love of it

From the Schemers to the Men of Great Courage, Mark Cutler’s songs have always gotten to ‘that special kind of place’
Whether driving his Men of Great Courage on a tune about a spooky midnight stroll, or gently declaring a deep camaraderie with “We Shall Always Remain Friends,” Cutler’s concocting a soundtrack to the feelings in the room.
By JIM MACNIE | May 05, 2010

Prince of darkness

Gordon Willis at the Harvard Film Archive
Gordon Willis, the master cinematographer to whom the Harvard Film Archive pays tribute in a seven-film retrospective beginning this Friday,
By STEVE VINEBERG | November 18, 2009

Review: New York, I Love You

A collection of acting and screenwriting exercises
The multi-episode portmanteau movie is usually less than the sum of its parts.
By PETER KEOUGH | October 14, 2009

The hub of film criticism?

A peek into the Phoenix archives
In his deep survey, Gerald Peary hardly conceals his opinion that Boston is the epicenter of film criticism.
By CHRIS FARAONE | September 02, 2009

Review: Tetro

Francis Ford Coppola: still lost in a cinematic jungle
Francis Ford Coppola made one perfect picture, The Conversation , in 1974.
By PETER KEOUGH | June 16, 2009

Review: Adventureland

Greg Mottola faces growing pains
Could the revival of the "Portrait of the Auteur As a Young Man" genre signal a new era of auteurship in Hollywood? Maybe, but Mottola, for one, hasn't quite reached that point.
By PETER KEOUGH | April 02, 2009

Master P's Theater

Local video editor Paul Proulx has built a following by paying homage to Hollywood's coolest directors. So why is YouTube all up in his grill?
"It's quite simple, really," Dr. Branom tells Alex DeLarge in A Clockwork Orange . "We're just going to show you some films."
By MIKE MILIARD | February 20, 2009

Wish-fulfillment for a burning world

The 2008 heroic holiday DVD and Blu-ray gift guide
From the shining big-screen debut of Iron Man to the large amounts of green produced by the Incredible Hulk, this was the year the public couldn't get enough of their favorite heroes.
By BRETT MICHEL | December 11, 2008

Quantum mechanic

Little Solace for Bond fans
Little Solace for Bond fans
By PETER KEOUGH | November 14, 2008

EXCERPT: The Conversation

Peter Keough discusses how The Conversation is a B List movie.
Peter Keough discusses how The Conversation is a B List movie.
By PETER KEOUGH | October 31, 2008

Flash of Genius

An unexciting, earnest homily
The title of Marc Abrahams’s first feature refers to the “eureka” moment that the US patent people insist must occur if an inventor is to prove that an idea is his own.
By PETER KEOUGH | October 01, 2008

Murder in six degrees

Peter Ivers — pals with john Belushi to the Circle Jerks — was killed in 1983. A new book recalls his fascinating life — and mysterious death.
You’ve probably never heard of Peter Ivers.
By MIKE MILIARD | September 10, 2008

Autumn peeves

Films with a full agenda
With pundits already reading political significance into summer blockbusters like The Dark Knight (“Is Batman a stand-in for George Bush? Discuss.”), the meatier movies of fall arrive not a moment too soon.
By PETER KEOUGH | September 11, 2008

Tropic Thunder

Tropic Thunder is stupid-funny
Despite a few soft spots along the way, Thunder combines the dark absurdity of Stiller’s underrated Cable Guy with the unrestrained dumbness of his Zoolander .
By PETER KEOUGH | August 13, 2008

Youth Without Youth

Reaching for the stars
Try telling Francis Coppola that, especially since he hasn’t uncorked a lulu like this one since From the Heart .
By PETER KEOUGH | December 19, 2007

Auteur land?

‘Film Culture’ in 2007
Granted, Sweeney Todd is a grim, violent, misanthropic musical.
By GERALD PEARY | December 17, 2007

Hot and cold

More French music plus Osvaldo Golijov at the BSO; Sarasa’s warm tribute to Craig Smith
James Levine’s second French program this season with the Boston Symphony Orchestra was more compelling than the one with which he began the season.
By LLOYD SCHWARTZ | December 11, 2007

Redacted

The camera war
The Iraq War movies are starting to resemble the war itself: miscalculated, mishandled, unpopular, and with no end in sight. Scialfa
By PETER KEOUGH | November 14, 2007

Jung rascals

The Police go undercover
This article originally appeared in the June 28, 1983 issue of the Boston Phoenix.
By JOYCE MILLMAN | July 25, 2007

Cinema of Shadows

We’re five years into the Iraq crisis, and Hollywood hasn't made a film about the war. Or is every film is about the war?
It’s not likely, but Judd Apatow’s pitch for Knocked Up might have sounded something like this.
By PETER KEOUGH | June 06, 2007

Road rules

Andrea Arnold takes on Lars von Trier
Dogme is out, done for, as are Lars von Trier’s sly strictures on making Dogme films: only natural lighting, the actors must wear their real clothes, etc.
By GERALD PEARY | May 08, 2007

The good Germans

Breaking through to The Lives of Others
It’s 1984. The Ruling Party monitors its citizenship, its minute observations allowing the “others” to be categorized –– and persecuted. Watch the trailer for The Lives of Others (YouTube)
By BRETT MICHEL | February 14, 2007

Movies from outer space

From the tsars to the stars at Harvard
Our new-found DVD-ness and cable-TV luxury notwithstanding, movies have always been a public medium, a spatial experience we share in the theater and a topical experience we share in the culture at large.
By MICHAEL ATKINSON | November 30, 2006

The future of an illusion

Reflections on 40 years spent in the dark
When I first realized that movies would, for better or worse, dominate my imagination forever, I really gave no thought to the forces at work creating these transfiguring images on a screen.
By PETER KEOUGH | November 15, 2006

Off with their heads

Recent polls are giving the GOP the willies. So should the movies.
The signs are getting bleak for the man in the White House and the party in power.
By PETER KEOUGH | October 20, 2006

The Lost City

Awful
In 1990, Sydney Pollack refashioned Michael Curtiz’s Casablanca , setting the action during a period of political upheaval in Havana , with Robert Redford doing little to erase memories of Humphrey Bogart.
By BRETT MICHEL | May 10, 2006