before i self destruct is a 2009 american crime drama film starring curtis jackson , who also served as writer , director , producer and executive producer that is included with his fourth studio album of the same name .

it was released on november 23 , 2009 , two weeks after the release of the album .

before i self destruct ( film )

50 cent movie i had in my library , from the lp before i self destruct .
) , and was delivered with his fourth album ' before i self destruct ' .
right now , before i self destruct is set to hit stores on november 17th via interscope .
if you want to answer the questions ,
who starred in the movie before i self destruct ?
and
what is the full cast list of before i self destruct ?
then this page has got you covered .
this cast list of who was in before i self destruct includes both lead and minor roles . ( 58 items )
‘before i self destruct’ is flawed and at times amateurish but it still draws you in with its well told story .
50 cent has unveiled the before i self destruct ‘s album art . like , seriously… and it’s actually pretty cool .
before i self destruct cast list , listed alphabetically with photos when available . this list of before i self destruct actors includes any before i self destruct actresses and all other actors from the film . you can view additional information about each before i self destruct actor on this list , such as when and where they were born . to find out more about a particular actor or actress , click on their name and you ' ll be taken to page with even more details about their acting career . the cast members of before i self destruct have been in many other movies , so use this list as a starting point to find actors or actresses that you may not be familiar with .
50 cent revealed on his twitter that he is writing a sequel that ' s in the works . before i self destruct 2 .
on top of an undisclosed amount for damages winstead is also suing for any profits from both the before i self destruct album and movie .
all you need to know about 50 cent ‘s alleged forthcoming studio album , before i self destruct , can be found in the first line of its wikipedia page : “initially , before i self destruct was planned to be 50 cent’s 2007 album , for which he confirmed he had already completed twelve songs . however , he decided to release curtis instead , and thus before i self destruct ‘s release date was originally pushed back to 2008 . ”
shadrach winstead , an author based out of new jersey , is in the process of suing rapper 50 cent over his movie and album before i self destruct .
the & apos ; before i self destruct , & apos ; screening tour raps up nov . 13 in dallas , texas while the album comes out nov . 16 .
the itunes lp for 50 cent ' s before i self destruct comes with the full - length before i self destruct feature film ( rated r ) , produced and acted by 50 cent , along with an itunes - exclusive interview with the rapper . 50 cent claims before i self destruct is better than get rich or die trying and who are we to argue . fiddy is in beast mode , tearing up the competition with a hunger unseen since his 2003 debut . tracks like “death to my enemies , ” “psycho” ( with eminem ) , and “ok , you’re right” are bigger , more aggressive , and more focused . before i self destruct also comes with the bonus tracks “flight 187” and “baby by me” ( with jovan dais ) .
50 cent is giving consumers a two - for - one deal by offering up the & apos ; before i self destruct & apos ; movie to accompany his new full - length album of the same name . the queens - native wrote , directed and starred in the 90 - minute film which will be featured in the & apos ; before i self destruct - - deluxe edition . & apos ;
according to a press release , plaintiff shadrach winstead claimed fif stole the concept for the before i self destruct film and album from his autobiography titled “the preacher’s son . ” he also claimed that lines were taken verbatim from the book .
for fif , the
before i self destruct
film
was an opportunity to show the cause and effect
of a good guy gone bad . fif also said making a 90 - minute film presented an opportunity to get more in - depth than a three - minute song .
sasha delvalle , 50’s beautiful co - star in before i self destruct the movie reveals to majormovesdvd that a part 2 to the film is on the way and she will be a part of it . frankly , i was fine with fif’s acting but that movie was very ordinary . i hope the second one is better .
starting next month , 50 cent will be taking his directorial debut , before i self destruct , on the road to 10 major cities across the u . s . [ watch the trailer below ] .
stream before i self - destruct [ explicit ] by 50 cent and tens of millions of songs on all your devices with amazon music unlimited . exclusively for prime members . new subscribers only . terms apply .
subscribe : urltoken inspired by 50 cents latest album of the same title , before i self destruct is a gritty 90 - minute film , written , directed and starring curtis jackson ( aka 50 cent ) . the film is a coming of age story about an inner city youth raised by a hardworking single mother .
before i self destruct
is available everywhere ! purchase the album here - - - - urltoken about 50 cent : curtis james jackson iii , better known by his stage name 50 cent , is an american rapper , entrepreneur , investor , and actor . this is his official youtube music channel . connect with 50 cent online : visit 50 cent website : urltoken like 50 cent on facebook : urltoken follow 50 cent on twitter : urltoken follow 50 cent on instagram : urltoken buy 50 cent music online : itunes : urltoken amazon : urltoken before i self destruct by 50 cent | teaser | 50 cent music urltoken
‘before i self destruct’ turned out be a surprisingly entertaining film even though , to be kind , curtis jackson isn’t a film director . at least not yet . there are certain elements in the film that an experienced film director wouldn’t have allowed to seep through such as the flat and sometimes seemingly non existent lighting , the odd and inconsistent use of certain camera angles or actors who stare into the camera and might stutter on a line or two are just a few of the cinematic transgressions that 50 cent the film director allowed to slide on by . what curtis jackson does happen to be , not surprisingly , is a very effective story teller .
from music to movies , 50 cent has faced down a plethora of lawsuits in the past . now , the wall street journal reveals that the queens rapper has won yet another suit , this time against an author who claims fif stole portions of before i self destruct from his book .
there are moments throughout before i self destruct where jackson seems to become divorced of his character , and they ' re wonderful . they ' re always snippets of conversation , where the camera seems almost to have lingered too long , even as it captures a plot - or character - relevant moment .
as for a soundtrack , tracks from before i self - destruct the album will be missing from the movie . “then interscope would automatically have the rights to it , when they had absolutely no ownership of the actual material , ” says 50 , who penned a separate score for the film and recruited unsigned artists to record vocals . but that doesn’t mean the tunes are sub - par . “i kept the music up to standards , ” says 50 . “i worked with it until it was right . ”
before i self destruct is a video starring 50 cent , clifton powell , and elijah williams . a coming of age story about an inner - city youth raised by a hardworking single mother . when his dream of becoming a basketball player fails to materialize , he finds himself employed in a . . . see full summary »
according to winstead , 50 cent stole the idea for before i self destruct from his book entitled “the preacher’s son - but the streets turned me into a gangster . ” the lawsuit against 50 cent was filed in a united states district court of new jersey and it is unclear how much winstead is seeking from the rapper .
i went to the store today and went to get bisd but on the album it didn ' t say anything about a movie / documentary blablabla and i asked one of the workers and knew nothing about it . i thought that every album came with the film but am i wrong , does it have to be a deluxe edition ? i didn ' t get it too make sure that i wasn ' t getting one without it . to stay on point , that would be cool to have a sequel to the film as long as the actual album isn ' t bisd pt . ii
i am very proud of 50 cent . i found his acting to have improved greatly . i also found for this to be his first directorial film he did an excellent job in directing it . i love the idea of him bringing in new fresh faces in the movie . i felt these actors did a great job . i was impressed . the story line was great . i am patiently waiting for him to direct another movie . i find this movie to be realistic and many people will identify with the story line . it showed the struggles one has to go through in order to try to make it . it also showed sadness and sorrow . i highly recommend this movie to all to see .
drrapid wrote : i went to the store today and went to get bisd but on the album it didn ' t say anything about a movie / documentary blablabla and i asked one of the workers and knew nothing about it . i thought that every album came with the film but am i wrong , does it have to be a deluxe edition ? i didn ' t get it too make sure that i wasn ' t getting one without it . to stay on point , that would be cool to have a sequel to the film as long as the actual album isn ' t bisd pt . ii
despite the first installment being nothing special , 50 cent is working on a sequel to his
before i self destruct
movie which came out the same time as the album with the same name . very little information is known about the project , but 50 ' s co - star in the original , sasha delvalle , announced her return in the second .
note : i included this picture of big booty model angel luv , who made a brief but memorable appearance in this movie only because i had just watched and reviewed the movie ‘ subtle seduction ’ which had big booty model buffie ‘the body’ carruth amongst it cast and i found a way to stick a picture of her in the middle of that review . if i’m not mistaken i’m required by law to give equal time to big booty models who show up in movies i watch . if i’m not mistaken .
in a q & a on november 19 , 2009 , 50 cent stated that a sequel is already in the works . shocka will be the main character as he grows darker . clarence will appear in several flashback scenes . the sequel will be packaged along with one of 50 cent ' s future album ,
before i self destruct - part 2 .
man , the bisd movie was dope , i hope this shit will be dope ,
50 cent ’s life is like a movie , so it makes sense that he’s writing one . the rapper is working on a feature film , before i self - destruct , which is based on his album of the same name . “it’s not purple rain , ” 50 says of the flick , which he also directed and produced . “but it was inspired by the actual music . ” ( his album is due out december 9th ; 50 plans to release the movie simultaneously . )
eminemislegend wrote : in a q & a on november 19 , 2009 , 50 cent stated that a sequel is already in the works . shocka will be the main character as he grows darker . clarence will appear in several flashback scenes . the sequel will be packaged along with one of 50 cent ' s future album ,
before i self destruct - part 2 .
man , the bisd movie was dope , i hope this shit will be dope ,
would companies be more diverse if a . i . did the . . .
50 ' s last two albums were really disappointing to me . i know the guy has all the talent in the world but he seemed more willing to make singles for the radios rather than good music for his fans . so when i bought
before i self - destruct
without having read any reviews or heard more than one single , i was nervous to say the least . after about the third song i knew 50 had a hit on his hands . the songs for the radio are there , but those songs don ' t dominate the album . in fact , i ' d say the vast majority of the album are bangers . eminem reverts back to his old self ( and not the nasally voice alter - ego that made that rehab ) and delivered some sick lines on psycho . i think i may have heard llyod doing the hook on one song , but other than the appearance by em this is all 50 . great album and definite contender for hip - hop album of the year . i just hope we don ' t have to go through another
curtis
and
massacre
to get to an album like this from 50 .
the other dvd to be included with the disc is a documentary on his slain mentor , run - dmc & apos ; s dj jam master jay , titled 2 turntables and a mic : the life and death of jam master jay . fif’s fourth solo album , before i self destruct , is set for release on november 23 . fans can preorder the album with an additional three bonus cuts on itunes now . — max g
additionally a limited number of & apos ; before i self destruct & apos ; albums will also feature a second dvd & apos ; two turntables and a microphone : the life and death of jam master jay . & apos ; the documentary , which is produced by 50 , discusses the unsolved murder of his friend and mentor run dmc member jam master jay . the film features interviews from some of jay & apos ; s family and friends including russell simmons and rev run , and theorizes that jay & apos ; s death was an inside job .
my boy russell , a budding hip - hop impresario in his own right , actually had this idea first . he wanted to make a feature length film and bundle it with the next release of one of the artist on his label , but unfortunately for my boy russ , curtis ’50 cent’ jackson beat him to the punch . mainly because curtis jackson is rich and russ is not . at least not yet . we all hold hope that russell will get his just deserts soon . that being said with the release of his latest studio album ‘before i self destruct’ we have the feature film of the same name , featuring music from his album and also directed by one curtis jackson .
i watch this film last night and i was like , wow , i did not move from the chair till it was all over , it was deep , original , and well done , great acting , just shows you how life is really like in the hood , i can relate to this situation , cause i ' m from the hood , not to far from were this took place , from newark , n . j so stuff like this really happens , he really took this film to another level , and i think this is a stepping stone , for what is yet to come in the future , he is more focus , and his acting has hit another its peak , the man can act , there is no doubt about that , well done curtis aka 50 cent , i hope there is a sequel to this one , in ( newark )
new york — thursday night was just a regular evening at the movies . . . well , if you ' re used to seeing [ artist id =
860639
] 50 cent [ / artist ] , [ artist id =
1245018
] lloyd banks [ / artist ] and [ artist id =
1689514
] tony yayo [ / artist ] at the theater ! fif held a screening of his film
before i self destruct
; the movie shares a title with 50 ' s new lp and they will be released together on november 16 .
deluxe cd / dvd edition includes bonus dvd that contains a full length feature film of the same name . 2009 album from the rap superstar . before i self destruct is 50 ' s fourth studio album and features collaborations with his mentors dr . dre and eminem . darker and harder than his last two releases , the album is a return to the roots and feel of 50 cent ' s debut album , 2003 ' s ' get rich or die trying ' , which went on to sell 12 million copies worldwide . includes the first single ' baby by - me ' featuring ne - yo .
50 cent wrote , directed in stars in a good little film about a young man who has to turn to crime when his mother dies and leaves him to take care of his little brother . the film is far from perfect but the film shows promise , even if 50 cent tries to be a little too flashy at times ( though points for not looking like every other film out there ) the real problem is that the films cast is wildly uneven and it runs from real performances to some were on the other side of
you must be joking
. its the lack of a good acting a couple of roles that really hurts this film . the ability to get through this film will depend upon how forgiving you are . if you can forgive the actors then you ' ll probably like this , if you can the stay away .
so , perhaps the album will actually be hitting shelves before the year’s out . maybe . possibly . we’ll see . who knows .
i think this is a brilliant film , yes i agree the visuals etc . are questionable . . . but that ' s not the way i am approaching this film , it shows us a very legitimate view of what life in the ghetto can be like . the film gives you a good sense of emotion with a good attempt to try and put you in the place of clarence , with the death of his mother driving him to revenge and then to participate in his new found skill of being a hit - man he turns from rags to riches and brings his little brother along for the ride . the fact that 50 cent is the producer gives authenticity to the film for those familiar with 50 cents history and the fact he actually came from queens , new york and became involved in the criminal world . the film however is highly predictable , with a brother that is so clever its only a matter of time until we see clarence get shot and shocka take revenge . clifton powell fulfills his role quite well , but admittedly some acting is questionable .
subscribe : urltoken trailer about 50 cent : curtis james jackson iii , better known by his stage name 50 cent , is an american rapper , entrepreneur , investor , and actor . this is his official youtube music channel . connect with 50 cent online : visit 50 cent website : urltoken like 50 cent on facebook : urltoken follow 50 cent on twitter : urltoken follow 50 cent on instagram : urltoken buy 50 cent music online : itunes : urltoken amazon : urltoken before i self destruct by 50 cent | trailer | 50 cent music urltoken
50’s lawyer reed smith moved to dismiss the allegations based on absence of substantial similarity between the book and film . judge chesler agreed and dismissed the complaint .
i usually like to state the positive prior to the negative . this flic had so little production value that i am at a loss for props . music tracks deserve ups . the fact that he did not make it
autobiographical
deserves ups . i have seen many community college media department films that scored better production points . script , acting , cinematography , lighting , music fades and placement . . . all at
student
level . not just bashing mr . jackson . i have deep appreciation and respect for his part in his audio artistic efforts . the overall concept of the story was not that bad either but i must say that for such a successful / talented audio artist , this film was a disgrace .
bisd 2 in the works ! ! ! i ' m soooo ready ! good morning ,
tweeted sasha .
embarking on a 10 - city tour to promote the film , 50 treated fans to a screening of the film in los angeles wednesday ( nov . 11 ) .
it & apos ; s not & apos ; purple rain ,
50 said in an interview .
but it was inspired by the actual music .
this is one dark , gritty , hardcore , gangsta ' , shock value rap album . i liked the movie included as well . suprisingly good acting and script . some of the toughest hardcore rap lyrics i ' ve ever heard in 20 years . not for kids . i mean it . this album turned up in your car ensures cops will be watching you from then on . you get the idea . that ' s why i like it . ' nuff said .
jackson does a good job of creating a character who realistically progresses from just below nothing to becoming a little bit of something , and while the character of clarence’s actions were deplorable , they flowed within the structure of the story and as such whatever sympathy you might’ve had for clarence before he became a killer you don’t lose it after he becomes a killer . morally speaking this is probably not a good thing but thematically speaking is does work . now i gotta point out that i’ve spent some time in the tri - state area and i’ve never seen as much broad daylight , police free murder as i’ve seen in this particular movie . i don’t how good of a hitman clarence actually was since his technique consisted of walking up to people , gun all out in the open , and shooting them in the face in broad daylight , but we’ll go ahead and roll with it .
not the typical 50 . i think he just put a bunch of songs together just to put out an album . not his best work .
full financial estimates for this film , including domestic and international box office , video sales , video rentals , tv and ancillary revenue are available through our research services . for more information , please contact us at research @ urltoken .
recently watched this movie on youtube . so many times i wanted to turn it off because it was so bad , but it was so bad i couldn ' t turn away if that makes any sense . the acting at times was quite comical but i ' ve seen worse . 50 cent ' s acting has improved since
get rich or die trying
. however that ' s not saying much as he can still seem a bit stiff and often times can come across as being
robotic
in some scenes . the
kill
scenes are pretty authentic and brutal . the story is basic but lacks depth . i ' ve seen worse street movies than this ( belly 2 ) . i will commend 50 cent for directing / writing / acting in this movie . it ' s hard work and for a debut in directing / writing , he did pretty well . i wouldn ' t recommend this movie to anyone , but if your a fan of 50 cent and g unit , then feel free to check it out . 4 . 5 / 10
also released with the album and film will be the documentary
2 turntables and a microphone ,
which explores the murder of run - dmc dj and 50 mentor jam master jay . the trailer was shown at the screening on thursday night as well .
like fif’s film and album , the novel follows the story of a rising inner city hustler who looks for redemption . however , the u . s . court of appeals for the third circuit in manhattan has upheld a decision today to dismiss winstead’s claims of copyright infringement .
aside from making a name for himself in the music industry 50 is also finding success on the silver screen . he starred in his first film & apos ; get rich or die trying , & apos ; in 2005 and has since worked with big name actors such as al pacino .
the film — which isn’t autobiographical — aims to show the complexities of what 50 refers to as “urban life” in a new way : “when [ movies ] portray certain lifestyles they don’t show cause and effect , ” he says . “but i showed characters under pressure in scenarios where they felt like there were no other options , even though there were . ” he adds , “there are always options . people just usually start to see them while being incarcerated — for not seeing them in the first place . ”
ugly cinematography , piss poor dialogue , clumsy editing , shoddy audio , bad acting , poorly shot action , some very awkward yet self - indulgent sex scenes , and an atrocious plot ( or lack thereof ) with possibly one of the dumbest endings of all time . just incompetent in every way .
it ' s not a random act of violence ,
50 also said about jay ' s murder .
people just don ' t walk in your studio , shoot and kill you with several other people around , and no one knows anything . i believe the documentary sheds light on it — a little bit . it creates a clearer picture of what actually happened at that point . people just heard , ' jam master jay got shot . ' they don ' t understand the circumstances . [ the film ] creates some clarity .
the g - unit general & apos ; s first stop will be in boston on monday ( november 2 ) . the film will then travel to philadelphia , washington , d . c . , new york city , atlanta , chicago , san fransisco , los angeles , and houston . the last stop will be on november 13 in dallas .
our film starts with the character of clarence ( jackson ) chasing poor michael wright up a flight a stairs before capping his ass . but clarence wasn’t always a maniac running around the streets of some city in new jersey shooting people in the face , no sir , he used to be a supreme street balling fool , a solid big brother to his little brother shocka ( elijah williams ) and a loyal son their mother . a couple of bad things then happen to clarence which profoundly affects his life direction . first he blows out his knee which effectively ends his promising basketball career and then tragedy hits the boys as a stray bullet ends the life of their hardworking mother .
i ' m far from a 50 cent fan but i was overall pretty impressed with this movie . it ' s a very standard hood / crime drama that doesn ' t exactly break much , if any new ground . there ' s lots of macho posturing and blood and even a gratuitous girl on girl scene . the plot kind of stagnates towards the middle of the film but still is able to stay interesting . the acting is one of the more surprised positive aspects . curtis is average - solid as usual but clifton powell really knocks it out of the park and none of the supporting cast is bad enough to ruin the movie , which is usually the case with similar movies . if you ' re a fan of the genre it ' s worth taking a look at if its on showtime or maybe even for a rental if you ' re also a 50 fan .
sounds good , and i don’t doubt it’s real . but people are going to ask for it so you might as well post the source off topic , but when are the videos you had coming up on your youtube channel ? viewtopic . php ? f = 29 & t = 70212
the movie also had some pretty decent humor to it , the main actors , those being jackson and clifton powell , were uniformly good though some of the other performers didn’t come off nearly as well . and while curtis jackson might not have learned how to direct a movie yet he made damn sure that he gave himself a rather lengthy love scene with his sexy starlet sasha delvalle , in addition to sticking in a completely gratuitous girl on girl scene in the middle of his movie . i can’t direct a movie either but i would’ve had the good sense to do that to .
50 cent directed and starred in this movie because no one else would . the dialogue is terrible . the
plot
is disjointed . narration was used very poorly . the sex scene was a joke . the target audience seems to be inner city youth and the message is to stay away from bad influences . i guess when one ' s music career is not going so well one may be forced to find other outlets for one ' s creativity . 50 cent has a lot to learn about film acting , directing , producing . . . . . as a matter of fact , just stay out of it . to the poor souls who are considering watching this on netflix : unless you hate yourself , do not waste your time on this junk .
it is believed that when vacuum decay eventually takes place , what will be left is a superheated , hard , and extremely dense sphere . some astrophysicists believe the universe , just before the big bang , may have looked like this . the higgs field is thought to have emerged shortly after the big bang . so it may be the driving force which deletes the universe and forces it to start over again .
i ' m trying to be ahead of the curve because things are changing in music ,
50 told the audience at the amc loews kips bay 15 theater in manhattan on thursday . members of the audience included red café , uncle murda , radio personality miss info , dj jazzy joyce and actor / mc albe back .
we first heard the news about this almost two years ago but there hasn’t been much development since then . but today , 50 cent’s co - star in the original film , the gorgeous sasha delvalle shared the news on twitter that a part 2 is finally in the works . not much detail is available at this point but we hope story wise , it is better than the first one , which was packaged along with 50’s last album of the same name .
theoretical physicist joseph lykken says it would probably take billions of years before we reach that point . lykken hails from the fermi national accelerator laboratory in batavia , illinois . if it did happen though , you wouldn’t know it . one instant you are here , the next , you and everything else is swallowed up by an enormous vacuum bubble , traveling at light speed in every direction . humanity would never see it coming .
it sounds like a plot from a comic book or a sci - fi film , a theory that got a boost when one of the greatest discoveries in physics in the modern era , the discovery of the “god particle , ”or the higgs boson , the missing piece in the standard model of particle physics . in the preface to his book starmus , stephen hawking warns that the higgs boson field could collapse , resulting in a chain reaction that would take in the whole universe with it .
“winstead’s book and jackson’s works are different with respect to character , plot , mood , and sequence of events . winstead’s protagonist embarks on a life of crime at a very young age , but is redeemed by the death of his beloved father , ” it continues . “jackson’s protagonist turns to crime when he is much older and only after his mother is murdered . he winds up dead at a young age , unredeemed . winstead’s book is hopeful ; jackson’s film is characterized…by moral apathy . ”
[ jam master jay ' s nephew ] phonz was working on that project for five years ,
50 explained to mtv news a little over a year ago .
he came to me , and i shot my [ interview ] portion that ' s on the documentary . we met in atlanta the first time and ended up shooting in amsterdam .
so even if we are able to escape the planet and become an intergalactic species before the sun engulfs the earth , the universe itself may collapse . the only way to ensure longevity is if the multiverse actually exists , and we can become a multi - universal species . whether it is the big crunch of vacuum decay that gets us , it’s interesting to think that perhaps after that dense , hot state , it could in theory explode again , causing a second big bang .
in the film 50 plays an adolescent basketball player , clarence , whose dreams of stardom are cut short due to a knee injury . following the murder of his mother , clarence is forced to become the sole provider for himself and his younger brother . scorned by her death he first seeks revenge on his mother & apos ; s killer then turns his newfound interest in violence into a job as a hit man . although the story is cliché at times , and his supporting cast gives continued lackluster performances , 50 garners points for his commitment to showing his character & apos ; s physical and mental maturity from teenager to head of the household .
? curtis was all the proof we needed truth be told , 2007’s relentlessly infectious “i get money” was 50’s biggest and best single in some years . but when you depend on disingenuous collaborations to help your commercial bottom line ( akon , justin timberlake , the pussycat dolls ’ nicole scherzinger , robin thicke and mary j . blige ) , you end up with the kind of pandering sing - songy release that made 50’s former nemesis ja rule such an omnipresent punchline . it makes you wonder if curtis would have sold it’s first - week tally of 691 , 000 if not for his savvy , manufactured , and at times baiting beef with kanye west , whose graduation sold nearly one million units .
this album overall gets a rating of 3 . 6 / 5 not the best album out there but with 50 cents clever raps and always changing flow and just cuz 50 is a g , its worth 9 . 99 for sure , it comes with the cd and a dvd , so you get what you pay for , so dont buy this album thinking its a album like get rich or die tryin it doesnt go that hard and have that many hits , but overall like i said its a pretty good album , but 50 could make better , for some reason he tried singing a little to much on this album instead of striaght up rapping . but if you like 50 or your just a big fan then buy it . and if you like gangsta rap or just rappers that rap with gangsta lyrics buy it . .
this movie is a great hood classic . it follows in the line of i ' m bout it , and other hood tales . 50 cent and clifton powell on screen interaction was pure magic . the young man that played chaka was talented as well . the movie was funny , heartfelt and painful all at the same time . my favorite line is
the insurance business .
50 cent is definitely a visionary and very talented businessman . this movie is a must see ! ! 4 stars out of 4 ! ! ! ! the accompanying album is a masterpiece as well . to all the 50 cent haters , go get a job and / or a life because this movie is the truth . support hood films and quit hating . the latino girlfriend with the face of an angel and the heart of snake was simply terrifying . please 50 make a sequel . you are the next rudy ray moore !
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a loan shark gives ex - con nick a period of 24 hours in order to pay back the money he owes . up against it , nick involves his best mate on a multi - part mission in order to raise the cash . . . see full summary »
story of a promising high school basketball star and his relationships with two brothers , one a drug dealer and the other a former basketball star fallen on hard times and now employed as a security guard .
craig and day day have finally moved out of their parents houses and into their own crib . the cousins work nights at a local mall as security guards . when their house is robbed on christmas . . . see full summary »
an undercover cop , accused of a crime he did not commit , regains his freedom and decides to take revenge .
a coming of age story about an inner - city youth raised by a hardworking single mother . when his dream of becoming a basketball player fails to materialize , he finds himself employed in a supermarket . after his mother is tragically gunned down , clarence ( played by jackson ) is consumed by revenge and takes up a life of crime in order to support his younger brother .
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50 stars as clarence , a street - basketball superstar with enough promise to possibly make it to the nba . when he injures his knee during a game , his hoop dreams are smashed and he ' s left to figure out what to do with the rest of his life . when clarence and his genius pre - teen brother chaka suffer the ultimate family tragedy , clarence turns to the streets for salvation and money . he becomes a ruthless hitman for a local kingpin played by clifton powell . lloyd banks also has a role as chaka ' s school teacher — yes , banks appears in a dress shirt and tie , surprising the crowd with a character no one expected .
one hilarious moment during the screening came when 50 had to cry onscreen , and an audience member started to laugh . 50 himself yelled from his seat ,
shut up , n - - - a !
causing the entire crowd to laugh .
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“the defendant infringed the copyright by publishing and selling an audio visual work ( a movie released in dvd format ) , coupled with an audio recording ( “recordings” ) , ” said winstead in his complaint , according to urltoken . “in many cases , the content and word choice used by defendants in their work is identical to that used in plaintiff’s book . ”
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update : yesterday afternoon , the copyright infringement lawsuit against 50 cent and his record companies was dismissed in federal court in newark , new jersey .
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the movie—which is just one of the two dvds to be packaged with his new cd of the same name—is about a kid ( played by 50 ) growing up in the ghetto with dreams of making it to the nba . after his mother is found murdered , the young baller takes matters into his own hands , with plans of revenge .
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now things are pretty bad for clarence and shocka as the bills are piling up high , and the refrigerator is getting empty . clarence soon finds himself out of work and he still burns with the fire avenging the death of his mother with this quest eventually taking the young man to big time bad man sean ( clifton powell jr . ) who could use somebody on his payroll who is in dire need of some cash and possesses the ability to kill indiscriminately to tie up the occasional loose end .
now freshly employed , things aren’t so bad for clarence and his baby brother who we should mention is some kind of genius as he has jumped from like eighth grade to college level classes in no time flat . things are less than good for people who sean needs silenced as clarence handles his business with extreme prejudice and efficiency . the only thing that could derail clarence now would be if he met the wrong bitch . not my words . say hello to a sexy lady named princess ( sasha delvalle ) who in the history wrong bitches could be wrongest bitch of all time . roll credits because we don’t want to be the one who spoils it for you .
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there are a few hiccups with editing in the movie . but the way the story went was really good . the fact that he is rapper ( with no direction background other than his fellow member ' s music videos ) . most of the dialogues , the conversations in the movie were like the ones we have in our everyday life . the storyline was pretty the same old seek revenge . but you feel for the character when he loses his mom and he gets betrayed . 50 cents ' s son ( marquise jackson ) can be seen at he beginning of the barber shop shot . for some reason the sex scene looked similar to the movie shottas . fifty can act and direct . in my opinion he needs to work as an assistant director with some good directors so that he would get a better perspective if directing anymore movies . all the best fifty .
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operation avalanche is a 2016 american-canadian found footage conspiracy thriller film directed by matt johnson , who co-wrote the film with josh boles .

johnson and owen williams star as cia agents who infiltrate nasa to expose a potential mole , only to become embroiled in a conspiracy to fake the 1969 apollo 11 moon landing .

operation avalanche ( film )

operation avalanche is a found - footage nasa conspiracy thriller shot clandestinely on real locations .
i just can ' t get over how intense operation avalanche was , jesus christ .
screenprism spoke with johnson and producer matthew miller at the sxsw premiere of operation avalanche .
operation avalanche is expected to land in toronto theatres later this year — and that’s no hoax .
read more : sundance review : ‘dr . strangelove’ meets christopher guest in moon conspiracy tale ‘operation avalanche’
xavier dolan ' s latest leads the race , with race , operation avalanche and weirdos close behind .
looking for movie tickets ? enter your location to see which movie theaters are playing operation avalanche near you .
toronto director matt johnson’s operation avalanche is set to enjoy its world premiere at the sundance film festival in park city , utah , in january .
there are no featured audience reviews yet . click the link below to see what others say about operation avalanche !
operation avalanche
director matt johnson in the mission control room at johnson space center in houston , texas .
operation avalanche ( matt johnson ) . 94 minutes . opens friday ( september 30 ) . see listing . rating : nnn
operation avalanche , a film by toronto ' s matt johnson , speculates about the rumored faking of the apollo 11 moon landing . the film has been selected to make its world premiere at the 2016 sundance film festival in park city , utah .
poster for operation avalanche . filmmaker matt johnson says the film relies heavily on recent updates to “fair use” laws regarding artistic appropriation of material previously considered untouchable due to copyright restrictions .
operation avalanche
is an inventive grab - bag of a film , a movie about making a movie that no one was supposed to know was a movie at all .
conspiracy theories and cold war - paranoia pulse through “operation avalanche , ” a comedy - thriller directed by matt johnson . it opens friday .
even though you have lived your entire life in toronto , you decided not to have
operation avalanche
premiere at the toronto international film festival last fall , for sundance this past january .
in addition to being a suspenseful action flick with plenty of laughs , operation avalanche is an homage to film and the process of making movies , from documentaries to science fiction . while the film’s characters demonstrate some filmmaking methods from the days of yore , the zapruder team had to develop some new techniques to make it look like operation avalanche was shot on 16mm and then buried for 50 years .
there’s a great chase scene involving vintage 1960s cars that looks like something hollywood would have cooked up on a much bigger budget than operation avalanche enjoyed .
but seriously , johnson interjected , operation avalanche relies heavily on recent updates to “fair use” laws regarding artistic appropriation of material previously considered untouchable due to copyright restrictions .
“operation avalanche” premiered at this year’s sundance film festival before going on to screen at south by southwest in march and will screen montreal’s fantasia festival next week . it will hit theaters on september 16th from lionsgate premiere .
park city , utah—“i want to give a shout out to our legal team right now , ” a smiling matt johnson said following friday’s sundance film festival world premiere of operation avalanche , his apollo 11 moon hoax thriller .
matt johnson , director and star of
operation avalanche ,
is documented by a film crew at the l . a . times studio at the sundance film festival in park city , utah , on jan . 23 . ( jay l . clendenin / los angeles times )
operation avalanche
shows real historical footage from nasa ' s apollo days as well as footage of real nasa employees at work . none of them had any idea about the film ' s true purpose at the time .
xyz films , which is made up of ucla tft alums and producers nate bolotin , nick spicer ( m . f . a . ’06 ) and aram tertzakian , has the film operation avalanche showing in the sundance next section .
race comes in just behind juste la fin du monde with eight overall nominations , while before the streets , operation avalanche and weirdos , tie for third place with six each .
that film has already secured distribution with lionsgate for 2016 , so be sure to be on the lookout this year to see it for yourself . for more on operation avalanche , be sure to visit them on sundance , imdb and facebook .
the end result is the clever found - footage conspiracy thriller
operation avalanche ,
which premiered in january at sundance and opened friday at the nuart theater in west los angeles .
director hugh gibson stands with his award for best canadian film for his film
the stairs
at the toronto film critics association awards , on tuesday , january 10 , 2017 .
cinematographers jared raab and andy appelle ( who play the cameramen in the film as well ) , and film editor curt lobb recently shared some secrets with us about how they seamlessly blended original footage with archival , creating a look for operation avalanche that sold the period — and on a relatively small budget too .
“operation avalanche” is rated r ( under 17 requires accompanying parent or adult guardian ) . reds under the bed and something nasty in the garage . running time : 1 hour 33 minutes .
for all their ( remarkably successful ) attempts to steal shots from nasa and shepperton studios ( as described in the video above when they are thrown out of shepperton because of the avengers ) , it seems the venture has paid off . operation avalanche was accepted to sundance after what johnson describes as “a miracle” . regardless of any divine intervention , it seems johnson , raab and appelle’s previous film the dirties helped pave the way to sundance , as everyone was waiting for their next film : operation avalanche .
we will have a pre - release screening of operation avalanche on tuesday , september 6 at 4pm in the folino theater . the filmmakers matt johnson ( writer / director / producer ) will be in attendance for a q & a after the film .
well , in terms of being accessible , the dirties was released on vod and streaming platforms , and operation avalanche is coming out in theaters . so that’s gotta be a huge difference , just in terms of the number of eyes on your film .
a cute , spunky found - footage thriller undone by a lumpy plot and a weak ending , “operation avalanche” revisits the urban legend that the moon landing was faked , with some fresh twists .
after debuting at the sundance film festival earlier this year , the faux documentary operation avalanche will be coming to theaters this fall . and for conspiracy theorists who think the moon landing was faked by the government , this could just be more fuel to the fire .
we spoke at sundance just after the premiere of operation avalanche , but you’ve been on the festival circuit for quite awhile now . have you noticed any trends or similarities with the way audiences react ?
soon you’ll get to know exactly what we mean ; operation avalanche should hit theaters later this year . lionsgate snapped up the film months ago , and already has a distribution plan . in the meantime , fire up room 237 and start polishing your tin - foil hat .
dolan also picked up a best director nod for his film . he’ll compete against chloe leriche for avant les rues ( before the streets ) , kevan funk for hello destroyer , matt johnson for operation avalanche , and mathieu denis and simon lavoie for “ those who make revolution . ”
after making its toronto premiere at the hot docs festival – a ballsy programming choice , given that it isn’t a documentary – matt johnson’s operation avalanche finally gets a theatrical run at the tiff bell lightbox this week .
i have never watched a piece of content that so immediately resonated with me as much as the first episode of nirvanna the band the show . and then it was the dirties . and now it ' s operation avalanche .
with operation avalanche opening in limited release last weekend – and expanding into more theaters tomorrow – i spoke with johnson via telephone to get his thoughts on the film’s reception , his current relationship with nasa , and the new series he’s been working on for the past year . enjoy the interview below .
operation avalanche tells the story of four undercover cia agents in 1967 who seek to document nasa and america’s race to the moon . only problem being that nasa won’t make it in time , so the agents decide it’s time to fake the moon landing before russia beats them to it . from writer / director matt johnson , operation avalanche required a discreet camera that could allow them to keep filming on the down low , which led them to the blackmagic pocket cinema camera .
this friday ( sept . 16 ) an ethically questionable and totally thrilling fake documentary about the first moon landing premieres in theaters . in the film , titled
operation avalanche ,
two cia agents pose as documentary filmmakers to infiltrate nasa and investigate a russian mole . then they stage the 1969 apollo 11 moon landing .
premieres jan . 22 at the sundance film festival ( sundance . org ) .
just when you thought the found footage genre was dead ( again ) , along comes operation avalanche , a movie that is thankfully not another cheap horror film - - it’s a cheap thriller of sorts . largely forgettable and annoyingly acted , the movie has its moments but never amounts to a whole lot . full movie review »
i remember my very first film’s public show . it was in 2005 as part of the student thesis - festival at cleveland state university . together with my film school classmates – i organized a small film event , consisting of several thesis films from our final production class at csu’s film program . our goal was to get together
operación avalancha ( operation avalanche ) de matt johnson es un falso documental que aborda el mito de que el alunizaje de 1969 fue falso y que las imágenes que se vieron de la llegada del hombre a la luna se rodaron en un plató .
the rogers best canadian film award , voted on by the 39 members of the toronto film critics association , features a cash prize of $ 100 , 000 . the two runners - up – matt johnson’s operation avalanche , about a cia operative trying to fake a moon landing , and kazik radwanski’s how heavy this hammer , a drama about a man addicted to online gaming – each received $ 5 , 000 .
i’m glad you mentioned shooting illegally , because one of the most interesting pieces of operation avalanche is that you guys went into nasa under false pretenses , and shot a bunch of footage that ended up in the film . at sundance , they hadn’t really commented on that – but between then and now , have you heard from them ?
that’s not to suggest you shouldn’t check out operation avalanche when you get a chance — the shepperton sequence alone is worth it . ( it should be released by lionsgate sometime this year . ) but i’m much more excited about what matt johnson does next .
awesome , man , i’m glad things are going so well . operation avalanche was one of my favorite films at sundance , and i’m glad it’s getting a theatrical release . i’m excited for you , and hopefully we’ll get a chance to chat again soon .
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me thinks the reports of the demise of found footage films was premature ! every time i turn around i keep finding brilliant examples that quite frankly blow my mind ! in fact . . i was so immensely pleasured by this titillating government conspiracy found footage film that you can now find operation avalanche listed in the newly revised kama sutra ; - )
character matt and andrew have id cards made up with their titles of director and camera , respectively . this reflects their real life status as operation avalanche ' s director and cinematographer . this sequence is supposed to subtly act as an opening credits sequence without breaking character .
“operation avalanche” doesn’t mark the first time director matt johnson and owen williams have played “themselves , ” although it’s hard to imagine a more inventive use of the duo’s reality - blurring faux - doc sensibility , which previously earned them top honors at slamdance 2013 for “the dirties . ” pretending to be the film crew that faked the apollo 11 moon landing , [ … ]
thankfully , operation avalanche has more going for it than its questionable legality . ( it ' s not that questionable ; johnson actually shouted out the film ' s lawyer following its sundance screening . ) set against the backdrop of the cold war in 1967 , it ' s by turns a buddy comedy , a thriller , a conspiracy theory film , and—thanks to a gnarly car chase—an action movie . it starts out like a christopher guest film , winds its way through oliver stone’s jfk and / or wag the dog , and eventually becomes enemy of the state .
the moon landing conspiracy theories claim that some or all elements of the apollo program and the associated moon landings were hoaxes staged by nasa with the aid of other organisations . operation avalanche was the preceding order in the arms and space race to bankrupt the soviet union in the cold war .
it also looks like vintage film , with much grainy b & w and desaturated colour imagery .
curt lobb : pablo would mess with the film reels ; he’d dirty and scratch them up .
new print created by sundance institute and ucla film & television archive . shown by permission of miramax
what kept running through my mind throughout the last third of operation avalanche was just how much better the film could have been if it had ditched the found footage conceit and told its story in a more conventional form ; if it could have focused on simply telling the best version of this story instead of constantly servicing the set - up . matt johnson’s first film , the dirties , followed a similar approach , using a meta - documentary premise to tell the story of a pair of friends making a movie about bullying that goes horribly awry . it’s clear he’s comfortable with the format , and to his credit operation avalanche is more ambitious in every possible way . but it’s already clear that johnson is a young filmmaker who has outgrown this particular bit of cinematic sleight of hand .
operation avalanche is a period found footage film following a pair of young cia agents ( matt johnson and owen williams ) who initially go undercover at nasa to expose a russian mole . but while posing as a documentary crew , they actually learn that there’s no way nasa is going to win the race to the moon . so they have an idea , and you already know what it is .
his follow - up , operation avalanche ,
investigates the truth behind the cia ' s involvement in the space race
and promises to be just as invigorating as his debut . according to a press release , lionsgate has snapped up all u . s . and canadian rights to the film . production is scheduled to begin on june 30 in toronto , houston , and washington d . c .
that conversation has taken center stage with you lately , and seems to be accompanying your film here .
i kept hoping that
operation avalanche
would eventually get so good that it would force me to overcome my innate skepticism . i didn ' t need the film to do anything except make me feel something for these characters , or at least make me want to invest in their cover - up scheme . that moment never came , and i can ' t help but feel that ' s because johnson and boles didn ' t do enough research on the type of characters who would , in the ' 60s , leap at the chance to fake the moon - landing . you can only coast so far on a novel idea ' s fumes , and
operation avalanche
doesn ' t go far enough .
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operation avalanche is set to enjoy its world premiere at the sundance film festival in park city , utah , later this month . the logline is appealing : a pair of cia agents infiltrate nasa in 1967 and endeavour to fake the moon landing – a period mockumentary . but when johnson wants to make a movie about the infiltration of nasa , he isn ' t content to merely stage it . he needs to infiltrate nasa for real .
here are the salient points : johnson’s first film , the dirties , didn’t play tiff , and johnson chose to take operation avalanche to sundance 2016 rather than offer it to tiff 2015 . plenty of canadian filmmakers aren’t happy with tiff , but few of them will say so on the record , so johnson instantly became a maverick . he’s also willing to discuss his dissatisfaction with telefilm canada’s funding preferences , and that has generated even more coverage .
reviewed at sundance film festival ( next ) , jan . 28 , 2016 . running time : 94 min .
stranger things is a great example of that . it has the look of an ’80s movie through and through , but you know it’s not an ’80s movie because you’re not watching it on film . film does all these weird things that look like mistakes , but you can’t plan them . through this process , we discovered that if you want something to look like it’s on film , the only way to get that look consistently is to actually use film .
a multimillion - dollar car chase , mind you , requires more than the will of one man ' s creative aspirations . johnson was afforded the opportunity by lions gate entertainment , which will distribute operation avalanche in the united states this year . that ' s a rare privilege for an independent filmmaker from toronto ; few reach escape velocity and make it stateside . johnson is of course well aware of that – and made the decision himself to premiere at sundance rather than locally , at the toronto international film festival , which had invited him to screen the film this past september .
operation avalanche is a very difficult beast to describe , but an easy one to love . set in the late 1960s during the simultaneous cold war and space race between the u . s . and russia , it’s structured like a documentary within a documentary , but it plays like a vintage espionage thriller or 1970s paranoia classic like the parallax view .
he definitely has a point . tiff and telefilm could both be doing a lot better by emerging filmmakers ; johnson’s sparked a conversation the industry very badly needs to have , and i’m really glad he’s done this . but now that operation avalanche is playing in town , we have to shift the focus back to the movie , not its maker .
across the walls of the zapruder offices sprawl pages of script notes and storyboards for projects in the works – bigger and more ambitious projects than even operation avalanche , though of the details i have for now been sworn to secrecy . but i do wonder if johnson isn ' t concerned about having his intentions so plainly on display . not a chance .
necessary to be a late - night talk radio / dorm room smoke session favorite : a super - secret government organization ( probably the cia ) enlists a filmmaker ( possibly stanley kubrick ) to fake footage of us astronauts on the moon . matt johnson milks this preposterous idea for drama and laughs in * operation avalanche , * which opened at sundance last week .
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johnson : i think it had to start as something linked to a new film , but hopefully the conversation keeps going .
we ' re thrilled to be in good company at the guanajuato international film festival , mexico : urltoken - july 23rd .
ucla film & television archive , in conjunction with the sundance institute and others , has digitally preserved and / or has had new prints created for the following films , which premiered at the sundance film festival and will be shown again in january .
but here ' s the crazy part : the makers of
operation avalanche
say they really did lie to nasa so they could gain access to the johnson space center in houston , texas . there , they told nasa that they were filming a real documentary about the moon landing . instead , the filmmakers created a hilarious but fake documentary about faking the moon landing .
the tomatometer score — based on the opinions of hundreds of film and television critics — is a trusted measurement of critical recommendation for millions of fans . it represents the percentage of professional critic reviews that are positive for a given film or television show .
after
the dirties
picked up the grand jury prize at the slamdance film festival , the 31 - year - old toronto - based filmmaker and his crew thought about expanding the model they created for the first film and make a period documentary .
operation avalanche is , in the end , a clever entertainment , but all the work that johnson , boles , and co . have put in — the savvy recreations and incorporation , the documentary - style filming , not to mention plugging into a world of conspiracies both imagined and real — gives it extra resonance . for what emerges is a portrait of a time period when our whole relationship with the filmed image was beginning to change . americans had already seen a president shot on tv . they would soon see men walking on the moon , even as they also saw images of death and destruction in vietnam . the earnest enthusiasm with which operation avalanche begins , and the paranoia and fear toward which it proceeds , chart the course of an entire nation .
and operation avalanche is… well , it’s fine . conceptually , it’s pretty nifty , taking the form of a found - footage conspiracy thriller about a pair of junior cia agents ( johnson and his dirties co - star owen williams , once again using their own names for their characters ) who attempt to out a russian mole at nasa and wind up faking the apollo 11 moon landing .
the one thing i really like about operation avalanche that really kind of sets it apart from other indie flicks is that it feels like a lot of indie directors are trying to go for this darker , nihilistic or pessimistic tone , and there’s such an air of optimism in this film . especially with your character – no matter what obstacle you put in his way , he’s going to get it accomplished , which – after speaking with you a few times – seems like just an extension of who you really are .
mm : especially [ documentaries ] from the period , especially the look of the film , all those seminal docs from the 60s .
the sequence is simply delightful , and it’s operation avalanche at its very best : clever , funny , and so in love with movies themselves that it nearly forces you to smile . those kind of flashes come throughout the film — it may be the only found footage movie i’ve ever seen where they show somebody actually cutting the footage you’re watching — but that delight starts to fall away as the team begins to suspect that they’re being hunted by russian agents , or even worse , double - crossed by the cia because they know too much .
what they’re really doing is trying to unmask a russian mole within nasa , but in the course of their sleuthing , they discover nasa has been hiding an earth - shaking fact : the space agency is nowhere near ready to land a man on the moon , not in time to meet the end - of - decade deadline set by late president john f . kennedy , whose bold challenge opens operation avalanche .
just don ' t ask them to give you justifications for the more implausible footage ostensibly captured by the film - within - the - film ' s
documentarians .
put on the spot , johnson would probably just invent an elaborate , if entertaining , set of lies .
the nominations for the 2017 canadian screen awards were announced tuesday , honouring the best in canada’s film and television industries over the past year .
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operation avalanche is a sly little comedy - thriller , but , also like room 237 , it’s an act of movie love . “the moon landing is the greatest movie ever made , ” johnson tells me in a sundance condo , his boyish enthusiasm echoing the eager cheerfulness of the film - buff character he plays in the movie ( a character named , appropriately enough , matt johnson ) . “what piece of cinema is more famous than neil armstrong walking on the moon ? ” the only other possible contender is probably the one that gave johnson’s production company its name : zapruder films .
turning lack of sophistication into a virtue is a skill that the filmmaking hyphenate matt johnson has in abundance . three years ago , he directed and starred in his first feature , “the dirties , ” a shrewd commentary on the warped relationship between image and reality . now he and his prime collaborator , owen williams , are back to poke that beast some more with “operation avalanche , ” a cold war comedy - thriller pulsing with paranoia .
the film is directed by matt johnson , who co - wrote the script with josh boles . johnson previously directed “the dirties , ” about two high school best friends who make a film about getting revenge on school bullies only for one of them to take it more seriously than the other .
johnson , who recently received a master ' s degree in film at york university in toronto , chatted on the phone from his hometown this week .
villeneuve’s next film is the hotly anticipated blade runner 2049 with ryan gosling and harrison ford . presenting the prize , mckellar joked that the director’s last film , the science - fiction drama arrival , was really about bilingualism , and an alien race that comes to earth and forces us to learn their language .
while i prefer matt johnson ' s more comedic work , operation avalanche ' s more dramatic approach is pretty effective . it ' s clear a lot of thought and care went into developing the world and logic . the visual aesthetic , too , is pretty remarkable , especially considering the fact it was filmed with a blackmagic pocket cinema camera - and the amount of ' illegal ' filming that they actually got away with is also pretty impressive to learn about .
ingeniously using his low budget to address his ambitions , johnson has directed , co - written ( and starred in ) a unique science - fiction film .
for his first film , 2013 ' s
the dirties ,
which revolved around two high school friends making a film about the school ' s bullies that goes awry , matt johnson wanted to make it so authentic he enrolled in a high school and convinced students and teachers he was an actual student .
the ballad of narayama
is a japanese film of great beauty and elegant artifice , telling a story of startling cruelty . what a space it opens…
i left the film thinking of shakespeare’s famous line : “there are more things in heaven and earth , horatio , than are dreamt of in your philosophy . ”
congratulations to the class of 2018 ! above is a snapshot of the thesis film projects completed by the this year’s graduating class . this reel features the narrative , animation / visual effects and documentary projects created by the 2018 graduates of dodge college of film and media arts at chapman university . this video was compiled and edited by
it’s very hard to convince people of that when you’re dreading the result . and in many ways , operation avalanche talks about where that can lead , and the really dark , awful places that can take people like me . which it did – the story of that movie is very much the story of that movie getting made . but i think that real life is pretty optimistic and buoyant , and when movies come out that try to say it’s not , i try to reject that .
ultimately , the movie falls apart for the same reason so many other found - footage films do : it wants to tell a bigger story than the premise allows . watching documentary footage of johnson and his team building a fake lunar rover on a soundstage makes complete sense within the framework of the film ; accepting that somebody’s going to keep a camera rolling when people’s lives are at stake , or when the characters find themselves in a high - speed car chase with bullets whizzing by , simply doesn’t . if i’m thinking about the feasibility of the style , i’m not inside the world of the movie — and operation avalanche kicked me out time and again .
we did a full color grade on the digital and then our film artist did multiple prints on different film stocks to get different [ looks ] . we did physical damage . i took a piece of the movie , hung it on my bike and rode my bike around the university campus so that it would get all destroyed .
this apollo - era would - be suspense - thriller mockumentary is more an exercise in ' look how film - school cool and clever we are ' than anything else .
in 1967 , four undercover cia agents were sent to nasa posing as a documentary film crew . what they discovered led to one of the biggest conspiracies in american history .
it’s not the cleanest of set - ups , and the with the actors playing roles named after themselves and the film we’re watching ostensibly a documentary made by the group’s own team , the movie starts eating its own tail pretty early on . but operation avalanche is nevertheless a blast in the early stages , blurring the lines between reality and fiction as the duo first set up shop at nasa , then start outlining how they’d actually fake footage from the moon . johnson isn’t terribly strong as an actor , particularly in the heavier dramatic scenes , but he nails the overeager , selfish buffoon aspect of his character , and is immensely entertaining even while his character alienates the members of his team .
it seemed awfully easy to for you and your crew to get permission from nasa to film there by telling them you were college students doing a documentary on the apollo mission .
these kids are similar to our film’s characters . they’re just guys messing around with a movie camera , which is why that footage of them goofing around in the street and waving to people fit so well in our film . because filmmakers were so serious during that era , very little footage of that kind of jovial , loose camera stuff exists on 16mm .
while i was on a shooting hiatus with my last film , in football we trust , i lived in israel / palestine for 7 months on a rotary ambassadorial scholarship , which i had been awarded after graduating from chapman university . while there , i taught film , mentored local filmmakers , assisted ngos launch media advocacy projects , and continued my post - graduate
it sounds like comedy , and the film has many funny moments — but there are also many frightening ones , when other players in the scenario set out to silence any squealers .
much like the characters they portray in the film , johnson and his team gained access to nasa under false pretenses – they posed as a documentary crew shooting a film about the apollo missions . when you see their onscreen counterparts inside mission control , those aren’t sets – they’re the actual locations , and in most cases the crew had only a single take to get the scene just right . the result is an engrossing and entertaining film about one of the oldest conspiracy theories in america , and the ambitious cia agents who managed to pull it off .
they just do a fantastic job of showing how the moon landing could have been convincingly faked to a pre - internet world — the film crew even built a realistic lunar landing module .
aa : there’s that interesting sequence with bracket saying he’s going to shoot down apollo 11 . matt [ johnson ] buried that film because it’s the first thing his character buries in the movie .
johnson : that was his big project , he did all the vfx , there are about 200 effects shots in the film , but that was his baby . we had already gone to shepperton studios and broke in and shot those scenes illegally . that was the first film we rolled , was us breaking into that studio . we shot it when we were over there for the uk release of
melanie duke ( bfa / da ’17 ) started a new role with 20th century fox as a creative content coordinator . erika cohn’s ( bfa / fp ’09 ) film will receive its la theatrical release on april 20th at the laemmle monica film center . erika will be around afterwards for a q & a . jj englert ( bfa / crpr ’15 ) has started a company , industry jump ,
howie mandel hosts the 2017 canadian screen awards , to be broadcast live from toronto’s sony centre for the performing arts on sunday , march 12 . here is the complete list of film and television nominees :
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the group also presented quebec director denis villeneuve with the tfca 20th anniversary award for excellence , recognizing his record three wins of the best canadian film prize , for 2009’s polytechnique , 2010’s incendies , and 2013’s enemy .
canada’s richest film prize has been won by toronto filmmaker hugh gibson for his documentary the stairs , a penetrating and sympathetic portrayal of the city’s regent park neighbourhood , focusing on three staff members at its community health centre .
we never told them ,
said matt johnson , the director and lead actor .
we invited them to the screening of the movie at the south by southwest film festival , but no one ever came .
even though we were using a lot of older stocks , they would have been from the ’80s , not the ’60s . film technology has improved to the point where film is much better now than it was in the ’60s , so we had to do some degrading early on in the first color pass . shift some of the blacks a little toward red . things that these ’60s films naturally do . conor was huge for that .
that was our first big challenge . we started shooting the color footage on 16 and then we started realizing that we were shooting so much footage — we were going through 10 , 000 feet a day . we realized we could get a film artist to [ reprint digital footage ] on 16mm . conor fisher used a lab and did a one - to - one exchange of every single frame of the film . it took him four months .
mj : but i don ' t think many people watching the film are going to read those things instantly . because on the surface it ' s sort of a conspiracy thriller , as opposed to a criticism of government .
mj : yeah , that was pretty complicated . and that was the biggest challenge technically going into this movie was to make it look like we shot on 16mm . so we did everything . the opening of the movie is actually shot on black - and - white 16mm film . we had a really smart film artist named pablo perez do a frame - to - frame transfer of the entire movie to 16mm in a really , really dirty lab in toronto .
( full disclosure : xyz films , in which screenanarchy founder and editor todd brown is a partner , is involved in the production and sales of the film . he was not involved in the writing or editing of this article . )
the film stars johnson and owen williams , johnson’s accomplice in the dirties , as two young cia agents posing as filmmakers . they are pretending to be making a documentary about nasa’s preparations for the july 1969 first moon landing by apollo 11 .
life after death : it’s just the first month of 2016 , but it seems safe to say there will be no crazier film this year involving major actors than swiss army man , the existential love story having its world premiere at sundance .
it ' s the cheapest way to make a movie ,
he jokes by way of explanation .
whatever the characters are going after is the same as the film itself . if we can align those things it makes it easy for us . the less i get in the way of what ' s happening in real life while i ' m shooting , the better it is . the less work we do ahead of time , the better the film is .
johnson and co - writer josh boles , who also stars in the film , don’t actually believe that apollo 11 was a hoax . they studied the many conspiracies theories out there , as any fan of the x - files would tell you .
mj : it’s mostly what you see in the movie . in both cases , in fact , what we show the audience is more or less what we did . with nasa , we went in posing as a documentary film crew saying that we were from a film school in toronto , which we both were at the time . and we said we were making a documentary about the apollo program , in the exact same way the characters say they’re making a documentary about the apollo program .
the canada majority copro with france , which is currently vying for a best foreign language film nomination for the 2017 oscars , was produced by dolan and nancy grant of sons of manual , nathanaël karmitz of paris - based mk2 and sylvain corbeil .
with a full budget of $ 1 . 25 million and a physical production budget of just $ 400 , 000 , johnson and his team needed to keep costs down . this was helped by their need to be discrete , forcing them to use no additional lighting as well as use small lavalier mics with zoom recorders . their choice of lenses , old bolex glass from the 40s and 50s , also helped keep costs down while helping them achieve the filmic look that was necesary for the period piece . shooting in prores helped save digital space and kept them from needing too many sd cards . the other half of their budget , roughly another $ 400 , 000 , went toward licensing music for operation avalanche , such as tracks from creedence clearwater revival .
you know what ? it ' s pass / fail . i passed . my professors were really happy with the film . they thought i was crazy at first , but in the end i think they were surprised i was able to do it .
, i wish they didn’t include press on my film because it’s now angled the story so it seems as though i’m talking about my own career in relation to telefilm . i’ve made out fine ; i just understand that system because i went through those things .
johnson : as lightly as we could . what i didn’t want was for him to be a character in the film and have someone play him , it would be so hokey—but as soon as tristan zerafa was like , ' i can just make him . '
you’ve done a couple of these found footage films where you have a dual role as the camera operator : using camera movement to emote , yet still capturing the action . is doing this type of film second nature by now , or do you get specific direction ?
xavier dolan’s cannes winner juste la fin du monde ( it’s only the end of the world ) picked up nine canadian screen awards film nominations , including one for best picture , the academy of canadian cinema and television announced tuesday morning at a press event in toronto .
dolan’s latest is one of 10 films nominated for best picture at the 2017 csas . also nominated are les mauvaises herbes ( bad seeds ) , produced by luc vandal and lorraine dufour ; avant les rues ( before the streets ) , produced by chloe leriche ; hello destroyer , produced by daniel domachowski and haydn wazelle ; old stone , produced by xianjian wu , chi - an lin , jing wang , and sarah stallard ; operation avalanche , produced by matthew miller , lee kim and matt johnson ; race , produced by louis - philippe rochon , dominque seguin , jean - charles levy and luc dayan ; maliglutit ( searchers ) , produced by zacharias kunuk ; those who make revolution halfway only dig their own graves , produced by hany ouichou ; and weirdos , produced by marc almon , mike macmillan and bruce mcdonald .
the aptly named zapruder films operates out of a house just off the trendy queen street west in toronto . with criterion movie posters plastered on just about every square inch of wall space , shelves of dvds arranged chronologically , and a nintendo 64 in the living room , it feels more like a film student’s dorm room than a production house . while some of the staff do live there , nearly a dozen full - time creatives also work from the house , contributing to some of the most interesting and exciting films coming out of today’s independent film scene .
sundancing : i also caught friday night’s hot - ticket midnight world premiere of babak anvari’s under the shadow , a horror film set in the tehran of 1988 during the iran - iraq war , with a mother and daughter dodging bombs as well as an evil presence in their home .
mj : you mean , thematically , what it is we’re trying to do with this film ? that’s a good question because i ' m sure it could get misconstrued that we think that that this is almost like a proof of concept that the moon landing was faked . and because you put so much work into this film and we want audiences watch it , it’s almost like we ' re trying to create a thesis that this is how it happened , and you should believe this . but really that’s a very surface reading of what this movie’s actually about .
our producers are always telling us to shred our creative documents . why ? this is the great gift of the things we do : they ' re not stealable . somebody could have gotten a hold of our avalanche script before we made the movie . what are they going to do ? it says to sneak into nasa and stage a $ 2 - million car chase . what is anyone going to do with this ?
jr : get it as close as possible . we noticed that when we went to film , it smoothed out everything . it took all of the slight differences , the curves , and the grain structure , and it painted a layer over the top that gave it a unified look .
as much of the film is “shot secretly” in places such as nasa and stanley kubrick’s london studios , matt johnson and his cinematographers / performers andrew appelle and jared raab needed the blackmagic pocket cinema camera to get great footage while being as low profile as possible . “we needed a camera you could have under your coat , ” says johnson . but not just any camera of course , one you could shoot a film on . the pocket cinema camera ( which , as appelle points out , had only been out for less than a month ) was their camera of choice for these secretive shoots because of its size combined with its dynamic range . as raab explains , “when we found the pocket camera it just fit both something tiny and compact , where we could do our secret shooting , but it also had the dynamic range that could totally sell this film . ”
so he called mike after the film to say “hey , i just saw this” and he gave him my phone number . so i’m hoping the individuals at nasa get a chance to see it and have the same response that these guys did , because they went wild . it was awesome .
mj : no , we haven ' t heard from either of them , but we reached out to nasa because obviously galveston is not too far away from austin [ where the film played at sxsw ] , inviting the people from nasa to come to the screening , but we haven’t heard anything yet .
a film like this is a lot like watching an incredibly well constructed and performed magic trick ; convincing you that what you ' re seeing is real , even if it goes against everything you ' ve known before hand , and there ' s a greater sense of relief and satisfaction when everything comes together flawlessly .
mj : and of people having so much power . in our film , two guys essentially are changing history because the c . i . a thinks that ' s going to be good for the cold war , not really seeing the ethical dilemmas that owen keeps bringing up during the film . and of course because matt cares about nothing other than his own self - promotion , he doesn ' t ask those questions of himself at all until the very , very end when he thinks , “oh wow , maybe i shouldn ' t have done this . maybe the costs to success are higher than i had first thought . ”
this movie is not based on a true story . nasa really has landed six missions and 12 astronauts on the moon . but the film will likely spark the interest of conspiracy theorists who believe nasa did , in fact , fake the moon landing — which it didn ' t . [ top 10 apollo hoax theories ]
we needed them to [ find ] the film clips , which they did , which was really amazing . right now that photographic department is closed at nasa , sadly . nasa is criminally underfunded . our production company is the largest individual carrier of nasa archival footage in the world . it ' s actually kind of sad .