Susan Skoog’s underappreciated teen drama Whatever opens on a moonlit image of two lovers on a field of grass, he on top of her, in what appears to be flagrante delicto — but which is revealed shortly after to be a train run on an unsuspecting teenage girl. Disenchantment is the bedrock of Skoog’s unsparing debut, released by Sony Pictures Classics in 1998 but taking place in the early ’80s. Liza Weil — most famous as Paris Geller on Gilmore Girls — stars as Anna, a 17-year-old who loves listening to Chrissie Hynde, smoking Newports, partying and painting. She dreams […]...
- 11/10/2018
- by Steve Macfarlane
- Filmmaker Magazine - Blog
Susan Skoog’s underappreciated teen drama Whatever opens on a moonlit image of two lovers on a field of grass, he on top of her, in what appears to be flagrante delicto — but which is revealed shortly after to be a train run on an unsuspecting teenage girl. Disenchantment is the bedrock of Skoog’s unsparing debut, released by Sony Pictures Classics in 1998 but taking place in the early ’80s. Liza Weil — most famous as Paris Geller on Gilmore Girls — stars as Anna, a 17-year-old who loves listening to Chrissie Hynde, smoking Newports, partying and painting. She dreams […]...
- 11/10/2018
- by Steve Macfarlane
- Filmmaker Magazine-Director Interviews
Since any New York City cinephile has a nearly suffocating wealth of theatrical options, we figured it’d be best to compile some of the more worthwhile repertory showings into one handy list. Displayed below are a few of the city’s most reliable theaters and links to screenings of their weekend offerings — films you’re not likely to see in a theater again anytime soon, and many of which are, also, on 35mm. If you have a chance to attend any of these, we’re of the mind that it’s time extremely well-spent.
Quad Cinema
Often considered the most important filmmaker of the last 40 years, Claude Lanzmann is given a retrospective — including his landmark Shoah.
A 20th-anniversary screening of Susan Skoog’s Whatever is held on Saturday.
Metrograph
Newly restored, Chris Marker’s The Owl’s Legacy begins screening.
Two certified classics from Leos Carax are running, while...
Quad Cinema
Often considered the most important filmmaker of the last 40 years, Claude Lanzmann is given a retrospective — including his landmark Shoah.
A 20th-anniversary screening of Susan Skoog’s Whatever is held on Saturday.
Metrograph
Newly restored, Chris Marker’s The Owl’s Legacy begins screening.
Two certified classics from Leos Carax are running, while...
- 11/9/2018
- by Nick Newman
- The Film Stage
Commencing today at the Ifp’s Dumbo-based Made in NY Media Center is the Ifp Screen Forward Labs, an intensive program dedicated to the work of creators making story-driven, serialized projects for all formats, including television, web, Vr or apps. This year’s selections include an animated and Vr piece about the mind of Oliver Sacks; a 35mm-shot horror-thriller set in the world of infomercials; an iPhone-shot horror serial; and a suburban-set comedy about motherhood from indie director Susan Skoog (Whatever). According to Ifp, 80% of the creators/writers/directors are women and/or diverse voices. 30% feature predominantly African-American and Latino casts. “We are […]...
- 4/18/2016
- by Scott Macaulay
- Filmmaker Magazine - Blog
One can only imagine that something was lost in the translation when first-time filmmaker Susan Skoog turned her vision for "Whatever" into a movie. Meant as an unvarnished look at what it's like to be a teenage girl growing up in America, it's gritty and depressing without being illuminating or the least bit memorable.
Set in a style-less, nowheresville burg in blue-collar New Jersey, the film gets its only real energy from a ballsy, loud and liberally used soundtrack that distributor Sony Pictures Classics has clearly sprung some bucks for, with 1980s gems by the Ramones, David Bowie, Patti Smith and others. That and the title -- which is more clever and contemporary than the movie -- are likely to be the sole marketing points when this low-budget indie makes its brief theatrical appearance.
"Whatever" is one of those movies that bungles the first few scenes and only rarely redeems itself during the rest of its running time. Two girls in their final year of high school spend a lot of time together but seem to have nothing in common except downbeat prospects and plenty of attitude. Brenda (Chad Morgan) is bound for big-time trouble as a nymphomaniac who spends all her free time in search of fast company and more sex; Anna (Liza Weil) is her dazed, passive pal who's meant to be more sensitive and creative, based on her androgynous clothing and her application to art school in Manhattan.
But if art is at all exciting and inspiring to her, it doesn't come across; she merely falls for losers who babble about painting and passion, while her friend falls for losers who babble about motorcycles and drugs. Social life consists of teenagers in divey houses getting blasted on drugs and booze, all of which is graphically depicted.
But while Richard Linklater captured these rites of small-town passage with wit and enjoyment in "Dazed and Confused", Skoog directs with a much heavier hand and a sense of desperation and doom. There's no denying that this can be "what it's like," especially for young people as directionless and contemptuous of adults as these. But Anna, the central character, is too adrift to provide much hope for escape; what little redemption the movie offers comes as too little, too late.
WHATEVER
Sony Pictures Classics
Writer-director: Susan Skoog
Producers: Ellin Baumel, Michelle Yahn, Kevin Segalla
Executive producers: Circle Films, Irwin Young
Directors of photography: Michael Barrow, Michael Mayers
Editor: Sandi Guthrie
Casting: Adrienne Stern
Cast:
Anna Stockard: Liza Weil
Brenda Talbot: Chad Morgan
Mr. Chaminsky: Frederic Forrest
Eddie: Gary Wolf
Running time -- 112 minutes
MPAA rating: R...
Set in a style-less, nowheresville burg in blue-collar New Jersey, the film gets its only real energy from a ballsy, loud and liberally used soundtrack that distributor Sony Pictures Classics has clearly sprung some bucks for, with 1980s gems by the Ramones, David Bowie, Patti Smith and others. That and the title -- which is more clever and contemporary than the movie -- are likely to be the sole marketing points when this low-budget indie makes its brief theatrical appearance.
"Whatever" is one of those movies that bungles the first few scenes and only rarely redeems itself during the rest of its running time. Two girls in their final year of high school spend a lot of time together but seem to have nothing in common except downbeat prospects and plenty of attitude. Brenda (Chad Morgan) is bound for big-time trouble as a nymphomaniac who spends all her free time in search of fast company and more sex; Anna (Liza Weil) is her dazed, passive pal who's meant to be more sensitive and creative, based on her androgynous clothing and her application to art school in Manhattan.
But if art is at all exciting and inspiring to her, it doesn't come across; she merely falls for losers who babble about painting and passion, while her friend falls for losers who babble about motorcycles and drugs. Social life consists of teenagers in divey houses getting blasted on drugs and booze, all of which is graphically depicted.
But while Richard Linklater captured these rites of small-town passage with wit and enjoyment in "Dazed and Confused", Skoog directs with a much heavier hand and a sense of desperation and doom. There's no denying that this can be "what it's like," especially for young people as directionless and contemptuous of adults as these. But Anna, the central character, is too adrift to provide much hope for escape; what little redemption the movie offers comes as too little, too late.
WHATEVER
Sony Pictures Classics
Writer-director: Susan Skoog
Producers: Ellin Baumel, Michelle Yahn, Kevin Segalla
Executive producers: Circle Films, Irwin Young
Directors of photography: Michael Barrow, Michael Mayers
Editor: Sandi Guthrie
Casting: Adrienne Stern
Cast:
Anna Stockard: Liza Weil
Brenda Talbot: Chad Morgan
Mr. Chaminsky: Frederic Forrest
Eddie: Gary Wolf
Running time -- 112 minutes
MPAA rating: R...
- 7/10/1998
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
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