Dailies is a round-up of essential film writing and other highlights from our colleagues across the Internet — and, occasionally, our own writers. If you’d like to submit a piece for consideration, get in touch with us in the comments below or on Twitter at @TheFilmStage.
Austrian filmmaker Michael Glawogger (Megacities, Whores’ Glory) has suddenly died at the age of 54 after reportedly contracting malaria while filming in Liberia. Read his last journal at Der Standard, published last week and translated from German:
He woke up in his hotel room to a uniform noise. Half asleep, he could not make out whether it was the air conditioning or the rain outside. The distant police sirens made him a moment to think long, he was in New York or Detroit, where, however, at this time does not need air conditioning. So was it rain? In Detroit, it rains in April, as he was sure. With him at home there was always raining in April, sometimes even snowed. April was the month of upheaval was, waiting for the spring. But that was at a time when there had been seasons.
At Wired, see Italy’s famed movie studio Cinecittà Studios that is now a graveyard of film memories:
Hollywood isn’t the only dream factory. For more than 75 years, Cinecittà Studios has stood on the outskirts of Rome, the backdrop for thousands of films. Today its hundred acres stand nearly abandoned, littered with movie props and empty sound stages. Italian photographer Luca Locatelli dragged his medium format camera through the studio’s lifeless scaffolding and studios hunting for ghosts of cinema past.
NYC’s Rooftop Films have announced its 2014 summer series line-up, including Obvious Child, The One I Love, Cold In July, and more.
At Nonfics, Christopher Campbell counts down the seven best documentaries about Earth:
Earth Day was set up in conjunction with the growing environmental movement, and after 44 years that remains the main purpose of the occasion. But we can also think of this day as a time to celebrate the planet like it’s her birthday. Happy 4.54 billionth, Earth! Again! Therefore I’d like to not just devote the day to listing environmental issue films. Instead, I’ve compiled the best documentaries about Earth, as in the planet is the subject and these are portraits of her, both negative and positive. It’s a fairly brief list, because there aren’t a whole lot of nonfiction films qualified as being about or of the whole world. And I don’t want to just include them all just to fill the space, even though most of them are pretty good.
At Sound on Sight, David Klein explores Alexandre Desplat‘s score for The Grand Budapest Hotel:
I have no clue which country, if any, “Zubrowka” is meant to represent in The Grand Budapest Hotel. I can, however, point it out on a map. Er, at least I can point out where it should be. Wes Anderson’s fictional European nation doesn’t exist outside his eighth feature but from its intricate period design to the hotel concierge’s (Ralph Fiennes) well-rounded zest for life, Zubrowka feels real. Partial credit also goes to Alexandre Desplat, who teams with Anderson for a third time and crafts a rich, ambiguously European score both in sound and in name.
The Raid director Gareth Evans highlights his five favorite action scenes on /Film: