As Inception warped our minds and showed us a new generation of sci-fi, Christopher Nolan has admitted to “plundering cinematic history” and using many references while creating his latest film. The films on list below are not only heavily referenced in Inception, but our favorite cerebral sci-fi films.  Read the full story

E-mail Jordan Raup here. Follow him on Twitter and Facebook for the latest TFS updates!

Here’s a promising and inspiring concept for aspiring filmmakers with big dreams. Make a mashup trailer from some of your favorite films to pitch the film you want to make. It worked for Technotise, based on the Serbian anime film, which was pitched by Shutter Island scribe Laeta Kalogridis, producers Scott Glassgold and Raymond Brothers and picked up by Legendary Pictures. But how were they able to sell such a high concept plot? By hiring an internet youtube user Jaron Pitts to make a proof of concept trailer. Read the full story

Apple has debuted the trailer for Tim Blake Nelson‘s Leaves of Grass. Many of you might recognize Nelson‘s name from films such as The Good Girl, O Brother, Where Art Thou?, Minority Report, and Syriana. He is an established actor in the industry, and with Leaves of Grass, not only does he have a part in the film, but he has tackled the writer/director position.

For me, the main attraction to this film is easily the dual role performed by lead actor Edward Norton. He’s had so many great characters to date, and this one seems juicy enough to earn a place among some of his best work. The film has received pretty decent reviews since it debuted at TIFF last year, including an 8/10 from our very own Jordan Raup. Raup found the film to be “a successful tale of sibling rivalry” with elements both “dark” and “hilarious.”

Another article that caught my eye was delivered from none other than Roger Ebert. Ebert said that Leaves of Grass “was my last film of the festival…and it turns out to have been my favorite one.” Ebert goes on to call the film “some kind of sweet, wacky masterpiece.”

Plot: When Ivy League classics professor Bill Kincaid receives news of the murder of his estranged identical twin brother, Brady (both played by two-time Academy Award® nominee Edward Norton), in a pot deal gone bad, he leaves the world of Northeastern academia to travel back to his home state of Oklahoma. Upon arrival, he finds that reports of his brother’s death are greatly exaggerated, and he’s soon caught up in the dangerous and unpredictable world of drug commerce in the backwaters of the Southwest. In the process, he reconnects with his eccentric mother (Academy Award® winner Susan Sarandon), meets a wise and educated young woman who has bypassed academia in favor of the gentler rhythms of life (Keri Russell), and unwittingly helps his troubled brother settle a score with a pernicious drug lord (Academy Award® winner Richard Dreyfuss) who uses Tulsa, Oklahoma’s small Jewish community for cover. Leaves of Grass follows a twisting narrative path merging crime drama, drug comedy, classical philosophy and sudden violence in pursuit of answering one of humanity’s oldest questions: What does it truly mean to live a happy and constructive life?

Well, there you have it. Are you planning  to see Leaves of Grass once April rolls around? Those words from both Ebert and Raup have to ignite some sort of excitement, right?

A few days ago I was lucky enough to be able to do an on-phone interview with Scott Farrar the special effects supervisor and second unit director on Transformers: Revenge of The Fallen. You may not recognized Scott by name, but you have surely seen his work. Scott’s masterful resumé includes Star Wars VI- Return of The Jedi, Star Trek: The Wrath of Khan, Who Framed Roger Rabbit, Jurassic Park, Men in Black, Artificial Intelligence: AI, and many other classic films. His work on both the Transformer films are ground breaking achievements in special effects.

How’s it going Scott? Big fan by the way.

Scott Farrar: Very well, thank you.

Was it a challenge getting all the effects done in a two year span and how much time did you have to work on the first film?

Scott Farrar: Well on the first film, actually each film took about a year and a half. We start with the script and then we start breaking it down to figure out how many shots and how much work is going to be involved. So after reading the script we realize, “Oh my gosh there are forty to six new characters!”, and they have major speaking roles and they have to act a lot better then they did in the first one. So right away you see some pretty daunting challenges.

So how do you make sure all the robots are different and unique in their own way? So when they are battling the audience can tell the difference between an autobot and a decepticon.

Scott Farrar: Well we know that in the first movie some of the characters were a little bit confusing because some of their colors looked similar. So that was a big note from fans and audiences. So we tried very hard to make sure we had colors and shapes that were a little easier to tell apart. So we try to make sure the fallen standout and hopefully the voice actors help the audience recognize some of the characters. It’s pretty easy for us to keep track of the characters because each one has a name so right away we start calling them by their name when watching dailies. So we can recognize that buffoon Starscream kissing up to Megatron! (Laughs)

Check out the rest of the interview below >>