GERMANY: DIRECTOR OLIVER STONE PREMIERES HIS NEW FILM " ANY GIVEN SUNDAY" ABOUT AMERICAN FOOTBALL AT THE BERLIN FILM FESTIVAL

Record ID: 388889

  • Title: GERMANY: DIRECTOR OLIVER STONE PREMIERES HIS NEW FILM " ANY GIVEN SUNDAY" ABOUT AMERICAN FOOTBALL AT THE BERLIN FILM FESTIVAL
  • Date: 19th February 2000
  • Summary: (BERLIN, GERMANY (FEBRUARY 19, 2000) (REUTERS) (SOUNDBITE) (English) OLIVER STONE SAYS, "The NFL hated this movie we negotiated with them for a while but they would have nothing to do with us and frankly it was a very dark and gray area."
  • Embargoed: 5th March 2000 12:00
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  • Location: BERLIN, GERMANY
  • Country: Germany
  • Reuters ID: LVA7JNXFA3B7M9D1VXC6CNR20Y66
  • Story Text: Controversial U.S.film director Oliver Stone 'touched down' in Berlin this weekend to promote his new movie, 'Any Given Sunday' another searing expose of American society from the man behind 'Natural Born Killers,' and 'JFK,' Stone casting a granite hard look this time at the mean world of 'grid-iron' football.
    It's been four long years since the Miami Sharks won the football championship and the outlook for the team, trained by Tony D'Amato, looks pretty grim.
    After a series of defeats spectator attendance has dropped; moreover, as a result of injuries, both the team's aging star quarterback,"Cap" Rooney and his substitute, "J Man" Washington, will be out of the game for weeks.
    The club's owner, Christina Pagniacci, is on the verge of singing up new players when Tony decides to send the completely inexperienced quarter-back, Willie Beamen, onto the field.Willie fails and this match, too, is lost.
    Christina begins to consider selling the entire team, when Willie suddenly performs a few dazzling solo runs and wins the next match for the Sharks.
    Willie's trainer, however, is furious with Willie, because in his eyes, team spirit is more important than any victory.Tony's attitude has lead to many a row with Christina.Willie, on the other hand, becomes a star overnight.
    And that is where the team's problems really begin! With enough twists and turns to please any conspiracy theorist, Oliver Stone's searing look at US gridiron football played to an enthusiastic crowd at the Berlin Film Festival this weekend.
    As ever controversy always dogs the man behind 'Natural Born Killers' and 'JFK,' and controversy dogged his latest offering.
    This is no commercial for the National Football League in the United States.
    "The NFL hated this movie," Stone said in Berlin.
    "We negotiated with them for a while but they would have nothing to do with us and frankly it was a very dark and gray area."
    Stone was alluding to the strange disappearance of sponsorship for his movie.Originally major US companies were booked to pay for 'product placement' in the movie - particularly on the advertising hoarding during the stadium scenes.
    But as word of Stone's plot trickled out - the sponsorship trickled away.
    He may have had troubled attracting the financing - but there was certainly no problems attracting big-time Hollywood talent.
    Al Pacino, James Woods, Denis Quaid, Cameron Diaz, LL Cool J and newcomer James Foxx (correct) were all signed up - with Stone renewing a partnership with Pacino first begun in 1982 with 'Scarface' - Pacino's unforgettable take on the rise and fall of a Cuban drugs lord -a movie Stone worked on as scriptwriter.
    "It was a delight to get back and work with him, " Stone says.
    "He's mellowed quite a bit very few people know the real Al he's very funny he reads he knows current affairs he can talk about anything he has opinions he's a great conversationalist - but he's shy.
    "I wish sometimes he would come out and show the press what he's made of he's not the Godfather.
    "He's a very warm human being.All he cares about is acting that's it he stares at the wall between movies."
    Pacino brings his usual intensity to his character's role in 'Any Given Sunday,' and he needs to, as his 'coach' struggles to cope with the pressures on and on the field.
    Cameron Diaz has dumped the cute rolls to play the tough new team owner - inherited from her father.
    Other tough women fill the movie - including Quarter Back Denis Quaid's wife Lauren Holly.
    "I was criticized," Stone says, about his female characters.
    "The five women in the movie may not be politically correct but they are five real women there will be a Cameron Diaz in five, ten years.
    "Women do go into locker rooms in America and see naked men and men who are ambivalent about women or hypocritical, they'll say she's a bitch but they won't say that about a guy they'll say he's a tough guy they wouldn't call him a bitch or a bastard so if a women acts tough because women do sometimes act tough if you look at the American economy women own more wealth because they're widows."
    'Any Given Sunday' should see James Foxx tackle his way through the 'comers' pack and develop a hugely successful career.
    Pacino was full of admiration for the acting of Foxx, playing the cocky new quarterback 'Willie 'Steaming' Beamen - a role that also saw Foxx contribute to the movie's soundtrack, as his character develops a 'rap star' career off the field.
    Foxx treated a delighted Berlin press corps to a few bars of his rendition of the movie's soundtrack.
    Yardage is everything in gridiron - as the opposing teams struggle to force their way up a hundred yards of track.
    Every inch - literally - counts - a theme oft repeated in the movie.
    Was it a philosophy Foxx related to now? "Oh yes, I think you should look at life like that you blink and you're outta here - one hundred years - one hundred and fifty compared to infinity is nothing make every inch count.
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