Entertainment In Brief
Robert Rodriguez happily takes advantage of child labour. Plus, Paper Heart’s puppet actors
All in the Family
You’ll often hear filmmakers say they make movies for their kids, but Robert Rodriguez makes movies with his kids. This month the Texas-born director and father of five — Rocket Valentino, Racer Maximilliano, Rebel Antonio, Rogue Joaquin and daughter Rhiannon Elizabeth — unveils Shorts, a family flick about a group of children who come across a rainbow-coloured space rock that grants wishes.
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Rodriguez on the set of Shorts
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Rodriguez’s 10-year-old son Rebel co-stars as Lug, one of the film’s
kids, and it’s not the first time Rebel has appeared in one of his
dad’s films. He had a cameo in the decidedly adult Planet Terror, and played the very young Sharkboy in The Adventures of Sharkboy and Lavagirl 3-D.
Rebel’s
older brother, Racer, actually inspired Sharkboy. Racer told his dad
about a dream he had starring a superhero who was half-boy/half-shark,
and Rodriguez then asked him to come up with a female co-hero, a
villain and the setting. The film’s credits include the line: “Based on
the stories and dreams of Racer Max.”
And when Rodriguez was making the first Spy Kids
film in 2001, his oldest son Rocket would accompany dad onto the set
and sit alongside him as he directed to offer suggestions and advice.
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But Rodriguez’s most inspired use of his kids on screen had to be in 2002’s Spy Kids 2: Island of Lost Dreams. Worried about whether some of the fight scenes might be too dangerous for his child actors, Rodriguez cast the then six-year-old Rocket and five-year-old Racer as stunt doubles. Rodriguez cheerfully talks about his decision in a 2002 Newsweek article: “I said, ‘Who would let us use their six-year-old as a stunt double?’ And then I said, ‘I would!’”
—Ingrid Randoja
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Artifact
This month’s objet de film
Paper Heart Puppets
In this month’s half-fake documentary Paper Heart,
actor-comedian Charlyne Yi travels across America to interview people
about love (that’s the real part). Along the way, she meets actor
Michael Cera (her long-time, real-life boyfriend) and they begin to
date… awkwardly (the fake part).
Quirky enough
already. Then add the fact that the very real love stories told by Yi’s
very real interviewees are recreated using naïve paper puppets built by
Yi and her dad in their garage. It was Yi’s idea, she wanted to see her
subjects’ love stories unfold, instead of just watching their faces as
they recalled their tales.
The puppet sequences were
blocked and rehearsed, just like any live-action scene would be, before
being shot in a Burbank studio.
—Marni Weisz
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