I have a love/hate relationship with the Weinsteins. For all of the great film work they bring to the universe they also do a great deal of damage on the independent circuit. For some reason, going all the way back to the days of Miramax, they love to buy up the rights to Asian films and either sit on them or hack the shit out of them (earning the name Miramaxe). I recall 2003 being a rather spectacular year for the Weinsteins when they sat on Shaolin Soccer, Hero, and Infernal Affairs. All three films are now considered classics, but Asian film fans were chomping at the bit waiting for the movies to be released stateside.
I’d forgotten about this tendency until the current debacle with remnants of humanity on a train dystopian film Snowpiercer. For nearly a year now I’ve been waiting for the Weinsteins to trust the U.S. audience by releasing Snowpiercer. Much of the reason for the delay is due to typical Weinsteinian fiddling. They wanted to hack the film and make it easily digestible for a US audience and director Bong Joon-ho wasn’t having any of it. Neither side would flinch and the film has languished – until now.
My God, America, can you believe the Weinsteins are going to give you the benefit of the doubt that you might want to see an uncut foreign film? It’s true! Mostly. A tiny handful of theaters around the country are screening Snowpiercer. In San Francisco, the pleasure goes to AMC Metreon 16.
Snowpiercer is based on Jean-Marc Rochette’s graphic novel of the same name. The English translation of the graphic novels were released earlier this year by Titan.
