Fresh off the release of an extended 12-minute featurette, a new UK trailer and a batch of new images from director Steven Soderbergh’s upcoming Liberace film Behind the Candelaba have landed online.  The plot centers on the tempestuous relationship between the musician (Michael Douglas) and his lover Scott Thorson (Matt Damon) throughout their secretive five-year love affair that began in 1977.  This UK trailer goes deeper into the film’s story, as we see the beginnings of the relationship and start to see some of the great interplay between Douglas and Damon. You can go ahead and wrap up Douglas’ Emmy right about now.

Hit the jump to watch the trailer and to see the new images.  The film also stars Rob Lowe, Debbie Reynolds, Scott Bakula, Dan Aykroyd, Cheyenne Jackson, Paul Reiser, and Boyd Holbrook.  Behind the Candelabra will premiere on HBO on May 26th at 9pm/8c.

HBO has released a new extended featurette for director Steven Soderbergh’s upcoming Liberace film Behind the Candelabra.  The 12-minute video takes us behind-the-scenes of Soderbergh’s possibly final feature film, as we get an intimate look into how the filmmaker crafted his chronicle of the tempestuous relationship between Liberace (Michael Douglas) and his lover Scott Thorson (Matt Damon) throughout their secretive five-year love affair that began in 1977.  Much of the featurette’s focus is on the insane costume and production design of the film, but we also get some footage of Sodbergh operating the camera himself and of a nearly unrecognizable Rob Lowe as Liberace’s plastic surgeon.

Hit the jump to watch the featurette.  The film also stars Debbie Reynolds, Scott Bakula, Dan Aykroyd, Cheyenne Jackson, Paul Reiser, and Boyd Holbrook.  Behind the Candelabra will premiere on HBO on May 26th at 9pm/8c.

Before tonight’s season premiere of Game of Thrones, HBO aired a brief new trailer for Steven Soderbergh‘s ultimate film before retirement, Behind the Candelabra.  The film stars Michael Douglas as the famous musician Liberace and Matt Damon as his lover Scott Thorson.  The story centers on the tempestuous relationship between the two throughout their secretive five-year love affair that began in 1977.  Like the teaser trailer, the tone is fun, but this time we’re getting our first footage from the picture, and I like the look of the flamboyant hair and costumes.

Hit the jump to check out the trailer.  Behind the Candelabra airs on HBO on May 26th at 9/8c.

Writer/director Shane Carruth is one of the more enigmatic filmmakers working today.  After bursting onto the scene with his cerebral Sundance hit Primer in 2004, Carruth seemingly disappeared.  He finally emerged late last year by announcing that he had completed production on his Primer follow-up, Upstream Color, and that film was set to debut at the 2013 Sundance Film Festival.  Those looking for a more straightforward plot with Upstream Color were sorely disappointed, as Carruth crafted a film that was quite possibly even more complex than Primer, but it’s an unendingly fascinating piece of work that requires repeat viewings.

In the interim between the release of Primer and Upstream Color, rumors started to surface about an ambitious sci-fi project that Carruth was working on called A Topiary.  The filmmaker spent years developing the wildly ambitious pic but had trouble gaining financing, and he has seemingly given up getting the project off the ground altogether.  However, in a recent profile on Carruth, some highly intriguing plot details regarding A Topiary have been revealed.  Hit the jump to read on.

HBO has released the teaser trailer for Steven Soderbergh’s final film before retirement, Behind the Candelabra.  The film stars Michael Douglas as the famous musician Liberace and Matt Damon as his lover Scott Thorson.  The story centers on the tempestuous relationship between the two throughout their secretive five-year love affair that began in 1977.  Judging by the teaser trailer, there’s a fairly cheeky tone, which isn’t too surprising when you consider Liberace’s flamboyant personality and charm.

Hit the jump to check out the teaser trailer.  Behind the Candelabra premieres on HBO on May 26th.

This week on The Collision, we look back on Steven Soderbergh‘s career, his style of filmmaking, the variety of his filmography, his appeal, his retirement, and more.  We also talk about his new film, Side Effects.  As always, we finish up with our recommendations.

Click here to listen to the new episode of The Collision, click here for the previous episode (“J.J. Abrams and Star Wars“), click here to add the podcast to your RSS, and click here to find us on iTunes. To keep up to date with The Collision, you can follow us on Twitter at @MattGoldberg, @AdamChitwood, and @DrClawMD (Dave Trumbore). Hit the jump to check out the trailers for this week’s recommendations.

Though much of the Northeast is still drowning under an ocean of snow, Blizzard Nemo didn’t sink the national box office. In first place, Identity Thief took in an estimated $36.5 million, for the highest three-day total so far this year. The R-rated comedy is looking like a solid hit – coming in 40% higher than first projected and 73% higher than Side Effects, the weekend’s only other wide release.

We’ll dedicate more time to this topic after the jump, but in just a few sentences I want to share a quick thought I had while watching Netflix’s House of Cards last weekend. It’s not just that I think the show is great. When you involve talents like Kevin Spacey and David Fincher, it’s hard to imagine a scenario where quality work is in short supply. It’s that this level of material was birthed by and is only consumed via the Internet. I’ve been in debates where the question was whether or not the web would foster an age of amateurs. A future in which the training and dedication required to further perfect one’s craft would fall by the wayside leaving audiences with less than stellar work produced by those made lazy by the eased production and distribution technologies afforded by the Internet. While the fact that I’m writing to a considerable audience today via this site is evidence to that very argument, the overall quality of HOC is a strong rebuttal against those concerned about the quality of entertainment work in a digital age.

All thinking out loud aside, this week’s Top 5 features an editorial response to Disney’s announcement that Star Wars spinoff films are in the works, Side Effects interviews with Steven Soderbergh and more, a word about Hulk’s movie future, Matt’s editorial on Netflix and the affect time shifting has on viewing habits, and the latest news out of The Amazing Spider-Man 2 camp. As you’re probably expecting, a brief recap and link to each waits after the jump.

While Steven Soderbergh has made a number of movies over the past few years, for whatever reason, I’d never had an opportunity to speak with him.  So when I was offered a possible interview for his latest thriller, Side Effects, I sent an email saying I’d like to do it and figured it would never happen.  Thankfully, I was wrong.

At the Los Angeles press day, I was given 45 minutes with Soderbergh (he only does 45-minute interviews), and we talked about a wide variety of subjects like his his post-retirement plans, Twitter, comic book movies, his preferred digital camera, whether digital can ever match IMAX quality, 48fps, the success of Magic Mike and the sequel, his work as second unit director on The Hunger Games, championing Christopher Nolan before the world knew who he was, his filmmaking process, editing while shooting, why he cut 45 minutes out of Contagion and why you’ll probably never see the footage, Kickstarter, and so much more.  If you’re a Soderbergh fan, I promise you’ll dig this interview.  Hit the jump to either read or listen to what he had to say.

With movie theatres closed from New Jersey to Maine, box office watchers expect overall grosses to be down again this weekend. But while Blizzard Nemo battered the East Coast, the rest of the country appeared ready to pick up the slack. Identity Thief, the new comedy from director Seth Gordon, brought in an estimated $11.2 million from its 3,141 locations on Friday. The film, which was expected to take in around $25 million through Sunday, should now come closer to $35 million. Not only is that more than most expected from Identity Thief, it’s also more than Gordon’s last hit, Horrible Bosses, made on its own opening weekend in 2011. The news was not as good for Side Effects, the weekend’s second wide release. Steven Soderbergh’s drama grossed an estimated $2.8 million from 2,605 locations on Friday – far less than the $7.9 million the director earned with 2011′s Contagion.  Check back tomorrow for complete details.

Over the past few days, we’ve been sharing portions of Steve’s recent lengthy interview with director Steven Soderbergh.  The two sat down in anticipation of the filmmaker’s psychological thriller Side Effects, which opens this Friday, but the conversation covered a wide-range of topics.  If all goes according to plan, Side Effects will be Soderbergh’s penultimate feature film, with the HBO Liberace biopic Behind the Candelabra, starring Michael Douglas and Matt Damon, serving as Soderbergh’s last hurrah this summer.

For this final portion of the interview, Soderbergh talks about his plans post-film retirement, painting, his presence on Twitter and how he approaches the social media site, Behind the Candelabra, comic book movies, and he briefly talks about vouching for Joe and Anthony Russo as the directors of Captain America: The Winter Soldier.  Hit the jump to read on.

For better or for ill, we’re living through chemistry.  It is not a new phenomenon, but it is one that has drastically accelerated, and one with dangerous consequences we can’t escape.  Arguably the most dangerous is the field of anti-depressants/anti-anxiety drugs.  These drugs have value, but their effectiveness, and more importantly, their prescription, is always uncertain.  We’re flawed individuals who are asking for psychological help from other flawed people.  Steven Soderbergh‘s Side Effects spends its first-half exploring this fascinating and complicated issue, but in its second-half, the film ceases to explore the mind, and becomes a mind-numbingly idiotic thriller.

Over the past few days, we’ve been sharing bits and pieces from Steve’s recent extended interview with filmmaker Steven Soderbergh.  The two sat down for a 45-minute conversation in anticipation of Soderbergh’s upcoming film Side Effects, which opens this Friday, and they covered a wide range of topics.  In Part 1 we shared what Soderbergh had to say about digital filmmaking, his favorite cameras, and 48 frames per second, then in Part 2 we shared Soderbergh’s thoughts on the success of Magic Mike, the sequel, his second-unit work on The Hunger Games, and how he championed Christopher Nolan to direct Insomina when Warner Bros. was initially unsure about handing this larger-scale movie over to the guy who made Memento.

Today, in Part 3 of the interview, Soderbergh talks about the inception of Side Effects, his filmmaking process, editing while he’s shooting, his attitude regarding deleted scenes, cutting 45 minutes out of Contagion, and more.  Hit the jump to read on, and look for the full interview on Friday.

With director Steven Soderbergh’s latest film, the psychological thriller Side Effects, hitting theaters this coming Friday, the filmmaker has been sitting down for a few interviews as part of the film’s marketing campaign.  This is a curious case, though, because Side Effects also marks Soderbergh’s possibly final theatrically-released film.  As such, said interviews have been more varied than usual, with the filmmaker eager to discuss a multitude of subjects.

Steve recently sat down with Soderbergh for a 45-minute interview, and due to the conversation’s length we’re breaking it up into smaller portions before unveiling the whole thing (read Part 1 here).  Today, in Part 2, Soderbergh talks about the surprising success of Magic Mike, his involvement in Magic Mike 2, the new box office climate of knowing whether your film has succeeded or failed by Friday afternoon, his second-unit work on The Hunger Games, how he championed Christopher Nolan to direct Insomnia when Warner Bros. wasn’t so sure, and more.  Hit the jump to read on.

This year we will see, quite possibly, the final two films from one of the most fascinating and innovative filmmakers of our time: Steven Soderbergh.  The director first burst onto the scene in 1989 with Sex, Lies, and Videotape, and in the following years he became a pioneer of independent cinema.  His filmography is one of joyous variety, and he’s proven skilled at everything from big commercial hits (the Ocean’s trilogy), to serious dramas (Traffic), to comedies (The Informant!), and even small-budget experimental films (Bubble).

Steve recently sat down with Soderbergh for a 45-minute interview in anticipation of his upcoming psychological thriller Side Effects.  As the conversation is both lengthy and absorbing, we’ll be sharing a small portion of the interview each day this week before unveiling the full thing on Friday.  Appropriately, we’re kicking things off with the filmmaker’s thoughts on his preferred digital camera, his thoughts on 48 frames-per-second, whether digital can ever match IMAX quality, what Kickstarter means for today’s burgeoning filmmakers, and more.  Hit the jump to read on.