It’s a happy birthday to Keira Knightley, who turns 22 years old today. I don’t want to hate — really, I don’t — and it’s a totally superficial thing, but when eager-beaver friends ask about seeing celebrities up close, and who’s “hot” and who’s not, Knightley’s is for some reason a name that always pops into my head in the latter category.
Yes, I totally see the Natalie Portman resemblance given the right angles, but — and a certain friend will literally attempt to murder me for saying this — I guess she’s never particularly moved me either. (Maybe it’s that the latter looks too much like my sister.)
To be sure, Knightley is certainly photogenic, and seemingly naturally playful, candid, wittily self-effacing and spunky in a way that many young American actresses so obviously labor at under direction of their cabal of publicists (which Knightley doesn’t have… another reason to love her). I just don’t find her that worth lusting over. Up close the very “Britishness” of her features — larger ears, that intriguing jawline — combine to give off a slightly alien effect. And the skin is frequently airbrushed, though, again, Knightley cops to that, of her own volition.
Wait… this started out as a happy birthday post, right? Jeez, you can tell I don’t write for Hallmark…
Category Archives: Musings
On Selling a Turd
It’s a special art of evasiveness that not all Hollywood stars have, supporting a movie that they know to be a turd. Some are good at it through the sheer forcefulness of their exuberant personalities (John Travolta, for instance, who certainly should have enough practice). Others — in roundtable interviews, say — are able to speak in coded vagaries about how much “fun” they had making the movie. When tangential anecdotes dominate the conversation, a smart interviewer knows it’s by design, not accident.
The TV circuit is another matter, because it’s so much more manageable. Still, Sandra Bullock is not at all convincing in her stumping for Premonition (nor should she be — it’s retarded). On The Daily Show recently she slipped into a bizarre slipstream with host Jon Stewart about their (individual, not shared) experiences with re-shoots, and each joked about smoking pot. Then, last night on The Tonight Show Bullock was lobbed a characteristic softball by Jay Leno — who really still is an awful interviewer, after all these years — about the production of the movie, and she had this to offer: “We shot it in kind of a way where the audience is feeling everything she is too… it’s trippy, [watching it] you feel like you’re going crazy as well.” Now there’s a ringing endorsement!
Short Time’s Car Chase
So a friend sent me this link of the car chase from 1990’s Short Time, starring Dabney Coleman, and it’s true that if you have seven and a half minutes to burn, it’s worth a look — a reminder of the kinetic power of non-CGI-infused chase sequences. The early aerial shots really help sell it, and the hood’s smash of the windshield gave me post-traumatic flashbacks — I had that happen once, at 65mph on a freeway.
I particularly enjoy Matt Frewer’s exclamation of, “Your yogurt!” as well as the varied, repeated uses of the phrase “son of a bitch,” which is the perfect low-grade epithet for this chase. Again, for the YouTube clip, click here.
Underdog: Sigh… Really?
So a couple days ago in the mail I got this promotional calendar for Disney’s Underdog, slated for release August 3, and it elicited a deep sigh. Really? This is what we’ve come to? (Mostly crappy) remakes of every television serial of yesteryear aren’t good enough by themselves, apparently; we also need live action soiling of cartoon properties. I mean, I know the Air Bud franchise has done quite well, but is the name recognition value of Underdog going to help drive this ostensibly like-minded property? Why not just call it Caped Canine or something?
Promising “state-of-the-art CGI visual effects mixed with live action to create stunning visuals,” the film stars Jim Belushi (of course), Peter Dinklage, John Slattery, Patrick Warburton and Brad Garrett, with Jason Lee providing the titular mutt’s voice and Amy Adams voicing his putative love interest, a spaniel named Polly Purebread. And in case you were wondering, yes, there’s a maniacal scientist. It’s an accident in his lab that graces our ordinary beagle with unimaginable powers and the ability to speak. Finally… Underdog’s backstory revealed! Whatever…
Without seeing a frame, I can tell you that this movie is indicative of Hollywood’s backwards-plotted thinking with regards to production. They’d rather churn out almost exclusively carbon copies of previous fare — preferably with some sort of franchise attachment to a videogame or TV show or book, no matter how old, forgotten or cultishly niche said product was in the first place. Because no one really puts their name or reputation on the line for those movies, for movies like Underdog; there’s plausible deniability if it fails, and no shortage of credit if it succeeds. Ergo, no Hollywood suit ever really loses their job, because there aren’t any tough decisions in making these films. In fact, looking at the adventuresome, heroically lit photos of a blank-faced Underdog soaring past international landmarks in this calendar, you almost get the feeling that someone just forgot to say no to this film. And yes, yes, I know it’s “just” a kids’ flick, but still… c’mon.
300 Thoughts
Warner Bros.’ 300, opening March 9, and it looks to be a solid earner. Apart from producer Mark Canton’s amusingly blunt introduction of the movie as “fucking awesome,” and the generally enthusiastic reception of the young, hoodie-sporting masses which rounded out the audience (apparently having redeemed some Mountain Dew bottlecap points or something for admittance), what was most notable about the movie was its mesmeric visual scheme. It’s a storybook come to life — the type of thing that exists in adolescent daydreams.
Comic book fans will go ga-ga over its faithfulness to Frank Miller’s source material, but the film is a straight-ahead butt-kicker through and through, and will likely ring up the sort of audience that 20th Century Fox wished it had pulled in with Ridley Scott’s Kingdom of Heaven, an international hit to the tune of $164 million but a Stateside sputterer at $47 million. 300 skews young, in other words, but its rootedness in air-quote history — it’s based on the infamous story of Sparta’s 480 B.C. defense against an overwhelming Persian invasion — gives it inroads with hipper urban audiences for whom the History Channel represents consistently worthy edu-tainment. Between V for Vendetta and this, Warner Bros. is proving a most welcome and efficient home for artistically-toned graphic novel adaptations.
Also, a happy birthday shout-out to Amber Valletta, who turns 33 today. Amber, even as an ex-model, you were entirely credible as the object of Kevin James’ affection in Hitch, so much so that one is actually borderline-intrigued with regards to your participation in Saw helmer James Wan’s next picture, Dead Silence.
Tara Reid Takes a Tumble
Trying to put together the pieces of her adrift career, she took a red carpet tumble at a party/concert in Miami Beach on Saturday evening, in advance of Sunday’s Super Bowl. This Showbuzz/CBS piece gives a pretty comprehensive (and eviscerating) recap of her recent troubles and bad pub, but the sadly hilarious apex comes when Reid describes — in quotes from an October 2006 interview in US Weekly — a bout of “body contouring” gone bad, amazingly enough at the hands of the same surgeon who botched her boob job. Says Reid of her stomach: “[It was] the most ripply, bulgy thing …As a result, I couldn’t wear a bikini. I lost a lot of work.” Umm, sweetheart, I hate to break this to you, but it wasn’t just because you couldn’t wear a bikini that you lost a lot of work…
Wookie Street Performer Goes Nuts
So a man, Frederick Evan Young, dressed as Chewbacca from the Star Wars movies was arrested this past week for allegedly head-butting a tour guide operator in front of Grauman’s Chinese Theater, it’s being reported by Showbuzz/CBS. Even better? When initially asked to stop harassing two young Japanese tourists for money, he supposedly exploded and said, “Nobody tells this wookie what to do,” which I guess is the catch-all, let’s-throw-down loser phrase for Star Wars fans clad as Chewbacca, much like “Do you know who I am?” for celebrities, and “You think you’re better than me?” for drunks and/or rednecks.
I’ve lived in Los Angeles a decade now, and some of these characters — performers is too generous a designation, actually — are the saddest thing around. There are a few skilled mimics or upbeat folks, shaking hands and bringing awe to little kids. But mostly it’s a bitter bunch, these people who stand around in frequently natty costumes, shilling for money. And I have seen some of them react angrily when not compensated for a picture (the origin of this incident), even of the hasty, non-posed variety. It can be aggro panhandling, with capes, boots and the like.
So nice going Frederick. Like hardcore Star Wars devotees didn’t have to catch enough crap without you giving people grade-A bulletin board material like this.
On Film Touts and Self-Mockery
Another tangential thought on film credits and touts — hitching a movie’s prospects to the pedigree of its writers, producers or director is certainly nothing new. It’s almost as old as the movie business itself. But making fun of the filmmakers’ prior credits in self-effacing, post-modern fashion is becoming seemingly the latest trend in movie marketing.
Jason Friedberg and Aaron Seltzer helped kickstart the development last year, with Date Movie, which was billed as “from two of the six writers of Scary Movie.” This was a canny realization of the opening paragraphs of any number of hack critical savagings, and a preemptive strike against the same. It took the piss out of the pooh-poohing, in other words; the film went on to gross almost $50 million Stateside and another $35 million abroad. Follow-up Epic Movie — a scatalogical recapitulation of scenes from other recent genre films, plus random digs at Paris Hilton and a rip-off of Saturday Night Live‘s “Lazy Sunday” sketch thrown in for good measure — opened atop the box office at $18.6 million last week, auguring good things for this trend of promotional self-mockery.
March’s Aqua Teen Hunger Force Colon Movie Film for Theaters, meanwhile, raises the bar even further. The trailer for the feature-length adaptation of the “Adult Swim” cartoon bills
itself as “from the first assistant director of the 2nd unit of Hellraiser
III: Hell on Earth.” It’s not bullshit, either. That would be co-writer-director Matt Maiellaro.
On Wild Hogs’ Billing
Wild Hogs, opening March 2. Billed as being about four guys from the ‘burbs hitting the open road, the film’s poster touts stars Tim Allen, John Travolta, Martin Lawrence and William H. Macy, in that order.
Now I know that Travolta has sullied his overall box office average (and sometimes reputation) by appearing in a fair amount of crap. And he’s also shown an occasional willingness to cede top-spot billing; in Ladder 49 to Joaquin Phoenix, for instance, and in Mad City to Dustin Hoffman. (On the other hand, he’s also taken top billing in a few films in which he wasn’t the lead, including A Love Song for Bobby Long.) But second billing to Tim Allen? Allen hasn’t had a live action hit outside of the Santa Clause franchise and, arguably, the utterly forgettable Christmas with the Kranks and the admittedly brilliant Galaxy Quest, which each grossed just over $70 million in their respective holiday frames. Is Wild Hogs‘ billing a sign of Travolta’s slippage, a concession/nod to Allen’s (perceived) appeal to the “Bubba crowd” — via his long-running sitcom Home Improvement — that would putatively support a motorcycle flick, or both? Probably more of the latter, but all I know is that the public at large has had their referendum on Allen as a robust, leading man movie star (e.g., For Richer or Poorer, Joe Somebody, Big Trouble), and they’ve shrugged their shoulders, saying, essentially, “Ehh, he’s fine for the kids, I guess.” I’m still baffled, but I’ll chalk this one up to Travolta’s magnanimity, I guess.
On The Number 23 Poster
The Mask, Me, Myself & Irene and Liar, Liar to the teaser art for Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind and the famous micro-collage that comprised of The Truman Show. So on the one hand, the above poster for The Number 23, opening February 23 from New Line, isn’t at all surprising. The studio is selling their chief asset, which is Carrey.
But audiences have shown a certain resistance to Carrey in darker and/or melancholic roles (no news flash there), and while this one-sheet effectively hints at the film’s R rating and conveys the surging paranoia that overtakes his character in the movie, it’s emphasis on bleak obsession and cryptic symbology sells short the movie’s investigative aspects, which actually may represent an easier path to filmgoers’ wallets. I like the image itself — the slightly agape mouth somewhat mitigating Carrey’s glazed, killer’s stare — but when I look at that poster, the three movies I for some reason quickly think of, in no particular order, are The Grudge, Conspiracy Theory and, believe it or not, The Cable Guy. If The Number 23 underperforms, expect the typical boobirds to come out (however undeservedly) regarding Carrey’s dramatic efforts, and the advisability of selling such a film chiefly on his visage.
I Call Bullshit on Architects…
You know what I’m really tired of? Friggin’ architects. I
mean, does anyone out there really know an architect? And before you say, “You’re so full of shit, Brent. My dad’s actually
an architect,” is this the same father that lives in a neighboring state but
hasn’t seen you in 12 years, and once told your mother to “give you a cut” of
his monthly alimony check for your Christmas gift? I rest my case. Dude is
probably not an architect. “Pharmaceuticals redistribution manager” is more
like it…
Not to be impolite, but architect is one of those
bullshit jobs that Hollywood screenwriters seem to lazily trot out when they need some hot-shit occupation to
attach to a desirable young guy who, golly gee, at his core really wants to settle down and
have a family, or is already a nice young family man. When lawyer has a bit too much of a negative occupational
connotation for your protagonist, doctor is a bit too pointy-headed, and
advertising executive is a bit too in danger of puncturing the movie’s
entertainment value, architect is seemingly settled upon as the perfect
white-collar big screen job (see Adam Sandler in Click, Luke Wilson in My
Super Ex-Girlfriend, et al). It’s professional and lucrative — even vaguely
scholastic — but its day-to-day specifics seem to dance beyond our
intellectual grasp, and you never see any one of these characters do something related to their job except maybe deliver a passing line of dialogue about the “sleek angles” or open spaces of an area. If you believed the movies and television, 75 percent
of us are cops, lawyers, doctors, forensics investigators and architects.
week’s Because I Said So, in which Tom
Everett Scott’s somewhat rakish, entrepreneurial architect competes for Mandy
Moore’s affection with a guitar player played by Gabriel Macht. He easily wins
over
but the moment he reveals his occupation, you know that he’s a shit-heel in
waiting. Well… because of how that occupation doesn’t jibe with Moore’s
creative catering business, as well as the fact that he answered a mother’s
personal ad for her daughter, went along with contrived meeting with said
daughter, entered into relationship with said daughter, and never saw fit to
tell said daughter about the truth behind their meeting… though of course he (sort
of) tells his own mother. Idiot
architect…
On Cell Phone Insert Shots
So I caught Catch and Release for review last week, and it triggered another big screen irritation with insert shots for the lowest common denominator. A week after his death, after she’s already discovered a secret bank account with a hefty balance, there’s a point in the film where Jennifer Garner’s bereaved Gray comes across her deceased fiancé’s cell phone, and further cements the discovery that she didn’t know quite everything
she thought she did about him. Someone was calling late at night, you see; “10 missed calls,” reads the cell phone.
So eventually (which is to say, the next scene, the following day) Gray has to try to call this person back. We see her fiddling with the established cell phone, obviously to pull up the number to call. She then dials from her office phone. Instead of conveying this with one shot, though, director Susannah Grant gives us another look at “10 missed calls,” with Gray scrolling to the number. Why 10? Well, so there’s a full screen of the same number, of course, so there’s no possible confusion about what’s going on, even though the answering machine message that Gray reaches on the other end matches the voice of the messages she’s already listened to on her fiancé’s phone. Thanks Hollywood, thanks a lot. What a money shot. If you’re not engaged enough in the movie to pick up on and follow a simple detail like this, you’re an idiot. And don’t tell me this was for the technology-impaired, over-60 set. Is that Catch and Release‘s core audience?
Little Miss Sunshine: “We Can’t Handle the Truth”
Oscarwatch.com’s Sasha Stone pretty much nails part of the main reason for Little Miss Sunshine‘s popular groundswell of support when she points out the film’s rootedness in idealism in these turbulent times, and its contrast in this manner to the rest of the nominees. Still, while I’d agree with her analysis in respect to the film’s nomination, I’m not yet officially 100% sure this can be extended to a hypothesis that foretells a victory. Best Picture Oscar winners whose directors aren’t at least same-nominated for Academy Awards are few and far between.
But again, Little Miss Sunshine carries the impression of weight or substance, and it’s all pitched in such a heightened fashion as to make audiences feel both that their lives aren’t quite as screwy and/or depressing, and that there’s a profundity at its core. This is why many folks who don’t typically bite on traditional comedies really like the movie. And Fox Searchlight has run a very smart, shrewd awards campaign. So in the end it doesn’t matter that the seams of its story show, or that the characters are willfully colorful responses to the
sort of stale, cardboard characters we see in many broadly pitched,
mainstream comedies — atypical, therefore, but just as flatly
two-dimensional and in blind service to the contrivances of plot as
their less original contemporaries. No, Little Miss Sunshine is beloved because we all want to believe in goodness. It would be interesting to ponder the film’s reception, though, in a parallel universe in which the disasterous quagmire of the Iraq War didn’t exist.
On The Amateurs, Now Moguls
For several years, when I was editor-in-chief at the Los Angeles paper Entertainment Today, the venerable Brad Schreiber covered the Palm Springs International Film Festival for us in his bi-weekly column, Development Hell, and did a slam-bang job, it’s worth mentioning.
Two
hours from the city, the Palm Springs Festival has earned its international status by way of including the majority of films
offered up for nomination for the Best Foreign Film Oscar at the Academy Awards. This year’s festival, its 18th incarnation, screened 254 films from 74 countries, and offered plenty of star-gazing into the clear, desert night sky, as well as at its
annual awards gala, where honorees included Sydney Pollack, Kate Winslet, Todd Field, Cate Blanchett, composer Philip Glass and Babel director Alejandro
Gonzalez Inarritu.
Schreiber caught over 30 films, but it was his thoughts on writer-director Michael Traeger’s The Amateurs, which has since been retitled The Moguls, that caught my eye. This film has had its own hellish post-development track, well chronicled, but this was my first run-in with someone who’d seen it firsthand, in completed form. To wit, Schreiber’s review, redacted below:
“Perhaps
it is not surprising that the release of The Amateurs has been long in
the making. It is, after all, a sweet comedy about pornography and its premise
is enough to melt the synapses of your average filmgoer. To be honest, we in
America have a strong puritanical streak, despite the accessibility of adult
entertainment and its remunerative power.
It
is just that financial lure that guides loveable loser Andy Sargentee (Jeff
Bridges) to hit upon the idea of gathering a group of friends in the bucolic
town of Butterfield Faces to make a blue movie and cash in. Andy’s ex Thelma
(Jeanne Tripplehorn) bears his lack of money, discipline and goals, even when he
shows up to give their son a basketball, one that Andy pretends, unsuccessfully,
is signed by Michael Jordan.
Andy is
good-natured. But he just seems incapable of doing anything. He brings in on his
scheme his closeted gay friend Moose (Ted Danson), nerdy locals Barney
Macklehatton (Tim Blake Nelson) and Otis (William Fichtner), who claims he just
wants to watch, and thus, is made an executive producer. There’s lovelorn Helen Tatelbaum (Glenne Headley),
cinematographer Emmett (Patrick Fugit) and Some Idiot (Joe Pantoliano) who is
writing the script, such as it is. “Hollywood has a lot of people like me,” he
trumpets, “who are multi-gifted.”
The
wrong vernacular is the least of their troubles. Learning it is not enough to
simply get a group to pony up $2,000 apiece, Andy has to entice two girls
working at a fast food restaurant and then a few black guys who he assumes are
well-endowed. This reverse-racism results in a shockingly funny argument in a
café and The Amateurs, written and directed by Michael Traeger, certainly
has its charms in portraying the doltish production of a porn flick into goofy
fun, rather than a seamy indictment of society’s underbelly. Pantoliano is
hilarious in his conviction as a great screenwriter and artist and sad sack
Bridges is priceless when reading aloud narrative like, “Boris gives it to
Bianca in the butt as she defuses the bomb.”
The
film is not without its moments best left on a cutting room floor, including a
final product that looks a lot better than it would have, based on the group’s
ineptitude. Talented performers like Headley and Lauren Graham are
underutilized. And there’s a feel-good ending that pushes our acceptance of this
whole porno-as-empowerment premise. But Bridges, as always, is an actor who
provides not only believability but a cohesiveness. He struggles to put into
words his benevolence when he tells his collaborators, earnestly, touchingly, “I’ll give anything if someone can get some destiny from this.” And there is
something very desirable about wholesome, smalltown folks who refuse to see
anything wrong with filming sex in their local Softy Freeze.”
For more of Schreiber’s writing, check out his site, A Critical Moment, by clicking here.
The Scars of Oscars
Nikki Finke’s piece in L.A. Weekly, “The Scars of Oscars,” correctly assays that Hollywood is agenda driven, and awards circuit voting is as often about the demerits of certain films as all the positive aspects, but I’m not sure that it correctly pinpoints the reason for Dreamgirls‘ demise, if that can be said of a film with eight Oscar nominations.
Finke blames things on Hollywood jealousy of producer David Geffen, and reasons, “Individually, none of the Oscar voters would dare take on David. But there’s safety in numbers, so they figure, what the hell.” I’m not buying. I think it was simply a case of that film being outpaced in the home stretch. Babel had multi-culti support, and could be both a sociopolitical statement as much as an artistic one, at least in the minds of voters. Widely embraced by both critics groups and audiences predisposed to respectively attend, The Queen and The Departed (the latter despite a weak campaign) were too good to ignore, and the shrewdly marketed Little Miss Sunshine was easily slotted as this year’s indie darling/belle of the ball, a la The Full Monty. The remaining slot, then, came down to a resurgent Clint Eastwood’s Letter from Iwo Jima — would it be too of a piece, sociopolitically speaking, with Babel? — and Dreamgirls. The fact is, on the latter, there was simply a lot of noise about there not being enough substance, enough “movie,” in the last third of the film. It didn’t stick with you. And while Letters might not either, except for Ken Wantanabe’s performance, in a nomination dogfight, you can’t bet against the war movie. Maybe some voters resented the manner in which the film was being rammed down their collective throats as a breathless inevitability (I’m sure all the right restaurants were booked for celebratory lunches), but I don’t think that’s necessarily a David Geffen problem. That’s a hype > reality problem…
Forest Whitaker Exhales
I caught Forest Whitaker on The Late Show last night (gracias, TiVo!), and he certainly seems more at ease now than maybe I’ve ever seen him before. He’s always been a soft-spoken, very reserved guy, but it’s obvious that there was at least some tenseness or trepidation leading up to the Oscar nominations themselves. I’d had a chance to talk with Whitaker a few times with regards to The Last King of Scotland, both at its proper press day and since, and at any sort of mention of a positive reception to or surprise at his performance in relation to his persona, he would always “turtle.” It helped, certainly, chatting to the much more low-key, relaxed David Letterman — who exudes a naturalness that Jay Leno still can’t match — as well as the fact that Whitaker was rehashing stories he’s told a thousand times or more now. Still, it’s nice to see him seeming to enjoy the whole Academy Awards “ride,” and all the praise coming his way after a career of some very notable work.
Ewan McGregor as Kurt Cobain?
including Virgin.net, are reporting that Ewan McGregor — who memorably launched into song in Moulin Rouge — will likely be tapped to headline an eventual biopic about late Nirvana frontman Kurt Cobain, who committed suicide in 1994 at the age of 27. Cobain’s ex-wife, embattled rocker/actress/rehab-and-courtroom mainstay Courtney Love, has optioned the rights to Charles Cross’ biography, Heavier than Heaven, and is reportedly a big fan of the actor.
Usually I’m various shades of indifferent to casting news, but this strikes me as spot-on. McGregor has just the right deep baby blues and, when harnessed, stare of wounded, moody estrangement. Wipe that smile off his face (above) and slap Cobain’s dyed-blonde ‘do on him, and the mere surface resemblance already seems uncanny, without a word out of his mouth. His casting would actually get me jazzed about a Cobain biopic. The other crucial choice: the right director, one who wouldn’t pander to more prosaic instincts to overly indulge the grunge scene and deify Cobain as a sensitive, misunderstood artist corrupted by events and circumstances beyond his power. Well, that and the script, of course…
On Chasing Ghosts
A friend sent me this link to Roger Moore’s piece in the Orlando Sentinel, about the Sundance doc Chasing Ghosts, and I have to say… it sounds kinda awesome. I’m a sucker for looks back at optimism and naivety through the busted lens of melancholic maturation, and the use of the superb Dogtown and Z-Boys as a sort of leaping-off reference point is shrewd and spot-on. (Michael Apted’s Up series, meanwhile… not so much.) Still, if this flick gathers indie cool cachet like there’s every reason to believe it will, are we going to have to sit through a masturbatory procession of explorations of every fringe American adolescent pastime?
On Newsweek’s Oscar Roundtable
annual Oscar roundtable, but this year they were forced to submit to a live audience of ticket buyers — a potential antidote for candor if ever there was one — at the Egyptian Theatre in Hollywood.
That said, the above awards contenders still had some fun during the two-hour session; celebs talking amongst themselves is the new black. Among the confessions? “We’re all in it for the free food,” jokes Helen Mirren. Cate Blanchett, meanwhile, got in a nice, tangential Battlefield Earth dig, which makes me wonder… did she really watch the movie? I mean, when she and husband Andrew Upton were making it a Blockbuster night, did someone actually pick that up? For the entire Oscar roundtable, click here.
Razzie Nominations Announced
The final nods are in for the 27th annual Razzie Awards, and while these anti-Oscars are always generally more about celeb-slagging than actually rooting out the worst of the year in film, it’s telling, isn’t it, that Sylvester Stallone’s Rocky Balboa rated no nomination. That’s its own sort of high achievement, actually — a sign of respect for its accomplishments and solid critical notices.
In case anyone’s keeping score, in a very crowded field, the nominees for Worst Film of the Year are BloodRayne, Basic Instinct 2, Little Man, Material Girls and Lady in the Water. (Jessica Simpson got some love, too, unsurprisingly — though there’s little doubt that she could never top Halle Berry’s acceptance speech for Catwoman.)
All things considered, that’s a nicely diverse slate of lowbrow fare, adult-pitched hooey and technical ineptitude. Somehow I became a member of the Razzie’s “nominating body” (I use that phrase very loosely — mailing list is more like it) many years ago, and I actually do put some thought into their painstakingly open-ended ballots, so it’s heartening to see a spread of films that trends away from at least some of the easier big targets. For more on the Razzies, click here.
Onward, Slagging of Sundance!
David Lynch, above, who turns 61 years old today.
Meanwhile, though I’m chained to a desk in Los Angeles, it’s the second day of the Sundance Film Festival, and the inevitable trickle of the usual “worst year ever?” pieces has started. The latest is from Movie City News’ David Poland, though it does stoop to include a bit of backhanded friendliness and credit. One thing’s for sure: Grace Is Gone does sound like a snug fit for John Cusack, who never met an interview he couldn’t dispassionately grind his teeth through. (If you want to get him to open up, try asking about the Cubs — sometimes it works, sometimes not.) The film is about an emotionally detached father who loses his wife in the Iraq War, and goes on a roadie with his two daughters. Word is that the Weinstein Company is circling as a potential distributor…
Tara Reid… Honestly?
I don’t know where to begin with this item from The Hollywood Reporter, about Tara Reid being attached to star in and executive produce the indie romantic comedy Honestly. I mean, anyone who’s seen Alone in the Dark can attest to the fact that Reid can deliver laughs, and she did fit in OK on the small screen in Scrubs back when that show was still putting Zach Braff through the comedic ringer, before it had devolved into a gooey send-off.
No, Tara Reid starring in a comedy about a hard-boiled private eye who works as a temptress to out philandering husbands is fine, even though you and I already know she will not get naked in the movie, and her hard-boiledness will be conveyed by… what, a cute scene where she finds a missing dog? What really caught my eye, though, is that Reid’s brother Tommy is set to direct the film. This shouldn’t irritate me, but it does. Especially when interesting filmmakers with idiosyncratic voices like Lisa Cholodenko have trouble getting movies off the ground, not to mention solid for-hire comedy directors like Tamra Davis and Betty Thomas.
Also of note — that thick-necked Guy Ritchie pal Vinnie Jones and former NFL running back Eddie George have been inked to co-star in the film. (Honestly, what kind of movie is this? Zing!) Oh, and that Tara Reid… has a production company.
So… Babel, Huh?
So… Babel, huh? The continent-sprawling picture’s Golden Globe victory last night for Best Motion Picture in the Drama category ran counter to much Internet speculation, certainly, but also probably put the final nail in the coffin with respect to Children of Men‘s chances for sneaking in the back door and snatching some sort of significant Oscar nominations.
Meanwhile, the film critics of Los Angeles — which in the collective L.A. Weekly poll gave director Alejandro González Iñárritu’s movie more votes for Worst Film of the Year than Top 10 consideration, and placed it outside the Top 50, behind both Superman Returns and Jackass Number Two — are likely bitching or shaking their heads today, or both. Me, I’m shrugging. It is what it is — a good movie, about what I expected, wrapped loosely around Iñárritu’s typical “chaos theory” narrative gimmicky. Amongst some fine acting it was Riko Kikuchi who for me stood out as quite good, but at 142 minutes there are large swatches of sluggishness, and not quite enough payoff. I do dig Gustavo Santaolalla’s eerie score, though, even if my girlfriend would arch her brow at that one.
Still, the Best Picture Oscar nominees look to be, what — Babel, The Departed, Dreamgirls, Little Miss Sunshine and The Queen, right? I’d place Babel squarely in the middle of that pack, so another surprise victory on Oscar night wouldn’t have me reaching for the razorblades or anything…
Foreign Language Nominee Division of Labor
So what exactly was the deal, in announcing the Golden Globe nominees for Best Foreign Language Film, with sticking the somewhat rather thickly accented Djimon Hounsou with the directors of Volver, Pan’s Labyrinth and The Lives of Others — meaning he had to pronounce, in quick succession, the names of Pedro Almodovar, Guillermo del Toro and Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck — while co-presenter Sharon Stone got to namecheck… Clint Eastwood and Mel Gibson. Was that a desire to get everyone to lean forward in their seats, or a reflection of someone’s consideration that perhaps Hounsou would be more sober than Stone?
Eastwood’s Confidence, Scorsese’s Bowels
Props to Clint Eastwood’s “This does wonders for my confidence” crack
— echoing Best Supporting Actress winner Jennifer Hudson’s remarks
from earlier in the evening — upon receiving the Best Foreign Language
Golden Globe for Letters from Iwo Jima. When he said that, Martin Scorsese no doubt laughed weakly and crapped his pants.
I still think Scorsese has the directorial prize sewn up tonight, and is far better shape to trump Eastwood and (finally) score his long-coveted Best Director Academy Award. In The Departed, he’s got the stronger film. Look for a bulge in the back of his pants, though, when he waddles up on stage…