Friends and followers, few that they may be...

I've stopped attempting to sound smart about the industry.

But over here, I attempt to sound smart about all sorts of things... sort of.

RIP Mr Lumet, and Thank You.

To say that Sidney Lumet helped shape the American film scene would be a bold understatement. But I can really only speak to how he impacted my love of film, particularly the 70's era, and how his style and unabashed quality has influenced my own efforts in this lazy, crazy town.

When I was in boarding school, in the 80's, I was terribly out of touch with culture & pop culture all those elements that help shape your life in the upcoming, post adolescent years. I think all of us, in that tiny school on a tiny mountain in tiny Vermont, could say the same thing. We were sort of stuck in the low heat dryer cycle of  The Grateful Dead, Led Zeppelin and a late 60's ideology. No complaints but when it came to what was happening in the world outside our oasis, we were lost. 

Watching movies meant finding a teacher that had a VCR and somehow finding a movie to put in it. There was a copy of Ferris Beuller's Day Off that someone had taped off the television. I brought a copy of Stand By Me. And then, when I was in 11th grade and they installed a TV and VCR in the school-wide common area, I discovered Apocalypse Now. Well, to say I discovered it sort of an overstatement. It was the only tape around. Except Josh Somebody's skateboarding movies. I think every Saturday night for a year we would gather there and watch as Martin Sheen struggled with his demons and confronted Marlon Brando's. Needless to say, this was before you could call up every known fact about the making of a film and discuss until you passed out. All we really knew was that it was loosely based on the book "Heart of Darkness", which most of us had recently read. I also knew that the director was a producer (though I didn't know what that meant) of "The Black Stallion", without a doubt my most favorite film up to that point.

So, as I gently opened my eyes to the power and influence of film I became thirsty for more of it that strayed from the beaten path. I just couldn't find those films in that part of the world. I had to move a mountain to get some teaching intern to take me to see the latest River Phoenix movie at a theatre almost an hour away. And I had no idea how that effort would change my life.

The film was Sidney Lumet's "Running on Empty". I knew nothing about it, save for it starring the lovely, doe-eyed River. That was enough for me. But I knew I was in for something totally different when the opening credits came on (one long shot of the yellow lines down the center of a country road at night) and the music seemed a little more mournful than typical Hollywood fare. What followed was, as everyone surely knows by now, a fantastic exploration of a family trying to live a normal life when their ideals have cost them the ability to exist in a "normal" sphere. I was struck by the notion of family, sacrifice and a love so strong that you can let someone go. Not to mention River Phoenix!

The following weekend there was an article about Mr. Lumet in the New York Times, which I stumbled across at the local general store. Not having any cash, I stole the Arts section and scurried back to campus. I kept that article for years. It helped define my adoration of film. I was hotly desperate to get my hands on these movies. I begged the general store to order Dog Day Afternoon and Network, to no avail. So I waited for Spring Break when I could raid the local video store. 

(That video store and it's influence on me could be it's own post. Not to mention that one of it's employees asked me out on my first date, thinking I was in college and then promptly took me home when he learned I was only 16.)

Sidney Lumet introduced me to the quality and terrific subversiveness of movies made during, what I consider the greatest decade of filmmaking, the 1970's. Even when I went to graduate school a few years ago, the thrill of one of my professors having been the screenwriter of Dog Day Afternoon was weirdly child-like. I actually got nervous around him. 

So today is a sad day for the film community, but it's a joyous moment to remember someone without whom the cinematic landscape, in it's ideal iteration, would be as evolved as it is. 

How Best To Enjoy Your Movie Theater Experience or Why The Arclight Is The Only Game In Town

There are very few things as exhilarating to me as seeing an awesome movie in the theater. And I don't mean some Michael Bay crap. I mean movies like Blue Valentine or Fishtank or The Bourne Identity. But by that measure, there a fewer things worse than seeing a bad movie. In fact, I won't tolerate it. In the last four years I've developed a serious reputation for walking out of movies. So much so that if I'm even slightly concerned that a movie won't interest me, I probably won't go see it unless it's playing at the local luxury theater that comes equipped with a bookstore, a restaurant and a bar (!). If I'm on my own, and I love to indulge in a movie by myself, it's fine... but when you are with friends there is pressure to stay for the whole thing, if for no other reason than to discuss its flaws in the post-show recap. That's where the bar / restaurant comes in handy, I'm far less bored watching people and sipping a glass of wine than being subjected to a film that bores me or falls short of quality entertainment because of it's smug attitude - a movie that seems to say "I've got Angelina Jolie and Johnny Depp all up in me, you're going to love me even though my script is half-written and I'm not what I've sold myself to be".

That brings me to this past weekend where I managed to walk out of, not one, but TWO movies in the space of 24 hours. 

Now, granted, I was skeptical about both of them from the start. But I'm generally a skeptical person and I've been won over by many movies that I was lukewarm about when buying my ticket. So Friday afternoon, after a nice pitcher of New Orleans beer at the Farmer's Market with my friend Sandra (whom I was happily distracting from her dissertation), we decided to check out The Adjustment Bureau.

I'm no dummy. I'd heard solidly mixed reviews about this one. But also enough interesting things to think that it could well be worth my time. I don't mind Matt Damon and I love Emily Blunt, and that always helps... Well, this movie commits cinematic and story crimes for which it should be all kinds of punished - so much so that I was forced to sigh loudly in an obnoxious manner before, finally, getting the nerve up to ask Sandra if she was enjoying it. Thank god she said no. Freedom, fresh air and a beautiful L.A. day were waiting.

Here's my main quandary with a movie like this... where is the story? An hour in, I gots to have me some story! And I truly think the meet-cute-in-a-bathroom-and-fall-in-love-forever notion is played. Better. And there are some truly insipid details like.... a young, attractive New York state congressman wanders around on his own constantly, unnoticed by onlookers, unattended to by staffers? Do I know so little about state government that this seems impossible? (My former father-in-law is a lawyer and lobbyist for the state of Virginia and we couldn't go anywhere without a zillion people coming up to us. And that was Virginia. I don't think a zillion people even live there.) And all of this nonsense had nothing to do with the central theme of the movie, which I THINK was about how a group of magical people, one of whom being the yummy Anthony Mackie, control everyone's fate to their own benefit. So, undoubtedly, after we left Matt and Emily go on a wild goose chase to escape their "adjusted" fates, blah blah blah. 

So, really, what we're talking about here is someone's cheap and underdeveloped rehash of a notion the Mr. Nolan was exploring in Inception. The difference being, Inception was interesting and engaging - if also downright confounding. And I don't really blame the director, I have to blame the screenwriter and whoever saw this through development. But that's a conundrum because George Nolfi wrote AND directed this and it's his directorial debut. Which leads me to a whole other diatribe about skilled screenwriters turning in to shit directors. But I'll save that for later... Suffice it to say, most often there is a great collaborative process between the director and the screenwriter in the wake of selling a script and then producing that script. In the best case scenario, the product rises out of its paper and becomes what an audience is attracted to. But often, seasoned and skilled screenwriters (which Mr. Nolfi certainly is) fail to maintain any objectivity when they are reworking their own material for their own purpose. Especially when you involve countless producers, development execs and a very big star.

And then there was Saturday. Which begs to point out a horrible snafu that seems to happen around big box office-y types. 

In The Lincoln Lawyer, Matthew McConaughey plays a battle ready, rode hard defense attorney who is attracted to the worst kind of cases. But he's a Really Nice Guy. When the driver of his Lincoln, oh heee heee hee, asks what he'll be doing after M. McC. gets his driver's license back, Matthew responds with "I've had it back for 3 months now"... clearly he loves his astute black driver whose wisdom surely comes into play after I was forced to leave the movie.

Basically, what starts out as a brisk-ish, entertaining judicial mystery suddenly, in the early part of the second act, throws it's red-herring out the window, it's cards on table and devolves into a morality tale. Well, that's about all I can handle. You just don't switch horses mid-race. 

Looking back at these two most recent walkouts, I realize that I should have known better. But we all get sucked up by the Hollywood Hellcat Machine. Why didn't I go see Win Win? When will Putty Hill open here? Or do I just succumb to the On Demand / Redbox / Netflix / Pirate Bay way of life and see things on the small (or largish) screen at home. Hmmmm... let me think, um, NEVER!

How To Succeed in Business by, Perhaps, Over-Extending Yourself...

I had been planning to write a post-Oscars piece. I was halfway through with it, in fact. But let's face it, that show was (as a friend said once) "a bloodcurdling joke".

I am not even sure it bears going into the train wreck that it was. Except, that most of the burden of blame falls on my handsome boy-hero, Mr. J. Franco. As much as I am tepid about Miss A. Hathaway, she did her best against the static, stuck-up, void that was James. I was kind of waiting for him to break in to hysterical giggles and yell "cut" and say "sorry, sorry, sorry, that was all a big haha - now on with the real show!".

Was his "hosting" really a performance piece? Will it come out in the future that it was part of some of his ever expanding body of art work? Let's hope some good can come from this, I don't need to lose respect for another actor, few of whom I have anything but blah to think of when they cross my sight.

Let's be real, acting is a tough job. Even when it's done with mediocrity. As anyone that's worked or sat on a film set knows, nothing about anyone's job there is easy. Forty people (minimum) with jobs that are as important to them as the actor's is to him or her. The main behind-the-scenes big wigs with egos the size of Alaska. I mean, we've all heard the Christian Bale rant. And I can tell you that most of the people in the biz were not that surprised. My reaction was what the hell was up with that idiotic DP crossing Bale's eye-line? That is a mortal sin on set. Something that even the lowest members of the totem pole know not to do. But what Bale highlighted, in that expletive-rich love letter in defense of actors everywhere, was that film sets are tense places. And acting is a tough job.

But you know what's harder? Getting your PhD. You know what's harder than that? Getting your PhD from Yale. 

Monday morning after the Oscars, and I mean 9:30AM not 11:59AM, our James was in class in New Haven. Studying Medieval manuscripts. 

And you know what he was doing the night before the Oscars? Attending the opening of his latest artwork. A 100 minute film he cut from the out-takes of the cult classic (and I don't throw that term around lightly), "My Own Private Idaho" - which is, essentially, an ersatz study of the late, intensely missed, River Phoenix. (And as an editor, I have to say... that's one hell of a job.) 

So, I wonder about JF, sometimes. Is he scrambling to put his mark on the world? Perhaps, make so many marks that he can not possibly be forgotten? Is he really, stupendously ADD? Is he so gifted that we barely deserve to have him count among our plebeian population? 

Well, as one of my daily morning interweb readings told me today "Be More Fucking Productive". So, I'll take a page from James. But I won't host the Oscars, sorry.

That Is So Meta!!

First, and (really) most importantly, we must discuss the latest James Franco stunt-extraordinaire. My very close friend, who is hard at work on her PHD, happened to be watching General Hospital the other day (I know, I know, I had the same question) wherein the illustrious Mr. Franco appeared in full tux regalia, reprising his role of "Franco" the serial killer. He sat alone in an office, surrounded by semi-nude "self-portraits", talking on the phone to a friend (lover?) and fellow serial-killer, Jason Morgan. He mentions that he has to go to an "important event"... hmmmm. Because that's what he gets for spending his spring between a "rock and a hard place"... hmmmm. But he does "hate cliches". Wow. I mean WOW. Does it get more meta than that? Can we count the layers?

So, let's move on to meta-data... 

I realize that not many peeps will be peeping this before tuning in to the Oscars(TM) on ABC(TM) at 8pm EST / 5pm PST. Therefore, I find it a perfect time to discuss one of my favorite film subjects and Oscar categories... Editing.

I went to grad school for editing, it's my secret love that is not so secret. It is kinda what I do. So I obsess over this category. It's not like the main ones in which you can sort of predict what's going to happen and occasionally there are shockers. It is completely without context. Maybe one day, I'll be in the ACE and I'll get it. But I don't so I have nothing but experience and instinct to go on. So let's have at it...

(Except, I must ask... where is Inception's nomination? That is so clearly the best edited film of the year, it's like these dudes, and dudette, are competing for second place.)

Andrew Weisblum - Black Swan

I saw Andrew speak a couple years back at a screening for The Wrestler (LOVE that movie) and was fascinating and vastly articulate. I'd love to give this to him and he did a fantastic job, for sure. That's the incredibly hard thing about this category. Just to be in it proves so much about your abilities that it's like you have to pull some new trick out of your sleeve to win it. Oh look - he did that! Blah, blah. He may very well win, because this is a super big fave of the year. But this, as far as this little editor is concerned, is no stretch. And I hate the film. So, I can't go out on a ledge and tell you all that above it's flaws this really is the movie that should win. And yet, I won't be disappointed if it does... because this guy knows how to cut the shit out of dance, fake-dance, psycho-sex shit, horror and just plain nut ball-ness.

Pamela Martin - The Fighter

Phenomenal film, phenomenal editing. A perfect match. This woman, and thank god there a few woman out there that are doing the old snip snip, she did an amazing job (and she's hot, too - always a nice addition). This is a great example of a perfect pairing of director and editor - as it always should be, but often fails to be because of lame studio constraints or some other bullshit. She won't win. But for pure academia, she should.

Tariq Anwar - The King's Speech

This guy's career is so cool I could hunt him down and make him my mentor at the edge of a razor. He happened upon everything (so he says) that he's done in his life. He's worked with amazing people and always done an amazing job. No one ever really knows what happens behind the curtain between the editor and the director and since this movie was just a "movie" to me and I can't jump all over myself with praise. But I envy the hell of Tariq for the way he's lived his life. Please call me. I'll listen to you all night long.

Jon Harris - 127 Hours

I mean, come on. This category's winner comes down to this movie and the next one or the world must have started spinning backwards Superman-style. This movie should reap so many awards that General Hospital would feel the effect. BUT it won't. And I doubt it even will in this, it's second most deserved, category (behind best director). Godspeed, Jon Harris. You're a genius.

Angus Wall & Kurt Baxter - The Social Network

As for my opinion, and I KNOW that I am biased, these two should win the golden paperweight. Maybe because I know what goes into editing a feature film, maybe because I know what D. Fincher shoots and therefore puts his editors (and his utterly phenomenal sound editor, Ren Klyce) through, but Angus and Kurt can make some goddamn magic. As I've said earlier, watch the opening scene of this movie alone and you'll see. I dare you. I'll fight anyone that wins over them... and I'm a tough old broad.

And the Best Actor, Excluding Ryan Gosling, (or If Your Name Does Not Start With The Letter "J" You Will Probably Win) category ...

Javier Bardem - Biutiful

Javier B. is absolutely always remarkable. Always. Someone please tell me when he's less than stellar. But this movie irks me, as do all of A.G.I.'s movies (except Amores Perros) do. As the despicable, yet inimitable, George Lucas said, "it's easy to make an audience cry, just throw a kitten off a cliff". Alejandro knows how to pull those goddamn strings. And that just bores me to death and makes feel manipulated and want to throw tomatoes at the screen. As much as I want to place a wreath of laurels around Bardem's head, I can't for this film because it's just too obvious. Everything is thrown at us. Cancer! Children! Repentant Hitman! Puhleeze. 

Jeff Bridges - True Grit

Can't we just realize by now that, post Lebowski, this guy does no wrong? He won the award last year, he ain't gonna win it this year... but he deserves an award almost every time he bursts from the gate. He's mutable, malleable, and a revelation each time on the track. Proof that we don't reach our peak until we've, um, reached our "peak". 

Jesse Eisenberg - The Social Network

If mumbling and being angry get you nominated, then I know a lot of people that have been overlooked for this award over the years. I'm sure Jesse will be a force in years to come but this is most certainly not his moment. His performance owes EVERYTHING to Fincher's direction.... and I sort of want the actor to bring something of their own if they're nominated. Of course, this isn't always the case - so be it. A brilliant performance is a brilliant performance. But this is pretty much one note. Albeit, a great note.

Colin Firth - The King's Speech

Yeah, yeah, yeah.... we all know he wins. 'Nuf said.

James Franco - 127 Hours

Now THIS is some serious acting. THIS is some amazing shit. I can not say enough goodness and delight about this performance. If we lived in my world, he'd take home ten Oscars. I could wax on about all he had to accomplish in the face of this sort of story telling, but the truth is that it doesn't matter. All we see is a brilliant film with an absolutely incredible performance by a man too handsome to be this talented. I mean, Brad Pitt? Handsome, yes - but only shines forth when man-handled by the proper director (um, Fincher). I could go on. But Franco, he can do anything, from soap operas, to David Gordon Green's first foray into comedy ("Don't fucking get on my case, all right? Look, only reason I started selling pot is so I could put my bubbeh in a nice retirement home.") Need I say more? Danny Boyle, casting genius. Danny Boyle, sorrowfully overlooked this year. Danny Boyle, you deserve it for this flick far more than for that pandering Slumdog Millionaire... Franco, keep it up. MFA's, PHD's, shorts, etc... you da man.

Ladies first.... So on to the Best Actress in a Leading Role category.

Annette Bening - The Kids Are All Right

 What can really be said about her. She's rather wooden, which works out great for her in most films. She can be quite sprightly which works out even better, think Bugsy. Her deployment here, albeit a little William Hurt-ish, works to utter perfection... but in my opinion, she does not deserve the Oscar (TM). But I'm not the one to look to for your betting pools... I'm just telling the "truf". And the "truf" is that she can be shrill. But in her shrillness lies a truth that belies anything we've faced before in the filmic world. Something that speaks honestly and with value, regardless of it's sexual orientation. Part of me wants to just give her all the gold in Hollywood for being brave. But then I'm reminded that she's married to Warren Beatty and she really has nothing to lose. She could play whatever she damn well pleases and still come home, cook up some fixins' (or order in, or drive down Coldwater) and be one of the sexiest things around. The bottom line is, she can do whatever the damn well she pleases, and that's the tits. So go win some shit, bitch. Because you are a goddamn gem, on a lot of levels. Just turn down the vocals.

Nicole Kidman - Rabbit Hole

 Shut up. Stop getting injections of any sort. Stop trying to prove yourself. We KNOW you can do anything. Why don't you go out on a limb. I, and every intelligent person in the filmmaking universe is tired of this crap. Either be a Chanel icon or just make more movies like To Die For. That's the best shit you ever did. And you were a goddamn genius in Moulin Rouge, too. And a lot of other things. Just stop with the injections.


Jennifer Lawrence - Winter's Bone

 This is always a strange thing. An out-of-nowhere lovely gets nominated for a performance that no one knows if it came from the heart, the soul or a beating from the director. Usually, if it were in the Supporting Actress category, we'd all say Done Deal - bitch has it. I mean who'd have known, that despite her Vampiric success, Anna Paquin, who was so wondrous and deserving in The Piano would turn out to be such an utterly REPULSIVE actress. Sorry, just an example, by no means a comparison to Miss Lawrence. It's just that Jennifer's performance requires more than hardness, brutality and a modicum of hard brutal sweetness to her younger siblings - but, whoa does she succeed, wherever it comes from. This just has that Oscar stench of... "we love your little movie, we love your work... but really we all know who this award is going to..."

Umm..


Natalie Portman - Black Swan

Which leads me to the lovely N.P. And I can only imagine the brutality she was put through in the face of this particular director and the requirements of this film. All I can really say is... as much as I deplore the film, I admire N. Portman's work. She put every ounce of being into it. And as I once sat in that mid-town Manhattan (gross) theatre, lo so many years ago, watching The Professional thinking that this little bitch has TRULY got something... now, please reward her. Because she's worked every which way in the scale of this industry and always done an inarguably solid job. But Nina Sayers will go down in the books as a true work of conviction. Undergraduates from here to eternity will struggle to make their own versions. But it will all be for naught. The utterly exquisite Miss Portman has transcended a film not worthy of her performance, but entirely retrieved by it. And if this little pregnant nymph doesn't leave with that leaden crack pipe of a trophy, I'll throw my body on the Gold Line (but it doesn't run that often).


Michelle Williams - Blue Valentine

 Once again I'm forced to bring up the nature of the Oscars and the desire, if not need, to showcase truly brilliant performances. And if not those, then at least performances done by actors who are so long over due that it's utterly shameful that they do not leave with gold in their paws. So, I'm sorry Miss Williams, Sunday will not be your night. But think of yourself as Meryl, gather many noms... keep doing the work you are so good at. So valiant and brave with. And your day will come. Soon, H.L. will be forgotten, and B.M. will be but a memory... and you will be considered the actress you truly are. This film is phenomenal. Because this performance is phenomenal. No doubt partly owed to R.G., the give and go you were so tightly wound up in, and the rigor that Derek Cianfrance put everyone through. So.... please, may more films be made like this. With convicted talent signing on (way early) and seeing through the development process. Because if Blue Valentine is the result - I want to go to that island.