comment #1

Edward says ...

Let's hope it's not of the Zwicky-y-icky variety.

comment #2

JD says ...

Ed Zwick IS the Stanley Kramer of our time. And that isn't a compliment (even though Kramer made a few decent movies).

I haven't read this article yet, but wasn't it reported a few months ago that the diamond industry was planning a smear campaign against this movie?

comment #3

jeffmcm says ...

Ed Zwick is not as good of a director as Stanley Kramer. Kramer never did anything as ridiculously awful as the 'SAKE!' scene in The Last Samurai.

comment #4

D.Z. says ...

I don't see what's so noble about exploiting mutilated children for an Oscar. It's just another "feel-good" film for rich white people who don't even live next to the blacks in Hollywood. They'll get their tax breaks, and people will still die, just like Pitt and Jolie after "speaking out" against the genocide in Darfur.

comment #5

MASON says ...

And just what do you do for the greater good, DZ? I'm as cynical as the next guy, but at least the celebs are doing something -- no matter what their reasons may or may not be.

comment #6

Michael says ...

Come on, dude. There are no blacks in Hollywood.

comment #7

sardine says ...

hey Jeff! forget EZ....there is only sofia coppola....

» More From The Star Ledger

Attacking Marie -- and Sofia
Sunday, October 22, 2006
BY CHARLES TAYLOR
Years ago in a radio ad for some forgotten product (probably cake), a cartoonish Marie Antoinette, informed that the peasants are revolting, answers, "Yes, zey are quite ree-vol- teeng!" The voice said as much as the punch line did: It was cold, im perious, filled with contempt at the thought that such things as peasants exist, let alone that they would impinge on the queen's consciousness.

Reading some of the reviews that Sofia Coppola's "Marie Antoi nette" has garnered since it premiered last May at the Cannes Film Festival, it appears that there are critics whose sense of history might have been taken from that commercial burlesque. These are the people who appear to think that Marie really did say "Let them eat cake," a phrase first attributed to, among others, a Spanish princess about 100 years before Marie arrived in France from her native Austria. That she was actually criticized in her lifetime for the simplicity of her style, or that much of France's ruinous debt was a result of the wars the country waged long before she and Louis XVI ascended to the throne, has simply escaped the critics.

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Or more likely, they don't care.

"Marie Antoinette" has given critics the license they have been looking for to attack Sofia Coppola ever since she made her filmmak ing debut with "The Virgin Sui cides" in 1999. Too often, in reviews of Coppola's pictures, the movies are a mere springboard to complaints that having a famous father gave her a leg up in the movie business (no, really?), or that she shows up in the audience at fashion shows, or hangs out with actual celebrities. Of course, these critics would never dream of dismissing the work of Luchino Visconti because he was an Italian count, or Wong Kar-wai because he's made commercials for Motorola and Lacoste. So what is it about Coppola that galls them?

The answer, I think, is "Lost in Translation," whose success threatens the entire view of Cop pola as a little out-of-touch rich girl. For all the ridicule expended on Coppola, none of her attackers has ever reckoned how such an allegedly insulated, privileged filmmaker managed to make a picture that, on its own with no particular push from the studio (which didn't know what to make of it), connected with such a large audience. And a movie that, as many of the films critics often champion do, operates on mood and shifting, evanescent emotion rather than more conventional storytelling.

The argument being made against Coppola and "Marie An toinette" -- that the film is Cop pola's apologia for rich, empty- headed luxury; that it has no historical or political sense; that it has, God help us, no ideas -- is elitism masquerading as populism. "Marie Antoinette," which scores the doomed queen's story to post-punk bands like Gang of Four and New Order, removes the story from the realm of stulti fied costume epics, all those stiff, worthy pictures that parents and teachers -- and, yes, critics -- urged on us because they were "enriching" without ever being pleasurable. Marie herself (Kir sten Dunst) rebels against that stiffness. Sold into marriage to fortify a diplomatic alliance between Austria and France, she ar rives at Versailles, age 14, to find the place a farce of protocol.

Coppola arranges her own marriage here, one that doesn't take nearly as long to bear fruit as Marie and Louis' did, the marriage of teen rebellion to the inherent sensuality of movies. Far from fetishizing the decorum and rules of Versailles, Coppola films it as if it were the 18th-century "Groundhog Day," with Marie's days ones of endless, predictable routine. The determination to find fun in this stuffy domain is not only Marie's provocation, but Coppola's.

Coppola's critics have reacted against her use of post-punk, and the style of the film's titles, bor rowed from the British graphic artist Jamie Reid's work for the Sex Pistols, as if punk can have no meaning in such a rarefied atmosphere. But punk meant breaking through false accepted reality to force to consciousness what had been hiding in plain sight all along. The provocation that Coppola forces here is an ar gument that sensual pleasure is and should be at the heart not just of art but of life. Predictably, the puritans have taken the bait. Writing from Cannes in Film Comment, Amy Taubin says the movie "confirms that Coppola has a sensibility but no ideas." How alien does the sensual side of movies have to be for her not to recognize that in many movies, the sensibility is the idea?

But even more than the place that sensuality should play in art, "Marie Antoinette" has brought into the open the attack going on right now against the notion that our response to art should be one of sympathetic imagination. Critics writing about Stephen Frears' "The Queen" seem -- so far -- to have no problem with the film's sharp yet sympathetic view of Helen Mirren's Queen Elizabeth as stuck in a tradition of public stoicism and thus unprepared for the emotionalism over Diana's death. No one has suggested that to sympathize with Elizabeth is to be a royalist. And yet critics are writing as if having sympathy for Marie Antoinette is to defend the most shallow and grasping materialism. There is no sense in their writing of her tragedy as springing from her character. Marie's shortsightedness cannot be, for them, a condition of her upbringing but only a deliberate, heedless and selfish disdain for the masses.

Taubin can only compare Marie to Paris Hilton and Laura Bush -- in other words, only to a society airhead and the mate of a despised ruler. Even Nathan Lee, whose ambivalent Film Comment feature doesn't dismiss the film's sensual pleasures and acknowledges that Marie was "lost in the shuffle of her mother's dynastic maneuvers," notes the young Marie's lack of interest in politics and history (which, you know, 14-year-olds through the ages just live for) and concludes the movie is "in thrall to a dunce." That this was a 14-year-old girl who had been taken away from her family and country for an ar ranged marriage; who had been the subject of vicious attacks be fore she set foot in France; who became the subject of misogynist rumor and pornographic slander afterward -- none of that enters the picture. The message is that her class deprives her of being considered a human being. Tau bin had complained there were no films by women in competition at the 2005 Cannes Film Festival. Yet she fails to see "Marie Antoi nette," a picture made by a woman, as a vision of a woman who has been the subject of lies and misconceptions -- many of them rooted in barely disguised misogyny -- for centuries.

Both Taubin and Rob Nelson, in a remarkably snarky piece in "Cinema-Scope," claim Coppola is too tasteful to show us Marie's execution. Actually, both of them should be grateful because had Coppola shown the execution, they'd be forced to confront whether she deserved to be murdered, and to confront the worm of fascism in their fantasies of revolution.

"Marie Antoinette" hits theaters about a month after another film about privileged youth, the American indie filmmaker Andrew Bujalski's reverently received "Mutual Appreciation," which follows a trio of slackers on the fringes of the New York academic and musical world. None of the three show any interest in politics, society or any culture be yond the occasional small-club show; none of them seems to have any knowledge of or interest in anyone beyond their circumscribed slackerville. And when one gets into credit-card debt, daddy is luckily there to help. But does anyone accuse these characters, or Bujalski (who plays one of them), of existing in a privileged bubble? Of course not. And why? Because the movie looks like hell and the characters wear ratty, ragged sweaters. As a work of moviemaking, "Mutual Apprecia tion" is a joke. But as a hairshirt to suffer through, it's a suitably ascetic devotional object.

Sometimes, the works that stir the deepest, most vituperative debates are the ones that seem the lightest. "Marie Antoi nette" is work of sensual surfaces and bone-deep convictions. Impressionistic in its approach, it is also, as a piece of history, faithful to its impeccable source, Antonia Fraser's "Marie Antoinette: The Journey." What makes it a disruptive work is the way Coppola has used it to raise questions about the place sensuality and empathy should hold in art. Even if it were only cake, it would be more nourishing than the gruel we're being told is good for us.

Charles Taylor is a writer who lives in Brooklyn. High & Low, his column on popular culture, appears monthly in The Star-Ledger.

comment #8

D.Z. says ...

I've done community service, give change to people on the street, and listen to people's problems. I also helped the elderly and disabled a few times, since they're pretty much left to die around here.

comment #9

Rod32303 says ...

Whatever, if Zwick never does another good film EVER (and one does not have much hope after Legends of the Fall, The Seige, and The Last Samauri), he's responsible for GLORY, a film that introduced WHITE America to a story all us black folk always knew, the all black 54th regiment that fought in the Civil War...and he did it with grace and style and heart. It is the one film my students in high school always look forward to seeing, or seem to be moved the most by, plus the man produced "Traffic," and helped create some wicked authentic television for its day ("Family," "My So-Called Life," "Thirtysomething," "Once and Again") - A twee bit sensitive here? Possibly, but all this negative mess over a film none of you have seen. Ridiculous...and Michael should watch his fucking ass and his back...if there are no blacks in Hollywood, then there are no whites here in Tallahassee, Florida.

comment #10

christian says ...

"Actually, both of them should be grateful because had Coppola shown the execution, they'd be forced to confront whether she deserved to be murdered, and to confront the worm of fascism in their fantasies of revolution."

actually, sofia coppola would be forced to confront that question in her fantasy of fashion and revolution.

comment #11

christian says ...

and i love stanley kramer, especially INHERIT THE WIND, a grand film that one of my college teachers refused to show in class because it still pricks feelings.

comment #12

sardine says ...

courtesy: Warner Bros., ThinkFilm, New Line Cinema, Sony Pictures and Kino International.
AWARDS WATCH: IFP Unveils Gotham Nominees: "The Departed," "Half Nelson," "Little Children," "Marie Antoinette," "Old Joy"

by Eugene Hernandez (October 23, 2006)
The Independent Feature Project (IFP) announced the nominees for its 16th Annual Gotham Awards fundraiser, unveiling a selection of films that may stun some observers. The nominating committee for the Gotham Award for best picture chose a list that includes an incredibly wide spectrum of films. Ranging from big budget studio movies to low budget indies, the nominees for best feature are: Martin Scorsese's "The Departed," Ryan Fleck's "Half Nelson," Todd Field's "Little Children," Sofia Coppola's "Marie Antoinette," and Kelly Reichardt's "Old Joy." A total of 148 films were submitted to the Gotham Awards Nominating Committee for consideration in all categories, with the best picture nominees selected by critics and journalists John Anderson, Karen Durbin, Stephen Garrett, and Lisa Schwarzbaum. The event will be held on November 29, 2006 in New York City.

comment #13

anti-sardine says ...

Great! Another story hijacked by sardine and her obsession. I don't know what to say....Oh yeah, Go fuck yourself.

comment #14

jeffmcm says ...

Yeah, we are SO OVER stories about Old Joy. Get over it!

comment #15

Walter Sobchak says ...

I'm beginning to think Sardine IS Sophia Coppola....or Zoe, or Caitlin, or Adam or any one of Sophia's L.A. posse... yeah, I know Jeff seemed to have this unhealthy obession with seeing M.A. go down in flames but turn the page already....jeeez

In other news.... one problem I've always had with do-gooder Hollywood liberal films was the point of view of nearly all of them... in most cases it seems like they center around courageous, good-guy white people coming to the rescue of the down-trodden darker people... remember "Ghosts of Mississippi"? A film about Medger Evers? No, a film about the crusading white lawyer who brought justice to the Evers' killer.

comment #16

jeffmcm says ...

Exactly, Walter, that's why films like Mississippi Burning or The Last King of Scotland or The Last Samurai or Dances With Wolves or Dangerous Minds and so on are ultimately more harmful than good: because they suggest that people of color are incapable of reaching their own success and need the help of the White Man to do things for them, patriarchally, condescendingly.

comment #17

austin111 says ...

Amen, to the mention of GLORY. It's one of the few films on American history that I can remember in which I was as deeply moved. And it also took the novel approach of showing that both white and black men learned something from each other. Thus was I shocked to see that the same director did Legends of the Fall, an ambitious overwrought western soap opera spanning decades and a general failure except for some beautiful cinematography.

comment #18

Rod32303 says ...

As an African American, I've never looked for "do-gooder Hollywood liberal films" for anything other than entertainment. Most black folk I know feel this way also. To WHOM, exactly do these films "suggest that people of color are incapable of reaching their own success"? To other white people who are dense enough to believe this? The truth of the matter is, and Dr. King said this himself, sometimes we DID need the help of white folk to get things started or to have a certain point of view recognized. And I don't judge what a director feels is the best way to tell a story - whether it is from the point of view of the white protagonist, or from the black (as WHITE director Taylor Hackford did in "Ray," and WHITE director Steven Speilberg did in "The Color Purple" and WHITE director Doug Atchison did with "Akeelah & The Bee") - I judge the STORY - the performances, the direction, the look and feel of the movie.

comment #19

Tram says ...

"To other white people who are dense enough to believe this?"

I'm a person of color and I believe that Hollywood is condescending in its PoV. I'd like to add though that it's just a single opinion. I'm sure my opinion does not represent any black, Asian, or Hispanic contingent. It's just my own two cents.

To be fair though, Hollywood didn't start this kind of a narrative. You can trace this to literature. Who owns these means of communications? The white man. So it's quite understandable why the end-product, no matter how well-intended [the white person is], it's more likely than not, be a reflection of the white man's self. And film is all mirrors.

On a brighter side, I've heard that Philip Noyce's Catch a Fire will be told via Derek Luke's perspective. That's reassuring to hear that sometimes a white filmmaker is able to take a step back, and try to imagine himself in the black man's shoes.

"The truth of the matter is, and Dr. King said this himself, sometimes we DID need the help of white folk to get things started or to have a certain point of view recognized."

I think Dr. King had a point. But I also think Malcolm X had a good point as well.

comment #20

Michael says ...

It was a joke, Rod32303, on the 'rich, white' comment in D.Z.'s post. Some of my best friends are bla...oh, never mind. Good to see you have a keen sense of humor though.

And why do you think The Siege is one of Zwick's bad films? Have you seen it lately? It's spooky watching it now...how far ahead of its time it was.

comment #21

Dixon Steele says ...

Why do I think if DiCaprio wasn't in this, Jeff wouldn't be inclined to run it down?

Having read all his previous posts, I do believe Jeff has a major jealousy problem with Leo.

The looks, fame, money, women...he just can't handle it.

Tell me I'm wrong, Jeff.

comment #22

le corbeau says ...

"I've done community service, give change to people on the street, and listen to people's problems."

Based on the last two, then, you're an enabler who is making things worse.

comment #23

D.Z. says ...

Mgmax: I'd rather give money to a potential homeless junkie than to bombs being dropped on Iraq and subsidies to Halliburton.