Day: April 17, 2006

Newsweek is doing a double-track, opening-round trashing of The DaVinci Code. That is, reporting that people around town (i.e., Newsweek‘s sources) are trashing Tom Hanks‘ longish, vaguely unwashed-looking hair in the film, and then going, “Tsk-tsk…those sources sure are shallow, but it’s fun to report on what they’re saying!” And here I am doing the same thing, dinging Newsweek a bit but at the same time spreading the bad word about Hanks’ hair. And I don’t even see anything wrong with it. A little long in the back, a little unkempt…so what? The guy’ has to wear the same You’ve Got Mail haircut in film after film? And yet I agree that Hollywood’s “favorite parlor game” is “trying to put a dent in a rival movie’s prospects by quietly trashing it.” And I love this quote from a studio executive in the Newsweek piece: “People are really trying to sabotage each other. It’s not a sport anymore…it’s a science.”

Don’t get me wrong — I understand the need to trash The DaVinci Code. Like I said earlier today under that photo of that big fat DaVInci billboard, I can feel the urge building without really knowing why. Okay, here’s why: book too successful, ads too big, Tom Hanks and Audrey Tatou running everywhere and always holding hands and always frowning, too much money likely to be made…Ron Howard, Dan Brown, Brian Grazer…that dead naked bald guy on the floor…Alred Molina sneering and hamming it up…you just wanna throw a spitball at all of ’em. Consider this snapshot of DaVinci costar Ian McKellen , which I feel speaks volumes. I mean, it seems as of this photo is the movie…y’know?

Speaking of Hollywood’s favorite parlor game, I’d say right now that Tom Cruise is against the ropes and has a cut over his left eye, and that the industry crowd is starting to get a little bit excited at the possibility of seeing him hit the canvas, or at least watching him get slugged so many times he goes all wobbly in the knees. And yet Mission Impossible III (Paramount, 5.5) is paradoxically hanging in there , if for no other reason than the fact that people are hot for Phillip Seymour Hoffman‘ s bad-guy performance and, to a lesser extent, are up for what might happen with J.J. Abrams at the helm.