Day: April 29, 2008

“Lawrence of Latin America,” my Huffington Post article about Steven Soderbergh‘s two forthcoming films about Ernesto “Che” Guevara, went up a few minutes ago. I’ve said some of the same things in previous postings, but here are two taster graphs anyway:

“If you love epic-styled movies you’ve certainly seen and loved Lawrence of Arabia, which also means you’ve been influenced by the great win-lose Lawrence theme. The first half of David Lean‘s Oscar-winning 1962 film is mostly about climbing the mountain — the dream, the struggle and the rush of an enigmatic hero fighting and winning an underdog battle. The second half is about tumbling down the other side as the cards — personal, logistical and political — turn against him.
“It’s the basic template for almost every ambitious life or grand adventure. Things are always glorious and heart-pumping when you start out with God or fate on your side, but sooner or later these same forces will hand you clouds, complications and downturns. Just ask Barack Obama.
“This theme is why I’ve been so enthused about seeing Steven Soderbergh’s Che Guevara films, The Argentine and Guerilla, for over a year now. Because Peter Buchman‘s two scripts, which I read in March 2007, made it clear that this two-part epic, which Soderbergh has been struggling to finish in time for the Cannes Film Festival and which reportedly runs over four hours, is essentially Lawrence of Latin America.
“Benicio del Toro, the moody and mesmerizing Marlon Brando-ish actor whose work keeps getting deeper and more fascinating, is all but certain to stir Oscar talk for his performance as Ernesto “Che” Guevara, the legendary Argentine/ Cuban firebrand. Even if the Che movies turn out to be problematic, Del Toro can’t not whip ass. He’s too strange, too gifted. Guevara is too perfect a role for him. All the stars and planets are aligned.”

Nicole Kidman is intending to star in a Dusty Springfield biopic (’60s music, manic perfectionist streak, lesbian longings, drugs and booze, early death) being written by Michael Cunningham. Great, but there’s a side issue. It isn’t mentioned in this New York “Vulture” piece, but it seems too coincidental for this project to be announced two and a half months after a play about Springfield called “Stay Forever: The Life and Music of Dusty Springfield,” played for three weeks last February (2.7 through 2.24) at the L.A. Gay & Lesbian Center.

Many industry people caught this show. CSI‘s William Petersen was there the night I attended. Previous Springfield biopic projects have come and gone, but a voice is telling me that the idea for the Kidman project probably came from this show. That or the show certainly goosed things along. The star, Kirsten Holly Smith, was excellent in the role. Looked like Springfield, sang and talked like her, etc. I can’t imagine Kidman being better than she.

After he finishes Mary, Queen of Scots, Phillip Noyce will probably direct The Art of Making Money, a DreamWorks project about Art Williams, a real-life Chicago counterfeiter who printed more than $10 million in fake bills, etc. The guy is currently doing time for this. Screenwriter Frank Baldwin is adapting Jason Kersten‘s Rolling Stone 2005 profile of Williams.

Mel Gibson isn’t Mel Gibson any more. The last time “that guy” appeared in a film was What Women Want. Since the Malibu DUI arrest he’s gotten too heavy and thin of hair to be an attractive box-office draw. To me he’ll always be the bearded wacko in the flannel shirt with a shave. The upside is that Edge of Darkness, an adaptation of a six-hour BBC miniseries, has been written by the great William Monaghan (The Departed) and the very competent Martin Campbell.

I worked for three hours this morning on a piece about Steven Soderbergh‘s Che Guevara films, The Argentine and Guerilla, for another website, hence my silence. It feels like a funny thing to write something longish (1700 words) and send it off and then…wait. I’ve become accustomed to instant gratification.

Come the fall Steven Soderbergh will direct The Girlfriend Experience — a 14-day quickie about “the world of prostitution from the vantage point of a $10,000-a- night call girl” (according to Variety‘s Michael Fleming). This will probably be one of Soderbergh’s interesting sidelight films, most likely. Soderbergh, who “gets” women, hasn’t mined this turf enough.
But it’s a 2929 Entertainment whatsis movie (Mark Cuban, Todd Wagner, HD Net) so let’s keep things in perspective. I say this as a huge fan of Bubble, by the way. As far as I’m concerned Bubble was Soderbergh’s big comeback film after being in a slump for God knows how many years. Soderbergh will direct The Informant with Matt Damon for Warner Bros. before doing the Girlfriend thing,

As Defamer’s sum-up points out, Jon Cusack‘s War, Inc. has gone into the tank after showing at the Tribeca Film Festival. Reviews from N.Y. Post critic Lou Lumenick, Spoutblog‘s Karina Longworth and the Hollywood Reporter‘s Frank Sheck are viewable for all to see. But HE reader Joseph Kay has something interesting to say besides.

Jon Cusack, Joan Cusack in War, Inc.

“Apologies if you’ve covered/couldn’t care less about this, but John Cusack’s War, Inc. silently crept into theaters here in Toronto this week, and I believe nowhere else,” he writes. “The reason for the stealth, I’m guessing, having seen the film last night, is that it’s pretty much an unmitigated disaster, messy and all-over-the-place and largely nonsensical
“But it does have a point-of-view (albeit very on-the-nose) and in a world where every third major release is seemingly about the romantic chemistry generated by the metaphor of street dancing, at least Cusack and his partners were trying to do something interesting and different.
“The big problem is they were shooting for the darkly comic impact of Dr. Strangelove, obviously an impossible target for anybody except maybe Charlie Kaufman, and also the film is very weirdly grafted onto the template for Grosse Point Blank , a strange decision which seems to have the mutual effect of hurting War, Inc. while you watch it and Grosse Point retroactively.”

The trailer for Tim Burton‘s original Batman vs. one for Chris Nolan‘s The Dark Knight. The College Humor guys who put this up are using the headline “why so similar?” Indeed — these spots are remarkably alike.

Hollywood Chicago‘s Adam Fendleman is pointing to an ugly, cell-phone video of the new Dark Knight trailer — shot in a theatre with reddish tints and all the crappy ambient noise that you always get with these things. An official, much better looking version of this trailer will be viewable this Sunday.
The best thing about the trailer is Heath Ledger‘s voice. He’s speaking in a kind of raspy Midwestern twang. Nothing at all that sounds the least bit Ennnis del Mar-ish.

“With all that’s gone down between Washington and Hollywood, it’s a shame that politicians still don’t trust their showbiz supporters,” Politico‘s Jeff Ressner notes, observing that “for the most part, D.C. treats L.A. as a gigantic ATM machine and the movie business as a means to pick up campaign cool points — while trying to keep potentially radioactive celebrities at arm’s length.
“But as candidates exploit moguls and movie stars for cash and cachet, they often reject creative assistance from the artists and executives at Hollywood’s dream factories.”
Like — hello? — Oscar-winning documentarian Errol Morris? A director who has knocked out brilliant ad spots for years, and arguably put together the most convincing anti-Bush/pro-Kerry spots of the 2004 campaign? A couple of weeks ago I wrote that Morris (Standard Operating Procedure, The Fog of War), working with MoveOn.org, created a brilliant series of TV ads about ‘real people’ (mostly Republicans) who’d voted for George Bush in 2000, but had decided to vote for John Kerry in 2004.
“This year, there are many more Republicans talking about voting for Obama than were persuaded about Kerry four years ago. See where I’m going with this?” The Obama campaign should contract Morris to do a series of spots about Obamacans, and this time actually put them on the air — as opposed to what happened in 2004, which is that they were basically shelved for TV use and seen only at moveon.org and at errolmorris.com.
Ressner talks to “a top marketing vice president at one of the leading motion picture studios to explain just how he might help the three current candidates in each of their respective quests for the White House,” etc. And that’s fine. Except nothing this guy says is as interesting or persuasive as the cumulative effect of those ’04 Morris spots.

Barack Obama has finally thrown the Rev. Jeremiah Wright under the bus. A friend said Obama needs to throw Wright under the iron wheels of a subway train — which I think he’s now done. Less than an hour ago Obama said he was “angry,” “outraged,” “saddened” and “appalled” by “the spectacle that we saw yesterday,” describing at one point some remarks Wright said last weekend as “ridiculous.”

“At a certain point when a person contradicts what you believe fundamentally, and then he questions whether you believe it in front of the press corps…that’s enough. It’s a show of disrespect to me, and an insult to what we’ve been trying to do in this campaign.”
Obama said that Wright “obviously hasn’t shown much concern for me.” He said he had heard that Wright had given “a performance” and when he watched tapes, he realized that it more than just a case of the former pastor defending himself.
“What became clear to me was that he was presenting a world view that contradicts what I am and what I stand for,” Obama said. “What he said directly contradicts everything about my life. I am outraged by the comments that were made and saddened by the spectacle that we saw yesterday,” Obama told reporters at a North Carolina news conference.

The Cannes Film Festival has officially announced that Fernando Meirelles‘ Blindness (Miramax, 9.12) will open the festival on Wednesday, 5.15. Julianne Moore, Mark Ruffalo, Danny Glover and Gael Garcia Bernal costar.

Gwynneth Paltow during shooting of Two Lovers

On top of which a third French film — Laurent Cantet‘s Entre Les Murs, with Francois Begaudeau — has been added to the Competition:
An American film has also been added to the Competition slate: James Gray‘s Two Lovers, a Brooklyn-set romantic drama about a guy (River Phoenix) torn between the good woman his parents wish he would marry and his beautiful but volatile new neighbor (Gwynneth Paltrow).
As tipped earlier by Variety, Steve McQueen‘s Hunger will open Un Certain Regard on Thursday, 5.15.
French actress Jeanne Balibar and the Iranian author-director Marjane Satrapi (Persepolis) have joined the jury, which will be led this year by Sean Penn.
And finally, it turns out that Barry Levinson‘s What Just Happened? — the Sundance bomb costarring Robert De Niro, Bruce Willis, Catherine Keener, Robin Wright Penn, John Turturro and Sean Penn — will close the festival after all. De Niro will present the Palm d’Or at the closing night ceremonies.