Day: April 21, 2010

Naturally I never considered seeing Shrek Forever After, tonight’s opener for the Tribeca Film Festival. But the festival does start tomorrow in earnest, and will continue until May 2nd. I’ve already seen The Trotsky (nope), Get Low (yup), that reasonably decent Rush documentary that I despised and the admirable Joan Rivers: A Piece of Work. I realize that I’m obliged to see Clio Barnard‘s The Arbor and Brilliante Mendoza‘s Lola, only I’d rather not on some level. I really don’t have a choice in the matter. I understand that.

I’m otherwise down for The Two Escobars, Alex Gibney‘s My Trip to Al-Qeada and Untitled Eliot Spitzer Film, Bjorn Richie Lob‘s Keep Surfing, James Franco‘s Saturday Night Live doc, Jean-Pierre Jeunet‘s Micmacs (finally), that Serge Gainsbourg biopic, Jorge Navas‘ Blood and Rain and…whatever, I’m still poking through the book.

Listen to this rundown on the evils of super-banks by recently-arisen British political superstar Nick Clegg. The Guardian‘s Oliver Burkeman recently called him the new Obama, but when was the last time Barack Obama spoke the truth about fix-is-in banking practices as bluntly and plainly as Clegg says it here? Obama should aspire to be the American Clegg.

“A week ago, most people in Britain considered Nick Clegg, the ‘little-known leader’ of the Liberal Democrats, to be, by all measures, a long shot to become Britain’s next prime minister,” a 4.21 Huffington Post summary reads. “But that was before ‘Cleggmania’ swept the country.

“The origins of Cleggmania can be traced to last week’s televised debate — a first in Great Britain — in which Clegg was widely considered to have stolen the show from the leaders of Britain’s two largest political parties: current Prime Minister Gordon Brown of the Labour Party, and Conservative Party leader David Cameron. The headline the next day in the London Times read ‘Clegg comes of age.’ A poll taken after the debate led the Guardian to declare that ‘Clegg is now in contention as potential PM.’

“To top it off, the latest YouGov poll shows the Liberal Democrats to now be in the lead with 34 percent of the vote. The Conservative Party came in second with 31 percent. A week ago the Liberal Dems were hovering around 16 percent. Andrew Sullivan of the Daily Dish referred to the poll result as ‘the earthquake in Britain.’ John Curtice of the Independent has called the Liberal Dems’ surge ‘the biggest shock to the electoral landscape in years.'”

Here’s an insightful, well-written piece about Clegg by the Globe and Mail‘s Doug Saunders.

In a chat with Movieline‘s Stu VanAirsdale, Oscar-winning documentarian Alex Gibney indulges in moralistic musings while comparing the wick-dipping pathology of Eliot Spitzer, whom Gibney has made a new untitled documentary about, with that of Tiger Woods. The Spitzer doc will screen under the auspices of the Tribeca Film Festival this Saturday.

A mildly funny riff on The Blind Side, posted yesterday by “Rod” of The Editing Room. The tone is rather like those Mad magazine movie parodies of the late ’50s, ’60s and ’70s.

“Is it just me, or is he extremely articulate when he wants to be?” I’ve seen Aaron Schneider‘s Get Low (Sony Classics, 7.30) twice now, and have felt soothed and stirred both times. In the lead role as an ornery old cus, Robert Duvall scores in a way that recalls, here and there, his Oscar-winning turn in Tender Mercies. But Bill Murray, as a low-key funeral-home operator, and Lucas Black, as his employee, are just as spot-on.

N.Y. Times critic Charles Isherwood more or less agrees with my American Idiot rave, which I posted on 3.31. His review begins as follows: “Rage and love, those consuming emotions felt with a particularly acute pang in youth, all but burn up the stage in American Idiot, the thrillingly raucous and gorgeously wrought Broadway musical adapted from the blockbuster pop-punk album by Green Day.

“Pop on Broadway, sure. But punk? Yes, indeed, and served straight up, with each sneering lyric and snarling riff in place. A stately old pile steps from the tourist-clogged Times Square might seem a strange place for the music of Green Day, and for theater this blunt, bold and aggressive in its attitude. Not to mention loud. But from the moment the curtain rises on a panorama of baleful youngsters at the venerable St. James Theater, where the show opened on Tuesday night, it’s clear that these kids are going to make themselves at home, even if it means tearing up the place in the process.

“Which they do, figuratively speaking. American Idiot, directed by Michael Mayer and performed with galvanizing intensity by a terrific cast, detonates a fierce aesthetic charge in this ho-hum Broadway season.

“A pulsating portrait of wasted youth that invokes all the standard genre conventions — bring on the sex, drugs and rock ‘n’ roll, please! — only to transcend them through the power of its music and the artistry of its execution, the show is as invigorating and ultimately as moving as anything I’ve seen on Broadway this season. Or maybe for a few seasons past.”

I’m trying hard to be interested in the Weinstein-Ron Burkle-Miramax-Disney negotiations, but I’m just not feeling it. Okay, there’s one sentence that caught my attention in Anne Thompson‘s 4.21 Indiewire report, to wit: “It bears repeating that the Weinsteins themselves are not buying anything. Burkle is trying to acquire the Miramax library and will own it, while The Weinstein Co. will distribute the films.” Employees, in other words.

A cheap whiney punk (James Dean) vs. a conservative middle-class doctor (Ronald Reagan) in a 1954 live teleplay called The Dark, Dark Hours, about a couple of thugs doing a home invasion. A Desperate Hours-type deal. Dean’s emotional howl is similar to the one he used that year in East of Eden. Reagan doing the intro and outro obviously interferes with the suspension of disbelief.

There’s a 4.20 story on the Huffington Post claiming that “scientists fear tremors [from] the Iceland’s Eyjafjallajokull volcano could trigger an even more dangerous eruption at the nearby Katla volcano, creating a worst-case scenario for the airline industry and travelers around the globe.

“A Katla eruption would be 10 times stronger and shoot higher and larger plumes of ash into the air than its smaller neighbor, which has already brought European air travel to a standstill for five days and promises severe travel delays for days more.”

If Katla erupts over the next few days there’s obviously a chance that Cannes Film Festival flights could be interrupted or affected to some degree. It’s only 19 days away. Perhaps airlines will re-figure established routes from the U.S. to southern France. You know…fly in a more southerly direction (over Spain, let’s say) and avoid the Northern European ash plume situation altogether.

“There’s always a feeling of slight excitement as your jet angles down and over the Mediterranean and gets closer and closer to the sparking blue water with the hills of Nice in the distance and the white beaches and palm trees and oceanside condos and whatnot….it’s quite a vibe.”

So began an e-mail I sent this morning to a friend who’s attending the Cannes Film Festival — two and a half weeks off — for the first time. She’s never been to southern France or the Cote d’Azur, never seen the Mediterranean…nothing. And was asking this and that question.

“I’m flying straight to Nice from NYC this time — never done that before,” I wrote. “Eight and a half hours…awful. I usually fly to Paris and give myself a leg-stretch for a couple of hours before taking an Easy Jet down to Nice. I don’t know what I was thinking when I booked it. I hate flights that last more than five or six hours.

“Cannes is teeming with little cafes and restaurants. But I’ve made a point in the past of eating only warm paninis out of the food trucks (cheaper) and free party food. The only time I pay for a meal is the first night at La Pizza, and perhaps one other time during the festival. My 24-7 motto is cheap-ass, cheap-ass, cheap-ass.

“And it’s going to be worse this time because I’m not eating pizza as a rule, and bread is a general no-no, of course, so fewer paninis. And I’m drinking less wine these days — water, Diet Coke instead. Beer is out. Free cappucinos inside the Orange press room inside the Palais. But I always grab a double cappucino before the first screening of the day at 8:30 am.”

I was a little unsure at first about seeing Dagur Kari‘s The Good Heart (Magnolia, 4.30). I’m not a big fan of scruffy, armpit-scratching indie dramas about unlikely but nourishing relationships between oddballs, or in this particular case between a kind-hearted lost youth (Paul Dano) and an older, snarly, curmudgeonly barkeep (Brian Cox). I read the synopsis prior to Heart‘s Toronto Film Festival debut and went “later.”

But I went to last night’s premiere at the Sunshine Cinemas, persuaded in part by the respected reputation of the Iceland-born Kari (Noi The Albino, Dark Horse), and the re-teaming of the excellent Cox and Dano, who first worked together on Michael Cuesta‘s L.I.E. (which opened in New York on 9.7.01).

And sure enough, Cox and Dano are quite good. How could two of the finest character actors around right now disappoint? Fascinating fellows to the last. I was also taken with French actress Isild Le Besco, who plays a homeless person looking for shelter and whatever else. (Kari told me last night she’s directing her next French-language film sometime soon.)

Cox’s Jacques character struck me as a bit too angry and blustery, however. I just didn’t like him or want his company after a certain point. “Will you please chlll down?” I muttered at one point. “I mean, would it kill you to ease up and not be a cantakerous asshole every waking minute?” Life is short but time spent with a guy like Jacques in a movie can feel like an eternity. On top of which I don’t care for fellows who smoke and stink up the joint, and who cut farts while eating broccoli.

But I was held by Kari’s directorial discipline. Time and again The Good Heart cuts right to the story chase — it doesn’t dawdle or meander. Usually when strangers (i.e., the kind fated to be friends) meet in a small film, they paw at each other, spar, argue, dislike each other intially, bicker, betray each other…and then after 15 or 20 minutes they relax and find some way of being friends or at least partners. Kari doesn’t fool with that. Cox and Dano meet in a hospital room, and in the next scene they’re chatting and getting down to business. No muss or fuss.

The film runs 95 minutes. It costars a white duck who lives in a cage in the bar owned by Cox/Jacques. It has one of those muddy-bleachy color schemes — grayish blues, murky browns, blacks, whites, grayish skin tones.

Last night’s post-premiere-screening party for The Good Heart (Magnolia, 4.30) happened at the Parkside Lounge (317 East Houston near Avenue B). The crowd included Good Heart director Dagur Kari, costar Paul Dano and g.f. Zoe Kazan. Not long after 11 pm The Martinets — the hard cranking garage-poet band fronted by Magnolia Pictures president Eamonn Bowles — took the stage in the rear room.

Magnolia Pictures president Eamonn Bowles during last night’s set at the Parkside Lounge.

This was my third Martinets encounter (the first happened five years ago at the Knitting Factory Tap Bar on Leonard Street), and I was reminded yet again that these guys are vigorous, fast and rock-sharp. They play crafty, well-shaped material with intellectually pointed lyrics, and Bowles “sings like a mad banshee and plays electric guitar like a ringin’ a bell,” as I wrote in ’05. The other Martinets are guitarist Daniel Rey, bassist Dave Rick and drummer Roger Murdock. Last night’s lead-off number was “I Don’t Follow.” (Or was it the second song?) It was all twangy kick-chop-bang-yow…whuh-buhm-buhm-buhm-bop.

I realized after listening to my video that my Canon SD1400 IS is a bust when it comes to recording amplified sound.

The Good Heart director-writer Dagur Kari — Tuesday, 4.20, 10:25 pm.

Parkside Lounge