Bruce Willis‘s attempt to get past the paid-huckster thing doesn’t work. He and the writers should have ignored this and approached from the opposite direction. “I’m Bruce Willis and I know more about vodka than most Russians or Poles,” he could have said. “I fly around on private jets, I’ve been with Russian hookers, I know Russian mafia guys and trust me…or don’t trust me, I don’t care…but I know what the real stuff tastes like.”

With no one willing to even speculate about why Al and Tipper Gore recently decided to separate after 40 years of marriage, I might as well toss some lettuce leaves around.

I’m convinced that older couples don’t break up unless one of the parties is seriously fed up and wants out. It’s very easy and natural for older couples to stay together because it poses the least amount of difficulty, and because breaking up can be (and usually is) enormously stressful and traumatic. Even if things aren’t that terrific between a couple, nobody wants to go there.

So something — a situation or circumstance, I mean — has to be pretty damn intolerable to upset a comfortable 40 year-old apple cart. And most of the time — let’s face it — it’s about the husband wanting to pick up that spear and feel like a hunter again — about his wanting that “great winter romance…[that] last roar of passion before settling into [his] emeritus years,” as Paddy Chayefsky put it in Network.

Or, less frequently, it’s the wife needing more in the way of comfort and tenderness. Or about the couple just opting for a “nice civilized time-out,” which is usually a code term for one of the parties being theoretically open to something new.

I know for sure that people don’t break up after 40 years unless some kind of enormous pressure is forcing them to do so. They break up not because living apart seems like a mildly intriguing idea, but because living together has become intolerable for one of the parties, and because it’s the only solution to “the problem” that affords a certain dignity.

The fact that there’s no apparent intention to screen Sylvester Stallone‘s The Expendables (Lionsgate, 8.13) in tandem with a 6.23 L.A. Film Festival interview he’ll be doing with Elvis Mitchell is another indication (on top of that pompous trailer that posted three or four days ago) that this all-star actioner may have problems. The web page says only a “sneak peek” (a presumed reference to a product reel) will be shown.

If the film has issues (I say “if”), here’s a shot-in-the-dark guess as to why. It may be that The Expendables has too many aging-macho-guy egos to juggle, and in its struggle to give everyone a fair (or contracted) amount of studly screen time with cool dialogue and all, the rhythm of the story, as it might be or could have been, may have been been lost. Perhaps it doesn’t flow together and operate like a organic, integrated, well-oiled thing; perhaps it feels more like a kind of muscular, gun-totin’ fashion show on a runway in Milan. Again — a guess!

I’m not gunning for this film. I loved the last Rambo for its comically excessive violence and am still hoping that The Expendables will somehow work. But the notion that some kind of trouble may be afoot is definitely on the wall.

In Get Him To The Greek, Jonah Hill “looks to have expanded to Macy’s-parade balloon size since Superbad but plays the same prematurely middle-aged guy he did there.” — Time‘s Richard Corliss in a 6.3 review.

Another thing I’m late on due to recent travelling is Entertainment Weekly‘s 6.1 cover story — “The Greatest Characters of the Last 20 Years.” The fact that EW has essentially become an Eloi under-25 girlie magazine explains why some of the most intriguing characters are near the bottom of the list and some of the blandest are near the top — naturally!

HE reader Kurt Bainer explains it as follows: “Wow, talk about upside-down rankings! There are a ton of characters at the bottom who should be at the top, and some that don’t even belong on the list in the first place.

“I have no problem with Homer J. Simpson as # 1 — still going strong after 21 years — but consider the placement of the following:

“#99 — Kill Bill‘s The Bride (i.e., Uma Thurman). #95 — Jim Carrey‘s Truman from The Truman Show. #90 — Marge Gunderson (Frances McDormand) in Fargo — should be in the top 20. #85 — Daniel Day Lewis‘s Daniel Plainview in There Will Be Blood — should be among the top 15 or 20. #64 — Russell Crowe‘s Maximus in Gladiator — deserves placement among the top 30 or 40. #52 — Kathy Bates‘ Annie Wilkes in Misery — should reside among the top 10-20.

“Not to mention Kevin Spacey‘s Keyser Soze in The Usual Suspects at #37 — clearly a top-20 character. Or Vincent Vega/Jules Winnfield of Pulp Fiction at #29 — they should be among the top 15. #14 — Jeff Bridges‘ Jeff Lebowski in The Big Lebowski — should be among the top 5-10. #4 — James Gandolfini‘s Tony Soprano in The Sopranos — should definitely be #1.

“Now think about these names having been placed higher than those listed above…

“#48 — the Harold and Kumar guys; #40 — Will Ferrell‘s Ron Burgundy. #28 — Tyler Perry‘s Madea. #24 — Felicity (please). #20 — Ally McBeal (should she even be on this list?). #9 — Carrie Bradshaw of Sex and The City — deserves to be somewhere between 50th and 75th place. #6 — Jennifer Aniston‘s Rachel Green on Friends. #3 — Buffy The Vampire Slayer (Buffy over Tony Soprano?).”

I caught all but the first 20 minutes of last night’s MTV Movie Awards, and was stunned by the absence of even half-funny material throughout most of it. The show’s popularity derives from its blatant goof-off attitude and being 100% opposed to the idea of movie theatres as churches. Movies are presented instead as things you might watch on your iPhone while farting and belching during a McDonalds break. So you’d think that at least some of the routines would be at least chuckle-worthy, except almost nothing worked.

With the exception of Tom Cruise‘s Les Grossman dance number with Jennifer Lopez and Jonah Hill and Russell Brand‘s make-out session in the seats, pretty much every line and routine had a “that’s it?” quality. Nobody seemed to have the slightest clue. Time and again the show stalled and sputtered.

I said to my son Dylan, “Is it me or is almost nothing on this show even remotely funny? I mean, I’m sitting here frowning.”

It doesn’t seem to have occured to anyone (least of all the writers) that low-road wallowing is never funny unless fortified by exceptional wit, smarts, sophistication. Or political subversiveness. Or some display of outrageous, never-seen-before vulgarity or razzle-dazzle (like the Cruise-Lopez routine). Instead the show was mostly an assemblage of glittery ca-ca moments.

Will Ferrell and Mark Wahlberg dangling from wires and bitching about how it didn’t feel cool enough?

It would have been nice — change-of-pace classy — if “Best Kiss” winners Kristen Stewart and Robert Pattinson had simply kissed in the classic tradition. But no — they had to go with a tiresome routine about Pattinson being too clumsy to pull if off. It was awful. This plus Stewart’s cowardice over the rape remark has lowered her stock considerably.

Bradley Cooper‘s witless blathering-on as he introduced special honoree Sandra Bullock (particularly the beaming look in his eyes as he spoke of the $163 million earned by The Proposal) persuaded me that he’s a giddy and fizzy-souled showbiz whore. I began to admire Cooper after seeing him in The Hangover, but I’m off the boat now. His stupidly grinning puss had the exact opposite effect that Ben Stiller‘s Oscar show routines (the Na’vi thing, the ’09 Joaquin Phoenix parody, that great bit he did years ago with Owen Wilson) have had — i.e., he gets it, he’s cool.

And in the middle of all this Ken Jeong (The Hangover), while accepting the Best WTF Moment award, starts crying about his wife having dodged cancer? Now I’ve got a handle on the guy — he has the soul of an owner of a Monterey Park Chinese food restaurant who drives a big car and lives in a tract house.

Okay, the Jeong-Ed Helms Elton John routine wasn’t too bad. Christina Aquilera‘s light-up crotch was striking. And I was mildly aroused by the trailer for Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows.

New Moon was named Best Movie, and Stewart won the Best Female Performance award for sleepwalking through it? The emptiest Eloi GenY girls would have trouble with those calls. And Zach Galifianakis won the Best Comedic Performance for playing an all-but-diaper-wearing retard in The Hangover when the general consensus is that Ed Helms’ performance stole it?

There’s a difference between taking a hold-your-nose, straight-paycheck acting job in some deplorable mainstream monstrosity (i.e., Johnny Depp in the Pirate movies, John Cusack in 2012) and having a nice little gig going with the family trade. Nearly all CG-mounted family films are atrocious (i.e., Furry Vengeance), but I’m not feeling the revulsion over Owen Wilson‘s Marmaduke voicing, despite the 11% Rotten Tomatoes rating and the weak opening numbers.

The bottom line is that Marmaduke plus Marley and Me has made Wilson the go-to GenX guy for family dog movies. If he’s smart he’ll play this like Donald O’Connor did with the Francis the Talking Mule movies in the ’50s and dog it as long as he can. Dog movies could be Wilson’s retirement fund/nest egg. Nobody watches them anyway or pays them any mind so who cares? Suck it in, do the job, take a shower.

It was reported late last week that Anne Carradine, widow of the late David Carradine, has filed the most absurd wrongful-death lawsuit in world history. The filing essentially claims that MK2 S.A., the producer of Carradine’s last film Stretch, should have hired someone to keep him from accidentally strangling himself to death while jerking off in his Bangkok hotel room.

Which is why I found a 6.4 Huffington Post comment mildly amusing, or at least in keeping with the Anne Carradine spirit: “I’m suing 20th Century Fox [for having] suffered a broken ankle, bulging discs in my neck and lower back, a sprained knee, two chipped teeth, a gash on my forehead and five groin pulls. All of these injuries occurred as a result of fleeing the theater every time the Marmaduke trailer came on (except for the groin pulls — those details are unnecessary).”

Last July’s first-peek-at-Avatar presentation at ComicCon made it imperative to attend. This year the big draw is a Tron Legacy looksee, and I’m not too sure about it. I’m feeling 65% of last year’s juice, if that, and that’s not enough to make me part with the $1600 or $1700 it’ll cost to fly out to LA, rent a car, stay in some crappy-ass motel, cover food-and-drink tabs, etc.

I’m not trying to diminish Tron Legacy or suggest it might not be good. I loved that early trailer they put out, and I’m into the cult of Joseph Kosinski as much as the next guy. I have no reason to believe that he’s not “the next ‘real deal’ in that he’s got a Cameron-like technical knowledge, is responsible with budgets and operates on an even keel…overall a remarkably talented, well adjusted guy,” as a director-writer said a while back. I just don’t think a Tron Legacy product reel-and-pep rally is worth flying across the country for.

I’d shell out if ComicCon was happening in mid-to-late June, and I knew for certain that the very first screening of the fully finished Inception was on the schedule. That would be worth it, no question.

A friend says the only complete movie that he knows will be showing at ComicCon 2010 is Scott Pilgrim vs. The World. Bamboo shoots under my fingernails. The other big attractions are things like Green Lantern and Thor and what-have-you. I have a certain amount of geek fervor in my system, but to be into this year’s ComicCon you have to be 110% into geek theology. You have to be willing to go over the geek waterfalls in a barrel. You have to be Ed Douglas, Katey Rich, Devin Faraci, Drew McWeeny…one of those who exalt in the ComicCon atmosphere. “Whoo-whoo…we’re here! Among our own kind! Doesn’t get any better than this!”

Well, it does get better. A lot better. ComicCon can be (and was last year for me) a moderately bruising experience in terms of getting into the big panels and presentations. You have to call and beg and hustle your way into everything, and that means tons of pre-arrival calls and e-mails and cajolings. Unlike the major film festivals, you can’t just show up at ComicCon and pick up your pass and go to town. It’s much, much more difficult to finagle this San Diego soiree than Cannes, Toronto or Sundance. It’s hard enough to file six or seven or more stories per day under any festival circumstance, but to deal with what I’ve come to regard as ComicCon crap pushes it into the red zone.

Tron Legacy will open on 12.17.10.

Meet Marlon Brando is a 25-minute documentary by Alfred and David Maysles. All it is, basically, is footage of Brando schmoozing with journalists at a press junket for Code Name: Morituri, a World War II thriller that costarred Brando and Yul Brynner. And it’s a very cool thing to simply watch Brando as he sidesteps the usual protocol, dumps on the film and charms the shit out of everyone.

Among other things he (a) studies his questioners like a bank officer, squinting his eyes and picking up everything they’re thinking but not saying while interviewing them about their quirks and backgrounds, (b) does whatever he can to avoid discussing the film, (c) jokes around a lot, (d) discusses the plight of American Indians, (e) flirts with each and every female, (f) speaks French and so on.

Pretty Female Journalist: “Just tell us about your new movie.” Brando: “Well….why?”

Morituri opened in the U.S. on 8.25.65 so this junket probably happened two or three weeks before. Here’s part 2 and 3.

The generic impression of Brando is that of a guy who gave up, got fat, stopped caring, blew it big-time as a dad, hated acting and so on. But here, at least, all that self-hating stuff hasn’t taken him yet, and in fact doesn’t seem to have established a foothold. He seems like somebody you’d really like to hang and drink with. Sharp, self-deprecating, perceptive, whimsical.

“The idea was to let scores of television reporters meet the star in order to sell Morituri,” an IMDB poster writes. “Brando, however, had other plans. Declaring that he hates being ‘a hawker’ he turns the situation upside down, interviewing the interviewers, mocking the vacuousness of the set-up and flat-out refusing to promote Morituri.

“Don’t you have anything to say about the film?’ asks an exasperated journalist. Brando replies, ‘Bernie Wicky smokes the worst cigars I’ve ever known!’

“With a lesser personality, this might be perceived as the arrogant posturing of a spoiled movie star, but the mischievous twinkle in Brando’s eyes, combined with the fierce intelligence and wit of his answers, make it a joy to behold. The documentary does not get us any closer to Brando the actor, but it does offer an insightful glimpse into the mind of a man who was too smart to go with the flow, too independent to compromise and who, throughout his life, refused to play by the rules.”

Kristen Stewart‘s apology for her “being paparazzi’ed is like being raped” remark in a new British Elle interview is, for me, a matter of some disappointment.

By caving in to pressure and throwing herself upon the mercy of the court Stewart has indicated that for all her slouchy rebel posing in public, she’s no Sean Penn where it counts — i.e., in the backbone.

Instead of explaining to the idiots out there that the term “rape” doesn’t strictly refer to sexual violation — that it means being “invaded and occupied and suffering a kind of brutal violation or wounding or theft, be it physical or emotional,” as I explained last Wednesday — she did exactly what her publicist told her to do and kowtowed to the simple-minded.

“I really made an enormous mistake — clearly and obviously,” Stewart told People two days ago. “And I’m really sorry about my choice of words. ‘Violated’ definitely would have been a better way of expressing the thought [than rape].”

In other words, if you’re a certified, card-carrying moron the word “violated” can allude to sexual assault or being brutalized by paparazzi, but the word “rape” cannot and must not refer to anything other than the former. Hooray for Stewart and her publicist for doing their part to approve and ratify American stupidity.

Somebody get in touch with Roberto Paglia and explain that his “Best of Sicily” article called “The Rape of Palermo” constitutes a woefully insensitive use of the term, and that he needs to take out ads in newspapers and on websites worldwide and apologize to all the women who’ve been offended.