Day: December 29, 2013

Almost eleven years ago I wrote a complaint piece about the “tedious” and “narcotizing” pronouncements of box-office analyst Paul Dergerabedian (formerly of Exhibitor Relations and Media By Numbers, currently with Rentrak). At the time Dergarabedian was the default quote guy among the big-time industry reporters (New York Times‘ Rick Lyman, USA Today‘s Scott Bowles, AP’s Dave Germain) when they wrote their Monday morning box-office stories. I said that Dergarabedian’s “almost oppressively mundane” analysis was driving me insane.

I’m not saying that In Contention‘s Kris Tapley is the new Dergarabedian. His film reviews and award-season analysis pieces over the years have always been greater in scope and have cut much deeper than mere box-office analysis, and I respect his comment that “few [seem to] have really gotten into the formal elements of the film, lost in a fog of their own farts.” But I got a faint whiff of that old Dergarabedian blandness when I read his 12.29 Hitfix piece called “Wolf of Wall Street Dispute Reminds Us That Martin Scorsese Is No Stranger To Controversy.”

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“I suppose that in certain quarters, the only thing interesting about a movie, or the launching pad for anything interesting about a conversation or consideration about a movie, is how the moviemakers feel about their characters. Golly, the Coen brothers sure hate their characters, don’t they? But that David O. Russell, he LOVES his characters — characters who, like those in The Wolf of Wall Street, are criminals — but they’re NICE criminals, they’re passionate, they’re in love, they’re cuddly, and Jennifer Lawrence is AWESOME.

“Gosh, when did the critical class become so (a) filled with flowery feeling and (b), for lack of a better world, thick? [Luis] Bunuel wouldn’t do well with this crowd at all. “Hey…he’s…he’s…he’s making FUN of us!” — from Glenn Kenny‘s 12.26 Some Came Running piece about the whys, wherefores and rationales of the ensconced opponents of Martin Scorsese‘s masterpiece.

After reading last night’s rave tweet about The Wolf of Wall Street, I asked LexG to write a full-out review. His response: “I don’t think you’d wanna hear my take [as] I loved it mostly for the expected/probable ‘wrong reasons’. If I can whip something up in the next day or two I’ll e-mail it, but I can’t promise. I just KNOW it’s gonna lead to commenters pissed at you for giving me a forum and the expected nobodies ragging on me endlessly about what a loser I am, which always makes me feel doubly shitty. In a weird way WoWS is one of those movies I loved SO MUCH [and] am so excited about that I LOATHE even arguing about it with people, and thus the inevitable 23 brusque comments from Dulouz Gray about how much it sucks and how stupid we are is only gonna cheapen the movie for me by engaging [in] that kinda thing. We’ll see.”

I was half-amazed to find a line of maybe 75 or 80 tourists in a cab line outside Penn Station yesterday. Because there were absolutely NO CABS lined up to take anyone anywhere. I tried a little counselling with a woman who was about 50th in line. “You don’t have to do this,” I told her. “Just walk two or three blocks south. You’ll get a cab much sooner.” She shrugged and said, “Too many bags.” Translation: “I’m too intimidated to walk alone on the streets of New York with luggage. I’d rather suffer here with the other tourists. Feels safer.”

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