A little more than two years ago Warren Beatty‘s Howard Hughes movie, which he’d been developing since the early ’80s and preparing in his usual meticulous way for God knows how many years, seemed to fall apart. A few months before this Beatty biographer Peter Biskind discussed the history of the Hughes project with Vanity Fair‘s Bruce Handy, and the only thing clear was that Beatty was moving at his usual snail’s pace. But now Beatty is actually shooting the Hughes film, according to Deadline‘s Anita Busch, with Alden Ehrenreich and Lily Collins costarring with Beatty as an elderly Hughes. (Biskind/Handy observed that Beatty probably regards Hughes as a kindred spirit, certainly in terms of their “control freak” personalities.) Busch reports that billionaires Ron Burkle and Steve Bing, Windsor Media’s Terry Semel, Arnon Milchan’s New Regency and James Packer’s and Brett Ratner’s RatPac Entertainment are financing the project to the tune of $27.6 million. I don’t know if that’s the whole budget, but $27.6 million is much lower than a 2011 ballpark budget mentioned by The Hollywood Reporter‘s Borys Kit and Gary Baum, between $42 and $47 million.

Mike Judge‘s Silicon Valley series (HBO, eight episodes, debuting 4.6) takes place in contemporary times, but some of the hair styles look like the ’70s or early ’80s. The atmosphere and the dialogue sound right. “Partially inspired by Judge’s own experiences as a Silicon Valley engineer in the late ’80s,” etc. Thomas Middleditch, T.J. Miller, Martin Starr, Kumail Nanjiani, Josh Brener, Matt Ross and Christopher Evan Welch.

I have one tiny criticism of Leonardo DiCaprio‘s brilliant performance in The Wolf of Wall Street. Which is really a criticism of Martin Scorsese‘s direction, to be fair about it. I’ve been telling myself it’s not important, but I have to spit it out. In one of the his earliest scenes (included below) DiCaprio’s Jordan Belfort casually mentions all the various drugs he takes to get through the day. In the middle of the shpiel he takes a quick slurp of orange juice and throws the glass in the direction of the shrubbery behind him. (But not far enough — we hear it break upon the pavement.) I just can’t buy tossing the glass. It’s too anarchic, too coarse. A guy like Belfort wouldn’t behave like a zoo gorilla in front of his chauffeur. In front of his drugged-up Stratton-Oakmont pals, perhaps, but not the help. Besides nobody smashes a glass of orange juice in front of their own home on their way to work. It’s a bullshit move.

Boris Kachka‘s New York piece about our Oscar blogging demimonde, “For Their Consideration”, will be online Tuesday morning around 8 am Eastern. It’s now available via New York‘s iPad app and also at L.A. newsstands. I bought a copy this morning around 7 am. I have my arguments with this and that portion but it’s a relatively fair-minded, well-honed, smoothly written piece. Kachka is a very good writer. He quoted me honestly. It says that a lot of people on my side of the fence have put me down, but in my mind these people are odious, tip-toeing one-eyed jacks. I basically come off as a sober but eccentric sui generis transparent sort with some minor but tolerable flaws. Boris didn’t give me credit for being a relentless workhorse but I guess that speaks for itself. Kachka says that in early 2013 I “predicted glory for Saving Mr. Banks on the basis of a leaked script alone”; in fact the title of that piece was “If Saving Mr. Banks Is As Good As The Script” — the operative term was “if.” The New York proofreader failed to correct the spelling of Hennessy cognac — the print edition of the article spells it “Hennessey” but that’ll be fixed online and on the iPad version soon. David Poland, Steve Pond and Kris Tapley are mentioned once and that’s all; I’m not recalling that Indiewire‘s Anne Thompson is mentioned at all. It’s basically about Sasha Stone, Tom O’Neil, Scott Feinberg, Pete Hammond and myself. Nikki Finke is quoted and she sounds like a snitty, sour-attitude type. I’ll post a more thorough response tomorrow morning or very late tonight.

Harold Ramis, the director and co-writer of Groundhog Day, one of the greatest, funniest and most profoundly spiritual, philosophically robust comedies ever made, has left the earth at age 69. Everything that Ramis did from his birth on 11.21.44 until be began to develop and prepare for Groundhog Day was Phase One, and everything that came after Groundhog Day was Phase Two. Ramis never did anything better than make Groundhog Day, and he didn’t need to. His life was fulfilled by this 1993 film. Really. And not everyone realized this right away. I did but a lot of people didn’t.