Why release another Jupiter Ascending trailer now that it’s been bumped into next February? Who cares? What’s the point? Game all but over.

After (a) persuading six major-league directors (Guillermo del Toro, JJ Abrams, Alfonso Cuaron, Rian Johnson, Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu and Matt Reeves) to sign a letter requesting MGM to allow Robert Harris to attempt a restoration of the 70mm version of The Alamo with outside funding, (b) warranting a mention on the Alamo Wiki page and (c) getting editorial attention from Breitbart.com’s John Nolte, Team Alamo is having a slow second day. The two Stevens (Soderbergh and Spielberg) haven’t responded; ditto Martin Scorsese and David Fincher. I also haven’t heard back from Wes Anderson and Alexander Payne, but give ’em time. I’ve been too lazy to reach out to George Lucas and James Cameron, but a critic friend has offered to ask Clint Eastwood to sign the letter. Who else should I approach?

Tweet #1: Matt Reeves‘ excellent Dawn of the Planet of the Apes (7.11), which I saw Tuesday night on the Fox lot, is the Empire Strikes Back of this franchise — a drizzly, darkly lighted dystopian noir that is nonetheless a remarkably subtle and nicely-shaded film about peace and compassion. Tweet #2: It’s basically a thoughtful and humanistic deal that pays off in dramatic terms (or as much as a middle-act trilogy film can do that, given the restrictions), but has a thematic current that laments the war impulse in all beings and species. Tweet #3: Rather than endorse the original Pierre Boulle idea about all men being violence-prone and all apes being basically peaceful (or at least not as bad as humans), Dawn shows that both species have their warmongers and troublemakers, and that the actions of wiser, calmer peacemakers (i.e., leaders more in the Obama than the Dubya mold) are needed to chill things down. Tweet #4: Dawn has some truly beautiful 3D photography with one exquisitely moody composition after another (when it’s not flat-out nocturnal the movie is covered start to finish in misty rainfall and rainforest fog) and a generally lamenting anti-violence attitude. Tweet #5: I was particularly struck by Andy Serkis‘ remarkably subtle performance as the sad and heavily-burdened Ceasar, which is easily an award-quality thing. Cheers also to Jason Clarke for lending real heart and tenderness to a role that might have felt rote or routine with another actor. Tweet #6: Dawn is a much less predictable and more layered film than I expected.

I don’t want to know from Michael Bay‘s Transformers 4: Age of Extinction. Nothing…nothing. It’s not playing anywhere, people aren’t going to see it, I don’t know what you’re talking about, it doesn’t exist. After next weekend it literally won’t exist and we can all move on. I just don’t see why any kind of attention whatsoever should be paid. To what end? What good can possibly come? I don’t understand why Indiewire‘s Anne Thompson and Eric Kohn took the time to discuss it.

I saw Steve James‘ warm, amusing, candid and sometimes hilarious Life Itself (Magnolia, theatres/VOD/iTunes, 7.4) for the third…well, nearly the third time last night. It holds up. It will always hold up. They say “dying is easy but comedy is hard” but dying is pretty hard stuff. I was admitting to myself as I watched that I might not have the courage to face up to disease and difficulty the way Roger Ebert faced it, particularly when things got really tough during the last year or so of his life. The man was a bull, and I’m not sure I have even half of that strength. I nonetheless smirked, laughed, felt a little sadness, smiled, felt the fervor, etc. Life Itself is a journey through the realm of serious, devotional movie-worship over the last 45 years or so, and it’s quite a thing to let into your heart. A vital, necessary film for the HE crowd.

Six weeks ago composer and longtime David Fincher collaborator Trent Reznor told Entertainment Weekly‘s Kyle Anderson that working on Gone Girl (20th Century Fox, 10.3) “has been really fun. It’s been an interesting challenge with some different parameters, and it keeps us on our toes. That’s what makes it good. [But] it’s a much darker film than I was expecting. The book is not exactly uplifting or happy, but it’s a nasty film.” Reznor’s quote would have been just a tiny bit better if he’d said “nasty-ass.”