I’ve been waiting for a long, long time to see those mountains of water, rolling and cresting in the big red-sea sequence. In this respect and in terms of general visual panache, Ridley Scott has finally elbowed aside Cecil B. DeMille. The first press screenings of Ridley Scott‘s Exodus: Gods and Kings (or at least the ones I know about) will happen on Wednesday, 12.3. Pic opens nine days later.
A North Korean government-controlled website, Uriminzokkiri, has laid into The Interview, the satiric political comedy opening on 12.25, and, by inference, its star and co-director Seth Rogen, co-director Evan Goldberg and costar James Franco. In the usual blustery, militant tone of official North Korean pronouncements, the statement declared that the filmmakers “must be subject to stern punishment.” Which could mean bare-bottom spanking or something heavier.
“The cheekiness to show this conspiracy movie, which is comprised of utter distortions of the truth and absurd imaginations, is an evil act of provocation against our highly dignified republic and an insult against our righteous people,” the statement said.
The 88-second teaser for J.J. Abrams‘ Star Wars: The Force Awakens (Disney, 12.18.05) will pop on iTunes early tomorrow morning, or roughly around 7 am Pacific. The teaser was going to just be shown theatrically but thousands from outlying areas bitched so that’s been scrapped. I’ve been told that the iTunes appearance will coincide with the first theatrical showings of the teaser at Hollywood’s El Capitan, which is selling tickets for a Big Hero 6 showing at 7 am. They would never schedule this if it wasn’t for the teaser hoo-hah. New York teaser screenings will begin around 10 am, the folks in England will have to wait until 3 pm or thereabouts, etc.
Producer and former Paramount Pictures president Frank Yablans, who presided over that studio during its early-to-middle”70s golden period (The Godfather, Serpico, Paper Moon, Chinatown, The Godfather, Part II, Murder on the Orient Express) and then served as vice-chairman and COO of MGM/United Artists under Kirk Kerkorian, died earlier today at age 79.
Unlike his slightly older, still-living brother Irwin, a producer of second-tier “product” who was Billy Carter to Frank’s Jimmy Carter, the younger Yablans believed in class and quality. He produced Silver Streak (good comedy), The Other Side of Midnight (glitzy garbage), The Fury (second-tier DePalma), The Star Chamber (Peter Hyams crap) and Congo (crap).
Yablans also produced and co-penned screenplays for North Dallas Forty (a very good football film) and Mommie Dearest (classic, hilarious, over-the-top kitsch).
I’ve never been a fan of that “plink plink plink plink plink pink plink plink” Twilight Zone theme, which replaced Bernard Herrmann‘s music after the first ’59-to-’60 season. Herrmann’s original score is wonderfully solemn and vaguely creepy, and much more affecting in a moody-undercurrent way than anything that followed. Sidenote: I own Bluray box sets of seasons #1 and #2. Which make the episodes look much cleaner and sharper than they ever did on the tube way back when, and even better than they did in private screenings for CBS executives.
Unfinished Business (20th Century Fox, 3.6.15) is apparently a lowbrow Animal House-type comedy among struggling entrepeneurs during a do-or-die business deal in Germany. It’s also a re-teaming of a noticeably thinner Vince Vaughn with Ken Scott, who directed Vaughn in Delivery Man (’13), a remake of Scott’s Canadian-produced Starbuck (’11). I wish Vaughn could make a comedy that reflected his actual, real-deal comic sensibilities without having to pander to the megaplex apes. Pic was filmed in the Boston area (Framingham, Braintree) and Berlin and HE’s own Studio Babelsberg.
This morning I read Eric Kohn‘s Indiewire interview with Selma director Ava DuVernay and Fruitvale Station director-writer Ryan Coogler about their support of the Black Friday Blackout. For me, the stand-out portion is when Kohn asks DuVernay if she sees “any direct connections between today’s climate in the immediate aftermath of Ferguson in the story of Selma.” And Duvernay responds as follows: “Yes, absolutely. It’s the same story repeated. The same exact story.
“An unarmed black citizen is assaulted with unreasonable force and fatal gunfire by a non-black person who is sworn to serve and protect them. A small town that is already fractured by unequal representation in local government and law enforcement begins to crack under the pressure. People of color, the oppressed, take to the street to make their voices heard. The powers that be seek to extinguish those voices with brute, militarized force and disregard for constitutional rights. That’s Selma 1965. That’s Ferguson right now.”
This moved me to write the following to DuVernay a few minutes ago:
“Ava — Today I noted your statement in the Eric Kohn Indiewire interview in which you link the Selma marches & non-violent protests of 1965 with what has happened in Ferguson.
“In line with this, I want to bring to your attention (or perhaps clarify if you’ve already heard of it) a different linkage that I mentioned three nights ago. Regretfully, I would add, as it turned out all wrong…even if my heart was in the right place.
I’m not quite as enthralled by Mike Nichols and Steven Soderbergh‘s DVD discussion about Who’s Afraid of Virginia Wolff (’66) as their Catch 22 DVD commentary, but it’s still damn good. Nichols did and knew so much…everyone, everything. 60-plus years of being right smack in the middle of da coolness, da coolness being himself. Nichols’ schwing might have had something to do with “starting out your life by having to avoid being murdered,” Aaron Sorkin says in the Hollywood Reporter tribute issue. “He was seven years old when he put an ocean between himself and Nazis. It’s hard — impossible — to sum up Mike Nichols in a short space, but in his memory I’ll try to make a hard thing simple. He was the most talented person I’ve ever known. He was also the kindest. And we’ll never see his equal.”
When Citizenfour was first being screened in late September the emailed invitations said that screeners definitely wouldn’t be sent out. So either (a) they changed their minds or (b) this was a push to get people to see it in screening rooms and theaters. It came in a package with other Radius screeners including Bong Joon Ho‘s Snowpiercer, Charlie McDowell‘s The One I Love and Margaret Brown‘s The Great Invisible. It’s also delightful, of course, to be able to watch Birdman whenever and wherever. It’s nice, also, to have Mike Binder and Kevin Costner‘s Black or White on the shelf.
Every time I listen to The Velvet Underground & Nico‘s “banana” album I think of roaming around downtown Manhattan in pleasantly chilly weather. That brisk, bundle-up weather you get around Thanksgiving and Christmas. And the soothing holiday vibe that seems to permeate all people and places from now though New Year’s Eve. Yes, from listening to Lou Reed sing about a Lower East Side girl drifting into prostitution. I would sooner listen to this than “O Come All Ye Faithful” any day of the week. You know what’s also great? Letting Spotify take you on a Lou Reed trip that lasts for hours and hours.
A recent Hollywood Reporter FYC trade ad for Dan Gilroy‘s Nightcrawler uses a misleading photo of Best Actor contender Jake Gyllenhaal, who plays a personable if sociopathic video-shooter named Lou. Jake looks a little Phantom of the Opera-ish, like a fiendish John Carradine on the campaign trail, but that’s not what he projects in the film. Lou’s vibe is open, eager, ultra-polite and all but inhuman. The second shot is his trademark expression, which is all about projecting “empathy” and “sincerity.”
