From Eric Kohn‘s 4.22 Indiewire review of Maggie (Roadside/Lionsgate, 5.8) , filed from the Tribeca Film Festival: “Arnold Schwarzenegger is not your average action hero in Henry Hobson‘s Maggie. The movie contains no impossible stunt work, hail of bullets, outrageous explosions or nefarious mega villains. Instead, as even-tempered midwestern farmer Wade, Schwarzenegger faces a far more daunting foe: the imminent death of his daughter Maggie (Abigail Breslin).
“Bitten by a zombie before the story begins, Maggie’s plight doesn’t so much adhere to the standard tropes of the walking dead genre so much as it magnifies one of them — the slow, painful transformation of a zombie victim and the question of whether those around her have the courage to put her out of her misery. Needless to say, it’s a welcome change of pace for the actor as well as the material itself, which Hobson and screenwriter John Scott 3 tackle with an impressive degree of restraint that strengthens its inevitably sentimental conclusion.
Start watching this interview between Avengers: Age of Ultron star Robert Downey, Jr. and Channel 4’s Krishnan Guru-Murthy at the four-minute mark. At that point Downey begins to show irritation and then increasing levels of anger as Guru-Murthy goes off-topic and asks about Downey’s druggie years as well as that noteworthy 2008 N.Y. Times quote about Downey’s political views having shifted away from traditional Hollywood liberalism. The angry glare in Downey’s eyes before he gets up and says “bye” is the same that Al Pacino had in The Godfather, Part II in that Washington, D.C. hotel room scene with Diane Keaton, right when she was telling him about her abortion. Downey’s parting shot is that Guru-Murthy has tried to “do a little Diane Sawyer.”
I’ve never been a huge fan of CinemaCon product-reel shows. The emphasis is always on rumbling, pounding, gut-slamming wham-o-rama rather than intrigue and seduction, but big-studio trailers have been operating this way since the ’80s. They all say “we know you’re looking for a ride rather than a film, and that you’re probably ADD-afflicted and texting someone while you watch this so we’re cutting and scoring this trailer in order to snag your attention for 60 seconds or so.” This is mostly what I was feeling from yesterday’s Warner Bros. presentation at CinemaCon — a series of attempts to make you want to try this or that Magic Mountain ride rather than watch this or that movie.
I realize, of course, that Warner Bros. occasionally makes and distributes films that aren’t aimed at Shallow Hals (American Sniper, Her, Inherent Vice) but they’re not really in the business of trying to entertain semi-educated adult film mavens. That notion flew the coop a long time ago.
From my balcony seat I saw four trailers for Warner Bros. films that (a) didn’t feel theme-park-y or franchise-y or cloying or aimed at submentals and (b) appear to be about semi-adult, character-driven situations and didn’t necessarily involve monsters or supercool heroes or chase scenes or explosions.
The most distinctive seemed to be Scott Cooper‘s Black Mass (9.18), a fact-based drama about notorious ex-Boston crimelord Whitey Bulger. It was clear from the footage that Johnny Depp‘s striking, atypical performance as Bulger is going to be in Best Actor contention. Heavy makeup, a steely demeanor, a voice that I’ve never heard come out of Depp before — he’ll be in “the Derby”, for sure.
I don’t believe Ben Affleck was being entirely honest yesterday when he explained in writing that he asked Finding Your Roots producer Henry “Skip” Gates, Jr. to ignore the fact that one of his ancestors was a slave owner because he “felt embarassed…the very thought left a bad taste in my mouth.” That may well have been the case, but the main reason, I strongly suspect, is that Affleck feared — understandably, I would add — that the outrage culture crowd on Twitter would tar and feather him as a scion of a racist bloodline, however moronic that notion sounds.
If Finding Your Roots had decided to reveal this particular lineage, would it make a lick of sense for the p.c. crowd to scream “Affleck is descended from racists so he must be a closet sympathizer”? No, it wouldn’t. That would be a bone-dumb assumption, to say the least. But you know that at least some lefty Stalinoids would suggest this all the same. They won’t tolerate the slightest manifestation of anything that doesn’t express a morally correct, ethically forward-thinking representation of humanity or history in any film, TV show, political discussion or what-have-you. And they don’t want to know from nuance.
“Outrage culture” is running wild these days and Affleck, no dummy, is fully aware of the potential. Time and again the p.c. mob has read things in a kneejerk, cretinously simple-minded fashion and made absurdly broad conclusions as a result. For all Affleck knew, this “scion of racists” idea could become an urban legend like Richard Gere putting a gerbil up his ass, and it could affect his financial and creative future.
It’s nuts out there, really nuts. But Affleck didn’t want to characterize Twitter culture as stupid or deranged, which in itself could land him in hot water, so he decided to use the “really embarassed” line, which is true, I’m sure, as far as it goes. Who wouldn’t feel shamed by this knowledge, but then again who was walking around during the early to mid 1800s with the moral convictions of a decent 20th Century person, letaloneaveteranofourowntime? Not everyone, I assure you.
It’s now 11:45 pm in Los Angeles. I flew from Burbank Airport to Las Vegas’s McCarran Airport early this afternoon, arriving around 1:25 pm. A little more than seven hours later I was on an 8:45 pm flight back to Burbank. Why? Basically bad luck. A Southwest Airlines traveller innocently (and, I have to say, rather stupidly) mistook my smallish black suitcase for her own and left the airport with it, leaving hers behind. But I didn’t discover what had happened until early this evening. All day long I was considering the possibility that my bag had been stolen or perhaps sent to Baltimore or Portland or whatever, and I just didn’t want to deal with this, certainly not in godawful Las Vegas with the dregs of Middle America waddling around in their shorts and sandals and summer dresses…I despise almost everything about that town, and being without a suitcase just pushed me over the edge.
It was my fault for not standing vigilantly by the McCarran baggage carousel earlier today. I decided instead to sit down and flip through Twitter and write a couple of quick emails. And then I made the grievous error of hitting the head just before the baggage carousel began revolving. When I returned my bag wasn’t there. No trace, no clue…the fuck? I went to the Southwest baggage claim office and filled out a form, etc. The baggage ladies said they’d almost certainly find it and call me within three or four hours.
I checked into my pathetic dump of a Howard Johnson’s hotel on Tropicana Avenue and then ambled over to Ceasar’s Palace. I picked up my “Admit One” press badge (thanks Mitch!) and attended the Warner Bros. presentation, which I found numbing and oppressive and mostly depressing. (More on that tomorrow.) But when I got out of the show I didn’t see a message from Southwest. Uh-oh. I started to ask myself what I was going to do. No suitcase meant I’d have to hit a market a mile or two away and buy the usual toiletries along with a couple of pairs of socks and underwear and maybe an extra shirt and whatnot, and I really didn’t feel like doing that. I was tired and irritable and made a snap judgment to bail on the whole Cinemacon thing and just head home. Sincere apologies to Mitch Neuhauser, but I’ll probably survive without the 2015 Cinemacon experience.
