Day: January 27, 2016

There was less of a pulse prior to yesterday’s 6 pm screening of Meera Menon‘s Equity than I’d felt during Sundance Film Festival screenings over the previous five days. “Everyone goes home on Tuesday,” an entertainment attorney explained. The buyers, she meant, plus much of the talent plus the party/entourage crowd. “Really? I thought they all went home on Wednesday,” I said, “but whatever.” Today things are barely percolating. You can definitely feel the absence of juice. But a downshifted festival has its advantages — more seats, less crowded buses, more of a devoted cineaste atmosphere.

Park City Marriott — Wednesday, 1.27, 11:20 am.

Nate Parker and The Birth of a Nation team on Eccles stage following Monday evening’s premiere screening.

Bedroom in HE’s 1-bedroom abode at Park City Regency.

Jim director Brian Oakes (far right) with (l. to r.) John Foley, Diane Foley (parents), French journalist who shared cell with James Foley (can’t pinpoint his name), former Syrian-coverage colleague of Foley’s (her name could be Manu Brabo or Clare Gillis…you tell me). Pic taken following Monday afternoon’s screening at Library.

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Sundance reactions to Louis Black and Karen Bernstein’s Richard Linklater: Dream is Destiny have been entirely favorable. The Hollywood Reporter‘s John DeFore called the doc “one of the most enriching and enjoyable about a filmmaker in recent memory.” Well and good, but when a publicist friend asked yesterday if I’d seen it I responded candidly. Linklater is definitely one of my favorite artists in this business, I said, but why is it worth my time during this super-busy festival to watch a kiss-ass portrait of the guy? I don’t need a sum-up tribute piece and neither, I would think, does Linklater. He’s nowhere near the end of his career — he’s in the thick of it and going great guns. I’ll watch it on cable when it pops a couple of months hence.

“The other day Bill Clinton attacked Bernie Sanders’ proposal for a single-payer health plan as unfeasible and a ‘recipe for gridlock.’ Yet these days, nothing of any significance is feasible and every bold idea is a recipe for gridlock. This election [must be] about changing the parameters of what’s feasible and ending the choke hold of big money on our political system.

“I’ve known Hillary Clinton since she was 19 years old, and have nothing but respect for her. In my view, she’s the most qualified candidate for president of the political system we now have. But Bernie Sanders is the most qualified candidate to create the political system we should have, because he’s leading a political movement for change.” — from Robert Reich’s Salon piece, posted today (1.27), titled “Bernie Is Our Only Hope For Real Political Change.”

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“A Los Angeles Times study of the 5,765 Academy members concluded that 94 percent are Caucasian (77 percent male), 2 percent are black, and less than 2 percent are Latino. The average age is 62, with only 14 percent younger than 50. Looking at this pasty gray demographic, one can’t help but wonder whether or not they saw the lovely little coming-of-age film Dope, or were at all interested in the powerful N.W.A biopic Straight Outta Compton, or cared about Spike Lee’s insightful Chi-Raq, or marveled at Samuel L. Jackson’s mesmerizing performance in The Hateful Eight. Why Concussion‘s Will Smith was ignored is still a head-scratcher. Maybe they thought his previous two nominations were enough.” — from Kareem Abdul-Jabbar‘s 1.27 Hollywood Reporter guest column titled “Why Black People Are ‘Invisible’ to Oscar Voters.”

HE to Abdul-Jabbar: (1) My Sundance review of Dope, posted on 1.26.15, called it “smartly assembled exploitation crap — a fleet, Tarantino-like hodgepodge of fantasy bullshit in the vein of a New Line Cinema release from the ’90s (i.e., House Party), and adapted to the general sensibility of 2015…nothing is soft or subtle or indirect.” (2) HE on Compton, posted 7.31.15: “A tight, satisfying, straight-ahead telling of the N.W.A. saga from ’86 to ’95 (roots, breakout, success, conflict and falling apart, concluding with the death of Easy E.), and quite an indictment of police racism and brutality to boot. Deals tough straight cards.” (3) I never saw Chi-Raq. (4) Jackson delivered his usual ballsy-loquacious Tarantino thing in The Hateful Eight — okay as far as it goes but rote, familiar. (5) From my 11.11.15 Concussion review: “Smith delivers a better-than-decent performance, nicely augmented by what sounded to my white-ass ears like a believable Nigerian accent, but at best he’s a mild Best Actor threat. If he gets nominated, fine…but the film isn’t good enough to bounce him into contention.”

Are you now or have you ever been a reviewer with a suppressed racial bias that you don’t even know you have? Will you now atone for this by pledging full & absolute allegiance to the New Order, and more particularly to Nate Parker‘s The Birth of a Nation and the Sundance cominterm that has recently praised it to the heavens? Will you pledge here and now to do cartwheels in the lobby the next time you see a politically significant African-American film? Join us now and we’ll forgive you. But we also want you to give us names of other reviewers with a suppressed racial bias. It’s for their own good as well as your own. We already have a lot of their names so you’ll mainly be confirming.