Yes, I’m queer for backstage color photos taken during the filming of classic black-and-white films. Yes, the Marlon Brando-in-Julius Caesar shot below is a fake — i.e., digitally colored. And yet the marble looks accurate; ditto the blood smears. And red wardrobe is, of course, often used on black-and-white films as it photographs well in that process. Yeah, it’s fake but I wish it wasn’t.
Several weeks ago I tapped out a piece called “Whither La La Land‘s Encounter With Joe Popcorn?“. The gist was that (a) Tom Hanks was spot-on when he said “if the audience doesn’t go and embrace something as wonderful as this then we are all doomed,” but that (b) I was concerned about Bobby Peru‘s prediction that Damien Chazelle’s 21st Century musical (Summit, 12.9) will only do arthouse-level business.
Well, I saw La La land again last night at the Savannah Film Festival, and while the audience was a mixture of elite film lovers (which all film festivals attract) and SCAD students, it went over like gangbusters. Cheering, whoo-whooing, a standing ovation for Chazelle. Three SCAD kids (two girls and a guy) were sitting next to me, and they were all having kittens. Delighted, emotionally affected, planning to buy the soundtrack and see it again with their parents, etc. Everyone in the house was blissed, floating.
Bobby Peru’s response would presumably be “naaah, people who go to film festivals are foo-foos…real popcorn types aren’t going to embrace this because musicals are regarded as arcane exercises in nostalgia, especially those that don’t feature major music stars.”
Nobody has seen Robert Zemeckis‘ Allied (Paramount, 11.23), but the trailers have told us it’s a WWII espionage-and-assassins drama. But this new poster conveys a kind of swoony champagne vibe from High Society (’56). This is what Zemeckis wanted. Sexy stars, romantic vibes, perfect hair and wardrobe, Alfred Hitchcock‘s Notorious, etc. An aura of flush, pampered glamour.
All hail the late Tom Hayden, reigning lion of ’60s-era activism, principal author of the 1962 SDS Port Huron statement, a Chicago 7 defendant and a California Assemblyman and Senator for almost 20 years. Hayden has passed at the age of 76 after suffering a stroke last year, and his absence is no small thing. Hayden was the George Washington of the rabble-rousing antiwar left from the mid ’60s to mid ’70s. The man was graced with exceptional smarts, vision and a pair of steel balls.
Hayden was also the only anti-establishment activist to marry a brilliant, sexy, major-league Hollywood actress — Jane Fonda. To the best of my knowledge no other SDS superstar, megaphone speech-giver or Chicago 7 defendant (Abbie Hoffman, Jerry Rubin, John Froines, David Dellinger, Bobby Seale, Rennie Davis, Lee Weiner) even dated a world-class, Oscar-winning Hollywood headliner. I’m sorry but that means something. Hayden was a political star and his 16- or 17-year partnership with Fonda was a significant part of that lustre.
With today’s announcement that Fences costar Viola Davis will compete for a Best Supporting Actress Oscar instead of a Best Actress trophy (which would have made sense given that she won a Best Actress Tony for playing the same character, Rose Maxson, in a 2010 Broadway production), the Best Actress race is, I believe, all but settled.
The falling-down reactions to Emma Stone‘s La La land performance at Telluride seven weeks ago made it clear to almost everyone that the Best Actress race would be between Stone and Davis, based on her earlier triumph and the storied reputation of August Wilson’s 1987 play. Then Natalie Portman‘s Jackie scored in Toronto and she became another peak contender. But now with Davis out it seems pretty obvious that Stone all but has it in the bag.
Why? Portman hits a ground-rule double or, at most, a triple. Stone hits a grand slam. It’s that simple.
It’s not just the skillfulness of her La La Land performance but the depth and exuberance and intensity of it. Portman’s Jacqueline Kennedy turn, which will almost certainly be nominated, is more poised and precise — the role as written doesn’t coax or require her to dig down and release an emotional gusher, not the way Stone does in La La Land.
“The Best Picture Oscar is going to La La Land, an uncontroversial and safe film about actors (a large majority of Oscar voters) from one of the big upcoming directors too. Moonlight has a decent shot but in a year with not only La La Land but a new Scorsese film as well it’s going to be really difficult.” — Nicholas Joseph Lemos on Facebook.
“Not to sound crude, but Moonlight appeals to black as well as the gay/lesbian voters, so it may get more votes than Loving. Then again, the older conservative voters may not like Moonlight‘s gay-friendly theme, which also hurt Brokeback Mountain‘s chances. I think it’s a two-way race between Manchester By The Sea and Moonlight.” — Jeffrey Wang, ditto.
The Savannah Film Festival launched last night, as if HE readers weren’t aware. This morning Rodrigo Santoro (Dominion, The 33, Jesus in the catastrophe known as Ben-Hur) was having breakfast near my table at the Brice Hotel restaurant, and that was that. I keep to myself, hold my own. Dozens upon dozens of dogs were wearing Halloween costumes last night as they strolled along Broughton Street, and I mean costumes that involved a lot of thought, effort and creativity. I had never before seen this many costumed dogs in a single area in my life, no shit.
Once again, hats off to the marketing team behind Tom Ford‘s Nocturnal Animals (Focus Features, 11.18) for making this ambitiously conceived but mostly uninvolving psychological drama seem more intriguing than it is. The new trailer is flat-out masterful, and the mildly spooky one-sheet nails it also. I’m not sure if Focus used an outside agency or what, but this is the kind of sell-job that every distributor wants.
Jennifer Lawrence playing Zelda Fitzgerald, based on a screenplay by Emma Frost (The White Queen)? Presumably embarked upon as a prestige acting project that will showcase Lawrence’s range, but sure, why not? And yet Ron Howard‘s interest in possibly directing the biopic sounds, no offense and due respect, like a pay-grade reach. Former Lionsgate exec Allison Shearmur, who worked with Lawrence on the Hunger Games franchise, will produce. Really?
In the view of Variety‘s Peter Debruge, Doctor Strange (Disney, 11.4) “shares the same look, feel, and fancy corporate sheen as the rest of Marvel’s rapidly expanding Avengers portfolio, but it also boasts an underlying originality and freshness missing from the increasingly cookie-cutter comic-book realm of late.”
Okay, maybe…
Debruge then calls Doctor Strange “Marvel’s most satisfying entry since Spider-Man 2, and a throwback to M. Night Shyamalan’s soul-searching identity-crisis epic Unbreakable, which remains the gold standard for thinking people’s superhero movies.”
That’s a recommendation?
I distinctly recall not being especially impressed, much less feeling “terrifically satisfied”, by Spider Man 2, which is otherwise known as “the Alfred Molina Doc Ock one.” And I regard Unbreakable, which arrived in the immediate wake of The Sixth Sense, as a quirky non-starter in the Shyamalan canon. I felt distinctly underwhelmed as I shuffled out of the Los Angeles all-media screening and saying “that’s it?” to a couple of colleagues. I remember Gregg Kilday repeating “they call me Mr. Glass!” during a post-screening discussion on the sidewalk, and my saying that any film that announces the fate of a major character with a freeze-frame title card at the conclusion is doing something wrong.
