Day: February 4, 2017

It struck me earlier today that Kenneth Lonergan‘s Manchester By The Sea is similar to Martin Ritt‘s Hud in that the lead protagonist doesn’t find salvation or redemption at the finale — no healing and certainly no parting of the clouds. What other films have a main protagonist who can’t find a way out of the pit or doesn’t care to find one, who finally says “aahh, the hell with it…I am who I am”?

From Hud Wikipage: “Paramount executives were unhappy with the film. They felt it was too dark; they were displeased by James Wong Howe‘s black-and-white cinematography and Hud’s lack of remorse and unchanged behavior at the finale. 

“After Hud was previewed, Paramount considered dropping the project, feeling that it was not ‘commercial enough.’ But director Martin Ritt flew to New York and convinced the executives to release the film unmodified.

“Hud was acclaimed during its premiere at the 24th Venice International Film Festival. After opening on 5.29.63 it grossed $10 million, earning $5 million in theatrical rentals against a budget of $2.35 million.

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This Mercedes AMG GT Roadster spot is okay, I guess, in a dopey, broadly satirical sort of way, but what’s happened to the Coen brothers? I’m asking because after Peter Fonda turns over the engine there’s an insert shot of a couple of full glasses of beer shuddering so badly they nearly tip over. That’s not cool, not the Coen brothers style. The Coens of yore would have shown a closeup of the beers vibrating ever so slightly without the glasses moving — still a bullshit notion but it would have passed muster. Comment #2: A single Mercedes “blocks in” motorcycles belonging to…what, at least 12 or 15 bikers? Comment #3: Fonda could use a little neck-wattle surgery and a thousand micro-hair-plug grafts. He needs to at least try to look like Terry Valentine again. Aging is inevitable, but you can at least make an effort to shave a decade or so.

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For all those HE commenters who’ve incorrectly claimed that Real Time‘s Bill Maher and author-neuroscientist Sam Harris had somehow supported or aligned themselves with Trump’s Muslim travel ban, here are the facts. In passing: A 6.14.16 Washington Post story by Philip Bump attempted to calculate how many terrorists the Bush and Obama administrations have each killed. It was estimated that former President Barack Obama is responsible for having sent between 30,000 and 33,000 terrorists to Allah.

Hats off to Santa Barbara Film Festival exec director Roger Durling for generating an easy, amusing interview vibe last night with La La Land costars Ryan Gosling and Emma Stone at the Arlington theatre. Alpha alfalfa adoration vibes…love love love. Everyone enjoyed it. That said, the chat lasted over two hours, which is a half-hour too long. 90 minutes should more than suffice. Incidentally: An HE salute to the Santa Barbara Film Festival’s tech team for turning around high-quality video clips of the previous night’s tribute the next morning. This has never happened before — I for one am seriously impressed.

A photo call moment following last night’s SBIFF tribute to La La Land‘s Emma Stone and Ryan Gosling. They are flanked by director-writer Damian Chazelle (r.) and SBIFF exec director Roger Durling (l.)

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