Day: March 18, 2017

I haven’t time to write anything now, but hats off to the father of rock ‘n’ roll, a guy who had it all and knew it all in the mid to late ’50s — a masterful singer-songwriter who played guitar like a ringin’ a bell, a guy who held mountains in the palms of his hands and owned it until…what, ’60 or ’61 or thereabouts? Okay, “Nadine” and “No Particular Place To Go” followed, but for the most part he cruised the nostalgia circuit from around that time on. He was the great Chuck Berry, after all — all he had to was show up, grin and perform “Maybeline”, “Sweet Little Sixteen”, “Roll Over, Beethoven” and “My Ding-a-Ling.” Play on, play on. Respect & condolences.

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Speaking as a fan of Niki Caro’s Whale Rider and McFarland, U.S.A., I’m wondering why there’s zero buzz on The Zookeeper’s Wife (Focus Features, 3.31). I’m hearing nothing, feeling nothing — not even after the 3.8 premiere in Warsaw or a 3.12 Cinequest Film Festival showing. I’ll be attending the 3.27 premiere at the Arclight. Shot in Prague in late ’15 and based on the book by Diane Workman, pic costars Jessica Chastain, Johan Heldenbergh, Daniel Bruhl and an assortment of exotic animals. Based on a true story about the hiding of Jews from Nazis by Warsaw zookeepers Jan and Antonina Żabinski.

Richard Linklater‘s Last Flag Flying, a kind of long-throw, post-9/11 sequel to Hal Ashby‘s The Last Detail (’73), is being research-screened in Pasadena on Wednesday evening. If it’s good enough to test-screen, why not take a whirl on a Cannes Film Festival showing? This is precisely the sort of little film that could actually benefit from a successful Cote d’Azur showing. Based on Daryl Poniscsan’s 2005 novel, it focuses on a reunion between Badass Buddusky, Mulhall (a.k.a. “Mule”) and Larry Meadows, who were played in Ashby’s film by Jack Nicholson, Otis Young (who died in ’01) and Randy Quaid. Flying stars Bryan Cranston (Buddusky), Laurence Fishburne (Mule) and Steve Carell (a much shorter Meadows…maybe he shrank in the Portsmouth brig?).

(l. to r.) Last Flag Flying‘s Laurence Fishburne, Bryan Cranston, Steve Carell.

(l. to r.) Randy Quaid, Jack Nicholson, Otis Young in Hal Ashby’s The Last Detail.

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A soldier shot and killed at Orly Airport? Okay, that’s it — cancel all flights! Bring the entire Orly travelling community to a screeching halt while we determine if this is part of a vast conspiracy, which of course it isn’t. Obviously. Bad guys have to be stopped, of course, but law enforcement’s highest priority when this stuff happens is to shut airports down. Update: Yes, Orly is now back in business but how many tens of thousands were affected? All because of one Muslim asshole (“I am here to die for Allah!”) who was on the terrorist watch list. Guys like this are always lone wolves.

“President Crazypants”, et. al. Jake Tapper (“I refuse to buy into that paradigm…there’s no bias when it comes to facts, and no bias when it comes to decency”). Barney Frank vs. Andrew Sullivan (“Boys!”), et. al. Friends, sane guys…Friday night comfort, an hour’s respite. Agreed — Gavin Newsom.

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Jeff to Alejandro: “Hope you and your family are well & well-travelled. When, pray, will your Mexican immigrant virtual reality film (yours and Chivo‘s, I mean) be viewable by guys like myself? How will the viewings work? To view the Real McCoy I’ll have to strap on a VR unit, of course, but where and how?

“No offense, of course, but I don’t particularly want to to buy a VR viewer just to watch your short. Will there be a HD or better yet a 4K version that I can stream down the road on my Sony 4K?

“Secondly, why can’t I stream The Revenant in 4K off Amazon? You can buy a 4K Revenant Bluray, but I don’t yet own a 4K Bluray player. Why can’t I just stream a 4K version? Have you watched Lawrence of Arabia via Amazon 4K streaming yet? It’s probably only 2K or a bit more due to compression and upconverting, but it’s quite brilliant.”