Month: June 2017

Legendary documentarian Errol Morris on Donald Trump, as quoted in a 6.17.17 piece by The Daily Beast‘s Nick Schrager:

“I can’t even stand people trying to make sense out of [Trump’s bullshit],” Morris says. “There’s no point in trying. There’s a scene I’ve always loved in Dr. Strangelove, where General Turgidson (George C. Scott) is reading his letter from General Ripper (Sterling Hayden) in the Pentagon war room, and Ripper is going on and on about precious bodily fluids. Peter Sellers’ president says ‘Give me that’, looks at the letter, and suddenly says, ‘It’s obvious this person is insane!'”

Wells correction: No argument about Trump, but Morris is misremembering. As the end of Ripper’s letter there’s a passage about “God willing, we will prevail, in peace and freedom from fear, and in true health through the purity and essence of our natural…fluids.” Turgidson reads this deadpan, and then adds, “Uh, we’re…still trying to figure out the meaning of that last phrase, sir.” To which Sellers replies, “There’s nothing to figure out, General Turgidson. This man is obviously a psychotic.”

I wanted to see MSNBC’s “All The President’s Men Revisited” doc last night, but Tatyana and I were riding around Santa Monica on bicycles and couldn’t get home in time due to the slow-as-molasses 704 bus (Santa Monica to downtown on S.M. Blvd.). Why can’t I find information about rebroadcastings or at least ways to stream it? What is this, 2003?

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“There were brawls. I had guys die. You know, the show would end and someone’s still sitting there and then you realize they’re never getting up. I had a projectionist die one time in the booth. I heard the crowd booing, and then the movie’s off the screen. This is when there were carbon arc projectors, so a lot of times these projectionists would just fall asleep or they’d be screwing somebody up there and they’d forget to change the carbon arc. So I go up there…and the guy’s dead on the floor. I called the cops, and then I thought — this is how sick you’d get after being in New York for a few years in those days — I thought, ‘This is my big chance to actually shame a New York audience.’ So I went into this theater and I looked at them, and I said, ‘I’m very sorry for the inconvenience [but] the projectionist has passed away. We have someone going up there now, and your film will be on shortly.’ And they booed me!” — Savages author Don Winslow recalling a Times Square movie-theatre gig in the ’80s, reported by Bilge Ebiri in the Village Voice.

True story #2 (i.e., my own): I worked as a Brooklyn theatre manager sometime around late ’79 or early ’80. I honestly forget the name of the theatre, but it was a midsize house that played mainstream films. I remember telling the guy who’d hired me that I’d been a licensed projectionist in Connecticut and that I’d worked at the Carnegie Hall and Bleecker Street Cinemas under Sid Geffen. So I got the gig, but I became bored with the job very quickly. On top of which I was never all that reliable about keeping track of ticket sales and whatnot. I wasn’t skimming — I just wasn’t an efficient mathematical type. And then I decided to play Warren Zevon‘s Excitable Boy over the theatrical sound system before the show began. And I didn’t play it quietly — I had the sound levels up to at least 7 or 8. I was eventually canned, of course. The story of my life from the time I was 17 to the launch of Hollywood Elsewhere in August ’04 was “and then I got fired.”

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Go to 3:40 in this Real Time with Bill Maher sit-down with Breitbart Editor Alex Marlow:

After more than 50 hours of deliberations, Bill Cosby‘s trial on three charges of aggravated sexual assault against Andrea Constand was declared a mistrial today (i.e., Saturday, 6.17) after the jury declared it was “hopelessly deadlocked” on all counts.

This despite the obvious fact that Costand’s account of having been violated by Cosby after being drugged closely matched complaints from dozens of other women (over 40 according to the L.A. Times, 58 according to the Washington Post) — i.e., that the same thing had happened to them.

“The Cosbies” on the cover of New York a year or two ago.

Two of the Cosby jurors were black. Do I know for a fact that the O.J. syndrome was a factor? No, I don’t. But who wouldn’t be very, very surprised if they were told this wasn’t a significant reason for the jury’s inability to reach a verdict? We know that at least one juror was unable to vote guilty and send the beloved Cliff Huxtable to jail.

Cosby faced up to 10 years in the slam on each of the three counts. This is the jury system, the social values of this country, the way people tend to see things. You’re rich and famous and played a nice guy on TV? A juror or two will find a way not to convict.

Will Pennsylvania authorities re-try the case? Yes, they will.

“It’s a Cosby sweater….A COSBY SWEAT-AHHHH!”

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The once-great John Avildsen has departed this realm at age 81. Hugs, regrets & condolences to family, friends, fans. Avildsen’s peak achievement years happened in the early to mid ’70s — Joe (’70), Save The Tiger (’73) and the original Rocky (’76). That was his glory period, tapping into the zeitgeist, as good as it got.

Joe was his rawest and most explosive — a low-budgeter that caught the hardhat vs. hippies thing at exactly the right moment. I re-watched Rocky in high-def last year and found it even better than I’d remembered. Save The Tiger probably hasn’t aged as well but it has its moments. Avildsen directed three others that were at least decent — The Formula (’80), Neighbors (’81) and Lean On Me (’89).

Very few directors can point to a respectable roster of grade-A films made over two decades; fewer still can say “I made three…okay, two that really rocked the culture.” Avildsen can say that.

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I relate a lot more to Mark Wahlberg and Mel Gibson‘s characters than I do to Will Ferrell and John Lithgow‘s. Because the former are real, studly, straight-talking guys and the latter are overly sensitive p.c. candy-asses with shrivelled appendages. That’s the intended response when you watch this, of course. And you’re not meant to be bothered by the fact that in real life Wahlberg and Gibson are right-wingers. If I didn’t know better I’d say that Daddy’s Home 2 is Republican propaganda.

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It feels icky to post Alex Jones‘ recordings of his pre-interview conversation[s] with NBC’s Megyn Kelly, during which they discussed the tone and perimeters of their then-forthcoming sitdown. Jones says he told Kelly in the interview that he believes that the Sandy Hook massacre “probably happened.” He actually says this — that the massacre of all those little kids probably fucking happened. Then again it might not have since “probably” suggests that not all the facts are in.

From 6.13.17 Media Matters post containing links to what Alex Jones has actually said about the Sandy Hook massacre:

“While we don’t know how the Sandy Hook exchange will play out in Jones’ full interview with Megyn Kelly, what can be proved is that Jones is a liar who has attempted to sanitize his definitive past claims that the shooting was a ‘hoax.’

In 2013, Jones called the shooting “staged” and said “It’s got inside job written all over it.”

In March 2014, Jones said, “I’ve looked at it and undoubtedly there’s a cover-up, there’s actors, they’re manipulating, they’ve been caught lying, and they were pre-planning before it and rolled out with it.”

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