Month: March 2022

If I never again hear Kamala Harris nervously laughing in response to a question about Ukrainian refugees, it’ll be too soon.

Originally posted on 3.3.13: “A reading of Stanley Kubrick‘s 9.29.69 screenplay makes it fairly obvious that Napoleon would have had the same vibe as Barry Lyndon, and been spoken the same way and framed and paced the same way.

“Okay, the lead character would be a determined egomaniacal genius instead of an amoral Irish lout and Napoleon would have more than one battle scene, but beyond these and other distinctions we’re talking the same line of country. Everything Kubrick wanted to accomplish or put into Napoleon he put into Lyndon — simple.

“Remember the scene when Ryan O’Neal‘s Lyndon asks the pretty blonde fraulein if he could pay her for a meal, and then the follow-up scene inside her cottage when they carefully and delicately get around to talking about him staying that night and being her lover, etc.?

Consider this scene from Kubrick’s Napoleon — same tone, same idea, same sexual undercurrent. A lonely soldier, a poor young woman, etc.

EXT. LYON STREET – NIGHT

It is a witheringly cold winter night, in Lyon. People, bundled up to the eyes, hurry along the almost deserted street, past empty cafes which are still open. Napoleon, 16 years old, hands deep in his pockets, shoulders hunched against the cold, passes a charming, young street-walker, about his own age. He stops and looks at her, uncertainly. A large snowflake lands on her nose which makes him smile.

GIRL: Good evening, sir.
NAPOLEON: Good evening, Mademoiselle.
GIRL: The weather is terrible, isn’t it, sir?
NAPOLEON: Yes, it is. It must be one of the worst nights we have had this winter.
GIRL: Yes, it must be.

Napoleon is at a loss for conversation.

NAPOLEON: You must be chilled to the bone, standing out of doors like this.
GIRL: Yes, I am, sir.
NAPOLEON: Then what brings you out on such a night?
GIRL: Well, one must do something to live, you know. And I have an elderly mother who depends on me.
NAPOLEON: Oh, I see. That must be a great burden.
GIRL: One must take life as it comes. Do you live in Lyon, sir?
NAPOLEON: No, I’m only here on leave. My regiment is at Valence.
GIRL: Are you staying with a friend, sir?
NAPOLEON: No…I have a…room…at the Hotel de Perrin.
GIRL: Is it a nice warm room, sir?
NAPOLEON: Well, it must be a good deal warmer than it is here on the street.
GIRL: Would you like to take me there, so that we can get warm, sir?
NAPOLEON: Uhhn…yes, of course. If you would like to go there. But I have very little money.
GIRL: Do you have three francs, sir?

If I was a youngish Floridian dad raising a couple of toddlers, I would have no problem with the “Don’t Say Gay” bill.

The proposed law, which Gov. Ran DeSantis reportedly intends to sign, bans public school districts from teaching about sexual orientation or gender identity in kindergarten through the third grade, or “in a manner that is not age-appropriate or developmentally appropriate for students.”

I was in kindergarten once, and I distinctly recall that my interest in hormonal and sexual matters was nonexistent; my interest in same when I was in third grade (9 or 10 years old) was advancing but fairly minimal. So what’s the rush? Why indoctrinate kids with trans teachings when they’re in their soft-clay phase? Why not acquaint students with the basics (respect all persuasions, discrimination based on sexual orientation is callous and wrong) at age 12 or thereabouts, or when they first begin to taste puberty?

State Rep. Joe Harding, a Republican who introduced the bill, has said that the bill’s intention is to keep parents “in the know and involved on what’s going on” with their child’s education. What kind of parent would say “no, no…I want my kid to be indoctrinated into the trans theology as early as possible”?

Ridley Scott‘s Napoleon (formerly Kitbag) has released a still of Joaquin Phoenix in the title role. Right away you’re reminded that the 47-year-old Phoenix (born on 10.28.74) is looking his age, which leads to a presumption that Scott’s film is about an older Napoleon during the last five or six years of his life.

Born in August 1769, Napoleon’s career peaked between the early 1790s and 1810, give or take. The 51 year-old Napoleon died in exile on the island of Saint Helena in May 1821.

But the film’s Wiki page says that Scott will depict “Napoleon’s rise to power through the lens of his addictive and volatile relationship with Empress Josephine (Vanessa Kirby).”

Napoleon’s rise-to-power period happened between his mid 20s (or the mid 1790s) to late 30s — he was crowned Emperor of France in 1804, at age 35. So a guy in his late 40s (and who looks like he’s nudging 50) is playing a guy in his mid 20s to late 30s.

The 25-year-old Phoenix who played Roman Emperor Commodus in Scott’s Gladiator (’00) would have been a better fit. It’s always easier to age an actor rather than de-age.

Marlon Brando was a fitting and appropriate 30 when he played Napoleon in the 20th Century Fox costume drama Desiree (’54).

We can only surmise that Scott will have no choice but to de-age Phoenix with digital touch-ups and whatnot.

Basic Wiki history: “Napoleon began principal photography in February 2022. The film will feature six major battle sequences, unlike other films about Napoleon, such as Waterloo (’70), that include only one. The crew will reportedly spend a week to prepare England’s Lincoln Cathedral for two days of filming, starting on March 17.

“Filming will also take place in Blenheim Palace in Woodstock, Oxfordshire, and at West Wycombe Park in Buckinghamshire, England.

“It will also shoot in Malta for three weeks, starting in May 2022. Fort Ricasoli in Kalkara, Malta, is set to be transformed into the site of 1793‘s siege of Toulon, where the 24-year-old Napoleon had his first victory.”

Our gas-pump pain is quite acute — filling my empty VW Passat tank last night cost over $90 — what is the murder of families and the shelling of innocent mothers and children compared to this? Only Ron DeSantis can save us!

Note to HE readership: I’m being facetious.

Yes, it looks well done. Yes, it seems to have a certain visual scheme and stylistic discipline. On the other hand it’s the same old material — same old rehash,

Bill Maher and Ben Shapiro engaged in a substantive Daily Wire discussion on Sunday, 3.13? Sounds good. Ditto the lineup on Friday’s (3.11) Real Time with Bill Maher with Newsweek’s Batya Ungar–Sargon and N.Y. Times guy Frank Bruno. But where could Kenneth Branagh fit into this? The people-pleasing Branagh doesn’t strike me as a fellow of take-it-or-leave-it political integrity. He’ll probably just do the opening one-on-one.

Tom Gormican and Kevin Etten‘s The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent will have its big premiere at South by Southwest on Saturday, 10.12 — three days hence.

The less they go for the meta-humor stuff and the more they try and tell a half-believable, character-driven story of some kind, the better this film could be. I’m sensing fatigue and possible headaches, but who knows?

We do know that most SXSW critics and audiences tend to be easy lays — they’ll cheer anyone and anything.

This Nic Cage comedy shot in Croatia in late ’20. Lionsgate will release it on 4.22.22.

It’s been 39 years since I first saw Brian DePalma‘s Scarface, and two fresh observations have suddenly hit me. Okay, one and a half.

The first concerns the “South Beach motel drug deal gone bad” scene — pure pornoviolence with a yellow chain saw. Tony Montana (Al Pacino) and Angel (Pepe Serna) have been overpowered by Hector (Al Israel), a Columbian cocaine dealer, and two cohorts, and told “give us your buy money or else.”

With Angel handcuffed to a shower-curtain rod, Hector saws Angel’s left arm off. Tony has been watching the carnage at gunpoint, two or three feet away.

But with Angel’s arm gone, he’s no longer constrained by the curtain rod, and has almost certainly collapsed into the bathtub. And yet Hector says to Tony, “Now the leg, eh?” How was that supposed to work exactly? Angel — bleeding profusely, in shock, probably close to death — is no longer hanging or standing but writhing in the tub, and probably howling for dear life. It makes no logistical sense.

The second observation is that after the shooting starts, Tony runs downs the staircase and drills the wounded Hector in the forehead. A natural revenge thing, but with dozens of horrified eyewitnesses looking on, Tony was being reckless. Are you telling me the cops didn’t get an excellent description of Tony from these onlookers? Not to mention the model and approximate year of the getaway car?

I’ll accept that no one happened to have a camera with them (even with Miami’s South Beach region having become a major tourist mecca), but if I were Montana I would have grabbed the yejo and escaped by the motel’s rear entrance and dealt with Hector later on. Way too many witnesses.

Tatiana and I visited the site of the chainsaw motel on 11.20.17, following a visit to the Key West Film Festival. The address is 728 Ocean Blvd., just south of 17th Street. Alas, it had been torn down and was being converted into a CVS.

Backstage footage taken following last weekend’s (3.5) Virtuoso panel at the Santa Barbara Film Festival — (l.to r.) Spirit Awards Best Actor winner Simon Rex (Red Rocket), Emilia Jones (CODA), Alana Haim (Licorice Pizza), Ariana DeBose (West Side Story), Ciaran Hinds (Belfast) and Saniyya Sidney (King Richard). Okay, so I’m posting this three or four days late…big deal.

The Russian shelling of mothers and young children inside a maternity hospital in the Ukranian city of Mariupol is off-the-charts evil. History now has no choice but to regard the war crimes of Vladimir Putin in the same light as those of Slobodan Milosovic. Or should we compare him to Ralph Fiennes‘ Amon Goth in Schindler’s List? War is cruelty, horror, depravity. The mind shudders.

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An excerpt from an Ankler newsletter from Nicole LaPorte, titled “It Feels Like the Last Days of Rome”:

“But if older, white men are still driving the agenda in many ways, they’re also more scared in this new world order, which has not only been defined by COVID, but the BLM and StopAsianHate movements, as well as the ongoing #MeToo currents.

“Dennis Palumbo, a psychotherapist and former screenwriter, who has an industry-heavy clientele, says his white male patients “feel very restricted creatively. Most of them say, ‘This is a very necessary corrective, but I wish it didn’t affect me so much.’ And that presents a real dilemma. I have a lot of ostensibly liberal, white guy patients who have a lot of credits. And their agent says, ‘I can’t even put you up for this job because you’re a straight, white guy. So there’s an enormous amount of internal conflict.

“Culturally, in spite of inclusion, the problem now is there’s an exclusion for you. As one of my patients said, an executive told his agent, ‘Nobody cares what a white man thinks.’”

“[A] publicist says fear is rampant in Hollywood for everyone — male or female — particularly the big, brash personalities that historically defined the business. Today they fear being ‘cancelled’ because of an offensive Tweet or poorly-chosen Instagram post, or because they just don’t understand the current vernacular and mores.

“Social media has chased away the big, old Hollywood types. You don’t hear about big names doing bold things or being naughty. Everyone is afraid of social media and getting cancelled because you partied the wrong way, you said the wrong thing by accident. So all the big execs and producers and talent — they’re hiding, mostly. That’s not the way Hollywood was.

“Every top executive is holding onto their seat, nails digging into the wood, as if riding Space Mountain. Conventional wisdom used to put studio film execs at the top of the pecking order. Then streaming people were layered over them. But they come and go fast. And now everyone would rather just lay low lest they screw up, or someone uncover something embarrassing they did way back, or maybe, possibly shouldn’t have said to an assistant in 2004.”