11:55 pm: I watched and waited, and it didn’t kick in. It’s pizazzy and well ordered and visually dynamic, but it felt synthetic. I was always aware that I was watching a really slick film. I lost interest.

Earlier: From Todd Gilchrist‘s 4.23 Variety review:

“Bullet Train Explosion (Netflix, now streaming) meets a believability threshold that feels virtually unparalleled.

“Like his previous film Shin Godzilla, director Shinji Higuchi’s action thriller (a follow-up to the 1975’s The Bullet Train) explores with meticulous and realistic detail what a bureaucratic response might be to, well, a scenario that’s likely only to happen in the movies.

“Even without a movie star fighting his way up and down the trail (à la Bullet Train or Kill), Higuchi ensures that this scenario is no less exciting, relying on quieter but no less affecting acts of heroism as well as an escalating series of set-pieces that will thrill audiences until the last story beat has reached the end of the line.”

Earlier today the Cannes Film Festival announced a decision to give a midnight slot to Ethan Coen and Tricia Cooke‘s Honey Don’t, a lesbian detective comedy and the second in a “lesbian B-movie trilogy.” Which sounds unfortunate.

Even without Joel on board, the Coen brand is a “thing” — a bona fide signifier of edge and substance, going all the way back to the premiere of Blood Simple 41 years ago. But perhaps not so much in this instance.

It seems to me that consigning Honey Don’t to the Midnight Section is the festival’s way of saying that Honey Don’t is, no offense, insubstantial. They’re basically acknowledging that it’s a goof-off movie.

I for one am sorry that Ethan is committed to such tripe. He’s obviously capable of a great deal more.

A 4.23 report from World of Reel‘s Jordan Ruimy is, like, bumming me out, bruh.

Ruimy wrote earlier today that David Fincher and Quentin Tarantino‘s The Continuing Adventures of Cliff Booth, the eight-years-later Netflix sequel to Once Upon A Time in Hollywood (’19) that will focus upon Brad Pitt‘s stunt-guy character — a performance that won a Best Supporting Actor Oscar, by the way…Ruimy has reported that “unlike the 2019 original, which was a major theatrical release, this sequel will be made for Netflix.”

Wait…what?

I’ve been assuming all along that Netflix would at least put Booth into theatres for two or three weeks and then go to streaming, if for no other reason than to satisfy popular demand. Ruimy seems to be reporting that Booth won’t have any (or a bare minimum of) theatrical playdates or will just appear on Netflix from the get-go…theatrical de-emphasized.

Could that really be the plan? If so, that would be terrible. I want to see this puppy with a pumped-up crowd inside a crowded theatre…c’mon!

Booth wouldn’t be a stunt guy this time, Ruimy reports, but an Eddie Mannix-type fixer — “a guy studios call when something—anything—needs to quietly disappear. Scandals, blackmail, problematic stars, even bodies. He operates in the shadows, loyal, unshakable, and totally unfazed by the dirt beneath Hollywood’s golden surface. It’s a natural evolution for a character already written as a war hero, stuntman, and possibly even a murderer.”

Also: “According to reports, it was Pitt himself who floated the idea of bringing Fincher on board. The pair have a strong creative history together, having previously collaborated on “Se7en,” “Fight Club,” and “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button.” Tarantino, who typically directs his own scripts, was reportedly open to stepping aside for Fincher—a rare shift that gives this project a distinct identity within the larger Tarantino-verse.

Cliff Booth will begin lensing in July, and probably open in the summer or fall of ’26.

“Give me libirum or give me meth” — Leonard Frey‘s Harold in William Friedkin and Mart Crowley‘s The Boys in the Band (’68).

I was completely taken and fascinated with R. Scott Gemmill‘s The Pitt during the first nine episodes, but in episode #10 something happened that really pissed me off — something that felt a teeny bit wokey by way of anti-white-male bias. It made me pull back emotionally.

I’m speaking about Patrick Ball‘s Dr. Frank Langdon, a brilliant, highly-stressed, wrapped-too-tight E.R. doctor, having illegally and unethically used librium — a chill drug — to take the edge off.

Technically known as chlordiazepoxide, librium, according to WebMD, “produces a calming effect on the brain and nerves, which helps to reduce anxiety symptoms and promote relaxation.”

It was obviously not cool and a blatant violation of the Hippocratic Oath for Langdon to have occasionally dosed himself. But in the greater scheme of things, taking librium isn’t that different from popping an occasional valium. It didn’t strike me as that big of a deal.

Did Langdon need to face up to a potential health issue or worse? Yes, but aside from making him detour into stridency or excitability, taking lithium wasn’t interfering with his abilities or duties. Not as dramatized, at least. It would have been far worse if Langdon had been drinking, say, or taking morphine as a stress-alleviator. Langdon is a first-rate physician. He was just moderately medicating.

If I was a fellow doctor in this situation and I’d discovered what Langdon was up to, my first and only response would have been to speak with him after-hours. I would say “Frank,this really has to stop and not only that, you have to seek counsel from an outside doctor, or perhaps even from a psychologist. But it has to stop, and on a provable basis. You can’t jeopardize your career like this.”

I would add the following: “If you don’t take immediate steps to remedy this situation I’m definitely going to report this matter to our supervisor (Noah Wyle‘s Dr.’Robby’ Robinavitch). I don’t want to torpedo you, Frank — you’re too good of a doctor to just be thrown over the side by a mistake. But this has to stop now.”

So what happens? Langdon’s adverse relationship with a rookie female doctor quickly turns petty and vindictive, and the shit hits the fan.

Isa Briones‘ Dr. Trinity Santos, an assertive feminist firebrand who’s only been working in “the Pitt” for a few hours, gets wise to Langdon’s behavior. She and Langdon have already developed a dislike for each other, partly because he’s been overly critical and scolding of some of her judgment calls. So not long after she discovers his librium problem, she tattle-tales to Dr. Robby. And then Robby, ignoring the fact that Langdon is one of the two or three best physicians he has in the E.R., angrily tells Langdon to “go home”. No warnings, no scoldings….just “fuck you, you’re done.”

If someone is really good — brilliant, amazing — at a tough and demanding job, the fair-minded thing is to give him or her a chance to man up and fix a personal problem. If he/she fails to correct it, then you lower the boom. It would be one thing if Langdon’s librium-chipping was causing medical mistakes or jeopardizing the well-being of patients, but that’s not the case.

So now I don’t like Dr, Robby any more. Noah Wyle‘s performance is awesome and he’ll almost certainly win an Emmy, but I don’t like how Dr. Robby reacted. In my mind he threw a good man under the bus for insufficient cause.

And I really don’t like Isa Briones. And I’m not the only one who feels this way. When Briones/Santos confides her concern about Langdon’s unethical behavior to Dr. Samira Mohan (Supriya Ganesh), the latter says “I don’t want to hear about it…I don’t want to know this!” And then she adds, rather angrily, “You’re trouble.”

It happened yesterday (midday by the Pacific clock). Tail-end wrap-up sequence.

Carolla’s sardonic, regular-guy skepticism plus his standard-issue loathing of woke derangement syndrome meshes well with Sasha’s traumatic saga of ‘24 (incoming missiles launched by THR’s Rebecca Keegan led to a significant award-season income plummet) and her continuing discomfort with left-instructional content (i.e., all women, POCs and LGBTQs are glorious, all straight males are kinda bad), which I regard as healthy. The discomfort, I mean.

Did they discuss Sinners? Well, they might have but Sasha still hasn’t seen it. Did they get into the over-and-done-with Anora Oscars? Did they kick around Minecraft or Adolescence or season 2 of The Last of Us? Or…whatever, the upcoming Cannes or Venice film festivals? Naaah, too elitist…too fringe!