Is Barbie the supreme post-#MeToo architect of white-guy-despising or white-guy-pitying cinema? Which isn’t to say, of course, that white-male behaviors haven’t generally warranted enormous enmity and condemnation over the centuries. Too many men are dogs, animals, wolves, brutes. We all know this.

Then again when, you could also note or at least ask, have older white guys not played proverbial villains? But over the last decade or so leftist Hollywood ideology has steadily and persistently maintained that older white guys are the main bringers of toxicity, venality, ignorance, arrogance and immaturity. Call them a basic proverbial problem afflicting everyone and everything — a “theme” that isn’t likely to change anytime soon.

And yet the persistence and dependability factors alone naturally reduce dramatic engagement — how could they not?

There are two major films opening later his year in which — in script form, at least — a deceptive, two-faced white guy is revealed to have behaved like a sexual scumbag, and is in fact a ground-zero shithead. You’ll know them when they open. How many have there been since ’15 or thereabouts?

A bit less than three months ago (3.26) I sent $2K and change to Tommaso, my Dorsoduro-residing Airbnb host. That was the tab for 13 days in his spacious one-bedroom apartment (8.25 thru 9.7) during the Venice Film Festival.

It was all locked in — no worries, not too pricey, friendly messages from Tommaso and his dad, Valentino, etc. And a really nice neighborhood.

Yesterday (6.19) I asked Tommaso about the two beds, and he replied as follows around midnight:

Roughly nine hours ago Airbnb told me Tommaso had cancelled the booking. My Citibank app said Airbnb had sent a full refund — the money will be liquid and usable on Tuesday, 6.24. The fuck?

Nearly three months of soothing Tomasso vibes, and suddenly I was Joe Pesci in his final Goodfellas scene…pop and flop.

Tommaso almost certainly blew me off because somebody offered him more dough for the place, and that was that. Unethical, shitty, inconsiderate, dishonorable…all of that stuff.

I immediately reserved another place on VRBO, a little smaller but close to the San Zaccaria vaporetto stop and oh, yeah..,about $900 more expensive than Tommasso’s rental.

You fucked me in the ass, Tommaso. Left me high and dry. Uncool, dude…you cost me and it hurts.

HE to vast int’l readership: Beware of Tommaso!

Why doesn’t Greenwich Entertainment announce a distribution plan for Michael Franco‘s Dreams? Why don’t they firm up a release date, release a trailer, etc.? Franco is one of the most interesting major-league directors out there right now, and I’m not the only one who doesn’t want to just watch summer crap movies between now and the Venice Film Festival. Hubba-hubba.

I’m trying to think of an urban territory that exudes more deep-down misery than the shitty parts of Brooklyn and Queens. Dull tenement buildings, miles and miles of gloom…cornucopias of character-free, hand-me-down ugliness.

I’ve roamed around the boring, dull-as-dishwater outskirts of many European cities (Paris, London, Rome, Berlin, Barcelona, Geneva, Belgrade), and while these regions are rarely what any visitor would call intriguing or delightful or agreeably colorful, none feel as culturally gutted or meaningless as downmarket Brooklyn or Queens (East Midwood, Bensonhurst, Canarsie, East Flatbush, Brownsville, South Ozone Park).

What a ghastly proposition for a resident of these nabes to stand on a streetcorner and look around and say, “Yup, this is it…I”ll be spending the rest of my life here.”

[Previously paywalled] This morning on Facebook Michael McDaniel passed along a conversation he had with AI Writer about Bill Forsyth‘s Local Hero. He asked the software which character is the actual “local hero” of the title. The AI said it was eccentric, beach-dwelling Ben (Fulton McKay)

“Wise old Ben is the only Ferness resident person who refuses to sell his land to Knox Oil and Gas. Ben is a symbol of the old way of life, and represents the values of community and tradition — a reminder that there is more to life than money, and that some things that are worth more than oil,” blah blah.

HE dispute: “Ben is an eccentric old coot who doesn’t care about anything but his own notion of basics — living in his beach hut, having enough to eat and enough firewood to keep warm with — and he certainly believes in his own theology. Ben believes, quite properly, in the stars and tides and eternity and sand granules. He’s the soul of this half-mystical film — the sardonic, good-natured fool on the beach who allegedly grasps the whole cosmic equation.

“But that little handful-of-sand trick he plays on Peter Reigert‘s MacIntyre is a tiny bit cruel. On top of which Ben is obviously complacent and calm about depriving the residents of Ferness of a huge payday that will make their lives much more comfortable and secure. Ben is not morally wrong in his priorities, but he’s also a bit of a shit. There’s certainly nothing heroic about the guy.

“Local Hero is not Ben’s story, of course, but the story of MacIntyre’s spiritual awakening. As the film begins Reigert is a brusque Houston oil executive, ‘a telex man,’ no girlfriend and no pet, skimming along and not especially bothered or moved by anything or anyone. But at the end ‘Mac’ is a changed man. For the first time in his adult life he’s begun to feel strong emotions about fundamental things, and has fallen in love with Jennifer Black‘s Stella, a married Ferness woman, and at the very end he’s rocked by heartbreak.

“Local Hero delivers one of the saddest ending of any movie, ever. But it’s moving for that.”

Facebook’s Rex Gordon: “I don’t recognize the movie that the AI watched. There is no evidence that Ben is kind or generous. He shows no traits that represent ‘the values of community’; he’s a loner who keeps himself apart from the community (the type who only has one cup for visitors. He obviously knows the stars and tides, but there’s no other evidence that he’s wise. I can’t think of a scene in which he helps anybody else, although he helps himself to more than his share of food at the cèilidh. The community hates his stubborn refusal to sell the beach. But Ben is “a reminder that there is more to life than money and things worth more than oil.”

Facebook’s Derek Davidson: “At least the AI gave a thoughtful answer. This has me thinking what does it actually mean by hero anyway? Hero to who? I assume all the town are still taking their buy out anyway to make way for the observatory? If it’s Gordon, is he hero for selling the town out? We see Mac (presumably) calling in the end. In one year, will any of those people in town even be there to return to? Gordon and Stella I assume will move away… it’s not such a happy conclusion, even if it’s not strictly an Knox Oil site.”

Upon reading last night’s 28 Years Later pan and particularly a money paragraph that called Danny Boyle‘s newbie “the filthiest, emptiest, most repellent and nihilistic film of this sort…almost certainly the most physically disgusting film of any kind that I’ve ever seen in my life”, HE commenter “Tomosophy” called this “huge praise…exactly what I want from this kind of film.”

He will therefore “definitely be seeing this in a theatre,” he added.

Either Tomosophy was being flagrantly insincere or was flaunting his perversity for egoistic reasons…showing off for the commentariat. Or he’s simply one sick fuck. Because 99% of moviegoers (i.e., the sane ones) don’t want to wallow in miserableism, which is definitely what 28 Years Later is selling.

I’m the kind of guy who can laugh joyously at lines like “I wish I was in hell with my back broken” but being dragged through the malevolent and very bloody predations of Boyle’s film….forget it.

Two famous quotes apply: (a) “I’m a human being, goddamit…my life has value!” (Peter Finch in Network) and (b) “I’m not an animal” (Albert Brooks in Lost in America).

Like the headline implies, people may pay for escapism but they sometimes wind up neck deep in the grim.

Moviegoers are not interested in what willful auteur-level directors like Boyle are composing or assembling, much less what his actors are feeling or conveying unless the actor in question happens to be someone on the level of Ralph Fiennes.

Moviegoers, boiled down, are interested in what they’re feeling, and what I was feeling last night was profound disgust. And I don’t care what film critics who are filing from the planet Pluto (guys like Bob Strauss) are saying. For I am King Solomon…the ultimate arbiter, the one-man jury, inspector of the final product, giver or denier of the HE seal of approval.

A performance or a movie, in other words, is not about some idea or theme or cultural undercurrent propelling the filmmakers, but about how I fucking feel as I contemplate the finality of it. And what I wanted to do last night was throw up in a bucket.

…but all I experienced were the dry heaves.

Bill McCuddy to HE after seeing Danny Boyle, Alex Garland and Anthony Dod Mantle’s 28 Years Later:

“Terence Malick has made a zombie movie under the name Danny Boyle. This is a thinking man’s running dead movie. When I say Malick I mean it’s beautifully shot and deals with family, survival and death by way of a poignant, non-zombie subplot. It has a little Children of Men vibe going on to but you may not want to reveal that.

“Ralph Fiennes arrives at the three-quarter mark…a nice bump.

“And Aaron Taylor Johnson fans eager to see the ‘maybe James Bond’ may be disappointed to learn he’s not really in the film all that much.

“The story is mainly about ATJ’s son (Alfie Williams) and wife (a sickly Jodie Comer) departing a semi-safe island compound in search of Ralph Fiennes, playing a doctor of sorts. It’s never really clear why anyone would risk leaving said compound but you kinda have to go with that.

“I liked it and am recommending, but I don’t know how commercial it will be. It’s smaller than even the first film — a walking road picture with mother and son. Plenty of blood and manic action. In some ways this is the best of the franchise. But it’s not a blockbuster. It’s just good. Will that be enough?”

HE to McCuddy after catching this well-made if godforsaken film early Thursday evening:

“What’s wrong with you? What do you mean you ‘liked it’? I wasn’t expecting all that much, but I was somewhere between appalled and truly, deeply repelled. I remember being positive on 28 Days Later way back in ‘02, although my all-time favorite zombie flick is still Dawn of the Dead. But this…! The instant judgment is ‘artistically honorable but mostly indigestible.’”

McCuddy to HE: “I should have known when Perri Nemiroff liked it you’d hate it.”

HE to McCuddy: “I HATED, HATED, HATED this film.  I hated the futility and hopelessness, the blood and gore and goo-glop-slime, the sickening grunge, the stench, the puddles, the cheap shock cuts, the yelling, the all-but-impenetrable accents, the obese corpses, the vomiting, the cancer, the rage, the fury, and the worms, flies, rats and insects…the brutal slam cuts, the incessant howling, the tower of skulls, the endless supply of arrows…the sudden, left-field use of subtitles when a small crew of soldiers appears when subtitles were clearly required throughout most of the film…the relentless, all-but-vomitous spewing and spraying of blood, blood, blood and slithery, odious, Chicago stockyard pig organs…arrows, chest shots, head shots….guts, guts, guts.

“28 Years Later is probably the most skin-crawling, the least engaging…let me start over…the filthiest, emptiest, most repellent and nihilistic film of this sort and…oh, hell and damnation and repulsion…almost certainly the most physically disgusting film of any kind that I’ve ever seen in my life.

”Yes, it is partially redeemed toward the end by Fiennes, whose dialogue is actually understandable (as always, his elocutionary skills are admirable) and who has a delightful moment when he recalls a famous Hamlet line…but let’s not get too carried away.”

I first heard this crack in Billy Wilder‘s One, Two, Three (’61), and for a throw-away line I’ve always found it hilarious. How so? Jimmy Cagney feels so pressured and anxiety-plagued that he prefers the broken-back-coupled-with-hellfire scenario to the one he’s currently experiencing. Any comedy that conveys this kind of over-the-top, kill-me-now despair gets my vote.

If I’d written the line, it would’ve been “I wish I was in hell with my back broken.”

What are the odds of Kathryn Bigelow‘s A House of Dynamite (Netflix, streaming on 10.24) playing the Venice Film Festival? Fairly high, I would guess. Perhaps Telluride also.

Noah Oppenheim‘s script is set inside the White House. It’s a high-tension political/military situation drama about a rogue missile heading for the United States. Presumably targeting some location in Washington, D.C. or maybe New York….some place symbolically significant.

Who’s behind it?, how much time before it hits?, how to respond?, etc.

The U.S. president, I’m guessing, is being played by Idris Elba. The costars are Rebecca Ferguson, Gabriel Basso, Jared Harris, Tracy Letts, Anthony Ramos, Jonah Hauer-King, Moses Ingram, Greta Lee and Jason Clarke.

Sasha Stone: “I know two things about this movie without seeing it. The first is that the politics will lean left. Which means there are only two people who can be responsible for the missile — a Trump-like MAGA figure or a Putin-like dictator. And, because it’s Netflix, it can’t be anyone who is non-white doing the damage.

“Only one kind of villain is allowed in Hollywood in 2025 — a heterosexual white man. Occasionally a heterosexual white woman. This isn’t just a Netflix thing — it’s a Hollywood mandate.”

The trailer will probably pop sometime in July.

Day after day and screening after screening I’ve noticed that when the lights go down but before the movie sound kicks in, dozens of people start coughing with a minor subgroup clearing their throats.

They’re doing this deliberately, of course. We’re about to remain silent for two hours, they seem to be saying, so we’re going to loudly cough before the film starts as a way of…you tell us. Are we expelling demons, kicking out the jams, ridding ourselves of hesitations, all of the above?

I for one find it irritating. On top of which I’ve never coughed before a film begins, or during one even. Okay, I’ve cleared my throat once or twice.

The general assumption is that people are coughing for natural reasons and that the theatre just happens to be filled with people who have colds and coughs…right? Wrong. The coughing is performed. Which means, to recap, that there are two kinds of coughing in theatres — one, waiting-for-the-show-to-start coughing and two, middle-of-the-movie coughing which indicates that some are bored and restless.

Listen to this and share your intuition or estimation about Jessica Lange‘s granddaughters. They don’t honestly sound to me like the sharpest tools in the shed. Unless they’re five years old or younger, in which case nor harm or foul.

@jessicalangearchive Jessica talking about her granddaughters watching her in Tootsie. ❤️ #jessicalange #actress #tootsie #film #1982 #80s #jessicalangeedit ♬ It Might Be You (Theme from Tootsie) – Stephen Bishop

I’d be lying if I didn’t admit to feeling a surge of quiet comfort about yesterday’s Supreme Court ruling (United States v. Skrmetti) that upholds Tennessee’s ban on transgender surgery and puberty blockers for minors.

I’m not a rightie but a sensible centrist with a colorful, even strident left-liberal history, and yet in my mind the “bad guys” have lost. You can howl all you want, but Matt Walsh is on the right side of this issue.

All I want is for kids to be left alone….unencouraged and un-prodded. When they attain legal maturity at age 18 or 21 or whenever they’re obviously free to choose their own mode of gender expression, and nobody will say squat. Not in my corner, they won’t.

Last week I had a nice 10-minute consultation with a dress-wearing trans person (in her early 30s) who works for the Wilton Library, and I would never, ever want to inject the slightest amount of grief or judgment into this person’s life, but “hey, teacher, leave the kids alone!”

The trans community and its wokey supporters would be relatively uncriticized and un-messed with if they had just left kids out of the equation. But they had to push it.

N.Y. Times‘ Nicholas Confessore: “On Wednesday, the Supreme Court delivered a new, crushing blow, upholding in 6-to-3 decision a Tennessee law that bars doctors from providing puberty blockers, cross-sex hormones and surgery to young people who feel that their bodies are the wrong sex.

“In allowing Tennessee to outlaw blockers and hormones, the court not only shielded similar laws on the books in some two dozen states. It effectively closed the door on extending new constitutional protections to trans people.

“Some advocates fear that Skrmetti could open the door to banning medical transition for adults” — HE would be strongly opposed to this — “and perhaps other health care that some conservatives oppose, like birth control or in vitro fertilization — even vaccines. The fate of a once-obscure medical treatment could have profound consequences for American law.”

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