It goes without saying that if Norman Mailer had made it into his late 90s and was alive and lucid in 2017, there’s no way he’d be invited to present an Oscar due to his reputation for chauvinism and that one awful instance of brutality with his wife, Adele Morales, in the mid 1950s. He would, in today’s climate, almost certainly be ostracized, reviled, shunned. And if by some odd twist of fate Mailer was invited to present an Oscar anyway, that Voltaire joke he told at the Oscar podium on 3.28.77 would have never been told today, and if it had would be greeted with embarassed silence.

Note to Twitter banshees: I happened upon this clip a half-hour ago and was simply struck by the stark differences in the socio-political climates of 1977 vs. 2017. I didn’t post this to indicate any sort of admiration for Mailer’s chauvinism, which was difficult to process even back in the day, or to suggest that his Voltaire joke is amusing to me today. I’m just saying “wow, things were really different back then” — nothing more.

[Note to A24: I haven’t posted the following because I’m not an admirer of Willem Dafoe‘s performance in The Florida Project, or because I disagree with the likelihood of his winning a Best Supporting Actor Oscar. I’m just trying to explain why I think his performance is by far the most popular of all the 2017 contenders in his category.]

Make no mistake — Willem Dafoe is going to win the Best Supporting Actor Oscar for his performance as a harried building manager in The Florida Project. Everyone “knows” or assumes this because he’s won this prize from eight critics groups (NYFCC, LAFCA, BSFC, National Board of Review, San Francisco, NYFCO, Detroit, Atlanta). Aaaah, but why have the elite know-it-alls chosen Dafoe? I’ll tell ya why, and it ain’t deep. Because he’s this year’s Mahershala Ali.

Supporting performances generally win awards not because of sustained inventiveness but because the character does one thing that the audience really likes, and because people tend to remember that one thing when they vote. Sometimes the performance will make that one thing feel extra-powerful or extra-resonant (i.e., Beatrice Straight‘s big moment in Network), but Academy and guild members primarily vote for what a character does or says at a crucial juncture in a film.

Dafoe is way ahead this year because his character, Bobby Hicks, does one righteous and compassionate thing that everyone loves — he saves a group of little kids from being preyed upon by a creepy child molestor. That’s it, the whole thing.

Dafoe plays a middling low-life character with conviction and compassion, but when you boil it all down what else did Dafoe actually do in that film? What major crescendo or galvanizing moment did he otherwise deliver or take part in? Nothing. He reminded deadbeat tenants to pay their rent, tolerated the kids’ raucous behavior, painted the apartment walls, etc.

Last year Mahershala Ali‘s performance in Moonlight won a Best Supporting Actor Oscar because his character, Juan, did one righteous and compassionate thing — he taught “Little” to float and maybe swim around in the Atlantic Ocean. That was it, the whole thing.

I knew early on that I wouldn’t want to see David Ayer‘s Bright (Netflix, 12.22), much less review it. An obvious conceptual ripoff of Graham Baker‘s Alien Nation, I knew it would put me through anguish, frustration, irritation. I knew this, in fact, because of four factors.

Reason #1: Will Smith, whose movies always either suck eggs or try my patience. I haven’t really liked a Smith film since Six Degrees of Separation.

Reason #2: “Antagonistic cop partners getting to know, respect and like each other as they investigate a crime or crime wave”…same old same old.

Reason #3: The script is by formula-roulette screenwriter Max Landis, whose ideas and writing style — “a pop-culture savant who synthesizes everything from pulp-fiction fantasy to Shane Black action-comedies into a kind of wild and witty blockbuster super-weapon,” according to Variety‘s Peter Debruge — represent the bane of my moviegoing existence.

Reason #4: Ayer has been off his game since End of Watch — Fury disappointed and Suicide Squad was mostly appalling. That was enough to stop me right there.

And now the reviews are in — 27% Rotten Tomatoes, 29% Metacritic. Case closed, end of story. Wait….Debruge likes it? “The best Netflix original movie to date”?

I’d be lying if I said I’m sorry that Emily Blunt isn’t costarring in Soldado, the upcoming Sicario sequel that opens on 6.29.18. Badass Benicio del Toro and Josh Brolin will do the job fine, thanks. I’m not interested in watching Blunt deliver her looks of horror at all the carnage, no offense. If you have fast eyes you’ll spot a glimpse in the trailer of Catherine Keener. Who’s the woman who dives under the truck? Isabela Moner? Matthew Modine also costars.

A damning portrait of arrogant male power and the ultimate abuse of a female subordinate, Chappaquiddick (Entertainment Studios, 4.6.18) is obviously its own raison d’etre. The story of the 1969 Chappquiddick tragedy is well-known and has been well-investigated, but producers Mark Ciardi, Chris Fenton and Campbell McInnes, screenwriters Taylor Allen and Andrew Logan and director John Curran wanted to deliver a concise but take-no-prisoners version of this cold, tragic tale in a narrative theatrical form.

Chappaquiddick has the cojones to call a spade a spade about a late, much beloved political figure, a respected liberal deal-maker and the most powerful and longest serving representative of what was, for decades, American’s premiere political family — the closest thing we ever had to a version of the British royals.

But over the last couple of months, Chappaquiddick has unwittingly slipped into the here and now. Without design or anticipation, what Chappaquiddick said last year during its making, the portrait it created of a world-famous power abuser and blame-shifter suddenly fits right into what’s happening now with this and that alleged sexual abuser being taken to task and made to walk the public plank.

There’s no question that the film is dealing straight, compelling cards, and that it sticks to the ugly facts as most of us recall and understand them, and that by doing so it paints the late Massachusetts legislator and younger brother of JFK and RFK in a morally repugnant light, to put it mildly.

All along I’ve been hoping that Curran would just shoot the script efficiently, minus any kind of showing off or oddball strategies that might diminish what was on the page. This is exactly what he’s done. Curran has crafted an intelligent, mid-tempo melodrama about a weak man who commits a careless, horrible act, and then manages to weasel out of any serious consequences.

I tried to pick 20 or 25 of HE’s best 2017 photos. Not every shot was taken with my iPhone 6 Plus, but 97% were. Anyway, I couldn’t do it — had to go for 39.

I’m afraid that Ridley Scott‘s All The Money In The World is one of my picks of the litter, and so HE’s Best of 2017 roster has to be once again recalculated:

Top ten: (1) Luca Guadagnino‘s Call Me By Your Name, (2) Chris Nolan‘s Dunkirk, (3) Greta Gerwig‘s Lady Bird, (4) Darren Aronofsky‘s mother!, (5) Ruben Ostlund‘s The Square, (6) Matt Reeves‘ War For The Planet of the Apes, (7) Oliver Assayas‘ Personal Shopper [2016 holdover], (8) Michael Showalter’s The Big Sick, (9) Steven Spielberg‘s The Post, (9) Ridley Scott’s All The Money in the World, and (10) Cristian Mungiu‘s Graduation [2016 holdover].

Honorable fraternity: (11) Andrey Zvyagintsev‘s Loveless; (12) Martin McDonagh‘s Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri, (13) Edgar Wright‘s Baby Driver, (14) Sean Baker‘s The Florida Project, (15) Guillermo del Toro‘s The Shape of Water, (16) David Lowery‘s A Ghost Story, (17) David Gordon Green‘s Stronger, (18) Fatih Akin‘s In The Fade, (19) Brad Pitt‘s War Machine, (20) Joseph Kosinski‘s Only The Brave, (21) Paul Thomas Anderson‘s Phantom Thread, (22) Jordan Peele‘s Get Out, (23) Denis Villeneuve‘s Blade Runner 2049, (24) Patti Jenkins‘ Wonder Woman, (25) Taylor Sheridan‘s Wind River, (26) Steven Soderbergh‘s Logan Lucky, (27) Geremy Jasper‘s Patty Cake$ and (28) John Curran‘s Chappaquiddick (saw it in Toronto, opening in April ’18).

By the way: I didn’t know until today that All The Money stars Mark Wahlberg and Michelle Williams worked “for free” when Ridley Scott flew back to England and Rome to re-shoot 22 scenes with Kevin Spacey replacement Christopher Plummer. You can bet, however, that their travel, hotel and per-diem expenses were covered.

Wells to Lodge: “So I can’t voice a distaste for Japan (actually Tokyo) without being slagged by the likes of yourself? My reservations about this or that city, region or culture are about tradition, aesthetics, architecture, atmosphere. I said in one of my Japan riffs that I found Tokyo lacking in character and personality for the most part. (Though not entirely.). I said it reminded me of Cleveland or Houston; I also said Seoul reminds me of Newark.

“On the other hand I adore Hanoi and much of Vietnam. But not Nha Trang (impersonal, overbuilt, Cannes without the personality) or the overdeveloped, skyscraper-heavy Ho Chi Minh City. I’m told that much of Bangkok has fallen to the same corporate influences.

“All in all my objections are about certain standards and appreciations for native flavor and urban design that I’ve developed over the decades. Racial animus has never once entered into it. I don’t even know what it is. How dare you accuse me of anything in this realm…how fucking dare you?

“You’re a brilliant critic who knows his stuff, and then you turn around and tweet like the lowest troll. And you also eat up my time as I have to rebut your sloppy tweet darts. Don’t be an ass.”

Lodge responds: “When you boil it down to ‘I’m not a fan of Japan’, that says something far less specific to me, as does your routine dismissal of most Asian cinema, for example. So maybe choose your words more delicately.” Wells to Lodge: “What I wrote was that I’ve ‘never been a huge fan of’ Japan.” which can be translated as ‘while I haven’t seen that much of Japan, the small section of Tokyo that I’ve seen has not enthralled me.’ I didn’t say that I dislike the whole country, which would be pretty close to ridiculous.

David Oyelowo has gone from playing a nice-guy boyfriend in Ava DuVernay‘s Middle of Nowhere (’12) to the son of Forest Whitaker in Lee Daniels‘ The Butler (’13) to Martin Luther King in DuVernay’s Selma (’14) to a chess coach in Queen of Katwe (’16) to Seretse Khama, the president of Botswana, in A United Kingdom (’16) to…an excitable chump running from the Mexican cartel in Nash Edgerton‘s Gringo (Amazon, 3.9).

I don’t think so. Not for me. If for no other reason than not relating to protagonists who let go with falsetto screams when they’re scared. Feels paycheck-y.

David Wain‘s A Futile and Stupid Gesture (Netflix, 1.26) is based on Josh Karp‘s same-titled biography of the National Lampoon‘s brilliant and self-destructive Doug Kenney, the leading formulator of anarchic, horndoggy, anti-establishment ’70s humor, and which largely influenced the comedic attitudes of Saturday Night Live, National Lampoon’s Animal House (’78) and National Lampoon’s Vacation (’83), et. al.

You can sense right away, however, that this Netflix production won’t be all that great. The trailer suggests a rote, paint-by-numbers scheme. If you were Doug Kenney in heaven and you had absolute mystical power in choosing who would direct this film, would you be cool with the director and co-writer of Wet Hot American Summer (’01) and Wanderlust (’12)? I didn’t think so.

Quote from 12.20 EW story by Jeff Labrecque: “The spine of Futile and Stupid is the relationship between Kenney and his more responsible and aristocratic Harvard classmate Henry Beard (Domhnall Gleeson), during and after they partnered to take their campus Lampoon publication national. So think The Social Network but with cocaine, pranks and food fights.”

In a deleted, apologized-for tweet, Rose McGowan recently attacked Meryl Streep for allegedly knowing about Harvey Weinstein’s criminal assaults but saying nothing: “Actresses, like Meryl Streep, who happily worked for The Pig Monster, are wearing black @goldenglobes in a silent protest. YOUR SILENCE is THE problem. You’ll accept a fake award breathlessly & affect no real change. I despise your hypocrisy. Maybe you should all wear Marchesa.”

And now a street artist, ignorant of or indifferent to McGowan’s apology, is pushing the “Streep knew” narrative. Every revolutionary political movement has its radical purists and Robespierres, and history never forgets them; the #MeToo movement is no different.

Yesterday Streep released a statement about the McGowan charge. Here’s part of it:

“It hurt to be attacked by Rose McGowan in banner headlines this weekend, but I want to let her know I did not know about Weinstein’s crimes, not in the 90s when he attacked her, or through subsequent decades when he proceeded to attack others.

“I wasn’t deliberately silent. I didn’t know. I don’t tacitly approve of rape. I didn’t know. I don’t like young women being assaulted. I didn’t know this was happening.

“Rose assumed and broadcast something untrue about me, and I wanted to let her know the truth. Through friends who know her, I got my home phone number to her the minute I read the headlines. I sat by that phone all day yesterday and this morning, hoping to express both my deep respect for her and others’ bravery in exposing the monsters among us, and my sympathy for the untold, ongoing pain she suffers. No one can bring back what entitled bosses like Bill O’Reilly, Roger Ailes and HW took from the women who endured attacks on their bodies and their ability to make a living.. And I hoped that she would give me a hearing. She did not, but I hope she reads this.

Imagine if Gary Ross‘s Ocean’s 8 (Warner Bros., 6.8.18) was made like a modern-day Rififi. If eight shrewd women got together and successfully pulled off a big heist, but then one of them rats another out to the cops. Or a rival crew finds out about the job and kidnaps the child of Sarah Paulson, and so Paulson, Sandra Bullock and Cate Blanchett hunt down the kidnappers except Bullock gets shot in the stomach. Or after flashing too much money around Helena Bonham Carter gets busted by detectives and pressured to reveal who else pulled off the job, and Mindy Kaling panics and realizes HBC has to die or she’ll spill the beans on everyone. I would love an escapist film like that, one that promises the usual bullshit but then turns around and gets real. But of course, no one would be allowed to make a Rififi about ruthless women thieves as this would go against the narrative.

Incidentally: The MovieBox copy that accompanies this new trailer starts with the words “to steal a priceless neckless…”