Sorkin remark #1: “No one ever in life starts a sentence with ‘dammit.'” Wells counter: “True, but I say ‘dammit’ to myself over and over so if a character is alone at a desk, in bed, driving or in the shower, it’s usable.” Sorkin remark #2: “I’m in a constant state of writers’ block. Writers’ block is my default position.” Wells counter: “What Aaron means is that it’ll sometimes take him a couple of hours to start churning out thoughts and passages. Which is more like writers’ stall than block.” Sorkin remark #3: “It’s not that dialogue sounds like music…it actually is music.” Wells counter: “But if you try too hard to write ‘music’ it’ll come out stilted and turgid. You just have to turn on the spigot and hope for the best.”

Six years ago I wrote the following about a trailer for Terrence Malick‘s The Tree of Life: “It’s basically saying that the cosmic light of the altogether is out there and within us, but the rough and tumble of survival (along with some brutal parenting at the hands of a guy like Brad Pitt‘s character) keeps us in a morose and damaged place. And what a sadness that is when brutalized kids (Sean Penn‘s character) grow up and start passing the grief along.”

I dealt with a fair amount of dark-cloud vibes from my late dad, an advertising guy who passed eight years ago this month. I’d like to think that I didn’t pass along the bad stuff to my sons, but of course I did to some extent. This is especially true concerning my younger son, Dylan, and for this I am truly sad and sorry. This morning I happened upon a piece that I wrote about my father a couple of days after his passing. It’s honest and decently written, and in honor of all that water under the bridge…

“My father, James T. Wells, Jr., had 86 years of good living, mostly. He was miserable at the end, lying in a bed and watching the tube and reading and sleeping and not much else. I think he was okay with moving on because his life had been reduced to this. He was a good and decent man with solid values, and he certainly did right by me and my brother and sister as far as providing and protecting us and doing what he could to help us build our own lives.

“But he was also, when I was a kid and a teenager, a crab and a gruff, hidden-away soul (his Guam and Iwo Jima traumas as a Marine during World War II mashed him up him pretty badly) and, when he got older, something of a curmudgeon. But not altogether. He could be funny about it. Mean funny. Two or three years before his death we were in a Woodbury luncheonette, and when one of the waitresses called out to another in a nasally tone — ‘Jeanine!’ — my dad delivered a nasal imitation that was audible to several diners sitting nearby — ‘Jeanine!’

“I feel very badly for his suffering the indignities of old age and the mostly horrible life my dad lived over his final year or two. I know that whatever issues I have with my manner, attitude or personality, it is my charge alone to deal with, modify and correct them. But I also know deep down that Jim Wells was the father of it. He lived in a pit so deep and dark.

I’m visiting the Wilton-Fairfield-Georgetown area this weekend, mainly to attend a tribute party/concert for the recently departed guitarist Tommy Schulz. Born into wealth, Tommy grew up on a sprawling horse farm in Wilton. Distant father, badgering control-freak mom. He lived for decades on a modest inheritance, and of course had been influenced by the usual liberal values. But as he grew older Tommy embraced the working-man ethos of Georgetown, the leafy, less affluent area that borders northeast Wilton, and — face it — became a kind of Donald Trump fan. Not actively, of course, but he was said to have muttered agreement with Trump’s views. We all have our foibles. Bruised and cynical, Schulz would have nonetheless loved this photo, which was thrown together this morning by HE Photoshop pinch-hitter Mark Frenden. (Mark also composed that brilliant American Friend poster last January.)

The late Tommy Schulz, Donald Trump during a Washington, D.C. gathering that Schulz never in fact attended. But that’s okay.

During a wedding reception in Fairfield last night, a guy was demonstrating a DJI Phantom drone, the latest version of which sells online for $1400. Very cool. It has a little gimbal-mounted vidcam that sends video back to the user’s cell phone. It can rise 400 feet without breaking a sweat, and can fly as high as a mile depending on weather conditions. The owner said he’s registered the drone with the FAA.

The forthcoming TV spots supporting Trump and Hillary will almost certainly be more savage than anything seen in any previous Presidential season. That famous 1964 “Daisy” ad, an anti-Goldwater spot beginning with a little girl picking flowers and ending with nuclear Armageddon, is generally regarded as the most damning, but Hillary’s forthcoming beware-of-Trump ads will be tastier still. This 6.20 PAC ad hits the mark, but seems relatively restrained given what Trump has said over the past year.

“Published in 1977, almost a decade after his yearlong sojourn in Vietnam and after he had recovered from his own bout of depression brought on by his war experience, ‘Dispatches‘ was a sensation — an acutely observed, acutely felt, wisely interpretative travelogue of hell, deeply sympathetic to the young American conscripts, and deeply skeptical of the political and military powers that kept them there.

“Written with the residual rhythms of the 1960s counterculture, redolent of drugs and rock ’n’ roll, it was also partly fictionalized, though its authenticity was received by critics — and ordinary readers — as indisputable, and they treated it as an exemplar of the kind of fiction that is truer than fact.

“In an interview on Thursday, the novelist Richard Ford, who was a friend of Mr. Herr’s, said ‘Dispatches’ ‘gave an emotional, verbal and aural account of the war for a whole generation — of which I am a member — particularly for those who didn’t go. His nose was right in the middle of it, and he wrote exactly what it was like to be in that place and to be that young.” — From Bruce Weber‘s 6.24 N.Y. Times obit-profile of Michael Herr. Here’s my 6.24 quickie.

There are three 20somethings bantering on my Fairfield-bound train.  They won’t stop giggling at almost every remark, and after a while you can’t ignore them any more.  You have to look up, give them a stink-eye and telepathically ask “what is fucking  wrong with you?” Some people have the serenity and the character to just listen and respond to others according to the funny-tude or intrigue levels or wisdom being shared.  If a laugh or a howl or a chortle is warranted, fine.  But when every other damn sentence is hyuck–hyuck hilarious, it’s an indication of a kind of social neurosis. I’m telling you it’s fucking exhausting to listen to these giggly dogs (two dudes and a girl).  I just zapped them with another stink-eye beam — ignored.  I just want you to hurt like I do.

Not to get all icky but some of us self-identify as female foot fans, and I thought I’d put this out there. Every woman on the face of the planet walks around in sandals during the summer but a very tiny fraction have feet that you could honestly describe as seriously arousing, astonishing or wowser. Most, I would say without malice, seem unfortunately shaped in one way or another. This is not “a problem” but it is, to be candid, a fact. Rather than sound all pervy by describing great-looking feet, here’s a shot that a girl I was friendly with four or five years ago sent me once. Her own, taken by herself. I’m sorry but this — this — is what world-class feet look like. Lean, trim, athletic with a perfect pedicure. Big toe not too long, little toe not too small.

Keep in mind that the “whee” in former Congressman Anthony Weiner‘s last name is spelled “wei” while Todd Solondz‘s just-opened black comedy, in line with the original German spelling of wienerschnitzel, goes with “ie.” Has anyone seen the Solondz? Were there any older women going “awwww” when the dachsund was on-screen? If so, what was their reaction to the finale? From my Sundance reaction: Todd Solondz‘s Weiner Dog is “a morose and depressive slog about a dachsund passing from owner to owner and bearing the sins of mankind. I’ve always hated Solondz and his dweeby, depressive attitude and particularly his attachment to depressive losers, so it was no surprise when I began hating this film early on. It was agony sitting through to the end, which I was determined to do no matter what. It’s about futility, fuck it, banality, depression, ennui, emptiness, death, Down Syndrome and cancer.”

Every time someone I like grows a moustache, something inside me dies a little. Or succumbs to a bad mood. When you grow a moustache, it’s like you’ve switched sides. Sign here on the dotted line…congrats, you look like a putz. Decades ago people believed that a moustache gave you a rakishly sexy vibe. That idea began, I suppose, when Clark Gable grew a pencil-line ‘stache in the mid ’30s. It peaked with Robert Redford‘s bushy squirrel in Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. It began to wither, I’ve come to believe, with the appearance of William Hurt‘s upper-lip growth in Body Heat. Example: I found Kirk Douglas‘s The Bad and the Beautiful character charismatic until he grew a moustache in Act Three. I could mention other instances. Just don’t grow the damn things.

A day or two ago Variety‘s Kris Tapley and Jenelle Riley posted a piece called “22 Deserving Oscar Contenders from the First Half of 2016.” I haven’t seen some of the films discussed. No excuses — I just didn’t or haven’t yet. But I feel highly enthused about two of their suggestions — Josh Kriegman and Elyse Steinberg’s Weiner for Best Feature Doc (I’m ignoring the Best Picture idea) and Ralph Fiennes‘ giddy, motor-mouth performance in A Bigger Splash.

Kris and Jenelle don’t appear to be seriously suggesting that the others might actually score a nomination in their categories. They seem to be mostly saying “hey, at least keep some of these in mind for a Spirit Award.” Fine, but where they got the idea that Mary Elizabeth Winstead and John Goodman merit acting nominations for their performances in 10 Cloverfield Lane…fuhgedaboutit.

Best Picture: Kriegman and Steinberg’s Weiner. HE response: For a half-second I thought Tapley and Riley were cranked about Todd Solondz‘s Weiner Dog…whoaahhh! Kriegman and Steinberg’s doc about how “Carlos Danger” destroyed the career of former Rep. Anthony Weiner is a fascinating, appalling, sometimes amusing thing to sink into. On the other hand it’s about the suffocation of a guy’s life, an execution by media and twitter dogs, and who can laugh at this level of carnage? All the guy did was make an ass of himself online — no affair, no sexual harassment, no cruelty, just stupidity. But that’s all it takes.

Best Director: Jeremy Saulnier, Green Room. HE response: Uhhmm…haven’t seen it.

Best Actor: Ethan Hawke, Born to Be Blue. HE response: Missed it at last year’s Toronto Film Festival, haven’t had a chance since. Miles Ahead, another jazz biopic with a darkish tone, is already out on Bluray while Born To Be Blue, which is more or less a portrait of the late Chet Baker, is only on DVD plus it’s not streaming on Amazon or Vudu. Why?

Best Actress: Susan Sarandon, The Meddler. HE response: Missed this also. At least it’s streaming. Tapley-Riley are claiming Sarandon’s performance “is one of the most accurate portrayals of grief seen on film in recent years.” Bill Maher said it made him choke up. Sorry for the dereliction.

Unbeknownst to me at the time, Michael Herr, whose legendary 1977 novel “Dispatches” will always be the definitive grunt’s-eye, bong-hit chronicle of the Vietnam War — an Elements of Style-defying, darkly poetic, run-of-the-brain masterpiece — died Thursday at an upstate New York hospital, which may have been near his home in Delhi, where he lived for years. I was writing, packing and flying to New York that day (i.e., yesterday) so yeah, I was buried but I still feel a little badly that I didn’t catch the news until tonight. Michael Herr was the King of literary Vietnam, a guy who brought the shit home like no one had ever dared or imagined, who rock-and-rollicized the nightmare and the murdering and the war highs. To me Herr was also the guy who sculpted much of Martin Sheen‘s voiceover narration for Apocalypse Now, although who knows who wrote what on that film? He also did some pinch-hitting on Full Metal Jacket. Herr was 76.

“‘Quakin’ and shakin’, they called it, great balls of fire, contact. Then it was you and the ground: kiss it, eat it, fuck it, plow it through with your whole body, get as close to it as you can without being in it or of it, guess who’s flying around about an inch above your head? Pucker and submit, it’s the ground. Under Fire would take you out of your head and your body too. Amazing, unbelievable, guys who’d played a lot of hard sports said they’d never felt anything like it, the sudden drop and rocket rush of the hit, the reserves of adrenalin you could make available to yourself, pumping it up and putting it out until you were lost floating in it, not afraid, almost open to clear, orgasmic death-by-drowning in it, actually relaxed.

“Unless of course you’d shit your pants or were screaming or praying or giving anything at all to the hundred-channel panic that blew word salad all around you and sometimes clean through you. Maybe you couldn’t love the war and hate it at the same instant, but sometimes those feelings alternated so rapidly that they spun together in a strobic wheel rolling all the way up until you were literally High On War, like it said on all the helmet covers. Coming off a jag like that could really make a mess out of you.” — page 63 of a dog-eared 1978 paperback version of Michael Herr‘s “Dispatches.” — “Vietnam Vietnam Vietnam, We’ve All Been There,” posted 12.29.15.