Jeffrey Wells

This morning I had a pleasant conversation with Dave Strohmaier, who’ll be directing the Smell-o-Vision presentation of Michael Todd, Jr. and Jack Cardiff‘s Scent of Mystery (a.k.a. Holiday in Spain) at the Cinerama Dome on Sunday, May 2nd, under the aegis of the TCM Classic Film Festival.

I explained that I can’t attend the public showing (I’m flying back to NYC on 4.29) and asked if there might be a technical rehearsal screening of some kind before May 2nd. Strohmaier, the guy who restored and re-mastered Scent, invited me to observe a smell test showing at the Dome on 4.20…great.

The 12.2 screening will involve and in fact require audience participation. Earlier this year In70mm.com‘s Tammy Burnstock wrote a piece about the process, which was tested successfuly at special-event screenings of Scent of Mystery last October. The first happened during the Widescreen Weekend Festival (10.15 thru 10.18) in Bradford, England, and the second was staged at Copehhagen’s Cinematek on 10.22.

Read more

A never-before-seen extended cut of Amy Berg‘s Janis: Little Girl Blue, which I fell for in Toronto six and a half months ago and which really needs to be seen by anyone who ever felt the Joplin transportation, will debut as a PBS American Masters special on the evening of Tuesday, 5.3.16, or about a month hence. Below is an outtake interview with Dick Cavett. He had Joplin on his ABC late-night talk show two or three times, got to know and like her pretty well, got high with her, shared an intimate moment, etc.

From 9.17.15 HE review:

A 73% RT rating for Dan Kwan and Daniel Schienart‘s Swiss Army Man indicates a certain intrigue…maybe. And yet Variety‘s Ramin Setoodeh filed the following on 1.22.16: “[This] bizarre fable about a lost man (Paul Dano) who befriends a farting corpse (Daniel Radcliffe) could win the festival’s award for the most walk-outs, as a continuous stream of audience members kept standing up and bolting for the door throughout the film.” Chilling speculation from Variety‘s Peter Debruge: “Cannes tends to be ultra-picky about programming films that previously played Sundance, although there is speculation that Swiss Army Man…could be picked.”

Sunday email from colleague: “Take this from me…you HAVE to see The Invitation. Email Ryan Fons for a link. It’s incredible. Trust me.” Variety‘s Justin Chang: “Set during a mysterious reunion among old friends where something is quite palpably not right, this well-acted, beautifully modulated exercise represents director Karyn Kusama’s strongest work in years, revealing an assurance of tone, craft and purpose that haven’t been in evidence since her Sundance prize-winning debut, Girlfight.”

I’m aware of the 90% Rotten Tomatoes rating, of course, but honestly? I was dissuaded by that teaser/trailer. It’s too vague. Letting that go. Catching a screener later today.

Read more

Jonas Never‘s “Touch of Venice” wall mural (102 x 50 feet) was painted between November 2011 and April 2012. It’s a tribute, of course, to Orson Welles‘ Touch of Evil, which was filmed in the Venice area in 1957, or nearly 60 years ago. I did a three-hour stroll in the region on Sunday night.

I love that there’s an outfit called Carl Denham Productions paying rent in the small complex of offices on 73 Market Street.

Read more

I’ve seen two of the 12 films opening on Friday, 4.8 — Demolition (Fox Searchlight) and Louder Than Bombs (The Orchard). I’ll be attending screenings of The Boss (Universal) on Tuesday and Hardcore Henry (STX Entertainment) on Wednesday. And I don’t have a great amount of interest in five others — Before I Wake (Relativity), The Dying of the Light (First Run), The Invitation (Drafthouse), Mr. Right (Focus Worlds) and One More Time (Starz Media).

Opening the following Friday (4.15) will be Barbershop: The Next Cut (no, thanks!), Criminal (no invites yet and it opens in 12 days), The Jungle Book, John Carney‘s Sing Street, Above and Below, Colonia, Fan, Green Room, Our Last Tango, Rio, I Love You.

I saw Milos Forman‘s Oscar-winning One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest at least a couple of times when it opened in November ’75. I knew the play pretty well as I’d played Dr. Spivey in a Stamford Community Theatre production a couple of months earlier. I’d always admired Ken Kesey‘s play and particularly the metaphor of rebellion behind it, but I couldn’t quite love the film. Liked it, admired the construction and the ensemble performances, didn’t love it.

Maybe I just wasn’t all that aroused by Jack Nicholson‘s Randall P. McMurphy. I know what the consensus view is, but to me Jack seemed to be mainly playing himself while flirting with McMurphy. I would’ve loved to have seen Kirk Douglas’s 1963 Broadway stage version.

I can tell you that after those two viewings of Forman’s film I never saw it again…not once. And yet I’ve seen Nicholson’s other seminal ’70s films over and over — Chinatown, Five Easy Pieces, The Last Detail, Carnal Knowledge, The Passenger, The King of Marvin Gardens, etc. So why have I avoided Cuckoo’s Nest all these decades? Mainly, I think, because it’s essentially about terms of confinement.

McMurphy triggers a rebellion but he’s a sloppy Spartacus, and he winds up lobotomized and dead. And for what? The right to sneak prostitutes into the ward and get everyone drunk? Is McMurphy a champion of free will or isn’t he? He blows at least a couple of chances to escape Nurse Ratched’s control during the second half but he just hangs around.

I’ve just never felt much rapport with films that focus on prisoners and life sentences. That includes The Shawshank Redemption. One exception: Robert M. Young‘s Short Eyes.

Read more

As John Boorman‘s Point Blank opened on 8.30.67, I’m guessing it shot sometime in the early to mid fall of ’66. The wrap party, I’m guessing, was probably held in November or December of ’66. It happened at a place called “The Zoo” which was also known as Osko’s (333 So. La Cienega, corner of La Cienega and San Vicente, south of Third Street) around the same time. I’d like to time-machine back so I can attend. How many times in the life of the planet did Lee Marvin, Boorman (33 at the time, looked 27), Warren Oates (38 at the time, looked 30), Steve McQueen (36), Burt Reynolds (30), Keenan Wynn and probably Angie Dickinson joke around, get silly and dance the shing-a-ling at the same gathering?

(l. to r.) Lee Marvin, John Boorman, Michelle Triola.

(l. to r.) Steve McQueen, Neile McQueen, Burt Reynolds.

Warren Oates, Marvin.

Read more

This morning Jason Henschel (‏@Henschie42) asked Big Red One costar Mark Hamill (@HamillHimself) to describe Lee Marvin, who starred in the same 1980 Sam Fuller war film, in seven syllables. Hamill said nothing to I stepped into the breach: Flinty deep-voiced irony. Can anyone top this?

…he would announce that he’s made some huge mistakes, that he realizes he has certain limits and blockages, that he lacks the self-awareness and general finessing skills that all politicians need to survive, and that because he’s now facing all-but-insurmountable negatives he’s decided that for the good of the Republican party to fold his candidacy, and may the best man win. If he were to do this Trump would be applauded by all sides, and he’d be on a path to a certain kind of redemption. His brand would henceforth glow in people’s minds.

.@nytdavidbrooks says @realDonaldTrump will be known as the greatest loser in American politics in 100 years. #MTP pic.twitter.com/jkebfbPe0G

— Meet the Press (@meetthepress) April 3, 2016

Read more

Like almost everyone else, I became a fan of jazz saxophonist Gato Barbieri through his music for Bernardo Bertolucci‘s Last Tango in Paris, and particularly the moody composition that plays during the opening main titles. I’ve never forgotten that score…never. Nor Barbieri himself. I bought the soundtrack album way back when, and…okay, I’m going to be really honest and admit that I never listened to his stuff off iTunes, but mainly because I’m not a jazz buff. (Sorry.) Respect for Mr. Barbieri, a native Argentinian, upon news of his death. He was 83, man.

Read more

New Yorker critic Richard Brody has again written about how great Ishtar is. He was inspired by a 3.30 screening of the financially ruinous 1987 comedy at Pleasantville’s Jacob Burns Film Center, after which director-writer Elaine May, who’s been in movie jail for the last 28 and 1/2 years because of Ishtar‘s failure, spoke a bit.

Five or so years ago Brody called Ishtar “one of the most original, audacious, and inventive movies — and funniest comedies — of modern times. It isn’t just a movie worth rescuing for a few choice bits; it’s a thoroughgoing, beginning-to-end masterwork.”

All right, that’s just horseshit. Over-cranked, over-exuberant, not trustworthy. And yet Ishtar, on the whole, is worth seeing. Here’s how I explained it in January 2010:

(1) “The general…well, at least marginal view that Ishtar is better than its rep and is actually hilarious in portions”;

Read more