Jeffrey Wells

Scott Feinberg did it right in Santa Barbara last night. The Hollywood Reporter columnist kept last night’s group interview with the five Oscar nominees for Best Director — Room‘s Lenny Abrahamson, The Revenant‘s Alejandro G. Iñárritu, Spotlight‘s Tom McCarthy, The Big Short‘s Adam McKay and Mad Max: Fury Road‘s George Miller — to a tolerable two hours, and it just seemed to zip along. And it was funny at times. And I got into the after-party (thanks to Sunshine Sachs’ Brooke Blumberg) and had some chummy words with Inarritu, etc. A good night, zero frustrations, bons amis.

Oscar-nominated directors on the Arlington theatre stage (l. to. r.): Room‘s Lenny Abrahamson, The Revenant‘s Alejandro G. Iñárritu, Spotlight‘s Tom McCarthy, Mad Max: Fury Road‘s George Miller and The Big Short‘s Adam McKay.

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Pete Hammond suspects that Adam McKay‘s The Big Short will win the Best Picture Oscar. He believes that if The Big Short wins the top BAFTA award on Sunday night, “It’s over.” But you know something? During the film-clip reel at the start of last night’s Directors Tribute at the Santa Barbara Film Festival, The Revenant got the biggest applause. It was only a gathering of well-to-do Santa Barbara film fanatics, yes, but you could feel it — The Revenant has the most passionate following. I’m a devoted Spotlight fan, but my insect antennae is telling me that The Revenant will take the big prize on 2.28. It has the most Oscar nominations, Alejandro G. Inarritu won the DGA award, Leonardo DiCaprio is locked for Best Actor, it won the Golden Globe award for Best Picture, Drama, etc. Oscar voting began today — Friday, 2.12.16 — at 8 am Pacific. Voting closes on Tuesday, 2.23.16 at 5 pm Pacific.

Yes, this is somewhat amusing, but the CG isn’t quite good enough. Black-and-white Trump has been overly tweaked and fiddled with.

Ted Cruz’s campaign has pulled an anti-Marco Rubio ad (i.e., a kind of “Conservatives Anonymous” discussion group scenario) after learning that the ad features Amy Lindsay, an adult film actress who’s pushing 40 and was simply looking to expand her repertoire. What’s wrong with an actress trying to grow her life and deepen things a bit by appearing in a prominent political ad?

I understand why the Cruz campaign guys panicked, but maybe they shouldn’t have? If you’re any kind of fair-minded human being you have to believe in potential, growth, tomorrows, transcendence. Deep-sixing an Amy ad just because she’s “done” a parade of guys on camera seems heartless. Is she not human? Does she not have thoughts and rights? Does she not pay taxes?

Lindsay’s IMDB page list credits going back to to 1994, which indicates she was born in the mid to late ’70s. Her credits include Passion Lane, Indecent Disclosure, Animal Lust, Deviant Whores, Kinky Sex Club, Exposed and Insatiable Obsession, as well as an appearance The Portrait of a Lady (’96) which costarred Nicole Kidman and John Malkovich.

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I haven’t yet had the pleasure of catching Zoolander 2, but Leonard Maltin has. And he broke a career tradition by walking out. Which he never does, he says. Ever. But I’ve been proudly and decisively walking out on certain films for decades, and I’ve never looked back. With some films walking out is an act of dignity and self-respect. The feeling of pride when you bail on a rancid film is wonderful.

So okay, yes…perhaps it wouldn’t mean as much if I bailed on Zoolander 2. But a Maltin walk-out matters.

“As I embarked on the experience of watching Zoolander 2 at a press screening the other night, I had an immediate reaction of annoyance and impatience,” he writes. “The film was stupid right from the start. I told myself that I was wasting my time for no good reason. But I stayed. Ten minutes passed, then twenty, filled with puerile and unfunny gags; along with gratuitous cameo appearances by everyone from Katy Perry to Willie Nelson. If even one of them had seemed clever I might have summoned some hope for the rest of the picture, but it was not to be.

“Mind you, I thought the original Zoolander was pretty funny. I had no reason to expect this one to be so much worse. But it is.

“Finally, after almost an hour, I strode out of the theater, proud of myself for taking positive action and sparing myself further insult. If there are hilarious moments in the latter half of the movie I can’t cite them for you. I can only offer an honest appraisal of what I saw. I bear no permanent grudge against anyone connected with the movie and hope they do better the next time out.

“By the way, it felt good to get home earlier than usual, and I think I turned a corner. Life is too short to spend two hours in a state of total exasperation.”

In other words, Maltin, who’s been in this racket since the ’60s, has finally gotten to a place where I’ve been since the ’80s.

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Some p.c. goosesteppers have been giving Meryl Streep a hard time for saying a politically incorrect thing about diversity during a Berlin Film festival press conference. When asked about the lack of diversity on the Berlinale jury, of which she’s the president, Streep said, “We’re all Africans, really…there is a core of humanity that travels right through every culture, and after all, we’re all from Africa originally.” Which is true — homo sapiens did originate on the African continent. Streep was basically saying that we’re all the same species, all God’s children, all bonded under the skin. Which some of us recognize from time to time.

All along I’ve been curiously uninterested in seeing Louis Leterrier‘s The Brothers Grimsby (Columbia, 3.11), partly because (a) I’ve been feeling a bit Sacha Baron Cohen-ed out and (b) I don’t trust any movie that opens in another country first (i.e., 2.24 in England) and under a shorter title (i.e, just plain Grimsby). But now, after seeing this 2.10 Jimmy Kimmel Live! clip, I want to see it. Two qualifiers: (1) the bit everyone is laughing at won’t be in the film, and (b) something tells me I personally won’t find it nearly as funny. I’d rather see a biopic about the famously sarcastic New York TV newsman Roger Grimsby — seriously.

Boilerplate synopsis for Ariel Vroman‘s Criminal: “In a last-ditch effort to stop a diabolical plot, a dead CIA operative’s memories, secrets and skills are implanted into an unpredictable and dangerous death-row inmate (Kevin Costner) in hopes that he might complete the operative’s mission.” And in the process Costner is romantically paired with Gal Gadot, who’s about 30 years younger. The Summit/Lionsgate release, costarring Gary Oldman, Ryan Reynolds, Tommy Lee Jones and Alice Eve, pops on 4.15.16.

Promising as Criminal seems to be, the trailer doesn’t match this clip from an earlier Costner film:

Over and over you hear that African Americans aren’t all that familiar with Sen. Bernie Sanders, and that they feel a natural kinship with Hillary Clinton because she’s associated with the liberal largesse of her husband’s administration. Nobody wants to say that “aren’t all that familiar with” is code for (a) lazy, incurious, low-information attitudes and (b) a brilliant presumption that despite his having gotten arrested for demonstrating for civil rights in the mid ’60s, a U.S. Senator from a mostly all-white state (i.e., Vermont) can’t be trusted to understand or respond to the concerns of black voters. Harry Belafonte‘s Bernie endorsement is fine, but the South Carolina black vote is hugely in Hillary’s favor, to go by the polls. Related: A 2.10 column by N.Y. Times columnist Charles Blow called “Stop Bernie-splaining to Black Voters.”

Tonight’s Santa Barbara Int’l Film Festival event is a group interview with the five Oscar nominees for Best Director — Room‘s Lenny Abrahamson, The Revenant‘s Alejandro G. Iñárritu, Spotlight‘s Tom McCarthy, The Big Short‘s Adam McKay and Mad Max: Fury Road‘s George Miller. The moderator is Hollywood Reporter columnist Scott Feinberg, who will conclude with a presentation of five Outstanding Director of the Year awards.

The Big Question is whether or not Feinberg will subject the audience to a 2 & 1/2 hour ordeal like he did last year (described in a 2.5.15 HE piece called “Existential Ordeal, Man”), or whether he’ll keep it to a more reasonable 100 minutes. I realize that the temptation is to go longer. I realize that last weekend’s DGA theatre event (same deal, same directors minus Abrahamson with the addition of Ridley Scott) lasted for 2 hours and 40 minutes. But I’m begging Feinberg anyway. End it before people start coughing and taking bathroom breaks. Please.

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