Jeffrey Wells

Yorgos Lanthimos‘ The Lobster (Alchemy, 3.16) is a half-effective parable piece, dryly comedic and lightly romantic at times, that was made to be shown at film festivals and particularly to effete critics like Variety‘s Guy Lodge. It’s darkly pulsing and tingly during the first half, and then it runs out of gas and becomes a drag to sit through. In Cannes I called it “a dryly amusing, Bunuelian parlor piece about societal oppression, singlehood, conformity and totalitarianism.” It’s about a society in which singles are routinely arrested and sent to “The Hotel”, where they have 45 days to pair up with someone. If they fail, they’re transformed into an animal of their choosing and released into “The Woods.” Fundamental question: Who could possibly fail to find a mate under these circumstances? Obviously singles would find someone on at least a pretend basis, if for no other reason than to avoid being turned into a four-legged beast of some kind. I found a place in my head for Dogtooth and I know Lanthimos is a kind of late-Bunuelian, crazy-salad type of guy but The Lobster is whimsical and undeveloped. Costarring Colin Farrell (rockin’ a seriously chunky dad bod), Rachel Weisz, John C. Reilly, Olivia Colman, Ben Whishaw and Lea Seydoux.

Sunday’s Oscar Poker chat was obliged to focus on the significance of Alejandro G. Inarritu’s DGA win, which happened late Saturday night and which indicated to many (myself included) that The Big Short is all but dead in the water as a Best Picture contender, and that the final lap will almost certainly be a mano e mano between The Revenant and Spotlight. But after 15 minutes the discussion began to feel oppressively wonky with a torrent of precedents, statistics and inside-baseball speculation. “If I hear the term ‘preferential ballot’ one more time I’m going to start screaming,” I said. I really don’t like the way Awards Daily‘s Sasha Stone and Awards Watch‘s Erik Anderson often ignore or patronize the points that I make, and are often ganging up on me and trying to commandeer the discussion and suffocate the chimes of freedom flashing. Again, the mp3.

I attended the 2016 Santa Barbara Film Festival screenwriters panel on Saturday afternoon (2.5), which was moderately engaging. I then tried to write it up but it wouldn’t come. So here, at least, is the full video. Anne Thompson moderated; the participants were Ex Machina‘s Alex Garland, Inside Out‘s Pete Docter (who really does look like a cartoon character), Room‘s Emma Donoghue, The Martian‘s Drew Goddard, Straight Outta Compton‘s Jonathan Herman (one of the four white writers), Anomalisa‘s Charlie Kaufman, Carol‘s Phyllis Nagy, The Big Short‘s Charles Randolph and Spotlight‘s Josh Singer. Watch it or don’t, but…well, I’ve already described it.

“The first rule is, you do not talk about Fight Club. The second rule is, you do not talk about Fight Club.” Jason Bourne (Universal, 7.29) seems lively enough, but is anyone else concerned by the fact that it wasn’t even co-written by Tony Gilroy, a Bourne regular going back 14 years? Or at least some major-league veteran from the action realm? The screenplay is co-credited to director Paul Greengrass, producer-star Matt Damon and editor Christopher Rouse. I’m sorry but that concerns me. Where’s the real-deal writer on this thing?

“Don Cheadle flails about trying to channel the spirit of late jazz-trumpeting legend Miles Davis in Miles Ahead (Sony Classics, 4.1), a biopic that rejects typical genre conventions to the point of chasing itself down lame, tangential paths. A passion project for its star, who also directed, co-wrote and co-produced the feature, this portrait aims for insight by striving to match its own form to that of its subject’s music, whose inspired improvisational tunes repeatedly defined the course of modern jazz. A wild, and wildly uneven, free-form investigation of Davis’ turbulent personal and professional life that’s bolstered by an outsized lead performance, [pic’s] all-over-the-place style will temper mainstream theatrical interest.” — from Nick Schrager’s Variety review, posted on 10.10.15.

If Jen Yamato had been working a half-century ago and had an opportunity to interview Becket director Peter Glenville, I could imagine her writing the following: “I asked Mr. Glenville to respond to criticisms that there aren’t more minority characters in his film. Why is #BecketSoWhite? Why can’t we create a medieval England as culturally diverse as the United States is now? It may not be historically accurate to do so, but accuracy needn’t be our ultimate arbiter. Why limit or restrict ourselves? As a filmmaker, Mr. Glenville, is it important or not important to consciously factor in concerns like diversity?” Yamato has a point, no? If Julius Caesar can be performed by an all-black cast and Hamilton can reimagine the colonial culture of the Founding Fathers as racially diverse, why not the court of King Henry II? I’m thinking of Don Cheadle as Henry II.

There’s nothing inherently wrong with an occasional posting of Paul Simon Kodachrome pics. A little bit boring, perhaps, but there’s nothing “wrong” with it. When I looked up at that lemon eucalyptus tree yesterday afternoon (second from top) I was touched. “This is one of those serene moments,” I said to myself. “I’m surrounded by the usual coarse people, jabbering and texting and eating yogurt and whatnot, but this is between me, the tree and the deep blue sky.”

Kids and puppies will always steal the show, and last night’s Virtuosos presentation at Santa Barbara’s Arlington theatre was no exception to the rule. Room‘s relentlessly quippy, chipmunk-voiced Jacob Tremblay, aided and abetted by smooth moderator Dave Karger, slayed the competition. Well, not “competition” exactly but Tremblay’s co-recipients — Elizabeth Banks, Paul Dano, O’Shea Jackson Jr., Géza Röhrig, Jacob Tremblay and Alicia Vikander — were certainly looking for a fair share of the attention. They got some of that, yes, but on the way out everyone was saying “the kid was so cute, the kid was so cute, the kid was so cute,” etc. For some curious reason I was actually allowed into the after-party last night, but I was so consumed with waiting for news of the the winner of the DGA award (Inarritu was announced around 11:10 pm) that I didn’t socialize much. Sorry.

(l. to r.) Moderator Dave Karger, Jacob Tremblay (Room), Paul Dano (Love & Mercy), Geza Rohrig (Son of Saul), Elizabeth Banks (Love & Mercy), O’Shea Jackson, Jr. (Straight Outta Compton), Alicia Vikander (The Danish Girl, Ex Machina).

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For what it’s worth, I wouldn’t shake a germ-infested hand either. Who would? Nonetheless, the writers of this SNL “Bern Your Enthusiasm” segment are saying it’s better to get infected than to lose the potential vote. A dislocated shoulder is about the ball having popped out of the socket, right? So you…what, gently pull and release to allow it to sink back in? Or do you sharply pull? I don’t know about such things and would frankly be hesitant to assist. The shoulder sufferer can tough it out until the paramedics arrive.

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“Marco Rubio knew exactly what he was doing on Saturday night. Marco Rubio knew exactly what he was doing on Saturday night. Marco Rubio knew exactly what he was doing on Saturday night. The problem was he flubbed it. Rubio awkwardly pivoted four times to a well-rehearsed line that President Barack Obama ‘knows exactly what he’s doing’ as he tried to drill home the idea that he’s the inevitable general election candidate – an unforced error that his rivals pounced on and that quickly went viral. ‘There it is. There it is. The memorized 25-second speech. There it is, everybody,’ Chris Christie charged.” — from a 2.6 assessment of Saturday’s Republican debate by Politico‘s Shane Goldmacher.

Tonight Alejandro G. Inarritu became the first guy to win two back-to-back DGA awards for Outstanding Directorial Achievement in Feature Film — Birdman last year and now The Revenant. My insect antennae vibrations are hummin’ like the Lovin’ Spoonful, and despite what Sasha Stone and other Big Short die-hards are saying, hanging on to a frayed-sewing-thread hope that Adam McKay‘s film might still have a chance, all the flashing signs in the Hollywood Elsewhere universe point to a Revenant vs. Spotlight showdown for Best Picture. McKay had to win tonight and he didn’t, and in my mind that means The Big Short is a dead…okay, a bleeding deer in the snow. The stubborns are insisting otherwise. Preferential schmeferential…the Big Short egg fell off the wall tonight and broke on the pavement, and the yoke and clear goo and eggshell fragments are soaking the stones and the mortar. Note from a friend: “The DGA is an interesting choice and yes, Inarritu will likely win a second Best Directing Oscar but Best Picture is still very much up in the air because of the preferential ballot. In that scenario, The Big Short still won. The DGA does not trump PGA for Best Picture.” Note from friend #2: “It’s not The Big Short that’s out of the Best Picture race but Spotlight. McCarthy needed to win tonight for his film to have a chance.”

Excerpt from Maureen Dowd’s 2.6 N.Y. Times column, “Hillary Battles Bernie Sanders, Chick Magnet”:

“In 2008 Hillary was running against the Tulip Craze Barack Obama. Now she’s running against a grumpy gramps, a stooped socialist with a narrow message, brusque manner and shaky grasp of world affairs.

“And she’s still not likable enough for the young women who were supposed to carry her forward as a Joan of Arc. According to an NBC News/Wall Street Journal/Marist poll, Sanders won among young men and women in Iowa by 70 points. And in New Hampshire, going into the weekend, polls showed him leading with women, racking up yawning margins with women under 45 and with both sexes under 30.

“Hillary is traveling around New Hampshire with a former president who could easily layer in some poetry, and a handful of specific snappy plans for the future, to her thicket of substance and stack of white papers. But somehow, Hill and Bill campaign side by side without achieving synergy. Is it that he’s as tired as he looks or does she feel too competitive with him to ask for that kind of help?

“As one Hillary booster in Hollywood marveled: ‘There’s no chance her husband doesn’t understand the problem. The look on his face during her speeches evokes a retired major league All Star watching his son strike out in a Little League game. This is so fixable.’

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