Jeffrey Wells

But they certainly fill an empty wall.

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This morning “Rosso Veneziano” dismissed Sam Mendes’ Empire of Light as a “panned” film, at least in terms of its award-season potential.

HE response: “Empire of Light is my idea of a sublime and deeply moving yesteryear film, and is exceptionally well acted. There was no question in my mind that it was an authentic, emotionally fine-tuned masterwork after I saw it at the Herzog. It seemed “just right” in so many ways.

“As a study of a few characters living smallish lives in a somewhat isolated English coastal village in 1980 and ‘81, it recalls the complex textures of another tale of small-town characters, some of them grappling with sexual matters and with a certain movie theatre occupying an iconic space in their lives — Peter Bogdanovich’s The Last Picture Show (‘71).

“A few wokester fanatics panning Empire of Light in Telluride (vigilant defenders of Black identity and dignity, they didn’t care for the curious but affecting inter-racial romantic rapport between Olivia Colman and Michael Ward’s characters) doesn’t mean shit.

“Critics are truiy their own species these days, living on their own politically-attuned planet. Eternally fickle and excitably hair-trigger, they often seem divorced from and in some cases contemptuous of Average Joe perceptions about this or that film, and particularly those, it seems, that have explored racial situations or narratives. (2018’s Green Book being another example.)

More than any other time in cinema history, today’s elite critics are, to a large extent, living for and within their own realm.

“There are noteworthy exceptions and honorable outliers, thank God, and I’m not saying the elite critic cabal is entirely untrustworthy, but in the matter of films that either touch upon or seriously explore the holy woke covenant (race, gender, sexuality and whitey-very-bad), they’re never been more unreliable than today.”

Friendo: “I dunno. I’ve spoken to folks who don’t like it, and they didn’t seem to be coming from a woke perspective.”

HE to friendo: “They’re not ‘wrong’ but they’ve allowed themselves to be triggered by the romantic inter-racial dynamic. If Michael Ward’s character (who is only slightly older than Mendes’ age was in ‘80) had been white, the same know-it-alls you’ve spoken to would be much more accommodating. Then again the film wouldn’t stand out as much, of course, if Ward’s character had been a pale-faced Mendes stand-in.”

Bottom line: If you’re dealing with a Black lead character, a director-writer has to play his/her cards in exactly the right way or the elite critics will scold to no end.

Mendes casting Ward as a generational stand-in for himself seemed, at first, like a fashionably woke gambit before I saw it. But the writing and the acting and the overall quality factor won me over. I melted. And Ward is so charming and good-looking.

We can assume that “not suitable for general exhibition” was roughly equivalent to what an R rating means today. (Or used to mean). What in Casablanca could have given moral guardians this level of concern? Probably the allusion to sexual relations outside the bonds of marriage between Richard Blaine (Humphrey Bogart) and Ilsa Lund (Ingrid Bergman). What else could it be?

Danielle Deadwyler’s performance as the late Emmet Till’s grieving mom was seen this morning by NYFF press…

I have no problem with Rege-Jean Page, the 34 year-old Bridgerton and Gray Man costar, becoming the next James Bond.

Well, maybe I do. I wasn’t knocked out by his one-note Gray Man performance, and Page is kind of slender and small-shouldered and lacks the necessary Sean Connery-like brawn, no? If he were to get into a brutal fight with Robert Shaw aboard the Orient Express (Istanbul to Venice), nobody but nobody would bet on him winning. He’s a bit willowy.

Just for the pure euphoria of it, I would love it if they write the next Bond so he’s not in touch with his delicate inner feelings, but would regress into a courtly, well-educated, Connery-like hound. Connery’s Bond was polite and deferential with women, but he was also a caddish, semi-entitled, self-amused sexist swaggerer. Which is what everyone liked that about him.

A friend says “alpha men can’t be eliminated from film or film will die” — it’s that simple.

Honestly? I say put aside the idea of a BIPOC James Bond and cast Jake Picking. You can dismiss the idea but Picking has the goods — 31, good-looking, muscular, big-chested, nice jawline. All he lacks in the British accent, but that can be learned.

And may I say one other thing? The last time I checked James Bond was dead — killed by British missiles at the end of No Time To Die. I realize that at the end of the credit crawl it didn’t say “007 will be back” but that “James Bond will return.” Which made no sense, of course. How would that work unless the Bond films are going to become period pieces, set in the ’60s or ’70s or whatever? What’s the point of killing a franchise figurehead if you’re just going to bring the character back in a couple of years, like nothing ever happened?

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Late yesterday afternoon I caught Manhattan’s first commercial screening of Peter Farrelly’s The Greatest Beer Run Ever (Apple, 9.30 streaming). It happened at 5 pm on the top floor of Union Square’s Regal plex, and I almost died from watching all the crap-level trailers. (The Black Adam is especially toxic.)

This isn’t about the film (my review will appear later this morning) but about a mentally disturbed guy who talked loudly throughout the entire film. To himself.

Nobody said or did anything to influence the behavior of this horse’s-ass-who-was-off-his-meds, myself included. I should’ve manned up and walked over and offered my usual usual —“due respect, bruh, but would you please shut the fuck up?” But an instinct told me that this erudite 30something skull-capped gentleman might be the hair-trigger type. So I sat there and took it.

Thank you, Regal management. I paid thirty-six bills (including medium-size popcorn and a “small” half-quart-sized drink) to have my Greatest Beer Run experience interfered with by a muscle-bound, brain-scrambled psychopath.

It didn’t feel like a burn, I mean. I was mildly intrigued as far as it went. It’s a mid-level creeper about the lure of idyllic fantasy realms, and how people are so forlorn or morose in their day-to-day that they find fantasies all the more tantalizing.

That’s not a bad thematic premise to rest a film upon. You have to give DWD credit for aiming at people with the capacity to process a metaphor.

Florence Pugh is given all the big “what the fuck is going on?” acting moments, and she handles them pretty well. Harry Styles absolutely passes the test — he’s a completely decent actor and pleasing to gaze upon, and can dance reasonably well. Chris Pine is passable as the Manipulative Bad Daddy of Victory.

Yes, I had a few logic quibbles but I’d rather take issue tomorrow. It’s kinda late and I’m on a slightly bumpy train.

After all the alleged bad blood and off-screen scandal I guess I kinda expected something mildly shitty or a tiny bit disappointing. But DWD is mildly watchable, and that I didn’t expect.

Do I think it’s an extra-brilliant, extra-delicious, top-tier film? No, but it’s certainly tolerable, and the ‘50s cars are in great shape. I especially liked the black T-bird.

Honestly? I found it slightly more engrossing than Booksmart.

Okay, one complaint: The first time Harry goes down on Miss Flo he doesn’t yank off the undies so I didn’t believe it. Why didn’t he just flip ‘em off? (That’s a lyric from “Louie Louie” — “It won’t be long now…she’s flippin’ ‘em off”). But the second time he does.

One more: You can’t run barefoot up a hard dirt road — it would be painful as hell and you’d wind up limping.

The strangest thing happened about one-third of the way through — there’s a close-up of a large, thick uncooked steak that’s been marinated and sprinkled with peppercorns. And then it’s cooked and placed on the dining table, and I couldn’t stop thinking about eating at least a portion of it. My mouth was literally watering.

I don’t know how many minutes of screen time Michelle Williams has in The Fabelmans, but the tally was apparently low enough to persuade some that her performance as Sammy Fabelman’s mom belonged in the Best Supporting Actress category.

Screen time, of course, is not the ultimate measure. Patricia Neal’s Hud performance only amounted to 21 minutes and 51 seconds (or one-fifth of the 112-minute running time) and she was nominated for Best Actress anyway. And she won.

Second to last paragraph in Sasha Stone’s Awards Daily piece (9.20.22) about Hollywood’s devotion to to radiant Academy values (virtue, goodness, inclusion, equity, Millennialism): “It isn’t just that people are no longer watching the Oscars; it’s that people are tuning out the whole community.”

Excerpt #2:

Posted by The New Yorker’s Richard Brody on 9.20.22:

Posted by HE on 9.17.22: