Joe Biden said he’s fine after this morning’s bicycle accident, but he won’t be feeling fine a few hours hence — trust me. (I’ve been there.)

The late Sydney Pollack suffered a similar bicycle accident 22 years ago, resulting in a broken hip. Both misfortunes happened because of those infernal bike pedal “cages” that riders put their feet into — Pollack and Biden couldn’t pull their feet out in time. Pollack told me this directly over the phone — it was the fault of those damn pedal cages.

It isn’t irresponsible or disrespectful to share concern about Tom Hanks‘ severe weight loss. There may be a very simple, no-big-deal explanation. (Radical dieting for a forthcoming performance in Robert Zemeckis‘ Here?) If I were Hanks I would put out a statement or explanation of some kind. Spit it out, put it to bed, no biggie.

HE somberly acknowledges the passing of liberal political commentator and former election consultant Mark Shields, 85. Analysis and commentary for the PBS NewsHour for 32 years — 1988 to 2020 — and partnered with David Brooks for 19 of those years (’01 to ’20). Previous partners: William Safire, Paul Gigot, David Gergen. Regrets, respect, condolences.

Life is a grim bowl of cherries, betrayal lurks around every corner (especially in the realm of relationships), and your worst enemy is more often than not yourself.

This is Woody Allen‘s basic view of things, as echoed in nearly every one of his films. Ditto Stanley Kubrick when it comes to Lolita, Barry Lyndon and Eyes Wide Shut; ditto the relationship-oriented films of Roman Polanski, David Fincher and Paul Thomas Anderson, but not so much Chris Nolan (who doesn’t focus all that much on relationships).

Let’s flip it around by asking which auteur-level filmmakers haven’t embraced this basic view of the human condition? In other words, which auteur-level directors and producers (excluding broadly-commercial-minded hacks and high-concept, Jerry Bruckheimer-type producers) have deliberately embraced a somewhat…well, less skeptical view of life?

Hal Ashby to Joseph McBride after early Star Wars screening: “What about yours, film critic?”
McBride to Ashby: “The difference is I know it.”
Ashby to McBride: “All right, so we’ll all turn in our Arriflxes and Avid editing machines to the Academy, and we’ll all go to work at Pink’s. Is that it?”
McBride to Ashby: “Not quite yet. [turns to George Lucas, standing nearby] We haven’t heard from your friend here.”
Lucas: “I wouldn’t push too far if I were you. Our fight ain’t with you.”
McBride: “It ain’t with me, Lucas?”
Lucas: “No it ain’t, Joe.”
Ashby: “I wouldn’t pull on Lucas, Joe. [to Will Atkey] Will, you’re a witness to this.”
McBride: “So you’re George Lucas.”
Lucas: “What’s that mean to you, Joe?”
McBride: “I’ve heard about you.”
Lucas: “And what’ve you heard, Joe?”
McBride: “I’ve heard that your movies are injecting an infantile serum into American commercial cinema, and in so doing are helping to destroy a cinematic golden age. You and Steven Spielberg, I mean.”
Lucas: “Prove it.”

The great Jean-Louis Trintignant, 91, has left the earth. In my mind he was the most deeply French actor alive for so many decades, even going back to the ’50s. That unaffected, un-acted manner, that deepish voice and handsome face, that air of casual unpretentiousness. He was a marquee name for seven decades, but mostly in the ’60s, ’70s and ’80s.

The cancer-stricken Trintignant announced his retirement from acting four years ago.

My favorite Trintignant performances are probably the same as everyone else’s. My three all-time faves are Marcello, the snivelling coward, in Bernardo Bertolucci‘s The Conformist (’70); the tough, low-key prosecutor in Costa-Gavras‘ Z (’69); and the elderly, quietly suffering husband in Michael Haneke‘s Amour (’12).

My fourth favorite is his vaguely Humphrey Bogart-like Cote d’Azur detective in Without Apparent Motive (’71), which was based on a 1963 Ed McBain novel.

I also loved his protagonists in Roger Vadim‘s And God Created Woman and Les liaisons dangereuses, “Éric Grandin” in Costa-Gavras‘ The Sleeping Car Murders, the race-car-driving smoothie in Claude Lelouch‘s A Man and a Woman, the Trintignant guy in Ettore Scola‘s La Terrazza and Roger Spottiswode‘s Under Fire (’83)

His last great performance was as the horrified, overwhelmed and finally resigned-to-fate Georges in Amour.