Jeffrey Wells

Yesterday Fox 411‘s Roger Friedman said he’d been “banned” from seeing Bryan Singer‘s Valkyrie, and then Patrick “Big Picture” Goldstein had a discussion with Mike Vollman about the Friedman situation, during which Vollman said that the New York-based columnist “just wasn’t invited…screenings are a privilege, not a right, and [if Freidman had] indicated a desire to be open-minded and not telegraphed his intentions ahead of time, we would’ve acted differently.”

The interesting part comes when Goldstein writes that he doesn’t “like the idea of studios banning writers from screenings, since judging from the state of my frosty relations with a couple of studios right now, it’s quite possible that, ahem, I could be next.” I don’t believe that for a nano-second. Nobody would dare ban Goldstein because of the lingering (i.e., actually much diminished) don’t-tread-on-me factor stemming from his L.A. Times employment. On top of which he’s finally too much of a political chess player and not nearly enough of an emotionally free-swinging, Miles Davis-styled loose cannon to get banned by anyone. I know, having experienced a few temporary freeze-outs by some major distributors in my time.

Friedrich Nietzsche once said words that I’ve always lived by: “When in danger, always move forward.” If a studio bans you, my advice is to just go “okay, whatever” and focus your energies elsewhere. Keep your head down, keep moving. Most of the time the anger over the banning issue subsides and the studio reconsiders after three or four months. I’m proud to say that right now I am no one’s shit list right now.

In a 12.15 petition, Tom Hanks, George Clooney, Alec Baldwin and more than 125 other SAG members urged guild leaders to deep-six a scheduled strike authorization vote. “We support our union and we support the issues we’re fighting for, but we do not believe in all good conscience that now is the time to be putting people out of work,” the petition said.

If an Academy member or press person allows a watermarked screener in his/her possession to be pirated and is thereafter busted for this, we the people (a) want to know the name and profession of this person, partly so we can speculate on his/her idiocy levels or circumstance, and (b) want to see the perp severely punished. But no such satisfaction has come out of the Quantum of Solace screener situation, that was recently reported by Gold Derby‘s Tom O’Neil, and which involves a female Academy member.

We didn’t need to hear any details back in ’04 when former Academy member Carmine Caridi was popped for participating in the pirating of several screeners. It was all but impossible to avoid the implications of his last name. A guy who probably had Godfather and Goodfellas posters on his den wall, was possibly mobbed-up, maybe had a cousin who worked for a Tony Soprano type back in Jersey — something along those lines. But we don’t know zip about the errant female.

The San Francisco, San Diego and St. Louis film critics announced their best-of lists yesterday, and I have to confess to a sense of growing tedium. Okay, there are two or three variations (thank God), but mainly they’re all marching in lockstep with the status-quo faves. Half award-giving, half photo-copying.

At least the St. Louis gang gave their Best Supporting Actress award to Doubt‘s Viola Davis — good call. And their Best Actress award to Revolutionary Road‘s Kate Winslet — check. Their Best Picture award went to The Curious Case Of Benjamin Button…okay. But their remaining awards were the same old Slumdog/Boyle/WALL*E/Man on Wire blah-dee-blah. Wait…they gave Burn After Reading their Best Comedy award! Agreed and then some.

I respect the judgment (as well as the local sentiment) that led the SF contingent to pig out on Milk — i.e., Best Picture, Best Director for Gus Van Sant , Best Original Screenplay to Dustin Lance Black, Best Actor (tied with The Wrestler‘s Mickey Rourke) for Sean Penn. But too many critics orgs have tumbled for Happy Go Lucky‘s Sally Hawkins . It’s starting to feel like a cross between a personality fetish (how can anyone actually fall for Hawkins’ Poppy character?) and a herd mentality thing.

The only stand-out calls from the San Diego film critics was handing their Best Actress award to Kate Winslet for The Reader and not Revolutionary Road — figure that one out — and Tom McCarthy‘s The Vistor winning for Best Original Screenplay.

Otherwise they went the lazy conformist route — Slumdog Millionaire for Best Picture, Danny Boyle for Best Director, The Wrestler‘s Rourke and Tomei for Best Actor and Best Supporting Actress respectively, Ledger for Best Supporting Actor, etc. The Best Documentary award went to Man on Wire…of course. Best Animated Film, WALL*E…what else?

The San Diego-ans also handed their Body of Work award to Richard Jenkins (The Visitor, Burn After Reading, Step Brothers, The Tale of Despereaux) as a sop for not winning Best Actor.

I suck at this Bush Shoe-Throwing Game. My highest score has been 13 or something. You think it’s easy? The trick is to throw the instant Bush pops up; hesitate and he drops right down again. He’s very agile, good reflexes, no easy target. Plus the soundtrack is distracting, messes with your concentration. And the blood-hit effect is unnecessarily vicious.

I’m not saying I’m so persuaded or even in the mood to go poking around, but since we’re all pretty clear on the likely Oscar nominees, I’m wondering if there’s any yearning out there to see this or that contender taken down. I’m really not feeling any of the old fire myself (it’s been a bit of a tepid year) but does anyone out there feel anything? In terms of wanting a film or filmmaker out of contention, I mean?

Alliance of Women Film Journalists Special Mention Awards: (1) AWFJ Hall Of Shame Award to 27 Dresses; (2) Actress Most in Need Of A New Agent: Kate Hudson ; (3) Movie You Wanted To Love But Just Couldn’t (Tie) — Mamma Mia! and The Women; (4) Best Of The Fests — Hunger; (5) Unforgettable Moment Award (tie between The Dark Knight (Joker’s first scene) and Slumdog Millionaire (young Jamal jumps into the poop….what?); (6) Best Depiction Of Nudity or Sexuality (tie between Elegy and The Reader); (7) Best Seduction — Vicky Cristina Barcelona; (8) Sequel That Shouldn’t Have Been Made Award — tie between Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull and Saw V; (9) The Remake That Shouldn’t Have Been Made Award — The Women; (10) Cultural Crossover Award — Slumdog Millionaire; (11) Bravest Performance Award — Mickey Rourke in The Wrester; (12) Best Leap from Actress to Director Award — Helen Hunt, Then She Found Me; (13) Most Egregious Age Difference Between Leading Man and Love Interest —

The Wackness, Ben Kingsley and Mary-Kate Olsen.

“Over the years, Detroit bosses kept repeating, ‘We have to make the cars people want.’ That’s why they’re in trouble. Their job is to make the cars people don’t know they want but will buy like crazy when they see them. I would have been happy with my Sony Walkman had Apple not invented the iPod. Now I can’t live without my iPod. I didn’t know I wanted it, but Apple did. Same with my Toyota hybrid.” — Thomas L. Friedman in his 12.14 N.Y. Times column.

Muntadhar al-Zeidi, the Egyptian journalist who threw two shoes at President Bush yesterday during a Baghdad press conference yesterday, is suddenly a new Middle-Eastern folk hero, and no wonder. Thousands of Iraqis “took to the streets today to demand al-Zeidi’s release, to hail him as a hero and to praise his insult as a proper send-off to the unpopular U.S. president,” says this AP story by Qassim Abdul-Zahra and Omar Sinan.

I agree with the angry masses. Like Peter Finch‘s Howard Beale did in Network, Muntadhar al-Zeidi has articulated a popular rage. Throwing those shoes

was an act of civil disobedience no different than Boston patriots throwing tea into the harbor. He did an impolite thing, but he didn’t use a weapon or hurt anyone and he said what an awful lot of people (myself included) feel. If the Iraqi authorities were smart, they’d let him go. With this act they would be saying to the Iraqi people, “We hear you” and “issues of bad manners to a visiting head of state aside, we don’t entirely disagree.”

HE reader Andrew Corks writes that he “saw Let The Right One In this year at the Tribeca Film Festival, where it took one of the top prizes, and was blown away by the overall quality of the film. It has an uncanny ability to successfully cross all genres — horror, love story, comedy, coming-of-age — combined with genuine acting and spectacular cinematography.

“Now that Let The Right One In has now picked up its second major critic’s society award, why is it still absent from the Oscar Balloon and general Oscar talks?”

Wells to Corks: I’m not looking to put it down or exclude it from anything. It’s one of the most unusual, originally conceived, genre-bending films I’ve seen in a long time. A really magnificent creep-out and a beautiful adolescent love story combined. I just didn’t like it all that much. Or rather, I like having seen it but didn’t like the way I felt as I watched it. I didn’t care for the funny-looking girl who played the little vampire. I thought the little blonde boy was way too much of a candy-ass. I didn’t like the low-rent fleurescent lighting, the constant snowstorms, the drab instiutional palette. I recognize without hesitation that it’s an exceptional film. I’m just looking forward to the American remake.