What a colossal, shattering embarassment for Jeffrey Toobin. Author, columnist, New Yorker contributor, CNN’s top legal analyst since ’02. And of course, a notorious monkey spanker. 28 years as a distinguished, top-tier journalist, trashed in a matter of seconds.

It would appear, however, that Toobin has begun his public rehab process with CNN’s approval. Being interviewed by CNN’s Alisyn Camerota on “CNN Newsroom” is the first salvo.

Toobin has obviously been punished, and will continue to suffer for months if not years to come. Am I allowed to say that not every crime deserves the death penalty? I am? Okay, good — not every crime deserves the death penalty.

It’s humiliating enough for a woman to be conducting Toobin’s first interview after he was caught masturbating on a work zoom, but to make her, *not him*, detail the ordeal for an audience is disgraceful. pic.twitter.com/DhdaYJtuIa

— Natalie Johnson (@nataliejohnsonn) June 11, 2021

It would appear that Antoine Fuqua‘s Infinite (6.10) stinks. Certainly to go by David Rooney‘s Hollywood Reporter review.

Opening line: “It’s an intriguing idea in theory to hitch the reincarnation beliefs of Eastern religions to a futuristic scenario of gifted souls with perfect recall of their past lives, split into good and evil factions at war over humanity’s survival”…okay, stop right there.

Any scenario that insists on clear-cut delineations between good and evil is horseshit from the get-go. For the most part there are few absolute moral black or white extremes in any realm — except for the pure rancid evil of Donald Trump and the fact-denying wackazoids who would trash American Democracy for an authoritarian whitebread dictatorship defined by decades-old cultural values. Almost everything on the face of the planet is defined by varying shades of gray.

Rooney: “But Infinite is a soulless grind. Juiced up with a succession of CG-enhanced accelerated chases and fight action interspersed with numbing bursts of high-concept geek speak, Antoine Fuqua’s sci-fi thriller isn’t helped by a lead performance from Mark Wahlberg at his most inexpressive.

“His character is basically a charisma void with a permanently furrowed brow suggesting brain strain. It’s no surprise Paramount shunted this thrice-delayed theatrical release to its streaming platform.”

This two-day-old Lorraine interview with Anthony Hopkins took me back to the whole soul-draining, otherworldly disappointment of the Steven Soderbergh Oscars — easily the most bizarre, tilt-level Academy Awards telecast in human history.

Not to mention that awful, mind-warping post-Oscar assessment video by Variety wokesters Elizabeth Wagmeister, Clayton Davis, Angelique Jackson and Jenelle Riley.

The best response was posted by HE’s “Deydou“:

“Wagmeister, Davis, Jackson, Riley… you could add many more of these so-called columnists, entertainment journalists and Oscar bloggers who know nothing about movies or care about performances. They’re only interested in writing about what descent is this or that actor, and pushing for awards because of this or that origin.

“Who will remember these ignoramuses who ridicule themselves to please those Twitter hyenas that don’t represent anyone in real life? They should be ashamed of themselves. As should be every hypocrite who did their ‘who will win and who should win?’ before the Oscar and always put Boseman’s name in the ‘should win’.

“Chadwick Boseman wasn’t robbed nor snubbed and Hopkins’s win wasn’t shocking at all. Boseman gave one of the best performances of the year in a so-so movie. Hopkins is one of the GOAT giving one of the best performances of all time in an excellent movie that most people loved.

“There was no competition. Hopkins doesn’t even play in the same league than the other four. The Best Actor Oscar is not supposed to be a consolation prize or a race prize. Hopkins has no responsibility in Boseman’s shocking death. He doesn’t have to apologize for being a old white male. Boseman‘s Ma Rainey performance was great but he was not as good as Hopkins, nor was he overdue.

“R.I.P. Chadwick. As a great artist and and great man, I’m sure from where you are, you know Hopkins deserved it.”

Checking out of Placencia’s Cozy Corner hotel at 7:30 am tomorrow (Thursday), and then returning the SUV near Belize int’l airport between 10:30 and 10:45 am. The Belize-to-Houston flight departs at 12:50 pm. LAX touchdown expected around 7:25 pm.

We should allow for extra breathing room by leaving at 7 am…right?

The broadly satiric tone conveyed in the trailer for Michael Showalter‘s The Eyes of Tammy Faye (Searchlight, 9.17) comes as a surprise. I wasn’t expecting a goofy comedy, but that’s what it seems to be. A certain subsection of urban blues will love it, I presume; perhaps even your rural bumblefucks will derive a few chuckles.

Jessica Chastain obviously has a Best Actress nomination in the bag, and perhaps Andrew Garfield‘s Jim Bakker will also become an award-season contender. But right away my attention went to Cherry Jones as Tammy Faye’s disapproving mom and especially Vincent D’Onofrio as Jerry Falwell.

The Guess Who was a happening band there for a while. HE favorite: “No Sugar Tonight.”

The below quote appears at the very beginning of Mark Harris‘s “Mike Nichols: A Life,” which was published four months ago.

I’m a bit puzzled by the line “disaster can reorder our lives in wonderful ways, and then you go on to the next thing.”

I’ve never considered the idea of a disaster being any kind of wonderful experience. The only wonderful thing about getting hit in the side of the head by a waffle iron is what happens in the aftermath — you’re forced to either sink or swim when it happens. According to romantic Nietzschean principles, it makes you stronger by toughening your resolve and determination, or else you drop to your knees and lose your confidence or whatever.

I know that after a certain point in life most people (as in 98% or 99%) aren’t that interested in do-or-die scenarios. But they happen all the same.

Two and one-third years ago I raved about S. Craig Zahler‘s Dragged Across Concrete. This morning I happened to re-read my 3.21.19 review, and I’m wondering how it may have settled into HE community consciousness since then.

Was it an intense flash-in-the-pan thing, or has it acquired some kind of cult status? Has anyone watched it more than once, recommended it to friends, argued about it, found it wanting the second time, etc.?

I called it “a dead fucking brilliant exercise in slow-burn, element-by-element, ultra-violent urban action melodrama. It’s longish (158 minutes) and methodical and about as riveting as this kind of step-by-step ensemble crime film gets. It may be the best rightwing (if morally corrupted) urban action flick since Man on Fire.

“It takes its time, you bet, but once the disparate characters and plot threads start falling into place and it all starts to pay off like a slot machine, watch out.

“Concrete offers the best snarly-tough-guy performance from Mel Gibson in ages, another excellent turn from Vince Vaughn (his best since that True Detective criminal he played during season #2) and a serious pop-through turn by Tory Kittles, who looks like a slightly older Jussie Smollett.

“It’s like a politically conservative Jackie Brown without the mellow, likably laid-back lead performances from Robert Forster and Pam Grier, although Gibson and Vaughn are kind of brusquely charming in their roguishly rightwing, fuck-all deadpan way. Like Jackie Brown it waits and waits and reflects and reflects and then talks and talks and talks some more, and then finally, around the 100-minute mark, wham.

“It’s basically a talkfest thing that waits until Act Three to bring out the hardware and spill the vino. At 154 minutes, Jackie Brown is only four minutes shorter.

In the Heights has a curious exchange that’s been bothering me.

A 50ish female character named Daniella (Daphne Rubin-Vega) is moving out of her Washington Heights apartment and has hired movers. But when an overweight mover addresses her as “ma’am,” she barks at him for not addressing her as “Senorita.” He quickly apologizes and says “uhm, sorry’ ma’am…I mean Senorita.”

Like the film itself, Daniella is driven by cultural pride and, one gathers, a certain amount of resentment of Anglo culture, and so her irritation is understood. But my reaction was “whoa, sensitive enough?” The term “ma’am” is, of course, not a slur. In every English-speaking territory throughout the world it conveys deference and respect, and there’s really no debate about this. So why bite the guy’s head off?

Magnificent rant. Wonderfully sane. Plain and straight.

After a lovely drive south on the Hummingbird highway, we arrived yesterday afternoon in Placencia, a small peninsula village that radiates a fine coolness. Placencia obviously needs tourist dollars but it doesn’t feel touristy…not really.

The local culture is arts-and-crafty (handmade artisans selling their goods along beach promenade), and the general vibe reminded me in some ways of Key West without Duval Street. Plus it has a few inexpensive places to flop, and a hardware store, an auto-repair garage, a one-man carwash joint, a barber shop, plenty of restaurants, high temps mitigated by gentle Caribbean breezes…hot and humid but calming regardless. The sea aroma is magnificent.

I dropped by Omar’s Creole Grub for some shrimp tacos, but I couldn’t stay awake.

Right now HE’s Placencia lodging is the Sea Spray hotel, an air-conditioned two-story complex with five or six stand-alone cabanas. White, electric pea-soup green, teal. Our bungalow runs $75 per night.

After crashing a little after 9 pm, I awoke at 3:30 am — the basic pattern since arrival day. And as I sit on the fenced-off outdoor porch (hammock, eating table, four chairs, beach view), I’m thinking how much I adore tapping out the column, and indeed writing itself. It’s always there, the well from which I drink, the hill upon which I stand, and the only assured safe-space activity that I know. It nurtures and provides (even with the reduced ad income). Happiness is a warm Macbook Pro.

We’ll be moving around noon (Wednesday) into the Cozy Corner hotel, which is even closer to the beach and has an adjoining restaurant.

…that Steven Soderbergh‘s No Sudden Move (HBO Max, 7.1) will be, at the very least, half-decent.