I’ve driven through Buffalo two or three times, and every time the same question comes to mind: “Even under the best of circumstances, who would want to live in this godforsaken region, this cultural Siberia of Upper New York State?”
I’m not saying anything as dismissive as “if I never visit Buffalo ever again, it’ll be too soon,” but I’m honestly wondering why anyone would say “yes, this is where I want to live.”
Anyone who uses the word “scream” or “screaming” in any context or circumstance, I regard askance. As in “he was screaming at me” or “screaming at the flight attendant” or whatever. Because people, in fact, almost never actually “scream.”
Millions of people get upset and angry about stuff every day, but very few of them scream like baboons or chimps or rhesus monkeys. Babies and little kids scream, of course, but adolescents, teens and adults merely get loud.
Screaming is primal and half-animalistic — it’s what Faye Wray did when King Kong approached or what scream-queens do in horror films. I’ve raised my voice or shouted or snarled or bellowed in heated arguments, sure, but I’ve never screamed at anyone, and I’ve never once claimed that anyone I’ve heard shouting or hollering or howling has screamed. Not once.
Here’s the part that gets me in trouble: I’ve heard the term used over and over, but in my experience it’s more favored among women.
Fair warning: Don’t say the “s” word if you can help it. Try to avoid it altogether. It’s used by people who tend to exaggerate, and it’s better to keep your distance from that sort.
Which sounds decent or semi-acceptable (it’s taken from Dylan’s “Like A Rolling Stone“) until it hits you that Martin Scorsese‘s No Direction Home (’05), a landmark doc about Dylan, also took its title from “Like A Rolling Stone” and in fact from the same chorus — “How does it feel, how does it feel? / To be on your own, with no direction home / A complete unknown, like a rolling stone.”
In short, Mangold’s title sounds lazy. His Dylan biopic is already covering the same territory as Scorsese’s film (the early ’60s folky troubadour years, ending with the 1966 motorcycle accident). He clearly needs to poach another Dylan lyric, but which?
HE suggestions: (a) The Ghost of Electricity (obvious allusion to the original title), (b) Darkness At The Break of Noon, (c) Shelter From The Storm, (d) All Along The Watchtower, (e) Simple Twist of Fate, (f) My Weariness Amazes Me.
Any of these six would make for a fascinating, catchy title — the only problem is that they might seem a bit too poetic for the dumbasses. Other suggestions? Remember that the title has to suggest something about the difficulty of change and finding a new direction.
Seriously, my favorite is The Ghost of Electricity followed by My Weariness Amazes Me.
Lurie started me off with a taste of 20 performances, and right away I was saying to myself “these are too familiar, too boilerplate…where’s that special-passion choice that defies conventional thinking?”
What is a greatest-ever performance anyway? My theory is that picks in this realm have less to do with skill or technique or even, really, the actor, and a lot more to do with the viewer and what they choose to see. The choices that people make tend to reflect their intimate personal histories on some level. Because they’re choosing performances or more precisely characters who closely mirror and express their deepest longings, fondest hopes and saddest dreams.
My late younger brother was tremendously moved by Mark Ruffalo‘s portrayal of a loser in You Can Count On Me, in large part because my brother was that character. I know a lady who’s always felt close to Vivien Leigh‘s Scarlett O’Hara in Gone With The Wind for the same reason. Bill Clinton once said on a High Noon DVD documentary that Gary Cooper‘s performance in High Noon is his all-time favorite because Will Kane‘s situation (everyone chickening out when things get tough and leaving him to stand alone) reminded him of what it’s often like for a sitting U.S. President.
When I began to assemble my pantheon the first nominees that came to mind were Gandolfini, Marlon Brando in On The Waterfront, Monica Vitti in L’Avventura, Amy Schumer in Trainwreck (I’m dead serious), George Clooney in Michael Clayton, Gary Cooper in High Noon, Mia Farrow in Broadway Danny Rose, Lee Marvin in Point Blank, Alan Ladd in Shane, Brad Pitt in Moneyball, Marilyn Monroe in Some like It Hot and Jean Arthur in Only Angels Have Wings. This is without thinking anything through or second-guessing myself.
Somebody complained earlier today that I don't write rich, longish reviews any more. Actually, I do but only if the spirit warrants. The complainer cited my Secretariat review from 12 years ago. Listen, man...I write all day long, every damn day without fail. There's more cultural-political stuff blended into the mix these days, and that's what stirs my soul. If the current output doesn't ring your bell, you know what you can do.
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HE is reminding that the next big Bedford Marquee event is a special 4K screening of William Cameron Menzies‘ recently restored Invaders From Mars (’53). A special master class instruction from restorationist Scott MacQueen will also occur. It’ll happen three weeks hence on Sunday, 1.15.23 at 11 am.
How keen will local film buffs be about catching a sci-fi classic on a lazy Sunday morning? Understand this: This will be the only first-rate screening in a AAA first-rate theatre (which the BP definitely is) of an absolutely mint-condition restoration of perhaps the most influential Eisenhower-era space invader film ever made. This will almost certainly never happen again…trust me. Hot chocolate served in the indoor cafe. The more, the merrier!
Jeff Sneider is a whipsmart, fair-minded guy with that strange intestinal fortitude quality known to very few journos in this racket. Co-panelist Scott Mantz is also part of this fraternity, having showed his own form of courage a few months ago in that Hollywood Critics Association dust-up.
In the minds of woke hive-mind fanatics I am a “divisive” columnist, as Jeff notes, but I care deeply about films and the remnants of the film culture that used to prevail in this industry (i.e., more cinematic, less of an emphasis on political instruction), and at least I’m not some breezy, constantly smiling opportunist (those Noovies promos!) and zeitgeist cruiser like Perri Nemiroff, whose face freezes and whose eyes narrow into a skeptical squint when Sneider mentions me.
“Emotional” sometimes gets conflated with “divisive”. What I am, boiled down, is a devotional, storied (40 years and counting), richly seasoned, aspect ratio-attuned, well-travelled and still strongly relationshipped Film Catholic who’s (a) filing as passionately as always and loving the grind, (b) had a pretty great peak ride for nearly 30 years (early ‘90s to late teens) but (c) has also endured some fairly intense cash-flow trauma over the last three years due to woke fanaticism, hence Sneider’s use of the term “divisive.”
Excepting the sea-change event of embracing sobriety in March of ’12, I haven’t changed that much over the last 20 or 25 years. My film devotion has been steady and reverent since I got into this racket in the late ‘70s, and I still regard myself as a sensible center-left type, but there are some Robespierre loonies (especially those from the absolutist DEI brigade and the older-white-guy-hating #MeToo fringe vengeance squad) who began going over the waterfall in ‘18 and ‘19.
That mad fervor is starting to calm down as we speak. Will woke lunacy last as long as the rightwing Red Scare paranoia did in the ‘50s? Maybe but who knows? It’s very easy to just go along with the mob. Very few have spine or sand. Even I am doing whatever I can to groove along with the loonies — no point in getting into small slap fights that I can’t hope to win.
In sum I appreciate and admire Mr. Sneider’s fairness and his respect for my integrity. Yes, I sincerely meant it when I put Empire of Light at the top of my 2022 list. Ditto my other selections, 30 in all.
“Not happening…way too laid back…zero narrative urgency,” I was muttering from the get-go. Basically the sixth episode of White Lotus Thai SERIOUSLY disappoints. Puttering around, way too slow. Things inch along but it’s all “woozy guilty lying aftermath to the big party night” stuff. Glacial pace…waiting, waiting. I was told...
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After three-plus-years of delay and fiddling around, Bernard McMahon's Becoming Led Zeppelin, an obsequious 2021 doc about the early glory days of arguably the greatest metal-rock band of all time, is opening in IMAX today in roughly 200 theaters. Sony Pictures Classics is distributing. All I can say is, it...
To my great surprise and delight, Christy Hall's Daddio, which I was remiss in not seeing during last year's Telluride Film Festival, is a truly first-rate two-hander -- a pure-dialogue, character-revealing, heart-to-heart talkfest that knows what it's doing and ends sublimely. Yes, it all happens inside a Yellow Cab on...
7:45 pm: Okay, the initial light-hearted section (repartee, wedding, hospital, afterlife Joey Pants, healthy diet) was enjoyable, but Jesus, when and how did Martin Lawrence become Oliver Hardy? He’s funny in that bug-eyed, space-cadet way… 7:55 pm: And now it’s all cartel bad guys, ice-cold vibes, hard bullets, bad business,...
