Jeff Wells You know that the sound mix on Chris Nolan‘s Oppenheimer (Universal. 7.21) is probably going to be hellish, certainly to some extent. It’s going to be a bear, you know this, and yet you’ve been avoiding the act of thinking about it, or more honestly dreading it. You know what’s coming.
There’s only one fulfilling way to watch a Nolan film these days, and that’s at home with subtitles. I truly wish this were otherwise.
…is to sit there and take it. Man up and take it because you need to face your guilt and complicity. Deep down you know who and what you are, and the sooner you accept this…
Congratulations Robin DiAngelo and Ibram X. Kendi! You did it!✊🏿◼️ pic.twitter.com/TO2KkmvCAt
— Joel Berry (@JoelWBerry) March 21, 2023
Kingsman: The Secret Service, Kingsman: The Golden Circle, Billionaire Boys Club, the absolutely vile Robin Hood and the slow-paced (except for the opening 40 minutes) Rocketman…I’ve never liked and have mostly hated films starring Taron Egerton. I’m therefore reluctant to see anything he’s starring in.
From Brian Tallerico’s 3.16 review of Jon S. Baird and Noah Pink‘s Tetris (Apple, 3.31):
“Egerton stars as Henk Rogers, the founder of a company called Bullet-Proof Software, and a man who basically stumbled into the legacy of Tetris at a gaming convention in his new home country of Japan. He instantly realizes the potential of a game that had yet to make its way around the Iron Curtain to any part of the world other than Tokyo. And he wants a piece of it.
“Rogers narrates Tetris, a complicated film about a simple game. It’s just a rolling array of dropping blocks, but the details about market shares, legal rights, and Cold War politics drive this plot, not the game itself. Rogers is a low-level player in the gaming world, and getting the rights to something as Tetris will require navigating around power figures in both business and politics.
“It sounds like a lot, and yet it’s also not enough. All of this intrigue and negotiation gets Tetris to a remarkably repetitive and monotonous place that’s not helped by director Jon S. Baird’s glib tone, one that looks back on the ‘80s with a sort of goofy bemusement that feels disingenuous. The movie bounces back and forth between conference rooms and scary Russian alleys, but it never finds the right depth of character or deviation in either, choosing to enliven the dry material with an odd amount of condescension instead of actual tension. “Can you believe these crazy Russians?” is an odd tone to strike, especially with the current state of the world in 2023.
“The saddest thing about Tetris is that it’s easy to see why someone wanted to tell this story. The little guy never wins in Russia, and he usually goes to jail for even thinking he could play, but American business is built on narratives of Davids beating business Goliaths. Merging the two for a story in which an ambitious American had to use the tools of Capitalism to topple Communism sounds like an easy sell, and there’s probably a great documentary to be made on this subject. But breaking it out into a drama or thriller requires a different set of rules, and, despite Egerton’s best efforts, the team behind “Tetris” never figured out how to tell this story.”
Because of the always-urgent need for presentism by way of diverse casting, the forthcoming Tom Jones miniseries (PBS, 4.30) is going with a beautiful woman of color as Sophia, the main romantic interest of Solly McLeod‘s titular lead character. And that’s fine because Sophie Wilde is drop-dead dishy + well spoken.
In Tony Richardson’s same-titled 1963 farce, which closely followed Henry Fielding‘s 1749 novel, Wilde’s character was called Sophie Western and played by Susannah York. The blonde and beautiful Sophie was the daughter of Squire Western (Hugh Griffith) and the niece of the elderly Miss Western (Edith Evans).
In the new miniseries Alun Armstrong plays Squire Western, and Shirley Henderson plays Aunt Western.
Dont ask me to explain anything — I just work here.
The other “off” aspect is McLeod’s way-too-short hair. Men of the mid 18th Century wore their hair long or certainly longish as a rule.
Some folks appear to be having trouble with how things work. When Dilbert cartoonist Scott Adams said that white people “need to get the hell away from Black people,” it was entirely hateful and racist. (And it was, not to mention stupid of Adams to blurt this out.) But when White Fragility author Robin DiAngelo said “I think people of color need to get away from white people,” it was cool or, you know, not a problem.
And if you, the reader, don’t understand this system, you’ve got a problem. Not DiAngelo or Adams…you.
“I think people of color need to get away from white people.”
“White Fragility” author Robin DiAngelo, sounding a lot like Scott Adams. pic.twitter.com/RHV4EMOVpY
— Steve McGuire (@sfmcguire79) March 19, 2023
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“We can’t help but marvel that it took Hollywood this long to see what kind of Hangover-styled mischief an all-Asian American crew might come up with.
“Like Girls Trip with an all-Asian-American cast (and one nonbinary lead), the Seth Rogen-produced, hard-R road movie follows small-town besties Audrey (Ashley Park) and Lolo (Sherry Cola) to Beijing, where they tackle everything from taboo tattoos to a devil’s threesome with all the gusto you’d hope or expect from Crazy Rich Asians co-writer Adele Lim’s directorial debut.
“The movie may not be Bridesmaids-level brilliant, [but] it’s showing that another underrepresented demographic can be just as extreme as your average Seth Rogen movie. With that goal in mind, Joy Ride features more irreverent vagina monologues than Sausage Party did dick jokes, which is a surely an accomplishment of some kind.” — from Peter Debruge’s 3.18 SXSW Variety review.
“Joy Ride is a prime example of how important representation is on screen and proves that Asian American comedians can be just as funny, raunchy, and successful as their white male counterparts.” — from Marisa Mirabal’s 3.18 IndieWire review.
As someone who loathes and despises coarse humor, who was moderately amused by portions of Bridesmaids but that’s all, who was irritated by Girls Trip and found Sausage Party tedious, who was okay with the first Hangover but hated the rest of them, I can’t wait to not laugh at Joy Ride and to subsequently pour my heart into trashing it.
HE to Mark Caro: What “manned a grill” means is that some beefy or bearded or broad-shouldered dude (i.e., someone like me in the latter case) strapped on a clean white apron and commandingly assumed responsibility for grilling meats of one kind or another during am outdoor 4th of July party. Melted butter and sauce brushes. He “took over” the grill and, you know, handled the chore of grilling stuff with a certain confident panache…exerting a Dwayne Johnson– or Ben Affleck– or John Wayne-like sense of authority. Not a complex concept.
Teary-eyed wokester girlymen (i.e., Ben Whishaw in Women Talking) could never and will never be accused on “manning” a grill.
Friendo: “Mark Caro is a reasonable guy, not a wokester. He’s basically saying that the idea of ‘manning’ anything isn’t cool…that it’s a trigger term that’s only looking for trouble. It’s bizarre how there’s an ongoing effort to eliminate masculinity. On the left obviously. Good lord, a healthy society needs men to be men. Which means that our current society, at least as represented in many urban blue regions, is somewhere between moderately unhealthy and unhealthy as fuck.”
In order to convincingly portray Nike marketing guy Sonny Vaccaro in Air (Amazon, 4.5), Matt Damon had to either (a) fatten up or (b) wear a fat suit. (Not sure which.) Director, producer and costar Ben Affleck insisted upon this.
And I’ll tell you right now I wish Damon had played Vaccaro as a relatively slender guy. I don’t give a shit if the real Vaccaro was on the beefy side and neither does anyone else.
HE Rule #17: Never, ever fatten up for a movie role unless the intention is to look appalling or grotesque a la Robert De Niro in Raging Bull.
During yesterday’s CBS Sunday Morning interview Damon said that upon seeing the finished film his wife Luciana Bozán said, “The movie is great but you look like shit.” Why would anyone out there feel differently? Name one fattened-up performance that really worked…that really lent an extra dimension of realism or whatever. Charlie Sheen in Wall Street?…wrong.
In explaining why an actor wasn’t cast to play Michael Jordan, Affleck told CBS Sunday Morning that “the only actor who could play Jordan was a little old to play this part and we probably couldn’t afford him” — who’s he talking about? I’m guessing that Affleck was fibbing with flattery and actually meant that the unaffordable actor was Mahershala Ali, who, currently 48, is more than twice as old as Jordan during the time of the Nike deal. Who else could he be referring to? Somebody lithe and tall.
Affleck: “This is a movie about an icon, about somebody’s who so meaningful that the minute I show you somebody and say ‘that’s Michael Jordan’ you’re gonna say ‘no, it’s not’ and then the rest of the movie is fake.” Fair enough, but why have at least 18 actors played JFK in various dramas over the years? None of them got him right, not really…none of them really captured the voice or the hair or anything. But they did it anyway because the gig was there and the money was good.
8:15 am: No time to write about Matt Ruskin‘s Boston Strangler due to my New Jersey axe-throwing engagement (leaving in less than an hour), but last night I said the following about the hugely annoying color scheme: “A subdued palette of grayish green (or is it greenish gray?) mixed with mud, mist and slurpings of lentil soup.”
Could the dp, Ben Kutchins, be the new Bradford Young?
I tried re-watching Richard Fleischer‘s The Boston Strangler (’68) a couple of nights ago, but it’s been pulled.
Both are gone now. The redoubtable David Carr in actuality (passed on 2.12.15) and Scott because the person he was ten years ago no longer “exists”, in a certain sense. Because he went over to the woke side sometime around ’19 or ’20, and in so doing jettisoned the 2013 version — a guy I really liked and admired and lament the absence of.
Nine, ten years ago I was fine with the idea of splitting the U.S. of A. into two nations. But that was before woke Stalinism. Now I don’t feel as comfortable with the concept of living in an all-blue nation because a significant portion of the blues have become advocates of a Great Cultural Revolution a la China-in-the-’60s…scolds, fanatics, Robespierres.
“This isn’t the 1860s,” I wrote on 3.15.13. “Our borders are secure, we have nuclear weapons, and nobody’s going to invade. We can be two countries and make out just fine. Yugoslavia broke up into two or three chunks and they’re doing okay. Czechoslovakia became two nations and they’re holding it together. We could create our own Czech Republic — a Blue America — and let the ‘Slovakians’ have their own. I’m perfectly serious here. Get rid of the dumbshits and a lot of the nation’s big problems will become much more managable.”
But now I don’t know.
In a 3.15.13 riff titled “Common Knowledge,” I wrote that “the best thing that could happen all around would be to create a separate nation among the Midwestern and Southern areas of this country — just cut the yokels off and let them raise their own revenues and nurture their retro beliefs, values and prejudices. They’re just a drag on the rest of the country and the sooner Red America is cut loose, the better for the rest of us. Seriously.
In a 7.4.14 piece called “Independence From Ignorance, Stupidity, Downmarket Vibes,” I wrote that “the U.S. of A. is impossibly divided and never the twain shall meet. The right has gone totally around the bend. The urban Blues are the Czech Republic and the rural Reds are Slovakia, and I really think it’s time for the Czechs to sign a new Declaration of Independence and cut those bozos loose.”
“It’s not a rumor — many of the bumblefuck regions are where the least affluent, most downmarket, under-educated and culturally resentful U.S. citizens reside. If you can’t re-educate them the next best thing is to isolate them and let them stew in their own juices.” Alternate rationale: “Fuck ’em if they can’t take a joke.”
A New York “Intelligencer” piece by Sasha Issenberg (“Maybe It’s Time For America To Split Up?“) has taken a serious look at cutting the red states loose and creating a sensible, solid-blue America that wouldn’t be hindered by racist bumblefuck obstinacy — an old HE fantasy. The difference is that Issenberg is envisioning a three-federation system — Blue, Red and Neutral.
A.O. Scott, the long-serving N.Y. Times critic (1999-2023) who’s shifting into book-reviewing, has tapped out a kind of farewell essay. Here are my reactions, including one unanswered question.
1. Why doesn’t Scott explain why he’s bailing? Does he feel like a burnt-out case? Okay, then say that and relate how he got to this point. What led to this presumed lethargy? What turned him off? Scott isn’t that old (56) but has reviewed films for the Times for roughly the same number of years that Vincent Canby did (23 or 24, give or take). So what’s the lowdown?
2. An unfortunate fact (and I take no pleasure in bringing it up) is that Scott, an excellent, highly perceptive critic for the better part of two decades, began to drink wokester Kool-Aid about three or four years ago, and in my humble view dented his rep to a proportionate degree. (Ditto Manohla Dargis.) On 1.17.22, I wrote about “a category of film lovers who have lifted off the planet so often and gone so far around the bend and outside of our solar system, caused for the most part by extra-passionate wokeness (which includes a rapt belief in the wondrous and transcendent benefit of abosrbing any and all films about POC characters, POC history and starring POCs), and who seem oddly committed to contrarianism for contrarianism’s sake (i.e., the Armond White syndrome). Due respect but after pondering A.O. Scott‘s recently posted list of the most award-deserving films of 2021, I have to acknowledge the possibility that even within his bizarre arena of N.Y. Times woke-itude, Scott may be even more of an eccentric than White, and that’s saying something.”
3. “Let’s not even mention Woody Allen,” Scott writes. No, let’s mention Allen and particularly Scott’s decision to wash his hands of this great Brooklyn-born artist, which for me was entirely foul and cruel and horrid. Allen is incontestably a great filmmaker — a man of considerable genius and relentless innovative creativity, a guy whose output has enhanced the quality and worldliness of American cinema over the last 55 years, and whose sterling reputation as a filmmaker will be remembered and cherished long after Scott and the other Allen denigrators have died and been forgotten.
4. Scott on Allen’s Match Point (’05): “It is the film’s brisk, chilly precision that makes it so bracingly pleasurable. The gloom of random, meaningless existence has rarely been so much fun, and Mr. Allen’s bite has never been so sharp, or so deep. A movie this good is no laughing matter.”
5. One of the finest opening paragraphs in the history of movie reviewing was contained in Scott’s 5.25.01 review of Michael Bay‘s Pearl Harbor: “The Japanese sneak attack on Pearl Harbor that brought the United States into World War II has inspired a splendid movie, full of vivid performances and unforgettable scenes, a movie that uses the coming of war as a backdrop for individual stories of love, ambition, heroism and betrayal. The name of that movie is From Here to Eternity.”
6. From Scott’s farewell essay: “I’m not a fan of modern fandom. This isn’t only because I’ve been swarmed on Twitter by angry devotees of Marvel and DC and (more recently) Top Gun: Maverick and Everything Everywhere All at Once. It’s more that the behavior of these social media hordes represents an anti-democratic, anti-intellectual mind-set that is harmful to the cause of art and antithetical to the spirit of movies. Fan culture is rooted in conformity, obedience, group identity and mob behavior, and its rise mirrors and models the spread of intolerant, authoritarian, aggressive tendencies in our politics and our communal life.”