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Five and a half weeks ago I caught a Toronto Film Festival screening of David Gordon Green‘s Our Brand Is Crisis, a Sandra Bullock-goes-to-Bolivia political dramedy, and pretty much panned it. It’ll open on 5.30 in the face of critical disdain — 40% Rotten Tomatoes, 60% Metacritic. Here are excerpts from my 9.12 review:

Excerpt #1: “David Gordon Green‘s Our Brand Is Crisis (Warner Bros., 10.30) transforms Rachel Boynton’s same-titled, decade-old documentary into a Sandra Bullock film in much the same way that the once-austere Gravity became a spacesuit-Sandy-in-peril movie for her fans.

Excerpt #2: “Imagine Michael Ritchie‘s The Candidate with Robert Redford still playing Bill McKay but instead of Peter Boyle as his campaign manager you’ve got the spirited and irrepressible but at the same struggling-with-depression Barbra Streisand (half the way she was in What’s Up, Doc?, and half Kuh-Kuh-Katey in The Way We Were), and that’s pretty much what Our Brand Is Crisis is, except it’s set in Bolivia and Redford is played by Joaquim de Almeida.

Excerpt #3: “Over and over and over Bullock gets her closeups in this thing, and she looks so reliably and relentlessly herself in every shot and scene. She’s playing a brilliant political consultant in a sometimes surly, sometimes pratfally way, but Our Brand is Crisis is mainly about the fact that (a) she looks burnt-out sullen and kind of Lauren Bacall-y with her one-size-fits-all deadpan glamour-puss expression, nicely dyed blonde hair and distinctive black-rimmed glasses, and (b) she has a great-looking ass for a woman of any age, let alone her own.

Excerpt #4: “Before people start calling me a sexist pig, understand that at the climax of a completely absurd mountain-road race between two political campaign tour buses, Bullock drops trou and shoves her creamy biege, perfectly-shaved butt cheeks out of a side window, ‘aimed’ at her political opponents who are riding alongside. (It’s called “mooning.”) I would have respected this scene more if Bullock’s ass (or that of the ass model who was hired for this one bit) didn’t look so CG-scrubbed. It looks like a love-doll ass. (And don’t blame me — I’m just describing what I saw.)

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Somebody needs to explain how a boilerplate comedy of humiliation works exactly. A feminized, middle-aged stepdad (Will Ferrell) is intimidated and out-swaggered and constantly humiliated by an edgy bike-riding type (Mark Wahlberg) who’s the ex-husband of his wife (Linda Cardellini) and the biological father of the two kids. What kind of person would actually pay to see this? Would it be…what, women who enjoy watching two guys try to out-man or out-father each other? Or Ferrell-like schlumps looking to laugh about the usual frustrations of any suburban dad? Mystifying. Directed and co-written by Sean Anders (We’re The Millers, That’s My Boy), and being released by Paramount on 12.25.

Right away you can sense that John Travolta‘s inhabiting of former O.J. Simpson defense-steam attorney Robert Shapiro is more than a blithe impersonation, and that Ryan Murphy, Scott Alexander and Larry Karaszewski‘s The People vs. O.J. Simpson (FX, February) will probably be a cut or two above. But the best clip by far is the wake-of-the-murder crane shot in which Nicole Brown Simpson’s pet Akita is reacting to what’s just happened.

Hollywood Elsewhere’s American Airlines flight landed at Dulles around 4:10 pm, and 20 minutes later at the baggage carousel I ran into producers Albert Berger and Ron Yerxa (Nebraska, Little Miss Sunshine) and Steve Golin (The Revenant, Spotlight) plus four or five industry-related ladies whose names I didn’t solicit or have forgotten — no offense. We threw our bags into a dark-chocolate Middleburg Film Festival shuttle and off we went. (Golin told me during the 70-minute drive that The Revenant has just locked, and that the final running time is two hours and 31 minutes.) We pulled into Middleburg’s Salamander Resort & Spa, which is owned by BET co-founder and billionaire Sheila Crump Johnson, around 6 pm. Ten minutes later I was speed-walking into town (roughly 1/3 of a mile) to pick up my press pass.

At 7:30 pm Tom McCarthy‘s Spotlight screened inside a large Salamander conference room following remarks by Ms. Johnson and Virginia Governor Terry McAuliffe. It was my third viewing, and I swear to God I could see it another three or four times without blinking. I feel such a bond with Spotlight that I wish it would run longer, or at least that a longer cut would be available some day on Bluray. It’s a seriously moral and compassionate film, almost in a Bressonian sense. Every scene is about good, reasonable-minded journalists doing the best they can without any monkeying around. No screaming arguments (okay, there’s one flash of temper), no drunkenness, no excessive behaviors of any kind, no car crashes or chases. In a way, Spotlight is a film you want to move into and never leave.

(l. to r.) Washington Post film critic Ann Hornaday, Washington Post Executive editor Marty Baron, Spotlight producer Steve Golin following this evening’s screening.

Old-world, country-estate library/lounge inside Salamander Resort & Spa.

After it ended Golin and Washington Post executive editor and former Boston Globe editor Marty Baron (who is perfectly portrayed in the film by Liev Schreiber) were interviewed by WashPost film critic & longtime HE pally Ann Hornaday. The film necessarily compresses the story of the Boston Globe Spotlight team’s investigation into sexual abuse within the Boston archdiocese, Baron said, but it tells it skillfully and accurately. And the filmmakers asked all the right questions and double-checked the facts. Hornaday called it “journalist porn” of the highest order.

There’s such a flush and settled vibe here in Middleburg. Acres and acres of sprawling green meadows and wooded areas everywhere you look, and no ugly shopping malls or fat families or Kim Davis types waddling around. An affluent haven. The outdoors smell wonderful — grassy, earthy, a slight hint of horse dung. This is God’s country, or the kind of country, at least, that the well-off tend to cultivate and tastefully build upon with or without God’s assistance. It’s a bit like the English countryside, which I sampled six years ago during a Fantastic Mr. Fox press junket visit to the late Roald Dahl‘s home in Great Missenden. I don’t belong but I’m glad to be here, and am very gratified to wallow in all this splendor and comfort. Thanks again to Obscured Pictures‘ R.J. Millard for inviting me, and thanks especially to Ms. Johnson. And a tip of the hat to festival programmer Susan Koch for choosing wisely and well.

No question about it — the Salamander Resort & Spa has been built primarily for the swells.

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I’m on a packed American flight, halfway to Dulles and ultimately the Middleburg Film Festival, the “horsey Sundance” that I briefly described on 10.7. I’ll be there for four days and then it’s back to Washington for 48 hours (including a visit to the Library of Congress’s Packard Campus of the National Audio-Visual Conservation Center) and then down to the Savannah Film Festival, where I’ll be for six days…well, five and a wake-up.

What’s with the Gotham Independent Film Award guys nominating Marielle Heller’s The Diary Of A Teenage Girl for four awards — Best Feature, Screenplay, actress and breakthrough director? It’s really not good enough for this level of attention. And I haven’t even heard of Josh and Benny Safdie‘s Heaven Knows What, which was also Best Feature-nominated. And yet the Gothams didn’t nominate Love & Mercy except in the case of Paul Dano for Best Actor and Oren Moverman‘s screenplay? Not cool. At least I can applaud their decision to award a special Gotham Jury Award jointly to Spotlight‘s Mark Ruffalo, Michael Keaton, Rachel McAdams, Liev Schreiber, John Slattery, Stanley Tucci and Brian D’Arcy James for their ensemble work. Among the Best Documentary nominees I’ve only seen Stevan Riley‘s Listen to Me Marlon so no comment. As I regarded Josh Mond‘s James White as underwhelming and certainly nothing to shout about, nominating Mond for a Bingham Ray Breakthrough Director Award feels curious. Among the Gothams’ Breakthrough Actor nominees my far-and-away favorite is Mistress America‘s Lola Kirke, but I’m presuming they’ll give it to Tangerine‘s Kitana Kiki Rodriguez or Mya Taylor. (Right?) I’m torn on the Best Screenplay award but my heart slightly favors Carol, penned by Phyllis Nagy.

Spectre (10.26 in U.K.) “starts in Mexico City, however, with something completely new: a hold-your-breath tracking shot, perhaps five minutes in length, that follows Bond through a surging street parade, into a hotel, up three floors, into a suite, out of the window, and much further, without a single observable cut — an instant all-time greatest moment in the franchise.

“It’s a swaggering show of confidence from returning director Sam Mendes and his brilliant cinematographer, Hoyte van Hoytema, who shot Spectre on luxurious 35mm film — a marked change of texture from Skyfall’s gleaming digital froideur. The film’s color palette is so full of mouth-watering chocolates, coffees and creams that when the story moves to Rome, the city looks like a $300-million-dollar, fascist tiramisu.” — from a 10.21 Telegraph review by Robbie Collin.

Doctor Zhivago is a long and at times tedious milquetoast “romance” — a stately, grandiose chick flick. And yet there are portions…okay, quite a few portions that are brilliant and pretty much unforgettable.  This BFI trailer reminds me of these, and more particularly of Freddie Young and Nicolas Roeg‘s cinematography. My favorite shot is one of the most nonsensical in film history — i.e., the closeup of Yuri’s deceased mother inside her casket after it’s been sealed and lowered into the grave, but with just enough nonexistent light for the camera to catch her bluish features.

The kindly paternal tone in Alec Guinness‘s voice as he speaks to Rita Tushingham. That wall of ice covering the freight-car door during that eternal train trip. That scene when the advancing Russian troops are turned by the deserters, and then the British-accented officer stands on top of a water barrel and tries to persuade them to hold fast in the ranks, and then he falls through the top, soaked, and is shot. Klaus Kinski‘s fury as he shouts “I am the only free man on this train!” — an HE rallying cry. Julie Christie‘s blonde hair and gleaming blue eyes. The troops raising their fists and yelling “Strelnikov!” as Tom Courtenay‘s train passes by. Guinness’s final line: “Aahh. Then it’s a gift.”

There’s always a slight flash of a faint spark — in the air, between your ears, somewhere nearby — when you hear or read the name Terry Gilliam. Despite the fact that 12 Monkeys, which I consider to be his last semi-engaging film, opened 20 years ago. His animated Monty Python days aside, Gilliam’s reputation rests on a five-film, 14-year run that began with Time Bandits (’81), continued with Brazil (’85) and The Adventures of Baron Munchausen (’88) and concluded with the one-two of The Fisher King (’91) and Monkeys. It’s been fairly dicey for the poor guy ever since. I’m saying that as a fan of the idea of Terry Gilliam more than the reality, but at least I’m saying it. Which is why, despite his 21st Century history, I want to read his book. I do. Honestly.

Three years I wrote the following, called “The Answer“: Deadline‘s Michael Fleming is reporting Christoph Waltz — Waltz! — will star in Terry Gilliam‘s The Zero Theorem. Waltz will play ‘an eccentric, reclusive and angst-plagued computer genius’ named Qohen Leth who’s working ‘on a mysterious project aimed at discovering the purpose of existence — or the lack thereof — once and for all.”

“HE memo to Gilliam and Waltz: I figured this out years ago and have explained it once or twice in this column. The purpose of human existence is the same one shared by trees, grass, insects, trout, elephants, cats, dogs, worms, poisonous snakes and armadillos, which is to manifest and re-produce for the elemental purpose of manifesting and re-producing. To be is to be is to be…that’s it!

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Two or three weeks ago I tapped out a little riff in praise of Michael Shannon. He’s always the guy to watch no matter what the role is, and sometimes he’ll steal films outright. He made Freeheld his own by portraying the compassionate cop partner of the cancer-afflicted Julianne Moore; ditto 99 Homes by playing a chilly but curiously vulnerable real-estate eviction agent. I said that Shannon is the guy, the master of that thing he always does, and that he doesn’t have to be nominated for Best Supporting Actor this year — he’s fine — but he should be. Because he scored twice.

I sat down with Shannon at the offices of IDPR today and kicked it all around. We talked about 25 minutes. A breeze to shoot the shit with. Mostly because I really respect him, I suppose, and also because I get along with guys with Irish names. Very matter of fact, no hedging or sidestepping. Shannon has this vibe or attitude that seems to say “go ahead, bring it up, I don’t care.” And he asks you questions half the time.

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