The Social Network “is absolutely emblematic of its time and place. It is shrewdly perceptive about such things as class, manners, ethics, and the emptying out of self that accompanies a genius’s absorption in his work. It rushes through a coruscating series of exhilarations and desolations, triumphs and betrayals, and ends with what feels like darkness closing in on an isolated soul. And it has the hard-charging excitement of a very recent revolution, the surge and sweep of big money moving fast and chewing people up in its wake.” — from David Denby‘s lengthy but exhilarating review in the 10.4.10 New Yorker.

Roman Coppola directed this New Yorker iPad app promo featuring the whimsical Jason Schwartzman, but the attitude is pure Wes. I just went to find the app on my iPhone and it’s not there — I found only a New Yorker cartoon app and a New Yorker Festival app. Not right, not fair, not kosher, not cool. But the spot’s cool.

One of the nicest dreams ever offered by Hollywood is that death frees you. Not just from having to grapple in a tough, cruel world but, if you pass in your 80s or 90s, from a body that’s been sinking into physical decline. Death means you can be a kid again. This, at least, is a fantasy I considered when my father went a couple of years ago, and it’s what I’m thinking now that Titanic star Gloria Stuart has passed at age 100.

Jim Cameron was obviously charmed by the youth-regression idea — he used it for the finale of Titanic. The Four Poster, a 1952 romantic film with Rex Harrison and Lili Palmer, also went there. I haven’t seen it since the late ’70s, but Harrison and Palmer escape their wrinkled and withered bodies when they push off, and are free to be young lovers again.

About 12 hours ago Cinema Blend‘s Katey Rich tweeted about two films “ending with overly literal Beatles songs” — the most recent episode of Mad Men, which ends with an instrumental of “Do You Want To Know A Secret?,” and The Social Network, which ends with “Baby, You’re a Rich Man.”

The latter is kind of a weird song because it says two diverse things. The chorus makes fun of people with scads of dough but don’t have much of a life (“keep all your money in a big brown bag inside a zoo / what a thing to do”) but the verses allude to spiritual satori as a source of immense wealth of another kind, hence the last chorus line “baby, you’re a rich man too.”

Most of the song is about a questioner asking a certain guy where’s he travelled inside his head, and what it’s like to know enlightenment. “And have you travelled very far? / Far as the eye can see / How often have you been there? / Often enough to know / What did you see when you were there? / Nothing that doesn’t show.” You could also say that these lyrics describe the adventures of a guy who’s gone off on his own and found something novel and head-turning — a guy, you could argue, who’s a bit like Jesse Eisenberg‘s Mark Zuckerberg. Not in a spiritual sense, of course, but in the realm of being an intellectual pathfinder and/or finder of treasure.

All to say that Rich, usually a sharp observer, has considered only the song’s title and hasn’t really settled into the lyrics.

Incidentally: it was reported in Bob Spitz‘s The Beatles that as the chorus is repeated at the end of the song, John Lennon sings “baby, you’re a rich fag Jew,” an allusion to Beatles’ manager Brian Epstein, who was Jewish and a closeted homosexual. That sounds like Lennon’s cruel humor, all right, but I’ve listened to the song four times this morning and I don’t hear it.

Wait a minute, c’mon…the guy who owns Segway (James Heselden) goes off a cliff while riding on a Segway and plunges into a river, killing himself? This actually happened?

This is the kind of comically absurd death that Blake Edwards might have invented for one of his ’60s or ’70s farces. It would have fit right into J. Lee Thompson‘s What A Way To Go!, which is about four guys who die “comically” (Dick Van Dyke, Paul Newman, Robert Mitchum, Gene Kelly) after marrying Shirley MacLaine, who carries some kind of black-widow, rotten-luck curse.

What A Way To Go! was one of those glossy, brazenly shallow and grossly unfunny big-studio comedies that were built around MacLaine’s popularity in the wake of Irma La Douce. But I’ll bet men in pubs all over England right now are chuckling (or at least shaking their heads and grinning) about Heselden’s death. If his death has been videotaped it would have been ghastly to watch, but thinking about it as an abstraction — a bit that might have been used in a Laurel & Hardy two-reeler — is somehow funny.

The trick in making death seem “funny” is to keep the particulars vague and emphasize the random bad luck that goes into suddenly being killed — its inevitability, illogic, lack of fairness.

There’s a moment in John Frankenheimer‘s The Train when a bespectacled German sergeant wakes up from a nap in a caboose on a stalled Germany-bound train, opens up the rear door and sees another train heading right for him. He barely has time to react before the crash totally decimates the caboose . Why is this funny? Because of the precise timing of the cutting and the fact that we don’t see the sergeant suffer.

There’s another moment in Mike Nichols‘ Day of the Dolphin when a dolphin plants a magnetized bomb on the hull of a large yacht carrying a group of scheming bad guys. Cut to a shot of them sitting around a poker table. One of the baddies — a young dolphin trainer who has betrayed his colleagues — hears a sound, gets up, goes to a porthole and sees the dolphin swimming away. He puts two and two together, goes “oh, shit” and BLAM! It’s funny because of the editing, and the way the actor delivers the “oh, shit” line. If it hadn’t been done just so it wouldn’t have worked.

Olivier Assayas‘ Carlos (IFC films, 1o.15 — 10.20 On Demand) is “a fascinating, never-boring, you-are-there masterwork of a certain type,” I wrote during last May’s Cannes Film Festival. “Not exactly a levitational thing and more in the realm of a long triple than a home run, but exquisitely done in so many small and great and side-pocket ways that there’s really no choice but to take your hat off and say ‘sure, yes, of course.’

“This is a politically crackling, intrigue-filled saga of Carlos the Jackal (a.k.a, Ilich Ramirez Sanchez) with a no-bullshit, this-is-what-it-was, rock-solid authority in every line and scene and performance — no Hollywood crap of any kind, no comic relief and nothing artificially heightened. And it boasts a riveting, never-alienating but never-sympathetic lead performance by Edgar Ramirez, whom I know from relatively recent roles in Che and The Bourne Ultimatum (in which he played a bad guy who cut Matt Damon a break at the end).

“It’s essentially a portrait of a hard-charging, true-believing, very impressive type-A asshole who loved guns and blowjobs and Marlboros and being forceful and committed, and who enjoyed a kind of haunted celebrity for a few years during the 1970s when anti-capitalist revolution and terror were in fashion, at least in some overseas circles.

“Carlos doesn’t exactly throb with emotional poignancy or resonance, or deliver what you might call a ground-level universal theme. All it ‘says,’ really, is the same thing that any film about a terrorist or a gangster says, which is basically “live hard, burn brightly and enjoy the passion and thrills while you can, pal, because you’re looking at an early death or being sentenced to a very long jail term before you hit middle-age.’

“But then it’s hardly fair to expect this kind of film — an exacting, fact-based account of the life and times of a fierce and somewhat chilly sociopath who doesn’t laugh or smile much or pet kittens or make friends with homeless children — to swim in streams of emotionality or meditation, even. Like Che, Carlos is simply about ‘being there’ and believing everything you hear and see, although it delivers much more in the way of urgency and tension and thrills that Steven Soderbergh’s film did. It occasionally settles down for brief periods, but it never drops the ball.”

Here’s the really long version (i.e., about an hour) plus the 20-minute cut of the debut podcast of Oscar Poker. Hats off to partner and colleague Sasha Stone of Awards Daily for making us both sound good as well as well as her technical expertise (i.e., she knows everything). We’ll show more discipline next time, but I have to say that the extended director’s cut flows along pretty well.

Richard Tillman, brother of the late Pat Tillman, talklng to Bill Maher two nights ago on HBO’s Real Time. Here’s an early assessment of Amir Bar Lev‘s film. (Video originally spotted on Sasha Stone‘s Awards Daily.)

I don’t care what anybody says (and I know there are naysayers out there), but the last seven minutes of Sam Mendes‘ American Beauty deliver one of the most mystically calming finales I’ve ever sat through, or will sit through. And the music! “Yellow leaves from the maple trees that lined our streets”…serenity itself. A new Bluray/DVD is about to hit the shelves.

Let’s not forget that The Social Network isn’t the only upcoming film with a 100% Rotten Tomatoes rating. There’s also the more-or-less-perfect rating for Matt Reeves‘ Let Me In (Overture. 10.1), which is based on 12 film reviews (including Variety‘s Peter Debruge and the Hollywood Reporter‘s Michael Rechstaffen) so far.

“I would argue that Matt Reeves’ Let Me In is at least as good as Tomas Alfredson‘s Let The Right One In, which Reeves’ film is a remake of,” I wrote on 9.11.10. “I’m guessing that this view will be regarded as heresy in some quarters, particularly since there’s no denying that much of Let Me In feels like a scene-for-scene, and in some portions a shot-for-shot ‘copy’ rather than a remake.

“But it’s very carefully copied with a meticulous, unhurried, highly absorbing style, and there is a Reeves signature of sorts here and there.

“Hollywood remakes of European-made hits tend to not be as good — they needlessly gloss them up or water them down or otherwise miss the basic vitality. Let Me In doesn’t do this, in my view. It doesn’t diminish — it respects and pays tribute to the original by keeping what worked — adhering as closely as possible for the most part — and enhancing here and there.

“The truth? I liked it better than the original, in part because I’m a much bigger fan of Chloe Moretz‘s Abby (i.e., the little-girl vampire) than the young Swedish actress in Alfredson’s film. Moretz can do no wrong in my book. ‘Hit Girl’ and now this — she’s really got it.”

Honestly and truly and in every other emphatic “no, really, I’m serious” way, Let Me In should be one of the ten 2010 Best Picture nominees. It’s that good. If this happens, would Let Me In be the first horror film since The Exorcist to be Best Picture nominated? Would it be the first vampire flick ever to be so honored?

Which super-budgeted Warner Bros. tentpole attraction will be more depressing to sit through — Guy Ritchie‘s Sherlock Homes 2 or the Superman reboot that Chris Nolan is producing? Which is more likely to make you feel as if a plastic tube filled with green poison is snaking out of the screen and leaking into your bloodstream?

For me, it’s definitely Homes 2 (shooting this fall, opening on 12.2.11). And yet the idea of Nolan’s Superman (even if Matt Reeves directs) is also immensely depressing. The Man of Steel is dead, dead…irreversibly dead. Let it go, for God’s sake. If Bryan Singer‘s reboot (which I liked) hadn’t come along two or three years ago, maybe…but post-Singer the idea of getting up for another Supie flick just isn’t there. I’m limp with no interest…please!

I’ve always had a sight problem with actors who “act” — i.e., performers who are clearly using acquired skills to inject varying degrees of feeling into a given scene. The rule of thumb is that a performance that is driven by “acting” is very admirable and enjoyable, but not necessarily one you can believe in 100% because you’re too aware of the gears moving and various tricks and devices being applied.

(l.) Jesse Eisenberg in The Social Network; (r.) Colin Firth in The King’s Speech.

As good as Colin Firth‘s King George performance is in The King’s Speech, and without disputing the conventional wisdom that he’s probably going to win the 2010 Best Actor Oscar, I sense “acting” going on in his performance. Not to any problematical degree, mind — he’s inhabiting a member of the British royal family in a late 1930s mode, and there are only a few ways to skin a cat in this respect. By any measure it’s a quietly penetrating and fitting portrayal.

But I still felt less “acting” from Firth when he played a dignified gay college professor contemplating committing suicide in A Single Man. I detected very few gears and devices in that performance (Tom Ford‘s muted high-fashion directing style seemed to filter Firth’s emoting), and yet, as noted, they slip through here and there in The King’s Speech. And yet it’s a touchingly written character and Firth knows exactly how to play him, so it works overall. So I’m really not putting it down.

And yet the almost mystifying absence of noticable “acting” in Jesse Eisenberg‘s performance (if you want to call it that) as Mark Zuckerberg in The Social Network is, for me, spellbinding. He’s playing one of the smartest guys who ever sat in any room in any realm, certainly in internet visionary terms, and not once does Eisenberg indicate to the audience that he’s even slightly interested in showing that he’s got a hidden-soft-underbelly thing going on. He’s just that fucking guy, and he doesn’t back off for an instant. The notion that he’s performing doesn’t surface. At all.

And yet — this is the astonishing part — you can feel the guy he could be (and wouldn’t mind being if it didn’t get in the way of his Facebook dreams) and perhaps one day will be if he ever gets some therapy and really works through his issues. I’m delighted by the fact that Eisenberg/Zuckerberg’s emotional currents never break through, blocked as they are by his massive ego and intellect and hunger for power and affection from Rooney Mara‘s character (i.e., the girl who breaks up with him in the opening scene). And yet you can feel them trying to be heard in each and every scene. They leak through like tiny droplets of moisture (which in reality would be nitroglycerine but let’s not get technical) seeping out of a stick of dynamite.

Here’s a portion of Mark Harris‘s New York interview with David Fincher that discusses Eisenberg:

Harris: It was kind of shocking to hear Jesse Eisenberg doing Aaron Sorkin’s dialogue, because you suddenly realize this is what he was born to do.

Fincher: We looked and looked and looked. We read every young actor in Hollywood. And it had been rumored on blogs and stuff that we were talking to Jesse Eisenberg. And you know, I hate to be told what to do by blogs, so I was like, “Yeah, we should probably see him but I don’t know if this is his thing … ” And he put himself on tape reading the first scene, and I remember getting this thing on my computer and opening this little QuickTime, and here’s this kid doing Sorkin: the first person that we’d heard who could do Sorkin better than Sorkin.

“Oftentimes, you’ll say to an actor that, you know, the notion of being present is not to be thinking of the next thing you’re going to say but to actually be listening. You know, a lot of people are trained to give you the ‘thoughtful’ thing, but at the same time, they’re trying to process their next line. And Jesse can be half a page ahead, and in the now. I remember turning to Aaron and saying, ‘Okay, have we ever seen anything this good?’ He just said, ‘That’s the guy.’ We brought him out to LA and he came into my office and I said, ‘Hey, it’s a pleasure to meet you.’ And he said, ‘Great, what do you want me to read? I’ve prepared three scenes.’ And I said, ‘No, no, no. You got the job. We’re just having you here because we wanted to meet you and say hello, but you’re in the movie.'”