Obsession (Netflix, 4.13) is the second filmed adaptation of Josephine Hart‘s “Damage,” a 1991 novel about a self-destructive affair between a British politician and his son’s fiance.

The newbie is a four-parter, and, in my judgment, far less appealing than Louis Malle’s 1992 feature version for the simple reason that Jeremy Irons and Juliette Binoche, as the doomed lovers, are much more attractive and dynamic that the Netlix duo, played by Richard Armitage and Charlie Murphy.

I don’t especially want to see the latter couple get it on — it’s really that simple. They just don’t have it.

Plus Malle is and was, I gather, a much more gifted and accomplished director than Glenn Leyburn and Lisa Barros D’Sathe, the co-helmers of the Netflix series. That said, I’ll be watching the Netflix just to compare and quibble.

What am I missing?

I honestly hadn’t noticed it until Facebook‘s Robert Chandler posted about it yesterday. Be honest — don’t “say” you knew all along unless you really did.

After stating that Woody Allen‘s Coup de Chance had not been officially submitted to the festival, Cannes topper Thierry Fremaux has revealed in a Le Figaro interview (page 33) that he did see it unofficially.

Fremaux also said — this is a real shocker — that even if it had been officially submitted he might have had reservations because showing it would rip the festival apart into pro- and anti-Woody camps.

Fremaux: “The Polanski, we have not seen it. The Woody Allen, it’s a bit special. I saw it without seeing it. The film was not a candidate. We also know that if his film was shown at Cannes controversy would take over the fest, both against him and against the other movies.”

Was this Fremaux conveying what he himself is actually fearful of, or was he sharing the view of the Woody camp? Either way this is flat-out cowardice. The statement essentially says “there will be too many Woody haters attending the festival, and there are serious concerns about the spectacle of the festival being convulsed by Woody hate vs. Woody defenders.”

Imagine if the Cannes Film Festival had voiced similar concerns about showing Michelangelo Antonioni‘s L’Avventura and wimped out? After screening that classic film in May 1960, it drew howls of derision. Ditto, in 1977, Marguerite Duras‘s The Truck (Le Camion) — following the Cannes showing, “Duras stood atop a flight of stairs while a crowd yelled insults at her.” Or Vincent Gallo‘s problematic but certainly brave The Brown Bunny, which screened in Cannes 20 years ago? Or, a year earlier, Gaspar Noe‘s Irreversible, which would almost certainly not be screened now due to squeamishness about the #MeToo community.

And Allen’s film, to judge from earlybird reactions posted by Showbiz 411‘s Roger Friedman and resturateur Keith McNally, is hardly an envelope pusher but a tart and crafty 90-minute noir about infidelity and murder.

Ten years ago Fremaux and the Cannes Film Festival would have been delighted to screen Coup de Chance. Now they’re letting the woke banshees control things, at least in this instqnce.

(Thanks for World of Reel‘s Jordan Ruimy for providing the Le Figaro link.)

I’m definitely not predicting that Ari Aster’s Beau Is Afraid will snag a Best Picture nomination early next year. It’s way too unconventional for those dumb-ass, easy-lay SAG-AFTRA voters who loved EEAAO, but it is the kind of unhinged, wackazoid, Fellini-esque family psychodrama that deserves such an honor.

I’m serious as a heart attack. I was expecting hell but it kind of knocked me flat. Not altogether but close. The craziest, trippiest and least predictable film I’ve seen since I don’t remember what.

It’s a nightmare comedy that’s really out there and ooh, man, does it swing for the fences! At the very least it’s a solid triple. Speaking as a confirmed LQTM-er it means something, trust me, that I laughed out loud four or five times.

I can’t call this 179-minute crazytown film “pleasant” but aside from a couple of sluggish spots it’s truly fascinating and exciting as fuck for the most part. Not a perfect film but unmistakably brave and intelligent and immaculately conceived and constructed, and certainly all of a piece.

It struck me as mining similar turf as that which the Coen’s A Serious Man lies upon, only way more surreal. Is it God or your mother who’s out to torture you to death, or are you the bad guy, consumed by cowardice and self-loathing?

During the super-imaginative first 60% to 70% I was thinking Beau would be a great film to watch with a little lysergic acid diathylamide in my system, but I wasn’t thinking along those lines during the last third, which is alternately loopy and sexual and fiercely guilt-trippy (please, mama!) and intense.

Even when it’s not fully working, it’s a brilliant tour de force on a Fellini Satyricon level…hoo-hoo and cuckoo…through the looking glass & down the white rabbit hole…a truly no-holds-barred, psychologically warped Wizard of Oz mescaline nightmare, unleashed and unloosed…a fine madness…demonic, crazy-ass shit and much of it half mind-blowing and half-hilarious.

Paunchy, balding and unshaven Joaquin Phoenix whimpers and weeps and moans his way through the whole thing, but like a hemophiliac with blood pouring out of his arm. Patti Lupone is amazing, . blistering — instant Best Supporting Actress noms. And it’s great to have Parker Posey back in the swing of it!

This is a landmark feat of imaginative wackazoid filmmaking. Yowsah!

The great Pedro Almodovar on Strange Way of Life, a Brokeback Mountain-ish, seemingly tongue-in-cheek short that will debut next month in Cannes:

The brilliant title of this post was thought up by “Filmklassik”, not me.

A few weeks ago I spoke to Marilyn Ann Moss, the Los Angeles-residing author of “The Farrows of Hollywood: Their Dark Side of Paradise” (Skyhorse, 4.11).

In late ’21 I had seen and reviewed an interesting doc about the late filmmaker, titled “John Farrow: Hollywood’s Man in the Shadows.”

My motive is speaking to Ross was to try and persuade her to tell me a bit more about Farrow’s personal life and maybe answer a couple of other dangling questions that the doc hadn’t really gotten into. Alas, Moss was more into verbal volleying for its own sake. So we just kind of chatted and danced around. Cool.

I haven’t had a chance to read her Farrow book, but Moss seems to know nearly everyone and everything…she’s really been around. And her literary credentials are impressive — author of “Raoul Walsh: The True Adventures of Hollywood’s Legendary Director” (2011) and “Giant: George Stevens, a Life on Film (2004). In 2021 the Criterion Collection released her 2019, feature-length documentary, The True Adventures of Raoul Walsh, on Blu-ray. Moss is a former film and television critic for The Hollywood Reporter and Boxoffice Magazine.

“Undimmed Saga of John Farrow,” posted on 10.17.21: Last night I watched John Farrow: Hollywood’s Man in the Shadows, a 96-minute doc about the prolific, under-rated Australian-born director. Farrow made scores of better-than-decent, lower-budgeted films (The Big Clock, Five Came Back, Calcutta, His Kind of Woman, Hondo). A skilled and dependable craftsman, he directed no drop-dead masterpieces but was great with long takes.

Married for 20-odd years to Maureen O’Sullivan while constantly catting around, the Roman Catholic Farrow sired seven children, including Mia Farrow.

Co-directors Claude Gonzalez and Frans Vandenburg have delivered a respectable effort, often edifying if less than fully satisfying, for reasons I’ll try to explain.

The sage talking heads include Australian directors Phillip Noyce, Bruce Beresford and Philippe Mora, plus film critics Todd McCarthy, David Thomson, David Stratton, Margaret Pomeranz, Imogen Sara Smith and Farran Smith Nehme. Hollywood biographer Charles Higham and Farrow’s wry look-alike son, John Charles Farrow, also participate.

I’m not a serious Farrow devotee but I respect his assurance and sense of polish and control, and his extra-long takes are Scorsese– or Coppola-level.

I’m as much of a fan of The Big Clock as the next guy. Vincent Price’s performance in His Kind of Woman is one of my all-time camp favorites of the ’40s, and Five Came Back (’39), a crashed-in-the-jungle survival story with Lucille Ball, is a keeper. I’m trying to recall if I saw Farrow’s 1956 remake, Back From Eternity. And the 3-D, John Wayne-starring Hondo is pretty good.

I understand why producer Mike Todd fired Farrow off the direction of Around the World in 80 Days (i.e., Todd wanted a less headstrong director, someone he could push around) but why exactly did Farrow lose the King of Kings gig? The filmmakers couldn’t explore that? This is one of the issues I wanted Moss to explain.

Farrow losing two high-paying 1950s prestige gigs in the space of five years is odd. It alludes to an imperious, uncooperative manner.

Was Farrow’s 1963 heart attack a genetic thing? Was it due to alcohol abuse? Farrow was only 58 when he passed — a relatively early departure for a man who wasn’t overweight.

How many years ago was this doc shot? The answer seems to be “not recently.” Three, four years ago for the most part? More?